There is not the slightest hint in the New Testament that Jesus ever married. Yet, Jesus’ marital status has become a hot topic—again—as a result of the best-selling book The Da Vinci Code.1 Novelist Dan Brown claims not only that Jesus married Mary Magdalene, but that the happy couple bore a daughter who became the ancestress of the Merovingian dynasty of France.
In 1970 New Testament scholar William Phipps created a smaller-scale sensation with his work of nonfiction, Was Jesus Married?2 Noting that in Jesus’ day, all ordinary Jewish men were expected to marry, Phipps suggested Jesus was probably no exception. According to Phipps, Jesus would have married by the time he turned 18.
As to who Jesus’ wife might have been, Phipps also suggested Mary Magdalene as the most likely candidate (see box). Phipps offered the following scenario: Jesus married Mary Magdalene during the second decade of his life, and she became an adulteress.3 Jesus forgave her, and she repented, staying faithful to him until the end. His experience with her contributed to his strong stand against divorce. In a later book, The Sexuality of Jesus, Phipps admitted that although he believed Mary Magdalene was the most likely candidate for Jesus’ wife, no certainty could be achieved on the question. He concluded: “It is considerably more risky to attempt to identify whom Jesus married than it is to affirm that he married.”4
But is it really possible that Jesus married? One answer to that question is: Anything is possible. After all, we know precious little about Jesus’ life before we encounter him in the Gospels in connection with the activity of John the Baptist sometime around 27 C.E. (Luke 3:1). We know that he grew up in the Galilean 034town of Nazara (Matthew 4:13; Luke 4:16) or Nazareth (Mark 1:9; John 1:45–46), that his mother’s name was Mary (probably Miriam in Hebrew), his father was a carpenter named Joseph, and he had four brothers and at least three sisters (Matthew 13:55–56; Mark 6:3; Luke 4:22; Acts 1:14). But we do not know much else of his early years. So what was he doing before he fell in with John?
Phipps answers this question by assuming that Jesus did what almost all young Jewish men did. In The Da Vinci Code, however, Dan Brown claims that Jesus’ marriage to Mary is a matter of historical record, attested in ancient writings suppressed by the Church. According to Brown, in order to cover up the secret relationship between Mary and Jesus, the Church smeared Mary by creating the legend that she had been a whore (it is not in the New Testament; see box).
Brown mentions “countless references to Jesus and Magdalene’s union” in the ancient record, but he cites only two apocryphal gospels, both of them texts preserved in Coptic: the Gospel of Philip, known from a fourth-century copy found at Nag Hammadi, Egypt, and the Gospel of Mary, known from a fifth-century copy.5 Phipps also relied on the Gospel of Philip in concocting his vision of Jesus’ and Mary’s life together.6
The Gospel of Philip was originally written in Greek, probably sometime in the third century, probably somewhere in Syria. The title of the Gospel of Philip is likely not original, and is evidently based on the observation that Philip is the only apostle named in it. The text consists of a compendium of teachings on various subjects reflecting the tradition of an eastern branch of the Valentinian school of Gnostic Christianity.a Unfortunately the manuscript is damaged, and there are lacunae, or gaps, in the text. The passage given in The Da Vinci Code reads as follows (with brackets indicating lacunae):
And the companion of the […] Mary Magdalene. [… loved] her more than [all] the disciples [and used to] kiss her [often] on her […]. The rest of [the disciples …]. They said to him, “Why do you love her more than all of us?” The Savior answered and said to them, “Why do I not love you like her”?7
The first two lacunae can safely be restored as references to Jesus (“the Savior”), and “mouth” is a likely restoration for the third lacuna, so the text could read: “And the companion of the Savior was Mary Magdalene. The Savior loved her more than all the disciples and used to kiss her often on her mouth.”
