Mary's Role Models

DID MARY KNOW, on that puzzling and fateful afternoon when the angel Gabriel visited her, that she was about to join a line of mothers in Israel who would be remembered and honored within a tradition dominated by men?

Did she think of her forebear and namesake, Miriam, co-deliverer of her people from Egyptian slavery? Did Deborah, prophet and judge, come to mind—or Jael, the housewife who drove a tent peg into the brain of an enemy general? Had anyone told this nonliterate young woman about Huldah, the prophet and scholar who identified Deuteronomy as sacred scripture? Surely Queen Esther, who saved her people from a Persian pogrom, was known to Mary from the annual festival of Purim.

More likely Mary would have remembered women in Israel who gave birth to important men, such as Samson and Samuel. The late pregnancy of her cousin Elizabeth brought Isaac’s mother, Sarah, into view.

But her own premarital pregnancy may have reminded her more of Bathsheba, mother of Solomon. In this patriarchal culture, wives who could not conceive were disgraced and considered of little worth, but pregnancy before marriage could result in an honor killing. No wonder Mary fled to Elizabeth as the only person who might understand her unusual plight (Luke 1:39-45). Guided by the Holy Spirit, Elizabeth enabled Mary to turn her fear into a song of praise adapted from Hannah’s prayer after her son Samuel was born (Luke 1:46-56; 1 Samuel 2:1-10). God lifts up the lowly and brings down the proud.

If she pondered her place in Israelite history, did Mary also think of more-recent heroes? If Hanukkah was celebrated in Nazareth each year, she would have known how the second temple in Jerusalem had been rededicated to Yahweh after its desecration by the Seleucid ruler Antiochus IV, 160 years earlier. Hanukkah acclaimed the successful Maccabean revolt and subsequent Judean independence; it also exalted Judith, whose name means “Jewish woman”; she saved Israel from destruction by beheading the Assyrian general Holofernes.

In Mary’s day, knowledge of these past events evoked similar longings for freedom from the Roman occupation of Palestine. Would Mary’s son lead the next revolt? The angel had promised that “the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David” and “he will reign over the house of Jacob forever” (Luke 1:32-33). Mary had prophesied that “all generations will call me blessed” (1:48). Perhaps she will become another Judith!

What happened between testaments?

But who is Judith? For many Christians today, the 400-plus years between the last Old Testament prophets and the coming of Jesus in the New Testament is a dark hole. As a child, I recall hearing Matthew 4:16 read at my church during Advent: “The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light.” At the time, I figured everyone just sat around in the dark waiting for Jesus.

But high school world history taught us about the conquests of Alexander the Great, the spread of Greek culture and language throughout the Mediterranean world, and the subsequent rise of the Roman Empire. Throughout this period, the Jewish diaspora increased as well. The Hebrew Bible was gradually translated into Greek, probably in Egypt. Called the Septuagint, it also embraced more-recent Jewish writings in Greek. The Septuagint, which was the Bible of the early Christians for the first 300 years, included the intertestamental books Protestants call the Apocrypha. Today, neither Jews nor Protestants consider these books canonical, although Catholics include them, following early church tradition. In any case, these writings open a window into Jewish thought and life during these intervening centuries.

Theology trumps history

The 16-chapter book of Judith, from the first or second century BCE, reads more like a historical novel than literal history. It is set in Judea not long after Jews have returned from exile in Babylon. They are now threatened by Nebuchadnezzar, who rules the Assyrians from Nineveh (Judith 1:1). Historically, however, the Assyrians were long gone by this time, conquered by the Babylonians (under Nebuchadnezzar!), who are then taken over by the Persians. It is the Persian king Cyrus who first allowed Jews to return from Babylon to Judea in 538 BCE to rebuild the Jerusalem temple.

Theology, not history, dominates in this story—the Deuteronomistic theology that promises blessings and safety from enemies if the Jewish people worship only Yahweh, and defeat and destruction if they worship other gods (see Deuteronomy 30:15-20). The author probably chose Nebuchadnezzar as antagonist because he declares himself a god—“the Great King, the lord of the whole earth” (Judith 2:5; see Daniel 3:1-18). Nebuchadnezzar sends his chief general, Holofernes, to subdue all the peoples in the region who have not yet submitted to the Great King. To underscore this Deuteronomistic theology, Achior, an Ammonite, recounts to Holofernes the history of the Israelites, explaining that they will be protected by their God so long as they worship Yahweh alone.

The Israelites at this time are centered in the hill country, in the fictional town of Bethulia. Determined to defeat them, Holofernes cuts off their water supply. Uzziah, the ineffectual Jewish leader, is ready to cave in if no help comes within five days.

“By the hand of a woman ...”

Enter Judith in chapter 8. With an impressive genealogy, she is the devout widow of her deceased husband, Manasseh. Unlike Uzziah, she knows how to save Israel if the Israelites are faithful to Yahweh. After receiving the blessing of Uzziah and his cohorts, Judith prays fervently to God, using the language of reversals adopted many years later by Mary: “You are the God of the lowly, helper of the oppressed, upholder of the weak, protector of the forsaken, savior of those without hope” (Judith 9:11; Luke 1:51-55). But unlike Mary, all her forthcoming actions depend on deceiving the enemy.

