2. Mary The Bridge Between The Old And The New Testaments (a) introduction The richness of the Scriptural portrait of Mary is manifested most prominently in the Old Testament prophecies and prefigurings of Mary and the New Testament passages that portray her as the link between the Old and the New Covenants. Mary serves as a link between the two Covenants not just through parallel or prophetic verses but by embodying common themes. She is a bridge between the Old and the New Testaments because Scripture shows her representing both the people of Israel and the Church begun by her Son. The Scriptural images of Mary in the context of both Testaments are astounding in their variety. We see Mary as: The New Eve, the Virgin Mother prophesied in the Old Testament The embodiment of all the qualities prefigured in the heroines of the Old Testament The people of Israel, the Daughter of Zion The Ark of the Covenant: the parallels are too numerous to be ignored The Church The exalted Mother of Jesus The Mother of all the Faithful Spouse, Mother and Daughter The mystery of Marys role in the Old and the New Covenants is brilliantly underscored by Ignace de la Potterie: A very important insight of modern exegesis has brought to light that the mystery of Mary forms in some way the synthesis of all the former revelation about the people of God, and of all that God by his salvific action wishes to realize for his people. In Mary are accomplished all the important aspects of the promises of the Old Testament to the Daughter of Zion, and in her real person there is an anticipation which will be realized for the new people of God, the Church. The history of revelation on the subject of the theme of the Woman Zion, realized in the person of Mary, and continued in the Church, constitutes a doctrinal bastion, an unshakable structured ensemble for the comprehension of the history of salvation, from its origin up to its eschatology. A vision of the mystery of Mary, biblically founded, ecclesiologically integrated and structurally developed, gives then a complete image of the concrete realization of the total mystery of the Covenant. (3) In Down to Earth: The New Protestant Vision of the Virgin Mary, the Protestant theologian John de Satge highlights Marys position with respect to the Old and the New Testaments: She is the climax of the Old Testament people, the one to whom the cloud of witnesses from the ancient era look as their crowning glory, for it was through her response to grace that their Vindicator came to stand upon the earth. In the order of redemption she is the first fruits of her Sons saving work, the one among her Sons people who has gone all the way. And in the order of her Sons people, she is the mother. (4) Three other Scripture scholars may be cited here. In an ecumenical conference on Mary, Ralph Russell draws attention to the witness to Mary in Scripture as a whole: Scripture must be seen as a whole. The Holy Spirit who inspired it means it to be seen in entirety. Then the Woman in Genesis will be answered by the Woman in the Book of Revelation (ch. 12), the Fall will go to the Annunciation, Adam with Christ (cf. St Paul), Eve with Mary. This is the way the earliest fathers saw Scripture and if we look through their eyes we shall not be tempted to think that the Bible has little to say about Marys place in the work of her divine Son, the one redeemer. Another way of approach is to ask what is the central event to which all salvation history builds up? St. Paul answers that: When the time had fully come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman (Gal 4:4). What more has Scripture to tell us about this? The Old Testament prophets, struggling, against the spirit of proud self-sufficiency, to shift attention from man to God, had spoken of the anawim, the humble and lowly people, who leant upon the Lord, the holy one of Israel, in truth (Is. 10:20). They were not necessarily poor as a class, for David was one, but they usually were. They were conscious of their need for God, ready to wait and serve, with the trusting love of a child for their saviour. This is the meaning of the poor in the Isaian passage which Jesus applies to himself: The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor (Luke 4:18; Is 61:1); and the first of the Beatitudes is Blessed are the poor in spirit (Matt. 5:3; cf. Luke 6:20). The flower of the poor and humble of the Lord is the handmaid of the Lord, who said let it be to me according to your word. and he has regarded the low estate of his handmaiden, (Luke 1:38, 48). From other Old Testament themes, provided they are read with traditional Jewish and Christian interpretations, there emerges the figure of the woman, mother of the redeemer. There is Matthews interpretation of Isaiah: All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son (Matt. 1:22ff.; Is. 7:14). There is Genesis 3:15, the enmity between the woman and the serpent, her seed and his seed, of which more later. There is the prophetic figure of the Daughter of Sion. This takes us to St. Luke and the Annunciation. The angel says to Mary: Hail full of grace, (or10 favoured one), the Lord is with you,. And then Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have favour (or grace) with God. And behold you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus (Yahweh-Saviour) (Luke 1:28-31). The Old Testament background