Reading Notes: Women Saints, Part B

Painting of Saint Martha and the Dragon by André Abellon in 1430. Web source: Wikimedia Commons. 

Today's story is about Saint Martha, sister of Mary Magdalene.


Saint Martha 

- Martha is a hostess of Jesus Christ, and after his ascension, she goes a on a big trip in a boat. A few of the people on this trip are her sister Mary, brother Lazarus, and Saint Maximin.

- The boat is going on the river of Rhone. There is a dragon in this area. The dragon is half beast and half fish, with sharp teeth, horns, a lion's head, and serpent's tail. So yeah, this thing sounds pretty scary and gross. Did I mention that this dragon monster thing eats humans? Because it does.

- Because somebody has to stand up to the beast, Martha takes charge and attacks it with holy water and showed him a cross. She then tied up the creature with her girdle and killed it with a sword weapon.

- Moving forward, Martha lived a rather blessed life. She fasted and ate only once a day and prayed one hundred times each day and each night.

- So one day Martha was preaching and a guy wanted to hear her speak, but he was all the way across the river. He began swimming toward her, but he drowns and dies. The next day, the people bring the man's body to Martha and she prayed for him to be raised from the dead. The man comes back to life and he is baptized in the Holy Spirit.

My thoughts: 

- I loved reading this story because of its depiction of Martha being the toughest out of her traveling group. I think that it would be really cool to retell this story with a focus on the battle with the beast, because come on, the defeat of the dragon is definitely the most interesting part of the story.

Stay tuned to see what story idea I decide to go with later this week!

Bibliography

The Golden Legend edited by F.S. Ellis. Web source: UnTextbook.