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The
Mother of Jesus
In Holy Scripture
BIBLICAL-THEOLOGICAL ADDRESSES
BY
THE RIGHT REVEREND DR. ALOYS SCHAEFER
BISHOP OF DKESDEN. S4Jft>ra
ST. BASIL'S SCHOLASTICATE
+ \ 5 * jJlllJ^L-
TRANSLATED FRM%- THE MECONITGERMAN EDITION
BY
THE VERY REVEREND FERDINAND BROSSART, V.G.
OF COVINGTON, KENTUCKY
Frederick Pustet & Co.
Printers to The Holy Apostolic See and The Sacred Congregation of Rites
RATISBON ROME NEW YORK CINCINNATI 1913
REMIGIUS LAFORT, D.D.,
Censor.
MAR - 5 1953
•i-JOHN CARDINAL FARLEY,
Archbishop of New York,
NEW YORK, June 5, 1913
COPTRIQHT, 1913
In the United States and Great Britain
BY FR. PUSTET & CO. NEW YORK AND CINCINNATI
IESE biblical-theological addresses contain a wealth of scriptural material concerning the Mother of our Re deemer, collected under dogmatic viewpoints. They appeal,
^^ therefore, at once, to every sincere and earnest mind,
whether scientifically developed or of an humbler station, determined in the search of truth.
They were delivered in substance in the lecture halls of the Uni versity of Muenster, in Westphalia, during the winter semester of 1885-86 by the Rev. Dr. Aloys Schaefer, now Bishop of Saxony. - They were published with a view of offering a systematic exposition, based on an exact interpretation of striking passages, of the teachings of Holy Scripture concerning the Mother of God. And this has been done in a manner so that the book might be accessible to the widest possible circle of readers, and afford to priests most practical service, and, if read by Non-Catholics, that it might aid them in forming a correct view of the teaching of the Church concerning the Mother of God, and of its biblical foundation.
The author groups the mariological passages under certain view points for the various lectures. This, however, necessitated an occa sional repetition of a consideration of the more important scriptural expressions, a reference to preceding expositions. In this manner , however, it became easy to note the distinction between the sense which corresponded to the occasional historical period, especially of the Old Testament, and that which is gathered only from the standpoint which arises from a possession of complete revelation.
A view of the entire extent of such texts is facilitated by a record of the scriptural texts given at the end of the book.
I hope that the same generous disposition which greeted the original may also be accorded to the work in its English dress. There is, to my knowledge, no other scientific work in the English language that covers the entire Holy Scripture upon these dogmatic points, and there fore, I believe that I have done some service not only to the clergy, but also to the entire English reading public in search of the truth concern ing some of the most important and interesting, though greatly mis understood doctrines of the Catholic Church, yet most firmly grounded in Holy Scripture.
6 PREFACE
The work is most assuredly an acquisition of great value to the most thorough exegetical literature existing, and will aid much in pre venting the inexhaustible wealth contained in Holy Scripture from becoming "a dead capital^ and in rendering it serviceable for the strengthening of our faith and for the guidance and security of our will. To show that our faith rests upon scientifically established con victions was the object of the author } and to labor for the same purpose is the reward of the translator.
I have chosen the title: "The Mother of Jesus" because it is the title which the beloved disciple of Jesus loved to give the Mother of our Redeemer (See John, 2, 1.3; 19, 25.26; Acts. 1, 14).
May the Blessed Mother extend the usefulness of the work is the ardent prayer of the
TRANSLATOR
COVINGTON, KY.,
Feast of the Annunciation, 1913
ODl manifests His greatness through His works. Therefore a creature glorifies its author the more, the higher the grade of its elevation is established by the Lord. In considering the vast series of beings on earth and in heaven and in viewing the constantly richer and more exalted graces and privileges which God's infinite richness and inscrutable bounty hath imparted to His own images, the eye finally rests, before it reaches the Most Holy Humanity of the Son of God, upon the Mother of God as the next most perfect creature.1
If the Church in her Lauds, by the words of the three young men in the fiery furnace,2 calls daily upon all the works of God to bless the Lord, to praise and exalt Him above all for ever on account of His greatness, if she makes use of the words of the Psalmist3 to invite all creatures of heaven and earth to praise their Creator — she also lingers, at the conclusion of her "Daily Hours," with the "Queen of Heaven," in praising and adoring her author through the admiration of this uniquely great and holy work of divine omnipotence and love. Therefore, the special veneration of Mary can do no harm to the adoration and the acknowledgment due to God alone. The acknowledgment of the "great things" in Mary serves as a glorification of Him that "is mighty/' who hath done " these great things" to her.
It is well known how the Church, therefore, seeks to glorify the Mother of the Most High in various ways: "quibus laudibus
1 ... Whatsoe'er may be Of excellence in creature, pity mild, Relenting mercy, large munificence, Are all combined in thee. . . .
Dante, Paradise, XXXIII, 20.
2 Daniel, 8, 57-88. 3 Ps. 148.
8 INTRODUCTION
te efferam nescio." From most ancient times the Fathers have praised her, and in most lofty strains have the Doctors of the Church l and writers 2 manifested her dignity and perfection. She furnished for Christian art, from the earliest days* a most exalted and yet humanly intelligent ideal for its creation. And even many, who do not join in the praise which the Church bestows upon Mary} regard these masterpieces with astonish ment and admiration. And is not that which is so over whelmingly attractive something beautiful and, therefore, something true?
Protestantism, in its beginning, did not attack the veneration of the Blessed Mother of God; of course, it did not hesitate long 4 and the complaint expressed by the protestant Dietlein is most pertinent. He says: "A condition obtained of fleeing con stantly from the Mother of God, of a constant fear of addressing to her a solitary word of salutation, of saluting her by that Ave which the Father had really sent her by the mouth of an angel, . . . To every human child that has preceded us to the eternal home we may address an ( Ave pia anima} as often as we wish — but not to the Mother, for that would be — Catholic ! " 5 The former profession of the author, who had been a very active pastor in the midst of a population mostly protestant, led him to ascertain, by experience, that almost the whole of protestantism is penetrated with what the aforesaid Dietlein said of its science: "An
1 Summa aurea de laudibus B. V. M. (ed. Migne 1866); Lehner, die Marien- verehrung in den ersten Jahrhunderten. Stuttgart, 1881, 1887. Compare also Linsenmann, on Marien-und Heiligenverehrung im christl. Kultus. Tuebingen, Theolog. Quartalschrift, 1887, p. 5-29, gegen Benrath, Zur Geschichte der Marien- verehrung, in "Theolog. Studien und Kritiken, 1886, p. 7-94; 197-267, Liell, die Darstellungen der allerseligsten Jungfrau und Gottesgebaererin Maria auf den Kunst- denkmaelern der Katakomben. Freiburg, 1887.
2 Maracci, Bibliotheca Mariana, Romae, 164.8. Roscovany, B. V. M. in sua concept, immac. ex monumentis omnium saeculorum demonstrata. Budapestini, 1873 sqq.
3 Lehner, 1. c. p. 283-342. Kraus, Roma sotteranea, Freiburg, 2 ed., 1879, p. 801 sqq.; Liell, 1. c.
4 The formula of the concordances, de persona Christi, ep., 7, decl. 24. The confession of the four cities of 1530, chap. 11 declares: Dei parentem sacratissimam Virginem. In the first confession of Basle, 1534, the words "eternally pure," as pre dicated of the Mother of God, were eliminated down to 1566. Compare her eon Dietlein, Evangelisches Ave Maria, Halle, 1863, p. VI, note. — Besides, Canisius — Mariologia shows this fact very frequently. Occasionally we shall find proofs hereof, especially in the consideration of the events in which, for the purpose of attacking the veneration of Mary, misrepresentations are mostly admitted. 6 Ibid. p. VII.
INTRODUCTION 9
independent desire to enter upon these questions (concerning Mary) is so little in place in our science, that it scarcely ever touches them except when there is question of calling forth lamentations over what the Roman Church teaches and does in regard to Mary."
2. A glance at the non-Catholic — yet specifically protes- tant — scientific literature of the various times furnishes, as a first objection against the Catholic doctrine of the Mother of God, the questions: Why, precisely, does Holy Scripture — especially the New Testament — report so little about Mary? and: Does it not sometimes appear that just the contrary of the picture in which the Church represents her is found therein ?
3. It must not be denied that the Gospels report only particular features of the life of the Mother of Jesus; but a similar silence is also observed — especially by Mark and John — concerning thirty years of the life of Jesus. And if the Gospels narrate how the Redeemer extolled the sinner Mary Magdalen, and ap peared especially to her after the resurrection, if they speak of His love for sinners and publicans, if they represent His longa nimity and patience toward the Apostles who grew only gradually in faith, if they report a special solicitude for Peter and recount the praise which the Messiah bestowed upon the pagan Captain and upon the Canaanitish woman: then they follow a purpose of showing Jesus as the Redeemer of the world, who came to seek and to save that which had been lost, who desires mercy, who established a kingdom or an institution wherein all may attain a dwelling with the Father. But Mary, she who is "highly favored," with "whom the Lord is," may retire; for "if any one should be disposed to complain in favor of Mary, as the duti ful son in the parable of the prodigal son complained . . . then Jesus might indeed make use of the words of that parable: "My child, thou art always with me, and all that is mine, is also thine.1
Jesus, the Son of God, the promised Messiah and the Re deemer of the world,and His works of redemption are the essential contents of the Gospels, and the relation which Mary bears thereto is also a subject thereof. Therefore it is that she appears to us therein as the Mother of God, as the Mother of Jesus, as the "highly favored" and "the blessed among women." And when
1 Spencer-Northcote, Mary in the Gospels, p. 16.
10 INTRODUCTION
Jesus is induced, in the fulfilment of His office, to speak of His Mother, then the purpose of speaking seems to be to teach and to heal.
Furthermore, it must not be overlooked that Mary herself had to be a source of information, in a special manner, for the Evangelists. With the inmost appreciation of the concealment of the majesty of her Son, she remained not merely in retirement, but, in her communications she passed over in silence many years of her life. And this modest reserve adds now to the fulfilment of the words: "henceforth all generations shall call me blessed." The evangelical picture of the Mother becomes similar to that of the Son: as the latter shows through the greatest self-renunciation, the all-powerful brilliancy of the divine majesty, so, too, does the former show forth, in full retirement and through the imitation of the Son in humility, infinite dignity, a unique distinction and perfection. The silence and the sayings of these sacred records are grouped into a true image of the Mother, who is the most complete image of her Son in a voluntarily selected humiliation and in an exaltation conferred by God.
The alleged meagreness of the report of the Gospels should, therefore, not be considered, generally speaking, strange; but, the fact that especially the insinuation of Mary at the marriage of Cana, and her treatment in the company of the "brethren" of Jesus by Him have been so often misconstrued and abused for her abasement, makes it a duty to pay special attention to these events.
4. Not the Gospels and the rest of the New Testament alone are the biblical sources for the presentation of the doctrine of the Mother of God. The Old Testament also gradually furnishes the features to recognize more distinctly, the nearer the fulness of the time approaches, the splendid Temple of the Holy Ghost which Mary had become by God's grace, and to value, beforehand, her exalted task and position and to view in the most blessed Virgin and Mother of God the promised "sign" of the redemption and "the woman" mentioned in the very first announcement of salvation. However long the interval between the first promise in Paradise and the Gospel may be, and however gradually revelation developed in the time of the preparation, still it is always the same image of the Mother of God that the inspired authors depict.
INTRODUCTION 11
5. The entire Sacred Scriptures are the work of one author, of the Holy Ghost, who made use of human writers. But, since this was done in a manner corresponding to their nature it follows on the one hand, that, the personal peculiarities and the casual conditions of the times of the "instruments" assert themselves, and, on the other hand, that a divine unity controls all the several writings. Whilst through Christ the fulness and the perfection of revelation was given, God, in the Old Testament, in the adaptation to the history or the educational task thereof, had spoken gradually to men in a progressive manner by word and history.
6. It is, therefore, the scope of the following treatise to follow the entire biblical doctrine concerning the Mother of God in its progressive development through the entire history of the redemption to its completion in Christ, and to present it as one united and perfect picture, drawn from the entire scripturally recounted revelation.
Not infrequently will it therefore be necessary to distinguish, from a viewpoint of the Old Testament, between the sense of a passage, in which the contemporaries of an inspired author were enabled to recognise it only partially, and the full and complete sense which the divine author wished to impart to it, but for a full and complete conception of which it required first the exalted standpoint of the New Testament. It is within the nature of the pre-christian times, in the imperfection of its revelation, that a certain obscurity remained, which was only removed by Christ — and that questions remained open which could only receive their answer in the fulness of time. But, with all this, throughout all the sacred records of the varied periods of historical development, such a remarkable unity of ideas is evident, and such a constant adherence to the same purpose — more specifically in Mary to the same picture — that a uni form author must necessarily be admitted for these scriptural works.
The discussion of the biblical-theological questions must proceed on its own, independent way: it may especially disre gard the "results" of so-called "criticism": for it assumes the contents of the Sacred Scriptures, compares them in themselves and — especially of the Old Testament — in their development and their unity.
12 INTRODUCTION
On the other hand, biblical theology must be taken into account by "criticism." l A further development or unfolding of an idea are marks of a more recent origin. Thus, f.i., it may be assumed with "higher criticism" that the Sacred Books, which tradition places into our hands as a united whole, may be reduced to vari ous authors; for it must be admitted that, precisely with a diver sity on the one hand, and a constant unity in the development of doctrine on the other, the divine character of the same may be proved the more readily.
7. God, the author of the biblical books, is also the director of the history of Israel, and He speaks not merely in words but also through His works. The Old Testament, however, is essentially constructed for the future and has for its object the time of the Messiah. God directs, accordingly, the history of Israel and therefore are the historical books called likewise prophetic.2 Therefore God also manifests Himself in the Old Testament through typical persons, events, arrangements, and even through voluntary human actions. Such a language is worthy of God and is mysterious, for it is based on His power, omniscience and wisdom by which He subordinates all events and actions — even the voluntary human — to His own pur poses.
As the name already indicates (TVTTO<;= model), the type stands in the same relation to the thing represented (antitypus) as does a model or a sketch to its execution. The same bears a partial relation to the intellectual-sensual nature of man, when he is shown a picture, and partly to the educational purpose by the possibility of attaining thereby a gradual progress in the New
1 Even H. Schultz, Altestamentliche Theologie, Die Offeribarungsreligion auf- ihrer vorchristlichen Entwickelung, Goetting. 3d. ed. 1885, p. 4, acknowledges that a careful development of the history of religion may, on its part, become also, in many particular points, very fruitful in the decision of introductory questions; this is the case to the extent of the existence of reasons "for disputing, over and over again, the results of the introductory science, still in its primary foundation," and as long as "many details of " higher criticism" are "extraordinarily questionable."
2 A proof of this character is the appellation of the books of Josue, of the Judges, of Samuel and the Kings — "the earlier prophets." Luke, 24, 44; Flav. Jos.ctra. Ap. 8, already contain an indication of such a conception of these historical books. The taking in consideration of the prophetic character is, for a gratifying explanation of the same, also an essential condition. I admit that a setting aside thereof makes a united conception of the aforesaid books a difficulty for me, which, however, disappears with a reference thereto.
INTRODUCTION 13
Testament up to a complete clearness,1 and it serves, finally — because an actual prophecy — as a proof of truth.
To aid in painting the image of the Mother of God in such a typical sense is therefore no child's play, but corresponds to the intention of God, the author of the Holy Scripture. The Old Testament itself makes this manifest whenever, f.i., it speaks of Sion, of Jerusalem, of the House of God in ways which never can be applied to these in themselves, but only to the "Kingdom of heaven'' 2 of the New Testament, and whenever it surrounds persons and events of history with features which never receive their full verification in themselves, but only in the anti-type3.
The New Testament removes all doubt. Christ recognized the typical character of the Law 4, of the brazen serpent 5, of the sign of Jonas 6. The Apostles followed His example when they recognize, f.i., in the omission of the breaking of the bones of Jesus — the fulfilment of the typical feature of the paschal feast 7, in the salvation through the ark of Noah — the supernatural salvation through baptism 8, in the passing through the Red Sea - the image of baptism, in the manna — the holy Eucharist and in the rock — Christ 9, in Adam — the "type" of Christ 10. The demonstration of the excellence of the New Covenant and sacrifice over the "Old" rests upon the typical character of the sanctuary and the sacrifice of the Old Testament n. In a similar manner St. Paul developed, with typical proof, the excellence of the Gospels compared to the Law 12; but this to readers who were familiar with the writings of the Old Testament and to whom the soundness
1 Therefore, it follows as a rule, that "each of the several types . . . represents merely one of the many sides or peculiarities of the one high anti-type," "neither preforms the whole, or carries the sense of the whole within itself," Reithmayr's Lehrbuch, der bibl. Hermeneutik, edited by Thalhofer, Kempten, 1874, P- 50.
2 For an example compare herewith Selbst, Die Kirche Jesu Christi nach den Weissagungen der Propheten, Mainz, 1883, p. 112 sqq.
3 Thus, f.i., I Kings, 7, 14, on Solomon compare Heb. 1. 5; The Isaianic repre sentation of the saving of Jerusalem from the hands of Senacherib, which presents herein a type of the judgment and of the redemption through the Messiah.
4 Luke, 24, 27, 44, 45. 6 John, 3, 14-
6 Math. 12, 39 sqq.; 16, 4; Luke, 11, 39. 1 John, 19, 36.
8 I Pet. 3, 20-21.
9 I Cor. 10, 1-4 and 6: TaCra 8« rvrrot ly/xaii/ eyev^r/crav, and 10, 11: Tavra
e^3aiv€v CKeu/ots, fypdfj)rj 8e ?rpos vovdetriav ly/xaiv, £is ovs TO,
10 Rom. 5, 14 (TWOS TOV /^AAovros) . n Heb. 7, 10 s. 8; 9, 1 sqq.; 10, 1.
12 Gal 4, 22 sqq. —
14 INTRODUCTION
of such proofs was a necessity. From this the conclusion may be drawn that by the Judaic explanation, at the time of Christ, and by the Apostles the significance of the typical sense was not ignored, as it is, finally, a sufficiently proven and a well known fact that the Church, walking ever since the days of the Fathers in the footsteps of Christ and of the Apostles, made a ready use of types for demonstrations of truths. The series may properly be opened with the letter of Barnabas,1 with Clement of Rome,2 in which not only the Alexandrian, but the exegetes of the Holy Scripture of every age and of every line of thought are to be found.3
Therefore, a wellfounded reference to the types of Mary is not only justified, but a duty. How could it be expected that Mary - who was destined for the dignity and the task of being the Mother of God and chosen to give a Redeemer to the world according to the divine plan of salvation — should have remained without any preparation in the Old Testament? 4
8. It is not intended to serve as proof, but only as an explana tion of some doctrine concerning Mary, if the Church, in her office and lessons during the holy sacrifice of the mass, makes use of words of Holy Scripture which, according to their literal sense, do not exactly refer to her. The reason is often only contained in the fact that they are suitable, but not infrequently is an unmis takable important point for such a determined application contained in the text itself. If the Church, therefore, loves to utilize, in this manner, scriptural texts for the glorification of Mary, it should not in the least seem strange to any one, since the sacred books themselves are a model for her in this regard.
1 Barn, epist. XII etc.
2 Clem. Rom. ad Cor. 1,12.
3 Compare herewith especially Theodor of Mopsuestia comment, in Jon Proleg. (cTreiSi? TVTTOV avrov ra>v Kara TOV SCO-TTOT^V Xpurrbv ^eXXev aTro^aiVeiv) . In Mich, et in Joel. Kihn, Theodor von Mopsuestia and Junilius Africanus as Exegetes, Freiburg, 1880, p. 128-134; my pamphlet: Die Aufgaben der Exegese nach ihrer geschichtl. Entwicklung. Muenster, 1890, p. 9, sqq. Thorn. Aqu. Summa Th. I. qu. 1. a. 10. Quodl. VII. qu. 6 a, 14-16. Several expositions: Patritius de introd. Bibliorum institutio. Romce ed. 2, 1876, p. 189 sqq. Comely, histor. et crit. introductio in V. T. libros. Paris, 1885, Vol. I, p. 530 sqq.
4 A collection of types of Mary is presented by the: oral, de nativ. Virg., which is commonly ascribed to John Damasc. (Le Quien doubts, Langen, Johannes von Damas cus, 1879, p. 224, Scheeben, Dogmatik III., 1882, p. 470 attack the genuineness.) Passaglia, de immacul. Deiparce conceptu. sectio 3. A selection is presented in the Bui. "Ineffabilis"of Pius IX.
INTRODUCTION 15
The admonition for contentment, f.i., in the letter to the Hebrews l is based on the words of the Lord to Josue 2: "/ will not leave thee, nor forsake thee." In like manner does St. Paul admonish us in pointing to the history of Israel: "and they are written for our correction" 3. Words, which David directed principally against his enemies, receive in the address of Peter a special application, intended by the Holy Ghost for the enemy of the anti type of David — for the betrayer of Christ — Judas 4.
9. After what has been hitherto said the gradual development of revelation, founded on the educational scope of the history of Israel, carries with it the meaning that the significance of any event or apportioned period of time and a therewith connected prophetic manifestation are combined with each other. Turning points in the history of Israel are also designated by the appear ance of great prophets. Though both of these were of a general importance, and surpassing the significance of those times, still, the Prophets spoke or wrote for their own times, and, therefore, the great prophecies stand forth in bold relief upon the history of the time and require, therefore, for their understanding, a knowl edge of the accompanying events. Herein a due regard for the history of the times finds its justification, especially when, at first sight, it should appear to extend too far. It is natural, of course, that the New Testament is mostly to be explained, in its manner of speech, through a spirit of the Old. Finally -
10. every reader ought to agree with the effort that attempts to demonstrate the harmony of an enjoined explanation with the conception of the Scriptures of the time that is nearest to the Apostolic age, and he ought to agree with what the "Fathers" "endowed with the manifold gifts of the Holy Spirit, of the most varied times and places, have ascertained through deep researches into these sacred writings" 5. But, we must not overlook herein that which Newman once pointed out to Pusey 6 when he said: "Christians have never gone to Scripture for proof of their doctrines, till there was actual need from the pressure of con troversy; — if, in those times, the dignity of the Blessed Virgin
1 is, 5.
2 Deut.81,6; Jos. 1,5.
3 I Cor. 10, 11 compare Rom. 15, 4; II Tim. 3, 16-17.
4 Ps. 68 (69), 26; 108 (109), 8 and Acts. 1, 20.
5 So wrote Reithmayr, in Thalhofer, Hermeneutik, p. XXIX.
6 The Blessed Virgin Mary. "Certain Difficulties," etc., Vol. II, p. 54-
16
INTRODUCTION
was unchallenged on all hands, as a matter of doctrine, Scripture, as far as its argumentative matter was concerned, was likely to remain a sealed book to them." And we will assuredly not fail to notice that, because the words were still clear to them, they dispensed with their discussion, and that the obscuration of the scriptural sense often only appeared then when it became incon venient for some error or was pressed into its service.
