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Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition of Same-Sex Love
by Will Roscoe
Illustrations by Winfield Coleman
Praise for Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition of Same-Sex Love
"What raises the book above the level of academic treatise is that it has a heart as well as a head. Roscoe felt and saw the AIDS catastrophe at first hand (his longtime companion died of the disease in 1996), and for him, as the personal reflections that close the book make clear, the idea that Christian love might include the devotion of one man to another is not an abomination or intellectual abstraction but a living hope and comfort."
—Paul Reidinger,
San Francisco Bay Guardian
Read the full review here.
"Will Roscoe's first book, The Zuni Man-Woman, was the winner of a Lambda Literary Award and of the Margaret Mead Award from the American Anthropological Association. Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition of SameSex Love is the latest book by the scholar whom Bo Young of the White Crane Journal rightly ranks alongside the late Harry Hay, Joseph Campbell, and Randy Connor. It is also Roscoe's most thought-provoking and timely book. At a time when the teachings of Christ are misused to bash sexual and gender minorities, Roscoe's book suggests that same-sex love was the chrysalis in which Christianity's revolutionary ideal of a universal and redeeming form of love was forged, and it suggests that this concept of love was derived from its rituals (not the other way around)--in particular, a secret ritual whose symbols and gestures are shown to have an ancient history. This moves same-sex love from the margins of Western religious history to its center.
"Recently the late C. A. Tripp raised a ruckus with his Intimate World of Abraham Lincoln, which argued that the Great Emancipator was homosexual. Roscoe is wise not to make the same claim regarding Jesus of Nazareth; nor does he have to do it to make his point. As Roscoe writes, "Jesus was not a 'homosexual baptizer'...his own sexuality remains a mystery--but he was someone for whom love between men could embody some of the highest ideals of humanity." Like Plato before him, "Jesus considered the love of comrades qualitatively different from that of other relationships...For Jesus, the love of friends is the "greater love" because it is voluntary. Nothing demands or requires that friends love each other; they can love without conditions...As shocking as it may seen to today's conservative Christians, Christian ideals of love are rooted in a philosophical tradition inspired by homosexual desire."
"According to the Gospel of Mark (14:51-52), when Jesus was arrested in the Garden of Gethsemane in Jerusalem "a certain young man was following him, having thrown a linen cloth around his naked body. And the young men caught him. But he, leaving behind the linen cloth, fled from them naked." Though the canonical Gospel of Mark says nothing more about this wayward youth, Roscoe found clues in a "Secret Gospel of Mark" which, though no longer available was quoted extensively by Bishop Clement of Alexandria (150-215 ce). Though the Bishop's letter "conveniently" vanished after it was re-discovered in the monastery of Mar Saba, scholar Morton Smith (who found the letter) quoted it for posterity. It speaks of a young man, whom Jesus raised from the dead, who "loved him [Jesus] and began to implore that he might be with him...When evening arrived, the young man came to him, having wrapped a linen cloth around his naked body, and he remained with him that night. Jesus taught him the mystery of the kingdom of God." That this can have sexual connotations there is no doubt, for Bishop Clement goes out of this way to point out that this "mystery" did not involve "naked man with naked man."
"From the Secret Gospel, St. Paul's Epistles, and other writings, Roscoe was able to put together what "Mark" meant by "the mystery of the kingdom of God." In Roscoe's words, "the image evoked by these examples is that of two males, unclothed, standing in the baptismal pool (or something representing that), embracing--an intimate procedure to be sure, but not necessarily sexual." On the other hand, Roscoe adds, "if a nude embrace was a method of transferring a spirit from oneself to another"--the goal of many an ancient initiation ceremony--"intercourse or an exchange of bodily fluids as part of that embrace would have made the symbolism even more powerful. It is important to keep in mind, however, that such contact would not have been thought of as occurring between two human males. Rather, since the initiator (Jesus) was possessed by a spirit, any sexual exchange would have been between the initiate and that being. In this case there would be no need for the spirit to leave Jesus to be transferred to the initiate--the initiate went to the spirit, as it were, by uniting with the body it possessed. And if the spirit was God or an emanation from God, then so the initiate became, at that moment, God."
