Paul and desire, including homosexual desire

[gryan]

Re: Paul and ἐπιθυμία (desire)

1 Thes 2:17
Brothers, although we were torn away from you for a short time (in person, not in heart), our desire (ἐπιθυμίᾳ) to see you face to face was even more intense. 18 For we wanted to come to you—indeed I, Paul, tried again and again—but Satan obstructed us.

Phil 1:21
For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. 22 But if I am to live in flesh, this is the fruit of labor for me. And what shall I choose? I do not know. 23 But I am pressed between the two, having the desire (τὴν ἐπιθυμίαν) to depart and to be with Christ, indeed very much better, 24 but to remain in the flesh is more necessary for your sake.

My interpretation: When Paul admits to being motivated by ἐπιθυμία (desire) in a positive sense of the word ἐπιθυμία, the meaning is only partly positive. He is foreshadowing that he will not get his way. If it had been God's will or spirit leading for him to go and see the Thessalonians again, then Satan probably would not have stopped him.

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I think that Paul was probably married before his conversion. I think that after his conversion, his wife probably asked for a divorce, and he granted it, in accord with 1 Cor 7:15, for the sake of "peace": "But if the unbeliever separates him/herself, let him/her separate him/herself. The brother or the sister (ὁ ἀδελφὸς ἢ ἡ ἀδελφὴ) is not under bondage in such cases. But God has called you into peace".

Paul offers himself as having the gift of self-control in the unmarried state:

1 Cor 7:5f
Do not deprive each other, except by mutual consent and for a time, so you may devote yourselves to prayer. Then come together again, so that Satan will not tempt you through your lack of self-control. 6 I say this as a concession, not as a command. 7 I wish that all men were as I am. But each man has his own gift from God; one has this gift, another has that.

How was this possible? What was the nature of his particular gift for the unmarried life? My own working hypothesis is that Paul's sexual orientation was what we modern people would call "gay". He was comfortable being around strong, attractive women and they were comfortable being around him too, in part because they both sensed that he was not going to overstep boundaries sexually. As for how he related to men; I think his desires were sublimated. He desired to depart the body of flesh to be with the Lord, but he knew it was not God's will to commit suicide. Likewise, I also think he desired to be intimate with the Jewish and Gentile men he traveled with and served and evangelized, but he "knew" from his Jewish upbringing, that it was not God's will to act out such desires through what Jewish society of his day stereotyped as the paradigmatic "Gentile vise"--homosexual activity (for an extended exposition on homosexual activity as "Gentile vice" from the Jewish perspective of Paul's day, see EP Saunders, Paul: The Apostle's Life, Letters, and Thought). As in larger Roman culture, so also in Paul's view, the worst part of this "Gentile vice" was to play the passive role in gratifying the desires of dominant males, and by being penetrated. Thus, I am inclined to agree that Romans 1 targets playing the passive/receptive role via oral or anal vice, whether the one is a female passive partner in such vice, or a male who becomes like a female who performs such vice.
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/atheology ... loral-sex/

For Paul to write what he wrote in Romans 1:26f, he had to have thought about the topic a lot, especially as it related to mission to Gentile godfearers who would likely have agreed with the Jewish shaming attitude to male same-sex vice. Nevertheless, some of his converts would likely have had experience with such Gentile vice, as 1 Cor 6:11 suggests ("...that is what some of you were"). Furthermore, some of those he evangelized may have been actively engaging in such "vice" during the time when Paul first met them. Evangelization required associating with "immoral people", as Paul makes clear in 1 Cor 5:9f, "I wrote you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people. I was not including the sexually immoral of this world, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world."

To be clear, in the modern context, I am in favor of gay rights and inclusion. My comments on Paul relate to understanding his situation in the ancient world. Nevertheless, I never cease to be amazed at how often gay men refer to Paul's thorn as inspiration as is the case even here, at minute 9:30 of Andrew Solomon's excellent TED talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RiM5a-vaNkg

[Charles Wilson]

1 Corinthians 7: 5 (RSV):

[7] I wish that all were as I myself am. But each has his own special gift from God, one of one kind and one of another.

I believe that you are correct - and more. I believe the original Template for Paul was Mucianus, Procurator of Syria. The "Vision on the Road to Damascus" tells the tale of Mucianus being convinced by Titus (Whom Mucianus...ummm...cared for deeply) to join Daddy Vespasian and march on Rome.

Vespasian owed the Empire to Mucianus, who arrived in Rome before Vespasian, took care of the Senate and dispatched Antonius Primus, who wanted much more than a Triumph.

Suetonius, 12 Caesars, "Vespasian":

"He bore the frank language of his friends, the quips of pleaders, and the impudence of the philosophers with the greatest patience. Though Licinius Mucianus,​ a man of notorious unchastity, presumed upon his services to treat Vespasian with scant respect, he never had the heart to criticize him except privately and then only to the extent of adding to a complaint made to a common friend, the significant words: 'I at least am a man.'..."

Mucianus may have been a eunuch by this time, which would explain the odd use of language:

Dictionary of Greek and Roman Names (or something... like, 1870):

MUCIA'NUS, LICI'NIUS, three times consul in A. D. 62, 70, and 75 respectively, must have passed by adoption from the Mucian to the Licinian gens. His character is drawn in a few strokes by the masterly hand of Tacitus. (Hist. i, 10.) He was alike distinguished for good and for evil, for luxurious indulgence and energetic work, for affability and haughtiness; when he had nothing to attend to, he revelled in excessive pleasures; but when business required his attention, he displayed great abilities. Thus his public conduct deserved praise, his private condemnation. As a youth, he courted with assiduity the favour of the powerful, and succeeded in obtaining the consulship in the reign of Claudius, a.d. 52; but having squandered his property, and becoming likewise an object of suspicion to Claudius, he went into retirement in Asia, and there lived, says Tacitus, as near to the condition of an exile as afterwards to that of an emperor..."

That Mucianus was a member of a Sub-Culture on the Sexual Continuum is obvious. I can play "Match'em Up" with all of this but without the explicit description required with certainty. Mucianus, however, does fit-the-bill for the odd Pauline Literature that you describe.

Best,

CW