The anointing of Jesus is one of the few stories that all four of the gospels relate. However, they differ in many details. In the synoptics (Matthew, Mark and Luke) the event occurs at the house of a Pharisee. In John it was at Lazarus’ house. The synoptics do not named the woman. In Luke she is called a sinner. (In some traditions Mary Magdalene is proposed.) In John, Mary of Bethany, his good friend, is the anointer. In Matthew, Mark and John the anointing was immediately before the Passion and the expense scandalized the bystanders but Jesus claims it presaged prepartion for his burial. In Luke it happened in the middle of his ministry and illustrates the forgiveness that Jesus brought. This scene illustrates how the gospels operate: the evangelists took the memory of what Jesus said and did and how the Church remembered it (which might have gotten fuzzy in the fifty or so year gap between his life and the writing of the gospels) and reflect on its meaning. In St. John’s account, for example, the emphasis is on the total self-giving of Jesus’ faithful disciple in loving service.