"If this interpretation is correct, we can see why Clement of Alexandria and others like him were determined to suppress both the Secret Gospel and all who believed in it. Even today, as Roscoe puts it, "a predilection for private rituals with naked youths would still land even a messiah in jail." But Roscoe's Jesus is vastly unlike the Christ of Revs. D. James Kennedy or O'Neal Dozier. Roscoe places Jesus at the center of the "heritage of queer shamanism [that] is woven through the entirety of Western religious history....=Many characteristics of Jesus' career are similar to that of a shaman. His ministry starts with a spiritual crisis. Voices instruct him to enter the wilderness where he is attacked by demons. Surviving this trial, he returns to his community with powers of healing and prophecy and the ability to control spirits. His subsequent suffering, death, and resurrection are all typical patterns of shamanistic initiation. Like a shaman, Jesus backed up his claims with convincing demonstrations of his powers. In the [apocryphal] Gospel of Thomas and other early Christian writings, he is credited with preaching the negation of gender--spiritual androgyny--another common element of shamanism."
"Roscoe wrote Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition of Same-Sex Love partly in reaction to the AIDS epidemic that took the life of his partner, Bradley Rose, and of so many other gay men. But amidst so much grief, Roscoe found hope and inspiration, as "gay men demonstrated the capacity for passionate love [and]...laid down their lives for each other as Jesus challenged his disciples to do...I have seen gay love heal, if not the body, then the spirit of those tormented by disease and those devastated by grief." In short, "it was the epidemic that enabled me to see the real significance of the Secret Gospel of Mark. Love between equals and sames--agape ,subject-subject-love--is heaven on earth." You do not have to be a believer to learn much from these wise teachings."
—Jesse Monteagudo,
The Weekly News
Spirituality
Naked and Alone with Jesus
"The Gospel of Mark is the shortest of the four gospels in the Christian
scriptures, yet it includes an interesting footnote the others omit. Just
before Jesus was crucified, he was arrested while praying in a garden. As
Mark tells the story, a young man accompanied Jesus wearing nothing but a
linen cloth, and when soldiers tried to grab him, he fled naked, leaving
behind the empty cloth.
"It's a small, yet tantalizing, detail. Growing up, I had a healthy
appreciation for the homoerotic nuances of some Bible stories, and I often
wondered about this naked young man with Jesus. Of course no one ever seemed
to notice. It was as if everyone thought that it was perfectly normal for
Jesus to be alone in a garden with a naked man, but my imagination soared.
What could have been going on there?
"Fortunately, Will Roscoe has written a book to explain this and other
mysteries. Suspect Thoughts Press released Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition
of Same-Sex Love in 2004. Roscoe has written widely about queer studies and
religion, and in this book he explores the history of Western religion from
a queer perspective.
"Roscoe begins with the incident from the Gospel of Mark. Without jumping to
conclusions, Roscoe asks the obvious question: what was Jesus doing alone
with a naked young man? If anyone caught a priest alone with a naked young
man we all know what the obvious assumption would be. Roscoe, however,
doesn't take the easy route--and his years in academia shine in his careful research to back up his ideas.
"The path eventually leads us on a convoluted path from Jesus through Plato
to Shamanism, and finally to Walt Whitman. More signposts would help the
reader follow the tortuous trail, but Roscoe's ideas are compelling and well
worth the effort required to keep up. I suggest reading the preface first,
followed by chapters 11 and 12. These sections lay out the framework of the
book most clearly. Chapters 1-10 fill in the details, while essay-style
appendices add a lot of background information in a very readable style.
"The book ends on a very personal note as Roscoe tells of his lover¹s death
of AIDS. My initial reaction to this was a raised eyebrow-how did we go from Jesus with a naked young man to the AIDS epidemic? Gay men of a certain
generation often seem to end up there, but Roscoe makes no apologies for the
horror he experienced nor for the perspective he writes from. I'm grateful
for this, because it grounds the spiritual abstractions in a part of GLBT
history that we ignore at our peril.
"Although I have long sensed that many within the GLBT community have a
heightened spirituality, I have never read anything that explained this.
Roscoe fleshes out that hunch nicely, and Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition
of Same-Sex Love represents the beginning of an authentic formation of
Queer spirituality.
"For example, Roscoe mentions the active fantasy life that many of us had as
children. Think of that wonderful time before we were aware of society¹s
demands, when we were able to run naked without shame, when we could skirt
gender roles without fear of rejection. But at some point, GLBT kids learn
to limit the expression of that inner world out of self-preservation. 'Gay
spirituality begins with reclaiming the childlike awareness we had before
the crippling and stifling influence of homophobia penetrated our lives,'
Roscoe wrote.