HE words of the ancient Simeon: 1. "Now Thou dost dismiss Thy servant, O Lord, according to Thy word in peace: because my eyes have seen Thy salvation, which Thou hast prepared before the face of Thy people," l give expression to the desire, coming from the depth of the heart of this true Israelite, for the Messiah and also to the entire and perfect joy that he had lived to see the time of the beginning of salvation. The Lord Jesus said to His followers: "Amen I say to you, many prophets and just men have desired to see the things that you see, and have not seen them." 2 But the son of Abraham passed out of this world consoled by the hope that he could see in his descendants the Redeemer, could have part, through his seed, in the promised salvation.3 Therefore the people regarded it as a great promise of blessing that "there shall not be one fruitless nor barren in thy land."4 The vocation to motherhood was a distinction and happi ness to the Israelitish woman, and a rich blessing in chil dren was considered a sign and a proof of great favor with God.5 Sterility was deplored as a severe affliction, a visitation or punishment.6 To this really sanctified longing for posterity the Law had special regard, and ordained that if an Israelite died childless "the wife of the deceased shall not marry to another, but his brother shall take her and raise up seed for
1 Luke 2, 29-31. 2 Math. 13, 17.
3 Tobias 6, 22: "Thou shalt take the virgin with the fear of the Lord, moved rather for love of children than for lust, that in the seed of Abraham thou mayest obtain a blessing in children." 4 Exod. 23, 26.
5 Compare Gen. 24, 60; 30, 1; I Kings 1, 11; Deut. 28, 4; Ps. 113 (112), 9; 127 (126), 3 sqq.; 128 (127), 3, 6; Prov. 17, 6; Eccle. 6, 3.
6 Gen. 16, 2; 30, 23; I Kings 1, 6; Isa. 47, 9; 49, 21.
18 THE MOTHER OF JESUS
his brother: And the first son he shall have of her he shall call by his name, that his name be not abolished out of Israel." 1
If, therefore, the vocation of the people of the Covenant — to have the Messiah to proceed from amongst them — brought with it a universality of marriage for the sake of posterity, could it possibly be opposed to the spirit of the Old Testament if, toward its end, souls, to whom a deeper knowledge of the Law and of the Prophets, to whom prayer and meditation, or even a special revelation had made known the fulness of the time, should resolve not to marry again, or even not to choose that state of life, at all? Luke calls Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, "a prophetess," who, after a marriage of only seven years, had served God, as a widow up to her eighty-fourth year in the temple, by fasting and prayer.2 And that which the Holy Ghost had revealed to Simeon, the " signs of the time" forced upon the Israelites, for thus they ask John the Baptist : "Who art thou?" and he confessed and did not deny and answered: "I am not the Christ."3 The words and the actions of the Jews repeatedly testified, as the New Testa ment sufficiently proves, that they believed that the time for the fulfilment of the prophecies had come.4 Even the worship on the Sabbath in the synagogues added essentially to this belief, for of it the Acts of the Apostles remark that " since ancient times" 5 chapters of the Law were read therein.
Therefore, in the resolution of the Virgin Mary to remain in this state of virginity there can be nothing that would indicate an abandonment of the vocation of a true Israelite who longingly expected the Messiah. Furthermore, the in stitution of the Levirate marriage teaches that God, in His
1 Deut. 25, 5 sqq. Compare Gen. 38, 8 sqq.; Math. 22, 24; Mark 12, 19; Luke 20, 28. 2 Luke 2, 36 sqq. 3 John 1, 19. 20.
4 Compare Math. 11, 3; Luke 7, 19-20; Math. 16, 13 sqq.; Mark 8, 27 sqq.; Luke 9, 18 sqq. The conduct of the Jews at the entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem. Math. 21; Mark 11; Luke 19; John 12. Compare Schuerer, Geschichte des juedischen Volkes im Zeitalter Jesu Christi. Leipzig, 3 ed., 1898, II, p. 512 sqq.
6 15, 21; compare Flav. Jos. ctr. Ap. 2, 17. Compare Zunz, the addresses at Jewish worship, 1832, p. 3. The custom to read in the synagogues, on certain days of the week, chapters of the books of Moses tradition attributes partly to Moses and partly to Esdra. So much may be safely maintained that it is not later than the Age of the Machabees in which the reading of prophetic parallel passages had already been introduced.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 19
grace, had determined, besides the natural, also an extraor dinary mode of propagation, according to which one who died childless might see the Messiah. Aye, even more. The Old Testament confers a preference and a distinction on virginity. Thus the Law determined that the bearer of the dignity of the high priest may only take to wife a virgin from among the people.1 "If a man find a damsel that is a virgin" who is not espoused, and he dishonor her, he should "give to the father of the maid fifty sides of silver and shall have her to wife ... he may not put her away all the days of his life."2 Thus, in like manner, does the Law protect virgins, especially against calumniators by inflicting upon these a great punishment.3 Even more clearly is the exalta tion of the virginal state shown in this, that the nearer a per son approached God the greater was the requirement placed upon him to lead a life of continency. This we read of all the people of Israel, when the Lord had concluded to give it the Ten Commandments on Sinai;4 and of the priests, who were not permitted to leave the tabernacle during the seven days of dedication.5 As long as the time of the service of the priests lasted, so long were they to abstain from marital inter course. The living of the priests in the temple, the retirement of the high priest into the temple — in later days, seven days before the great feast of the atonement — these were all cir cumstances which were calculated to lead to a conception that only a virginal life corresponded to a most intimate proximity with God.6
2. But even the Old Testament acknowledges a dedica tion to God: "The man who shall have made a vow, and promised his soul to God, shall give the price according to estimation."7 But if there was question of service in the sanctuary, then, during the time of engagement in the service of the Lord, a chaste, respectively a virginal life was a con sequence. Such an obligation was also to be assumed by
1 Lev. 21, 10-14. Compare Ezech. 44, 22. f Deut. 22, 28, sq. Compare Exod. 22, 16. 8 Deut. 22, 13-19.
4 Exod. 19, 15; "And come not near your wives." Compare I Kings, 21, 5 sqq.
5 Exod. 29, 30 sqq.; Lev. 8, 33 sqq.
6 Compare also herewith I Kings 21, 4. 7 Lev. 27, 1-8.
20 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
the women who served in the temple.1 It might possibly have been the rule that virgins only served for a certain time, and that widows rather " served" permanently " before the tent of the Covenant" or the temple; but the possibility, however, that a virgin dedicated herself permanently to the Lord is granted.
Did such a case ever occur before the Mother of God con ceived her resolution?
To the much mooted questions belongs likewise that of the vow of Jephte.2 "If Thou wilt deliver the children of Ammon into my hands, whosoever shall first come out of the doors of my house, and shall meet me when I return in peace from the children of Ammon, the same (shall belong to the Lord) (or?) I will offer a holocaust to the Lord." But the victorious Jephte was first met by his daughter, who was his only child. Her father was deeply moved by sadness, and she said to him: "My father, if thou hast opened thy mouth to the Lord, do unto me whatsoever thou hast promised; since the victory hath been granted to thee, and revenge of thy enemies, of the sons of Ammon. . . . Grant me only this which I desire: Let me go, that I may go about the moun tains for two months, and may bewail my virginity with my companions." And the two months being expired: "he did to her as he had vowed and she knew no man." To decide this question is not our scope, still the following reflections may not be out of place.
1 Exod. 38, 8 speaks of such women who serve in the temple, [ijno hnx nns ixns TON (a'Btt sell.) nxnsn nxnos ] The t*ss the LXX translate by vr/oreveiv, the Vulg. excubare, the Chal. translation by K^r = praying, and they afford such varied conceptions of the Hebrew expression, which signifies to congregate, to gather, and especially by the Lord. Since this word in Number 4, 23; 8, 24 is also applied to the activity of the priests and the Levites it may be rendered by "serving." Therefore, the above passage: "the mirrors of the women that served at the door of the tabernacle." That with such women the sons of Heli committed sin the first book of Kings narrates in a manner that thereby only virgins, and possibly widows, but not married women, might be under stood. In the latter case these sins would have assumed a different character and the punishment of stoning to death would have been inflicted therefore, all of which is contrary to the report.
2 Judges, 11, 29 sqq. Reinke, in his lectures 1. 419-528, counts on p. 425 sqq. 23 special works. Besides, compare Schoenen, in Tuebingen, Quartschrift, 1869, p. 533 sqq. Auberton, Studien und Kritiken, 1860, p. 540 sqq., also Zschokke, Die biblischen Frauen des A. T. 1882, p. 184 sqq. and Kaulen, Commentatio de rebus Jephte ducis ex sacrae scripturse recte describendis, Bonn, 1895.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 21
The assumption that Jephte had carried out the sacrifice of his daughter as a real holocaust,1 mainly based on the words r6iy and ?"6j?n, which designate such,2 has for its con clusion that the former was already prepared, when mak ing the vow, to sacrifice a human life, for it is said: tWH, that is, he who meets me.3 But even then the questions arise: How could Jephte, who at the time of the vow was already filled with the Spirit of God,4 promise such a sacrifice so strenuously forbidden by the Law? 5 Furthermore, how could it be permitted that women and virgins should annu ally assemble and lament the daughter of Jephte for four days?6 And, besides, the manner of praise in which Holy Scripture, I Kings, 12, 11; Sirach (Ecclesiasticus) 46, 13 sq.; Hebr. 11, 32 sqq., speaks of Jephte, scarcely corresponds with this, and the passage (v. 39): "And he did to her as he had vowed: and she knew no man," would remain without a motive.
We do not intend to decide here whether the word rfnjj = " holocaust" and the Hiphilform r6pn = "to sacrifice" may also be used in a biblical sense,7 or whether it may be translated: "and should be for the Lord, or I will sac rifice him as a holocaust," in which case the sense would be: he who meets me, if he be a man, shall belong to the Lord, but if it be a sacrificial animal, it shall be offered as a holocaust.8 The fact that virgins, who served in the sanc-
1 This opinion is maintained by Chald. Targ. Midrasch; Flav. Jos.; Greg. Naz., Chrys., Epiphan., Theodoret, Tertull., Ambrose, Jerome Augustin, Ephram, Isidor., Pelus, Elisaeus v. Amathumik (poor commen. on Jos. & Jud.), Thorn. Aqu., Menoch., Serar., Salian, Genobrad., Cajet. Nat. Alex., Cornel, a L., Thin., Calm.. Welte, Allioli, Hummelauer, Michaelis, Winer, Ewald. Compare, especially in regard to the Fathers, Reinke, 1. c. p. 433, Zschokke, 1. c. p. 185 sq. or Hummelauer com. in II Jud. et Ruth, Paris, 1888, p. 219 sqq.
2 Welte, in the Tuebingenr Quartschrift. 1842, p. 608 sqq.
3 The: rbiy inwSyni ron^ rvm is translated by "and he shall belong to the Lord and I will sacrifice him as a holocaust"; thus the second member would be an explanation of the first.
4 Judges, 11, 29.
5 Gen. 9, 6; Deut. 12, 31; 18, 9. 10. 12.
6 Judges, 11, 40.
7 Compare Reinke, 1. c. p. 471, sqq. who cites a series of passages of the Old Testament for proof; against this see Schoenen, 1. c. p. 541 sqq.
8 Compare Cassel in Herzog's Realencyclopd. and Schoenen, 1. c. p. 553 sqq. who justly bases his argument on Gen. 19, 12, where the LXX translate the i
22 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
tuary, were dedicated to God, and also the additional text: "and she knew no man" -which is not compatible with the assumption of a real holocaust — suggest the conception that Jephte dedicated his daughter permanently to the Lord, and, therefore, by permanent virginity.1 The sadness in con sequence hereof is such as the Israelitish woman would con ceive on account of her childlessness, in view of the Redeemer of her race.
Jephte and his daughter recognized the divine will and sub mitted themselves thereto and thereby proved to be worthy children of Abraham who had been willing to sacrifice his son, and to whom, therefore, the Messianic blessing had been promised. But, are not their lives, precisely from this stand point, ever since then to be compared to the "tent of the shepherd," which "is rolled up?" are they not "cut off, as by a weaver," to use the words of Isaias (Isa. 38, 12)? And still the Lord accepts this sacrifice and does not return to the judge his only child. Thus Israel may learn therefrom that a perpetual virginity is pleasing to the Lord. What can prevent us, therefore, from agreeing with the old tradition which tells us that Joachim and Anna dedicated their child Mary to the temple — witness : the feast of the presentation of Mary — and to find the resolution prepared to please the Lord by the vow: "<u>S/>a ov yiixoo-Kw " — by the selection of perpetual virginity?
The significance of the virginity of the Mother of God jus tifies such a preparation in the history of Israel and the account thereof given in the book of the Judges, which is also a prophetic book. Thus we come to the question:
3. Are there any types in the Old Testament which pre figure the virginity of the Mother of God?
St. Jerome 2 finds in Abisag, who was brought to David,
with 17, the Vulg. with -aut; Ex. 21, 15, 17, where the same conception is con firmed by a citation of the New Testament of Math. 15, 4 and Deut. 13, 3 where i is put for n«.
1 Thus also: Nicol. Lyr. Arias Mont., Mariana, Sanctius, Pagninus, Vata- blus, Estius, Mavenda, Dereser, Stolberg, Reinke, Schoenen, Zschokke, Heng- stenberg, and of the rabbis Drach mentions, in de 1'harmonie entre l'e"glise et la synagogue II. p. 241: Abarbanel, David Kinchi, Levi ben Gherschen, Isaak Abuhab, Sam. Lamiado. Recently Kaulen and Halevy, Journal asiatique, 1896, t. VII. p. 333 adopted the same opinion. 2 Ep. 52 ad Nepot. n. 4.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 23
but "not known by him" l a type of the Blessed Virgin Mary. This should not seem to us arbitrary, because the addition: "and the king knew her not" scarcely found a sufficient motive in the wish of Adonias to take her as his wife. If this desire meant as much as did the coveting of the throne of David,2 then the counsel of Achitophel and the crime of Absalom committed with the concubines of his father3 show that the inviolability would not have been a pre-requisite for the desire of Adonias, as a pretender to the throne.
I do not desire to read anything into the miracle of the revelation given by God to Moses in the burning thorn- bush, which, was not consumed 4; but the question presents itself: Why was the mediator of the Old Testament called precisely in connection with such a miracle? Mindful, again, of the prophetic character of the history of the Old Testament, the clearness of which is only attained through the full light of revelation, the Fathers recognize, with a special predilection, in that miracle a sign of the maternity and the inviolable virginity of the Mother of the Founder of the New Covenant. Possumus per rubum — so writes St. Ambrose 5 — qui flammas ex se producebat et non combure- batur, B. V. Mariam intelligere, quae filium Dei ex suo utere protulit et virginitatem non amisit.6
In the days of the judges, when God again wished to save His people, He called Gideon and gave him as a sign that a heavy dew would fall upon the fleece spread upon the thrash ing-floor, whereas all around the floor would remain dry.7 The dew, a symbol of grace and of its author, of the Mes siah,8 is applied by the Psalmist,9 in reference to that miracle, to God: "He (God) shall come down like rain upon the fleece." To this the second sign may be applied, that the
1 III Kings 1, 4. 2 m Kingg 2j i7_25.
3 II Kings 16, 21 sqq. 4 Exod. 3. 6 Expos, in Apoc. 5.
6 Thus also a Greg. Nyss. de vita Moys. and sermo in nat. Dom., Theodotus Ancyr. horn, in natal. Salvatoris (in Gallandus t. IX. p. 450) ; Prochus Archiep. Constant, orat. I (in Gall. t. IX p. 614). The orat. II. in Deip. nat., generally ascribed to John Damascene, the orat. III. in Deip. Annunt. — generally ascribed to St. Gregor. Thaumat., which probably belongs to Prochus. — Besides, the so-called choir-bishop Balaeus, Prayer in honor of the Blessed Mother of God, translated into German by Bickell: "Moses malte dich im Dornbush."
7 Judg. 6, 36-38. 8 Isai. 38, 8. 9 Ps. 71 (72), 6.
24 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
ground around shall be moistened by the dew : " and as showers gently falling upon the earth. " If we consider these circum stances and ask whether this miracle, considered in its unique ness and closely connected symbolism, has not a significance aiming at the future, then we shall find the application of the Church, on the feast of the Circumcision, well founded1: Quando natus est ineffabiliter ex Virgine, tune impletae sunt Scripturae: sicut pluviae in vellus descendisti, ut salvum faceres genus humanum, Te laudamus, Deus noster. The noiseless and inviolable penetration of the dew is therefore a favorite type not only of the incarnation,2 but also of the inviolability of the Mother 3 with Rabulas of Edessa,4 Pro- chus,5 John Damsc.,6 Peter Crysologus,7 Bernard,8 Canisius,9 Corn, a Lap.10 and Calmut.11
Finally, let us mention that several Fathers of the Church and ecclesiastical writers see a type of the Virgin-Mother in the mountain from which was loosened, without the aid of any human hand, a rock which crushed the pagan kingdoms of the earth.12 Without a human hand, that is, without human aid, without the seed of man, was Christ born of the virginal womb13; but we must not conceal from ourselves that, even without any reference to Mary, the " without human hands" finds already a satisfactory explanation.
Novum testamentum in vetere latet, vetus in nove patet; the unique inviolability of the Virgin who conceives and
1 Laudes, 2d. Antiphon.
2 Jerome, ep. 108 (al. 86), 10 — epitaph. Paulae — : Pastores . . . invene- runt Agrium Dei puro et mundissimo vellere, quod in ariditate totius terrae coelesti rore complutum est.
3 Compare the address attributed to Ambrose: Sermo III. de natali Dom. and the ep. 9 ad Paul, et Eustoch. improperly attributed to S. Jerome.
4 In BickelTs translation, p. 259 sqq. 5 In Gallandus, t. IX 614.
6 Orat. in dorm. 9; compare the orat. II. in Deip. nat.
7 Sermo, 143 de annunt.
8 Sermo 2 supra missus est, n. 7; sermo in nat. Mar. n. 9.
9 Mariologia, lib. II. c. 6. Igitur niveum hoc Gideonis vellus virginitatem illius exprimit, quae a carnis contagio longe semota, at coelesti rore ter compluta sanctissimae trinitatis opificio mirabilem foetum pura concepit, pura enixa est, et post partum pura usque permansit.
10 In Jud. 6, 37. n In Jud. 6, 37. ** Dan. 2, 34, 35. 45.
13 Compare Corn, a Lap. in Dan. 2, 45 and Zschokke, 1. c. 425, also note 2, the appeals to Justinus, Irenaeus, Jerome, John Damsc., Epiphanius, Theodoret, and others.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 25
brings forth, this exception in the law of nature, illumines the darkness which, from a standpoint of the Old Testament, rests upon the uniqueness of the miracle on Mount Horeb and upon the "sign" granted to Gideon.
The declarations of Holy Scripture, which teaches the virginity of the Mother of God before, in, and after the birth.
4. From the words of St. Paul1: "Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and by sin death and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned"; from this antithesis of the one man to the other, Christ, it follows that original sin is attached to man, that, therefore, a sin committed by Eve alone would not have passed upon humanity.2 But from this it follows that the human nature of Jesus, because conceived without "the will of man" by the Virgin, considered in itself, i.e., without regard to its union with the divinity in the one divine person, must necessarily be without original sin.3 How could the human nature of Jesus, through which original sin was to be overcome and all grace has been merited, have been subjected to sin? From this follows the infinite significance of the birth of the Re deemer of the Virgin Mary, which is also testified to by the fact that a knowledge thereof was not lost even among the pagans.4
It is in keeping with such central position of this doctrine that it may be pursued to the beginning of the revelation of a Redeemer, to the Proto-Gospel. It is not expressed therein, but it is contained in the assumption or the foundation of the words: "And I shall place enmities between thee and the woman, between thy seed and her seed."5 All those who
1 Rom. 5, 12.
2 Consult my exposition of the letter of S. Paul to the Romans. Muenster 1891, p. 174 sq.
3 Thorn. Aqu. S. Th. I, II. qu. 82 a 4. remarks that original sin is equal in all, " aequaliter enim omnes relationem habent ad primum principium vitiatae originis, ex quo peccatum originale recipit rationem culpae." But in the sacred humanity of Jesus the relatio to the progenitor, upon whose decision original sin was founded, is another one; for Jesus, according to His human nature, is not born "of the will of man" (John 1, 13), but only of the Virgin.
4 Even St. Jerome, adv. Jov. 26, points to the fact that pagans also expected the birth of a benefactor of humanity of a virgin. Compare hereon the exposi tion by Reinke, Die Weissagung von der Jungfrau und vom Immanuel, 1848 p. 163 sqq. and especially Drach, de Fharmonie ... II. pp. 235-310.
5 Gen. 3, 15.
26 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
consider these words merely a promise may ask: Why does God only speak of the woman, only of her seed, and this the more so, because they are accustomed to hear only the seed of man mentioned? — There still remains, furthermore, an inclination to ask this from the fact that the Mosaic law, when speaking of the purification of a woman that had been con fined, adds: suscepto semine.1 Discrimen statuat, remarks Canisius,2 inter Mariam et alias feminas parientes. What is the meaning of the addition: suscepto semine, if the author of the law thought not of "the woman" who, since she conceives and gives birth without the aid of man, remained pure.
In like manner does the psalm of the Passion speak only of the mother: ". . . Thou art he that hast drawn me out of the womb: my hope from the breasts of my mother. I was cast upon thee from my womb. From my mother's womb thou art my God." 3 In this we must not merely consider that mention is made but once of the mother, but that the address is directed mainly to God: "Thou art he that hast drawn me out of the womb/' whereby it is clearly indicated that there is question of an extraordinary birth, of one that is accomplished by a special miraculous interference on the part of God. Therefore, these words point to a virginity in birth. However, we do not desire to emphasize such scriptural texts too much; but others, that are in a line with these, mention God as the Father of the Messiah: "The Lord hath said to me: Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee." 4 Both important points combined we receive from Isaias6: "Give ear, ye islands; and hearken, ye people from afar. The Lord hath called me from the womb : from the bowels of my mother he hath been mindful of my name. . . . And now, saith the Lord, that formed me from my womb to be his servant." "It is surely not merely an accident, nor a natural assumption that the prophets, when speaking of the birth of the Saviour, never mention a human father, but only speak
1 Lev. 12, 2.
2 1. c. II. c. 4 appealing to Origen. (horn. 14, in Luc., cfr. horn. 8 in Lev. n. 2), Ambrose (in Luc. 2), Theophyl. (in Luc. 2).
