I would like some feedback on the strength of the hypothesis that Paul’s thorn in the flesh (2 Cor 12:7) was homosexual desire. Here are my arguments:
Paul viewed desire and lust as the greatest sin, and himself as God’s chosen apostle. He says in 2 Cor 12:7 that God put a thorn in his flesh to keep him humble, and describes it as a messenger of Satan. That to me says that the thorn was not a physical weakness, even though he speaks of his weaknesses in 2 Cor. In his rationality of course Satan would try to corrupt him – he was God’s most important man on Earth. What would be more corrupting than carnal desire? (he probably didn’t distinguish between same-sex and other desire, but viewed same-sex behaviour as extreme desire as was the general view in antiquity).
Furthermore the weaknesses he speaks of in the letter, he says are really strengths. But if the thorn was a physical weakness, it would be something to cherish and boast about, but Paul wants to get rid of it. That tells me that the thorn can not be counted among his weaknesses.
Paul condemns same-sex behaviour, and sees it as God’s punishment of the Gentiles for their idolatry (Romans 1). He probably wasn’t sexually active himself. But that still leaves room for the desire.
Paul finds it easy to live in celibacy, and thinks it is not good for a man to have sex with a woman (1 Cor 7). He views marriage as a lust prophylaxis, and sex without lust as the only recommendable kind (see Sex and the Single Savior by Dale Martin). Sex without lust in a marriage would have been easy to suggest for a homosexual. And if Paul was homosexual, he wouldn’t himself need a marriage as lust prophylaxis. His easy celibacy cannot be explained by his apocalyptic views, because he must have been in celibacy before his conversion in 37 CE, due to his age, which was at that point long past the normal marital age, and he couldn’t have had an apocalyptic world view as a pharisee. So why is he in celibate? It would have been a rarity in the Jewish community.
He speaks of an embarrassment and temptation in his letter to the Galatians that in my view could have been of a sexual nature: “Ye know how through infirmity of the flesh I preached the gospel unto you at the first. And my temptation which was in my flesh ye despised not, nor rejected; but received me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus.” (Gal. 4)
Finally, even though Paul says he kept the law like no one else, he admits that he has also struggled and known lust. In Romans 7, he says:”
“What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet…But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.”
What do you think?
Really interesting topic, but i do not think Gal 4:13-14 can be marshaled as evidence in modern translations. Your quote is a revised KJV, not ? A more modern translation like NRSV talks about “physical infirmity” and “my condition”, which I think refers to a real physical illness, or else the whole meaning of the verses collapses. Paul says that his need for physical care at some time brought him into contact with people who then became his proselytes, because he seized the opportunity to preach, and they converted, even in the face of his physical illness.
The passage about the “thorn in the flesh” comes at the end of the “boasting” section (chapters 11-12) where he describes his weaknesses as strengths. In this case the thorn is given him because he has received revelations unheard of. All the way in these verses he gives contrasts of weak and strong. So I really doubt that the “thorn” refers to homoerotic leanings. They probably refer to a chronic disease, and there a lots of guesses as to the nature of this.
Thank you for your points, Gavriel. I am unsure about the best translation of Gal 4:13-14, but as for the boasting in 2 Cor, my problem with reading physical defect or disease into the thorn, is that Paul is very specific and detailed about what he has bodily endured:
“I am a better one: with far greater labors, far more imprisonments, with countless floggings, and often near death. Five times I have received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I received a stoning. Three times I was shipwrecked; for a night and a day I was adrift at sea; on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from bandits, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers and sisters; in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, hungry and thirsty, often without food, cold and naked.” (2 Cor 11:23-27 NRSV)
Yet he is strangely vague about the thorn – which is clearly a metaphor for something else. Why use a metaphor? Why not say “I was given a blind eye” or “coughing without end”? Why not tell the Corinthians exactly what he is boasting about here? This suggests that the thorn is not something physical, I think, but something intangible. Furthermore, the thorn is precisely a counter to his revelations unheard of, and is set apart from the other weaknesses. It is important that revelations give him spiritual authority, and it would therefore make sense that the counter, the price paid, is also something intangible – like unwanted desire, to keep him down.
It would not do for Paul to admit that he could also be aflame with passion. Passion is orchestrated by Satan in Paul’s view (1 Cor 7) – and Paul describes the thorn as exactly that – a messenger of Satan(!). So he would use a metaphor to say that he is paying a price for his revelations, but he won’t disclose exactly what the price is, only that it is of Satan. Paul writes that he agrees with the Corinthians that it is well for a man not to touch a woman, but suggests marriage to quell passion, for those who need that prophylaxis. But he wishes everybody could be like him – meaning he doesn’t need a wife to keep temptation away. This could either mean that Paul had no passion, or it could mean that a wife wouldn’t keep away HIS passion.
