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The Quest for the Historical Mary, Mother of Jesus

Introduction

Everyone knows the Mary of theology and tradition, but what about the “real Mary,” the widowed Jewish mother of seven children—four sons and two or more daughters—the names of whom we know. Tabor begins to uncover the extraordinary and revolutionary role of Mary as the Matriarch of the Jesus movement—not as the “Mother of God,” but as the “Godmother.” Tabor is convinced she could rightly be called the real “Founder” of Christianity—which was led by three of her sons up through the end of the first century—all who ended up executed by authorities. Women like her, along with Mary Magdalene and others, who were influential leaders in their time, have been largely written out of the story.

Texts:

Mary in the New Testament

Birth

Matthew 1 & 2: Genealogy of Joseph; conception of Jesus; Joseph’s dream; birth of Jesus; flight to Egypt; settling in Nazareth
Luke 1 & 2: Annunciation; visit to Elizabeth; birth of Jesus; back to Nazareth
Genealogy of “Mary” as Hasmonean and Davidic (Luke 3:23-38)

Age Twelve in Jerusalem

Jesus at age 12: His mother said…Behold, your father and I have been looking for you anxiously (Luke 2:48);
His mother kept all these things in her heart (Luke 2:51)

Wedding at Cana

Mother mentioned but not named at wedding at Cana (John 2:1-12)
Jesus takes his mother and brothers to Capernaum after wedding at Cana (John 2:12)

At Capernaum

And his mother and his brothers came…contrast to disciples (Mark 3:31; Matt 12:46; Luke 8:19; cf. Luke 11:27-28, indirect reference)

At Nazareth

Is this not the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James, Joses and Judas, and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us? (Mark 6:3)
Is not his mother called Mary? (Matthew 13:55)
Is this not Jesus son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? (John 6:42)

In Jerusalem

We were not born of fornication; you are a Samaritan (John 8:41, 48)

At the Crucifixion

Standing by the cross were his mother and “her sister” Mary wife of Clopas (John 19:25)
Mary the mother of James & Jose (Mark 15:40, 47); Mary the mother of James (Mark 16:1 Luke 24:10) The “other Mary” (Matthew 27:56, 61; 28:1)

With Twelve after Jesus Death

Mary, the mother of Jesus and his brothers in Jerusalem after Jesus’ death with Twelve (Acts 1:14)

Paul

God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the Law (Galatians 4:4)

Jesus’ Paternity in the New Testament

Is this not Joseph’s son? Luke 4:22 at Nazareth
Is this not the carpenter’s son? Is not his mother called Mary? Matthew 13:55
Jesus…being as was supposed, of Joseph Luke 3:23
Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph John 1:45
Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? John 6:42
We were not born of fornication; you are a Samaritan (John 8:41, 48)
Jesus, you son of David, have mercy on me; Mark 10:47-48; Matthew 20:30; Luke 18:38-39
Have mercy on us you son of David Matt 12:23; 15:22; 20:30; 21:9, 15
Descended from David, according to the flesh  Rom 1:3
For it is evident that our Lord was descended from Judah  Hebrews 7:14

Transcript

Click here for a printable transcript (pdf file, opens in a new tab).

Shirley Paulson

I want to give a great big welcome to you all. This is the August 2024 Bible and Beyond discussion. I am your host, Shirley Paulson, and our guest scholar this evening is Dr. James Tabor. We’re talking about the quest for the historical Mary, the mother of Jesus. My guess is that many of you already know James Taber, but for those of you who don’t let me say that he’s a well-known biblical scholar and retired professor of ancient Judaism and early Christianity in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. James is probably best known for his work on Paul, the ancient concept of the Noble Death, his book on the Jesus dynasty, and his archeological work in Israel. Alright, so here we go. James Tabor. So glad you’re with us.

James Tabor

I’m very glad to be with you. I know about your work and the program, and I just think it’s one of the most quality things out there. So when you asked me, it was an easy yes for me.

Shirley Paulson

I’m so grateful to hear that. That’s just wonderful. Well, we’re going to have a great time with you tonight too, because your topic sounds right up our alley. It’s just interesting because we’ve been very interested in pursuing the idea of finding the historical Jesus with a focus on understanding it in the context of his Jewishness. It appears that you are doing the same kind of wonderful discoveries with Mary, the mother of Jesus. I want to ask you maybe to start us off with why do you think it’s been so unusual for the public at large to have access to the life of Mary? What’s the deal?

James Tabor

Yeah, I started the book seven years ago. It’s just now done. It’ll be out next fall. It’s called the Mary: From the Jewish Mother of Jesus to the Virgin Mother of God. It does immediately step into theological territory, but I sort of let that be. And I’m interested in Mary as a Jewish woman of her own time. There is a bit of a cause involved in that. I think she’s a lost woman, a forgotten woman. We’ve sort of rehabilitated Jesus a bit in terms of trying to see what he was really like to some degree, John the Baptist and James. We’ve got the three J’s. But what about the three M’s? We’ve got Mary Magdalene. According to our apocryphal stories, there were three Mary’s who walked with Jesus closely. Mary Magdalene, who was the closest to him, apparently from our traditions, his mother, and his sister, Mary.

