Does the Bible say that sex change is sinful?

National Public Radio recently posted a story on a disagreement over sex education in a public school. NPR quoted one person involved in this struggle: "When you fundamentally discredit the very nature of God's creation of our youth as male and female, you are seeking to discredit God."

There are a lot of people who believe that God's living creation is either male or female. Why? One reason is this verse: Genesis 1:27 "God created man in his own image. In God’s image he created him; male and female he created them." Claiming that there is legitimacy in changing gender, however it is proposed to be accomplished, is taken to violate this verse, and, therefore, to "discredit God."

Gender variations in non-humans
This verse does not seem to apply to non-humans, as it is in the section of Genesis 1 which speaks of the creation of human beings. Many non-human organisms are not either male or female. Many plants and invertebrate animals are both male and female. Especially in plants, and in some animals, sex simply has to  do with who produces sperm and who produces eggs. There is no courtship in plants, and there are no obvious sex role differences in them, or in some animals. In some animals, sex roles are not what you might expect. For example, there are amphibians in which the sperm-producing male takes care of the young. See here and here for videos. Many kinds of birds share care of the young. Some birds, especially pigeons and doves, produce crop milk, which serves some of the same functions as the milk of mammals. Crop milk is produced by both male and female birds.

There are vertebrate animals (fish, amphibians, reptiles, mammals and birds) that can change sex. For example, chickens (and some other birds) can change sexes. Clown (Nemo) fish can change sex. Wrasse fish can change sex. The Wikipedia says this "Some species exhibit sequential hermaphroditism. In these species, such as many species of coral reef fishes, sex change is a normal anatomical process." There are not many examples of sex change in non-human mammals, and even in fish, birds and reptiles, as groups, sex change is the exception, not the rule.

Intersex humans
Many humans are born without being unambiguously male or female. Such intersex individuals are that way for several reasons, such as not having a normal complement of chromosomes, not having the normal anatomical apparatus for sex and reproduction, or having some of the anatomical apparatus of both sexes. See the Wikipedia article on "Intersex."

Genesis 1:27 is not the only passage with a statement that God created male and female. Genesis 5:2, Matthew 19:4 and Mark 10:6 also make this statement, and the latter two quote Genesis 1:27. Please remember that some people believe that Genesis 1 and 2 were meant to be taken literally, and some other Bible-believing people believe, with good reason, that it wasn't so meant. I suppose that the two quotes of 1:27, by Jesus, strengthen the literalness of that verse's interpretation.

The purpose of Genesis 1:27 probably was not to declare that a desire for gender change treatments or surgery is sinful. Even so, it's not necessarily wrong to conclude that from the verse. Intersex humans, and those desiring a gender change, may be a result of the Fall.

OK. Even If intersex people are a result of the Fall, shouldn't we do something about this? Weeds, malaria mosquitoes, AIDS, earthquakes, and many other entities may not be part of God's original plan for the earth, but are the result of a Creation that is not the way God wanted it. We typically do whatever we can to alleviate these, and other conditions. Adam was told, according to Genesis 3:17-19, that he would have to till the ground, in order to obtain food from it. Some of this tilling was pulling weeds, no doubt. 

There are more results of the Fall. Babies are born with cleft palates, for example. I doubt if God's original plan for humans included that, and believe that such a condition, insofar as we can, should be treated, as should leprosy, diabetes, poor eyesight, heart conditions, and many more things. Why not, then, perform surgery, or otherwise treat, babies born as intersex? (In cleft palate surgery, and intersex surgery, the best interest of the patient, so far as it can be determined, should be a guiding principle.) Usually, such surgery is performed. Genesis 1:27 doesn't preclude occurrences of intersex babies. Some of them aren't unambiguously either male or female.

I have argued, so far, that it is right to try to correct various ills in the world, insofar as we are able to, and are correcting for unselfish reasons.

Now we come to people who desire transgender treatment. Do we owe them, like an intersex or cleft palate baby, such treatment? Clearly, some people do not believe so, and, in fact wish to deny anyone transgender treatment, because changing sex is wrong in principle. I have cited a Biblical basis for such belief above. But, my experience tells me that some of the objection to transgender has nothing to do with the Bible, but, instead, is based on an intuition that such treatment is wrong -- unnatural, not the sort of thing we want to have anything to do with.

I cannot judge anyone's reason for desiring transgender treatment. Some people's desires for that may be no more wrong that my desire to get glasses so I can see well enough to read and drive. If that is true, I would argue that such a person should get transgender treatment. But it is also possible that some, or all, people who want transgender treatment are twisted souls whose desires and motives are evil, and going against what God planned. If I knew that that was true, I would be against any such treatment. But I don't know, and I'm glad that it's not up to me to judge. It seems to me that desiring sex change treatment is not necessarily a violation of God's will, whatever Genesis 1:27 may say.

He Lives has a good post on Gender Dysphoria (thinking you are a male in a female body, or the reverse, as I understand it), and argues that saying that that condition is always due solely to the wrong desire of the person affected comes close to being heresy.

Thanks for reading. Feel free to comment.

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Added May 13, 2019: There is an article referred to in the first comment, below, which is highly critical of the ideas behind a lot of gender dysphoria and trans-sexualism.