JESUS IN GENDER TROUBLEi

Hafvor Moxnes

T he seminal question posed by feminist theologian Rosemary Radford

Ruether, "Can a male saviour redeem and save wo/men?"2 sounds like an
innocent question, one that could be raised by a child. But it v^^as not a sim-
ple question, because it introduced the particular into an area that in Christian
thought v^^as considered to be universal: the belief in Jesus/Chdst'^ as saviour for
all of humanity. That question unmasked both "saviour" and "humanity" and
pointed out that these "universal" concepts in reality were gendered and had
privileged the masculine,^ And that was the case not only in the praxis of the
church and the world that was shaped by Christianity, but also in the very struc-
ture of language, philosophy and theology, Christianity and its formulations of
faith with regard to Jesus/Christ and humanity are gendered. And once these
terms are gendered, as "male saviour" and "wo/men" it is impossible to return
to the previous state of innocence. The net result of this is that the gender issue
is not just "an issue" to be added onto the list of issues within ethics and anthro-
pology, but it changes Christian reflection and discourse in a groundbreaking
way,
Christology is the most important issue in feminist theology in the 20* cen-
tiiry, Elizabeth Schiissler Fiorenza says,^ and feminist theologians have been
engaged in discussing the gender of Jesus/Christ in relations to wo/men. In the
process they have been part of the discussion of women's gender, personhood,
and identity in dialogue vwth the most sophisticated literary, philosophical and

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psychological studies.^ As a result, "women" in the original question is no

longer (if it ever was) understood in an essentialist fashion, as a unified term.
Rather, the differences and diversities in context and experience have become
important, not least in terms of race and class, so that women speak with very
many different voices7
How have "men" responded to this? I write "men" because men are not to
be essentialized either, as a singular group;^ I am speaking of male scholars in
the field of Biblical studies and theology. Some have engaged in a critical revis-
ing of Christian traditions to employ these traditions in the work for justice for
women, and to make women visible vwthin expressions of tradition. But so far
there has been a lack of interaction with the rich theoretical works undertaken
by many women. Another way to respond is to use the gender perspective to
investigate and unmask the male/ the masculine from a male position. However,
interest in critical studies of masculinity lagged far behind feminist studies. The
result of feminist studies was therefore many differentiated positions on women
and women's experiences, whereas "the male" often remained a singular cate-
gory. Thus, it is only belatedly that studies of the constructed nature of mas-
culinity and its many different forms have been taken up and developed, espe-
cially in literary and cultural studies.^
This study will try to go in this direction. It is inspired by feminist criticism
to question the way in which Jesus/Christ and "humanity" has been gendered
masculine, but it is questioning from a queer position, i.e. from another mar-
ginal male position vis-a-vis a hegemonic masculinity rather than that of femi-
nist/ womanist etc. interpreters.^"
In this essay, I shall first indicate some ways in which male theologians have
presented Jesus and wo/men from and vwthin "malestream" positions, before I
give a queer position a try.^^

I. Jesus/Christ in Male Places

The Historical Jesus as men's place

Historical Jesus studies started in the 19* century as a white man's study, vwth-
in the context of imperialism and nationalism in Europe. If one looks at histor-
ical Jesus studies 150 years later, it is still very much a white men's domain, now
with its main centers in North America.^^ Elisabeth Schtissler Fiorenza has in
several books outlined a study of Jesus from a feminist perspective,^^ but has

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rightiy complained that male scholars have not seriously engaged with her posi-
tion. Her suggestion that Jesus saw Cod in terms of the feminine Sophia,
Wisdom,!'* has not been accepted in full, but elements of a Wisdom Christology
has been incorporated in some studies,!^ She has also pointed out how the so-
called Third Quest, by emphasizing Jesus' location in a Jevwsh context, has iden-
tified him vwth tiraditional male positions,^^ Thus, in New Testament and his-
torical Jesus studies, "woman" becomes "the Other", in complementarity with
but also in subordination to men. This becomes visible in the form and struc-
ture of many studies on New Testament topics. After discussions of "general",
"universal" topics (as e,g, Jesus' relations to his disciples, to the village crowds,
to the sinners, his proclamation of the Kingdom etc) "women" are often added,
as a particular issue. This holds ti-ue also when Jesus is presented as a feminist
who gives equal rights to women,

Jesus/Christ-the "modern man"

