Love at first sight? David, Jonathan, and the biblical politics of gender

This article presents an alternative queer reading of the relationship between David and Jonathan in 1 and 2 Samuel, and suggests looking at the relationship between the two men not as homosexual but as heterosexual, as the attraction and love between David, who performs the role of a man, and Jonathan, who performs the role of a woman. This study argues that the text seeks to justify David’s rise to power not only by discrediting Saul on political and religious grounds, but also by undermining the eligibility of Jonathan as the king’s successor through a subtle manipulation of gender roles. This article shows how, in order to justify the termination of the Kish dynasty, the text sexualizes the relations between Jonathan and David, and then destabilizes these relations until it finally reverses them to portray Jonathan as David’s ‘female bride’. The article concludes that by describing him as passive and effeminate the text does not suggest that Jonathan is ‘homosexual’ but rather that he is a ‘woman’, and, as such, unqualified for kingship according to the ancient, Israelite tradition.