Difficult Bible PassagesAnswered

Does 'uncovering nakedness' in Leviticus mean only intercourse, and what sin was committed against Noah?

A viewer asks whether Leviticus's language about 'uncovering nakedness' means to sleep with one's wife, and whether the phrase is bound up with sexual immorality, in connection with the account of Noah and Canaan.

Answer

To uncover nakedness is to engage in fornication with someone other than yourself, but fornication is not limited to sexual intercourse; it can mean any exchange of nakedness, from pornography to fondling to petting to whatever, and the Greek actually says it includes anything of a sexual nature. This is exactly the dodge Bill Clinton used about Monica Lewinsky when he said he 'did not have sex with that woman,' meaning he did not penetrate her, and it is what a lot of teenage boys tell themselves; but the Hebrew and the Greek do not leave the definition that narrow, and it does not even have to involve one's main organ. So once you open up the definition, you see that Noah and Canaan are open to some kind of homosexual engagement, with Noah himself partly responsible, first for getting drunk, and second for leaving himself uncovered and exposed in a close-knit community where a curious, hormone-driven young man could do something. So you have two sins by Noah and one by Canaan; we are not exactly sure what it was, but we have a fairly good idea, and it is a recipe for disaster.

Dr. Robert Sungenis

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