Mary Magdalene from the New Testament to the New Age and Beyond

Mary Magdalene from the New Testament to the New Age and Beyond

Author: Edmondo F. Lupieri

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2019-10-14

Total Pages: 518

ISBN-13: 9004411062

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

An international team of twenty scholars under Edmondo F. Lupieri’s direction produced Mary Magdalene from the New Testament to the New Age and Beyond. While the historical figure of the Magdalene may be lost forever, the construction of her literary images and their transformations and adaptations over the centuries are a lively testimony to human creativity and faith. Different pictures of Mary travelled through time and space, from history to legend and mythology, crossed religious boundaries, going beyond the various Christianities, to become a “sign of contradiction” for many. This book describes a special case of biblical reception history, that of the New Testament figure of a woman whose presence at the side of Jesus has been disturbing for some, but proves to be inspiring for others.


Magdalene's Lost Legacy

Magdalene's Lost Legacy

Author: Margaret Starbird

Publisher: Inner Traditions / Bear & Co

Published: 2003-05-05

Total Pages: 178

ISBN-13: 9781591430124

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Using New Testament "gematria, " symbolic number values encoded in the Greek phrases, the author reveals that the sacred couple was one of the essential pillars of early Christian teachings, before being denied by the architects of institutional Christianity and obscured by later Church doctrine.


Mary Magdalene

Mary Magdalene

Author: Philip C. Almond

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2022-11-30

Total Pages: 365

ISBN-13: 1009221698

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Tells the story of Mary Magdalene from its beginnings in the New Testament up to the present time. This book is the first major work on Mary Magdalene in thirty years. It explores the many different Mary Magdalenes created for each age.


New Testament Apocrypha, vol. 3

New Testament Apocrypha, vol. 3

Author: Tony Burke

Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing

Published: 2023-05-25

Total Pages: 751

ISBN-13: 1467466840

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

An expansive compilation of New Testament apocrypha in English translation, featuring fascinating but heretofore unpublished texts. New Testament Apocrypha, vol. 3, continues to unearth the vast diversity of Christian Scripture outside of the traditional canon. This new collection encompasses a broad range of languages—Greek, Church Slavic, Old English, Coptic, and more—and spans centuries, from the formation of the canonical New Testament to the high Middle Ages. The selections here represent some of the least studied apocryphal texts, many of which have not previously received an English translation or a critical edition. Notable newly edited and translated selections include The Martyrdom of Zechariah, The Decapitation of John the Forerunner, The Birth of John, The Revelation about the Lord’s Prayer, and The Dialogue of Mary and Christ on the Departure of the Soul. Each text is accompanied by a robust introduction, bibliography, and notes. Scholars of apocrypha, Scripture, and hagiography from a breadth of disciplines will find this an indispensable reference for their research and teaching. Contributors: Carson Bay, Mark Glen Bilby, Rick Brannan, Christian H. Bull, Slavomir Čéplö, Alexander D’Alisera, J. Gregory Given, Nathan J. Hardy, Brandon W. Hawk, Stephen C. E. Hopkins, Alexander Kocar, Brent Landau, Jacob A. Lollar, Christine Luckritz Marquis, Ivan Miroshnikov, Tobias Nicklas, Samuel Osborn, Stephen Pelle, Bradley Rice, Julia A. Snyder, Janet E. Spittler, James Toma, Péter Tóth, Sarah Veale, J. Edward Walters, Charles D. Wright, Lorne R. Zelyck


Mary Magdalene, La Malinche, and the Ethics of Interpretation

Mary Magdalene, La Malinche, and the Ethics of Interpretation

Author: Jennifer Vija Pietz

Publisher: Lexington Books

Published: 2022-11-08

Total Pages: 253

ISBN-13: 1978712553

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

By comparing the intersecting histories of interpretation of Mary Magdalene, a first-century disciple of Jesus, and La Malinche, a sixteenth-century Mesoamerican woman enslaved by the Spanish conquistadores, Jennifer Vija Pietz critically evaluates the use of past lives to address contemporaneous concerns. She demonstrates how the earliest sources portray each woman as an agent in the foundation of a new community: Magdalene’s proclamation of Jesus’s resurrection helped form the first Christian community, while La Malinche’s role as interpreter between Spanish and native people during the Conquest helped establish modern Mexico. Pietz then argues that over time, various interpreters turn these real women into malleable icons that they use to negotiate changing conceptions of communal identity and norms. Strikingly, popular portraits develop of both women as archetypal whores who represent transgression—portraits that some women have experienced as harmful. Although other interpreters present contrary portraits of Magdalene and La Malinche as admirable emblems of female empowerment, Pietz argues that the tendency to turn real people into icons risks producing stereotypes that can obscure past lives and negatively affect people in the present. In response, she posits strategies for developing historically plausible and ethically responsible interpretations of people of the past.


