Veneration of Mary and Luke 11:27-28
In this passage, Jesus is not reproaching His Mother, or slighting her - as some would suggest. Rather, He is telling us that blood relations are not what is important. It doesn't matter if you are a relative of Jesus - as if that were something to boast about. What is important is to hear the Word of God and obey.
And this is exactly what Mary did and does to this day. It is precisely because she was immaculately conceived and sinless, because she listened to the Word of God and obeyed that she was able to freely give her assent, her fiat to God and conceive of Christ in her womb. The Father of the Church said that Mary conceived Jesus in her heart before ever conceiving Him in her womb.
And this is exactly what Mary did and does to this day. It is precisely because she was immaculately conceived and sinless, because she listened to the Word of God and obeyed that she was able to freely give her assent, her fiat to God and conceive of Christ in her womb. The Father of the Church said that Mary conceived Jesus in her heart before ever conceiving Him in her womb.
I know this is an old thread, and may have already been debated heavily in others.
But I felt compelled to sign up and post here.
The answer to this problem can be clearly found in Luke 1:38 where Mary says "behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it unto me according to thy WORD".
So when Jesus says in Luke 11:28 "blessed are they that hear the WORD of God, and keep it", he is not putting down his mother.
In fact, it is Jesus himself honoring Mary.... because indeed, she heard the WORD, and kept it, despite it being revealed by Simeon that her soul would be pierced also (Luke 2:35).
Everything is in scripture, but the key is to read and put things in context.
But I felt compelled to sign up and post here.
The answer to this problem can be clearly found in Luke 1:38 where Mary says "behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it unto me according to thy WORD".
So when Jesus says in Luke 11:28 "blessed are they that hear the WORD of God, and keep it", he is not putting down his mother.
In fact, it is Jesus himself honoring Mary.... because indeed, she heard the WORD, and kept it, despite it being revealed by Simeon that her soul would be pierced also (Luke 2:35).
Everything is in scripture, but the key is to read and put things in context.
Well Adam came from the ground and eve came from the side of him Jesus came from heaven and through his mother’s womb Adam & Eve where our first parents Adam calls eve mother in Genesis 3:20 Now the man called his wife's name Eve, because she was the mother of all the living. They brought death and original sin to all man.
Christ sacrifice on the cross eliminates sin and final death Mary besides being Christ mother is our spiritual mother not by mere blood relationship to Christ but my her obedience to the lord she first had a vow of purity to remain a virgin and said yes to the angel Gabriel without that yes there would be no salvation the exact opposite to eve's yes to sin. This is very important to understand if eve had said no there would be no sin period but since Mary said yes to God the road to salvation can be had.
God and the Church didn't leave out woman in this very important salvation plan.
The bible is very well written all good books have symmetry all artists can be seen by their works and the bible is God's fingerprints left for us to know him.
I would suggest to anyone to read the bible in its entirety not just to stick to the New Testament but rather like a historian reading a novel about clues to our history.
Christ sacrifice on the cross eliminates sin and final death Mary besides being Christ mother is our spiritual mother not by mere blood relationship to Christ but my her obedience to the lord she first had a vow of purity to remain a virgin and said yes to the angel Gabriel without that yes there would be no salvation the exact opposite to eve's yes to sin. This is very important to understand if eve had said no there would be no sin period but since Mary said yes to God the road to salvation can be had.
God and the Church didn't leave out woman in this very important salvation plan.
The bible is very well written all good books have symmetry all artists can be seen by their works and the bible is God's fingerprints left for us to know him.
I would suggest to anyone to read the bible in its entirety not just to stick to the New Testament but rather like a historian reading a novel about clues to our history.
What Jesus means is, "We are blessed by hearing and obeying His Word.... not by who we are". Are pedigrees will not get us anywhere.
Mary was blessed for participating in Salvation History, not simply because she was the "Mother of God".
Mary was blessed for participating in Salvation History, not simply because she was the "Mother of God".
I had to laugh, really, and hard. To think that any one who has read the bible would not only think but actually give voice to such a dump-witted thought is, well, laughable.
There is a reason why the angel Gabriel gave Mary the royal treatment in announcing to her: Hale Mary, full of Grace. The Lord is with you. blessed are you amongst women.
the reason is simple. Mary was, and still is, free from sin. God the Father created her in that manner and God the Son protected her, his beloved mother, against it.
Mary is special and unique. She is not only our savior's mother, she is also our mother. truly she is.
There is a reason why the angel Gabriel gave Mary the royal treatment in announcing to her: Hale Mary, full of Grace. The Lord is with you. blessed are you amongst women.
the reason is simple. Mary was, and still is, free from sin. God the Father created her in that manner and God the Son protected her, his beloved mother, against it.
Mary is special and unique. She is not only our savior's mother, she is also our mother. truly she is.
To take this verse as meaning that Mary is not blessed is based in a poor understanding of English and grammar! (And a study of the Greek word translated as "rather" or "yea, but" also reveals this.)
