Midwife Salome

Salome (right) as midwife, bathing the infant Jesus, is a common figure in Orthodox icons of the Nativity (fresco, XII c., "Dark Church", Open Air Museum, Goreme, Cappadocia.

Midwife Salome is a midwife at the Nativity of Jesus who appears in several apocryphal Gospels, and is still depicted with a companion in Eastern Orthodox icons of the scene, though she has long vanished from most Western depictions. A midwife Salome appears in the infancy gospel attached to the name of James the Just, the Protevangelion of James (ch. XIV):

14 And the midwife went out from the cave, and Salome met her. 15 And the midwife said to her, "Salome, Salome, I will tell you a most surprising thing, which I saw. 16 A virgin has brought forth, which is a thing contrary to nature." 17 To which Salome replied, "As the Lord my God lives, unless I receive particular proof of this matter, I will not believe that a virgin has brought forth." 18 Then Salome went in, and the midwife said, "Mary, show yourself, for a great controversy has arisen about you." 19 And Salome tested her with her finger. 20 But her hand was withered, and she groaned bitterly, 21 and said, "Woe to me, because of my iniquity! For I have tempted the living God, and my hand is ready to drop off."

That Salome is the first, after the midwife, to bear witness to the birth and to recognize Jesus as the Christ, are circumstances that tend to connect her with Salome the disciple. By the High Middle Ages this Salome was often identified with Mary Salome in the West, and therefore regarded as the believing midwife.^[1]

References

1. ^ G Schiller, Iconography of Christian Art, Vol. I,1971 (English trans from German), Lund Humphries, London, p.62, ISBN 853312702