The Magdalene Review

MM in the news

I realize posting has been slow lately…trying to remedy that soon!

This is an article I came across at SouthFlorida.com:

Who was Mary?
by Denise Flaim

The article begins:

Singer-songwriter Tori Amos called her a “blueprint for women” and described her saga as “the greatest story never told.” Publishers Weekly dubbed her the “It Girl of biblical studies.” And – perhaps the ultimate sign of having arrived in these “Surreal Life” times – she has a “Complete Idiot’s Guide” devoted to her.

Heh.

The article is mostly a rehash of information that we see in other articles about Mary Magdalene, an outline of what people are saying about her today, a few quotes from Karen King, a little bit of Dan Brown-bashing for his misunderstanding of history. It’s not a bad piece though, and I like the fact that at the end, the journalist gives a brief paragraph about a few Gospel women with whom Mary Magdalene has been confused.

This Is My Blood press release

For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been busy rewriting a short piece about Mary Magdalene in popular culture for publication. This, among other usual life concerns like birthdays, holidays, and–oh, yes–taxes, has made for less regular blogging.  I have a number of posts that have been waiting to be made, among them the following press release from David Niall Wilson, author of This Is My Blood. In this book, Mary Magdalene appears as a fallen angel become vampire.  Unusual, yes, but intriguing, and more theologically complex than one might immediately assume. The press release is aimed at Gospel of Judas readers, but is relevant to Mary Magdalene watchers as well.

Coming soon will be a full review as well as an interview with the author, who has graciously agreed to talk with me about this unusual depiction of Mary Magdalene and the whole Gospel story.

The press release: › Continue reading

New theme

Yesterday, while relaxing on the holiday, I decided to do some blog maintenance. I upgraded to the latest version of WordPress and changed my theme. When first starting this blog, I felt that I wanted to include as much of everything as possible. Now that I’m a number of months into it, I’ve learned what kinds of things I really care about presenting to readers, and my old theme felt too crowded.

The theme I’m using now is called “Rin,” which has a rather soothing and Zen-like quality to it.  Currently I am working on creating a unique theme for The Magdalene Review, but until it’s ready, I’m quite fond of this one. 

“He is risen!”

Mary Magdalene is best known in Christianity, of course, as the woman, or one of the women who visited Jesus’ tomb in order to anoint his body. Upon arrival, she (or they) discovered that the tomb was empty. Given a commission by an angel (or angels) to go tell the other disciples that Jesus had risen from the dead, Mary Magdalene then ran to carry out her task.  In Matthew, she and another woman meet Jesus along the way. They fall at his feet and worship him.  In the long ending of Mark, we’re told only that Jesus appeared first to Mary Magdalene on the morning after the Sabbath.  John, of course, has the most elaborate resurrection narrative, placing primary emphasis on Mary Magdalene’s witness, and even giving her a speaking part.

It seems that everyone in Christendom is reading the resurrection accounts today. Is there really any need to quote them here again?  Instead, I’d like to go a step further, and point out that Mary Magdalene stands at the origins of Christianity.  As one of the foundational events of the faith, the Resurrection is inextricably linked to Mary Magdalene’s witness.

A couple of days ago I received a copy of Bart Ehrman’s new book, Peter, Paul, & Mary Magdalene from Amazon.  He sums up my thoughts on Mary Magdalene’s Easter role, and her role in Christianity at large, very well:

I should emphasize that even though Christianity is based ultimately on the life and ministry of Jesus, it is much more than that. Traditional Christianity is the belief that he died for the sins of the world and was raised from the dead. Technically speaking, Christianity could not begin until someone proclaimed Jesus raised from the dead. It appears that the first to do so was Mary Magdalene. If so, as I argued in the previous chapter, Mary really is the one who started Christianity. There could scarcely be a more significant woman for the history of Western civilization–or man, for that matter–who is at the same time less known than Mary Magdalene.

My best Easter wishes to all!

Easter eggs and MM

For many years now I have had the email username “redegg,” in honor of an old legend that is retold in Orthodox Christianity. There are several variations, but the thrust of the story is this: after the Resurrection, Mary Magdalene travels to Rome and dines with Tiberius Caesar. As they eat, she tells him about Jesus, the crucifixion, and his resurrection. Incredulous, Caesar exclaims, “A man could no more rise from the dead than that egg in your hand could turn red!” The egg, miraculously, is transformed to a deep red color before his eyes in testimony to the power of God to raise Jesus from the grave.

