Folia Theologica 6. (1995)
János Székely: Mary and Martha how to receive the divine guest?
168 J. SZÉKELY not only to account a biographical episode of the life of Jesus28, or to indicate the right behavior of ladies when receiving an itinerant preacher. It depicts the right behavior of the disciple towards the Lord and his word, the right behavior of man towards his God. It affirms that to receive the Lord is to be received by Him, and to serve Him is to be served by Him (cf. Lk 12,37). To interpret then our pericope as a comparison between the active and the contemplative life29, beyond the fact of having applied an outside philosophical category (theoria - poiesis) apparently not present in the lukan gospel, misses the point of the story. Luke doesn’t compare here two possible ways of life. He presents the only one which is appropriate.30 Having thus determined the main direction of interpretation, which according to my opinion must be followed, I would finally show some connections of the themes of the Mary and Martha story with the whole lukan work to give them their depth of meaning. The wandering Jesus Luke takes from Mark the information about Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem (Mk 10,46=Lk 18,35; Mk 10,1.32), but he shapes from it one of the major theological patterns of his gospel (and of the Acts). This wandering of Jesus has been differently iterpreted by the scholars, and one interpretation doesn’t exclude the other. Cristological interpretation. The wandering of the Lord with his face ’hardened’31 (9,51) towards the city of his sufferings, the city which kills the prophets (13,34-35) is a littéral means of Luke to underline the cons28 So DIBELIUS. 29 This kind of interpretation was general from the patristic times till the last decades of our cetury. Cf. GREGORIUS MAGNUS, Ezech, II. horn. 2,9. 30 Which, of course, can be called 'contemplative'. In this sense 'everyone who serves the table' must be first of all a contemplative person, listening continually the Lord's word. Otherwise the Christian love degenerates in activism. Cf. PLUMMER, Luke p. 290. These somewhat abstract considerations don't exclude at all a biographical interpretation. Jesus in his way towards his death (already near to Jerusalem in Bethany?) might have been much more content having Mary near to himself listening, than to eat a great dinner. Martha hasn't realized the necessity of the hour. How much time it happens in our 'charity' activities the same. In the troubles of serving we forget the person before us. 31 An allusion probably to Is 50,7.
