So… what happened to Mary Magdalene?
This post is not one of conspiracy theories. It’s also not another volume of The Da Vinci Code. But it is a post about my biggest question after reading The Gospels of Mary: The Secret Tradition of Mary Magdalene. A mentor friend gave me this book because I was writing a chapter centering on Mary Magdalene in my own unfolding book.
This book contains many Gnostic writings that mention, and at times center, Mary Magdalene — The Gospel of Mary, The Gospel of Thomas, The Gospel of Philip, The Dialogue of the Savior, Pistis Sophia, and The Manichaean Psalms of Heracleides. It has been fascinating to read these.
I don’t know that Mary Magdalene was Jesus’ wife, as Dan Brown claims in The Da Vinci Code. But it is clear that she was very close to Jesus. And she is pivotal to all the resurrection accounts in the canonical Gospels of the New Testament.
So… what happened to her?
What I mean is that she’s never mentioned in any of the other New Testament writings — not the Acts of the Apostles, not any of the epistles. This seems surprising.
Years ago, I listened to one of the most invigorating sermons I’ve ever heard. It was by Diana Butler Bass, and it was part lecture and part sermon. It’s called All the Marys, and it’s worth the length of the listen or read.
She tells the story of Elizabeth (Libbie) Schrader, a scholar who began this research as a master’s student at General Theological Seminary and later earned her PhD at Duke University. Schrader discovered something fascinating in an early manuscript of the Gospel of John: in the pivotal story about Lazarus, Mary, and Martha, there are textual changes involving the names Mary and Martha. Many times, “Mary” is changed to “Martha.” Her research raises the possibility that an earlier version of the story featured one sister named Mary rather than two sisters, Mary and Martha. Schrader has also explored whether that Mary could have been Mary Magdalene.
Why did this happen?
I don’t have the answers to any of this. I’m just sharing that I’ve found all of it so fascinating.
Mary Magdalene is quite the figure.
And if all of this isn’t really a part of your world personally, I hope you’re asking big questions that intrigue you.
Smuggling Grace 