MRS. A. S. LEWIS, ON THE GENEALOGIES OF OUR LORD. 35 



There may be a difference of opinion as to whether " Mary the 

 daughter of Heli," who is mentioned in the Jerusalem Talmud, 

 is Mary the mother of our Lord, or Mary Magdalene. She is 

 represented as suffering great torture in Gehenna, and I would 

 submit that this really fiendish idea must have sprung from the 

 spite which many of the Jews undoubtedly felt for the most 

 blessed among women, and which nothing in the history of Mary 

 Magdalene could have been sufficient to awaken. We know that 

 in their blind hate they confounded the two Marys, and gave out 

 that the Virgin Mary had earned her living as a woman's hair- 

 dresser, the verb gadal in Hebrew meaning " to plait." Jewish 

 tradition says that after the Virgin-birth had been spoken about 

 at Pentecost, she had to bear with many gibes and insults from 

 her fellow-countrymen. May it not have been for this reason that 

 she perhaps ended her days at Ephesus, as well as for the purpose 

 of being under the care of her sister's son, the Apostle John, to 

 whom her Divine Son had entrusted her 1 



To Mr. E. Sewell I reply, that the question as to which Mary 

 is mentioned in the Talmud would be best decided by Jewish 

 scholars. He will find the subject discussed in Dr. Dalman's book, 

 Jesus Christ in the Talmud, translated by Dr. Streane. I cannot see 

 that Dr. Gore's authority, although great, is final, nor is Lightfoot's, 

 because new editions and translations of the Talmud have appeared 

 since his day. 



The legends about Mary in the Talmud are certainly a tissue of 

 confused nonsense ; but still it is remarkable that the name of Heli 

 should be brought into connection with Mary's at all. 



Amongst the German scholars who support the Heli theory, 

 I may mention Drs. Zahn, Laible, Vogt, and Bardenhewer. One of 

 these, I think it is Dr. Zahn, points out that the name Joseph is 

 not part of Luke's genealogy, for in that genealogy the name 

 of each member is preceded by tov, whereas the word vlos stands 

 before Joseph to express the supposition that our Lord was his son. 



I cannot help thinking that Joseph would have clearly been 

 included in the genealogy if rov had stood before his name, i.e., if 

 we had read vlo^ rov 'Icocrricf). Tov has the same effect in Greek as 

 the Irish " 0 " in names like O'Donnell, or as I am told that the 

 Northumberland miners put it when they call a boy " Jack o' Jim," 

 " Tom o' Jack," without any further surname. I would point out 



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