For Burial Or For Tonight?

[adrift]

For Burial or for Tonight?

The NT claims that Jesus was anointed by Mary in preparation for his burial. (Mark 14:8) I have never heard of such a thing in my whole life as a Jew.

Jesus had probably just arrived from one of his usual missions and was very tired. However, he had no time for any rest, because he had to go for that dinner. A compromise he could not postpone. (Luke 7:36)

Nevertheless, Mary had decided to follow him up with her perfumed oils to make him feel good. So, she did the anointing right then and right there where Jesus was: At the dinner table.

Since there is no precedent in Judaism for anointing to be done on a living person with the purpose to prepare him for burial, it is only obvious that Mary did that anointing on Jesus in preparation rather for “tonight” than for burial. Quite romantic, wasn’t it?

Ben

When he was in Bethany reclining at table in the house of Simon the leper, a woman came with an alabaster jar of perfumed oil, costly genuine spikenard.

A Pharisee invited him to dine with him, and he entered the Pharisee's house and reclined at table.

37
Now there was a sinful woman in the city who learned that he was at table in the house of the Pharisee. Bringing an alabaster flask of ointment,
38
she stood behind him at his feet weeping and began to bathe his feet with her tears.

The woman was not named. Your speculation as to who it was is just that unfounded speculation.

 

[Ben_Masada]

Thank you Ben. You seem to indicate that the church was involved in the direct editing of Luke and John. While I think that it is generally accepted that editing occured, I am not familiar with the train of thought that the church in any formal sense was involved in that. It is usually attributed to individual copyists. Is there a compelling reason to assume that it was an organized effort?
My problem with this hypothesis as I understand it assumes that a minor detail of the life of Jesus was compelling enough to HAVE to be included if it contains elements contrary to the image being portrayed.
I understand the rationale, one of the tenets of some scholarship is that phrases or events can be determined to be historical based upon differing presuppositions (ie that Mark records that SOME were healed as opposed to ALL in Matthew indicates that Mark reflects an earlier tradition).
I think what your line of reasoning can create is that anything that agrees with your presuppositions, ie the Jewishness of Christ(which of course I accept probably more than most on here) can be accepted and those things that go against cultural or religious norms (a non-sexual close relationship) can be rejected.
In other words, it seems that the unique qualities of Jesus can be descarded if they go against religious or cultural norms. While someone can do, I find it highly speculative. You are an example of that yourself. If someone was studying Jewish thought and writing about a man named Ben 2000 years later with a scant amount of actual first hand accounts, and it was said that he unlike most Jews accepted 20 percent of the gospels as accurate and described himself as a biblical Judaism, a phrase not often used and certainly not associated with the four major branches, I would if you would accept those things about him that differed from the norm?
Speculative to be sure. Thanks for your time and your answers; they are at least interesting as opposed to too much of the normal banter.
BH

**You are welcome BrianH. And thank you for the pleasant surprise of a reply without a single negative adjective, when I thought I was up for some heavy hearring. Yours is indeed an emancipated mind. **

 

[Ben_Masada]

Ben Masada;5564709:

Firstly - I should have put ‘good’ Jew in quote marks when applied to Jesus. Obviously the New Testament indicates that Jesus did many things - touching corpses and lepers, eating with unwashed hands and associating with sinners - for which He was criticised at the time, and which certainly would’ve made Him look like a ‘bad’ (again in quote marks) Jew to others. To make up such breaches of the law flies in the face of logic, it would turn off most potential Jewish converts and certainly Gentiles would not care either way.

**LilyM, can you imagine how untrue is all the above about Jesus because of the purpose it was written for? If you reread it undressed of any Christian preconceived notion, you will realize that Jesus is intentionally depicted to be the antithesis of being Jewish. Not that he is made to break the Jewish laws, but to prove with his actions that something has changed. Hence, the Pauline policy of Replacement Theology. The paragraph above would be a contradiction to Matthew 5:19, when we have Jesus declaring to have come to fulfill, and confirm for our fulfilling, the Jewish laws down to the letter; even to the dot of the letter. **

I find your whole train of thought incredibly disturbing. Fact is Mary was exposed to this censure precisely BECAUSE Jesus didn’t (by your logic) put an end to that censure by stating that she was His wife. If He had stated (verbally, it doesn’t need a gesture) that they were married, it would have stopped the critics dead much more effectively than what He did say.

What was Mary exposed to? Pehaps glances? Nobody said anything. Simon did not censure her. If there was something going on in his mind, we all know that it never came out. Perhaps the thing never happened, and it was interpolated by Luke to tell the readers later that Jesus was so divine that he could read minds. But do you know something? I am glad he put that down. Othewise, we would never have a Pope (Gregory) to identify that woman for us as Mary Magdalene. I am sure you agree with me that the word of a Pope deserves credibility.

But to not even verbally state that the woman is your wife when she is criticised for making a public gesture of affection - is a verbal statement not permissible? Even when, as in this case, it would’ve SAVED the wife from censure? Sounds illogical, twistedly unloving and lacking in righteous concern for one’s God-given spouse.

