LDS Freedom Forum

BuriedTartaria wrote: ↑December 20th, 2022, 10:40 am Wow, you know a lot about history. I wasn't aware of a lot of this stuff.

Mary Magdalene would have been born to a Sadducee, rich and powerful family historically well-known - the Boethus. Her father, Eliezer, was a one-year Jerusalem high priest around 4 CE, after having bought the position. Bright and having benefited from a high education, she would have acquired an outstanding personal position and outreach. She would have taught and given lectures to large audiences and personal advice to in-dividuals. She would have had many suitors. In a hypocritical familial milieu with low ethical standards, she would have had “a morally lax period.” But she would have become tired of such a life. The Nazoreans “so much feared by her parents,” had a center in Bethany, near her family home. She would have met them and would have turned to the Nazorean faith. That is how, we are said, she met Jesus who would have been ‘high priest’ in this sect without sacrifices.

Not only would her parents have unwillingly accepted her conversion (seen as causing a drop in her status), but also a lot of suitors would have been jealous, in particular a gang leader named Zatan.
With him, several of his friends took an oath, which is reported to have been: We will slay them [the Nazoreans] and make Miryai scorned in Jerusalem. A stake [cross] we will set up for the man who has ruined Miryai and led her away. There shall be no day in the world when a For-eigner [Nazorean] enters Jerusalem.

It’s seems unlikely that this oath would have been invented later out of thin air. Anyway, these details of the whole story that I am summing up not only do not seem unlikely but even appear to nicely dovetail with what we know from other sources and to inform obscurities in the traditional version of the facts coming from the Canonical Gospels. Firstly, the bright and strong personality of Mary Magdalene would explain her special relationship with Jesus and with the apostles (had she not been called the ‘Apostle to the Apostles’? Secondly the “morally lax period of her life” would explain the ‘repented sinner from whom Jesus would had cast out demons’, suggested by the Gospel of Luke.

Pazooka wrote: ↑December 21st, 2022, 10:44 am Some interesting information regarding Mary Magdalene, form the Mandaeans (Nazoreans who did not follow Jesus).

It paints a vivid picture of the time - Holy carp. Makes me wonder how much of it is true. High priests buying their position? That kind of elitist hypocrisy?

From the article posted in the OP:

Mary Magdalene would have been born to a Sadducee, rich and powerful family historically well-known - the Boethus. Her father, Eliezer, was a one-year Jerusalem high priest around 4 CE, after having bought the position. Bright and having benefited from a high education, she would have acquired an outstanding personal position and outreach. She would have taught and given lectures to large audiences and personal advice to in-dividuals. She would have had many suitors. In a hypocritical familial milieu with low ethical standards, she would have had “a morally lax period.” But she would have become tired of such a life. The Nazoreans “so much feared by her parents,” had a center in Bethany, near her family home. She would have met them and would have turned to the Nazorean faith. That is how, we are said, she met Jesus who would have been ‘high priest’ in this sect without sacrifices.

Not only would her parents have unwillingly accepted her conversion (seen as causing a drop in her status), but also a lot of suitors would have been jealous, in particular a gang leader named Zatan.
With him, several of his friends took an oath, which is reported to have been: We will slay them [the Nazoreans] and make Miryai scorned in Jerusalem. A stake [cross] we will set up for the man who has ruined Miryai and led her away. There shall be no day in the world when a For-eigner [Nazorean] enters Jerusalem.

It’s seems unlikely that this oath would have been invented later out of thin air. Anyway, these details of the whole story that I am summing up not only do not seem unlikely but even appear to nicely dovetail with what we know from other sources and to inform obscurities in the traditional version of the facts coming from the Canonical Gospels. Firstly, the bright and strong personality of Mary Magdalene would explain her special relationship with Jesus and with the apostles (had she not been called the ‘Apostle to the Apostles’? Secondly the “morally lax period of her life” would explain the ‘repented sinner from whom Jesus would had cast out demons’, suggested by the Gospel of Luke.