Judith casts off her widow’s garments and decks herself out in fine clothes, makeup, and jewelry. She puts food in a bag and then, with her maid, heads for the Assyrian army. A patrol captures them, and she asks to see Holofernes in order to show him a way to conquer the Israelites without losing a single soldier. Convinced and overcome by her beauty, Holofernes prepares a banquet and invites her as his special guest, even though she and her maid eat only their own kosher food.

Holofernes asks her what she will do when she runs out of her own food. As an example of irony and double entendre in the story, she replies, “As surely as you live, my lord, your servant will not use up the supplies I have with me before the Lord” (the Lord!) “carries out by my hand what he has determined” (12:4). On the last night of the banquet, Holofernes invites her into his tent to drink wine and thus seduce her. His eunuchs leave, and she is alone with him. Her maid stands outside to wait.

Holofernes drinks himself comatose, whereupon Judith takes his sword from the bedpost and chops off his head. She puts it into their food bag, and she and her maid return to Bethulia, where she shows the people the head of Holofernes. Uzziah praises Judith in words we recognize from Elizabeth’s response to Mary in Luke 1:41b-42a: “O daughter, you are blessed by the Most High God above all other women on earth!” (Judith 13:18).

When the Assyrians see Holofernes’ head on the wall of Bethulia, they flee in terror. The Israelites follow and slaughter many, claiming rich spoils. Judith is given Holofernes’ possessions and then leads the women of Israel in a victory dance. The book ends with her hymn of praise to God for saving their nation.

Through her courage and faithfulness, Judith shames the Israelite men of Bethulia, but she still operates within a patriarchal context of sexual conquest and violence. Her culture would have permitted only a respectable and devout widow like her to use sexual allure as a weapon. And after her triumph over Holofernes and his army, she returns home and submits to her proper role as a celibate widow.

Susanna

Mary’s other role model from the intertestamental writings must also operate within a male-dominated context. Susanna’s story comprises chapter 13 of the Greek version of the book of Daniel, probably written in the first or second century BCE. It is a detective story set much earlier in Babylon among the exiled Jews.

By this time some Jews are living comfortably, judging by the respect given to Susanna’s husband, Joakim, and the fact that he owns a house with a large garden. These Jews apparently reside in their own quarters in Babylon and are free to observe the law of Moses. Joakim’s house serves as a court where the elders meet to try cases within their own legal system. Even so, Daniel, an exile from Jerusalem, is anachronistically still a “young lad” (verse 44).

Like all heroic women in patriarchal narratives, Susanna is gorgeous! So much so that two elders, recently appointed as judges, who come to Joakim’s house on court days, start lusting after her. Each day, after the others leave at noon, Susanna takes walks in the garden, where they can barely tear their eyes away from her. Eventually they confess their lust to each other, and then make a plan to find a time when they can get her alone and rape her.

One hot day they hide in the garden at a time when Susanna wants to bathe. She sends her maids away to get some supplies and then shuts the doors of the garden for privacy. The two men run up to her and confess their desire for her. If she refuses, they will “testify against you that a young man was with you, and this was why you sent your maids away” (verse 21). Trapped, Susanna loudly refuses to comply “rather than sin in the sight of the Lord” (verse 23), so the men bring charges of adultery against her before the full court the next morning. She could do nothing but lift her eyes to heaven, “for her heart trusted in the Lord” (verse 35). But because these men were judges, they were believed, and Susanna was condemned to death, against her strong protestations of innocence.

Detective Daniel to the rescue! As Susanna is led off to execution, “the Lord heard her cry.” Daniel challenges the verdict and interviews each man separately. He asks each one, “Under what tree did you see [Susanna and the young man] being intimate with each other?” Each man mentions a different tree, whereupon Daniel declares them guilty of bearing false witness. In accordance with the law of Moses, they are put to death (Deuteronomy 19:16-21). Thus God vindicates the innocent sufferer.

What did Mary teach?

How might Mary have been influenced by either Judith or Susanna? Israelite women are so rarely mentioned in scripture that it is quite possible that their stories were carefully handed on from one generation of women to the next. Some of Mary’s statements echo those of Judith. She was willing to be the instrument of God in raising a special son, just as Judith became God’s instrument to defeat Israel’s enemy. Like Susanna, Mary submitted herself to God’s purposes while standing up for her innocence and righteousness.

What did Mary, who pondered much in her heart (Luke 2:19), teach her son about Judith and Susanna? Mary’s story in Luke 1 gives no hint of the nonviolent path Jesus followed as an adult. He did not attempt to overthrow Roman occupation, as his Maccabean ancestors had resisted the Syrian-Greeks, nor did he use deceit to commit murder, as did Judith. Perhaps Susanna, submitting to God while proclaiming her innocence, provided a better role model. What do you think Jesus learned from the lives of these heroic women?