Introduction
Combatting hyperallergic Christianity’s leery stance on biblical obscenity, Albanese broaches the conversation delineating “issues” such as “bodily excretion [Lev 15], physical maladies [Lev 21; Deut 23], and sexual misconduct [Lev 18–20]…human anatomy, humor, marital intimacy, and idolatrous worship.” Responding to his post, I would like to glorify and add to his offensives by addressing the etiology of unbiblical, societal obscenity by primarily investigating fatherlessness, then idolatry.[1]
Albanese asks whether Christians should imitate or image the “entire speech-world of the Bible.” Immediately a careful reader notices much sexually explicit material populates the Prophets,[2] which transpired during the kingly and imperial eras—the “romantic” age of Ruth, Song of Songs, and Esther. As wizened “friends” in the divine council (i.e., 24 archangel-elders[3]), these white-haired interlocutors (in the true sense, translators) “get the joke.” As the saints harvested in Revelation 14–16 ascend in priestly white linens, having obtained Christ-bought access to the Holy of Holies (Lev 16), they, created in the image of the Playful Laughter of the God-Word, are translated in comic maturity. After four millennia of stringent paedagogy under old-world elements (Gal 3:24–26; 4:3, 9; Col 2:8, 20; Heb 5:12; 2 Pet 3:10, 12), the saints, who accede their archangelic predecessors, can now imitate the “entire speech-world of the Bible” and laugh alongside the Divine. With this Albanese concurs, proposing a tota biblia hermeneutic.
There are some significant Hebrew etymologies Albanese didn’t discuss. For example, compare “profane” (from חָלַל = chalal) to “make light of” (from קָלַל = qalal). The former is literally “he pierced,” usually translated “common,” but the latter translates as “he lightened,” in the sense of de-glorification. Hence, by degrading or devaluing something or someone glorious (heavy) (כָבֵד = kavēd), such as parents (Ex 21:17; Deut 27:16), civil and ecclesiastical authorities (Ex 22:28), and even the ancient glories (δόξας = doxas) of the Tabernacle, Mosaic rites and cultus, Torah and so on (2 Pet 2:10b-11)—recalcitrant sons, for example, hang them up for ridicule while also pressing them down into the profane dust.[4]
Other improprieties include “he besmalled [or ‘belittled’]” (קָטַן = qaṭan) in contrast to the heavy/extra Glory-Cloud upon the Covering-Lid (Lev 16).[5] The profane/common, however, has been sanctified (i.e., upgraded into the Holiness [הַקֹּדֶשׁ = haqqōdesh], the Levitical title for the Holy of Holies[6]) by God the Son’s blood, which libates and cleanses from the curse-prosecuting dust (cf. Acts 10-11; 15; 20:28). In other words, cursing[7]—not including imprecatory Psalms (e.g., Ps 109),[8] which are liturgical warfare commanded by the Holy Spirit (Eph 5:19; Col 3:16)—can be properly contextualized in the holy environment (i.e. the Holiness), and thereby all other formerly-common climes have likewise been upgraded/sanctified into clean, as well as holy, status. Context, in short, requires fit-ness, which shall be defined below.
Fatherhood
Case in point:
“Knock, knock.”
“Who’s there?”
“Amos.”
“Amos who?”
“Amos-quito just bit me!”[9]
A light-hearted joke, this silly banter elicits giggles from my 2-year-old. But it likely wouldn’t elicit ab-crunching laughter if told by a stand-up comedian. The joke would be misplaced and mal-timed, for the comedian has misjudged his audience. Likewise with unfit obscenity.
