Gospel for Thursday, August 15: Luke 1:39-56

By Carlo Miglietta On Aug 12, 2024

Assumption of the B. V. Mary

39 In those days Mary set out for the mountain and quickly reached a town in Judah. 40 As she entered Zechariah’s house, she greeted Elizabeth. 41 As soon as Elizabeth had heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb. Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit 42 and exclaimed in a loud voice, “Blessed are you among women and blessed is the fruit of your womb! 43 To what do I owe that the mother of my Lord should come to me? 44 Behold, as soon as the voice of your greeting reached my ears, the child rejoiced with joy in my womb. 45 And blessed is she who believed in the fulfillment of the words of the Lord.”
46 Then Mary said:
“My soul magnifies the Lord
47 and my spirit exults in God my savior,
48 because he has looked upon the humility of his servant.
From now on all generations will call me blessed.
49 Great things has the Almighty done in me
And holy is his name:
50 From generation to generation his mercy
Is stretched out upon those who fear him.
51 He has unfolded the power of his arm,
Has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;
52 he has overthrown the mighty from their thrones,
he has lifted up the lowly;
53 he has filled the hungry with good things,
has sent back empty-handed the rich.
54 He has rescued Israel, his servant,
remembering his mercy,
55 as he had promised to our fathers,
to Abraham and his descendants,
forever.”
56 Mary stayed with her about three months, then returned to her home.

Lk 1:39-56

Dear sisters and brothers of Misericordia, I am Carlo Miglietta, a doctor, biblical scholar, layman, husband, father and grandfather (www.buonabibbiaatutti.it). Also today I share with you a short thought meditation on the Gospel, with special reference to the theme of mercy.

In meditating on this passage, Prof. Antonino Grasso’s lecture to the Oblates of St. Benedict on May 28, 2006 in Catania will help us.

THE MAGNIFICAT

A number of canticles liturgically celebrate the mystery of Jesus’ incarnation.

Zechariah’s “Benedictus” (1:67-79) is thanksgiving to God “because he has raised up a mighty salvation,” and prophecy of the mission of John (1:76-77) and Jesus (1:78-79).

Mary’s “Magnificat” (1:46-55) is a hundred Old Testament phrases.

a) Mary, a woman of faith rooted in the Scriptures, reads her story in their light.
b) Mary is an example of praise, like Mary the sister of Aaron (Ex 15), Anna (1 Sam 2:1), Habakkuk (Hab 3:18), Isaiah (Isa 61:10), praise that starts from “zikkaron,” blessing memory.
c) Mary is the poor of IHWH who reminds, with a harsh “classist” hymn, that God chooses the poor and the last and condemns the rich and the powerful, in keeping with Hannah (1 Sam 2:8), Ezekiel (Ez 21:31), Job (Job 12:19), Sirach (Sir 10:14-15) and the Psalms (Sl 113:7).

“The Magnificat is a fundamental text, like a hinge between the Old and New Testaments that meet in the “poor of IHWH,” new people of the promise, of whom Mary is the privileged expression. The song is an ecclesial song placed on Mary’s lips, which the community repeats unceasingly, uniting its voice with hers. Many Eastern liturgies have given the Magnificat a place of honor; the Latin liturgy included it, from the fifth to sixth centuries, in the daily recitation of Vespers. Also impressive is how many times music has sung the Magnificat. Orlando di Lasso alone composed as many as 101 Magnificats from 4 to 6 voices in the 16th century.

Since the late 19th century, the Magnificat has also been the subject of profound critical-exegetical research that has led to fruitful actualizations. Today the Magnificat presents the concreteness and chorality of the ancient liberation songs of God’s people, often sung, as in our case, by exceptional women such as Myriam, Deborah, Judith, etc.

Moreover, the rediscovery of the anthropological and sociopolitical significance of the Magnificat has given considerable impetus to the revaluation of women, of whom Mary, is increasingly revealed as a credible archetype and privileged expression.