to this is Zephaniah 3:14-17: Sing aloud, O daughter of Sion ... The Lord is in your midst ... Do not fear, O Sion, the Lord your God is in your midst (your womb), a warrior who gives victory. So in Luke hail means rejoice, with messianic joy, and Mary, favoured one or full of grace is seen as the Daughter of Sion, who realizes the hopes and longings of Israels history, and in a more wonderful way the Lord will be in her midst. The angel goes on, in the words of the prophecy of Nathan, to tell her that her Son will be the Messiah, and when Mary asks How shall this be, because I have not husband? he explains: The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the most high will overshadow you. Therefore the child to be born will be called holy, Son of God (Luke 1:32-35). Overshadow refers to the Shekinah, the cloud of Gods presence which went with the Israelites in the desert, filled the temple of Solomon, appeared at the transfiguration and the ascension, and according to Israelite tradition, covered with its shadow the Ark of the Covenant (cf. Exodus 40:35). Thus Mary, like the Ark, becomes Gods resting place on earth. Son of God is a messianic title, but its full meaning will be gradually unfolded, and gradually also Christian faith will come to Be what it means to be Gods Mother. Marys humble answer, Behold I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word is an unhesitating acceptance of her place in Gods redemptive plan. This is what the second century fathers saw, together with its consequences for salvation: The knot of Eves disobedience, says Irenaeus, was untied by Marys obedience, and in her obedience Mary became the cause of salvation for herself and for the whole human race (Adv. Haer. 3, 22, 4; PG 7, 959). (5). Rene Laurentin sees Marys presence in the OT on three planes: Mary is seen to be envisaged in three ways by the Old Testament. I. Moral Preparation From among mankind disgraced by sin, God untangles a line of faith and holiness at the end of which his Son will be able to be born into the human race without the contamination of sin. The last stage of this progress is found in the privileged circle of the poor of Israel. Mary explicitly places herself in this group in the Magnificat (Lk. 1:48, 52) ... II. Typological Preparation Gods plan for the world works toward accomplishment according to the slow cadence of human duration, slowed down the more by the inertia of sin. God does not bring perfection to be all at once, but gradually. At each stage of the plan of salvation—Israel, the Church, heaven—one can discern the sketch and prefiguration of the perfect forms that will be reached at the end. At each stage in the development of an embryo the imperfect forms of the organs on their way to full formation can be detected. There is no more delicate task than to appreciate these developmental relationships. In the final analysis, only Scripture and Tradition can authentically discern typological equivalents. In what concerns Mary, the types are found principally in three lines: 1. First there are the women of the Old Testament, notably those who were favored with miraculous births, those who were ancestors of the Messiah, those who contributed to the triumph and salvation of Israel. By taking up in connection with Mary the words that concerned Sarah, Nothing is impossible with God, (Gen 18:14 and Lk. 1:37), or Judith (Jud 13:18-19 and Lk. 1:42), Luke gave the first guidelines for this typology. 2. But Luke compares Mary especially to Israel in its ensemble. He identifies her with the Daughter of Zion according to Zeph. 3:14-17, an identification that is found again in substance in John 19:25-27 and in the twelfth chapter of the Apocalypse ... 3. Finally, the Daughter of Zion was the place where Yahweh rested. Thus Luke glimpsed in Mary the new Ark of the Covenant, the eschatological resting-place of Yahweh Savior. In this comparison he opened the way to a typology involving sacred objects ... III. Prophetic Preparation Mary was prefigured not only by realities corresponding to her in nature or function, but also by words that announced her in advance ... Two series of texts merit attention: (a) Eschatological texts whose meaning applies to Mary and at the same time to the Church; (b) Texts that apply to the Mother of the Messiah. (6). Finally, Stefano Mannelli tells us: The Mariology of the Old Testament has all the essential characteristics of a Mariology at its roots. In that Mariology are contained in fact the roots of that unique, precious plant that is Mary most holy. From those roots has sprung, in the New Testament, the one full of grace (Lk 1:28), the Mother of God and of the new humanity. In these mariological texts of the Old Testament are discovered the roots of the mystery of Mary, predestined in one and the same decree (Ineffabilis Deus) to be the woman. Mother of the New Adam, with whom she is united in the same enmity for the serpent whose head is to be crushed (Gen 3:15). This woman is the Virgin Mother of Emmanuel, that is, of God with us (Is 7:14). She is the woman in travail bearing God made man, the Savior of the remnant of Israel, of the People of God (Mic 5:1-2). The two mysteries of the Incarnation and of the redemption, foreshadowed in these prophetic oracles, are intimately linked to the mysteries of the Immaculate Conception (Gen 3:15), the divine and virginal