We know so little about the sister, virtually nothing. The name surfaces here and there. But what about the mother? I mean, she’s supposed to be a major figure in Christianity, but I would put it like this, she’s been deprived, I’m willing to even say robbed, of her humanness on a certain level, her womanhood, her sexuality, and then her religion. I mean, who thinks of Mary as a Jewish woman? Maybe people that have studied her a bit, but she’s kind of a nun, right? Or a sister. Or even more than that, sort of the ultimate one. She’s heavenly, not earthly. What I try to do in the book is to talk about her as a woman in her own time, not just the cooking and sewing and making flowers grow the way Bob Dylan put it once. Not just that, but what was it like in those times and what sort of courage did she need to have to survive? And what do we think about the four boys that we know of that are mentioned in Mark 6:3? If you recall, Jesus is called there “Son of Mary.” It’s a very important verse I think. And then you’ve got James, Joseph, Simon, and Jude. And what do you essentially do with those? And then the sisters, we’re not sure how many, we have three names: Salame, Mary, and some think maybe Sarah, but it’s gone from our history. I want us to put Mary back in those times.

I start the book by talking about 4 BCE. Herod the Great has died. This is standard chronology. Mary’s back in the village of Nazareth nursing her one-year-old child, assuming Jesus was born in 5 CE.

And the dates could change, but I’m trying to give you a picture here. And suddenly three revolts break out the major one in the north. The Romans send down three legions of troops from Damascus and from Syria, a virus. The famous Roman general who this is under Augustus, Caesar took charge of it. And they put down the revolt of Judas, not Judas, the Galilee. And that’s later in year 6 CE or ad. This is 4 BCE when hers a vacuum. And then there’s one Simon of Peria, and then there’s the shepherd King down in the south. But in the north, the Judas sets fire to Sepphoris. And I don’t know how many of you familiar with Sepphoris. A lot of people aren’t. I’ve excavated there. It’s the urban capital of all Galilee. What happened when I grew up, I grew up in a conservative church, a Bible oriented church, churches of Christ, and I never heard of Sepphoris.

And in the Bible maps in the back, I could see Nazareth like a huge city, which it wasn’t. It was a village of maybe 200 people. From what we can tell Sepphoris is the urban capital of all Galilee and it’s going up in flames. Imagine Mary walking to the top of the hill at Nazareth, which I’ve done many times looking over or from Sepphoris even looking back, that’s when you can see Nazareth. Well, today, Nazareth is the largest city in the Galilee and Sepphoris is gone. It’s a tele or a ruin, but we just want to reverse that and it’s so important. And then you think of her losing two of her sons, James and Jesus by such a horrible violet death crucifixion. And James was literally thrown off the eastern side of the temple Mao, according to our earliest source, and then beaten to death with a club.

I think Mary might’ve lived past 70. I’m not sure. We just don’t know when she died. We have traditions in the Roman tradition of when she died, but they’re founded much, much later. But whenever she died, she’s just this extraordinary woman. If Joseph dies early on, which he seems to just disappear, I guess when Jesus is 12, right? We never hear of him again. Then she’s also a single mother with seven kids. And how do you handle that? I make the leap that, well, I think that’s factual. But the leap I make is that she’s also the teacher. T, when Jesus is teaching. Others love your enemy, turn the other cheek. Of course you can get that from some proverbs, but there’s also other texts you can quote about get back at your enemy and don’t let that person get by with anything. And I’m hearing Mary, when Jesus is young, her firstborn son being taught these things.

Now I could be accused of, well, Tabor, you got quite of imagination. You don’t know that. And people like to quote these texts. I’m sure some of you’ll ask about them. I’ll reserve that and explain later where I can give you an overview. But doesn’t Jesus say in effect, well, my family is the followers, not you guys. You’ve got that story in Mark. Well, it’s a misreading of the story as I’ll explain. Ask me that question. What about that saying where he says, this is my family right here. I’ll explain what I think that means, but I want to bring her back in all of her power. And when I’m reading the sayings of Jesus, we scholars talk about the Q source, our earliest strata of material. If you don’t like the word Q, what some people, I don’t believe in Q. How about the material that Luke and Matthew have in common that they didn’t get from Mark that exists, whether you call it Q, Y, Z, or X, it does exist. And I read that and then I go to the letter of James and I’m reading the same thing. When I read James, I’m thinking Sermon on the Mount, what we call Sermon on the Mount, right? It’s the same thing. Well, isn’t it odd? What did he learn from Jesus? Or did maybe both of them learn from the mother?

I want to see her. It’s just like Mary Magdalene, like, well, what did she ever do? What did she teach? But we get these traditions that she was a major influence. I think you’ve covered that. I’ve seen some of the, I haven’t watched them yet. That’s what the book is about. It’s about much more than that. But essentially, let’s follow the breadcrumbs and it is breadcrumbs or maybe little strings in the forest because we only have a couple dozen passages about her.

Shirley Paulson

And I wanted to ask you on that subject there, thank you. This is such a helpful foundation forest to know where you’re going with this. And just to follow up on this, what resources are you using to study your life? You’ve mentioned a couple of texts. Do you have archeological things too? What all are you turning to get this?

James Tabor

Yeah, I basically go to probably four things. And one of them is my educated imagination, which I’ve sort of used here. But the more, let’s call it scientific or historical material would be of course every possible text in the New Testament that we can deal with and get something out of. And since you have three synoptic gospels, you have to distill it down. And I usually would follow Mark because I think Mark is the earliest and the others are derivative. Basically Mark is a source. John is a source which is major and then a little bit in the book of Acts. But sometimes you can hang a lot on a single peg. And all I want from Acts is one verse in chapter one where they’re gathered after Jesus’s resurrection, appearances and so forth. The day of Pentecost is near, they’re meeting to choose a replacement for Judas who’s now gone and dead the betrayer.