3 Ps. 21, 10. 11.
4 Ps. 2, 7, see Heb. 1, 5.
5 Isai. 49, 1. 5.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 27
of a virgin, a woman giving birth." l So, too, does Mathew only mention the Mother of the Divine Infant, and this in connection with the narrative of the introduction of Joseph into his lawful position as father.2
In this sense does St. Paul desire to exclude man when he mentions Christ as "made of a woman" 3; but, at the same time, he points out through the word "made" -com paring this idea with "conceived," "born" -that a creative principle was active.4 Mathew 6 concludes the genealogy of Christ in a manner which forbids us to think of Joseph as the natural father of Jesus. He says: "And Jacob begot Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ." •
1 Zschokke, 1. c. p. 385, and the same: Theologie der Propheten des A. T. 1877, p. 574.
2 See Math. 2, 11; also below Math. 1, 18-25.
3 Gal. 4, 4: yevo/Aevov CK ywaiKos. Thus Cyrill. of Jerus. conceives these words in Catech. XII, 31.
4 Thorn. Aqu. Expos, ad Gal. 4, 4: Principium . . . non fuit conjunctum, sed separatum, quia virtus Spiritus Sancti formavit illud.
5 1, 16.
6 In the Syrian translation, found by Mrs. Agnes Lewis on Sinai, called Syrus Sinaiticus (compare herewith the details, among others, in my Einleitung in das N. T., Paderborn, 1898, p. 35 sq.) we read: "Jacob begot Joseph; Joseph, espoused to whom was Mary the Virgin, begot Jesus, who is called the Messiah." The first question is: does the Syr. Sin. give its Greek original correctly? An affirma tive answer cannot be given without some doubt, for the closely allied Syrian Curet. (only a different version of the same translation?) gives the following: "Joseph to whom was espoused Mary the Virgin, she, who gave birth to Jesus Christ"; of the allied group D reads: "Joseph, to whom the Virgin was espoused, and she gave birth to Jesus"; k (Bolliensis, 5th. cent.) : Josef, cui desponsata virgo Maria genuit Jesum Christum. Thus also in substance d g q a and b (Veron. 5th. cent.) : Josef, cui desponsata virgo Maria. Virgo autem genuit Jesum. But, even granted that the Syr. Sin. has given, in its present form, correctly the copy from which it trans lated; then the translator himself accepted the notion of "to beget" in the wider sense, which comprises also a filial relationship on a legal ground (and not that of nature); for the Syr. Sin. relates, immediately afterwards, the proof of the birth of Jesus by the Virgin Mary (Math. 1, 18 sqq.) and does this with the character istic form of 1, 21 : "She shall bring forth a son to thee (Joseph) and of 1, 25: "She begot a son for him." In these two passages there can be no doubt, according to the context, that there is only question of a legal paternal relationship of Joseph on the ground that "he took to himself" Mary. Because Mary was espoused to Joseph ("the husband of Mary"), therefore Joseph occupies the legal position of a father and therefore does Mathew offer with the genealogical tree (not of Mary) the proof that Jesus is the son of David and of Abraham. For other attempts at an explanation see the Innsbruck, theol. Zeitschrift, 1895, p. 390 sqq. and Holzhey, der neuentdeckte Cod. Syrus Sinaiticus, Muenchen, 1896. The second question
28 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
A marvelous birth, which, in a certain sense, may be called a creation, finds in the Old Testament still another preparation. When the Israelite remembers the birth of Isaac by the already deceased Sara,1 then he cannot remain incredulous if he perceives that God, even without the co-operation of masculine seed, will operate through a virgin in a creative manner, when he hears of the Virgin-Mother whom
5. the prophet Isaias announces in the words: "Behold, a Virgin shall conceive, and bear a son; and his name shall be called Emmanuel." (7, 14.)
If we consider the history of salvation under the view points presented to us by the evangelist St. John, in the prologue of his Gospel2: "And the light shined in darkness," "He was in the world . . . and the world knew Him not," and "but as many as received Him, to them He gave power to be made the sons of God/7 then we go back to the words of the promise of a redemption, to the Proto-Gospel; but we shall also see how, in the succeeding ages, mankind constantly deviated, more and more, from God's revelation, so that only Noe and his family were saved from the deluge with which the Lord punished the world. And, again, the human race entered, as a whole, upon the same path. In conse quence of this it was left to itself, and Abraham and his pos terity were selected in order that among them, as with the special "possession" of God, the light might continue to shine.
But of this people it is also said: "And He (the Son of God) came unto His own; and His own received Him not." Israel's history is a history of the revelation of the fidelity and the long-suffering of its God of Covenant. Ever since the exodus from Egypt it announces how the Lord, during the migration in the desert and in the capture of the land of Canaan and during the time of the judges and of the kings, fulfilled His promise that He had made at the waters of
relates to the actually original form of Math. 1, 16. It must be admitted here that an entire chorus of all other texts-witnesses arises in favor of the above accepted form.
1 Rom. 4, 19: TO eavrov a-w/j.a veveK/Wftevov . . . KOI rrjv v€K/>u>(rii/ 7-775 as.
2 John, 1, 5. 10. 11. 12.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 29
Mara: "I, the Lord, am thy healer."1 The seeking of aid from a pagan power meant, at the same time, an acceptance of the idols adored by it, and it contained within itself also a transgression of the first commandment.
It came to pass that the king Achaz of Juda, pressed by Israel's kings Pekah and the son of Romelia, Rasin, king of Damascus, sought aid from Tiglath-Pilesar, the king of the Assyrians, for "his heart was moved and the heart of his people, as the trees of the woods are moved."2 And the Lord said to Isaias: "Go forth to meet Achaz, thou and Jasub 3 thy son, to the conduit of the upper pool and in the way of the fuller's field, and thou shalt say to him: See thou be quiet; fear not, and let not thy heart be afraid of the two tails of these fire brands smoking with the wrath of the fury of Rasin king of Syria and of the son of Romelia, saying: Let us go up to Juda . . . and draw it away to us, and make the son of Tabeel king in the midst thereof. Thus saith the Lord God: It shall not stand, and this shall not be." To this positive announcement of the failure of the plan directed against Juda and Achaz the prophet adds: "If you will not believe, you shall not continue."
Tempting, no doubt, it was to Achaz to send his mes sengers to Assyria — to the commander of his opponents, against whom these revolted and into which conflict they wished also to drag Juda — and to ask help, for the danger seemed to him very great. Therefore the prophet continues to address the king: "Ask thee a sign of the Lord thy God, either unto the depth of hell, or unto the height above." 4 The entire world, the subterranean and the supernal, is placed at the disposal of Achaz for a selection of a sign (HIS). Though this word H1N has also the general significance of "sign," as, f.i., a sign of remembrance, or a sign of covenant (at the circumcision), a sign of the future (the rainbow of
1 Exod. 15, 26. Compare Josue 23, 15 sqq.
2 Isaias 7, 2 sqq. II (IV) Kings, 16, 5; II Chron. 28, 5-15.
3 aw* *HW: "the rest will be converted" is at the same time a prophecy, which declares that God will convert a small portion unto salvation.
4 nSxc> a pausalform, not as an imper. conceived with n corresponding to the rhynh. In profundum inferni, sive in excelsum supra (Vulgate).
30 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
Noe), still it has the special significance of " miracle." This is the case, f.i., in Exod. 7, 3, of the miracles and the signs in Egypt, in Judges 6, 17, of the sign of Gideon, and especially in Isaias himself (38, 7. 8. 22) of the turning back of the shadow on the sun-dial of Achaz. In this sense, according to the context, the proposed sign of Isaias must be con ceived.1 Still, it must not be simply identified with "miracle," it must rather be regarded as a most remarkable miracle — as one that proves and teaches or reveals, 2
The appearance of the great prophet Isaias and the offer ing of a miracle indicate that there was question of a decisive time for the future history of the people of the Covenant. How often had it not, since its miraculous exodus from Egypt, abandoned the Lord its God and still was always taken back in grace. The time had now come when the long-suf fering of God, in bearing with this stiff-necked and rebellious people, had become exhausted; for the degree of the per versity of the will should not determine the measure of grace. The people was ripe for its rejection, if now it rejected the aid of God offered in unbounded goodness and condescension and turned again to strange gods. We therefore see the prophet in the supreme height of his office, when he speaks in this moment to the king Achaz and to the "house of David."
But Achaz rejected the proffered "sign" by saying, in an allusion to Deuteronomy: "I will not ask, and I will not tempt the Lord." He thereby declined to say, in response to the address of the prophet, "my Lord," and instead of confiding in his Lord of the Covenant, he sent messengers to Tigleth-Pilesar, the king of the Assyrians, saying: "I am
1 This is also admitted by the rationalistic commentator Hitzigs, since he thinks that Isaias had ventured to perpetrate a dangerous trick ( !) ; still it con tradicts also the other rationalistic notion of Knobel, who thinks that it was "a matter of a very simple affair." In like manner does H. Schultz, Alttestamentliche Theologie, 1878, p. 731, express himself: "It must have been some visible evidence of the future, therefore of something invisible."
2 This second important point Isaias emphasizes very clearly when, f.i., he says (8, 18): "Behold, I and my children, whom the Lord hath given me for a sign, and for a wonder in Israel from the Lord of hosts, who dwelleth in Mount Sion." Therefore the prophet had given names to his sons, which announced the saving of a portion of Israel after the judgment of the Lord. Compare above p. 29, note 4. The second son of the prophet is called: ta vn hbv ino = in haste — prey — quick — robbery."
MARY — THE VIRGIN 31
thy servant and thy son, come up and save me." And he sacrificed to the idols of the pagans, but the altar of the Lord he set aside.1 Thus he, the Israelite, the theocratic king and the offshoot of the house of David, had broken the Cove nant and thereby exhausted the long-suffering of the Lord. Therefore the prophet entered upon his mission, which was committed to him in his call and which was as follows 2 : " Hearing, hear and understand not: and see the vision, and know not. Blind the heart of this people and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted and I heal them.'7 Isaias spoke and acted before the people, and after him many prophets down to the time of the Messiah. But what was the result? In the biblical language, which describes the actual result as one intended by God — for the same serves finally the divine counsel, even though it had withstood the divine will — is given to us a picture of the hardening of hearts and of the impenitence of Israel, which is constantly augmented by the continually abused conferring of grace. Therefore God announces, furthermore, by the mouth of His prophet, the rejection of Israel except a very small portion which will be converted.3 " Until the cities be wasted without inhabi tant, and the houses without man, and the land shall be left desolate. And the Lord shall remove men far away: and she shall be multiplied that was left in the midst of the earth. And there shall still be a tithing therein: and she shall turn, and shall be made a show as a turpentine-tree, and as an oak that spreadeth its branches: that which shall stand therein, shall be a holy seed." 4 For the great mass of the people — so the prophet is informed in his mission — his and his suc cessors7 and even the Messiah's labors shall be in vain, aye, indirectly, on account of the contempt of the call to grace, downright fatal and provocative of judgment.
Isaias opposed Achaz, who did not understand, did not see, and could not be converted, and he began to realize that
1 6, 16; compare Exod. 17, 7. 2 c. 6, 9 sqq. 3 6, 11-13.
4 Though in another picture the Vulgate presents essentially the same sense: et erit in ostensionem sicut therebinthus et sicut quercus, quae expandit ramos suos: semen sanctum erit id quod steterit in ea.
32 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
that which God had revealed to him in the beginning of his call was about to be accomplished. After this rejection by the Lord it is no longer the intention of the prophet to move the king to a change of mind.1 With this ruler Israel entered upon a way at the end of the conduit of the upper pool, in the way of the fuller's field, which terminated in the judgment hall of Pilate and on Golgotha. The declaration: "I will not ask nor tempt the Lord/' receives its most frightful echo in the cry: "We have no king but Caesar." 2
In these words the Jews pronounced their own condemna tion as Achaz did long before in those other words. Therefore, from this time on, the prophet proclaims so often the judg ment and, as a sign, gives to his son, born thereafter, the name "hastily" -"prey" -"quickly" -"robbery." St. Paul, who realizes the fulfilment, declares3: "Isaias cries out concerning Israel: If the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved," and "unless the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed, we had been made as Sodom, and we had been like unto Gomorrha." 4
The Chronicles judge of Achaz's beginning that "it availed him nothing."5 The dependence upon Assyria, and upon Babylon which followed that power, had as a result the ruin of the realm and of the city, after Jeremias had pro tested in vain against a covenant with Egypt. Neither events
1 Herewith the objection falls: "It was, above all, question of giving the unbelieving Achaz a sign which was soon to be fulfilled and was, as it were, apparent to him. How could this have been conceded by the miraculous birth of the Messiah, which was to follow centuries afterwards? How could Achaz have accepted a promise which was to be fulfilled far later, as a guarantee of an earlier result?" (Thus reasons Gesenius on this passage. Before him Abarbanel and Isenbiehl.)
2 John 19, 15. Isaias 6, 9 sq. is therefore quoted by the Lord, at a time when the Lord is about to begin to turn away from Israel and, therefore, no longer explains to it the parables as a sign that they hear and do not understand. Thus in Math. 13, 13. 14. 15 (*<u dvaTrX^/oovrat avrotg 17 Tr/oo^eTeia'Horaiov). Compare also John 12, 36-41.
3 Rom. 9, 27, 29 in reference to Isaias 10, 22; 1, 9.
4 Hereby the other objection of Abarb. Isenb. and Gesen. is refuted. For such a pompous announcement of the Messiah the description following, in v. 17, of the misfortune does not harmonize in the least, since with Him the misfortune of the nation is to cease and the victory over all enemies is to begin."
6 Chron. 28, 21.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 33
nor prophet — not even the Baptist nor Jesus Himself — have effected, with all their lamentations and working of miracles, a change in the sentiments of the people as a whole, so that, in a decisive hour, it would have believed in its Messiah. Whilst thus, on the one hand, the saying of the prophet: "If you believe not, you shall cease to be" was verified, there was accomplished, on the other hand, among the people a begin ning of their special preparation for the time of the Redeemer.
With the announcement of the judgment there is also connected the promise that a small remnant shall be the seed of a new people of the Lord, and that, as the Apostle of the Gentiles teaches1: "by their (the Jews) offense sal vation is come to the Gentiles. " Whereas the Lord says to Israel 2: "I have stretched forth my hand all the day to an unbelieving people, who walk in a way that is not good, after their own thoughts, " and to the pagans He says: "I was found by them that did not seek me: I appeared openly to them that asked not after me"; and to those: "Thou hast cast off thy people, the house of Jacob," but to these: "and many people shall go and say: Come and let us go up to the moun tain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob and he will teach us his ways, and we will walk in his paths; for its law shall come forth from Sion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem." 3
Therefore, with a faith in the divine government of the world and in the divine ordaining of salvation, it will surely not be considered a matter of accidence that, at this same time — Achaz was king from 741-726 — there should begin, with the foundation of Rome, a special preparation of the pagan world for the kingdom of God. The importance of this city and its extent of power in behalf of the Gospel cannot be ignored since the days of the apostle Paul.4 And precisely since the exile, which was a divide visitation upon Israel and Juda, are the dispensations of ^race increased among the pagans. Ezechiel and Daniel are engaged among them. The dispersion of the Jews, the origin of the Septuagint, and the increase of proselytes prepared "the nations" for the Gospel.
1 Rom. 11, 11. 2 Isaiag> 65> 2; Rom. 10, 20. 3 Isaias, 2.
4 Compare my explanation of the Letter to the Romans, Muenster, 1891, p. 1 sqq. and my introduction to the N. T., 1898, p. 1.
34 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
There is question, therefore, of a decisive period in the actual development of the whole history of salvation. But it is thereby also fully and completely established why Achaz is offered such a great miracle. The consequence follows, furthermore, that the "sign" which the Lord an nounced through the prophet Isaias must be conceived as one pertaining to and significant for all times.
Every conflict between truth and error turns finally upon Christ and His birth of the Virgin Mary. Herein the Fathers see a sure proof of the divinity of Christ.1
This importance, manifested of the time in which the "sign" was given, finds a confirmation in a certain analogy with the first turn of the divine plan of salvation that took place in Paradise. The first human couple had sinned and thereby lost Paradise; Israel broke the Covenant through Achaz and forfeited its right as a people to the Covenant : in Paradise, to innocence, punishment and atonement succeeded; here, instead of an entry of the Messianic kingdom of peace between God and the people a judgment upon Israel and upon the nations follows. But, as God had connected in Paradise the promise of a Redeemer with the doom of punishment, so does He also here combine with the declaration to Achaz the promise of the Emmanuel.2 Therefore, the question at once arises: Is the address directed to Achaz and to the house of David, at the same time also an announcement of punishment? The comparison established gives an affirmative answer. In the Proto-Gospel appears the "woman" and she alone; in the address of Isaias: the Virgin-Mother and she alone.
These relations manifest that God resumed, through the mouth of the prophet, the revelation which was made in Paradise and closely adhered to ever since in the history of Israel, and that He continues and emphasizes it more clearly.
The prophet Isaias continues (w. 13-16): "Hear ye
1 See below, p. 37 and note 1. Compare Lehner, Die Marienverehrung id. e. Jahrhunderten, 1881, p. 120-143.
s Fillion, Essais d'Exeg&se, Paris et Lyon 1884; la prophe*tie de la vierge m£re et d'Emmanuel, p. 18 sq. remarks: La situation n'est pas sans anologie avec celle d'Adam et d'Eve au paradis terrestre imme*diatement apr&s la chute. Les hommes se de*robent, mais Dieu prend 1'initiative, et, tout en chatiant les coupables, il daigne leur promettre de grandes choses dans 1'avenir. Propter hoc dabit Dominus ipse vobis signum.
MARY— THE VIRGIN 35
therefore, 0 house of David: Is it a small thing for you to be grievous to men, that you are grievous to my God also ? There fore the Lord Himself shall give you a sign. Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son; and his name shall be called Emmanuel,1 He shall eat butter and honey, that he may know to refuse the evil, and to choose the good.2 For before the child knows to refuse the evil, and to choose the good, the land which thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of the face of her two kings."
These verses are some of the most discussed in Holy Scripture.3
About the interpretation of the Church there can be no doubt. She makes use of the Septuagint, and declares the Vulgate authentic, in which, by the translation of irapdevos, virgo concipiet — pariet, the virginity of the Mother is expressed; in this sense she makes reference to the dogmatic definitions, f.L, of the council of Ephesus4;- she places into the missal and the breviary these words in praise of the virginal Mother of God; she censured the contradictory interpretation of Isenbiel (in 1779) as false, erroneous, and containing heretical propositions.5 In this matter the Church is in harmony with the Syrian translation
1 b# tatty i»tr nxipi ja nnh*\ mn n&Syn nan
2 In this translation I am following that of Pesch and of the Vulgate, which conceive the h not of time. Compare Bredenkamp, die Immanuel-Weissagung in Luthardt's Zeitschrift 1883, p. 625 sq. on the authority of Giesebrecht, the Hebrew preposition Lamed, Halle, 1876 p. 21 sqq.
3 Reinke, 1. c. p. 60-64 enumerates 40 works on this subject. To this must be added the commentaries on Isaias; compare, furthermore, Drach, Har- monie . . . t. II. p. 70-383; Patritius, de evangeliis, 1853, lib. III. diss. XVI and Knabenbauer, comment, in Isaiam prophet. I Paris, 1887, p. 165 sqq., who quotes especially the medieval and more ancient interpretations of recent times, G. K. Mayer, Messianische Prophezien. (New ed.) Vienna, 1863, p. 51 sqq., Paielli, PEmmanuelle e la Madre Vergine sec. Isaia. (Periodical, La Scienza e la fede, 1876, IV). In Rohling, das Solom. Spruchbuch, 1879, p. 356 sqq. A. Kurz, Mario- logie, 1881, p. 180 sqq. 211 sqq. Faivre, La proph. de la Vierge Mere et d'Emmanuel. Controverse, Lyon, 1882, Nr. 37-44. Galfano, La vergine delle vergini, Palermo, 1882, p. 330 sq. Fillion, 1. c. p. 1-99. Corluy, Spicilegium dogma- tico-biblicum, Gandavii, 1884. I. p. 394-421. H. Schultz, altest. Theologie, 1878, p. 731 sqq. Bredenkamp, Vaticinium quod de Immanuele edidit Isaias (VII, I-IX, 6) explicatum, 1880, and the Immanuel-Weissagung in Luthardt's Zeitschrift, f. kirchl. Wissenschaft, etc., Leibzig, 1883, p. 621-632. Giesebrecht, die Immanuels- weissag. Stud. u. Krit., 1888; Legrange, lavierge et Emmanuel, Revue bibl. 1892, p. 481 sqq.
4 Can.^1. ®eov eiroi Kara aXvfitwv TOV 'E/x/tavov^A, /cat Sia TOVTO OCOTOKOV rrjv dytav irapQivov. 5 Compare Reinke, 1. c. p. 7.
36 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
— which selected the unambiguous "bethultho" -and with the unanimous interpretation of the Fathers. The latter often speak of the words of Isaias, because they assumed the task of defending the conception of the Church against Judaic polemics. Thus did Justin, Irenaeus, Cyrill of Jerusalem, Origen, Cyrill of Alexandria, Basil, Athanasius, Gregory of Naz., Epiphanius, Eusebius, Chrysostom, Theodoret, Theodo- tius Ancyramus, Procopius of Gaza, John Damascene among the Greeks; St. Ephraim the Syrian; and among the Latin: Tertullian, the Constitutiones Apostolorum, Lactantius, and SS. Cyprian, Ambrose, Jerome, Augustin, Leo I, and Gregory I.
These refer to the word nzby, which the LXX translate by TrapOtvos and which signifies " virgin" in the more limited sense1; they emphasize that it is said: ua virgin shall con ceive — and bear a son/' 2 they refer to the article and the word " behold," which, they claim, point in prophetic vision to Mary 3; they emphasize the context, which, they claim, demands a miracle; this cannot be predicated of a mere natural birth.4 The fulfilment of the "sign" the Fathers
1 Origen referring to the LXX (7rap0eVos) contra Cels. I. 34. Cyrill of Jerus. Kat. XII. 21 referring to Deut. 27, 27; III Kings, 1, 4, according to which veans signifies a virgin untouched. Compare the commentary attributed to Basil, on Isai. 1, 1. c.; Euseb. of Caes., Demonstr. evang. VII, 1. 1. Jerome, ep. 54 (vers. Jovin.) and on Isai. 7, 14: Pro eo, quod in Latino dicitur, abscondit a me, in Hebraeo scriptum est ttiao nSyn. Ergo nnSy, non solum puella vel virgo, sed cum tTriTcura virgo abscondita dicitur et secreta, quae numquam virorum patuerit aspectibus, sed magna parentum diligentia custodita sit.
2 Justinus Martyr., Apol. 1, 33: KCU 7raA.iv u>s avroXe^ei 8ta irapBevov ftev re\Or}(r6iJifvo<i Sia TOV 'Hcrcuou Tr/oo^Tei^fy, d/covcraTe: . . . Justin now quotes Isai. 7, 14 and turns against the Jews, who claim to see the birth of Ezechias announced. Cyrill Alex. serm. IV. in Isa. 7, 14; Cyprian, ad mart, et conf. ep. 8; Ambros., ad Siric. ep. 7; August., de cons, evang. I, 26; Leo I, serm. 23 and 28.
