Images of the Feminine in the Gospels
Rev. Baudouin Heuninckx,
ULCMS in Engineering, Royal Military Academy (ERM/KMS), Brussels, Belgium
MA in International Politics, University of Brussels (ULB), Belgium
Master of Wiccan Studies, ULC Seminary, Elk Grove, California, USA
PG Dipl in European Union Law, Northumbria University, Newcastle, UK
BS in Law, Saratoga University, California, USA
Introduction
The publication of the best-selling novel ‘The Da Vinci Code’ by Dan Brown has recently re-awakened the interest of the general public about the feminine and the position of women in the dogma of the Christian faith. However, this novel was far from the first attempt at reinvigorating the feminine aspect in religion. A number of Neo-Pagan religions, especially Wicca, have been mostly centered on the Goddess, the Divine Feminine that some authors claim is the original image of God, almost occulted by the repression of the Christian Church .
Despite the fact that the persecution of witchcraft by the Catholic Inquisition may have been greatly overestimated , it remains true that, since the Middle Ages, the role of women in society had been limited , and that her role in the Catholic Church and in many later Christian denominations remained minimal.
It is therefore interesting to refer back to the sources of the Christian faith and look at the visions of the feminine offered by the Gospels. We will concentrate on those who are probably the most important female characters of these writings: the Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalene. We will attempt to include in this paper sources other than the Canonic Gospels , namely some of the apocrypha, such as the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Philippe and the Gospel of Mary.
The Virgin Mary
We will begin our analysis by a study of the mentions of the Virgin Mary. This study is complicated by the fact that more than one woman called Mary are mentioned in the Gospels. We will attempt to identify them and their role in the overall life of Jesus Christ.
The first Mary to appear in the Gospel of Matthew is clearly the mother of Jesus. Mary is the wife of Joseph and gave birth to Christ . She was impregnated by the Holy Ghost before her marriage to Joseph . However, mentions of the Virgin Mary in Matthew remain limited. It is interesting to note that, in the Gospel of Matthew, the Annunciation is made to Joseph, and not to Mary .
The Gospel of Mark does not even mention the birth of Jesus.
The Gospel of Luke is the one that goes into the most details on the Annunciation. Mary is told by the angel Gabriel that she will conceive Jesus despite the fact that she is a virgin (nothing, however, indicates that she intends to remain a virgin). It seems that at that time, she is already married to Joseph . She has been compared to a new Eve, restoring the divine identity of the human race . When she goes to visit Elisabeth, who is pregnant with John the Baptist, the child recognizes her in the womb (this event is often called the Visitation). She remains three months with Elisabeth, and one could wonder why she seemingly left just before the latter gave birth to John .
The apocrypha Gospel of Philip argues that Mary could not have conceived by the Holy Spirit, but that Jesus must have had another father than the One in Heaven . In the apocrypha Gospel of Bartholomew, the apostles attempt to have Mary explain the mystery of the conception of Jesus, but she cannot tell it without destroying the world through flames coming out of her mouth . This story does not grant much credibility to that apocrypha.
Luke also tells the story of the birth of Jesus with more details than the other Gospels. Joseph and Mary, who is then pregnant, go to Bethlehem to be taxed . Jesus is born during that time. Mary is sometimes said to keep all these things, and ponder them in her heart . She is told by Simeon that her child will fall and rise again, and that a sword shall pierce her soul . She is often seen to behave like one would expect a mother to do towards her son .
Mary is not much mentioned by John before the crucifixion, but it is at His mother’s urging that Jesus turns water into wine at the wedding in Cana . Mary is there held to embody fidelity and promise, calling for the wine of the new Alliance to replace the wine of the old , an image that will be reflected at the time of the crucifixion . John is the only Gospel to mention this event.
We can see that only Luke gives the Virgin Mary some significance in the early life of Jesus. Mark does not mention Jesus’ mother in the beginning of his Gospel. Matthew only refers to Mary as the mother of Jesus in the beginning of his Gospel, when He is still a child . John only mentions her at the Cana wedding .
All these images of the Virgin Mary are much weaker and of less spiritual significance than the icon usually presented by the Catholic Church. Her role in the birth of Jesus in all Gospels except Luke is generally passive, and she seems to be considered only as a vessel for the Son of God.
