The Queen (Part 1)

For the past month I have been studying Marian consecration.  In the beginning, I was actually quite upset.  There were a lot of things that I felt should have been taught to me when I was first learning about the faith, if, in fact, they were true.  The Church makes some bold claims about Mary.  BOLD.  Pun intended. :)  Anyway, I was viscerally upset when I started it.  Then I stopped and took a good hard look at myself.  I don't get viscerally upset over anything, almost ever.  This feeling was foreign to me.  This feeling was not something that I experience on a day to day basis.  That's how I knew... That's how I knew it wasn't from God...  That feeling I had of anger was not a gift of God, and that's how I knew I was getting close to the truth.  The devil doesn't want you to learn the truth, it takes away his power.  After I let go of that, the understanding blossomed, and I found that the Church's bold claims were not only quite sound, but remarkably biblical.  And so, let's begin there.  How is the Church's teaching on Mary biblical?

The First Woman:
Any study of Mary must begin at the first woman, Eve.  Let's go back to Genesis and recount a couple passages that will be important.  Genesis 2:21-23

So the LORD God cast a deep sleep on the man, and while he was asleep, he took out one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh.  The LORD God then built the rib that he had taken from the man into a woman. When he brought her to the man, the man said: “This one, at last, is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; This one shall be called ‘woman,’ for out of man this one has been taken.”

Notice a couple things.  First, this is before the fall.  She was created without sin, just as Adam was.  Second, her name was "woman".  It wasn't until later, after the fall, that Adam named her Eve.  Speaking of the fall, what happened next?  The serpent tempted Eve (and Adam, he was there), they ate the fruit, they brought sin into the world, and then God found out (so to speak).  Look at what he says to the serpent.  Genesis 3:15

I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; They will strike at your head, while you strike at their heel.

This passage contains something known as "the protoevangelium" or "the first gospel".  It is the first promise that mankind will be redeemed.  A few things are interesting here.  In context, this woman isn't Eve.  God will put "enmity between" the serpent and the woman.  But, Eve, just made a covenant with the serpent.  If you want to read more, take a look at the post I did called How Bad Was The Fall of Man?  So this woman isn't Eve.  It is a new woman that is promised by God.  The next thing to notice is the "between your offspring and hers".  In another, probably better, translation it says, "between your seed and her seed."  The general effect is the same.  Offspring=seed.  However, to whom do we refer to as the "seed giver?"  This is definitely the task of the man.  It is always the seed of the man.  Take a 5th grade lesson in the anatomy of the reproductive system and you will know why.  The seed is "planted" by the man.  But, here, the seed is that of the woman.  The woman's offspring will be of her "seed".  

As we will see, this "woman" is in fact Mary.  And this is a reference to the conception of Jesus.  There is some difficult theology here too.  Don't dismiss it.  If you get Mary wrong, you will inevitably get Jesus wrong too.  Jesus was all God, but he was also all man as well.  In His conception the only "man" part he was given was from Mary; God provided the rest.  Hence, it is the "seed" of the woman.  Jesus' only DNA came from Mary, as that was his only human parent.  Jesus' divinity is that of God.  The hypostatic union is the fancy word for the way in which Jesus is both all God and completely divine, and all man.  So, Mary is the woman, Jesus is the seed.  This is how the Church comes to say that Mary is the "Mother of God".  Jesus is God.  However, don't confuse this with the "Mother of the Trinity."  That isn't what is going on here.  She is the true mother of Jesus, and he got his seed from her.  Therefore, Mary is the mother of the second person of the trinity, Jesus.  Since Jesus is God, Mary is the Mother of God. 

The Annunciation:
Let us fast forward to the annunciation.  It will be even more jam-packed full of information than the protoevangelium.  I want to isolate two verses in particular.  Luke 1:28 when the angel Gabriel says to Mary,

Hail, full of Grace, the Lord is with you!

It is amazing how much can come from a mere handful words of the bible.  Where to begin.  When the Angel first greets Mary his word is "Hail".  What kind of greeting is this?  Actually, it is a greeting that is afforded to royalty.  If you look at the greek (this is clearly is hearsay as I know not Greek), the word "hail" is the same one used later on in the new testamant for "Hail, king of the Jews" when Jesus was on the Cross.  The word Hail was reserved for royalty.  Mary is being refrenced to with words used for a Queen by an Angel.  Not just a mere man.  Mary is the queen of the Angels too.  She is the Queen of heaven (more on this title in another post).  Second, the angel says "full of Grace."  Not "with grace", not "favored one," not even her name.  Unless, this IS her name.  That would be the appropriate thing to put there in the sentence.  Her given name is Mary, but her real name is "Full of Grace."  She is FULL of grace.  No grace is lacking.  No sin.  No fallen nature.  Full of Grace.  She was born without the stain of original sin.  She was the created immaculate conception.  If you want more on those choice words, read Maximilian Kolbe's reflection on the Immaculate Conception.

Gabriel goes on to explain that Mary will be with child conceived of the Holy Sprit.  And Mary's reply is, in Luke 1:34

"How shall this be, since I know not man?"

Get that "How shall this be".  Shall.  I have done a little bit of contract reading in my line of work and I know what the word "shall" means.  It is a guarantee.  If I say that I "shall drop a student" and I don't, then I have violated the terms of the syllabus.  Her reply is remarkable.  Mary doesn't use any kind of questioning tone, her first impression is that it WILL happen, and her question is How.  When she says "How shall this be" we can see her complete "yes" to God's invitation, the unity of Mary's will to God's.  She is ready and willing to perfectly do the will of God.

What about the question: "since I know not man?"  If you have read a little bit of Genesis, the word know will be familiar.  To "know" your husband was a word for sexual relations.  She says "Since I know not man."  At this point, she and Joseph were already betrothed.  The Jewish betrothal period was quite a bit more formal than our "engagement" period.  They were, for all intents and purposes, married.  Joseph would have gone off for a period to build a house for the couple.  Then, after that, their official marriage ceremony would have taken place.  If her relationship with Joseph had been one that was going to be a sexual one, then the question is completely asinine.  God didn't give the 4th grade talk "Well, Mary, when a man and a woman really love each other..."  She knew how children were made.  Her question doesn't fit.  The obvious answer is "When you and Joseph know each other."  But, that isn't what transpires.  It looks as though Mary isn't planning on having relations with Joseph at all, and that Mary was a consecrated virgin to begin with.  That is the only context in which her reply makes sense.  In fact, that is the teaching of the Church.  That Mary was a perpetual virgin.  She knows not man, forever, and that is the only way her comment makes sense.

We can see that from a few simple exegetes we have come to see biblical evidence of the immaculate conception, the mother of God, and the perpetual virginity of Mary, as well as hitting on the point of Mary's queenship (though, admittedly, there is more about the queenship that I didn't get into).