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The Departure
of Mary's soul from her
body
This is a rarely depicted scene in Art. Before the Assumption of the
physical body of Mary, a number of texts tell of the departure of
Mary's soul, leaving the body behind:
And when the Lord's day came, at the third hour, just as the
Holy Spirit descended upon the apostles in a cloud, so Christ descended
with a multitude of angels, and received the soul of His beloved mother.
For there was such splendour and perfume of sweetness, and angels singing
the songs of songs, where the Lord says, As a lily among thorns, so is my
love among the daughters, that all who were there present fell on their
faces, as the apostles fell when Christ transfigured Himself before them
on Mount Thabor, and for a whole hour and a half no one was able to rise.
But when the light went away, and at the same time with the light itself,
the soul of the blessed virgin Mary was taken up into heaven with psalms,
and hymns, and songs of songs. And as the cloud went up the whole earth
shook, and in one moment all the inhabitants of Jerusalem openly saw the
departure of St. Mary. (The Passing of the Blessed Virgin Mary, 7th
century, Attrib. Joseph of Arimathea)
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The plot thickens
At this point the various texts become
distinctly anti-Semitic in tone. Previously, we learn that Mary was
forbidden by local Jews from making her twice-daily pilgrimage to the tomb
of Christ:
The Jews, as soon as the Messiah was dead, closed
the tomb, and heaped up large stones against its door; and set watchmen
over the tomb and Golgotha, and gave them orders that, if anyone should go
and pray by the grave or on Golgotha, he should straightway die.
. . . . .
And the watchmen came in and said to the priests, ‘Mary comes in the
evening and the morning and prays there.’ And there was a commotion in
Jerusalem concerning my Lady Mary; and the priests went to the judge and
said to him, ‘My lord, send and order Mary not to go and pray at the
grave and Golgotha’. (The six books - book 2)
Following the death of the Virgin, her
cortege is attacked on the way to the tomb:
And, behold, one of them, who was chief of
the priests of the Jews in his rank, filled with fury and rage, said to
the rest: Behold, the tabernacle of him who disturbed us and all our race,
what glory has it received? And going up, he wished to overturn the bier,
and throw the body down to the ground. And immediately his hands dried up
from his elbows, and stuck to the couch. And when the apostles raised the
bier, part of him hung, and part of him adhered to the couch; and he was
vehemently tormented with pain, while the apostles were walking and
singing. And the angels who were in the clouds smote the people with
blindness. Melito of Sardis, The Passing of Blessed Mary.
In Duccio's picture we see the haloed apostles, and the non-haloed
Jews behind. The chief priest, whom John the Scholar names as
Jephonias, is just about to touch the bier despite Peter telling him that
it would be a really bad idea.
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