means the preparation for burial, the layong out, or embalm- ment. It is explained by xix. 40, as the binding in linen cloths with spices, “as the manner of the Jews is evrapidfew to prepare for burial,” not to bury. It is the Latin pollingere, to wash and prepare a corpse for the funeral pile. Hence the name of the servant to whom this duty was committed was pollinctor. He was a slave of the libitinarius, or furnishing undertaker. Mary, then, has kept the ointment in order to embalm Jesus with it on this day, as though He were already dead. This is the sense of the Synoptists. Matthew (xxvi. 12) says, she did it with reference to my preparation for burial. Mark, she anticipated to anoint.
The reading of the Received Text is, however, disputed. The best textual critics agree that the perfect, rerjpnxev, she hath kept, was substituted for the original reading Tnpnon, the aorist, she may keep, or may have kept, by some one who was trying to bring the text into harmony with Mark xiv. 8; not understanding how she could keep for His burial that which she poured out now. Some, however, urge the exact contrary, namely, that the perfect is the original reading, and that the aorist is a correction by critics who were occupied with the notion that no man is embalmed before his death, or who failed to see how the ointment could have been kept already, as it might naturally be supposed to have been just purchased. (So Godet and Field.)
According to the corrected reading, iva, in order that, is in- serted after des adtyy, let her alone, or suffer her; tetnpn- xev, hath kept, is changed to tnpyjon, may keep, and the whole is rendered, suffer her to keep it against the day of my burying. So Rev.
But it is difficult to see why Christ should desire to have kept for His embalmment what had already been poured out upon Him. Some, as Meyer, assume that only a part of the ointment was poured out, and refer avro, ¢¢, to the part remain- ing. “Let her alone, that she may not give away to the poor this ointment, of which she has just used a portion for the anointing of my feet, but preserve a for the day of ny embalm- ment.” Canon Westcott inclines to this view of the use of only