Item Details

Collusion or Critique?: Reading the Exorcism of Mary Magdalene through a Postcolonial Optic

Issue: Vol 48 No. 3-4 (2019)

Journal: Bulletin for the Study of Religion

Subject Areas: Religious Studies Buddhist Studies Islamic Studies Biblical Studies

Abstract:

While a variety of sources explore the character of Mary Magdalene and her popularly conceived configurations throughout history (Maisch 1998; King 2003, 2006; Jean-Yves 2002; Mead 2005; Kiely 2010), little attention has been paid to her representation in the Gospel of Luke, specifically her scant exorcism and possession narratives. Drawing upon contemporary archaeological insights and historical and textual sources, this article reconstructs an image of Mary before exploring her presentation in the canonical and non-canonical accounts of the first two centuries CE. Working with similar methodologies pioneered by Stephen D. Moore (Moore 2004) and Virginia Burrus (Burrus 2009), in conversation with Mary L. Keller’s (Keller 2002, 2015) theoretical framework of spirit possession, this article investigates the possession and exorcism narratives of Mary Magdalene in Luke’s gospel from a postcolonial optic.

Author: Tyler M. Tully

View Full Text

References :

 
Adshead, S.A.M. 1992. Salt and Civilization. New York: Palgrave. 
Applebaum, Shimon. 1987. “Economic Life in Palestine.” In The Jewish
People in the First Century: Historical Geography, Political
History, Social, Cultural and Religious Life and Institutions, Vol.
2, edited by Shemuel Safrai, M. Stern, and David Flusser, 631–700.
Philadelphia: Fortress Press.
https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004275096_003 
Attridge, Harold W., and Society of Biblical Literature. 2006.
HarperCollins Study Bible. New Revised Standard Version.  San
Francisco: Harper San Francisco. 
Bauckham, Richard. 2006. Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as
Eyewitness Testimony. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdman .
https://doi.org/10.3138/tjt.33.2.303. 
Beavis, Mary Ann. 2012a. “The Deification of Mary Magdalene.”
Feminist Theology 21: (2) 145–54. https://doi.org/ 
10.1177/0966735012462840. 
———. 2012b. “Reconsidering Mary of Bethany.” Catholic Biblical
Quarterly 74:, 281–97. 
Bhabha, Homi K. 2012. The Location of Culture. New York: Routledge. 
Brandon, S. G. F. 1961. “The Date of the Markan Gospel.”New
Testament Studies 7 (2): 126≠41. 
Brock, Ann Graham. 2001. “Setting the Record Straight: The Politics
of Identification: Mary Magdalene and Mary the Mother in Pistis
Sophia.” In Which Mary? The Marys of Early Christian Tradition,
edited by F. Stanley Jones, 43–52. Atlanta: Society of Biblical
Literature. https://doi.org/10.1177/000842980203100336. 
Brock, Ann Graham. 2003. Mary Magdalene, the First Apostle: The
Struggle for Authority. Harvard Theological Studies. Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press.
https://doi.org/10.1177/000842980403300108. 
Burrus, Virginia. 2009. “The Gospel of Luke and The Acts of the
Apostles.” In A Postcolonial Commentary on the New Testament
Writings, edited by Fernando F. Segovia, and R. S. Sugirtharajah,
133–154. New York: T & T Clark. 
Charlesworth, M.P. 2016. Trade-Routes and Commerce of the Roman
Empire. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 
Chilton, Bruce. 2005. Mary Magdalene: A Biography. New York:
Doubleday. 
Chow, John K. 1992. Patronage and Power: A Study of Social Networks
in Corinth. JSNT Supplement Series 75. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic
Press. 
D’Angelo, Mary Rose. 1999. “(Re)Presentations of Women in the Gospel
of Matthew and Luke-Acts.” In Women & Christian Origins, edited
by R.S. Kraemer, and Mary Rose D’Angelo, 171–95. Oxford: Oxford
University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0360966900032746. 
DeMille, Cecil B., dir. 1927. The King of Kings. DeMille Pictures
Corporation. 
DeSilva, David. 2007. “Using the Master’s Tools to Shore Up
Another’s House: A Postcolonial Analysis of 4 Maccabees.” Journal of
Biblical Literature 126 (1): 99–127.
https://doi.org/10.2307/27638422. 
di Bondone, Giotto. 1320. St. Francis Cycle. 
Edersheim, Alfred. 2006. The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah:
New Updated Edition. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, Inc. 
Ehrman, Bart. 2006. Peter, Paul, & Mary Magdalene. Oxford:
Oxford University Press. 
Evans, Craig. 2008. Fabricating Jesus: How Modern Scholars Distort
the Gospels. Downers Grove. IL: InterVarsity Press.
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1748-0922.2007.00171_15.x. 
