It is obviously of real interest to us whether the Bible has anything direct to say about boylove, rather than just extrapolating from teachings about homosexuality. After thinking about this question, I can think of at least two examples.

The first we already know about, though I think we may not have recognised the "boyloving" nature of the relationship. David and Jonathan. Think about it, that classic verse in 1 Sam 18 "Jonathan became one in spirit with David and loved him as himself", comes just after David has first turned up on the scene, after he defeated Goliath. In Sunday School they loved telling us how David was just a boy, certainly he was too small and untrained even to be able to handle Saul's armour. I put him at about 15. Jonathan, on the other hand, is an established hero. He has been defeating the Philstines since Ch 14 and is loved and respected by the whole army. My guess is he is at least in his 20's by the time David appears. Certainly, my Thomson chain reference bible puts Ch 14 at 1087 BC, and Ch 18 at 1063 BC, a difference of in fact 24 years, making Jonathan maybe about 44 when he meets 15yo David! So certainly Jonathan is a boylover, and David a loved boy. (personally I believe they didn't express their love sexually, but that is a different question. Certainly David had the hots for Jono's sister Michal later in Ch 18)

My other reference is very much more obscure, but, I think, very relevent. Ezekial 16. Ezekial has a vision of how Israel has been unfaithful to God. He sees Israel as a young girl, whom God finds and loves. He sees her "kicking about in her own blood" and takes her in, makes her live. She becomes like a "plant of the field", she "grows up and develops and becomes the most beautiful of jewels".

Here, the key verse is v 8. "Later, I passed by, and when I looked at you and saw that you were old enough for love, I spread the corner of my garment over you and covered your nakedness. I gave you my solemn oath and entered into a covenant with you, declares the Sovereign LORD, and you became mine". (It later goes on to show how she spurned him and became a prostitute, an image of how Israel had treated God)

I won't talk about the homosexual nature of boyloving. What's relevent here is the inter-generational facet, the issues involved in loving a child sexually.

What I see is that there is a time for everything, a time to wait for love, and a time to consummate that love, a time to embrace and a time to refrain (yes I do love Ecc 3). We see the same in the Song of Songs "Do not arouse or awaken love until it so desires". Is it OK to love a child? If we can take God as an example, yes it is. But there is a time when the child is still young and not ready to accept the covenant of love. During this time we are called to celibacy, or rather, chastity (celibacy is swearing off all sexual relations ever, chastity is swearing off them until the marriage-bond) But there comes a time when that child has grown up and is ready to love, ready to enter into a covenant which says "I am yours and you are mine"

So I see two lessons from Exek 16. First, to abstain from sexual love until your lover is ready for it. Secondly, when that lover is mature and ready, sexual love is made in the context of an oath and a covenant. There is no room here for promiscuity or letting your lust get its sex without any oath of love being there.

In Christ,
F.O.D.