#Revised Standard Bible

[mybeautifulchristianjourney]

The Good Samaritan

25 And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, "Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?" 26 He said to him, "What is written in the law? How do you read?" 27 And he answered, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself." 28 And he said to him, "You have answered right; do this, and you will live." 29 But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?" 30 Jesus replied, "A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him, and departed, leaving him half dead. 31 Now by chance a priest was going down that road; and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. 32 So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was; and when he saw him, he had compassion, 34 and went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine; then he set him on his own beast and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. 35 And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, 'Take care of him; and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.' 36 Which of these three, do you think, proved neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?" 37 He said, "The one who showed mercy on him." And Jesus said to him, "Go and do likewise." — Luke 10:25-37 | Revised Standard Version (RSV) Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright © 1946, 1952, and 1971 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. All rights reserved. Cross References: Deuteronomy 6:4-5; Deuteronomy 6:24; Leviticus 18:15; Leviticus 19:18; Isaiah 58:7; Matthew 10:5; Matthew 18:28; Matthew 19:16; Matthew 24:34; Mark 8:34; Luke 9:52; Luke 10:38; Luke 16:15; Luke 18:31; Luke 19:28

[quotesfromscripture]

Never again

"The rest shall hear and be afraid, and a crime such as this shall never again be committed among you. Show no pity: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot."

(Deuteronomy 19:20-21 NRSVA, 1995)

[oh-dear-so-queer]

As the monumental RSV stuff-up in 1946 demonstrates, the fault for a lot of negative Christian response to homosexuality lies with those who translate, interpret and preach the Scriptures.

"In/Out: A Scandalous Story of Falling Into Love and Out of the Church" - Steph Lentz

[christianity-crucible]

Hoping to find an article I had but lost track of talking about how messed up the evangelical-favored English Standard Version (ESV) of the Bible is, especially compared to the version it was cribbed from, the Revised Standard Version (RSV), which at least according to one telling tried to make it translation as accurate as possible. By contrast, the changes made in the English Standard Version were very political and were LESS linguistically accurate, though more political convenient for evangelicalism.

If I can find that article again, I'll post a link here.

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

Do you have a list of good sex ed books to read?

BOY DO I

please bear in mind that some of these books are a little old (10+ years) by research standards now, and that even the newer ones are all flawed in some way. the thing about research on human beings, and especially research on something as nebulous and huge as sex, is that people are Always going to miss something or fail to account for every possible experience, and that's just something that we have to accept in good faith. I think all of these books have something interesting to say, but that doesn't mean any of them are the only book you'll ever need.

related to that: it's been A While since I've read some of these so sorry if anything in them has aged poorly (I don't THINK SO but like, I was not as discerning a reader when I was 19) but I am still including them as books that have been important to my personal journey as a sex educator.

additionally, a caveat that very few of these books are, like, instructional sex ed books in the sense of like "here's how the penis works, here's where the clit is, etc." those books exist and they're great but they're also not very interesting to me; my studies on sex are much more in the social aspect (shout out to my sociology degree) and the way people learn to think about sex and societal factors that shape those trends. these books reflect that. I would genuinely love to have the time to check out some 101 books to see how they fare, but alas - sex ed is not my day job and I don't have the time to dedicate to that, so it happens slowly when it happens at all. I've been meaning to read Dr. Gunter's Vagina Bible since it came out in 2019, for fucks sake.

and finally an acknowledgement that this is a fairly white list, which has as much to do with biases with academia and publishing as my own unchecked biases especially early in my academic career and the limitations of my university library.

ANYWAY here's some books about sex that have been influential/informative to me in one way or another:

The Trouble With Normal: Sex, Politics, and the Ethics of Queer Life (Michael Warner, 1999)

Virginity Lost: An Intimate Portrait of First Sexual Experiences (Laura M. Carpenter, 2005)

Virgin: The Untouched History (Hanne Blank, 2007)

Sex Goes to School: Girls and Sex Education Before the 1960s (Susan K. Freeman, 2008)

Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex (Mary Roach, 2008)

Transgender History: The Roots of Today's Revolution (Revised Edition) (Susan Stryker, 2008)

The Purity Myth: How America's Obsession with Virginity is Hurting Young Women (Jessica Valenti, 2009)

Not Under My Roof: Parents, Teens, and the Culture of Sex (Amy T. Schalet, 2011)

Straight: The Surprisingly Short History of Heterosexuality (Hanne Blank, 2012)

Rewriting the Rules: An Integrative Guide to Love, Sex and Relationships (Meg-John Barker, 2013)

The Sex Myth: The Gap Between Our Fantasies and Realities (Rachel Hills, 2015)