Fahlbusch, Erwin, and Geoffrey William Bromiley, eds. 2003.
Encyclopedia of Christianity. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans. 
Findon, Joanne. 2014. “’Now is aloft pat late was ondyr!’:
Enclosure, Liberation, and Spatial Semantics in the Digby Mary
Magdalene Play.” In Mary Magdalene in Medieval Culture: Conflicted
Roles, edited by Peter Loewen and Robin Waugh, 247–57.
https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203068106. 
Gibson, Mel, dir. 2004. The Passion of the Christ. Icon Productions. 
Giordano, Luca. 1660. The Ecstasy of St. Mary Magdalene. 
Gregory, Pope. 1844. Homilia 33. In Homiliarum in evangelia, edited
by J. P. Migne, PL 76 1238–246. Paris. 
Hearon, Holly E. 2004. The Mary Magdalene Tradition: Witness and
Counter-witness in Early Christian Communities. Collegeville, MN:
Liturgical Press.   https://doi.org/10.1111/ 
j.1748-0922.2006.00034_13.x. 
Horsley, Richard A. 2013. Jesus and the Politics of Roman Palestine.
Columbia: University of South Carolina Press. 
Jensen, Morten Hørning. 2014. “The Political History in Galilee from
the First Century BCE to the End of the Second Century CE.” In
Galilee in the Late Second Temple and Mishnaic Periods: Life,
Culture, and Society, edited by David A. Fiensy and James Riley
Strange, 51–75. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress Press. 
Jewison, Norman, dir. 1973. Jesus Christ Superstar. Universal
Pictures. 
Johnson-DeBaufre, Melanie. 2005. “The Blood Required of This
Generation: Interpreting Communal Blame in a Colonial Context.” In
Violence in the New Testament, edited by Shelly Matthews and E.
Leigh Gibson, 22–34. New York: T & T Clark 
Johnson, Luke Timothy. 1991. The Gospel of Luke. Edited by Daniel J.
Harrington. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press.
https://doi.org/10.1177/002096430004700411. 
Jones, Horace Leonard, ed. 1989. The Geography of Strabo. Geography:
Books I–II. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. 
Josephus, Flavius. “The Works of Flavius Josephus: The War of the
Jews.” http://sacred-texts.com/jud/josephus/.
https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004320079_fjo_itinary. 
Keller, Mary L. 2002. The Hammer and the Flute: Women, Power, and
Spirit Possession. Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press. 
———. 2015. “Spirit Possession.” In Handbook of Spiritualism and
Channeling, edited by Cathy Guttierez, 66–86. Leiden: Brill. 
Kiely, Robert. “Picturing the Magdalene: How Artists Imagine the
Apostle to the Apostles.” Commonweal.
https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/picturing-magdalene (accessed
January 6, 2018). 
King, Karen L. 2003. The Gospel of Mary of Magdala: Jesus and the
First Woman Apostle. Santa Rosa, California: Polebridge Press.
https://doi.org/10.1086/447715. 
———. 2006. “Canonization and Marginalization: Mary of Magdala.” In
The Postcolonial Biblical Reader, edited by R. S. Sugirtharajah,
28–36. Malden, MA: Blackwell.
https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470775080.ch19. 
Lanfranco, Giovanni. 1616. Mary Magdalene Raised by Angels. 
Leloup, Jean-Yves. 2002. The Gospel of Mary Magdalene. New York:
Simon and Schuster. 
Levine, Lee I. 2014. “The Synagogues of Galilee.” In Galilee in the
Late Second Temple and Mishnaic Periods: Life, Culture, and Society,
edited by David A. Fiensy, and James Riley Strange, 129–150.
Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress. https://doi.org/10.1093/jts/fly066. 
Liew, Tat-siong Benny. 2008. “Redressing Bodies in Corinth:
Racial/Ethnic Politics and Religious Difference in Context of
Empire.” In What is Asian American Biblical Hermeneutics: Reading
the New Testament, 75–97. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i
Press.https://doi.org/ 
10.1515/9780824865573-006. 
Liew, Tat-siong Benny. 2009. “The Gospel of Mark.” In A Postcolonial
Commentary on the New Testament Writings, edited by Fernando F.
Segovia and R. S. Sugirtharajah, 105–32. New York: T & T Clark. 
Loewen, Peter. 2014. “Mary Magdalene Converts her Vanities through
Song: Signs of Franciscan Spirituality and Preaching in
Late-Medieval German Drama.” In Mary Magdalene in Medieval Culture:
Conflicted Roles, edited by Peter Loewen and Robin Waugh, 181–207.
New York: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203068106. 
Maisch, Ingrid. 1998. Between Contempt and Veneration . . . Mary
Magdalene: The Image of a Woman through the Centuries. Collegeville,
MN: Order of St. Benedict, Inc. 
Martini, Simone. 1333. Orsini Polyptych. 
Masaccio. 1426. Crucifixion. 
Mason, Steven. 2016. A History of the Jewish War, A.D. 66–74. New
