Mary Magdalene is a …. representative and symbolic person, who has been part of the tradition since the very beginning. It’s like having a photograph in which one of the major images has been airbrushed out and now we’re seeing that the image has been there from the beginning, and belongs as part of the tradition we know.
Elaine Pagels (1943 – )
(Professor of Religion at Princeton University, best known for her studies and writing on the Gnostic Gospels)