Posted on 01/03/2018 10:28:23 AM PST by Salvation
Yesterday we continued our meditation on the Eighth Day of Christmas by pondering the meaning of the Lord’s circumcision, which occurred on that day. In today’s post we consider another thing that took place on the same day: The name “Jesus” was announced and ascribed to Him.
Was this really the best name for Him? Why did the angel say that He should be called Jesus? Was He not referred to by other names (e.g., Emmanuel) in the Old Testament? What is the significance of the name “Jesus”?
St. Thomas Aquinas, through his Summa Theologiae, will be our teacher in this analysis. His teachings are presented below in bold, black italics, while my commentary appears in plain, red text. St. Thomas takes up the following question:
Whether His name was suitably given to Christ? (Summa Theologiae III, Q 37, Art 2).
A name should answer to the nature of a thing. This is clear in the names of genera and species, as stated Metaph. iv: “Since a name is but an expression of the definition” which designates a thing’s proper nature.
Now, the names of individual men are always taken from some property of the men to whom they are given. Either in regard to time; thus men are named after the Saints on whose feasts they are born: or in respect of some blood relation; thus a son is named after his father or some other relation; and thus the kinsfolk of John the Baptist wished to call him “by his father’s name Zachary,” not by the name John, because “there” was “none of” his “kindred that” was “called by this name,” as related Luke 1:59-61. Or, again, from some occurrence; thus Joseph “called the name of” the “first-born Manasses, saying: God hath made me to forget all my labors” (Genesis 41:51). Or, again, from some quality of the person who receives the name; thus it is written (Genesis 25:25) that “he that came forth first was red and hairy like a skin; and his name was called Esau,” which is interpreted “red.”
But names given to men by God always signify some gratuitous gift bestowed on them by Him; thus it was said to Abraham (Genesis 17:5): “Thou shalt be called Abraham; because I have made thee a father of many nations”: and it was said to Peter (Matthew 16:18): “Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church.” Since, therefore, this prerogative of grace was bestowed on the Man Christ that through Him all men might be saved, therefore He was becomingly named Jesus, i.e. Savior: the angel having foretold this name not only to His Mother, but also to Joseph, who was to be his foster father.
This line of reasoning raises another question, which St. Thomas now takes up by articulating an objection to the fact that He was named Jesus rather than something else (e.g., Emmanuel):
It would seem that an unsuitable name was given to Christ. For the Gospel reality should correspond to the prophetic foretelling. But the prophets foretold [other names] for Christ: for it is written (Isaiah 7:14): “Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and His name shall be called Emmanuel”; and (Isaiah 8:3): “Call His name, Hasten to take away the spoils; Make haste to take away the prey”; and (Isaiah 9:6): “His name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor God the Mighty, the Father of the world to come, the Prince of Peace”; and (Zechariah 6:12): “Behold a Man, the Orient is His name.” Thus it was unsuitable that His name should be called Jesus (Objection 1).
All these names in some way mean the same as Jesus, which means “salvation.” For the name “Emmanuel, which being interpreted is ‘God with us,’” designates the cause of salvation, which is the union of the Divine and human natures in the Person of the Son of God, the result of which union was that “God is with us.”
When it was said, “Call his name, Hasten to take away,” etc., these words indicate from what He saved us, viz. from the devil, whose spoils He took away, according to Colossians 2:15: “Despoiling the principalities and powers, He hath exposed them confidently.”
When it was said, “His name shall be called Wonderful,” etc., the way and term of our salvation are pointed out: inasmuch as “by the wonderful counsel and might of the Godhead we are brought to the inheritance of the life to come,” in which the children of God will enjoy “perfect peace” under “God their Prince.”
When it was said, “Behold a Man, the Orient is His name,” reference is made to the same, as in the first, viz. to the mystery of the Incarnation, by reason of which “to the righteous a light is risen up in darkness” (Psalm 111:4). (Reply to Objection 1).
The key to interpreting Scripture is doing so within the context of the entirety of Scripture. One must read Scripture with the Church, not apart from it. God is not in the business of contradicting Himself.
“Jesus” (God saves) pretty well sums it up!
11We count blessed those who endured. You have heard of the endurance of Job and have seen the outcome of the Lord’s dealings, that the Lord is full of compassion and is merciful. (NASB)
It's use is not unique to Mary.
