1 Corinthians 6:9-11: Was "Homosexual" Added to the Bible
Short answer: No single 1946 event added the concept of homosexuality to the Bible. The Greek text of 1 Corinthians 6:9-11 contains two words, malakoi and arsenokoitai, and translators have rendered them in various ways for centuries. The word homosexual did enter some English translations in 1946, when the Revised Standard Version used it at this verse, and that choice shaped decades of English Bible reading. But the underlying Greek words are older than any English translation, and other passages such as Leviticus 18:22, Romans 1:26-28, 1 Timothy 1:9-10, and Jude 1:7 address the same subject in their own vocabulary. Whether the traditional reading is correct is a real debate among Christians, but the debate is about what the Greek means, not about whether a word was secretly inserted.
What the claim about 1946 actually says
The popular version of the claim runs like this: before 1946, no Bible translation used the word homosexual, and the RSV introduced it, thereby inventing a biblical prohibition that had not existed before. That is partly true and partly misleading. It is true that the English word homosexual is a nineteenth-century coinage and that the RSV was among the first major English translations to use it at 1 Corinthians 6:9. It is misleading to say the concept was absent, because the Greek words being translated were already there and had been translated by other English words.
Tyndale, the Geneva Bible, the King James Version, and the American Standard Version all rendered the terms with phrases such as abusers of themselves with mankind, effeminate, or sodomites. Those are not the same word as homosexual, but they are attempts at the same Greek terms. The change in 1946 was a change in English wording, not the insertion of a new Greek word into the text.
So the honest answer to the popular claim is mixed. The date 1946 marks something real in English translation history. It does not mark the moment a prohibition entered the Bible, because the Greek manuscripts long predate any English version. Anyone repeating the claim as though a verse were fabricated in 1946 is overstating a genuine but narrower fact about translation wording.
The two Greek words in 1 Corinthians 6:9
1 Corinthians 6:9-11 says, "Or don’t you know that the unrighteous will not inherit God’s Kingdom? Don’t be deceived. Neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor male prostitutes, nor homosexuals," and the verse continues into a list that ends with the promise that some of the Corinthian believers had been washed and sanctified. The two terms in question are malakoi, rendered male prostitutes here, and arsenokoitai, rendered homosexuals.
Malakoi literally means soft, and in moral contexts it commonly referred to the passive partner in male same-sex activity, or more broadly to a man given over to sexual vice. Arsenokoitai is rarer. It appears to be formed from the Greek words for male and bed, and it shows up in a small number of ancient texts, including this letter and 1 Timothy 1:10. Its precise nuance is debated, but its sexual sense is not seriously in doubt.
What matters for the claim is that both words are in the Greek manuscripts. No translator invented them. The question is whether homosexual is a fair English rendering of arsenokoitai, and that is a question about translation philosophy, not about textual corruption. Careful readers can examine the evidence and reach different conclusions about the best rendering while agreeing the Greek words are genuine.
How translation wording changed over centuries
English Bibles before 1946 did not use the word homosexual, but they did not leave the verse blank either. The 1611 King James Version reads effeminate and abusers of themselves with mankind. The Geneva Bible used similar phrasing. The 1901 American Standard Version kept effeminate. These translations were making a judgment about what the Greek meant, and their readers understood them as prohibiting male same-sex conduct.
When the RSV appeared in 1946 with homosexual at this verse, it was consolidating a phrase into a single modern word. Later translations split again. Some use homosexual offenders, some use men who have sex with men, some use practicing homosexuals, and some keep the more literal male prostitutes alongside a separate term. The variation shows translators wrestling with the same Greek, not discovering a new doctrine.
It is fair to say the English wording has shifted and that shifts matter for how readers hear the text. It is not fair to say the shift created the prohibition. The prohibition, whatever its scope, rests on the Greek words and on the wider biblical witness, and that witness includes passages outside 1 Corinthians.
Why 1 Corinthians 6:11 matters as much as verse 9
The list in verse 9 does not stand alone. Verse 11 says that some of the Corinthian believers had been these things and were washed, sanctified, and justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of God. Any use of this passage that turns it into a weapon against a group of people has to reckon with the next verse, which addresses the Corinthian church itself.
Paul is not writing to outsiders about a category of people he despises. He is writing to a church arguing about lawsuits and sexual ethics, reminding them of what they were and what they have become. The list includes idolaters, adulterers, thieves, the greedy, drunkards, and swindlers alongside the sexual terms. Singling out one item and ignoring the rest distorts the passage.
This does not erase the moral content of the list. Paul says plainly that the unrighteous will not inherit God's Kingdom, and he includes these behaviors. But the pastoral force of the paragraph runs toward repentance and transformation, not toward contempt. That is the tone any faithful teaching on this text should carry.
Does the rest of Scripture depend on this one verse
No. Even if a reader concluded that arsenokoitai is too obscure to bear the weight placed on it, other passages address the same subject. Leviticus 18:22 says, "You shall not lie with a man as with a woman. That is detestable." Romans 1:26-28 describes women exchanging the natural function for what is against nature and men likewise. 1 Timothy 1:9-10 places the same rare word in a list of lawbreakers. Jude 1:7 cites Sodom and Gomorrah as an example of those who went after strange flesh.
These passages have their own translation histories and their own interpretive debates. Leviticus is part of the holiness code, and Christians differ on how its ceremonial and moral elements apply. Romans 1 is set within a long argument about idolatry and universal guilt. Jude is a brief letter using Sodom as an illustration. None of them is a simple proof text, and together they are more than a single disputed word.