Male systematic theologians have mostly shov^ni little awareness of gender issues
in discussing the humanity of Jesus/Christ,^'^ A few, mostly from vwthin a liber-
al, white male theological establishment, have tried to accommodate the criti-
cism against a "male Jesus" within the paradigm of gender complementarity.
The binary oppositions of male and female are taken for granted, as a given.
Thus, they have emphasized that biologically, Jesus' maleness is a sexual "fact"
(something also accepted by many feminist theologians), but his "personhood"
appears to be read as "gendered," i,e, as culturally constructed, even at the level
of the individuality of Jesus, He is portrayed as integrating both masculine and
feminine character traits,!^ However, since his male sex is not questioned, this
use of a binary gender system serves to emphasize both the masculine priority
in personhood and its heterosexual normativity. This picture ofJesus has its par-
allel in modern representations of the "new father" (or "new man"), who inte-
grates (motherly) care concerns in his relations to children, while at the same
time preserving his pre-eminent masculine position. Thus, by integrating
female characteristics the heterosexual role pattern is confirmed,

Jesus/Christ from white man's place to shifting geographies

A search in the catalogue of a theological library vfill show that a large number
of recent books on Jesus Christ are written by scholars from Africa, Latin
America and Asia, Thus attempts to locate Jesus/Christ in particular contexts
represent the most challenging forms of historical and hermeneutical studies

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today. These studies present a criticism of the "universal" personhood of a simi-

lar kind as the feminist criticism, but from the perspective of race, class and
power. As Latin Americans, South Africans, Indians, etc. the authors represent
"the others." From the position of the dominant. Western theological para-
digms they are characterized as "contextual", i.e. theologians of the "particular"
not of the "universally" human. However, these theologians have unmasked the
"universal" theology and anthropology as one that expropriated the title "uni-
versal" for white. Western theology.^^ They have turned anthropology on its
head: Jesus is placed among and identified not with men in a dominant posi-
tion, but the victims, the oppressed, even as the crucified among the many cru-
cified ones.20 But in a similar way as much white feminism has been blind to
the issue of race,^^ much of this predominantly male liberation theology has
been blind to the issue of gender and sexuality.22 In many cases there is not even
the representation of women as "the other" or the "particular," they simply are
an absence in the texts.23 A feminist theologian from Latin America, Maria Pilar
Aquino, states this explicitly: "the christology done by male theologians has
failed to give the relationship between Jesus and oppressed women the impor-
tance it should have in liberation hermeneutics and which is present in the
gospel itself. This means that systematic work on christology today is not auto-
matically inclusive: it is necessary that the person doing it consciously choose
that it should be so."24

Ma(i)nly anxieties?
So far most male theologians have not made this conscious choice. The attempts
by feminist scholars to dislocate Jesus and man from the position of a "person-
hood," where the masculine and the universal are conflated and taken for grant-
ed, have so far been met mostly by silence. When the challenge has been taken
up, the response has ofren been to integrate women into a heterosexual and
masculine order that is naturalized, taken for granted as "the way things are."
And it is striking that within the context of the other great challenge to the tra-
ditional, dominant paradigm of "universal humanity," from the position of
race, class and power, gender is mostly lefr out as that which is unrepresented.
Moreover, the representations of Jesus as Black, as mestizo, as Native American,
etc., appear to be much less threatening to white. Western theologians than the
challenges to the masculine Jesus. It may be that the Western global supremacy
is still so strong that the African, Asian, mestizo "faces of Jesus" can be regard-
ed as "local," "particular," to be treated with a benign tolerance.

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But such tolerance cannot be extended to challenges to the masculinity of

Jesus that also appear to challenge the masculinity of Christian men.^s That anx-
iety about sex and masculinity is more deeply located in the subject than the
anxiety about race may have a long history. It might have been no accident that
Paul, who claimed that "in Christ" there is "neither Jew nor Greek, neither male
nor female" (Galatians 3:28), offered a strong argumentation for the breaking
down of boundaries between Jews and non-Jews, whereas "neither male nor
female" remained a slogan, with little supporting argumentation.^^ This fear
may have been an undercurrent in male writings about sex and gender during
history. From a modern period, when studies have focused on this issue, we find
that the anxiety about masculinity surfaced concomitant with the history of the
emancipation of women in the 19* century, exemplified in writings about "the
manliness of Christ" and "muscular Christianity."-^^ Maybe as a reaction to the
"new (soft) man" images as a response to the feminism of late 20* century,
men's movements like the Promise Keepers bear witness to a very different
response with their strong defense of "traditional" masculinity.^^