Mary Magdalene herself is occasionally pictured holding an egg in Orthodox iconography, a splendid example of which occurs in a mural in the Church of St. Mary Magdalene on the Mount of Olives. She is deeply connected to the Orthodox practice of exchanging red eggs during Pascha. A Russian friend of mine described a typical scenario in the church of his upbringing, in which parishoners would greet one another with red eggs after the Pascha service with the words, “He is risen!” This greeting was then answered with “Yes, he is risen.”

In some versions of the Mary Magdalene egg legend, the back story is eliminated and she simply holds an egg that turns red while announcing the resurrection. This can occur at Tiberius’ table, on the road to Rome, to the Caesar, or to Roman soldiers. This year I was surprised to hear a few variations on the folklore surrounding Mary Magdalene and the red egg. In one version, according to Venetia Newall in An Egg At Easter (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1971), she gave a red egg to Pontius Pilate as she begged for Jesus’ life before the crucifixion. In yet another,

[she] was arrested by a centurion in Alexandria. She offered him an egg and he allowed her to pass.

It seems that in one Polish folktale, Mary Magdalene carried with her to Jesus’ sepulchre a basket of eggs, which she intended to eat while carrying out the work of anointing his body. Newall says:

But no sooner had she arrived than they were all miraculously changed, their shells stained with brilliant hues.

Perhaps the most interesting variation on all of these tales that I’ve seen this year has absolutely nothing to do with eggs, but is a parallel sort of story. Chris dredged this one up from a 1916 issue of the journal Folklore, for which I’m extremely grateful.

In the Cathedral of Lismore, in County Waterford, Ireland, there is an altar tomb with a peculiar statue: a three-legged cooking pot on the lid of which is a crowing rooster. The sexton of the church explains this symbolism with what is allegedly an ancient story: the Roman soldiers who were guarding Jesus’ tomb joked among themselves that Jesus would be able to rise from the dead as well as the chicken that was currently cooking in the pot. Immediately, the lid of the pot was thrown off, the rooster emerged and crowed loudly.

A badly articulated poem was recited by a Galway peasant for the author Dr. D. Hyde, for his book, Religious Songs of Connacht:

There was a flag in the doorway, and surely it was so firm
That a hundred men would not raise it without breaking it up
Until an angel came out of heaven, till he ‘redded’ the road
And he lifted the flag out of their presence.

Mary Magdalene came hastily into it
That she might heal the wounds of Our Lord.
She searched the tomb all round about, hurriedly
And she did not get one sight of Jesus

Until she saw the gravestones ready beside the wall
In the portion that the cover was off (1) (?) it was
She asked timidly, “Are you a man or a ghost (?)
Or where have ye made the room (?) of Our Lord?”

“I never left this place,” said the guard who was watching Him,
“And I do not know who would go looking for Him
I have a small little bird of a cock boiling in this pot”
(And they making a mock of Our Lord.)

“I have a small little bird of a cock boiling in the pot,”
said he, mocking at Our Lord
“And until the cock rises up out of the pot
It is impossible to make a resurrection.”

But up rose the cock out of the pot
He shook his two wings and put a crow out of him.
“My ochone,” says the guard, and surely not without cause,
“There is no use putting a stoppage on Jesus.”

Tonight, as I colored eggs with my three-year-old, trying time and again to get an egg dyed to a true red, I thought of these stories. I look forward to sharing them with him as he gets older.

Good Friday and crucifixion art

For another forty-five minutes, here on the West Coast of the United States, it is still Good Friday. It has taken me until now to get time to scan a couple of images and post them. With my love of Passion art combined with my recent interest in Romanesque and medieval Spanish art, I wanted to post a crucifixion image from that region. The trouble is, however, Mary Magdalene rarely showed up in crucifixion art before the 13th century.

For quite some time I believed that the earliest painting to depict Mary Magdalene at the foot of the cross was by Cimabue, a Franciscan painter of the 13th century. (This piece is shown at left.) Upon closer inspection, however, I believe that she is one of the group of woman standing to the far left, behind the Virgin. The figure kneeling at the foot of the cross, although difficult to see due to the state of the mural, clearly has a tonsure hairstyle; shaved at the crown like a monk. Surely this figure is Francis of Assisi. The woman standing near the cross, arms in the air, is a mystery. Although Mary Magdalene has been shown in similar attitudes of grief, there is no halo on this woman. My guess is that she is an anonymous mourner, an “orant” figure.

Mary Magdalene’s appearance at the foot of the cross had much to do with the devotions of the Franciscans, focus on penitence and “observing” the crucifixion through the eyes of one who was there. Coupled with the fact that her presence in that position appears earliest in works of Franciscan-influenced painters establishes a clear relationship between the monastic group and the artistic trend.

