As I thought about the theme of one of the Easter Sundays, the Myrrhbearing Women, I wondered: what’s the deeper symbolic meaning that the first witnesses of the resurrection were female? Then, the answer came to me through the movie Shrek. (Reflections on the Sunday of the Myrrhbearing women)
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Seeing Symbolically
Lately, I’ve been interested in deeper symbolic meanings found in stories (such as movies, books, or even scripture) or images (think, iconography). As the argument goes there are deep patterns (archetypes) that are biologically built into us. These patterns are what we draw on to give meaning to the world around us – whether we’re aware of those patterns or not.
For example, one such pattern is death and rebirth. Nature goes through this cycle constantly: from the death of winter to the rebirth of spring.
Scripture records Jesus also playing with this idea: “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” (John 12:24). Of course, this is also the idea of the cross and resurrection.
How does knowing any of this help with understanding? Well, it helps us understand the significance of sacrifice, especially the ones we embrace in life. For example, we sacrifice fun in college in order to prosper later in our careers. The sacrifice of fun is a “death,” while the successful career one gets as a result of a college degree is a “rebirth” of a “new” you.
So, it’s in this sort of light that I wondered about the Myrrhbearing women.
In a post-truth world that’s full of “fake-news,” we know that a story can be rooted in history, but the story-teller still chooses how to “spin” the story. Even if it was the Myrrhbearing woman who historically discovered the empty tomb, that doesn’t mean the evangelists (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) had to record that fact. By emphasizing some events over others, the story can take on different meanings. (In our world, this makes the “truth” ever more important.) I also believe that the evangelists were very careful about what they wrote. Every word is embedded with meaning.
So, my question two-fold.
One: why did the evangelists decide to record the story of these women (they could have very well said that the disciples heard of the empty tomb and carried the good news forth and left out how they heard the news)?
And, two: what’s the deeper symbolic meaning that of a resurrection that was first proclaimed by females? Here I’m not looking for a feministic or patriarchal or political explanation. I actually think there’s something symbolically important happening here that has to do with an understanding of “feminine” that isn’t just biological sex or gender (here I’m asking about “feminine” in the sense of archetype).
So, I started to think.
And I started some conversations to figure all this out. Then I stumbled upon, or rather, remembered a video by Orthodox carver, Jonathan Pageau. In this video, he explains the deeper symbolic meaning of the movie Shrek.
I’m including that video here. I encourage you to watch it, but I’ll also summarize the import parts below.
So essentially, Pageau talks about the balance, or the unsettling of the balance, of the center (city) by the margin (countryside and forests).
The Father
The center, represented in Shrek by Lord Farquaad, represents order, authority, power, organization, government, beauty, tradition…and the rest. In short, the kingdom represents everything that fits in an ordered world. It’s everything we can make sense of. It’s things that have meaning for us.
The archetype of the center is usually represented by the “Great Father,” who represents known or explored territory. As I’ll argue below, the Father also stands for tradition. As an image, the “Father” can either be good or bad. (Don’t confuse this archetype with God the Father, a person of the Trinity. That’s an entirely different concept. Also, don’t confuse this with a biological father.)
The Mother
The margin, represented in Shrek by Shrek, is everything that doesn’t fit. It’s the beginning of the chaos, the unorganized… It’s where monsters, ogres, and barbarians live. If there’s something we don’t understand, it’s regulated to the margin. The margin also functions as a boundary marker between the organized and disorganized. It’s the marker between life and death. But, when chaos is organized, the margin also represents potential. All good stories are of heroes entering into the unknown to find the treasure, to rescue someone of importance, or to find glory.
The margin is usually represented by the “Great Mother,” who represents images of the unknown or unexplored territory. Why? Because entering into the unknown has the possibility of giving birth to something new — a “Motherly” image, if you will. Just as the “Father” can be good or bad, so too does the “Mother” have positive and negative aspects.
Understanding Shrek
The movie is about what happens with the center asserts too much control, power, and authority. It’s about what happens when the center doesn’t make room for the margin. In this case, Lord Farquaad casts out everyone who doesn’t “fit,” which upsets the balance. Shrek, as a representative of the margin, is forced out of his home and goes to confront the center. Eventually, the balance is so upset that the center is consumed by the margin — literally, in this case, when the dragon eats Lord Farquaad.