Come as You Are: The Surprising New Science That Will Tranform Your Sex Life (Emily Nagoski, 2015)

Not Gay: Sex Between Straight White Men (Jane Ward, 2015)

Too Hot to Handle: A Global History of Sex Education (Jonathan Zimmerman, 2015)

American Hookup: The New Culture of Sex on Campus (Lisa Wade, 2017)

Buzz: A Stimulating History of the Sex Toy (Hallie Lieberman, 2017)

Histories of the Transgender Child (Jules Gill-Peterson, 2018)

Revolting Prostitutes: The Fight for Sex Workers' Rights (Juno Mac and Molly Smith, 2018)

Ace: What Asexuality Reveals About Desire, Society, and the Meaning of Sex (Angela Chen, 2020)

Pleasure in the News: African American Readership and Sexuality in the Black Press (Kim Gallon, 2020)

A Curious History of Sex (Kate Lister, 2020)

Boys & Sex: Young Men on Hookups, Love, Porn, Consent, and Navigating the New Masculinity (Peggy Orenstein, 2020)

Black Women, Black Love: America's War on Africa American Marriage (Dianne M. Stewart, 2020)

The Tragedy of Heterosexuality (Jane Ward, 2020)

Hurts So Good: The Science and Pleasure of Pain on Purpose (Leigh Cowart, 2021)

Strange Bedfellows: Adventures in the Science, History, and Surprising Secrets of STDs (Ina Park, 2021)

The Right to Sex: Feminist in the Twenty-First Century (Amia Srinivasan, 2021)

Love Your Asian Body: AIDS Activism in Los Angeles (Eric C. Wat, 2021)

Superfreaks: Kink, Pleasure, and the Pursuit of Happiness (Arielle Greenberg, 2023)

[theonion]

In the first-ever union of the Word of God and the Synthesizer, the Catholic Church’s College of Cardinals voted unanimously Monday to incorporate the lyrics of Yes into the New Testament. The resulting new Bible, the Revised Standard YesScriptures, will replace the Jerusalem Bible of 1966 as the standard accepted record and vehicle of divine revelation.

“Let us rejoice in this momentous occasion,” said Pope John Paul II in a special service at St. Peter’s. “And let no man be unmoved, remembering the words of Jesus: ’In and around the lake, mountains come out of the sky, and they stand there.’ Amen.”

Full Story

[maybe-boys-do-love]

What are some possibly significant queer associations with St. Bartholomew for Ticket to Heaven?

I'm glad you asked!

For those who don’t know, Bartholomew’s considered one of Jesus’s twelve disciples, but barely mentioned in the Bible. It's generally agreed that he is referred to also as Nathanael in the gospel of John, and as someone with the name Nathaniel, which means gift of God in Hebrew, I can tell you that’s a gay-ass name and will also def make me cry if I think too hard about Gem's character having that parallel during the show).

Bart’s often depicted holding his flayed skin (ew gross!) from when he got martyred, most famously in queer Italian Renaissance artist Michelangelo’s "Last Judgment" painting in the Sistine chapel at the Vatican. The skin St. Bart’s holding there is actually a (skinned) self-portrait of the artist. Peek at Aof’s insta and you’ll see that he actually visited the work. It’s giving queer influence in (Catholic) Christianity and autobiographical reference, baby ✨

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Bartholomew and another disciple Philip, who was written to have introduced Bartie to the big JC party and to have traveled with him after JC’s post-post-mortem, are mentioned in a translation by Yale scholar John Boswell of a liturgy for an adelphopoeisis ceremony between two monks from the tenth century. Boswell argued that adelphopoeisis, or spiritual brotherhood unions in the pre-sodomy-law-era early church should be understood as same-sex unions. This, as most discussion of gay shit with the Church, has been controversial, although some of those controversies are issues with Boswell’s translation. There does seem to be some evidence that these spiritual brotherhoods were understood to have the potential to be sexual in nature. Either way, it seems likely Aof has come across Boswell’s ideas because it’s pretty prominent in discourse for anyone looking into gay Christian history.

THEN, although it might be unintentional, the Thai-ification of Bart is homophonic with Bath????!!!! If Bart can be short for Bartholomew, y'all are gonna have to let me stretch a little bit past Aof's official statement so Bath can be short for Bathsheba because...

Giving us another Biblical name reference but from the other gender who's THE example of coveting in the Bible/Torah is such a power move! King David sees Bathsheba bathing from his roof and has her over to sleep with him even though she's the wife of one of David's soldiers who's literally off fighting for his kingdom. Then he gets her pregnant. Then David has the poor guy over for dinner and doesn't admit to it, sends him back out and has him put in the front lines to get killed. He dies and Bathsheba mourns for a bit before becoming David's wife. It's heterosexual failure! It's the temptations of the flesh! It's one of the inspirations for Leonard Cohen's cold and broken Hallelujah! This connection reframes the queer temptations as something no less normal than heterosexual desire.

