{"id":946,"date":"2014-06-06T05:22:46","date_gmt":"2014-06-06T09:22:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.northernway.org\/weblog\/?p=946"},"modified":"2014-06-06T05:22:46","modified_gmt":"2014-06-06T09:22:46","slug":"mary-magdalene-lost-bride-queen-of-christianity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.northernway.org\/weblog\/?p=946","title":{"rendered":"Mary Magdalene – Lost Bride & Queen of Christianity"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Married<\/a>
Jesus and Mary Magdalene Married<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

My friend (and teacher these 20 years now!), Margaret Starbird writes:<\/p>\n

I hope this finds you thriving in the light and enjoying the fresh greening of the land —
\n<\/span><\/p>\n
<\/div>\n
For anyone interested, I just posted a new blog article “A Timely Lesson” on my website:\u00c2\u00a0http:\/\/www.margaretstarbird.net\/blog.html<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0.\u00c2\u00a0 [Text included below in case the link leads to a newer article]<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
I hope you’ll pass this on to anyone you know who might be interested in sharing these thoughts from my on-going “quest” for Mary Magdalene, the Lost Bride of the Christian story.<\/span><\/div>\n
\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
peace and light,<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
Margaret
\n<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
\n

copyright 2014 by Margaret Starbird. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n

06-02-14<\/p>\n

A Timely Lesson<\/p>\n

In 1983 Ann Requa, a dear friend since my college years at the University of Maryland, told me about Holy Blood, Holy Grail,<\/em> that she thought I needed to read the book, and that I could probably find a copy in my local library. A few days later I looked the title up in the lubrary\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s card catalogue, found it listed, and discovered it in the stacks. The front cover said Holy Blood, Holy Grail, <\/em>as expected. But the back cover asserted that Jesus was probably married and that his wife and progeny survived the Crucifixion and fled into exile as refugees in Gaul. At the time in 1983 I was still \u00e2\u20ac\u0153singing in the choir\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and teaching catchism classes for the Roman Catholic Church, and I was definitely not inclined to accept any notion that I perceived as so clearly blasphemous.<\/p>\n

For two years I did not read the book my friend had recommended, but, radically disillusioned after reading \u00e2\u20ac\u0153In God\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Name\u00e2\u20ac\u009d <\/em>(an expos\u00c3\u00a9 of the Vatican Bank scandal and alleged assassination of Pope John Paul I by David Yallop), I returned to the library in 1985 and checked out Holy Blood, Holy Grail. <\/em>I read the book from cover to cover, still reluctant to accept the fundamental premise of the marriage of Jesus to his \u00e2\u20ac\u0153consort\/companion\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Mary Magdalene. I asked myself agonizing questions: How could we have lost the Bride of Jesus? How could the Church have hidden such a momentous secret for so many centuries? Surely the Church fathers would have told us if Jesus were married with children! I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve recorded details of my quest for the truth of the Magdalene \u00e2\u20ac\u0153story,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d published in The Goddess in the Gospels <\/em>in 1998. Numerous synchronicities and Scripture passages that confirmed the sacred partnership of Jesus and Mary Magdalene at the heart of the Christian story made their way into that book, so I won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t repeat them here.<\/p>\n

But some important illuminating incidents didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t make the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153cut\u00e2\u20ac\u009d for that book, including one I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t fully understand at the time, but which has grown on me over the years and has become a very important key understanding of the tragic consequences of the “Lost Bride.”<\/p>\n

One Monday afternoon in 1986 while I was doing my usual chores, I sent out a special request\u00e2\u20ac\u201dasking God to have the mailman deliver something to my mailbox that would confirm or deny the assertion of Holy Blood, Holy Grail <\/em>that Mary Magdalene was the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Bride of Christ.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d I had no idea what I would consider a proof or denial of the theory\u00e2\u20ac\u201dbut I asked for it anyhow.<\/p>\n

When the mailman had passed, I ran to the box to see what he had left there. To my befuddlement, the only item in the box was a small package, about 7\u00e2\u20ac\u009d by 10\u00e2\u20ac\u009d, from a company that \u00c2\u00a0advertised ant farms. Opening the container, I remembered having ordered the item weeks before so I could teach my children about the almost legendary work-ethic and industry of ants. The advertisement for the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153farm\u00e2\u20ac\u009d stated that viewers could watch the community of ants through the plastic walls of the box — tunneling and moving food particles through the network of tunnels the worker ants would create. I was sad that I hadn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t received an answer to my prayer for the confirmation or denial of the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153married Jesus\u00e2\u20ac\u009d hypothesis, but I decided maybe my request had come too late — probably the mailman had already packed his bag and started on his rounds.<\/p>\n

When the kids got home from school, they were excited the ant farm had arrived. They bent their heads together over the instructions and unpacked the package to set up the ant farm. There was a narrow box with clear plastic panels on each side, a package of sand and a small packet containing the live ants! Carefully we assembled the project, added the ants and watched as they began scurrying to and fro digging their first tunnel. Sure enough, over a period of hours, the ants built tunnels and started carrying food particles from place to place. The kids watched with fascination for a few minutes, then went on to other activities, returning at intervals to see how the ants were doing with their project. As advertised, the ants continued to scurry around behind their plastic walls tunneling and carrying food particles.<\/p>\n