As Bonaventura says in his Arbor vitae (Tree of Life):

O my God, good Jesus,
although I am in every way without merit and unworthy,
grant to me,
who did not merit to be present at these events
in the body,
that I may ponder them faithfully
in my mind
and experience toward you,
my God crucified and put to death for me,
that feeling of compassion
which your innocent mother and
the penitent Magdalen experienced
at the very hour of your passion.(1)

Perhaps 60 years after Cimabue’s crucifixion, Pietro Lorenzetti presented a well-formed vision of the Descent from the Cross, with a woman in red kneeling at the foot of the cross kissing Jesus’ feet. Although there is a similar model in the painting, the fact that the woman at the foot of the cross wears red identifies her as Mary Magdalene. The Virgin cradles Jesus’ head. Although Mary Magdalene’s position in similar images would vary, the “Virgin at the head, Magdalene at the feet” theme would be replayed throughout the Renaissance. This formula occurs so often, in fact, that one modern mystical Mary Magdalene author suggests that Mary Magdalene’s place at Jesus’ feet is a hidden allusion to her sexual intimacy with him. (I don’t make this stuff up, I promise.)

The imagery we typically think of during Good Friday, of Jesus hanging on the cross, of the loving hands taking him down, has evolved a great deal through the centuries. Mary Magdalene’s presence was, for the most part, anonymous until Franciscan devotions at the foot of the cross came along. So powerful was this trend among them and, in fact, other mendicants, that the idea seeped into medieval culture at large. Dante even included a reference in his Paradiso; not only does Mary appear at the foot of the cross with Francis and Lady Poverty, she actually places herself upon it with Christ:

Naught it availed being constant and undaunted,
So that, when Mary still remained below,
She mounted up with Christ upon the cross.

But that too darkly I may not proceed,
Francis and Poverty for these two lovers
Take thou henceforward in my speech diffuse. (2)

Now that Mary Magdalene is no longer a penitent, I suppose that such devotions are now obsolete. But penitent or not, she will likely always remain now at the foot of the cross.

* * *
(1) Bonaventura, Bonaventure: The Soul’s Journey into God, The Tree of Life, The Life of St. Francis, trans. Ewert Cousins (New York: Paulist Press, 1978), as cited by Jansen, Katherine Ludwig in The Making of the Magdalen: Preaching and Popular Devotion in the Later Middle Ages (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000).

(2) Dante, The Divine Comedy (Paradiso: Canto XI), translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. http://www.ccel.org/d/dante/paradiso/para.txt

Holy Thursday and the Last Supper

Today is usually recognized as Holy Thursday (or Maundy Thursday), commemorating the day when the Eucharist was first instituted by Jesus during the Last Supper. This seems like a good opportunity to discuss Leonardo da Vinci’s famous painting The Last Supper, a mural (technically not a fresco) that covers a large wall in the refectory of Convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie, Milan, Italy.

A rumor has been spreading now for many years, made popular by Dan Brown in his 2003 book, The Da Vinci Code, that the person sitting to Jesus’ right (our left) is not the disciple John, but Mary Magdalene. Contrary to popular belief, Brown didn’t come up with this on his own, and neither did his art historian wife, Blythe. I’m not actually sure who first suggested this, but the earliest mention of the idea I recall coming across was in Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince’s 1998 book, The Templar Revelation: Secret Guardians of the True Identity of Christ. This title is, not surprisingly, also mentioned in The Da Vinci Code.

The $64,000 question: is Mary Magdalene in Leonardo’s Last Supper?

After giving it a great deal of thought, spending way too much time looking at scans of the painting as well as reproductions made before it had deteriorated, and reading many opinions on the matter, I’ve come to believe the following:

1. If the person to Jesus’ right could have been mistaken for a woman by the monks who commissioned the painting in the 16th century, they would have rejected it. We have no record that this was the case.

2. Many other paintings of the Last Supper created during the Renaissance depicted John as a “youth” who was quite feminine. Depicting young men in this fashion was not uncommon at all, and examples can be found in secular art as well.

3. It has become common to view art completely outside of the cultural context in which it was created, leading people to read into paintings what they understand of the world during their own time and in their own society. Since DVC especially, we’ve begun to remove paintings from their context entirely, treating them as conspiracies needing to be solved. This is unfortunate. It’s true that some artists conveyed heterodox ideas, inserting symbolism into their work to thumb their noses at someone or something, but we need to consider them within a broader field of work. Compare “mysterious” paintings to other works by the same artist, to other pieces by contemporary artists in the same culture, and even to earlier pieces depicting the same subject. Usually, such exercises can lead to a great deal of insight and a better understanding of what an artist was trying to do. I believe that the current obsession with the notion that Mary Magdalene is present in the Last Supper is the result of viewing the piece way, WAY out of context.

