An Anglican group claims that the Bible affirms LGBTQ identities. The group, LGBTQ Faith U.K., argues that “[n]ot everyone in the Bible is cisgender. Nor is everyone in the Bible biologically or anatomically male or female.”
The claim, included in the group’s “Bible Affirms” series and written by Anne Reddecliffe in LGBTQ Welcome, adds, “In the Bible, the clearest example of this are eunuchs, who can be seen as the biblical ‘ancestors’ of trans people. In the twenty first century, we would understand eunuchs to be men who have had their male genitals removed. In biblical times, things were understood a little differently.”
One of the “most likely” intersex people in the Bible is the Samaritan woman described in John 4, the group says. The resource states that Jesus affirmed the woman.
The resource, reported by Breitbart, goes on to suggest that Deborah was “queer.”
“Finding queer characters in the Bible depends a little bit on the definition of the word queer. Defining queer in terms of gender identity is something that is absent from the Bible, or any writing up until recent times. However, looking at queer in terms of gender performance shows some clear queer characters,” the resource says. “One of the most obvious is the story of Deborah, which is told in the book of Judges.”
According to the group, Deborah was “queer” because “[g]oing to war was a very male thing for a woman to do.”
The group further claims that the Bible affirms bisexuality by arguing that David loved Jonathan as well as Bathsheba.
Naomi and her daughter-in-law, Ruth, are lesbians, the group claims, asserting that this was “very explicitly a same-sex relationship and the Bible is uncompromisingly positive about it.”
The LGBTQ group noted the views are not official Church of England policy.
