The Magnificat -- What Can We Learn From It?

Lollard said:

To understand what God did for me, I do not have to meditate or even think about Mary beyond what the scripture says. I choose to meditate and think about Jesus the Christ, The Holy Spirit, and God the Father.

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Exactly. It's the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit that's the center of my attention. Mary doesn't usually enter my thoughts at all. Well said.

The Person of MAry is the Work of God. This is reflected in her life and what she said in scripture. It is throught God's work in the person of MAry and what she said in scripture that helps me center on God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

Lollard said:

Actually no one would know about these events today without the written word. Actually that is not really a true statement. The church has handed down these same thoughts from the very beginning as well. But, stories and legends that have been created over time and then meted out as oral traditions are what I do not buy into.

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again you make charges that the early Church was full of frauds and liars. Where is your proof of this?

We have no proof that John or Paul or even Peter thought or taught these things they are said to be orally handed down. How very conveinient. We do however have written proof of what they did teach and that is what I personally hold to.
The circular question that comes to mind is how do you know that these oral traditions are really as old as they say they are and If they were oral there is no written record, so how do we know that they are genuine?

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And how then do we know that what is written in our gospels is what the Apostles actually taught, and that the New Testament is actually their work, other than that this is what the Church tells us? The same church, which according to you was packed with people who lied and invented false stories and doctrines? If the church invented oral traditions, it could have invented the written traditions (scriptures) too.

In Christ Forever said:

How do arrive at the conclusion that it is "Mary" represented as the Woman?
It indeed shows "her" bearing a manchild that is then caught up to God, but also remember Christ was born through the Holy Spirit and was the Son of God. The woman could represent the Glory of God or even the Holy Spirit. You have to look beyong "names" in the bible and look at who Christ was and what He represented.

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You have to look at the sytem of symbolism in Revelation, which is very consistent. Nowhere is God or the Holy Spirit ever represented as a woman.

In Revelation 12 every symbolic character, Woman, Child, Dragon etc. represents an individual person. The simplest interpretation of the Woman who gives birth to Jesus is that she is His mother, Mary. If anything other than the most natural interpretation of a symbolic character in Revelation is intended, that "more difficult" interpretation is explained in the text. No such "other" explanation exists for the Woman.

If we compare with Isaiah 7, the same symbolism is used as a sign, a woman giving birth to a child. This is always interpreted as Mary and Jesus.

I really don't dwell on Mary that much because of the fact that God stated that Christ was His beloved Son, not Mary's.

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I think the bible tells us often enough that Mary is Jesus's Mother - or are you denying this?

Polycarp1 said:

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That was the entire point to this thread -- because it was the one place in Scripture where Mary is directly quoted at length, and she's talking about God's work in her life. (And thanks to you, Lollard, for dealing with the question I asked in the OP.)

With all the threads about Mary and the divisiveness that's resulted, I wanted to see if we could look at what she actually said, as recorded in the written Scriptures, and turn the focus from her as a person, to her testifying to God's work in her life.

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I tried to answer the OP, but no-one seemed particularly interested in discussing that post. However quite a few people have appeared to challenge the historic teachings on Mary and post allegations about their origin, and so they have had to be answered, taking the thread off track.

Axion said:

I tried to answer the OP, but no-one seemed particularly interested in discussing that post. However quite a few people have appeared to challenge the historic teachings on Mary and post allegations about their origin, and so they have had to be answered, taking the thread off track.

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ditto on that.

"My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, my spirit rejoices in God my Savior;"
Imagine the feeling that Mary must have been feeling at this point? We can get an idea from Hannah in the OT. Hannah we read in 1 Samuel chapter one was a barren woman who one day in the temple of God was praying in earnest that God would hear her prayers and give her a a male child. She vowed that this child would be dedicated to the temple and he would live there the days of his life. While she is there a priest walks by and sees her mumbling to herself. Thinking she is drunk he rebukes her and she tells him what the deal was. The priest says:"Go in peace, and may the God of Israel grant the request that you have asked of him." to which she relpied: "May I, your servant, find favor in your sight." Well we know the rest of the this part of the story, she does get pregnant because the Lord remembered her, and she did as she promised and dedicated this child to the Lord. Her first words when this act of obedience was done? "My heart rejoices in the Lord;" If you read the rest of her song of praise it sounds very much like Mary's praise.

