“The Song of Temptation”
Description
Her seduction attempt: birds sport, why shouldn't we? And we are born naked: why wear clothes? Don't quote Holy Writ. He cites David's fall and Sodom; she, Solomon's queens and concubines. He bids her "Begone you slut!" "Without ado they then withdrew"
Notes
Both sides have some slight holes in their Biblical logic. David did indeed get into trouble for sexual impropriety (his affair with Bathsheba, told in 2 Samuel chapter 11, with the working-out of the consequences occupying chapters 12-20) -- but that was specificly adultery (Bathsheba was married to the Uriah the Hittite) and David compounded it by killing Uriah. Casual fornication is not nearly the same.
As for Sodom, there was a "great outcry" against them (Genesis 18:20), but fornication was hardly their problem; recall that, just before the destruction of the city, Lot offered his virgin daughters to the Sodomites to rape rather than having then assault his guests. But the Sodomites wanted the (male) guests, so their crime was seemingly homosexuality (Genesis 19:1-10).
But the example of Solomon is hardly a counter-argument; he had supposedly 700 wives and 300 concubines (1 Kings 11:3), but these wives "turned away his heart after other gods" (1 Kings 11:4), with the eventual result that his descendants lost control of most of Israel.
I'd call the debate pretty close to a draw. - RBW
Cross references
- cf. "Kissing's No Sin (I)" (theme of the antiquity of sexual relations)
References
- Tunney-StoneFiddle, pp. 45-46, "The Song of Temptation" (1 text, 1 tune)
- Roud #5333
- BI, TSF045