Orthodox Christian teaching on the Mother of God (St John of Shanghai and St Ignatius Brianchaninov)

 

St John of Shanghai:

I. Veneration of the Mother of God during the days of Her earthly life

From Apostolic times to the present day, all who truly love Christ have paid homage to the One who gave birth to Him, raised Him, and protected Him in His childhood. If God the Father chose Her, the Holy Spirit descended upon Her, God the Son dwelt within Her, obeyed Her in His childhood, and cared for Her while hanging on the cross, then should not everyone who confesses the Holy Trinity bow down to Her?

Even in the days of Her earthly life, the friends of Christ, the Apostles, showed great care and devotion towards the Mother of the Lord, especially the Evangelist John the Theologian, who, fulfilling the will of Her Divine Son, took Her to himself and cared for Her as a Mother, from the time when the Lord said to him from the cross: “Behold thy mother” ( John 19:27 ).

The Evangelist Luke painted several images of Her, some with the Eternal Child, others without Him. When he brought them and showed them to the Most Holy Virgin, She approved of them and said, "The grace of My Son will be with them," and she repeated the song She had once sung in Elizabeth's house: "My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Savior" ( Luke 1:46 ).

However, during her earthly life, the Virgin Mary shied away from the glory due to her as the Mother of the Lord. She preferred to spend her life in silence and prepare for her passage to eternal life. Until the last day of her earthly life, she strove to prove herself worthy of the Kingdom of her Son, and before her death, she prayed that He would deliver her soul from the evil spirits that encounter human souls on the path to heaven, seeking to seize them and lead them to hell. The Lord fulfilled His Mother's prayer and, at the hour of her death, He Himself came from heaven with a multitude of angels to receive her soul.

Since the Mother of God was still praying that she could say goodbye to the apostles, the Lord gathered all the apostles, except Thomas, who were brought by an invisible force that day to Jerusalem from all ends of the universe, where they preached, and they were present at Her blessed transition into eternal life.

With sacred hymns, the apostles buried Her Most Pure Body, and on the third day, they opened the tomb to venerate the remains of the Mother of God once more, along with the Apostle Thomas, who had just arrived in Jerusalem. But they did not find the body in the tomb and, perplexed, returned home. During the meal, the Mother of God herself appeared to them in the air, radiant with heavenly light, and revealed that Her Son had glorified Her body, and She, resurrected, stood before His Throne. She also promised to be with them always.

The apostles greeted the Mother of God with great joy and began to venerate her not only as the Mother of their beloved Teacher and Lord, but also as their heavenly helper, patroness of Christians, and intercessor for all mankind before the Righteous Judge. And wherever the Gospel of Christ was preached, His Most Pure Mother began to be glorified.

II. The First Enemies of the Veneration of the Mother of God

The more the Christian faith spread, the more the name of the Savior of the world was celebrated on earth, and with Him, the One who was deemed worthy to be the Mother of the God-Man, the more the hatred of Christ's enemies increased. Mary was the Mother of Jesus. She showed an unprecedented example of purity and righteousness, and even after departing this life, She was a powerful, though invisible to the physical eye, supporter of Christians. Therefore, all who hated Jesus Christ and did not believe in Him, who did not understand His teachings—or rather, who did not want to understand them as the Church did —who wanted to replace Christ's preaching with their own human speculations—all of them transferred their hatred of Christ, the Gospel, and the Church to the Most Pure Virgin Mary. They wanted to humiliate the Mother in order to destroy faith in Her Son, to create a false image of Her among people, so that they could reconstruct all Christian teaching on a different foundation.

In Mary's womb, God and man were united. She was the One who served as a ladder for the Son of God, who descended from heaven. To strike at her veneration would be to strike Christianity at its roots, to destroy it at its very foundation.

And the very beginning of Her heavenly glory was marked on earth by an outburst of malice and hatred toward Her among the infidels. When, after Her holy death, the apostles carried Her body to the place She had chosen for burial in Gethsemane, John the Theologian led the way carrying a branch of paradise, which three days earlier the Archangel Gabriel had brought to the Holy Virgin, coming from heaven to announce Her impending passage to the heavenly realms.

"When Israel came out of Egypt, and the house of Jacob was a barbarian people" ( Psalm 114:1 ), began the Apostle Peter. The entire assembly of apostles and their disciples, such as Dionysius the Areopagite , who had also been miraculously brought to Jerusalem, took up the "Alleluia." And while this sacred song, called by the Jews "the great Alleluia," i.e., the great "Praise God," was being sung, a Jewish priest, Athonius, rushed up to the bier and wanted to overturn it and throw the body of the Mother of God to the ground.

