Today, December 8, 2023, is the Catholic feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
I have a few thoughts to offer on this, and what follows is an excerpt from my book
Lady of the Sea: The Goddess Who Births the New Age; (c) Margie McArthur, 2014, All rights reserved.
http://musingsonthedivine.blogspot.com/2022/12/the-immaculate-conception.html
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| "Noli mi tangere" |
From the few mentions of Mary Magdalene in the New Testament, it would seem that she is a minor character. However, the stories in which she is mentioned show that she is a significant character. And when the Nag Hammadi scriptures were found, some of them mentioned her—and in a way that showed her to be even more significant in the story of Christianity than previously thought. Her words show her as a woman of great intelligence and depth, able to discern deep and different levels of meaning in what Jesus taught. She is mentioned in the Gospel of Philip, the Dialogue of the Savior, and among those ancient scriptures was a fragment of a“gospel” seeming written by Mary Magdalene herself, now referred to as the Gospel of Mary.
Given her deep understanding of the teachings of Jesus, it would appear that Magdalene was not only very wise and intelligent but that she also may have had some previous exposure to the concepts of what he was teaching to the other apostles and disciples.
After thinking about and researching this idea for many years, I have concluded to my own satisfaction that she did actually have such an education – and perhaps in more than one place. The most likely place might be with the Essene community at Lake Mareotis near Alexandria, Egypt, though possibly at other locations as well. Unlike many other Essene communities that were strictly male, the community at Mareotis had both men and women as members.
Can I prove this with historical documents? Not really, but my research, thoughts, and intuition have led me to this tentative conclusion.
In De Vita Contemplativa, first century philosopher Philo of Alexandria tells us that the Therapeutae of the Essene Community at Lake Mareotis devoted their time to prayer and study, including the study of allegorical methods of interpreting Holy Scripture – believing that the words of scriptural texts were mostly likely not to be taken literally, but were, in fact, symbols of things hidden. The Therapeutae were also said to be healers of both body and soul.
Ancient Alexandria was a busy and cosmopolitan city 2000 years ago, just as it is now today. Peoplefrom many nations found a home there. Located on the tip of the northern Delta region of Africa, it was not terribly far from Palestine, and was indeed, a crossroads where many cultures met and mingled, and ideas were exchanged. Two thousand years ago there was Jewish quarter in the northeastern part of the city. At that time there were, in fact, several Jewish settlements in Egypt.
Lake Mareotis was a bit south of Alexandria, and 2000 years ago, the lake stretched north from Taposiris at in the south, and paralleled the Mediterranean coast toward Alexandria, Canopus, and Menouthis. As it did so, it widened out to both east and south and into a much larger body of water than it is currently. The Essene Therapeutae community was located somewhere on the shore of this lake, though its actual site is now unknown and may have been in the areas which have since dried out or have been submerged in the Mediterranean due to earthquakes.
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| https://www.southampton.ac.uk/assets/imported/transforms/content-block/UsefulDownloads_Download/AE0682121F8D43D89D42CD69AFEDFA4A/mareotis.pdf |
Where else might a young Mary Magdalene have received the education that made her such a wise, well-educated, and discerning disciple of Jesus?
Not terribly far from the Jewish quarter of Alexandria was the Serapeum – a temple to the god Serapis & the goddess Isis. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serapeum_of_Alexandria Located quite close to the famous Library of Alexandria, it was considered a sort of “daughter temple” of the Library. It was known to be not just a religious temple but also had a school of philosophers, and was a place of both learning and healing. Since such places practiced and taught some very advanced healing techniques, it’s quite possible that Mary Magdalene could have received some of her training there as well as with the Therapeutae of Lake Mareotis. And perhaps some of the healers of Mareotis may have received their training there as well.
It should be noted that the Serapeum of Alexandria had a sister-facility a few
miles away in the city of Canopus, a school well known for its teachings
of both medicine and magic.
There were, of course, many temples in Egypt, especially in its northern Delta region, but in other areas as well, including further down the Nile River. These temples, dedicated to Osiris, Isis, and other deities, often had schools attached to them – schools where students were educated in the mysteries of both nature and spirituality; schools devoted specifically to knowledge of the healing arts (and which often actually served as hospitals) were known as Per Anhks – meaning “Houses of Life.”
Though there has certainly been a lot of speculation, we know nothing of Mary Magdalene aside from when she shows up in the gospel stories, and of course more recently, in the Nag Hammadi scriptures. Who knows where she was previously, what she was doing, or what her life was like? She was certainly not the repentant prostitute that the 6th century Pope Gregory the Great mistakenly proclaimed her to be. Thankfully, in 1969, Pope Paul removed this demeaning and incorrect classification.
