# *******Jesus' Resurrection

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Posted by Bibleman [Bibleman] on November 13, 1999 at 10:58:56 {OA5YBxH8IAf9UnUPxURUslyACFuF8c}:

In Reply to: ******Jesus' Resurrection posted by mntzion on November 13, 1999 at 09:34:38:

Sorry, but as I said before. Too many people have
cultural bias in this regard.

But I don't need to defend my position. You can believe what you want. The only issue you need to realize is that the apparent "contradictions" are all resolved when you increase the number of Mary Magdalenes to three.

Now here is the logic in this.

First of all, notice how many Marys total there are. Everybody and their mother is named Mary practically. It's like Mexico and "Marias". It's that kind of a culture as far as names are concerned.

Besides that, many persons adopted "nicknames" for themselves or sometimes they were renamed. Jesus renamed Cephaus Peter.

And look at how many duplicate names there were even among Jesus' disciples! There were two Judases, two Simons and two Jameses.

So your strong reaction is unfounded when someone suggests there may have been a common-name problem in this culture. Or I should say a popular name problem. And that may back then have reflected the custom of some naming their children after relatives.

The other thing to consider is that three Marys who took up the name "Magdalene" may have not been at all unusual, in fact, there may have been more than three.

But the IDEA in translation and understanding is to give the writers the benefit of the cultural doubt if there is a premise for that. The premise for duplicate names is definitely there.

Then you have to consider the presentation of the events themselves. That is, you must first presume that say there were three Mary Magdalenes who each went to the grave. Let's presume, there are five Marys that called themselves "Magdalene" and out of those five three went to the tomb at three different times. How would the Bible writers handle this if it was well-known that there were five Mary Magdalenes?

If one gospel writer only talked about one of them and three of them went to the tomb, then you know there will be conflict. They would have to try and identify which Mary Magdalene went when if they were to solve the confusion. And that is the context of how this is presented.

Each gospel is specific about enough details but especially specific about the TIMES that each arrived, so that we not only can separate the three Mary Magdalenes that went to the tomb, but we can also see in which order and at which time each arrived.

This was especially important since two of them actually saw Jesus under certain circumstances. So it was nearly imperative to give each of the encounters just so that there was no confusion.

Thus three different gospel writers handled the account of a different Mary Magdalene.

And that's where we enter into another issue and that is the style of the gospels. The style of the gospels is to fill in details the others didn't present but also to give parallel accounts but with slight bits of detailed information that the other accounts don't have.

Therefore, one might expect as in other parallel accounts that they would be giving different details. So really, it is almost inept that one presumes based upon the specific information given, that just because these women shared the name "Mary Magdalene" that there was just one of them. That's cultural bias.

And look at how specific the accounts are:

The first one came at night, interacted with John and Peter. Saw Jesus in the garden and left.

The second one came "as it was getting light", a totally different time. With another "Mary" to come and view the grave. No Peter. No John. When it was no longer completely dark. No spices. Just these two companions. They see angels and no Jesus in the garden. Then they run into him on the road. (The account really doesn't say this but they were running so fast they didn't see Jesus and they knocked him down...maybe... well, nah, I'll stick to the written word...okay..forget about knocking him down..:>).... Anyway, they meet Jesus on the road. They see him for the first time and do obesaince to him. A totally different incident.

Then the third encounter wasn't at night at all but was "after the sun had risen"! This Mary Magdalene was in the company of Jesus' mother and other relatives who had brought spices to the tomb. And the context shows that they hadn't been to the tomb yet since they were wondering who was going to open the tomb. So if this was the same Mary Magdalene she wouldn't be saying this. Plus she would have known Jesus had risen and would have seen him already as well as the angels. So why is she playing dumb now? It doesn't work!

So these accounts are not just casually different. They are SPECIFICALLY different. And you're trying to tell me these men can't get these simple details straight? That they deliberately wrote their own gospels to contradict one another. And they did write the gospels in reference, one to the other, we know that because of how they are written. So it is not like they wrote them separately then showed up with different accounts and rumors of what happened with Mary Magdalene.

But if there were three Mary Magdalenes, it makes sense they had to tell the details of each one, so there was no confusion. But they may not have bothered mentioning in one of the verses: "Oh, by the way, there were three Marys who were from Galilee and the town of Magdala who called themsevels Magdalene who were good friends with Jesus." Everybody knew about them already. So merely making sure the separate accounts were recorded and the specific time and details were included with each experience was what they are doing.

This makes far more sense for the context than to presume these guys just decided to openly contradict themselves.

But what amazes me more is the complete prejudice people have with respect to resisting this concept, when it is totally within the process of harmonizing this text.

So just so you know, the text as it is, is perfectly in harmony with the three Mary Magdalenes that Jesus knew. It is only cultural bias that makes you think there was only one and that the gospel writers were simply incompetent and couldn't get a simple encounter correct. So that idea is just as IGNORANT as it can be.

But as I've said, in my experience, there are just a LOT of totally ignorant people who don't know what they're talking about with their opinions, etc. and actually criticize people who DO know what they're talking about. It's amazing!

But...it doesn't matter. And that's because it still boils down to a matter of interpretation.

You want to superimpose a limited Mary Magdalene and have chaos.

I want to superimpose a multiple Mary Magdalene and have biblical harmony.

So...you're entitled to your biases and opinions. I respect that. But I'm entitled to mine as well.
Just so that we know, though, that the "contradictions" are based upon OPINION and not the text itself.

Thanks for your comments.

It's irresponsible not to give any ancient writer the benefit of the doubt and to bend over backwards to erase cultural and linguage gaps as a translator. That's a fundamental rule. You're doing just the opposite. If multiple Mary Magdalenes solve the problem in a culture that obviously has multiple duplicate names does that, then you should allow for that possibility rather than insisting these men, alleged "inspired" didn't notice they were boldly contradicting each other.

You've got to go the higher level sometimes... That's what professionalism is.

Cheers,
Bibleman

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