The verb, μακαρίζω (makarizó) conveys the meaning of: pronounce blessed, as the result of enjoying the benefits (privileges) that (literally) extend from God. See 3107 (makarios).http://biblehub.com/greek/3106.htm
A person unable or unwilling to make the distinction between the Catholic Church and the entire CHURCH -the body of all believers in Christ Jesus as their Savior- will not be able to differentiate traditions and God authored Scriptures because they are not discerning the spiritual ...
I never said "Blessed" is unique to Mary.
It seems you find the term "Blessed" to be of wide applicability, Excellent! How very Catholic!
Here's a list of approx. 750 "offical" "blesseds" in the Catholic Church (These are people who have been officially beatified (Link) It's definitely worth a click, because each name is hyperlinked to a short article which tells his/her story. They range from about the 6th century to the late 20th century.
This does not include the canonized saints (of whom there are thousands) or angels (of whom there are "myriads") or people who are in heaven but have received no especial recognition. This latter number will ultimately be "countless":
Revelation 7:9
After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands.
You too --- I hope --- Blessed Ealgeone.
Never said you did. You asked why I never called her "Blessed". Because she is not called that in Scripture.
I also noted the difference between what Rome says and what Luke says...there is a difference.
I will note though that based on James, all believers could be considered blessed.
As Rome teaches none can be sure they gain Heaven at death....how can Rome affirm or deny if the 750 "beatified" individuals are really in Heaven? Or any of the "canonized" saints?
Christianity teaches that we can know if a departed believer is in Heaven based on the following promise of Jesus:
24“Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life. John 5:24 NASB
Christianity and Roman Catholicism....there is a difference.
We like to fulfill this prophecy with joy, because Scripture says she's our mother: precisely in that section about the Mother of the Messiah, the "Woman Clothed with the Sun" which says we are "the rest of her offspring":
Revelation 12:17
Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring --- those who keep God’s commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus.
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Oh, my gosh! A twofer!
I've already shown you what the Greek says. Mary is "counted" as blessed by all generations - not called blessed. So your statement is false twice, Mrs. Don-o.
Second, Scripture never calls Mary our mother. Ever. The passage about Israel is not about Mary. Great try though.
I do hope your new year is off to a good start.
Luke 7:28 I tell you, among those born of women none is greater than John. Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he.”
If I remember my church history correctly...
1: Jesus dies and is resurrected.
2: Apostles are sent out.
3: Majority of what we call Scripture is written.
4: Apostles start to die, mostly from martyrdom, and so they are not available to settle theological disputes.
5: Church leaders write creeds or statements of faith in accord with apostolic teaching in order to settle theological disputes. Some of the early forms of these creeds can be found in the epistles, especially in 1 Corinthians.
6: The canon of the New Testament starts to be formed. The Pauline epistles are already being circulated together, but there are requirements for any other additions. A: They must be written by an apostle or a companion of an apostle. B: They must be truthful, and this is where the Creeds come in. Because the creeds were simple statements of faith, any epistle or gospel that contradicted them could be easily dismissed.
7: So it goes that Jesus teaches Apostles, Apostles (and companions) write Scripture, Church uses Scripture and apostolic teaching to write Creeds, then Creeds are used to authenticate Scripture. The Creeds are also accepted as accurate confessions of the Christian faith.
8: But because the Creeds are drawn from Scripture, which is drawn from the teaching of the Apostles, which is drawn from the teaching of Jesus, it is Scripture that predominates. The only places that traditions show up are in the Creeds, and even then the Creeds are drawn from Scripture and subservient to the Word of God.
9: Scripture, therefore, is the norm of our faith because it is the accurately preserved teaching of the Apostles—and the teaching of Jesus, and anything that contradicts Scripture (which in turn contradicts Jesus and the Apostles) must be thrown out. And that unfortunately includes a whole MESS of Roman traditions.
tl;dr: Roman traditions have no evidence for coming from the Apostles and Jesus other than Roman Catholic because-I-said-so, whereas Holy Scripture has plenty of evidence of coming from the Apostles and Jesus. So we should be paying attention to what the Apostles themselves actually wrote before anything else.
"... and the woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, in which she is to be nourished for 1,260 days." (All Bible quotes from the ESV)
The sun, moon, and twelve stars were shown in the Old Testament to be the nation Israel, for in Joseph's dream, it represented the family of Jacob (Israel), as written in Genesis 37:9-10:
"Then he dreamed another dream and told it to his brothers and said, 'Behold, I have dreamed another dream. Behold, the sun, the moon, and eleven stars were bowing down to me.' But when he told it to his father and to his brothers, his father rebuked him and said to him, 'What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall I and your mother and your brothers indeed come to bow ourselves to the ground before you?'"