Later, when Jesus is talking to the people and his mother and brethren wish to see him, he refuses to do so, saying that His real family is made of those who do the will of God . In the apocrypha Gospel of Thomas, He is even quoted as saying that he hates his earthly father and mother . This quote is softer and more general in the other Gospels .
From then on, Mary is only called His mother when the Gospels quote what the people of His own country say about Jesus . Matthew even calls her ‘the other Mary’ to differentiate her from Mary Magdalene (although some have argued that this is a different character than his mother, as we will see below). Only John continues to call her His mother , and describes her as following Jesus and His disciples .
It seems that, at least in some of the Gospels, Jesus stopped considering Mary as his mother when he came of age and started teaching the people. This is even more significant if we consider the uncertainty of her presence and status at the time of the crucifixion.
We see Mary again on the Golgotha, but she is then referred as ‘the mother of James and Joses’ , or ‘the mother of James’ . It has been argued that this Mary is actually another character than the mother of Jesus, namely the mother of the apostle James , but this would be contradicted by the fact that ‘the mother of the sons of Zebedee’, who include apostle James , is named as a distinct character in the same paragraph. Therefore, as it was mentioned that James and Joses are among Jesus’ brethren , she should arguably be the Virgin Mary.
John is the only Gospel where Mary is clearly at the Golgotha and referred to as ‘His mother’ . She is there with her sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas, who is there mentioned for the first time, although it has been argued that ‘her sister’ and ‘Mary wife of Cleophas’ could be two different characters, the first one being the mother of the sons of Zebedee . In the Gospel of Mark, she is there with a woman named Salome , who is also mentioned in the apocrypha Gospel of Thomas , and who could be the mother of the sons of Zebedee mentioned in Matthew .
The apocrypha Gospels of Philippe also mentions that Mary, her sister Mary and Mary Magdalene were the three Maries walking with Jesus.
The importance of the Virgin Mary at the time of Jesus’ death in the Gospel of John differs widely from the other Gospels, where she is at best only named as being present. In that Gospel, Jesus creates a mother-son bond between Mary and John . It has been argued that in this text, Mary is the symbol of the Church that the disciples agree to take care of from then on .
In Matthew, Mary – or at least the person of that name who was present at the crucifixion – is with Mary Magdalene at the sepulcher of Jesus after his burial . They come back to the sepulcher at the end of the Sabbath and are told by an angel about the resurrection of Jesus Christ , before meeting him on their way to tell his disciples . However, in Mark, Jesus appears only to Mary Magdalene , while in Luke He does not appear to them. Luke adds that the rest does not believe the women . In John, it seems that only Mary Magdalene goes to the sepulcher .
It has been argued that the women at the sepulcher represent the new Church, new figures of Eve gone through redemption , but who still need to be guided by the light of the angel’s revelation .
More details on the life of the Virgin Mary before or about the birth of Jesus appear in some apocrypha Gospels such as the ‘Protevangelium of James’, the ‘Gospel of the Nativity of Mary’ or the ‘Arabic Gospel of the Infancy of the Savior’. It is uncertain what credit to give to these apocrypha, especially because the facts related there are often very private, happened long before Jesus started His public life, and that it is unclear how they could have become common knowledge available for publication. It has been argued that these are simply derived from what was written by Luke . The Protevangelium of James, although very old, and probably at the source of the other documents responsible for the cult of the Virgin Mary, is probably of pagan origin and created as an a-posteriori explanation of the incarnation of Jesus . Moreover, some of these are probably of a much later period and therefore less reliable as primary sources.
In summary, the Gospels, both canonical and apocrypha, present a very faint and weak image of the Virgin Mary. The only Gospel in which she plays some spiritual role at the time of conception and birth of Jesus is Luke , and the only Gospel in which she is certain to plays a role at the time of the crucifixion is John, where she is probably used only as a symbol. The other Gospels mention her name only in a cursory manner, if at all. Even if she was present at the time of the death of Jesus, these other Gospels do not even refer to her as the mother of Jesus, and this could be evidence of Jesus’ rejection of His mother at some point during His ministry.
Therefore, the Gospels, except some apocrypha of doubtful value, do not seem to substantiate the importance that was given to the Virgin Mary by the Christian faith, especially the Catholic Church, neither do they present the Virgin Mary as any form of beacon of the feminine.
