NATIVITY OF THE THEOTOKOS

Of all the Gospel passages that might be suitable for reading at today’s service, the most theologically appropriate would be the story of the Nativity of Christ from the Gospel of Matthew. This short narrative begins immediately after the genealogy of Jesus Christ, and takes up only eight verses, from 18 to 25. “The birth of Jesus Christ was thus,” are the opening words. “Finally, she brought forth her firstborn Son, and Joseph called His name Jesus,” is the end of the story of the Nativity. The Mother of God had nothing of her own. The birth of the Son was both the beginning and the end, accomplished on the Cross of Christ, of the entire biography of the Most Holy Theotokos.

By analogy with the Christmas time of the liturgical year, when the doxology “Christ is born” is proclaimed, the liturgical texts repeat the whole story of Mary bringing joy to the world with her birth. “Your Nativity, O Virgin, has proclaimed joy to the whole universe; the Sun of Righteousness, Christ our God, has shone from You, O Theotokosç by annulling the curse, He bestowed a blessing; by destroying death, he has granted us eternal life,” is sung in the troparion of the feast. At the same time, the Holy Spirit, through the mouth of the Apostle Paul, says that “we no longer know Christ according to the flesh” (2 Cor. 5:16). We do not have direct, historical, “linear,” biographical access to the events which took place in the biblical times contemporary with the Lord Jesus.

Perhaps, apocryphal texts help us to better understand and comprehend what was happening to Mary at that time. This is what the Church’s memory chose to call those early documents that were inscribed with the names of the Apostles and other contemporaries of Christ’s earthly deeds, but did not have sufficient authority to be accepted into the canon of the Holy Books of the New Testament Scriptures. Apocryphal texts help us to better understand and comprehend, to feel in a certain “symbolic way” what was then happening.

Thus, by analogy with the infertility of Sarah, Abraham’s wives, Mary’s parents were also infertile. Thus, in analogy with the barrenness of Sarah, Abraham’s wife, Mary’s parents were also barren. Like the precious Ark of the Covenant, which kept the tablets of God’s Commandments given to Moses, Mary was consecrated as a child at the Temple, so that the Living Commandment of God, Jesus, would come forth from Her for the salvation of all. Finally, just as the Ark of the Covenant was not destroyed, but secretly hid it in a cave on a mountain (2 Macc. 2:4-5), Mary’s body did not see the devastation of human death, but was taken up by the Son of God in Her Assumption into Heaven. Thanks to these texts, among which the “Protoevangelium of James” stands out, we can, if not literally learn, then internally comprehend some glorious details of this or that event in the Life of Mary. However, these texts could not become for Christians bearers of truths in the direct historical sense of what was happening in that distant time.

Due to this historical imperfection in knowledge of the specific details of the celebrated event, the theology of the Nativity of Mary acquires poetic features. The liturgy of the feast has features of doxology. The Nativity of the Virgin Mary is the fulfillment of biblical promises. The Nativity of the Virgin Mary is a pledge of the Nativity of Christ, which is approaching in the birth of the Mother of God. After all, the Nativity of Christ itself, in accordance with the words of Paul just quoted, is also inaccessible to us, and is sometimes understood by us as a completely theological narrative.

Christ is risen, He sits at the right hand of the Father. And He is returning. He is about to return in His glorious Second Coming. And the celebration of the Nativity of the Mother of God is undoubtedly one of the echoes of the approaching event In the prayers of the Liturgy, the Second Coming of Christ is perceived as an already accomplished fact. And if something has happened, then everything that preceded this accomplished fact can and should be perceived exclusively as a prelude and remembrance that has already taken place. Therefore, celebrating the Nativity of the Mother of God, we, in the words of the Early Christian Church, cry out with the words of the Apocalypse: “Our Lord is coming. Maranatha!” (Rev. 22:20).