York: Cambridge University Press. 
Mead, G.R.S. 2005. Pistis Sophia: The Gnostic Tradition of Mary
Magdalene, Jesus, and His Disciples. Mineola, NY: Dover. 
Meza, Marcela Zapata. 2014. “A Preliminary Report on the Miqwa’ot of
Migdal.” Israel Exploration Journal 64 (1): 63–71. 
Miller, Robert J., ed. 2010. The Complete Gospels: The Scholars
Version, 4th ed. Salem, OR: Polebridge Press. 
Moore, Stephen D. 2004. “Mark and Empire: ‘Zealot’ and
‘Postcolonial’ readings.” In Postcolonial Theologies: Divinity and
Empire, edited by Catherine Keller, Michael Nausner, and Mayra
Rivera, 134–48. Danvers, MA: Chalice Press.
https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470775080. 
ch13 
———. 2006. Empire and Apocalypse: Postcolonialism and the New
Testament. The Bible in the Modern World. Sheffield: Sheffield
Phoenix Press. 
Oakman, Douglas E. 2014. “A Late Second Temple Galilee:
Socio-Archaeology and Dimensions of Exploitation in First-Century
Palestine.” In Galilee in the Late Second Temple and Mishnaic
Periods: Life, Culture, and Society, edited by David A. Fiensy and
James Riley Strange, 346–56. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress Press.
https://doi.org/10.1093/jts/fly066. 
Osiek, Carolyn. 2008. “Roman and Christian Burial Practices and the
Patronage of Women.”In Commemorating the Dead: Texts and Artifacts
in Context, edited by Laurie Brink and Deborah Green, 243–270.
Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110211573.3.243. 
Overman, J. Andrew. 2014. “Late Second Temple Galilee: A Picture of
Relative Economic Health.” In Galilee in the Late Second Temple and
Mishnaic Periods: Life, Culture, and Society, edited by David A.
Fiensy, and James Riley Strange, 357–65. Minneapolis: Augsburg
Fortress Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/jts/fly066. 
Pinter, Dean. 2013. “The Gospel of Luke and the Roman Empire.” In
Jesus is Lord, Caesar is Not: Evaluating Empire in New Testament
Studies, edited by Scot McKnight and Joseph B. Modica, 101–15.
Downers Grove. IL: IVP Academic.
https://doi.org/10.1111/rsr.12124_17. 
Pringle, Denys. 1993. The Churches of the Crusader Kingdom of
Jerusalem: A Corpus. Churches of the Crusader Kingdom. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
https://doi.org/10.1017/s0003598x00046081. 
Punt, Jeremy. 2010. “Empire as Material Setting and Heuristic Grid
for New Testament Interpretaton: Comments on the Value of
Postcolonial Criticism.” HTS Teologiese Studies / Theological
Studies 66 (1): 1–7. https://doi.org/10.4102/hts.v66i1.330. 
Reni, Guido. 1575. Mary Magdalen between Two Angels. 
Riemenschneider, Tilman. 1490. Altarpiece of the Magdalen. 
Robinson, James M., ed. The Nag Hammadi Library in English. Leiden:
Brill. 
Safrai, Shemuel. 1987. “Home and Family.” In The Jewish People in
the First Century: Historical Geography, Political History, Social,
Cultural and Religious Life and Institutions, Vol. 2, edited by
Shemuel Safrai, M. Stern, and David Flusser, 728–92. Philadelphia:
Fortress Press. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004275096_005. 
Schaberg, Jane. 2002. The Resurrection of Mary Magdalene: Legends,
Apocrypha, and the Christian Testament. New York:
Continuum.https://doi.org/10.1177/004057360306000124. 
Schiller, Gertrud. 1972. Iconography of Christian Art: The Passion
of Jesus Christ. London: Lund Humphries Publishers. 
Schrader, Elizabeth. 2017a. “Was Martha of Bethany Added to the
Fourth Gospel in the Second Century?” Harvard Theological Review
110: 360–92. https://doi.org/10.1017/ 
s0017816016000213. 
———.  201b.. “Was Martha of Bethany Added to the Fourth Gospel
in the Second Century?—CORRIGENDUM.” Harvard Theological Review 110:
473–474. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0017816017000207. 
Schüssler Fiorenza, Elizabeth. 1983. In Memory of Her: A Feminist
Theological Reconstruction of Christian Origins. London: SCM.
https://doi.org/10.1177/0040573684040 
00419. 
Scorsese, Martin, dir. 1988. The Last Temptation of Jesus Christ.
Universal Pictures. 
Seim, Turid Karlsen. 2004. The Double Message: Patterns of Gender in
Luke-Acts. Edinburgh: T & T Clark. 
Signorelli, Luca. 1505. Crocifisso con la Maddalena. 
Smallwood, Mary. 2001. The Jews Under Roman Rule: From Pompey to
Diocletion: A Study in Political Relations. Leiden: Brill. 
Talbott, Rick F. 2003. “Nazareth’s Rebellious Son: Deviance and
Downward Mobility in the Galilean Jesus Movement.” Biblical Theology
Bulletin 38 (3): 99–113.
https://doi.org/10.1177/01461079080380030201. 
Tintoretto, Domenico. 1598. The Penitent Magdalene. 
Van Slingelandt, Pieter Cornelisz. 1657. Holy Magdalene 
Penitent.