The Wife of Jesus: Ancient Texts and Modern Scandals

FROM PERSIA, WITH LOVE

Happy love has no history. Romance only comes into existence where love is fatal, frowned upon and doomed by life itself.

– DENIS DE ROUGEMENT

The first line of Dave Matthew’s “Christmas Song” refers to Jesus’ parents: “She was his girl; he was her boyfriend.” When Jesus meets “another Mary” his heart is full of “love, love, love.” I discussed this song more fully in chapter 4, where I also discussed the early frames of Cecil B. DeMille’s King of Kings, in which Mary of Magdala was called a “courtesan.” In Veronica Patterson’s “love poem” (also discussed in chapter 4) she hints at a sexual tension between Jesus and Mary. In these portraits and in many others we see the influence of romantic or “courtly love.”

This should come as no surprise; romance is one of our most celebrated themes in the Christianized West. A love story can be a potent and effective vehicle to drive a narrative. When modern storytellers want to humanize a character, adding a “love interest” is quite common. Given that the iconic Jesus has always been just above humanization, it was only a matter of time before modern storytellers attempted to humanize him: adding romance to his story is perhaps part and parcel of our attempt to do this.

It is hard to blame these popular storytellers. Romance and the pursuit of love is so much a part of our cultural psyche that we can hardly help but explore Jesus’ emotions. Furthermore, we should expect that Jesus experienced a full range of human emotions. Of course, a “full range” of emotions varies from person to person, and while there are probably several analogies to be drawn between Jesus’ culture and ours, caution is warranted. One major difference between the two cultures is the importance of emotional motivation for marriage. While modern, Western marriage is built on the freedom to choose a mate on the basis of romantic courtship and mutual affection, this was not the world in which Jesus lived. Any exploration of the wife of Jesus must account for these differences. In Jesus’ culture, there were no “boyfriends,” as Dave Matthews imagines; the word “romance” had not been coined, and “courtly love” – what we moderns just think of as “love” – was not a primary motivation for marriage.

IMPASSIBLE BARRIERS

In human history, romance is a relatively new motivation for marriage. I won’t be able to provide a detailed history of romantic love in this book, but it might be helpful to point to a few historical developments that stand between us and the ancient culture of Jesus.

Concerning “chemistry,” one might point as far back as four million years when “the first cascades of neurochemicals flowing from the brain produced goofy grins and sweaty palms as men and women gazed deeply into each other’s eyes.”¹ Or one might imagine that the modern, Western notion of romantic love has been deeply influenced by commercial culture. Perhaps the words of fictional Mad Men ad executive, Don Draper, ring true: “What you call love was invented by guys like me to sell nylons.”² Erotic pursuits are as old as the hills and as new as Madison Avenue. But when did erotic attraction become romantic love? And when did romantic love become the primary motive to marry?

Those familiar with the Hebrew Bible will remember the intense emotion and physical intimacy described in the Song of Songs. It is, however, important to remember that this poem describes the playful exploits of the wealthy and not the common “courtship” of regular people. Moreover, it is not clear that the partners in the Song of Songs are consummating their marriage.³ This helps to illustrate an important point: eroticism is an important part of the human experience, but it has not always been a primary reason to marry.

While the developments of “romantic love” vary from culture to culture, it would be difficult to understate the global impact of medieval Persian poetry. From eighth-century Baghdad (perhaps earlier⁴) to the height of Moorish Spain, love poetry thrived in the Arab world. While many poems focused on the mere physicality of sexual encounter, some poems (usually associated with rural, Bedouin verse) voiced an affection that transcended physicality. The distinction between rural and urban love poetry should not be drawn too neatly, but it does convey a long-held stereotype of Bedouin innocence. Interesting for this chapter is a conversation written by a thirteenth-century scholar named Ibn al-Qayyim. This scholar claims to recount a conversation between an eighth-century urbanite and his rural, Bedouin aunt:

I [al-Asmāṣ’i] said to a Bedouin woman: “What do you consider love to be among you?”

“Hugging, embracing, winks, and conversation,” she replied.

The she asked: “How is it among you, city-dweller?”