maternity (Is 7:14), and the co-redemption (Gen 3:15) attributed to the woman in travail of Bethlehem (Mic 5:1-2). Together with these three fundamental Mariological texts, we also find in the Old Testament an abundance of minor texts that converge to give to those roots a certain consistency in prefiguring and symbolizing the extraordinary personality of Mary. Thus, we discover the roots of Mary in the daughter of Zion (Mic 4:8), in the poor of Yahweh (Ps 9), in the strong woman (Sir 26:2) who works for the regeneration and salvation of the people. We find her prefigured by Sarah, Rebecca, and Rachel, by Miriam, the sister of Moses, by Deborah, Abigail and Ruth, by Judith and by Esther. We can read of the virtues and sanctity of Mary in the various and richly allusive biblical symbols, such as the burning bush, the fleece of Gideon, the holy ark, the rainbow, Jacobs ladder, and in many others ... We find, then, the Mariology of the New Testament already sketched in that of the Old. The figure and mission of Mary are already limned in the prophecies, in the figures, and in the symbols of the Old Testament. The prophecies foretell and describe her personality, outlining its primary characteristics: Marys freedom from original sin because of her enmity with the serpent, her divine maternity as the Mother of God with us, her virginal maternity as the virgin in travail, the universal co-redemption because if her victory over the serpent whose head is crushed ... In the New Testament, the entire Mariological content of the Old Testament is found to be fulfilled in the reality of the person and life of Mary, as the woman, as the virgin, as the mother of the Emmanuel, as the exalted Daughter of Zion, as endowed with those sublime gifts and virtues of more admirable women of the Old Covenant, and by the more suggestive, poetic symbols employed by the sacred writers. The great St. Augustine, therefore, was right when he wrote that in the Old Testament is hidden the New, and in the New the Old becomes clear. That is especially true of Mariology, which has sprouted and flowered in the New Testament, an it were, from its roots in the Old. Mariology has developed from an admirable Old Testament sketch to that still more admirable portrait painted in the New. St. Andrew of Crete once wrote that our Lady is the seal of the Old and of the New Testament; she is clearly the fulfillment of every prophecy. (7). In the era of the Old Covenant Mary is invited to be the mother of the Messiah because she has won favor with God. In the era of the New Covenant she will be called blessed by all generations because she has believed. (b) Old Testament Prophecies of Mary The most famous Old Testament prophecies concerning the coming of the Messiah are Genesis 3:15, Isaiah 7:14 and Micah 5:1-4. In all three prophecies the Mother of the Messiah plays a prominent part. The Genesis prophecy will be considered in a section below. Here we will study the prophecies in Isaiah and Micah. These are the prophecies in Isaiah and Micah: The Lord spake again unto Ahaz, saying, Ask thee a sign of the Lord thy God; ask it either in the depth, or in the height above. But Ahaz said, I will not ask, neither will I tempt the Lord. And he said, Hear ye now, O house of David; Is it a small thing for you to weary men, but will ye weary my God also? Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. [Isaiah 7:10-14]. But thou, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel, whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting. Therefore will he give them up, until the time that she which travaileth hath brought forth: then the remnant of his brethren shall return unto the children of Israel. And he shall stand and feed in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God; and they shall abide: for now shall he be great unto the ends of the earth. And this man shall be the peace, Micah [5:2-4]: Concerning the prophecy in Isaiah which was made by the Prophet Isaiah to King Ahaz urging him to trust God rather than to rely on the Assyrians, Stefano Manelli points out, Biblical- theological exegesis correctly insists on one literal, messianic, and Marian interpretation of this well-known prophecy: the Emmanuel of whom the prophet speaks is exclusively the future Messiah, Jesus Christ, and the childbearing virgin is exclusively Mary, the Virgin Mother of Jesus ... One must consider the well-nigh unanimous agreement with this interpretation on the part of the Fathers and ecclesiastical writers, both in the East and in the West, from St. Justin on. So, too, the uninterrupted teaching of the Magisterium of the Church, the witness of the liturgy and of sacred art (as early as that of the Catacombs of Priscilla in Rome) have favored this interpretation. Concerning modern theologians who deny this interpretation, Manelli writes, they run counter to the practically unanimous view of the exegetical tradition and of the Faith of the Church. Yet modern, rationalistic exegetes cannot avoid facing the fact that if there are any prophecies of the Old Testament expressly cited in the new as fully verified, one is this precise passage from Isaiah, cited verbatim by St. Matthew and clearly referred to by St. Luke. The prophecy is significant also for understanding Mary: One of the fundamental ... points of Isaiahs prophecy surely concerns the virginal conception and