This collection of entire chapters and excerpts from Valtorta’s major work provides a comprehensive biography of Mary Magdalene.
It was suggested and edited by Marisa Tiraboschi, a renowned scholar of women’s issues in the religious sphere.
The preface to the volume highlights the most interesting and timely aspects of the fascinating research on this controversial evangelical figure.
Mary Magdalene, who is she?
If we remain within the textual context of the four Gospels, we can only say that Magdalene (from Magdalena) is the name given to Mary Magdalene, whose name appears among those of the women who follow Jesus.
They witness his crucifixion on Calvary and are before the tomb when the stone that closes it is rolled away.
At least some of them are, to a certain extent and in different ways, witnesses to the Lord’s Resurrection, which He entrusted to Mary Magdalene the task of announcing to the disciples.
Today, very few are willing to see the Magdalene in the nameless sinner who, in the house of a Pharisee, receives Jesus’ forgiveness after anointing His feet with perfumed oil, as the Evangelist Luke recounts.
Her unusual act of homage is similar to another mentioned by the Evangelist John, attributing it to Mary of Bethany, which he himself describes as having taken place in Bethany itself, a few days before the Lord’s last Passover.
This Mary of Bethany, whom scholars say they cannot identify either with Mary Magdalene or with the anonymous sinner, is the contemplative one whom the Master extols, contrasting her with Martha, his busy sister.
And we find her again with Martha at the resurrection of her brother Lazarus.
Mary Magdalene, the unmistakable Magdalene, was freed from seven demons. Mark and Luke affirm this, leading us to imagine a spiritual resurrection as prodigious as the physical resurrection of Lazarus described by John.
This mysterious and disconcerting fact, combined with the other scant information the Gospels give us about her—her faithfulness as a disciple, her presence beneath the Cross, and finally her role as herald of the Risen Christ—lead to the idea of a great personality about whom much is said. It would not be entirely outlandish, therefore, to associate Mary Magdalene with the nameless sinner absolved by Jesus and with her namesake in Bethany who preferred to drink in the Master’s words rather than attend to household chores.
Moreover, an ancient tradition in the Church has already identified the three female figures as a single character: Mary Magdalene, venerated as a saint.
