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VIRGIN
Lauds of the Feast of the Circumpision sees in "the
bush that was on fire and was not burnt" (Ex., iii,
2) a figure of Mary conceiving her Son without the
loss of her virginity. The second antiplion of Lauds
of the same Office sees in Gedcon's fieece wet with dew
while all the ground beside had remained dry (Judges,
vi, 37-38) a type of Mary receiving in her womb the
Word Incarnate (cf. St. Ambrose, de Spirit. Sanct.,
I, S-9, P. L., XVI, 705; St. Jerome, Epist.,cviii, 10;
P. L., XXII, 886). The Office of the Blessed Virgin
applies to Mary many passages concerning the spouse
in the Canticle of Canticles (cf. Gietmann, In Eccles.
et Cant, cant., Paris, 1890, 417 sq.) and also concern-
ing Wisdom in the Book of Proverbs, viii, 22-31
(cf. Bull "Ineffabilis", fourth Lesson of the Office for
10 Dec). The application to Mary of a "garden
enclosed, a fountain sealed up" mentioned in Cant.,
iv, 12, is only a particular instance of what has been
said above (Hesiionse of seventh Noeturn in the Office
of the Immaculate Conception). Besides, Sara,
Debbora, Judith, and Esther are variously used as
figures of Mary; the ark of the Covenant, over which
the presence of God manifested itself, is used as the
figure of Mary carrying God Incarnate within her
womb. But especially Eve, the mother of all the liv-
ing (Gen., iii, 20), is considered as a type of Mary
who is the mother of all the living in the order of grace
(cf. St. Justin, dial. c. Trvph., 100; P. G.,VI, 709-711;
St. Iren., adv. haer.. Ill,' 22; V, 19; P.G., VII, 958,
1175; Tert., de carne Christi, 17; P. L., II, 782; St.
Cyril., catech., XII, 15; P. G., XXXIII, 741; St.
Jerome, ep. XXII ad Eustoch., 21; P.L., XXII, 408;
St. Augustine, de agone Christi, 22; P. L., XL, 303;
Terrien, La INI^re de Dieu et la mere des hommes,
Paris, 1902, I, 120-121; II, 117-118; III, pp. 8-13;
Newman, Anglican Difficulties, London, 1885, II,
pp. 26 sqq.; Lecanu, Histoire de la Sainte Vierge,
Paris, 1860, pp. 51-82).
III. M.\RY IN THE New Testament. — We shall first con.sider Mary as portrayed in the Gospels, and then add the references to Our Blessed Lady found in the other books of the New Testament.
A. MaTyinthe Gospels. — The reader of the gospels 13 at first surprised to find so little about Mary; but this obscurity of Mary in the Gospels has been studied at length by Blessed Peter Canisius (de B. Virg.,
I. IV, c. 24), Auguste Nicolas (La Vierge Marie d'apr^s I'Evangile et dans I'Eglise), Card. Newman (Letter to Dr. Pusey), and Very Rev. J. Spencer Northcote (Mary in the Gospels, London and New York, 1885, Lecture I). In the commentary on the "Magnificat", pubhshed 1518, even Luther expresses the beUef that the Gospels praise Mary sufficiently by caUing her (eight times) Mother of Jesus. In the following paragrajjhs we shall briefly group together what we know of Our Blessed Lady's life before the birth of her Divine Son, during the hidden life of Our Lord, during His public life and after His Resurrection.
(1) Mary beforetheBirthof JesusChrist. St. Luke, ii, 4, says that St. Joseph went from Nazareth to Bethlehem to be enrolled, "because he w;is of the house and Family of David". As if to exclude all doubt concerning the Davidic descent of Mary, the Evangehst (i, 32, 69) states that the child born of Mary without the intervention of man shall be given "the throne of David His father", and that the Lord God has "raised up an horn of .salvation to us in the house of David his servant" (cf. Tertul., de carne Christi. 22; P. L., II, 789; St. Aug., do cons. Evang.,
II, 2, 4; P. L., XXXIV, 1072). St. Paul too testifies that Jesus Christ "was made to him [God] of the seed of David, according to the fle.sh" (Rom., i, 3). If Mary were not of Davidic descent, her Son con- ceived by the Holy Ghost could not be said to be "of the seed of David". Hence commentators tell us that in the text "in the sixth month the an^el Gabriel was sent from God ... to a virgin espoused to
a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David "
(Luke, i, 26-27); the last clause "of the house of
David" does not refer to Joseph, but to the virgin
who is the principal person in the narrative; thus we
have a direct inspired testimony to Mary's Davidic
descent. Cf. St. Ignat., ad Ephes., 18; St. Justin,
c. Tryph., 100; St. Aug., c. Faust, xxiii, .5-9; Bar-
denhewer, Maria Verkiindigung, Freiburg, 1896,
74-82; Friedrich, Die Mariologie des hi. Augustinus,
Coin, 1907, 19 sqq.
While commentators grnerally agree that the gene- alogy found at iIh' liciriiniint; of the first Gosjiel is that of St. Joseph, Annuls nl \'iii-rho proposes the opinion, already alluded to by St. .\iil-- •:- , it St. Luke's genealogy gives the pedigiee of Mary. The text of the third Gos- pel (III, 23) may be explained so as to make Heli the father of Mary:
"JftSUS
being the son (as it was supposed of Joseph) I if Heli", or "Jesus . . . being tlie son of Joseph, as it was supposed, the son of Heli' (Lightfoot, Ben- gel, etc.), or again "Jesus
being as it was supposed the son of Joseph, who was [the son-in- law] of Heli " (Jans., Harduin., etc.). In these explanations the name of Mary is not mentioned explicitly, but it is imphed; for Jesus is the Son of HeU through Mary. Though few commentators adhere to this view of St. Luke's genealogy, the name of Mary's father, Heh, agrees with the name given to Our Lady's father in a tradition founded upon the report of the Protoevange- hum of James, an apocryphal Gospel which dates from the end of the second century. According to this document the parents of Mary are Joachim and Anna. Now, the name Joachim is only a variation of Heli or Eliachim, substituting one Divine name (Yahweh) for the other (Eli, Elohim). The tradition as to the parents of Mary, found in the Gospel of James, is reproduced by St. John Damascene (hom. I. de nativ. B. v., 2, P. G., XCVI, 664), St. Gregory of Nyssa (P. G., XLVII, 1137), St, Germ, of Con.stantin. (de pra;.sent., 2, P. G., XCVIII, 313), pseudo-Epiphan. (de laud. Deipar., P, G., XLIII, 488), p.seudo-Hilar. (P. L., XCVI, 278), St. Fulbertof Chartres (in Nativit. Deipar., P. L., CLI, 324). Some of these WTiters add that the birth of Mary was obtained by the fer- vent prayers of Joachim and Anna in their advanced age. As Joachim belonged to the royal family of David, so Anna is supijosed to have been a descend- ant of the priestly family of Aaron; thus Christ the Eternal King and Priest spr.ing from both a royal and priestly family (cf. Aug. Consens. Evang., 1. II, c. 2). According to Luke, i, 26, Mary lived in Nazareth, a city in Galilee, at the time of the Annunciation. A certain tr,adition maintains that she was conceived and born in the same hou.se in which the Word became flesh (Schuster and Ilolzammer, Handbuch zur biblischen Geschichte, Freiburg, 1910, II, 87. note 6). .Another tradition ba.sed on the Gospel of James regards Sephoris as the earliest home of .loachim and Anna, though they are said to have lived later on in Jerusalem, in a house called by St. Sophronius of
The VraaiN of Sorrows
Sasaoferrato, National Gallery
