"And it came to pass,” – we are on chapter 18 – “when he had made an end of speaking unto Saul, that the soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul. And Saul took him that day, and would let him go no more home to his father’s house. Then Jonathan and David made a covenant, because he loved him as his own soul. And Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was upon him, and gave it to David, and his garments, even to his sword, and to his bow, and to his girdle.”

I’ve heard it said that, back then, fellows were forever telling other fellows that they loved them and taking off their clothes and swapping girdles, and nothing deleterious to be read into any of it. But when I offered this interpretation to Sean Morrin at the Rainbow Project on Queen Street (say nothing), he responded, “God, but you’re innocent,” before admiring my socks.
Those who were paying attention during Bible Study will recall that Saul soon became deeply perturbed at the effect David was having on the household, what with his winsome ways and all the admiring chatter from the younger set about how, with stone and sling-shot, he’d slain Goliath of Gath. So, Saul pushed David into marrying his daughter, Michal.
The match didn’t work – predictable that, really – which caused Saul to regard David with even sharper hostility, to the extent of making a serious attempt on the young man’s life. “And David... came and said before Jonathan, What is my sin before thy father that he seeketh my life?”
Actually, David had a pretty good idea what the problem was: “Thy father certainly knoweth that I have found grace in thine eyes.”
Eventually, Jonathan tells his dad that he is confused about his love for David, and laments that he may not be able to establish his own lineage. Which, the family being of the Royal variety, was perceived as something of a crisis.
“Then Saul’s anger was kindled against Jonathan, and he said unto him, Thou son of the perverse rebellious woman, do not I know that thou hast chosen the son of Jesse to thine own confusion, and unto the confusion of thy mother’s nakedness? For as long as the son of Jesse liveth upon the ground, thou shalt not be established, nor thy kingdom. Wherefore now send and fetch him unto me, for he shall surely die.”
But instead of fetching David, the conscience-stricken Jonathan rushes to warn him against the wrath of the king. “And they kissed one another, and wept one with another, until David exceeded.”
After David has finished exceeding (no, I’m not entirely certain, either) Jonathan makes a getaway, heading for the city.
It is in the second book of Samuel that David, upon receiving the dread news from the front that Saul and Jonathan have both been cut down in battle, utters his extravagant lament: “O Jonathan, thou wast slain in thine high places. I am distressed for thee, my brother Jonathan: very pleasant hast thou been unto me: thy love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women.”
I see Peter Tatchell as David. Graham Norton as Jonathan. Lily Savage as Michal. The Brokeback Bible, anyone?
Is it true that Samuel was Billy’s favourite book of the bible? Or has somebody just made that up?
Many of King Billy’s followers assumed that he would cleanse the Augean stables of Jacobite immorality, once he was snug on the throne. But Billy was followed by other boys, too. And thus the disillusionment of those who realised, too late, that James had been,
“Turn’d out and replaced by Allmighty Sodomy.
But here content with our own homely joys,
We had no relish of the fair fac’d Boys.
Till you came in and with your Reformation,
Turn’d all things Arsy Versy in the nation.”
The essayist Rictor Norton (no relation) suggests that, “Reasonable evidence has been gathered to confirm the existence of a gay court circle, consisting of more than a dozen members including King William, Charles Talbot, Duke of Shrewsbury, Bentinck, Van Keppel (the 20-year-old page who accompanied William to England and eventually received the title of Earl of Albemarle)... King William was widely believed to belong to the sodomitical brotherhood, but he defended his fondness for one of his courtiers: ‘It seems to me a most extraordinary thing that one may not feel regard and affection for a young man without its being criminal.’”
Bentinck, in circumstances which have never been fully explained, resigned as William’s First Lord of the Bedchamber in May 1699 and went to live in Amsterdam in an atmosphere of velvet.
After visiting William’s court, the Duchesse d’Orleans wrote to a friend that “nothing is more ordinary in England than this unnatural vice.” She quoted a description of the court as “un château de derriére.”
But that’s all we have time for. We’ll come back to this soon. In the meantime, young Paisley, read your bible. And a bit less of the revulsion at King Billy, if you don’t mind.