Jesus was probably gay

The intransigent position that homosexuality is "wrong" taken by some Christian sects, and strongly held particularly by the Roman Catholic Church and the so-called evangelical or fundamentalist protestant sects would certainly be dealt a blow if it could be established that Jesus was himself a gay man.

The evidence we have is: 1. Jesus did not marry; 2. Jesus spent most of his time with other men; 3. there was "the disciple whom Jesus loved"; 4. there was Jesus with the naked boy in the garden. This evidence is by no means conclusive, but at least there is some evidence. There appears to be none at all that he was heterosexual.

I am bringing up this topic, because I am tired of hearing from members of certain christian sects that the Bible condemns homosexuality in no uncertain terms, when in fact it is well known that the Bible contains without condemnation a variety of stories about gay relationships. Moroever, the context in which the Bible appears to condemn homosexuaity is one in which a long list of other activities, like wearing clothes made of two different kinds of material are also condemned, and makes the condemnation of these activities ridiculous when viewed from our modern perspective. It is sad that these people, who purport to base their beliefs on this book, do so only to the extent that they are able to find selected passages that seem to support their prejudices.

They will do nothing to educate themselves but ardently hold on to their bigotry. I feel sad for them. I have no problem with their holding on to their "beliefs", so long as they keep them to themselves, but when they use them to harm other people, such as through legislation or by indoctrinating children then I draw the line on religious freedom.

What say you?

Two books you might want to look at are both by
Jennings Jr., Theodore W. "The Man Jesus Loved: Homoerotic Narratives from the New Testament" Pilgrim Press (May 2003) ISBN: 082981535X
"Jacob's Wound: Homoerotic Narrative in the Literature of Ancient Israel", Continuum, 2005 ISBN: 0826417124

Jennings is a well-regarded professor at the Chicago Theological Seminary (and as it happens heterosexually married, I am reliably told)

And there's also that matter of the Secret Gospel of Mark. What should we make of it? (rhetorical question)

Well, the fundamentalists don't care about reason. There are more hints that Jesus was not a straight person. The Bible scholars point to the fact that Jesus was definitely married, because the rabbinical tradition did not allow a man to become rabbi without being married. On the other hand, even if he was married, it's true that he has spent all his life with men and he had a preferred disciple. It makes no sense to pretend that his "beloved disciple" was preferred only because of some divine spiritual qualities, because he was...the youngest of twelve!

I have asked once a group of fundamentalists: why don't you celebrate the "friendship between Jesus and John" like in the biblical passage, by embracing each other? There is no way to communicate with mentally deaf people!

In fact, even when talking about something really obvious, like the relation between David and Jonathan, they are refusing to see the reality!

It might not have been obvious 3000 years ago, but now, if we are seeing two men kissing each other, embracing each other, dating each other, one of them giving to the other one his own right to be a ...king, crying on each other's shoulder etc....we know right away that they are not straight...at least not the one who gives everything!

Plus, in the Evangelia by Mark, there is a passage which has survived only in one of the Apocrypha: where Jesus spends his night with "a young man covered only with a linen" and they spoke all night about the kingdom of God!

I would like to do that too, in remembrance of Jesus!

I'm gay, and I believe that Jesus' orientation was not important. It's like when you consider anyone; what is important about them... You consider their actions, words, and demeanor.

I understand the point you are making here with this discussion. However, we can speculate about this, but it might as well be another "DaVinci Code"... only this time it's a story involving Jesus and his male partner (rather than Jesus and a woman procreating and creating a lineage up to the present time).

The fact that Jesus never married and spent his time with men doesn't equate a sexual orientation. You might as well say that all single football players are gay. (Well, granted a few of them are. It is ten percent, after all.)

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I once mentioned the idea that Jesus was gay to a woman from India. She told me that in India, it is widely assumed that Jesus was gay. I had never heard this before.