After all, David is the good guy. The celebrated little David who killed Goliath. It's essential to trace Jesus's lineage back to this most-celebrated king in the Bible for the messianic prophecies to be correct. So giving us a reference to this venerated and simultaneously deeply human figure really complicates the kind of Christianity that expects immaculate humans.

And, Bathsheba wasn't David's only paramour. Researching same-sex relationships in the Bible, David and Jonathan will be at the very top of the list. "The soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul...Then Jonathan made a covenant with David, because he loved him as his own soul. And Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was upon him, and gave it to David, and his armor, and even his sword and his bow and his girdle." That's coming from the book of Samuel in the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, which was the first in 1946 to have any reference to word ‘homosexuality,’ using it to replace in the King James Version "abusers of themselves with mankind" and "effeminate” (which at that time did not have the common association with gay men the way it does today) on the list of sinners barred from heaven. Would David have been far enough on the Kinsey scale to qualify? Well, David had some other wives on top of Jonny and Bath, too. Whatever happened to family values!?

Of course, Bath also gives us images of washing and purifying alongside the sacrament of baptism!

The Bartholomew connection deserves more legit emphasis with Aof's statements and actual evidence for his visit to the Vatican, but how fun that the translation gave us another queer part of Christianity even if it wasn't intentional!

Complicating all of this discussion further is Catholicism's very late switch away from Latin and its more emphatic focus on tradition, hagiography, and liturgy rather than the text of the Bible. My ex-Christian fixation is on issues in Reformed Christianities (and I still love me some iconophobia, a topic with which Aof loves to engage), so I know more about the books and interpretations. I'm looking forward to the Catholic and ex-Catholic contributions here as the show gets underway. Like, y'all have been doing the most for production values of a Sabbath!

And to all my ex-Christians who can get sucked into spirals about this stuff, just remember that the concept of God is chill and all if it's just the comforting sense of connection between things in the universe, but any concepts of Christology, sin, or puppet-master deities are literally the most whack things if they're being thought of as anything more than a kind of out-there overly-simplified metaphor for trying to live a life where you can be yourself and get along with other people.

*This info and a great deep dive into the induction of the language and discourse of homosexuality in the Bible and its progressive! roots and aftermath is Reforming Sodom: Protestants and the Rise of Gay Rights.

[jesuschristisgod]

Matthew 11:29–30 in the Revised Standard Version of the Bible reads: 29 "Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls".30 "For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light".

[bluecatwriter]

Jonathan: Do I have to read it, oh my dear one?

Me: (cries)

Jonathan: "I will keep my mouth as it were in a bridle: while the ungodly is in my sight. I held my tongue, and spake nothing: I kept silence, yea, even from good words; but it was pain and grief to me. My heart was hot within me; and while I was thus musing the fire kindled."

Me: (cries harder) Do you have to remind me!

OKAY BUT THE INCLUSION OF THIS LINE HAS ME GOING FERAL

(Theological ramble incoming. You have been warned.)

Jonathan is reading from the Book of Common Prayer, but the scripture is Psalm 39. (I originally thought that this was a quote from Jeremiah 20:9, which uses similar language to show the prophet's frustration with burning up inside if he refuses his call to prophesy, but this is even better.)

The psalmist here is a great example of how people's responses to God in the Bible do not fit neatly into the "unquestioning obedience and reverence" framework any more than Jonathan's actions do. The narrator of this psalm speaks despairingly about the vanity of life, begs God to stop heaping hardship on him ("Remove thy stroke away from me: I am consumed by the blow of thine hand"), and while he expresses near the middle that his ultimate hope is in God ("And now, Lord, what wait I for? my hope is in thee"), he also flat-out asks God to leave him alone (the last line of the psalm in King James Version says "O spare me, that I may recover strength/before I go hence, and be no more," though I love the more modern translations such as the New Revised Standard version, which reads, "Turn your gaze away from me, that I may smile again/before I depart and am no more").

It's a gut-wrenching psalm that doesn't flinch from the realities of life: things feel meaningless, hardships are heaped on those who are faithful, humans are fragile, riches cannot safeguard against death— and the right to rage and weep before God is a given. It ends not with the line of hope from the middle but with a challenge to God, and the main conflict of the psalm is not resolved or neatly tied up. Like all the Wisdom literature in the Bible, it invites the readers to sit in the tension and the confusion and the pain, rather than hastening on to a "correct answer" or even a sense of resolution.