And you know the story, but it mentions in one verse and his mother and brothers were there. That’s enough for me, right? Then I go, I got a book because otherwise she disappears. Paul says, Jesus, born of a woman. Okay, that’s in Galatians. Well, I assume he’s a born of a woman. He didn’t drop down from heaven, but do you know anything about her? Maybe her name or something. I think Paul knew her. He went to Jerusalem. She’s there. I use texts both later texts as well as New Testament material. The archeology puts her on Mount Zion, which is that southwestern hill. It’s the highest point of Jerusalem. I think that’s really early. And if you know Bargi work, the archeologist, he’s deceased now, but you can find it on my website, jamestabor.com. I put the articles up with permission, so PDFs of them.

But one is the Church of the Apostles on Mount Zion. And that goes back to the first century that they turned the house of the last supper into a church house, as we call it. A home meeting has a courtyard and so forth. And the foundations of that are still there. And then later, and this would be in the Byzantine period, a Church of Mary was built, and then even later a Crusader church was built, but always over that same space. And the Crusader Church was huge. It was a basilica and it actually had the house inside it, and that’s why it’s somewhat preserved. Today, if you’ve been to the room of the Last Supper, you’re not in the original walls or up the original stairs, but the property we think is the property where she lived and died. And right next to it is the door Mission, Abby Doormat to fall asleep.

It’s where Mary died, and there’s this huge Roman Catholic memorial to her. And also the early traditions are that she died in Jerusalem. Some of you might ask me, and again, I’ll let you ask me, because you probably read a lot about this. What about Mary? And didn’t she go to Ephesus with John and so forth? Yeah. Well, as you know Shirley, another part of Mary for me is her son James. And I believe James is the beloved disciple. The John tradition makes no sense when Jesus says to the one he loves, the disciple he loves who leans on him. I think that’s his kid, brother James, who he then puts in charge of the movement. He’s old enough, he’s probably 30. And when you’re 30, you can become a leader. Jesus started his own work at 30 sort of says, Hey brother, passing it on to you and take care of mother.

And remember the famous statement, mother, behold, your son, son, behold your mother. I know it’s different. Everybody said, oh, but I thought it was John. But if you look at the evidence for him being an Ephesus for her, why would she go to Ephesus? And then she came back and died on Mount Zion. These are later traditions that have to do with John. And actually, I don’t want to run John down, but the little we know about those sons of thunder, they’re always asking, could I be the first in the second? And could we, they’re not necessarily that loving John figure that we are told about. And UUs says, that could be John the elder, another person named John. All of that is a little complicated. But if James is the beloved disciple, think about that. That means that testimony that we’re getting in the gospel of John, that’s why it’s so eyewitness. When you read John, you feel like, oh, all the details of the trial of the pretor, of the pavement he’s standing on, which has now been uncovered in Jerusalem, I think she’s there. I use archeology, history, new Testament, other texts and try to put ’em all together.

Shirley Paulson

Well, this is really thrilling to have you help us to envision Mary as a human being, not as some ethereal kind of ghost in the sky, something but a real human being. And could you help us think a little bit about why you would think the erasure of Mary and her life was happening? Was it deliberate or was it just why? I mean, did people forget her? What happened? What do you think?

James Tabor

It was deliberate. It was deliberate. It was motivated by two things. One is that Paul, look, he hardly even mentions James either he does in Galatians say, I saw Peter for two weeks and yes, I did see James briefly. And then he goes, the so-called pillars of the Church. What they are mean nothing to me. And that’s the RSV translation. I think it definitely conveys the right feeling only because Paul is so resolute about his gospel. Maybe he had reason to be, but the thing is, he says things like we no longer know Jesus after the flesh, even if we once knew him that way, no longer. And he’s focused on the heavenly Christ. I think that since Paul is so dominant with 13 letters and the book of Hebrews sometimes attributed to him, but 13 letters with his name on them, Mary’s gone.

James mentioned once the book of Acts mentions James twice, once in Acts 15, it doesn’t even tell you who he is. Have you ever noticed that it’s the great decision of the church about should we take Gentiles? Peter speaks, Paul speaks, a guy named James gets up and he goes, my decision is, and you go, what? We had Peter and Paul deciding they’re the chief apostles, right? One to the Jews, one to the who’s this guy now deciding? He doesn’t say, and James, the brother of the Lord, the leader of the movement stood up. I just love the book of James. I think it’s so wonderful. And I think Mary, everything in James, he learned from his mother. I’m going to say now, that’s where I can’t prove it, but the hand that rocks the cradle, come on. I know when you’re raising little kids, you teach them the values, everything we need to know.

We did learn in kindergarten and preschool. We know that that’s true. So where did Jesus otherwise? That’s number one, just to kind of get away from the physical, the family, let’s make everything heavenly Jerusalem above is the mother, not Jerusalem. Below the other is sexuality. More and more Paul recommends celibacy, but it’s apocalyptic celibacy, it really is. He is telling couples to be sexual regularly. He’s not against sex, he’s against immorality or sexual immorality as he calls it. But he says in view of the appointed time of the end has grown very short in view of the present distress. The form of this world is passing away. I think he means the end of the age. Some people think, oh, he’s talking about 70 and so forth, different preterist interpreters. But I think he thinks that he’ll live to see it when he talks about the Parousia, the coming of Jesus, he says, and we who are alive and remain will rise to meet him in the air. I think because of that, he’s saying it’s probably good not to get married, but if you jump forward a hundred years, that’s not the reason they’re giving. It’s better not to get married because it’s holier.