Athonius's insolence was immediately punished:

Archangel Michael, with an invisible sword, severed his hands, leaving them hanging on the stretcher. The stricken Athonius, experiencing excruciating pain, in the knowledge of his sin, turned in prayer to the hitherto hated Jesus and was immediately healed. He quickly accepted Christianity and confessed it before his former co-religionists, for which he was martyred at their hands. Thus, the attempt to insult the honor of the Mother of God served to further her glorification.

The enemies of Christ no longer dared to show their disrespect for the body of the Most Pure One by brute force, but their malice did not cease. Seeing that Christianity was spreading everywhere, they began to spread all sorts of vile slanders about Christians. They did not even spare the name of the Mother of Christ, inventing that Jesus of Nazareth came from a base and immoral background, and that His Mother had befriended a Roman soldier.

But the lie here was too obvious for this fabrication to attract serious attention. The entire family of the Betrothed Joseph and Mary herself were well known to the contemporary residents of Nazareth and its environs. “Whence comes this man this wisdom and might? Is not this Tekton, the son of Tekton, the son of Joseph, the son of Mary, and the brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here among us?” – said His compatriots in Nazareth, when Christ revealed His unearthly wisdom to them in the synagogue. ( Matthew 13:54–55 ; Mark 6:3 ; Luke 4:22 ). In small towns, the family details of each person are well known; the purity of married life was then very strictly observed.

Would Jesus have been treated with respect and allowed to preach in the synagogue if He had been born of illicit cohabitation? The Mosaic Law, which commanded the stoning of such persons, would have been applied to Mary; the Pharisees would have repeatedly seized the opportunity to reproach Christ for His Mother's behavior. Yet the opposite was true: Mary was held in high esteem, was an honored guest at the wedding in Cana, and even when her Son was condemned, no one allowed themselves to ridicule or criticize His Mother.

III. Attempts of Jews and Heretics to Discredit the Perpetual Virginity of Mary

Jewish slanderers soon realized that it was almost impossible to discredit the Mother of Jesus, and that, based on the information they themselves possessed, it was much easier to prove her praiseworthy life. Therefore, they abandoned this slander, which had already been taken up by the pagans ( Origen , Against Celsus, I), and sought to prove at least that Mary was not a virgin when she gave birth to Christ. They even asserted that the prophecy of the Messiah's birth by a virgin never existed, and that therefore Christians were completely wrong to exalt Jesus by claiming that the prophecy was fulfilled in him.

There were Jewish translators (Aquila, Simachus, Theodotion), who compiled new translations of the Old Testament into Greek, and in them they translated the famous prophecy of Isaiah: "Behold, a young woman shall conceive" ( Is. 7:14 ); they claimed that the Hebrew speech aalma means a young woman, and not a virgin, as it stood in the sacred translation of the 70 interpreters, where this place is translated "Behold, a virgin shall conceive."

The new translation wanted to show that Christians, based on an incorrect translation of the word aalma, think to attribute to Mary something completely impossible – birth without a husband, while in reality the birth of Christ is no different from other human births.

However, the new translators' malicious intent was clearly revealed, as a comparison of various Bible passages clearly shows that the word "aalma" means "virgin." Indeed, not only Jews but also pagans, based on their traditions and various prophecies, expected the Savior of the world to be born of a Virgin. The Gospel clearly stated that the Lord Jesus was born of a Virgin.

“How will this be, where I know no man?” Mary, who had taken a vow of virginity, asked the Archangel Gabriel, who announced to her the birth of Christ.

And the Angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore, the child to be born will be called Holy, the Son of God” ( Luke 1:34–35 ).

Later, an angel appeared to the righteous Joseph, who wanted to send Mary away from home, knowing that she had conceived without entering into marital cohabitation with him. The Archangel Gabriel said to Joseph, "Do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for what is born in her is of the Spirit," and reminded him of Isaiah's prophecy about the conception of the Virgin ( Matthew 1:18–25 ).

Aaron's rod that sprouted ( Numbers 17:8 ), the stone cut from the mountain without hands, seen by Nebuchadnezzar in a dream interpreted by the prophet Daniel ( Dan 2:31–45 ), the closed gates seen by the prophet Ezekiel ( Ezek 44:1–4 ), and many other things in the Old Testament foreshadowed the Virgin Birth. Just as Adam was created by the Word of God from the uncultivated and virginal earth, so the Word of God created flesh for Himself from a virgin womb when the Son of God became the new Adam to correct the fall of the first Adam (St. Irenaeus of Lyons , Book III).