In Deep Exegesis, Leithart explores the episode of a 38-year-old blind waif in John 9.[10] The Light of the World “tabernacled among us” and the bright-peacocked (an unclean fowl) Jewish clerics “didn’t apprehend him” (Jn 1:5, 14). Jesus the Jocose continually subverts the erudite “enlightened-ones” with wonderful eye-rony. Because they cannot see the biblical-theological thesis culminating in the Incarnate God-Word, these philistines are stupefied and don’t “get the joke,” though they claim heritage from Isaac. Injudicious Lampstands, Jesus “knocks their lights out,”[11] and heaven, congealing with jollity, laughs/plays (Ps 2:4).[12] The immediate parley situates fatherhood amidst the parties. While πατήρ (“father” = patēr) isn’t explicitly employed in Jn 9—rendering the chapter fatherless—the blind waif’s “parents” appear and effectively orphan him (9:2–3, 18, 20, 22–23 [6x]). In the surrounding context (Jn 8–10), the Jews previously accused Jesus of bastarditude, rhetorically asking, “Where is your father?” (8:19), later inveighing, “We out of πορνείας [pornēyas =fornication] haven’t been born” (8:41), predicating their credibility on their Abrahamic genes (8:39). They, Jesus retorts, are conceived by their father, the traducing Devil (8:44).
Their inability to “apprehend” the punchline and subsequent fratricide in the crucifixion, in other words, stems from Satanic discipleship.
Throughout Proverbs, Solomon often depicts obscenity-indulgent fools (characterized as פְּתִי [pethī] = “open/gullible,” often translated “simple”) with juxtapositions. For example:
- Fine speech is not becoming to a [flaccid-fool[13]];
still less is false speech to a prince. (Prov 17:7 ESV [+ personal translation])[14] - It is not fitting for a [sluggish-fatty[15]] to live in luxury,
much less for a slave to rule[16] over princes. (19:10 ESV [+ personal translation]) - Like a lame man’s legs, which hang useless,
is a [parable] in the mouth of [sluggish-fatties]…
Like a thorn that goes up into the hand of a drunkard
is a [parable] in the mouth of [sluggish-fatties]. (26:7, 9 ESV [with YLT + personal translation]) - Like a madman who throws firebrands, arrows, and death
is the man who deceives his neighbor
and says, “I am only joking!”[17] (26:18–19 ESV) - This is the way of an adulteress:
she eats and wipes her mouth
and says, “I have [not done trouble].” (30:20 ESV [+ personal translation]). - A slave when he [reigns], and a [flaccid][18] fool when he is [satisfied] with [bread]; an unloved [hated] woman when she [weds][19], and a maidservant when she [dispossesses] her dame.[20] (30:22–23 ESV [with YLT + personal translation]).
Agur then descants about gentile beasts that paradoxically resist the norms of human leadership—e.g., resilient, provisional ants; prudent rabbits; kingless hosts of locusts; and a vulnerable lizard invading king’s palaces (30:25–28). The very list itself impels the reader to consider the dietary codes too (Lev 11), since unclean (i.e., gentile) beasts can exhibit fatherly discipleship principles by nurturing the covenant community (cf. Is 49:23). Fathers, therefore, acclimate children—sons, specifically—into fit-ness. And what is fit-ness? The skillful-wisdom (חָכְמָה = chōkmah) to dextrously be fruitful (not flaccid), multiply, and subdue the earth physically and linguistically (Gen 1:28).[21]
Exhorting the Christian diaspora to tame the infernal tongue (contra Pentecostal language [Acts 2]), the Apostle James (literally “Jacob”) posits fig trees (good; sweet) don’t generate olives (good; bitter), nor does a fresh (semi-sweet; fecund) spring burble seawater (good; bitter, yet sterile) (Ja 3:10–12).[22] Fresh springs (fecund speech) skillfully-befit fig trees, irrigating olive trees too, exhibiting wise maturity. “Immature” seawater (sterile speech) best buoys ships and is most hospitable for aquatic life (Ja 3:3–4, 7). Yet Elijah the Potty-Mouth, a wizened elder-friend and father (2 Ki 2:12; 13:14), exemplifies sardonic maturity when besmalling and profaning Baal (1 Ki 18).[23]
But why do the wizened prophets, “[men] of the Spirit” (Hos 9:7), employ obscenities (bitter; sterile), including the vulgar and beyond? And why do priestly and prophetic literature, in the form of Levitical “codes of conduct” and priestly inspection handbooks for diagnostic purposes (e.g., leprosy, Lev 13–15), pronounce the graphic? The answer is twofold.