Well, he uses the term “flesh”, which clearly refers to something Paul felt to be bodily, or else he would have been talking about a mental or spiritual nuisance. The real metaphor is the word “thorn”, because he does not want to name and publish a disease that he felt was embarrassing, perhaps a chronic digestion problem.
Elsewhere he explains homosexuality to be a punishment for sinful life, it would not apply to his own self understanding, in which he felt to be an apostle and messenger of God.
Could the “thorn in the flesh,” have been poor eyesight? I think his custom was to dictate his letters to a secretary, but to sign them himself. In Galatians 6:11, he says “See with what large letters I have written to you in my own handwriting?” That, to me, is a clue. It would have been a thorn, for sure, to be nearly blind. It would have made his work a lot more challenging, particularly the written communication with his churches.
Nancy
NancyGKnapp said
Could the “thorn in the flesh,” have been poor eyesight? I think his custom was to dictate his letters to a secretary, but to sign them himself. In Galatians 6:11, he says “See with what large letters I have written to you in my own handwriting?” That, to me, is a clue. It would have been a thorn, for sure, to be nearly blind. It would have made his work a lot more challenging, particularly the written communication with his churches.
Nancy
Every aging person experiences problems of focussing and reading small letters, due to loss of flexibility of the eye lenses. If this deficiency was very serious from early age, Paul would not have been able to uphold his work as some kind of a leather crafter, from which he made a living. “Thorn in the flesh” in my view refers to something painful/awful and chronical, about which he did not want to be specific. I even doubt epilepsy, because it does not fit properly with Paul’s own hints. If he had his visions in epileptic fits, he would hardly have referred to them as “thorns”.
Simulacrum said
I would like some feedback on the strength of the hypothesis that Paul’s thorn in the flesh (2 Cor 12:7) was homosexual desire. Here are my arguments:Paul viewed desire and lust as the greatest sin, and himself as God’s chosen apostle. He says in 2 Cor 12:7 that God put a thorn in his flesh to keep him humble, and describes it as a messenger of Satan. That to me says that the thorn was not a physical weakness, even though he speaks of his weaknesses in 2 Cor. In his rationality of course Satan would try to corrupt him – he was God’s most important man on Earth. What would be more corrupting than carnal desire? (he probably didn’t distinguish between same-sex and other desire, but viewed same-sex behaviour as extreme desire as was the general view in antiquity).
Furthermore the weaknesses he speaks of in the letter, he says are really strengths. But if the thorn was a physical weakness, it would be something to cherish and boast about, but Paul wants to get rid of it. That tells me that the thorn can not be counted among his weaknesses.
Paul condemns same-sex behaviour, and sees it as God’s punishment of the Gentiles for their idolatry (Romans 1). He probably wasn’t sexually active himself. But that still leaves room for the desire.
Paul finds it easy to live in celibacy, and thinks it is not good for a man to have sex with a woman (1 Cor 7). He views marriage as a lust prophylaxis, and sex without lust as the only recommendable kind (see Sex and the Single Savior by Dale Martin). Sex without lust in a marriage would have been easy to suggest for a homosexual. And if Paul was homosexual, he wouldn’t himself need a marriage as lust prophylaxis. His easy celibacy cannot be explained by his apocalyptic views, because he must have been in celibacy before his conversion in 37 CE, due to his age, which was at that point long past the normal marital age, and he couldn’t have had an apocalyptic world view as a pharisee. So why is he in celibate? It would have been a rarity in the Jewish community.
He speaks of an embarrassment and temptation in his letter to the Galatians that in my view could have been of a sexual nature: “Ye know how through infirmity of the flesh I preached the gospel unto you at the first. And my temptation which was in my flesh ye despised not, nor rejected; but received me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus.” (Gal. 4)
Finally, even though Paul says he kept the law like no one else, he admits that he has also struggled and known lust. In Romans 7, he says:”
“What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet…But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.”
What do you think?
I think that Paul’s sexual orientation was probably what we would call “gay”.
** you do not have permission to see this link **
Has Ehrman ever responded publicly, one way or another, to modern speculation that Paul was gay?
Simulacrum said
I would like some feedback on the strength of the hypothesis that Paul’s thorn in the flesh (2 Cor 12:7) was homosexual desire. Here are my arguments:Paul viewed desire and lust as the greatest sin, and himself as God’s chosen apostle. He says in 2 Cor 12:7 that God put a thorn in his flesh to keep him humble, and describes it as a messenger of Satan. That to me says that the thorn was not a physical weakness, even though he speaks of his weaknesses in 2 Cor. In his rationality of course Satan would try to corrupt him – he was God’s most important man on Earth. What would be more corrupting than carnal desire? (he probably didn’t distinguish between same-sex and other desire, but viewed same-sex behaviour as extreme desire as was the general view in antiquity).
