The other day, I saw a headline and link to a story of a Lesbian asking to be stoned at a church displaying a sign that said "Jesus would stone homos".
The story can be found here:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
I'm sorry, but no, Jesus would not stone homos. I'm pretty sure that he would not stone anyone. If someone got stoned and Jesus approved, it was probably the way Bill Maher gets stoned. In the interests of disclosure, I'm Jewish, and I've never read the Sequel. My acquaintance with the Original is not the most scholarly one.
However, I feel confident when I say that if you read the Bible and came away thinking that Jesus would stone homos, you read it wrong. Either that, or you bought a used copy and the person who wrote in the margins before you got it wrong.
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You are probably familiar with the 10 Commandments. If you asked me to name them all, I'd probably name six and finish by saying, "Happy, Grumpy, Bashful and Doc." I'm always amused, though when some wrongwing politician rails about how we need to display them everywhere and he can't cite them all. In any event, I think it's more important to heed them than to display them. At least that one about killing. I think we can all agree that you shouldn't kill.
You probably know the story about how we got them. Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt and brought them to Mt. Sinai to receive God's laws. The 10 Commandments are what we got. Make no mistake about it, they are emphatic. It's not just that "Thou Shalt Not Kill" It's NO KILL! In other words DON'T DO IT!
I have heard a story or two about Jesus. One goes directly to stoning. Some men presented Jesus with a woman who had committed adultery. How did they know? Was she caught in the act? and who was she committing it with and where was he? Apparently, the wrongwing were misogynistic A-holes even then. He told the gathered crowd that the one who had not sinned should cast the first stone. Nobody came forward to claim to be free of sin.
Now, I'm pretty sure that committing adultery is a violation of one of the 10 Commandments. Yet Jesus did not condone stoning the violator. Maybe you took that to be a demonstration of His fairness. That He truly believed that the stoning should commence with someone who had never sinned. In that case, since we're all born with Original Sin, except Jesus, you'll just have to wait until He returns. But even then, you can't throw your stone until He does, which He won't. So, you're just SOL.
Whatever else you might think about the stories of the Bible, the story of the 10 Commandments is the only time where God speaks directly to all the people, not through a prophet. I'm God! No Idols! Keep Sabbath! No Kill! Honor Parents! No Adultery! No Covet! Wow, I got seven! Don't tell me they're out of order.
Nowhere in all of that is a penalty mentioned for violating those commandments. Now, I'm a strict constructionist. I believe you have to go back to the original intent. What did God mean by "No Kill!"? This is something that the Rules committee got wrong. The punishment for everything is death! Work on the Sabbath? You Die! Adultery? You Die! Wearing a blend of fabrics? You Die! Wait a second, that one isn't even a commandment.
God has commanded us not to kill. Period. Some people kill. What should we do with them? We have to punish them. So we catch a killer and a death penalty proponent wants to kill the killer. I remind him that we have been commanded not to kill. He responds "Why not? He did!" I respond, "And if he jumped off a bridge would you follow?"
Jesus got that one right. He would not stone an adulterer. I know I'm missing 3 commandments from my list above, but I'm pretty sure No Gay! is not among them. It was also reported that as Jesus was dying, He called out to God asking for forgiveness for His own killers.
So, if you don't kill people for breaking the Commandments, you definitely shouldn't kill people for lesser offenses. I wonder if the woman returned for her stoning the next day.