"Roscoe does not, however, elevate one sexual orientation over another by
romanticizing it. In fact, he employs the term 'same-sex love' (as opposed
to 'homosexual') purposefully, steering clear of hinging his theory on sex.
The focus of this book is love, which may or may not include sexual
expression. This is an important distinction, as it opens the field to
everyone through friendship, family relationships and romantic love.
"Drawing from the work of several scholars, Roscoe lays out a plausible
argument that same-sex love played a central role in Jesus' radical message
that in our love for others we draw closest to the Divine and experience a
bit of heaven on earth. Roscoe further suggests that same-sex relationships
can represent a high form of love because in a world of power-inequalities,
same-sex relationships of any kind have a greater chance to achieve love
between equals. If anything, the willingness of some to accept the stigma of
being gay preserves an example of the expansive possibilities of same-sex
love. Ideally, we would not need such an example, for as Roscoe says, '…One
of Jesus' most profound teachings is that different people are to be equally
loved, and that we should love not because of the value of the other, but
because of the value of the loving.'
"I heartily recommend this book to anyone who has struggled to find a place
within the Christian church. I promise it will give you much food for
thought at the very least--and it just might help you find your way home."
—Thomas Soule,
Orange County & Long Beach Blade GLBT Newsmagazine
"In Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition of Same-Sex Love, Will Roscoe takes us on a remarkable journey into the heart of Jesus, one who loved passionately and equally with his whole body and his whole being. We are invited to consider anew the radical nature of Jesus' life and how it speaks to the deepest spiritual longings of our age--finding hope in the midst of grief, finding community in the midst of alienating and oppressive culture--and to the revolutionary potential of those who strive to love without condition."
—Rev. Paul G. Fairley,
MCC San Francisco
"While a graduate student at Columbia University, Mortan Smith was invited to catalogue the holdings of the Mar Saba monastery library, near Jerusalem. Smith began his work in the Spring of 1958. He discovered several interesting, though not earth shattering, manuscripts among the collection, including new scholia of Sophocles. This was the case until, in his words, an 'afternoon near the end of my stay, I found myself in my cell, staring incredulously at a text written in a tiny scrawl.' (Smith, The Secret Gospel of Mark, 1973, p. 12) This text, written in the blank back pages of a 17th century edition of Voss's Epistolae genuinae S. Ignatii Martyris, purported to be a partial transcription of a much older manuscript--a letter from Clement of the Stromateis to a follower identified only as Theodore.
"Known more commonly as Clement of Alexandria, the author was an important second century neo-platonic church theologian. In the Mar Saba letter, Clement is responding to questions raised by his follower stemming from a debate the latter had with the Carpocratians, a heterodoxical sect. The questions posed by Theodore relate to a variant version of the gospel of Mark used by the Carpocratians in their arguments. Clement does not attack the authenticity of this 'secret gospel of Mark.' Instead he tells Theodore that it is held by the Alexandrian Church, who utilizes it in their initiations, and then proceeds to quote from his personal copy.
"The 1972 publication of Smith's findings in two editions, one general and one scholarly, caused a stir in biblical academic circles. Though debate continues, many scholars now accept the letter as authentic. Yuri Kuchinsky has set out a detailed case demonstrating the near impossibility of the document being a modern forgery--an accusation leveled by some. Indeed, the letter is included in the scholarly edition of Clement's collected works.
"What remains more controversial is Smith's exegesis of the text and subsequent interpretation. Smith proposed that the text of Secret Mark alluded to a secret baptismal rite conducted by Jesus. Within the ritual, the postulant was dressed only in a single piece of linen (similar to a shroud) over his naked body. In the context of the baptizing Jesus was able to transfer (directly) to his disciple a direct vision of the kingdom of God.
"The manuscript's discovery and resulting scholarly debate is fascinating. Roscoe does a superb job retelling the story and capturing in detail the import of discovery and the debate surrounding it. He also provides a clear analysis of Smith's interpretations of Secret Mark--bringing into the discussion many supporting instances (and telling omissions) from the canonical synoptic gospels. Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition is, in part, a scholarly work and adheres to the necessary rigors of that discipline. Though some readers may indeed find the level of detail daunting, it provides a necessary background from which Roscoe jumps into the interpretative second half of the book.
