Easter: The Apostle To The Apostles

I have reached the point in my life when I can see what has mattered, what has become a part of its substance - I might say a part of my substance.  Some of these things are obvious, since they have been important to me in my career as a student and teacher  But some of them I could never have anticipated   The importance to me of elderly and old American hymns is certainly one example.  They can move me so deeply that I have difficulty even speaking about them.   The old ballad in the voice of Mary Magdalene, who "walked in the garden alone," imagines her "tarrying" there with the newly risen Jesus, in the light of a dawn which was certainly the most remarkable daybreak since God said,  "Let there be light."  The song acknowledges this with fine understatement:  "They joy we share as we tarry there/ None other has ever known."  Who can imagine the joy she would have felt?  And how lovely it is that the song tells us the joy of this encounter was Jesus's as well as Mary's.   Epochal as the moment is, and inconceivable as Jesus's passage from death to life must be, they meet as friends and rejoice together as friends.  This seems to me as good a gloss as any on the text that tells us God so loved the world, this world, our world.   And for a long time, until just a decade ago, at most, I disliked this hymn, in part because to this day I have never heard it sung well.  Maybe it can't be sung well.  The lyrics are uneven, and the tune is bland and grossly sentimental.  But I have come to a place in my life where the thought of people moved by the imagination of joyful companionship with Christ is so precious that every fault become a virtue.  I wish I could hear again every faltering soprano who has ever raised this song to heaven.  God bless them all.

Marilynne Robinson:  Wondrous Love

I can't say that I've arrived at exactly the same point in my life as Marilynne Robinson has about that particular song, though my mother told me it was a favorite of her mother (a Catholic, if you will) my dear Grammy McCarthy who died when I was quite young, and it was played at the funeral of my sister-in-law's Congregationalist  mother, who we all loved dearly,  one of her favorites as well.   I do, though, understand that it is one of the most profound passages in the Scriptures and, as I will point out, one of the hinges on which enormous change would seem to rest.  I would suppose for me Morning has Broken would play a similar role, a hymn I associate with the Vatican II era funerals of my parents.  By the way, a hymn not written by Cat Stevens, as so many people my age mistakenly believe but of the Scottish writer Eleanor Farjeon, sung to a Scottish folk tune.  But that's a different post.

That passage which In The Garden is based onis in The Gospel according to John, which is highlighted in the current cycle of the lectionary. 

Early in the morning on the first day of the week wile it was still dark,  Mary of Magdala came to the tomb.  She saw that the stone had been rolled away from the entrance so she ran off to Simon Peter and the other disciple - the one Jesus loved - and told the,  "The Rabbi has been taken from the tomb!  We don't know where they have put Jesus!" 

[There follows a passage in which Peter and the other disciple generally assumed to be John go and discover what Mary told them but they don't understand what it means and they return home   The reason I'm not giving it will be clear in a minute.]

Meanwhile Mary stood weeping beside the tomb.  Even as she wept, she stooped to peer inside - and there she saw two angels in dazzling robes.  One was seated at the head and the other at the feet of the place where Jesus' body had been. 

They asked her,  "Why are you weeping?"

She answered them,  "Because they have taken away my Rabbi, and I don't know where they have put the body." 

No sooner had she said this than she turned around and caught sight of Jesus standing there, but she didn't know it was Jesus.  He asked her,  "Why are you weeping:  For whom are you looking?"  

She supposed it was the gardener, so she said,  "Please, if you're the one who carried Jesus away, tell me where you laid the body and I will take it away."

"Jesus said to her,  "Mary!"

She turned to him and said "Rabboni" - which means "teacher".  

Jesus then said,  "Don't hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to Abba God.  Rather, go to the sisters and brothers and tell them,  "I am ascending to my Abba and to your Abba, my God and your God!"  

Mary of Magdala went to the disciples  "I have seen the Teacher!"  she announced.  Then she reported what the savior had said to her. 

Inclusive Language Bible.

Here is what an important article by Ruth Fox, OSB, Women in the Bible and Lectionary, says about the segregation of the person and figure of Mary of Magdala in the Resurrection into the remoter corners of liturgy, not on Sundays when most people would have a chance to hear them.

It is well known that Jesus’ women disciples, led by Mary Magdalene, according to all the gospels were the first witnesses to the resurrection. Easter Sunday’s gospel in the U.S. lectionary (#43), however, stops just at the point of the beautiful story of Jesus’ appearance to Mary Magdalene in the garden and his important commission to her: “Go to my brothers and tell them...” (John 20:17; the newer Canadian lectionary rectifies this problem by adding verses 10--18.) In fact, this appearance of Jesus to Mary Magdalene does not rate any Sunday of the Easter season but is assigned to Easter Tuesday (#262) and is used again on the saint’s memorial (always a weekday, never a Sunday) in July (#603). Peter and John’s race to the tomb in John 20:1 -9 (#43), though, is retold every Easter Sunday, and Jesus’ appearance to Thomas in John 20:19-31 (#44) is read on the Second Sunday of Easter every year.

