Mary Magdalene. Orthodox and Catholic versions

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

We continue to collect and link together the scattered information about the mysterious, covered with ancient legends, secrets and sacred veneration of the name. Why delve into the legends of a thousand years of antiquity, when you do not know for certain what was happening just a century ago, the reader will ask. Outside the windows of affairs, it is easier to leave it as it is and habitually be content with the generally recognized versions of the Orthodox and Catholic traditions? In this habitual and indifferent contentment, we admit, after all, humanity has spent a truly terrible two thousand years, going through bloody wars, conquest and crusades, milestones of economic enslavement, as a result of building a technocratic model of a consumer society, in which knowledge about nature has been completely lost man and the purpose of his short stay on this beautiful little planet. And today, even if someone does not believe, we have approached the brink beyond which another global destruction is possible. Why? We will try to answer this question through a deep examination of the essence of such a grandiose, seemingly fantastic and inconceivable for the ordinary mediocre consciousness of the phenomenon as Mary Magdalene … Indeed, behind this name, believe me, there is much more than the story of one of the devoted disciples of one of the Teachers of mankind.

Let us not in the least doubt the historical fact of the coming of the Savior as the Son of God, in those distant times and in his epoch-making mission. The well-founded suspicion that the real Teachings of Christ was distorted, rewritten and adapted for the creation of a new powerful, more improved religious institution, the purpose of which is the ordinary power and manipulation of the consciousness of the masses. We will certainly highlight in the near future the striking paradox of the fanatical conviction of the religious consciousness of Christians in their own exclusivity and ambitions for Truth, while the officially recognized and objective point of view of modern historians banally casts doubt on almost all basic sources, which for some reason are unshakable for a billion church electorate and untouchable phenomena of "manifestation of divine revelation." Not in order to encroach on the dignity of the believers of one of the revered religions, but in order to look at the situation from a slightly different angle, in order to still see the truth through the deceitful dust of age-old snows. Judging by the information found in the Gnostic works of the Nag Hammadi library, there is full reason to believe that the true Teachings of Christ went with her, Mary Magdalene, into the circles of the early Gnostic Christians, while the other branch, the apostolic "through Peter and Paul" created what we see today. Further confrontation or struggle for power divided the followers of Christ into RASKOLNIKOV and APOSTOLIC CHRISTIANS.

So, not unreasonably continuing to assume that Mary Magdalene is the One that has kept our human civilization afloat for two millennia, let us take a closer look at the form in which information about her has come down to our days through the Orthodox and Catholic traditions. We will use information from Wikipedia that is authoritative for the majority.

Mary Magdalene (Hebrew מרים המגדלית, Old Greek Μαρία ἡ Μαγδαληνή, Lat. Maria Magdalena) - a devoted follower of Jesus Christ [1], a Christian saint, a myrrh-bearer, who, according to the Gospel text, followed Christ, was present at his Crucifixion and witnessed his posthumous appearance. In the Orthodox and Catholic churches, the veneration of Magdalene differs: Orthodoxy venerates her according to the Gospel text - exclusively as a myrrh-bearer,cured of seven demons and appearing only in several episodes of the New Testament, and in the tradition of the Catholic Church for a long time it was customary to identify with her the image of the penitent harlot and Mary of Bethany, sister of Lazarus, as well as to attach extensive legendary material.

In the New Testament, her name is mentioned only in a few episodes:

• She was healed by Jesus Christ from being possessed by seven demons (Luke 8: 2; Mark 16: 9)
• Then she began to follow Christ, serving him and sharing her wealth (Mark 15: 40-41, Luke 8: 3)
• Then she was present at Calvary at the death of Jesus (Matt. 27:56 and others)
• Then she witnessed his burial (Matthew 27:61 and others).
• And she also became one of the myrrh-bearing wives, to whom the angel announced the Resurrection (Matt. 28: 1; Mark. 16: 1-8)
• She was the first to see the resurrected Jesus, at first she took him for a gardener, but when she recognized him, she rushed to touch him. Christ did not allow her to do this (Do not touch Me), but ordered her to announce his resurrection to the apostles (John 20: 11-18).

