The Wife of Jesus: Ancient Texts and Modern Scandals

ALTERNATIVE LIFESTYLE

I mean, brethren, the appointed time has grown very short. From now on, let those who have wives live as though they had none … and those who buy as though they had no goods.

– THE APOSTLE PAUL

Our default position should be that Jesus was probably married before he was thirty, unless we have good reason to think otherwise. But default positions are not conclusions. In this chapter I will suggest a few reasons as to why we might think of Jesus as a sexual nonconformist.

Jesus was expected to marry. If he wasn’t matched to a wife in his early twenties, the pressure would have been mounting by his late twenties. Jesus’ marriage – especially if he was the eldest son – would have provided civic stability and honor for his family. He would have felt the pressure to become a social and economic contributor. Civic responsibility and marriage fit hand-in-glove in Jesus’ culture. In this chapter I will refer to this network of religion, honor, economics, and family as “civic masculinity.” I will offer evidence that Jesus preached an alternative to civic masculinity.

CIVIC MASCULINITY

Biblical scholar Susan E. Haddox, in her reading of Genesis, suggests four criteria for masculinity.¹ While there are different ways to exhibit masculinity, a typical, biblical male:

1. avoids being feminized (especially avoids excessive attachment to women);

2. displays virility and strength (including warfare);

3. acts with honor (including provision for family, especially women);

4. speaks with persuasiveness, wisdom, honesty.²

It might be interesting to examine how the biblical portraits of Jesus compare and contrast with these criteria.³ Because of my present focus, I will highlight only her third criterion: manhood was defined, in large part, by one’s ability to act with honor within the clan with special emphasis on economic integrity.

Honor, of course, is a well-known biblical ideal. Famously, the fifth commandment given to Moses is to “honor your father and your mother.” Less famous is the second part of this verse: “honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land which the Lord your God gives you.”⁴ Honoring one’s parents is directly tied to land stewardship. In both the traditional narratives and practical realities of Jewish life, honor connected one’s ancestral property rights to future generations of inhabitants. We should not reduce honor to property considerations, but there is a greater danger in forgetting this connection. Honoring one’s family included commemoration, ritual, worship, and so on. But no less noble, and of paramount importance, was honorable stewardship of one’s inheritance.

This notion of familial honor was common throughout the ancient world, and continues in many parts of the world today. A model citizen in the ancient Mediterranean would honor the father–son relationship above all others. The bond between the father and the eldest son was the most important because it represented more than just the “nuclear family” – it represented the continuity between patriarchs and their ongoing (hopefully eternal) lifeblood through progeny. Jewish tradition honored this connection by keeping a portion of the ancestral land and wealth undivided as the joint possession of the extended family. While secondary heirs would receive portions of the inheritance, the eldest son would become the economic patron who would anchor the family’s well-being.

The ideal eldest male in Greek society carried similar responsibilities as “he assumed the responsibility for the honorable marriage of the family’s daughters; he acted as patron with the family by distribution of the father’s patrimony to his male siblings and to the family’s clients.”⁵ The Roman institution of “paterfamilias” mirrored this Greek ideal. This “father of the estate” managed the fortunes of the extended family and was responsible for the family’s civic connection within larger society. While the ideal of civic masculinity normally envisions a father figure who presides over a grand estate, the impact of this ideal was veritably global and created expectations for men even in modest households.⁶ One did not need to be a wealthy landowner, or even the eldest male of a clan, to feel the pressure of civic masculinity: “Corresponding to gender-specific space are gender-specific tasks and roles. Males are either engaged in agriculture or civic affairs (= ‘outdoors’ or ‘public’); thus they are farmers, herders, traders, or civic leaders.”⁷ Civic masculinity was built on the premise that the ideal male would have the power and responsibility of ownership. However wealthy he was, he would wield authority over his people and possessions. In this way, the ideal civic male would contribute to the larger economic and social integrity of the nation.

In the matrix of Greek, Roman, and Jewish cultures, civic masculinity provided the continuity of family wealth, but it also provided a continuity of collective morality. So integral was the family to Roman society that a first-century trend toward celibacy was seen as a national threat. As I mentioned in the previous chapter, Caesar Augustus introduced laws to penalize celibate citizens. Celibate males were prohibited from inheriting wealth and property from their next of kin. Married couples without children were obligated to release as much as half of their inheritance to kinsmen with children, or to the state.⁸

Augustus imposed these laws to preserve traditional marriage and family, put into place when Jesus was a child. Tacitus, a Roman politician and historian, wrote that these laws did little to squash the trend among social elites.⁹ What these laws show, however, is that the ideal of civic masculinity was a norm that (according to some) needed defending against the alternative lifestyle of celibacy. While on the rise, celibacy was considered by many to be a lifestyle set against the common good. This lifestyle would have been equally (perhaps even more) subversive for traditional Jewish families in Roman-ruled Israel.