3 Chrys. i. h. 1.
4 Irenaeus, ad. haeres. III. 21, 5. 6. "Ipse Dominus dabit signum; id quod erat inopinatum generationis ejus significavit, quod nee factum esset aliter, nisi Deus Dominus omnium Deus ipse dedisset signum in domo David. Quid enim magnum, aut quod signum fieret in eo, quod adolescentula concipiens ex viro peperisset, quod evenit omnibus, quae pariunt mulieribus? Sed quoniam inopinata salus hominibus inciperet fieri, Deo adjuvante, inopinatus et partus Virginis fiebat. Deo dante signum hoc, sed non homine operante illud. Origen., 1. c. The commentary ascribed to Basil i. h. 1. Euseb. v. Caes., 1. c. VII, 1, 1. Chrys., 1. c. Theodoret, i. h. 1. Theophyl., in Math. 1, 22. 23. Tertull., adv. Jud. 9: Signum autem a Deo, nisi novitas aliqua monstruosa fuisset, signum ergo nobis posita virgo mater merito creditur. cfr. adv. Marc. Ill, 13.
MARY— THE VIRGIN 37
see in the miraculous birth of Jesus by the Virgin Mary, and they use this as a proof of the divinity of the child; 1 they explain that the forming person in the case of this child is not man, but God Himself, and they partly refer the expression "He shall eat butter and honey" to the humanity of Emman uel.2 Though the Fathers emphasize the one or other sig nificant point more or less unanimously, still they are united in this that the words of the Evangelist of the Old Testament constitute a proof for the declaration: "born of Mary, the Virgin." 3 The testimony of ancient Christian art should not be omitted: "Isaias, prophesying the birth of Emmanuel by the Virgin" is represented on a golden goblet.4
This unanimous conception of the Fathers was and is the way that Catholic interpretation has followed and main tained. St. Thomas Aquinas, who follows St. Jerome, also insists that the "sign" need no longer be a sign for Achaz, because it is said: "hear O house of David, and not hear 0 Achaz." 5
Interpretations in favor of the virginity of the Mother of God are found in the commentaries on Isaias; the word of the prophet is adduced in proof of it in dogmatic theology.
1 Justinus, 1. c. 31; dial. c. Tryph. 43. 68. 84. Irenaeus, adv. haer. Ill, 21, 4. 6; see 33, 11: Ot TOV CK T^S trapOivov 'E/oi/nai/ov^A. K^/WTTOVTI/S, rrjv a/tocriv TOV Aoyou TOV 0eov Trpos TO 7rXao-/xa avrov f)8r]Xov. Origenes, cntr. Cels. I, 35; Cyrill. of Jerus., Kat. XII, 21. 22. Athanas., ep. ad Adelph. 5; ad Scrap. 8 (in the first writing this passage is used against the Arians, in the latter against the Mace donians). Euseb. of Caes., in Isa. 7, 14. Ephraem, i. h. 1. (bethulto); Greg, of Naz., serm. 35:
e* yuraiKos fJ^v
a\\a Kal irapOfvov.
dAAa K
Epiphan., adv. haers. LIV. 3; Ancoratus 32; Cyrill. Alex., 1. c. Cyprian, testi- moniorum II, 6. Ambros., de inst. virg. et s. Mar. virginit. perpetua ad Euseb. 5, 33; Leo. I., serm. 22. Gregor I., in ps. poenit. 27 (in V. ps.).
2 Irenaeus, 1. c. IV. 33, 11; Chrys. 1. c. Ephraem, 1. c. Hieron. i. h. 1. Theodoret i. h. 1.
3 Consult also besides those already mentioned: Const. Apost., V, 16, II, 55; Lactantius, div. instit. IV, 12. Epiphan., adv. haeres. XXX, 20. 30; LXXIX, 6. Tertull., de Came Christi 17.
4 Lehner, 1. c. p. 330, referring to Garucci T. 171, 3.
5 On Isai. 7, 14, compare Cat. in Math. 1, 13, where also the Dialogus contra Judaeos of the Spaniard Petrus Alphonsus is mentioned.
38 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
Therefore does the " recent attempt on the prophecy of Emmanuel" by Isenbiehl, of 1778, offend against Christian sentiment; in this attempt the objections of Jews are partly repeated which had already been refuted by the Fathers, and others were taken up which were advanced by later rabbis. It is, therefore, to be presumed, from the very outset, that the rationalistic exegesis would go hand in hand with these, because otherwise an incontestable genuine prophecy would be presented. To register and to refute each and every one of the objections advanced is not neces sary; for this is already partly done by themselves, and partly the occasion has offered itself and will appear again to show, in particular, how they proceed from entirely incorrect concep tions of the prophet.1
On the contrary, the orthodox Protestant interpretation essentially maintains the traditional reference to the virginal Mother of God.2 It unites, however, partly with the indirect or typical-Messianic conception — also advocated by the more recent Catholic writers — which refers the prophecy directly to a child of the days of Isaias — specifically to Maher-Schalal,
1 In Justin and Jerome (see above) the assumption of a Jew is mentioned that Emmanuel is Ezechias. Thus also de Lugarde, Goett Gel. Anz. 1887 N. 15 p. 584, note to Ps. 46 (novae psalterii graeci editionis specimen. 1887). But, since this will not hold water, on account of his age, therefore it must be — accord ing to Kimchi and Abarbanel — another son of Achaz; — or a child of the prophet Isaias — thus Abenesra, Jarchi, Plueshke, Gesenius, Hitzig, Maurer, Knobel — and therefore the nnfy, the wife or the betrothed of the prophet. In reference hereto even Ewald remarks: (die Propheten des A.B. 2 ed. I. p. 344): "nothing more preposterous can be imagined, than that the prophet is supposed to have pointed by 'virgin' to the wife of the king or, rather, to his own." The same may also be said of H. Schultz, 1. c. p. 733 : " the prophet directs the attention of the people to a young woman of the present time," and p. 737: to his "own wife," so that Immanuel might be the younger brother of Sheargaschub, and the older brother of Maherschalal Chasbas." But Ewald's own opinion, that there is question of a child soon to be born, which is to possess marvelous signs, is purely arbitrary. The same is to be said of Cheyne, in his introduction to the Book of lesaya (German by Boehmer, Giessen), 1897, p. 33 sq.: It (the sign) consists solely in the name, which mothers still give their new-born children long before the event, through a sort of a mental impulse from above." Concerning the Jewish rabbis consult Drach, 1. c. t. II. p. Ill sqq., 206 sqq. Also Reinke, Fillion, 1. c. and Corluy 1. c t. I. p. 409 sq.
2 Compare especially Hengstenberg, Christologie des A. T. Bd. 2, p. 51 sq.; the commentaries of Olshausen, Bibl. Comm. z. d. Schr. d. N. T. I. p. 56 sqq.; Bredenkamp, 1. c. and others.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 39
but only inasmuch as he is merely a type of the Emmanuel.1 This typical- Messianic interpretation is especially based on vv. 15 and 16, and, therefore, will yield later, through the explanation of these, to the superfluousness of the others; still, it points to the main difficulty which is connected with the traditional interpretation.
A preliminary, brief exposition of the words of v. 14 will not be hi vain.
The great prophecy opens with one word (p1?) which may signify "therefore," "since," but also "nevertheless," "yet." If one wishes to translate it by "nevertheless," then, in contrast, one would be obliged to say: "I will not tempt the Lord," and "the Lord Himself will give a sign" ; thus the sense would be: Achaz really wished no sign, neverthe less, the Lord will give him one. In this case, however, no connection would exist between the immediately preceding: "Is it a small thing for you ..." (v. 13) and v. 14; and yet v. 13 forms a continuous speech with this verse. Therefore, I agree with the LXX (Sia rovro), with the Vulgate (propter hoc), with the Syrian (methul hono), and with the Chaldean translation (Oil) in the sense of "therefore," "for this reason." According to this meaning, the following would be the sense: Hear, 0 house of Israel, is it a small thing for you, to tire men, i.e., to exhaust their patience and long- suffering, that you also must exhaust the patience and the long-suffering of my God f 2 Therefore, the Lord Himself gives you a sign, which, being a consequence of an abuse of divine patience, contains a threat of punishment for the house of David. We have once more this request for a sign.3 Still it announces also — corresponding with the context of vv.
1 Calmet, dissert, sens, liter, et figuratus; Bossuet, Explication de la pro- phe*tie d'Isaie VII, 14: Tirinus, Gratz, kritischer Comment, zu Matth. 1821: Dieringer, System der gottlichen Thaten des Christent. 1841. Le Hir, Etudes bibliques I. p. 78 and les trois grands Proph&tes p. 66 sq. Schegg, der Prophet Isaias, 1850. S. 87, who by "Virgin" means "not any specific (probably present) virgin, but the Virgin as a representative of all." Compare his Gesch. d. letzen Propheten. I. p. 119 sqq.
2 Jerome i. h. 1. quia non solum prophetas persequimini et eorum dicta con- temnitis, sed et praesentis et jubentis Dei dictis contradicitis.
3 See above p. 30 and p. 34. I cannot agree with the following description: Achaz really rejected the "sign" and made himself unworthy; — but, on account of the promise made to the house of David, this sign will be given by the Lord; —
40 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
7-9 which prophesy the downfall of the royal enemies — the reason why these cannot attain their aim: the dethroni- zation of Achaz and the inthronization of the son of Tabeel. As long as Juda possesses a kingdom it shall be connected with the house of David, which, for the sake of the Messiah, must continue to exist until He shall have come. Then, however, the time will have arrived of the fulfilment of the threat: "If you will not believe, you shall not continue."
And, even though the people, as a whole, shall be rejected, there will still remain thereof a holy remnant, a " stump," after the turpentine tree is fallen, from which the new king dom, the tree of the Church of Christ, shall sprout forth. Therefore, the "sign" which the prophet offers, contains a consoling and a victorious significance for the little faithful flock. With the prophet it places therein its unshakable hope, based upon the significance of the name of the child, which is to become a fact and a truth. Since, in the Old Testament, names often contained a lesson, this may be expected the more in the name which is here given to the Messiah. That the "God — with us (*?K -iJtej;) is the Messiah, from this Isaias removes all doubt. In the next chapter he describes the influx of the enemies of Israel. "And shall pass through Juda, overflowing; and going over, shall reach even to the neck. And the stretching out of his wings shall fill the breadth of the land, O Emmanuel. Gather yourselves together, 0 ye people, and be overcome: and give ear, all ye lands afar off: strengthen yourselves, and be overcome; gird yourselves and be overcome. Take counsel together, and it shall be defeated: speak a word, and it shall not be done: because God is with us." 1 It is the Emmanuel who will break the power of the Assyrians and who will shatter the power of the world. This Victor is described still more plainly: "For a child is born to us; and a son is given to us; and the government is upon His shoulders: and His name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, God the Mighty, the Father of the world to come, the Prince of Peace." 2 He
for the complaint contained in v. 13 is not only made against Achaz, but also against the house of David; not only the former, but also the latter abused the patience of the Lord.
1 8, 8-10. 2 9, 6, but punctuated by Hip'i instead of
MARY — THE VIRGIN 41
is called, finally, in the same cycle of speeches "a rod out of the root of Jesse" upon whom "the Spirit of the Lord shall rest," who "shall judge the poor with justice, and shall reprove with equity for the meek of the earth," "and with the breath of His lips He shall slay the wicked," He shall establish a kingdom, which shall possess within itself the power and exercise it to give the world a most perfect peace, — who "standeth for an ensign for the people," "him the Gentiles shall beseech, and His sepulchre shall be glorious." 1
Jerome and Eusebius see the significance of the name Emmanuel in the presence of the Redeemer with Israel in its power, by which He shall save it from the hands of its enemies.2 Such is the concept within the frame of the Old Covenant, which knew nothing of the other presence of God in the Incarnation. To this, however, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Basil, Chrysostom, and Theodoret refer the name "God- with-us." 3 And from the standpoint of the New Testament the significance of this name is given by the evangelist John (1, 14) in "the Word was made flesh and dwelled amongst us"; we will add the thought expressed by St. Paul, that He dwells in us and lives in us by His grace: " Christ liveth in me." 4
In the explanation of the much disputed word A-lmah its derivation was primarily sought for, as a rule. St. Jerome (who is followed by many even to the present day5) derives it from thy, i.e., "to veil"; the meaning, therefore, would be "one concealed," according to the cus tom of keeping virgins in concealment. But to this fits neither the form (which in that case ought to be no^J? or no^SM) nor the word D^y, "youth," which is traced back to the same root. It may be left undecided whether it is to be derived from D/J?= to become manly, strong, powerful;
1 c. 11, 1-10.
2 Hieronym. i. h. 1. Ergo iste puer, qui nascetur ex virgine, o domus David, mine a te appellatur Emmanuel, id est, nobiscum Deus, quia rebus ipsis probatis a duobus inimicis regibus liberata, deum te habere praesentem: et qui postea vocabitur Jesus, id est Salvator, eo quod universum hominum genus salvaturus sit, nunc a te Emmanuelis appellatur vocabulo.
3 Theodoret, i. h. 1. A^Xo? Se TO ovopa TOV /u.e0' ^JLUOV 0€ov rbv f.va.vQpu>irr)<Ja.vTa,
Oeov, TOV TT/V avOpuireiav <j>v(Ti,v avaXyfyoTa. 0eov, TOV cvtofle'vTo. ravrrj Otov, rrjv TOV
Oeov nop<f>r)v} KCU TTJV TOV BovXov fj.op<frr)v cv evi wa> yvopi^o/xev^v. 4 Gal. 2, 20.
6 Compare Drach, 1. c. II. p. 132 sqq. Fillion, 1. c. p. 63 sqq. Corluy, 1. c. I. p. 401.
42 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
or from ^1J? [TJJ] = to swell, to be strong,1 for in either case the meaning would be: the " matured," wherein, of course, it would be naturally supposed that it referred to a virgin, even though, strictly speaking, this were not the case.2
A custom of speech is more conclusive for the real mean ing. In all passages of Holy Scripture, wherever the word is found, there is question of a virgin.
Thus in Genesis, 24, 43, Rebekka is called A-lmah, of whom it is written in v. 16: an exceedingly comely maid, and a most beautiful virgin (nSinS) not known to .man. In Exodus, 2, 8, the sister of Moses, still a maid at the home of her mother, receives this name. If it is said in Psalm 68 (67), 26: ". . . singers, in the midst of young damsels (virgins) playing on timbrels (mo1??), then that translation is justified by Jeremias 31, 3 and Judges 11, 34, from which passages it follows that those who played the timbrels were, as a rule, virgins. In the Canticle of Canticles (7, 3; 6, 8) the doubt about the meaning of filD^J? is removed by the antitheses to " queens" and " concubines "; therefore, virgins must be meant in the first instance. In Ps. 46, 1 and I Chron. 15, 20 it is most probable that niD^jrtp is intended to express: to sing according to the custom of virgins.
More difficult, however, is the question in Proverbs 30, 1819: "Three things are hard to me; and the fourth I am utterly ignorant of : The way of an eagle in the air, the way of a serpent on a rock, the way of a ship in the midst of the sea, and the way of a man (in youth) with A-lmah. Such is also the way of the adulterous woman, who eateth and wipeth her mouth, and saith: I have done no evil."
It must be admitted, first, that nothing is in the way of admitting that A-lmah, in opposition to the "adulterous woman" in the following verse, means a virgin, who, how ever, after man had found "the way" to her — presuming that "way" means such — of course ceases to be a virgin. And granted, even, that she would here be still called A-lmah,
would, in that case, be a formation with the afformativ o, as in tbs and *&: shaddow DIB from 110= to await: hope, etc. Compare Reinke 1. c. p. 120.
2 H. Schultz, 1. c. p. 732 note 3, admits that "presumption requires always, if the contrary be not proven, that one unmarried be meant. (Compare above p. 37, note 1.)
MARY — THE VIRGIN 43
though in fact she already ceased to be such, in the eyes of the people she still would be regarded as such. The sup position would be that in the eyes of the people the marks of sin are not traceable (as such is not the case with the adulterous woman), and that, therefore, such might be re garded afterwards as well as before an A-lmah. This would be "a hard thing" to understand.1
But, since the "way" may also be used in a metaphorical sense, therefore, Corluy explains it of the manner of action: "Non intelligo, inquit Sapiens, qua ratione aquila, avis tanta, possit in coelo tarn alte et tarn recte itinere volare; qua ratione coluber, animal adeo glabrum et pedibus carens, possit se pro libitu movere super petram; qua ratione, quibus occultis artibus, vir libidine aestuans pervenire conetur ad virginem illibatam et absconditam. Talis est enim agendi ratio plena dolo et variis artibus occultis, qua mulier adultera, postquam adulterii voluptati indulsit, audacter dicat: Nihil mali feci." 2
It would be simple if, with the LXX, the Syrian and the Vulgate, we would read "youth"; still the parallelism of the members recommends the masoretic (also the Chaldean and the Symmachus versions) text. I am of the opinion that Corluy is right when he seeks the mysterious in the relation of the eagle to the height of heaven, of the serpent to the rocks, or of the ship to the sea. Still, I do not find any special reason to think that in man there should exist a desire to seduce precisely a virgin. It appears to me most probable that A-lmah means an adult virgin, but, as a gender — and precisely in its youth, and also in opposition to man — so that the sense would be: the fourth hard thing to under stand is the relation of man to the female — youthful — gender. However, it was far from the Wise man to say that A-lmah was one who had been violated. Just so 03), that is, inconceivable is to Solomon the way of the adulteress:
1 See Reinke, 1. c. p. 126. Since it follows from v. 20 that the incomprehen sible in the four ways is the incapability of being traced, and this is in relation to the ways, therefore Rohling's explanation (in The proverbs of Solomon, 1879, on the text) is irrelevant, inasmuch as it is made to mean that the fornicatio with a (hitherto) virgin is as little traceable to the sinning man, and, therefore, punish able as if a married woman herself had been unfaithful.
2 1. c. I. p. 399 sq.
44 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
every sin leads to a new sin; there is something mysterious about the way of malice, which is called, even by Paul, a "mystery." l
Hence, in the entire investigation of the meaning of the word A-lmah, it is an ascertained result that it is used in Holy Scripture only of persons who are virgins, and, as a rule, who are still young, in contradistinction to Bethula, which is the common expression, irregardless of age, for a virgin.
The Greek, Syrian, and the Vulgate translations advocate especially in our Isaianic passage the meaning of "virgin," and, at least not opposed to it, are the Chaldean translator,2 Aquilas, Symmachus, and Theodotion.3
The mother gives the name to the child.4 Though this circumstance does not exclude a father,5 yet it is not to be overlooked in Isaiah, since therein (8, 3) the father gives the name, and there is never mention made by him of a human father of Emmanuel.
But, still more important is the fact that, according to the explained connection, the "sign" must be a miracle. Such is offered to Achaz; but the same word is used by the prophet for the "sign" which the Lord will give. Therefore, it must be a miracle even though it is not to effect a change in the mind of Achaz, and therefore may belong to the dis tant future. It is in keeping with the importance of the period of the time of the entire history of salvation, that a far greater sign be granted than that which the king might have asked for.
Since, as has already been remarked, Emmanuel is the Messiah, therefore, the "sign" which the prophet sees ("Be hold") is the Virginal Mother of God: the Virgin who con ceives, the Virgin who brings forth, or: the Virgin before and in the birth.
This "sign" does justice to all the proposed requirements: it is a miracle which surpasses all others, and is infinitely greater than the miraculous conception of Sara and of Anna, the mother of Samuel; it is the miracle around which all
1 II Thessal. 2, 7. 2 Mnafny.
4 ntopi = rwip. III. pers. sing. fern. See Gesen. § 74, note 1.
5 See, f.i., Gen. 4, 1. 25; 9, 37 and other passages where the mother imposes the name.
MARY --THE VIRGIN 45
history revolves, and therefore corresponds to the importance of the period — the beginning of the vocation of the pagan world and of the rejection of Israel as the people of the Cove nant. But, it is likewise a "sign," and such indeed for the faithful and the saintly portion of Israel, which hears from the lips of the authenticated prophet in the days of Achaz, that, for the sake of the Messiah, born of a virgin, the work of the "enemies" of God shall not be successful, that, for the sake of Emmanuel, the two confederate kings are merely to be compared to smoking stumps of trees.
Still — this question arises : did not a general pointing out of the Messiah suffice for this? Why precisely here, and amidst such circumstances, should a Virgin-Mother be pointed at? This leads to the questions which are suggested by the connecting circumstances. How does this "sign," given by the Lord, contain a threatening aspect for Achaz who was hardened by infidelity? and: what relation is there between this "sign" and the calling of the pagans connected there with? or: between this "sign" and the universality of the Church?
Achaz had exhausted the patience of the Lord; there fore does God also give him the "sign" of the Virgin- Mother. The antithesis to the "Virgin," who shall conceive and bring forth, is the motherhood — suscepto semine — by means of a man. After Achaz had first rejected the offer of the Lord, God rejects him and God Himself gives the "sign" which consists herein that He Himself shall directly do that which is otherwise done by the father. "A virgin shall conceive and bring forth, hereby the natural paternity is clearly excluded from the conception and the birth, and every participation of an earthly power of generation, and especially the house of David may never again flatter itself by claiming the honor of having occasioned the entrance of the "Son of the Virgin " into life in any manner, or by means of any direct physical co-operation."1 The people of the Cove-
1 Grimm, Geschichte der Kindheit Jesu, 1876, p. 234. See Bredenkamp, Zeitschrift f . kirchl. Wissenschaft, etc. v. Luthardt, p. 622 : The context demands imperatively a sign of judgment against the unfaithful king and his house. "That heavy and dreadful judgments must precede the salvation by Emmanuel" does not follow from the emphasized significance of the sign alone, nor does it reveal it as such, though this is to be expected.
46 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
nant of the Old Testament was formed by a descendency in the flesh. It was considered a great honor to be regarded a "son of Abraham." The birth by a "Virgin," is a "sign" that that constitutive bond, which hitherto had set apart the children of Jacob as the chosen people of God, is now rejected. Hereby, precisely, it lost the basis of its distinc tion and glory and thus received a punishment for its infidelity. The dispersion among the nations is the exterior expression thereof.
But it is not hereby asserted that the Lord would not have excluded man of the house of David if Achaz had believed, since — as is well known — the Saviour was to be the child of a virgin; though this birth of Emmanuel would not have had the described character of a judgment which is now attached to the same.