I'm gay, but it doesn't matter to me whether Jesus was gay or not. I do know, however, that if he was there has definitely been a huge effort by modern (pseudo-) Christian leaders to suppress that information. Modern Christianity surely has very little to do with Jesus, except for the Quakers and maybe the United Church of Christ.

I think the 'evidence' is fairly weak that Jesus may have been gay. I don't think that just because he spent a lot of time with 12 guys means too much (there were also women that traveled with him and the others as well). It is difficult to even address this question viewing it thru the lens of 21st Century. There certainly appeared to have been deep love relationships been Jesus and the apostles, but I don't think one can immediately assume these were erotic in nature. The bigger question I have is how he would have treated a gay folks based on what has been written about his life and interaction with others.

(And actually, it isn't ten percent, after all. It's probably more like in the 2-4% range.)

In fact, as I said, it's not just that. There are more reasons to that.
1. He was described as talking all night about the kingdom of God with a naked youth, covered only with a linen, in the Apocrypha
2. In Mark, the same naked youth appears and talks to him furtively
3. He has a beloved disciple That was absolutele a no-no in the Jewish history!
4 The beloved disciple is the youngest of all, which is in agreement with the helenistic traditions for gay relations
5. Palestine was situated in the helenistic area, and we know about fights between the helenists and the tradional Jews
6. None of the previous Judaic traditions have described any "prophet" of Israel as having a "beloved disciple". This is entirely new for that homophobic culture!
7 The perception of "impropriety" in the Jewish tradition was definitely not related with the "more than friendly" relations between men (see the David and Jonathan "friendship"); but only with the physical relations between men. Like everybody, gay people were all married at that time. Our present-day mentality is different: we can distinguish much better the gay love even in the absence of physical relations!
I think chances are that Jesus was gay (more than 70%).
On the other hand, he also was friends with the "sinners" like the prostitutes! That can tell everybody that he was quite liberal, if referred not only to the ancient standards, but also to our standards.

I think the point is moot....Jesus was God incarnate...How could he love or prefere one gender over another? I don't think it matters. For me, it couldn't matter less whether or not He has sex while he was here, or who might have had sex with. To my mind, it wouldn't change or lessen His divinity. While He was here, He was human. Humans have sex. And they aren't made evil by the act. The only difference it would make it that proving He did these things would silence the haters...I believe that because Jesus saw each individual through the eyes of God, that He loved everyone equal...I like to think that He was in love with every person He ever met.

Michael Travis Jasper
author of the novel, "To Be Chosen"

This point isn't moot! This is the problem: your question is valid: "How could he love or prefer one gender over another? ". Yet HE DID PREFER the younger guy to be his beloved disciple! A god or a relative of god, be it his son, his daughter-in law or some other relative (mother-in-law, father-in-law, etc) would not prefer a young cute human being over another human being: for such a supernatural being (god) everybody would be equal! But obviously Jesus was no god! He did so many mistakes! Nobody agrees any longer with everything he said or did!

I agree with Sardonicus.Anyone can put their own spin regarding Jesus. Years ago a book was published "We Are Not the First". This author took passages from the bible that he interpreted to prove that people were descended from people from space who inhabitated earth!
Regarding Jesus:Gay or Straight - I always felt that he was more of a 'hippie' type character-someone who marched to the beat of a different drum - who had nothing but philisophies and some people followed him. Somewhat the same as Charles Manson(to use an extreme example)
Put Charlie in the time of Jesus and you have someone people talk about.(of course Jesus didn't kill)
Straight or gay is really a MOOT point. Nothing can be proved.
If you are a gay author like Michael Scheifelbien - all his vampire books are based on Jesus being gay.
So it depends on who you are.

I agree with you , Jane. The most probable image of Jesus is that of a non-criminal Charles Manson or David Khoresh. You can identify many clear mistakes in the sayings and deeds of Jesus. Plus, he did not "cancel" the savage rules of the "Old Testament". And it is obvious that he never cared too much about what the future generations would think about him or do in his name! Many people died with the expectation that "he will be with us until the end of times". Yet gruesome wars have happened, ethnic cleansing has happen, the inquisition has happened and so on, without any evidence of the presence of Jesus!!!

