and so, blood pounded in my ears and my feet pounded the path back into the city, but i was deaf to the cries of my body to stop, my face tear-streaked and wild-eyed, mouth agape in vain effort to stop the burning in my lungs: but it was the burning in my heart that blinded and bemuted me. i wanted it to burst so that i could die. i felt like i was going to die every time i thought of what happened. “and i will die”, i thought, “just as soon as i tell the disciples. i will not live in this world anymore, that betrays and deceives and tears to pieces every holy thing. i will not live in this world that takes the best of all men and exults in his slaughter! i will not live in this world that destroys the one thing in it that ever gave me real love. i cannot live without that love!”
“and is there no end to the darkness?”, i screamed inwardly as i continued to run and the crazed and adrenaline-pumped energies started to coalesce into a huge pit of dread in my center. “judas was not enough. his eyes were not enough, that never stopped roving where they should not. his stealing hands were not enough, that harmed the poor we were trying to help. and of course his betrayal was not enough! neither was the sin of the priests so high that it could not be topped, even in executing my lord—for now the most base deed has been done. they have taken my lord, and i do not know where they have put him!”
these were my thoughts as i ran, still, as always, not comprehending the truth. and these were the words that fell in shattered pieces out of my mouth, between gasps, to peter and john when i arrived at the place where they were hiding. when they realized what i was saying and believed that because of my obvious exertions it must be the truth, their already-drawn faces fell all the more, but in peter’s eyes i saw a spark of defiance and anger. immediately he thrust me, not unkindly, out of the doorway, and began running. john saw that i got some water and then was off like a shot after peter, quickly catching up and overtaking him even while i could still see them.
i fell to the ground then after satisfying my thirst and contemplated how i would die. later it surprised me when i became aware that this was the lowest point of my life–where my heart passed closest to what it must feel like to be in sheol. my lord was now not just dead, but gone, forever unreachable except in blurry memory. then in utter desolation it occurred to me to go back to the tomb and commit suicide there, in the last place i had seen my lord. i recalled how i had dropped the burial spices at the tomb to run the more quickly, and figured that if i ingested these i would die.
with this hint of purpose all the pain in my side from running subsided, and my mind grew deathly calm. i trotted back to the tomb fancying that samson must have felt much the same with his hands on the pillars at his sides, although i hated that, unlike samson, my death would not cause the thieves of my lord’s body to be crushed and destroyed. do you see, child, how far gone i was? and how short-sighted?
when i reached the tomb john was outside with tears still on his face, but looking more thoughtful than anything else. at that time peter strode out of the cave with fury and murder written in his eyes. i saw his hands shaking, and i knew that, had the thieves been there, those powerful hands of peter’s would have struck down any number of the villains. he glanced at me and then left, intent on doing i know not what. john left shortly thereafter by another route, leaving me alone with the jars of spices, the gaping tomb, and my dark plan.
it was then that i became aware of another person in the area. i turned around and saw an unfamiliar man, who i assumed had been hiding nearby while peter and john were examining the tomb. my first reaction was an anger that surprised me–i felt that this person, whom i thought to be the gardener because of his clothes, was symbolic of all those in jerusalem who had, in one moment, crowned my lord the ‘king of kings’, and in the next laughed and jeered as he was lashed. but before i had even a chance to give vent to this anger, a huge wave of shame came unbidden and pierced my heart, as i thought of my plan to die there. the smooth stone of the jar that i had picked up seconds before now felt heavy and scalding like heated metal. i dropped it to the ground and my own scalding tears joined it, mixing with the embalming fluids that pooled on the dirt.
with the intrusion of the unknown man and the inescapable weight of shame, all the stoic, self-destructive purpose that was driving me disappeared, and pain and grief once again flooded into my body. the presence of the man made my shame all the greater, and my eyes were downcast.
“woman,” he said, “why are you crying? who is it you are looking for?”
anger rose again as i saw that his words proved he must have been eavesdropping on peter and john, but i had no strength to display it. instead, my voice came weak and small, and i hated it. “sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and i will get him,” i said, not daring to look up and feeling nauseous.
“mary”
the voice came like a knife to my heart and a splinter of light to my benighted mind. not daring to look up, i froze as a rush of images and memories joined the reverberations of the voice in piercing my heart. i felt that a thousand needles were running to and fro inside my body, and above all, a massive fear shadowed my mind…the fear that i would raise my eyes and see just the gardener, or worse: nothing at all. i had thought it could not get any worse, and now i was being taunted by the very voice of my lord!
and yet…and yet the addicting gentleness of the voice still called to me long after the echoes had died down, insistently but not urgently, as if the speaker had all the time in the world. in that instant i knew that my mind, in all its delusion, could never manufacture or reproduce such a sound–a sound of command, yet patience, grace, and love. with that realization hope exploded throughout my body and i trembled with the warmth of it. it grew until it would no longer be refused, and i turned my eyes from the broken jar at my feet (the very instrument of my death) upwards in glorious surrender to hope, not quite daring to believe what would meet my eyes.
“rabboni!” i cried, recognizing jesus at last, and with that cry the world exulted. i felt in that moment as i have never felt before, and i knew that the greatest secret, the greatest surprise, the very telos of the universe had just called my name. my name! i was suddenly aware that every blade of grass, every grain of sand, every tree, and every mountain had been dying with me, and was now full to the overflowing with joy because death had been defeated! i knew that i, the most humble of people, a woman and a prostitute, had witnessed the unveiling of the purpose of humanity and of existence. and i knew that god delighted in making his mystery known first to a broken and suicidal prostitute.
truly, i had never felt more embarrassment and shame than in that moment. i had never before been so unaware and disgusted at my failings–at my body and the tears and the evil things that occuppied my mind. and yet i had never experienced more acceptance. i saw that in and because of my lord, all the things that were broken in me, that were broken about me, could be redeemed! i saw that, one day, i would be able to be naked without shame, as even adam and eve were unable to be for long. i saw this and i knew it, because of the living proof in front of me.
and now, though that proof is gone and taken into heaven, i know it will not be long. i can feel the transformation will take place soon, and my body trembles at the very imagining of it. i can no longer hear the voice that opened my understanding for the first time, and that called my name–that spoke inside the walls of my own house! nay, too many years have gone by and that memory has faded with all the others. joyfully, it no longer worries me, because the image of his love is burned onto my scarred heart, just as the image of the sun is burned into our eyes if we look at it, but everlasting.
and know this, child (for though you are grown, you are still a child to me): if jesus of nazareth chooses to save me, whom they call mary magdalene, the lowest of all the women in judea, he will without a doubt open his love even unto you, and to any who asks it of him…
therefore, child, ask!
