And why we have to talk about Mary
Lent 5A  |  John 11:1-45

In 1945, while the world was still at war, archeologists made a discovery that would shock the world more than artillery shells. They found intact scrolls of Scripture dating from the second and third centuries. Which makes them among the oldest sources for the Bible in the world.

The discovery, famously referred to as the Dead Sea Scrolls, gave us an impossible opportunity; to make new discoveries within an old tradition.

One of those scrolls was from the gospel of John.

And in 2017, a graduate student named Elizabeth Schrader made a remarkable claim.

Martha was made up.

Schrader has studied John’s gospel for years from the most authoritative fragments of John’s gospel in the world. And to understand what she’s looking at, we have to understand how the Bible, as we know it, exists.

The Bible is a collection of books. Each passed on long before the printing press and bound books were invented. And much of it long before most people were literate.

People shared scripture out loud. And sometimes scribes would write them down. Then, if they wanted to pass these stories along, a scribe would handwrite a copy. Over the centuries, scribes would make comments in the margins, change wording, or give their own spin on the text. Touch it up a bit.

In the three most authoritative sources of John 11, including the earliest, dating to around 200 CE, Lazarus has one sister: Mary. And in each of these most authoritative sources, scribes have added Martha, turned “sister” into “sisters”, and other such changes.

Authority

As a good scholar, Schrader is clear that she doesn’t have affirmative proof that Martha was made up. She argues that the evidence makes this the most likely conclusion. And eminent scholars are including this possibility in their own study and publications.

So, what does this mean? Is this an 1800 year-old cover-up? Or are we supposed to just read the Scripture as we’ve received it? I honestly don’t know.

But I do know this. Knowing Mary of Bethany witnessed the resurrection of her brother, Lazarus, and then anointed Jesus for burial in the next chapter and confesses Jesus as Messiah—that’s a big deal.

And if this Mary is Mary Magdalene, it’s an even bigger deal.

So if we know this is a possibility, how can we read this text as written and just…go with that—without at least considering it. It would feel dishonest. And you deserve better than another rehash of tradition.

What’s the big deal?

This story is about a man’s death. What does it matter if the story includes one sister or two? A lot actually. It’s about where this particular name for the sister sends our minds.

If there are two sisters in Bethany named Mary and Martha, our minds inevitably go to a different gospel, Luke. In Luke chapter 10, Jesus visits two sisters way to the north, far from Jerusalem.

The focus in that passage is on expectations, assumptions, and being with the people we’re with. It divides service and devotion between the sisters and generates rivalry, correctness, and the sense of responsibility.

John’s Mary has a brother and lives in Bethany; two miles from Jerusalem. Without Martha, we aren’t drawn to Luke’s gospel and that story of division of labor. We’re drawn instead to what Jesus says Lazarus’s death is for: to witness the glory of God.

Our attention then stays in John’s gospel and we focus on the story that is presently unspooling. A story of a woman who is friends with Jesus and believes that the one who can give sight to the blind can save his friend from dying.

And then Jesus does better than that.

He raises Lazarus from the dead.

Mary witnesses this. She already believed in him, but this… This is beyond belief. And because he said he’s going to die, she anoints him for burial. She follows and watches as he is hung from the cross. She weeps like she wept for her brother.

Then, on the third day, she visits his tomb to find he is not there. But he appears to her in that moment. Tenderly. He isn’t teacher. He is Lord! And this one witness to the very glory of God through Christ and the risen Christ, proclaims the Good News to the disciples.

This is a true picture of discipleship.

Speculating

Mary as the lone sister of Lazarus makes so much more sense. So why is Martha here? This we can’t know definitively. But Elizabeth Schrader thinks there are two really good (related) reasons why this might be.

In the other gospels, it is Peter who makes the main confession, the proclamation that Jesus is Lord.

And in John, putting that discipleship in Mary Magdalene — not just Not Peter, but in a woman! The same woman who Pope Gregory would later, in the 6th Century, associate with the prostitute in Luke’s gospel. 

The early church, since at least 200 CE, were as afraid of Mary Magdalene as many of today’s Christians are afraid of women preaching and wearing miters. 

And here we are. Reading a text, handed over century-to-century, with a tradition based on fear of the power of a woman to proclaim the Good News.

We’re reading Scripture we’re still afraid of. Scripture we are scared to trust in.

The Word.

In this week’s newsletter, I wrote about our Word Confusion.

We speak of The Word of God or The Word of the Lord as Scripture. 

But we also know the Word of God is Jesus.

And guess who reminds us of that? John.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”

John 1:1

And the beauty of those words: The Word: is that it gets to be both for us. Always tangled and inseparable.

Jesus is revealed in this Scripture we love and loathe. The Scripture that frustrates and confuses and messes with our hearts. And even (especially?) in the stuff that scares us because it expects more from us.

Like letting go of possessions
+ control.

Of power
+ certainty.

Encouraging generosity
+ hope.

Expecting commitment
+ love.

Unbind Them

When Jesus tells the disciples that they’re going to Bethany, in spite of the threat of his death there, he says he’s going to wake his friend who has fallen asleep. Then he admits his friend has already died.

Their literalistic interpretation confounds them. And threatens to confound us.

But Jesus rouses his friend from “sleep.”

And while we obsess about our mental categories of “real” and “metaphor”: that he is really dead and metaphorically sleeping: Jesus is raising him either way. And says that burial wrappings are unsuitable for the living. Anyway.

“Unbind him, and let him go.”

Our Scripture; its people, stories, and theology; Our people, culture, and church; and our Christ must receive the same treatment.

Unbind them.
Unbind them.
Unbind them, and let them go.

We are witnessing the glory of God! Stop controlling it! Wrapping our church in burial shrouds and putting our neighbors in coffins. 

We are disciples, apostles, and saints. And God is transforming the world! Christ is on the move! The Spirit is wrapping us in comfort and pushing us out into the world.

This is our calling and our faith! Unbound and unbinding. Each other and the world. For this is God’s glory. The glory we witness and proclaim. That others might witness and know the same.