Now Mary says two profound things:
My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
I think magnifies the Lord as the KJV would have it more a resounding statement. Can our souls give anyone a magnifying glance at the Lord? Do we as mary did proclaim the greatness of God, from deep down inside of us?

My Spirit rejoices in God my saviour.
It seems to me that at this point there was such a rush of the Holy Spirit involved here that even Mary's spirit was rejoicing of the likes I cannot imagine. That state of bliss in which all earthly cares vanish and there is a total release of pure joy, and submission. One could argue that she was foretelling of her future salvation or she could have been speaking in past tense as some would say, but never the less she proclaims that God is her saviour. Remarkable, really.

"for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant."
Doesn't this sound just like Hannah? No doubt Mary must have heard these stories when she was a child, and perhaps she had Hannah in mind when she echoed her words (May I, your servant, find favor in your sight). So what can we learn from this? God is not a respecter of persons. He doesn't care where you came from, who you were born from or what your status in the community is. He will use you, if you are willing, to bring others to Him.

Mary, when she said let it be to me as you said, became a bondservant(verse 1:38), one who had at this point sold herself into service to the Lord. Now the word that is used for her at this point at least in the Strongs concordance is doule, or woman slave. Hopefully you will not get the idea that she became an unwilling slave of the Lord. She did it willingly! What we can learn from Mary at this point is what the young rich man did not. "You lack one thing, go and sell all you own and follow me" He could not do it. Mary did. She gave away her future as a normal everyday housewife, she even gave away her chance to be married and possibly even was risking her own life by being pregnant and unwed. Mary at this point was saying I Mary who sold myself into being a slave of the Lord, have found favor with God. Imagine if we sold out for God what He could do through us, lowly servants that we are.

"From this day all generations will call me blessed: the Almighty has done great things for me, and holy is his Name."
How prophetic is it that even today Mary is still called the Blessed Virgin? Who could argue that the Lord did not only do great things for her, but through her act of obedience? Holy is his name!!!

Imagine being in that time and really your only role a a woman would be to be a wife and to bear children. Time after time I am sure there were many women who like Hannah prayed to God for a son, and maybe even some of them prayed to give birth to the Messiah. Some were rich, and some came from very influential families, but God chose this girl, barely a woman, of no consequence, betrothed to a carpenter, to bring about His plan of salvation for not only her but all of mankind? Do you still feel weak and insignificant in the family of God? Humble yourself before God, and let Him, use you as well, and all nations may call you blessed one day.

"He has mercy on those who fear him in every generation."
Not every generation has feared the Lord. This generation we live in now is so full of post modern thought that the ideals of God are challenged every day. What does it mean to truly fear God? I do not mean just reverence either. I think people have watered down what it really means to fear God. I believe that "The fear of Jehovah is the beginning of knowledge; But the foolish despise wisdom and instruction." "And be not afraid of them that kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell." Does this generation fear earthly death or everlasting hell? From this we can learn that mercy is given to and found by those who do fear God.

"He has shown the strength of his arm, he has scattered the proud in their conceit."
If you look in the OT you will see many references to the right hand of God, who we all know is Jesus the Christ. Who were the proud of that time? The religious zealots who had turned into worshippers of their own religion over the worship of god. They would parade in with their flowing robes and would make a scene of giving alms. They thought they new every jot and tital(sp?) of the law, and they ended up being burned by that very law. Sometimes I wonder today if we haven't made our religion a God. I wonder if we take for granted the beatitudes, or even if we give mercy in the same manner that we were given mercy.

