VIRGIN
469
VIRGIN
Christi, XLIX, I), Maldon. (In IV Evang., ad
XXVIII Matth.), etc. See Terrien, La mere de
Dieu et la mere ties hoinmes, Paris, 1902, 1, 322-325.
That the risen Christ should have appeared first to
His Blessed Mother, agrees at least with our pious
expectations. Though the Gosjjels do not exprcssl.y
tell us so, we nia.v suppose that Mary was present
when Jesus showed himself to a number of disciples
in Galilee and at the time of HLs Ascension (cf. Matt,
xxviii, 7, 10, 10; Mark, xvi, 7). Moreover, it is
not improbable that Jesus visited His Blessed Mother
repeatedly during the forty days after His Resurrec-
tion.
B. Mary in the Other Books of the Neiv Testament. — According to the Book of Acts (i, 14), after Christ's Ascension into Heaven the apostles "went up into an upper room", and: "all these were persevering with one mind in prayer with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren". In spite of her exalted dignity, it was not Mary, but Peter who acted as head of the assembly (i, 15). Mary behaved in the upper room in Jerusalem as she had behaved in the grotto at Bethlehem; in Bethlehem she had cared for the Infant Jesus, in Jerusalem she nurtured the infant Church. The friends of Jesus remained in the upper room till "the days of the Pentecost", when with "a sound from heaven, as of a mighty wind com- ing, . . . there appeared to them parted tongues as it were of fire, and it sat upon every one of them, and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost" (Acts, ii, 1-4). Though the Holy Ghost had descended upon Mary in a special way at the time of the Incarnation, He now communicated to her a new degree of grace. Perhaps, this Pentecostal grace gave to Mary the strength of properly fulfilling her duties to the nascent Church and to her spiritual children.
As to the Epistles, the only direct reference to Mary is found in Gal., iv, 4: "But when the fulness of time was come, God sent his Son, made of a woman, made under the law". Some Greek and Latin manu- scripts, followed by several Fathers, read yivvaiiivov iK ^uraiKJs instead of femfiivov iK ymaiKds, "born of a woman" instead of "made of a woman". But this variant reading cannot be accepted. P'or (1) ytnnwfUvoy is the present participle, and must be rendered, "being born of a woman", so that it does not fit into the context (cf. Photius, ad Amphiloch., q. 228, P. G., CI, 1024). (2) Though the Latin variant rendering "natum" is the perfect participle, and does not imply the inconveniences of its Greek original, St. Bede (in Luc. XI, 27, P. L., XCII, 408) rejects it, on account of its less appropriate sense. (3) In Rom. i, 3, which is to a certain extent a parallel of Gal. iv, 4, St. Paul writes yemii^ms ix VTripuaTOi AavtlS Kara adpKa, i. e., "made of the seed of David, according to the flesh" (4) TertuUian (de carne Christi, 20, P. L., II, 786) points out that the word "made" implies more than the word "bom " ; for it calls to mind the "Word made flesh ", and estabhshes the reality of the flesh made of the Virgin. Furthermore, the Apostle employs the word "woman" in the phrase now under considera- tion, because he wishes to indicate merely the sex, without any ulterior connotation. In reality, how- ever, the idea of a man made of a woman alone, sug- gests the virginal conception of the Son of God. St. Paul seems to emphasize the true idea of the Incarna- tion of the Word; a true understanding of this mystery safeguards both the Divinity and the real humanity of Jesus Christ. Cf. TertuUian, de virgin, vel., 6, P. L., II, 897; St. Cyril of Jerus., Catech., XII, 31, P. G., XXXIII, 766; St. Jerome, in ep. ad Gal. II, 4, P. L., XXVI, 372.
The Apostle St. .John never uses the name Mary when speaking of Our Ble.s.sed Lady; he always refers to her as Mother of Jesus (John, ii, 1, 3; xix, 25-26). In his last hour, Je.sus had estabhshed the relation of mother and son between Mary and John, and a child
does not usually address his mother hy her first
name.
In the Apocalyiise (xii, 1-6) occurs a passage singularly api)lical)li' to Our Blessed Mother: "And a great sign appeared in heaven: A woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars; and being with child, she cried travailing in birth, and was in pain to be de- livered. And there was seen another sign in heaven: and behold a great red dragon, having seven heads, and ten horns, and on his heads seven diadems; and his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and cast them to the earth; and the dragon stood before the woman who was ready to be dehvered; that when she should be delivered, he might devour her son. And she brought forth a man child, who was to rule all nations with an iron rod; and her son was taken up to God, and to his throne. And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she had a place prepared by God, that there they should feed her a thousand two hundred sixty days". The appUcabihty of this passage to Mary is based on the following considera- tions : (1) At least part of the verses refer to the mother whose son is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron; according to Ps. ii, 9, this is the Son of God, Jesus Christ, Whose mother is Mary. (2) It was Mary's son that "was taken up to God, and to his throne" at the time of His Ascension into heaven. (3) The dragon, or the devil of the earthly paradise (cf . Apoc. xii, 9; XX, 2), endeavoured to devoiu- Mary's Son from the first moments of His birth, by stirring up the jealousy of Herod and, later on, the enmities of the Jews. (4) Owing to her unspeakable privileges, Mary may well be described as "clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars". (5) It is true that commentators generally understand the whole passage as applying literally to the Church, and that part of the verses is better suited to the Church than to Mary. But it must be kept in mind that Mary is both a figure of the Church, and its most jjrominent member. What is said of the Church, is in its own way true of Mary. Hence the passage of the Apocalypse (xii, 5-6) does not refer to Mary merely b.y way of accommodation (cf. Drach, Apocal., Paris, 1873, 114), but apphes to her in a truly fiteral sense which appears to be partly limited to her, and partly extended to the whole Church. Mary's relation to the Church is well summed up in the expression "coUum corporis mys- tici" applied to Our Lady by St. Bernardin of Siena. Cf. pseudo-Augustin, serm. IV de symbol, ad cate- chum., I, P. L., XL, 661; pseudo-Ambrose, expos, in Apoc, P. L., XVII, 876; Havmo of Halberstadt, in Apoc. Ill, 12, P. L., CXVII, 1080; Alcuin, Comment, in Apoc, V, 12, P. L., C, 1152; Cassiodor., Com- plexion, in Apoc, ad XII, 7, P. L., LXX, 1411; Richard of St. Victor, Explie. in Cant., 39, P. L., CXCVI, 517; Rupert of Deutz, Comm. in Apoc, VII, 12, P. L., CLXIX, 1039; St. Bernard, serm. de XII pra?rog.B.V.M., 3, P. L., CLXXXIII, 430; de la Broise, Muher amicta sole, in Etudes, April-June, 1897; Terrien, La mere de Dieu et la m^re des hommes, Paris, 1902, IV, 59-84.
Card. Newman (Anglican Difficulties, London, 1885, II, 54 sqq.) considers two difficulties against the foregoing interpretation of the vision of the woman and child: first, it is said to be poorly sup- ported by the Fathers; secondly, it is an anachronism to ascribe such a picture of the Madonna to the apostolic age. As to the first exception, the eminent writer says: "Christians have never gone to Siriplure for proof of their doctrines, till there was actual nee<l, from the pressure of controversy; if in those times the Blessed Virgin's dignity was unchallenged on all hands, as a matter of doctrine, Scripture, as far as its argumentative matter was concerned, wa.s likely to remain a sealed book to them ". After developing
