Two Episodes from Holy Thursday

Circa 1250-70
The Cloisters, New York City

The lower image has Jesus washing the feet of Peter (John 13:1-11). In the one above Mary Magdalene wipes and kisses the feet of Jesus after anointing them. In the speech banderoles Judas protests the wastefulness and Jesus replies that Mary's gesture is in anticipation of his own burial. The scene is clearly the Last Supper. In John 13:25-26 John leans on Jesus' breast and asks which of the apostles is the betrayer. Jesus answers, "‘He it is to whom I shall reach bread dipped.’ And when he had dipped the bread, he gave it to Judas Iscariot." This is precisely what we see on the right in the upper image, even to the morsel, which significantly resembles a communion wafer.

I explain the conflation of the anointing with the Last Supper and of Mary Magdalene with Mary the sister of Lazarus in my comments on this mosaic in Sicily.

Posted below are enlargements of the two panels.
Read more about images of the Last Supper.

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• The Last Supper
• This Picture

Photographed at the Cloisters by Richard Stracke, shared under Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.