Is Profanity a Sin?
Sometimes, yes. Other times, no.
Naturally, an explanation is demanded. It’s the conventional wisdom of the invisible church to rule out all forms of profanity as a matter of principle. It’s rude, it’s socially unacceptable, it’s vulgar, and it has no place in the Body of Christ.
I have found that most of the Church’s arguments against profanity, while well-reasoned, lack nuance. Profanity is a function of language, and language is an incredibly complicated subject. Words change meaning constantly. Their usage in everyday speech evolves. Words come into and out of existence at the whim of the people who speak them. Profanity is no exception. It serves a specific purpose in language and has legitimate functional value.
Profanity goes by many names: swearing, cussing, cursing, bad language, strong language, offensive language, crude language, coarse language, foul language, bad words, blasphemous language, vulgar language, lewd language, choice words, or expletives all refer to the same thing. So, what is profanity, really? What makes a bad word bad? What does the Bible have to say about profanity?
Depending on how you define profanity, the Bible either says a lot or very little, so let us define our terms, open up our ancient Biblical manuscripts, and come to a more comprehensive look at how profanity relates to Christianity.
What is Profanity?
Profanity is a part of any natural language’s lexicon (think of a lexicon as the exhaustive list of every word the language contains). It describes every word in a given lexicon that is considered unfit for polite conversation because the word itself is either rude or offensive. They can show a person has a low opinion of someone or something (pejoratives), express extreme emotion (interjections), or simply be thrown into a sentence without adding anything to what is being said (filler words). In this sense, profanity is in the same category as racist slurs as well as words like “uhm” or “uh”, which speaks more to the flexibility and applicability of profanity in language than it does to its morality.
Traditionally, profanity was used to blaspheme sacred entities, objects, or institutions. The English euphemisms “zounds” and “gadzooks” were interjections that replaced shouting “God’s wounds!” (referring to the nail marks of Christ) and “God’s hooks!” (referring to the nails driven into Christ’s hands and feet). Contemporary superstition had people believing that uttering such blasphemous phrases would literally injure God, so they replaced their profane utterances with tamer, more innocuous words.
So, broadly speaking, profanity is the list of words that ought not to be said (or heard) in polite company. In a stricter sense, we can compartmentalize profane words into several distinct categories depending on their function:
• Abusive swearing is specifically intended to offend, intimidate, or otherwise cause harm.
• Dysphemistic swearing is used to convey that the speaker thinks negatively of the subject matter, and to force the listener to do the same. It is the opposite of a euphemism.
• Emphatic swearing is used primarily to draw additional attention to what is considered to be worth paying attention to by the speaker, or to add emphasis to or intensify another word.
• Cathartic swearing is used in response to pain or misfortune and is usually involuntary.
• Idiomatic swearing is used for no other particular purpose, but as a sign that the conversation and relationship between speaker and listener is informal. By definition, idiomatic swearing is impossible in formal or polite contexts.
What Does the Bible Say About Profanity?
The Bible gives us an excellent moral framework with which to address the issue of profanity, even when we break up swearing into different categories. In the third chapter of James, the author explains that the words we use can cause catastrophic damage to those around us. This is no exaggeration on my part. James says that the tongue is “a restless evil and full of deadly poison” (Jas. 3:8). Verse ten tells us that “from the same mouth come blessing and cursing”, but what does James mean by cursing in this context?
The word James uses for “cursing” is κατάρα (katára), which refers to invoking or wishing evil upon another person. This could refer to a literal curse, as in witchcraft, but it seems obvious in the context of the passage that James is referring to cursing in a more general sense, along the lines of wishing misfortune upon someone (e.g. “I hope you get sick and die!”). It’s quite understandable why James would condemn such cursing as immoral. Wishing harm upon any person is not only profoundly unkind but also reflects the attitude of our hearts, as mentioned in Luke 6:45.
Notice, however, that the example I gave would be deemed immoral according to James, yet I did not use a single curse word. It seems that it is not merely the words themselves that James takes issue with, but their function. Therefore, it would be most appropriate to examine each of the functions of profanity and determine which the Bible would condemn as unsuitable for Christians.
On Abusive Swearing
I think Ephesians 4:29 explains quite succinctly why abusive swearing is unacceptable behavior for the Christian: “Let no unwholesome word proceed from your mouth, but only such a word as is good for edification according to the need of the moment, so that it will give grace to those who hear.” The phrase for “unwholesome word” in Greek is λόγος σαπρὸς (lógos sapròs), which literally means “words corrupted”. The Greeks had several different words for “word”, and λόγος refers not just to the spoken word, but also the idea behind the word. Just like with James, the issue here is not the specific word used, but how it is used. The word σαπρὸς likewise has the additional connotation of worthlessness due to rotting or putrefaction. So Paul was really saying to let no rotten, putrid words come from your mouth.
