The Temple of Portuno is one of the oldest structures still preserved from ancient Rome, believed to have its foundations laid in the 3rd or 4th century before Christ, and then to be re-constructed between 80 and 100 BC. It is in the same piazza as Santa Maria in Cosmedin, where Gregory Peck and Aubrey Hepburn embraced in front of the “Mouth of Truth” in the classic 1953 film “Roman Holiday.” Many centuries after being erected, the temple was rededicated as a Christian church honoring Santa Maria Egyziaca, in English: Saint Mary of Egypt.
Even educated believers often confuse Mary of Egypt with the most maligned and misunderstood of Christian saints, Mary of Magdala. The reason for this is the tendency of (mostly male) church leaders to associate both with the “world’s oldest profession.”
In the scriptural accounts, Mary Magdalene, the first witness to the Resurrection and the “apostle to the apostles,” was not associated with sexuality or with the anointing of Jesus as is commonly thought. None of the three scenes where Jesus is anointed by women (a remarkable enough occurrence given the social constraints of the day) refer explicitly to Mary Magdalene. And there is absolutely no reference to her being a prostitute anywhere in the Bible.
Mary of Egypt’s life (sometime between 400 and 500 AD) occurs between the life of Magdalene (contemporaneous with those of Jesus and his companions, c. 30 AD) and a homily preached by Pope Gregory I where he conflated the latter with the fallen woman washing Christ’s feet and Mary of Bethany (in 591 AD). All of these Mary’s led to confusion, even among popes, theologians and art historians.
Mary of Egypt is reported to have undergone a powerful mystical conversion experience while venerating the relics of the Holy Cross after leaving her native Alexandria. She rejected her own (more established, but still problematically sexualized) life of ill repute and fled to the desert to live as an ascetic near the banks of the Jordan, attempting to meditate within the very desert where Jesus experienced his own temptations.
The artistic depictions of her, often naked but completely enveloped in hair, living in the wild, were confused in many instances with those of Magdalene, who some traditions argued also lived for a time in a cave to atone for her sins. I’ve seen quite a few sources and textbooks confuse the two over the years, not to mention the conspiratorial claims about Magdalene’s post-Resurrection family life in France which further muddy the issue.
These two women, so mischaracterized for millennia, continue to speak to us about God’s incarnational presence, even – or particularly – in the midst of desperate acts, psychological and spiritual trauma, miscarriages of justice, and raging societal forces that seem to engulf everything in their path without constraint when kindled with the accelerants of misinformation and willful imputation of others. Our responsibility to “the way, the truth, and the life” mandates that we sometimes at least attempt to set the record straight.
Originally from Collingswood, Michael M. Canaris, Ph.D., teaches at Loyola University, Chicago.
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