Furthermore, Revelation 12:13-17 says,
"And when the dragon saw that he had been thrown down to the earth, he pursued the woman who had given birth to the male child.But the woman was given the two wings of the great eagle so that she might fly from the serpent into the wilderness, to the place where she is to be nourished for a time, and times, and half a time.
The serpent poured water like a river out of his mouth after the woman, to sweep her away with a flood.
But the earth came to the help of the woman, and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed the river that the dragon had poured from his mouth.
Then the dragon became furious with the woman and went off to make war on the rest of her offspring, on those who keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus. And he stood on the sand of the sea."
When was Satan cast down? When did/will this happen to the Woman? When were/are these 1,260 days? Why exclude these other portions of Revelation 12 when describing the Woman?
Aside from the translation error, you persist in the error of putting blessed in caps.
It is not a title no matter how much Rome wants it to be.
If you're going to go with this then everyone should be referred to as "Blessed Mrs.Don-o" or "Blessed ealgeone".
Scripture does not support this usage or the Roman Catholic claim.
Christianity and Roman Catholicism....there is a difference.
You asserted, “It says all generations “will” call Mary Blessed.” How very cunning, to capitalize blessed so that it becomes a part of title for the Mother of Jesus. Could nopt bring yourself to write ‘all generations will call Mary blessed.’ Typical and quite telling ...
“Why is the quote cut off in the middle of Revelation 12:6?”
I suspect it is caused by adding the Roman element Hopium.
Surely your comments about "counted" blessed vs "called" blessed are a distinction without a difference.
The meaning here is not "counted" as in "enumerated" (it's not like they're using numbers, saying "1-2-3 Mary Blessed Be") --- the meaning is "counted" as in "called."
Over here at BibleHub (LINK) it shows 25 translations for Luke 1:48. Twenty say "call," three say "count," and one vote each for "ascribe" and "account". Note that KJV and KJV2000 both use "call".
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Now! For the second part of the "twofer": is the woman of the "Great Sign" Mary? Or somebody else?
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The answer is "yes" and "yes." Like most signs, it is multivalent. Signs can have, and so often do have, multiple layers of meaning.
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A very good line of reasoning would conclude that the Woman of the Great Sign has four related meanings:
So: four overlapping references for this Great Sign personage. Does any one of them have priority?
You could get votes for each of the four. All four are meaningful but I would lean toward "Mary" having priority, because meanings always start with the literal, and she's the literal mother of the literal Messiah described in the passage. And because Jesus, on His cross, gave his mother a son (John)(representing the faithful --- all the others had fled) and gave His faithful --- His Church --- a Mother.
You'll notice that these images inhere in each other.
So many Christians have portrayed her in all these different ways, contemplating the meaning(s) of the Great Sign of Rev. 12.
Some Freepers here in FReeperville like to cheep and cheep that she's nothing special.
But countless numbers of Christians would say, yes, this faithful handmaid, this fair Jewish girl of Galilee, this redeemed one, this Kecharitomene, this Lady of the Incarnation, this Virgin-Mother Mary--- because He who is mighty has done great things for her --- is Something Special.
Could nopt (sic) bring yourself to write ‘all generations will call Mary blessed.’
Here ya go:
No problem at all.
Aramaic, Hebrew, and I think Latin and Greek (at that time) are all-caps. These alphabets did not even have, at the time of late Roman antiquity, lower-case letters.
To address your larger point: what's your allergic itch about "titles"? Titles as we're using them don't confer anything, they acknowledge something. I can call Mary "Queen of the Little House on Unaka" if I want to. "Woman Clothed with the Sun": that's quite an honor, right there, much greater than anything I could say about it.
All honor comes from Christ and accrues to Christ. We love His Mother. We love all His people. "Blessed be God in His Angels and in His Saints."
Don't you know that the Lord LOVES to lift up the lowly? Negative reactions against the strewing of flowers at this good girl's feet seem so wizened and petty.
There ya go.<
You insinuate bad motive where none is intended.
Short answers for you.
1. I referred you to the Greek, because those are the words inspired by the Spirit. Best translation is that people will surely considered blessed.
Mary is never given the title Blessed.
2. The correct ID of “the woman” is Israel.
I’d add art, but of course the opinions of artists are not inspired by the Spirit.
“A very good line of reasoning would conclude that the Woman of the Great Sign has four related meanings:”
Roman Hopium & wishogesis.
Nothing in the context, nor Daniel’s prophecy says anything except Israel.
So, in your no-hopium view, who is the mother of the Messiah?
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