On our third day at Ephesus,
we saw the terrace houses, magnificent structures in the process of excavation
and restoration. These “houses” are more like an elaborate luxury apartment
complex for the upper class of the city. And we saw the Ephesus Museum rich in
ancient art and artifacts. Several more themes from Ephesus are now formulating
themselves into something I can sort of express or at least hint at.
In this post, I will take up
the question of gender and divinity/
holiness. This plays out for us in the person of Mary the Mother of Jesus. Very
generally speaking, In the Neolithic era when society was more matriarchal,
religion was dominated by worship of Mother Goddesses. In the Bronze Age
(roughly 3,000 BCE to 1,200 BCE in the Near East), the Mother Earth Goddesses
were supplanted by Male Sky Gods. Aeschylus’s classic tale of Orestes being
pursued by the vengeful displaced goddesses after he has killed his mother
makes the point explicitly. Apollo shows up in the end and tames them, turning
the old goddesses from the Furies into the Kindly Ones. Basic point: as society
became patriarchal, the image of the divine became patriarchal along with it.
But the goddesses would not
go away, especially in cities where they were the chief guardians, like Athena
in Athens and Artemis in Ephesus. The feminine held a strong place in the
pantheon here on the Aegean coast. The Temple of Cybele (a Neolithic mother
goddess!) appears to have been going strong in the 1st Century CE.
In Roman culture she was called “the Great Mother.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cybele
There was, or at least recently had been, a strong cult of the Egyptian
goddess, Isis, worshiping in the Isis Temple in Ephesus. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isis The mother of Horus the King (Mother of the Lord), Isis was the
model wife and mother, and was the friend of the poor, the downtrodden, and
sinners. Does that remind you of the Magnificat? Her image was a throne, which
may remind us of the throne on which Mary sits in Byzantine Icons. But the main
goddess in Ephesus was Artemis. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artemis She is the virgin goddess who is paradoxically
the patron of motherhood and childbirth. Her temple here in Ephesus was one of
the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis
This is the religious context
of Ephesus in which Mary, not so much the person as the symbol, took on a new
place in Christian faith. But first, we need to think back on the real person
behind the Madonna of Faith. We can be pretty sure historically that Jesus’ birth
was “irregular” in a way not condoned by Jewish society. We Christians may
believe in the Virgin Birth or at least have an affinity for the notion acquired
from singing “round yon virgin, mother and child” every Christmas, but the Jews
of 1st Century Galilee would not have interpreted Mary’s pregnancy
that way.
In the Gospel Of Thomas
(believed by many to contain some genuine sayings of Jesus) Jesus says, “He who
knows the mother and father will be called the son of the harlot.” If he means
himself, then Mary may have had a hard life in Nazareth, and Jesus’ affinity
for the outcast may have come from seeing his own mother shunned. When he was
condemned and crucified, things hit rock bottom not only for him but also for
his already disgraced mother. His resurrection then would have validated and
justified them both.
In Luke, Mary is visited by
the Angel Gabriel, she consents to God’s will with the immortal Fiat (Let it be), she exclaims the
Magnificat praising God for vindicating the outcast (is this her song about her
pregnancy or is it about the resurrection read back into the pregnancy?). She
visits her cousin Elizabeth who recognizes her as the bearer of the Messiah and
says, “All generations will call you blessed” – Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb
Jesus.
The Synoptic Gospels do not
show Mary at the crucifixion or the discovery of the resurrection.[i]
But John places Mary at the foot of the Cross alongside the Beloved Disciple.
Jesus says to her, “Woman behold your son” and to the Disciple he says,
“Behold your mother.” So the Mary-John link is forged.
Luke places her among the
disciples praying in Jerusalem up to the day of Pentecost, but then we hear
nothing more in the Gospels or Acts. But 2nd Century legend has it
that John and Mary came to Ephesus and spent their lives sharing the gospel
here. A house said to have been Mary’s home still stands and has been visited
by Popes to pray there.
One has to wonder if it is
coincidence that the Virgin Mary should have grown to prominence in Ephesus the
city of the Virgin Artemis and the Mothers Isis and Cybele. The spiritual
context was at a minimum ripe for her. It may well be that Christianity without
her could not have gotten traction here.
After her death, dormtion, or
assumption (the end of her earthly life however that happened) John the Divine on
the nearby island of Patmos wrote this prophesy: “A great sign appeared in the
sky, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and her head
crowned with 12 stars. It was with child and wailed aloud as she labored to
give birth.” From this image, the Roman and Orthodox Churches would later come
to call Mary the “Queen of Heaven.”
All of this leads to a point
of church politics and geography. In the early 5th Century, a
dispute arose between two church leaders, Cyril and Nestorius, as to whether it
was proper to honor Mary as the Theotokos,
the god-bearer, or the Mother of God. A council was called to solve the
issue and the die was cast when they determined the venue – Ephesus – if it
wasn’t Mary’s hometown, they sure thought it was. So, yes, after having been
honored as the Theotokos in popular
piety for centuries, she was given the title officially by the Church at the
Council of Ephesus in 431 CE.
Mary’s virginity, especially
the Roman Catholic claims of her perpetual virginity, bother some as it seems
to denigrate sex and be nigh unto gnostic. That strikes me as a fair point. But
there may be more at work here than an aversion to sex as sex. It may have to
do with independence and power. I am not at all clear on this, but I am struck
for example by The Acts of Paul and
Thekla which extolls celibacy at the same time as containing some
erotically charged passages. There was for some mystics the practice of
sublimating sexuality into a spiritual ecstasy. I am not prepared to defend
these claims of perpetual virginity. I don’t think biological virginity is necessary
for the incarnation. Mark and John did not seem to think so in their gospels. I
am just saying there may be more involved here and I am not ready to denigrate
anyone’s belief about this.
Mary is certainly not God,
but her symbolic role of surpassing and salvific holiness strike that kind of
chord in our collective spirit. Some people recoil against Marian piety as some people, especially men, recoiled against the goddess cults in the Bronze Age. Others find Mary’s prominent place in the faith to be a gracious
crack in the patriarchy. It seems to me that the visceral reactions to Marian
piety, both pro and con, say that there is something important going on with
her in our souls, something that bears attention.
As for what should we believe
about Mary, Linda made the point in our class, that it may not matter so much
what we believe. We are called to “be like” Mary. We are called to be
god-bearers, to give birth in our lives to the Christ who God has already implanted
in our souls. It is not so important to “believe” as to “be like.” As the 14th Century mystical monk Meister Eckhart said, "It does not matter that Christ was born in Bethlehem long ago unless he is born in you today."
Still we may want some
guidance about belief and piety. Fortunately we now have a bit from the
Anglican-Roman Catholic international Consultation (ARCIC) Agreed Statement On
Mary, Mary: Grace And Hope In Christ. If
you would like to hear some official word on the question of Mary, I commend
the Statement to your consideration. http://ecumenism.net/archive/arcic/mary_en.htm
[i] Except that Matthew says the women at the tomb
were “Mary Magdalene and the other Mary” (most likely Mary of Bethany).
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