"At the outset of his work Roscoe is careful to point that his is not (another) book retelling the life and a gay Jesus. 'For the record,' Roscoe writes, 'I do not believe that [The Secret Gospel of Mark] provides any evidence regarding Jesus' emotional or sexual orientation.' He does, however, propose that it 'provides compelling evidence that the first Christians, including Jesus, engaged in mystical practices involving intimate same-sex contact.' For Roscoe the moments of the mystical (shamanic) Jesus glimpsed in the Secret Gospel of Mark provide for gay people 'an opportunity to read themselves into the heritage of Western religion and spirituality as a whole.'
"Jumping off of Smith's interpretation, Roscoe theorizes that Jesus practiced a baptismal ritual based on same-sex contact, yes perhaps sexual in nature, in which he imparted a mystical vision of heaven or the kingdom of God. This is not dissimilar from other shamanic practices in other parts of the world. Roscoe spends a good portion of the book discussing these other traditions and distilling from them similarities which help in an understanding of the conduct of the mystical initiating Jesus.
"Roscoe is a respected scholar. His earlier works have included studies of gender and third-genders among the Zuni, Africans and Native Americans. He brings his unique wealth of knowledge to bear on his interpretive arguments relating to Jesus as a shaman, without allowing it to overwhelm his core discussion.
"Secret Mark seems tied to gay spirituality. Smith's book came into Roscoe's hands from those of Harry Hay, the legendary founding father of the modern gay rights movement and the radical faeries. 'I think there's something in here we should be concerned with,' he told Roscoe cryptically.
"His is a unique and at times powerfully beautiful interpretation of agape (Love). The egalitarian notion of love expounded by Hay during his life, and its connection to the mystical side of Jesus' teachings and ritual practices, was brought into sharp relief for Roscoe when the AIDS epidemic hit the gay community. 'It was the epidemic that enabled me to see the real significance of the Secret Gospel of Mark. Love between equals and sames--agape, subject-subject love--is heaven and earth.'
"Roscoe has set himself no small task… yet he carries it out flawlessly. He grounds his revolutionary theory in canonical and apocryphal scriptural sources and teams this with an expert's background in cross-cultural anthropology of gender and sexuality.
—Sven Davisson,
Ashe Journal
"If you believe, as many do, that Jesus is always with you, then that means he was with you that time you made out with Rodney Alan Greenblat in the coat check at Limelight in 1987.
"Perhaps Jesus even called in the favor for you, for as Will Roscoe asserts in his book, Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition of Same-Sex Love, the son of God had something of a weakness for cute, young boys himself. The difference is that Jesus grew up before the eighties really happened, before something we came to call 'identity politics' burst into vogue. As a result, Christ was never given his gay due, and contemporary Christianity remains thoroughly square.
"According to a letter allegedly written around the year 200 A.D. and discovered in a monastery outside of Jerusalem in 1958, there exists a Christian text called the Secret Gospel of Mark. If believed, this text offers evidence that Jesus Christ engaged in intimate same-sex contact, and perhaps even intercourse, with young men to provide them the momentary sensation of rocketing toward the kingdom of heaven.
"Two thousand years later, gay boys are still searching for the man who can provide them a similar service, and Roscoe says it's possible, even in our steely, sin-choked modern world--if we know where to look. Let us pray.
—Will Doig,
Nerve
Read an interview with Will Roscoe at Nerve.com.
"'My mom wanted me to be Catholic. My father was basically agnostic. And lately I've reunited with some long-lost relatives--only to discover that they are all very, very Christian,' says Will Roscoe, author of the new book Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition of Same-Sex Love.
"Although Roscoe may want to tread lightly when speaking with some of those relatives, it's clear that he has no problems discussing his views on homosexuality and religion with others. In fact, Roscoe's need to be vocal fuels much of his latest book with a scholarly yet accessible deconstruction of what he terms 'Christian mythology' and its relation to same-sex relationships--both platonic and sexual.
"Using a little-known ritual/initiation ceremony allegedly practiced by Christ with his male protégés, Roscoe places same-sex love in a historical context previously unacknowledged by many churches and biblical scholars, and makes a strong case for the importance of such relationships within and outside of the gay community. It might sound like heady material to some, but it is perfectly suited to Roscoe's track record, which includes not only several books on sexuality and gender, but also his experience working with the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, as well as helping Harry Hay found and organize the famous gay liberationist organization the Radical Faeries.