Only those who reject the Gospel can and could deny the seedless birth of Christ, while the Church of Christ has always confessed Christ "incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary." But the birth of God from the Ever-Virgin became a stumbling block for those who desired to be called Christians but were unwilling to humble their minds and strive for purity of life. Mary's pure life became a reproach to those impure in their thoughts. To appear Christian, they dared not deny that Christ was born of the Virgin, but began to assert that Mary remained a Virgin only "until she brought forth her firstborn son... Jesus" ( Matthew 1:25 ).

"After the birth of Jesus," said the false teacher Helvidius in the fourth century, as did many before and after him, "Mary entered into married life with Joseph and had children by him, who are called in the Gospel the brothers and sisters of Christ." But the word "until" does not mean that Mary remained a virgin only for a certain time. The word "until" and similar words often denote eternity. Holy Scripture says of Christ:

"In His days shall righteousness and an abundance of peace shine forth, until the moon be taken away" ( Ps. 72:7 ), but this does not mean that when the moon is gone at the end of the world, God's righteousness will not exist; it is then that it will triumph. Or what does it mean that it is fitting for Him to reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet ? ( 1 Cor. 15:25 ; Ps. 110:1 ). Is it possible that the Lord is to reign only so long until His enemies are under His feet! And David says in the fourth psalm of ascents: "As the eyes of a handmaid look to the hand of her mistress, so are our eyes toward the Lord our God, until He has mercy on us" ( Ps. 123:2 ). So, will the prophet have eyes for the Lord until he asks for mercy, and having asked for mercy, will he turn his eyes to the earth? (Blessed Jerome. On the Ever-Virginity of Blessed Mary). The Savior says to the apostles in the Gospel: "Behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age" ( Matthew 28:20 ). So, at the end of the age, the Lord will depart from His disciples, and then, when they will judge the twelve tribes of Israel on twelve thrones, they will not have the promised communion with the Lord? (Blessed Jerome. Ibid.).

It is also incorrect to think that Christ's brothers and sisters were the children of His Most Holy Mother. The terms "brother" and "sister" have widely varying meanings. These words are used in a broader or narrower sense, denoting a certain kinship between people or their spiritual closeness. In any case, brothers or sisters are people who share a common father and mother, or only a common father or mother, even if they are descended from different fathers and mothers, if their parents later (having been widowed) married (half-brothers), or if their parents are closely related (cousins).

Nowhere in the Gospel does it appear that the brothers of Jesus named there were or were considered to be the children of His Mother. On the contrary, it was known that James and the others were the sons of Joseph, the betrothed of Mary, who was a widower and had children by his first wife. (St. Epiphanius of Cyprus . Panarion on Heresy, 78). Likewise, His Mother's sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas, who stood with Her at the Cross of the Lord ( John 19:25 ), also had children who, with full right, in view of such a close relationship, could be called the Lord's brothers. That the so-called brothers and sisters of the Lord were not the children of His Mother is clearly evident from the fact that the Lord entrusted His Mother to His beloved disciple John before His death ( John 19:27 ). Why would He do this if She had other children besides Him? They would have cared for Her themselves. The sons of Joseph, the supposed father of Jesus, did not consider themselves obligated to take care of their stepmother, as they thought, or, in any case, did not have the same love for her with which natural children relate to their parents, and which the adopted son John had for Her.

Thus, a careful study of the Holy Scriptures clearly reveals the inconsistency of the objections to the perpetual virginity of Mary and puts to shame those who teach otherwise.

IV. The Nestorian heresy, which proclaimed the Mother of God to be only the Mother of Christ, and the Third Ecumenical Council

When those who dared to speak against the sanctity and purity of the Blessed Virgin Mary were to be silenced, an attempt was made to destroy her veneration as the Mother of God. In the fifth century, the Archbishop of Constantinople, Nestorius, began to preach that Mary gave birth only to the man Jesus, in whom the Divinity had entered and dwelt as in a temple. He first allowed his presbyter, Anastasius, and then himself, to openly teach in the church that Mary could not be called the Mother of God, since she had not given birth to the God-man. He considered it humiliating to venerate the Infant, wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger.

Such sermons caused widespread confusion and concern for the purity of the faith, first in Constantinople and then in all other places where rumors of the new teaching reached. Saint Proclus, a disciple of John Chrysostom , then Bishop of Cyzicus and later Archbishop of Constantinople, delivered a sermon in church in the presence of Nestorius , confessing the Son of God, born in the flesh of the Virgin, who is truly the Theotokos, for already in the womb of the Most Pure One, at the time of conception, the Divinity was united with the Child conceived by the Holy Spirit. Although born of the Virgin Mary only in His human nature, He was born true God and true man.

