James the Brother of Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls II (39 page)

In John 11–12, Mary and Martha in two successive episodes ‘
anoint
(
Jesus
’)
feet
’ (as does Luke 7:37–50’s
unidentified f
e
male
‘
Sinner
’) – at least ‘
Mary
’ does (12:2–3, prefigured not a little anachronistically in 11:2). Martha, it seems,
is only doing the
‘
serving
’ (12:2),
a matter about which she is
pictured as complaining bitterly
. Also note the allusion to ‘
feet
’ which Mary will anoint with ‘
a hundred-weight of ointment of pure spikenard of great price
’ in John 12:3 and which
the unidentified
‘
Sinning Woman
’ just did as well in Luke 7:38. Prior to this, when Jesus is about
to resurrect her brother
Lazarus
(John 11:32), like
Ben Kalba Sabu‘a
’s daughter greeting Rabbi Akiba, ‘
seeing Jesus, Mary fell at his feet’
.

Jesus’ ‘
feet
’ – whether
Mary
or her stand-in
is
‘
sitting
’
at them
, ‘
wiping them with her hair’
, ‘
kissing them’
, or ‘
anointing them with expensive ointment of pure spikenard
’ – will appear repeatedly in tradition after tradition. Also the locale, specifica
l
ly noted in John 11:18 and
12:1 as
being
‘
in Bethany’
, will be the connecting link between the several traditions, since Mark 14:3 and Matthew 26:7 will picture the same basic incident as taking place at ‘
Simon the Leper
’
s house in Bethany’
, when the ‘
woman comes
’ with ‘
the alabaster flask of pure spikenard ointment of great worth
’ to anoint him (Matthew actually reads, dropping the ‘
spikenard’
, ‘
with an alabaster cask of very precious ointment
’).

The Woman at
Simon the Leper’s House
, Jesus’
Feet
, and Rabbi Eliezer’s
Bad Breath

To drive home the motif of ‘
feet
’ and several others in John,
Mary
is not only pictured twice
wiping Jesus’ ‘feet with her hair
’ (twice as well in Luke), but also ‘
falling down at
’
Jesus
’ ‘
feet
’ (11:32). We shall see this motif of ‘
falling down at his feet
’ repeated, interestingly, twice too in Rabbinic tradition in
Kethuboth
’s story about how
Ben Kalba Sabu‘a
’
s daughter Rachel
‘
falls down at
’
Rabbi Akiba
’
s feet after his several returns from study with his several times
‘
twelve thousand Disciples’
. In this trad
i
tion, Rachel is also pictured, not as ‘
wiping (his feet) with her hair
’ as here in John, but as simply rather ‘
falling at his feet and kissing them’
.
49

We saw this motif in Luke 7:38’s ‘
woman of the city who was a Sinner’
. In fact, this ‘
kiss
’, portrayed as
very
‘
ardent
’ or ‘
loving’
, becomes the source of
Jesus
’ complaint against
Simon
above, whom he seems to feel
did not
‘
love him
’
enough
and
did not show him enough adoration
or
obeisance
–  typical of the Gospel’s
Gentilizing
approach.

We have the ‘
serving
’ theme as well in John 12:3’s picture of Martha doing the ‘
serving
’ (
diakonei
) while Mary goes about her ‘
anointing his feet
’ and ‘
hair wiping
’ ministrations – an activity that in Luke 10:40’s version causes all the trouble. This all
u
sion relates to the issue of ‘
daily serving
’ (
diakonia
) in Acts 6’s ‘
deacon
’-appointment introduction of its ‘
Stephen
’ episode, in which the ‘
Seven Men
’ and ‘Stephen’ are described as ‘
full
of the Holy Spirit
’. Note the curious parallel with Luke 16:20’s ‘
Poor Man
’
Lazarus
, whose
body
was rather described as ‘
full
of sores
’ – ‘
full of sores
’ replacing ‘
full of the Holy Spirit
’ in Acts 7:55.

After ‘
Martha does the serving
’ in John 12:2, then, it is rather ‘
the house
’ which is next described, pointedly and strikingly, as ‘
filled
with the smell of the
ointment
’ or ‘
the perfume
’ – here, not only our
filled
/
full
allusion but also that of ‘
the ointment
’ or ‘
perfume’
, now combined with the new one of ‘
the smell
’ or ‘
the odour’
. This theme of Martha’s ‘
serving
’ rather than Mary’s
expensive anointment
and
hair-wiping ministrations
will form the basis of Luke 10:38-42’s more compressed and obviously derivative version of these events, specifically now
at
‘
Martha
’
s house
’ (10:38). This episode is the second of these basically interchangeable encounters in the same Gospel. The first was at ‘
the house of the Pharisee
’ (a write-in clearly for what is being represented as the ‘
James Party
’ in both Acts and Galatians) who, in the guise of ‘
Simon’
, will bear the brunt of the
cred
i
tor
/
wages
-parable rebuke.

