And certain women. — The words bring before us a feature in this period of our Lord’s ministry not elsewhere recorded, though implied in Luke 23:49. The Master and the disciples formed at this period one travelling company. When they arrived at town or village, they held what we, in the current Church-language of our time, should call a Mission, the Twelve heralding His approach, and inviting men to listen to Him as He taught in synagogue, or market-place, or open plain. Another company, consisting of devout women, mostly of the wealthier class, travelled separately, journeying, probably, in advance, arranging for the reception and the food of the Prophet and His followers. In the history of Elisha (2 Kings 4:10) we have something analogous to this way of helping the preachers of repentance. It is said to have been a not uncommon practice in Judæa in our Lord’s time, for women of independent means to support a Rabbi in his work as a teacher.
Mary called Magdalene. — On the legends and conjectures connected with her name, see Notes on Luke 7:37 and Matthew 27:56. Here it may be enough to note that (1) as being of Magdala, a town near Tiberias (see Note on Matthew 15:39), she had probably heard our Lord in one of His early mission journeys; (2) that the “seven devils” or “demons” point, as in the parable of Matthew 12:45, to a specially aggravated form of possession. with paroxysms of delirious frenzy, like those of the Gadarene demoniac; (3) that her presence with the mother of our Lord and St. John at the Crucifixion (John 19:25) seems to imply some special tie either of sympathy or of earlier connection with them; (4) that she appears, from the names with which she is associated, and from the fact that she too “ministered of her substance,” to have belonged to the more wealthy section of Galilean society. Later Western legends tell of her coming with Lazarus and Martha to Marseilles, and living for thirty years a life of penitence in a cave near Arles. The Eastern form of the legend, however, makes her come to Ephesus with the Virgin and St. John, and die there.