Re-Imaging the Three Marys

Published in "Imagine: Arts Ministry Magazine of Imago Dei" Winter 2008

Re-Imaging Three Marys

            In the last two years, women have marked milestones in leadership: Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, elected Presiding Bishop in the Episcopal Church; Nancy Pelosi, elected Speaker of the House; twelve Catholic women, the "Pittsburg Twelve," ordained to the priesthood.  And as historical as these achievements are, they point to an important question.  Why, in this 21^st Century, are these achievements remarkable?  In other words, why has it taken so long for women to be recognized as capable for these positions?  One of the primary reasons is the Christian mythology around women.  In order to recreate the way women are viewed today, we must re-image the women who have been standard-bearers for two thousand years. 

Mary the Mother of Jesus

In the sixth month, the angel Gabriel

was sent from God to a town of Galilee

called Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed

to a man named Joseph, of the house of

David, and the virgin's name was Mary.

                                                                                                Luke 1:26

             Immediately, upon reading or hearing these words, an image comes to mind: a young woman, her robes bordered in gold, sitting in a roses-strewn, arched doorway, her head bowed and her hands prayerfully folded at her breast.  A winged being, whom we recognize as the Angel Gabriel, stands in front of her.

            It's a beautiful image and one that many Christians treasure.  It is also an image that perpetuates a myth.

            Thirteen verses beyond the Annunciation passage, the Gospel of Luke continues, "During those days Mary set out and traveled to the hill country in haste to a town of Judah, where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth" (Luke 1:39).  The passage then goes on to recount a conversation between Elizabeth and Mary, followed by The Canticle of Mary, and concludes, "Mary remained with her about three months and then returned to her home."

            In other words, a sweet, submissive, newly-pregnant virgin tramps across the hills from Galilee to Judah, some sixty to seventy miles across plains and desert, through country known to contain wild animals, rebels, and robbers.  And then, three months later, she tramps back again across the same hostile territory. 

            No wonder that at nine months into her pregnancy, she was able to ride a donkey south, again into Judah, to Bethlehem, we are told, where she gives birth.  Quite remarkable feats for anyone let alone a pregnant teenager.

            Perhaps, after all, she wasn't so submissive.  Perhaps, instead, Mary lived her life as a Jewish country woman, robust, dark-haired and dark-eyed, a woman who understood birth and death, who saw the cycle of life in the village where she lived, who knew how hard life could be.     

            Why, then, do we hold on to this image of a perpetually virgin, blond-haired, blue-eyed Mother of God?  Who benefited from this image of a pure and chaste Mother?

            Scholars agree that the Gospel of Luke was written by a second or third-generation Christian who probably did not personally know any of the first disciples.  In the first verses of the gospel, the writer says he has "undertaken to compile a narrative of the events ... just as those who were eyewitnesses from the beginning....           

Luke's Gospel is often called a "friend of women" because women are written about more often than in any other gospel.  However, a careful reading might offer a different interpretation than that of "friend."  Jane Schaberg, author of The Illegitimacy of Jesus, writes:

The Gospel [of Luke] attempts to meet various needs, such as instructing and edifying women

                        converts, appeasing the detractors of

                        Christianity, and controlling women who

                        practice or aspire to practice a prophetic

                        ministry in the church.  One of the

                        strategies of this Gospel is to provide

                        female readers with female characters as

                        role models: prayerful, quiet, grateful

                        women, supportive of male leadership...

            Luke never names the women in this Gospel "apostles" or "disciples"; rather the women are portrayed as listeners, pondering what they don't understand.  Who would benefit from this image of women as "prayerful, quiet," and "supportive of male leadership"?  As Schaberg says, "Luke restricts the roles of women to what is acceptable to the conventions of the imperial world."

 Mary Magdalene

                        Now there was a sinful woman in the

                        city who learned that he was at table

                        in the house of the Pharisee. Bringing

                        an alabaster flask of ointment, she

                        stood behind him at his feet weeping

                        and began to bathe his feet with her

                        tears. Then she wiped them with her

                        hair, kissed them, and anointed them

                        with the ointment.