"It was Roscoe's association with Hay, in fact, that led to what he describes as 'a conscious decision to shift to what I consider to be cultural work.' He began publishing a series of essays and books on various topics associated with gay liberation, but it was his experience watching the gay community being ravaged by AIDS (which claimed the life of his partner, Bradley Rose, in 1997) that most affected Roscoe.
"Inspired by the sense of healing he found in San Francisco's nightlife scene at the end of the '90s--and fueled by the writings of Morton Smith (whose 1981 work 'Secret Gospel' revealed the alleged existence of a secret Gospel of Mark that spoke of the mysterious shamanic ritual), Roscoe began to write the book that would eventually become Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition of Same-Sex Love. 'There was a kind of healing that I found by going out to the dance scene in San Francisco…and from that I realized, Love is all there is time for,' he says. 'Love can be so powerful and redemptive, and it's the only value worth seeking in a life [so] short. And via love, healing, mystical experience, union, becoming divine, and having your best motivations brought forward through caring for another person--[you learn that] all of these things are connected through the [Christ ritual] and the role of shamanism and the role of queerness within shamanism.'
"Although he was careful not to equate same-sex love with homosexuality ('I think what we really ought to be looking for in history is not sex but love,' he says), Roscoe's book is informed by a decidedly queer voice. And, while he expects critics to dismiss the book based on his sexual orientation, it is his hope that the book will nonetheless serve as tool for gay men to discover a sense of historical identification. 'I hope those who see themselves as outside of the Christian tradition can read it and see a mythology in which they see themselves, and for those who are believers, [I hope they] can find in this material--if not the exact interpretation or story of it, but all of the material I bring together--a process of seeing themselves as part of the Christian tradition,' he says. 'We need custom, tradition, institution, symbols, teachings. We need stories that we will create and pass on from generation to generation.'
"Most importantly, however, Roscoe says he hopes the book serves as a conduit that helps bring the community closer together. 'I think that there is a need for love in the gay community,' he asserts. 'I think the love that gay men have for each other is healing and can lead to our psychological fulfillment and realization, so it's always very important that we love each other and that society acknowledge that what we have to contribute is so intimately connected to our sexuality that--even if they don't like our sexuality--they need to let us have it.'
"Roscoe confesses that he does not associate with any one religion or ideology ('I'm kind of a lapsed everything,' he says with a laugh), but also says it shouldn't matter what his own religious beliefs are. 'In the end, [the book] is not a manual for a new alternative religion,' he says. 'It's really just saying that, whatever religious path we may want to take, we're never closer to that shamanic heritage than when we love each other intensely and passionately, and sometimes foolishly.'
—Ken Knox,
Frontiers
"In his new book, Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition of Same-Sex Love, Will Roscoe lives up to the archetype of consciousness scout: going first and pushing boundaries, taking the reader on an intriguing, insightful, and illuminating journey from Plato to the Gnostic Gospels to Siberian shamanism to AIDS. I found the book engaging, well-written, and thought-provoking."
—Christian de la Huerta,
author of Coming Out Spiritually
"Wonderfully readable…a real contribution to the field of gay spirituality, in part because of the in-depth research and academic excellence… Roscoe has indeed managed to synthesize a coherent spirituality that places same-sex love and modern gay consciousness at the heart of humankind's religious/spiritual quest."
—Toby Johnson,
author of Gay Perspective: Things Our Homosexuality Tells Us about the Nature of God and the Universe
"Will Roscoe's gift has always been the ability to see the seemingly familiar with a new eye, a queer eye that leads him off in unexplored directions. Before we know it, we're seeing with a new eye as well, reimagining everything, even Jesus."
—Carol Queen,
author of The Leather Daddy and the Femme
"Will Roscoe always takes us places we never thought we'd go. By delving into the sacred heart of the Jesus myth, he opens gateways of revelation that both astound and inspire. Precise, political, and deeply personal, Roscoe's work moves the discussion about the role of same-sex love in the evolution of human consciousness ahead by a quantum leap."
