What can we learn from these passages? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.
Frost starts off this section with looking at Ezekiel 16. He quotes 36-37:
36 This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Because you poured out your lust and exposed your naked body in your promiscuity with your lovers, and because of all your detestable idols, and because you gave them your children’s blood, 37 therefore I am going to gather all your lovers, with whom you found pleasure, those you loved as well as those you hated. I will gather them against you from all around and will strip you in front of them, and they will see you stark naked.
He argues at this point that nudity is not morally sinful to which I am still left saying “Who is making this argument that nudity in itself is morally sinful?” Does not Frost know that people against the naturist position have to take showers and if married, like to have sex? This is still the straw man.
He does say that public nudity was humbling and so constituted a fitting punishment. He says it was common in contexts such as manual labor and public bathing. Unfortunately, he has not shown us that public nudity was done in any of those locations. He has just asserted it. His emphasis is just it wasn’t sinful. Frost could have learned something about shame, but it seems he’s more interested in a justification for his position than seeing what the actual position of Scripture is.
What about John? In this story, Jesus goes out fishing with the others and Jesus calls to them from the shore and they have a miraculous catch. The beloved disciple says that it is the Lord and Peter puts on his outer garment and swims to the shore to see Jesus. Frost says the word outer isn’t in the Greek, and fair enough, it isn’t, but either everyone else is involved in some conspiracy here to cover up, or perhaps there is some nuance that is not being understood.
Yet notice this, Peter still puts on his garment and even SWIMS in his garment to the shore. One would think if nudity was so common and acceptable, Peter would not have had any need to put it back on. This would be especially so to go swimming in a garment and wind up on the shore in a wet garment.
So let’s suppose Peter was nude while he was fishing. To this, so what? What does this prove? Peter is out with his friends and there’s no one else around. Also, there’s no word of what anyone else was doing or wearing. As has been my contention, there could have been settings where nudity even in public to an extent could have been acceptable and this could be like men and women being in their respective gym shower rooms together.
Next time, we will look at two more passages from the Old Testament and see what Frost has to say about them.
In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)
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