How can you imagine? And it isn’t just sex, it’s bodily functions. I mean, I had trouble covering this in my book because it’s just kind of personal, but as it develops, she doesn’t even go to the toilet. She eats so perfectly the amount of food because she’s so perfect that basically just enough water and food, it’s all used by our body. Well, it just becomes ridiculous, I think to most people who want to know. And I want her to be as she was. And I think it’s robbing her. I mean, if any of you have children, I’m sure some of you do, many of you probably imagine if later you become the queen of heaven, but you’ve never been with the father of your children. You didn’t even have children except maybe one by a miracle from heaven. And that wasn’t you. I don’t think you’d want your kids written out of the record.

The Roman Catholics say that they’re, they’re not even Joseph’s kids, Joseph’s brother’s kids, he can’t have sex either. The holiness kind of begins to spread holiness so called interesting, interesting. But then we have texts in the New Testaments that say marriage is holy and the bed is undefiled. This is a later thing that develops. It’s Neoplatonism. Neoplatonism takes over. The body is to be subjugated and put down. Anything to do with humanity is put down. And women are the first casualty because they’re the seduces, right? They’re the ones that tempt the men. And just, I mean by the time of poor Augustine, I love Augustine. I love reading his confessions, but what a tortured soul when he talks about his temptations. And so I think it’s just how could you think of the holy mother of God ever having sex or going to the toilet or being like us? Well, if you’re a historian, it’s pretty easy to think that way because I think you don’t think of that as deprecating her in any way. I admire her for being that courageous woman, woman and raising those children in such an extraordinary time of danger and then watching her son die.

I can’t even imagine. And if you’re a mother, then you’ve got to just be trembling thinking about this.

Shirley Paulson

Exactly. And this is such a moving way for you to introduce to us the humanness of Mary, because I think many of us have had that experience of mothering our children. And we only have a few minutes before I turn the tables over to everybody else to talk to you. I want to ask a few more questions before we get everybody else involved in this. I’d like for you to talk a little bit about the fact that you referred to Mary as one of the founders of the earliest Christianity is like a godmother of the Jesus movement. Could you briefly tell us a little bit of what that means? That’s one of my questions before we go

James Tabor

Right along the lines of what I said. I think she raised these extraordinary boys. And by the way, when James dies, Simon takes over. And some people say, well, that couldn’t be his brother that has to be a cousin because he’s too old. But I work out the chronology of he gets crucified under Trajan, which does make him very elderly. And then we hear of Jude and his grandsons being arrested under Hadrian. This family has some longevity except they’re getting killed by the gang of priests that are ruling Jerusalem later by the Romans. But the two priests are connected. It’s Anna Sr. and Anna Jr. Anna Sr. has Jesus killed Anna Jr. Has James killed. I just think that we have to factor that in as to where did this extraordinary family get their inspiration? But then she’s in Jerusalem living there. Imagine she’s there, the matriarch of the house as Paul visits, as Peter comes back, as people are coming and going, I like to just get practical and think, wow, we’re going to have 40 people here tonight. Did somebody do the shopping? Did we get the fresh bread? Many of you have done this. You know what it’s like to handle large groups? She’s the hostess of the Jesus movement. My goodness. Think about it, what that would involve. I bet they’re having people coming every day, streaming in from all over the world, coming to visit, and they would want to see Jesus’, mother of all people. Think about it. You’d want to see her and meet her. Yeah,

Shirley Paulson

Absolutely. I want to see her now.

James Tabor

We don’t even talk about her. She, oh yeah, she was so holy. He was the ever virgin. And it goes from virgin to ever virgin. Well, there’s a big difference in Virgin and ever apparently Matthew doesn’t know about that because he said Joseph knew her not until she brought forth her firstborn son. He’s not the father, but he definitely after that has these other children.

Shirley Paulson

Do you think it was important for her historical work to be a royal lineage as the Jews were concerned? Or do you think that that didn’t have any impact on our human successes or her

James Tabor

Family? I do think it’s very important. I argue something in the book that I’ll get slammed by all of my colleagues for, and I’m convinced it’s true that Luke’s genealogy is Mary. Now everyone in the early church says that Matthew is Joseph and Luke is Mary. But when the critical scholars got going in the 19th century, they’re like, no, no, no, you’re just trying to harmonize. They contradict. Just face it. We’ve got two gene of Jesus. Yeah, we do. We have two. Guess what? One is from his mother, the other is from his adopted father, meaning Joseph took Mary. I’m not even sure anybody knew other than it says that he took her in the marriage. I don’t know that he made loudspeaker announcements. It says he doesn’t want to shame her or make any kind of a case of her. But anyway, I think if you look at the names, I go through it, you’ve got Levi, you’ve got all the Levitical names, Azar, which is a priestly name.

You’ve got Mary the Matron. And it also comes through Nathan, the brother of Solomon, not through Solomon. And that’s actually mentioned in one of the prophets that in the book of Zecharias talks about the family of Nathan will mourn as the Son of David. And what do we know about Nathan? Nothing other than he’s listed as one of the sons of King David. What I call this handbook knowledge, Shirley, I know you’re familiar with it.