“He sits amidst her four limbs (shu ‘abihā⁵) and presses her to the limit,” I answered.

“Nephew,” she cried, “this is no lover (‘ashiq), but a man after a child!”⁶

This conversation supports the general stereotype of relative innocence among rural people and/or commoners. It is also important to recognize a difference between the views of urban males and others. The candid reply of the aunt in this exchange would have seemed novel to the wealthy men of Baghdad in the eighth century, but this notion of mutual affection (rather than mere physicality) would soon become influential among the elite. Bedouin notions of love driven by the vehicles of rural poets were eventually popularized and made famous across the Arab world.

One of these poems (perhaps inspired by Bedouin themes) is titled “Layla and Majnun.” This poem tells a story of unrequited love.⁷ Attributed to a seventh-century poet named Qays ibn al-Mulawwah, the poor shepherd poet pursues a childhood friend named Layla. When her father refuses the match and marries Layla to another man, the poet is driven mad and retreats to the wilderness. This is how he receives the name “Majnun,” which means “possessed” or “madman.” Both Majnun and Layla die separated, in grief. As the legend goes, the corpse of the poet is found beside the tomb of a nameless woman whereupon he has scratched his verse.

Famously, the story of Layla and Majnun inspired the blues/rock hit “Layla” by Derek and the Dominos. But, until its incarnation on the 1970s music scene, the tragic legend of Layla and Majnun reached an apex of popularity in the twelfth century. Unlike many sexually explicit poems, this poem demonstrates a kind of love that is never consummated. It is therefore something of a departure from simple eroticism.

We might also point to a collection of poems from the tenth century by a poet named al-Sarraj. This popular collection is titled Masari al-Ushshaq, which translates into “Battle of Lovers” or “Death of Lovers.” These poets were “falling” in love centuries before Eric Clapton crooned “I’m falling on my knees, Layla!” But more importantly for this chapter is the entry point of this Persian art form into Western consciousness.

Layla and Majnun (c. 18th century). This Keshan carpet is based on the story made famous by the twelfth-century poet Nizami Ganjavi. The rag-clad “madman” on the left is surrounded by wild beasts and foliage, suggesting his eventual retreat from civilized society.

The period when poems such as “Layla and Majnun” and collections such as Masari al-Ushshaq were widely known in the Arab world corresponded with the height of Moorish Spain. It is highly probable that this is when romantic courtship emerged in the Western world. Echoing their European Arab neighbors, a wandering band of French poets called the “troubadours” of Occitania became popular in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. It is possible that the name “troubadour” derives from the Arabic word “taraba,” which means “to sing.”

These French poets and musicians turned the affection of elite “ladies” into a noble pursuit. Key themes in their music included “humiliation to the lady, love as a means of spiritual improvement, the exclusive focus on married women of superior rank.” The troubadours, “had a single term for the ensemble of emotions and behavior they sang about: they called it fin’ amors, literally ‘fine love.’”⁸ It is now common to call this “courtly love.”

Many of these songs portray lovesick men falling over themselves attempting to woo an objectified – almost deified – woman. In these portraits, the elite “lady” has the power to accept or reject the humiliated suitor, and she often rejects him. Consider this give-and-take between lover and lady:

Gui d’Ussel, I’ll ask you this: when a lady

Freely loves a man, should she do

As much for him as he for her,

According to the rules of courtly love?

Lady Maria, my reply is this:

That the lady ought to do exactly

For her lover as he does for her,

Without regard to rank.

Gui, the lover humbly ought to ask

For everything his heart desires,

And the lady should comply,

And she should honor him the way

She would a friend, but never as a lord.

Lady, here the people say

That when a lady wants to love

She owes her lover equal honor,

Since they’re equally in love.

Gui, when suitors seek a lady’s grace

They get down on their knees, and say:

Grant that I may freely serve you, Lady,

As your man, and she receives him.

Thus to me it’s nothing short of treason

If a man says he’s her equal and her servant.⁹

The troubadours do not represent, as some have thought, the monumental shift toward feminism, but their influence marks a decided shift toward courtship as a primary societal value.¹⁰ Propriety and honor were at stake for the man in the winning of a “lady’s” affection. Here we see the ideal of elite society stated in terms of reciprocal affection rather than an exchange of property or a fortification of political power. It would take centuries for this ideal to become a common reality, but we see the seeds germinating.