I assume this is why it's included in the Book of Common Prayer's burial service: death cannot be tied up with a bow, or smoothed over with platitudes. This psalm expresses solidarity with people from every generation who have tried to make sense of their hardships and pain and the devastating reality of mortality.

Anyway, inclusion of this line in this scene was absolutely stunning. I suspect that many of Bram Stoker's original readers would have familiarity with the burial service since it would be read at every funeral, so adding in the words was wonderful to enhance the experience for the modern non-Anglican reader. This passage helped drive home how thematically resonant these words are with what's happening in the story in the moment. Very cool.

[transhuman-priestess]

“None of these words are in the Bible”

Really? Which translation are you comparing to?

There are hundreds, if not thousands of translations of the Bible available from everybody and their grandma.

I’m not even talking about French vs English vs Arabic etc I’m talking about just within the English language.

You’ve got King James, Revised King James, New International, English Standard, New Living, and those are just the ones I can remember off the top of my head. Some of those absolutely have the word penis in them. Quit lying, you uncultured buffoons.

[mybeautifulchristianjourney]

Solomon’s Prayer for Wisdom

1 Solomon made a marriage alliance with Pharaoh king of Egypt; he took Pharaoh’s daughter, and brought her into the city of David, until he had finished building his own house and the house of the Lord and the wall around Jerusalem. 2 The people were sacrificing at the high places, however, because no house had yet been built for the name of the Lord.

3 Solomon loved the Lord, walking in the statutes of David his father; only, he sacrificed and burnt incense at the high places. 4 And the king went to Gibeon to sacrifice there, for that was the great high place; Solomon used to offer a thousand burnt offerings upon that altar. 5 At Gibeon the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream by night; and God said, “Ask what I shall give you.” 6 And Solomon said, “Thou hast shown great and steadfast love to thy servant David my father, because he walked before thee in faithfulness, in righteousness, and in uprightness of heart toward thee; and thou hast kept for him this great and steadfast love, and hast given him a son to sit on his throne this day. 7 And now, O Lord my God, thou hast made thy servant king in place of David my father, although I am but a little child; I do not know how to go out or come in. 8 And thy servant is in the midst of thy people whom thou hast chosen, a great people, that cannot be numbered or counted for multitude. 9 Give thy servant therefore an understanding mind to govern thy people, that I may discern between good and evil; for who is able to govern this thy great people?”

10 It pleased the Lord that Solomon had asked this. 11 And God said to him, “Because you have asked this, and have not asked for yourself long life or riches or the life of your enemies, but have asked for yourself understanding to discern what is right, 12 behold, I now do according to your word. Behold, I give you a wise and discerning mind, so that none like you has been before you and none like you shall arise after you. 13 I give you also what you have not asked, both riches and honor, so that no other king shall compare with you, all your days. 14 And if you will walk in my ways, keeping my statutes and my commandments, as your father David walked, then I will lengthen your days.”

15 And Solomon awoke, and behold, it was a dream. Then he came to Jerusalem, and stood before the ark of the covenant of the Lord, and offered up burnt offerings and peace offerings, and made a feast for all his servants. — 1 Kings 3:1-15 | Revised Standard Version (RSV) Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright © 1946, 1952, and 1971 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. All rights reserved. Cross References: Genesis 15:5; Genesis 22:17; Genesis 28:16; Genesis 41:7; Leviticus 17:3; Numbers 27:17; Deuteronomy 6:5; Deuteronomy 12:2; Deuteronomy 31:2; Joshua 18:21; 1 Samuel 13:9; 2 Samuel 7:8; 1 Kings 1:48; 1 Kings 2:10; 1 Kings 4:31; 1 Kings 7:1; 2 Chronicles 1:11; Psalm 91:16; Proverbs 3:2; Daniel 2:21; Matthew 1:20; Matthew 2:13; Matthew 6:33; 1 Corinthians 8:3; Ephesians 3:20; Hebrews 5:14; James 1:5; James 4:3; 1 John 5:14-15

Read full chapter

Hymns for 1 Kings 3

[quotesfromscripture]

Life for a life

"But if someone at enmity with another lies in wait and attacks and takes the life of that person, and flees into one of those cities, then the elders of the killer's city shall send to have the culprit taken from there and handed over to the avenger of blood to be put to death. Show no pity; you shall purge the guilt of innocent blood from Israel, so that it may go well with you."

(Deuteronomy 19:11-13 NRSVA, 1995)

[oh-dear-so-queer]

The clincher was the discovery that the word 'homosexual' first appeared in the Bible (1 Corinthians 6 RSV) in 1946, following an error in the translation of the Greek words 'arsenokoitai' and 'malakos'.

