Porn and the Bible

I think I'm going to write up a little series of things that I disagree with many or most of my fellow Christians about. Here's why I disagree with my fellow Christians on porn.

There are two passages generally quoted; one is the italicized one in here:

Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ himself? Shall I then take the members of Christ and unite them with a prostitute? Never! Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body? For it is said, "The two will become one flesh." But he who unites himself with the Lord is one with him in spirit. Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a man commits are outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body. Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body.(1 Corinthians 6:15-20, NIV).

The argument is generally that porn is sexual immorality and forbidden here, but that argument is perfectly circular; the whole question is whether porn is sexual immorality, so a passage forbidding sexual immorality doesn't prove anything. Also the context implies it's the kind of thing you could do with a prostitute. My take is that it's more a prohibition of what is sometimes called 'saddlebacking' with someone you're not married to; e.g. it's not OK if your do oral with your intern but stop short of orgasm.

The other passage is the italicized

You have heard that it was said, 'Do not commit adultery.' But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell.(Matthew 5:27-30, NIV)

There are a couple of interpretations of this, which involve the interpretation of the whole chapter. One is that it is hyperbole, but still truth. Jesus is making a point about the fact that everyone is a sinner; we all all sinners because the true standard we must measure ourselves against is perfection, as explained in the concluding verse of the chapter: "Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect." (verse 48) Our eye or hand does not actually cause us to sin, we would sin just as much without them. But the standards and stakes are both so high that if they did cause sin, we'd be better off performing home amputations.

Another interpretation, in no way conflicting with the first, is that this is about training and mental preparation, rather like I talked about here. This is where I originally got that concept. If you are fantasizing about how you'd seduce the people around you, you are preparing yourself to do that; you are seducing them in your heart. I don't see porn as connected to that at all. Porn isn't exactly training the viewer to seduce the people around; for one thing I'd need to be a plumber or pizza delivery guy first. And of course her reactions would have to be totally implausible. It's just all too disconnected from reality. If my favorite porn star, Aria Giovanni, showed up on my doorstep and propositioned me, I don't think the time I've spent with her pictures would incline me to accept one bit; I'd just be looking for the hidden cameras and trying to figure out what's really going on.

I do think as a Christian that I shouldn't be paying people to commit sins, and since I think sex with people you're not married to is a sin, that rules out most everything besides softcore and hentai; I include in that thinking the fact that I'm implicitly paying porn sites with pageviews/ad views. I do have some hardcore porn I collected before coming to that conclusion, which I didn't feel it necessary to delete after the fact.