Despite these facts, the cult of the Virgin Mary as Theotokos, the Mother of God, was made official by the Church at the Council of Ephesus in 431 . Some have seen this as an attempt of bringing the Christian religion closer to the old Pagan religions, especially to stories such as that of Goddess Cybele and her son and lover Attis , a parallel already strongly suggested by Sir James Frazer.
Mary Magdalene
Mary Magdalene is mentioned by Luke as the first of the many women who follow Jesus and ‘minister unto Him of their substance’. He adds that Jesus had cast seven devils out of her . She is similarly mentioned in the apocrypha Gospel of the Lord written by Marcion, bishop of Sinope .
The Bible of Jerusalem in French translates ‘which minister unto Him of their substance’ by ‘qui les assistaient de leurs biens’ (who supported them through their possessions) , which could mean that they either were wealthy women, or that they were working to sustain the disciples. The exact role of these women following Jesus, even with two different translations, is unclear. They probably followed Him and His disciples to attend to their needs, but their actual role in religious affairs is uncertain on the basis of these references.
It is interesting to consider further the fact that Jesus cast seven devils out of Mary Magdalene. We will see below that Mark also refers to her in the same way. The number seven is usually used in the Bible as a symbol of completeness, of totality. One common interpretation, used in many Catholic teachings, had been that she was an especially bad sinner. However, one could argue that, as seven demons had been cast out of her, the entirely of her evil self had been removed, and that Mary Magdalene had therefore become ‘completely pure’ . This could mean that she was the only human close to perfection, and could explain why, in at least some of the Gospels, she is the first to whom Jesus appears after His resurrection, as we will see below.
The analysis of Mary Magdalene in the Gospels is complicated by the fact that there is another character of some importance named Mary, and that her identification to Mary Magdalene, although probable, is not dispositive.
Mary, sister of Martha, is first mentioned in Luke. She sits at Jesus’ feet to listen to Him while her sister is serving Him. When Martha complains about this, Jesus tells her that Mary has chosen the good path, and that Martha should not be worried about so many things . Mary has been held to be the image of life in the times to come, while Martha is the image of life in this world .
John adds that Mary and Martha are the sisters of Lazarus , and that it was Mary who anointed Jesus with ointment, and wiped his feet with her hair after the resurrection of Lazarus . She tells Jesus that if he had been there her brother would not have died . It has been argued that the perfume used by Mary represents the faith in the Savior, and that the fact that she wipes his feet is a foreshadowing of the same gesture done by Christ before the Last Supper . Despite the fact that the Gospels are unclear, some have argued that this Mary is Mary Magdalene , although others would see there a different character, called Mary of Bethany .
Because of the similarity of her actions, this Mary is sometimes thought to be the woman of many sins who anoints Jesus in the house of Simon (called sometimes ‘the leper’ and sometimes ‘the Pharisee’, which is not necessarily a contradiction) in Bethany , but some hold her to be a different character . That woman has been considered as a symbol of humankind, which after having sinned repented and came back to God, embracing the mystery of the incarnation and praising him . It is worth noting that, contrary to popular belief, nothing in the Gospels tends to show that this woman was a prostitute. The nature of her sins is not mentioned.
The Gospels do not tell us that this woman is Mary of Bethany or Mary Magdalene, but identifying her with Mary of Bethany, who in turn can be identified with Mary Magdalene, could explain why the latter is often described as a sinner, something that is not directly evident from the Gospels themselves, apart from the quote concerning the seven devils .
In the old Coptic manuscript called ‘Book of the Resurrection of Christ by Bartholomew the Apostle’ , Mary the mother of James, Mary Magdalene, Mary the sister of Martha, and the woman mentioned above are clearly distinct and find themselves together at the sepulcher. However, in other parts of this manuscript, the Virgin Mary is clearly confused with Mary Magdalene, which cannot make the earlier statements of that apocrypha dispositive.
It has been argued that these three women could actually be three aspects of the same Mary Magdalene at different stage of her spiritual journey: at first, she was a sinner enlightened by her meeting with Jesus, then a disciple in contemplation of Him, to finally become an intimate companion , potentially after the death of Lazarus. This interpretation has the advantage of reconciling similar names and gestures from different Gospels and putting them in a somewhat coherent picture.
Someone named Mary is also seen in the apocrypha Gospel of Thomas as asking a question to Jesus together with the other disciples . Considering the hatred for his earthly mother that Jesus professed in that Gospel, we could assume that this Mary is also Mary Magdalene , although she could also be Mary of Bethany if the two are distinct persons.