How do we date our gospels? Let’s say Mark is just after 70, Matthews 80. Luke is 90, John is 100. This is handbook knowledge. You just look it up, but you ask for the arguments and all of a sudden, I don’t know. Everybody says, I can’t believe Tabor thinks that’s marriage genealogy. Yes, I do think that. I think it is an extraordinary genealogy and it has these Hasmonian names as well as Davidic names. And so the priestly has married in with the Judaic or the line of David. And Jesus is actually carrying both. And I think that gave him some, I think Mary is a kind of a princess in that sense. She’s related to that Ashman and priestly line. And maybe we’ll show it with DNA someday. We’ll see.

Shirley Paulson

I can’t wait. We have hit the half hour point here, which means I’m going to open up the mic for everybody else. I have a lot more questions, so I imagine others do too. Let’s just raise your hand if you’ve got a question, if you or a comment you’d like to offer to James Tabor. Meanwhile, I might ask you to think about one thing before others get their hands up, but could you just talk for just a minute about how you envisioned Mary’s role with the remaining followers of Jesus after his death? What happened then?

James Tabor

I think she is right there. I’ll tell you something to Google. Just go to Google images and put Day of Pentecost and you’re going to see hundreds of paintings that have Mary at the center, Jesus in heaven and the six apostles around her. In the early church, this was remembered that Mary is the matriarch. All I have is one verse and X, but I don’t care if she’s there in the upper room and that’s where they make their headquarters. And then we get the archeology. It’s a courtyard house. You can sit on the well. And when I take groups there, we gather around that. Well, it’s closed now, but it’s the first century well of that house and it’s the courtyard area where she spent, you spend all your time in an ancient house of that period in the court. And I sit there and I’m practically breathless because the space is the same. You’ve got to go down about 12 feet to actually get to the level that it was in places. Some places only eight feet, but you can go under that area.

Shirley Paulson

Wow. Alright. Well, so while people are still waiting to get their hands up, I want to ask you one more thing then. You’ve mentioned the dorm mission, and I don’t think maybe many of our people know what dorm mission means or what has to do with Mary. Could you talk about why that’s important to understand

James Tabor

About Yeah, I probably didn’t make that clear to fall asleep. It means the church built over where Mary fell asleep and it is a Catholic monastery and study center. It’s essentially German. The Germans built it at the, I think in the early part of the 20th century, end of the 19th, early 20th. It’s a beautiful church. You should visit it. And if you go down under below at the level where she would’ve been, there’s a wooden image of her carved on a bed and she’s dying. Dormitian. So it’s remembering her. And if you know Steven Schumacher, he’s probably the world’s expert on Mary. He has a whole book showing that the traditions of her death are in Jerusalem, nowhere else she dies in Jerusalem. And where does she die? That’s why I have the Church of Mary in the Byzantine period and later in the Crusader period it’s called Hague, the Holy Church of Mary.

Shirley Paulson

There’s so much more to learn about. Mary. This is amazing. I see Henry’s got a hand up. Go ahead, Henry.

James Tabor

Hey Henry, good to see you.

Henry

Yes, hi. I’m just wondering, one thing, as you know, the Catholics are very fond of collecting relics. I say that as a Catholic myself. I’m wondering why would you think that there are no relics of Mary?

James Tabor

I’m not sure. I haven’t ever thought about that. And actually I wasn’t sure that there weren’t, because I do know there’s milk somewhere. Her breast milk is somewhere in some church in Europe. Oh really? And I think maybe there are some things here and there, but nothing compared to Jesus or John the Baptist with all his heads and so forth that are scattered about or holy grails. I think there are five or six of those. I’m going to think about it and maybe take a wild guess that because she lived maybe up until the siege of Jerusalem, I hope she didn’t see her son James die. I truly do. I hope she had passed by then. I don’t know how anyone could take that. We like saving private Ryan and we talk about losing two children, but then Simon later, if that is who I think it is, he also is crucified by the Romans, what that family gave up.

And remember, even when Mary dies, the family goes on. Shirley, do you know the term or do any of you know (???) or the Lord and Suzanna is the relatives of the Lord. There’s a whole group in the late first, early second century. We have records of them and they’re called the ???, the families of the Lord. And the Pauline church doesn’t like that because they’re like, well, it doesn’t matter. God is our Father and Jerusalem is above, and who cares whether you’re the family of the Lord? But this group is remembering traditions. I wish we had more from them, but we do get stories here and there about them. Like the grandsons of Jude. We have a great story about them. They’re farmers and they till the soil and they get arrested and tortured and interrogated because they think they could be doing something politically against Rome. This is during the second revolt. And they said, we didn’t find anything they’re guilty of except excessive foolishness. They were probably saying things like, God will judge you and this is evil or whatever. This material is largely lost. I’m trying to recover as much as I can in my book.

Shirley Paulson

Mary, what do you want to ask or say?

Mary

Yeah. Hi Dr. Tabor. This is a real simple question. I love your comment about you thought Mary was a teacher of her children, and isn’t there a reference in the Bible of Mary telling Jesus to please change the water into wine for the wedding? And he said, it’s not my time yet. Can you comment on that particular Bible passage,

James Tabor

Please? Yeah. That’s one of the ones that’s quoted as negative on Mary. And I don’t want, first of all, we’re in the gospel of Johns. We have to realize we’ve changed, I guess genres even. And we’ve changed the language. And

Mary

Why is it negative? Why is it negative?

James Tabor

Doesn’t have to be negative, but it’s read as negative.

