In a late Medieval play Mary Magdalene is the hero of her own story. She "opens to full bloom as a literary figure in Christian drama" says Marjorie M. Malvern.
Mary having met Jesus, vows to follow him and leave her worldly pleasures behind. She willingly exchanges romantic love for holy love of the Christ which sets the scene for her anointing of Jesus in the home of Simon the Leper. Later at the tomb after Mary mistakes the risen Jesus for the gardener, Jesus explains in beautiful allegory that a man's heart is his garden and when "the garden is watered with tears, he says virtues spring up and smell full sweet."
Mary anointed the feet of Jesus with her tears and weeps once more at the tomb in sorrow and then in joy when she meets her risen Lord.
At the end of her long life and after 30 years of living as a hermit where she is lifted up to heaven by angels and fed manna daily to sustain her, Mary’s final gesture is to kiss the ground in humility. “Thys erth at thys tyme fervently I kysse.” She is human and goddess of the earth, a paradox of the literary figure of Mary Magdalene developed over centuries after the gospels were penned.
The green of the painting is the earth. The garden. The bliss of new creation and new life. Resurrection. Love that is stronger than death.
In my latest for Baptist News, I write of domestic and foreign politics, and news of war and the death of children in Jim Jordan Shows Us The Danger of Eating Our Own Children. Our violent theology has led us to this point. From the article:
“Here’s where we have gone wrong in our churches. The narrative around the story of the almost sacrifice of Isaac mirrors the Crucifixion of Jesus, somehow making it make a sick sense. God gave up Jesus to appease God’s own wrath for our sins. Violent sacrifice was necessary to pay the price for our wretchedness. God ate God’s own young.”
I strongly believe that we have focused too much on the crucifixion of Jesus and have neglected careful study and imagining of the resurrection of Jesus. Mary Magdalene is helping me to see another way. A way that reveals a more beautiful and loving picture of God. A God who loves us freely and deeply and invites us to do the same.
Let us kiss the earth and join with Mary and Jesus in rejoicing in new life and that one day their will be no more need for tears of sorrow, only tears of joy.
May it be so.