Nestorius persisted and refused to change his teaching, arguing that Jesus must be distinguished from the Son of God, that Mary should be called not the Mother of God but the Mother of Christ, since Jesus, born of Mary, was merely a man—Christ (meaning Messiah, anointed one), like God's previous anointed ones—the prophets—though surpassing them in the fullness of his communion with God. Nestorius's teaching, therefore, was a denial of God's entire dispensation, for if only a man was born of Mary, then it was not God who suffered for us, but man.

Saint Cyril, Archbishop of Alexandria, having learned of Nestorius's teachings and the ecclesiastical unrest it had caused in Constantinople, wrote a letter to Nestorius, urging him to adhere to the teachings the Church had professed from its inception and not to introduce anything new. Furthermore, Saint Cyril wrote to the clergy and people of Constantinople urging them to remain firm in the Orthodox faith and not fear Nestorius's persecution of those who disagreed with him. Saint Cyril also reported everything to Rome, to Saint Celestine, Pope of Constantinople, who, along with his entire flock, was then steadfast in Orthodoxy.

St. Celestine, for his part, wrote to Nestorius and urged him to preach the Orthodox faith, not his own. Nestorius remained deaf to all persuasions and responded that what he preached was the Orthodox faith, and that his opponents were heretics. St. Cyril also wrote to Nestorius and composed the Twelve Anathemas, that is, he outlined in twelve articles the main differences between Orthodox teaching and that preached by Nestorius, excommunicating anyone who rejected even one of the articles he had composed.

Nestorius rejected St. Cyril's teachings entirely and wrote his own exposition of the doctrine he preached, also in twelve articles, anathematizing, that is, excommunicating, anyone who did not accept them. The threat to the purity of the faith grew ever greater. St. Cyril wrote letters to Emperor Theodosius the Exile, then reigning, his wife Eudokia, and his sister Pulcheria, asking them to also attend to church affairs and curb heresy.

It was decided to convene an Ecumenical Council, at which hierarchs gathered from all corners of the universe would decide whether the faith preached by Nestorius was Orthodox. They chose the city of Ephesus, where the Blessed Virgin Mary had once stayed with the Apostle John the Theologian, as the site of the Council, which became the Third Ecumenical Council. St. Cyril gathered his fellow bishops in Egypt and, with them, traveled by ship to Ephesus.

From Antioch, John, Archbishop of Antioch, and the Eastern bishops departed by land. The Roman Bishop, St. Celestine, was unable to travel himself and asked St. Cyril to defend the Orthodox faith. He also sent two bishops and Philip, a priest of the Roman Church, to whom he also instructed what to say. Nestorius and the bishops of the Constantinople district, as well as the bishops of Palestine, Asia Minor, and Cyprus, also arrived in Ephesus.

On the tenth of the July calends according to the Roman calendar, i.e., June 22, 431, the bishops, led by Cyril of Alexandria and Memnon of Ephesus, gathered in the Church of the Virgin Mary in Ephesus and took their seats. The Gospel was placed in the center, as a sign of the invisible leadership of the Ecumenical Council by Christ Himself. First, the Creed , drawn up by the First and Second Ecumenical Councils, was read, followed by the Royal Charter, delivered to the Council by a representative of the Emperors Theodosius and Valentinian, Emperors of the Eastern and Western Parts of the Empire.

Having heard the Imperial Charter, they began to read the documents and read the letters of Cyril and Celestine to Nestorius, which preceded the Council, and Nestorius's responses. The Council, through its members, recognized Nestorius's teaching as impious and condemned it, depriving him of his see and priesthood. A resolution to this effect was drawn up and signed by approximately 160 participants. Since some of them represented other bishops who were unable to attend the Council in person, the Council's decision represented the decision of over 200 bishops holding sees in various parts of the Church of that time, and they testified that they professed the faith that had always been held in their respective regions.

Thus, the decree of the Council was the voice of the Universal Church, clearly expressing its faith that Christ, born of the Virgin, is the true God incarnate, and since Mary gave birth to a perfect man, who was at the same time perfect God, she should rightly be venerated as the Mother of God.

At the conclusion of the session, its resolution was immediately communicated to the awaiting people. All of Ephesus rejoiced upon learning that the veneration of the Holy Virgin had been upheld, especially revered in this city, where She was a resident during her earthly life and a patroness after Her passage to the eternal life. The people enthusiastically greeted the Fathers as they returned home that evening after the session, accompanying them to their homes with lit torches and burning incense in the streets. Joyful greetings, glorification of the Ever-Virgin, and praise of the Fathers who had defended Her name from heretics were heard everywhere. The Council's resolution was posted in the streets of Ephesus.