There are actually two passages in the Gospel of Philip relating to Mary (although Brown only quotes this one). The other passage reads:
There were three who always walked with the lord: Mary his mother and 8 sister and the Magdalene, the one who was called his companion. His sister and his mother and his companion were each a Mary.9
An accurate interpretation of these passages from the Gospel of Philip is by no means obvious.10 A sexual relationship between Mary and Jesus cannot be ruled out a priori . But it does seem unlikely. First, both passages refer to Mary Magdalene three times as Jesus’ “companion.” The Greek word koinonos is used twice, and its Coptic equivalent hotre is used once.11 The word can also be translated as “partner” (in business), “fellow-member” (of a society), “accomplice” (in crime) or “sharer” (in something). But I know of no instance where the word means “spouse,” though it is not out of the question that the word could be used for a sexual “partner.” The reference to the savior’s “kissing” Mary might also be interpreted romantically, but it is more likely a reference to the chaste, liturgical “kiss of peace” mentioned several times in the Gospel of Philip and the New Testament (Romans 16:16; 1 Corinthians 16:20; 2 Corinthians 13:12; 1 Thessalonians 5:26; 1 Peter 5:14).12
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More importantly, immediately following the first passage quoted above, Jesus goes on to explain Mary’s special role in terms of her capacity to receive his instruction—and not her sex appeal. When, in the Gospel of Philip, the disciples ask Jesus why he loves Mary more than them, Jesus responds, “Why do I not love you like her?” He then answers his own question: “When a blind man and one who sees are both together in darkness, they are no different from one another. When the light comes, then he who sees will see the light, and he who is blind will remain in darkness.”13 Jesus is suggesting that he favors Mary because she is like a sighted person compared with the dullard male disciples, who are like blind men. Thus, Mary’s “companionship” is spiritual rather than physical. When quoting this passage, Brown conveniently left off the second half.
In any case, there is no indication at all in the Gospel of Philip that Jesus and Mary Magdalene were man 037and wife. A sexual relationship might be read into that gospel, but it seems a stretch. Further, no conclusion about Jesus’ historical relationship to Mary Magdalene should be drawn from a third-century Gnostic text like the Gospel of Philip.
The second noncanonical gospel Dan Brown relies on in The Da Vinci Code is the Gospel of Mary ,14 which was originally written in Greek, probably sometime in the mid-second century. It consists of a revelation dialogue between Jesus and his disciples, and a report of a revelation given by Jesus to Mary. Unfortunately the text is incomplete; several pages are missing from the manuscript. The only passage quoted in The Da Vinci Code reads as follows (the unnamed woman is Mary):15
Peter answered and spoke concerning these same things. He questioned them about the Savior: “Did he really speak with a woman without our 038knowledge (and) not openly? Are we to turn about and all listen to her? Did he prefer her to us?” … Levi answered and said to Peter, “Peter, you have always been hot-tempered. Now I see you contending against the woman like the adversaries. But if the Savior made her worthy, who are you indeed to reject her? Surely the Savior knows her very well. That is why he loved her more than us.”16
Out of context—which is how Dan Brown presents this quotation—the text could be read to suggest that Jesus had an intimate relationship with his beloved Mary, and that he didn’t want the other disciples to know about it.
But when the passage is read in context, we get a very different impression of their relationship, as described by the Gospel of Mary. Just before Peter made this speech, Mary had recounted a revelation she had received in a vision she had of the Savior, and the disciple Andrew had commented that “these teachings are strange ideas.” Then Peter speaks. At issue here is whether or not Mary’s account of her experiences is valid. Levi’s comment that the Savior “loved her more than us” is based on his observation that she has been given instruction that has apparently been denied to the male disciples. Nothing is said of any sexual relationship between Jesus and Mary, least of all any hint of marriage between them.
Jesus’ special love for Mary is mentioned earlier in the Gospel of Mary, too. Mary is discussing with the other 039(male) disciples teachings they had heard from the Savior. At one point Peter says to Mary, “Sister, we know that the Savior loved you more than the rest of women. Tell us the words of the Savior which you remember—which you know (but) we do not, nor have we heard them.”17 Mary then recounts what she learned in a vision of the Savior. Peter is suggesting that of all the female followers of Jesus, Mary is the favored one. No sexual relationship is implied, only that Mary has a greater capacity to understand and act upon Jesus’ teachings.
Thus, the Gospel of Philip and the Gospel of Mary lend no support whatsoever to William Phipps’s and Dan Brown’s independent suggestions that Jesus married Mary Magdalene. The Gospel of Mary underscores her role vis-à-vis Jesus’ male disciples as an authoritative source for his esoteric teaching, but there is nothing in it to support the notion that Jesus and Mary were man and wife. While a sexual relationship between Mary and Jesus cannot be completely ruled out in the Gospel of Philip’s treatment of Mary, their relationship is more likely to be seen as a spiritual one. Completely absent from the Gospel of Philip is the notion that Jesus and Mary were man and wife.