As already intimated, this ‘
smell
’ or ‘
odor
’ motif will reappear with surprising ramifications in the more colorful Talmudic tradition having to do with ‘
dung
’, specifically,
the dung
Rabbi Eliezer
(
Lazarus
’ namesake)
puts into his mouth because he was hungry on the Sabbath but which gave him bad breath
. Nor is this to mention the ‘
dung
’ which we shall encounter in ot
h
er scenarios and traditions relative to these spoiled daughters or daughters-in-law of these proverbial
Rich
parvenus and rel
a
tive to Rabbi Yohanan ben Zacchai himself, whose two
Disciples
putting
dung
into his coffin to convince both ‘
the Zealots
’ and the Romans not to stab (or ‘
pierce
’) him with their swords because he was already dead.
50

Where Eliezer ben Hyrcanus himself is concerned, the ‘
dung
’ in question allows his mentor, this same Yohanan b. Zacchai, to observe and turn what was essentially the negative impression the young Eliezer was making into a positive: ‘
Just as an offensive smell came forth from your mouth
,
so shall a great name go forth from you in
(
teaching
)
Torah
.’
51

The relation of this to Jesus’ calling ‘
the Pharisees
’ ‘
Blind Guides
’ (the ‘
Jamesian Party
’ again and evoking the
Maschil
at Qumran
52
)
concerning ‘
that which enters the mouth going down into the belly and being cast out
(ekballetai
) the toilet bowl
’ in Matthew 15:17 should be obvious. As this reads in Matthew 15:11, purporting to respond to disputes concerning ‘
the Phar
i
sees
’’
insistence on
‘
eating with clean hands
’ and
purity regulations generally
: ‘
Not that which enters into the mouth defiles the man but that which goes forth from the mouth
,
this defiles the man
.’
In fact, Matthew 15:18 adds: ‘
but the things going forth out of the mouth come forth out of the heart
and they defile the man’
.
Again, the negative parallel with
the
‘
great odour
’
of the
Torah
‘
going forth out of the mouth of Rabbi Eliezer
should be clear.

Furthermore, this allusion to both the ‘
stench
’ of Rabbi Eliezer’s breath in the
ARN
and the lovely ‘
smell of the ointment
’
of pure spikenard
‘
filling
’
Lazarus
’
house
in John 12:3 is presaged even earlier in John 11:39 in the context of
Lazarus
’
startling
resurrection
. There the ‘
stink
’ of Lazarus’ body – not
unlike Rabbi Yohanan
’
s body above with the
‘
dung
’
in his coffin – dead
‘
for four days’
, becomes a key component of more of
Martha
’s complaining in 11:21–22,
53
duplicated in 11:32 when
Mary
complains that if Jesus had been there
her
‘
brother would not have died’.
These
complaints
metamorphose back into the issue of ‘
table service
’ (
diakonian
) again,
Martha
(as in John 12:2)
doing all the
‘
serving
’ (
diakonein
), while her sister ‘
Mary
’, now ‘
sitting at Jesus
’
feet
’ no less,
enjoys all the attention
!

Jesus’ response is classic and suitably arcane: ‘
Mary has chosen the good part
,’ which directly echoes a phrase at the end of the First Column of CD referring to ‘
those who sought Smooth Things and chose illusions
’ – normally considered Pharisees but, in the writer’s view, also intended to include Pauline Christians – ‘
they chose the fair neck’
, a passage generally based on Isaiah 30:10–13, meaning, seemingly, ‘
they chose the easiest way’
.

Another variation of the ‘
anointment
’ theme is found in Matthew and Mark where Jesus encounters
the unnamed woman carrying the alabaster flask
at ‘
Simon the Leper
’
s house’
. This is still ‘
at Bethany
’ as in John, but not ‘
Martha’s house
’ or even ‘
Lazarus
’’ (though, in reality, it is). ‘Simon the Leper’ now stands in for ‘
Simon the Pharisee
’ and in John 12:4 even ‘
Simon I
s
cariot
’. Paralleling Lazarus’ ‘
sister Mary
’ in John, this unnamed woman ‘
comes
’ in with ‘
an alabaster cask of very precious ointment
’
to anoint Jesus
’ ‘
head
’ and not ‘
his feet’
, as ‘
Mary
’ does in John 12:3. Literally in Mark 14:3/Matt. 26:7, she ‘
poured it on his head while he reclined’
, meaning
he was
‘
eating at the table
’ or ‘
dining’
. The locale, Bethany, is the key detail connecting Matthew and Mark’s episodes to John’s.