I love Ephrem the Syrian. He witnesses what I consider to be an older 'orthodoxy' but I won't get into my beliefs. Let's allow the Commentary on the Diatessaron (Saint Ephrem's Commentary on Tatian's Diatessaron. Translated and edited by Carmel McCarthy. Journal of Semitic Studies Supplement, 2) speak for itself. I will start with the comments of McCarthy on the section as a whole:Ephrem appears to confuse Mary, the mother of Jesus with Mary Magdalene here. See II. 17 above and XXI.27 below for similar types of 'fusion' or confusion and the note on John 20:15 at II. 17 above for the comment on this 'fusion' of the two Marys. [p.98]
I don't believe for one moment that Ephrem is confused. In my opinion, the Syrian tradition is right and our 'separated' gospels are wrong. But again I don't want to let my opinions distract from the original testimony of Ephrem which offers the BEST explanation for how Jesus could have used 'Woman' as part of his address to Mary (answer - Mary wasn't his mother according to Ephrem, she was Mary Magdalene).
Boisimard has argued that two commentaries have been fused into one in the existing MS - the original text of Ephrem being blended with another orthodox treatise by a later editor. He cites this section as an example of the 'diluting' process.
Let me now transcribe the entire section in the Commentary which forms the start of Section V. The Commentary as it now stands begins:
There was a wedding feast in Cana. When our Lord came there, his mother said to him. There is no wine here. He said to her, What is that to me and to you, Woman? My hour has not yet come. This means 'Shall I impose myself on them [the Jews]? Rather, let them perceive themselves that the wine has run short, and let them all ask to drink' ...[p.95]
This is considered to be an example of the 'inauthentic' text of the Commentary and is followed by a much more interesting discussion:
Mary hastened to be a servant of his will instead of the apostles, but since it was not her place to give orders or to anticipate his word, he reproved her for having been hasty. My hour has not come, that is they will ask to drink and become aware that the wine had run short, and thereafter will be the miracle. Thus, after his victory over Sheol, when she saw it, she wished to express affection for him like a mother [cf. John 20.16 - 17]. He entrusted Mary, who had followed him to the cross, to John there saying Woman behold your son, and Young man, behold your mother. [John 19.26-27] He restrained her again from drawing near to him, because he said, 'From henceforth, John is your son.'[p.98]
Okay, now that I have cited the section let me remind the readers of the Coptic tradition which says that St. Mark is John Mark and has a mother named Mary and who appears secretly throughout the narrative.
Indeed I should note that as Tertullian attacks Marcion and the heretics associated with him for denying Jesus had a mother (he was an angel), he gives us a clear idea of what was actually reflected in the Marcionite gospel. So in De Carne Christi:
But as often as there is discussion of the nativity, all those who reject it as prejudging the issue concerning the verity of the flesh in Christ, claim that the Lord himself denies having been born, on the ground that he asked, Who is my mother and who are my brethren? So let Apelles too hear what answer I have already given to Marcion in that work in which I have made appeal to the Gospel which he accepts, namely that the background of that remark must be taken into consideration. Well then, in the first place no one would ever have reported to him that his mother and his brethren were standing without unless he were sure that he had a mother and brethren ... [t]his I say, in spite of the fact that the heresies have deliberately removed from the Gospel the statements that those who marvelled at his doctrine said that both Joseph the carpenter, his reputed father, and Mary his mother, and his brothers and sisters, were very well known to them. 'But,' they say, 'it was for the sake of tempting him that they announced to him the mother and the brethren whom actually he had not.' ...But let Apelles, as well as Marcion, hear from me what was the reason behind the reply which for the moment denied mother and brethren. Our Lord's brethren did not believe in him: this also is included in the Gospel as it was published before Marcion's day. His mother likewise is not shown to have adhered to him, though Martha and other Marys are often mentioned as being in his company. [De Carne Christi 7]
Indeed Tertullian's understanding of this passage and others like it is that Mary the mother of Jesus was a real person but she did not accompany him like the Marys and his disciples. Indeed the idea that Jesus' mother never attended him as he progressed through his ministry is reflected elsewhere in Tertullian's texts:
A woman from the multitude cries out, that blessed was the womb that had borne him, and the breasts which had given him suck. And the Lord answers, Yea rather, blessed are they that hear the word of God, and keep it: because even before this he had rejected his mother and his brethren, because he prefers those who hear God and obey him. For not even on the present occasion was his mother in attendance on him. It follows that neither on the previous occasion did he deny having been born. [AM iv.23]
Just thought it would be nice to allow a different perspective to come forward namely that the passages which say that Jesus' mother WAS IN ATTENDANCE with him would likely be seen by Tertullian, Ephrem and Marcion as having been systematically altered by later editors