At breakfast the next morning, the kids inspected their ant colony performing its activities — and rushed in again after school. For several days the ant farm was a magnet for attention. Neighborhood children were invited in to watch the ants. Everyone was enjoying observing ants busily scurrying around inside their plastic box, tirelessly tunneling and carrying food particles hither and yon.<\/p>\n

But by the end of the week activity gradually slowed and then finally ceased. The ants had apparently worn themselves out and\u00c2\u00a0one at a time\u00c2\u00a0had begun to die off. After another forty-eight hours, we sadly agreed that the experiment was over and that it was time to trash the ant farm. We had gotten the message that the ants were an industrious community, but somehow they had failed to thrive. We carried the plastic box out to the back yard and dumped the experimental ant farm onto the ground, hoping any survivors might find a new colony and home outdoors.<\/p>\n

Much later I realized that I actually HAD received an answer affirming the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153sacred marriage\u00e2\u20ac\u009d in the mailbox that Monday afternoon.\u00c2\u00a0The meaning was clear.\u00c2\u00a0The ant community had failed to thrive because they had no \u00e2\u20ac\u0153organizing principle\u00e2\u20ac\u009d at the heart of their \u00e2\u20ac\u0153farm.”\u00c2\u00a0The goal of any community, its “reason for being” is the continuity and nurturing of life. They had no Queen and therefore, no reason for their labor, no progeny to nurture, no \u00e2\u20ac\u0153vocation.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d All their activities were ultimately just \u00e2\u20ac\u0153busy work\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00e2\u20ac\u201dand wasted.<\/p>\n

I believe the earliest Christians established their community with the partnership of Jesus and Mary Magdalene at its heart — modeled on the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Song of Songs,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d where the devoted relationship of the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Beloveds\u00e2\u20ac\u009d was a mirror of God\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s passionate love for his people. While Jesus represented Yahweh as \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Bridegroom,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d (an epithet confirmed in various Gospel passages), Mary Magdalene represented the people of Israel, the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Daughter of Sion,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d as Sister-Bride and Beloved. Their union was celebrated at all levels of human experience, exemplified in the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Sacrament of the Bridal Chamber,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d in early Christian communities.<\/p>\n

In his letter to Corinthians 5:9, Paul states that Cephas and the brothers of Jesus and the other apostles all \u00e2\u20ac\u0153travel around with their sister-wives.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Where did Paul get that phrase, if not from the original Christian community that modeled itself on the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Song of Songs,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d derived from an ancient rite of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153sacred marriage,\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 where the Bridegroom frequently refers to his Beloved as \u00e2\u20ac\u0153My sister, my spouse: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153You have made my heart beat faster, my sister, my bride\u00e2\u20ac\u009d (SoS 4:9); \u00e2\u20ac\u0153a garden enclosed is my sister, my bride\u00e2\u20ac\u009d (SoS 4: 12); and \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I have come into my garden, my sister, my bride\u00e2\u20ac\u009d (SoS 5:1).<\/p>\n

English translations of Paul\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s letter invariably call these sister-wives \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Christian sisters\u00e2\u20ac\u009d even though the phrase in the original Greek does not contain the word \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Christian\u00e2\u20ac\u009d at all.<\/p>\n

Why did the Jerome and later translators of the Greek Gospels wish to obscure the knowledge that the closest associates and kin of Jesus traveled with their \u00e2\u20ac\u0153sister-wives\u00e2\u20ac\u009d as missionary couples, bearing the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Good News\u00e2\u20ac\u009d to the farthest outposts of the Roman Empire? When he sent them forth \u00e2\u20ac\u0153two by two,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Jesus was apparently sending couples, not pairs of males, according to Paul, the earliest witness to Christian practices.<\/p>\n

It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a good thing Noah didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t misunderstand God\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s instructions about bringing the animals into the ark \u00e2\u20ac\u0153two by two\u00e2\u20ac\u009d as the early church fathers apparently misunderstood the instruction of Jesus to preach the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Way of the heart\u00e2\u20ac\u009d in a couples\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 ministry!<\/p>\n

* \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 * \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 * \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 * \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 *<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My friend (and teacher these 20 years now!), Margaret Starbird writes: I hope this finds you thriving in the light and enjoying the fresh greening of the land — For anyone interested, I just posted a new blog article “A Timely Lesson” on my website:\u00c2\u00a0http:\/\/www.margaretstarbird.net\/blog.html\u00c2\u00a0.\u00c2\u00a0 [Text included below in case the link leads to a … Continue reading Mary Magdalene – Lost Bride & Queen of Christianity<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,7],"tags":[33,245,50,264,244],"class_list":["post-946","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-jesus-family","category-mary-magdalene","tag-christian-goddess","tag-lost-bride","tag-married-jesus","tag-mary-magdalene","tag-sister-wives"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernway.org\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/946","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernway.org\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernway.org\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernway.org\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernway.org\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=946"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernway.org\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/946\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":949,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernway.org\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/946\/revisions\/949"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernway.org\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=946"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernway.org\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=946"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernway.org\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=946"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}