HIEROGAMY & THE MARRIED MESSIAH
by
James Wesley Stivers
Copyright, 2003
P.O. Box 8701, Moscow, ID 83843
Table of Contents
Author's Preface
Introduction
Chapter One: The Married Jesus In Popular Literature
Chapter Two: The Married Jesus Among the Heretics
Chapter Three: The Married Jesus According to Academics
Chapter Four: The Case for the Married Jesus
Chapter Five: Hierogamy in Ancient Israel
Chapter Six: Hierogamy in the Early Church
Chapter Seven: A New Paradigm for Marriage
Appendices
INTRODUCTION
This book is about Jesus - Jesus as a man of the flesh. It is also about a married Jesus, a Jesus who loved women and was not afraid to touch them.
This is a taboo topic in the world of the Church. Even though the Church in its Creeds proclaims a truly human Savior, our Lord's humanity still remains an embarrassment for Christians to contemplate. They are willing to admit that Jesus grew tired and slept. They are willing to admit that when He hungered, he ate. But when it comes to other bodily functions, like defecating, they grow intensely nervous. The thought of the Son of God squatting behind a bush to relieve Himself does not seem very holy to the sanctimonious mind. Imagine the disgust at the suggestion that Jesus might have fondled a woman's breast.
Even though the Scriptures plainly state that our Lord bore the "infirmities of the flesh" and was "tempted in like manner as we are", yet Christians are horrified at the thought of a sexual Jesus. The quick retort, of course, is that Jesus did not sin in these temptations. Yes, the pious mind will affirm a sinless Messiah. But what does a sinless Messiah mean? Does it mean perfection? What kind of perfection? Does it mean that Jesus dropped no crumbs when He ate His food? Does it mean He did not lose consciousness when He slept? Does it mean He had no erotic dreams or nocturnal emissions?
The Creeds of the Church affirm that Jesus Christ had two natures: one human and one Divine. The natures existed with each other side by side "without mingling and without confusion". What this means is that Jesus did not cheat. Unlike the gods of pagan mythologies, He did not allow His Divine nature to communicate its powers to His human nature. Even though He had the power to raise the dead, He did not have the power to prevent Himself from catching a cold. He had the power to calm the stormy seas, but He did not have the power to avoid smacking His thumb with a hammer. He had the power to cast out demons, but did not have the power to prevent an erection.
I have already lost half of my readers - intentionally so. The largest hurdle to overcome when considering this proposition is not the bare facts. It's the denial of our humanity that plagues Christianity. If you cannot get through this Introduction calmly and with piqued interest, you are not ready for this subject. You have problems: emotional problems rooted in a Christianity twisted by a hatred of the created order.
For the rest of you, consider the beautiful implications of what I have just said above. Our Savior experienced our humanity. He was "touched by our infirmities", bore them with dignity, and sanctified them.
This was the claim of one leader of early Christianity: Irenaeus. He was a bishop from Gaul who lived in the 2nd Century. He taught what theologians call the "doctrine of recapitulation". We will visit it again later in this book. But basically, what it taught was that the idea of a Savior required the salvation of our humanity. Irenaeus debated against the Gnostics who were members of various heretical Christian groups during his time. The Gnostics taught that Jesus saved mankind, not in its humanity, but from its humanity: that the union with the Divine was metaphysical and not ethical, as the Christians taught it. One group of Gnostics was called the Docetists. The Docetists taught that Jesus was not really human. He just pretended to be human. They felt that had He really been human, His flesh would have disqualified Him from being the Savior of the world. Leaders like Irenaeus resisted this claim and insisted that Jesus was truly flesh and blood. They taught that all of the experiences of humanity were His experiences also. The Doctrine of Recapitulation affirmed that Jesus entered into every stage of human experience - from cradle to grave - and sanctified them. Thus, to the Christian, the experience of our mortal existence becomes one great sacrament; for we are following in the footsteps of our Lord.