I know cases when monks in Eastern Europe (recently) have castrated themselves because of his crazy anti-sexual sayings! Recently a monk has even cut his penis "in his name"!
As for the question if he was "gay" or not, the word gay designates a reality that did not exist at that time!

If even his existence is doubted by many people, how can we know for sure if he has had "homosexual tendencies"? For the "true believers" in anything, this would be a blasphemy! For those insisting that he did not exist, that he is just another myth, this issue is a nonsense!

But when you put together all the information we think we have about him, it is obvious that most of this information suggests that the "pro-gay" arguments are far more numerous than those that suggest a typical heterosexual orientation!

I had vowed to myself that I would not participate in this ridiculous thread, but I feel I must comment on:

"the word gay designates a reality that did not exist at that time!"

Homosexuality has existed from the beginning of mankind. Just because there wasn't a name for it or anyone understood what it was, doesn't deny its existence.

Ever seen graffitti on the Roman Baths?At that time there was no taboo,about men being with men.It was as natural as men being with women. Centuries later people started covering up male nude statues, etc. Now we uncover them. We are trying to apply our modern day values and terms on something that was as natural as breathing! It was what it was.

Remember as well, Anton, that at that time across Europe and especially Rome, having a relationship and sex with men was the norm.The phallus in Roman baths and on doors was acceptable. We are trying to apply our modern sensibilities to ancient people. Erastes has photos of ancient jars and jugs that have men and boys together.
Ever see the myriad documentaries on 'how did they build the pyramids?' Of course WE modern people can't figure it out because we are applying our modern techniques to something that was a natural to the Egyptians as breathing.
He was what he was..as The Romans and Spartans, did what they did.
Jesus was a man who hung out with a group of other men.He was a hippie so he called his group followers.He was a man who loved other men.

To Mark Probst:
You are actually wrong. In fact the term homosexuality was invented in 1868 by a Hungarian journalist who wrote a letter to Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld in Germany. The term heterosexuality was invented only 10 years later, while asexuality...much, much later! These terms are marking a deep change in the paradigms about sexuality! It is not just the use of a different word or expression, as you think, but it is in fact a change in the entire conception about sexuality!!!!

The ancient people did not understand sexuality the way the majority of our contemporaries are understanding it! While the Ancient Greeks and then Romans, or Celts, and Hittites were understanding sexuality in terms of "the love of the young and beautiful", the sex of the beloved ones being irrelevant, the Semitic tribes were considering it only as a "transgression" of "the Book"!

In other words, homosexuality was never perceived in the ancient world as a stable and irreversible condition, as the word Gay implies! For the Jewish mentality, I recommend you to read the Bible!
So there is a huge difference!!!

This is because "the pie" of sexuality, like many other pies, can be divided in totally different fashions: either by separating "the actives" from "the passives", regardless of the sex of the "passives", as it was the case in the ancient world, or by age, regardless of sex, as it was the case mostly in the Roman world, or by other criteria, like sex or gender, as it is the case for us today, because of the semitic heritage, in homosexuals and heterosexuals (no matter how sick these words sound!).

In fact in the Ancient Greece this different brand of bisexuality from their society was put to good work, to educate young boys, under the name of "pederasty", a term which for Christians has become an Anathema, exactly because a different perception of sexuality!!!

I am repeating myself, Jane: you are absolutely right!

The problem is that nowadays many people cannot even understand these facts, mostly because of the Christian, Jewish and Muslim religious brainwashing!

The meaning of the the Phallus exposed in the Roman world on almost every house even on the walls was...a sign of Good Luck!!!
Read the first novel of the world: "Satyricon"!