The Council held five more sessions: June 10 and 11, July 16, 17, and 22, and August 31. At these sessions, six canons outlined measures to be taken against those who dared to spread the teachings of Nestorius and reject the decrees of the Council of Ephesus.

In response to the complaint of the Cypriot bishops against the claims of the Bishop of Antioch, the Council determined that the Church of Cyprus should maintain its independence in church governance, which it had received from the apostles, and in general, no bishop should subjugate areas that had previously been independent of him, “so that under the pretext of priesthood the pride of earthly power would not creep in, and so that we would not lose, little by little, that freedom which our Lord Jesus Christ , the Liberator of all men, granted us with His blood.”

The Council also reaffirmed its condemnation of the Pelagian heresy, which taught that man could be saved by his own efforts, without the need for God's grace. It resolved several matters of church governance and addressed letters to bishops not present at the Council, announcing its decrees and calling on all to defend the Orthodox faith and ecclesiastical peace. Moreover, the Council recognized that the teaching of the Orthodox Universal Church was sufficiently fully and clearly set forth in the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed. Therefore, it did not compose a new Creed and forbade the future "composition of another faith," that is, the composition of other creeds or the modification of the Creed approved at the Second Ecumenical Council.

The latter was violated several centuries later by Western Christians, when first in individual localities, and then throughout the entire Roman Church, an addition was made to the Symbol that the Holy Spirit proceeds “and from the Son,” which addition has been approved by the Roman popes since the 11th century, although until that time their predecessors, beginning with St. Celestine, firmly adhered to the decision of the Council of Ephesus, which was the Third Ecumenical Council, and carried it out.

Thus, the peace broken by Nestorius was restored to the Church. The true Faith was defended, and false teachings were exposed.

The Council of Ephesus is rightly considered Ecumenical, on par with the Councils of Nicaea and Constantinople that preceded it.

Representatives of the entire Church attended, its decisions were accepted by the entire Church "from one end of the universe to the other," and the teaching that had been held by the Church since apostolic times was confessed. The Council did not create a new doctrine, but resoundingly testified to the truth that had been attempted to be replaced by fiction; it precisely set forth the confession of the divinity of Christ, born of the Virgin. The Church's belief and its judgment on the issue at hand were now so clearly expressed that no one could any longer attribute their own false reasoning to the Church. Other questions requiring a decision by the entire Church could be raised in the future, but not the question of whether Jesus Christ was God.

Subsequent Councils based their decisions on the decrees that preceded them, did not compose a new Creed, but merely clarified it. At the Third Ecumenical Council, the Church's teaching on the Mother of God was firmly and clearly confessed. Previously, the Holy Fathers had rebuked those who slandered the immaculate life of the Virgin Mary, but now, regarding those who belittled her honor, it was proclaimed to all: "Whoever does not confess Emmanuel as the true God and therefore the Holy Virgin as the Theotokos, since She in the flesh gave birth to the Word, who is from God the Father, and became flesh: let him be anathema" (excommunicated from the Church – 1st Anathema of St. Cyril of Alexandria ).

V. The Iconoclasts' Attempts to Diminish the Glory of the Queen of Heaven and Their Disgrace

After the Third Ecumenical Council, Christians, both in Constantinople and elsewhere, began to turn even more fervently to the intercession of the Mother of God, and their hopes for Her intercession were not in vain. She showed Her aid to numerous sick, helpless, and distressed people. She repeatedly appeared as the protector of Constantinople from external enemies, once even visibly showing Her wondrous protection to St. Andrew the Fool-for-Christ over the people praying at night in the Church of Blachernae.

The Queen of Heaven granted victory to the Byzantine Emperors in battle, which is why they had the custom of taking Her icon of the Hodegetria (Guide) with them on campaigns. She strengthened ascetics and zealots of the Christian life in their struggle with passions and human weaknesses. She enlightened and guided the Fathers and Teachers of the Church, including St. Cyril of Alexandria himself , when he hesitated to acknowledge the innocence and sanctity of John Chrysostom.

The Most Pure Virgin placed songs in the mouths of composers of church hymns, sometimes making famous singers of those who were incapable and lacked the gift of song, but pious toilers, such as St. Romanos the Melodist . Is it surprising, then, that Christians strove to exalt the name of their constant Intercessor? Feasts were established in Her honor, wondrous songs were dedicated to Her, and Her images were venerated.

The malice of the "prince of this world" armed the "sons of apostasy" to once again wage war against Emmanuel and His Mother in Constantinople, which now, like Ephesus before it, venerated the Mother of God as its Intercessor. Not daring to speak openly against the Champion Leader at first, they sought to diminish her glorification by forbidding the veneration of icons of Christ and His saints, calling this idolatry. Here too, the Mother of God strengthened the zealots of piety in their struggle for the veneration of icons, manifesting many signs from her icons and healing the severed hand of John Damascene, who wrote in defense of icons .