When I consider the whole Northern Delta area of Egypt, with its Jewish settlements, Essene communities, the Leontopolis Jewish Temple near Heliopolis, and the Egyptian Per Anhks - Houses of Life - many of whom had schools attached, I realized that there were many places where Mary Magdalene may have gone to learn the healing wisdom needed for both bodies and souls.
As continuing archeological research unearths more history, objects, and documents of the Egyptian past, perhaps we will find evidence of a young Jewish female student named Miriam, who was a student of one of the many Egyptian schools of philosophy and healing arts a couple millennia ago.
Notes:
The Leontopolis Temple (near modern-day Tel Basta), often referred to as the Onias Temple after its founder, Onias IV, was a valid Jewish Temple with a valid Zadok priesthood. It had been established sometime between 300-200 B.C. It was located approximately 80 miles to the northeast of Cairo, on a site that had previously been a temple of the Egyptian feline goddess Bubastis, daughter of the goddess Bast. From what I have been able to discover, it seems likely that the Leontopolis temple – since it may have been in essence, an Essene Temple with regard to at least some of its beliefs.
As my readers may have already noticed, the last 20 years or so have brought a renewed interest in the biblical character Mary Magdalene. In my book, Lady of the Sea - The Goddess Who Births the New Age, I wrote a bit about her which I will share here.
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Mary Magdalene is mentioned twelve times in the New Testament in conjunction with the ministry, crucifixion, burial, and resurrection of Jesus from which we learn that she was a devoted follower of Jesus and helped provide for him and his apostles from her own resources. In recent years there has been a renewed interest in Mary Magdalene and a new understanding of her role in the life of Jesus. The non-canonical scriptures referred to as the Nag Hammadi have more to say. From the Gospel of Mary (i.e. Mary Magdalene) we learn she was a much favored disciple of Jesus, his respected and much loved companion. Due to her innate spiritual intelligence and deep understanding, he shared many teachings with her that he did not share with the rest of the apostles. After he had departed the earth plane the apostles asked her to share some of these teachings with them. When she did so, they immediately became jealous, particularly Peter, and wondered why Jesus chose to share these things with her, a mere woman,rather than with them?
In the Gospel of Philip it is said that Jesus loved Mary Magdalene more than the other apostles and used to kiss her often; this, too, made the other apostles jealous and resentful. The Gospel of Philip seemingly equates her with Divine Wisdom, saying she is "the mother of the angels," a title previously accorded by the early Hebrews to the Goddess Asherah. Though mentioned only a few times in the New Testament, legend has much to say about her. Recent interpretations of both biblical and non-canonical scripture show her to be a strong figure, chief disciple of Christ, first witness to his resurrection, "Apostle to the Apostles, and a missionary of his good news to the people of Gaul (modern day France). A fresh interpretation of legends and traditions of southern France and of the apocryphal gnostic Gospels of Philip (9), Thomas, and Mary suggest she was the chief and most favored disciple of Jesus, and that she may have been his spouse and mother of his child. (1)
The implications of a marriage between Jesus and Mary Magdalene are enormous. Could it be that the Jesus, portrayed as sexless and celibate, actually possessed the characteristics of a normal human male, capable of sexuality, desirous of love and marriage? These new readings of the Mary Magdalene stories say she may have borne a daughter and that this daughter, Sara (whose name means “princess”), was the ancestress of many of the royal houses of Europe. This child, then, would be a representative of the new (new because the Piscean Age was just dawning) evolutionary development in which the divine blood – that is, the power of the spirit world not only manifests fully and physically in the world in the form of that particular person, but its power is spread down through the succeeding generations, gradually working its way down through the bloodlines of humanity over time, thereby transforming humanity by infusing it with the power of divinity.
This new understanding of the Magdalene suggests that, in a sense, she herself is the “Holy Grail” of legend, because she, as the mother of Jesus’s child, was the “vessel” containing his “holy blood” – his child within her very body -- very similar to what is said of the Virgin Mary, whose body, quickened by the power of God’s Spirit, was the vessel that held the divine infant, Jesus.
But more than that: the logical extension of this new understanding posits that Magdalene is important in and of herself, as the feminine aspect of divinity’s manifestation for the new age. Jesus and Mary Magdalene are thus seen as co-avatars or “archetypal bearers” of the Piscean Age.(1)
Such a vision of the Holy Grail is intimately linked with the Sea Temple* because the Sea Temple (*) is about bloodlines, reproduction, motherhood, new life, and cycles and rhythms. The Jesus story dates from the beginning of the Piscean Age. Mary Magdalene, as the mother of the human-plus-divine child of Jesus, might be viewed – along with her mother-in-law, Mary, – as goddess - of the “exalted woman” type - of the Piscean Age.