As for Phipps’s suggestion that Jesus must have married because that’s what young Jewish men did in his day—no certainty can be achieved on this point. Nothing at all in our meager sources, biblical or extrabiblical, suggests that Jesus ever did get married. But there is something in the New Testament that suggests Jesus probably didn’t: Jesus’ own attitude toward marriage.
It is not really possible to know, for lack of evidence, how Jesus felt about marriage in his formative years. It is possible to determine, based on his teachings in the Gospels, what he thought during his later years as a public prophet. From his teachings, we can extrapolate what his marital state was at the time.
Interestingly, Jesus’ attitude toward marriage and procreation relates directly to Jesus’ most basic and central message: that the kingdom of God was at hand. The “kingdom” or “rule” of God was another term for the Age to Come, when evil would finally be abolished, and God’s reign established on earth for all time. According to some apocalyptic thinkers of the day—including Jesus—the dead would be resurrected at this time.
The nearness in time of the kingdom of God was a concept well known to Jews of Jesus’ day. It was regularly given expression in an Aramaic prayer, the Kaddish, which originated as a prayer said at the dismissal of people from synagogue services or from study of Torah at a school:
Magnified and sanctified be his great name in the world that he has created according to his will. May he establish his kingdom during your lifetime and during your days, and during the life of all the house of Israel, ever speedily and at a near time. And say, Amen.18
In Mark, Jesus begins his ministry with the proclamation, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel” (Mark 1:15).19 And he taught his disciples to pray likewise: “Sanctified be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, as in heaven so also on earth” (Matthew 6:9–10; cf. Luke 11:2).20 In accordance with Jewish eschatological hopes and an apocalyptic worldview, Jesus emphasized the imminence of the absolute rule of God, for which pious Jews of Jesus’ day prayed. That’s why he solemnly told the crowds who gathered around him, “Truly, I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see that the kingdom of God has come with power” (Mark 9:1).
Not all Jews of Jesus’ day believed in the resurrection, however. One day, some Sadducees, who didn’t believe in resurrection, taunted Jesus with a hypothetical case (Matthew 22:23–33; Mark 12:18–27; Luke 20:27–40). Moses had commanded that, in the case of a man who died childless, his brother should marry the widow (Deuteronomy 25:5). Suppose there were seven brothers who all died childless. In the resurrection, whose wife would she be? Jesus’ answer is simple: “In the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven” (Matthew 22:30).
Elsewhere, Jesus challenges his followers to live in the present as though the kingdom had already come. In the Sermon on the Mount, he explains that love for one’s neighbor was a common enough command, but that his ethical norm was much stricter: People should even love their enemies (Matthew 5:43–47; Luke 6:27–28, 32–36). His teaching on marriage and divorce was also very strict: Divorce was forbidden (Matthew 5:27–32, 19:9; Mark 10:11–12; Luke 16:18).21 When his disciples suggested that such a strict teaching would discourage people from getting married at all, Jesus replied,
There are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. He who is able to receive this, let him receive it.
(Matthew 19:11)
While some people in the early Church took Jesus’ saying literally,22 we should understand it as a case of deliberate hyperbole, such as is found in other of
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his injunctions (see, for example, Matthew 5:27–30 on adultery: “… If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and throw it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell.”)
The point Jesus is making about the eunuch is that it is possible for a man to live on earth as he would in God’s kingdom, where there is neither marriage nor procreation. Jesus is challenging people who are “able to receive it” to live a life of celibacy for the sake of the kingdom, and thus to live now as though the future kingdom had already come. It would be absurd to think that Jesus placed this challenge before others without accepting it for himself.
Was Jesus married? Despite what we might read in the popular press, we have no evidence in the New Testament or the apocryphal gospels that Jesus ever married. Further, Jesus’ own teachings from his days as a prophet of the kingdom of God rule out the possibility that he could have been married to Mary Magdalene—or to any other woman—at that time.