In His miraculous conception and birth by a virgin the Mes siah is already the "sign" of grace and "the sign" of judg ment,1 a guarantee of the truth of the words: "If you will not believe, you shall not continue." The Lord's answer becomes through this "sign" a revocation of the Covenant which the house of David had broken. "Sanctify the Lord of hosts Himself: and let Him be your fear, and let Him be your dread. And He shall be a sanctification to you"; this was not done, therefore Isaias continues2: "but for a stone of stumbling, and for a rock of offence to the two houses of Israel, for a snare and a ruin to the inhab itants of Jerusalem. And very many of them shall stum ble and fall, and shall be broken in pieces and shall be snared and taken." Therefore does the aged Simeon say to the Virgin-Mother: "Behold, this child is set for the ruin and for the resurrection of many in Israel, and for a sign which shall be contradicted." 3 In view of the future devel opment of the fate of Israel, for which the infidelity of Achaz gave occasion, St. Paul writes: " Behold, I lay in Sion a stum bling-stone and a rock of scandal: and whosoever believeth
1 See Vitringa (in Reinke, 1. c. p. 70): "It is no less certain that Jesus Christ was given and born both as a sign of anger and of grace to mortals; but particularly the latter; the first Kara TO o-uft/Se/fy/cos which, however, though said in other passages, does not occur here and is not considered." But why is this not here? 2 8, 13-15. 3 Luke 2, 34.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 47
in Him, shall not be confounded."1 "To you, therefore, that believe/'— thus continues St. Peter 2— " honor; but to them that believe not, the stone which the builders rejected, the same is made the head of the corner and a stone of stumbling, and a rock of scandal to them, who stumble at the word, neither do believe, whereunto also they are set."
The Mother of God, as a Virgin, is the means which the Lord uses to give His blessing or to inflict upon stiff-necked infidelity a judgment; she is the means by which original sin is overcome, because its inheritance is connected with the propagation by man. In the very moment, therefore, wherein sin is to attain its victory through Achaz, by endeav oring to frustrate the design of God, by seducing the chosen people to reject the Saviour; in short: in the moment when the dominion of the serpent threatens to become universal, then divine revelation points out "THE WOMAN" again, the "Virgin," who is to conceive and bring forth without the co-operation of man,3 whose Child, therefore, according to human nature also — considered in itself — could not be brought under the subjection of original sin 4; then it is that the Virgin-Mother appears, through whose Son the head of the serpent is to be crushed.
Though we shall meet this truth later on, still we ought not to overlook it here entirely, for it leads us to the fact that the Mother of the Saviour is a Virgin. But it also directs us to the following consideration that the Mother- Virgin is, at the same time, a "sign" of selection, of the vocation of the pagans. The bond which bound the Old Covenant was a natural descent from Abraham. The moment the "sign" is fulfilled in the world, that bond ceases and a new covenant enters, in which the bond of unification is the direct divinely accomplished childhood by means of a Virgin; in place of the
1 Rom. 9, 33. Compare also Isaias 28, 16: "Behold I will lay a stone in the foundations of Sion, a tried stone, a cornerstone, a precious stone, founded in the foundations."
2 I Pet. 2, 7. 8.
3 In order to point precisely to the feminine gender in antithesis to the mascu line, I believe Isaias chose the word nnSy in place of the common expression for virgin: nSina.
4 See above p. 26.
48 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
natural procreation from Abraham the creative interposition of God or filiation through grace obtains. This is not limited to one people; through it all men may become members of the Covenant. " Behold, I will create all things anew." l According to the interpretation of St. Paul, that which is typically represented by the motherhood of Sara is fulfilled by a direct, and, in a certain sense, by a creative interposi tion of God. The Apostle writes in reference to our prophet: " Rejoice, thou barren, that bearest not: break forth and cry out, thou that travailest not: for many are the children of the desolate, more than of her that hath a husband." 2
The prophet speaks to the " house of David"; he, there fore, directs his view over the entire future history thereof, from his time to the entrance of "the rod of Isaia." Precisely this circumstance, that at first (v. 13) the word of the Lord is directed to Achaz and then (v. 13) to the " house of David," is evidence that this last expression does not refer to Achaz alone, but also to his house and as long as it shall exist as such. But this it must until the fulness of time. Therefore, also, does the introductory address of the seer encompass the whole time from Achaz to Christ, and it intends to con vey the meaning that the "sign" which the Lord shall give, will retain its meaning for centuries to come.3 And since he sees it ("Behold") and therefore sees it as present, it must be such that it may be seen, in some manner, during the entire period down to the Messiah, as ever present. The prophet does this really himself, since he views the "sign" — in the continuation of his address — as present in his time, for he says:
V. 15 : "He shall eat butter and honey, that he may know to refuse the evil, and to choose the good."
V. 16 : "For before this child know to refuse the evil, and
1 Jerem., 31, 21, comprises all that Isaias often expresses: the dominion of grace or of the Messiah is a new creation.
2 Gal. 4, 27, sqq. and Isaias 54, 1 sqq. Compare also my explanations of the books of the N. T. I. vol. p. 321, sqq. on Gal. 1. c.
3 Hereby another objection is solved, aye, it is turned into the very opposite — which Isenbiehl raises in 1. c. p. 71 : This basis of consolation is applicable to all other circumstances as well as the present and might have been applied by any prophet of all times, whenever danger appeared to threaten the Jewish State. It would have retained all its strength for 140 years later and might have been addressed to Sedekias, when Nabuchodonosor besieged Jerusalem.
MARY --THE VIRGIN 49
to choose the good, the land which thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of the face of her two kings." 1
The obvious sense of these verses is that the boy will have to eat "milk and honey/' food of the uncultivated land, because it is devastated by war and the inhabitants can only be nourished by the herds and by bees 2; but before he shall have attained the years of discretion Israel and Syria shall be abandoned, through the abduction of its inhabitants by the Assyrians. "In the days of Phacce, king of Israel, came Theglathphalasar, king of Assyria, and took Aion, and Abeldomum, Maacha, and Janoe, and Cedes and Asor, and Galaad, and Galilee, and all the land of Nephtali, and carried them captives into Assyria." 3 And: "The king of the Assyrians went up against Damascus, and laid it waste: and he carried away the inhabitants thereof to Cyrene: but Rasin he slew." 4 The object ("in order that") of this visi tation, which consists in the devastation of the land, is their conversion to the Lord, to learn to reject evil and to select good.
An interpreter of Isaias of recent date says: "But inas much as the prophet announces this 'sign' as an uncertain future occurrence, the event becomes to him one ideally present in the prophetic vision. He sees in spirit that which he announces." "He perceives in the prophetic vision the highly favored Virgin, with her miraculously given Child as present, therefore he may use the Child and his growth also as a measure for determining the imminent future; and since he is to determine the time, therefore there is nothing nearer to the seer in his present inner range of vision than Emmanuel Him self, for his sake" — or, let us rather say — through whom the
1 With the Masoretic text the Vulgate, the Syrian, the Chaldean, the Aquilian, and the Symmachus texts agree. The LXX, however, has it thus: "He shall eat butter and honey; before he shall know and select evil, he shall select the good. Therefore the boy, before he shall know the good and evil, will not consent to wickedness in order to select evil; and the land shall be deserted, which you fear, by the two kings." In consequence of this, some Father Cyril of Alex, (on John 48), John Damasc. (de fide orthod. 3, 13), Theodoret (i. h. 1.) have recognized herein a proof of the divinity of Emmanuel because He rejects evil before the years of discretion.
2 The conception that butter and honey are food of superfluity is incorrect. (Schegg.)
3 II (IV) Kings 15, 29. 4 Ibid. 16, 9.
50 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
very salvation of Juda is accomplished. A child actually born may be assumed as a basis for a determination of time, why, therefore, should it not be supposed that the seer, who sees this child in spirit, to whom therefore he is ideally present and in the world, may not use him as a measure of time, since he is at the same time the center of the entire develop ment of history and is especially established as a norm for Juda? 1 In connection herewith, however, we must not sup press the question: What objective basis, beyond the view of the seer, justifies the showing of Emmanuel as present, and also existing at some other time? An entire satisfac tion does not seem to be found in the fact that the seer should represent the child merely "as a measure of the time for Juda"; might it not be asked: Is not Emmanuel "the measurer of time" also in some mysterious manner?" 2
The New Testament, especially St. Paul, teaches that the relation of Christ to His Church is so intimate, that they form, as it were, a union. "I am" says Jesus, "the true vine; . . . Remain in me, and I in you. As the branch can not bear fruit of itself unless it abide in the vine; so neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you the branches: he that abideth in me, and I in him, the same beareth much fruit: for without me you can do nothing." 3 This intimate community of life is repeatedly stated by the Apostle of the doctrine of grace, the teacher of super natural life, by St. Paul. He calls the faithful a building (iv (5 Tracra oi/coSo/x?) crvvapfjioXoyovfJievr) avfet eis vabv ayiov iv
1 Knabenhauer, Explanation of the Prophet Isaias, 1881, p. 122, 125. See also, f.i., Fillion, 1. c. p. 98: " Maintenant nous ajouterons avec S. Jerome, et toute difficult^, non I'espe'rons aura disparu (?): Sic futurorum (propheta) texit vaticinium, ut praesens tempus non deserat. Cela s'apelle 1'anticipation pro- phe'tique . . . les voyants ainsi que les nomme FEsprit-Saint, s'elevent audessus des spheres contemporaines et leur regard divinement e'claire' contemple les choses futures comme si elles existaient de*ja. La vue de 1'avenir se reliant alors pour eux a celle du present, ils associent le tout ensemble dans leurs descriptions."
2 We find an attempt in Hengstenberg, 1. c. II, p. 66: " We have here an ideal anticipation of the real incarnation, the justification of which lies in this: that all salvation, which was imparted to the people of the Covenant before Christ, had its root in His future birth, and the occasion thereof consisted herein, that the Jewish people had entered into a moment of a great' crisis, of its conflict with the powers of the world, which demanded the clothing of a consoling thought, as it were, in flesh and blood, and thus to place it in such manner into the midst of popular life." • 3 John 15, 1. 4. 5.
MARY— THE VIRGIN 51
; He calls Christ the "head from which (cf ov) the whole body is joined together and united." 1 He describes the community of the lives of the just with Christ: "I live, now not I; Christ liveth in me (£# Se eV e/xoi X/SICTTOS)"; " There is neither Jew nor Greek: there is neither bond nor free: there is neither male nor female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus (irdvres -yap v^els els core lv Xptcrrw 'ITJO-OU) " 2 especially does he describe them minutely in the Letter to the Romans,3 where, among other things, he says: "Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall live also together with Christ. Knowing that Christ rising again from the dead dieth now no more, death shall no more have dominion over him. So do you also reckon yourselves to be ... alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord (£oWas Se TW 0€<p iv Xpio-Tu '1170-01)). . . . For the wages of sin is death. But the grace of God, everlasting life, in Christ Jesus our Lord (TO Se -^apia-pa TOV deov £0)77 atcu^to? eV Xparra> 'Iiyaxw ra> Kvpup
Without Christ there is no grace, no supernatural life except in Him. The just of the Old Covenant, therefore, were only justified through and in Christ: or — to speak in the language of the Old Testament — through and in the Messiah, or — to express it in Isaianic words — through and in Emmanuel. Emmanuel lived even in the Old Covenant.
After St. John 4 had reported how the Jews had rejected the Redeemer through their infidelity, and the pagans, how ever, had sought Him, he introduces the Prophet Isaias 5 saying: "Who hath believed our report?" and: "Blind the heart of this people, and make their eyes heavy, and shut their eyes, lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I heal them." "This is said by Isaias when he saw His glory and spoke of Him (ravra ^nrev 'Hcraftxs on, eloev Tr)v §6£av avTov Kal cXdXrjaev trepl avrov)." According to the context the Evangelist means here the Messiah who had called Isaias and prepared him. John, therefore, teaches that the Logos, who became Man, acted in the Old Testament.6
1 Ephes. 2, 20. 4 12, 38 sqq.
2 Galat. 3, 28. * 63, 1; 6,9.
3 Chap. 6, 3 sqq. 8 sqq. 23. 6 Compare John 1, 4. 5. 9.
52 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
It is, furthermore, evident from the New Testament that this concept of a mutual relation between God and His people — considered as the people of the Covenant — between God and the just could, by no means, have been alien to the spirit of the Old Covenant. From this entirely does the Letter to the Hebrews argue, when the Apostle has the words of the prophet Isaias, concerning the Messiah, to refer to the prophet himself; the words by which the prophet means first himself and his children as the "just," and then the "just" in general: "Behold, I and my children, whom God hath given me." *
Thus St. Paul may say of Moses that he "esteemed the reproach of Christ greater than the treasures of the Egyp tians." 2 Through such a viewpoint it becomes clear why, in the same writing to the Judaic-Christians, David and Solo mon, the types, and Christ, the antitype are interchanged.3
But, through Isaias himself the Holy Ghost has given expression in this manner to the inmost relation of the Redeemer and the redeemed. Not only that "the God with us" is the cause of the salvation of Israel from the hands of the enemies, but also the pagans will "come over" to Israel and "worship" it; for — thus it is addressed — "only in thee is God, and there is no God besides thee."4
1 Hebr. 2, 13. Compare my "Erklaerung des N. T." vol. V. Letter to the Hebrews, Muenster, 1893, p. 85.
2 Hebr. 11, 26: ftei£oi/a irXovrov rjyrja-dfjievos TCOV Aiyi/irrov Or)<ravpG>v rov ovu- Surfiov rov Xpiorov. See ibid. p. 305.
3 Hebr. 1, 5 and Ps. 2, 7; II Sam. 7, 14. 'Eyco 20-o/wu avr<*> ets irarepa KOI avros la-rat pot eis vlov. Compare II Sam. 7, 12 sqq.: "And when thy [David's] days shall be fulfilled, and thou shalt sleep with thy fathers, I will raise up thy seed after thee, ... He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom for ever." The above words follow and then: "And if he commit any iniquity, I will correct him with the rod of men, and with the stripes of the children of men ..." and again: "And thy house shall be faithful, and thy kingdom for ever before thy face: and thy throne shall be firm for ever." Compare Letter to the Hebr., p. 46. Besides also, p. 190 sqq. on the same relation of the Messiah as High-Priest to Melchisedech, "the Priest of the Most High."
4 Isaias 45, 14. In the preceding Cyrus, the "servant" and instrument in the hands of Emmanuel, the saviour of Israel, is spoken of, and in the third person. In these words of v. 14 God addresses Israel in the second person: "Thus saith the Lord: the labor of Egypt, and the merchandise of Ethiopia, and of Sabaim, men of stature shall come over to thee, and shall be thine"; — by the people men tioned is meant the pagan world (Compare also Ps. 68 (67), 32; 72 (71), 10; Isai. 18, 7; 19, 23), which with its treasures will join the Messianic kingdom — "after thee" [i.e., after Israel, which the prophet still sees in captivity] "they shall
MARY — THE VIRGIN 53
This relation between the Emmanuel and His people is the reason why the prophet sees the "God with us" present and can make Him a rule for measuring his time.
One feature not to be overlooked in the great Isaianic prophecy is this, that the Emmanuel is seen, in the child of whom there is mention made in v. 15 and 16, in Israel and Syria, for these were the lands of devastation wherein, there fore, " butter and honey" are the food, which are mentioned as food for the boy. Herewith the seer already announces that the Messiah, after having been rejected by the house of David, by Juda, makes an impression on the ten-tribe-king dom of Samaria and on the pagan world.1 In this the rejec tion of Juda is again apparent as the threatening character
walk after thee; they shall go bound in manacles: and they shall worship thee, and shall make supplication to thee; only in thee is God [hx 13 fx] and there is no God besides thee."
Anton Scholz, in Zeit und Ort der Entstehung der Buecher des Alten Testa- mentes (feast-sermon), Wuerzb., 1893, p. 24 writes: "Since the Messiah repre sents with His people one person, so that the vicissitudes of both must be the same. ..." Scholz expresses the same idea in his "Commentar ueber das Buch Esther mit seinen Zusaetzen," Wuerzb., 1892, p. xxxvii, wherein he appeals to St. Thomas, Summa theol. III. qu. 15, a 1.: Ad primum dicendum, quod sicut Damascenus dicit in III. lib. (de orthod. fid. XXV) dupliciter dicitur aliquid de Christo: uno modo secundum proprietatem naturalem et hypostaticam; sicut dicitur quod Deus factus est homo, et quod passus est pro nobis; alio modo secun dum proprietatem personalem et habitualem, prout scilicet aliqua dicuntur de ipso in persona nostra, quae ipsi secundum se nullo modo conveniunt. Unde et inter septem regulas Tychonii, quas Augustinus ponit (de doct. Christ. III. 31, 44): "prima ponitur de Domino et ejus corpore," cum scilicet " Christi et ecclesiae una persona aestimatur." Et secundum hoc Christus ex persona membrorum suorum loquens dicit Ps. 21, 2 "verba delictorum meorum," non quod in ipso capit delictae fuerint. The words quoted from Augustin are as follows: Prima (scilicet regula) "de Domino ej usque corpore" est, in qua scientes aliquando capitis et corporis, i.e., Christi et Ecclesiae, unam personam nobis intimari — neque enim frustra dictum est fidelibus : Ergo Abraham semen estis, Gal. 3, 29, cum sit unum semen Abraham, quod est Christus — non haesitemus quando a capite ad corpus, vel a corpore transitur ad caput, et tamen non receditur ab una eademque persona. Una enim persona loquitur dicens: sicut sponso imposuit mihi mitram, et' sicut sponsam ornavit me ornamento (Isai. 61, 10); et tamen quid horum duorum capiti, quid corpori, id est, quid Christo, quid Ecclesiae conveniat, utique intelligendum est.
1 We might pursue a concrete fulfilment in the fact that the Divine Child was not to remain in Bethlehem nor to return to Judea, but had to return to Galilee, and that the Messiah found, at His public appearance, incredulity and enmity in Jerusalem, in Samaria, however, a reception, and in Galilee security against perse cution, and the faith He missed in Israel, He found in Sidon and Decapolis — with the pagans.
54 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
of the "sign." Not Juda; but its enemies will become par takers of the blessings of the Messiah: "that which Israel sought, he hath not obtained; but the election hath obtained it," * and the Virgin-Mother is the "sign" that the communi cation of the Messianic blessings is not bound up with the natural descendency from Abraham, but is a "sign" for the election of the nations.
One of the tasks of the prophet Isaias was — to teach the universality of the Messianic kingdom; to make known that, in consequence of their unbelief, the Jews were to be rejected, except a small "portion," and that thereby the Gospel would reach the pagans. In the announcement, therefore, that Emmanuel is to be conceived and born of a virgin, he complies with the imposed mission, and he is in the very midst of his vocation.
The consideration of these Isaianic words is somewhat mi nute, and, still, we have not yet comprehended them fully and from all sides. They will appear to us again, when we shall lay the principal stress upon the word "Mother" and upon the "Mother- Virgin," whom the seer realizes as present.
That the conception of the Church can be just to this great prophecy and all its requirements, which the closer and the more remote connections demand, is the test of its truth. The birth of Emmanuel by a virgin will also aid in a grati fying explanation of a peculiarity of the image, which Isaias uses in the almost universally acknowledged 2 Messianic address. "And there shall come forth a rod out of the stump (Vulg. de radice) of Isaias (Jesse) and a flower (")¥J, Vulg. flos) from its roots (Vulg. de radice ejus) shall bear fruit. (Isai. 11, 1.)
1 Rom. 11, 7.
2 Thus the Fathers: Justin, dial. c. Tryph. 86, 87; Tertul. de carne Ch. c. 21; Hippolyt. demonstr. de Christ, et Ant. 8; Ambrose, in Luc. 2, 24; Jerome i. h. 1.; August, sermon de symb. ad Cat. 4, 4; Leo M., sermo 4 in Dom. nat.: In qua (scil. Isai. 11, 1) non dubie B. V. Maria praedicta est, quae de Jesse et de David stirpe progenita, et Spiritu Sancto fecundata, novum florem carnis humanae utero quidem materno, sed partu est enixa virgineo. Gregor M., in I. Reg. 1, II. homily in Deip. nat. 2. Besides, also, the Targum Jonath. ["and a king will arise from the sons of Isaias and the Messiah will grow from the sons of his sons,"] and the majority of the rabbis and even rationalistic interpreters. Knobel finds in Isa. 11, 1-5 "the description of those noble Davidides 9, 6." Compare Reinke, Messian. Weissag. I, p. 206 sq.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 55
The Messiah — compared to a rod — designating the lowli ness, in which He shall appear — shall arise from the " stump" of Isaias. The house of David is compared to a cut-down tree, of which merely a stump remains and from which new life sprouts forth.1 As Micheas speaks2 of Bethlehem, so does Isaias speak here of the house of the Bethlehemite Isais, as the trunk to which the Messiah belongs. A " stump," of a tree, however, does not naturally bud forth a new twig, which might possibly develop into a tree. Therefore, there is con tained in this image a marvelous arising of the twig of Isais. Besides, there is also excluded the mediation of the tree in which the roots of Isais had already been developed: a thought, which in the second half of the verse: "and a rod from its roots shall bear fruit" —receives a clearer expression still. The miraculous birth by a Virgin, revealed by Isaias, through a direct intervention of God and by the exclusion of a man of the house of David is the explanation of a peculiarity of this image.
The same is true of the other words of Isaias 3: "Drop down dew, ye heavens, from above, and let the clouds rain justice (the Vulg. : the just) let the earth be opened, and bud forth salvation (the Vulg.: a Saviour)."
The Vulgate gives, instead of the abstract, the concrete and thus establishes a very close relation to Christ of the words: "the just" and "bud forth a Saviour." This explana tion is also adopted by Jerome 4 and the most of the inter preters of the Church.5 "This earth is the Most Blessed Virgin," is the explanation of this text given by Cornelius a Lapide, "which received the dew of the Holy Ghost and budded forth the Redeemer. For no other earth hath done or could do this." Such is also the universal opinion of the Fathers. As therefore, the first Adam was formed . . . from the virgin soil, so also did the second Adam form for Himself a body from the purest blood of the Most Blessed Virgin.
To the birth of the Redeemer by the Virgin have also been applied the words6: "He shall grow up as a tender plant before him and as a root out of a thirsty ground."
1 Compare Isai. 6, 13; 4, 2. 2 5, 2. 3 45, 8. 4 i. h. 1.
5 The Concil. Hispalense (can. 13) has referred these words to the union of the divine and human nature. e Isai. 53, 1.
56 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
By this "the virginal womb, unfructified by any human seed, of the Mother of God" was understood.1 The context in that prophecy of the Passion favors the explanation, how ever, that the seer wished to describe, in a climax, the unsight- liness and the humility of the human manifestation of Jesus, which is compared not only to a twig, but to one that is paltry and wretched, that grew up from parched soil.
6. "God with us" is the significant name which the Virgin gives her child. "Those," says St. Irenaeus,2 "who announce Emmanuel through the Virgin, proclaim the union of the Word of God with His form." To show His real human nature — Christ was made of a woman; to reveal His divinity, He was born of a virgin, says St. Thomas Aquinas.3 For: "God was born of a virgin, not God and a man" --as St. Athanasius emphasizes 4 ; it is not nature that is conceived and born, but the person in and with nature. But in Christ there is but one person, the divine, whose Father is God. Therefore the Father is likewise the God of the human nature of Christ, or: Jesus is also as man the natural son of God. Therefore, every other father is excluded, save Him Whom Jesus has according to His divine nature. The mystery of the God-Man demands the mystery of the Virgin-Mother.
