ON ST. JOANNA,
WIFE OF CHUZA, AT JERUSALEM.
HISTORICAL COLLECTION,
On her Acts, and the cult of the Myrrh-bearers among the Greeks.
Joanna, wife of Chuza, at Jerusalem (S.)
D. P.
[1] We begin this XXIV of May with the most holy woman Joanna, whom the Evangelist Luke praises in the eighth chapter of his Gospel toward the beginning in these words: And it came to pass afterward, that he himself made a journey through the cities and villages, preaching and evangelizing the kingdom of God, and the twelve with him: and certain women, Memory in the Gospel, who had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities, Mary who is called Magdalene, out of whom seven demons had gone forth; and Joanna, the wife of Chuza, Herod's steward; and Susanna, and many others, who ministered unto him of their substance. Again Luke, having related the passion of Christ, subjoins these things toward the end of chapter XXIII and the beginning of the following: which, because they pertain to St. Joanna, we add here: But the women who had come with him from Galilee following after, saw the sepulchre, solicitous for the burial of Christ, and how his body was laid. And returning, they prepared spices and ointments, and on the sabbath day indeed they rested according to the commandment. But on the first day of the week very early in the morning they came to the sepulchre, bearing the spices which they had prepared, and they found the stone rolled back from the sepulchre. And going in, they found not the body of the Lord. And it came to pass, as they were astonished in mind at this, behold two men stood by them in shining apparel. And as they were afraid and bowed down their countenance toward the ground, admonished of the resurrection. they said unto them: Why seek ye the living with the dead? He is not here, but is risen. Remember how he spake unto you, when he was yet in Galilee, saying: That the Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again. And they remembered his words. And returning from the sepulchre they told all these things to the eleven and to all the rest. Now it was Mary Magdalene, and Joanna, and Mary of James, and the rest that were with them, who told these things to the Apostles; and these words seemed to them as idle tales, and they believed them not. Thus St. Luke. But Matthew also understood her, when in chapter XXVII, having related the death of Christ, he adds: And there were there many women afar off, who had followed Jesus from Galilee, ministering unto him, though he expresses only three.
[2] Further, her name is inscribed in the Martyrologies of Usuard, of Ado, and of the Author under the name of Bede, in these words: Likewise of the most blessed Joanna, wife of Chuza Herod's steward, whom the Evangelists commemorate. But Notker has at the end: Who tarries in the Gospel. In the Roman Martyrology, Whom Luke the Evangelist commemorates. Bellinus, Grevenus, inscribed in the sacred calendars, Maurolycus and other more recent writers have the like. Among the women healed by Christ was the Magdalene, from unclean spirits; so likewise Joanna seems to have been freed from her infirmities; and because she was rich, to have ministered to God of her substance, and to have had Chuza as a husband devoted in mind even toward Christ: who was the steward of Herod Antipas Tetrarch of Galilee, by whom Christ had been clad in a white garment and despised. In Greek Ἐπίτροπος, the administrator of the household estate; she ministers to Christ of her substance. but perhaps Chuza had died before Christ, and therefore in the later place she is not called the wife of Chuza, and then she could more freely follow Christ. How long she lived after Christ's resurrection is not clear. But of Susanna, whom Luke praises as a companion of Joanna in the same office toward Christ, much less notice survives: for not even her name is found ascribed to any Latin Martyrology.