The ancient understanding of the sexuality was indeed very different than the Christian understanding of today, which, according to many personalities, is an anomaly and it does not fit reality. Actually Goethe once said: "he who doesn't believe in a return in full force of the Ancient Greece is a fool!". He also said "Die Knabenliebe sei so alt wie die Menschheit!".

This is exactly the aspect you were referring to: the change in our civilization toward coming back to a non-religious understanding of the world, toward a more humane civilization!

Obviously things are even more complex than that. The Ancient Greek understanding of sexuality is clearly bisexual in a very specific way (not covered by today's use of this word). All men had actually an obligation to love boys for pedagogical purposes. "HO PAIS KALOS" - "the boy is beautiful" was written on almost all vases! Even on those ones which are showing an older guy...vomiting!
It was like a slogan!

On the other hand, in the Roman culture, the poet Catullus writes poems to both Juventius (whom he wants to kiss many thousand times) and to...young Lesbia!
In the case of the couple of brother and sister Aufilenus and Aufilena, he still prefers...Aufilenus!

To think that exactly in the same time the Jewish tradition pretended that those who transgress the Torah have to be put to death!

Hopefully the barbarian age of Judeo-Christianity is almost over!
Bye-bye Jesus! Bye-bye David... Khoresh or not!

I agree totally with Jane. I also agree it is 10% plus. Unless you are gay, you probably don't realize how many are living as heterosexuals because of the fear and shame the churches want to place on homosexuals.

It's existed forever because it is a natural phenonemon. People are gay because they are born that way. You don't become gay. Betwen 5%-6% of the population is gay and always has been. The same applies to so called paedophiles. It's not a matter of choice.

GREAT point!!!

A number of responses indicate the lack of historical appreciation for the homosexual orientation. This is true; everyone who lived in any of the places or at any of the times when the various books of the Christian bible were written married out of necessity as early as they could start producing children, usually to someone of their parents' choosing. They didn't have the luxury of marrying for love or passion; anyone who didn't have children to take care of them when they were old (at, say, 42) would be a charity case on everyone else's children.
So whether Jesus was gay or not, and even if he knew that one day it would be no burden on society if gay people lived as gay people, he couldn't have said that two thousand years ago; it would have made no sense to anyone, no one would take him seriously, and his mission would fail.
In terms of older bible passages, consider this: all the essentials for the creation of a new life were believed to be in male ejaculate, and the woman's only function was that of an oven. This is why it was once okay to rape your female slaves (talk about abomination); the baby was the man's alone. By the same token, any man who wasted his seed in any way was essentially killing people. This could be masturbation, and it could also be having sex with another man. Also, consider this: the Jewish race, at the time the Torah (the first five books of the Christian Old Testament) was written, was desperate to increase its numbers and to purify its identity. So wasting seed was a capital offense that got men like Onan killed (look up Genesis 38, 1-11). It was mostly tangential that a man wasted seed with another man. It was wasting seed at all that got people (that is, men; women were just ovens) condemned.
Anyone who'd like to read a story about how a gay person can be comfortable in Christianity should check out my second novel, THINKING STRAIGHT, about a gay teen whose Christian fundamentalist parents put him into a deprogramming center to straighten him out. He goes in Christian, and that doesn't change. It doesn't need to because of what he figures out while he's in there.
So, was Jesus gay? I guess I don't think it matters.

Mr Reardon: I mostly disagree with you while I strongly agree with Jane!

I cannot agree with your "explanations" about Jesus! First of all I do not agree with you "trying to have it both ways"! Got it???

If you really believe that Jesus was a god and he was "here on Earth" in a "mission", as you are expressing yourself, then all your blah blah blah about historical factors is not an excuse, it is just junk! To say that "... whether Jesus was gay or not, and even if he knew that one day it would be no burden on society if gay people lived as gay people, he couldn't have said that two thousand years ago; it would have made no sense to anyone, no one would take him seriously, and his mission would fail"..well, this would be just plain CRAP!! This is like believing on one hand that Jesus is god, but giving him attenuating circumstances because you are also analyzing the historical condition for the times he lived in! If he was the god that created the Universe, it would have been a very simple thing for him to change like a magician everything he has "created"! Right or not???