Why is there so much attention to the Magnificat today? Because in it there are elements that:

emphasize God’s mercy toward the poor;
extol his energetic intervention against the oppressors;
present Mary as the Lord’s servant and poor and as a model for the identification of every believer;
they regard Mary as the spokeswoman of the community and as a woman faithful and obedient to the Word;
they manifest the unity of the song in the glorification of God and in the praise of her who believed

For these elements, the Magnificat is an excellent expression of the new people of God, the song and prayer of the Church of all Times.

Historical – salvific song

Is the Magnificat a liturgical song or a hymn of political-social liberation? The two aspects are by no means alternative but complementary ereciprocal. For the Liturgy, which celebrates salvific events, also contains an episodic – paschal element, and that is to celebrate the Liturgy means that salvation has truly been realized.

A one-sided reading of the Magnificat is erroneous: both the intimate and private one and the sociopolitical one only. The Magnificat proclaims God the powerful savior who lays down the great and raises up the humble. This protagonism of God and the condition of poverty in which he intervenes cannot be separated from each other because the Magnificat would lose all its meaning. Mary is not a heroine or a superior creature, but a person freed from her poverty, cooperating with God and proclaiming his salvation.

Christmas and Easter song

Does the Magnificat celebrate Christ’s birth into the world or his glorious Resurrection? According to the actual context in which it is placed, between the annunciations and the births, it cannot fail to evoke first of all that a Christmas atmosphere. But one quickly realizes that it has much in common with psalms and hymns of deliverance. Mary’s song celebrates the Christ event, including from Easter and extending to his earthly birth. All the infancy narratives are Easter texts that project the glory of the Risen One onto the events of his earthly origins. It is symptomatic that Mary never mentions the child or speaks of her coming motherhood.

Because of this paschal undertone, Mary’s song should be read in the light of the Sea Song of Exodus 15:1-27, which also celebrates the paschal deliverance of the people.

Mary’s song, then, is:

memory of past events;
current celebration of the ultimate salvation wrought by Christ;
prophecy of a future in which God’s victory will triumph over the world.

Theological and Marian song

Is the Magnificat a theological or Marian song? Here again there is no divergence, but total convergence between the two aspects:

it is a Marian song because it is theological, in that the story of the maiden of Nazareth is all God’s work;
it is a theological song because it is Marian, in that God’s action is manifested in Mary in its pure state, without compromise with men or the logic of the world’s powerful.

The song attributed to Mary tells the story of a “poor one” of the Lord, but it is the typical tale of all the “poor of IHWH.” Mary almost disappears into the entire people of God and blends in with them.

In response to Elizabeth’s praise, Mary blesses the Lord, the ancient adage truly appears to be fulfilled here: Mary is the echo of God: you say Mary, she repeats God. Marian and theological singing, then: the Virgin of Nazareth is the first recipient of the salvation wrought by God in Christ, his first witness, the one who proclaims without end the blessing, mercy and deliverance of God.

Reductive readings of the Magnificat

There are some interpretive readings of the Magnificat that must be discarded so as not to deaden its full meaning. They are:

the “spiritualistic” reading whereby the powerful and the rich are only the proud and the poor and the hungry are the humble. Fathers and doctors of the Church have read this meaning into it (Cyril of Alexandria, St. Bernard, Hugh of St. Victor, etc.), but to reduce it to this alone is to move toward agnostic-style abstoricism. Indeed, in this view one does not read the historical mediations of the evil one, as, for example, Revelation does, i.e., one interprets the song without any meaning for and in history and makes it socially insignificant;
the “spiritualistic-moderate” reading, which accepts the realist meaning of the Magnificat but mutes it, nullifying its meaning in favor of the spiritualistic interpretation;
the “enragée”, rabid reading, that is, the one that sees God as the “Lord of armies” and of “holy war” and considers the Magnificat as the call to a holy war, marked by the spirit of hatred and violence;
the “enragée-moderate” reading, which in addition to the above also recognizes the hymn’s religious significance but gives it a secondary place.

Synthesis of faith and life

For the reading of the Magnificat to be integral, the hymn must be interpreted in a double light:

in the light of the Exodus to detect its ethical-social and historical dimension, a dimension that concerns Israel above all;
in the light of Passover to detect the soteriological and eschatological dimension of messianic deliverance, a dimension that concerns above all the Church.

