ADAM AND EVE, NOT ADAM AND STEVE: CHRISTIANITY AS A SEX-GENDER SYSTEM. AN APPLICATION OF GAYLE RUBIN'S THOUGHT

Abstract

This article analyzes Christianity as a sex-gender system, drawing on Gayle Rubin’s The Traffic in Women. Through a critical hermeneutic reading of the Genesis creation narratives and their reception in hegemonic Christianity, it examines how this tradition has produced sexual hierarchies, naturalized compulsory heterosexuality, and subordinated women and sex-gender dissidents. The study highlights the role of biblical translation, Pauline theology, and patristic reception as discursive technologies that regulate bodies and desires and connects these mechanisms with current conservative movements in Latin America that deploy the slogan “Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.” The main contribution is to frame Christianity not only as a religion but also as a political regime of sexual and gender control, while opening hermeneutical possibilities that destabilize the dominant heteronormative grammar.