Why do “men of the Spirit” employ obscenities? Answer #1
First, God the Father, in Leviticus, likely depicts and demonstrates the pervasive nature and effects of the Fall to his son (Israel) so that he might cleanse all of him. Nothing transcends or evades his care and concern. Notice, for instance, the sexually (anatomically) explicit vocabulary occurs in the context of the Sanctuary, under the Shekinah-wing of Israel’s discipling Father. During the Feast of Clouds/Booths, the entire biblical corpus, with whole families present, was read aloud (Deut 31:10–13), even the yucky and blushy parts.
Solomon ironically characterizes obscene flaccid-fools as “interlocutor(s)” (לֵץ = lētz, also translated “translator” [Gen 42:23]),[24] who babble and prate. Because flaccid-interlocutors haven’t inherited fatherly tact (i.e., skillful-wisdom [חָכְמָה = chōkmah]) nor translated or read the room, they’ve never prevailed over (literally “princed”) their older, archangelic brother (Gen 32).[25] Revolution and anarchy, the orphaned sons of the misplaced and mal-timed, ensue. Rosenstock-Huessy observes,
“Decadence” or “tyranny” is a failure of the older generation, the past, to initiate and inspire the young, the future…The decadence of an older generation condemns the younger generation to barbarism…Wars occur when speech ceases between one group and another; peace is established when ‘people who have not been on speaking terms, begin speaking again.[26]
Rejection of the Matchmaking Spirit of Wisdom[27] devolves into improper, anarchic obscenities such as phallic jokes. Case in point: King Rehoboam’s juvenile retinue advise he retort to Jeroboam I,
“‘My small-peter [קָטָנִּי = qaṭannī][28]
of thicker-foliage
than (the) waist of
my father’” (1 Ki 12:10 personal translation).[29]
Conversely, a fluent yet tactful vilifier (Ac 23:1–5; cf. Matt 23:27), Paul, the polyglot Apostle, well-versed in Hebrew, likely detected the etymological play-on-words (paranomasia) between the distinguished Pharisees (פְּרוּשִׁים = perūshīm) and “intestinal-particle” (פֶּרֶשׁ = peresh), both of which were deposited outside the Camp (i.e., Church) in a clean dumping ground for fatty-ashes.[30] When Paul dictated σκύβαλα (skübala) to Timothy, he likely had the Fecal Pharisees (Φαρισαῖοι = Pharīs-eye-oi) in mind (Phil 3:5, 8). Despite their pedigree, when compared to Jesus—the Scapegoat expelled outside the camp (Heb 13:11-12)—they scored lower than the ejected “intestinal-particle,” flesh on the head, and shins of the holiest Purification for priesthood and civil rulers (Heb 13:10-13). The Fecal Pharisees, therefore, had been relegated to the incestuous seed of Lot, nocturnal emissions, and the “outhouse” wherein Nazirite knights buried their excrement with a shovel outside the holy war camp (Deut 23).[31]
Concerning euphemism, Albanese alleges in his post that “the Hebrew contains the euphemistic expression that ‘Naboth blessed God and king’ in order to soften an otherwise blasphemous expression,” but this suggestion of censorship seems tenuous. Sure, King Job’s wife tempted him to “bless God and die” (Job 2:9), but this invites discretion for the reader,[32] not necessarily importing a Jewish superstition akin to replacing the Divine Name (“Yahweh” = יהוה) from the canon with the vulgar (i.e., colloquial) “Adonai” (“My Lord/Master” = אֲדֹנָי)—a lacuna Nehemiah condemned (Neh 13:24).[33] God, moreover, explicitly prohibits Israel from “making-light-of” (קָלַל = qalal) God (Lev 24:15) and human elohim (Exod 22:28) without citing the Third Word as the rationale (Ex 20:7; Deut 5:11). Albanese also notes the Masoretes proposed less offensive verbiage in the marginalia to dampen obscene candor with Qere (“public reading”) alternatives. Yet the Masoretes retained the original Ketiv (“what is written”) and did not erase the inspired text, including the visceral descriptors, altogether.[34]
The Joseph narrative, Albanese notes, substantiates a better caliber of euphemism for discipling children in the mode of dietary symbolism. Judah sates his jealous fervor with bread after plunging his brother, Prince Joseph, in a barren womb-well (Gen 37:25); Mrs. Potiphar is explicitly identified as off-limits “bread” (39:6);[35] a treasonous baker dreams that unclean fowl peck his brains out like a bread basket (40:16–19); Pharaoh promotes Joseph (a Shemite) to Prime Minister of Bread and Wine over the Egyptian (a Hamite) empire; then Joseph the Hebrew Magician weds Asenath, his priestly “bread” (41:38–57); a famine scorches the Middle East after Simeon and Levi break their oath and hough (Gen 49:6) Hivite Salem—Melchizedek’s city of bread and wine—thereby contracting leprous mold on Jacob’s bread (34:30), and Rachel dies near Bethlehem (“House of Bread,” 35:18–20).
