SOME OF MY BEST FRIENDS ARE GAY: A GUIDE TO SAME-SEX MARRIAGE

From the Manufacturer’s Instruction Manual

By Samuel Silver, March 2004

The debate about legal recognition of same-sex marriage is ultimately grounded in our understanding of human nature, values, and the role of human relationships in creating and defining the type of society we desire.

For the vast majority of Americans, these issues are understood in the context of the Bible and religious traditions—the Instruction Manual provided by our manufacturer.

This critical debate is not truly between homosexuals and heterosexuals; it is between two opposing worldviews—one secular and the other religious. Approximately 80% of Americans hold a religious worldview, but the secular left has done an excellent, yet nefarious, job of dividing those with a religious worldview through false stereotyping. Their manipulative divide-and-conquer strategy has led many religious people to erroneously fear other religious people more than they fear the secular fundamentalists set on destroying religion and Judeo-Christian values.

Everyone does not fit neatly into the purely religious or purely secular worldviews, but sitting this one out is not a viable alternative. The stakes for our families and free society are too great. We have to join one team or the other.

The Religious Position

Everyone knows the secular and radical gay rights side of the argument; the public schools, universities, and mass media faithfully present it to us. Fewer understand the religious side—which is falsely portrayed as ignorant, bigoted, hateful, intolerant, and homophobic.

A proper understanding of the religious position is necessary if a real debate is to take place—prior to the destruction of a 5,000-year-old institution by a minority of citizens, against the will of the majority.

To discuss the religious view of human nature is not to ignore science. In his courageous book The Blank Slate, MIT professor Steven Pinker concludes that the theory of human nature coming out of the cognitive revolution has more in common with the Judeo-Christian theory of human nature than with behaviorism or social constructionism.

The United States was not created morally tabula rasa as a secular nation. The unifying moral principle of this country’s founding was a religious faith in a divine Creator—and the freedom of each individual to practice his or her religion (or no religion) without interference from the government.

The Founders believed that religious faith, particularly the Judeo-Christian tradition, provided the objective ethical basis needed for a free society to properly function. To this day, the majority of Americans share this belief.

A review of traditional Judaism’s opposition to homosexuality—and most importantly its public sanction with the legal recognition of same-sex marriage—will highlight the fallacies many well-meaning people have apparently accepted. (Judaism will guide this discussion, although the ideas should be in agreement with traditional Christianity.)

To have compassion and tolerance for all of God’s children is admirable—and a mitzvah (commandment) under Jewish law—but there is no way Jewish law and tradition can be perverted to endorse and publicly sanction same-sex marriage.

The Instruction Manual is clear and unequivocal:

“You shall not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; it is an abomination.” (Leviticus 18:22)

The ultimate punishment for homosexuality—along with other sexual sins—is kares: God’s cutting off of their souls spiritually. Kares is considered one of the most severe punishments for a sin.

Judaism also teaches that sexual immorality, including homosexuality, is universally prohibited to all humans as one of the seven Noahide Laws—God’s natural law for all mankind.

The very first commandment in the Bible comes immediately following God’s creation of human beings, male and female together and equally in His image:

“Be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it.” (Genesis 1:28)

Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch describes this fourfold mission as a guide to the whole free-willed moral development of the human race: Fruitful is marriage; multiply is the family; fill the earth is society; and subdue it is property.

Rabbi Hirsch further points out the critical nature of heterosexual relationships—based on the commandment for man to leave his father and mother and cleave unto his wife, and they will be one flesh. Woman was created from man to show that only in partnership do the two form a complete human being.

Fallacy #1: Natural Inclination Equals Acceptable Public Behavior

Whether a homosexual inclination is caused by genetics, hormones, psychology, or whim is irrelevant. The Creator of human nature would not have prohibited homosexual activity if He did not design this inclination to be controllable by human free will.

As Maimonides taught:

“It is possible for a person to be born with a tendency to one of the virtues or one of the shortcomings… He should not say that these shortcomings are already ingrained… For in every situation a person has the choice of changing… The choice is in his hands.”

Without free will, there is no basis for morality—or for Judaism or Christianity. To argue that a prohibited behavior is OK because it is a natural inclination is an oxymoron.

Fallacy #2: Opposition to Same-Sex Marriage Is Hateful Homophobia

The idea that opposition to homosexual activity and its public sanction is equivalent to hatred of individual homosexuals is a big lie—created to demonize, intimidate, and silence opponents.

According to the latest FBI Hate Crimes statistics, less than 0.0001% of homosexuals were victims of violent assaults—not exactly an epidemic.

Judaism and Christianity both abhor the sin of homosexual behavior—but only teach love, respect, and toleration for individual fellow humans—all created in the image of God. Religious people can sincerely say, “Some of my best friends are gay!”

Fallacy #3: Same-Sex Marriage Is a Private Act Between Consenting Adults

Private sin is for God alone. But public acts—especially legal marriage—are a matter for society.

A fascinating Midrash teaches:

“The generation of the Flood was only blotted out from the world because they wrote marriage contracts for males and for females.”

As economist Thomas Sowell explains:

“Marriage is not an individual right… Unions of a man and woman produce the future generations on whom the fate of the whole society depends. Society has something to say about that.”

Fallacy #4: Economic Benefits for Homosexuals Can Only Be Obtained by Government Force

Many corporations (Disney, GE, Walmart) already voluntarily extend domestic-partner benefits. Just as sexual activity should be private, economic accommodations should be voluntary—without redefining marriage.

A Final Fallacy: Same-Sex Marriage Hurts No One

It does affect children—especially through public school indoctrination. Parents should not be forced to accept as “normal” what their faith declares immoral.

The difference between worldviews:

Question

Religious Answer

Secular Answer

How did humans come to be?

God created us in His image

Random evolution

Where is humanity headed?

Messianic redemption

Extinction (climate, nukes, etc.)

What is our purpose?

Obey God, grow in holiness

No objective morality—“anything goes”

As Rabbi Hirsch prophetically wrote over a century ago:

“It is no longer enough for the apostate to live undisturbed… He sees in the Law an intellectual slavery… He wages fanatical campaigns of persecution against those loyal to the Law.”

The Ultimate Victims

On a micro level: our children.

On a macro level: our free society.

John Adams (1798):

“Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

George Washington (1796):

“Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports.”

Harry Truman:

“If we don’t have a proper fundamental moral background, we will finally end up with a totalitarian government…”

Biblically based faith helps maintain freedom by holding together the invisible framework of social stability.

As one former gay activist admitted:

“For people whose entire identity is rooted in sexuality, what do they need to do? They must work to sexualize every part of society—and, as every good marketer knows, that effort must begin with children.”

Will God Continue to Bless America?

Same-sex marriage, in religious terms, desecrates God’s name—and risks loss of His blessing on the nation.

As Washington prayed in 1789:

“May [God’s] benediction consecrate to the liberties and happiness of the People of the United States a Government instituted by themselves for these essential purposes.”

— Samuel Silver is Chairman of Toward Tradition (www.towardtradition.org), a national movement of Jewish and Christian cooperation, fighting anti-religious bigotry and secular fundamentalism.

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