The Magnificat appears, therefore, to be an open and inclusive messianic song, primarily soteriological, but also requiring a “political messianism” as one of its internal dimensions. Thus, the social dimension of the Magnificat cannot be silenced, and the Church must rediscover and value this dimension as well if it is to make a comprehensive discourse about the poor and oppressed.

In other words, according to Hőring, the Magnificat embodies the synthesis between the praise of God and the humble service of one’s neighbor so that in its “symphonic” character it is a meeting point between different categories of people: liberals and charismatics, Catholics and Protestants, Christians and non-Christians, believers and non-believers, men and women, etc.

Echoed in the Magnificat are the strongly earthly and historical expectations typical of the Old Testament and the realization of eschatological salvation, inaugurated by Easter and Pentecost in the New Testament. The Christian faith understands, expressing itself in the Magnificat, that ultimate salvation must and can also be realized in historical society in terms of social liberation and that this liberation is and must be stretched toward the eschatological goal. The Magnificat is the synthesis of the eschatological and the historical: the ultimate realities simultaneously traverse and surpass the “penultimate realities.”

Context of the Magnificat

What is the context of the Magnificat? We can read in it a remote context and an immediate context.

Remote context is the social background in which Mary of Nazareth was living, which can be summarized in these features:

sociopolitical poverty due to the Roman colonial system based on latifundia and the tax regime;
sociopolitical domination by a foreign, pagan power supported by its legions;
ideological-religious oppression by the Pharisaic system;
revolutionary uprisings by the zealots;
expectation of apocalyptic-messianic deliverance by the weary and exhausted crowds.

Immediate context is the episode of the Visitation, which narrates an encounter that has these relevant features:

are two women who meet, a fact that strongly challenges the subordination of women in Palestinian patriarchal society;
they are two poor women, both despised, one because she is barren and the other because she is a virgin;
they are two women who are pregnant and therefore “blessed” because they are bearers of life, of whom one indeed bears Life par excellence.

Literary origin of the Magnificat

The most probable hypothesis is that, beginning with some phrase of praise spoken by Mary herself in the Visitation, the early Judeo-Christian Church, perhaps even a community of “anawin” converts, would have expanded this short doxology into an actual Psalm, singing of the wonders wrought by God in Jesus Christ and thanking him for the salvation manifested in the resurrection event. Luke would take up this hymn and rework it freely, also echoing in it the context of politico-religious persecution that the Church was suffering at the time and also turning it into a hymn of the persecuted and the martyrs (c. A.D. 80).

Luke, however, places this hymn on Mary’s lips, making her the bearer of the Church’s feelings in a context of suffering. Why? Because Luke thinks of Mary as the Servant of the Lord, poor and persecuted with and like her Son. One might conclude, then, that even if the Magnificat was not composed by her, it could in truth be because, according to Luke, it corresponds perfectly to her feelings. The early Church felt the Mother of Jesus was the most authoritative figure to utter the Magnificat of the poor and suffering Community. Mary thus elevates herself as the privileged representative of all the poor.

Beyond this interpretation, it is certain that Mary emerges in the Magnificat as the personification or type of the People of God of all times, so Christians today must take up this hymn and relive it in faith and practice with and as Mary of Nazareth, according to Augustine’s words, “In each of you let Mary’s soul magnify the Lord; in all of us let Mary’s spirit exult in God.”

The Magnificat thus stands between past, present and future in this double relationship:
Early Church – MAGNIFICAT- Church of the 3rd millennium.

This reading must not overlook the perspective of the poor on which the Magnificat is centered, since it is proclaimed by a poor and the Church of the poor and persecuted, and this is to rediscover all its liberating power towards the last. Indeed, the whole Magnificat is resonant with the voices of the Old Testament and shows a Mary-Church imbued with biblical faith, a strongly messianic and liberating faith that looks to the Exodus and the coming of the Messiah. Mary is the Israel in which the promises are fulfilled.

Happy Mercy to all!

Anyone who would like to read a more complete exegesis of the text, or some insights, please ask me at migliettacarlo@gmail.com.

Source

spazio + spadoni