Does the Bible Condemn Transgender People?
Priest of Cybele (gallus), S 1207, Roman, age of Antonines, mid 2nd century AD, marble - Musei Capitolini - Rome, Italy. Public Domain. Wikimedia Commons.
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Justifications for discrimination against transgender people often include claims that such views are biblically based. Biblical antagonism to transgender people is assumed.
Not so fast, though! The Bible says some surprising things about some transgender people in the ancient world. While “transgender” is a modern term, people in ancient times were recognized as neither male nor female. Some of them were known as eunuchs.
Eunuchs?
A eunuch is someone who was born with male genitals and has been castrated, whether accidentally or intentionally, whether as a child or as an adult. Today hardly anyone identifies publicly as a eunuch, but in biblical times eunuchs had well-known and prominent roles.
Many of the royal courts of the ancient near east relied on eunuchs in their administration. Eunuchs were usually enslaved people. Their inability to procreate was considered an asset because their loyalty to the absolute ruler was not complicated by a commitment to their own children and descendants.
Some eunuchs formed an inner circle around certain goddesses, too. As young men, they had castrated themselves in a ritual of initiation and then dressed in distinctive clothing that indicated their new religious role.
In the Greco-Roman era, eunuchs, especially the servants of the goddesses, were often understood as neither male nor female but as a distinctive gender of their own. Sometimes they were referred to using female pronouns, sometimes male.
What Do Hebrew Scriptures Say about Eunuchs?
The Hebrew scriptures include many references to eunuchs. Most refer to the role of eunuchs as royal court officials, including the role they often filled as guardians of royal harems. Their physiological identity as eunuchs was often simply assumed for the administrative role.
Some references indicate a negative view of eunuchs. The fate of some sons of Judah involuntarily being made eunuchs in the Babylonian court was named as one of the painful consequences of the exile (2 Kings 20:18; Isaiah 39:7). Deuteronomy 23 offers a list of people to be excluded from the assembly, beginning with those with damaged male genitalia. Also excluded are foreigners, named as Ammonites and Moabites, and people born of “an illicit union.”
Yet Isaiah 56:3–5 explicitly reverses the exclusions mentioned in Deuteronomy. Isaiah offers a welcome to foreigners and a promise of a monument within God’s house better than children to eunuchs who observe the sabbath and the covenant.
References in the Hebrew scriptures generally accept eunuchs as a category of people in their time. While being made a eunuch involuntarily was considered a sad fate, eunuchs were not morally condemned for their gender ambiguity or their inability to procreate. These were simply facts of their existence.
Does the New Testament Mention Eunuchs?
Eunuchs are mentioned twice in the New Testament.
~ Acts 8:26–40
A eunuch features prominently in Acts 8:26–40. He is identified as an Ethiopian man, a eunuch, who is the court official in charge of the treasury of the Ethiopian queen Candace. The passage recounts the interaction that leads to Philip baptizing the eunuch. His identification as a eunuch appears to emphasize the importance of his position in relation to the queen, not his gender identity.
~ Matthew 19:10–12
Matthew 19:10–12 is especially notable yet often overlooked. This passage follows a discussion about marriage and divorce in vv. 1–9. In the controversy, Jesus opposes those who justify discarding their spouses, particularly wives. The discussion is also found in Mark 10:1–9. Interpreters who contend that an exclusive gender binary is a biblical view often cite this passage and emphasize its quotations from Genesis 1:27 and 2:24 about the creation of humans as male and female. Jesus cites these verses to affirm the permanence of marriage between men and women. Curiously, the verses that follow are usually ignored. Here, quite literally, there’s more to the story.
As the passage continues, the disciples express concern about Jesus’ teaching against divorce and ask if it is better not to marry at all. Matthew portrays Jesus responding about the difficulty of the choice and adding:
For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by others, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let anyone accept this who can. (Matthew 19:12, New Revised Standard Version)
The description summarizes three kinds of eunuchs in the world of Jesus’ time. Then, as now, people were born with various conditions that meant they were not clearly identified as male or female, and some were associated with eunuchs. The second reference indicates a practice in those days. Some enslaved boys were castrated for the sexual use that was part of the Greco-Roman slave system. The third category refers to the servants of deities who had castrated themselves in initiation rituals. This became a practice among some followers of Christ in the early centuries as well.
All three types of eunuchs mentioned were commonly maligned by commentators and satirists in those days. Yet here all three forms are lifted up for affirmation with the implication that, according to Jesus, eunuchs are model disciples.
So Does the Bible Actually Affirm Transgender People Then?
While we should not take one verse as speaking for all the other biblical writings, we see that Matthew’s gospel quotes Jesus as explicitly affirming eunuchs. Eunuchs do not represent all transgender people, however, and they were people who were part of a context very different from today. Many other writings in the Bible offer a variety of views on many aspects of gender. Some views can seem quite antiquated today. We do well to consider that the Bible includes perspectives from a time when the existence of eunuchs and slavery were taken for granted. We can learn, however, from an often studiously overlooked passage about eunuchs, that affirmation of these transgender people is found in the Bible where we might least expect it.
Because there are so many passages about gender that are open to multiple conflicting interpretations, we have not rated the answer to “Does the Bible Condemn Transgender People?” an absolute no. Yet an often-overlooked passage that so clearly affirms some transgender people in the time of Jesus weighs heavily in that direction.
Additional Resources
A transgender-affirming article with additional references:
A Westar Institute video lecture and interview about the galli, eunuch servants of the Mother of the Gods in the Greco-Roman era.
Interview with Alexis Waggoner: Elliott Q & A
For other perspectives on this post, see Podcast 7