Mary

Yeah. I’m not sure why it’s negative. Basically woman,

James Tabor

Like woman, we would say today, what are the things of you to me? But all of that has to do with tone and colloquial expressions. Yeah,

Mary

I never read it that way.

James Tabor

Just, yeah, you read it as positive then. Good. I’m glad. Because first of all, it’s his first miracle in John. And I tend to take those things as more mythological myself and bringing out a theological point. My time isn’t yet come. Meaning if I start doing these mighty miracles, things are going to unfold much faster than I want them to. But I just don’t take John on that level. But I don’t see the story as negative. I really don’t. And people have written about this, that the Greek expression is not necessarily negative, but look what she’s in charge of. Why is she asking about the wine? Once again, Mary’s the matriarch somehow attending at the wedding. Whose wedding is it? Well, I’d take a guess that it might be James’s unless it’s Jesus’s. But if it’s Jesus’s, then it would be like, Hey, it’s your wedding.

We’ve run out of wine. That’s a good stretch for us. It depends on what you think of the whole Mary Magdalene thing. But I’ve written three books. It’s a trilogy: the Jesus dynasty. Then I wrote the Jesus discovery where I came out of the closet and changed my mind and I said, no, I think Mary Magdalene was with Jesus. However you want to say that she was intimate with him, doesn’t have to immediately go to sex, but she’s his intimate companion. And then I wrote a book on Paul, and it’s my editor and agent who said, James, because I have a big section on Mary Magdalene in the Jesus discovery. And he said, you got to do the mother. And at first I thought, there’s nothing about her. What would I write? He goes, you’ll be able to do it. Start digging.

Shirley Paulson

Seven years

James Tabor

Later, but thank you for that question, Mary,

Mary

You’re welcome.

James Tabor

If someone asked you, how would you explain that? It’s not negative.

Mary

It’s not negative because she’s giving him instruction to encourage him to move forward and make progress. And he’s reluctant to take that first step publicly. Hey, so

James Tabor

You’re making the teacher you’re making? Yes. And have you noticed he takes his family and goes to Cana. Why is he taking his family there? This is also in John, and then he takes his mother and brothers to Capernaum where he sets up headquarters. So I’m not throwing John’s framework out, I’m just wondering about the theology. But I like your idea. And also to say woman is like, that’s not a today, it would be pejorative. We don’t use it like that, mom. It’s not like that. It’s basically lady like, man.

Mary

Well, he is not going to tell her. He’s not going to say to her mother just like he didn’t say father to Joseph either. Yeah, he knows where he is from.

Shirley Paulson

Okay, we’re going to move on to Peggy. Peggy, go ahead.

Peggy

Renee’s having some trouble with microphone. Her question is, can Dr. Tabor explain his reasoning for calling it a misreading of the text when Jesus talked about his family being his followers? And it looks like Toto agrees with that question. Somebody also has that question.

James Tabor

Great. Good. That’s a good one. I always get asked. It very simply put, it’s very crowded. You can’t get in the place and the mother and brothers are there. They live there, they’re staying there, and they come home maybe from shopping or doing something and all of a sudden you can’t even get in. And what Jesus is saying there, we would say, as we often say in English, which is Spanish Mi Casa, Su Casa, they go, your mother and brothers are out there. And he’s like, oh, well the family’s here. You guys are going to have to leave now because we’re going to get back. He says, your mother and brothers are here. And yes, all of you who listen and hear are my mother and brothers and sisters, and we’re all one. I think it’s extremely positive. It’s not a rejection in any way.

Shirley Paulson

Well, this is fun.

James Tabor

Yeah, that’s how I read it.

Shirley Paulson

Alright.

James Tabor

This is not going to be disrespectful to his mother. If so, we’ve got a real problem. It’s one of the 10 commandments.

Speaker 6

Right?

Shirley Paulson

Exactly. Helen,

Helen

This is a continuation of this what you’re talking about. I lived in Africa for nine years, so I’m pretty familiar with the culture in Southern Africa. And their word for brother or cousin is the same word. Their word for mother and aunt or uncle and father are the same word. And they treat each other. They treat the mother and the aunt the same. They treat the brothers and the cousins the same. They often exchange children and raise each other’s children. So this whole idea of Jesus not having any brothers or having brothers that might not be actually something that was created by Mary is I think a very distinct possibility because I see a lot of parallels with the way that whole idea of family is treated in the Middle East and in perhaps antiquity. And I wondered if you could comment on that. And the other question I had, if I can throw it in here, is where did the Catholic idea come that Mary herself was from a virgin birth? So those are my two questions. Yeah.

James Tabor

Okay, good. On the first one, the only listing we have of the brothers, Matthew is secondary and he even gives the full names. But Mark six verse three, it’s my most important verse for the book is this. Not the son of Mary, the carpenter, the son of Mary are not his brothers with us names the four and his sisters, they’re here. And I think the most natural reading is that those are her children western. And since Joseph does sleep with her, even in Matthew who certainly believes in the virgin birth as it’s called, it’s actually the virgin conception when you really read it, not necessarily birth.