Continuing, Albanese juxtaposes Leviticus 15 (the notorious cleansing rites for seminal emissions) and Ezekiel 23 (a very Levitical, pornographic depiction of bestiality).[36] While “exposed-flesh” (בָשָׂר = basar) often connotes leprous-mortality (σάρξ = sarx) generally, especially in Pauline literature, it entails “exudations”[37] and eruptions through sundry firmament-barriers (e.g. skin/hide, fabrics and clothing articles, chairs), and Leviticus 15:2–3 introduces a series of genital-centric “drivel” (רָר = rar) against spiritual rinsings (i.e., baptisms). Yet the disseminator is instructed to “rinse in/with the waters [presumably from the bronze basin/laver] all his exposed-flesh,” including the non-genital parts of his body (15:6). This must not, however, detract from Albanese’s observation that equine “exposed-flesh” in Ezekiel 23 bears potent weight. The force of Ezekiel’s language propels both a nakedness-centric (Gen 2:25–3:21; Lev 18–21) and leprous-mortality thread, which leads to the final rationale for biblical obscenity.
Idolatry
Why do “men of the Spirit” employ obscenities? Answer #2
Leithart, in his Theopolis article “Toward a Biblical View of Obscenity,” notes surly Elijah and the Prophets employ sexually explicit or scatological speech when vehemently condemning idolatry.[38] He writes,
It is significant that the graphic sexual imagery used by Ezekiel is never used in Scripture to describe loving, marital sex. Rather, it is the language of prophetic denunciation. The effect of the language is to heighten the horror and shame of Israel’s idolatry. The language is graphic, but not pornographic;[39] it is not intended to produce lust, but shame and repentance. Ezekiel’s point is: this is how your idolatry appears in the eyes of God; this is how ugly you are in your sinfulness.
By comparing the lyrical poetic language of the Song of Solomon with the violent and nauseating sexual imagery of Ezekiel 16 and 23, we can approach a biblical understanding of the appropriate medium for expressing human sexuality, and the beginnings of a definition of obscenity.[40] Poetry, and with it poetic, lyrical, allusive music and visual imagery is the appropriate medium to express true and Godly sexual love. Graphic sexual imagery, if it is used at all, should be used to produce shame and horror; it should be used as a metaphor for covenant adultery.
On the other hand, composed by skillfully-wise lyricists, the romantic Writings (Psalms, Proverbs, Ruth, Song of Songs, Ecclesiastes, Esther) effuse a loving symbolism intended to convey married sex within the context of the Holiness.
Resolution and Conclusion
Wizened prophets, “[men] of the Spirit” (Hos 9:7), employ obscenities, including the vulgar and beyond; priestly and prophetic literature, in the form of Levitical “codes of conduct” or priestly inspection handbooks for diagnostic purposes (e.g. leprosy [Lev 13–15]), pronounce the graphic for: 1) the fatherly edification of baptized disciples (i.e., children), and 2) forensic prosecution of idolatry/adultery.