I really hope you will understand that if you take the approach that "Jesus is God" all your "explanatory" blah blah blah here has no value at all! If he is God, no "mission" of God can fail, because He is anyway...God himself! The "god" that created the Universe cannot make mistakes; even less...blunders! Because he is anyway,..."The Creator of the Universe"...blah blah blah!

He is All-powerful and blah blah blah and it does not matter if people don't understand anything! True or not?

On the other hand, if you think (as Jane does - and as I do too) that Jesus was very similar to a present-day hippy, then again what you are saying has no value at all, because his pretensions of being an incarnate god has no merit at all! But in this case we can indeed explain or try to explain everything in terms of human sociology and just accept the (true) fact that he said and did many stupid things!
Which is true, but there is no excuse for Jesus in doing and saying stupidities as it happened!

To try always to have it "both ways" has no future and anyway it is , to say the least, very very sad!!!

I still do not know if you understand the fact that if Jesus would have been "a god" we would be entirely justified in asking from him to be a perfect Being, which is in no way the case!

To Mr. Constantinescu -

Hmmm... I seem to have struck a nerve.

Actually, if you read the Christian bible from the beginning of the Old Testament, you see that the way the scriptures tell people to live their lives changes from book to book to book - that is, from one period of time (with all its associated politics, technology or lack thereof, social infrastructure, etc.) to another. You will see that the "do-s" and "don't-s" vary significantly from one period to the next.

For example, Jesus seems to have been trying to grant to women a much more human status than they were given at - oh, say, the time that Sodom was destroyed, when Lot offered his two virgin daughters to the rapacious crowd outside his house instead of the two strangers (angels in disguise) who had arrived there to tell Lot and his family to flee. Jesus seemed to treat women as more than ovens for babies. And if he were among us today, I daresay he would tell us that being homosexual today - in our time and place - is not a problem.

Quite the opposite of trying to have things both ways, as you accuse, what I'm suggesting is that since God has always granted "man" free will to do what he will and believe what he will, it's not likely that Jesus would have gone against that to force people to believe something that made no sense to them.

In Genesis, if God had wanted to "fix" the people of Sodom (who were condemned as merciless and without charity), anyone who believes God to be almighty must admit that he could have done that rather than destroying the entire city. Abraham himself argued with God about this. But God decided to destroy the place without doing anything to force them to think, act, or believe in a certain way. And since God himself didn't force people to follow his dictates then, why would Jesus suddenly force people to believe him? If he wanted to do that, and if he wanted everyone to believe the message as presented in the New Testament, there would be no people on earth who didn't call themselves Christians.

Over and over we see the books of the bible speaking to people in language that made sense to them - in their respective times. Jesus himself spoke repeatedly, as reported in the New Testament, in language using anecdotes and metaphors and similes that related to fishing. Why? Because if he was God incarnate, he knew that his mission would be a very short one, and that he'd have to communicate his message quickly and efficiently to his followers. And what had most of his disciples been prior to becoming his disciples? Fishermen. So Jesus spoke to them - in fact, to everyone - in language that made sense to them. This approach, rather than denying his sanctity, actually supports it. Would he have known to do that if he had been just some rabbi from Nazareth?

Both ways? I don't think so. Because even if you believe that every word in the bible is the direct and infallible word of God himself, it's still true that the specifics change over time, from book to book, according to the times the people were living in. To take scripture out of its historical context will not, I think, lead to greater understanding, but rather to a kind of absolutism in which thinking is denounced. And it would mean that we must still condemn men who lie with men - which I, for one, refuse to do.

We're told to love God with all of ourselves, including our minds. That means thinking. If God didn't want people to understand what he's saying, why would he say it? Why would he create a human "son" to address man on his own level? I think God wants us to understand. And I think the fact that the bible changes its instructions for us over time proves that.