This foundation for the virginity of the Mother of the Most High we find contained in an expression of Micheas,5
1 Zchokke, Bibl. Frauen, p. 387 sq. Thus: St. Jerome, Procopius and Theo- doret, on Isaias 53, 1. Aquila has a-n-o y^s d/Jarou, whereon Jerome remarks: Pro sitienti Aquila interpretatus est invia, ut virginitatis privilegium demonstraret, quod absque ullo humano semine de terra prius invia sit creatus. Iste est, de quo et supra legimus: Exiet virga de radice Jesse et flos de radice ejus ascendet.
2 See above p. 37, note 1.
3 Summa theol. III. qu. 28 a. 2 ad 2: Ita Christus voluit veritatem sui corporis demonstrare, quod etiam ejus divinitas declararetur. Et ideo permiscuit mira humilibus. Unde ut corpus ejus verum ostenderetur, nascitur ex femina: sed ut ostenderetur ejus divinitas, nascitur ex virgine.
4 Contra Apollin. I. 10. II. 4. Compare the development of the suitability of the birth of the " Word " by a Virgin : Summa contr. Gent. IV. c. 45. In Morgott : Die Mariologie des hi. Thomas v. Aquin., 1878, p. 101.
5 5, 2. 3; the Messianic character of this passage is not alone acknowledged in the New Testament and by all believing interpreters, but also by the Chaldean paraphrase which translates: "From thee, the Messiah will proceed before me," — by the Talmud of Jerusalem, Midrasch-Rabba at Threni, 1, 16; R.R. Salm. Yarhhi, Kimhi. Compare Galatinus, de arcanis cathol. veritatis, lib. IV. c. 13. Drach, 1. c. II. p. 66 sqq. Also Hitzig-Steiner, Die zwoelf kleinen Propheten, 4th ed. 1881, p. 222.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 57
the contemporary of Isaias. This prophet speaks (5, 1) directly of Bethlehem: "And Thou, Bethlehem Ephrata, art a little one among the thousands of Juda: out of thee shall He come forth unto me that is to be the ruler in Israel: and His going forth is from the beginning, from the days of eternity." The antithesis, in both of the members, teaches, that by the name " Bethlehem" and the words "out of thee shall He come forth" the birth of Jesus in time, or the human nature of the " ruler of Israel," is expressed, and by the determination, how ever, "from the beginning" and "from the days of eternity," the divine nature of "Him" is expressed.1 The conjunction with the following sentence (p*7) shows that the seer finds in this double nature of "Him" the basis for that which he further along announces:
V. 2: " Therefore he will give them up (the sons of Israel) even till the time, wherein she that travaileth shall bring forth2: and the remnant of his brethren shall be converted to the children of Israel."
V. 4: "And he shall stand, and feel in the strength of the Lord, in the height of the name of the Lord his God: and they shall be converted; for now shall he be magnified even to the ends of the earth."
The contemporary of Isaias sees the sons of Israel delivered into servitude. The starting point of his address is the Assyrian captivity. As a consolation he shows "the ruler" who in the strength of the Lord, and in the glory of the name of the Lord shall at some time nourish the returned "brethren," but not these alone, but also the pagans, for "he shall be magnified even to the ends of the earth." Micheas confines himself as little to his time as does Isaias, he surveys and gathers in also future generations, which "had been given up." Therefore, the interpreters of the prophetic diction could think partly of the Assyrian, partly of the Babylonian captivity, and partly also of the Roman dominion.3 The
1 Chrysost. hom. 61: OVTOS /cat ryv OeorrjTa Kal TYJV avOpoyrroTyTa Set/cvoV TO> /tev yap eiTretv ai 2£o8oi avrov OLTT' dp^ry? e£ ~fjp,€p(i)v ataii/os, rrjv TT/DOCUOJVIOV eSryXoocrev virap£w' TO) 8e etTretv e^eAeva-erat ^yov/mevos, os rts Troi/xam rov Xaov /u,ov rov *I<rparj\ rrjv Kara o-apKa yevtviv. See Petavius, de incarnat. XVI, 3. 8. (Compare Ps. 109, 4 according to the LXX and the Vulg.)
2 mSi ni^Ti 3 Compare Corn, a Lap. i. h. 1.
58 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
" giving them up" will last "till the time wherein she that travaileth shall bring forth"; for the Child has come forth from Bethlehem and belongs to the people " given up"; but He is also from eternity and is God. Herein, precisely, con sists the reason why the sons of Israel cannot be delivered up permanently. Micheas thus expresses in this manner that which is contained in the words of Isaias: "because Emmanuel" l One of the effects of the Incarnation, there fore, is every salvation in the history of redemption, as, on the contrary, every subjection, under a power in enmity with God, is an exercise of the dominion of sin. This domin ion, however, is dissolved by the birth of the sinless God- Man of one of our own race: "till the time wherein she that travaileth shall bring forth." And, again, there is only mention made of a mother and not of a human father, though Bethlehem is mentioned as the place of birth. In connection with other prophetic words, which only know the "Woman" or the Virgin Mother, a key is given for the understanding of the expression "till she that travaileth shall bring forth." But that this child is the " ruler," who is to redeem and nourish " Israel," is beyond all doubt. And because this "One" was not only born in time, but is also "from eternity," or — as we may say from the viewpoint of the revelation of the New Testament — proceeded from God the Father, therefore, He cannot have a man also for His father. And since He cannot therefore be subject to the dominion of sin over humanity, therefore the same must be broken by Him, by His becoming man. With the "time till she that travaileth shall bring forth" the "prince of this world2 is judged," to use the expression of Jesus. The person and the work of the Redeemer require, therefore, a virgin as His Mother.
7. To describe the kingdom of the Son of the Virgin, or of Emmanuel, the Evangelist of the Old Testament prefers to designate it as a new creation.3 Jeremias,4 the interpreter
1 See above p. 41 sq.
2 John 12, 31 and 16, 11.
8 Compare Isai. 43, 7; 45, 7; 48, 7; 65, 17; 66, 22.
4 31, 21-22. Compare herewith Reinke, Beitraege, III. p. 359 sqq., Mess. Weissagungen, III. p. 525 sqq. and especially Anton Scholz, Commentar zum Buche des Propheten Jeremias, 1880, on this text.
MARY --THE VIRGIN 59
of Isaias conceives the birth of the Messiah itself as a new creation. Ephraim had obtained permission to return from the captivity: " pitying I will pity him, saith the Lord " (31, 20). Then the prophet continues:
V. 21: "Set thee up a watch-tower; direct thy heart into the right way,1 wherein thou hast walked; return, 0 virgin of Israel, return to these thy cities.'' At this demand of Israel, that it return upon the way on which it had gone into exile, special allusion is made — in reference to 6, 16 2 — to the way of the law, which in its inmost essence leads to the Messiah. But this is too difficult for Israel, and therefore it hesitates. Hence the prophet says:
V. 22: "How long wilt thou be dissolute in deliciousness, 0 wandering daughter?"3 And for an encouragement he mentions the motive: "for the Lord hath created a new thing upon the earth; A woman shall compass a man.4
Both the new creation and promise: "a woman shall compass a man/' should dispose Israel to return. Since there is mention in the first member of a new creation, nothing is more natural than to find in the second member this new crea tion more fully described — and this— according to the whole object of the address — in a manner which removes all doubt. All hopes, which might invite to a return, shall then be ful filled. Since at the time of Jeremias it was already known that Emmanuel is not only to create all things anew, but is to enter into the world, in consequence of a direct creative inter vention of God, by the exclusion of the co-operation of man, and therefore the relation of these singularly sounding words "a woman shall compass a man" are to be referred to the virginal maternity of her who is to give birth to the Redeemer.
This interpretation finds its justification in the several expressions. The word " woman" emphasizes the one gender in contrast to the other, but a more definite determination is offered to the Israelite by the promise in Paradise and by the
1 Compare Isai. 40, 34; 37, 8. 9.
2 Thus saith the Lord: "Stand ye on the ways and see, and ask for the old paths, which is the good way, and walk ye in it; and you shall find refreshment for your souls."
3 Here also the dependency on Isaias is to be recognized in the expression; compare ibid. 43, 19; 48, 6. 7. The same is also true of the following tna.
4 123 aaiofi rtapa
60 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
prophets Isaias and Micheas. In reference, therefore, to Isaias, who calls the Messiah the " stronger " 1 (1123 ^K), Jeremias may have selected for him the name "Man" OU3),2 which in its derivation from "to be strong" ("OS) is proper. In Isaias as well as here the Messiah appears as the almighty Saviour of Israel. The general meaning of the word "compass," which is to express an entirely peculiar pregnancy, receives a closer definition by being a "new thing," which "the Lord shall create"; therefore, a work of His omnipotence. The "Man," whom the "woman shall compass" is therefore not created in the usual way, but by a supernatural, direct inter vention of God. The announcement of Isaias and Micheas make known to the Israelite, doubtlessly, that there is ques tion concerning the miraculous birth of the Messiah.3 That the Messiah, the expected Redeemer, is to be born, is the mightiest motive which is to determine the hesitating Ephraim to return.
Several of the Fathers understand the words of Jeremias as a Messianic passage. The Greeks, however, who depend upon the LXX text,4 read according to it: "How long wilt thou still turn away, stubborn daughter? For the Lord will create salvation for the new plant: in salvation the people shall wander about." (cv (rajrrjpiq, TrepteXevcrovTcu avB '/XWTTOI) . Therefore they were moved to interpret this passage as Messianic, but not as relating to the virginal maternity.5 It
1 Isai. 9, 5; 10, 21.
2 Drach 1. c. remarks: C'est aussi le «*ttJ, 1'homme de la paraphrase chal- daique de Zacharie, V, 12: " Voici 1'homme qui est appele" Messie."
3 For the uncommon manner of speech compare also Scholz 1. c. p. 368: "I consider the passage a paraphrase and interpretation of Isaias 7, 14. Such ex planations may be well assigned to the already existing knowledge in Scripture, down to the time of Jeremias, abused by pharisaism. Compare Ez. 31, 32."
4 The LXX is followed by the Itala and the Arab, translation of the Walton Polyglott. With the Hebrew text agree the Peschitta ("the woman shall compass a man"), the Vulgate (femina circumdabit virum). Among these is also Theo- dotion: (l/crwe KV/OIOS o-cor^pi'av /cau^v, yvvrj TrepieAevo-ercu avOpuTrov) , Aquilas, and Symmachus (ywawces irepteAcvawrtu avS/ms). Scholz remarks very correctly, 1. c. p. 369, that the text of the LXX is most probably an attempt of an illegibly written text. See his: Der masor. Text und die LXX-Uebersetzung des Buches Jeremias, 1875, p. 92.
5 Compare G. K. Mayer, die mess. Prophez. II. p. 59; after him Schnee- dorfer, das Weissagungsbuch des Propheten Jeremias, 1881, p. 503, refers favorably to the Hebrew text and to the Vulgate, without any other reference to Justin, who "must have been especially attentive to the original text." "Have
MARY — THE VIRGIN 61
is natural, in a manner, that St. Jerome l should see here — in this case, a "hebraica veritas" against the LXX — the "new, which the Lord hath made" in the conception and the birth of the "man" by the virgin. This passage is referred to the Incarnation through the Virgin in an address (incon clusively) ascribed to St. Augustin,2 also by Cyprian,3 Leo I,4 Bernard,5 Canisius,6 and the interpreters: Nicolas of Lyra, Hugo of St. Caro, the Franciscan Vatablus, Menochius, Maldonat, Sanctius, Sa, Tirinus, Mariana, Corn, a Lapide, Estius, Calmet, Dereser, Allioli, Zchokke, Anton Scholz, Schneedorfer, Knabenbauer. Galatinus 7 and Drach 8 fur nish proof that this concept is not foreign to the rabbinical interpretation.
In opposition to this interpretation, adopted by the Church, is a whole series of other attempts, which, however, through their variety and multiplicity show that they are lacking a solid foundation.
It cannot mean (Abarbanel) a strong people ("man") shall "be compassed," i.e., besieged and conquered by a weak people ("a woman"); for to compass does not mean besiege or conquer; nor: "the woman shall wind herself around the
possibly the Apostles, directed by the Lord Himself, thus explained this prophecy to the faithful? But I have not been able to find in Justin any such formation of a text, i.e., such conception."
1 Novam rem creavit Dominus super terrain. Absque viri semine, absque ullo coitu atque conceptu, femina circumdabit virum gremio uteri sui, qui juxta incrementa quidem aetatis, per vagitus, et infantiam proficere videbitur sapi- entia et aetate, sed perfectus vir in ventre femineo solitis mensibus continebatur.
2 Sermo de temp. 119 in Natali. Dom. (in append): Res nobis perfecta est nova, quae olim fuerat repromissa, ut sine virginei detrimento pudoris filium lactarent ubera genitricis. Haec ilia est no vitas Jeremiae prophetae vaticinio nuntiata: faciet Deus novum super terram. Et quasi quandam lucernam hujus obscuritatis accendens, continuo subjecit: femina circumdabit virum, hoc est, inquit novum, quod super terram dico Dominum esse facturum, quia femina cir cumdabit virum.
3 Sermo 3 de Nat. 4 Sermo 2 de Nat.
5 Sermo 1 in virg. Nat. and horn. 2 super " Missus est."
6 Mariologia, lib. II. 4; 5; 6. 7 De arcanis, lib. VII. c. 13.
8 Harmonic II. p. 43 sq. Que cette prophe'tie se rapporte re*ellement au Messie, c'est ce dont les anciens rabbins ne faisaient pas difficult^ de convenir. . . . Le Me'drasch-Yalkut sur Je're'mie, article 315, enseigne e'galement que cette prophe'tie aura son accomplissement lors de la venue du Messie. Rabbi Mosche* Haddarschan, . . . R. Hunna dit au nom de R. Idi et de R. Josue'-ben-Levi. . . . Le Zohar entend de la me" me maniere la prophe'tie dont nous par Ions. Voici comment il s'exprime dans la section Bere*schit. . . .
62 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
man" (Hitzig, Fuerst, "as when a woman winds herself around a man"), since this would be precisely a sign (see Isai. 4, 1) of a misfortune or of a visitation by God, and, therefore, it cannot be a symbol of this that the "man seek Jahveh Himself," and that the congregation of the people seek Him, even strive to obtain His hand and His love" (Hitzig, 2d ed); furthermore, such is not the meaning of "compass." This reason also forbids a symbolic interpretation of such a translation, as: the "woman," i.e., the synagogue, which unfaithfully abandoned the Lord ("Man") shall return again to the Lord, after the exile, and seek reconciliation with Him (Ben. Jonatham, Sanctius, Muenster, Calovius). The translation of de Wette by: "The woman protects the man" is also against the meaning of the words; (Gesenius, Umbreit, Schnurrer) or: "the true congregation, though defenseless, shall protect the land with all its heroes of war" (Orelli); or this other explanation: "women shall dance with men as on festive occasions" (Dathe). Besides, the question still remains: Where is the "new creation" ? The explanation by Keil seems to meet this: "the new creation, which God effects in this way, consists herein that, "the woman, weak and helpless, will lovingly and nourishingly compass man, the strong one;" but; the subjectivity of this puts it in the same solitary position as that of Ewald: "a woman shall transform herself into a man," i.e., also those who formerly were women shall become heroes.
How can it be maintained that Jeremias wished to say what those returning would become. "The strong ("Q3, i.e., the Lord) shall put into His intimate companionship and under His protection and His loving care the weak (the weak and the discouraged Israel J~QpJ)" (Reinke, see Graf and Hengstenberg) ; but this concept overlooks the fact that, even though "to compass" might be conceived in this sense, still the very opposite is to be read in Jeremias.1
8. When the Lord gave the command of the sanctifica- tion of primogeniture, He said to Moses: "Sanctify unto me every first-born that openeth the womb among the children of Israel." Why this addition — quod aperit vulvam —
1 Reinke, in the Tuebinger Quartalschrift, 1851, p. 534 ff. Compare Scholz, 1. c. p. 367, on these various views.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 63
if it is always self-evident? The question is different if it regards a case in which it should not be applied to a first born,1 if there is question concerning a mother who had not only conceived as a virgin, but had also presented her child to the world through closed gates, as it were.
Ever since the days of the Fathers, were the following words of the prophet Ezechiel (44, 2) applied, with a certain pre dilection, to the virginity of the Mother of God:
V. 1: "And he brought me back to the way of the gate of the outward sanctuary, which looked towards the east: and it was shut."
V. 2: "And the Lord said to me: This gate shall be shut: it shall not be opened; and no man shall pass through it; because the Lord the God of Israel entered in by it: therefore it shall be shut."
This application is made in such a manner that the con viction becomes evident that such a reference to Mary was also intended by the Holy Ghost. St. Ambrose repeatedly asserts: " Who is this gate, " so he asks, "if not Mary? therefore closed, because a virgin? The gate is Mary, through which Jesus entered into this world, since He came forth through a virginal birth (fusus est partu et genitalia virginitatis claustra non solvit). The enclosure of virginity remained intact, the seals of purity inviolate, since He came forth whose great ness the world could not contain." 2
Before him the great Dionysius of Alexandria refers to the closed gate of Ezechiel, as an image of the integrity of the virginity of Mary.3 "In no wise were the virginal gates opened," remarks Amphilochius, the Bishop of Iconium,4 "according to the declaration which is uttered concerning Him: This is the gate of the Lord, and He enters and passes out and the gate shall be closed. Therefore, according to the virginal nature the virginal gates are by no means opened." "He has not violated the womb of the virgin. . . . He passed out without any corruption, as the prophet Ezechiel expresses it." * "Hail, Mary, Mother of God, Virgin-Mother . . .
1 Compare Exodus 13, 2; Num. 8, 16; Luke 2, 23.
2 De instit. virg. 52; see ep. (42) ad Siric. Papam n. 6.
3 Ep. c. Paul. Sam.
4 De occursu Christi. 5 Proclus, orat. I. in Gallandus IX, p. 619.
64 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
for the King hath entered into your city, rather into your maternal womb and He passed out as He wished and your gate was closed/' is said in the: Enconium in S. Mariam Dei- param, a transformation by a more recent hand of the fourth address which St. Cyril of Alexandria delivered in the church of Mary at Ephesus.1
The great defender of the perpetual virginity of the Mother of God, St. Jerome, repeatedly affirms that Mary "is the Eastern gate, as Ezechiel says, ever closed, the beautiful one"2 "through which the High-Priest enters and passes out, and which is nevertheless always closed." 3 Rubinus 4 remarks that the miraculous birth is foreshadowed by the prophet Ezechiel. After quoting our passage he continues: "... closed was that gate of virginity; through it passed the Lord, the God of Israel, into the world from the maternal womb of the Virgin, and the gate of the Virgin was closed eternally, for her virginity was always sustained." To these voices are also added a prayer by the choir-bishop Balaeus5 which salutes Mary, "who is designated by Ezechiel as the closed and sealed gate," and a sermon de laudibus vir- ginis,6 the expressions of St. John Damascene,7 of Modestus,8 of St. Bernard,9 of St. Thomas of Aquinas,10 of Bl. Canisius,11 and also of Catholic interpreters through centuries down to our own times.12
1 In Migne, t. LXXVII, 1032. Compare herewith A. Ebhard, an unauthenti- cated homily on Mary by Cyril of Alexandria, in the Roemische Quartalschr. fuer christl. Altertumskunde, u. Kirchengeschichte, vol. 3 (1889), p. 97-113. Bardenhewer, Patrologie, Freib. 1894, p. 339, 342.
2 Ep. 48 (ed. Vallarsi) ad Pamach. pro libris adv. Jovin.
3 Dial. adv. Pelag. II, 4 and in the commentary on this passage of Ezechiel: Pulchre quidem portam clausam, per quam solus Dominus Deus Israel ingreditur, et dux, cui porta clausa est, Mariam Virginem intelligunt, quae et ante partum et post partum virgo permansit.
4 Comment, in symbol, apost. on "qui natus est."
6 In Bickell's: Ausgew. Geschichte der syr. Kirchenvaeter.
6 This address is erroneously attributed to St. Epiphanius, but it emanates most probably from some one else, possibly from another Epiphanius of Cyprus, of the eighth century. 7 oratio 1. (eis koimesin.): as Koifirjo-iv.
8 Enconium Deiparae semperque Virginis Mariae. 9 Sermo super Salve reg.
10 Sum. theol. III. qu. 28 a 3. n Mariologia, II. c. 6.
12 Knabenbauer, com. n. Ezech. proph., Paris, 1890, p. 463 sq. accepts this inter pretation of the perpetual virginity of Mary as a "sensus subsequens" ("propter similitudinem rationis") based on Cornely, introd. in utriusque T. lib. I Par. 1885, p. 327 sqq.
MARY --THE VIRGIN 65
The prophet Ezechiel sees the Church under the image of the temple,1 for he speaks repeatedly of the temple in a manner which could only be attributed to the Church,2 and also of the worship which takes place therein,3 and he describes especially the entry which "the glory of God" makes into the temple. This is, of course, primarily the "cloud," but only in as far as it concerns no longer the type, but the fulfilment, Christ Jesus Himself.
This entrance is made through the eastern gate,4 because salvation is to come from the east. The rising sun, the image of salvation, presents hereto a connecting point; therefore the tabernacle and the temple had to be constructed with an entrance in that direction.5 The prophets beheld salva tion coming from the east, from the rising of the sun the redeemer of the people is to be called.6 The eastern gate points, therefore, toward the Messiah.
If, therefore, we consider the entrance of the Messiah into the world, of whom the "Star in the East" is such, a striking image, and if we ask : in what manner does the vision of Ezechiel find its complete fulfilment? is there a perpetu ally closed gate through which Christ hath entered? If we then observe how extensive the use of typical language is in the Old Testament, how, furthermore, the Lord Himself compares Himself to the door of the sheepfold: "Amen, amen, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep" 7 — can it, after all this, be declared unfounded, if this fulfilment of the "closed gate" be considered in Mary, because through her the Lord entered into this world? since, as we know, similar ref erences occur in the inspired writers.8 But, if this prophecy of Ezechiel finds only in Mary a concrete fulfilment, then it fol lows that — "closed shall be this gate and not opened, no man shall enter therein ' ' - that the perpetual virginity and the reason thereof: "for the Lord, the God of Israel, hath entered there-
1 cc. 40-42.
2 47, 1-12, for instance the description of the river, which originated in the temple and flows into the Red Sea. 3 c. 43 f . 4 43, 2. 4.
5 See Exod. chap. 26: in the description of the tabernacle the veil is placed on the eastern side.
6 Isai. 41, 2: "Who hath raised up the just one from the East?" Compare 44, 28; 45, 1; Baruch 4, 36; 5, 5.
7 John, 10, 1 sqq. 7. 8 See above p. 13 sq.
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in" is a necessary conclusion: and she, who is the Mother of God, cannot be also the mother of a man. Mary, therefore, is the gate through which the Messiah entered, but only He; for He is "the Lord, the God of Israel/' and therefore, "it shall remain closed. " We hear it expressed in figure by Ezechiel that there cannot be "brethren" of Christ by nature, for brethren of Christ we are only by adoption, by grace.1
The revelations made by Isaias, Micheas, and Jeremias receive through Ezechiel this supplement: The Virgin — because Mother of God — is a perpetual Virgin.
