Bedroom Talk — Saturday Sermons from the Sidelines

Bedroom Talk

“If you think you can find God in the comfort of your bedroom,” wrote St. John of the Cross, “you will never find him.” Tell that to Mary in her room in Nazareth! God comes as the original alien invader. “Do not be afraid,” the angel tells Mary.

Easier said than done.

I don’t share this often, but it seems appropriate today. I was in my bedroom on our farm west of LeMars, Iowa. It was Christmas break in 1978, my senior year in college. A few weeks before, I had failed to take the Graduate Record Exam. That was required for me to apply for the doctoral program in my future. The application deadline had passed. I hadn’t made any conscious decision. I simply forgot.

To this day I cannot imagine how that happened. I can remember the day with relative clarity, but I cannot see how I could have missed such an important appointment. Others have suggested over the years that Divine intervention was the cause. I’m not willing to write off my own sloth, lack of organization, and subconscious resistance (perhaps) as God’s work. Instead, I’m grateful that God could take such shoddy material and create a life of meaning, purpose, and joy.

In any event, there I sat in my room, wondering what to do with my life. I was engaged to be married. I was going to graduate with degrees in history and philosophy—highly unmarketable majors. I hadn’t told anyone except my fiancé about my failure—not my parents, not my friends, not my advisor. There was no comfort in that December bedroom for me.

Late one night during that lonely Christmas break, I heard a voice that said, “Go to seminary.” Speculate if you will whether it was a real voice — whatever “real” means in that context. Wonder about my mental stability at the time. I certainly did (and have never really left off wondering). Debate whether this came from vocation or desperation. It makes little difference.

My first question was, “What did you say?” My second question was, “Are you sure you have the right number?” Of course, somewhere in there was the factual question — What’s a seminary?

I didn’t hear the voice again, but the voice vexed me. When I got back to school, I really had to make some sort of decision. One morning, I called my home pastor. I said, “I think I’m supposed to go to seminary.” I waited for the laughter on the other end of the line. He said, “I’ll be there by supper time.” He drove the five and a half hours to see me and hear my story.

Before long I visited Wartburg Seminary, registered for my New Testament Greek class, and the rest, as they say, is history. I did not find God in the comfort of my bedroom. Instead, God decided to make my bedroom a very uncomfortable place indeed. That hasn’t changed much in forty years.

Because of my experience, I have a special place in my heart for Mary, the mother of our Lord. This week, we read the story of the Annunciation—the angelic announcement that God had big plans for this little girl. She did not find God in the comfort of her bedroom. Instead, God decided to make her bedroom a very uncomfortable place indeed.

This announcement is about Mary’s vocation. Her first question is, “What did you say?” Her second question is, “Are you sure you have the right number?”

God comes to us — where we are, whether in bedrooms or boardrooms, in faith or in doubt, in comfort or in crisis. That is the heart of the Christmas message. Strip away the tinsel and trees, the parties and presents, the elves on shelves and hooves on housetops. God comes to us. And as a result, nothing can stay the same.

God comes to Mary with a call. That’s always the way with God’s coming. She is not qualified. She does not apply. She doesn’t even know there’s an opening. God’s grace comes first. “Greetings, favored one!” the angel declares. “The Lord is with you!” In response to this announcement (and after the questions), Mary sings a song of praise that we call “The Magnificat.”

God sees Mary in the depths of life and calls her to the heights of faith, hope, and love. She puts her trust, according to Luther, not in the gifts but rather in The Giver. She loves God for God, not for what God will produce. She can do that by the Spirit’s power because she is loved “for nothing” rather than for what she can produce. This love, which is the fruit of faith given by the Spirit, is the only source of real peace for the believer.

The Magnificat begins with that mystical experience of God’s unconditional regard, but it does not end there. The result of that experience, as Lois Malcolm puts it, is Mary’s “prophetic witness to God’s great transforming work of justice in history” (page 171). This witness issues forth at precisely the moment when Mary is at her “lowest,” just as the great work of Life issues forth precisely when Jesus dies on the cross.

“The Magnificat does not tell a tale of God meeting a prideful sinner,” Malcolm writes, “Rather, it tells a tale of God meeting a woman whom society has seen as insignificant and giving her a new status…as well as a new sense of agency in God’s coming reign…Far from recapitulating the dynamics of her previous life,” Malcolm argues, “Mary was transformed and entered a new beginning” (page 173).

God comes to us. That Christmas message is for you as well. Greetings, favored one! You—beloved of God, marked with Christ, sealed with the Spirit—the Lord is with YOU! You are not qualified. You need not apply. You may not even realize there’s an opening. God comes to you in Jesus. You have found favor with God. That is true even, and especially, when we find ourselves at the lowest points of our lives.

God comes to us – especially at those low points. This is the heart of the Christmas message. God comes to you and me with a call. Now we can return to that opening quote from St. John of the Cross. “If you think you can find God in the comfort of your bedroom,” he wrote, “you will never find him.”

When we need God’s comfort, God will indeed bring it. But mostly we want God to give us a life that is undisturbed and pain-free. That’s not something God will do. Because that sort of life is not worthy of those who bear the image of God in Creation. We are not called to be boring and mediocre.

God comes to us. And when God comes, God turns our lives inside out and upside down. The Holy Spirit turns our focus from inside ourselves and out into the world. The Holy Spirit turns our worldview from a race to the top of the heap to a love for the least, the lost and the lonely.

Our God does not come as a theological therapist. God comes as the Divine Disruptor. Our God is not nice. Our God is not safe. Our God is not comfortable. Our God is good and loving and merciful — and destabilizing.

God invades our sanctuaries and changes our lives. And our God has big plans for those who are called to bear Jesus to the world.

Just ask Mary.

And then look to Mary as a model of faith. “Here am I, the servant of the Lord,” she says. “Let it be to me according to your word.” We can relax into self-satisfied serenity. We can resist the call and run the other direction. Or we can surrender to the call of the Holy Spirit and find true comfort and peace.

That surrender will involve struggle. It will require sacrifice. It will produce pain. I tell people that I have spent almost forty years trying to run the other direction. But there is no joy in fleeing. There is only joy in accepting. Accepting God’s call makes us bearers of God’s presence in the world, just as Mary has led the way.

The revelation of the Kin(g)dom of God is not reserved for spiritual savants or religious rulers. It does not happen only in temple precincts or pastoral pulpits. The Holy Spirit is not an endowment limited to the privileged few or regulated by academic or ecclesial authorities. As John reminds us, the Spirit blows where it will. Age or gender, status or ethnicity, position or power – these are not factors in determining where the Spirit works and through whom the Spirit speaks.

God comes to us where we are. These are the last words of the Advent season. God comes calling in Jesus. How will we respond?

References and Resources

Boesak, Allan A. “The riverbank, the seashore and the wilderness: Miriam, liberation and prophetic witness against empire.” HTS Teologiese Studies/Theological Studies 73.4 (2017).

Croy, N. Clayton, and Alice E. Connor. “Mantic Mary? The Virgin Mother as Prophet in Luke 1.26-56 and the Early Church.” (2011).

Gonzalez, Justo L. Luke: Belief, A Theological Commentary on the Bible. Westminster John Knox Press. Kindle Edition.

Jacobson, Karl. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/fourth-sunday-of-advent-3/commentary-on-luke-139-45-46-55.