There is not the slightest hint in the New Testament that Jesus ever married. Yet, Jesus’ marital status has become a hot topic—again—as a result of the best-selling book The Da Vinci Code.1 Novelist Dan Brown claims not only that Jesus married Mary Magdalene, but that the happy couple bore a daughter who became the ancestress of the Merovingian dynasty of France. In 1970 New Testament scholar William Phipps created a smaller-scale sensation with his work of nonfiction, Was Jesus Married?2 Noting that in Jesus’ day, all ordinary Jewish men were expected to marry, Phipps suggested Jesus was […]
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Gnostic Christianity teaches that knowledge, rather than faith or observance, is the basis for salvation. “Knowledge” in this tradition is basically knowledge of the human self as divine, and salvation involves the soul’s escape from the body and its return to its transcendent origins. This teaching is rejected in the later writings of the New Testament (1 Timothy 6:20–21). Valentinus, who taught in Alexandria and Rome, was the greatest of the second-century Gnostic Christian teachers. The Valentinian “heresy” persisted into the seventh century.
Endnotes
1.
Dan Brown, The Da Vinci Code: A Novel (New York: Doubleday, 2003).
2.
William E. Phipps, Was Jesus Married? The Distortion of Sexuality in the Christian Tradition (New York: Harper & Row, 1970; repr. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1986).
3.
Phipps, Was Jesus Married? p. 67.
4.
Phipps, The Sexuality of Jesus (Cleveland: Pilgrim Press, 1996), pp. 122–142, 174.
5.
The Gospel of Philip is the third tractate in Nag Hammadi Codex II (hereafter, NHC II), and the Gospel of Mary is the first tractate in the closely related Berlin Gnostic Codex (BG). See James M. Robinson and Richard Smith, eds., The Nag Hammadi Library in English, 3rd rev. ed. (Leiden: E.J. Brill; New York: Harper & Row, 1988), pp. 139–160 and 523–527 respectively. The translations given here are from that volume. The translations given in Dan Brown’s novel are rather free.
6.
Phipps (Sexuality, p. 137, cf. p. 173) also suggests that the Gospel of Philip may preserve authentic tradition to that effect.
7.
NHC II 63, 33–64, 5.
8.
Angular brackets indicate an emendation to the text. Here the manuscript reads “her,” but one should emend the text to read “his.” Otherwise the second Mary would be Jesus’ aunt.
9.
NHC II 59, 6–11.
10.
For an excellent discussion see Antti Marjanen, The Woman Jesus Loved: Mary Magdalene in the Nag Hammadi Library and Related Documents (Leiden: Brill, 1996).
11.
The Coptic language, the latest form of the language of the pharaohs, is written in a modified Greek alphabet and has incorporated into its vocabulary numerous Greek words.
12.
In the Second Apocalypse of James (NHC V,4), Jesus kisses his brother James on the mouth (56, 14–15). It would be absurd to conclude from this that Jesus was a bisexual.
13.
NHC II 64, 5–9.
14.
For a recent translation, with extensive discussion, see Karen L. King, The Gospel of Mary of Magdala: Jesus and the First Woman Apostle (Santa Rosa, CA: Polebridge, 2003).
15.
Mary is the only follower of Jesus named in the Gospel of Mary, and it should be noted that she is simply called Mary—not Mary Magdalene. It is usually taken for granted that Mary Magdalene is meant, but that is by no means certain. Although I continue to be persuaded by this majority opinion, Stephen J. Shoemaker (“Rethinking the ‘Gnostic Mary’: Mary of Nazareth and Mary of Magdala in Early Christian Tradition,” Journal of Early Christian Studies 9 [2001], pp. 555–595, esp. 581–589) has made a strong case for identifying the Mary of the gospel with Jesus’ mother, Mary of Nazareth, rather than Mary Magdalene.
16.
BG 17, 16–18, 15.
17.
BG 10, 1–6.
18.
Translation (slightly modified) in Abraham E. Millgram, Jewish Worship (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1971), p. 154. Nowadays the Kaddish is normally used in connection with intercession on behalf of a deceased person.
19.
New Testament quotations are from the Revised Standard Version, unless otherwise specified.
20.
My translation. There can be no question that Jesus modeled his own prayer (“the Lord’s Prayer”) on the Kaddish.
21.
The prohibition is absolute in Mark and Luke, while Matthew adds a loophole: “except for unchastity.” Matthew’s version is probably secondary, and reflects the Pharisaic teaching of the “School of Shammai.”
