The Intersex Immortal Jesus and His Student, Lao Tzu

Jesus the Intersexual by Bruce L. Gerig

Jesus the Intersexual
HOMOSEXUALITY AND THE BIBLE
Key Passages: Luke 1:31,35, 2:21; Matt 19:12[see previous post], 23:37b; John 8:41b, 13:3-5,23

By Bruce L. Gerig

Jesus’ androgynous birth. Every Christmas we return again to the Nativity story, which relates how the archangel Gabriel appeared to Mary and told her, “[Y]ou will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus” (Luke 1:31 NRSV). When Mary asked how this could be since she was a virgin, he explained: “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called the Son of God” (v. 35). Indeed Mary became pregnant, her womb grew as she hid out with her relative Elizabeth (v. 39), and nine months later “she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger . . .” (2:7). Now there is no doubt that the Bible presents this as a miracle; yet can anything more specific be known about how a woman might give birth to a child all by herself? In fact, Edward Kessel, emeritus professor of biology at the University of San Francisco, has offered just such a scenario in his article “A Proposed Biological Interpretation of The Virgin Birth,” in the Journal of the American Scientific Affiliation (9/83), a publication which presents an evangelical perspective on science and the Christian faith. Such parthenogenetic births (reproduction from a female alone) have been known for centuries to occur naturally among lower forms of the animal kingdom (e.g., in bees, flies, ants, fish, lizards, and beetles);1 and scientists in the laboratory have observed spontaneous division of unfertilized germ cells from various kinds of organisms (e.g., in worms, cats, guinea pigs, and humans), induced by artificial stimuli. While none of these latter cases resulted in a viable (surviving) young, embryologists are convinced that such unfertilized eggs could develop to full term and maturity under optimal conditions. Artificial stimuli used in such cases have included mechanical agitation, temperature shock, and pricking the eggs with a needle. Therefore, female unfertilized eggs have within themselves the potential for successful embryonic development; and various stimuli may trigger cell division in them.2 Helen Spurway of London University said that she supports the view that virgin birth is “probable among humans,” and in fact some mothers in the past who claimed that they gave birth without intercourse with a man could well have been telling the truth. R. A. Beatty of Cambridge University agrees that human parthenogenesis is possible, as well.3

Yet, how could God have brought about a Virgin Conception and Virgin Birth by using natural processes? Well, the Holy Spirit might have provided the environmental stimulus, like a simple cold shock which has worked so well in animal studies. Lacking male chromosomes, Jesus would have possessed an XX (female) sex chromosomal genotype, at conception and throughout his life. But how was he born a male phenotype (with male anatomical and psychological features)? Geneticists have now discovered two genes that might explain this: The histocompatibility-Y (H-Y) gene is believed to direct the first steps toward testes formation, after which testicular hormones take over the job of converting the nondifferentiated embryo into the male form. However, the H-Y gene, normally on the male Y chromosome, can also be transplanted to the female X chromosome, where normally it is inactivated by a regulatory gene (S) which suppresses H-Y gene expression in the female. Now if Jesus had developed from a diploid germ cell (containing all of Mary’s chromosomes), he would have had exactly the same chromosomal makeup and look of his mother. But if he developed from a haploid germ cell (containing only a single set of unpaired chromosomes, i.e., half of Mary’s genes), this could have displayed an Hs genotype (including the H-Y gene but with the S gene missing), which then split into HHss, lacking the S gene which had been passed down to Mary so that she formed into a functioning female.4 However, the masculinizing factor (S) which had been submerged in Mary’s line for centuries now expresses itself in the embryo of Jesus, producing an individual with chromosomal identification as a woman, but with anatomical and psychological expression as a man. Thus God could have used a natural biological process of sex reversal which is fully supported by known facts in the field of genetics.5 Jesus became male not instead of female but as well as female. Although Kessel is careful to assure the reader that Jesus was not bisexual, nor an hermaphrodite or a pseudohermaphrodite (all of which he views as pathological and defective),6 Virginia Mollenkott cannot help but think how Christ reflects the Father, who is imaged in the Bible as both male (Ps 68:5, 98:20; Isa 64:8; Jer 31:9; Matt 6:9) and female (Gen 3:21; Ps 22:9; Isa 49:15, 66:13; Hos 11:3-4), and yet is neither (without genitals). God is presented as an “androgynous” Being, a Creator who made both male and female “in his image” (Gen 1:27). Yet Mollenkott asks, don’t intersexuals come closer to a physical resemblance to Jesus than anyone else, unless we think of a postoperative female-to-male transsexual?7