Choosing celibacy in Jesus’ culture would have been as aberrant as choosing to not have a bank account in modern Western culture. Such an odd choice would demand some sort of explanation. Worse – and this is where the bank-account analogy fails to convey the full consequences – this decision would have had ramifications for mothers, siblings, and extended family members. For an eldest son to choose a lifestyle contrary to civic masculinity would have been seen as a dishonor to patriarchs and a willful neglect of future generations.

GODLY EUNUCHS

The Gospel of Matthew includes one of the most peculiar sayings in the New Testament. Jesus addresses the topic of men who differ from sexual normalcy:

For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by others, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let anyone accept this who can.¹⁰

This saying is notoriously perplexing. Taken at face value, Jesus addresses masculinity. But does he also imply gender more generally? It is unclear whether Jesus is talking about a simple absence of penis and/or testicles or whether he is talking about a gender principle that might extend to women as well as men. You may recall that some rabbis saw fit to declare a boy a “eunuch” if he had not produced two pubic hairs by the age of twenty. Is Jesus referring to stunted maturity and/or sterility? I would argue that this saying has much more in view than just physical deformity. To this end, I will make four observations.

My first observation is that Jesus acknowledges that both nature and choice are involved in this identification. Some people are simply born with a physicality that differs from sexual norms. Others choose an alternative lifestyle. I think that the conversation that leads up to this saying helps to explain what Jesus is talking about: Jesus’ disciples say, “It is better not to marry.” Jesus confirms, “Not everyone can accept this teaching, but only those to whom it is given.”¹¹ It is a conversation about singleness that leads to Jesus’ statement about eunuchs. At least in Matthew’s context, being a eunuch is not simply about lacking reproductive organs, it implies a lifestyle choice: celibacy.¹² Those who choose the life of a eunuch are choosing to forgo the traditional avenues of marriage and family.¹³

Second, there can be no doubt that this statement would have undermined civic masculinity for those who knew the instructions of Deuteronomy: “He whose testicles are crushed or whose male member is cut off shall not enter the assembly of the Lord.”¹⁴ From this perspective, becoming a eunuch is a subversion of the Jewish ideal for civic masculinity. Even if Jesus is simply talking about mere physical deformity, this particular deformity would have had civic disadvantages.

Third, Jesus thinks that choosing this sexual alternative can be done for godly reasons. Jesus clearly states that some men choose this as a godly alternative. The choice to forgo fatherhood and traditional masculinity is not necessarily contrary to God’s purposes. Indeed, Jesus says here that some choose this alternative lifestyle for the sake of “the kingdom of Heaven.” Given that marriage was woven together with social and economic security, Jesus’ suggestion that a man might choose otherwise for godly reasons is both socially and fiscally subversive.

Fourth, whatever our interpretation of this passage, we must acknowledge that Jesus is saying something scandalous. Jesus says that “not everyone can accept this teaching, but only those to whom it is given.” He then makes his statement about godly eunuchs and concludes with these words: “Let anyone accept this who can.” Clearly Jesus knew that this saying would be hard to hear for many people – he says so twice. Jesus expects that people with traditional views of fatherhood and masculinity are going to have a hard time accepting this teaching.

In today’s climate of gender advocacy, it is common for scholars to “oversex the text.” It would be typical for those invested in social activism to turn Jesus into a modern advocate. I would suggest that we must be cautious when our Jesus begins to look too much like us. But it is equally irresponsible to tame Jesus – to smooth over his words in favor of a traditional view of sexuality and gender. In the case of eunuchs, Jesus is clearly challenging a first-century view of civic masculinity.

SECURITY IS FOR THE BIRDS

Jesus’ saying about godly eunuchs is just one indication among many that Jesus discouraged traditional notions of civic masculinity. This short section will list a number of Jesus’ sayings as they are found in the Gospels. In providing this list, I am not making any judgment about whether these are word-for-word citations from the lips of Jesus. What I hope to show is that Jesus left the general impression that his views on marriage and family did not follow societal expectations for civic stability.

Consider this exchange between Peter (who represents the disciples) and Jesus:

Peter said, “See, we have left our own and followed you.” And Jesus said to them, “Truly I say to you, there is no one who has left house or wife or brothers or parents or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, who will not receive many times as much at this time and in the age to come, eternal life.”¹⁵

I must confess that I find this saying to be among the most troubling in the New Testament. Did Jesus encourage his disciples to leave their families behind? Did the men who followed Jesus become irresponsible husbands and fathers? Did they leave their dependants in the lurch? In a culture of collectivism, such a teaching would have had enormous economic and social consequences.¹⁶ Jesus knew well the costs. His disciples remembered these words:

Do not think that I have come to bring peace on earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s foes will be those of his own household. He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and he who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.¹⁷

In Luke’s Gospel, this sentiment is even more troubling: “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.”¹⁸