Jacobson, Rolf, https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/fourth-sunday-of-advent-3/commentary-on-luke-146-55-3.

Malcolm, Lois E., “Experiencing the Spirit: The Magnificat, Luther, and Feminists” (2010). Faculty Publications. 275. https://digitalcommons.luthersem.edu/faculty_articles/275.

Skinner, Matthew L., “Looking High and Low for Salvation in Luke” (2018). Faculty Publications. 306. https://digitalcommons.luthersem.edu/faculty_articles/306.

Wilson, Brittany E. “Pugnacious precursors and the bearer of peace: Jael, Judith, and Mary in Luke 1: 42.” The Catholic Biblical Quarterly 68.3 (2006): 436-456.

Text Study for Luke 1:39-55 (Pt. 6); December 19, 2021

Mary and Mamie Till

Here in the States, we Christians find ourselves in the now-annual kerfuffle regarding “Mary, Did You Know?” It’s a song loved and hated by millions of Christians and is a staple of the Contemporary Christian Music scene during the Christmas season. The lyrics ask Mary if she knew she was the God-bearer, the mother of the Lord, if when she kissed her little baby that she knew she “kissed the face of God.”

Well, I don’t know what Mary knew or didn’t know about Jesus’ divine status. Nor does the song. It ends with the same question as it began. The minor key and the longing tone of both lyrics and melody seem to indicate that perhaps Mary didn’t know (but would have been better off if she did).

Photo by mohamed abdelghaffar on Pexels.com

Every time I hear the song, I wonder what exactly the point is, if it leaves Mary as apparently ignorant as she began. It seems to me that the point of the song is to make sure that we “know” all about the Divinity of Jesus as the Incarnate One.

I find that the song reflects the perspective on Christian faith that equates believing with intellectual assent to a set of facts and/or principles and/or doctrines. It reflects what the theologians would call a Christology “from above.” Such a Christology privileges the “God’s-eye” view of Jesus and is always in danger of minimizing or ignoring the human, finite, limited, and suffering dimensions of Jesus’ life.

The Lukan account, by contrast, is pretty specific about what the angel tells Mary. The Magnificat doesn’t put this knowledge in the theological or narrative terms of the Lowry/Greene lyrics. But Mary does sing pretty clearly that she knows what God is up to in this baby – the overturning of the powers of sin, death, and evil, and the establishment of God’s reign as God intended it to be from the beginning.

Lukan Christology certainly knows the details that come “from above.” But the Lukan author begins with the view of Jesus “from below” and stays there through the crucifixion. Not only does the Lukan author see Jesus “from below,” but the author portrays Jesus as seeking out those who are “below” in the world around him and spending most of his time with them. Those are things that Mary could know.

That being said, it seems to me that we can say something more about what Mary may have known. Or, at least, I wonder about other things she might have known. Mary may not have known about the miracles and the manifestation of Divinity. But I’m pretty sure that Mary had an idea what this little boy would face in his life under the oppressive rule of empire and the terrified compromises of those kept in power by the oppressors.

I recently watched the PBS documentary, “The Murder of Emmett Till.” In that film, Mamie Till, Emmett’s mother, describes the conversation she had with her barely-fourteen-year-old son before he boarded the Illinois Central train in Chicago to spend some time in the Mississippi Delta. She described how she told him when meeting a white person to step off the sidewalk, to keep his eyes down, and never to talk to or touch a white woman for any reason whatsoever.

Emmett apparently thought she was exaggerating the danger, and she agreed that she thought she was as well. But she hoped that through this heightened description, she might penetrate Emmett’s teenage bravado and natural good will. I know that Black parents across this country can identify with the need to have “the talk,” especially with their pre-teen and teenaged sons, hoping and praying that those sons will not become another story on the evening news after an interaction with local police.

I’m pretty sure that Mary knew what dangers lay ahead for a little Jewish boy in Galilee in the twenties of the first century. Judas of Galilee led a revolt against the increasing and crushing tax burden imposed by the Romans. At least some of the fighting during the revolt happened in the neighborhood of Nazareth. The surrounding hills were covered with the crosses of the revolutionaries as a clear advertisement of what happened when Galilean boys resisted the Empire.

Did Mary have the first-century equivalent of “the talk” with Jesus at some point in his young life? Did she give him instructions on how to deal with the Roman occupiers and their local collaborators? Did she remind him of the crosses and the rotting corpses on those hills while he was playing with his toys in Nazareth?

Did she worry that no matter how much she tried to explain things, she couldn’t protect him from that world?

Mamie Till described the last time she talked to her son as she put him on the train headed south. Emmett was exuberant over the possibilities and in a hurry to get on the train. He had forgotten to give his mother a goodbye kiss, and she called him back for one last embrace. She told him that she wasn’t about to put him on a train, possibly never to see him again, without that goodbye kiss. That conversation was far too prophetic.

Did Mary ever send Jesus over the hill with lunch for his father, wondering if she would him again? A chance encounter with a few Romans, a sideways glance, an ill-chosen word, and her son might have disappeared into the oblivion of oppression. Jesus was certainly capable of a sharp word to the grownups, as we shall note in the second chapter of Luke. What if that wise mouth had gotten him in trouble with a sharp sword and a Latin curse?

I don’t have to wonder if Mary knew about that.

And it didn’t take an advanced degree in political science to know that someone who was destined to challenge the powers was destined for trouble. If this child of hers was to bring the powerful down from their thrones, was to send the rich away empty, was to scatter the proud in the imaginations of their hearts, Mary knew there was going to be trouble.

Is it any wonder that after Jesus’ birth, Mary’s response was a thoughtful “pondering”?

“I wonder as I wander out under the sky,” the old spiritual says, “that Jesus my Savior did come for to die.” John Jacob Niles heard the song and captured it on paper for us to know and to love. We can come to terms with that sentiment knowing how the Jesus story turns out. But what about those other young people, those young black people among us, who seem to have “come for to die”?

Did Sybrina Fulton, Trayvon Martin’s mother, know that her son had come for to die? No, I don’t think so. Did Samaria Rice, Tamir Rice’s mother, know that her son had come for to die? No, I don’t think so. Did Larcenia Floyd, George Floyd’s mother, know that her son had come for to die? He cried out for his mother as he breathed his last, but I don’t think she knew.

Except that these mothers did know. They did know that it could happen. That it happens all the time. That the chances of their sons dying at the hands of white law enforcement are many times that of white sons. I never had to have “the talk” with my sons (well, not that talk, anyway). I never had to think about how likely it was that my sons had come for to die.

But Mary had to think about it. Mary, did you know that your little boy could die at the hands of Roman executioners after a trumped-up trial with the collaboration of the local power bosses? Of course, you did. That was the one thing Mary could know for sure in this whole story, and it didn’t take a prophetic vocation or the gift of the Spirit to figure it out.

It didn’t get better as Jesus grew into adulthood. We know how things worked out for his kinsman, John. Speaking truth to power is a good way to get yourself killed.

In the end, it’s not about what Mary knows or doesn’t know. The song of victory we know as the Magnificat isn’t about what Mary knows but rather is about who she trusts. Mary trusts in God, who is bringing about the promised end of a world where “the talk” is still necessary. She trusts in the God who brings down the powerful, rejects the reign of riches, and stills the hands of violence. She trusts that her baby will bring the inauguration of that new world, and she rejoices in the hope of that promised future.