We might say that twelfth-century Europe was not capable of conceiving of equality as we imagine it. It is noteworthy, however, that the conversation of “equal honor” is being openly discussed. Further to this point, we would do well to remember that some of the earliest troubadours were women poets. Scholar of French literature Marilyn Yalom writes:

Although it is difficult to know how much these songs and stories related to actual practice, it is safe to say that they did affect the way people began to think about love. The invention of romantic love represents what we today call a paradigm shift, one that offered a radically new set of relations between the sexes and one that has had surprisingly long-lasting consequences.¹¹

Medievalist C. S. Lewis wrote:

The troubadours effected a change which has left no corner of our ethics, our imagination, or our daily life untouched, and they erected impassible barriers between us and the classical past and the oriental present.¹²

In fact, it has become commonplace to say that the troubadours invented romantic love as we know it. While this is perhaps a Eurocentric overstatement, the point is well taken. Truly, “no corner of our ethic, imagination, or our daily life” is untouched by our desire (need?) for romantic affection.

In the fourteenth century, from the vernacular of Old French, the word “romanz” emerges. The word that once meant “verse narrative” evolved into our concept of “romance” and all that it now implies. This is not to say that erotic love or love poetry did not exist before this period. Of course, the term “erotic” reminds us of the Greek god “Eros” who embodied sexuality and power as early as 700 B.C.E. There can be no doubt that countless commoners across the ancient world felt a deep affection for their partners. But courtship (romance as primary motive for marriage) seems to be a medieval development. It should also be noted that erotic attraction had been a factor in choosing a mate long before the medieval period. It is the centrality of courtly love that is relatively recent.

The modern, Western concept of marriage is a case in point. Simply put, we marry for love. To marry for money, or power, or almost anything else is almost taboo. A “loveless marriage” is commonly seen as grounds for divorce. Undoubtedly it took centuries for the impact of the Persian and French poets to become the common basis for marriage, but the Western world is now driven by romance; it has become fundamental to our psychology and moral fiber. Because of this, it is almost impossible for us to imagine a world where romantic love wasn’t the basis for marriage.

C.S. Lewis claims that the explosion of courtly love ideology created “impassible barriers” between the modern, Western mind and the rest of human history and culture. Our preoccupation with romance motivates us, indeed defines us, in profound ways. This perspective on the world stands between us and a clear view of Jesus’ culture. It is also important to underscore a point I’ve made above: eroticism among the social elites (for example, the biblical eroticism of Song of Songs) probably doesn’t represent the experiences of common folk. Being of an artisan and farming class, Jesus’ life in first-century Galilee would have been dissimilar in a number of ways from those of the social elites such as Antony and Cleopatra. So not only are there cultural barriers between Jesus’ culture and ours, there were barriers between the ruling classes and the peasant classes during Jesus’ time.

In short, the motivations for and the functions of marriage in Jesus’ culture are simply going to seem remote to us. Our inability to imagine a world where courtship is not the basis for marriage is going to be a barrier that hinders our understanding of Jesus’ culture.

When we Westerners think of marriage, we think of a relationship built upon mutual affection, desire, and respect. Social and financial stability, extended family considerations, and progeny are often seen as important, but secondary. But in Jesus’ culture these priorities were reversed. Social and financial stability, extended family considerations, and progeny were primary. Mutual affection, desire, and respect were often seen as important, but secondary. If we are to take seriously the possibility that Jesus might have been married, we must anticipate motives for marriage that will seem quite alien to us.

GOOD FOR THE CLAN

Another conceptual barrier that stands between our culture and that of Jesus is the difference between individualism and collectivism. An appreciation of these fundamental differences might have a dramatic effect on how we feel about a married Jesus. After all, what if Jesus was arranged to be married when he was still young? In many collectivist cultures, this is not uncommon.

