Magnificat

(A belated Christmas post.)

And Mary said: "My soul glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has been mindful of the humble state of his servant. From now on all generations will call me blessed, for the Mighty One has done great things for me -- holy is his name. His mercy extends to those who fear him, from generation to generation.

He has performed mighty deeds with his arm; he has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts. He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty.

He has helped his servant Israel, remembering to be merciful to Abraham and his descendants forever, even as he said to our fathers."

-- Luke 1:46-55

My favorite picture of Mary is from Henry Ossawa Tanner's "The Annunciation" (see a much larger image here).

Like every picture of Mary, it is a work of the imagination, but it rings true. Tanner shows Mary as a very young girl. She looks small and scared and brave, all of which she was.

"You will be with child and give birth to a son," the angel said to her. "The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; his kingdom will never end."

With the angel's promise still ringing in her ears, this young girl sings her Magnificat -- a song of praise and revolution:

"He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty."

Luke's Gospel records the Magnificat. And it is Luke who tells us, in the midst of his extended account of the Christmas story, that "Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart."

Luke did not write as an eyewitness to these events, but as a journalist. "I myself have carefully investigated everything" he writes. And because his account includes material about Mary that the other Gospels do not, many scholars believe that Luke's careful investigation involved him meeting and discussing these things with Mary herself.

But Luke never met the young Mary we see in Tanner's painting. If he met Mary, it was many years after the events described in the first chapters of his Gospel.

When Mary recounted her Magnificat to this eloquent gentile years later she was no longer still giddy with the angel's heady promise of King David's everlasting throne. She was an old woman who had watched as her eldest son was arrested, beaten and put to death as a criminal.

Yet still she repeats this song triumphantly --

"He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty."

She sings this song for the Syrian journalist as though her son had marched to Rome and toppled mighty Caesar -- as though the revolution it speaks of had succeeded and her slain son had been lifted up to a throne instead of to a Roman cross.

What can explain this?

Perhaps as an old woman Mary had succumbed to grief and been driven mad. Or, maybe, she understood something about her son and his revolutionary, mustard-seed kingdom that most of us still do not.

Comments

[Andew Smith]

Compare the Magnificat with Hannah's Song in 1st Samuel 21-10. Luke was evoking a very old tradition, updating it to modern (to him) civilization. Same message: our society is about to be turned on its head. Oh, if only the mighty would fall, and the downtrodden be raised up! Perhaps the earthquake and subsequent tsunami will lead to the overturning of society, perhaps not. Signs get us all excited, but then the portented event never occurs.

[Andew Smith]

That's 1st Samuel 2:1-10

[Shag from Brookline]

There's something about Mary that suggests a movie .... But not by Gibson.

[Cotterperson]

"she understood something about her son and his revolutionary, mustard-seed kingdom that most of us still do not."

I think this is it. The "secret"? The mustard-seed kingdom is spiritual, for most of us an inner experience of some kind. Mary was chosen for a spiritual mission, and she accomplished it. It was a spiritual triumph she knew inside.

"He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty."

In context with the teachings of Jesus that I've read in the Bible, I believe the quote above can be thought of as something like a parable.

"Rulers" he brought down were the self-righteous. "The humble" is someone demeaned (tax collector). "The hungry" were the "poor in spirit," and he offered new life (inside, in the spirit). "The rich" are those who focus on their material possessions instead of spiritual.

.02

[Charles]

Fred, you might be interested in my lectio divinae site www.lectiodivinae.com.

I also do a blog, www.lectiodivinae.blogspot.com

The post on 1 Sam. 2 in the blog discusses Hannah's Song, BTW, Andrew.

[TEd]

Fred - congrats on getting linked by Atrios! You deserve it!

[Dale]

I'm always amazed that people so often read right over the political language in the Bible without so much as a notice. Very nice commentary.

[julie]

Indeed. ;o)

Really, this is a beautiful post. Merry Christmas, Fred.

[Catherine]

Actually, Luke didn't see himself as a journalist. From the little bit of Biblical Studies I did in secondary school, I believe I would be right in saying that the way in which he describes his role would fit more with the notion of historiography that was contemporary with the time. This didn't value accurate chronological recounting so much as an original interpretation of the events. From memory, he says that he has investigated the other accounts of the story, in order to construct his. Thus Luke's rearrangement of the order of events, according to themes of his own choosing (fulfilment, the journey into Jerusalem in the Gospel of Luke, following by the journey out of Jerusalem in Acts). And 'eyewitness', as it was understood then, meant someone that could bear witness to documents and records, rather than 'eyewitness' as we understand it.

Still, I always appreciate this emphasis of the political in the Bible. Thanks for the post.

[Riggsveda]

Fred, I ran across a wonderful piece on Mary's Magnificat when I posted A Christmas Message at my own site. In it is a link to the Rev Giles Fraser's Dec. 24 article in The Guardian, in which he "...contemplates the difference between Nicene Christianity, which concentrates on a Jesus muzzled by infancy or death throes, and a Christianity that focuses on the adult Christ with his message of revolutionary concern for the poor and weak." His is a tremedously powerful piece, which includes a link to Jim Wallis' 2003 article on the Bush movement to create a state religion. Highly readable and timely.