Reply #53: Mary Magdalene - bad rap [View All]

Mary Magdalene --- likely prostitute or adulteress

Just to address one in your list, evidence suggests that it is much more unlikely that Mary Magdalene was a prostitute.

http://www.magdalene.org/faq.php#prost
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Was Mary Magdalene a prostitute?

Well, we don't know for sure, but probably not. There is nothing in the Gospels, or anywhere else for that matter, that says that she was a prostitute, a fallen woman, a harlot, or a sinner. Nowhere. Nothing. Nada.

Her reputation as a redeemed prostitute has two likely origins:

1. She was associated with Mary of Bethany, who performed the anointing of Jesus in the Gospel of John. The woman who performed the anointing in the Gospel of Luke was an anonymous "sinner" from the city. It is assumed that the sinner woman was a prostitute, but even that is an extrapolation. So if Mary Magdalene was Mary of Bethany, and Mary of Bethany was the anonymous sinner from Luke, and if the anonymous sinner from Luke was a prostitute, well, there goes Mary Magdalene's good name.

2. Mary Magdalene was relieved of seven demons. In the Middle Ages, there were seven cardinal sins, and Mary Magdalene's seven demons were often thought to be related to them. Primarily, Mary Magdalene was associated with the sins of lust and vanity, but the correspondence of seven demons with seven sins was just too good for the medieval mind to pass up. This association contributed to Mary Magdalene's sinful reputation.