Jesus’ blurred gender boundaries. The New Oxford American Dictionary (2005) defines “intersexual” as “relating to or having the condition of being intermediate between male and female.”8 Jesus was not a hermaphrodite (displaying both male and female genitals); and we know nothing about his development as a fetus and how this might or might not have been affected by chromosomal or hormonal variations that can lead to homosexual, bisexual or transgendered feelings or orientations.9 Still, at one point Mary must have told Jesus that he was “different,” that he was born without a human father; and continuing rumors about his ‘illegitimate’ birth (John 8:41; and “son of Mary,” Mark 6:3 NRSV10) could only have increased this feeling in him. One could forgive Jesus, Mary’s special son who no doubt was especially loved by his mother, if he felt sometimes like a “momma’s boy,” very attached to her (cf. John 19:26-27). Yet during his ministry, Jesus turns away from his biological family and its patriarchal system, his disciples also become ‘displaced persons’ who flout traditional gender roles (by not getting married), and the women followers of Jesus seem most responsible for supporting him as an itinerate preacher (Luke 8:1-3).11 These ‘outsider’ women leave their homes to be with Jesus, even accompanying him to the cross (Mark 15:40-41); and they are the first witnesses to his resurrection (Luke 24:1-8). Probably they were not married and didn’t have children, they were widowed or divorced or older, or they had not wanted to marry―i.e., they were “irregular women” (Moxnes).12 In any case, a ‘demasculinized’ Jesus is being supported by women, rather than being a wage earner. In not having a household Jesus did not behave like a “real man.”13 He was ‘out of place.’ He rejected marriage (or at least the Bible does not mention him being married at all), and he abandoned his family name, power and status. He also called his disciples to abandon their households (Luke 9:59-62, 14:26), removing them from their normal gender roles in society.14 Instead of promoting ‘traditional family values,’ when Jesus’ brothers show up, they are not allowed through to speak to Jesus, who tells those around him that “My mother and brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it” (Luke 8:19-21 NRSV). Probably his brothers wanted to complain of rumors circulating that Jesus had ‘lost his senses.’15 In fact, he adds: “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:26 NRSV).16

In ancient times it was traditional for women (or slaves) to wash men’s feet when they came in from outside (1 Sam 25:41, 1 Tim 5:10);17 yet at the Last Supper, Jesus removes his robe, gets down on his hands and knees, and begins washing all his disciples’ feet, to Peter’s outspoken rebuke (John 13:1-17). On another occasion we find Jesus cooking breakfast for his disciples (John 21:9-10). Jesus’ tender emotions are repeatedly noted in the Gospels:18 He picks up little children in his arms, speaks softly to them, and blesses them, against his disciples’ objections (Mark 10:13-16, 9:36-37; Matt 19:13-15). When Lazarus dies, the crowd marvels at Jesus’ weeping in public, remarking, “See how he loved him!” (John 11:35). His disciples find him weeping over Jerusalem (Luke 19:41); and he declares to the city, “How often I have desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood together under her wings, and you were not willing!” (Matt 23:37b NRSV, italics added). He is “[m]oved with pity” when he sees the sick (Mark 1:41) and feels “compassion” for people in general (Mark 6:34). He offers gentle invitations like “Come to me, all you that are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matt 11:28 NIV). So, Jesus was not afraid to do menial tasks, to spend time with children, to cry in public, to feel empathy for the needy, or to speak tenderly―which some might consider “feminine” qualities and expectations, rather than “masculine.” Aristotle (Politics) claimed that men were by nature more fit to lead, self-controlled, courageous, and rational than women.19 Yet, this seems like an arbitrary presumption when one views those women who bucked society’s norms to follow Jesus, who stand bravely near him hanging on the cross (when all his male disciples, except for ‘the beloved disciple,’ have left him, cf. Matt 27:55-56, John 19:25b-27), and who are the first to believe that Jesus has risen from the dead, as he had predicted (Luke 24:1-10). Still, Jesus could also show so-called “masculine” qualities, e.g., when he bluntly denounces the Jewish leaders who oppose him (Matt 23:13-36), angrily drives out greedy money changers and animal sellers from the Temple and overturns their tables (John 2:13-17, Matt 21:12-13), and responds to the Pharisees’ trick questions with strategic answers, and then with questions of his own which they could not answer (Matt 22:15-46). Also, as a carpenter, following in his adoptive father’s footsteps (Matt 13:55), Jesus worked in a manual trade, requiring physical strength and stamina and probably giving him muscled arms and calloused hands.20 Phipps notes, “Qualities that many cultures have considered feminine or masculine were harmoniously blended in his lifestyle,” and Jesus illustrates the artificiality of gender stereotypes.21 Even though Jesus spent most of his time with men, he highly respected women, sharing long conversations with them (as with the Samaritan woman, John 4:7-26), teaching them as opposed to Jewish protocol (as with Mary of Bethany, Luke 10:38-41), and defending them in the face of male injustice (as with the adulteress brought to him, John 8:1-11). In the end, as Phipps declares, Jesus was both a brawny “he-man” [shout-out to HOWDY – lol] and a sensitive “she-man.”22