It's unclear to me whether you believe Jesus was the son of God, or God incarnate. It seems to me that you assume I do. Don't assume anything.

Indeed you have strucked a nerve here, Mr. Reardon! I really think that you are better as a writer than as a thinker and analyst!

I will start by presenting my observations: Quote:

" Actually, if you read the Christian bible from the beginning of the Old Testament, you see that the way the scriptures tell people to live their lives changes from book to book to book - that is, from one period of time ...to another...".

Yes! The more I read this, the more astonished I am about people believing for one hand that everything in the bible is "god's word" and on the other hand making (pertinent) sociological observations based on our 21st century values! By this I mean "having it both ways". Next:

"For example, Jesus seems to have been trying to grant to women a much more human status than they were given..."

Yeah right!!?? How can you say that?

The Jewish tradition was indeed very oppressive to women, almost like the Muslim tradition of today. But before Jesus, women could at least divorce from a bad husband! Jesus has changed all that: the divorce was no more possible for the next...2000 years! Even now, during the last century, the divorce was impossible even in...Italy!! Have you seen the movie "Divorce-Italian style" ?

Jesus has introduced the impossibility of splitting families, even if the husband was a psychopath, an "adulterer", an impotent or a...homosexual! No exception to the rule! No meant no, for 2000 years or so!

By the way, Mr Reardon, have you noticed in the bible that the persons who wrote the "new testament" have mentioned very accurately the names of Jesus' brothers while paying no attention at all to his sisters? Did you know why? I am telling you: because in the eyes of the Hebrew religion women were considered non-persons, just property with no name! Like cows or chickens! Next:

"oh, say, the time that Sodom was destroyed, when Lot offered his two virgin daughters to the rapacious crowd outside his house instead of the two strangers (angels in disguise) who had arrived there to tell Lot and his family to flee"

What can I say, Mr Reardon? What I told you in the beginning: that I am more than astonished that people like you can believe that biblical spam! How come can you believe that Lot's wife has been transformed into a salt statue? Really, Mr Reardon, if you can believe that, you can believe any crap! Next:

"n Genesis, if God had wanted to "fix" the people of Sodom (who were condemned as merciless and without charity), anyone who believes God to be almighty must admit that he could have done that rather than destroying the entire city. Abraham himself argued with God .." The whole paragraph is just a bunch of non-sense! Who can believe that non-sense other than a ...fundamentalist? Anyway, you are trying here to justify awful crimes! Good luck to you! Next:

"To take scripture out of its historical context will not, I think, lead to greater understanding,"

I was ready to yell: "Evrika" Finally a common-sense statement! Heck no! After I saw that you are doing exactly the opposite of what you are saying!

Le's put things into the right context! The Leviticus and the Deuteronomy, both of them requiring "punishments" like stoning to death, without due process, for being a homosexual, or for a woman for having sex during her menstruation, were written after the Babylonian captivity. That means they were written IN THE SAME TIME when in Athens NOBODY COULD BE PUNISHED WITHOUT A DUE PROCESS!!!
In Athens , the lowest number of judges considered legal was...501!! See Socrate's trial! For important cases, their number was 2001!! Can you make a difference between the Jewish Law (which in fact did not exist; everything was performed by the religious mob) and the Ancient Greek courts?? Next:

"It's unclear to me whether you believe Jesus was the son of God, or God incarnate. It seems to me that you assume I do. Don't assume anything."

Well, Mr Reardon, you actually don't need to assume anything about me, because I have explained myself at least twice, when I mentioned that Jane's assertion that Jesus was like a hippy is correct. Why do you assume though that I need to choose only between your two proposals: that either I believe that Jesus was God incarnate or I "only" believe that he was "merely" the son of god! Really, I believe none of your...alternative!!
I don't believe either one of these two proposals of yours!