One might think of individualism as a typically Western default position. In general, the countries of Western Europe and those colonized by the British have tended to privilege the rights and well-being of the individual. These cultures also tend to emphasize personal achievement, even at the expense of family or group identities. It is often argued that individualist cultures nurture a greater sense of competition. Collectivist cultures, on the other hand, emphasize family identity and group ideals, often at the expense of individual needs, desires, and achievements.¹³ Jesus’ culture was closer to what we would call collectivism as compared to modern Western individualism.

An example of collectivism comes from a biblical book called Ezra that was written a few hundred years before the time of Jesus. Ezra tells the story of Israel’s displacement and slavery in Babylon and their eventual return. Ezra recounts how Cyrus the Great, King of Persia, helped Ezra’s people return to Jerusalem after almost two generations of exile. The Persian king is remembered so fondly for this act that he is called the Lord’s “messiah” by the prophet Isaiah.

For the Jews returning from Babylon, this was a chance to rebuild their culture from the ashes of Jerusalem. Ezra the priest was tasked with rebuilding a religion, culture, and ethnicity from the ground up. Ezra, chiefly concerned with the survival of Israel, was not a live-and-let-live sort of fellow. The freedom offered by Cyrus was not nearly enough to restore Israel. According to this story, Israel required a collective identity based on firm cultural boundaries, or it would not survive.

Ezra returns to Jerusalem to find that a group of Jews (who had been living in Judea during the exile) had married ethnic/religious foreigners. When he learns of this, Ezra tears out his beard, rips his clothing, and laments in prayer. Ezra, echoing a command from Deuteronomy, instructs: “Do not give your daughters to their sons, neither take their daughters for your sons.”¹⁴ He believed that Jewish–gentile intermarriage would result in collective sin. If Israel didn’t repent of this sin collectively, they would be guilty of national disobedience. The majority of the leaders of Judea agree, saying: “We have broken faith with our God and have married foreign women from the peoples of the land, but even now there is hope for Israel in spite of this. So now let us make a covenant with our God to send away all these wives and their children.”¹⁵ This story of collective repentance continues:

Then Ezra the priest stood up and said to them, “You have trespassed and married foreign women, and so increased the guilt of Israel. Now make confession to the Lord the God of your ancestors, and do his will; separate yourselves from the peoples of the land and from the foreign wives.” Then all the assembly answered with a loud voice, “It is so; we must do as you have said … Let our officials represent the whole assembly, and let all in our towns who have taken foreign wives come at appointed times, and with them the elders and judges of every town, until the fierce wrath of our God on this account is averted from us.” Only Jonathan son of Asahel and Jahzeiah son of Tikvah opposed this, and Meshullam and Shabbethai the Levites supported them.¹⁶

This tragic and troubling story concludes: “All these had married foreign women, and they sent them away with their children.”¹⁷ I highlight this story for three reasons. First, it illustrates a collectively felt guilt and a collective attempt to restore a social ideal. Second, it illustrates how the identity of the clan can sometimes trump the desires and needs of individuals and individual family units – sometimes with harrowing severity. Third, it speaks directly to marriage expectations. Each of these deserves greater explanation.

In Robert Frost’s famous poem, ‘Mending Wall,’ a cordial neighbor repeats the phrase “good fences make good neighbors.” In this poem, Frost laments the individualism of his culture. From his neighbor’s perspective, well-maintained property lines are good. But Frost questions their ultimate virtue. He wonders what he is “walling in” or “walling out” when he builds a fence. He wants to ask “to whom I was like to give offense.”¹⁸

Ezra’s first audiences would have had no concept of the kind of alienation voiced by Frost’s poem. In the cultures of Ezra and of Jesus, offenses were committed as a group and solved as a group. In cultures of collectivism, your sins are the sins of the entire group, and the collective sins of the group belong to you. Sacred traditions (especially) including marriage norms and taboos served to keep cultural fences intact.

