ABSTRACT
Mary Magdalene is a figure of immense importance to religious life and to other expressions of culture during the Middle Ages through to the early modern period and beyond. Therefore, this volume, Mary Magdalene in Medieval Culture: Conflicted Roles, should need little justification. The purpose of it is to discuss and define in a more specific and comprehensive way than previously the various roles, together with their intersections and apparent contradictions, assigned to the character called Mary of Magdala or Mary Magdalene in the Bible. It is a broadly interdisciplinary collection of chapters that engages material and ideas from late antiquity to the age of J. S. Bach, but with a major emphasis on the high and late Middle Ages. Very quickly in early Christianity, Mary Magdalene, as scripture represents her, develops a singular and remarkable significance among apologists, exegetes, and dramatists because of her crucial role in the Passion and Easter stories: the gospels consistently assign her the role of witness to the Crucifixion and discoverer, typically along with other women, of Jesus’ empty tomb (Mt 27:56, 28:1–11; Mk 15:40, 47, 16:1–11; Lk 24:10). Though obviously crucial to the fundamental Christian narrative, this role is complicated by its various representations. Unlike the other gospels, John’s tells of an individual encounter with the risen Christ. She at first thinks He is a gardener (20:1–18). Nevertheless and regardless of which version of the Easter story is chosen for elaboration, interaction between Mary Magdalene, angel-messengers, and the risen Lord quickly came to dominate the services for Holy Week and became increasingly important in the liturgy—witness the proliferation of tropes, sequences, and liturgical dramas for Easter alone—where it gains the widest possible currency.
