woman was, and at what time in our Lord's ministry the transactions here described took place, have occasioned much discussion, and called forth much variety of opinion among commentators. On one point only almost all are agreed : She had been a notorious sinner against the seveoth commdndment.
The Romish writers, MaJdouatus and Cornelius a Lapide maintain strongly that this woman was Mary Magdalene, and that the anointing here recorded is the same as that which took place at Bethany, and is described by Matthew, Mark, and John. Both these opinions seem untenable.
There is not the slightest evidence in Scripture that the "woman who was a sinner" was Mary Magdalene. Ohemnitius says there is no authority for the opinion but tradition, and that this tradition began with Gregory the First, and was un- supported by the earlier fathers, Chrysostom, Origen, Ambrose, and Jerome. — There is no evidence that Mary Magdalene was the sister of Martha and Lazarus, and lived at Bethany. — Above all, there is not the least proof in Scripture that Mary Magdalene had ever been "a woman that was a sinner* against the seventh commandment.
Qn the other hand, there is strong internal evidence that the event here recorded by St. Luke, took place at an entirely different time and place from that recorded by Matthew, Mark, and John. Granting that St. Luke does not always relate events in regular chronological order, it seems asking too much to sup- pose that an event which all the other evangelists agree in placing at the end of our Lord's life on earth, should be so entirely dragged out of its place by St. Luke as to be brought in at this early period of His ministry. — Moreover, the expressions which St. Luke reports in this passage, appear very unlikely to have been used at the end of our Lord's ministry, and at the house of friends in Bethany. The question, " who is this that for- . giveth sins also?" sounds like a question that would be asked at a comparatively early period of his ministry, and not like one that men would ask at the end of three years, and just before His death.
The true account I believe to be, that the events here recorded by St. Luke are entirely distinct from those recorded by Matthew, Mark, and John, and that the woman here mentioned is one whose name is, for wise and kind reasons, withheld from the Church. This is the view maintained by the great majority of all Protestant commentators.
It is a curious fact, that John Bunyan, in his famous sermon called " The Jerusalem sinner saved," maintains the strange view that the woman here described by St. Luke was Mary the sister of Martha, though he confeses that he got the picturesque story he founds on it, from a book which he saw twenty-four years before. For once the good man seems to have made a mistake.