[3] The Greeks, which is to be wondered at, appointed neither of them by name to be venerated: but they keep the memory of the Women bearing ointments to the sepulchre of Christ, together with that of St. Joseph of Arimathea, on the third, or (as we call it) the second Sunday after Easter, which in the Typicon is called Κυριακὴ τῶν ἁγίων Μυροφόρων, καὶ Ἰωσὴφ τοῦ Δικαίου, the Sunday of the Holy Myrrh-bearing Women and Joseph the Just. Joseph the Just and the Myrrh-bearers spoken of among the Greeks. But the full Office is found in the Pentecostarion of the Greeks, which is the book containing the ecclesiastical Office from the Paschal Vigil to the octave of Pentecost, or (as the Greeks call it) the Sunday of All Saints. In that Office for those holy Women there is prescribed to be sung in parts the third Canon, after the first concerning the Cross and the second concerning the Mother of God. Among these is interposed the reading of the Synaxarium, explaining the Gospel history, in so far as it pertains to Nicodemus and Joseph and to these Women: the 2nd Sunday after Easter, and this is the conclusion of that reading. Ὅτι γοῦν ἇυται τὴν ἀνάστασιν ἐκήρυξαν, καὶ πολλὰ τῷ καθ ἡμᾶς δόγματι συνεβάλλοντο ἐις πίστωσιν καὶ πληροφορίαν ἀκραιφνῆ τῆς Χριστοῦ Ἀναστάσεως μετὰ τὸν Θωμὰν καὶ τάυτας παρέλαβεν ἑορτάζειν ἡ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐκκλησία, ὡς ἰδούσας πρώτας Χριστὸν ἐκ νεκρῶν, καὶ τοῖς πᾶσι καταγγειλάσασας τὸ σωτήριον κηρύγμα καὶ τὴν κατα Χριστὸν πολιτείαν μετελθούσας ἀρίστως, καὶ ὡς ἔχρη γυναιξὶ μαθητεκθείσας Χριστῶ. Ταῖς τῶν ἁγίων ἁγίν Μυροφόρων πρεσβείαις ὁ Θεὸς ἐλέησον, ἡμᾶς. Ἀμὴν. Because therefore these women preached the Resurrection, and according to our opinion many things befell them, for the confirming in us of an undoubting faith concerning Christ's Resurrection, after St. Thomas (to whom, as among the Latins, is ascribed the Octave of Easter, or, as the Greeks call it, the second Sunday) the Church of God undertook also to venerate them festively; as those who first saw Christ raised from the dead, and announced to all the saving preaching, and conducted themselves most excellently according to Christ, even as became those instructed by him. By the prayers of the Holy Myrrh-bearers, O God, have mercy on us. Amen.
[4] Before the reading of the Synaxarium there is prefixed, according to custom, a single distich, and it is of this kind:
Χριστῶ φέρουσιν ἁι μαθητρίαι μύρα, Ἐγὼ δε τάυταις ὕμνον ὡς μύρα φέρω.
The women disciples bring ointments to Christ, But I bring to them a hymn as ointment.
There is extant also a sermon of a certain Macarius Chrysocephalus ἐις τὰς ἁγίας Μυροφόρους Γυνᾶικας, καὶ Ἰωσὴφ τὸν ἀπὸ Ἀριματθίας, καὶ περὶ τῆς τοῦ Κυρίου Ἀναςτάσεως, καὶ τῆς δι᾽ ἀυτῆς ἐσομένης παγκοσμίου τῶν γηγενῶν ἐξαναστάσεως: on the holy Myrrh-bearing Women, and Joseph of Arimathea, and the Resurrection of the Lord, and the universal resurrection of those born of earth that shall be through it. Of Joseph we have treated on March XVII, and again in the Supplement we shall tell by what means his body was, under Charlemagne, by Fortunatus or Macarius the Patriarch of Jerusalem, brought to the Medianum monastery: but some of the Greeks recall his memory on the XXXI of the month of July, where it would have been fitting for them also to recall not only Joanna, but also Susanna, whose name from the Hebrew is rendered Lily. Of Nicodemus, why not also Joanna, Susanna, Nicodemus? whose care shone forth together with Joseph's in burying the body of Christ, many things indeed are said in the reading of the Sunday already mentioned; but of him as a Saint no mention is anywhere made, unless perhaps on September XV, when the Greeks recall the Finding of St. Stephen, found together with the bodies of Nicodemus, Gamaliel, and Abibus; which Finding is celebrated by the Latins on August III.