So the 1946 claim, even if granted in full, does not remove the biblical material. It narrows the discussion to translation choices at one verse while leaving the broader witness intact. A reader who wants to engage honestly has to deal with the whole set of texts, not just the one with the most interesting history.
What Genesis 19 and Jude 1:7 contribute
Genesis 19:1-11 tells of the angels visiting Lot in Sodom and the men of the city demanding to know them. The supplied text begins the account with the angels arriving at evening and Lot rising to meet them. The episode is often cited in this discussion, and Jude 1:7 reads it as an example, saying, "Even as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, having in the same way as these given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are shown as an example, suffering the punishment of eternal fire."
Many interpreters note that the sin of Sodom in Genesis is bound up with violence, inhospitality, and attempted rape, and that Ezekiel 16:49 emphasizes arrogance and neglect of the poor. Others point to Jude's explicit mention of sexual immorality and strange flesh as evidence that the sexual dimension is part of the indictment. Both observations can be held together.
What Genesis 19 does not do is give a settled answer to every modern question about same-sex orientation or identity. It is a narrative about a specific city and a specific night. Using it as the sole foundation for a doctrine asks more of it than it was written to provide, and ignoring its sexual language asks less.
Where faithful Christians disagree
Christians who hold the historic view read these passages as teaching that sexual relations are reserved for marriage between a man and a woman, and they see 1 Corinthians 6:9-11 as one witness among many. They argue that arsenokoitai is a broad term for male same-sex activity and that the 1946 change in English wording was a translation improvement, not an innovation.
Christians who affirm same-sex relationships argue that the relevant terms are narrower than modern categories, that malakoi concerns exploitation or prostitution, and that arsenokoitai may refer to specific abusive practices in the ancient world rather than to consensual relationships as understood today. They also emphasize the cultural distance between the first century and the present.
Both groups appeal to the same Greek text and to the same wider canon. The disagreement is real, it is not new, and it deserves to be described accurately rather than caricatured on either side. What neither side should do is claim that a word was smuggled into the Bible in 1946 when the Greek has been there all along.
How to read 1 Corinthians 6:9-11 well
Read the whole paragraph, not just the list. Verse 9 names behaviors, verse 10 extends the list to thieves and drunkards and swindlers, and verse 11 announces washing, sanctification, and justification for those who were these things. The movement is from warning to hope.
Read it in context. Paul is answering a church that prided itself on knowledge while tolerating sexual sin and taking each other to court. The letter's argument is about the body, the Lord's ownership of the believer, and the difference between the old life and the new. This passage belongs to that argument, not to a modern culture war.
Read it with humility about translation. The English word homosexual is recent, and translators have chosen it and rejected it for reasons worth understanding. That is a reason to study, not a reason to dismiss the text. The goal is to know what Paul wrote and what it means, and to let the whole paragraph, including its promise, shape how we speak to and about others.
Biblical fidelity check
The passage establishes that Paul named specific sexual behaviors among the practices that exclude a person from God's Kingdom, and that he applied the same warning to a range of other sins. It establishes that some Corinthian believers had practiced these things and had been washed, sanctified, and justified. It does not establish the modern English word homosexual as the only or final translation of arsenokoitai, and it does not by itself settle every question about orientation, identity, or how a local church should pastor people who experience same-sex attraction.
A common misreading is that 1946 added the prohibition to the Bible. That is wrong because the Greek words malakoi and arsenokoitai appear in manuscripts centuries older than any English Bible. What happened in 1946 was a change in English wording in one translation, not the insertion of new Scripture. A second misreading, on the other side, is that the translation history makes the passage irrelevant. That is also wrong, because the Greek words remain and other passages address the same subject. Careful teaching names both errors.
Other passages that speak to 1 Corinthians 6:9-11
Readers who want to see how this letter develops its themes of holiness, the body, and community can trace the argument across the surrounding chapters. 1 Corinthians 1: Called, United, and Boasting in the Lord sets the tone for a divided church. 1 Corinthians 10: Warnings and Freedom applies Israel's history as a warning about idolatry and self-confidence. 1 Corinthians 11: Order, Unity, and the Lord's Supper connects the body of Christ to how believers treat one another. 1 Corinthians 12: One Body, Many Members in Christ reminds the church that every member belongs to one body.
Frequently asked questions
Was the word homosexual really added to the Bible in 1946?
The English word homosexual first appeared in a major English translation at 1 Corinthians 6:9 in the 1946 Revised Standard Version. But the Greek words being translated, malakoi and arsenokoitai, are present in ancient manuscripts. So the 1946 date marks a translation choice, not the insertion of a new verse. Earlier English Bibles used phrases like effeminate and abusers of themselves with mankind.
What do the Greek words in 1 Corinthians 6:9 mean?
Malakoi means soft and in moral contexts refers to the passive partner in male same-sex activity or to a man given to sexual vice. Arsenokoitai is rarer, formed from words for male and bed, and appears in a small number of ancient texts including 1 Timothy 1:10. Its exact nuance is debated, but its sexual sense is widely accepted.
Does 1 Corinthians 6:11 change how the passage should be used?
Verse 11 says some of the Corinthians had been these things and were washed, sanctified, and justified. That frames the list as a warning to the church, not a weapon against outsiders. Any teaching on this text should include the promise as well as the prohibition, and should remember that the same list names thieves, drunkards, and the greedy.