Who then may dispel boyish “issues” with the serrated Sword of the Spirit? Well, Paul enjoins all Christians to arm themselves with the flaming-Tongue, a priestly weapon (Eph 6:17). But which priest-knights are most trained by Grace[41] and the Word (Heb 5:14; 12:5, 7–8, 11; 1 Tim 4:6–7; 2 Tim 3:16; Ti 2:11–12)? Timekeeping, judicious elders. Anachronism, eisegesis, and obscenity are concomitant; mal-timed, misread, and mis-fit jokes incur naked embarrassment and judgment. However, wizened “friends” in the divine council—white-haired interlocutors (in the true sense, translators) who “get the joke”—who have blossomed like Aaron’s almond-stand into mature dotage, accede their heavenly predecessors as the most seasoned, literate, and robed/glorious fathers.[42]
And how might the saints repel the propensity to prematurely seize the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Bad and erect idols? The Apostle Paul answers: thanksgiving (Rom 1). And enfleshed Thanksgiving is Christ the Peace Offering (Eucharist) of vows and oaths. In other words, when our Father fills our mouths with the sweet, fecund Bread and Wine of Christ, we will better laugh alongside the Divine.
Jeremy Bennett teaches Bible and Languages at Geneva Academy in West Monroe, LA.
[1] Holy mixtures also play a significant role, but that exceeds the scope of this contribution.
[2] Elijah the taunting Potty-Mouth (1 Ki 18).
[3] See James B. Jordan’s exegesis in his lecture series on Revelation; see too Revelation 4–5; 7:11, 13; 11:16; 14:3; 19:4.
[4] Ralph Allan Smith, Hear, My Son: An Examination of the Fatherhood of Yahweh in Deuteronomy (Athanasius Press, 2011).
[5] כַפֹּרֶת (= kappōreth) commonly mistranslated, “mercy seat.” Also, by belittling others, especially their fathers, sons dethrone, divest, depose.
[6] דְבִיר (devīr = “The One/Thing Being Worded”); see 1 Ki 6:5, 16, 19–23, 31; 7:49; 8:6, 8; 2 Chr. 3:16; 4:20; 5:7, 9; Ps 28:2.
[7] Everett Fox translates אָרוּר (arūr) “Damned!” (Gen 49:7); see The Five Books of Moses: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, The Schocken Bible (Schocken Books, 1997), 1.230.
[8] Trevor Laurence. Arise, O Lord: A Christian Guide to Cursing with God, Theopolis Explorations: Liturgy 3 (Theopolis Books, 2025); Trevor Laurence, Cursing with God: The Imprecatory Psalms and the Ethics of Christian Prayer (Baylor University Press, 2022).
[9] Roy McKie. The Riddle Book (Random House, 1978).
[10] Peter J. Leithart. Deep Exegesis: The Mystery of Reading Scripture (Baylor University Press, 2009).
[11] Jordan employs similar terms in his Revelation lecture series.
[12] God the Father laughs (שׂחק = sachaq) at his interlocutors (“scoffers”). Conversely, in Prov 8:30–31, Lady Wisdom playfully procreates (צחק = ṣachaq).
[13] Also identified with corpses or carcasses (נְבֵלָה = nevēlah); see Lev 5:2; 7:24; 11:11, 24–25, 27–28, 35–40; 17:15; 22:8.
[14] Honorable mention: “Apples of gold in imagery of silver, [Is] the word spoken at its fit times” (Prov 25:11 YLT).
[15] Generally translated “fool,” כְסִיל (kesīl) stems from כֶסֶל (kesel) = “sluggish-perirenal-fat” of the royally fatty Peace Offering (Lev 3:4, 10, 15), priestly Purification Offering (4:9), and priestly Trespass (7:4). This term in Proverbs characterizes the sluggish-fatties’ ironic anti-glory, not denigrating their corpulence per se, though the Bible has fun with Eglon the Rotund-Calf (Judg 3) who instantiates apostate Israel’s heart disposition. Douglas Wilson, from a different angle, translates this “fat-head.”
[16] Infinitive verb for “parable” (literally “to juxtapose”), from מָשָׁל (mashal). See Jeffrey J. Meyers, Ancient Wisdom for Today’s Christian Dissidents: The Epistle of James Through New Eyes (Athanasius Press, 2022).
[17] Even in English we qualify our impudence with “I was just kidding!”, thereby exposing our puerile nature.