                                                                                    Luke 7:37-38

                                                The name "Mary Magdalene" evokes a very particular kind of image: red-haired, voluptuous, the repentant prostitute who washes the feet of Jesus with her tears, wipes them with her hair, and anoints them with the costly ointment she has carried in an "alabaster jar."

            Interestingly, all four gospels have an account of a woman anointing Jesus with a costly ointment: Matt 26:6-13; Mark 14:3-9; Luke 7:36-50; John 12: 1-8.  In Matthew and Mark, the woman brings an alabaster jar filled with costly ointment and pours it on the head of Jesus; in John's Gospel, Mary, the sister of Lazarus, "took a liter of costly perfumed oil...and anointed the feet of Jesus and dried them with her hair."  Only Luke describes the woman as a "sinner."

            How then, and even why, did the account evolve from a woman anointing Jesus' head to one of a repentant prostitute named Mary Magdalene wiping his feet with her hair?  Who would benefit from such a story?

            Mary Magdalene, scholars now say, was probably a cherished disciple of Jesus.  From the information on early Christianity gleaned from the fragments of the Nag Hammadi manuscripts, she was likely vocal, smart, and a leader in the early community.  She also challenged the leadership of Peter. 

            From Luke's Gospel we know she followed Jesus from town to town, along with "the Twelve and some women who had been cured of evil spirits and infirmities," and that Jesus had driven "seven demons" from Mary Magdalene (Luke 8:1-2).  She was also a woman of resources; she helped bankroll the ministry of Jesus, says Professor Amy-Jill Levine of Vanderbilt Divinity School.  "Women," Levine goes on to say, "paid his bills"(Luke 8:3).  If Mary Magdalene wasn't a poor prostitute, where did she get her money?

            In fact, says Jane Schaberg, first-century Judaism contained great diversity: "Inscriptions, papyri, and archaeological data as well as literary sources indicate that...some Jewish women were leaders in synagogues, were financially independent landowners and businesswomen, and acquired religious education." 

            Why then do we have this consummate image of Mary Magdalene, repentant prostitute, washing the feet of Jesus with her hair?

            We have that image because Pope Gregory VIII, at the end of the 6^th Century, wrote a sermon connecting Chapter 7's woman with the alabaster jar, a woman who is called a "sinner" (nowhere in that passage is she called a prostitute), with the woman Mary Magdalene at the beginning of Chapter 8.  Gregory's sermon effectively revised history, changing Mary Magdalene from the woman who financially and emotionally supported the ministry of Jesus, the first one to whom Jesus appeared after his resurrection, to a fallen woman. 

            Gregory's view held sway for fourteen hundred years and gave artists a rich palette of feminine imagery to complement and contrast to the virginal mother.  The Vatican did not officially rescind that view until 1969.  In the intervening centuries, the image of a woman repentant and humble before the Lord became an overriding symbol for the way women ought to act.  A woman, in the image of Eve, was the original sinner; now, before the Lord, she was given the chance to be saved - humbly.     

 Mary of Bethany

                        Now as they went on their way, he

                        entered a village, and a woman named

                        Martha received him into her house.

                        And she had a sister called Mary, who

                        sat at the Lord's feet, listening to

                        him speak. But Martha, burdened with

                        much serving, came to him and said,

                        "Lord, do you not care that my sister

                        has left me by myself to do the serving?

                        Tell her to help me." The Lord said to

                        her in reply, "Martha, Martha, you are

                        anxious and worried about many things.

                        There is need of only one.  Mary has

                        chosen the better part and it will not

                        be taken from her."

                                                                                    Luke 10:38-42

                                       The most common image of the third Mary and her sister Martha also comes from Luke: Martha, busy with cooking and serving, complains about her sister Mary who sits at the feet of Jesus, listening to him teach.  Mary does not enter into dialogue as do other disciples; rather she is a passive audience.  Martha is told that her cooking and serving is of little importance.