The persecution of icon venerators and saints again ended in victory and triumph for Orthodoxy, for the reverence shown to icons derives from those depicted on them; the holy saints of God are venerated as friends of God, for the sake of the grace of God that dwelt in them, according to the words of the psalm, "But thy friends are very precious to me" ( Psalm 139:17 ). The Most Pure Mother of God is especially glorified in heaven and on earth, having manifested such wondrous miracles through them even during the days of the desecration of the holy icons that even now we remember them with tenderness. The song "In Thee, O Blessed One, all creation rejoices" and the "Three-Handed" icon recall the healing of John of Damascus before this icon; The image of the Iveron Icon of the Mother of God is about the miraculous rescue of this icon from its enemies, which was thrown into the sea by a widow who was unable to save it.

No persecution of those who venerated the Mother of God, nor anything associated with her memory, could diminish Christians' love for their Intercessor. It was established that each series of liturgical hymns ends with a song or verse in honor of the Mother of God (the so-called Theotokion). Many times a year, Christians from all corners of the universe gather, as they always did, in church to praise her, thank her for her blessings, and ask for mercy.

But the adversary of Christians, the devil, who "walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour" ( 1 Peter 5:8 ), could remain an indifferent spectator of the glory of the Most Immaculate One? Could he admit defeat and cease to wage war against the truth through people who do his will? And so, when the entire universe resounded with the good news of the Christian faith, when the name of the Most Holy One was invoked everywhere, the earth was filled with churches, and Christian homes were adorned with icons dedicated to her, then a new false teaching about the Mother of God arose and began to spread. This false teaching is especially dangerous because many cannot immediately understand how it undermines the true veneration of the Mother of God.

VI. "Zeal not according to knowledge" (Rom. 10:2). The Latins' perversion of the true veneration of the Blessed Virgin Mary in their newly invented dogma of the "Immaculate Conception."

When those who censured the immaculate life of the Most Holy Virgin, who denied Her Ever-Virginity, who denied Her dignity as the Mother of God, who disdained Her icons were exposed—when the glory of the Mother of God illuminated the entire universe, then a teaching appeared that seemed to exalt the Virgin Mary highly, but in reality rejected all Her virtues.

This teaching is called the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary, and it was adopted by the followers of the Roman papacy. It states that "the Most Blessed Virgin Mary, in the first moment of her conception, by the special grace of Almighty God and by a special privilege, for the sake of the future merits of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the human race, was preserved free from all stain of original guilt" (Bull of Pope Pius IX on the new dogma). In other words, the Mother of God was preserved from original sin at her very conception and, by the grace of God, was made impossible to have personal sins.

Christians had not heard of this until the ninth century, when the Abbot of Corvey, Paschasius Radbertus, first expressed the opinion that the Holy Virgin was conceived without original sin. Beginning in the twelfth century, this idea began to spread among the clergy and flock of the Western Church, which had already fallen away from the Universal Church and thus lost the grace of the Holy Spirit.

However, not all members of the Roman Church agreed with the new teaching. Even renowned Western theologians, the pillars of the Latin Church, so to speak, were divided in their opinions. Thomas Aquinas and Bernard of Clairvaux resolutely condemned it, while Duns Scotus defended it. From the teachers, the division spread to their disciples: the Latin Dominican monks, following their teacher Thomas Aquinas, preached against the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, while Duns Scotus's followers, the Franciscans, sought to impose it everywhere. The struggle between these two currents continued for several centuries. On both sides were individuals considered among the greatest authorities among Catholics.

The fact that some claimed to have received revelations from above did not help matters. The nun Bridget, renowned among Catholics in the 14th century, wrote in her notes of apparitions to her of the Mother of God, who told her that she was immaculately conceived, without original sin. The even more famous contemporary ascetic, Catherine of Siena, asserted that at conception the Holy Virgin was involved in original sin, but that she received revelations from Christ Himself (Archpriest Al. Lebedev, "Differences in the Teachings on the Most Holy Theotokos in the Eastern and Western Churches").

Thus, for a long time, the Latin flock was unable to determine the truth, either from theological writings or from mutually contradictory miraculous phenomena. Popes up to Sixtus IV (late 15th century) remained aloof from these controversies. Only this pope, in 1475, approved a service that clearly expressed the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, and several years later forbade condemnation of those who believed in the Immaculate Conception. However, even Sixtus IV hesitated to assert that this was the unwavering teaching of the Church. Therefore, while he forbade condemnation of those who believed in the Immaculate Conception, he also did not condemn those who believed otherwise.