There are no "natural" male/female places

Feminist criticism questions what appears to be the underlying presupposition
of male Christology, namely that the binary division of genders represents a
"natural fact," or a metaphysical essence that is "given." Fiorenza claims that it
has a much more practical reason:^^ "the notion of the two sexes is a sociocul-
tural construct for maintaining wo/men's second class citizenship rather than a
biological given or innate essence." The social, political and economic conse-
quences of this predominance of the heterosexual, masculine paradigm are
enormous, easily visible both in workplaces and in homes. But these conse-
quences are often hidden under a web of culture and ideology. On the political
and religious right the ideology of heterosexuality and masculinity is cloaked in
terms of "values," as in the proposed amendment to the US Constitution in
defense of heterosexual marriage. And most of the Democratic opposition to the
amendment was in defense of states' rights to determine the issue, and not a
defense of the right to same-sex marriage. This shows how pervasive the hetero-
sexual and masculine paradigm is, so much that one can speak of a "hetero-
normativity," not only in the US but in many other societies as well. Another
example is the violent protest from African Anglican bishops against the ordi-
nation of gay priests and bishops within English and North-American
Anglican/Episcopal dioceses. This is a position that is hegemonically heterosex-

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ual, in that sex in terms of homosexuality is either not represented, it is a taboo

that is an absence in the texts, or it is violently denounced.
It was from a position of non-representation or absence that Judith Butler
wrote her groundbreaking book Gender Trouble. Here she suggests how this web
of culture and gender ideology is formed and why it is so dominant: "To the
extent that gender norms (... heterosexual complementarity of bodies, ideals
and rule of proper and improper mascuhnity and femininity...) establish what
wdll and will not be intelligibly human, what vwll and will not be considered to
be 'real,' they establish the ontological field in which bodies may be given legit-
imate expression."30 Butler self-consciously wrote her book exactly to provide
trouble for the way in which these gender norms exert control and even per-
form violence. Thus, she considers it a normative task of her book, "to insist
upon the extension of this legitimacy to bodies that have been regarded as false,
unreal and unintelligible."

II. Reading and Re-Reading Mascuiinities

It is this kind of "gender trouble," of questioning gender norms, that I suggest

we find in a word by Jesus in Matthew 19:12 on "eunuchs for the sake of the
kingdom of heaven."-'^ One might say that to start a study of "personhood" with
a passage about the eunuch is to start "off center", but I think that starting at
the margins will reveal what ideas one holds of "normal" and "normative" mas-
culinity. I will propose a "deconstructive" reading of Matthew 19:3-12 inspired
by Butler, and suggest that the passage presents a questioning of a heterosexu-
al, masculine definition of personhood.

Matthew 19:3-12:
•^And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, "Is it lawful
to divorce one's wife for any cause?" ^He answered, "Have you not read
that he who created them from the beginning made them male and
female, ^ and said, 'Therefore a man shall leave his father and his moth-
er and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh'? ^So they
are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined togeth-
er, let not man separate." ^ They said to him, "Why then did Moses com-
mand one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?" *He
said to them, "Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to
divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. ^ And I say to

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you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and mar-
ries another, commits adultery."|il

disciples said to him, "If such is the case of a man v^th his wife,
it is better not to marry." ^^But he said to them, "Not everyone can
receive this saying, but only those to v/hom it is given. ^^ For there are
eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have
been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs v/ho have made
themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let the one
who is able to receive this, receive it."
(English Standard Version)

Eunuchs as a negation of "a man's place is in the home."

