Holy Week: Wednesday
Mark 14:3-11, Matthew 26:6-16, Luke 22:1-6
At dinner the weekend prior to Jesus’ death and resurrection, the Lord’s friends and disciples gathered for a dinner at Simon the leper’s home. Mary — who is the same Mary from Lazurus’s tomb, the same Mary that sat at the Lord’s feet — carries out a symbolic pre-burial ritual by anointing Jesus with a fragrant oil called nard, speaking to the faith of those in the room.
Jesus had been telling the disciples since the beginning he would have to die, but that he would be raised to life again. They didn’t want to believe him, and many didn’t until, like Thomas, they saw it for themselves. Mary, on the other hand, had a strong faith in her friend. She loved him. Because she loved him and believed him, she poured out everything she had on him — her costly oil, her reputation, her financial means; she bet everything on him.
The nard she poured out on Jesus was genuine, unadulterated nard from India; the bottle she broke made of a precious, expensive marble called alabaster. The nard itself cost one day’s wages for a laborer, but for someone like Mary, it cost much more. Nard is considered to have self-reflective, relaxing, and uplifting properties. In today’s market, you can buy nard for about $40 a 5mL jar.
It’s not hard, then, for us to see this from the disciples’ point of view. They scolded her: she could have taken the money from selling it to support the poor among them.
Jesus jumped to her defense, “Leave her alone. Why do you trouble her? She has done a beautiful thing to me. For you always have the poor with you, and whenever you want, you can do good for them. But you will not always have me. She has done what she could; she has anointed my body beforehand for burial. And truly, I say to you, wherever the gospel is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in memory of her” (Mark 14: 6-9, emphasis mine).
In John’s coverage of the dinner, he intimates that Judas was the one who started getting on Mary’s case for pouring the nard on Jesus “because he was a thief, and having charge of the moneybag he used to help himself to what was put into it” (John 12:6). His reaction stands in stark contrast to what Mary had done. It was what Judas did after this that reveals to us his true character; Judas “went to the chief priests in order to betray him to them. And when they heard it, they were glad and promised to give him money. And he sought an opportunity to betray him” (Mark 14:10-11).
When we read these two accounts with an awareness of the contrast between the motivations of Mary and of Judas, the betrayal seems even more ridiculous. How could Judas walk with the incarnate Word of God and then betray him? How could Judas watch Mary pour out all she had in an act of love and worship to Jesus and then turn around and sell him?
Mary is remembered in the gospel story for her beautiful act of worship, literally pouring out all that she had that was worth anything on Jesus. Judas is also remembered for his wicked act of greed, betraying Jesus for 30 pieces of silver.
May we turn from our wickedness in this season as we reflect on Mary’s act of worship and Judas’s wicked greed.
