re: #108 Fozzie Bear

Then what technically qualifies one as an adulterer in the biblical sense?

Sex between a man and a woman married to someone else.

Since the biblical world assumes plural wives and concubines, there is no reason a man can’t have sex with multiple women, and this is not considered ‘cheating’ on his part.

However, there are other concerns, since sex with a virgin without permission of her family is its own issue.

The problem we’re dealing with here is:

1. The Tanach assumes the social world of the tribal late Bronze, early Iron age.

2. The Gospels assume the social world of the Romanized first century.

3. The wingnuts assume that both of these documents will somehow reflect their own, rather culturally complex and distinct, social norms, and they recognize no formal tradition of interpretation that could link all of these things together for them.

This is why you need the Talmud, or canon law, or SOMETHIN’.