The text in Matt, 19:3-9 represents one of those foundational texts within the
Christian tradition that has the function Butler described as gender norms: it
presents (in modern terms) heterosexual complementarity of bodies, ideals and
rule of proper and improper masculinity, in short, it establishes the "ontologi-
cal field" for what is possible and what is not possible. The challenge presented
to Jesus is that of divorce procedures, exclusively from the side of the male: are
there rules , i.e. restrictions on his right to divorce his wife (19:3)? In his riposte
Jesus presents his opponents with a position based on the creation narrative: the
complementarity of male and female, and their union to "one body". This divine
unity forbids humans, i.e. husbands to divorce their vnves (19:4-6). But this posi-
tion is countered by Jesus' opponents with a reference to the divorce procedures
prescribed for husbands by Moses (19:7). In his second riposte Jesus attributes
this right "for you to divorce your waves" to the hardness of their hearts (19:8).
This emphasis upon creation as male and female, and upon the union that a
man is not allowed to break at will may amount to Jesus' defense of women's
rights within a heterosexual system of complementarity. However, 19:9 puts the
woman in the position of blame: a woman's pomeia is valid reason for divorce.
Read in modernity as a "foundational text," it confirms all the feminists'
descriptions of a (Christian) male gender system: The masculine dominance in
marriage is taken for granted, although circumscribed in various ways.
Moreover, what we would speak of as a normative heterosexual structure is pre-
sented not only as a given, but as part of a cosmological system. And the
male/female complementarity that is introduced, is limited by a male superior-
ity that puts the blame on woman as "the sinner" (19:9).
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But what shall we then make ofJesus' words in 19:12. to male disciples who
seemed to despair at the problems he caused them with his words about
divorce: "For 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."
W^at is the meaning of this saying about the eunuchs? Eunuchs were well
known in the ancient Middle East and Roman empire, in all the forms described
in the saying by Jesus. Castration of slaves, particularly young ones, was a com-
mon practice, and in various cults, e.g. for Cybele and Dea Syria, there were men
who castrated themselves and banded in groups of followers with special tasks
for the goddess. So what could have been implied by the description of those
who had "made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven "?
Did it refer even to physical castration?
This saying has caused difficulties to exegetes throughout history, not just
with the rise of modern biblical scholarship, but also in antiquity.'^^ Rather than
going into exegetical details of these interpretations, I suggest a discussion in
light of the passage from Butler presented above. One alternative is to read the
saying along vnth Matt. 19:3-9, viz. a reading within the established ontological
fields of heterosexuality, marriage and masculinity. The other alternative is to
read it in contrast to that established ontology, in Butler's words, as a sajdng
causing "gender trouble" by extending legitimacy to "bodies that have been
regarded as false, unreal or unintelligible."
Needless to say, the overwhelming majority of interpreters have chosen to
read the eunuch passage within the parameters set by 19:3-9, a text dealing with
marriage between man and woman, and with divorce and remarriage. The con-
text for interpreting "eunuch" therefore becomes "marriage" within a hetero-
sexual paradigm, and the only possible interpretation therefore becomes "non-
marriage": a eunuch is somebody who does not enter into (heterosexual) mar-
riage. A typical position is to say that "made themselves eunuchs for the sake of
the kingdom of heaven" is "of course" (German naturlich) to take it in an alle-
gorical meaning, as "to make a decision for an unmarried state or for sexual
asceticism."33 The word "of course" here gives away the presupposition: the nor-
mative structure of heterosexual marriage is naturalized and taken for granted.
Therefore "eunuch" must be related to a voluntary decision not to enter into mar-
riage, not to castration, an act which would remove one from the context of
marriage altogether, as totally unfit to fill that role. This interpretation is not

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just the majority position among exegetes, it has also worked itself into many
modern Bible translations that take marriage as the "obvious" context for the
eunuch passage,'^^ Understood in this way the saying places eunuchs outside of
marriage, but it actually confirms marriage as the ideal ontological

"A man's place" and a eunuch misplaced

Within the context of the normative structure of marriage in Matt, 19:3-9, we
noticed also the androcentric focus on the husband and his rights. In modern
terms, heterosexuality goes together with masculinity. And masculinity is even
more important than marriage. That was a characteristic aspect of the interpre
tation of "eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom" among male theologians in the
early church, and it is still pervasive.^^ A recent interpretation illuminates this
concern for masculinity. That eunuchs were men who voluntarily abstained
from marriage is again "naturalized" as "the plain meaning of Mt 19:12," But
then the explanation turns on the masculine character that this decision rep-
resented:

The eunuchs that Jesus defended were those vk^ho, as heralds of the
coming kingdom, had as little time for marriage as for business. To
leave all for the sake of the grand cause was to leave behind the world
and its attendant affairs once and for all. If the discipline of the
Spartans was to prepare for war, and if the exercises of the Greek ath-
lete were to prepare him for the athletic contest, the asceticism of the
pre-Easter Jesus movement was similarly a strategy to meet a specific

In this interpretation the eunuchs of Jesus' sayings have their parallels and
counterparts in the Spartan warriors and the Greek athletes, champions of mas-
culinity in the ancient world. Thus, the eunuch is included vwthin the "ideals
. , , of proper masculinity," ideals that "establish what wdll , , , be intelligibly
human," But can this pass as an explanation of eunuchs7 Being castrated they
had lost the very sign of their masculinity, their sexual virility, and therefore
they could not fill the masculine role within the heterosexual system of family,
property and descent. One can virtually see how the author here struggles
against the idea that behavior and identity that Jesus proclaimed as "for the
sake of the kingdom" might represent "improper masculinity," that which "-will
not be intelligibly human," that which could not have "legitimate expression"
within the established ontological field,
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Eunuchs outside men's place

