Is dancing a sin?

Dancing

Through the years, gospel preachers have warned against dancing.  "Revelries and such like," which Paul condemned as works of the flesh (Galatians 5:21), have been commonly defined by lexicographers to include dancing.  In the past, both Christians and non-Christians considered dancing worldly.  Devout parents urged their children not to dance and many a teenager missed the Senior Prom because it involved a dance.  In the last thirty years there has been less and less teaching against dancing, and more and more young people from good homes are participating.

We have already observed that the word revelries in Galatians 5:21 is often defined to include dancing.  Perhaps even more to the point is the word lasciviousness (licentiousness, KJV), also found in the Galatians passage.  The Greek word which it represents is found in nine other New Testament texts, always to be condemned.  Paul says of both revelry and lasciviousness that "those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God." But what is lasciviousness?

Thayer's Greek-English Lexicon defines lasciviousness as "wanton acts or manners as filthy words, indecent bodily movements, unchaste handling of males and females."  If the dances that are now popular are not "indecent bodily movements" it would be difficult to know what indecent bodily movements would be.  Many dances, both old and new, also include unchaste handling of males and females.

Surely this is an area where Christians must be different than the world in which they live.

- by Sewell Hall