Premarital Sex, is it every right?

Ruth

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I really could care less about what anyone has to punish me with; I am me and love myself as I am and as I do.
 

Krissy Cakes

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I think its a sin. Even tho I had it with my husband as we knew we were going to get married so we didn't see a problem.
 

tango

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I really could care less about what anyone has to punish me with; I am me and love myself as I am and as I do.

Nobody is punishing you. If you don't care what people think why did you ask?
 

Ruth

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Nobody is punishing you. If you don't care what people think why did you ask?
I asked at a moment when I thought people would be understanding.
 

Ruth

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I think in the context of the question it's entirely appropriate to see if there is a valid appeal to Scripture that justifies sex outside of marriage.

As you say it needs so much more than "the Bible is old". Personally I'm usually interested in a sensible appeal to Scripture that doesn't involve endless semantic gymnastics or assuming a specific meaning from Scriptural silence. I'm not sure it helps to say "a case could be made" and then doing nothing to indicate how.

Ruth isn't explicitly saying that we know better than God but the call to rewrite the Bible because it's old is implying that we know better than God, or that God's word isn't relevant to us today. If we are going to ignore some passages from Scripture (and we do, given how many of us ignore the dietary requirements of Leviticus, have tattoos, shave the edges of our beards, don't isolate women during their special time of the month etc) we need to have a clear indication of which passages were cultural and which are eternal. Absent such a distinction we end up with little more than a Crowley style "do what thou will shall be the whole of the law" as each of us decides which passages of Scripture we consider too bothersome.
I think that the entire Bible needs to be looked at suspiciously instead of bling adherance to it.
 

Ruth

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Unfortunately no exegesis is going to settle things, because the real question goes beyond specific passages to how we treat Paul’s letters. The passages that might involve premarital intercourse aren’t actually specific teachings. He doesn’t say “I have it from the Lord …” on this topic. Rather, a couple of passages show that Paul accepted standards of 1st Cent Jews on this topic. (The issue is Paul. Jesus didn’t say anything on the topic.)

So the question is: Does accepting Christianity mean that we accept 1st Cent Jewish culture? If not, where can we diverge? In the 1st Cent, Jews got married earlier than today. If someone didn’t have the gift of celibacy, the simplest solution was to get married. (1 Cor 7:9) But today that often isn’t the best solution. Is this an area where we’re permitted to differ from Paul’s culture?

[One exegetical note. I Cor 7:9 is the clearest reference of Paul to this topic. But in 1 Cor 7:10 he implies that the section including 7:9 was his own opinion, not the Lord's. This is very rare in Paul's letters. We might want to take it seriously.]

People often cite data that people who cohabit are more likely to divorce when they get married. But it turns out that this difference disappeared when you control for the age when they start. (https://www.theatlantic.com/health/...-step-toward-marriage-not-a-rebellion/284512/) In today’s society, marriage and cohabitation both work better if you wait until your 20s. Thus Paul’s recommendation, which I’m sure was right for the people he wrote to, may not be helpful today.

What should you do before it’s appropriate to get married? This is a question Paul never faced. He did understand that celibacy is a gift that not everyone had (1 Cor 7:7)

I looked back over my own Church’s detailed report on human sexuality, from 1991. It never actually justifies premarital intercourse. But it assumes it will happen. It says we should be providing guidance to help kids from getting pressured into doing things they aren’t ready for. The data I know says “just say no” doesn’t work. Good sex education reduces teen pregnancies more than abstinence-only approaches. (There are many studies that could be cited. E.g. see https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3194801/. The real shock in this report was how our statistics compare with other developed countries. Our prudery seems to be backfiring.)

The fact is, Christians today don’t typically remain virgins until marriage. 41% believe cohabiting before marriage is a good idea. (https://www.barna.com/research/majority-of-americans-now-believe-in-cohabitation/) Even more actually do it. http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/09/27/why-young-christians-arent-waiting-anymore/. The links go nowhere, so I’m not citing the underlying research, but here's what their summary says: “While the study’s primary report did not explore religion, some additional analysis focusing on sexual activity and religious identification yielded this result: 80 percent of unmarried evangelical young adults (18 to 29) said that they have had sex - slightly less than 88 percent of unmarried adults, according to the teen pregnancy prevention organization.”

We have a long period during where there is dating, something that wasn’t present in Paul’s time. We provide little guidance for it, because of course Scripture would have no reason to talk about how to do something that wasn’t part of 1st Cent life, and the Church’s main position is “don’t.” But I believe there are better and worse approaches. Indeed I think kids get pressured into having sex when they shouldn’t and probably even don’t want to. But by not giving advice for the kinds of relationships they're actually in, we’re not helping kids deal with this.
I have read what you wrote and there is more to take into consideratiion; more than what I have to say because there are many with different claims. I cannot get married with my govt. income or else they will take away a good part of it if not all. I would want a potential mate to prove how much he is good for me and loves me, that is if I feel the same. Many people are going through this and do not need the old testament thrown at them. Just an expression there.
 

Ruth

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This is sort of interesting. Surveys suggest that most Christians actually act as if they believe this. But I'm not aware of any serious attempt to build a sexual ethic that allows it, not any church that would endorse such an ethic.

So it's never been clear to me whether the large number of people who engage in premarital sex believe what Ruth here says or if for one reason or another they simply don't follow their own ethics.

I worry about broad statements like "these are modern times ..." In principle I agree with Ruth's whole first sentence. But I also worry about leaving people without any principled way to make ethical decisions. If we just say it's OK to ignore standards when we want to, we're likely to end up in places we don't want to be.

This is more visible in dealing with homosexuality. It's clear that many Christians now accept it. I do, and my church does. But if the next generation of Christians just sort of casually ignores Scripture I think it's dangerous. My own church has tried to define exactly what Paul was getting at in the passages that mention same-gender sex, and why we don't think it applies to Christian gays. We've also tried to build a serious sexual ethic (although it wasn't officially accepted). But I'm not sure how common that is. I'm worried that a lot of people are just thinking vaguely, oh well, the Bible is out of date, and leaving it at that. Or worse, not even going that far and just kind of going with the flow.

[Incidentally, I've watched and participated enough in discussions like this that I've looked pretty carefully at what's in the Bible about premarital sex. I think it's frowned upon but not flatly prohibited in the OT, but I don't see any way to avoid saying that Paul considers it wrong.]
I am a person involved in ministry believe it or not. It is okay if you don't agree with me. I still feel the same. I don't read the bible any longer.
All of the bible only gave me extreme anxiety and depression. I avow that people don't follow the nonsense that is highly dubiious.
 

tango

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I think that the entire Bible needs to be looked at suspiciously instead of bling adherance to it.

Suspiciously? What sort of suspicion would you consider appropriate?

I agree that we should look to correctly apply Scripture to our lives but ultimately we have to make a decision whether we believe it to be the inspired word of God or not. If it is not the inspired word of God there is no need to follow it. If it is the inspired word of God we have to decide whether to follow God or follow our own desires.
 

tango

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Lamb

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It's true that there are things in the bible that we don't want to read and we'll disagree with as well. But don't forget that the bible also helps us understand how God is saving us through Christ. That should give joy and peace and not anxiety.
 
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