30. The Gospel of Mary
- he Gospel of Mary is a gospel written in the name of Mary of
I Magdala, a follower of Jesus according to a number of early Chris-
JL tian texts and his dear companion according to the Gospel of
Philip. In the Gospel of Mary she is said to be loved by Jesus more than the
other followers, but Peter and Andrew wonder whether she can be taken seri-
ously as a female teacher of revelatory wisdom. This dispute between Mary
and the male followers of Jesus reflects the argument between gnostics and
representatives of the emerging orthodox church about whether women can
teach in church and whether private revelatory teachings can have the same
authority as the official teachings of the priests and bishops.
After six missing pages, the Gospel of Mary introduces Jesus speaking
about sin, and Jesus proclaims that sin is not an ethical problem but rather a
cosmological problem, as Karen L. King puts it.^1 Sin is the material mixing
improperly with the spiritual. Thereafter Mary recounts a vision of the soul's
ascent beyond four cosmic powers (perhaps the four elements), in a passage
that unfortunately is largely missing from the manuscript. After a hostile en-
counter between Mary and the male followers of Jesus, Levi intercedes, invit-
ing all the followers of Jesus to put on the perfect person and go out to
preach, without establishing any additional rules or laws. And, the Gospel of
Mary concludes, that is what they did.
i. Karen L. King, "The Gospel of Mary," in Robinson, Nag Hammadi Library in English, rev. ed.,
P- 523.