In the Orthodox tradition

In Orthodoxy, Mary Magdalene is revered as an Equal-to-the-Apostles saint, relying only on the evangelical testimonies listed above. In Byzantine literature, you can find a continuation of its history: after spending some time in Jerusalem, some time after the Crucifixion, Mary Magdalene went to Ephesus with the Virgin Mary to John the Theologian and helped him in his labors. (It is worth noting that it is John who gives the most information about the Magdalene of the four evangelists).

It is believed that Mary Magdalene preached the gospel in Rome, as evidenced by the appeal to her in the epistle of the Apostle Paul to the Romans: “Greet Mary, who worked hard for us” (Rom. 16: 6). Probably, in connection with this her journey, an Easter tradition associated with her name arose later. The death of Mary Magdalene, according to the version of this branch of Christianity, was peaceful, she died in Ephesus.

The Orthodox tradition, unlike Catholicism, does not identify Mary Magdalene with a nameless evangelical sinner, but venerates her exclusively as an equal to the apostles holy myrrh-bearer. There is no mention of fornication in her akathist. In addition, in Orthodoxy, the identification of Magdalene with several other evangelical women, which happened in Catholicism, did not occur; it traditionally venerated these women separately. Dimitri Rostovsky emphasizes: "The Eastern Greek-Russian Orthodox Church now, as before, recognizes all these three persons mentioned in the Gospels with different signs as different, special, not wanting to base historical information on arbitrary, only probable interpretations."

Relics in Orthodoxy

According to the "Chetya Menaei" by Demetrius of Rostov, in 886 under the emperor Leo VI Philosophe the relics of the saint who died in Ephesus were solemnly transferred to the monastery of St. Lazarus in Constantinople. Their further fate is not described. Currently, it is known about the finding of the relics of Mary Magdalene in the following Athonite monasteries: Simonopetra (hand), Esphigmen (foot), Dochiar (particle) and Kutlumush (particle).

In the catholic tradition

In the Catholic tradition, Mary Magdalene, called directly by name only in the above New Testament testimonies, was identified with several more evangelical characters:

• Mary, mentioned in the Gospel of John as the sister of Martha and Lazarus, who received Jesus in their home in Bethany (John 12: 1-8)
• unnamed woman who anointed the head of Jesus in Bethany in the house of Simon the leper (Matt. 26: 6-7, Mark. 14: 3-9)
• the unnamed sinner (harlot), who washed Christ's feet with peace in the house of Simon the Pharisee (Luke 7: 37-38) (for more details, see Jesus' anointing with peace).

Thus, the Magdalene, identifying with these characters (and also borrowing some scenes from the life of the non-Gospel repentant sinner of the 5th century, the Monk Mary of Egypt), acquires the features of a repentant harlot. A vessel with incense becomes its main attribute.

According to this tradition, the Magdalene earned fornication, when she saw Christ, left her craft and began to follow him, then in Bethany she washed his feet with peace and wiped her hair, was present at Calvary, etc., and then became a hermit in the territory of modern France.

The opinion of the Church Fathers. The image of the harlot

One of the main reasons for the identification of Magdalene with a harlot is the recognition by the Western Church that she was the nameless woman who washed Jesus' feet in peace.

And behold, the woman of that city, who was a sinner, learning that He was reclining in the house of the Pharisee, brought an alabaster vessel with ointment and, standing behind at His feet and weeping, began to pour tears on His feet and wipe her hair with the hair of her head, and kissed His feet., and smeared with the world. (Luke 7: 37-38).

The problem of reconciling the Gospel stories about the anointing of Jesus by an anonymous woman was solved by the Church Fathers in different ways (for more details, see The Anointing of Jesus with Myrrh). In particular, Saint Augustine believed that all three anointing was performed by the same woman. Clement of Alexandria and Ambrose of Mediolan also admitted that it could be about the same woman.