Jesus’ enigmatic sexual nature. Augustine (City of God) believed that Christ had no strife of flesh and spirit: he had “no infirmity of human nature” and only experienced emotions “when he chose to.”23 One can recall Jesus’ saying in the Sermon on the Mount, that “everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matt 5:28 NRSV). Therefore, a supremely pure Jesus could not have felt sexual desire. However, as Phipps points out, the Greek verb for “lust” here (epithumeō, G193724) is morally neutral, and the subject is really adultery. In fact, “woman” (gunē, G113525) is better translated as “another man’s wife,” as in the Renaissance “Great Bible” (and cf. Strong’s Greek-English dictionary and Van der Pool’s Septuagint translation).26 John Robinson notes that “the real difficulty for many is to admit that Jesus had any sexuality―and was therefore a normal human being.”27 Yet Tom Driver affirms that Jesus indeed had sexual feelings, because “Jesus lived in his body as other men do.”28 Phipps notes that the fact that Joshua (Hebrew: Yehoshua), or Jesus (Greek: Iēsous), was circumcised (Luke 2:21) shows that he had a penis;29 and Edwin Bennett, in writing about Jesus’ sexuality, adds, “I would be very surprised if Jesus never masturbated, for example; every boy does.”30 And Paul Johnson asks, are we to suppose “that Jesus never had a wet dream . . . ?”31 One can see how much guilt and sin Christians still associate with even the most basic natural sexual acts.