If Jesus entered every stage of human experience, then what about sex and marriage? Irenaeus didn't say anything, or at least, we have no record that he did. It is possible that these sorts of things were edited out by later copyists who were hostile to the idea of a phallic Christ. I don't know. But the demands of logic require that when Irenaeus said "every stage of life" he meant to include the period which is so basic to our existence: the period of fertility and mating. The Gospel record tells us that Jesus was about 33 years old when He was crucified, at the time when most men have reached the peak of their virility. The average Jewish male was married between the ages of 16 and 20. It is difficult to imagine Jesus avoiding marriage, not when He came to redeem it.
And that is a part of the message of this book. I do not stop with the proposition of a married Messiah. I ask the questions of what it means and how might it change our paradigm of what marriage is supposed to be. Hence, I introduce the term hierogamy (hi-raw-gamee). Coined from the Greek hieros (sacred) and gamos (marriage), I go beyond the classical view of the Church that marriage is a sacrament. Indeed, it is. But what kind of sacrament? Scholars use the term "hieros gamos" to refer to the ancient pagan practice of mating temple priestesses with sacrificial kings who make atonement for the land. A part of the old fertility religions, hierogamy was a ritual union of the masculine and feminine principles which was designed to maintain balance in the cosmos and times of plenty on the earth. Is this the kind of hierogamy we see in the Bible?
Some current scholars think so. I don't think so.
Modern scholarship does not take into account that these fertility cults were degraded and superstitious forms of the old paganism of the Biblical patriarchs. While the faith of Enoch, Noah and Abraham was rooted in natural revelation, many of their ancient contemporaries engaged in religious rites without knowing their true meaning or why they came into existence. Modern scholars are also compromised by a Gnosticism which propagated many of these ancient beliefs and customs within a Christian garb, but not a truly Christian paradigm. They do not understand the mysteries of the Church. You will be introduced to those mysteries in this book.
However garbled the Biblical record might appear to be to such scholars, there is one thread which admittedly ties it all together: the doctrine of the covenant. There is a unity of the Covenant in the Biblical record. Hierogamy cannot be understood without first understanding the Covenant. Once that doctrine is understood, a spiritual awakening occurs. It becomes immediately obvious why Jesus had to be married to be the true Messiah. Suddenly, the Scriptures come alive with new meaning and the sometimes cryptic messages of the patristic writings become apparent.
That is your privilege in reading this book.
Let me offer some explanation of the chapters in this book.
The first four chapters deal with the question of whether Jesus was married or not. The first three chapters focus on what others have said. I do not profess the reviews to be complete or exhaustive. But I think they are representative of what is available on the market right now.
The fourth chapter offers my contribution to the discussion. In that chapter, I deal with theological questions arising from the Biblical text, the Creeds, and cryptic messages of some of the early Church Fathers. It argues the case that Christianity denies its own rhetoric in failing to affirm the phallic Christ.
With the fifth chapter, "Hierogamy in Ancient Israel", we begin to explore the meaning of a married Messiah. What was the messianic role of the kings of Israel and how does that define the role of Jesus Christ as the Messiah?
The sixth chapter, "Hierogamy in the Early Church", answers the question of whether hierogamy ended with Jesus Christ or whether it continued in a messianic office within the Church. It argues the case that the Christianity prior to the Bar Kochba rebellion (circa 135 A.D) was very different from the Christianity which emerged afterwards. If it is New Testament Christianity we want to revive, it is necessary to pierce the veil of the historical revisionism of the post-Nicene fathers: the men who defined for us what historic Christianity has become.
Finally, in the last chapter, "A New Paradigm for Marriage", we explore what this new information might mean for the institution of marriage. How did Jesus heal with hierogamy and how might our culture be healed today with a new definition for marriage?
The Spirit and the Bride say, Come!
- Revelation 22:17
Click below to read
To correspond with the author write to:
Return to Promotion