Sodom and Sodomia V

Genesis 19:5 says sungenåmetha autoîs to say hello to them. The root in sun-g-e-nå-metha is gnå- to know. Words from this root occur many times in the OT and NT. 934 to be precise.

Of these, the aorist imperfect knew may be a euphemism for "heterosexual" copulation. This occurs 8 times in the OT (several times in Genesis 4, such as “And the man knew his wife Eve…”) and once in the NT (Matt 1:25 “And he knew her not before she had given birth to a Son…”).

Which makes possibly 9 times out of 934 – the context permitting.

But sungenåmetha is a different word: to say hello…

Outside of the Noble Art Of Exegetics, words and forms aren’t interchangeable with each other...

Now to the Text:
Transcription of Genesis 19:5 according to the LXX after the Codex vaticanus (c:a AD 300) ed. Brenton (1854):
kaì exekaloûnto tòn Låt, kaì élegon pròs aitòn,
poû eisin oi ándres oi ei­selthóntes pròs sè tän núkta;
exágage autoùs pròs ämâs ína syngenåmetha autoîs.

Translation:
And they called out Loot and said to him:
Where are the men who came to you this night?
Bring them out to us that we may know them!

The Parisian Versio vulgata (around 1200) renders as usually correctly,
after the reliable 2nd Century ff. North African Vetus Latina:
vocaveruntque Loth et dixerunt ei:
ubi sunt viri qui introierunt ad te nocte,
educ illos huc ut cognosca­mus eos.

The Swedish State 1917 also translates correctly:
Dessa kallade på Lot och sade till honom:
Var äro de män som hava kommit till dig i natt?
För dem ut till oss så att vi få känna dem.

But, in 1955 Derek Sherwin Bailey published Homosexuality and the Western Christian Tradition, in which he showed that the Sodom story wasn’t sexual but addressed the regularly recurring OT commandment to Hospitality, to receive the Levite, the Poor and the Stranger – a question of survival in a Clannish pre Modern Society.

The result was that some 45 references to Sodom in both Testaments, including Jesus's own, were changed back to from sex to material in translations after 1955.

post 1955 things begin to happen with Genesis 19. Dr Calvinus’s claim “to know in the Biblical sense” had gotten too sound a thrashing that the current “translations” were changed in order to defend the traditional homo-sexualization which the academics now knew was wrong.

Le Bible de Jérusalem, the French Dominicans' translation after Codex sinaïticus; La Sainte Bible, traduite en français sous la direction de l’École Biblique de Jérusalem, was actually the first in 1961:
Ils appelèrent Lot et lui dirent:
Où sont les hommes qui sont venus chez toi cette nuit?
Amène-les nous pour que nous en abusions.

This has followers in different languages, such as the 1966 English Jerusalem Bible:
Calling to Lot they said,
”Where are the men who came to you tonight?
Send them out to us so that we may abuse them.”

The Roman New American Bible, though officially after the official Roman Bible, the Versio vulgata, Catholic Publishers Incorporated, New York & Nashville, Tennessee, (1966) 1969 follows the Jerusalem Bible closely:
They called to Lot and said to him,
”Where are the men who came to your house tonight?
Bring them out to us that we may have intima­cies with them.”

The New English Bible 1961/1970 is a paraphrasing collaboration between Oxford and Cambridge, which strong and justified criticisms have had a great influence on later “translations”, not least the last Swedish State NT 1981 and Bibel 2000. One might have thought that Oxford and Cambridge in collaboration should have come up with something useful, but the opposite is true: the more cooks, the worse the soup:
They called to Lot and asked him where the men were who had entered his house that night.
”Bring them out” they shouted,
”so that we can have intercourse with them.”

Good News Bible; Today’s English Version 1976, a ”common Language” paraphrase; in an impoverished language, not unlike that of NT 1981 – which occasionally translates TEV versions, not the Text – and meant for sectas, USA Free church proselyting in Latin America. Interestingly enough the TEV adds the Renaissance Academic interpretation after the Text as a gloss:
They called out to Lot and asked,
”Where are the men who came to stay with you tonight?
Bring them out to us ína syngenåmetha autoîs.“
The men of Sodom wanted to have sex with them.

Bibel 2000 dramatises:
De ropade till Lot kaì élegon pròs aitòn:
Var är männen som kom till dig i kväll?
Skicka ut dem till oss, vi skall ligga med dem.

The invention of the last Swedish State Bible Commission: vi skall ligga med dem; we shall lay with them – which ultimately derives from Filo’s failed essay in Symmetrical Concepts – also was brought into Judges 19:22, Romans 1:27, 1 Cor 6:9, alias 1 Tim 1:10 and alias Judas’ Letter verse 7...

A lie which is not repeated will not be believed...

This means that the NT 1981 versions in 1 Cor 6:9-11 and alias 1 Tim 1:10 were changed in Bibel 2000! There are in fact a few such very interesting changes – but such are officially denied…

A couple of decades later, in the 1976 Today’s English Version (Good News Bible) Judges 19:22 and the Letter of alias Jude, verse 7 joined in. And in 1981 the new Swedish State homosexualized also 1 Thess 4:6 (which in the latest Danish Bible still addresses Honesty in Commerce between Christians… ; = )

ante Bailey – and still correct – is the 1947 Revised Standard Version of the New York Bible societies:
and they called to Lot,
”Where are the men who came to you tonight?
Bring them out to us, that we may know them.”

As is the ancient Spanish Santa Biblia, versión Reina 1569/Valera 1602, revisada 1960:
Y llamaron a Lot, y le dijeron:
?Donde están los varones que vinieron a ti esta noche?
Sácalos, para que los conozcamos.

It is interesting to see that the various ”translations” post 1955 differ so fatally, even where they agree… They defend the same old erroneous interpretation, but happen to be produced independently of each other, out of different traditions of translation, in different ecclesiastical surroundings.

Renaissance Volkssprache translations don’t expose themselves to such calamities nearly as openly, because they are made from the same “original”, the Scholastic Versio vulgata of Paris.

The horrid story of Judges 19 to 21, which starts as a paraphrase on Genesis 19 but turns into something very different, ethnical cleansing in the manner of the Ezraic, Persian inspired, “reform” of BC 398 can perhaps better wait 'til yet another time…