But maybe we should entertain this possibility, and follow up on Butler's
suggestion: might Jesus' Kingdom proclamation extend legitimacy even
"to bodies that have been regarded as false, unreal and unintelligible"
within the established ontological field?
Let us first consider the possible range of meanings for the eunuch
saying if it does not conform to the heterosexual marriage/ non-marriage
pattern of the preceding verses. It is possible, even plausible that this verse
was later added on to this context, and that it originally might have been
a saying of Jesus in response to a slanderous accusation against Jesus and
his followers from critiques: "You are just a bunch of eunuchs!"^^ xhis
might not necessarily refer to an actual castration on the side ofJesus and
his group of male disciples, but was a way to accuse them of not being
"real men."^^ To unsympathetic critics Jesus and his group might have
just enough in common with the groups of male castrates, galli, associat-
ed with Dea Syria and Cybele, who roamed the countryside, begging and
proclaiming the goddess, for the accusation to stick. Moreover, Jesus and
at least some of his followers had left their households, their responsibil-
ities as men, their male places in society as upholders of traditions, fami-
ly loyalties and access to power. In terms of sexuality, male social roles and
power they had left their "male place"—just as eunuchs had. So was Jesus
here deliberately taking up the accusation and turning it around, instead
presenting the eunuch as an ideal figure for the Kingdom, although or
because he did not conform to the role patterns of binary genders?*"
Thus, I am not arguing that Jesus and some of his disciples were
eunuchs, i.e. castrated. If that had been the case, I think there would have
been much more controversy around it. But I think that the saying is one
that causes "gender trouble" because it presents a challenge to the mas-
culine role taken for granted by most interpreters. In the Greco-Roman
world the eunuch was an ambiguous person. He represented sexual
renunciation, but at the same time also a renunciation of masculinity,
and that made it difficult to find a defined place for eunuchs. Critics
found it difficult to ascribe to them an "essence" or identity, they were
described as that which they were not: they were not "real men", but semi-
vir ("half-men"), and when they were described as "soft" or "feminine,"
they were actually compared to another identity that they were not, viz.
women. In Butler's terms, eunuchs were not "real," since they had no

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fixed identity, and they were outside "the ontological field in which bodies may
be given legitimate expressions."
Interestingly, there is one author in early Christianity who seems to be
aware of this, and that is Tertullian. He is the only writer to use the term eunuch
about Jesus, using the Latin word spado, a common word for a castrated or impo-
tent man. In a statement that must have sounded shocking to his audience, he
says: "For the Lord himself opened the Kingdom of heaven to eunuchs. He him-
self being a eunuch.'"*^ And Tertullian was aware that eunuchs caused "gender
trouble." In the context of a discussion of levirate marriage (Deut 25:5-6), he
gives as a reason for that historic custom that "eunuchs and the unfruitful were
despised." But that command was no longer valid, Tertullian argued, and one of
the reasons he gave was that "Now no longer are eunuchs despised; rather they
have merited grace and are invited into the kingdom of heaven.'"'^ That is, with
Jesus words in Matt. 19:12 the eunuchs had "come out of shame", or again, in
Butler's words: legitimacy had been extended "to bodies that had been regarded
as false, unreal and unintelligible."

The Kingdom of heaven as no-man's land

In this reading of the passage, the "eunuchs" are not forced into the normafive
pattern of hegemonic, masculine heterosexuality that dominates modern inter-
pretations of Matt. 19:3-9. For these interpretations it seems to have gone unno-
ticed that also "the Kingdom of heaven" has been forced into the same "onto-
logical field" as the heterosexual family. But is the Kingdom of Heaven in Jesus'
preaching a confirmation of the existing ontological fields of sex and gender? Is
it not rather a reversal, an opening up offields?Matthew's gospel itself appears
to suggest as much, when it combines the eunuch saying with the story of how
Jesus reverses the position of children (19:13-15): "Let the children come to me,
and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven" (19:14). Not
the disciples, the adult males are the keepers of the kingdom, the roles are
reversed, the kingdom is for children.
Read not within the "ontological field" of the marriage and divorce passage
(Matt. 19:3-9), but within the ontological field of the passage about the children
and the kingdom (19:13-15), a saying about the place in the kingdom for males
without an acceptable masculine identity makes good sense. Not just eunuchs,
but also children are causing trouble for male prerogatives. And in another
breaking of boundaries Jesus blesses the "barren women," (Luke 23:29; Gos.Thom.
70), pitied figures in Jewish scriptures, who did not conform to the ideals of a

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childbearing mother in the patriarchal family. They were in a way a feminine

parallel to the eunuch, living in shame. Jesus' words about barren women and
eunuchs therefore amount to, again in Butler's terms: extending legitimacy to
bodies that were previously regarded as unreal and unintelligible.
With his sayings Jesus gave a picture of people and life in the Kingdom that
was very different from the ideal patriarchal household. The male world in
which "everybody know their place" is turned upside dovwi, the eunuch, the
barren woman and the child without status are all lifted up. It is those least val-
ued, those of httle status, "the others," who are lifted up, blessed and accepted
into the Kingdom.