We who follow Jesus are privileged to proclaim that same Advent of justice and hope. Yet, we still live in a world where “the talk” is necessary for Black and Native children in America, for Palestinian children in Israel, for Uighur children in China, for Muslim children in Europe (and North America). But “the talk” is only necessary because we who benefit from power, privilege, position, and property allow it to be so.

I don’t think Mary knew about the miracles and the majesty. And I don’t think that mattered. She trusted the One who was bringing the Good News. She depended on God for all she was and hoped and knew. She didn’t have to believe the What because she trusted the Who.

What Mary knows is that how things work in the “real word” will come to an end. What she trusts is that ending begins in Jesus. We Jesus followers today – do we?

References and Resources

Boesak, Allan A. “The riverbank, the seashore and the wilderness: Miriam, liberation and prophetic witness against empire.” HTS Teologiese Studies/Theological Studies 73.4 (2017).

Croy, N. Clayton, and Alice E. Connor. “Mantic Mary? The Virgin Mother as Prophet in Luke 1.26-56 and the Early Church.” (2011).

Gonzalez, Justo L. Luke: Belief, A Theological Commentary on the Bible. Westminster John Knox Press. Kindle Edition.

Jacobson, Karl. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/fourth-sunday-of-advent-3/commentary-on-luke-139-45-46-55.

Jacobson, Rolf, https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/fourth-sunday-of-advent-3/commentary-on-luke-146-55-3.

Malcolm, Lois E., “Experiencing the Spirit: The Magnificat, Luther, and Feminists” (2010). Faculty Publications. 275. https://digitalcommons.luthersem.edu/faculty_articles/275.

Skinner, Matthew L., “Looking High and Low for Salvation in Luke” (2018). Faculty Publications. 306. https://digitalcommons.luthersem.edu/faculty_articles/306.

Wilson, Brittany E. “Pugnacious precursors and the bearer of peace: Jael, Judith, and Mary in Luke 1: 42.” The Catholic Biblical Quarterly 68.3 (2006): 436-456.

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Text Study for Luke 1:39-55 (Pt. 5); December 19, 2021

Let Heaven and Nature Sing

On the fourth Sunday of Advent in the year of Luke, the hits just keep coming. We’ve talked about Jael and Judith, and Hannah and Elizabeth. But we have not yet come to the oldest of songs, the Song of Miriam in Exodus 15. Rolf Jacobson has an excellent discussion of the relationship between Mary’s song and the Song of Miriam in his workingpreacher.org commentary on the psalm for this Sunday.

The psalm? Yes, in the Revised Common Lectionary the Magnificat is the appointed and preferred psalm reading (or singing) for this Sunday. On the one hand, the Magnificat is a psalm (or perhaps a medley of psalm references) and a song. So, it should be sung, and a variety of settings is available for that purpose. On the other hand, it is one of the most important texts in the Lukan account and should not be detached from its context any more than necessary.

What is the liturgical solution to this scriptural dilemma? I think the best response to most either/or choices is “Yes.” Sing it as the psalm at the time of the psalm in worship – if that’s what you do. Then read it as part of the gospel lection at the appointed time as well. This can help liturgically oriented congregations remember that most of the sung liturgy is simply quoting scriptural texts. And it can remind us that in our singing we should pay attention to texts as well.

The Exodus references in the Magnificat are fairly transparent. Especially the second half of the psalm, from verses fifty-one through fifty-three reminds us of the flight from Egypt. The reference to the “strength of his arm” is a clear reference to the power of God to rescue the enslaved from tyranny and oppression. The “strong arm of the Lord” is a frequent scriptural reference to God’s power and desire to free all those who are held in bondage.

Mary refers to herself as a “slave” in verse forty-eight. She names Israel as the “slave of the Lord” in verse fifty-four. While these labels are and should be problematic for us, especially in predominantly White, western, European churches, they can remind us of the liberation focus of Mary’s psalm. In the Exodus, the powerful is brought down from his throne. The hungry are filled with good things both at the Passover and in the wilderness wanderings.

Of course, Mary’s name in the Greek is actually “Mariam” or “Miriam.” The Magnificat is, in a deep and powerful way, the second song of Miriam. It is an announcement of the Exodus finally and completely fulfilled. The Great Reversal is not merely the humbling of Pharaoh but rather the humiliation of each and every power that seeks to lower the lowly, starve the hungry, and imagine itself as the Master of the Universe.

The psalm begins on a deeply personal note, but it shifts to a communal and historic focus in the second half. In a significant sense, Mary embodies and recapitulates Israel. What happens to her in microcosm is what God intends for Israel in the macrocosm. The psalm reaches back through Miriam to Sarah and Abraham. Israel bears the Messiah for the saving of the world.

If the description of Mary as a humiliated slave is purely personal, it might be offensive and require us to distance ourselves from such a portrayal of a woman. But if Mary represents Israel, then the phrase is historically descriptive. In the Exodus from Egypt and the Return from Exile, God has dealt favorably with those downcast in slavery and done great things for them.

Just as Abraham was blessed in order to be a blessing to all the families of the earth, so now Mary is blessed. That blessing, to be the bearer of God’s presence in and for the world, will be remembered by all generations. Most important, God has remembered this mercy for Israel, just as God promised in the covenant with Abraham and his descendants.

Mary represents and embodies faithful Israel. She is certainly portrayed as the prototype of a faithful disciple in her response to the Annunciation. Here the Lukan author shows her to be the representative of Israel, bringing forth the Messiah and rejoicing in the vocation.

Why does this matter, apart from historical and literary concerns? There is an interplay in the Magnificat of the personal and the communal. You can’t have the one without the other. Salvation is never a merely personal reality. Salvation of the individual person is always rooted in the rescue of all – of all flesh, if we trust what the Lukan author wants us to hear.

Western Protestantism, especially in its Evangelical flavors, tends to focus exclusively on the individual being saved. Salvation is a sort of additive process. If every individual in the cosmos would be saved, then the whole cosmos will be saved. I know that’s a bit of a caricature of the perspective, but I think it’s close enough in the thinking of many Christians. I need to focus on my own salvation. You need to focus on yours. Then let’s meet together at the end.

This perspective fits snugly into the Individualism which is part and parcel, first of the Enlightenment modernism – with its horror of group identities and the warfare such tribalism can produce – and then postmodern theories of truth, knowledge, and ethics as being true for the individual only, since there is no Truth with a capital “T.” It is one of the oddities of history that a theological movement committed to maintain Tradition is comfortable with one of the most radical propositions of modern and postmodern thought.

God’s rescue from Sin, Death, and the Devil is a project directed at the whole of Creation, the entire cosmos which God loves. My “being saved” is a part of that project, not the entire goal of the project. If I think that my being saved is enough, will be complete, without the rescue of all that God loves, then I am still caught in the malignant narcissism which is so much the definition of Sin. I am with David Bentley Hart, among others, on this one. The logic of salvation is that God desires that all shall be saved. And “all” means ALL.

Notice, therefore, how the song moves from Mary’s personal joy to a joy for the rescue, release, and redemption of all. At least it’s a song that moves from Mary to the whole of Israel. The mention of Abraham and blessing reminds us that the purpose of Israel’s existence is to be a blessing to all the families of the earth, not merely to themselves.

