| 1 | In classical Greek, compounds like ἀρσενοκοίτης or ἀρσενοκοιτία are rare and largely descriptive — literally “male-bedder” or “male-bedding” — without a fully codified moral or legal connotation. The sense is primarily literal or poetic, sometimes morally disapproving in a general way, but not a fixed category.
The leap from κοίτη = “bed” to ἀρσενοκοίτης = “homosexual” is not straightforward in classical Greek; it is very much a later moralized interpretation rather than a direct semantic development:
1. κοίτη in classical Greek
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Literally: bed, bedstead, marriage-bed (Aeschylus, Euripides, Homeric texts).
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Extended meanings: sick-bed, lair of animals, riverbed, quarters of a house, etc.
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Figuratively: bed-time, lodging, parcel of land, container, even sexual connection (mostly in LXX / late texts).
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In classical literature, κοίτη does not inherently encode sexual morality or orientation; it is context-dependent.
2. ἀρσενοκοίτης / ἀρσενοκοιτία
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Formed from ἄρσην + κοίτη, literally “male-bedder” / “male-bedding.”
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In classical Greek, it appears only in epigrams or rare literary traces, without a clear moralized sense.
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Early Christian interpretation gave it a fixed sexual sense. The modern interpretation of 'homosexual' gave it the sense of the emerging identity of the 20th century. Are the lines and usage of this word changing and shape-shifting as we go?
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The Latin Vulgate translators (Jerome) used the term masculorum concubitores which gave it a strictly sexual sense (e.g. “those who lie with men.”). The 1611 KJV used the term “Sodomites” explicitly linking ἀρσενοκοῖται to the story of Sodom — a further interpretive (judgment laden) step beyond Jerome. Today, modern English translations neutralized the moralized terminology and rendered it as “homosexual” or “homosexuals” or "practicing homosexuality", reflecting contemporary language rather than the KJV-era moral framing. From a philological perspective "practicing homosexuality" is vague and presents quite the leap from the term "male-bedder."
So the progression is essentially:
ἀρσενοκοῖται male-bedders → masculorum concubitores (Vulgate) → sodomiceites / abusers of themselves with mankind (KJV) → homosexual / men who practice homosexuality (NASB, ESV, NIV).
Who is bedding Who?
The Greek term ἀρσενοκοῖται literally denotes “male-bedders” (from ἀρσεν- “male” + κοῖτος “bed/sexual act”), referring descriptively to a sexual act rather than an identity category. Its renderings shift dramatically over time according to the cultural and theological assumptions of translators: Jerome’s Vulgate renders it masculorum concubitores, still fairly literal but moralized; the King James Version (1611) expands this to “sodomites / abusers of themselves with mankind,” explicitly ethical and linked to Sodom; modern English translations (NASB, ESV, NIV) render it “homosexuals” or “men who practice homosexuality,” framing it as a behavioral or identity category foreign to the original text. Each stage reshapes the term to fit its conceptual world—act → sin → identity—so that there is no semantic continuity, only a chain of interpretive overlays. Reading modern categories back into the Greek is therefore anachronistic. |