Kurt Queller

Explore the complex issue of slavery in the Bible. Discover different perspectives on whether scripture endorses or condemns this institution.

In Mark’s other “afterlife” controversy (10:17-31), Jesus responds to a rich man’s question about how to “inherit” eternal life. Jesus responds by reciting from the ethical commands of the Decalogue (the Ten Commandments). The man answers “I have kept all of these since my youth.”  

Regarding a hypothetical woman who has successively outlived seven husbands, before finally dying herself, they ask: “In the resurrection, whose wife will she be? For the seven had her.” 

It comes as a surprise to many that, historically speaking, the afterlife doctrines of the Abrahamic religions are a relatively late development. 

One of the biblical “prooftexts” most commonly used against queer people is Romans 1:26. There, Paul characterizes homoerotic relations as “against nature” (Greek: para phusin).