Reading this passage as Jesus correcting the woman's false thinking is wrong. He is not correcting the woman, but expanding on what she said.
Jesus is not saying Mary is not blessed, or even that she is not to be praised. He is saying that everyone who hears the word of God and does it is blessed.
Refer your friend back to the Annunciation, particularly Lk 1:28. Mary hears God's word and does it. She's a particularly good example of this!
Reading this passage as Jesus correcting the woman's false thinking is wrong. He is not correcting the woman, but expanding on what she said.
Jesus is not saying Mary is not blessed, or even that she is not to be praised. He is saying that everyone who hears the word of God and does it is blessed.
Refer your friend back to the Annunciation, particularly Lk 1:28. Mary hears God's word and does it. She's a particularly good example of this!
Jesus never passed up an opportunity to help people move to a higher truth. Yes, there were those who criticized him. Yes, there were those that idolized him. He came, however, to bring God's message of salvation and the Kingdom to people who had just about lost hope. He came to share God's truth with folks normally left out of the religious discussion. So Jesus uses both criticism and praise to be an opportunity to lead people to greater truth. The real blessing doesn't have to do with the physical ties to Jesus. No, the real blessing is given to those who put the Word of God into practice. He has spoken that word to them ... and to us!
True Blessedness
The teaching is precise: Listen to the word of God and keep it. A little earlier Luke tells us: “Then his mother and his brothers came to him, but they could not reach him because of the crowd. And he was told, ‘Your mother and your brothers are standing outside, wanting to see you. But he said to them, ‘My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.’" Lk.8:19‑21.
Now we have an additional instruction: Listen and keep, yes but put it into practice. Finally there is: Keep and ponder in the heart. Listen, keep, put into practice, ponder in the heart. It is not by chance that all these actions are centered around Mary. St. Anselm says: "She so listened to the word of God that it took flesh within her." Mary is the model of one who listens, keeps the word and puts it into practice in her life. But she is also the model of one who ponders the word of God. Speaking of the Gospel of John, Origen says: "No one may understand the meaning of the Gospel, if they have not rested on the breast of Jesus and received Mary from Jesus, to be their mother also."
The directions: Keep, listen, put into practice, ponder ‑ their strength lies in their being found together. Jacques Loew suggests the quality of our lives, as Christians, will depend on the extent to which we manage to unite them.
To listen means to pay heed, to have an attentive ear, to be quiet. It is said, it was a custom in some Palestinian families that when a slave was received into a home the master of the house took him over to the door and drove an awl through the lobe of his ear into the door post. The object of the exercise was to remind the slave that his work was to listen! In the Old and New Testament, hearing is more important than seeing. Seeing is good but for the biblical writers hearing is more important.
To listen means to pay heed, to have an attentive ear, to be quiet. It is said, it was a custom in some Palestinian families that when a slave was received into a home the master of the house took him over to the door and drove an awl through the lobe of his ear into the door post. The object of the exercise was to remind the slave that his work was to listen! In the Old and New Testament, hearing is more important than seeing. Seeing is good but for the biblical writers hearing is more important.
Why the primacy of hearing? Because God spoke. Yahweh speaks to his people. God's word is also creative. "He spoke and all things were made." The words "He said" are the first thing that we are told about God. Our relationship with God is a mouth to ear relationship. How often the prophets say: "Listen!" Each morning a Jew begins the Tephilah with the words: "Listen O Israel". Recall the number of times when Jesus begins preaching in parables ‑ and says, "Listen".
To these instructions we may add: Pondering in the heart. "Mary kept all these things, pondering them in her heart" Lk. 2:19. The Greek word means to ponder‑over. It is a process which has been described as a gentle chewing of the word that slowly releases its inner riches. In Hebrew, the word for pondering means murmuring, meditating. "How blessed are those... who finds their pleasure in the law of Yahweh, murmuring that over, day and night."
Keeping the word is the work of sowing a seed, allowing it to take root. It presupposes a climate in which it can germinate and become rooted in the heart. Once we have heard the word we must make it stay in us, not keeping it in cold storage but allowing it to grow through successive stages in our lives.
Reflection
• Today's Gospel is very brief, but it has a very important significance in the Gospel of Luke in general. It gives us the key to understand what Luke teaches regarding Mary, the Mother of Jesus, in the so called Gospel of the Infancy (Lk 1 and 2).
• Luke 11, 27: The exclamation of the woman. "At that time as Jesus was speaking, a woman in the crowd raised her voice and said: "Blessed the womb that bore you and the breasts that fed you!" The creative imagination of some apocryphal books suggests that the woman was a neighbour of Our Lady, there in Nazareth. She had a son called Dimas, who with other boys of Galilee at that time, went to war with the Romans, was made a prisoner and killed at the side of Jesus. He was the good thief (Lk 23, 39-43). His mother, having heard about the good that Jesus did to people, remembered her neighbour, Mary, and said: "Mary must be very happy to have such a son!"
