Was Jesus a sexually expressive human being?
The issue is further complicated. Quite simply, did Jesus, also acknowledged as a sinner who breaks the rules of the day and allows his disciples to do likewise, have sex freely with his followers? Of course he did! He was vigorous and young and male. He practiced compassion and love. He did not fast but he did pray a lot, as is reported in the texts. At one point Jesus says when questioned. "Why should I fast? I have done nothing wrong to repent from."
We must be careful not to view those times with the eyes and attitudes of these times, as I am afraid Karen King, the professor and Christian, does. Karen King tries to make out that Mary Magdalene was not a prostitute but a leading apostle of the earliest Christian Church. King cites a second century gospel, the Gospel of Mary, as the evidence that Mary Magdalene had a different image than that of a prostitute in those first Christian days. While this may be true, it does not counter the fact that Mary Magdalene might also have been a high level prostitute in her younger days. Being a courtesan was in fact an acceptable position for women in those times. A courtesan was an educated woman who was a companion at many levels to high level men or even one man at a time. It was recognized then that not every woman was meant to marry in the traditional way to have children and a family with one man, though in the Jewish tradition a man could have more than one wife, apparently.
What we are getting at is the sexual issue. The image of Jesus as the Christ has been one of being somewhat human but mostly divine and therefore devoid of sexuality himself, though he is described as maybe a heavy drinker of wine, a wine-bibber. What a strange term. It is so hard for the Christians to just describe things about Jesus in simply direct terms like they might have for any of the rest of us if we had lived significant lives in those days.
So the Karen King position that Mary Magdalene was not a prostitute simply cannot be sustained by the evidence. She could easily have been a redeemed sinner. Let's hope that all of us, including Karen King, are redeemed sinners in some significant way. Just because Karen King is a distinguished Christian professor now does that mean she never sinned, never gave sex for money or companionship, never had her orgies, never exploited people, never had secret affairs when she was of ripe sexual age? I hardly think that being a professor now in older age means decisively that she was never a sinner of any kind. It defies logic to say so.
So as with King then so with Mary Magdalene. Who is to say what the first Christian sexual practices were? There is in fact evidence in Paul's letters at around 50 J.E. that at least certain Christian groups were having sex together, yes, in groups. And so what!
Why does having sex with others make you a bad person, even if you charge money for it sometimes? Don't we charge money to others for what we are good at? Why should not someone who is really experienced at sexual love also charge for it? We all have to make a living, don't we? The fact is that people who marry also charge for their sexual favors, if not always in money, in goods and services. Is it true that both of a marriage earn equal income and contribute equal money to the upkeep of the marriage? Hardly ever. It is certainly acceptable in many marriages that one partner lives off the money of the other partner if earning nothing or less.
Why could not Mary Magdalene have had sex with Jesus and with Peter and with women such as Salomé? Don't forget, there are three women reported as observing the crucifixion of Jesus. Why are they there if they were not in very close relationship with Jesus and with each other? Mary the mother of Jesus was certainly at the crucifixion, as reported in the earliest synoptic gospel accounts. But so was Mary Magdalene, and so was another woman named Salomé, who is no where else mentioned in the Synoptics.
Salomé figures prominently in one of the sections of the Gospel of Thomas. Salomé is the only person reported anywhere in the earliest texts who confronts Jesus directly with a question about himself. No one else dares ask Jesus a personal question. But Salomé asks Jesus, by what authority, what power, do you just climb upon my couch? Jesus answers that he is not split apart like Salomé. He is united within his core self and so he can act the way he does. He knows what he is doing and doing what he knows. Salomé realizes she does not have this natural confidence and says to him, I will be your student.
Now what does it mean to climb upon Salomé's couch unbidden by her? If I were to attempt such an act, I would have to do it without fear or desire. I would not be thinking I would be rejected by her or that I would fail in my attention. But I would feel an attraction to this woman. I would want to be close to her and follow my feeling for greater intimacy, of whatever kind that would follow.