            Jesus' reply to Martha is the kindly voice of patriarchalism in the repeated "Martha, Martha..." in the same way many men today might say, "Now, now, dear."  This language reverberates throughout our modern society, the voice of patriarchy, patting a woman on the head as one would a loyal dog, and not understanding why a woman might feel offended. 

            Protecting the rights of the patriarchy is a political birthright of Western Culture, and like every birthright, survives past all reasonableness for divestiture.

            The Gospel of John gives a very different image of the sisters Mary and Martha.  The first verse of John Chapter 11 says, "Now a man was ill, Lazarus from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha."  In other words, Mary and Martha were well enough known so that the village, and the brother, were identified by the names of these two women.

            By the time Jesus reaches Bethany, Lazarus has died and we hear Mary's reproach, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died."  She speaks with confidence in Jesus' ability, but she also complains as one might to a friend - if you had been here, it would have gone differently. 

            "The initiative of these woman in sending for Jesus, their bold and robust faith, the grief and pain that they bring to Jesus, their willingness to engage Jesus in conversation about life, death, and faith, and their unfaltering love for Jesus are marks of the life of faith for John," writes Gail O'Day, author of The Word Disclosed: John's Story and Narrative Preaching.

            The writer of the Gospel of John shows women as active rather than passive actors in the ministry of Jesus.

            In John, the family of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus once more comes into prominence when Jesus returns to Bethany "six days before Passover" (John 12:1).  In this passage, Mary takes "a litre of costly perfumed oil made from genuine aromatic nard," anoints the feet of Jesus, and dries them with her hair (John 12:3).  This woman who anoints the feet of Jesus is neither a prostitute nor a sinful woman, but rather a leader in the community. 

            As O'Day writes, "In this story Mary models what it means to be a disciple: to serve, to love one another, to share in Jesus' death."  Mary of Bethany, along with Mary Magdalene, will once more bring costly ointments to anoint Jesus on the third day after his death.

            These three women's stories illustrate the political stress that was placed on early Christianity.  The Roman Empire put woman in a subservient position and the politics of Rome (and by extension Western Civilization's art and culture) kept women in a subservient position for nearly two thousand years.  Only in the last century have women begun to remove themselves from the smothering mantle of patriarchy.

            Regardless of how involved the women of Jesus' community were, regardless of how involved women were in the early Christian communities, by the 2^nd Century, women had been silenced.  One of the reasons, says Elaine Pagels  in The Gnostic Gospels, was that women, who were active and leaders, were often attracted to the Gnostic sects. 

            Pagels reports that Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons (c. 180) was dismayed by number of Christian women who were attracted to the Gnostic teacher, Marcus.  "Worst of all, from Irenaeus' viewpoint, Marcus invited women to act as priests in celebrating the eucharist with him..."        

            Tertullian, writing c. 196, agreed with the "precepts of ecclesiastical discipline concerning women":

                        It is not permitted for a woman to speak

                        in the church, nor is it permitted for

                        her to teach, nor to baptize, nor to offer

                        [the eucharist], nor to claim for herself

                        a share in any masculine function...

            As Pagels says, "This is an extraordinary development, considering that in its earliest years the Christian movement showed a remarkable openness toward woman.  Jesus himself violated Jewish convention by talking openly with women..."  What happened between Jesus' time and the 2^nd Century?

            While there are many possible answers to this question, too, - one might cite Pauline thinking, Roman authority, changes in the class structure of Christians, or a history of patriarchy dating from the Bronze Age - the fact remains that a change happened. 

            Today's political stresses demand a re-imaging of women's roles in early Christianity, a re-imaging of language, and a change in the way women leaders are defined.  In a world demanding new voices, new words seeking peace, it is not enough to simply make women priests; this new woman must be encouraged to speak out - for justice, for an end to discrimination against all peoples, and for an end to all oppression.  It is only by re-imaging what was that we will evolve into what we must become.

                                                                                          The End