So no, I don’t believe that Mary Magdalene is pictured in Leonardo’s Last Supper, as much as many people want to believe it, and as fascinating as it would be if it actually was her. The recent interpretation of this figure in this painting is another example of a general distrust of traditional scholarship and a desire for mystery. Now that Mary Magdalene mysticism has registered with such a large audience, I anticipate that we’ll see many more bizarre manifestations of such thinking in the years to come.

MM in the news

Lots of Mary Magdalene sightings in the news this week!

I found this at INQ7.net, a Phillipine news site:

Mary Magdalene, the woman Jesus loved
by Jaime Licauco

In this short piece, which also appeared in print, the author aggressively defends a belief in not only Mary Magdalene as an apostle, but as THE apostle, the one loved best by Jesus. As support for this position, he cites the famous passage from the Gospel of Philip, in which Jesus answers questions about why he loves Mary Magdalene more than the others.

In itself, I don’t have a problem with the argument that the authors of Philip believed that Mary Magdalene was loved more than Jesus’ other followers. It isn’t an uncommon theme in Gnosticism. I don’t even have a problem with considering the possible meaning of non-canonical, non-orthodox texts as it relates to the development of Christianity. But the author of this short piece seems to unquestioningly accept the testimony of Philip as history, and then complains that Mary Magdalene hasn’t been given her due by orthodox Christianity based on its content. He even goes so far as to compare it to the situation with heliocentrism in the Church:

Instead of explaining why Mary Magdalene was not even considered an apostle when it was to her that Jesus Christ revealed the most secret teachings after his resurrection, not to Peter and the other disciples, the Church simply labeled those who advocated this view to be heretics.
But labeling a statement or belief heretical does not mean it is wrong. It only means it’s different from the accepted or authorized belief.

For example, during the medieval period, it was heresy to believe that the earth revolved around the sun. In fact, the great astronomer Galileo was arrested by the Holy Inquisition because of such belief. He was made to retract this “heresy” or be burned at the stake. The Orthodox and accepted view at that time was that the sun revolved around the earth.

Further along the scholarship continuum we find Jane Schaberg, who delivered a guest lecture at the University of Michigan (“Truth About Mary Magdalene Debated By Professor”, by Sarah Wright).

Interestingly, Schaberg contends that the questions surrounding the nature of Magdalene’s relationship with Jesus, which have attracted much attention over the past few years due to the immense popularity of Dan Brown’s “The DaVinci Code,” are more important than their answers. The depiction of Magdalene as “Mrs. Jesus” is, she says, just another way to obscure her significance in her own right.

Another key element of Schaberg’s presentation included the revelation that in the mystical tradition, Magdalene is seen as the prophetic successor of Jesus. Several of the religious tracts, unearthed in 1945 in Egypt by a peasant who was digging for fertilizer, support the idea that Magdalene played an important role in the early Church. This finding has sparked renewed interest in studying other documents containing similar messages.

Schaberg also addressed a question regarding why Mary, the mother of Jesus, is often substituted for Mary Magdalene in religious texts. Her explanation is that the figure of the tame, perpetual virgin is far less threatening than that of the powerful leader.

In the Catholic Online, an orthodox defense of Mary Magdalene as an honored saint comes just in time for Easter (“Real Magdalene – Honored saint, depicted in fictional ‘Da Vinci Code,’ was 1st witness to the Resurrection”, by Pat McCarthy).

To Dan Brown, author of the fictional The Da Vinci Code and no stranger to exaggerated claims, she is the victim of a church-orchestrated smear campaign in “the greatest cover-up in human history.”

To the church, however, St. Mary Magdalene is an honored saint. She is celebrated as the first recorded witness of Christ’s resurrection and – whether a forgiven prostitute or not – is venerated as the “apostle to the apostles.”

On the Australian site, The Age, a discussion of new books and approaches to Mary Magdalene occurs in “The great new works of Mary Magdalene”. They even give me a mention:

Lesa Bellevie, an American who started www.magdalene.org in 1998, notes that books about Mary Magdalene have proliferated — from a handful to almost 100 listed on her website bookshop, including her own, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Mary Magdalene.

The Miracle Maker

Tonight I watched the claymation Gospel story, The Miracle Maker (2000). I’ve watched a lot of Jesus movies in the last couple of months, and I can honestly say that I enjoyed this one more than most. It is, apparently, much more difficult to look and act pretentious when you are a claymation model, much to the movie’s credit. The characters were accessible, both for adults and children, and although a consistent message of love was conveyed throughout the film, it never felt preachy or overly pious. Punctuated by good humor and moments of real depth, I found myself engrossed in the movie and eager to see how it would present the end of the story.