I always think that the fourth Sunday in Advent is the time to break out “Joy to the World” as the transition from the marvelous hymns of Advent to the glad songs of Christmas. It is, in our ELCA hymnals, the first hymn in the Christmas section. It could just as easily be the final hymn in the Advent section. The universal scope of Isaac Watts’ text amplifies the message of the Magnificat to great effect.

There is always, of course, the danger of triumphalism. There is the danger that we think God’s triumph over Sin, Death, and the Devil is a triumph over our political enemies as well. When a human system embodies arrogant power, control of resources, concentration of wealth and power, and enslavement of the poor, then God will triumph over that system in the end. However, it is not (as Abraham Lincoln so wisely observed) that God is on our side. The question always is whether or not we are on God’s “side.” When we believe and act as if God is on our “side,” we are guilty of triumphalism.

Allan A. Boesak argues that we see a move from rejoicing to triumphalism in the text as it unfolds after Miriam’s song in Exodus. The temptation is often to claim God’s triumph as our own. We do that in individual terms when we act as if God finally wised up and saved me because I’m so good. We do that in communal terms when we make our power preferences determinative for how God operates in the world.

“In biblical Israel,” Boesak writes, “the mark of greatness was not superiority in war and domination in imitation of empire. It was instead the imitation of the power of Yahweh: liberation from slavery, steadfast mercy and love, and justice done to the vulnerable, the widow, the stranger and the orphan. Indeed: Israel’s very greatness,” he continues, “was in preserving the presence of faithful prophetic witness, proclaiming this God, over against the gods of ‘the nations’” (page 5).

If anyone could be tempted to think, “This is about me,” it would be Mary. Yet, that is precisely what doesn’t happen. Her song moves from the personal to the communal, from the individual to the social, from the particular to the cosmic, because that is where God’s interests lie and what Christmas is about. It is not an opposition of “me” against “the world.” There cannot be the one without the other. If my salvation is disconnected from the redemption of all, it’s not salvation. If my salvation is not God’s concern for me within that larger picture, then we’re talking about the wrong God.

Watts says it well when he puts “let earth receive her king” and “let every heart prepare him room” in the same sentence. These are not separate or competing areas of interest for God. They are the same theater of operations, simply in different dimensions.

The outcome should be obvious for us as Jesus followers. If God’s focus is both me and bigger than me, then should our focus be any different? Christmas joy is a political position or it’s not worth the bother.

References and Resources

Boesak, Allan A. “The riverbank, the seashore and the wilderness: Miriam, liberation and prophetic witness against empire.” HTS Teologiese Studies/Theological Studies 73.4 (2017).

Croy, N. Clayton, and Alice E. Connor. “Mantic Mary? The Virgin Mother as Prophet in Luke 1.26-56 and the Early Church.” (2011).

Gonzalez, Justo L. Luke: Belief, A Theological Commentary on the Bible. Westminster John Knox Press. Kindle Edition.

Jacobson, Karl. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/fourth-sunday-of-advent-3/commentary-on-luke-139-45-46-55.

Jacobson, Rolf, https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/fourth-sunday-of-advent-3/commentary-on-luke-146-55-3.

Malcolm, Lois E., “Experiencing the Spirit: The Magnificat, Luther, and Feminists” (2010). Faculty Publications. 275. https://digitalcommons.luthersem.edu/faculty_articles/275.

Skinner, Matthew L., “Looking High and Low for Salvation in Luke” (2018). Faculty Publications. 306. https://digitalcommons.luthersem.edu/faculty_articles/306.

Wilson, Brittany E. “Pugnacious precursors and the bearer of peace: Jael, Judith, and Mary in Luke 1: 42.” The Catholic Biblical Quarterly 68.3 (2006): 436-456.

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Text Study for Luke 1:39-55 (Pt. 4); December 19, 2021

Listen to the Music

“Mary’s song,” writes Richard Swanson, “establishes her as a resister” (page 70). The Magnificat is the first piece of testimony in the Lukan “hidden transcript.” But the Magnificat is not the first such song in the Hebrew and Christian scriptures. It is now regarded as beyond doubt that Mary’s song is modeled on and refers to the Song of Hannah in 1 Samuel 2.

Karl Jacobson offers a good comparison between the Song of Hannah in 1 Samuel 2 and the Song of Mary in Luke 1 as part of his workingpreacher.org commentary. He lists the similarities between the two prophetic outbursts. Both Hannah and Mary exclaim their joy in their God. They both trust the promise that God acts on behalf of the lowly despite what we might expect. They both proclaim that what happens to them also is done through them for the whole people.

“Both Hannah and Mary sing a song that can be, should be, our song in this Advent season,” Jacobson writes. “As we have prepared for the coming of the Christ Child, now we too can sing in thanksgiving, in celebration, in remembrance, and in proclamation of the promise made to our ancestors. Like Hannah, and Mary, and Elizabeth too,” he concludes, “this is the time for us to indulge in unadulterated, celebratory joy in the promises that come to us in Jesus. Let us raise our voices in a great cry, magnifying our God.”

The Lukan author uses the Song of Hannah as a model, a template, a pattern, and a source of vocabulary for the Magnificat. But Justo Gonzalez argues that the relationship is more than a kind of first-century homage or plagiarism. He urges us to see the relationship as one of typology rather than mere template.

Reading texts in Hebrew scripture as typology is as old as the Jesus movement. Paul relies on typology in several of his letters. The early Church theologians relied heavily on typology as a method of interpretation. Gonzalez quotes Justin Martyr in his Dialogue with Trypho, eighty years after the Lukan author wrote: “Sometimes, by action of the Holy Spirit, something took place that was clearly a type of the future. But at other times the Spirit spoke in words about what was to happen, as if it were present or past” (Kindle Location 534).

The “words” Justin mentions are what we would call spoken prophecies. There are certainly such “words” in both the Song of Hannah and the Magnificat. Mary, in particular, speaks of things as already accomplished which have yet to take place in their fullness. The “type” that Justin notes is not the words of the writer but rather the event itself about which the writer speaks. “Both point to the future,” Gonzalez notes, “but in one case what points to the future is the text itself, and in the other it is the event of which the text speaks” (Kindle Location 538).

The Lukan author wants us to see the Song of Hannah not merely as an earlier example but rather as an interpretive frame of reference for understanding the Magnificat. The point of typology is that this is always how God works. We’re not dealing with mere historical contingencies but rather with the deeper structure and unfolding of God’s plan in and through history.

In addition, the latter member of the typology (in this case, the Magnificat) is really the fulfillment of the previous member of the typology. It’s not that somehow the Song of Hannah “predicts” the Magnificat and its content. No, it’s not that kind of fulfillment. What we mean here is that what the Song of Hannah hinted at through the history of Israel comes to fruition in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus and the coming of the Kin(g)dom of God through him. It is “fulfillment” in the sense of filling to fullest, bringing to flower, ready for harvest.

This is why, when the Lukan author makes references to texts and events in the Hebrew scriptures, the Lukan author always improves upon and even excels beyond the previous “models.” This isn’t a way to show off for the audience. Instead, this is a literary way to demonstrate that Jesus and his movement are the culmination of that path and plan that have been in action from the beginning.