So I just take them because the circumstance of saying they’re cousins or they’re actually cousins or sons, children of Joseph, the Eastern Church says children of Joseph, older children of Joseph by different woman, and each case they’re trying to protect Mary from ever being a sexual person and being with her husband and being married. She has to be above all of that because she’s holy. And I just think that’s a later in position in Judaism, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth is the first commandment. The rabbis say the first mitzvah, which it is when you open Genesis. Now, that would not actually detract at all from what you’re saying because that would mean the biological family gets merged with the new Jesus family, which is the rich and the poor and the slave and the free and the male and the female and Jew and everybody together. And that was why it was such a threat. He begins to propose this egalitarian society in which wealth is shared and all the barriers that we put up socially or going to come down. And no culture can stand that. They just feel like, well, we’re going to lose everything. We have to keep everything intact. And I think he thinks the end is near. And so the whole thing is the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God is at hand. It’s breaking into history. So your other one was remind me quickly. Yeah. It was about

Helen

If Mary herself was born of an immaculate word.

James Tabor

Yeah, yeah. Okay. Yeah. It’s almost sort of like who made God? Oh, this other being made God. Well, who made that being? They have to keep going back in terms of holiness. So it’s sort of like, okay, well Anna is her name Anna, by the way. She lives in Sepphoris. She’s born in Sepphoris. I covered that in the book. So Mary grows up in Sepphoris, she’s sophisticated, she’s an urban kid, urban chick as we say. She’s like a amazing woman. I think. Did you know the rabbis say that she’s a descendant of kings and princes? It’s in the toman. They say she’s a descendant, she’s a royal descendant. So now because of this idea of original sin, immaculate conception has to do not with Mary. Catholics generally have this straight if they listened in catechism, but most people don’t. My students always say, well, do you believe in immaculate conception?

They mean the so-called virgin birth, but the virgin birth in the early church is also virgin conception and virgin birth, to be frank, because after birth, Mary is still intact. And if you remember that crazy story and that pseudo gospel of James, which to me is just total mythology, she gets checked after birth and Yep, yep. Still a virgin, which just Jesus kind of basically appears if you read the account, it’s like is he even sort of has him and there he is, like he’s maybe walking around preaching the sermon on the mount already or something. So it’s not realistic. But original sin is the idea that when you’re born, you Adams and Eve’s transgression is passed on to all humans. It’s based on a misreading of Romans five where Paul says death passed to all people, but they don’t read the next verse because all have sinned.

Not we’ve all had our Garden of Eden. We’ve all eaten the forbidden fruit because we all have the knowledge of good and evil and we haven’t always chosen good, but that’s developed into a kind of thing that’s inherited. Well, if she’s going to be the pure vehicle that brings forth a sinless child, she has to somehow be born sinless as well. So basically you have a triple miracle when it really gets developed, Anna gets pregnant. That’s even a problem. If you read the story, Joachim is out of town and the reason he left is to go pray for his wife who’s barren, no children. And then he comes back and everybody runs and says, your wife’s pregnant. Your wife’s pregnant, but he’s been gone for months. So it almost wants to, you almost have another miraculous conception that’s sort of being implied.

Shirley Paulson

How old is that story?

James Tabor

How old is it, did you say?

Shirley Paulson

Yeah, how far back does it go?

James Tabor

It’s funny. It’s called the Protoevangelium of James. And it claims to be written by James, and I just think it’s, oh, she’s a Vestal virgin and grows up in the temple and then when she starts her period, she has to leave because you can’t have a menstruating woman in the temple. I mean, I think that sounds so pagan Jews don’t have Vestal virgins running around attending in the temple. We’re getting into the third fourth century now. You’ll hear scholars that that text, I’m not particularly fond of it. I don’t think it has hardly any history in it except that Zacharias came and Anna live in Sepphoris and they’re wealthy. I do like that. I think Jesus comes from a wealthy family and gives it all up. So thank you.

Shirley Paulson

Wow. So I’m just trying to understand your chronology here. You’re talking about this idea of the original sin, but that’s like with Augustine in the fourth, fifth century, isn’t it? So what was going on between maybe the second and fifth century with happening to Mary?

James Tabor

Yeah, I don’t know when it was actually formulated because since Paul has that verse about in Adam all sin and in Christ or Adam all died in Christ, all of be made alive. I just am not up on the history of that doctrine. You could probably even find it just in a Catholic dictionary or even Wikipedia. When was that first taught? But I think original sin goes back before Augustine. I think it is earlier.

Shirley Paulson

I see. Alright. I’m pretty sure. Okay, Pat, go ahead.

Pat

Yeah, I had read somewhere that the word that is used to describe Mary doesn’t just mean virgin, it means a young woman apparently in Greek. And the place that I read it said that that usage of the word was also in the Old Testament. And of course if you’re trying to make somebody sound holy, I guess you decide on the side of making it a virgin. But did the word also include the usage of a young woman as well?

James Tabor

Absolutely. Yeah. It’s quoting Isaiah 7:14. I have a YouTube channel and I have a program on this if you want to look up and get the whole thing.

It’s quoting Isaiah 7:14 where Isaiah in the King James says, behold a virgin shall conceive and bear his son and you’ll call his name Emmanuel, God with us. That’s picked up by Matthew. But if you look at Matthew’s quotations like that, we read it now, and fundamentalists read it as this: is that meaning this was a prophecy of that. But that this doesn’t mean, it means this is like that perfect example, “Out of Egypt, I’ve called my son, and that’s used for Joseph and Mary coming out of Egypt, the son. But if you look it up in Hosea, it’s my son Israel. See? It’s saying, so in Isaiah’s time, I think it might be Isaiah’s child because then he says, these children, the Lord has given me are signs and wonders of the Lord. It’s absolutely a simple Hebrew word that means a young woman.