The words of Ezechiel are not to be referred to any other entry into the temple, not even to that of the solemn entry into the city; for apart from the fact that others also entered with the Lord, the Evangelists, especially St. Mathew, would not have omitted to point to such a concrete fulfil ment of the prophecy. But none of the writers of the New Testament had an occasion or a reason to prove any further the perpetual virginity of Mary — for them it is a fact — by which it is explained that not one of them points to any expres sion of the Old Testament in relation thereto. It remains a matter of interpretation to investigate the entire sense of the figure described by Ezechiel and which aims at the future. Numerous and saintly interpreters point to a fulfilment, in the contemplation of which we must confess: "so it is." 2
Even though all these prophetic words could not be entirely understood by the Jews before the time of their fulfilment, still the truth that the Messiah, whose existence before time was acknowledged,3 — based probably on Micheas
1 Compare especially in the letters of St. Paul: Rom. 8, 15. 23; 9, 4; Gal. 4, 5; Ephes. 1, 5; Rom. 8, 12; Gal. 4, 28. 31; Heb. 3, 1.
2 This prophecy has had the fate of many others, upon which full light is only cast through their fulfilment. This feature is emphasized by the prophets them selves. It is, therefore, not required and, at times, not at all possible, that the actual contemporaries should conceive the full significance. Only those inter preters could enter a protest against this, who treat Holy Scripture purely as a mere human book and deny its first authorship to the Holy Ghost. Etiam veri prophetae non omnia cognoscunt quae in eorum visis aut verbis aut etiam factis spiritus sanctus intendit. Thorn. Summ. theol. II. q. 174 a 4. c. — Compare herewith John, 11, 49 sq. and I Pet. 1, 11 sq. where the Apostle says that the prophet investigates more closely the contents of what they have announced.
3 Schuerer, Geschichte des juedischen Volkes im Zeitalter Jesu Christi. Lpzg. 3d ed. II. 1898, p. 528 sqq., proves this, based especially on the book of Henoch and IV Esdras.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 67
5, 1 — could not have a human father, could scarcely have been generally unknown.
Such representations of the Messiah, however, easily explain the speech of the Nazarenes: "Is He not the son of the carpenter? the son of Mary? the son of Joseph? a brother of James, Joseph, Jude and Simon? and are not his sisters here amongst us?" 1 They make it readily understood how "some from Jerusalem" objected against the Messiah- ship of Christ: "But we know this man, whence he is: but when the Christ cometh, no man knoweth whence He is." 2 It is the terrestrial birth and descent concerning which there is question here.3 And since, in the Gospel of Matthew, the nar rative of "the birth of Jesus" by the Virgin Mary (1, 13-24) pursues the aim to prove the fulfilment of Isaias (7, 14), therefore, the correct conception of this passage could not have been unknown to the Judaic-Christian readers. We may, therefore, rightly assume that, at the time of Christ and of the Apostles, the idea of the virginal birth of the Messiah was not unknown to Judaism. The Recognitiones 4 report of Simon Magus that he pretended that his mother had con ceived him as a virgin. Pseudo-Messias, as Sepp5 affirms, always maintained that they were born of a virgin.
It is a subterfuge of later Jewish polemics when it explains the ignorance of the descent of the Messiah in such a manner as if He were to remain for sometime hidden, and then were to reveal Himself suddenly,6 and when it refuses to refer the Isaianic prophecy to the birth of the Messiah by the Virgin7 and maintains that it was natural.8
1 Mark, 6, 3; Math. 13, 55; Luke, 4, 22.
2 John, 7, 27.
3 Compare also Schanz, commentary on the Gospel of John, Tueb. 1885.
4 In Gallandus, t. II. p. 239, ante enim quam mater mea Rachel convenerit cum eo, adhuc virgo concepit me.
5 Leben Jesu. II. s. 62.
6 Compare Justin, dial. Tryph. 8. Lightfoot, horae in Math. 2, 1. Compare Schuerer, Geschichte des juedischen Volkes, 3d ed. II. 1898, p. 351 sq.
7 Mack is therefore mistaken in his " Messianischen Erwartungen und Ansichten der Zeitgenossen Jesu " (Tuebung. theol. Quartschrf . 1836, s. 199 sqq.) in trans ferring later Jewish interpretations to the time of Christ and in alleging as proof
8 Compare the Philosophumena X, 30 — of the beginning of the third cen tury — wherein the oldest Christian convictions as well as the polemic character of the later Jewish expectations of the Messiah are no less evident. "His (the
68 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
9. The fulfilment of the prophecies of the Old Testament, and the entry of the announced "sign" the Gospel narrates as follows: "The angel Gabriel was sent from God into a city of Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin espoused to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David: and the name of the virgin was Mary. And the angel being come in, said to her: Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee: Blessed art thou among women. And when she had heard, she was troubled at his say ing, and thought within herself what manner of salutation this should be. And the angel said to her: Fear not, Mary; for thou hast found grace with God: Behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and shalt bring forth a son; and thou shalt call his name Jesus. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Most High: and the Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of David his father: and he shall reign in the house of Jacob for ever, and of His Kingdom there shall be no end. And Mary said to the angel: How shall this be done, because I know not man (TTWS ecrrat TOVTO, eTrel dvSpa ov ywawrKa>)? And the angel answering said to her: The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee. And therefore also the Holy which shall be born of thee, shall be called the Son of God (Sto /cat TO yevvtoptvov ayiov K\7JOyj(T€TaL vtos ©eoi)). And behold, thy cousin Elizabeth, she hath also conceived a son in her old age: and this is the sixth month with her that is called barren: Because no word shall be impossible with God. And Mary said: Behold the handmaid of the Lord: be it done to me according to thy word. And the angel departed from her."
Thus speaks St. Luke, 1, 26-38. The Evangelist empha sizes repeatedly and expressly that Mary was a virgin and thereby indicates that this attribute is of an essential signifi-
that the "idea of the birth of the Messiah by a virgin did not really fit into its presentation of the origin of the Messiah; this appears from the objection which the Bl. Virgin makes at the annunciation of the Angel, Luke 1, 34." To this objection the following relative explanation is an answer. See below p. 54 sqq. Compare Langen, " Das Judentum in Palaestina zur Zeit Christi," 1866, p. 402. "According to this the Jews of the pre-Christian times had expected the birth of the Messiah by a virgin, in conformity to a correct understanding of the much disputed passage of Isaias 7, 14. This expectation, according to many prophecies of the Old Testament, is as little surprising as when the Messiah is promised under the name of the Son of God.
Messiah's) origin — they say — He shall have in the house of David, but not from the virgin and the Holy Ghost, dAAa e* -ywai/cos KCU avSpos a>s trao-w o/oos yewacrOai
MARY — THE VIRGIN 69
cance for the mystery which was to be fulfilled. Every idea of a human father is to be excluded in the Child of the Virgin, for He is "the Son of God," "the Son of the Most High." Because He was not generated by man, therefore the words: TO yewuptvov ayiov = is holy, — that which the Virgin con ceives and brings forth— are also to be referred to this human nature, which, therefore, is beyond every relation to original sin.
In the words: "How shall this be done, since I know not man," Mary does not decline the announced dignity of a mother; still, she expresses strongly that to her virginity is unalterable. When the angel announces to her that the almighty power of God will join motherhood to virginity then she pronounces her fiat: "Be it done to me according to thy word."
But, how may it even be imagined that the Mother of God had surrendered her virginity, that she had become unfaithful to the plainly expressed declaration1: "I know not man"? Christian sentiment rebels against the mere assumption of such an idea, because, as we have already seen, the institu tions, the precepts, and the history of the Old Covenant were calculated to lead a reflecting Israelite to the knowledge of God's complacency with a virginal state, and because the same views of the Old Law, which made motherhood amongst the Israelites a sacred rule, presented for the vow of perpetual virginity, in the discernible "fulness of time," also a motive.2 We do not wish hereby to exclude a supernatural enlighten ment of Mary, for the "fulness of grace" establishes the assumption that she did this " through such an evident mo tion of the Holy Ghost that she was perfectly convinced that it was the will of God3 that she should remain a virgin."
1 Schegg, in his Evangelium nach Lucas, 1861, remarks on this passage: "If these words of Mary merely intended to mean 'I know [as I now am] no man/ that would be a meaningless affectation; it would mean no more than our trivial saying: 'Oh, that is far off!' Mary could not speak thus; this we readily perceive, because it would have been a most useless saying. Her objec tion: 'I know not man/ regards, therefore, the future and all future time — it means: 'I will remain a virgin till death.' "
2 See above p. 17 sqq.
3 Schegg, 1. c. Albert Magn., de praeconiis et dignit. Mariae 26. Compare Canisius, 1. c. II. c. 14.
70 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
Such a special supernatural illumination might have also found some connecting point, in the eventual reflections of the highly favored soul of the Mother of God, concerning the idea of marriage according to the light of Holy Scripture. As marriage in the New Testament is a figure of the union between Christ and His Church, so it is likewise even in the Old Covenant a representation of the relation between God and His people. Unity and indissolubility are therefore requisites closely con nected with marriage. Would not the idea of marriage as a figure and union receive a still more exalted presentation if it were entered into by a soul consecrating herself entirely, unreservedly, and perpetually to the Lord? Does not such a union approach the prototype still more closely, when a single soul enters upon a marriage with God Himself? l
"We might therefore paraphrase the sense of the question thus: I declare, 0 messenger of Heaven, that I know not man: in my virginity I possess a treasure, which I owe ex clusively to the highest love of God," who teaches me that such is His will in my regard. "That which you announce, shall it be accomplished without my giving up this treasure, " without my becoming unfaithful to my vocation? "Therefore speak: How shall this be done, since I know not man?" 2
1 On account of the "hardness of hearts" of the Jews, polygamy was tolerated in the Old Covenant, though it was in opposition to the true idea of marriage. The New Covenant is distinguished therefrom in this: that grace conquers the sensual passions and makes marriage a true figure of the relation of Christ to His Church, so that monogamy and indissolubility are its distinguishing marks. In the Church, however, the fulness of grace is so great, so superabundant, that within her per petual virginity is possible and practiced by entire classes of people. A return to the dissolubility of marriage, and to the ignoring and degradation of virginity, is an outward sign that, wherever such is done, there neither abundance of grace nor full possession of truth exist. St. Athanasius writes, de incarn. c. 51 : "What man has taught virginity after his death, or even during his life, and that this virtue is not impossible to man? But Christ, our Redeemer, and the King of all things, had, since he taught it, such a great power that even children, who have not yet attained their majority, have voluntarily vowed virginity." And: "When pagans see these [the virgins, whom the Church calls "Brides of Christ"] they admire them as temples of the Word; for nowhere, except with us Christians, is, in truth, this venerable and heavenly mode of life cultivated. And this precisely is a great proof that we possess the real and true fear of God." [Apol. ad imperat. Constantium c. 33.] We do not hereby wish to assert that the many souls, who are really not within the pale of the Church, do not participate, as members of the invisible Catholic Church, in the treasures of grace and of that exalted virtue. But history proves, as a recognizable characteristic mark, that it is only practiced in the Catholic Church. 2 Compare Grimm, Kindheit Jesu, s. 146.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 71
Still, another thought arises. The more reason we have to presuppose in Mary a deep knowledge of the Law, of the sacred Books and of the Prophets, the more does the ques tion force itself upon us: Did not the grand declaration of Isaias, " Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bring forth a son," furnish the answer that with the motherhood of God vir ginity shall remain united? Did the prophecies of Micheas and Jeremias and the figure of Ezechiel, in no wise, come to the knowledge and understanding of the most perfect of the women of Israel? Though we may not be disposed to give a negative answer to this question, still we are compelled to acknowledge that the supposition of a want of knowledge, or rather, of an understanding of these words of the prophet would not imply in Mary a degradation; for, with such a conception we might refer to the want of an understanding of the words of the twelve year old child, Jesus, in the temple: "and they [Mary and Joseph] understood not the words that he spoke unto them." 1 But to assume that Mary— presup posing the preservation of her virginity — had only asked for the "how" contradicts the fundamental reason added by her: " since I know not man." The conclusive solution might be found herein that Mary, being completely under the influ ence of the declaration of the angel, had not thought in that moment of the words of the prophet. The very salutation of the angel, as the evangelist explains by the word trapd^Or), had troubled her. But God permitted this, in order that through such a reception of the message on the part of Mary, it might be established beyond all doubt that she, as a virgin, conceived of the Holy Ghost. Luke, who desires to strengthen his readers in faith therein, adopted this feature, which points out, at the same time, the fidelity of the source, which, ultimately, goes back to the Mother of God herself. This circumstance precisely, that she, who was " highly favored," communicated this trouble, which otherwise would have been foreign to her, and the finding of which in her surprises us,2 is a deeper proof of the truth of the account.
1 Luke 2, 50.
2 Compare against this Vilmar, Colleg. bibl. 1879, p. 36 (on Luke 1, 29), who seems to find in the Bierapa-xOr) a proof against the "impeccability" of Mary, "for the BiMTapda-o-ea-Oai belongs to concupiscence. Without it the Virgin might
72 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
The virgin was, so Luke adds, " espoused to a man, whose name was Joseph." In this sense the word /-u/Tyorevecrtfai * is received by the Vulgate,2 Justinus,3 Cyrill of Jerusalem,4 Hilary,5 Jerome,6 Epiphanus7 and others, and they thereby satisfy the demand that Mary and later her Divine Child had been preserved from every stain. And since the two espoused persons, whether the bride had been inducted already formally into the home of the bridegroom or not, are removed from any further observations, because they, in all events, possess legally all rights toward each other, therefore, accord ing to Jewish relations between espoused persons, the Holy Family was safeguarded against every questionable appear ance, which otherwise might have served, at the time, as an approach to a scandal in the case of the Messiah." 8 Thus the Law imposes upon the espoused duties similar to those of married people and punishes the infidelity of the former as it does adultery9; for marriage it was merely required that the bridegroom conduct the bride (called 'arusa) into his home,10 and this was done amidst various solemnities. "Thus the espoused became in the fullest sense, even in regard to the use of marriage, the wife of the groom. . . . Therefore . . . the woman is now called nesu'a-espoused." n
have stood with an immovable countenance before the annunciation of the angel." Nevertheless — apart from the fact that sin and concupiscence are not identi cal — the Gospel says that Mary was troubled by the words of the angel (CTTI r<5 A.oyo> Su-TapaxOij) ; the angel, however, had first saluted Mary, but not yet expressed the "annunciation."
1 Thus also the common — and with the LXX (compare Macch. 3, 56) also the customary — meaning of the word. Compare Stephanus, Thesaurus ling. gr. according to which /u^o-Teveiv never signified the tradition of the girl to the bridegroom or taking her to his home. (Pape, Jakobitz and Seiler translate it also with "to marry" but with a reference to this passage, and Passow also "to marry, of the man" — /iv^o-rcveiv ya/xov.) Funk, in the Innsb. Zeitschrf. f. kath. Theol. 1888, p. 656 sqq. and especially W. Grimm: despondeor nvL
2 ad virginem desponsatam. 3 Dialog, c. Tryph. 78. 4 Catech. XII, 31. 6 i. h. 1. 6 In Math, i, 18 compare ad Helvid. 7 haeres. 78, 8.
8 Grimm, 1. c. p. 125, compare Saalschuetz, Mosaisches Recht, 1846-48, p. 728 sqq. Keil Archaeologie 1875, § 109. Bisping, Erklaer. des Math. Evang. zu 1, 18; zu Lukas, p. 84 nm. 2. Schegg, zu Math. 1. 18 (1. p. 43 sq. 149).
9 Compare Deut. 22, 23 sqq. . . . "If a man have espoused a damsel that is a virgin, and some one find her in the city, and he lie with her . . . they shall be stoned ... the man, because he hath humbled his neighbor's wife."
10 Deut. 20, 7.
11 Compare for the solemnization of marriage of the Jews: Flunk, 1. c. p. 670 sq.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 73
It serves again as a proof of the Gospel that Mary remained a virgin, when Luke retains the same expression, " espoused," even after Joseph had already conducted her to his home: " And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth into Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem; because he was of the house and family of David, to be enrolled with Mary his espoused wife [r^ e/x^orev/ieVfl avrw], who was with child." 1
It is, therefore, not necessary to accept the expression fjii^o-Teveo-Oai as meaning "to marry" with Ambrose,2 with the Opus imperfectum, and especially with several other in terpreters,3 and to assume that Joseph had already inducted Mary into his home before the annunciation. Especially the saying of the angel to Joseph: "fear not to take unto thee Mary"4 will not admit such an assumption, especially so, since, according to Mathew, the calling of Mary "wife" is also justified among espoused persons. The evangelist may assume that the legal relation between espoused persons was known to his readers, and he may make this serviceable as a proof that Jesus is the Son of David according to Law and through Joseph.
But: How did Mary become "espoused," since she had vowed perpetual virginity?
The evangelists are silent upon this matter, and we are, therefore, directed to seek a reason for this elsewhere. Ulti mately we find it in a divine direction. God, who had inspired Mary to remain a virgin, showed her also clearly and distinctly that she should also become espoused to Joseph. As in the former case, so likewise is here the question in order: How and through what concatenation of circum stances did Mary "arrive at the knowledge of this divine disposition? It is easy to fancy that Mary, following the common custom of the Israelites in the selection of the marriage state, was instigated thereto by her relatives. It may be assumed as certain, guided by the entire character of the Mother of God which the evangelists indicate, that she would yield to such a direction of her kin, if it were
1 2, 4. 5. 2 In Luke lib. II.
3 Compare Theophyl, Maldon., Jansen., Cornel, a Lap.
4 Math. 1, 20.
74 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
favored by a legal provision, for then she might hope that God, who directed her upon this twofold path, would also point out to her the union of the same. The "not un founded assumption that Mary was a so-called daughter of inheritance, therefore, without a brother, and was there fore legally bound to offer 'her hand and fortune' — which latter, owing to a want of a brother, passed over to her — to her next kinsman/'1 led her to the espousal, and precisely with Joseph, who was one of the same descent and her next legal kinsman.
Thus the way was paved which permitted the mystery of the incarnation to be accomplished in secret, and admits the opinion of the Fathers 2 that the same should be concealed, especially from the devil; a way was prepared by which the Mother and the Divine Child were secured in the eyes of the world and gave them a protector.3
10. "Now the birth of Christ was thus:4' When Mary His Mother was espoused to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Ghost: Whereupon Joseph her husband, being a just man, and not willing publicly to expose her, was minded to put her away privately. But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared to him in his sleep, saying: Joseph, son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife, for that which is conceived in her, is of the Holy Ghost. And she shall bring forth a son: and thou shall call His name Jesus: for He shall save His people from their sins. Now all this was done that the word might be fulfilled which the Lord spoke to the prophet, saying: Behold a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call His name Emmanuel, which, being interpreted, is, God with us." Math. 1, 18-24.
Why should Joseph desire to leave Mary? or rather: What did divine Providence intend by directing Joseph to conceive the thought of separating himself from his "wife"?
1 Compare Numbers 27, 6; 36, 6-12; Tob. 7, 14; 6, 11; Grimm 1. c. p. 276.
2 Compare Jerome, in Math. 1 (referring to Ignatius the Martyr); Ambrose in Luke 2, 3.
3 Aug. de s. virginit. 4: Quia votum virginitatis Israelitarum mores adhuc recusabant, desponsata est viro justo non violenta ablaturo, sed potius contra violentos custoolituro.
4 r«Wis 0, B, C, A, P, etc.) : ortus, origo; Rec. has: yeWiyo-is: generatio.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 75
To this Holy Scripture gives a clear answer:1 Joseph himself is to be the unsuspected witness to the birth of Jesus of a virgin, to the conception by the Holy Ghost,2 and to the fulfilment of the words of the prophet Isaias. Besides, Mathew attains another purpose: the showing of the descent of Jesus from David. " Jacob" -thus he concludes the gene alogy of Christ — " begot Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ." 3 Therefore also does Joseph, who, as the " husband of Mary," is the father " according to law," receive the command: "and thou shalt call His name Jesus." And hence, through Joseph, is the Son of Mary the "rod" of the house of David.
As simple and clear as this essential purpose of the present account is, so mysterious and difficult is the knowledge of the way that leads to it. Therefore, also, are the answers not concordant which are given to the question: How did Joseph arrive at the conclusion to dismiss Mary secretly? What consideration directed him?
Whether it be reserved, by deep meditation, to offer every reader of this pericope of the Gospel a full and a complete explanation shall be left undecided in the following attempt. There are especially two opinions up to the pres ent time.
The one has Joseph to doubt the chastity of his spouse, and considers him justified, according to the law, aye, even bound to dismiss Mary; for the law punishes infidelity in the espoused as well as adultery4; but to retain an adulteress is, according to the "Proverbs of Solomon," foolish and impious.5 The words of the angel: "for that which she hath conceived, is of the Holy Ghost," are understood in this sense. If, therefore, such a conception had been possible to Joseph, why should he have thought of dismissing his spouse secretly?
1 w. 22, 23.
2 1, 16.
3 Ambrose, in Evang. Luc. 2, 2. 3. etc.: "As an unexceptional witness of her virginity her own husband is to be admitted," because he "recognized the sacred mystery. Aye, the very words of Mary obtain, through him, a greater credibility. ..." A reason to lie (to cover the guilt) "existed for one who was not espoused, but not for one who was." — Chrys. horn. 4. in Math, calls Joseph the witness of the conception by the Holy Ghost. August., sermo 225, 2: testis pudoris vir- ginalis fuit maritus. Hilar. in Mat. i. h. 1. Epiphan., haer. 78, 7.
4 Deut. 22, 24. 6 Proverbs, 18, 22.
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" ... in spite of his sense of justice, and out of love and respect for Mary, Joseph could not bring himself to the point ... of putting Mary in a bad light. . . . Therefore, Joseph chose a middle way, inasmuch as he thought of dismissing Mary secretly and of leaving the rest to God." 1 But it is hard to reconcile a consideration of being bound to dismiss a spouse as an adulteress, and still — out of love and respect — to adopt means to guard her against "talk." It naturally im presses itself upon one's mind that Joseph was not without a knowledge of the exalted worth and of the gracious gifts of his bride. The more "just" and the purer Joseph was him self, the more was he aware also of the holiness and the purity of her, who was "highly favored." Herein, however, we find the reason for the purest and inmost love for his bride. And we realize that it was animated and borne by a fulness of supernatural divine grace, as appears appropriate for the preparation of the inexpressibly exalted vocation of Saint Joseph.