parturition of the Mother of the Emmanuel. This is the object of the Churchs belief in the perpetual, virginal integrity of Mary, before, during and after childbirth. The special sign that Isaiah offers the King on behalf of God is in fact this: a pregnant virgin, that is to say, a virgin who conceives a child while remaining a virgin; and a virgin giving birth, that is to say, a pregnant virgin who bears a son while still remaining a virgin—hence a virginal conception and virginal parturition: in conception and in the act of giving birth the Mother of the Immanuel remains always ,the virgin, ... With the virginal maternity is foreshadowed the royal and divine maternity, given that the Emmanuel is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that He is a royal descendant of David because, being born of Mary, He is also of Davids lineage. Still another detail, particularly significant, is this: the prophet Isaiah states that the Mother of the Messiah will herself name her son, the fruit of her virginal womb (She shall call his name Emmanuel [Is 7:14]), even though this was contrary to traditional usage, whereby the father named the child. St. Luke underscores this same detail in recounting how the angel informed Mary she was to name the child she bore: You shall call his name Jesus (Lk 1:31). The correspondence between prophecy and fulfillment on this point is perfect. Finally, the relation between the prophecy of Isaiah and that of Genesis is not to be overlooked. Mattioli writes: The reference of the Isaian text to the Protoevangelium (Gen 3:15) seems clearly evident. The mother and son, the Almah and the Immanuel, announced by Isaiah, appear neither more nor less than further delienations of the woman, and of the seed, the Issah and the Zera, promised in Genesis. Manelli addresses one possible objection that could arise: How can Ahaz verify the sign the prophet offers, if the sign, will come to pass only eight centuries later? The difficulty can be resolved in this way. Isaiah in prophesying does not address himself to Ahaz, but to the house of David, (7:13), because the prophecy was intended to serve a far broader and weightier end, namely, that the Lord would keep his promise to preserve the line of David, and to make Davids throne forever stable through the Immanuel. The Scripture scholar William Most addresses another kind of objection: We cannot help noticing too that though many today deny that Isaiah 7:14 speaks of a virgin birth—although St. Matthew saw it—Mary could not have missed it. For she saw it being fulfilled in herself. It is true the Targum as we now have it did not mark this passage as messianic. But we know why, thanks to some splendidly honest modern Jewish scholars: Jacob Neusner (Messiah in Context, pp. 173 and 190), Samson Levey and E.J. Schoeps. Neusner tells us (p.190) that when the Jews saw the Christians using this prophecy, they pulled back, and said it was not the Messiah. But they gave themselves away, for the Targums do mark Isaiah 9:5-6 as messianic, and everyone admits that the child in 7:14 and 9:5-6 is the same child, for both passages belong to what is commonly called the book of Emmanuel. About the prophecy in Micah, Manelli writes: This Messiah-liberator, the prophet foretells, will be born in the tiny town of Bethlehem in the land of Ephrathah, not the Bethlehem of Galilee. Moreover in the prophecy it is said that the Messiahs origins are from of old, from ancient days. The expression from ancient days can also mean everlasting days and thus would expressly indicate eternity, that is, the divine origin of the Messiah rather than merely His long descent from David. The prophet Micah, therefore, would appear to have foretold both the earthly and heavenly places of birth, both the human and divine origins of the Messiah ... Meriting particular interest is the fact that Micah, rather than directly foretelling the Messiah, foretells His Mother instead, or more precisely, a Queen-mother whom God raises up from his people to beget a new king, at a specific place and time and so in reality. [D. Colombo]. Furthermore, in making this prediction, the prophet adopts a phraseology so exact that its meaning must have been perfectly obvious to this listeners: the woman in travail shall bring forth. This brings one to the well-founded supposition that the people were already well acquainted with the prophecy of Isaiah: Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bring forth a son ... For the prophet Micah, the concise expression, the woman in travail shall bring forth, was sufficient to make himself understood by everyone ... Finally, in the light of the prophecy already fulfilled, so in this prophecy as in that of Genesis 3:15 and in that of Isaiah 7:14, the figure of the mother is presented alone with her son. No earthly father of the Messiah-Savior is mentioned in any of the three great Old Testament prophecies. The mother appears always as virgin mother. The virginity of the mother is the ever-present, luminous backdrop for the event of the Annunciation and that of the birth of the Messiah. This virginity is an evident sign that the Messiah is truly a new creation, the new humanity, the beginning of the salvific era: the redemption. (10) (c) Old Testament Pre-figurings of Mary
Posted on: Sun, 03 Nov 2013 10:52:03 +0000
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