As a child of Western individualism, I am always going to be troubled by Ezra’s view of intermarriage. Dividing fathers from their wives and children to rebuild ethnic and religious barriers is going to seem repugnant to me. When I read this, I see racism and dehumanization. But I must admit that my cultural upbringing forces me to focus on the plight of the individuals in this story. I think that I will never know how to read this story from a collectivist perspective. But my cultural perspective should have no claim of superiority over and against others.¹⁹

This is a story about rebuilding the “necessary walls” around Israel to maintain a culture that is on the brink of extinction. What Ezra knows – in a way that I never will – is that very few borders are more important than marriage norms and taboos. I know that this is the point of the story, but it doesn’t make it any less troubling for me. Because of my cultural inclinations, I would much rather have Frost’s problem.

Ezra’s story of a collective divorce is an extreme example. We should not think that this episode is indicative of common practice among collectivist cultures or Judaism specifically. Historically speaking, we can be relatively certain that this story does not represent a widespread practice. Even in this story, we see that a few individual leaders oppose the will of the clan.²⁰ Ultimately the ideal communicated in this story shows a unified decision to rebuild a cultural institution.

Sometimes it takes extreme examples to illustrate which ideals a group will defend most fiercely. The Hebrew Bible repeatedly commands care for destitute widows and orphans. Several texts command care for foreigners as well. In this case, however, we see a rare example where the boundaries of group identity are seen to be at odds with the desires and needs of individuals. In this particular example of collectivism, the ideals of group identity are primary – even at the painful expense of individuals.

The third reason I appeal to this story is to illustrate how the ideals of marriage and family reinforce a group’s collective identity. Marriage ideals and practices are integral to a culture’s sense of stability. Simply put, if you removed all marriage norms and taboos from ancient Israel, you would no longer have a group that resembled ancient Israel. Even reaching back to its earliest network of farming families, marriage ideals were tied to land, food, religious expression, and countless other identity markers. Scholar of ancient Israel, Carol Meyers, writes:

Just as the family was inextricably connected with its landholdings, so too were individual family members economically and psychologically embedded in the domestic group. As is widely recognized by anyone looking at premodern societies, the concept of the individual and individual identity as we know it today did not yet exist in the biblical world … The profound interdependence of family members in self-sufficient agrarian families thus created an atmosphere of corporate family identity, in which one could conceive not of personal goals and ventures but only of familial ones.²¹

We might allow a few emerging aspects of individuality during the time of Ezra, and perhaps even more during the time of Jesus due to the widespread impact of Greek and Roman ideals.²² But Ezra provides us with an example of the widespread desire to return to the ideals and practices of previous times. Not all Jews would have agreed with Ezra’s vision of reform, but many did.

Of course, illustrations of collectivism can only be taken so far. No doubt there were varying expressions of group identity during Jesus’ time. But here is what we can say without qualification: marriage would have been a decision made collectively and for the good of the clan. Even if a patriarchal figure was the guiding force behind the decision, he would not have been an independent agent. There would have been social consequences for moving outside of the bounds of marriage norms and taboos.

Young men in this context would have had a voice in the decision, but the decision for marriage would have been much more in the hands of the parents and patriarchs. If the rabbinic conversations are any indication (discussed in the next chapter), the will and wishes of the groom might have been considered with regard to whom he married. But, for most young men, there would have been no question of whether to marry.

CHALLENGES

If a married Jesus seems awkward or sacrilegious to us, could it be that we are projecting our ideal of romantic love onto an ancient personality? Could it also be that we are imagining Jesus in a world of individualism rather than collectivism? As we will see in the next chapter, it was not uncommon for a young man, emerging from puberty and never having pursued a romantic relationship, to find himself matched to a potential wife. This match would have been pursued by his parents and for the well-being of the entire clan. Marriage was not a decision made on the basis of “falling in love.”

Conversely, we would do well to recognize that popular portraits of Jesus pursuing Mary Magdalene like a first-century Romeo are anachronistic. Novelist Nikos Kazantzakis imagined that Jesus wanted a “normal life,” one wherein he could pursue the woman (or women) of his desire and settle down. Historian William E. Phipps imagined that Jesus’ wife turned to a life of prostitution in a tale of love lost and regained.²³ Such imaginative reconstructions tell us much more about ourselves than they do about Jesus. If we are to come to an informed opinion about Jesus’ marital status, we will have to train our imaginations to work in ways that might seem foreign to us.