The Passion of Mary Magdalen by Elizabeth Cunningham

Do not believe in hearsay, rumor, speculative opinion, public opinion, or mere acceptance to logic and inference alone. Do not believe in something because the authorities say it is so. Do not believe in something a teacher tells you to. Do not believe in something believing a god has inspired it. Do not believe in something because a scripture says it is so. Do not believe in something because it has been practiced by generations or becomes a tradition or part of a culture. The Buddha himself is quoted: “Do not believe in something because it is reported. Moreover, insisting on the texts’ authenticity can lead to fundamentalism, which is an anti-Buddhist attitude. In addition to the gender-free nature of the teachings themselves, textual scholars confirm that the Buddha admitted women and lower castes into his sangha at a time when such things were simply not done. I don’t believe the Buddha was responsible for the misogyny in the stories of his life and teachings.

If this “violates” the myth, it does not violate the Buddha’s fundamental views. Hopefully, my version of Ananda suggests new possibilities for feeling and living these responses. The answers to these questions cannot be stated as propositions they must be felt and lived.

When her quest leads her to the Buddha’s all-male sangha, she disguises herself as a monk, eventually becoming Ananda, who in the scriptures is the Buddha’s attendant, the one who struggles with all the questions unenlightened practitioners face today. In my novel, Bride of the Buddha, the Buddha’s wife embarks on a spiritual journey of her own. These stories counter the traditional narratives that restrict women, as well as men, to roles that rob them of their full humanity. Unfortunately, they include stories, from Adam and Eve to Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty, that define women by using criteria such as gullibility, passivity, and the size of their feet.īut today women are shining light on the likes of Circe, Mary Magdalene, and Briseus, the young woman dismissed by Homer as an impediment to Achilles’s higher purposes.

Webster defines myth as “a usually traditional story of ostensibly historical events that serves to unfold part of the world view of a people or explain a practice, belief, or natural phenomenon,” and in this way myths tell us who we are.

The Passion of Mary Magdalen by Elizabeth Cunningham