After 10 years of blogging and digging and systematically reasoning based on the evidence, I have concluded that Jesus was gay.

When I finally admitted this to myself, and realized that I would have to share this publicly, I responded rather self-centeredly. I wondered, as a straight white male non-theist, “Where does that leave me?” Where do I fit into the story? I guess I’d be Philip the Tetrarch.

Jesus the Palestinian was gay, he was executed in Bethsaida just before 30 CE, and was the gay Jew mentioned in Luke 17:34. Jesus the Palestinian was “siezed” for execution.

The Q Source was originally a fuller account of Jesus’ teaching, community experience, trial, and execution. Back in the early first century, that whole historical episode was huge in the region.

Someone realized the value of the ethical richness and drama of the original story, but also realized that it would be of very limited use if two same-sex couples remained the focus of the drama.

Thus began a project to revise and expand the drama toward a different end. They needed to preserve the miscarriage of justice theme, the valuable ethical and moral teachings of the actual Jesus of Palestine, but lose the gay and lesbian element which would be a huge negative for audiences.

So the trial and execution elements were revised. The actual Pharisee and Roman surrogate were replaced or renamed, the location was changed from Bethsaida to Jerusalem, and the numerous same-sex couples were recast in various ways.

There were four main targets of the actual prosecution, the two mixed-ethnicity same-sex couples. The Jewish transgressors  were subject to Torah and were executed. The gentiles, one gay and one lesbian, were not subject to Torah and were released.

The names were not preserved in the legal summary of Luke 17:34-35. This was from an actual court document. The names were, however, preserved in the story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead.

Mary and Martha were the lesbian couple on trial. Mary was a surviving witness at Jesus’ execution, which makes her the lesbian gentile. Martha was the lesbian Jew, and was executed.

Jesus was executed as a sexual transgressor, while his gentile partner was released. His gentile partner was John. That name was changed to Lazarus in one story in order to obscure the connection. John’s connection to Jesus was already abundantly clear.

When he was on trial, some feared “Lazarus” was as good as dead. It is possible that during the original trial in Bethsaida, Jesus the Palestinian spoke in defense of his non-Jewish partner John, thereby saving his life, with words “given to him by the spirit.”

“The Seventy” were “sent out” in pairs. The canonical story is based on the sexually transgressive couples in Jesus’ community.

I know that many people have researched much of this material prior to me. There are many articles and books on the literary parallels between the gospels and contemporaneous novels. Researchers have been noting the parallels between the Jesus myth and other myths for centuries. There is a vigorous debate over how much, if any, of the Jesus myth is rooted in historical fact.

Were I thirty years younger, I’d write a book. But I’m probably not going to. A new age has begun, the Age of Covid. My health, and my eyesight, are deteriorating. But I will continue to discuss my research, hopefully for many years. Only you can figure out what this means for you and your community.