[18] With double entendre, נָבָל (naval) can translate both “fool” or “flaccid”; see Ps 37:2.
[19] Niphal verb form of בַּעַל (ba’al = “wedded-lord/husband”).
[20] The Hebrew reader expects בַּעֲלָה (ba’alah = “wedded-lady/mistress”), but Agur instead opts for a synonym, thereby displacing the anticipated word itself.
[21] Bill Smith, How It All Fits Together (Athanasius Press, 2023).
[22] All these qualities emit benefits in appropriate contexts.
[23] Interestingly, the “lords of hair” (Elijah the Potty-Mouth and Elisha the Bald) are the only OT saints to resuscitate (resurrect) bona fide corpses—particularly the corpses of sons; see James Jordan’s lecture on corporate resurrection in Revelation 20:4–6. Extraordinary trash-talkers exemplified extraordinary resurrective faith.
[24] Prov 9:7–8; 13:1; 14:6; 15:12; 19:25, 29; 20:1; 21:11, 24; 22:10; 24:9; cf. 1:22; 29:8 (לָצוֹן).
[25] Israel = “He (shall) prince(s) God” (יִשְׂרָאֵל).
[26] Quoted in Peter J. Leithart, I Respond, Though I Shall Be Changed (Theopolis Books, 2023), 62.
[27] James B. Jordan. From Bread to Wine: Creation, Worship, and Christian Maturity (Athanasius Press, 2019), 106. On Wisdom see Solomonic romance literature generally.
[28] Though “peter” (from πέτρος = petros) = “rock/cliff/crag/hollow-receptacle,” I’m untraditionally employing the alternative use of “petering out…” (i.e., becoming smaller/reduced).
[29] The above quotation can be arranged chiastically and parallelly. King Rehoboam’s contra-Solomonic proverb reads as ostensibly learnéd with alliteration—“thick-foliage” // “my father” (עָבָה, אָבִי)—and structural entendre—“my small-peter” // “waist” (קָטָנִּי, מִמָּתְנֵי)—but his rhetoric discloses pseudo-wit.
[30] See purification and blood inside Holy Place and/or Holy of Holies (Lev 4:11; ; 16:27).
[31] Deuteronomy 23 connects seminal “outgoings” with bastards, nocturnal emissions, and buried excrement. All of which are expelled outside the holy war camp and covenant community generally unless kinsmanly-redeemed.
[32] Toby J. Sumpter, A Son for Glory: Job Through New Eyes (Athanasius Press, 2012).
[33] Emmanuel Tov writes, “[T]he perpetual Qere of YHWH as ‘adonay…is a correction, as are the replacements of possibly offensive words with euphemistic expressions.” Footnote 79, at the bottom of the page, quoting an early rabbinic source, reads, “‘[W]herever an indelicate expression is written in the Torah, we substitute a more polite one in reading.’” Emmanuel Tov, Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible, 3rd ed. (Fortress Press, 2012), 57. This, however, warrants a definition of “indelicate” and “offensive.” Offensive or indelicate to whom? This, therefore, devolves into translation prerogative contingent upon vacillating cultures. Now, concerning the lacuna above in Neh 13:24, the unfortunate loss of the Hebrew language during the exile stems from mismatched marriages with pagans, thereby inferring a compromised discipleship enterprise among fathers and sons. Superseding the Hebraic father-tongue, Jewish children, therefore, forgot how to pronounce the Divine Name. Later rabbinic thought conflated this lacuna with magical superstition, which paralleled a previous judgment in the Northern Kingdom of Israel (Ephraim): “Baal” (“Wedded-Lord/Husband”) in Hosea 2:16 would no longer be a liturgical substitute for “Yahweh.”
[34] Censoring obscenities in MT (Masoretic Text) perpetrated by same rabbins and scribes censoring the vocalization and abridgement of YHWH (****).
[35] The conventional translation for “anything” (מְאוּמָה) woodenly = ‘blemish/stain/mark’ (see מְאוּם, מוּם) yet the sense of the passage retains the original, inspired impulse despite the technicality. Mrs. Potiphar was indeed moldy, leprous bread. Joseph recognized he must resist partaking of the gentillic/uncircumcised Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Bad until ripe (Lev 19), awaiting Asenath, daughter of Egyptian priest Poti-Pherah (Gen 41:45, 50; 46:20).
