posted
I've always considered myself to have farily good control of the english language, and to have a pretty extensive vocabulary. But the word "onanism" always mystified me. It sounded religious. So I looked it up.
And I am very, very disappointed in you all.
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YOu know what's sad? My aunt was talking about a Bible study she was doing on the story of Tamar....and I just kept giggling on the phone.
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I even looked it up twice, just to check, just to make sure. I thought maybe I had accidentally typed in "meat flinging" instead of onanism in one of the most utterly stunning typos in the history of typing, but nope.
But I was right. It was religious.... kind've....
[ March 05, 2004, 01:15 AM: Message edited by: Book ]
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posted
I actually have heard of Onan before, from the Stephen King book Insomnia... That was the argument against masturbation (roundly hissed and booed by many an adolescent male). But I never would've connected the two.
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posted
Technically, Onan wasn't masturbating. He engaged in coitus interruptus. A lousy form of birth control in that:
1) often the guy waits too long 2) Some sperm could get a head start (pre-ejaculate) 3) it makes a mess.
Which of those is the actual sin in Onan's case is debatable. The Bible makes a point of him "spilling his seed on the ground" so it might actually be #3. But I doubt it. The usual explanation is that he violated the duty of a brother to the widow of his brother. That is, to give her a child (a son?) so that "his line will not perish even though he is dead" or something like that...
dkw???
So, using this as a Biblical injunction against masturbation is kind of a stretch. There were so many other things that Onan did "wrong" according to the society in which he lived that the spilt seed seems minor in comparison.
Also, it is a fairly blatant attempt to reinterpret Scripture to shoe-horn it to fit a more modern (or more general) purpose than it may have been originally intended for.
There seems to be a lot of that when we look at sexual behaviors.
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But how is getting the woman pregnant supposed to make up for not having any kids with the guy's brother before he died? And poor Onan probably felt quite weird about doing things with his brother's wife. After all, aren't there ALSO Bible passages about adultery with relatives of this degree being a no-no?
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Well, here's the whole text of the Onan story. It's really a story about Judah and Tamar, not Onan.
quote:Genesis 38:6-30: 6And Judah took a wife for his first son Er, and her name was Tamar. 7Now Er, Judah's first son, did evil in the eyes of the Lord, so that he put him to death. 8Then Judah said to Onan, Go in to your brother's wife and do what it is right for a husband's brother to do; make her your wife and get offspring for your brother. 9But Onan, seeing that the offspring would not be his, went in to his brother's wife, but let his seed go on to the earth, so that he might not get offspring for his brother. 10And what he did was evil in the eyes of the Lord, so that he put him to death, like his brother. 11Then Judah said to Tamar, his daughter-in-law, Go back to your father's house and keep yourself as a widow till my son Shelah becomes a man: for he had in his mind the thought that death might come to him as it had come to his brothers. So Tamar went back to her father's house. 12And after a time, Bath-shua, Judah's wife, came to her end; and after Judah was comforted for her loss, he went to Timnah, where they were cutting the wool of his sheep, and his friend Hirah of Adullam went with him. 13And when Tamar had news that her father-in-law was going up to Timnah to the wool-cutting, 14She took off her widow's clothing, and covering herself with her veil, she took her seat near Enaim on the road to Timnah; for she saw that Shelah was now a man, but she had not been made his wife. 15When Judah saw her he took her to be a loose woman of the town, because her face was covered. 16And turning to her by the roadside, he said to her, Let me come in to you; for he had no idea that she was his daughter-in-law. And she said, What will you give me as my price? 17And he said, I will give you a young goat from the flock. And she said, What will you give me as a sign till you send it? 18And he said, What would you have? And she said, Your ring and its cord and the stick in your hand. So he gave them to her and went in to her, and she became with child by him. 19Then she got up and went away and took off her veil and put on her widow's clothing. 20Then Judah sent his friend Hirah with the young goat, to get back the things which he had given as a sign to the woman: but she was not there. 21And he put questions to the men of the place, saying, Where is the loose woman who was in Enaim by the wayside? And they said, There was no such woman there. 22So he went back to Judah, and said, I have not seen her, and the men of the place say that there is no such woman there. 23And Judah said, Let her keep the things, so that we may not be shamed; I sent the young goat, but you did not see the woman. 24Now about three months after this, word came to Judah that Tamar, his daughter-in-law, had been acting like a loose woman and was with child. And Judah said, Take her out and let her be burned. 25And while she was being taken out, she sent word to her father-in-law, saying, The man whose property these things are, is the father of my child: say then, whose are this ring and this cord and this stick? 26Then Judah said openly that they were his, and said, She is more upright than I am, for I did not give her to Shelah my son. And he had no more connection with her. 27And when the time came for her to give birth, it was clear that there were two children in her body. 28And while she was in the act of giving birth, one of them put out his hand; and the woman who was with her put a red thread round his hand, saying, This one came out first. 29But then he took his hand back again, and his brother came first to birth: and the woman said, What an opening you have made for yourself! So he was named Perez. 30And then his brother came out, with the red thread round his hand, and he was named Zerah.
Basically, Onan's sin was clearly not following his father's orders with respect to this woman.
I'm a little confused on one thing though, it seems on the face of it that the Lord is killing off Judah's sons, but another way to read it is that Judah killed them himself for being evil.
I don't know.
Anyway, we lack specifics in that regard.
But frankly, I find it hard to imagine that masturbation is really a big crime in the context of a culture that thinks it's okay to trade goats for sex.
Well, not okay for the woman, apparently, because she was to be put to death if it became known.
I think this story only makes sense in terms of an object lesson on obedience. To the law and to one's father...basically. Onan's sin was disobedience, not sexual in nature at all.
I think turning this into a story about masturbation is just off track completely. It makes no sense that way. Because in context it is saying that it is just fine to frequent prostitutes, but not okay to spill your sperm on the ground. What kind of legal code is that for a God to hold to.
There's also another possibility that should be considered. That is...that the authors of this text ASSUMED that the Lord killed Er and Onan because they did wrong, when in fact, they may have simply died young, as people sometimes do.
In that case, the entire story is more about supersitious thinking than about an object lesson in obedience.
I don't really like this story at all, come to think of it. It's got adultery and USE of prostitutes as normal, okay behaviors. Putting ANY of its lessons in that context would seem to be fairly important. IMHO.
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What I find especially troubling about this story is that it is considered ok to USE a prostitute, but BEING a prostitute is deserving of being burned alive.
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I don't think this story is saying that using a prostitute is OK. From what I understand neither Judah or any of his brothers were really considered role models. Well, Joseph was a good man, and maybe Benjamin, but the rest of them were not so good. Judah wasn't even the first born, he was only the heir becuase the older ones were SO bad they couldn't inherit. I think it's a story about God taking a really screwed up family and making it work for his purpose.
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I've never considered this story basis for calling masturbation a sin. To my knowledge, the Bible never specfically addresses masturbation at all.
dkw? Am I wrong?
Onan's sin was not obeying his father and the law. Judah's sin was not giving Tamar to his youngest son, and then in shamefully using a prostitute and not even paying her. Tamar is actually what could be called a pretty resourceful woman.
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posted
The only argument I've heard is the masturbation is sinful because it's selfish and causes one to bring up images of sinful things, or use someone as an object.
But you would think something like that would be addressed in the Bible.
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