Paul then juxtaposes these unwholesome words with words that are good for edification, encouragement, building others up. The implication here is clear: unwholesome, rotten words tear people down. This makes abusive swearing an absolute sin. It makes sense that Paul would call such speech putrid. Abusing someone with our words, whether we’re using profanity or not, is objectively disgusting behavior. On the other hand, encouraging and beneficial words are very wholesome indeed.
On Dysphemistic and Emphatic Swearing
It should be noted that dysphemisms are used in the Bible, especially in the Old Testament, but we cannot assume that means the Bible endorses dysphemistic swearing. The Bible describes many evil things, but that does not mean the Bible prescribes any evil thing. We must examine these dysphemisms individually, determine whether they are descriptive or prescriptive, and also compare these instances to known Biblical ethical prescriptions.
To the embarrassment of many translators of the Bible, the Old Testament contains many references to genitalia. Most of them are bowdlerized in English translations so as to not offend the layperson’s sensibilities, but when you look at the original Hebrew, you’ll quickly realize that word you thought was “thigh” was really “testicles”. The multitude of genital references should not be surprising to us, however. Circumcision was a ceremonial obligation for Jews, so it’s only natural that referencing the penis would at times become relevant to the Bible’s narrative.
What I find most interesting about this, however, is that the original authors did not always use euphemism while writing the Scriptures. This makes sense, as God is the ultimate author of the Scriptures, and so would have no need or desire to censor Himself. For instance, when Moses refers to Jacob’s direct descendants in Exodus 1:5, he uses the compound word ירך־יעקב (yarkon-Yakowb), literally “from the loins of Jacob” or “coming out of Jacob’s body”. This is a dysphemism in a more broad sense, because Moses could have easily used בני (beny; “sons”) as he did at the beginning of the chapter, and it would have been just as accurate — he was referring to Jacob’s literal sons, after all. It is not a dysphemism in a stricter sense, however, as Moses did not swear or use profanity. Instead, he just used a common phrase from that time and culture.
A more graphic example of dysphemism in the Bible comes from 1 Kings 12:10. King Rehoboam asks his childhood friends for advice about whether he should listen to the people. The advice his friends give would definitely be considered inappropriate language in today’s churches:
The young men who grew up with him spoke to him, saying, ‘Thus you shall say to this people who spoke to you, saying, “Your father made our yoke heavy, now you make it lighter for us!” But you shall speak to them, “My little finger is thicker than my father’s loins!”’
In today’s vernacular, that would read “My pinky is thicker than my father’s dick.” Wildly inappropriate language, especially for a king. The word here isn’t the same as the one used for Jacob’s *ahem* “issue”, but is instead the word ממתני (mothen), which is much more strict in its usage. It comes from an unused Hebrew root word meaning “to be slender”. “Mothen” literally means a small penis. The size is implied by the word itself.
It is clear, however, that the Bible isn’t endorsing this type of talk. The advice from Rehoboam’s friends is terrible advice. While the Bible does not condone this type of rude, immature language, it doesn’t shy away from it either. It is what Rehoboam’s friends said, and so the author of the books of the kings included it in his account. He didn’t see any reason to replace the words with something more innocuous, and we should keep that in mind moving forward.
The prophet Isaiah gives us an example of a rather shocking dysphemism. He forces us to think about something unpleasant in order to emphasize God’s distaste for something. Specifically, God doesn’t care for our righteous works. In Isaiah 64:6, we read “For all of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment”. The word for “filthy” in this verse is עדים (iddah), and there is only one definition for this word: menstruation. So, according to Isaiah, our righteous deeds are like a garment covered in a woman’s menstruations, the obvious message being that menstrual blood made one ceremonially unclean and unfit to enter into the Lord’s presence. Isaiah could have used a Hebrew word simply meaning “dirty”, but he didn’t. He wanted a more extreme, more precise word to illustrate God’s intolerance for our hypocritical righteous acts, and so he forced his audience to read “iddah”.
It seems that unlike with abusive swearing, dysphemistic swearing isn’t universally condemned, although great care ought to be taken. Ephesians 4:29 still applies here. A perfect example of this is the dysphemism King Saul uses in 1 Samuel 20:30, when he calls his son Jonathan the “son of a perverse, rebellious woman”. That sounds rather wooden to our modern ears, but it was the ancient near-eastern equivalent of calling Jonathan a “son-of-a-bitch” or a “bastard”. In fact, Today’s English Version translates that verse as saying “bastard”, and the New Jerusalem Bible translates it as “son of a rebellious slut”. Here, Saul was not only using dysphemism, but he was also abusing his son with his words. This is clearly immoral according to the ethic affirmed by Paul in Ephesians.