[36] Reflecting on Israel fording the Reed-Sea, Asaph composed, “Torrented [זֹרְמוּ = zōrmū] did waters of thick-canopies, triterated-cirri gave thunderous-voice/noise…The noise/voice/sound of Thy rumbling-thunder [is] in the [cherub-chariot] wheels” (Ps 77:17a–b, 18a YLT + personal translation; cf. 90:5). The psalmist, therefore, poses Egyptian chariots against Yahweh’s Glory-Chariot vanguarding Moses (ark; see Ex 2:3, 5) and Israel. Thus, Ezekiel pornographically depicts the phallic “torrent” of “Quean” Israel’s paramours in contradistinction with Husband Yahweh’s Glory-Chariot irrigating his Bride-Land with his Spirit-Rain. Moreover, Albanese, in footnote 15 of his post, catalogs eight terms employed for “penis,” some of which likely allude to genitalia (e.g., hand, spiller, lying-down of seed, peter) while several he inadvertently mistranslated, and their phallic connection remains tenuous: יַד = “hand” (e.g., Song 5:4); רֹאשׁ = “head,” likely referring to a “prince” (Judg 5:30); מַקֵּל = “rod” for rhabdomancy (Hos 4:12); Ketiv פחד = “terror/dread,” and is only related to “penis” in the Vulgate (“testiculorum”) and KJV (“stones”); שִׁכְבַת־זָרַע/זֶרַע = “lying-down of seed” (Lev 15:16–18, 32; 19:20; 22:4; Num 5:13); שָׁפְכָה = “spiller,” which is a more acute term for the membrum virile; קֹטֶן = “small/little-peter” (1 Ki 12:10); and waters (i.e., urine) proceeding from בִּרְכַּיִם = “both knees” due to intense, tremulous fear. Also, in footnote 16 he explicitly quotes the protrusive phalli of Egyptian swains in Ezek 16:26, which further affirms his thesis advocating for mature Christians to imitate/image the “entire speech-world of the Bible.” One could catalog more—e.g., Uriah the Hittite washing his feet with Bathsheba (2 Sam 11:8) or Vicegerent Belshazzar evacuating his bladder and bowels upon seeing the visage of the hand inscribing his doom in the shadow of the lampstand (Dan 5:1, 5–6).
[37] Samson Raphael Hirsch. The Pentateuch: Translated and Explained, trans. Isaac Levy, 2nd ed. (Judaica Press, 1982), 3.1.398–400, 412.
[38] Asherah the seductress (if memory serves correctly), in Assyriological myths, for example, employs pornographic speech to allure suitors.
[39] Leithart defines “pornographic” as titillating/prurient and “graphic” as sexually explicit but not titillating/prurient. Much of it depends upon perspective, however. Therefore I would amend his glosses, for Ezekiel indicts Israel with an indubitably pornographic depiction of their idolatry without, as Leithart clarifies, intending to arouse fantasy. Graphic, meanwhile, can encompass a wider genre of violence (e.g., blood and guts).
[40] It would be interesting to compare the rare, exotic calques (e.g., Persian) in King Solomon’s waṣf for his Egyptian wife (Song) against the rare, ugly obscenities in other parts of Scripture.
[41] Throughout Pauline literature, “Grace,” “Peace,” and “Love,” for example, are all metonyms for the Holy Spirit.
[42] Cross-referencing Leviticus 27, Numbers 1-10, and 1 Timothy 5 yields a safe, estimated age of 50ish–60+ years old for a wizened-friend and white-haired interlocutor who can properly fit and contextualize words, both benign and obscene, within their appropriate climes. For example, Douglas Wilson, in other words, fits the bill for fatherly saints laughing alongside the Divine. Since he “gets the joke,” he will deploy obscenities better than unfathered and undisciplined waifs or immature Christian children (anyone under 50) awaiting their time to grow up and learn how to deploy said vocabulary.