Incest - Acceptable or not?

[otseng]

Another thing is, incestrous marriage seems to be approved by God in Abram's and Sarai's case. However, in other parts of the Bible, it was condemned. Now you tell me, shall we have incest or not?

That's a good question. What does the Bible have to say about incest?

[Quarkhead]

Furthermore, stating other people's incest to approve of one's own is rahter baseless and shaky (its one of those fallacies, i think the bandwagon one). Just becuase in Biblical times people committed incest doesn't mean taht God approves of it. What it does mean is taht we don't know of any punishments they may have recieved, or will recieve, for their behavior.

Allow me a bit of devil's advocation here - how did Adam and Eve's children have children, if not by incest?

Why do we really find incest repulsive? It's not that you had no opinion on it until you read the Bible. You were raised with incest as a strict taboo. You find it repulsive because that is what you were taught from a young age. If a baby is raised believing incest is perfectly fine, they simply won't find it repulsive. I could never personally become aroused by a member of my family (well, maybe by a few of my cousins! ), because that taboo has been so ingrained in me. But there is no evidence that such a revulsion is natural or instinctive.

[otseng]

I made a statement of fact. I believe in the Bible and in God and in Jesus and I expect those here to judge me as a whore, although NO one has that right!

I do not believe anyone has called you a whore. If they have, please report that post and appropriate actions will be taken by the moderating team.

I posted a little of my lifestyle in the hopes of letting the general public understand that families like mine do exist.

Thank you for your boldness to admit to such a thing in a public forum. Certainly admitting to having an incestuous relationship is quite uncommon, esp here in the US. So, responses will be at the minimum... inquisitive.

I currently live in the Philippines with my dad, brother, my brother's wife and her parents, brothers and sisters and many cousins.

You've stated that you currently live in the Philippines. I am not familiar with the details of the Filipino culture. Is incest acceptable among certain Filipino ethnic groups? Or is it just your family that practice it?

Woah!

Adherent, please avoid posting one-line responses. We have recently modified the rules to prevent these.

9. No unconstructive one-liners posts are allowed in debates (Do not simply say "Ditto" or "I disagree" in a post. Such posts add little value to debates).

[tingnu]

You call it evil, I call it never cheating, never having to lie who I have been with or who's child I am having. Whatever you call it, we call it Family Love.
I am not endorsing it to everyone because many people can not handle it. I grew up in it and although I was never pressured or even around it, I am very happy having sex with the men in my family.

Lisa

I, too, had an incestuous relationship with my sister. No one forced any of us into it. It just sort of evolved. But it was beautiful and loving. We could experiment without fear of sexual disease and how we climaxed!

I believe the Bible forbade incest primarily so that families won't get too interested in each other and also socialize with others, thus propagating the race a bit faster.

[concerro]

I made a statement of fact. I believe in the Bible and in God and in Jesus and I expect those here to judge me as a whore, although NO one has that right!
So if any of you are without sin, go ahead and cast the first stone. I posted a little of my lifestyle in the hopes of letting the general public understand that families like mine do exist.
But while the Bible thumpers, and those that are perfect in every way, those who are without sin, are burning people like me at the stake, there can never be a true understanding.
Incest began the human race! It has continued down through the ages.

Lisa

People moral beleifs are dictated by how they were raised. I guess if I were raised in family that had sex together I would do the same thing. People always judge and I am sure you already know that. That is just how things are. I personally dont agree but I guess I can understand ur situation. My question is what is the point of mentioning the fact that you're filipina. I know many of your people and that is not a normal practice.

[Dilettante]

The taboo against incest seems to be one of the most widespread across cultures. I'm not sure that incest has any psychological benefits: I think that one benefits psychologically most when sexual relationships take place between equals, and incestuous relationships do not usually fit that description (except perhaps between cousins). Families have always been hyerarchical (at least until very recently), and fathers and daughters, mothers and sons, older brothers and younger sisters and viceversa were hardly on an equal footing. The medical disadvantages of incest are well known. By the way, I don't think that living less than 150 years can be ascribed to a genetic defect--rather, it would be a genetic anomaly if someone reached that age! But, just as I don't believe that the kings of Mesopotamia lived to be over 400 years old as tradition has it, I would be very cautious about taking the ages of Old Testament charachters too literally. Especially when there were literary reasons to exaggerate them.

