But I Feel Guilty
For this is the will of God, your sanctification; that is, that you abstain from sexual immorality; 1 Thessalonians 4:3 NASB
Sexual immorality – As you know, there are two kinds of impurity in the Bible. The first is ritual impurity. All kinds of ordinary human conditions can be the cause of ritual impurity, like seminal emissions or menstruation. These are not sins. Rather, they place the person in a condition where involvement with religious observance, like Temple worship, is prohibited. They are temporary. The condition can be transferred from one person to another (the famous story of Yeshua and the woman who touched the tzitzit of his robe). Ritual impurity is described as “pollution,” but it does not affect the “Land,” and it is never called an “abomination.”
On the other hand, moral impurity is personal (not transferred), permanent, volitional, and causative. According to Scripture, moral impurity requires repentance and restitution. Ritual impurity only requires absolution.
Why do we need to know this distinction? Because Paul lived in a world where the differences between ritual and moral impurity were often blended, confused, or irrelevant. For example, Greeks and Romans did not consider sexual intercourse between a married male and an unmarried female a matter of impurity. In their view, ejaculation was just a normal bodily function and copulation was a natural act. The only real issue was intercourse with married females, but that was not a moral issue. It was a legal issue because it potentially challenged the right of inheritance. Patrilineal identity was a very big deal. You can find the same concern in the biblical text, most famously with the sons of Judah and his daughter-in-law Tamar. God killed Judah’s second son because he refused to impregnate Tamar, although he did enjoy sexual contact with her. This is an issue of inheritance. In Paul’s world, inheritance was the principal concern—not intercourse.
Paul writes for Gentiles who have become believers in the Messiah and the God of Israel. Those Gentiles came from a culture where sexual contact outside of marriage was not a moral issue (the more severe prohibition on married women was, as we have suggested, also not a moral issue). When Paul instructs them to abstain from sexual immorality, what do you suppose they thought? Do you think they considered this statement a prohibition against the “natural” act of coitus between males and unmarried females? Consider some of the actions of the members of the assembly in Corinth. Perhaps we are a bit anachronistic when we assume they understood Paul’s directive as we do. Even in the Jewish world of the first century, some men (with appropriate wealth) had multiple wives, as suggested from Paul’s comment in 1 Timothy 3:2.
To this we can add the following: “Current psychological research . . . suggests that morality is rooted in the emotions at least as much as in what we call ‘reason.’”[1] If we were from Thessalonica, what would “sexual immorality” mean to us? Would it mean that the Greek and Roman practices must end? But those practices weren’t considered “immoral.” Would it mean we should adopt the Jewish view of sexuality? But some Jewish men still had more than one wife. Would we read Paul’s prohibition as if it applied only to fertility temple prostitution? And what about the acceptable homosexual practice of the Greek and Roman cultures?
The answer to these disturbing questions lies in Paul’s orientation toward all social/sexual engagements. Follow Moses’ instructions as interpreted by Yeshua. Of course, we have to assume that Paul knew how Yeshua interpreted Moses since the gospel accounts were not yet written. But both Yeshua and Paul are conservative rabbis. They hold the Law in as high a position as possible. So, despite the examples of the Patriarchs, the kings, and other historical figures, they taught that God expected a moral purity that exceeded the “natural” culture. In some real ways, we face the same issues today. Western culture has devolved to Greek and Roman practices. Paul’s instructions could be written to us too. But it’s up to us, as it was up to the Thessalonians, to sort out Paul’s meaning—in the context of Moses’ revelation. Emotions and the inheritance of “guilt” from past religious training needs to be understood in the light of our own culture—and evaluated on the basis of Moses’ revelation. The decisions are ours, and so is the responsibility.
A lengthy comment by Victor Hamilton is important:
Whenever the derivatives of šākab . . . are used in a context of sexual relationships, those relationships are illicit (Gen 30:15, 16; II Sam 11:11 may be exceptions). This is no less true with the verb šākab itself. In one instance it is used in legal statements that forbid certain types of sexual liasons [sic]. Exodus 22:16 [H 15] outlaws fornication: “If a man seduce a virgin who is not betrothed and ‘sleep/lie’ with her he shall pay her price and make her his wife.” Deuteronomy 22:22 advocates the death penalty for two people caught in adultery: “If a man is caught ‘sleeping/ lying’ with another man’s wife both must die.” Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13 use šākab in the statement that prohibits homosexual relationships: “The man who ‘lies’ with a man … they must die.” Finally in Deut 27:21 “lying” with animals is cursed by the Law.
It is sobering to notice that for the above sexual aberrations usually the death penalty was prescribed. To be sure, the Bible does not tell us to what degree the punishment was enforced across the board. But why do the Scriptures inveigh so forcefully against tampering with the sexual relationship. Could not at least one reason be that Israel was surrounded by cultures in which such practices were par for the course at the human or even at the divine level? Perhaps one of the most degrading features of pagan religions is the way in which religious and sexual expression were often one and the same thing. It was, however, not a sacramentalizing of sex but rather an eroticizing of religion.[2]
Topical Index: impurity, morality, 1 Thessalonians 4:3
[1] Eve Levavi Feinstein, Sexual Pollution in the Hebrew Bible (Oxford University Press, 2014), p. 7.
[2] Hamilton, V. P. (1999). 2381 שָׁכַב. R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed., p. 921). Chicago: Moody Press.
