Ben Witherington III
**This article was originally published in Bible Review. Full citation below.**
Being
first to hear doesn’t always mean being first to understand. In Luke’s
birth narrative, Mary is the first to be told that Jesus will be the
messiah. Luke adds that she “treasures the words” the angel Gabriel
speaks to her. But Mary is also puzzled by the divine message; she is
“perplexed” when the angel greets her and must “ponder” the meaning of
his words (Luke 1:29; see also 2:19). In this, Mary contrasts sharply
with Simeon and Anna, two elderly individuals who happen to be in the
Temple when Joseph and Mary bring the infant Jesus to Jerusalem for the
first time.
According
to Luke 2:22–24, “[Joseph and Mary] brought him up to Jerusalem to
present him to the Lord (as it is written in the law of the Lord, ‘Every
firstborn male shall be designated as holy to the Lord’ [quoting Exodus
13:2, 12]) and they offered a sacrifice according to what is stated in
the law of the Lord, ‘a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons’ [based
on Leviticus 12:2–8].”
At
the Temple, the family is approached by a man named Simeon, who has
been told by the Holy Spirit that he will not die until he has seen the
messiah. (The same Spirit told him to go to the Temple that day, too.)
Simeon takes Jesus in his arms and praises God: “Master, now you are
dismissing your servant in peace, according to your word; for my eyes
have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the presence of all
peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to your
people Israel” (Luke 2:28–32). Having seen the messiah, Simeon is now
prepared to die.
Anna
then approaches the Holy Family. She, too, recognizes Jesus as messiah,
but she has a very different reaction: “At that moment, she came and
began to speak about the child to all who were looking for the
redemption of Jerusalem” (Luke 2:38). She is 84 years old, according to
Luke, and she does not want to die: She wants to proselytize. Like the
disciples who will follow her, she is driven to bear witness to what she
has seen. Mary was the first to have the good news announced to her,
but Anna is the first woman to understand fully and proclaim the good
news.
This
is because in addition to being a proselytizer, Anna is a “prophetess”
(Luke 2:36). In fact, she is the only woman in the New Testament
explicitly described as a “prophetess.” She then stands in the line of
figures like the judge, military leader and prophetess Deborah and the
Jerusalem prophetess Huldah, who, in the days of King Josiah, was asked
to verify that an ancient scroll (a form of Deuteronomy) discovered
during Temple renovations was indeed the word of God (2 Kings 22).
Unlike
Simeon, Anna is not just visiting the Temple for the day; she is there
all the time. According to Luke, Anna “never left the Temple but
worshiped there with fasting and prayer night and day” (Luke 2:37).
Perhaps she was part of some sort of order of widows (Luke tells us her
husband died after only seven years of marriage) who had specific
religious functions in the Temple. She may have been able to undertake
this role in the Temple because she was no longer in periodic states of
ritual impurity caused by menstruation.
Luke may also
have seen Anna as the second witness in or around the Temple needed to
validate Jesus’ significance. Deuteronomy 19:15 stresses the importance
of having two witnesses to validate an event.
The
pairing of Simeon and Anna reflects Luke’s penchant for male-female
parallelism when he writes about the recipients of divine blessing and
salvation. The story of Jesus’ birth is framed by two such stories—that
of Elizabeth and Zechariah in Luke 1 and Anna and Simeon in Luke 2.
Interestingly, in both, the woman is portrayed as the more positive
example of discipleship. The women are not only more receptive to the
message, they are more willing to act upon it, with Elizabeth realizing
that her cousin is carrying the messiah and praising God for this
blessing and Anna spreading the good news.
Alfred
Plummer, in his classic commentary on Luke, suggested that the
difference between Anna and Simeon provides a clue to Luke as a
salvation historian, a chronicler of the mighty acts of God for his
people through the ages. Yes, a messiah has arrived, as Simeon
recognizes, but, as the prophetess Anna suggests, a new era, with a new
and living voice of prophecy, has at the same time dawned.
1
In this new era, the living voice of God will continue to speak about
the messianic one. Anna is the first in a line of prophetic disciples
who will speak about Jesus to all who were looking for the redemption of
Israel.
Not
everyone can be a prophet, however. Mary, for example, does not fully
understand what Anna immediately recognizes. And she won’t for several
years.
Twelve years after the presentation of Jesus in
the Temple, the Holy Family returns to Jerusalem and Jesus returns to
the Temple, this time by himself. Mary and Joseph search for him
frantically for three days. When at last they find him listening to and
asking questions of the teachers in the Temple, Mary asks, “Child, why
have you treated us like this? Look, your father and I have been
searching for you in great anxiety.” Jesus responds, “Did you not know
that I must be in my Father’s house?” But, Luke reports, “they did not
understand what he said to them … [but] his mother treasured all these
things in her heart” (Luke 2:48–51). The late New Testament scholar
Raymond Brown wrote:
“Luke’s idea is that complete
acceptance of the word of God, complete understanding of who Jesus is,
and complete discipleship is not yet possible. This will come through
the ministry of Jesus and particularly through the cross and
resurrection.”
This article was originally published in
Bible Review. All
Bible Review articles (1985-2005) are available in the
BAS Library, as well as on the
Bible Review Archive CD. Read more at - http://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/biblical-topics/new-testament/mary-simeon-or-anna-who-first-recognized-jesus-as-messiah/
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