Now many Jewish scholars believe that Jesus must have married. Schalom Ben-Chorin writes, “I am convinced that Jesus of Nazareth, like any rabbi in Israel, was married.” Many notable men of that era were married and their wives are never mentioned; surely if they were not married their adversaries would have pointed this out.32 A Talmud passage notes that the last of the five duties laid down for a Jewish father was to arrange a marriage for his son, and children were usually given little voice in this decision.33 Well, according to Mark’s Gospel, Jesus had four brothers (James, Joses, Judas and Simon), as well as sisters (Mark 6:3), so Joseph fulfilled his ‘sacred duty.’ Yet maybe Joseph’s premature death freed Jesus from this pressure (or one can imagine his mother telling Joseph, “Leave Jesus alone!”). Scholars have suggested numerous reasons why Jesus did not marry. In Jesus’ (in)famous saying about eunuchs (Matt 19:12) he seems to justify his single life, although Theodore Jennings notes also that he is “scandalous” in linking a rabbi like himself, who did not marry for his ministry’s sake, with other “eunuchs” who would not produce children, like males who had been castrated to become boy prostitutes or who had cut off their own testicles to honor the goddess Cybele, or who were those ‘peculiar’ hermaphrodites, or others who preferred having sex with their own gender rather than marrying. How “shocking” to link the reign of God to such outrageous behavior!34 Joseph Blenkinsopp suggests that “Jesus was celibate because he was too poor to marry,”35 and indeed Jesus noted during his public ministry that he had “no place to lay his head” (Matt 8:20 NIV), probably indicating that he and his disciples often slept outside under the stars. On the other hand, many have proposed that Jesus did marry. “The Gospel of the Holy Twelve,” allegedly written by Jesus’ disciples, claims that he married a Jewish girl named Miriam when he was eighteen, but she died seven years later.36 A more popular candidate for Jesus’ wife has been Mary Magdalene, who in the Synoptic Gospels heads the list of women who supported Jesus (Luke 8:1-3; Mark 15:40-41,47, 16:1-8; John 20:1-2,11-18; and possibly Luke 7:36-39, although unnamed here). Nikos Kazantzakis in his highly-criticized novel on Jesus (1960) describes “The Last Temptation,” a dream which Jesus has on the cross, after fainting. It seems that the Passion never happened; and now a green-winged angel produces Mary Magdalene, whom Jesus kisses passionately, and then they have sex. However, later when she is stoned to death as a “whore,” Jesus is transported to the home of Mary and Martha in Bethany, where he sleeps with Mary; and then late one night Martha slips in, like Ruth with Boaz (Ruth 3:7-9), and Jesus lies with her as well. Jesus lives to be an old man, while Mary and Martha compete to give him the most kids. Then, however, when a soldier puts a sponge of vinegar up to Jesus’ nose, he revives and realizes that he is indeed on the cross and that he has been faithful to his cause.37 Returning to the Bible, one interesting moment after the Resurrection is when Jesus tells Mary from Magdala, “Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father” (John 20:17 NRSV), or “Do not continue to hug me” (Phipps).38 Now in the Gospels there is nothing that indicates that Jesus felt sexually attracted to Mary Magdalene, or to any other woman, for that matter; and here at the end, whatever physical intimacy Mary desired, Jesus backs off. Jesus’ statement here is hard to explain for “spiritual” reasons, since later he invites Thomas to ‘put his hand into his side’ (John 20:27).

Many decades ago, even before Stonewall, Anglican bishop Hugh Montefiore made headlines in 1967 when he told a conference meeting at Oxford University that Jesus might have been a homosexual. After all, he said, “women were his friends, but it is men he is said to have loved [especially ‘the beloved disciple’].” Another delegate complained that Canon Montefiore’s words simply “smear our Lord.” Yet Montefiore argued that this view helps explain God’s efforts, through Jesus, to identify with society’s outcasts, just as he himself was born out of wedlock.39 In a related sermon preached at Great St Mary’s University Church, Cambridge, on August 6, 1967, Montefiore explained, “It is precisely my concern to show Christ’s complete identification with mankind that raises for me a question about our Lord’s celibacy.” If Jesus was fully a man, which he was, why then during all those ‘hidden years’ at Nazareth did he not marry? “Could the answer be that Jesus was not by nature the marrying sort?” This does not mean that he was less than perfect in any way, and it is important not to confuse temptation with sin. However, this shows “in a particularly vivid way, how God in Christ identifies himself with the outsider and the outcast from society.”40 And what it meant for Jesus to be “sinless” was to be “perfectly and entirely obedient to his Heavenly Father”41―although this often turned out to be different than what people expected. Of course, there are valid questions to raise here, and to try to answer. It is true that Jesus “loved” all his disciples (John 13:1,34, 15:9,12). But with regards to the Synoptic Gospels, Jesus is only specifically said to have “loved” a young man who came to him, asking what he must do to inherit eternal life (Mark 10:21).42 And in the Fourth Gospel Jesus is said (once) to have “loved” the sisters Mary and Martha (11:5); but then we are told how much more (3 times) he “loved” their brother Lazarus (11:3,5,36). Even more striking in this Gospel are repeated references (5 times) made to an unnamed male “disciple whom Jesus loved” (13:23, 19:26, 20:2, 21:7,20), held traditionally to be John and the author of this Gospel. Of course, conservative interpreters are not going to easily acknowledge that Jesus had homoerotic feelings, or that he felt pleasure from touching another man―although Catholic theologian James Conn has said, “I have always been intrigued by the closeness between Jesus and his beloved disciple, John. John was apparently young and strong and handsome.”43 Letha Scanzoni and Nancy Hardesty wrote that Jesus “must have ached to share love in the most intimate way.”44 One should also remember about “forbidden fruit,” as one New Jersey psychologist explained (who spent the sixties in a Catholic seminary): “Celibacy, by its very prohibitions, guarantees a preoccupation with sexuality. You always want what you don’t have or think you can’t get.”45 In most young people sex is a driving, undeniable force (which is the why the human race has always so successfully reproduced itself); and why should Jesus not also have experienced strong sexual, even homoerotic, feelings if he was fully human?