Again in the Gospel of Thomas, Peter is quoted as requesting Jesus to reject Mary because women are not worthy of eternal Life. Jesus answers that any woman who becomes man will be worthy of the Kingdom . This sentence also probably refers to Mary Magdalene, and has often been mistranslated: what Jesus meant is not that women have to change gender, but that if they, just as the men, succeed in becoming fully Human, they will be able to reach the Kingdom . It could be a statement of the equality of men and women before God (Peter embodies there the patriarchal attitude of the times). A similar quote is found in the apocrypha Gospel of Mary, to which we will come back. However, some have interpreted it as a reference to the Book of Genesis and to the inferiority of women .
Returning to clearer references to Mary Magdalene, she is named as the ‘companion’ of Jesus in the apocrypha Gospel of Philippe and they are explicitly mentioned as kissing each other on the mouth . Jesus is said to love her more than His other disciples, much to their anger and chagrin . On the basis of this Gospel, it has been argued that, if Jesus was to be perfect as a human, he had to have carnal relationship with a woman , on the basis of some verses that show the need for oneness in the union of man and woman . It is interesting to note that the same Gospel of Philippe states elsewhere that it is by a kiss that the Perfects conceive and give birth . This is meant in a spiritual sense, and could allegedly lead to the conclusions that Jesus and Mary conceived together something spiritual, possibly perfect oneness.
Mary Magdalene only appears in the Gospel of Matthew and Mark at the time of Jesus’ death , despite the fact that she is mentioned among the women who had been following Jesus from Galilee, ministering unto Him . The Bible of Jerusalem in French uses ‘le servaient’ (served Him) for ‘ministering unto Him’ . This wording is slightly clearer that that of Luke.
She is found in all Gospels to go to the sepulcher of Jesus after His burial . In Matthew, she and the other women are told of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and they meet Him on their way out . In Mark the first person to whom Jesus appears is Mary Magdalene, and Mark adds there that Jesus had cast ‘seven devils’ out of her . When Mary Magdalene tells the disciples that she saw Him, they do not believe her . In Luke, however, Jesus does not appear to the women.
A similar scene is found in the apocrypha Gospel of Peter. However, Mary Magdalene is there depicted as fearful of the anger of the Jews, and flees after seeing the angel who tells her about the resurrection . However, she is especially mentioned as a ‘disciple’ of Jesus . In addition, that Gospel mentions ‘twelve disciples’ after the death of Jesus, at a time when Judas Iscariot was already dead . Some have seen there a mistake of the author , but it is interesting to note that the eleven male disciples plus Mary Magdalene would again equal twelve.
Mary Magdalene’s fear of retribution in the Gospel of Peter is contradicted by the Gospel of Mary, where Jesus called her blessed because she did not waver at the sight of Him . Moreover, the Synoptic Gospels show that the women, not the disciples, are present on the Golgotha. They did not, therefore, seem to be fearful of the anger of the Jews.
In John, only Mary Magdalene goes to the sepulcher and, seeing it open, runs to Peter and John to warn them . After that, she is alone when the angels tell her of the resurrection , and when Jesus appears to her . For some reason she only recognizes him when he says her name . It is interesting to note that she calls him ‘Rabboni’, which means ‘master’, and one could wonder why this word, like a only few others in the Gospel, is used in the original language in most translations. Mary Magdalene, in this scene, has been said to embody hope. She remains behind after the disciples left and, looking down into the mystery of the sepulcher, she finds what she was looking for . She has therefore been considered by some as the true founder of Christianity , the first to receive the true revelation.
We can see that Mary Magdalene is about the only person who is consistently named in each Canonical Gospel as being at the Golgotha and of receiving the message of Jesus’ resurrection, often being the first person to see Him. This would not be inconsistent with the hypothesis mentioned above, that she had become completely pure and was therefore more worthy than the others. This could be confirmed the fact that Mark mentions only at the time she meets Jesus resuscitated that seven demons had been cast out of her.
An interesting point of view appears in the short apocrypha Gospel of Mary, which is generally held to refer to Mary Magdalene , but could also refer to Mary of Bethany if they are different persons (as the apostles call her ‘sister’ and she calls Peter ‘brother’, it is unlikely that she was the mother of Jesus). In this Gospel, Mary is said to have been loved by Jesus more than any other women, and seems to have received special teachings from Him, that she attempts to impart to the apostles. However, some of them do not seem ready to be taught by her. Her relationship with Jesus mirrors the one described in the Gospel of Philippe and would tend to confirm that she is Mary Magdalene, or that Mary Magdalene and Mary of Bethany are the same person.