III. Gender-trouble as possibility

What is the gain of reading the Jesus-saying that links "eunuchs" and "Kingdom
of God" against the grain, unmasking the hegemonic heterosexual and mascu-
line gender in Christian discourse on God and humanity? Does it in any way con-
tribute to a response to the question wherewith we started: "Can a male saviour
redeem and save wo/men?" Can a woman more easily identify with an image of
Jesus/Christ as a eunuch than wdth a virile, powerful man? This is difficult for
me to say,'*'^ but in addition to Butler, another queer critic has been helpful for
my reflections on the implications of this Jesus-saying. The literary critic Lee
Edelman discusses the rhetoric used by the Queer movement protesting against
the discrimination of gays and lesbians in the US in the wake of AIDS, i.e. a sit-
uation where understandings of gender and sexuality came into play. Edelman
says that this movement did not choose a consistent form of politics, rather, "its
vigorous and unmethodical dislocations of 'identity' create . . . a zone of possi-
bilities in which the embodiment of the subject might be experienced other-
wise." I find this statement useful since it seems to run parallel to what the
Jesus' eunuch saying performs. Thus, if we substitute Jesus for the Queer move
ment, we might say that his "vigorous and unmethodical dislocations of (mas-
culine) 'identity' create . . . a zone of possibilities in which the embodiment of
the subject might be experienced otherwise (even as a eunuch)."^
Here I see three aspects that can help to see the importance of the Jesus' say-
ing for the larger question of how one can speak of salvation after the loss of
gender innocence (or maybe with a second naivete). First, it has the critical edge
of questioning "the hegemonic gender frame" for Christology with regard to its

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rhetorical and socio-political power. The figure of the eunuch represents the
male in a non-hegemonic position, who is in a position similar to women.'*^ if
one holds, as I do, that the image of (the "historical") Jesus must always serve as
a criticism of Christology, the image of the eunuch destabilizes all male images
of Jesus/Christ in terms of power and reign. This image stays in front of us to
keep alive the ambiguity about Jesus/Christ in the gospel narratives; he is not
"fixed" in a defined or self-declared position. Thus, the most adequate modern
term for such a protest against fixed categories may be "queer.""'^
Second, in analogy with the Queer movement, this image of Jesus creates a
"zone of possibilities" for those who belonged to positions not only of gender
and sex, but also of race, class and ethnicity that were not in power. For Butler,
too, "possibilities" is a key word when she describes the aim of her text in Gender
Trouble. It was "to open up the field of possibility of gender without dictating
which kind of possibilities ought to be realized." Butler notes that some might
find this vague, and asks "what use 'opening up possibilities' finally is." Her
response sounds similar to Jesus' cry after the eunuch saying: "He who is able to
receive this, let him receive it" (Matt. 19:12d), when she continues: "no one who
has understood what it is to live in the social world as what is 'impossible,' illeg-
ible, unrealisable, unreal, and illegitimate is likely to pose that question."
Might we see "possibility" as another term for what in Christian terminolo-
gy is called with various names: "calling", "salvation", "hope"? In Edelman's
statement about "dislocation" and creating "a zone of possibilities." I find a sim-
ilarity to Christian terminology of "calling" or "conversion": of leaving one loca-
tion of identity to enter into a new position. In the narratives where Jesus calls
disciples to follow him (and most of the times this is men!), they are called out
from fixed places, from household and family, from work and established
responsibilities—and called to follow Jesus, without any clear directions. They
were called out from male spaces, from specific, normative ways of being men
into unsettled positions, and into company where their male role expectations
about power and honor were constantly questioned and put down (e.g. Mark
8:32-33; 9:33-37; 10:35-40). Thus, they were called, not into secure positions , but
into "possibilities," that were open-ended, pointing towards something new,
unknown and unexpected.
And third, this unmasking, followed by possibilities for those who previ-
ously had been without possibilities, is presented as an "opening," an experi-
ence that can be "otherwise." It is not closed into another dogmatic scheme, but
genuinely open. It conjures up the very idea of something that can be expected,