"He has cast down the mighty from their thrones, and has lifted up the lowly."
Once again the mighty priests who worshipped the law instead of serving the law giver, were kicked down from their perches. In their place came some fishermen, and a tax collector and even lowly gentiles. I think this tells us that we should be humble in our state. We are not better because we are saved, we are just better off.

"He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty."
It has been said that money cannot buy love, friendship, trust, or even happiness. This is true. From the sermon on the mount we hear how God will do great things if we humble ourselves before him. Once again something the rich man would not do. There is a story in the Bible that talks of it being easier for a camel to fit through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom. To the Jews, the more you had, the more God was blessing you. So what Jesus said made no sense to the disciples. Who will get in then if not the rich? The actual "eye of the needle" was a gate within a gate. There were huge giant gates so that the armies could go in and out, but during war times or at night they were always kept shut for saftey sake. Everytime somebody wanted to come in they had to go by way of the eye. The eye was a doggie door of sorts, a smaller door within one of the big doors. The thinking wa it was safer to open the little door rather than swing wide and let the city be taken unaware. A rider on a camel would not be able to just waltz through he would have to get off, unpack the camel, lead it on its knees through the eye, and then transfer all the stuff through the gate if it had not been stolen. If you were a nomad, or a loner no big deal but these rich guys had alot of camels and it took along time. So it seems to me that in order to get into the kingdom of heaven we must lay our things outside of the gate and kneel our way in as well

"He has come to the help of his servant Israel, for he has remembered his promise of mercy,"
"Mercy and truth preserve the king: and his throne is upholden by mercy." One story that I love is about the guy who got in way over his head in debt (perhaps it was credit card debt) Anyway he went up before the creditor and said I don't have the cash and begged and pleaded for his life. This man showed him mercy and forgave the debt ( Imagine if Visa/Mastercard/Amex called you up today and said, you know what I have been thinking about this and I know you will never be able to repay me this debt so I am going to just write this off, you owe me nothing.) When the guy walked out however he didn't retain the knowledge of the mercy he was given. No no, he ran down a guy who owed him money, and tried to make him pay up. The guy who showed him mercy found out about it and reinstated the debt.
We have been forgiven a great debt, that we could never have repaid. Our creditor showed us the ultimate mercy that no get out of debt service could ever do. What are we to do now? Show that same mercy back to those who have done to us the way we did God. The good Lord said if we don't forgive others he won't forgive us. Let's remember our promise of mercy.

"The promise he made to our fathers, to Abraham and his children for ever."
"Tho all men are liars God is true." That is a paraphrase by the NLT but it is one of my favorite sayings. In this world where we are hard pressed to even trust own clergy, it is good to know that God has never once lied to anyone. He never said I will give you this and give you that instead. God promised the people of Israel that He would send them a Messiah, and Mary just announced that promise was fulfilled, through her.

No wonder they call her blessed.

Is that more in line with what you wanted Polycarp?

I like the "magnificat"..........I must have sung it a thousand times.

It informs me even Mary was a sinner , only sinners need saving....."I rejoice in God my Saviour"

sorry if this has been said already.

With all the threads about Mary and the divisiveness that's resulted, I wanted to see if we could look at what she actually said, as recorded in the written Scriptures, and turn the focus from her as a person, to her testifying to God's work in her life.

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One can read thru the whole OT[psalms for example] for the work God was doing in people's lives. Abraham, David, Solomon not to mention the Prophets of God and also Paul. etc.

"From this day all generations will call me blessed: the Almighty has done great things for me, and holy is his Name."
How prophetic is it that even today Mary is still called the Blessed Virgin? Who could argue that the Lord did not only do great things for her, but through her act of obedience? Holy is his name!!!

Imagine being in that time and really your only role a a woman would be to be a wife and to bear children.

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Same thing can be said for those today, both men and women, that God calls upon through His Holy Spirit. Yes women are blessed with having children and bringing them to God also.