Of course, as scholars point out, climbing on Salomé's couch in those days could have meant only eating with her. Apparently people ate in those days in a reclining position. Jesus is not on his own couch, which would be the normal practice, but on Salome's couch, uninvited but received by her. It is more likely that Jesus had sex with Salomé on her couch than just ate with her because Salomé's challenge and Jesus' response are both strong, more befitting doing something strong, like having sex together rather than just eating together.
We know so little about Salomé except this incident from Thomas and the presence of Salomé as a witness to the crucifixion and the empty tomb after. It is implied that she was the mother of the sons of Zebedee, but her name is not mentioned in Matt, but in Mark. (Matt. 27:56 and Mark 15:40) Since women married after age twelve she could have been still an attractive lover to Jesus. Would Jesus thus be committing adultery also here, or is it best to infer that either husband Zebedee is dead, or that Salomé has a right to be sexually with whomever she wants, even if married and a mother of grown-up sons.
So despite the Christian attitude against sex, stated by Paul, Jesus himself was a delightful sinner in the eyes of the Jews like Paul. So much so that early Christain-Jews would be starting to de-sexualize Jesus himself. What is this Christian belief system that Jesus became human to save us all from sin? Would becoming human not mean that Jesus also had sex, and plenty of it, as most of us, male and female do, who are not overly influenced by unhealthy Christian attitudes against sex?
Let us end with looking at what Jesus may have said about marriage, in this example it is also about divorce. Jesus is asked by critics, "Is it lawful to divorce for any reason?"
Jesus replies that the Creator, a name for God, made male and female from the beginning. This is an example of how the authentic wisdom teacher Jesus teaches. He refers to natural experience, implying that what is real is what God created and therefore it must be good. In the passage from Matt. 19:3 onward a few verses Jesus is reported as saying the following. Jesus states that because of the creation of the genitals and the attraction that generates it is also nature that men and women leave their biological parents to then mate and unite as one with each other. Their intimacy relating shifts to sexual lovers away from familial relationships. This is the way it should be, says Jesus, because God as Nature created it that way. Then Jesus states that for this reason of genital attraction and leaving the parents God has joined male and female together. But he adds, as if speaking for God also, what God has joined together man should not separate, or wrench apart. To complete the argument, as adults we can separate from parents even though God joined us together with them from birth, because now we are no longer children and so it is not right to be together with parents but to join together with another where there is strong genital attraction. God made us male and female to do so. God made sex so it is a good thing, not a bad thing. Right? Maybe so? But Jesus is also reported as saying the following additional values.
Jesus says don't pull apart what God has joined together. The Pharisee critics challenge Jesus, then why did Moses permit us to divorce? Jesus replies that this is because people are hard and not sensitive to natural law and to how love works. For your 'hardness of hearts', he says. Is Jesus implying here that if you are hard and not feeling to the core of your being you will not be able to unite as one flesh even if you have sex with another? It is paradoxical, for why would you divorce someone you truly feel united with? Why would you be jealous of anyone when you truly experience love together? Why would you fall in love with another if you truly experienced the unity and fulness of love with that person? Clearly you would not be thinking or acting to divorce someone you truly loved. Those who divorce, following what Jesus is reported to have said, are not really that capable of uniting as one with another human being right for them. So maybe also we can say, with Jesus, that when two people are not right for each other, because they cannot truly unite as one together, then they should not be together. Thus, those who are wrongly married are not truly married at all and so can be divorced or separated to find and marry another that they can truly form a unity as one with another.
Was Paul not capable of a true unity with another human being since he did not marry in Jesus' terms? But if we imply this with Paul would we not have to imply this with Jesus also? Either Jesus was celibate, the traditional Christian view, or he was married or uniting in true intercourse with another. But the Christians suppressed any evidence for this possibility.