• Luke 11, 28: The response of Jesus. Jesus responds, giving the greatest praise to his mother: "More blessed still are those who hear the word of God and keep it". Luke speaks little about Mary: here (Lk 11, 28) and in the Gospel of the infancy (Lk 1 and 2). For him, Luke, Mary is the Daughter of Sion, image of the new People of God. He represents Mary as the model for the life of the communities. In Vatican Council II, the document prepared on Mary was inserted in the last chapter of the document Lumen Gentium on the Church. Mary is the model for the Church. And especially in the way in which Mary relates with the Word of God, Luke considers her as an example for the life of the communities: "Blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it". Mary teaches us how to accept the Word of God, how to incarnate it, live it, deepen it, make it be born and grow, allow it to shape us, even when we do not understand it, or when it makes us suffer. This is the vision which is subjacent in the Gospel of the Infancy (Lk 1 and 2). The key to understand these two chapters is given to us by today's Gospel: "Blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it!" Let us see in these chapters how Mary enters into relationship with the Word of God.
a) Luke 1, 26-38:
The Annunciation: "Let it happen to me as you have said!"
To know how to open oneself, to accept the Word of God so that it becomes incarnate.
b) Luke 1, 39-45:
The Visitation: "Blessed is she who has believed!"
To know how to recognize the Word of God in a visit and in many other facts of life.
c) Luke 1, 46-56:
The Magnificat: "The Lord has done great things for me!"
To recognize the Word in the story of the people and sing a song of resistance and hope.
d) Luke 2, 1-20:
The Birth of Our Lord: "She pondered all these things in her heart!"
There was no place for them. The marginalized accept the Word.
e) Luke 2, 21-32:
The Presentation: "My eyes have seen the salvation!"
The many years of life purify the eyes.
f) Luke 2, 33-38:
Simeon and Anna: "A sword will pierce your soul too!"
To accept and incarnate the Word in life, to be a sign of contradiction.
g) Luke 2, 39-52:
At twelve years old in the Temple: "Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?"
They did not understand what he meant!
Luke 11, 27-28:
The praise to the mother: "Blessed the womb that bore you!"
Blessed are those who hear the Word of God and keep it.
• Luke 11, 27: The exclamation of the woman. "At that time as Jesus was speaking, a woman in the crowd raised her voice and said: "Blessed the womb that bore you and the breasts that fed you!" The creative imagination of some apocryphal books suggests that the woman was a neighbour of Our Lady, there in Nazareth. She had a son called Dimas, who with other boys of Galilee at that time, went to war with the Romans, was made a prisoner and killed at the side of Jesus. He was the good thief (Lk 23, 39-43). His mother, having heard about the good that Jesus did to people, remembered her neighbour, Mary, and said: "Mary must be very happy to have such a son!"
• Luke 11, 28: The response of Jesus. Jesus responds, giving the greatest praise to his mother: "More blessed still are those who hear the word of God and keep it". Luke speaks little about Mary: here (Lk 11, 28) and in the Gospel of the infancy (Lk 1 and 2). For him, Luke, Mary is the Daughter of Sion, image of the new People of God. He represents Mary as the model for the life of the communities. In Vatican Council II, the document prepared on Mary was inserted in the last chapter of the document Lumen Gentium on the Church. Mary is the model for the Church. And especially in the way in which Mary relates with the Word of God, Luke considers her as an example for the life of the communities: "Blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it". Mary teaches us how to accept the Word of God, how to incarnate it, live it, deepen it, make it be born and grow, allow it to shape us, even when we do not understand it, or when it makes us suffer. This is the vision which is subjacent in the Gospel of the Infancy (Lk 1 and 2). The key to understand these two chapters is given to us by today's Gospel: "Blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it!" Let us see in these chapters how Mary enters into relationship with the Word of God.
a) Luke 1, 26-38:
The Annunciation: "Let it happen to me as you have said!"
To know how to open oneself, to accept the Word of God so that it becomes incarnate.
b) Luke 1, 39-45:
The Visitation: "Blessed is she who has believed!"
To know how to recognize the Word of God in a visit and in many other facts of life.
c) Luke 1, 46-56:
The Magnificat: "The Lord has done great things for me!"
To recognize the Word in the story of the people and sing a song of resistance and hope.
d) Luke 2, 1-20:
The Birth of Our Lord: "She pondered all these things in her heart!"
There was no place for them. The marginalized accept the Word.
e) Luke 2, 21-32:
The Presentation: "My eyes have seen the salvation!"
The many years of life purify the eyes.
f) Luke 2, 33-38:
Simeon and Anna: "A sword will pierce your soul too!"
To accept and incarnate the Word in life, to be a sign of contradiction.
g) Luke 2, 39-52:
At twelve years old in the Temple: "Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?"
They did not understand what he meant!
Luke 11, 27-28:
The praise to the mother: "Blessed the womb that bore you!"
Blessed are those who hear the Word of God and keep it.
Personal questions
• Do you succeed in discovering the Word of God in your life?
• How do you live devotion to Mary, the Mother of Jesus?
• How do you live devotion to Mary, the Mother of Jesus?
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