The following is a brief excerpt from Tattoo History: A Source Book, by Stephen G. Gilbert now available in print.

Tattoo History Source Book: Jews and Christians

Tattooing has been discouraged or forbidden by most Christian churches throughout history. A passage in Leviticus reads: "Ye shall not make any cuttings on your flesh for the dead nor print any marks upon you." (19:28) This has generally been interpreted as a prohibition of tattooing, and cited as biblical authority to support the church's position.

But other historical records and biblical passages seem to indicate that religious tattooing was common among ancient Jews and some Christian sects. As evidence of the antiquity of tattooing among Semites, Scutt and Gotch report that the sun god Baal required his worshippers to mark their hands with "divine tokens in a mystic attempt to acquire strength." The same authors have discovered what is probably the earliest recorded instance of the sacrilegious use of tattooing: a certain Jehoaikim defied the Almighty by having the Sacred Name tattooed on his penis and then compounded the insult by indiscriminately committing incest with family members.

According to biblical scholar M.W. Thomson, Moses "either instituted such a custom [tattooing] or appropriated one already existing to a religious purpose." Thomson quotes Exodus 9 & 16: "And thou shalt show thy son in that day, saying, this is done because of that which the Lord did unto me when I came forth out of Egypt; and it shall be for a sign unto thee upon thy hand, and for a memorial between thine eyes." Thomson theorizes that Moses borrowed tattooing from the Arabs, who tattooed magical symbols on their hands and foreheads. Moses supposedly adapted this custom to his own purposes, creating patterns "so devised as to commemorate the deliverance of the Children of Israel from bondage." According to Thomson, the prohibition in Leviticus referred only to heathen tattooing which had to do with idolatry and superstition, and not to the Moses-approved tattoo designs.

Thomson goes on to cite a number of other biblical references to tattooing. In Deuteronomy Moses scolds those who have "the spot which is not the spot of God's children." In Revelation there are numerous allusions to religious marks which were probably tattoos. For instance: "And he hath ... on his thigh a name written, King of Kings and Lord of Lords." (19;16). In Isaiah there is an apparent reference to tattooing in the following passage: (xlix. 15 & 16): "Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee. Behold I have graven thee on the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me." Paul's statement "I bear on my body the marks of the Lord Jesus (Galatians 6: 17) is thought by many scholars to refer to tattooing. In a commentary on Isaiah written in 528 AD, Procopius of Gaza reported that many Christians were tattooed on the arms with a cross or Christ's name.