The RSV Flap about "Homosexuals"

MY husband recently quipped about the new Covid vaccine and the RSV vaccine: "the recommendation is to get both at the same time, and for seniors to also get the RSV vaccine. That last one will prevent you from falling for dynamic translations like the NIV."

I thought it was hilarious and posted it on my FB wall. Others agreed, but then I got this comment:


I have been using the NRSV for several years now. I have yet to purchase the updated NRSV but have looked at it online. On the other hand, I have been re-studying the handful of passages in the Bible that have been used to ban committed same-sex relationships. I came to the conclusion on my own that the NT passages refer to pederasty. So it is kind of disturbing to realize that the RSV (1947) was the first English translation of the Bible to use the word "homosexuals" as a class of sinners who could not inherit the kingdom of God. I believe there is a video out about that, but I haven't seen it yet.

The word in question is ἀρσενοκοῖται (1 Cor. 6:9). It is what Greek scholars call a "hapax legomanon" a word that only appears one time in the Koine scriptures. Think of it as blend word or compound word, because it combines two words: "ἄρσην" a male and "κοίτη" a bed. ( We get the words "arsenic," "arsenal" and "coitus" from them.) So literally, it means men lying with men. You might not like the translation "homosexual." Apparently other versions prefer other translations: " buggerers" (1599 Geneva Bible) "lechers against kind, neither they that do lechery with men," (Wycliffe Bible), nor "liers with mankind" (1899 Douay-Rheims) “men who have sex with men” (NIV, CSB), “practice homosexuality” (NLT, HCSB), or “sodomites” (NRSV, New jerusalem Bible), "both participants in same-sex intercourse" (CEB), "men who have physical relations with other men" (ICB),

It's interesting to note these Jewish translations: "both participants in same-sex intercourse" (CJB/Complete Jewish Bible); "homosexuals" (OJB/Orthodox Jewish Bible)

I have studied Greek, but I am not a Hebrew scholar, so I welcome those who are such scholars for their insights on the following. I have read that ancient Jews used the Hebrew phrase "mishkav zakar", which means “lying with a male,” to describe male-to-male sexual contact. Thus, it seems that Paul has transferred that Hebrew term into Greek, which IMO would indicate that we should expect a continuity between his reading of the OT (cf. Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13) and what he has written in his epistles.

So the question, IMO, is about what lenses one brings to the text. One could sever the continuity by adopting a sort of Lutheran-inspired "law and grace" hermeneutic, (Jesus has abolished the law) or a dispensationalist hermeneutic ( The NT has succeeded the OT). Or one could do it by adopting a revisionist hermeneutic ("mishav zakur and arsenokoites refer to pederasty, or some other unbalanced power relationship, not a loving same-sex relationship"). My commenter is one who has chosen the latter course.

But the point is that how one translates and understands these texts is a matter of one's hermeneutic, the lenses that one brings to the text. (Which is why I think anyone who claims to read Scripture apart from a tradition/community/narrative is mistaken.) The RSV may well have been the first to translate ἀρσενοκοῖται as "homosexuals," but it was not the first to mean sexual relations between two members of the same sex. What one thinks of such relations is a product of the community one identifies with.