Martha 1st century AD
Biblical character

From Bethany, near Jerusalem, she was possibly the wife or widow of Simon the Leper. She was devoted to Jesus Christ, like her sister (purportedly Mary who anointed him) and brother, the Lazarus whom he raised from the dead (John 11). Perhaps unfairly, she is remembered for when Jesus rebuked her for fussing over domestic arrangements and being irked that Mary just sat listening to him (Luke 10.39-42). In later Christian tradition Mary and Martha have been taken as symbols for the two paths of contemplative and active spirituality and used in arguments about the superiority of one over the other.