It’s not only the Lukan author who sees things this way. Think about the beginning of the Letter to the Hebrews. “Long ago God spoke to our ancestors in many and various ways by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by a Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom he also created the worlds” (Hebrews 1:1-2). It is not that the previous witness was wrong or superfluous. The argument is, rather, that it contained the seeds of what has now born fruit.

“What Luke is doing in borrowing from the Song of Hannah for the Magnificat,” Gonzalez writes, “is precisely this sort of typological interpretation” (Kindle Location 548). Karl Jacobson’s commentary does an excellent job of demonstrating the parallelisms between the two songs, so we don’t have to review that here. But we can say that Hannah is a “type” for Mary, and Samuel is a “type” for Jesus.

Gonzalez argues that the typology has the most to do with barren mothers who miraculously conceive a son. He is careful to assert, however, that the stories are about more than the reversal of infertility and the vindication of these women. “The significance of the story of these barren women is also in the child who is born to them,” he writes. “Their barrenness is the sign that God has intervened in history to permit the birth of this child. And the child is an essential element,” he concludes, “in the continuation of the people of God” (Kindle Locations 554-556).

The Lukan author builds on this theme by placing the stories of Elizabeth and Mary, John and Jesus, next to one another. John is the forerunner. Jesus is the fulfillment. Gonzalez says of Mary, “In the child born of her the long history of agents of God born of barren women comes to its culmination. Its meaning has been fulfilled” (Kindle Location 563).

I think there is even more going on in this typological relationship. Samuel will warn the people of Israel about the dangers awaiting them if they choose to have a king like the nations around them. Their children will be pressed into imperial service. Their wealth will be siphoned off by royal taxes and levies. They will be forced to fight wars of conquest rather than defense. They will be governed by the interests of empire rather than the interests of the home.

This is a description of life under the later reign of David and the reign of Solomon. It is an inventory of complaints that led to the fracturing of the Solomonic regime into northern and southern kingdoms. It is also a precise description of life in Galilee in the first century under imperial Roman rule.

The books of Samuel and Kings have “hidden transcripts of resistance” buried in the text. While Samuel at one point offers this pointed critique of monarchy, at another point he is portrayed as supporting the establishment of a monarchy. The history books in the Hebrew scriptures were originally composed and compiled as an apology for the monarchy. I would argue, however, that in ways both obvious and subtle, a critique of the monarchy can be found in those documents as well.

Does that sound like someone we know? Samuel fell short in his efforts to resist the establishment of what became an oppressive monarchy. Jesus takes on the powers behind all human oppression, takes in those powers on the cross, defeats them in the resurrection, and replaces them at the ascension. If one of the functions of typology is fulfillment of the type by the later edition, then Jesus is the definition of such fulfillment.

“In placing these words on the lips of Mary,” Gonzalez writes, “Luke is letting us know both that the story he is about to tell is the culmination of the history of Israel, and that this history—and certainly its culmination—is of a great reversal in which the lowly are made high, the high are brought low, the hungry are filled with good things while the rich are sent away empty, the last become first, and the least become the greatest” (Kindle Location 580).

Why does this matter to us as preachers? The mission of resistance, reversal, and resurrection has been the plan and path of God for as long as there have been paths and plans. We can see the pattern of that mission throughout the Scriptures if we have eyes open to see it. This plan and path are not new inventions, not accommodations to culture, not new political or social fads. This is the music of creation, and we get to hear some of its songs.

There is a caveat we must always remember. We dare not engage in triumphalism or supersessionism. The Christian gospel does not “replace” what came before it. We do not appropriate Hebrew texts as “ours” now receiving the “right” interpretation. Our Jewish forebears and siblings have come to this place ahead of us and have much to teach us. We can only respond with gratitude and respect, with partnership and appreciation. Any other approach dangerously misses the point.

References and Resources

Croy, N. Clayton, and Alice E. Connor. “Mantic Mary? The Virgin Mother as Prophet in Luke 1.26-56 and the Early Church.” (2011).

Gonzalez, Justo L. Luke: Belief, A Theological Commentary on the Bible. Westminster John Knox Press. Kindle Edition.

Jacobson, Karl. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/fourth-sunday-of-advent-3/commentary-on-luke-139-45-46-55.

Malcolm, Lois E., “Experiencing the Spirit: The Magnificat, Luther, and Feminists” (2010). Faculty Publications. 275. https://digitalcommons.luthersem.edu/faculty_articles/275.

Swanson, Richard. Provoking the Gospel of Luke: A Storyteller’s Commentary, Year C. Cleveland, OH.: Pilgrim Press, 2006.

Wilson, Brittany E. “Pugnacious precursors and the bearer of peace: Jael, Judith, and Mary in Luke 1: 42.” The Catholic Biblical Quarterly 68.3 (2006): 436-456.

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Text Study for Luke 1:39-55 (Pt. 3); December 19, 2021

Mary is Among the Prophets

The Lukan account portrays a great “democracy of the Holy Spirit.” We are headed toward the general outpouring of that Spirit in Acts 2. In that passage, the Spirit equips the disciple community to speak the gospel in the language of “every nation under heaven.”

Peter interprets this outpouring by quoting from the second chapter of the prophet Joel. In the last days, God will pour out the Spirit on all flesh. Sons and daughters shall prophesy. Young men shall see visions, and old men shall dream dreams. Male and female slaves shall prophesy. And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.

The Spirit is no respecter of age or gender, of social status or political power, of ethnic origin or native language, of boundary or border. As we shall hear later in the Book of Acts, and elsewhere, God shows no partiality. That is a human game. Instead, the Spirit breaks all boundaries and transcends all barriers. That is the story of Acts, as the Gospel moves from Jerusalem to Judea and Samaria, and then to the ends of the earth.

As a result, the early Christian community (according to Acts) held all things in common, ate their food at home with glad and generous hearts, praised God, and had the good will of all the people. They lived in a Spirit-formed community that embodied and expressed values and practices at odds with the patriarchal, hierarchical, honor/shame driven culture of the Empire. And they paid for their oddity, sometimes with their lives.

The first chapter of the Lukan gospel prefigures and foreshadows this great democracy of the Holy Spirit. An old couple in Judea recapitulates the wonder of Sarah and Abraham. Zechariah meets an angel in the Temple – Zechariah, not the high priest or a member of the Sanhedrin. Zechariah is a nobody from the hill country, and he knows it. Elizabeth has suffered shame due to her barrenness for decades but now is expecting.

Then a teenager from Nazareth gets a visit from Gabriel announcing that she was favored with the Lord’s particular presence. She will experience the impossible possibility of bearing the Son of God. None of this good news makes it to the capitol or the Temple. Instead, these two women huddle together in the hill country and shout their joy and wonder. Elizabeth expresses the surprise we should all have – Why has this happened to me?

Then Mary sings the song which sets the agenda for all of Luke-Acts, the poem tradition calls The Magnificat. It is a hymn to the democracy of the Holy Spirit, a democracy that delivers the Great Reversals of the Kin(g)dom of God. It is clear that Mary is a young woman. And in our text, she describes herself twice as a “slave” to the Lord. The Lukan author wants us to understand that Mary functions as a prophet here.

