Is It Against the Bible to Buy or Sell a Dog?

Thou shalt not bring the hire of a whore, or the price of a dog, into the house of the LORD thy God for any vow: for even both these are abomination unto the LORD thy God. (Deut 23:18, King James translation)

"You shall not bring the hire of a harlot or the wages of a dog into the house of the LORD your God for any votive offering, for both of these are an abomination to the LORD your God.” (Deut 23:18, New American Standard translation)

You shall not bring the fee of a prostitute or the wages of a male prostitute into the house of the LORD your God in payment for any vow, for both of these are abhorrent to the LORD your God. (Deut 23:18, New Revised Standard translation)

Don't bring a female prostitute's fee or a male prostitute's payment to the LORD your God's temple to pay a solemn promise because both of these things are detestable to the LORD your God. (Deut 23:18, Common English translation)

Apparently, according to my mother, my great-grandfather would never buy or sell a dog. He would only give them away or receive them (I said take them, but Mom said that wasn’t a very nice way of putting it – receive is much better). Why? Because he said it was against the Bible to do so.

So my mother asked me, “Is that true? Is it true that the Bible tells you not to buy or sell dogs?”

I rubbed my temples and shut my eyes. I don’t know, I thought. This is one of those moments when it does not pay to be a biblical scholar.  There are a lot of weird things in the Bible. I honestly cannot list, or even remember, all of them.  But, I gathered my senses and shared what I know.

“It is possible, but unlikely. Dogs were not viewed terribly positively in the Bible. They are scavengers, and as such, were unclean animals. They tend to only show up in negative situations. Like they tear Jezebel to pieces after she is pushed out of the palace window by the guards. And Jesus even uses dog to insult someone. It is doubtful that it even came up because who would be buying and selling unclean animals? Though I guess it might just ban the purchase of dogs altogether, because they were scavengers. But who would be interested in buying and selling such animals in that context?”

“Then why did my grandfather think it was in the Bible?” she pushed.

“Well, let’s do what all good scholars do these days. Let’s google it.”

And that is how I found Deuteronomy 23:18.

You can see it in all its translated glory above. I knew to start with the King James because that had to be the version my great-grandfather was using. And there you go, you can’t bring the price of a dog into the house of the Lord. But does that really answer the question? People could say just because you sell a dog doesn’t mean you bring any of the profits into the house of the Lord, but of course then I would argue you are supposed to bring 10% of all you have into the house of the Lord, so by necessity at least part of it would come in.

But the other question is, are we really talking about dogs here? Because in the flow of that whole verse, bringing the price of a dog seems like a weird sidebar. All the other verses around it have something to do with various workers. 

I invited Mom to look at the whole of the chapter to get an idea. Plus, I said, this is a fun chapter.  It is the crushed testicles aren’t allowed in the Temple and always carry a shovel to bury your poop chapter. That hooked her.  While she was enjoying the nuances of Deuteronomy 23, I went to the Hebrew.  This was my first bit of confusion.

“Where is the not?!?!” I exclaimed.

“What?” she asked.

“This verse. Looking at the Hebrew, there is no ‘not’ in this verse.  It reads like, ‘Bring the wages of a whore and the price of a dog into the house of the Lord.’ But that doesn’t make any sense if this is supposed to be detestable to God. Does God want us to bring detestable things in?” For a brief moment, I had a fit of joy at that idea.  Of course we bring the detestable things in! Hallelujah! My joy was short-lived, though, because then I found the “not.” For some reason we have broken the verse up in the Hebrew numbering so that the “not” is actually the last word of the previous verse, which is just bonkers and doesn’t make any sense. Bad numbering on our part there, people.

So, with the “not” restored, I could set about the work of translating. It is literally the price of a dog. But as I mentioned, that seems like a random insertion here. So I did some more digging. The Septuagint, which is the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible (the text Paul would have most likely known) also has dog but the word translated as “price” here is untranslatable in the Greek. So that’s fun. 

So I dug into the translation of the Hebrew word for dog here, which is keleb. And at least one lexicon gives both a literal translation of the word, which means dog, and a figurative translation of the word, which means either “a faithful servant of a superior or a deity,” or “a male cult prostitute.”  Honestly, in the context, those make so much more sense. And also, wages that were earned working for another deity – those would be pretty detestable to God. And that, friends, is how we get to the latter translations shared above.

Now, what are the lessons from this little adventure?

·        Translation is tricky business. Every translator of any work going from one language to the next has to make decisions about what is meant. Often they have to decide between literal and figurative meanings. These are not attempts to mislead. Sometimes the translators themselves do not recognize a metaphor or idiom. Those things are notoriously difficult to translate. The old saying that some things get lost in translation is very accurate.

·        Comparing translations is good practice. Especially if something comes across as weird or kind of stuck out there, read the verse in multiple versions. Never a bad idea anyway, especially if you are going to find yourself sans dog as a result.

·        People play fast and loose with translations. I mean, maybe it is actually better practice that my great-grandfather never bought or sold a dog. Maybe it is better that they were given freely. But also, taking the Bible too literally can be a problem. Likewise, taking the Bible recklessly figuratively can also be a problem. We are dealing with both realities right now as people argue that God hates masks and the Bible says so. (Honestly, I have spent two days trying to figure out where that one comes from. Sorry, folks. I can find no good biblical reference. Just a bunch of crazy assumptions and careless interpretations).

·        God has a problem with wages earned in honor of other gods, but note that it does not say prostitutes are banned from the Temple. Take note of that distinction.  And then we all may need to tremble a bit about where our wages come from. But we should also make sure we welcome the prostitutes in our midst. Dudes with crushed testicles? That is another story for another day and another blog.

·        Finally, make time to listen to your mom’s crazy stories.  You never know where they will lead.

So go ahead and buy and sell dogs. And be sure to love them as you do. And welcome the prostitutes into your midst. And finally, stay tuned to this blog. Someday soon I will deal with my great-grandmother’s insistence that it was against the Bible to play cards…inside.

Image by Charles Deluvio at Unsplash.com