Below are verses from the Good
News of Mark, chapter 14, verses 3 through 9. Quoted from the World English
Bible:
While he was at Bethany, in the
house of Simon the leper, as he sat at the table, a woman came having an
alabaster jar of ointment of pure nard - very costly. She broke the jar, and
poured it over his head.
But there were some who were
indignant among themselves, saying, “Why
has this ointment been wasted? For this might have been sold for more than
three hundred denarii (300 denarii was about a years wages for an agricultural
laborer) and given to the poor.”
They grumbled against her.
But Jesus said, “Leave her alone. Why do you trouble her? She has done a
good work for me. For you always have the poor with you, and whenever you want
to, you can do them good; but you will not always have me. She has done what
she could. She has anointed my body beforehand for the burying. Most certainly
I tell you, wherever this Good News may be preached throughout the whole world,
that which this woman has done will also be spoken of for a memorial of her.”
In my opinion the above narrative recounts the
exact moment when Yeshua of Nazareth became the Messiah - Jesus Christ.
Unfortunately, the woman is nameless in this Gospel and little remembered
today, illustrating the bimillenial disdain for women in our Judeo/Christian
culture and the total disregard that theologians have given to this extremely
important passage in the first written gospel. It is surmised from the Gospel
of John, chapter 11, verse 2, that it was Mary - the sister of Martha and
Lazarus - that used the perfumed oil (chrism). In either case, whether a known
or an unknown person, the anointer was surely a WOMAN. This anointing
completely flies in the face of chauvinistic theologians who assert that the
future kingly and/or priestly Messiah could only be anointed by a MALE high
priest. The statement concerning the anointing of Jesus' body for burial and
the future worldwide evangelism was most likely added by Mark or a later
scribe. The comment, "that which this woman has done will also be spoken
of for a memorial of her" is most likely Jesus' own.
Why has this been ignored or
denied and forgotten through the centuries?
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