“Soon afterward he went on through cities and villages, preaching and bringing the good news of the kingdom of God. And the twelve were with him, and also some women who had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities: Mary, called Magdalene, from whom seven demons had gone out…”

Luke 8:1-2 RSV

Mary Magdalene has always intrigued me. I remember being taught about her in Sunday School. She was used as an example…anyone’s life can be turned around for God.

She’d had seven demons living inside of her, for crying out loud! And now look at her…Mary had become a disciple of Jesus.

I remember being taught that she’d been a prostitute before being delivered from demon possession. (Though the text said nothing of the sort!)

As a child, I thought Mary Magdalene must’ve felt pretty awful with seven demons living inside of her. How did seven demons find their way inside of a person in the first place?

It’s interesting how interpretations and opinions can easily change the way a text reads. Not only that, they can change the entire story.

The idea that Mary Magdalene was a prostitute originated from a sermon by Pope Gregory I in 591 AD. In this sermon, he incorrectly merged her story with the unknown prostitute from Luke 7. This interpretation completely overshadowed her role as a significant follower of Jesus. The Catholic Church officially repudiated this interpretation in 1969, though the damage had already been done.

But what if Mary Magdalene’s “demons” weren’t demons at all? What if the text was meant to be read as an analogy which pointed to something greater?

The Power of Seven

In the Bible, the number seven signifies divine perfection and absolute completeness. The world was created in seven days. The Sabbath occurred on the seventh day of the week. Jesus instructs us to forgive seventy-seven times.

Seven points to perfection.

Saying that seven demons had come out of Mary Magdalene means that she had been made “perfect.” She’d experienced profound spiritual liberation by following Jesus!

The Gospel of Mary Magdalene

The Gospel of Mary Magdalene is a gnostic text which scholars date to around 120-180 AD. It likely wasn’t written by Mary herself (though it may have been her version of the Gospel message passed down to her followers), and was not accepted into the Orthodox Canon because it elevated individual enlightenment above established tradition. In it, Mary was a spiritual teacher. The church hierarchy was strictly patriarchal, and the idea of Mary holding authority challenged that. The Gospel of Mary Magdalene’s message is about having a direct, personal relationship with God.

I personally love it!

Anyhow, in it we read…

“When my soul had conquered ignorance, it rose up and saw the fourth power, which assumes seven forms. The first is darkness, the second desire, then ignorance, fear of death, power of the flesh, foolish reason, and self-righteous pedantry…My soul replied, ‘What bound me is dead, what enveloped me has been vanquished; my desires are over and ignorance is no more.’”

Ah…everything is starting to click now.

Could these seven forms be the seven “demons” Luke 8 mentions?

Perhaps Mary was never possessed by demons at all.

After sitting with this quietly, I began to see Mary Magdalene in a different light. One not shadowed by an incorrect interpretation of the Christian Bible.

If a teaching ever seems off, I’d like to encourage you to dig deeper. You never know what you might find.

Originally posted on Nicole’s Substack.