“When a woman who had lived a sinful life in that town learned that Jesus was eating at the Pharisee?s house, she brought an alabaster jar of perfume, and as she stood behind him at his feet weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them and poured perfume on them.” Luke 7: 37-38 (NIV).

Luke locates Jesus at a Pharisee?s house reclining at the table. It is here that the weeping woman appears and creates a scene. Luke does not give her a name. He omits any familial or geographical connection. Who is she and where does she come from? We simply do not know. Probably, Luke omits these in order to stress the woman?s status in the community – she is insignificant, a nobody. Her name does not mean a thing.

Luke gives a hint: the woman lives a sinful life. What is her crime? Luke does not tell us. Maybe she is a prostitute who plies her trade at night, or a mistress who wrests a husband away from his lawful wife and family. Whatever it is, it is a public offense that alienates her from her family, friends, and community. Her sin makes her an outcast, a marked criminal like the urban cities’ prostitutes, gangs, and criminals, people we don’t want to be identified with, much more to be friends of.

The woman?s life is an open book to the community. Her crime is not a secret. Even Simon the Pharisee recognizes her. Had she lived in our permissive and individualist society, she could have gotten away from her misdemeanor. She could have kept her trade a secret. She could have lived a double life without being caught.

But she belongs to a community that puts premium on rigid law-keeping. To be a law-breaker is to be marked a criminal, an outcast. To be caught in sin is to be condemned in isolation and humiliation, hence, her intense and deep emotional-psychological anguish due to her alienation from her community. Her need of acceptance, love, and forgiveness is tremendous. She needs badly to be reconciled back to her community.

We are familiar with the deep human ache that incapacitates us, grinds our lives to a halt, plunges us into the abyss of depression and hopelessness. We feel such terrible and devastating feeling when we are rejected or condemned because we lapse in our moral obligations or fail expectations.

Innate to our humanness is our need to be in communion. We all need life companions. We need friends and family who will inspire and encourage us towards excellence, righteousness and holiness. A community is integral to the woman?s survival and well-being. She simply can’t make it alone. She needs to be an object of love, a recipient of kindness, friendship and hospitality. She is a woman in need.

In her abased state, she decided to see Jesus.

(Part 1 of a series).

Written by Millicent Guarin