Yet, the Lukan author does not identify Mary as such. It’s not that the author hesitates to call anyone a prophet. Zechariah prophesies. Anna is a prophet. Christian prophets show up in the Book of Acts. Clayton Croy and Alice Connor wonder why the Lukan author does not call Mary a prophet as well. They identify some reasons that give us more insight into the Lukan author’s agenda and strategy.

Croy and Connor seek to make the case for the Lukan portrayal of Mary as a prophet. They explore the connection between this prophetic role and Mary’s reported virginity. They note briefly that the early church theologians did not share the Lukan reluctance to cast Mary as a prophet. And they try to account for this difference in treatment in the Lukan account.

The birth announcement in Luke 1 strongly resembles such birth announcements in the Hebrew scriptures. It is not only modeled after those announcements but actually outdoes them all in both form and content. But this announcement, Croy and Connor note, also has the character of commissioning stories in the Hebrew scriptures – such as the commissioning of Isaac, Moses, Gideon, and Samson (page 256).

In addition, the Lukan text has many features in common with prophetic call stories in the Hebrew scriptures. The Annunciation is an example of the best of all three of the above genres. “While it’s primary purpose is to announce a birth,” Croy and Connor write, “the Lukan annunciation may also intend to depict Mary as a bearer of prophetic revelation” (page 257). The fact that Mary is referred to twice in the chapter as a “slave of the Lord” strengthens the notion of her prophetic call. And her response in the Magnificat is a Spirit-endowed, prophetic response to being “overshadowed” by the Spirit.

“The question arises, then, why Luke would portray Mary as a prophet and yet fail to call her one,” Croy and Connor write. “The answer,” they continue, “may have something to do with the fact that Mary is explicitly identified as a virgin” (page 261).

They note that virginity and prophetic vocation are not connected in ancient Judaism. The only exception is the anonymous figure in Isaiah 8:3. Early church writers often saw this character as a prefiguring of Mary, but the Lukan author doesn’t make this connection explicitly. “In the Hebrew Bible virginity had no essential relationship to prophetic aptitude,” Croy and Connor write, “but the picture differs somewhat when we turn to Greco-Roman religion” (page 263).

They briefly survey a number of connections between virginity and prophetic vocation in the dominant Mediterranean culture of the first century. Virginity was associated with the purity thought necessary to be worthy of a prophetic vocation. That vocation often had sexual overtones in Greco-Roman religion, so the reproductive status of the prophet was thought to matter. To what degree does this pagan perspective affect the Lukan presentation (with possibly some pagans in the audience)?

In early Christianity, Croy and Connor note, Christian prophecy was a quite democratic endowment. It “was understood as a charism given by the Holy Spirit rather than a function determined by an institution” (page 266). It’s clear in Paul’s letters that women, for example, served as prophets in early Christian congregations. In Luke-Acts, Christian prophecy is taken as a given and demonstrated by several characters, including Jesus.

While few women are named as prophets in Luke-Acts, the text from Joel 2 in Peter’s Pentecost sermon mentions women as prophets twice. “Mary, as a prophesying servant of the Lord, can be seen as proleptically fulfilling the prophecy of Joel cited in Acts 2.18,” Croy and Connor write. “The motif of virginity, however, is absent from Acts 2” (page 267). So, what’s the story here? The early church theologians are prolific in their portrayal of Mary as a prophet, in both the Eastern and Western church. So, why not the Lukan author?

“Our hypothesis is that Luke was sensitive to the pagan overtones of associating prophecy and virginity,” Croy and Connor argue (page 270). The Lukan author, they suggest, wants to avoid any explicit suggestion that Mary experienced a sexual contact with God in the Annunciation. The Lord is not Zeus, invading the bedrooms of unsuspecting girls and spreading the divine seed hither and yon. The fact that the Annunciation results in a child, they suggest, makes this Lukan caution all the more pressing.

In addition, they suggest that the Lukan author does not want to make virginity a condition for Christian prophesying. Nor does the Lukan author want this relationship to be one of possession or assault. Croy and Connor point out that the Lukan author knows of such possibilities and describes such in Acts 16. Mary is not possessed by the Holy Spirit. “Mary’s endowment with the Holy Spirit is quite different,” they write, “she fully retains her rationality and volition. Hers is not a mantic possession,” they argue, “but a voluntary reception of the Spirit” (page 271).

Therefore, the Lukan author does not identify Mary as a prophet but rather characterizes her as such. “If it is the task of a prophet is to speak and act in ways that further revelation and redemption,” Croy and Connor conclude, “one might say…Mary delivers” (page 271).

While the Lukan author wants this gospel to serve as an acceptable apologia that potentially persuades some privileged pagans, the author also uses it to subvert the values and structures of that pagan world. We must hear the witness of a teenager in Nazareth who for all the world simply looks like a girl in a bit of trouble. We must hear the witness of some old farts who these days would probably be diagnosed with dementia. We must hear the witness of smelly shepherds who can’t write their own names and who count sheep for a living rather than to fall asleep.

The Christian scriptures know the risks of such a democratic and democratizing Spirit. Chaos and self-aggrandizement often lurk just around the corner. Luther knew that as well and rejected the testimony and practices of the “Enthusiasts.” Yet, in our organized old-line congregations, we know that this has led to what Paul called “quenching the Spirit.” Perhaps we would do well to remind ourselves of the fact that Mary is among the prophets, to celebrate that fact, and to listen for prophetic words from unexpected quarters.

The “who” of Christian prophecy is one matter. Another matter is the “what.” More on that in the next post.

References and Resources

Croy, N. Clayton, and Alice E. Connor. “Mantic Mary? The Virgin Mother as Prophet in Luke 1.26-56 and the Early Church.” (2011).

Malcolm, Lois E., “Experiencing the Spirit: The Magnificat, Luther, and Feminists” (2010). Faculty Publications. 275. https://digitalcommons.luthersem.edu/faculty_articles/275.

Wilson, Brittany E. “Pugnacious precursors and the bearer of peace: Jael, Judith, and Mary in Luke 1: 42.” The Catholic Biblical Quarterly 68.3 (2006): 436-456.

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Text Study for Luke 1:39-55 (Pt. 2); December 19, 2021

Using the Back Door

The Gospel of Luke is a “dual process” document. When we read and interpret the account, we must look for multiple meanings and purposes in any and all of the texts. For example, the Lukan account is an apologia designed to make the Christian movement less threatening to Imperial authorities and more palatable to potential Gentile converts. It is also a “hidden transcript of resistance” that seeks to challenge and subvert the values of Imperial ideology and culture.

The Lukan author has a particular passion for the poor and an eye toward the wealthy who can be part of the movement under the right behavioral conditions. The author elevates the role of personal agency in repentance and renewal and highlights the work of the Holy Spirit in individuals and communities more than any other gospel account. The Lukan gospel is an invitation to hear and a call to do.

The Lukan author lifts up the ministry of women and makes them appear unduly subservient. The Lukan gospel affirms the absolute continuity between the Jesus movement and the vocation of biblical Israel. And this gospel tempts Christians to supersessionism in ways that are both surprising and shocking.

The Lukan author seeks to encourage a subversive and transformational movement without getting everyone killed in the process.

Thus, as we read and interpret the Lukan account, we need to attend not only to what is said, but also how, when, and by whom something is said. The Lukan author conveys as much or more by narrative structure, style, and tactics as the author does by the content of the narrative itself. If you find the Lukan gospel to be at times confusing and contradictory, that means you are paying close attention. That’s what happens when a theologian tries to satisfy several goals at once, and not all of them complementary to one another.

