Rehabilitation of the eunuch: biblical recognition of sexual diversity

The Baptism of the Chamberlain: this is the title of the painting by Rembrandt of the scene described in Acts 8.26–39. This event has attracted the imagination not only of artists, but also of storytellers about foreign missions. Following the example of his master Pieter Lastman, the young Rembrandt made an impressive, colourful painting of this baptism in 1626; it can still be admired in the St Catherine’s Convent Museum of Christian art in Utrecht. Rembrandt drew special attention to the role of the black men at the front of the painting. The richly dressed Ethiopian high official is kneeling, with his arms devoutly crossed on his breast, while behind him the evangelist Philip is lifting his hand filled with baptismal water. In the meantime, a black helper is holding the book with the Greek translation of the prophet Isaiah opened at a passage that the Ethiopian high official has just been reading aloud. ‘High official’ is the translation of the Greek dynastes in the New English Bible, which I have used for this article, but the title appears only once in this tale. The word ‘Ethiopian’, the standard biblical term for a black African, occurs only twice. Luke, the author of Acts, is colour-blind. The queen – Candace ¹ – the official is serving remains in the background; she is mentioned only once. In fact, apart from Philip, the other actors are not mentioned by name; their roles are determined by their functions. Philip is the man of the Church, the expositor of Scripture and the baptist. The Candace is the stateswoman, the Basilissa. But the central figure is the African official. He is well educated, reading even Greek. He is powerful, but subordinate. He is a man, but different from other men because he is a eunuch. Rembrandt portrayed the final act of the story: his rehabilitation as a eunuch. This tale is usually seen as the conversion of the first African. That is also true, but a closer reading reveals a deeper message. The story turns around the quotation from the prophecy of Isaiah and the status of the official as a eunuch, a man with a difference. The latest Dutch translation published by the Netherlands Bible Society, titled Bible in Common Language, drops the word ‘eunuch’, considering it unimportant. But is it superfluous? I do not think so. Why else does Luke use the word ‘eunuch’ five times when describing the official? In the fifth-century Alexandrian manuscript or codex, the word ‘eunuch’ appears six times. Omitting it would be like missing the keyword, the clue to the tale: the Ethiopian being a eunuch.

Divine interventions

Before I elaborate this point, I draw attention to three divine interventions in this story. The initiative is taken by ‘the angel of the Lord’, who commissions Philip. When Philip arrives at the carriage of the Ethiopian, the Spirit tells him what to say. And at the end, it is again the Spirit who defines the moment of Philip’s departure. It is the Spirit who prompts Philip to ask: ‘Do you understand what you are reading?’ And the eunuch replies: ‘How can I understand unless someone gives me a clue?’

Reading a second time

Then they both re-read the following passage in Isaiah:

He was led like a sheep to be slaughtered; and like a lamb that is dumb before the shearer, he does not open his mouth. He has been humiliated and has no redress. Who will be able to speak of his posterity? For he is cut off from the world of living men. (Isa. 53.7)

‘Now,’ says the eunuch to Philip, ‘tell me, please, who it is that the prophet is speaking about here: himself or someone else.’ This is the central and dominant question he has on his mind. It is not an academic or intellectual question or just curiosity; rather, for him it is an existential one: ‘himself or someone else?’ By raising this question, he exposes himself. The eunuch recognizes himself and his own experiences in this quotation. His feeling is that the prophet can share such experiences only if he has gone through the same things himself or has seen someone close to him suffering in this way. So he identifies himself to some extent with the unknown person described by Isaiah. From the outside he has the appearance of being powerful as the minister in charge of the finances of his queen. But he knows what people around him think of him. They probably secretly despise him. But he lets this happen and does not protest, because he is vulnerable. He reacts like a dumb sheep. He is trusted by his queen but is no threat to her position. He cannot marry her to share her power. He is immune to corruption, but at what price? He has felt humiliated probably ever since he was castrated as a young slave. He is one of those eunuchs, who, in Jesus’ words, were made infertile, incapable of marriage, but made so by men (Matt. 19.12). He will never be remembered.

Humiliated pilgrim

The official had been to Jerusalem on a pilgrimage to pray in the Temple. But, as a eunuch, he is not allowed inside. This refusal implied another humiliation. When asked for the reason, he is told that this is evident from Scripture: ‘No man whose testicles have been crushed or whose organ has been severed shall become a member of the assembly of the Lord’ (Deut. 23.2). But how could he know, being an outsider, a foreigner? He realizes that this also means he is excluded from baptism as a proselyte. The only thing left for him as a God-fearing African is to buy a scroll of one of the holy books of the Jews. He buys the largest he can get, containing the Greek translation of the book of Isaiah. Fortunately for the well-schooled high official, this translation was made some centuries ago by Jews in Egypt. It will not have been a cheap volume, but to him it is a treasure. Now he is on his way home, not far from Gaza in the desert.

