The Outrageous Anointing: 6/13/10

Holy Trinity/La Santisima Trinidad
Reflections on
Luke 7:36-8:3
6/13/10

The story of the anointing woman is a well-known and well-cherished one and probably was at the time that the Gospel of Luke was written. It is dear to my heart because it illuminates two of the elements of Jesus’ life and teachings that fascinate me most: Jesus’ relationship with the women of the New Testament, and the teaching that Jesus tried so hard to convey to his uncomprehending disciples - the teaching of unconditional, extravagant love.

This story occurs, in differing versions, in all four gospels, which is very unusual for any of the New Testament stories. In every version it is an outrageous act, for differing reasons. But in only one of the four stories, in our story of today from the Gospel of Luke, is the anointing woman is a sinner. And so in this version it is the fact of Jesus receiving and touching a “woman of the city- a sinner,” that shocks the on-lookers. As his host testily says, “If this man were a prophet he would know who and what this woman is.” There was a strict taboo against any first century woman letting a man other than her husband even see her hair, it was usually tightly bound with cloth-so you can imaging how shocking this scene would have been.

In the anointing woman story in John and in Matthew and Mark, it is the extravagant waste of the very precious oil that shocks the bystanders. It was then and is now an utterly counter-cultural act. Love without counting the cost. But the extravagance in our story today is the gesture, heedless of propriety, heedless of taboos, heedless of any thought of limitation or fear. It is a outrageously courageous act.

I suppose that in every one of us there is something of the Pharisee and something of the anointing woman. It is a little surprising that Jesus was invited to the home of the Pharisee. The Pharisees were a very strict and exclusive sect, their name coming from the Hebrew “Parush” or “set apart.” Jesus alienated himself constantly from the Pharisees by his contempt for the law- and the purity codes- healing on the Sabbath, refusing to fast, taking women as disciples, allowing the touch of a bleeding woman, speaking with, healing and raising up women of the despised races of the Canaanites and the Samaritans, and, of course associating with sinners, as he does in our gospel of today. You have to wonder if Simon the Pharisee did not have a few misgivings in inviting him over. Then when this outrageous act occurs, at his tidy dinner table, he must have thought “Oh my God, I was afraid something like this might happen!” Jesus obviously hears his thoughts when the Pharisee sneers at the woman, as she covers Jesus feet with her tears and her kisses.

“Simon, I have something to say to you.” This is one of the most direct statements we ever hear from Jesus. He will not let pass the opportunity to show the Pharisee what a true disciple should be like. He will not pass up the opportunity to show Simon the human miracle taking place before them.

There are many examples of Jesus performing miracles of unimaginable abundance in all the gospels: The feeding of the multitudes, the massive catch of fish that Simon and his fellow fishermen harvest, the gallons and gallons of expensive wedding wine, and Jesus’ instruction to forgive your brother not seven times but seventy times seven times. ”

But in the story of the anointing woman, we have someone other than Jesus actually performing a courageous, taboo-breaking act of tremendous generosity. We are shown that one doesn’t have to be Jesus of Nazareth, one doesn’t have to have miraculous powers to emulate the kind of unconditional and almost limitless love that Jesus models.

In Matthew and Mark, Jesus defends the anointing woman from the scolding disciples saying, “Truly I tell you, wherever this good news is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in remembrance of her.” Ironically, in these two Gospels, she is never named. And, for the most part, it is Luke’s sinful woman of the city that has traditionally remained as a composite portrait of her. She has often been inaccurately identified as Mary Magdalene, although nowhere in the Gospels is it written that Mary of Magdalene was any kind of sinner. But this sermon today and so many throughout the centuries have fulfilled the prophecy that she will be remembered. And Jesus’ words hold more importance than can be ascribed to a simple act of extravagance. It is the anointing of the Anointed One. It is the good news- the news that we can allow the Grace to rain from us for a change; we can give something without calculating the cost.

In the book of Isaiah, God says,

Do not remember the former things,
Or consider the things of old.
I am about to do a new thing
Now it springs forth do you not perceive it?

Like the Old Testament God of Isaiah, the anointing woman, and Jesus of Nazareth, were trying a new thing. As it sprang forth, like that flood of fragrant oil, like that extravagant gesture of love that Jesus presented to the uncomprehending Pharisee, a new idea came into being, a new life and a new hope, not based on market forces, not based on self-preservation, but based on unlimited love. Based on the unfettered compulsion to give back something for something incredibly precious that has been given. What we all have been given is unimaginably precious. We have been given the glory of creation, we have been given the miracle of Jesus, and we have been given boundless grace.

The Christian Buddhist, Thick Nhat Hahn best describes for me this abundance that we are all gifted with: He reminds us that:

The winds of grace are always blowing- we have only to put up our sails.

Jesus calls us to mirror the anointing woman and give back in some small measure, the love that has been so extravagantly poured out for us.
The never-ending raining down of Grace in our lives- Grace we did not earn, Grace we can’t even conceive of, and grace that does not ever exist in terms of lack or cost, but only in glorious abundance.

Amen