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J E S U S IN G E N D E R TROUBLE

that spurs fantasy and imagination of something different from that which is
known and experienced in the now. Thus, it has some of the same imaginative
qualities as Jesus' Kingdom sayings: they never explain what the Kingdom "is,"
they shatter preconceived notions and understandings of existence, they repre-
sent the "other" in contrast to that which is known."*^ Other interpretations of
Jesus include images that like the eunuch break with the "natural" and "given"
in attempts to get at the non-fixed, non-definable characteristics of Jesus.
Eleanor McLaughlin tries to explain this quality about Jesus by means of the
hermeneutics of "cross-dressing," and she concludes with a description of space
that also serves as an image of the Kingdom: "This 'transvestite' Jesus makes a
human space where no one is out of place because the notion of place and gen-
der has been transformed."'*^
Critical invesfigations can—I hope—contribute to relativize the masculine
images of Jesus/Christ and the way they place us according to gender (and race
and class), but in the end we must put our hope in the possibility that place and
gender, race and class will be transformed.

Notes
1. This article was written during my period as Coolidge Fellow at the Crosscurrents 2004
Colloquium. I am very grateful for the opportunity to participate in this exciting and stimulating
colloquium, and for ideas and suggestions from my colleagues in the discussion of this paper.
2. It is raised in many of her works, see e.g. "Can Christology be liberated from Patriarchy?" in M.
Stevens (ed.) Reconstructing the Christ Symbol (New York: Paulist, 1993). 7-29.
3.1 prefer to use the term Jesus/Christ to indicate that much of the criticisms as well as the
attempts at positive constructions of Christology are built on the presentations of Jesus in the
Cospels.
4. E.Schussler Fiorenza, Jesus and the Politics o/Interpretotion (NY: Continuum, 2000), 145-49; and Jesus;
Miriam's Child. Sophia's Prophet (NY: Continuum, 1994), 67-96.
5. E.Schussler Fiorenza, Jesus and the Politics o/Interpretation, 148.
6. See e.g. the works by E. Schiissler Fiorenza and Rosemary Radford Ruether; among younger
scholars e.g. Ellen T. Armour, Deconstruction, Feminist Theology and the Problem of Difference (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1999) and Serene Jones, Feminist Theory and Christion Theology:
Cartogrophies of Grace (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2000).
7. For a brief overview, see L. Susan Bond, Trouble wth Jesus: Women, Christology and Preaching (St.
Louis: Chalice Press, 1999), 75-107.
8. Cf. the criticism by Farid Esack, "Islam and Gender Justice," in J. C. Raines and D. C. Maquire
(eds.) What Men owe to Women (New York, SUNY, 2001), 187.
9. See e.g. Michael S. Kimmel, Manhood in America: A Cultural History (New York: Free Press, 1996); H.
Brod and M. Kaufnian (eds.) Theorizing Masculinities (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1994).
10. For related studies, but more directly based on gay and lesbian experiences, see e.g. Robert E.
Goss, Queering Christ: Beyond Jesus Acted Up (Cleveland: Pilgrim, 2002), 113-82; lisa Isherwood,

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 HALVOR MOXNES

Liberating Christ (Cleveland: Pilgrim, 1999), 89-109.