These words ring hollow in the Christianized West. In a culture where those most invested in Jesus’ teachings are the same people who tend to champion “traditional family” values, these are hard words to hear and even more difficult to render into religious practice. But among the earliest Christians, these words were commemorated and cherished. Many people who joined Jesus’ movement found themselves detached from their families. This meant that many were cut off from their social and financial support networks. These words legitimized an alternative view of marriage and family.¹⁹ It seems that Jesus redefined “family” for his followers:

While he was still speaking to the people, behold, his mother and his brothers stood outside, asking to speak to him. But he replied to the man who told him, “Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?” And stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother, and sister, and mother.”²⁰

In this passage, Jesus redefines family as those who are bound by religion over and against blood relations. To many of Jesus’ audiences, the distinction between religion and household responsibilities would have seemed counterintuitive. Like many modern religious people, most of Jesus’ contemporaries would have seen good religion, good family, and good citizenship as vines intertwined. But Jesus seems to want to drive a wedge through societal norms.²¹ It is also crucial to notice that Jesus models his teaching by belittling (dishonoring?) his own family. His scandalous redefinition of family is exemplified in his own life.²² In a similar vein, Luke provides this exchange:

While Jesus was saying these things, one of the women in the crowd raised her voice and said to him, “Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts at which you nursed.” But he said, “On the contrary, blessed are those who hear the word of God and observe it.”²³

The early Christians used these words to unify themselves as a spiritual family.

Traditionally, scholars have argued that new Jewish “converts” to Christianity were ostracized from their families and from their larger social and business networks. But I think this idea has missed an important element. I think that it is likely that Jesus’ first Jewish followers were encouraged to disassociate from their blood relatives. Many of these followers found themselves cut off from their social and economic networks because they chose to disavow traditional honor, economic, and family values. Furthermore, there is good reason to believe that this practice stems from Jesus’ preaching. This exchange between Jesus and two would-be followers illustrates my point:

… a scribe came and said to him, “Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.” Jesus said to him, “The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.”²⁴ Another of the disciples said to him, “Lord, permit me first to go and bury my father.” But Jesus said to him, “Follow me, and allow the dead to bury their own dead.”²⁵

Notice again that Jesus uses himself as a model. He calls himself the “son of man” and explains that he has “nowhere to lay his head.” This, of course, is hyperbole. Jesus probably slept in many different locations, including the houses of followers and patrons. What Jesus suggests here is that he has forsaken the home of his family. This would have been seen by many as a disregard for the command to “honor your father and your mother.”²⁶

Both of these would-be followers are forced to count the cost of discipleship. Following Jesus meant surrendering economic and social security. The scribe is told that becoming a follower involves the sacrifice of stable bedding and roofing. The disciple in this passage is told to abandon his responsibilities as a biological son. This, of course, would also mean sacrificing any claim he might have on inheritance. Set together, both conversations probably spoke against traditional notions of religion, honor, economics, and family – what I have called civic masculinity.

This is not to say that every follower of Jesus disavowed his or her family, but there is a great deal of evidence that the earliest followers of Jesus forsook civic masculinity, including marriage and family.²⁷ The problems that this must have created for the biological families of the first Christians must have been enormous. Perhaps this is why Jesus’ disciples eventually returned to the practice of marriage, as assumed by Paul.

Jesus’ stance on wealth and his indictments of the wealthy are well known. His famous “consider the lilies … consider the birds …” sayings are lofty aspirations in the Christianized West. Jesus preached, “do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear.”²⁸ But in a culture where honorable men promoted the social and economic securities of their families, such a message would have castrated would-be fathers and husbands. Without possessions and the power to provide for a family, influence society, and propel honor to future generations, men could not honor their fathers, much less support wives.

CHALLENGES

In the Introduction, I suggested that John the Baptist lived like an ascetic, forsaking all worldly comforts. Jesus, on the other hand, did not live like an ascetic. The reason that Jesus could feast, drink, and attend parties was because he was willing to accept patronage from wealthy followers. But, having forsaken his home in Galilee, Jesus would have had a very difficult time establishing himself as a civic entity.

Marriage allowed men to become socially and fiscally secure within civil society. Yet Jesus is remembered for criticizing social and fiscal security. Jesus, it seems, had an altogether different notion of family. So while our default stance should expect that Jesus was probably married, the Gospels give several indications that he might not have been the marrying type. He did not seem to hold blood ties in high regard. He did not choose a lifestyle that would provide for a household. He seemed to live as if the world as he knew it was coming to an end. Thus provision for future generations was not a part of his message. In all of these ways, Jesus subverted civic masculinity and quite possibly the institution of marriage, which stood at the center of civic masculinity.

For these reasons, I think that it is highly unlikely that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene or to any of his followers during his preaching career. We cannot rule out the possibility that Jesus was previously married (perhaps in his early twenties), but he seems almost “anti-family” during his teaching and preaching career. I have argued that civic responsibility and marriage fit hand-in-glove in Jesus’ culture. Jesus seems to have rejected traditional notions of civic responsibility. Does this suggest that he chose the aberrant and alternative lifestyle of celibacy?