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Passion Week (Holy Week)

Wednesday of Holy Pascha Week

by Mark Sedrak

On Wednesday of Holy Pascha Week, our Lord Jesus Christ spent the day in Bethany at the residence of Simon the leper. There, a woman, anointed our Lord’s blessed body with fragrance.

The Anointing at Bethany

Now while Jesus was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, a woman came to him with an alabaster jar of very costly ointment, and she poured it on his head as he sat at the table. But when the disciples saw it, they were angry and said, "Why this waste? For this ointment could have been sold for a large sum, and the money given to the poor." But Jesus, aware of this, said to them, "Why do you trouble the woman? She has performed a good service for me. For you always have the poor with you, but you will not always have me. By pouring this ointment on my body she has prepared me for burial. Truly I tell you, wherever this good news is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in remembrance of her." (Matthew 26:6-13)

Mary, as an indication of her great love, anoints Jesus’ feet and wipes His feet with her hair. By this she not only gave an indication of her devotion, but she also expressed the holy service of other souls faithful to God. By our Lord’s feet is represented the humility of His Incarnation. We anoint His feet when we proclaim with due praise the mystery of the Incarnation which he took upon Himself. Paul bears witness to this, saying, “Thanks be to God Who always causes us to triumph in Christ, and makes manifest the fragrance of the knowledge of Him by us in every place.”

We anoint the Lord’s feet when we spread the praise of His name by living uprightly, when we revivify His poor by a word of consolation; and we wipe the feet of these same ones with our hair when we share some of what is superfluous to us to alleviate the wants of the needy.—Venerable Bede

The judgment of God will be decisive and final in the day when the angels will separate the evil doers from amoung the righteous and the sinners will be thrown into the burning fire. May the Lord God have mercy upon us. – Shenouti the Archmandrite

See Also:

Wednesday in Holy Week
The figurative lamb is now to make way for the true one; the Pasch of this year will substitute the reality for the type; and Jesus' Blood, shed by the hands of wicked priests, is soon to flow simultaneously with that of victims which have been hitherto acceptable to God only because they prefigured the Sacrifice of Calvary.

Last Supper celebrated a day late, physicist claims in book
The Last Supper is commemorated a day late, a Cambridge University physicist claims in his new book, according to reports in the Sydney Morning Herald and the Belfast Telegraph.

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