This Gospel of Mary, despite being incomplete, seems to delve into much deeper aspects of the faith than the Canonical Gospels, and would be worthy of a specific analysis. It clearly sets Mary Magdalene apart from the apostles as an initiate having understood more than them from the message of Christ: the interconnection of all things, the fact that sin does not exist as such but is born of the deeds of man, and the need to avoid dependencies and reach harmony to become fully Human. At least some of this doctrine seems close to the heresy of Pelagius (who died in 430) , who denied the importance of the Original Sin, argued that man had the free will to choose between good and evil , and that grace only came by following the teachings of the Gospel. However, the Gospel of Mary is estimated to be of a much earlier period .
This Gospel also highlights the resentment of Peter (as well as Andrew) against her, as already seen in the Gospel of Thomas .
The Gospels, if we consider together both the Canonical and the generally reliable apocrypha, therefore present an image of Mary Magdalene much more spiritually active than the Virgin Mary. She is mentioned by all the Gospels as one of the followers of Jesus, and she could potentially be His companion and main initiate, close enough to perfection to be the first to meet Him following His resurrection.
It seems that, in some of the Gospels and in the canonical theology of the Church, the image of Mary Magdalene was either diminished or removed , maybe because she was found disturbing by a patriarchal Church.
Conclusions
This short study might be a surprise to many Catholics. The Virgin Mary, despite her undeniable role in the birth of Jesus, does not appear from the Gospels to have had any major role in the life and teachings of Christ. The only exception is the Gospel of Luke and some apocrypha, where her role before Jesus’ birth and during His childhood is emphasized. In the Gospel of John, she is probably used only as a symbol at the time of the crucifixion. There is therefore not very much in the Gospels to warrant the cult that has been given to the Virgin Mary over the last millennia.
However, the Christian Church fairly early on promoted the cult of the Virgin Mary as Theotokos, the Mother of God. There could have been a number of reasons for this, some of them political (bringing the new faith closer to Pagan believers), and some of them linked to the need to have an image of the feminine for the Christians to worship alongside Christ. One could wonder why the person chosen for that role was the Virgin Mary, especially considering her relative absence in the Canonical Gospels (it is somewhat of a contradiction that all elaborations on her past were found only in apocrypha). Maybe the answer is that the alternative was not sufficiently politically correct for the early Doctors of the Church.
As we have seen, the Gospels give a much more important role to Mary Magdalene. Even though this role is only alluded to – but still evident – in the Canonic Gospels, it is much more explicit in the apocrypha. Mary Magdalene seems to have been at least a prominent disciple, and could have been Jesus’ companion and prime initiate. She gives us the most solid image if the feminine in the Gospels, an enlightened woman who followed Christ, came close to perfection and understood the fundamentals of His message. Maybe that strong image, coupled with the fact that she could have known Jesus carnally, was too much for the leaders of the early Church, and it was easier to make her pass as just a repentant sinner.
We should not forget, however, that these strong images of Mary Magdalene come only form a limited number of quotes in the Gospels, both Canonical and apocrypha. The Gospels remain focused on the teachings of Christ, and it would be incorrect to think about putting Mary on some level of equality with Him. Despite disagreement on what her role in the life of Jesus might have been, she remains at best a disciple, and not the Messenger. It would be far-fetched to see in her an image of the Divine Feminine in the Gospels. That image is simply not there.
In his novel ‘The Da Vinci Code’, Dan Brown argues that Mary Magdalene was one of the twelve disciples, the lover of Jesus, and chosen by Him to guide the Church after His departure. Despite the fact that the author presents these facts in such a way as to appeal to the reader, as any good novelist should do, it is clear that Dan Brown did his homework. The fundaments of his hypothesis rest on a clear basis in the Gospels (especially the apocrypha), and should not be quickly disregarded, even though some of his elaborations are clearly fictional.
There are some images of the feminine in the Gospels, but these images remain faint, open to interpretations, and might very well have been distorted. Even at its best, this image remains that of a disciple of Christ. Religious persons longing for the Divine Feminine have unfortunately to look elsewhere for their spiritual development.
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