**What makes you think that Jesus should have identified his wife, because you think she was critized for that public gesture of affection?
She was not. Simon never spoke his mind. If Jesus read his mind, so what? Nobody else did. Even Simon did not know he was being read. Righteous concern for one’s God-given spouse has undergone evolution throughout these 2000 years. What was righteous in the threatment of our wives 2000 years ago is no longer the same today. Feminism has taken care of that change. At that time, respect to one’s wife was to hide her. Today is to expose her. Women today want to be seen, and no longer to be “for your eyes only.” **

The whole thing flies in the face of the scriptural idea of marriage. It spits in the eye of the scriptural injunction for husband and wife to cleave to each other and become one flesh. I would, I could, no more fail to acknowledge my spouse, whatever they did, as my spouse - flesh of my flesh and bone of my bone - than I’d fail to acknowledge my right hand or my left foot.

**LilyM, you are of the romantic type. A rare specie nowadays. The Scriptural idea of “cleaving to each other and becoming of one flesh” has been so long out of fashion that I doubt anyone remembers how it used to be. **

Your later comments also directly contradict your earlier comments that not only is public affection between husband and wife ‘beautiful and natural’ (you used those or similar words) but that you get great enjoyment out of watching it yourself.

Did I say I enjoyed watching public affections between husbands and wives? I must have been having a dream of Utopia. I can almost say that a couple walking down the street is married exactly for the lack of affections. There are no public passionate affections between husbands and wives. Once the magic is gone, mascarade affections please no eyes.

If this is the case, then what was there about what Mary’s ‘beautiful and natural’ gesture that wouldn’t lead Jesus to either lovingly reciprocate, or at least verbally tell the other guests so that they too could enjoy it for what it was rather than thinking it was something inappropriate? Something that is beautiful and natural cannot be at the same time, as your later comments indicate, something to be avoided and disowned.

**Do you know why Jesus’ disciples did not find Mary’s public demonstration of affection inappropriate? Because they knew that the woman was Jesus’ wife. And do you know why Simon didn’t say anything? Because he was probably aware of the same. Any good psychological reader can see that the purpose of the case was not the anointing per se but to enhance Jesus’ divinity for his omnipresence at reading
people’s thoughts. **

 

[adstrinity]

Do you know why Jesus’ disciples did not find Mary’s public demonstration of affection inappropriate?

Yes, because in Luke, they weren’t with him so they didn’t know about it. In John, when it was a different scenario, Judas did find Mary’s, sister of Martha and Lazarus (i.e., the different Mary as has been pointed out to you before because it was a different time), behaviour unbecomming.

 

[Ben_Masada]

Yes, because in Luke, they weren’t with him so they didn’t know about it. In John, when it was a different scenario, Judas did find Mary’s, sister of Martha and Lazarus (i.e., the different Mary as has been pointed out to you before because it was a different time), behaviour unbecomming.

**They criticized the behaviour of Mary or the wasting of the money paid to get the perfume? Check it out!

Then, what are you talking about a different scenario? A different woman? Who was this Jesus you are talking about, a Casanova or Don Juan? How about the cases presented by the other two gospels, two more different women? Listen, this is embarrassing for lack of a better word. I wonder how you guys put your faith in such ridiculous writings. **

 

[adstrinity]

**They criticized the behaviour of Mary or the wasting of the money paid to get the perfume? Check it out! **

**Then, what are you talking about a different scenario? A different woman? Who was this Jesus you are talking about, a Casanova or Don Juan? How about the cases presented by the other two gospels, two more different women? Listen, this is embarrassing for lack of a better word. I wonder how you guys put your faith in such ridiculous writings. **

1. Judas was annoyed at both.
2. The John scenario definitely was for burrial.
3. Jesus is Lord. Jesus is God. Jesus is One in Being with the Father and the Holy Spirit. He loves his bride, the Church.
4. How about them!
5. We don’t put our faith in writtings, we put our faith in God, who is Jesus the Christ.

I am not surprised you don’t understand.

 

[Ben_Masada]

1. Judas was annoyed at both.

**Both what, the money and the act? The money it could not be because Judas was the only well-to-do Jew of the group. Usually, a man who didn’t grow up with money is never trusted to take care of money. And the act, he wouldn’t because he knew that the woman was Jesus’ wife. He had been at the wedding of Jesus in Cana. **

1. The John scenario definitely was for burrial.

Jesus was Jewish and there has never been in Judaism such a thing as to anoint one for burial while he is still alive.

1. Jesus is Lord. Jesus is God. Jesus is One in Being with the Father and the Holy Spirit. He loves his bride, the Church.

This is pure Greek Mythology, completely alien to Judaism. Since Jesus was Jewish it is not true.

1. How about them!

The same nonsense.

1. We don’t put our faith in writtings, we put our faith in God, who is Jesus the Christ.

Again Greek Mythology.

I am not surprised you don’t understand.

You should not be surprised. I am Monotheistic.