Sitting with him in the coach, Philip fully understands his question. He tells him that the prophet, when speaking about a suffering servant, must have meant Jesus. And he vividly describes what happened to Jesus. How Jesus was humiliated and how he suffered. Jesus is the liberator of human beings. He identified himself with the humiliated and oppressed, with the marginalized.

Baptism cannot be stopped

The outcome of Philip‘s explanation is that the eunuch believes in Jesus, the servant who suffered on his behalf. When he discovers water on the roadside, the eunuch concludes that there is nothing to prevent him from being baptized. No Mosaic impediment to stop a eunuch! The Greek word used here for preventing/stopping (koluei) is the same Jesus used – according to Matthew 19.14 – against his disciples with reference to the children: ‘Do not try to stop them.’ ² The eunuch remains in charge and orders the carriage to be stopped. ‘Then they both [Philip and the eunuch] went down into the water, and he baptized him.’ In Rembrandt’s painting, Philip just scoops up a handful of water, following the baptismal rite of the Reformed Church in the seventeenth century. ‘When they came out of the water the Spirit [pneuma] snatched Philip away.’

Intermezzo on the Greek text

Only the Codex Alexandrinus (fifth century) adds after ‘Spirit’ that the pneuma fell on the eunuch. A scribe harmonized this tale of baptism with other records of baptisms in Acts (for example, 2.38, 10.15). A commentator in the early Church introduced the following condition for baptism in the margin: ‘Philip said, if you wholeheartedly believe, it is permitted.’ He replied: ‘I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.’ But this addition is not supported by a single major manuscript until the fourth century. The fifth-century manuscript with the code letter ‘E’ adds ‘you will be saved’ after ‘believe’. ³ The famous translator Jerome (c.342–420), however, must have used a Greek text containing this addition. That is why it is found in the standard Latin Vulgate. The New English Bible adds it as a footnote. The insertion is incongruous in any case, because the eunuch initially accepted Jesus as the ‘suffering servant’. That he is also the Son of God is not the issue in this story.

Fulfilment of prophecy

After the baptism, the tale comes to a quick end. The eunuch is not saddened by the sudden disappearance of Philip. ‘He went happily on his way.’ When he continues reading Isaiah, he is surprised to read the following passage in the Greek translation:

and the eunuch must not say, ‘I am nothing but a barren tree.’ For these are the words of the Lord: the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths, who choose to do my will and hold fast to my covenant, shall receive from me something better than sons and daughters, a memorial and a name in my own house and within my walls; I will give them an everlasting name, a name imperishable for all time. (Isa. 56.3–5)

Some manuscripts read ‘him’ for ‘them’.

G. U. Wolf writes: ‘[A]nd in the messianic kingdom, despite Deuteronomy, these castrated outcasts will rank before the unfaithful of Israel (Isa. 56.3–5).’ ⁴

Johannes Schneider comments: ‘In this way [by the baptism of the eunuch] the prophecy in Isaiah 56.3–4 was truly and completely fulfilled. The eunuch is no longer excluded from the kingdom of God and the Christian congregation.’ ⁵

Consequences

The prophet of Trito-Isaiah announces a time when the law of Moses concerning eunuchs is no longer applicable. This prophecy becomes reality in the life of this Ethiopian eunuch. Not by his own choice, he differs from other men. While speaking of eunuchs, Jesus mentions three possibilities: ‘For while some are incapable of marriage because they were born so, or were made so by men, there are others who have themselves renounced marriage for the sake of the kingdom of heaven’ (Matt. 19.12). The third possibility became true in the lives of Jesus and Paul. Isaiah 56 seems to imply this spiritualized status as well. A eunuch will receive ‘more than sons and daughters’.

The eunuch in this story becomes a model for those who are sexually different, most often not by choice. In this tale about the eunuch from Africa it becomes evident that for Christians there is room for new sexual distinctions besides the traditional categories of men and women as found in Mosaic law. Their difference is not an impediment to receive baptism or any other sacrament or rite.

This tale makes clear that some seemingly fixed and unchangeable creational structures and Mosaic regulations and laws are abolished in the messianic era inaugurated by Christ. The prophecy of Isaiah looks forward to this new era.

Breakthrough

The book of the Acts of the Apostles describes several such breakthroughs. On the day of Pentecost, the Spirit breaks through barriers of language – an encouraging promise for all translators of Scripture. In Acts 9, Peter is taught that the Mosaic law concerning pure and impure food is abolished and at the same time the difference before God between Jews and Romans. In Chapter 15, non-Jewish converts are exempted from circumcision and other Mosaic injunctions. The apostles make these decisions prayerfully, seeking the guidance of the Holy Spirit. The tale about the eunuch belongs to this series of liberating breakthroughs. I see these as a continuing realization of Jesus’ words: ‘However, when he comes who is the Spirit of truth, he will guide you into all the truth’ (John 16.13). I hope that the above explanation of the tale about the African eunuch in Acts 8 will help readers develop a more open attitude towards those who do not fit within our traditional categories and role models of male and female.