—Mark Thompson,
author of the Gay Spirit, Gay Soul, Gay Body trilogy
As one of the early exponents of the Two-Spirit/berdache tradition in Native American cultures, with his first book The Zuni Man-Woman, Will Roscoe has played a key role in the development of contemporary gay spiritualities. Now in his new book he offers a welcome synthesis of ideas and myths from such disparate sources as berdache tradition, Gnostic Christianity, Plato, Siberian shamanism, Walt Whitman, early gay liberation, and modern day AIDS activism--all to demonstrate, convincingly, that "love between equals and sames--agape, subject-subject love--is heaven on earth."
Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition of Same-Sex Love begins with the obscure story from the New Testament about the naked young man, wearing only a linen cloth, who appears to have been praying with Jesus in the Garden of Gethesemane, while the apostle who were supposed to be keeping guard kept falling asleep, the night Jesus was arrested. Who was that young man? What was actually going on?
About the curious incident in the Gospel of Mark, Roscoe comments: "The religion so often cited today as mandating the condemnation of homosexuality and gay people originated in a mystery cult in which same-sex love was not only idealized, it was an integral element of its oldest rite." That "oldest rite" was a form of baptism, performed "naked man to naked man," in which the initiate was taught the mystery of the Kingdom of God.
Discussion of this mysterious "naked baptism" is not new in contemporary gay spiritual circles. Theodore Jennings' The Man Jesus Loved also offered it as an example of an aspect of Jesus's ministry that the mainstream churches tend to ignore. While Jennings uses this reference, along with the much more elaborated story of the so-called "disciple whom Jesus loved," to make the case that Jesus was likely what today would be called homosexual, Roscoe takes the clue about this initiation rite of naked man to naked man to argue that "same-sex love was the chrysalis in which Christianity' revolutionary ideal of a universal and redeeming form of love was forged." Roscoe notes that the question of Jesus's sexual orientation, while interesting, misses the revolutionary point by its modern focus on sexuality rather than the broader notion of love between equals (which can, of course, include opposite sexed individuals, but in a totally different way from how they treated each other in traditional, "patriarchal," societies).
The story of this "naked baptism" actually comes down to us because of the effort in the early Church to deny it. (Does this sound strangely familiar?) In the 1970s, Biblical scholar Morton Smith reported discovery of a fragment of a letter by the Church Father Clement of Alexandria regarding an heretical Gnostic sect called the Carpocratians in which the raising of Lazarus is linked to initiation into the "mystery of the Kingdom of God." Smith realized that Clement quoted from a hitherto unknown "Secret Gospel" of Mark and inadvertently revealed the practice of naked-man-to-naked-man initiation precisely by condemning the Carpocratians for apparently continuing it.
Roscoe questions just what is this initiation into the mystery of the Kingdom and what's the mystery. Through an exhaustive analysis of early Christian teachings, including especially the writings of St. Paul, and the various Greek mystery religions that were popular throughout the Hellenistic world, he proposes that Jesus personally initiated his followers through a trance-inducing ritual--which certainly included a sacred kiss through which "spirit" was transferred, and which may have also included "a nude embrace [as] a method of transferring a spirit from oneself to another [and perhaps] intercourse or an exchange of bodily fluids"--by which "the initiate saw what the spirit saw: heaven in all its glory."
The point here though isn't homosexuality as we know it today, but rather love and respect (including sexual affection) between equals and sames as a revelation of heaven on earth. Roscoe early on notes that he uses the terms "same-sex" and "sames" rather than "gay" or "homosexual" to emphasize "the relative sameness and equality of the partners. The dynamics of such relationships are different from those of opposite-sex relationships, especially in societies where women have less status and autonomy than men. Further, these dynamics are present regardless of whether the individuals involved have sex or desire sex with each other, although they are especially likely to be present in intimate relationships."
Behind the notion of "sames" is a mystical realization of oneness with the other. This "sameness" isn't just political or legal egalitarianism, though at the time of Plato and Jesus et al that in itself was a radical and revolutionary idea (and in spite of Jefferson's lovely words in the Declaration of Independence, it may still be). "Sameness" is recognition of and participation in the deep unity of all conscious beings as outflowerings of Cosmic Mind or the Jungian Self. It's a realization of unity preceding polarization and duality. And there is something essentially "gay" about it, for we homosexuals live in a world in which the polarization between male and female--and the subsequent "battle of the sexes"--just isn't a very important part of our lives or of our perception of the universe.
