Mary the Mother of Jesus (2)

The last post introduced the subject of this occasional series. From this point on, then, when I speak of Mary, I mean the mother of Jesus. As you might know, there are several other Marys in the New Testament: Mary Magdalene, Mary the sister of Martha and Lazarus, and the list goes on. In fact, at least eight and perhaps as many as nine different women in the New Testament are named Mary.

So, we're talking about Mary the mother of Jesus, and the question is: What does the Bible say about her? What can we know about her? A few statistics. She is mentioned by name:

5 times in the Gospel of Matthew

1 time in Mark

12 times in Luke

never in the Gospel of John (we'll come back to that)

and 1 time in the Book of Acts

In addition to those 19 places where Mary is mentioned by name, there are a few passages where she is simply referred to as the mother of Jesus. For example, although the Gospel of John never names Mary, in fact this gospel tells us some things about her we would not know otherwise. Without calling her by name, the Gospel of John provides us unique information about her in two passages.

In John chapter 2, when Jesus performs his first miracle, turning water into wine, she's there. Here's how the chapter begins: On the third day a wedding took place at Cana of Galilee. Jesus' mother was there, and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. . . .

In addition, John is the only gospel account that clearly tells us that Mary was present at the crucifixion: 19:25 says that his mother and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene were present.

So, again, there are points in the New Testament where, although Mary is not named, the writer clearly refers to her.

There is still another type of nameless reference to Mary. Here I'm thinking of passages that do not speak of "the mother of Jesus" but nonetheless identify her. A good example of this is found in Galatians 4:4, where Paul says, But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, . . . And, of course, we know who that woman was.

So, then, what do we have? The New Testament mentions Mary by name 19 times. In addition, the New Testament includes a handful of references to her that do not use her name. More later.

Mary the Mother of Jesus (1)

Many years ago I was struggling to learn how to preach. It was around then that the elders of my home church in Altus, Oklahoma, invited me to deliver the Sunday-evening sermon.

I have no memory of what that sermon was about. That's probably good. The more I remember about my sermons back then, the more I feel a little embarrassed. There is a true sense in which ignorance is bliss.

What I do remember about that evening is not what I said, but what someone else said afterwards. After the final "Amen," after many of the people had left, I was talking with a woman who said something I haven't forgotten.

Before I tell you what she said, let me describe her to you. She was a widow, about seventy years old, in good health, very active for someone her age. She always looked nice, was soft-spoken, unassuming, kind-hearted, and just a fine person.

We were standing near the back of the auditorium, when she said to me, "I was so glad to hear you mention Mary tonight in your sermon. I don't think you know this about me, but before I became a member of the Church of Christ, I belonged to the Roman Catholic Church."

"No, I didn't know that."

She said, "After I became a member of the Church of Christ, one of the first things I noticed was, it was as if Mary had never lived. The preachers and teachers didn't talk about Mary, which was a shock because, in the Catholic Church, I heard about Mary all the time." 

Then she said, "I understand: the Catholic Church has made her out to be something she isn't. But, you know, there's quite a bit in the New Testament about her. And she was a great person. I sort of miss Mary, and wish I heard more about her."

As you would guess, the lady who said that to me isn't with us anymore. But I like to think of my posts about Mary as being partly for that good Christian woman. More later.

MacCulloch, Chapter 11

"The West: Universal Emperor or Universal Pope? (900-1200)" is the title of this chapter.

Abbots, Warriors and Popes: Cluny's Legacy

MacCulloch begins by describing the massive abbey at Cluny in Burgundy and how it represented devotion to "the creation of ever more splendid Benedictine houses" (p. 363). During this same time in England, the powerful influence of Bishop Aethelwold led to the building of cathedral churches which also served as monasteries. Along this line, the author remarks: "One should never underestimate the significance of architecture in Christianity and particularly not in the era of reform which now emerged" (365). MacCulloch also relates the expansion of Christian pilgrimage, especially to Santiago de Compostela located in northwestern Spain. Together, these developments expressed and led to what the author calls a real "Reformation" (366) of the eleventh century.

Along with this "Reformation of the Middle Ages," there was an economic boom that accompanied increased farm production and with it a change in "the nature of the Western Church's ministry to society, making it pay more attention to the needs and obligations of the humble and relatively poor" (368). The need to organize an expanded ministry led to the invention of the parochiae, parishes.

Ministry among the emerging middle classes had a major unintended consequence: unlike the wealthy, these people could not afford full payment for their sins. And this, says MacCulloch, "was where the idea of a middle state between Heaven and Hell, first envisaged in the theology of the Alexandrian theologians Clement and Origen at the turn of the second and third centuries, proved so useful and comforting" (370). By the late twelfth century, people were talking about a place called Purgatory. Something else: new found wealth led to local battles for it, and so it was that the church emerged as arbitrator and peacemaker.

The Vicar of Christ: Marriage, Celibacy and Universal Monarchy

During the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the Western Church "did its best to gain more control over the most intimate part of human existence, sexual relations and marriage" (371). Part of the motivation for this new effort was based on a fear: "Married clergy might well found dynasties, and might therefore be inclined to make Church lands into their hereditary property, just as secular lords were doing at the same time. The result was a long battle to forbid marriage for all clergy" (372-73).

The period also saw the growth of the papacy. A new era came with Gregory VII (reigned 1073-85), the pope "who drew together all the strands of papal self-assertion" (374). The development of the papacy generated "a complex central bureaucracy," the cardinals, as well as canon law and "a staggering heritage of architectural beauty: the cathedrals of medieval Catholic Europe" (376-78). "Perhaps the most perfect of all is the cathedral of Chartes" (380).

The Age of the Crusades (1060-1200)

Overall, I thought this section was inadequate. But maybe that had more to do with my interest in the Crusades than any deficiency in the author. Either way, MacCulloch identifies some of the factors that led to the Crusades. For decades on end, the Church in Spain had been driving out the Muslims; a certain Caliph al-Hakin in Egypt had ordered the demolition of the Basilica of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem; and much like the growing phenomenon of pilgrimage, warfare had become a means of accruing spiritual merit.

Cistercians, Carthusians and Mary (1100-1200)

Here MacCulloch describes the reaction away from the lavish institutional Church. In short, the Carthusian monastic order emphasized "simplicity and self-denial" (389), while the Cistercians focused on separation from the world and built austere churches, unlike those of "Clunaic splendor" (390). Last but not least during this time was the further development of the cult of Mary. When the Greek theotokos (God-bearer) was translated into Latin, the expression signified something more like "Mother of God." Such language led to the full adoption of Mary's perpetual virginity; to the development of the doctrine of her immaculate conception (which refers to the conception of Mary and is different from the doctrine of the virginal conception of Christ); and to the origin of the story of Mary's assumption. In Catholicism, it's not just "something," it's a lot of things about Mary.