In summary, Kessel’s human parthenogenesis theory explains how God the Father could have utilized natural (genetic) processes in a woman alone with supernatural intervention (the Holy Spirit) to produce a human body for his Son (John 1:14). Whether by this pathway or another, Jesus was born, and with a male anatomy (Luke 2:21). Yet in his public ministry he displayed a surprising “intersex” psychological profile, sometimes displaying more “feminine” qualities (e.g., a love for children, a nurturing instinct, and an emotional identification with those in need), and at other times more “masculine” qualities (e.g., an assured self confidence [in the Father], a strong assertiveness in his outreach, and a combativeness toward his enemies). Of course today we know that both males and females possess testosterone and estrogen, as well as other sex hormones, in varying degrees, although their interactions are still not well understood.46 Anyway, Jesus surely felt “different” (considered illegitimate on the grapevine) and “displaced” (with no personal home nor income during his public ministry); and he transgressed patriarchal and gender expectations in his society by criticizing marriage and family, by accepting women as full members in his new ‘community,’ and by doing many “unmanly” things, such as washing men’s feet, cuddling children, cooking breakfast, and crying in public. At the same time, he reached out to sexual outcasts in his culture, e.g., a woman living with a man not her husband, an adulteress brought to him for punishment (Jesus had no trouble setting aside the Law, when compassion and injustice called for it), and “eunuchs,” both physically and figuratively, who do not marry for one reason or another. Of course, the matter of Jesus’ own sexuality is a highly controversial subject (as charged as “sex” itself); and to understand this, one must be willing to set aside one’s preconceptions and prejudices, speak forthrightly about sexual matters, and study carefully what the Biblical text actually says related to this subject. Of course, Jesus “loved” all of his disciples and followers; yet later in the Fourth Gospel one special person appears unexpectedly and repeatedly: “the disciple whom Jesus loved,” and one has to ask what set this love, between Jesus and this man, apart from the full spiritual and friendly love which Jesus felt toward all of his disciples? Later articles will explore this enigma, along with other aspects in Jesus’ teaching and ministry that a growing number of interpreters believe actually point to a very special (homoerotic) understanding and friendship that Jesus had during his earthly life.

FOOTNOTES: 1. Kessel, pp. 129-130. 2. Ibid., p. 132. 3. Ibid., pp. 132-133; Spurway, p. 652. 4. Kessel, pp. 133-134. 5. Ibid., p. 135. 6. Ibid., pp. 129, 133. 7. Mollenkott 2001, pp. 105-106; Mollenkott 1977, pp. 56-60. 8. New Oxford American Dictionary, “intersexual.” 9. Roughgarden, pp. 207-279. 10. Robinson, p. 57. 11. Bohache, p. 509. 12. Moxnes, p. 100. 13. Ibid., p. 96. 14. Goss, p. 536. 15. Scanzoni and Hardesty 1992, p. 200. 16. Cf. Goss, p. 537. 17. Keener, 2, pp. 903-904; Phipps, p. 112. 18. Phipps, pp. 112-113. 19. Aristotle, 1.12-13, pp. 21-24. 20. Phipps, pp. 114-115. 21. Ibid., pp. 115, 112. 22. Ibid., p. 115. 23. Augustine, pp. 369-370. 24. Strong, G1937 (epithumeō). 25. Strong, G1135 (gunē). 26. Phipps, pp. 91, 94; also Strong, G1135 (gunē), and Van der Pool, Matt 5:28. 27. Robinson, p. 63. 28. Tom Driver, 1965; quoted in Phipps, pp. 95-96. 29. Phipps, p. 35. 30. Edwin Bennett, 1981; quoted in Phipps, p. 106. 31. Johnson, n.p. 32. Schalom Ben-Chorin, 1967; quoted in Phipps, pp. 58-59. 33. Talmud, Yabamot 62b; noted in Phipps, pp. 39-40. 34. Jennings, p. 153. 35. Joseph Blenkinsopp, 1968; quoted in Phipps 1996, p. 67. 36. Phipps, p. 5. 37. Kazantzakis, chaps. 30-33, pp. 444-496. 38. Phipps, p. 132. 39. Anonymous, “Was Jesus an Outsider?,” p. 83. 40. Montefiore, p. 182. 41. Ibid., p. 179. 42. Jennings, p. 106. 43. James J. Conn, 1991; quoted in Phipps, p. 71. 44. Scanzoni and Hardesty, 1974; quoted in Phipps, pp. 80-81. 45. Anonymous source, quoted in Ohanneson, p. 104. 46. Cf. Sullivan, online pp. 4.2-3; and Abrams, online pp. 1-2)

