Homosexuality and the Bible

I believe that homosexuality as described in the bible is wrongly viewed due to the context in which it was witnessed by the writers and biblical prophets of there day. The fact is that it was practiced in a hedonistic way then and is still to this day by the western world who first corrupted these individuals as sexual tools for there own selfish desires. It was and is practiced in such a degrading and immoral way then and now that it lends credence to the biblical descriptions of a damned lifestyle. But when one studies it in the context of the native American Indian and other cultures we find that it is a normal anomaly that occurs approximately in 5% + of the births in a given generation. To really understand homosexuality you can not study the western civilizations because they were the chief persecutors of the anomaly. One must turn there attentions to a culture which is free from any religious or personal bias. Below is an excerpt from a writing by Rae Trewartha which gives an in-depth view into the world of the homosexual in the historic Native American lifestyle.

Native Americans not only accepted lesbian and gay people, they also respected them as
prophets, hunters or healers. Rae Trewartha looks at homosexuality in traditional culture.

"To be lesbian or gay in modern Western society is to walk a tightrope. Every time you meet a new situation you have to decide how many steps forward you can take - just how 'out' you can be without offending the sensibilities of people who are afraid of the differences you force them to confront.

It is encouraging, therefore, to learn about the place of lesbians and gay men in traditional North American Indian society and to re-discover that homophobia is not some sort of genetic trait indigenous to all cultures. Indeed, many North American Indian tribes so valued 'gayness' that people who displayed these characteristics were picked for special office.

Gay traditions were prevalent in most American Indian tribes.¹ There are reports of both women and men living in same-sex marriages, of women who dressed and acted as men and men who acted and dressed as women.

The European chroniclers who first came across such behavior and customs described them in terms that belonged to their own world. So American Indian homosexual men were called 'berdaches' - French for 'slave-boys', used to refer to passive male homosexuals. The name stuck - although its servile connotations were quite inappropriate in the Native American context where berdaches were accorded considerable social prestige.

Indeed, gay transvestites were often the shamans or healers of the tribe. Sometimes they had specific religious duties. Among the Crow Indians, for example, the tree that was used in the Sun Dance ceremony would be cut down by homosexual men. Berdaches were regarded as having special intellectual, artistic and spiritual qualities. They were also reputed to be hard workers. Their ability to combine female and male qualities often put them into the role of mediators between the sexes. When asked 'when you die ... what will you be in the spirit land? A man or a woman?', one Sioux 'winkle' naturally replied 'both'."

Further Reading:

http://www.bidstrup.com/phobiahistory.htm

http://www.newint.org/issue201/dreams.htm