Meanwhile, the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception was gaining increasing support among members of the Roman Catholic Church. This was due to the fact that it seemed highly pious and pleasing to the Mother of God to bestow upon her as much glory as possible. The people's desire to glorify their Heavenly Intercessor, on the one hand, and the Western theologians' deviation into abstract reasoning that led to only apparent truth (Scholasticism), on the other, and finally, the patronage of the Roman popes after Sixtus IV—all this led to the opinion of the Immaculate Conception, expressed by Paschasius Radbertus in the 9th century, already becoming the universal belief of the Latin Church by the 19th century. All that remained was to definitively proclaim it as church teaching, which Pope Pius IX did, declaring during his solemn service on December 8, 1854, that the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary was a dogma of the Roman Church.

Thus, the Roman Church added yet another deviation from the teaching it professed while a member of the Catholic Apostolic Church, a faith which the Orthodox Church still holds unwaveringly and without change. The proclamation of the new dogma satisfied broad circles of the people belonging to the Roman Church, who in the simplicity of their hearts believed that the proclamation of the new teaching in the Church would serve to the greater glory of the Mother of God, to whom they thus made a gift. The ambition of the Western theologians who defended and elaborated it was satisfied. And most of all, the proclamation of the new dogma benefited the Roman See itself, for, by proclaiming the new dogma by his own authority, although after hearing the opinions of the bishops of the Catholic Church, the Roman Pope openly arrogated to himself the right to change the teaching of the Roman Church and placed his voice above the testimony of Holy Scripture and Tradition. From this, the direct conclusion was that the Roman popes are infallible in matters of faith, which the same Pope Pius IX also proclaimed as a dogma of the Catholic Church in 1870.

Thus the teachings of the Western Church, which had fallen away from communion with the true Church, were changing. It introduced ever newer teachings, thinking to further glorify the truth, but in reality distorting it. While the Orthodox Church humbly confesses what it received from Christ and the apostles, the Roman Church dares to add to it, sometimes out of "zeal... not according to knowledge" ( Rom. 10:2 ), sometimes "turning aside... into vain talk and contradictions of knowledge falsely so called" ( 1 Tim. 6:20 ). It could not be otherwise; that “the gates of hell shall not prevail against the Church” ( Matthew 16:18 ) is promised only to the true, Universal Church, and the words “as a branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me” ( John 15:4 ) are fulfilled for those who have fallen away from it.

True, the very definition of the new dogma states that it does not establish a new teaching, but merely proclaims it as ecclesiastical—one that has always existed in the Church and was held by many holy fathers, excerpts from whose works are cited. However, all the cited passages speak only of the high honor of the Virgin Mary, her immaculateness, and give her many names that define her purity and spiritual power, but nowhere does it mention immaculate conception. Meanwhile, these same holy fathers elsewhere state that only Jesus Christ is completely pure from all sin, while all humans, being born of Adam, bear a flesh subject to the law of sin.

None of the ancient holy fathers say that God miraculously purified the Virgin Mary while she was still in the womb, and many directly point out that the Virgin Mary, like all people, endured a struggle with sinfulness, but emerged victorious over temptations and was saved by her Divine Son.

Interpreters of the Latin faith also say that the Virgin Mary was saved by Christ, but they understand this to mean that Mary was preserved from the stain of original guilt in view of Christ's future merits (Bull on the Dogma of the Immaculate Conception). According to their teaching, the Virgin Mary, as it were, henceforth received the gift that Christ brought to humanity through His suffering and death on the cross . Moreover, speaking of the torments of the Mother of God, which She endured standing at the cross of Her beloved Son, and in general of the sorrows with which the Mother of God's life was filled, they consider these to be complementary to the sufferings of Christ, and Mary as our Co-Redemptrix. According to the interpretation of Latin theologians, "Mary is associated with our Redeemer as Co-Redemptrix" (See: Lebedev. Ibid., p. 273). "In the works of redemption, She assisted Christ in some way" (Dr. Weimar's Catechism). "The Mother of God," writes Dr. Lenz, "not only bore the burden of Her martyrdom courageously, but also with joy, albeit with a broken heart" (Dr. Lenz's Mariology). For this reason, She is "the complement of the Holy Trinity," and "just as Her Son is the only Mediator chosen by God between His offended majesty and sinful men, so precisely the chief Mediatrix, placed by Him between the Son and us, is the Most Blessed Virgin." “Through three relationships: Daughter, Mother, and Spouse of God, the Holy Virgin is elevated to a certain equality with the Father, to a certain superiority over the Son, to a certain closeness to the Holy Spirit” (Immaculate Conception, Malu, Bishop of Bruges).