In symbolic language, the movie is about the “Great Mother” overtaking and consuming the “Tyrannical Father.”
It’s here that it all made sense. The story of the resurrection, from Joseph of Arameatha to the Myrrhbearing women, is, essentially, the story of Shrek! (Or, maybe, it’s the other way around?)
Joseph and the Myrrhbearing Women
Joseph of Arameatha goes to Pilate after the resurrection to ask for the body of Christ in order to bury it. To most of us, this doesn’t strike us as odd. After all, that’s what you do when someone dies — you bury them.
But, Jesus had spent his entire career explaining to the disciples that he must die, after which this will be followed by resurrection on the third day. So, if you are a believing disciple, such as Joseph claims to be, why would you bother burying Jesus’s body? It’s almost as if Mark is telling us: Joseph didn’t really believe Jesus. So, instead of resurrection, Joseph thought he could seal Jesus into a tomb (perhaps to prevent the resurrection?). Remember, we talking about how the character of Joseph functions within the story, not about the overall nature (ontology) of Joseph as a saint or person.
The tomb, according to one of my seminary professors (Fr. Paul Tarazi), represents the Temple — established religion and tradition. The Temple regulated ancient Jewish religious life. There were several pilgrimage feasts where it was common for Jews across the Mediterranean world to travel to Jerusalem so they could partake of Temple rituals, including sacrifices. Part of the Temple’s role was to be the center of Jewish religiosity, an authoritative structure with priests. We could say that the Temple is the “Father,” symbolically.
While Jesus, on the other hand, represents the margin. He has no authority given to him by Temple officials, nor does he play any role within Jewish royalty of the day (Herod)(side note: when Jesus performs miracles in scripture, the question is not the modern, “How did he do that?” but, rather, “By whose authority does he do that?”). In fact, geographically, he even comes from the margin. Galilee was north of Judea, where Jerusalem lay, and Samaria even fell between these two regions. Socially, Jesus comes from a carpenter’s family and he was known to hang out with the marginalized of society — tax-collectors, sinners, drunks, orphans, widows, and those afflicted with ailments and diseases. In short, we could say that Jesus is the wilderness, the chaos that confronts the established order.
Jesus is Shrek
So, when Joseph seals the body of Jesus in the tomb, it’s symbolic of the Temple taking control over the Jesus movement. The authoritative power is asserting control over what it sees as a dangerous message. It’s Lord Farquaad expelling all the Disney characters.
However, the “Tyrannical Father” doesn’t win this time either. The margin confronts the “Father” head on and everything is turned upside down. In short, the resurrection affirms the authority of the margin over the center. Jesus rises from the dead.
The Myrrhbearing women, early in the morning, come and discover the empty tomb. Here, they represent the “Great Mother.” The resurrection has brought the possibility of new life — a mother bearing babies. It’s no accident, I think, that the tomb is a “garden tomb.” The garden, of course, also represents the “Great Mother” (think, “Mother Nature”). It’s a bit of chaos, yet in the midst of that, there’s a lot of potential. After all, the treasure is always hidden in a dangerous place.
St. Paul picks up on this when he calls baptism a death and rebirth. He also picks up on this when he says Christians are a new creation. The Myrrhbearing women, in this case, are representative of the Church (the Virgin Mary also plays this role), the mother of all Christians. No longer does the “Tyrannical Father” rule. The margin has overtaken the center.
Everything’s Reversed
This idea is a reversal of reality. It turns everything upside-down. But this is consistent with the gospel message — the last shall become first. Just check out the Beatitudes: the poor inherit the kingdom, the hungry are filled, those weeping laugh, those who are hated rejoice, and so on. It also gives understanding to Jesus hanging out with the marginalized.
The Myrrhbearing women, as the “Great Mother,” represent hope, new life, a new beginning, rebirth, and resurrection. But, if we’ve learned anything, we have to be careful. Now, 2,000 years later, we’ve inherited a complete religious tradition. If we’re not careful, it can turn into the “Tyrannical Father,” stifling life, hope, and resurrection. It can become too authoritative, sealing us in a tomb.
We have to constantly remember the power of the resurrection, where it’s strength comes from and how Jesus demonstrated that strength through his life, love, and death. We have to remember and celebrate the upside-downess of the margin overtaking the center.