"In/Out: A Scandalous Story of Falling Into Love and Out of the Church" - Steph Lentz

[babyangelsky]

*sits at a lighted vanity mirror with clown makeup half on and a multicolored wig on a stand beside me*

I would like to share with you all a little fact about me: I have an incurable case of Fluke Pusit Heart Eyes. All I asked for Christmas was more Fluke, then all I asked for New Year's was more Fluke, then all I asked for my birthday was more Fluke.

So while that may admittedly be coloring my judgement, I'm gonna ask ya'll to let me cook here for a second.

A few days ago I ran my lil self over to Petty to share a bit of news I came across, which was that Fluke stated in a recent interview that he had a project coming up and that it was maybe a BL.

THEN, a couple of days later, Be on Cloud announced that Ta, Copper, Bible, and Bas would be at the One D press conference and it began to be speculated by some that Bas would be paired with Bible in the upcoming series 4 Minutes. Nothing was announced or confirmed at the press con...

BUT!

In an interview with The Standard, the relevant portion of which has been kindly translated here, Pond Krisda stated that the script for 4 Minutes had just finished being revised and:

THAT AN ACTOR HAS BEEN CAST TO STAR ALONGSIDE BIBLE.

Now! I love Bas. I'm very excited to see him in Man Suang when it gets released on Netflix at the end of the month because by all accounts he gave a fantastic performance. If he is paired with Bible in 4 Minutes, I'll be seated for it. I'll be seated regardless.

But! I HAVE FLUKE PUSIT HEART EYES! AND NOT ONLY DO I HAVE THEM, A MONTH AGO FELLOW FLUKE PUSIT ENJOYER CHICA PUT THIS IN MY HEAD:

DO YOU SEE WHERE I'M GOING WITH THIS? DO YOU SEE?

Fluke shares that he has a project coming soon but can't share any details and then TWO DAYS LATER Pond gives an interview and says that they have a co-star for Bible! Is the co-star Bas or one of the other BOC boys? Very possible! Probable even! Is this all just coincidental timing and Fluke's new project is something else entirely? Maybe!

BUT WHAT IF IT ISN'T? WHAT IF IT REALLY IS FLUKE WHO HAS BEEN CAST TO STAR WITH BIBLE?

*secures my clown wig, completing the clown transformation, and takes deep breath*

There is absolutely no reason for this post to exist or be this long other than my profound desire to see Fluke star in something, and these may very well be the delusional ramblings of a freshly 30-year-old lady in a "-I've connected the dots/-You haven't connected shit" situation.

But I just want ya'll to consider that much like the chances of being attacked by a bear in everyday life, the chances of Fluke being in 4 Minutes with Bible are slim, but not zero.

And I would like to invite ya'll and @respectthepetty and @chicademartinica to join me in this clown car

[and-her-saints]

What do you recommend for someone who's starting to read the bible? Like where to start, complementary readings, methods of study, etc

short answer: not really, i am so sorry. i have not found anything i would publicly recommend. there has always been some really heavy drawbacks that make me not want to back them.

the only thing (method-ish) i would recommend for Gospel readings wholeheartedly is the podcast Imagine: A Guide to Jesuit Prayer . however, it IS a contemplation podcast. not a bible study.

long answer: hmmmmm… my buddy El really recommends the The New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (NRSV-CE) but i do not own it, i pretty much only read the bible in Spanish (REINA-VALERA‼️🔥) but the NRSV is a very good, recent and accurate translation 👍 or so i’ve heard…

in regards to Bible studies… i’ve taken so many Bible study/Theology online courses and they have all SUCKED 👎 i don’t have many (if any) recs on that end.

many (many) people would recommend “Bible in a Year” with Fr. Mike Schmitz, however! i cannot stand him (respectfully) i am SO sorry…

this America article has some really good points on how to approach Catholic bible studies and has some recommendations.

i must finally add that i will be checking out the Agustine Institute’s podcast on the Bible/Bible in a Year because i’ve really enjoyed the experience of the “Amen” app. but i’ll have to give it a shot first.

i’m sorry this was SO unhelpful. i’m sure some people on here might have some actual suggestions and recommendations. pls add them. pls….. for the sake of us all…..

[skepticalpigeon]

@anamericangirl

Sure, yeah, you can kill anything until God breathes the breath of life into it. That's what I mean. If it hasn't breathed it's first breath, it's not alive.

Also the Message Bible, New American standard Bible, New revised standard Bible, BBE, CEB, CJB, Good news translation etc say miscarriage.