Pisces is a water sign, the sign of the hidden and often murky depths of the ocean. There is much secrecy about it – secrets which may be revealed later when they are finally “pulled up from the depths.” The nature of Pisces is dual; its symbol is two fish swimming in opposite directions. Pisces wants to go both ways at once, which indicates an inner conflict and duality that it often tries to conceal. Given this, it is not surprising that the Divine Feminine figure of this age would have been split into two very different figures – the virginal Mother Mary, and Mary Magdalene, considered until quite recently to be a prostitute. It’s also unsurprising that the divine son of the Piscean Age, Jesus, would be portrayed as above and beyond normal human sexual desire, when in reality he may well have been a husband and father. (2)
Some legends about Mary Magdalene tell us that she and some companions traveled across the sea in a small rudderless boat, making landfall in what is now Provence, southern France – a place where the Isis cults were still flourishing. The somewhat crescent shape of such small boats are reminiscent of the crescent moon, and this iconography links her and her fellow travelers to the Sea Temple (*) and the Miriam Tradition.(*)
Some say her companions were her sister Martha, her brother Lazarus (whom Jesus had raised rom the dead), a youthful maidservant named Sara, and a priest called Maximin. Others say her companions were Mary Salome (Salome is related to the word Shalom, meaning peace), mother of the apostles James the Great and John the Beloved, Mary Jacobe (called Mary Clopas in the gospels), who may have been the mother of the apostle James the Less, and Sara, sometimes said to be either Mary Magdalene’s daughter or maidservant. Sometimes Joseph of Arimathea is cited as one of her traveling companions; it is said that Joseph and Mary Magdalene traveled to Britain and spent time there before going to the south of France. These Three Marys – Mary Magdalene, Mary Salome, and Mary Jacobe – were said to have been present at the crucifixion and were the three women (according to the Gospels of Mark and Luke) who went to the tomb to anoint the body of Jesus, only to find the tomb empty. (3)
These three Marys, and Sara as well, are still honored today in southern France where the legends about them are strong. There is a town on the Mediterranean Sea in the Carmargue region called Saintes Maries de la Mer – the Saints Marys of the Sea. The church there is called the Church of the Marys, and has statues of Mary Salome and Mary Jacobe, as well as an underground crypt with a shrine to St. Sara, who has become quite special to the Gitans (Gypsies). St. Sara is depicted as black, much like the Black Madonnas.
On May 24th every year many Romani people gather in the Carmargue for a festival in St Sara's honor; they dress the statue in beautiful and elaborate clothing, and take it in procession into the sea and back to the church again. The traditions of this area tell us that the Magdalene was said to have preached the gospel and converted many. She was also known as a healer and some say as a prophetess.
The legends tell us that towards the end of Magdalene's life, she retired to a cave outside the city where she spent the remaining years alone, ministered to by angels. Caves, as you will recall, are representative of the Underworld realm of the Dark Goddess, and are places where people have traditionally gone for meditation, retreat, and quiet reflection in their search for wisdom. Thus caves are related to Wisdom, who is depicted in the Bible as female – the first-created and greatly beloved creation/emanation of God who helped him create the universe. And Wisdom is, of course, the meaning of the Greek word Sophia, the goddess-like being who was greatly honored in her own right as the Wisdom of the Divine.
Whether or not Mary Magdalene was the spouse of Jesus and mother of his children, she remains, in her own right, a powerful figure̅beloved chief disciple of Jesus, first witness to the Resurrection, and Apostle to the Apostles. Of greater significance, however, is the implication that as the beloved and favored disciple of Jesus, she was actually his spiritual partner in the work he came to do for the world. Some legends seem to suggest that she may have been a priestess of the Divine Feminine – Asherah, Astarte, or perhaps Isis since at least one source indicates that she may have been trained in a Jewish temple located in Egypt, where the Divine Feminine was honored as Isis.(4)
Notes:
(1) This subject has been covered convincingly and in great depth by Margaret Starbird in her books about the Magdalene. www.margaretstarbird.net/ Starbird, Margaret, Goddess in the Gospels, Bear and Company Publishing, Santa Fe, NM, 1998, p 141.
(2) It might also help to explain why so many wars were fought in the name of Jesus, the Prince of Peace.
(3) According to the gospels, Mary the mother of Jesus was also present at the cross and the tomb.
(4) www.marymagdaleneshrine.org Click ‘Testament of Mary Magdalene’, then click ‘Egyptian Initiation.’
(*) For more information on the Sea Temple and the Miriam Tradition, please see my book, Lady of the Sea - The Goddess Who Births the New Age.
