Category:Married Jesus (subject)

This page is authored and edited by Gabriele Boccaccini, University of Michigan.

Married Jesus refers to the scholarly debate about the possibility that Jesus was married, but more specifically, to a series of fictional speculations about his actual marriage or love affair with Mary Magdalene (or other companion).

Overview

The language of "love" and "marriage" in describing the relationship between Jesus and his disciples is not absent in ancient sources, where Jesus is often introduced as the bridegroom. Some disciples in particular are said to have experienced a special love relation with Jesus (notably, the Beloved Disciple in the Gospel of John, or Mary Magdalene in Gospel of Philip).

Soon, the notion developed that a Christian virgin was like a bride devoting her soul to Jesus in "mystical marriage." Among the many female saints, whose mystical experience was described as a "marriage," are St. Agnes, St. Catherine of Alexandria, Blessed Angela of Foligno, St. Catherine of Siena, St. Colette, St. Teresa, St. Catherine of Ricci, Venerable Marina d'Escobar, St. Mary Magdalen de' Pazzi, St. Veronica Giuliani, and Venerable Maria de Agreda.

In the 1920s we have the first indications that the "mystical" was about to become "sexual." Nuptials of God (1922 Gill), art turned the traditional scene of Mary Magdalene embracing the cross into an overt sexual intercourse. In The Escaped Cock (1928 Lawrence), novel, after surviving the resurrection Jesus experienced the joys of love and sex.

In the 1950s, the idea that Jesus married appeared in O teleutaios peirasmos (1951 Kazantzakis), novel, as part of the last temptation Jesus had to reject on the cross. In the novel, marriage (and fatherhood) were still ideal possibilities, not incidents in the actual life of Jesus.

In the 1970s, the notion that the historical Jesus had sexual desire or was object of sexual desire, that he might have had a wife or lover, and fathered children, began to be explored even in theological and scholarly works; see Was Jesus Married? The Distortion of Sexuality in the Christian Tradition (1970 Phipps), book. It became commonplace to enrich fictional works with the idea that Mary Magdalene and Jesus had sexual feelings, as in Jesus Christ Superstar (1971 Webber), opera, or that Jesus was a widower, as in Man of Nazareth (1979 Burgess), novel.