The Man Nobody Knows

According to author Bruce Barton, the impetus of his book was a boyhood dislike of the traditional portrayal of Jesus as pale, frail, and soft. Jesus as the “lamb of God” sounded to the young Barton like “something for girls—sissified” (x). Barton admired masculine, physically strong fighters such as Daniel in the lion’s den or David defeating Goliath. As an adult, Barton became convinced that many artists and writers had incorrectly depicted Jesus, so he writes a revisionist portrayal of Jesus that appeals to American men of the 1920s. Barton emphasizes Jesus’ masculinity by asserting that Jesus was not a physical weakling. Jesus was a carpenter with strong muscles from years of toil. Barton strikingly revises the account of Jesus’ triumph over the moneychangers in the Temple by not emphasizing Jesus’ spiritual authority (“the halo around his head”) but rather his physical strength, his “muscles hard as iron” (37). Jesus’ manly fitness intimidates the corrupt, “flabby” priests and moneychangers who watch him in action and have “no doubt that he was fully capable of taking care of himself” (37). In these ways, Barton’s text is in dialogue with a Victorian theological movement and cultural trend known as Muscular Christianity, which emphasized the overlap between physical strength and Christian ideals.

Barton is particularly disturbed by the exaltation of “the feminine influence” in Christian worship, which he argues “denied any large place to the masculine,” and painted Jesus “as soft and gentle to the point of weakness” (40-41). Barton describes the feminization of Jesus as he was traditionally depicted in paintings: “They have shown us a frail man—under-muscled, with a soft face—a woman’s face covered by a beard” (42-43). While Barton acknowledges that thoughtful men are thankful for the “betterment of woman’s life by the fact that millions of human beings have been taught from infancy to venerate a woman” (40), he critiques “the glorification of Mary,” which he thinks has led to the “almost complete neglect of Joseph” (40). Some might find an anti-Catholic bias in Barton’s diminishment of the role of Mary in Christian theology, and Barton was the son of a Protestant clergyman. Others might find his viewpoint simply misogynistic when Barton suggests that Joseph be given “a larger reverence” (40), arguing that he must have been a fine father since “when Jesus sought to give mankind a new conception of the character of God, he could find no more exalted term for his meaning than the one word, ‘Father’” (41-42).

Barton cites several points as evidence that Jesus’ appearance must have differed from the traditional artistic portrayals: first, Jesus must have been healthy in order to restore health to others; second, Jesus appealed to women, who “are not drawn by weakness” (48) and prefer manliness; third, Jesus walked and slept in the open air, “the type of outdoor man whom our modern thought most admires” (52); and fourth, Jesus’ vigorous activities gave him nerves of steel, as evidenced by his fine example of “self-control” (53) when awakened from sleep in the boat on a lake during a fierce storm. When Jesus faces Pilate, Barton contrasts a tall, young man, bronzed and hard from days in the open air, with Pilate’s self-indulgence and his “colorless look of indoor living” (56). Barton interprets Pilate’s exclamation, “Behold, the man!” (56) as an involuntary testimony to Jesus’ assured masculinity. Barton recommends that people who love “courageous manhood” (213) read the Gospel account of Jesus’ final days. For Barton, then, masculinity is largely superficial. It is informed by physical characteristics and shallow behaviors, rather than moral decisions or internal traits.