The Gnostic New Age

The Gnostic New Age

Author: April D. DeConick

Publisher: Columbia University Press

Published: 2016-09-27

Total Pages: 515

ISBN-13: 0231542046

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Gnosticism is a countercultural spirituality that forever changed the practice of Christianity. Before it emerged in the second century, passage to the afterlife required obedience to God and king. Gnosticism proposed that human beings were manifestations of the divine, unsettling the hierarchical foundations of the ancient world. Subversive and revolutionary, Gnostics taught that prayer and mediation could bring human beings into an ecstatic spiritual union with a transcendent deity. This mystical strain affected not just Christianity but many other religions, and it characterizes our understanding of the purpose and meaning of religion today. In The Gnostic New Age, April D. DeConick recovers this vibrant underground history to prove that Gnosticism was not suppressed or defeated by the Catholic Church long ago, nor was the movement a fabrication to justify the violent repression of alternative forms of Christianity. Gnosticism alleviated human suffering, soothing feelings of existential brokenness and alienation through the promise of renewal as God. DeConick begins in ancient Egypt and follows with the rise of Gnosticism in the Middle Ages, the advent of theosophy and other occult movements in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and contemporary New Age spiritual philosophies. As these theories find expression in science-fiction and fantasy films, DeConick sees evidence of Gnosticism's next incarnation. Her work emphasizes the universal, countercultural appeal of a movement that embodies much more than a simple challenge to religious authority.


Mary Magdalene

Mary Magdalene

Author: Diane Apostolos-Cappadona

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2023-02-23

Total Pages: 177

ISBN-13: 0567705765

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

From faithful apostle and seductress to feminist icon, Mary Magdalene's many complex roles in Christian history have fascinated us for 2000 years. Illustrated in full colour, this visual history reveals how images and presentations have created a Mary who is often far different from the real woman, the first witness of the Resurrection in the gospels, or even from her appearances in the works of the Church Fathers. Beginning with the earliest sources, uncover who the real Mary was, and what she meant in her own time, before embarking on a fast-paced tour of Magdalene's depictions in great works of art, forgotten masterpieces and contemporary visual culture. Considering relics, statuary, paintings, sculpture and recent works for stage and screen, discover how Mary Magdalene has been seen across time as a witness, a sinner, a penitent, a contemplative, a preacher and a patroness. Above all her complex roles, Mary has emerged as a powerful feminist icon, the closest person to Jesus himself, with a visual history as rich and varied as the roles she has fulfilled in numerous contexts of faith and worship for two millennia.


Hidden Gospels

Hidden Gospels

Author: Philip Jenkins

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2002-12-05

Total Pages: 269

ISBN-13: 0199760705

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This incisive critique thoroughly and convincingly debunks the claims that recently discovered texts such as the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Mary, and even the Dead Sea Scrolls undermine the historical validity of the New Testament. Jenkins places the recent controversies surrounding the hidden gospels in a broad historical context and argues that, far from being revolutionary, such attempts to find an alternative Christianity date back at least to the Enlightenment. By employing the appropriate scholarly and historical methodologies, he demonstrates that the texts purported to represent pristine Christianity were in fact composed long after the canonical gospels found in the Bible. Produced by obscure heretical movements, these texts have attracted much media attention chiefly because they seem to support radical, feminist, and post-modern positions in the modern church. Indeed, Jenkins shows how best-selling books on the "hidden gospels" have been taken up by an uncritical, drama-hungry media as the basis for a social movement that could have powerful effects on the faith and practice of contemporary Christianity.


Review of Biblical Literature, 2022

Review of Biblical Literature, 2022

Author: Alicia J. Batton

Publisher: SBL Press

Published: 2024-01-30

Total Pages: 565

ISBN-13: 1628374586

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The annual Review of Biblical Literature presents a selection of reviews of the most recent books in biblical studies and related fields, including topical monographs, multi-author volumes, reference works, commentaries, and dictionaries. RBL reviews German, French, Italian, and English books and offers reviews in those languages.


Rediscovering the Marys

Rediscovering the Marys

Author: Mary Ann Beavis

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2020-01-23

Total Pages: 283

ISBN-13: 056768346X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This interdisciplinary volume of text and art offers new insights into various unsolved mysteries associated with Mary Magdalene, Mary of Bethany, Mary the Mother of Jesus, and Miriam the sister of Moses. Mariamic traditions are often interconnected, as seen in the portrayal of these women as community leaders, prophets, apostles and priests. These traditions also are often inter-religious, echoing themes back to Miriam in the Hebrew Bible as well as forward to Maryam in the Qur'an. The chapters explore questions such as: which biblical Mary did the author of the Gospel of Mary intend to portray-Magdalene, Mother, or neither? Why did some writers depict Mary of Nazareth as a priest? Were extracanonical scriptures featuring Mary more influential than the canonical gospels on the depiction of Maryam in the Qur'an? Contributors dig deep into literature, iconography, and archaeology to offer cutting edge research under three overarching topics. The first section examines the question of "which Mary?" and illustrates how some ancient authors (and contemporary scholars) may have conflated the biblical Marys. The second section focuses on Mary of Nazareth, and includes research related to the portrayal of Mary the Mother of Jesus as a Eucharistic priest. The final section, “Recovering Receptions of Mary in Art, Archeology, and Literature,” explores how artists and authors have engaged with one or more of the Marys, from the early Christian era through to medieval and modern times.