In writing this review of Will Roscoe's book, I've focused on the arguments in the first couple of chapters (Will, after all, put the reference to Jesus in the title), but this is really only a small part of the book and his synthesis of mystical traditions. For after placing Jesus in the line of spirit-initiated shamans, the book goes on to elucidate how shamanic tradition derives its authority, spiritual and healing power, and socially-contributing role from the shaman's personal experience of the unity of all life. In the same way that heterosexuality and opposite-sex love manifests the interplay of the polarities (light-dark, hot-cold, good-evil, male-female) that drive creation, so homosexuality and same-sex love manifests the primal unity that transcends creation--and that is God.
Roscoe goes on to investigate Plato's notions of love (including that story about the original androgynes who got cut in half by Zeus as a punishment for hubris), the Orphic mysteries, and then, expanding well beyond the Mediterranean world that gave birth to Western Civilization, Siberian shamanic religion, and Native American religions. All these demonstrate the point that there is a mystical revelation that comes from transcending or escaping conventional gender roles.
This is the revelation of primal unity that I personally resonate so strongly with in the Mahayana myth of the Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara, of whom it is said there are "three wonders": the first wonder is that the bodhisattva is both male and female simultaneously; the second wonder is that to the bodhisattva there is no distinction between time and eternity, between the world of suffering and nirvana; and the third wonder is that the first two wonders are the same!
This is the secret knowledge to be discovered beneath the surface manifestations of our homosexuality. On the surface we have sex with other men (or other women) because we're sexually attracted. In that, actually, we're just like everybody else: we have sex with people we find sexy. Beneath the surface though is the secret discovery that being alive and being conscious, we're in heaven now, right here, on earth.
Will Roscoe brings his arguments up to contemporary times and tells a little of his personal life and experience of modern gay life. In the early 1980s he and his lover, Bradley Rose, moved to Los Angeles and became friends and housemates with proto gay activists Don Kilhefner and Harry Hay. It was Kilhefner who presented Will with Morton Smith's book on the Secret Gospel of Mark way back then and Harry Hay with whom Will and Brad studied the esoteric meanings of early Christianity and the homosexual subtexts of Walt Whitman's poetry.
The notion of "sameness" is precisely what Hay meant with his idea that gay men experience "subject-subject" love rather than the conventional and socially approved "subject-object" love of heterosexuality, with all its emphasis on utility, reproduction, and social roles.
Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition is wonderfully readable. Only a few times did I find myself lost in the maze of italicized terms and foreign-language words. And even then it was OK. I was so captivated by the book, I just kept going. This book is a real contribution to the field of gay spirituality, in part because of the in-depth research and academic excellence which resulted in all those italicizations. Roscoe has indeed managed to synthesize a coherent spirituality that places same-sex love and modern gay consciousness at the heart of humankind's religious/spiritual quest.
The most moving section of the book is the account of how AIDS has affected gay life. Will's partner of sixteen years, Brad Rose, succumbed to the disease in 1996. That tragedy revealed to Will how gay community mobilization to support sufferers and combat the effects of the epidemic truly demonstrated the virtues of selfless love and generosity beyond familial bonds and social utilitarianism that Jesus--and all his shaman brothers and sisters--have been calling for.
The book ends with a series of short appendices which discuss in depth some of the scholarly issues raised in the course of the text. Placing them in such appendices (instead of long footnotes) allowed the body of the book to be more concise without entirely losing the discussions. The last of the appendices is a fervent call to Christian Churches to wake up and see that the gay issue demands them to turn back and discover what Jesus's teachings were really about: not social taboos and conventions that support the political and economic status quo, but unconditional love and recognition of the unity of all humankind.
Scattered throughout the book are wonderful little gems. As I complete my review and urge you to go get this book right away, let me quote my favorite. What a delightful insight into one of the sore points of gay-lib!
"This very capacity for identification [with oppressed others] sometimes leads gays to decry the labeling of people as 'gay' or 'straight' as inherently restrictive. Their sexuality, they will say, is only a small part of who they are; they feel themselves to be part of humanity as a whole. In fact, such feelings of cosmic identification are rare in the general population. Gays are never more queer than when they claim to be just 'humans.'"
Well, all us queer humans are likely to thoroughly enjoy this book. It's being released in time for Christmas 2004. What an appropriate gift for your friends and what an appropriate recognition of Jesus's gift of himself to the world--as one of us!
—Toby Johnson,
White Crane
release: December 2004
queer studies/religion
softcover, 5.5X8.5
232 pages
$16.95
0-9746388-3-8
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