The other explanation is based on the fact that the Evan gelist does not say: "it was found that Mary was with child," but that "she was found with child by the Holy Ghost." 2 It presumes that Joseph had already received knowledge of the accomplished mystery. "Who may still fancy that, whilst in the house of Zachary there is jubilation over the visit 'of the Mother of the Lord/ whilst the priest loudly proclaims the distinction of the Virgin and mighty presenti ments force themselves into all the surroundings, that just he, who is most proximately concerned, the groom of the highly favored spouse, should be entirely unsuspecting and excluded from all knowledge of the mystery? The Virgin had now, since her condition is no longer concealed from her spouse, left it entirely in the hands of the Lord to remove from him his doubts and fears. The love of God had already been transformed and spiritualized in both of the espoused into purity of hearts, so that therein they met each other in
1 Schanz in Math. 1, 19 (p. 84). Of such doubts, in Joseph, also thought Justin, dial. 78; Ambrose, in Luke 2, 5; August., sermo 82 (or de verbo dom. 16, 7) and 63, ep. ad Maced. 54; Chrys. in Math. 1, 20; Euthym.; Jansen., Lucas Brug., Estius, Maldonat, Pillion.
2 Grimm, 1. c. p. 220.
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mutual want" — a longing after a virginal life. " Therefore, in a compact of love, which was based upon such grounds, the Virgin may conceal from the whole world her mystery, and since she had already intoned, in a loud voice, her Magnificat, it would appear unnatural to consider her like wise reticent toward her husband. Since heaven itself had already broken silence and formally revealed the mysterious dignity of the Virgin, therefore has precisely her spouse a full right to the revelation. We need not confide the task any farther to the Virgin ... it appears more natural that the wonderful events, that took place in the home of Elizabeth, were not unknown to him and that the sacerdotal family considered it a most sacred duty not to conceal from the spouse of the 'Mother of the Lord/ by any means, the great mystery which had just been revealed in their midst/'
Therefore, to regard Mary "in any manner unfaithful" is absolutely beyond all reason; but, if "she conceived of the Holy Ghost, what shall the spouse any farther with this his bride? " . . . " who brings into his home a Son, in whom he believes he has no paternal right." For such a conception the angel's words "fear not" are proper. "It is merely a sentiment of fear, of a conscientious fear, which forbids him to thrust himself, through the espousals with his bride, into a paternity to which he considers himself not entitled: how ever miraculous and pure the conception of his spouse might appear to him, ... [he had] a tender fear of violating such sacred rights by maintaining a personal right."1
A consideration, based on the assumption of this second opinion, does not impose an obligation of assuming that Mary had to communicate to her spouse the mystery revealed by the angel. For this had not been done by her to Elizabeth, who recognized — as we shall see farther on — from the effects of the divine proximity upon the fruit of her womb, the "Mother of the Lord." And therefore, the assumption can not be considered groundless that the proximity of the Re deemer, of the Incarnate God, operated in a similar manner upon Joseph as it did upon the precursor, and that thereby the respect and the love for Mary constantly increased in his
1 Grimm, 1. c. p. 220-225.
78 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
soul and completely excluded every doubt in regard to her fidelity.1
It seems to me that Mary, in the knowledge of the mys terious manner and secrecy in which the incarnation was accomplished, did not raise the veil herself; and that also in regard to Joseph she preferred to leave it to heaven to instruct him concerning her peculiarly exalted dignity, of which she had already received testimony in the home of Elizabeth. Thus we find in the action of Mary again a trait of that uncon ditional abandonment to the recognized will of God, which follows it even when all human prudence and consideration would suggest otherwise.
Such action on the part of the Virgin leaves it an open question whether or not Joseph had obtained a knowledge of the miraculous events that took place in the house of Zachary, through the latter or through others of the numerous witnesses or initiated. However, in regard to that which occurred without witnesses and during the whole time that Zachary was dumb, a negative answer might possibly be justifiable.
The time came when Joseph unerringly recognized the blessed condition of his spouse; when he was forced to say to himself: She is a mother. Yet: How was this done? Who operated in her that which establishes paternal rights? Who possesses, therefore, paternal rights in regard to this child? How was he permitted to enter into a marriage which brought paternal rights over a Son, in whose regard he might always ask, as did his bride once before: How can this be done? But, whatever he heard pointed to a direct and miraculous intervention of God. Precisely because he was a "just," a perfect Israelite, he had to consider himself too unworthy, " unclean" to enter into such intimate relations with the Most High, to permit himself to be called " father" where God had intervened most manifestly and in an infi nitely more miraculous manner than He had once in behalf
1 A doubt or suspicion regarding the chastity of Mary on the part of Saint Joseph is excluded by Jerome, in Math. 1, 19: Joseph sciens illius castitatem, et admirans, quod evenerat, celat silentio, cujus mysterium nesciebat. The Opus imperf.; Bernard., horn. II. super missus est: Bonavent. specul. B. M. V. 17; Corn, a Lapid., Tirinus, Calmet, Keppler, die Bedenken d. hi. Joseph, Math. 1, 18-25 in Tuebingen Quartalschrf. 1889, p. 558-577; Knabenbauer.
MARY — THE VIRGIN 79
of Sara. Had he possibly thought, in his meditations, of the scriptural account of a Virgin-Mother? But, in order that the spouse and the husband of Mary might become a witness to the conception by the Holy Ghost, God left him in certain ignorance and doubt and anxiety as to whether he should conduct Mary to his home and thereby assume paternal rights, and this to such a degree that made him resolve to dismiss his spouse, so that then, taught by an angel, he should become the most trustworthy witness of the fulfilment of the prophecy of Isaias.
If for such an interior condition the declaration of the angel to Joseph is a solution, then it must be the answer to the question of the "How," or concerning Him who had operated that which otherwise pertains to a father, and it must be able to remove the fear of assuming the rights of a husband of Mary.
Mathew communicates first the revelation (evpeOy) of the condition of the espoused to Joseph. The addition "of the Holy Ghost" cannot,1 however, be regarded as a simul taneously made discovery; Joseph discovers this only in v. 20 through the angel. It is rather placed at the top of the narrative by the Evangelist, in order thus to express at once the object thereof.2 An analogy is likewise presented between the annunciation made to Mary and to Joseph herein that, with the latter, a revelation of the mystery of the Triune God has also been connected.
Just as much as it was against the sense of justice of Joseph (8t/cato9 w) to assume paternal rights over the Child of his spouse, so much was he also opposed to the public dis missal of Mary, because thereby he would have exposed her to a suspicion and talk of being guilty of adultery (avryv Say/xa/rtVcu) . Therefore Joseph adopted the plan of "dismiss ing Mary secretly," in order to relinquish his rights to her; but, in a manner that the world might still consider them existing.3
1 See above Grimm, also the Opus imperf.
2 "Such an anticipation, however, was the less surprising to the readers of the Gospel, since the fact was not unknown to them." (Schanz.)
3 The mode and manner seems to be most simple, that Joseph should leave Mary "to go thence, and return probably to Bethlehem again. Nothing seemed opposed to such a formless actual 'dismissal,' since on the part of the bride no
80 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
The angel offered him a solution which removed all doubts. The address: "Joseph, son of David/ ' makes it manifest why God had selected him to place His Son into his care; and "Thou shalt call His name/' i.e., thou shalt have com plete paternal rights, and, therefore, Jesus is a Davidite. "Fear not/' by these words the angel continues to encourage him, "to take Mary, thy wife." Whilst Joseph would not decide, upon his own responsibility, to assume paternal rights, he is moved to this by the heavenly messenger.1 As a reason for this the latter says: "that which she has conceived, is of the Holy Ghost." All the questions that arose in the mind of Joseph found their answer herein. The name of " Jesus" and its explanation: "He shall save His people from their sins," are capable of banishing every other anxiety and fear that may arise on account of personal unworthiness. If the first word of the angel indicates Joseph's vocation, the last points to his equipment therefor. When Isaias 2 was called to become a prophet, and he saw God in a vision, he said: "Woe is me ... in the midst of a people that hath unclean lips; and I have seen with my eyes the King of the Lord of hosts." A seraphim, who touched him with a live coal that he had taken from the altar of the Lord, said: "Behold, this hath touched thy lips : and thy iniquities shall be taken away, and thy sin shall be cleansed." Thereupon Isaias said: "Lo, here I am, send me."
The most joyful message, the most blessed task is thus given to St. Joseph: he is elevated by God to be the head of the Holy Family. He must not fear on account of such an exalted task, for he is to give a name to the Redeemer. "The
objection and no protest on account of violated rights were to be feared." (Grimm, 1. c. p. 223, note.) The people, however, could find an excuse for their separation the more they knew Mary and Joseph; and therefore were aware of their justice and piety, for according to a true Israelitic idea abstemiousness was regarded a good work, especially pleasing to God. See above p. 19 sqq.
1 If, in the trials which Joseph had to undergo, his willingness to give up Mary is considered meritorious, how much more his faithful obedience? The parallel between him "the son of David" and king Achaz is beautifully emphasized by Grimm (p. 225 sq.) : but better than the one descendant of David, does the other stand the test. That which Achaz had broken and became guilty of through his infidelity, Joseph at last amends by his fidelity.
2 Chap. 6. Eusebius also, quaest. evang. 1, is of the opinion that Joseph had intended to dismiss Mary "out of a respectful fear of the extraordinary."
MARY — THE VIRGIN 81
merit of humility, since the Son of God voluntarily accepts the form of a servant, is in the first line and in the richest measure accorded to the Mother, who conceives and gives Him birth: and the continued merit of obedience, which He renders, of a free choice, to a sinful mortal, who could be closer connected with the blessing of such obedience, or more naturally, immediately under the influence of the grace, of such merit than he whom He loved as a father, because He had selected him to be such? l As the angel had directed Joseph to do, so he did; he took unto himself Mary "his wife," to his home, whereby the espousals passed into a real and valid marriage.2 But the marriage was of a class that are now called "Joseph's marriages"; for the bride and the wife of Joseph had said: "I know not man." She, who may speak thus, and be espoused at the same time, must be sure of a similar sentiment in her spouse. If in the Old Covenant marriage is sanctified in the hope of finding in the descendants the Messiah, and in the New Covenant, because it serves the edification of the kingdom of Christ: must not that marriage be sanctified the more which possesses the source of all sanctity and the fulness of all grace through the Mother, on account of her natural relation to the Child, and through the father, to whom the Child has made Himself subject? Thus both are elevated to a higher sanctity through their Child, and this the more, since their marriage proceeds from that which otherwise forms an object of mar riage — from the control of sensuality, of the curse which adheres to the race." 3
11. Though the saying of the Mother of God: "I know not man" expresses most positively and clearly a perpetual virginity, nevertheless, it was denied by ancient and modern errors which sought to base themselves especially upon the
1 Grimm, 1. c. p. 227 sq. Hereby it becomes evident how well founded is the selection of St. Joseph by the Church as her special patron. The Almighty Redeemer, who was able to grant all to this most sacred humanity, had assumed into His plan that Joseph should serve Him as a mediator.
2 Compare herewith especially Funk, 1. c. p. 627 sqq.
3 Grimm, 1. c. p. 227. "If otherwise the object of marriage is mutual sancti- fication, which is gradually attained in the same degree, as sensual love, based on sacramental grace, becomes ennobled and purified through sacred intentions, aye, even finally terminates in pure love of God, how holy and sanctifying may we not regard a marriage," which proceeds from such perfections.
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words: " before they came together" (irplv f) <jweX#eu> (Math. 1, 18); and upon: "he knew her not till she brought forth her first-born son (KCU OVK lyivcoaKev avTrjv e<ws [ov] €T€K€v vioV),1 and he called his name Jesus" (Math. 1, 25), and upon Luke 2, 7: "And she brought forth her first-born son [TOV TTpuToroKov], and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger"; and, finally, upon the fact that in the New Testament mention is often made of "brethren" of Jesus.2
But iTplv or irplv 77 with the following infinitive indicates that the action did not take place at all, or its performance was a mere side issue; therefore, from the expression "before . . ." it cannot be inferred that they came together after wards.3 The word "to come together" (crwepxeo-Oai) may, of course, signify a coming together for marital cohabitation, but also only: to dwell together in the same house, and this latter signification is here the only correct one, because the antithesis thereof is "to be espoused,"4 and because Mary and Joseph had not yet dwelled together in the same house,
1 The rov nyxoToroKov is wanting in Math. 1, 25 in »BZ. Lachm., Tischd., and Westcott and Hort have stricken it.
2 Compare Jerome, adv. Helvidium; de Wette, Exeget. Handbuch I. p. 19: "Th'rough a superstitious anxiety for the immaculate virginity of Mary some wished to extend OVK eyivoxrKev avryv over the birth of the child . . . but pre cisely the reverse is contained in the saying, in virtue of the nature of the marital relation . . . the TT/HOTOTOKOS contradicts this concept evidently . . . never . . . is an only son called first-born when there is no thought of a further birth, and added to this is the fact that Mathew mentions the brethren of Jesus" (3, 55). It was with difficulty that St. Jerome resolved to refute a similar degradation of the Mother of God, because it was repugnant to his Christian sense to notice at all the scandal-creating work of Helvidius and to honor the ignoramus with a refutation. A proof, that it was repugnant to the Christian feeling to unite the dignity of the Mother of God with the vocation of an ordinary married woman, is given by the origin of the apocryphal Proto-Gospel of James (ed. Tischendorff, 1876, ed. 2), which, among other things, pursues the purpose of showing that the marriage of Mary was not one that was consummated. Compare Lehner, 1. c. p. 93.
3 Probably it is better known how Jerome corrected Helvidius in this matter by showing that the "before ..." includes the later coming together as little as the sentence: Before I took my breakfast in the port, I embarked for Africa — includes a later breakfast in port. Or that it may be concluded from the sentence: Helvidius was overtaken by death before he made an act of contrition — that he made an act of contrition after his death? This, according to Ps. 6, 6, is an impossibility.
4 Flunk, 1. c. p. 679 sq. See Math. 1, 20, the words of the angel: 7rapaAa/?eT» MapLafji rrjv yvvaiKa erov, and Luke, 1, 56, according to which Mary returned to her home after leaving Elizabeth.
MARY— THE VIRGIN 83
for only after the revelation made by the angel did he receive
her as his wife (wapaXa^elv Mapiav rr)V yvvaiKd crov). Even Bleek l remarks, therefore, that the coming together is not to be understood of marital cohabitation but of " domestic cohabitation."
St. Jerome points to the linguistic usage of Holy Scrip ture,2 according to which, from the words: "And he knew her not till . . . " as little may be deducted against the per petual virginity of Mary as from the expression: "I am with you all days till the end of the world," 3 that the Lord will abandon His disciples at the end of the world. Or, — when Paul says with the Psalmist: "Sit thou at my right hand: until I make thy enemies thy footstool"; — will the Lord cease to rule when His enemies are under His feet? 4 And — as St. Jerome furthermore remarks — these examples might be mul tiplied: Michol, the daughter of Saul, had no child till the day of her death" 5; or, "Noe sent forth a raven . . . which did not return till the waters were dried." 6
"But we" — thus St. Jerome continues his refutation of the 'proofs' of Helvidius — "reason thus: every only-born is a first-born, but not every first-born is an only-born. First born is not only he called after whom others are born, but also he before whom no other is born. The true, biblical definition of the word is found in Exodus (34, 19. 20) and Num. (18, 15). ... If only he were a first-born who is followed by brethren, then it would not have been necessary to release the only- born by a ransom, or the payment of the purchase price might have been delayed until brethren had followed. ... It might be asked, whether at the destruction of the first-born in Egypt the only-born were spared? Of course, if the existence of brethren were required for a first-born. But this would be a ridiculous assumption. ..." This signification of a first born amongst the Israelites is the reason why, in the Book of
1 Synopt. Erklaerg. der drei ersten Evangelien, 1862, p. 109, there the per petual virginity of Mary is abandoned.
2 Poteram super hoc innumerabilia exempla congerere et omnem lacessentis procacitatem testimoniorum nube celare; verum adhuc pauca subjiciam. . . .
3 Math. 28, 20. ^ 4 Ps. 109; I Cor. 15, 25. 6 II Sam. 6, 23 (Iws rJJs ^/xepas TOV aTroOavfiv av-n/v).
6 Gen. 8, 6 ((«os TOV £r)pavOfjvai. TO v8o)p a7ro T>}« y^s). Compare furthermore I Sam. 15, 35; Isai. 22, 14.
84 THE MOTHER OF JESUS IN HOLY SCRIPTURE
Josue,1 also Machir, the son of Manasses, is called the " first born," though he is also the only-born.2 The word " first born" is not precisely numerical, it denotes a relation of duty to God, to which also the only-born Son of Mary sub mitted Himself.
The New Testament, however, has a special meaning for this word, which is an additional reason why the Evangel ists, respectively, the Holy Ghost, selected this designation for Christ. St. Paul calls Him "the first-born amongst many brethren," 3 for the redeemed have become, through grace, the children of God. "First-born" —inasmuch as Christ is the source of all future childhood of God4; and inasmuch as He was the first among the brethren to enter into the posses sion of the inheritance.5 — "Behold, I ascend to my Father and to your Father, to my God and to your God" 6 — thus the "first-born" addressed the "brethren." He is not simply called "first-born," says St. Cyril of Alexandria, but with the addition "amongst many brethren," as it is written.7 But when did He become our brother — was it when He assumed flesh?" The "first-born" of creation,8 remarks Epi- phanius,9 "the first-born" amongst many brethren, "the first-born of the Father in heaven," who is the "only-born," "is always called at the incarnation also the first-born of Mary and, yet, He is the only-born and has no brethren through her." Mary, who gave birth to such an only-born, is also the Mother of the "first-born." 10
In order to bring the perpetual virginity of Mary into harmony with the Gospel of St. Mathew it was certainly not necessary to bring the doctrine into requisition, which was developed especially by St. Paul, concerning the relation of Christ to the redeemed. The circumstance that the Law dedicated the "first-born" to the Lord is of sufficient impor tance for the Redeemer, that it should be also emphasized by Mathew. "This first-born" it is whom the Lord accepts
1 17, 1 (LXX). 4 Ephes. 1, 5.
2 Compare Num. 26, 29-34. 5 Col. 1, 18; Hebr. 1, 6.
3 Rom. 8, 20. 6 John, 20, 17.
7 Thesaur. assertionum XXV, in Raithmayr, Commentar zum Briefe an die Roemer, 1845, p. 453.
8 Col. 1, 15. 9 Haeres. 78, 21.
10 Compare also Galfano, la Vergine delle vergini, Palermo, 1884, p. 330 sqq.
MARY— THE VIRGIN 85
as a sacrifice for all the other brethren. At His first presenta tion in the temple the priests return Him again to His Mother; but even Mathew emphasizes l the fact that it was precisely the High-Priests who, thirty years later, deliver Jesus unto death.
St. Jerome, the great defender of the perpetual virginity of Mary, points to the fact that the Evangelist indicates the miraculous virginal birth of Jesus, when he says that Mary herself wrapped the child in swaddling clothes and laid Him in a manger.2
"0 senseless innovation," writes St. Epiphanius about those who "dare" attack the perpetual virginity of the Mother of God and who "maintain" groundless opinions in regard to the Blessed Mother, for on the cross Jesus Himself gives testi mony of the former, by commending His Mother to John; but this He does because Mary was without any other chil dren, and on account of the virginity of that disciple.3 This proof is very forceful, for if Jesus had had brethren it would not merely have been their duty to take care of the mother, but also their right, which, of course, the Lord would not have violated.4 For, even when dying on the cross, He fulfils the fourth commandment.
Hereby the last objection raised from "the brethren of Jesus" falls to the ground. Holy Scripture, remarks St. Jerome again,5 uses in a fourfold sense the concept of "brother,"
1 Math. 26, 66; 27, 1. Compare John, 11, 47. 49.
2 1. c. ... ipsa pannis involvit infantem, ipsa et mater et obstetrix fuit: "et collocavit . . . Luc. 2, 7 ... Quae sententia et apocryphorum deliramenta convincit, dum Maria ipsa pannis involvit infantem." Luke 2, 21: "And after the days of her purification, according to the Law of Moses, were accomplished"; these words prove nothing, for the emphasis is not upon "purification" but upon " the days" and " the Law of Moses." Compare Luke 2, 23 above p. 26 sq.
3 adv. haer. 78, 5. 6. 10. Thus also conclude: Pope Siricius, ep. ad Anys. (in Constant, epist. Rom. pontificum. Parisiis, 1721, p. 682); Ambrose, de instit. Virg. 6 and 7. Compare Canisius, 1. c. II. c. 5.
4 Thus also Hengstenberg, Joh. Evangel. III. p. 267, says: The words: "Be hold, thy son," presuppose that Mary had no other sons besides Jesus. To honor parents, by taking good care of them, is not merely a duty, but also a right of children, and Jesus would have violated this right, had he given His Mother into the care of John."
6 A most excellent judgment by Lehner of the argumentation of St. Jerome, is very proper here in relation to this question: "Ingenious intuition, a sharp intellectual acumen and deeply penetrating biblical studies enabled the illumined doctor of the Church to attain a degree of apologetics which all later theological science . . . has not been able to surpass."
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in the sense of an own brother, of members of the same people, — thus all Jews are "brethren," -of members of the same family, — as Abraham and Lot, Laban and Jacob — finally in a spiritual sense, in which all Christians or all men are brethren.1 With such a wide range of the idea of "brother" 2 it is natural for the modern and latest opponents 3 of the honor of the Virgin and Mother of God to attempt a proof for their conception, which is in contradiction to the saying: "I know not man."
Granting even that James, the "brother" of the Lord and the son of Alphaeus, the Apostle, were not identical, still it would never follow from this that the former was the "own brother" of the Lord; it might merely be inferred therefrom that the traditional attempt of the explanation of the rela tionship between Jesus and the Alphaites is weak. For, according to this, Mary, the spouse of Cleophas,4 and Mary, the mother of the Apostles James and Jude, of Simon and Jonas,5 is the same person, and according to John (19, 26) at the same time the "sister " of the Mother of God. Even though the connection of the names of Cleophas and Alphaeus might raise a certain doubt,6 still, the identity of the person cannot therefore be called into question. For this not only the com-
1 1. c. n. 15. Compare Augustin, in Joan. tr. 10. c. 2; 28, c. 3.
2 Compare Gen. 14, 16; 24, 48; 29, 12. 15; Lev. 10, 4.
3 Thus besides de Wette, Winer, Zeitschrft. f. wissenschaftl. Theologie, 1829. III. p. 352 sqq., In Ersch und Gruber, Encycl. 2. p. vol. 23, p. 80 sqq. (Wilh. Grimm); Schaf, das Verhaeltnis d. Jac. d. B. d. H. z. Jac. Alph. 1842. Keim, Gesch. Jesu von Nazara, I. 1867, p. 422 sqq., Hilgenfeld. Galaterbrief, etc.; The N. T. Woerterbuch of Grimm, Cremer bibl. Theolog. Woerterbuch d. n. t. Graecitaet, 1886. Compare also Bernh. Weiss, das Leben Jesu 1882, II. p. 582, u. Lehrb. d. Einleitung i. d. N. T. Berlin 3