Christian Sexual Ethics
(1 Corinthians 6: 9-11, 15-20)
Shocking find
Discovered by archaeologists while
excavating a Roman bathhouse in
Ashkelon, 1990
‘Christianity brought a new conception
of humanity to a world saturated with
capricious cruelty’
Gender imbalance in the
Roman Empire
 131 males to 100 females in the city of
Rome
 140 males to 100 females in Italy, Asia
Minor and North Africa
 ‘By prohibiting all forms of infanticide
and abortion, Christians removed major
causes of the gender imbalance that
existed among pagans’ (Rodney Stark)
The status of women in the
Roman world
 Many girls were married at puberty and
often before
 Girls received little or no education
 A woman was the legal property of
some man at all stages of her life
 Men could divorce a woman simply by
ordering her out of the house
Low sexual mores were
reinforced by a male culture
that held marriage in low esteem
 Men often resorted to prostitutes
 Female prostitutes were common
 There were many male prostitutes, as bisexuality
and homosexuality were widespread
Revolutionary impact of the
Judaeo-Christian ethic
 It raised the status of women
 It gave value to human life
 It bestowed on marriage qualities of friendship and
equality
 It condemned promiscuity in men and women
equally
 It stressed the mutual obligations of husbands and
wives
 It transformed marriage into a love relationship
Christianity and paganism
 Sexual ethics became a pressing issue as
soon as Christianity moved out of the
Jewish world into the pagan environment
of the Roman Empire
 The Jerusalem Council (AD 49) considered
what standards of behaviour should be
required of Gentile converts
 Among the few minimal requirements it
laid down is that Gentile Christians should
‘abstain from porneia’ (Acts 15: 20, 29) –
from ‘sexual immorality’ (NIV) or ‘sexual
wrongdoing’ (William Loader)
Porneia refers to any sexual
intercourse outside of
heterosexual marriage
 Sexual intercourse should only be within its proper
context of heterosexual marriage
 Single people should be celibate, abstain from sexual
intercourse
 Couples should not have sexual intercourse till they
get married
 It’s not OK to have sex with someone you’re not
married to
 Sex between people of the same sex is wrong
Two New Testament
examples
 ‘It is God’s will that you be sanctified: that you should
avoid sexual immorality (porneia); that each of you
should learn to control your own body in a way that is
holy and honourable, not in passionate lust like the
heathen, who do not know God; and that in this
matter no-one should take advantage of a brother or
sister…. For God did not call us to be impure, but to
live a holy life.’ (1 Thessalonians 4:3-7)
 ‘Marriage should be honoured by all, and the
marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the
adulterer and all the sexually immoral.’ (Hebrews 13:4)
A sex-saturated city
 Corinth was a byword for sexual depravity
 ‘To Corinthianise’ was common slang for
corrupting a person’s morals or being
sexually promiscuous
 The temple of Aphrodite, goddess of love
(shown here), was serviced by more than
1,000 cult prostitutes
Many members of the Corinthian
church had been converted out of this
immoral lifestyle (1 Corinthians 6:9-11)
 The ‘sexually immoral’ (pornoi)
 ‘Idolaters’ – including those who took part in temple
prostitution
 ‘Adulterers’ – married persons who had had sexual
intercourse with someone other than their spouse
 ‘Passive homosexuals’ (malakoi, literally
‘effeminates’) – those who allow themselves to be
penetrated in receptive homosexual intercourse
 ‘Active homosexuals’ or ‘sodomites’ (arsenokoitai) –
those who penetrate someone anally or practice
insertive anal sex
 ‘Rapists’ – harpax is the Greek term for a ‘rapist’
Paul’s ‘theology
of the body’
‘Don’t be immoral in matters of sex.
That is a sin against your own body in
a way that no other sin is. You surely
know that your body is a temple
where the Holy Spirit lives. The Spirit is
in you and is a gift from God. You are
no longer your own. God paid a
great price for you. So use your body
to honour God.’ (1 Corinthians 6: 1820, CEV)
The gift of singleness
 Jesus shows that it is possible to be single and celibate
 With Christianity comes a new freedom not to marry
 Being single is ‘beautiful’ or ‘praiseworthy’: ‘It is good
(kalon, literally ‘beautiful’) for a man not to marry.’(7:1)
 If you can’t be celibate you should marry! ‘If you
don’t have enough self-control, then go ahead and
get married.’ (7:8-9)
 A single person is free from the hassles of marriage and
family life. ‘A married man has more worries.’ (7:32-34)
The joy of singleness
Testimony of Liz Hodgkinson
‘Although a life of celibacy is popularly
imagined to be one of misery, deprivation
and continual frustration and repression, it
can be the very opposite, and provide a
wonderful opportunity to get to know
yourself….
It can also allow you to develop hitherto
undiscovered talents…. It means you can
truly reclaim yourself, and become free from
the sexual demands of your own body and
also the sexual desires of other people….’
Testimony of Brenda McKillop
‘Playboy is more than a pornographic
magazine with pictures of naked women. It
is a philosophy that enticed me to throw
aside my Judaeo-Christian ethic of no premarital sex and no adultery and to practice
recreational sex with no commitments….
There is no way I can describe the beauty,
joy, fulfilment, and peace of having sex
within the bonds of my loving marriage.
Since my decision… to commit my life to the
Lord, I have never had to seek psychiatric
help and I have never been suicidal again.’