Paul, however, used dysphemism to emphasize his message on a few occasions in harmony with his admonition to speak only what is “good for edification according to the need of the moment”. In 1 Corinthians 4:13, he says that he and the other apostles “have become as the scum of the world”. Here, the word for “as the scum” is περικαθάρματα (perikathármata), which literally means “as the most abject and despicable filth imaginable”. This would have been very vulgar to Paul’s Corinthian audience, and that was the point. He was using the word sarcastically to describe the simple life he and the other apostles lived, in contrast to the leaders of Corinth.
Note that while Paul used a rather vulgar term, it was directed at himself, and it was sarcastic. He wasn’t cussing anyone out, as that would be immoral. He was using dysphemism as a rhetorical device. He does this again in Philippians 3:8, when he says, “More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ”. The word translated as “rubbish” is σκύβαλον (skýbalon), which literally means “dung”. Of the word σκύβαλον, theologian J.I. Packer writes:
In secular Greek this depressing word means rubbish and muck of many kinds: excrement, rotten food, bits left at a meal as not worth eating, a rotting corpse. Nastiness and decay are the constant elements of its meaning; it is a coarse, ugly, violent word implying worthlessness, uselessness, and repulsiveness.
So, how do we know Paul meant “dung” when he said σκύβαλον and not some other definition of the word? We know from extra-biblical sources, such as Josephus, Plutarch, Philo, and various medical texts from Aretaeus, Soranus, Galen, and others that σκύβαλον was commonly understood as referring to human excrement. That was the most common usage of that word, and with it came the connotation of repulsiveness and disgust. Had Paul wrote Philippians in modern English, it’s possible he would have used the “s-word”. Again, he only applied the word to himself, not to anyone else.
On Cathartic and Idiomatic Swearing
In 1 Peter 3:10, Peter quotes the Psalms and declares “The one who desires life, to love and see good days, must keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit.” When we bang our shins on the coffee table, it’s not uncommon for profanity to come forth from our mouths. Banging your shin hurts a lot, and sometimes, these words “slip out”. However, we do not want anything uncouth to come out of our mouths, even involuntarily, so cathartic swearing would be a matter of conscience. On the one hand, you didn’t mean to swear, but on the other hand, self-control is one of the fruits of the Spirit.
As for idiomatic swearing, there is no strong Biblical case against it, because idiomatic swearing is not offensive, rude, or unwholesome by definition. If you make someone uncomfortable or upset by swearing in a casual manner, even if you aren’t being gross or abusive, it’s not idiomatic swearing, and you may need to apologize depending on the situation. Rather, idiomatic swearing is an indicator that the setting, conversation, and the relationship between the speaker(s) and the listener(s) is relaxed, casual, and informal. Idiomatic swearing is therefore necessarily acceptable in that context because the very act of swearing is what signifies that the conversation is relaxed, casual, and informal.
In fact, idiomatic swearing is often used to build people up, rather than tear them down. Calling someone “badass” or something “kickass”, for example, is a form of praise. They’re compliments. In a casual setting, such words seem to be permissible. However, if you feel it would be wrong for you to swear in such a setting regardless, that’s fine. You should never feel pressured into swearing, nor should you keep silent if what the people around you are saying makes you uncomfortable. Most people are happy to stop swearing if you ask them politely.
Conclusion
Abusive swearing is the only form of profanity that is explicitly condemned in Scripture. Dysphemistic swearing is context-sensitive — sometimes it’s acceptable and sometimes it isn’t. If you are not sure whether it would be acceptable to use a dysphemism, err on the side of caution and use a euphemism instead. Cathartic and idiomatic swearing are more person-relative. They are matters of conscience. If you do not feel comfortable using swear words, don’t use them. If the people around you would not be comfortable with you using them, don’t use them.
Many Christians nowadays consider profanity to be sin for everyone, always, no matter what, but the Bible does not make this claim. James tells us that our words can hurt others, and the Proverbs tell us the same, but they do not single out “swear words”. When the Bible does speak against vulgar or obscene language, it is usually found in the context of being edifying with our speech (as with Ephesians 4:29 and 5:4; as well as Colossians 3:8). In other words, instead of swearing at people, we need to be loving with our language at all times. If what we are about to speak is anything less than loving, even if the words aren’t profane, we should not speak them.
Let us concede for the sake of argument that profanity is totally and absolutely sinful. Our focus or emphasis, then, should not be on refraining from using certain words. Instead, our focus should be on loving others with our words. These two concepts are not mutually exclusive, of course; however, Christians who focus on the sins of profanity often seem to neglect the weightier portions of the law:
Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier provisions of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness; but these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others. You blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel!
—Matthew 23:23–24 (NASB95)