Surprisingly, Mary Magdalene appears in the very first scene, in which we meet Jesus working on a building project in Sepphoris. Mary Magdalene is apparently the resident crazy lady, much to the entertainment of some and the consternation of others. Haunted by demons of mental illness, we eventually see what Magdalene sees; distorted faces and growling voices, an asymmetric world akin to what one could imagine a bad acid trip must look like.

About a third of the way through the film, as she runs from her terrifying visions and finds herself atop a garbage heap, a commanding presence appears in the person of Jesus. He directs the demons to leave Mary in a powerful animated sequence. Fractured by howling specters that rise from her body, Mary collapses as they leave her. Healed, she remains in Jesus’ embrace as the light of day dawns, and then makes her way back down into town. Mary Magdalene has much to be grateful for, and she follows him thereafter.

At the cross, she appears with Jesus’ mother, and together they watch in horror as he dies. In contrast to the his mother’s relative silence, Mary Magdalene wails with grief, and after Jesus’ body is taken down, placed in clean linen and entombed, she returns to the cross. Clutching it, she weeps alone.

Here the movie takes an interesting turn. Wracked with grief, Mary spends the night wandering. We are reminded of her life at the margins of society before she was relieved of her demons. At dawn she discovers the empty tomb, and as she sits alone, crying, she speaks with a “gardener” who stands behind her. When he says her name, she turns, and sees Jesus. She embraces him and he tells her that she no longer has to hold onto him. Sending her off with news of his resurrection, one senses that given her history and her night of wandering, things can’t possibly go well when she delivers the message. In fact, this is the case. The reason why Simon Peter disbelieves her is that he thinks she has once again gone mad.

I am reminded here of 19th century rationalists whose views of Mary Magdalene’s witness of the resurrection were colored by her identity as one formerly plagued by demons. Susan Haskins, in her book, Mary Magdalen: Myth and Metaphor (New York: Harcourt Brace & Co., 1993), had the following to say about 19th century Jesus scholar, David Friedrich Strauss:

Strauss mocked the fact that Christianity had been founded on the ‘ravings of a demented and love-lorn woman’; Mary Magdalen’s ‘impetuous temperament’ accounted for her return to the tomb, ‘she having been formerly a demoniac’. (Haskins, p. 330)

Ernest Renan took a similar approach in his 1863 book, Vie de Jesus:

Had his body been taken away? Or did enthusiasm, always credulous, in certain circumstances, create afterwards the group of narratives by which it was sought to establish faith in the resurrection? . . . Let us say, however, that the strong imagination of Mary Magdalene played in this circumstance an important part. Divine power of love! Sacred moments in which the passion of one possessed gave to the world a resuscitated God! (Haskins, p. 331)

So much for visiting the tomb out of devotion. Interpreted this way, Mary Magdalene’s ardor has more to do with madness than dedication.

Questionable interpretation of Mary’s witness aside, The Miracle Maker is an excellent Jesus film to watch with the family, though the scene with Mary’s demons might be a bit scary for younger viewers. An all-star cast provides voices for the characters, with Miranda Richardson, best known to me in her role as Black Adder‘s Queen Elizabeth, plays Mary Magdalene.

* * *

Update (04/10/06): Matt Page over at Bible Movies Blog posted a great review of The Miracle Maker this morning. I think he’s really on the spot with his observations, and I recall having some of the same thoughts while I was watching. Check it out!

Magdalene’s Day folklore

For the first time in many years, I don’t have anything special planned for Magdalene’s feast day. It’s a small miracle in itself that I didn’t have to work today–in favor of tomorrow–so I’ve decided to spend some time with my family.

This is a post I started around Easter with the intention of posting today. Only a couple of items, but still a quaint reminder of some folkloric traditions of Mary Magdalene:

“It is said that roses fade on St. Magdalene’s day.”

Beals, Katharine M. “Flower Lore and Legend.” Henry Holt & Co., 1917, pg. 121.

“The following charm was said to be very potent: On the eve of St.
Magdalene three maidens all under twenty-one must be gathered in the bed
chamber of one of the number and together must prepare a mixture of
wine, vinegar, and water in a ground glass vessel. Each maid must take
three sips of the liquid, into which she must dip a spray of rosemary to
be placed in her bosom. They must then all go silently to sleep in the
same bed. One spoken word will break the charm. If the conditions were
carefully complied with the dream of each, it was said, would reveal her
fate.”

ibid., p 237.

Best wishes to all on this Magdalene’s feast day!