While it is only natural that the gospels for the Sundays of Easter should proclaim the appearances of the risen Lord, the gospels assigned to the fourth through the seventh Sundays of Easter use excerpts from the prayer of Christ at the Last Supper, ignoring Christ’s appearance to and dialogue with Mary Magdalene in John 20:11-18 for Sunday proclamation. Similarly, the gospel for Easter Monday (#261) gives Matthew’s account of the women finding Christ risen (Matthew 28:8-15). Whereas Matthew 28:1-10 is read at the Easter Vigil in Year A, Matthew 28:8-15 would make an excellent follow-up Sunday gospel--but is relegated to Monday. The first reading for each of the Sundays of Easter is taken from the Acts of the Apostles. The selections focus on the sermons and activities of Peter, Paul, Barnabas and Stephen. The women leaders found in the Acts of the Apostles--Tabitha, Lydia and Priscilla--are given second place in the weekday readings of the Easter Season.

The article is such an eye-opener to what would seem to be a systematic exclusion of mention of Women in the scriptures, even such clearly central figures as Mary of Magdala that I thought it should be looked at.  The article starts by noting the shock of a woman who had spent decades as a faithful church goer but who had never known of how central women are in the Scriptures.  The figure of Mary of Magdala was conflated with the reformed prostitute mentioned in the Gospel and in the Western church that is certainly how she has been presented though if you read the actual text, she almost certainly wasn't a reformed prostitute and was, in fact, one of the central figures in the early Jesus movement which would eventually become Christianity. 

The time it takes for things to change and for the truth to be manifested in the Scriptures can take generations and centuries to happen.  In the Church, it can take millenia.   I think we're coming to a time when gender equality is coming to pass, though it might take longer than any of us are around to see it happen.  I think the attribution of misogynistic patriarchy in Europe to Christianity is absurd, as the pagan cultures of Europe were hardly woman friendly, except as recreated in romantic myth.  In most places, even medieval Christianity was an occasion of an elevation in the status of women over what had been there before.  I would argue that most of the patriarchal clap trap and actual oppression has a lot more in common with paganism than the teaching of Jesus, which were and are extremely radical.   As the article points out, when actually read, the role of women, even as found in the supposedly misogynistic Paul's letters, is far more extensive and included, certainly, the office of Deacon, and arguably in such figures as Mary of Magdala, the very Apostle to the Apostles, the first preacher of the risen Christ, exactly the same role as would be hijacked by an exclusively male clergy.

Here is a short sermon given at Catholic Women Preach on Mary of Magdala.

I am going to be concentrating more on the commentary by women from now on.   I've got a lot to learn from them. 

Note:  I've used the Inclusive Language Bible prepared by Priests for Equality to make this point.   I have read some scholars who say it's a good translation and some who don't like it for various reasons.  Some of the critics don't seem to like the idea of including women as fully human and deserving of attention.   Some, used to the structures of non-inclusive translations find it jarring.  I will admit that such things like including the names of the spouses of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob when they are referenced to be taking a little getting used to though I certainly get the reason they did it and even more so agree with it.

If it's properly called a translation is an interesting question.  I was originally tempted to call it a commentary but that opened the question as to what isn't a commentary?  Which we're not used to asking about various translations and editions of the Bible but which we should always keep in mind.

Every act of editing, every act of translating the Bible is an act of interpretation, a form of commentary on the text whether through the choices made for words and ideas or in the more obvious forms of explanatory notes.   That's even less often admitted is the case in very reading of every text, whether it's a translation of the Bible, every act of reading ANY TEXT is an act of interpretation of that text, any form of communicating our interpretation of it is an act of commentary.   I'm tempted to point out that's even true in science, generating different interpretations of data, quantum mechanics and even more standard physics generate different ways of seeing the raw data.  But that is also a different post.

The motivation behind why that is done is all important, it's as important for those capitalists who translate Matthew 25:31–46 to mitigate the clear condemnation of those who don't treat the least among us as they would treat God or who widen the eye of the needle or who do something similar, or, in the case of one of the most popular translations, reinforce the status of earthly royalty, having explicitly been commissioned with that in mind.  I think the motive of the Priests for Equality (not all of whom were priests) is one of the better ones for making a new translation.  One which takes the radical equality of the Gospel and much of the prophetic tradition with complete seriousness by people who understand the importance of our habits of thinking about things gained through the language we use to think in.   Brueggemann is only one of many Scripture scholars who note the importance of understanding that there will not be ONE understanding of the Scriptures and so it's necessary to read different editions and translations and commentaries.  I'm including the Inclusive Language translation-commentary in my reading, from now on.