Indirect evidence of the identification of Mary of Bethany with Mary Magdalene is first encountered in the "Interpretation on the Song of Songs" by Hippolytus of Rome, indicating that the first to whom the resurrected Jesus appeared were Mary and Martha. This, obviously, is about the sisters of Lazarus, but placed in the context of the morning of Resurrection, in which Mary Magdalene actually appears in all four Gospels. The identification of all women who appear in the Gospel stories about the anointing of Jesus with Mary Magdalene was finally made by the Pope Saint Gregory the Great (591): “The one whom Luke calls a sinful woman, whom John calls Mary (from Bethany), we believe is that Mary, from whom seven demons were expelled according to Mark”(23 omiliya). The unspecified sin of Mary Magdalene / Mary of Bethany was interpreted as fornication, that is, prostitution.

In the popular minds of the inhabitants of medieval Europe, the image of the penitent harlot Mary Magdalene gained extraordinary popularity and beauty and has been entrenched to this day. This myth was reinforced and literary processed in the "Golden Legend" by Yakov Voraginsky - the collection of the lives of saints, the second most popular book in the Middle Ages after the Bible.

In the 20th century, the Catholic Church, seeking to correct possible errors of interpretation, softens the wording - after the reform in the 1969 Novus Ordo calendar, Mary Magdalene no longer appears as a "penitent". But, despite this, the traditional perception of her as a repentant harlot by the mass consciousness, which has developed over the centuries thanks to the influence of a large number of works of art, remains unchanged.

SUMMARY

And again we are faced in an impenetrable "sacred" fog, let loose in the early Christian centuries by the brilliant "architects" of human history. Do not let it go then, who knows what kind of creative path our civilization would go and what heights it could reach. In the meantime, nothing is reliably known about Mary Magdalene from official sources, but at a subconscious level, the absolute majority has formed an erroneous opinion: "This story looks not entirely clean, so you shouldn't go into details." This is exactly what the author of these lines thought hitherto. And if we consider that 90% of parishioners have no idea at all who is depicted on the icons, just a slight unobtrusive hint of “uncleanness” is enough to ignore the name of Magdalene in comparison with the “holy fathers of the church”.

To be fair, let's summarize a small intermediate summary:

• Mary Magdalene was not a harlot, not possessed by demons - because there are no direct indications of this anywhere.
• Mary Magdalene was the most beloved student Jesus Christ, of which the testimonies:
• - The Gospels of Philip,
• - The Gospel of Mary,
• - the mysterious painting by Leonardo da Vinci "The Last Supper",
• - the version of Rigden Djappo himself (!!!), about her later …
• Pure Knowledge from Jesus went with Mary to the early Gnostic groups, which were later mercilessly destroyed by representatives of apostolic Christianity (here you can draw a tragic analogy with the Cathars, in the XII century).
• It was Mary Magdalene that Jesus Christ entrusted the secret of the holy grail (about this in our next publications).
• In addition, the history of the Order of the Knights Templar deserves special consideration, who worshiped her as the greatest shrine …

In conclusion, we can say the following, in our opinion, it is no coincidence that the fog was thrown, and it is no coincidence that the name of Mary has been indirectly discredited today, and defined in the church shadow. They try not to mention her, she is not on the revered icons, they do not know about her. In Orthodox churches, her image can be seen near the crucifixion of Christ, with a hunched back, with a darkened face, a downcast look. This is how I see her since those ancient and memorable times, when I first crossed the threshold of an Orthodox church. Neither in the large-circulation Orthodox literature I read later, nor in the "soul-saving conversations" with the confessors later, have I ever heard any mention of either her life or her spiritual feat.

Consciously or unknowingly, the Church diligently keeps silent about Mary Magdalene. And we already know why.

Prepared by: Analyst