Anointing of Jesus

The anointing of Jesus is one of the relatively few events reported by each of the four Gospels, although the details differ in the accounts. All report the anointing of Jesus with expensive perfume by a woman, who pours over Jesus the contents of an alabastron jar of "nard" (or spikenard), a very expensive perfume. The anointing angers some of the onlookers because the perfume could have been sold for a year's wages—which the Gospel of Mark enumerates as 300 denarii—and the money given to the poor. Matthew's gospel states that the "disciples were indignant" and John's states that it was Judas who was most offended. John adds that he was bothered because he (Judas) was a thief and desired the money for himself. Jesus is described as justifying the action of the woman by stating that the poor will always exist, and can be helped whenever desired.

The identification of the woman by Luke as one "who lived a sinful life" and by John as Mary of Bethany played a part in the long-standing identification of Mary Magdalene by the Western church as a former prostitute, once all three figures were thought to be the same "composite Magdalene". The identification of the woman is found in John 11:1-2 Now a man named Lazarus was sick. He was from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. 2 (This Mary, whose brother Lazarus now lay sick, was the same one who poured perfume on the Lord and wiped his feet with her hair.) NIV and King James Version.

The honorific anointing with perfume is an action frequently mentioned in other literature from the time; however, using long hair to dry Jesus's feet, as in John and Luke, is not recorded elsewhere, and should be regarded as an exceptional gesture.

The event (or events - see discussion below) is reported in Matthew 26, Mark 14, Luke 7, and John 12. Matthew and Mark are very similar:

While Jesus was in Bethany in the home of Simon the Leper, 7 a woman came to him with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, which she poured on his head as he was reclining at the table. When the disciples saw this, they were indignant. “Why this waste?” they asked. 9 “This perfume could have been sold at a high price and the money given to the poor. Aware of this, Jesus said to them, “Why are you bothering this woman? She has done a beautiful thing to me. 11 The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me. When she poured this perfume on my body, she did it to prepare me for burial. Truly I tell you, wherever this gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her.

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