The fact that the Bible is not consistent about incest does not trouble me, since I don't feel at all bound by OT commandments and I read the Bible as a great compilation of religious literature, inspired perhaps but not infallible.

Anecdotal evidence supporting incest as healthy does not, in my opinion count for much. The fact that incest is acceptable in some familes does not mean it should be acceptable to humanity in general. To me, the mere thought makes me claustrophobic! I am not morally judging anyone, but the immense benefits of mixing with people outside your family circle far outweigh anything which could be said in favor if incest!

[axeplayer]

Basically, if we consider that we are all from Adam & Eve, we'll all be incestrous bastards; you, me, your parents, everyone!

So, we're basically cornered by God into commiting incest. We have no choice, because every single soul on this damned planet is our brother/sister.

Also, I don't see how genetic defects have anything to do with this. We're talking about whether we should accept incest as a part of our lives, or not.

Oh, before I forget, there's also another person who screwed his two daughters in the desert. And this man was called a righteous one, Lot... Just another form of family values the Bible teaches us.

Genesis 19:33~36

You tell me, how bout your sister having sex with your father? Sounds good?

Ravemaster, the Bible never says that Cain and Seth married their sisters. Cain fled to the land of Nod or "Wandering" and married one of the women there. What other humans you ask? well in Genesis 6:1-4 it says this....
"1 And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them,
2 That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose.
3 And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years.
4 There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown."

There were women born of the "Sons of God" whom Cain and Seth more than likely married, seeing as how Cain moved away from his family after he killed Abel, and there's no account of either of them marrying their sisters.

[Prakk]

God eventually forbade the marriage of siblings and close relatives. He did not initially do so. Thus there is nothing inherent in incest that makes it wrong, with the possible exception of parent - child incest. We have no evaluation of Lot's adventure with his daughters. I tend to think it was wrong, but it did happen. It is certainly wrong now.

Hugh McBryde

[GR]

Hi , I'm new here... I saw Lot and his 2 daughters mentioned... the Bible says that his daughters made Lot drunk, and only then had sex with him on different nights, and only to get pregnant, because there were no other men anywhere around them. In other words, Lot was drunk and did not even know that he slept with his own daughters. How come nobody mentioned this fact??? Do you folks read the Bible carefully? Also, I think, I agree that one's attitude toward incest is either formed by somebody else in your youth, or it is formed on your own with somebody else you are playing with. And then later you either change your view about the (im)morality of incest, or you don't. However, God does not approve of incest. He considers it a big sin. In the past He permitted it, but no longer. In the past there was a need for it (procreation), but today you can choose your partner from a few hundred million people (and hopefully you will stick with your partner for good -- the Bible says something like this in the book of Ecclesiastes 9:9). I never practiced incest, but I guess I can understand how alluring and difficult to stop it may become. I suppose that it's not unlike someone's addiction to illegal drugs.

[keltzkroz]

It surprises me that nobody mentioned the fact that inbreeding = bad.

[mishmash]

B)Medical

- Children born within two very closely related individuals usually have a higher chance of some genetic defects, or the passing down of dangerous traits.

http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasci/m ... e00076.htm
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/quer ... ds=2077135

However, we can attach this back to the bible. If "god" knew that for humanity to increase in population there would be incest, and incest is bad for mental health and genetics, then "god" was condemming humanity to mental incapciation and sickness.

This seems to be a bit of a straw man (arguing against something nobody really believes). If you understand genetics, God is only "condemming humanity to mental incapciation and sickness" if genetic defects causing mental health problems and sickness happen to exist in the first two humans. Otherwise, there'd be no defects to worry about activating. Considering that they were created by divine intervention, Adam and Eve would likely not have had any defective genes that would cause such problems. These kinds of defects (i.e. albinoism or sickle cell anemia) are found in nature to be caused by mutations.

The argument that "God is cruel because we suffer", is a theological problem worth discussing, but completely off-topic, I would think. Also, there is no reason to presume conclusively that no other humans than the two mentioned by name were created spontaneously in the Genesis account(s), I've heard speculation that the two accounts are of seperate events.