Lois Malcolm deals with some of these textual tensions in her chapter of the 2010 book, n Transformative Lutheran Theologies: Feminist, Womanist, and Mujerista Perspectives. In this chapter Malcolm seeks to understand and explicate Luther’s commentary on the Magnificat and to show that Martin Luther sees Mary as a model of witness and faith for us. In the process, she helps us to see the importance of the Holy Spirit for Martin Luther (and for us who bear that tradition) in spite of the reputed Lutheran allergy to experience and embrace of the work of the Spirit.

As Malcolm points out, Luther was critical both of the Augustinian mysticism in which he was formed as a monk and the “enthusiastic” emphasis on the Holy Spirit demonstrated by some members of the later Reformation community. Luther’s understanding of the work of the Spirit was rooted in Romans 8:26 and the assurance that the Spirit intercedes for us in our weakness.

This work is always the work of creation – and particularly creation out of nothing, as was the case in the Genesis account. Thus, the Spirit makes something out of nothing, brings life out of death. “It is here,” Malcolm writes, “in the midst of life’s struggles and not in our higher strivings and aspirations, that the Spirit works in the strange garb of sin and suffering, showing us a God who is continually turning to those lost in sin and death in order to create new life out of nothing – life out of death” (page 167).

With this understanding of the work of the Holy Spirit, it is not surprising that Luther would find a powerful text in the call of Mary and her response in the Magnificat. Before we come to that assessment, however, Malcolm leads us to listen to feminist critiques of this understanding.

For one who has been told for a lifetime and culturally that she is, in significant ways, “nothing,” this reduction to “nothing” before being newly created sounds like the same old stuff. “Rather than opening into transformation and a new beginning,” Malcolm writes, “this conversion story simply reenacts this woman’s story of a cultural unraveling she knows only too well – more like sin than the freeing act of divine mercy” (page 168).

Malcolm invites us to keep this critique in mind as we hear Luther’s commentary on the Magnificat. Malcolm observes that Luther looks at Mary’s experience of God seeing her at the lowest point. It is at this point that Mary experiences, in Malcolm’s terms, both mystical exaltation and prophetic witness.

Luther attributes three insights to Mary in her experience. First, she teaches us that the Spirit creates out of nothing and reaches us at our lowest points. Second, the Spirit is not a one-size-fits-all experience. Instead, God brings down the mighty and raises up the powerless. “Those in affliction hear words of comfort,” Malcolm writes, “those who are self-satisfied – and oppress others – hear words that terrify them” (page 168).

Third, Mary’s experience teaches us that how God sees things and how we see things are quite different. God looks into the depths of human misery to raise us up. We humans look at what is above only to fall down. This is, as Malcolm notes, the real difference between the Theology of the Cross and the Theology of Glory. “Because we cannot create what we desire,” Malcolm notes, “as human beings we tend only to love or desire what we find attractive or appealing. By contrast,” she continues, “as Luther pointed out in the Heidelberg Disputation, God’s love always creates what it desires” (page 169).

The Magnificat begins with that mystical experience of God’s unconditional regard, but it does not end there. The result of that experience is Mary’s “prophetic witness to God’s great transforming work of justice in history” (page 171). This witness issues forth at precisely the moment when Mary is at her “lowest,” just as the great work of Life issues forth precisely when Jesus dies on the cross.

Yet, there is more going on here, Malcolm believes: “this tale of Mary’s mystical exaltation and prophetic agency is not merely a tale about a reversal of power” (page 173). Instead, it is a story of how God regards the lowly, the one who is “nothing,” and creates Life out of the nothing. Merely reversing the roles in the drama of power changes nothing. Instead, Mary bears witness to the God who seeks to dismantle the drama of power itself.

I noted earlier that as we read and interpret the Lukan account, we need to attend not only to what is said, but also how, when, and by whom something is said. That is certainly the case with the Annunciation and the Magnificat. The content of the song is radically subversive and a threat to the established powers and structures of the Empire. How does the Lukan author maintain that hidden transcript without blowing up the whole project in the first chapter?

I think it matters that the content comes in a song rather than in a manifesto or speech. Songs have a way of slipping in the back doors of our awareness and making changes in our feeling and thinking before we are aware of those changes.

One of my favorite musical settings of the Annunciation and the Magnificat is in Marty Haugen’s Holden Evening Prayer. This is beloved by thousands of worshippers. The music in these sections is beautiful. I wonder how much impact the words have because our minds and hearts are focused on that music while the Spirit is doing work in the background and under the surface? Quite a lot of work, I think.

I think it matters that the content comes with the voice of a woman. I wonder if the Lukan author uses the deep misogyny of the Roman patriarchal system against itself. Perhaps the author relied on the tendency of some readers to discount the testimony of a woman simply because she was woman. Thus, that testimony might not have been regarded consciously as a threat even as it worked once again in the background of thinking and feeling.

I’m not suggesting that the Lukan author discounted that testimony in the same way. Here is one of those places where we have to discern the dual process of the Lukan account. The Lukan author may be using the realities of the culture to undermine and subvert the values of that culture. It’s analogous to the power these days that political humor has to reach people when diatribes fall on deaf ears.

Hang on to this proposal as we go further into the Lukan account. Think about it, for example, when we read the parable of the Insistent Widow in Luke 18. Perhaps the Lukan author understands that in his culture, women could get away with things that men could not. That required faith, courage, and the willingness to exploit the opportunity.

Where might there be places where we can wedge our witness into the cracks in our own culture?

References and Resources

Malcolm, Lois E., “Experiencing the Spirit: The Magnificat, Luther, and Feminists” (2010). Faculty Publications. 275. https://digitalcommons.luthersem.edu/faculty_articles/275.

Wilson, Brittany E. “Pugnacious precursors and the bearer of peace: Jael, Judith, and Mary in Luke 1: 42.” The Catholic Biblical Quarterly 68.3 (2006): 436-456.

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Text Study for Luke 1:39-55 (Pt. 1); December 19, 2021

Not All Blessings are Equal

In these early days of our journey with the Lukan author, we preachers have the opportunity and the responsibility to remind listeners of themes and emphases that will persist throughout the Lukan account. One of those themes is the importance of the witness and ministry of women. Another is the theme of reversals. Yet another is the nonviolent and yet resistant nature of the work of disciples. Still another is the nature of discipleship as the Lukan author understands it. We get all of these themes and more in our reading for this week.

Scholars recognize that Elizabeth’s cry in Luke 1:42 is an echo of Judges 5:24 (NRSV) – “Most blessed of women be Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite, of tent-dwelling women most blessed.” They also hear in this outcry an echo of Judith 13:18 (NRSV) – “Then Uzziah said to her, ‘O daughter, you are blessed by the Most High God above all other women on earth; and blessed be the Lord God, who created the heavens and the earth, who has guided you to cut off the head of the leader of our enemies.’”

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“Though interpreters, both ancient and modern, have heard Judg 5:24 and Jdt 13:18 as echoes,” Brittany Wilson writes, “they often emphasize only the continuity between Jael, Judith, and Mary, overlooking the obvious point of discontinuity—namely, that Jael and Judith are blessed for killing enemy commanders whereas Mary is blessed for believing the words of the Lord and bearing a son” (page 436). Wilson looks at Elizabeth’s declaration through the lens of discontinuity between Mary and Jael/Judith.