REFERENCES:

Abrams, Douglas Carlton. “Father Nature: The Making of a Modern Dad,’ Psychology Today, 35(2), March-April 2002, pp. 38-47. Online,
http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200203/the-making-modern-dad, accessed 9/18/09.

Anonymous. “Was Jesus an Outsider?,” Newsweek, 70, 8/7/67, p. 83.

Aristotle. Politics. Trans. from Greek with Introduction and Notes by C. D. C. Reeve. Indianapolis and Cambridge: Hackett, 1998.

Augustine. The City of God: Books VIII-XIV. Trans. from Latin by Gerald G. Walsh and Grace Monahan. New York: Fathers of the Church, 1952.

Bohache, Thomas. “Matthew.” In Deryn Guest, ed., The Queer Bible Commentary, pp. 487-516. London: SCM Press, 2006.

Goss, Robert W. “Luke.” In Deryn Guest, ed., The Queer Bible Commentary, pp. 526-547. London: SCM Press, 2006.

Jennings, Theodore W., Jr. The Man Jesus Loved: Homoerotic Narratives from the New Testament. Cleveland: Pilgrim Press, 2003.

Johnson, Paul. “Christ Condemns Those Who Spoke Ill of Gays.” Privately published pamphlet, n.d.

Kazantzakis, Nikos. The Last Temptation of Christ. Trans. from Greek by P. A. Bien. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1960.

Keener, Craig S. The Gospel of John: A Commentary. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2 vols., 2003.

Kessel, Edward L. “A Proposed Biological Interpretation of The Virgin Birth,” Journal of the American Scientific Affiliation, 35(3), 9/83, pp. 129-136.

Mollenkott, Virginia Ramey. Omnigender. Cleveland: Pilgrim Press, 2001.

————. Women, Men & the Bible. Nashville: Abingdon, 1977.

Montefiore, Hugh. “Our Lord Jesus Christ.” In Hugh Montefiore, ed., Sermons from Great St Mary’s, preached 8/6/67, pp. 178-184. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1969.

Moxnes, Halvor. Putting Jesus in His Place: A Radical Vision of Household and Kingdom. Louisville and London: Westminster John Knox, 2003.

New Oxford American Dictionary. Oxford: University Press, 2nd ed. 2005.

Ohanneson, Joan. And They Felt No Shame: Christians Reclaim Their Sexuality. Minneapolis: Winston Press, 1983.

Phipps, William E. The Sexuality of Jesus. Cleveland: Pilgrim Press, 1996.

Robinson, John A. T. (Arthur Thomas). The Human Face of God. Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1973.

Roughgarden, Joan. Evolution’s Rainbow: Diversity, Gender, and Sexuality in Nature and People. Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University of California Press, 2004.

Scanzoni, Letha Dawson, and Nancy A. Hardesty. All We’re Meant to Be: Biblical Feminism for Today. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans (1974, 1982), 3rd ed. 1992.

Spurway, Helen. “Virgin Births,” Statesman and Nation, 50(1289), 11/19/55, pp. 651-652.

Strong, James. The Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible . . . King James Version . . . With “Greek Dictionary of the New Testament.” Nashville: Abingdon (1890); 39th repr. 1980.

Sullivan, Andrew, “The He Hormone,” New York Times Magazine, 4/2/00, pp. 46-51, 58, 69, 73-79. Online, http://www.nytimes.com/2000/04/02/magazine/the-he-hormone.html, accessed 9/17/09.

Van der Pool, Charles. The Apostolic Bible: Polyglot (Septuagint Greek, with English translation). Newport, OR: Apostolic Press (1996), 2006.

TRANSLATIONS: New International Version, 1978. New Revised Standard Version, 1989.

© 2009 Bruce L. Gerig