Furthermore the weaknesses he speaks of in the letter, he says are really strengths. But if the thorn was a physical weakness, it would be something to cherish and boast about, but Paul wants to get rid of it. That tells me that the thorn can not be counted among his weaknesses.
Paul condemns same-sex behaviour, and sees it as God’s punishment of the Gentiles for their idolatry (Romans 1). He probably wasn’t sexually active himself. But that still leaves room for the desire.
Paul finds it easy to live in celibacy, and thinks it is not good for a man to have sex with a woman (1 Cor 7). He views marriage as a lust prophylaxis, and sex without lust as the only recommendable kind (see Sex and the Single Savior by Dale Martin). Sex without lust in a marriage would have been easy to suggest for a homosexual. And if Paul was homosexual, he wouldn’t himself need a marriage as lust prophylaxis. His easy celibacy cannot be explained by his apocalyptic views, because he must have been in celibacy before his conversion in 37 CE, due to his age, which was at that point long past the normal marital age, and he couldn’t have had an apocalyptic world view as a pharisee. So why is he in celibate? It would have been a rarity in the Jewish community.
He speaks of an embarrassment and temptation in his letter to the Galatians that in my view could have been of a sexual nature: “Ye know how through infirmity of the flesh I preached the gospel unto you at the first. And my temptation which was in my flesh ye despised not, nor rejected; but received me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus.” (Gal. 4)
Finally, even though Paul says he kept the law like no one else, he admits that he has also struggled and known lust. In Romans 7, he says:”
“What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet…But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.”
What do you think?
Paul condemns same-sex behaviour, and sees it as God’s punishment of the Gentiles for their idolatry (Romans 1).
Steefen
Same-sex lovemaking is not God’s punishment.
Today, there are male Tops, Bottoms, and Sides; and, there are probably bisexual Sides (neither sodomy Tops or Bottoms).
Tell us about the Socratic method of homosexuality–homosexuality in moderation. Homosexuality available in moderation probably prevents lust.
gavriel said
Really interesting topic, but i do not think Gal 4:13-14 can be marshaled as evidence in modern translations. Your quote is a revised KJV, not ? A more modern translation like NRSV talks about “physical infirmity” and “my condition”, which I think refers to a real physical illness, or else the whole meaning of the verses collapses. Paul says that his need for physical care at some time brought him into contact with people who then became his proselytes, because he seized the opportunity to preach, and they converted, even in the face of his physical illness.The passage about the “thorn in the flesh” comes at the end of the “boasting” section (chapters 11-12) where he describes his weaknesses as strengths. In this case the thorn is given him because he has received revelations unheard of. All the way in these verses he gives contrasts of weak and strong. So I really doubt that the “thorn” refers to homoerotic leanings. They probably refer to a chronic disease, and there a lots of guesses as to the nature of this.
I think the “thorn in the flesh” was epilepsy–to be specific, complex partial seizures. I’m not saying Paul didn’t have homosexual fantasies because a large cohort of otherwise heterosexual men do. My vote for seizures comes from his description of a blaze of light, a voice and subsequent post-ictal blindness of several days’ duration. It tells me it was probably neurological. The usual rule of thumb is that visual effects in epilepsy are often transient. The fact that he remembered the effects tells me that the seizures were partial rather than grand male or even petit mal. Complex tells me that he experienced more than one phenomenon. It wasn’t anything he had control over and his lack of control would have indeed have been distressing to someone as hard-charging as Paul. If I recall correctly, it was Paul who mourned that “the evil that I would not do, that I do and the good that I would do, that I do not.” He was a control freak, I guess.
fishician said
You might want to look up Geschwind syndrome: kind of controversial in itself, and hard to diagnose someone in absentia, but sounds like Paul: temporal lobe seizures with hypergraphia, hyperreligiosity, reduced sexuality, etc.
“The great Russian novelist ** you do not have permission to see this link **
My “diagnosis” of Paul’s condition is more complicated. I based it on the parallel between 2 Cor 12:7, “a thorn was given to in my flesh” and Gal 4:12 lit. “your temptation in my flesh.” I read Paul as speaking of “becoming as” his Gentile male audience in terms of their kind of “fleshly weakness” and their kind of fleshly “temptation” of desire.
According to EP Sanders (Paul: The Apostle’s Life, Letters and Thought), the stereotypical Gentile moral weakness, as Jewish observers saw it, was homosexual desire. I think Paul “thorn” was his realization that he had become (or always was, from the womb) like a Gentile in terms of their kind of “fleshly weakness”.
cheriq said
How about desire for a married woman: Priscilla?He did live with she and Aquila for eleven months – working with the tent business, and teaching them his doctrines. He did include her in various letter “shout-outs”.
Why would heterosexual thoughts be a “thorn in the side” of a Jew?
BDEhrman
FreedomBen
evgendob
Robert