“According to Luke, Mary’s peaceful servanthood foreshadows the life and death of her son,” Wilson writes, “who overcomes violence through peace. Indeed,” she continues, “Mary ushers in a new age, in which women are called most blessed for their acts of peace rather than for their acts of violence” (page 438). This theme of peace is a major focus for the Lukan author and one which we can encourage our listeners to watch for in future readings. More on that below.

Wilson traces the historical background of the interpretive connection between Mary, Jael, and Judith, the access the Lukan author had to the texts and the way the author used both the Book of Judges and the Book of Judith in the Lukan work, and the extensive textual and linguistic echoes from Jael and Judith in the Lukan account.

Wilson also notes that, based on the structural analysis of Richard Bauckham (who finds a chiastic structure in Luke 1:5-80), verses 39-45 are the central and pivotal verses in the first chapter of Luke. Remember that ancient writers relied a great deal on the structure of a text to indicate emphases as well as connections. It may be that Luke 1:42 is, therefore, the center of the center of this first part of the Lukan account.

What is the connection that the Lukan author wishes to make between Mary, Jael, and Judith? “Jael and Judith are, in fact, the only named women in the entirety of Israel’s writings, both canonical and noncanonical, who kill a person with their own hands and are then exalted for assisting the people of Israel,” Wilson notes. She observes that as literary figures or images, “Jael and Judith are remembered mainly for their dismemberment of Israel’s enemies” (page 442).

Jael, Wilson notes, acts as a “mother” toward Sisera before driving the tent peg through his temple. As Danna Nolan Fewell writes, Jael is “the woman who mothers Sisera to death.” Judith is more seductress than mother but is no less “blessed.” Wilson notes that, in fact, the story of Jael serves as the template for the story of Judith, so the similarities in the stories are intentional and quite obvious. But how does Mary fit into this trio?

“Of the trio of biblical women called ‘most blessed,’ Wilson continues, “it becomes apparent that Mary’s faithfulness to Israel stands in stark contrast to her pugnacious predecessors” (page 447). Most obvious in this contrast is the lack of physical violence in Mary’s story. Even the theme of motherhood is a contrast since Mary’s motherhood will give life rather than take it. “Of course, Jael and Judith bring life to Israel through establishing temporary peace,” Wilson notes, “yet the manner by which they achieve this peace is drastically different” (page 448). Rather than engaging in violence, Mary puts herself at risk of violence by placing herself in a precarious social and personal position.

As in the stories of Jael and Judith, the “victory” Mary embodies is proclaimed in a song (well, two songs in the Lukan account). Wilson notes that the songs in the Jael and Judith stories recount and celebrate both the acts of violence and the defeat and death of the enemies. Neither Elizabeth’s song nor Mary’s song has that violent aspect. And Mary’s song ends with the prayer for mercy on the enemies, not execution.

Mary is not called blessed for doing violence but rather for being willing to hear and to obey God’s word. “Instead of being portrayed as a woman warrior,” Wilson concludes, “Mary is presented as a woman disciple, a peaceful hearer and doer of God’s word” (page 449). Therefore, Mary is displayed as a role model for disciples in the Lukan account – one who hears the word of the Lord and does it. “Responding to God’s word, through both listening to and acting on that word,” Wilson writes, “is an essential aspect of discipleship in Luke” (450).

Wilson notes the passage that came to mind for me immediately in this reflection. “While [Jesus] was saying this, a woman in the crowd raised her voice and said to him, ‘Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts that nursed you!’ But he said, ‘Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it!’” (Luke 11:27-28, NRSV). Here, on the lips of Jesus, is the Lukan description of the essence of being a disciple. These verses contrast Mary’s “natural” relationship to Jesus with her conduct as a prototypical disciple.

Wilson then moves to a third intertextual echo in Elizabeth’s cry. Deuteronomy 28 lists the blessings and benefits of obedience to the Lord. In particular, we can hear the echo of Deuteronomy 28:4 (NRSV) – “Blessed shall be the fruit of your womb, the fruit of your ground, and the fruit of your livestock, both the increase of your cattle and the issue of your flock.” The blessings come from hearing the Lord’s commands and carrying them out.

Jael and Judith listened to the command of the Lord as well and acted. Their actions, however, were violent, while Mary’s response is not. “The peaceful act of listening to the Lord creates a marked contrast with Judith and Jael’s actions,” Wilson notes, making the dissonance all the more jarring” (page 453). The emphasis on peace is a Lukan theme. The word for “peace” appears in the Lukan account at least four times as often as in the other Synoptics.

Wilson describes how this emphasis works out in the later chapters of the Lukan account. “Advocating healing rather than killing, Jesus’ actions stand in stark contrast to his disciples’ misperception that peace can be achieved through the sword,” she argues. “At the point when the disciples’ use of the sword could most easily be justified [during Jesus’ arrest in Gethsemane], Jesus still emphatically rejects violence, knowing that he is to die a violent death by the hand of those determined to bring about his demise” (page 454).

It may be worth noting in both the Advent and Christmas texts the prevalence of “peace” and the centrality of peace to the coming Kin(g)dom. We only have to listen to the song of the angels to hear this emphasis on peace. But we don’t have to wait for that song to hear this emphasis and know its important. “At the outset of the Gospel, Mary’s radical obedience to the Lord foreshadows her son’s radical obedience,” Wilson writes. “Both mother and son reject violence,” she continues, “Mary not only embodies peace because of her act of discipleship; she embodies peace by carrying within her very womb the savior who brings peace to the world” (page 455).

Then comes the question which has driven Wilson’s essay from the beginning. “Since Mary’s faithful discipleship ushers in her son’s peaceful reign,” Wilson asks, “why does Luke provide textual linkages to the two most violent women in all of Israel’s sacred writings?” (page 455). On the one hand, these linkages show a continuity with the women who save Israel from their enemies. She is the latest in a long line of those who reverse the dynamics of gender, political, and economic power that seek to keep people in bondage.

In spite of that, there is the discontinuity. Since the Lukan author uses this discontinuity, we are reminded that the Lukan author could assume a deep and intimate knowledge of the Hebrew Scriptures (probably in their Septuagint translation) on the part of the Lukan audience. “To the attuned hearer who catches the scriptural references and who already knows the story of Jesus,” Wilson proposes, “the irony practically pops off the page” (page 455). This irony demands that such an attuned reader would think about the discontinuity.

“Luke envisions Jesus’ story as the continuation of Israel’s story,” Wilson writes, “yet he revisions the continuing story in surprising and sometimes startling new ways” (page 456). The Lukan author challenged the first listeners and readers to hear and process those revisions. The author challenges us in the same way, Wilson argues. “From now on,” she writes, “those who are called blessed follow not the way of violence but the way of peace. Like Mary,” she concludes, “believers are to hear and act on the message of peace proclaimed by the fruit of her womb – Jesus Christ, the prince of peace” (page 456).

References and Resources

Wilson, Brittany E. “Pugnacious precursors and the bearer of peace: Jael, Judith, and Mary in Luke 1: 42.” The Catholic Biblical Quarterly 68.3 (2006): 436-456.

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