Jesus says to love one another as one flesh, no longer two, and to not split apart what God has joined together. So, according to Jesus it is God who joins the sexes together through the genitals and heart as one flesh. We do not do that. The pornography industry does not do this. The marriage industry does not do this. The government does not do this. The religion does not do this.
But the most startling fact is that Jesus was a sexually expressive being. He shared love with people in the flesh. He knew about sex, most likely from firsthand experience and not simply observing others. Jesus was a sexual being, and had he not been killed we would have learned of his sexual-emotional tendencies. Perhaps even Jesus was bisexual, Heavens help us! For there is a passage in John in which Jesus has his beloved in his arms at the last supper. How in the world did this happen? Jesus knows he may be about to die and yet he is able to love one he feels attracted to.
Let us not assume too quickly that Jesus says only express sex in marriage. As most of us know, we can experience the Great Unity with another in sex without being married to do so. Could Jesus be saying that experiencing the Sacred Unity as one flesh with a certain other person should lead to a complete partnership with that person, defined in those days as marriage. Such a partnership can stay as a unity experience for many years, so there is no need for divorce. A true unity means you are right for each other, but until you experience that true unity with a certain other person, why not keep looking, keep expressing yourself sexually?
Jesus does not say only express yourself sexually in marriage but when the sex leads to marriage, stay with it to the end because you both are experiencing God together in your unity and should keep working on your unity experiences together for this is at least part of your commitment together to know God together.
Jesus is also reported as saying in Matt. 19:9 that anyone who divorces his wife, or partner in modern terms, commits adultery. In his day you could be stoned to death for being found sleeping with another person's wife. Did Jesus mean the same thing that people should be stoned to death for divorcing their wives?
Probably not. We don't know if this is a Christian rule put in the mouth of Jesus or not. Does this pronouncement go against Jesus basic teaching above about seeking one you can share the complete unity experience of God with?Probably yes. The saying as reported also states that a man can divorce his wife if she is immoral, presumably meaning, sleeping with others sexually. If true it would have to mean that the partner who sleeps with others while married does not experience the full love unity with the married partner and so must seek elsewhere for the sexual, God-fulfillment that sexual unity truly is.
Is Jesus saying, never divorce from one you experience true God-unity as One with? Perhaps yes to this question in the sense that neither of you would want to look elsewhere when you are fulfilling the God in you together. Divorce is therefore only for those who do not feel themselves truly married to the one they find themselves with. Now this observation has strong weight. It is not the ritual form of marriage itself that is to be maintained at almost all costs. What is to be sought after and maintained is the God-Unity experience as One that you can only achieve with the right person. If you have it, stay with it. Don't give in to seductions elsewhere. If you succumb to an outside seduction then look in yourself to whether you are faking it with your present partner, or not capable of letting go to full intimacy and unity experiences because of yourself, or whatever blocks you from feeling God as One in your sexual expression with another.
Now surely with all the rich meaning being derived from these reported statements of Jesus can we not assume he had rich experience also of sexual union? Yes, we can! But does this say Jesus was married but that, as some scholars contend, it was so commonplace that no mention is made of it regarding Jesus and his life?
This position hardly holds the substance it is made with. In the earliest records we have about Jesus and what he lived and taught there is enough mention of Jesus and his family being around him and wanting him that surely had he his own wife and children they also would have been as interfering or otherwise involved as his family were.
Would you believe, had Jesus been married, that his wife would not have been there at his crucifixion, or indeed also opposed it? Well, say Jesus was married, then it could not be to his mother. Therefore it must have been to either Mary Magdalene or Salomé, also reported as being there with Jesus' mother at the cross in the Synoptics. As we surmise, Salomé was or is married and the mother of two sons. Yet she is there. Could she be the new wife of Jesus after Zebedee's death? Or is it Mary Magdalene that Jesus is married to? We simply don't know. But we can surmise that someone was familiar with Jesus' genitals. He was a man, after all, and one who taught about marriage and sex.
We leave it at that!
