Mary Magdalene and Her Sister Martha: An Edition and Translation of the Medieval Welsh Lives

4. Translation

101 4 TRANSLATION Additional section found at the beginning of the Life in Aberystwyth, National Library of Wales, Peniarth MS 27ii The Life of Mary Magdalene Mary Magdalene was so devout that Christ loved her most of all the women, next to Mary his mother, and for this reason all Christians should honor God and Mary Magdalene. She was the first in the age of grace to repent and undertake penance for her transgressions. And the Lord Jesus Christ granted her pardon, mercy, and forgiveness of her sins, [for] she became an example to all sinners in order to show them that if they repented and performed penance for their sins, they [too] would receive Mary Magdalene’s forgiveness and mercy. Mary Magdalene had a father called Syrus; her mother was named Eucharia and they were both descended from royal blood. Her father Syrus was an important lord who owned territory in Jerusalem that he left to his son Lazarus. He owned another lordship in a region called Bethany and he gave this to his daughter Martha. The fortified town of Magdalum, and the whole of that lordship, he gave to his daughter Mary Magdalene, and her name was derived from that town and for that reason she was called Mary Magdalene. She was the lady of that region and fortified town. 102 TRANSLATION As many books record, when John the Evangelist was due to marry Mary Magdalene, Christ asked John to follow him and preserve his virginity; and so he did. For this reason Mary Magdalene became very angry and gave herself to the seven deadly sins. Christ has often been seen to convert the worst sinners into the most righteous and when Jesus decided that it was timely and that it pleased him, he blessed Mary Magdalene in order for her to recognize herself, and she was then repentant of her misdeeds. When she heard that Jesus was a guest at Simon the Leper’s house, one of the Saracens, she took a jar of ointment, which people in that country regularly used because of the magnitude of the heat of the sun, and she went to the house where Jesus was. Ashamed she [felt she] could not come before Christ, so she approached him from behind , and took his feet in her hands, and because of the intensity of her heartfelt repentance she wept, and with her tears of regret she washed Christ’s feet, and with the hair of her head she dried his feet, and with complete and utter love from her heart she kissed his feet. Without saying a word she anointed him with ointment from the jar, and no one could hear a sound except the cry for mercy from the bottom of her heart. And she made a promise to Christ that she would never offend [again]. Jesus Christ pitied her and cleansed her of her seven sins. In these were seven devils and everyone who was there witnessed [this] and he forgave her of all her sins. Since Christ released her from the possession of demons, so great was her love of Christ that she relinquished all of her lordship and embraced him with true affection.1 When he suffered, after all of his disciples had fled from him fearing death, Mary Magdalene never left Jesus until she, with others, placed him in his tomb. When others did not dare approach his grave for fear of the soldiers guarding him, she did not fear death but instead came in the darkness with a jar of ointment to anoint his body. And thus she loved Jesus alive and dead. For that reason, for [love of] Mary Magdalene, Christ healed her sister Martha of an issue of blood 1. A more literal translation would be “surrounded him in true affection.” TRANSLATION 103 from which she had been suffering for seven years. Also for love of Mary Magdalene Christ raised her brother Lazarus from the dead, he who had spent four days in the grave. And when Christ rose from the dead after his death, he appeared physically to Mary Magdalene. Aberystwyth, National Library of Wales, Llanstephan MS 27 (The Red Book of Talgarth) The Life of Mary Magdalene In the fourteenth year following the passion of our Lord Jesus Christ, after the Jews had stoned Stephen the Martyr, and driven the apostles from the boundaries and limits of Judea and they...