You have to look at the sytem of symbolism in Revelation, which is very consistent. Nowhere is God or the Holy Spirit ever represented as a woman.

In Revelation 12 every symbolic character, Woman, Child, Dragon etc. represents an individual person. The simplest interpretation of the Woman who gives birth to Jesus is that she is His mother, Mary. If anything other than the most natural interpretation of a symbolic character in Revelation is intended, that "more difficult" interpretation is explained in the text. No such "other" explanation exists for the Woman.

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A whole book could be written on the symbology of revelation [which I am currently working on myself btw].
The New Jerusalem is represented as a Bride and woman and Paul describes the Jerusalem above as Mother of us ALL.[hard to see that as Mary right now] It doesn't mean I lessen the role of Mary, but I try to understand more of the devineness in the whole Bible itself and the devineness of God,His Holy Spirit and the Son. In fact, revelation mentions Christ as God the Almighty in places.

Luke 1:34 Then Mary said to the angel, "How can this be, since I do not know a man?" 35 And the angel answered and said to her, "[The] Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Highest will overshadow you; therefore, also, that Holy One who is to be born will be called the Son of God. 36 "Now indeed, Elizabeth your relative has also conceived a son in her old age; and this is now the sixth month for her who was called barren. 37 "For with God nothing will be impossible."

Paul is telling both of a bondwoman and a freewoman. In revelation, it also shows 2 women, One giving birth to the "manchild" taken up to God, and the other one both as a "Harlot" and "Great City". So the woman in chapt 12 could be either Mary or the Holy Spirit or both as the "Mother", depending on how one views the bible. It does show the Harlot[bondwoman and son] being cast in the "lake of fire".

galat 4:25 for this Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and corresponds to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children -- 26 but the Jerusalem above is free, which is the MOTHER of us all. 27 For it is written: "Rejoice, O barren, [You] who do not bear! Break forth and shout, You who are not in labor! For the desolate has many more children Than she who has a husband." 28 Now we, brethren, as Isaac [was,] are children of promise. 29 But, as he who was born according to the flesh then persecuted him [who was born] according to the Spirit, even so [it is] now. 30 Nevertheless what does the Scripture say? "Cast out the bondwoman and her son, for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman." 31 So then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman but of the free.

It informs me even Mary was a sinner , only sinners need saving....."I rejoice in God my Saviour"

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I don't see that in the Magnificat, nor am I aware of any Scripture that states that only those who sin need salvation. You are drawing your conclusion from a premise that I find doubtful.

"for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant."

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It informs me even Mary was a sinner , only sinners need saving....."I rejoice in God my Saviour"

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Oblio said:

I don't see that in the Magnificat, nor am I aware of any Scripture that states that only those who sin need salvation. You are drawing your conclusion from a premise that I find doubtful.

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So is the magnifcat prayed to worship Mary as much as Jesus? Put simply, Mary could have been any woman and the fact that Jesus had to be born of a young woman makes this even more relevant.[ Look at who Paul was when Jesus came to him just for an example.]
One thing that most don't appear to see is what the word Mary means "Mary or Miriam = "their rebellion". Elisabeth means "Oath of God". We have to remember that sometimes, names are used as symbolic titles and I look also at the meaning of names in the bible.
Of course when I am reading through Luke, I read this praise and prayer of Mary, but there are hundreds of those in the OT praising God and His Name. God bless.

12 "[Is] this not the word that we told you in Egypt, saying, 'Let us alone that we may serve the Egyptians?' For [it would have been] better for us to serve the Egyptians than that we should die in the wilderness." 13 And Moses said to the people, "Do not be afraid. Stand still, and see the salvation of the LORD, which He will accomplish for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall see again no more forever. 14 "The LORD will fight for you, and you shall hold your peace."

So is the magnifcat prayed to worship Mary as much as Jesus?