Of course, you assume and hope she’s a virgin. It means a young girl that’s of marriageable age in that time, 14, 15, 16, right in there. She’s a young woman. You don’t go like, well, has she slept with anybody yet? Because you’re thinking of something that would be a fit, that culture, which was considered honorable to not sleep with anyone until you’re married. Our culture seems to be shifting from that quite considerably and many cultures in the modern world. But it used to be an idea that was out when my grandmother was a child, and certainly when my mother was a child, that you waited till you were married to sleep with someone. I think that’s what you’re seeing there. It’s actually Matthew uses Parthenon, and people say, yeah, but Parthenon then is Virgin. Not really. It is assumed the young beautiful girl would be a virgin, but again, it doesn’t mean virgin.

It’s not, you’re going from Hebrew and Greek to English. You’re right, Pat, what you read was right. Read Raymond Brown, the Birth of the Messiah, big thick book by a Catholic theologian, right? Wonderful book. And he doesn’t let dogma get in the way of doing good historical research. I knew him well. He’s so many of these great people. I guess I’m getting old. So many have passed now and I just loved him and I love his work. He also wrote The Death of the Messiah, which is two volumes. So wonderful scholar. So good question though, because so many people ask that. Now, if you read Matthew, not Luke, but Matthew, I’ll tell you something interesting to note. The couple is engaged. This is the Joseph side of the story. Remember just Matthew, forget Luke for a minute. The couple is engaged. He finds out that she’s pregnant.

Maybe she tells him he’s not willing to shame her and put her away publicly and make an example of her. He could really ruin her life, but he doesn’t plan to marry her because it’s someone else’s child. He has a dream and the dream said, take that woman and take that woman means take that child. I wonder if he ever told anybody, we don’t know exactly. If you go to Luke, you get a certain chronology that marries in her third month and so forth. Well, those of you who’ve had children know that different people show pregnancy in different ways at different months and body sizes. And I think my wife actually was different with different children in terms of your body. I’ve just wondered sometimes if Joseph said, Mary the dream basically said that child is of the Holy Spirit. Now you can take it literally like, oh God impregnated Mary through some miracle. Or you can take it as that child is no reason to put her away. To the contrary, that child is destined to be the Messiah. Take her and marry her. And I think we say he adopted well, maybe nobody ever knew you don’t need an adoption if nobody knows who the father is. Wow. I don’t know. I’m suggesting possibilities here that go beyond just the typical virgin birth story.

Really that phrase by the Holy Spirit reminds me of Abraham and Sarah where the messenger or angel as it’s translated, which is actually Yahweh, if you look, it’s Yahweh speaking. I will come to her at this season next year and she will bear a child. I don’t think he’s thinking of impregnating Sarah, but it says, and then God did to her as he said. And yet the child is the seed of Abraham. So it’s not exactly parallel, but the language about a divinely ordained birth that otherwise wouldn’t have happened. So

Shirley Paulson

Wow, this is really stretching us in a lot of different wonderful ways here. I wonder,

James Tabor

I hope you think it’s wonderful.

Shirley Paulson

Oh, well, I think what’s wonderful is that you’re letting us imagine things without boundaries. That we don’t have to have it a certain way in order to believe something, but rather to just stretch our imagination. And I think that’s wonderful. Whether we can go with you on everything will be left to be seen.

James Tabor

We can, when you get the book, we’ll see. And if you read French, the book is already out.

I’ll take some flack, but also I think millions of women particularly and men are going to say, it’s about time we realize what Mary went through. And Catholics are open to that. It’s just the sexuality thing. Many years ago, I taught at Notre Dame. We didn’t mention that I taught at Notre Dame seven years. I’m not Roman Catholic, but boy, did I get to know Catholics? I’m in the Department of Theology and Catholics—I love the way they talk so much about Mary, how she would’ve suffered and how as the mother, if they’re very conservative, they’ll have a problem with the sexuality thing. But if that’s okay with them based on Matthew saying Joseph slept with her after Jesus was born, they can get over that. And then what they say, I think many of us have to agree with what an extraordinary woman to have taken over that family.

And most Catholics also say that Joseph probably died early on. If he’s a builder, he could have well been killed in a building accident. I mean, I think it’s stone, not wood. He’s a stone mason and they’re building … because it was burnt down by the Romans. They’re rebuilding it. So the family, I think they’re operating a construction company, so to speak, and Joseph is head of it and all the boys, they’re probably working since age three, carrying little hammers and chisels. And the reason I think it’s stone is every example Jesus gives a building is stone. Dig a foundation, dig a tower, be sure cornerstones. He’s talking about stone, he seems to know. He never talks about making door frames and wagon wheels and little wooden toys. I know it’s a quaint picture at Christmas, but I picture him as a stone mason. I think he’s tough too. Then if you’re a stone mason, you are tough.

Shirley Paulson

It is hard for us to say goodbye. But our hour has come to an end here.

James Tabor

Okay. It was great being with you.

James Tabor

I have a Patreon account too, and mine is patreon.com/jamesdtabor. You can also go to Patreon and search for Dr. James Tabor.

Shirley Paulson

Well, it’s so hard to say goodbye. There are so many more questions, but this has been great. I’m going to just sign off here with saying thanks to everybody for your participation. This was the August 2024 Bible and Beyond discussion titled “The Quest for the Historical Mary, Mother of Jesus” with guest scholar, Dr. James Tabor.