11. As a gay New Testament professor I find myself in an interesting and sometimes challenging
place, situated between "male-stream" theology and a minority position.
12. In the US e.g. E. P. Sanders, J. D. Crossan, J. P. Meier, M. Borg; in Europe G. Theissen and J.
Dunn.
13. Especially Jesus: Miriam's ChM, Sophia's Prophet and Jesus and the Politics of Interpretation.
14. Jesus: Miriam's Child, Sophia's Prophet.
15. Ben Witherington m, Thejesus Quest: The Third Search for the Jew of Nazareth (Downers Grove, 111.:
InterVarsity, 1995), 161-96.
16. Jesus and the Politics of Interpretation, 4041.
17. See e.g. J. Hick, The Metaphor of God Incarnate: Christology in a Pluralistic Age (Louisville, KY:
Westminster/John Knox, 1993); J. Moltmann, The Way of Jesus Christ: Christology in Messianic
Dimensions (San Fransisco: Harper, 1990); H. Schwarz, Christology (Grand Rapids and Cambridge:
Eerdmans, 1998). One of the few exceptions is Elmar Klinger, Christologie in Feminismus (Regensburg:
Pustet, 2000).
18. A very early example is Carl UUmann, who in 1828 wrote a book titled Die Sijndlosigkeit Jesu.
More recently, see Gerald O'Collins, Christology; A Biblicol, Historical and Systematic Study of Jesus Christ
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995), 318-21.
19. See the illuminating study by a young male scholar from Tanzania, Andrea M. Ng'weshemi,
Rediscovering the human: the quest for a Christo-theological anthropology in Africa, Studies in Biblical
Literature 39 (New York: Peter Lang, 2002).
20. See Jon Sobrino, Christ the Liberator: A view from the victims (MaryknoU, NY: Orbis, 2000).
21. See Ellen T. Armour, DecoTtstruction, Feminist Theology and the Problem of Difference, 7-44.
22. That is the case e.g. of Sobrino, Christ the Liberator.
23. Cf. J. Butler's comment that language can be so "pervasively masculinist" that women "consti-
tute the unrepresentable," Gender Trouble. New ed. (N.Y.: Routledge, 1999), 14.
24. Our Cry for Life: Feminist Theology from Latin America (MaryknoU, NY: Orbis, 1993), 140.
25. Cf. how the Promise Keepers combine heightened masculinity with racial plurality; Mike Hill,
After Whiteness. Unmaking an American Majority (New York: New York University Press, 2004), 75-133.
26. H. Moxnes, "Social Integration and the Problem of Gender in St. Paul's Letters," Studia Theologica
43 (1989), 99-113.W
27. Donald Hall, Muscular Christianity: Embodying the Victorian Age (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1994).
28. Dane S. Claussen, The Promise Keepers. Essays on Masculinity and Christianity (Jefferson, NC:
McFarland, 2000).
29. Jesus and the Politics of Interpretation, 149. Likewise in Armour (Deconstruction, Feminist Theology,
32.), referring to Butler: the sexual binary reflects not attention to nature, but the interests of a
heterosexist and phallocentric culture.
30. "Preface 1999," Gender Trouble, 1999, xxiii.
31. For a discussion of the historical context and the history of interpretation of Matt. 19:12 in the
Early Church, see my Putting Jesus in His Place: A Radical Vision of Household and Kingdom (Louisville:
Westminster/John Knox, 2003), 72-90. The reading in light of Butler is new and developed during
the Crosscurrents colloquium.
32. Elizabeth A. Clark, Reading Renunciation: Asceticism and Scripture in Early Christianity (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1999), 90-92.

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33. Ulrlch Luz, Dos Evangelium nach Matthdus. Vol. 3, (Neukirchen-Vlyn: Neukirchener, 1997), 103-11.
34. Notice Bible translations that introduce this meaning (http://wvirw.biblegateway.com/cgi-
bin/bible), for instance New International version: ^^"For some are eunuchs because they were born
that way; others were made that way by men; and others have renounced marriagel^l because of
the kingdom of heaven. The one who can accept this should accept it." Contemporary English version:
^^"Some people are unable to marry because of birth defects or because of what someone has
done to their bodies. Others stay single for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Anyone who can
accept this teaching should do so."
35. In some instances the meaning of the passage is totally turned on its head in defence of mar-
riage, cf. especially the translation of the exhortation in v. 12d in The Message: ^^ "Some, from
birth seemingly, never give marriage a thought. Others never get asked—or accepted. And some
decide not to get married for kingdom reasons. But if you're capable of growing into the largeness
of marriage, do it."
36. M. Kuefler, The Manly Eunuch: Mosculinity, Gender Ambiguity, and Christian Ideology in Late Antiquity
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001).
37. Dale C. Allison, Jesus of Nazareth: Millenarion Prophet (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1998), 202.
38. First argued by J. Blinzler, "Eisin eunochoi," Zeitschrift fUr die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft 48
(1957), 254-70.
39. Moxnes, Putting Jestis in His place, 75.
40. There may be an analogy here to Jev^dsh traditions that saw Adam as a hermaphrodite, combin-
ing male and female; Midrash Rabbah VIII:1 on Genesis 1:26.1 owe this suggestion to my
Colloquium colleague, Zion Zohar.
41. Mon 3.1.
42. Mon 7:3^.
43. It is possible to contemplate this, see C. Leon, "Simon de Beauvoir's woman: eunuch or male,"
Ultimate Reality and Meaning 11 (1988), 196-211.
44. Lee Edelman, Homogrophesis: Essays in Gay Literature and Cultural Theory (New York: Routledge,
1994), 114.
45. Cf. E. Schussler Fiorenza, 2000,4 n.lO: "I vmte wo/men in this w a y . . . also to signal that when
I say wo/men I also mean to include subordinated men."
46. William B. Turner, A Genealogy of Queer Theory (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2000), 1-35.
47. See J.D. Crossan, In Parables: The Challenge of the Historical Jesus (New York: Harper & Row, 1973).
48. Eleanor McLaughlin, "Feminist Christologies: Re-Dressing the Tradition," in M. Stevens (ed.).
Reconstructing the Christ Symbol (New York: Paulist, 1993), 144.

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