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No. Neither is it prayed to worship Mary the Theotokos in any capacity. If you have been told this by someone then they have misrepresented and borne false witness against those who rightfully venerate the Theotokos.

One thing that most don't appear to see is what the word Mary means "Mary or Miriam = "their rebellion". Elisabeth means "Oath of God". We have to remember that sometimes, names are used as symbolic titles and I look also at the meaning of names in the bible.

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Not sure what nameology you are inferring here. That the Theotokos was in rebellion ?? What is your point ??

One thing that most don't appear to see is what the word Mary means "Mary or Miriam = "their rebellion". Elisabeth means "Oath of God". We have to remember that sometimes, names are used as symbolic titles and I look also at the meaning of names in the bible.

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Not sure what nameology you are inferring here. That the Theotokos was in rebellion ?? What is your point ??

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I wasn't referring to Mary herself but to show how names in the bible are often used in the "context" of the bible.
The rulers of the House of Judah itself were in "rebellion against God" and was a symbolic reference to them I believe, not to Mary.
I am just into deeper study and I meant no offense. Just as the names Abraham and David. If you put them together you come out with "Jesus Christ, son of the beloved father of multitudes". It is just the way I study the bible.

Matthew 1:1 The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the Son of David["beloved"], the Son of Abraham["father of multitudes"]:


The children of Rachel were Joseph and Benjamin of the house of Judah. I feel this is a prophecy on the coming destruction of Jerusalem although this is talking about herod killing all the children under 3 yrs old. Of course the temple and its rulers were wiped out in the first century. Just the way I myself viewed it.

Matthew 2:18 "A voice was heard in Ramah["hill"], Lamentation, weeping, and great mourning, Rachel["sheep"] weeping [for] her children, Refusing to be comforted, Because they are no more."


1 corin 2:13 These things we also speak, not in words which man's wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. 14 But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know [them,] because they are spiritually discerned. 15 But he who is spiritual judges all things, yet he himself is [rightly] judged by no one. 16 For "who has known the mind of the LORD that he may instruct Him?" But we have the mind of Christ.

Oblio said:

I don't see that in the Magnificat, nor am I aware of any Scripture that states that only those who sin need salvation. You are drawing your conclusion from a premise that I find doubtful.

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so you know of some who never have sinned ?

Holy Scripture says ALL have sinned.

so you know of some who never have sinned ?

Holy Scripture says ALL have sinned.

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Read my statement again, I was not making any statements with regard to your question, nor was I stating that the Theotokos was sinless.

I said I do not see that (conclusion that Mary sinned) in the Magnificat. I also stated that the premise only sinners need saving in the original statemnt was faulty. I stand by that statement.

I mention this because many Protestants erect this strawman WRT to the Theotokos (usually in their attack on her Ever Virginity). They believe that Orthodox do not think that Mary needed to be saved and was somehow above the rest of fallen humanity. This is patently false. This is undergirded by a false (IMO) soteriologal view that sin is inherited and that if one were to lead a sinless life one would not need salvation. Neither one of these is true. As we all are born into this fallen world we are separated from God the author of life and wll die a physical death, a sinless life will not save us or the Theotokos.

Polycarp1 said:

Second, Paul was making a generic statement about people as a whole -- all of us have sinned, and need to repent and accept God's forgiveness.

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Excepet he does not say "all of us" but indeed "all" which would include Mary.

Polycarp1 said:

The only difference between Mary and the rest of us, according to them, is that Jesus waged a "pre-emptive strike" in her behalf, keeping her pure as a place in which He could take on human nature. She was saved ahead of time through His Atonement -- even though it hadn't happened yet from our perspective.

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And yet, even individuals in the Old testament spoke of God as their "Savior", so were they also saved ahead of time in the same way as Mary? Were they without sin? Or was Jesus simply the savior of all of God's people prior to His birth as a sort of forward looking to His actual death and resurrection? There is no indication that the use of this word by mary is any different than any other Old Testament claim of finding a Savior in God.