An emailer informs me:
Your reference to Jesus’ closes friend as a ‘former prostitute’ I assume is Mary Magdalene. Please know there is nothing to suggest she was a prostitute. Even the Vatican, many years ago, acknowledged the mistake of previous teaching. The assumption of sexual sin when women are described in the Bible as sinners is evidence of the patriarchy that continues today. I’ve heard it preached about the woman at the well, the woman who anointed Jesus and Mary Magdalene, all being guilty of sexual sin or being prostitutes. There are no facts in evidence to support that. The woman at the well, having five husbands, could just as easily been her first four died and she was handed off to brothers as property – the custom in those days. There have been other suggestions that the five husbands stood for five different iterations of God in Samaritan culture…etc. In future writings when you mention Mary Magdalene, don’t fall into the trap of a centuries old mistake. Give her a break. She’s had the worst press of anyone in the Bible.
Point taken.
The Dish 