Phil Robertson Breaks Silence at Bible Study: 'I Will Not Give or Back Off From My Path …I am a Lover of Humanity, Not a Hater'
"Duck Dynasty" patriarch Phil Robertson broke his silence for the first time since his indefinite suspension from the hit A&E show Sunday to declare he is "a lover of humanity, not a hater." But to critics of his biblical perspective on human sexuality, he says: "I will not give or back off from my path."
Robertson, who was excoriated in the media then suspended by A&E for calling homosexuality and other sexual behavior, including promiscuity and bestiality, sins in a candid GQ interview, told MailOnline that he was just quoting from the Bible when he made the comments and "didn't think much of it at all."
"Start with homosexual behavior and just morph out from there. Bestiality, sleeping around with this woman and that woman and that woman and those men," explained Robertson to GQ when he was asked to describe sin.
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"Don't be deceived. Neither the adulterers, the idolaters, the male prostitutes, the homosexual offenders, the greedy, the drunkards, the slanderers, the swindlers—they won't inherit the kingdom of God. Don't deceive yourself. It's not right," he further explained paraphrasing a portion of Corinthians from the New Testament of the Bible.
Robertson's resolve was reflected in a prayer at his home church in West Monroe, La., Sunday at the end of a Bible study class.
"I will not give or back off from my path because you conquered death, Father, so we are not worried about all the repercussions," he prayed.
Before that prayer, however, Robertson, dressed in full camouflage, shared with the Bible class at White's Ferry Road Church his journey from sinner to Christian.
"I have been immoral, drunk, high. I ran with the wicked people for 28 years and I have run with the Jesus people since and the contrast is astounding. I tell people, 'You are a sinner, we all are. Do you want to hear my story before I give you the bottom line on your story?'" he said.
"We murder each other and we steal from one another, sex and immorality goes ballistic. All the diseases that just so happen to follow sexual mischief… boy there are some microbes running around now. Sexual sins are numerous and many, I have a few myself. So what is your safest course of action? If you're a man, find yourself a woman, marry them and keep your sex right there," he urged the class.
"You can have fun, but one thing is for sure, as long as you are both healthy in the first place, you are not going to catch some debilitating illness, there is safety there. Commonsense says we are not going to procreate the human race unless we have a man and a woman. From the beginning Jesus said, 'It is a man and a woman.' Adam was made and Eve was made for this reason. They left their fathers and mothers and be united to become one flesh, that's what marriage is all about," he continued.
"But we looked at it and said it was an outdated stereotype. When you look back at the human race, the sins have always been the same: We get high, we get drunk, we get laid, we steal and kill. Has this changed at all from the time God burnt up whole cities because their every thought was evil?" he asked.
The "Duck Dynasty" patriarch also shot back at critics who claim he has no academic training by declaring he has a degree from Louisiana Tech. He said sexual immorality is the most obvious evidence of a sinful nature and it is a biblical position. Those who don't want to hear that message, he said, do not have to listen.
"I am just reading what was written over 2000 years ago. Those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom. All I did was quote from the scriptures, but they just didn't know it. Whether I said it, or they read it, what's the difference? The sins are the same, humans haven't changed," he said.
"If you give them the bad news, they'll start kicking and screaming. But you love them more than you fear them, so you tell them. A lot of times they don't even wait for you to finish and say, 'But there's a way out, do you want to hear the rest of the story or what?
"Jesus will take sins away, if you're a homosexual he'll take it away, if you're an adulterer, if you're a liar, what's the difference? If you break one sin you may as well break them all," he said.