Thus, according to the teachings of Latin theologians, the Virgin Mary stands alongside Christ Himself in the work of redemption and is elevated to near equality with God. There's nowhere else to go. While all this has not yet been definitively formulated as a dogma of the Roman Church, Pope Pius IX, having taken the first step in this direction, indicated the direction for the further development of his Church's universally recognized doctrine, indirectly confirming the above teaching on the Virgin Mary.

Thus, the Roman Church, in its quest to exalt the Blessed Virgin, is moving towards her complete deification, and if its authorities already call Mary the complement of the Holy Trinity, then one can soon expect that the Virgin will be revered as God.

A group of thinkers, still belonging to the Orthodox Church, have embarked on the same path, but are constructing a new theological system, basing it on the philosophical doctrine of the Wisdom of Sophia as a special force connecting the Divine and creation. Also developing the doctrine of the dignity of the Mother of God, they seek to see in Her a being somewhere between God and man. On some issues, they are more moderate than the Latin theologians, but on others, they are perhaps already ahead of them. While denying the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception and freedom from original sin, they nevertheless teach Her complete freedom from all personal sin, seeing in Her a mediator between humanity and God, similar to Christ: in the person of Christ, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, the Eternal Word, the Son of God, appeared on earth, and the Holy Spirit manifested through the Virgin Mary.

According to one of the representatives of this movement, with the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, Mary acquired "a two-fold life, human and Divine, that is, she is completely deified, which is why in her hypostatic existence she is a living created revelation of the Holy Spirit" (Archpriest Sergius Bulgakov . The Burning Bush, 1927 edition, p. 154), "she is a perfect manifestation of the Third Hypostasis" (ibid., p. 175), "a creature, but no longer a creature" (ibid., p. 191). This striving for the deification of the Mother of God is observed primarily in the West, at the same time that, on the other hand, various sects of a Protestant nature are widely successful there, along with the main branches of Protestantism: Lutheranism and Calvinism, which generally deny the veneration of the Mother of God and her prayerful invocation.

But we can say in the words of Saint Epiphanius of Cyprus : "The harm in both these heresies is equal, both when they humiliate the Virgin, and when, on the contrary, they glorify Her beyond what is due" (Saint Epiphanius of Cyprus. Panarion, against the Collaridians). The Holy Father rebukes those who render Her an almost divine adoration: "Let Mary be honored, but let the Lord be worshiped" (Ibid.). "Although Mary is a chosen vessel, she is by nature a woman in no way different from others. Although the history of Mary and Tradition relate that Her father Joachim was told in the desert: "Your wife has conceived," this nevertheless occurred not without the union of marriage and not without the seed of a husband" (Saint Epiphanius of Cyprus. Against the Collaridians). "One should not venerate the saints beyond what is due, but honor their Master. "Mary is not God, nor did she receive her body from heaven, but from the union of husband and wife, and, like Isaac, by promise, she was prepared to participate in God's dispensation. But, on the other hand, let no one dare to insult the Holy Virgin out of her mind." (St. Epiphanius, Against the Anti-Dicomarionites).

The Orthodox Church, while highly extolling the Mother of God in its hymns of praise, does not dare to ascribe to Her anything that is not communicated about Her by Holy Scripture or Tradition. "Truth is free from all exaggerations and diminutions: it gives everything its proper measure and its proper place." (Bishop Ignatius Brianchaninov) . While glorifying the immaculateness of the Virgin Mary and her courageous endurance of sorrows during her earthly life, the Fathers of the Church reject, however, the idea that She was a mediator between God and humanity in the sense of Their joint redemption of the human race. Speaking of Her readiness to die together with Her Son and to suffer together with Him for the sake of their common salvation, the famous father of the Western Church, Saint Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, adds: “But the suffering of Christ did not need help, as the Lord Himself predicted long before: “I looked, and there was no helper; and I considered, and no one stood up for me, and my arm delivered me” ( Is. 63:5 ) Saint Ambrose. On the Education of the Virgin and the Ever-Virginity of Saint Mary, ch. 7).

The same Holy Father teaches the universality of original sin, with the exception of Christ alone. "Of all those born of women, there is not one who is perfectly holy, except the Lord Jesus Christ, who, according to the special new form of the immaculate birth, did not experience earthly corruption." (St. Ambrose. In Luke, chapter II). "God alone is without sin. Ordinarily, all who are born of a woman and a husband, that is, of carnal union, are guilty of sin. Therefore, he who does not have sin was not conceived in this way." (St. Ambrose. Ap. Aug. de nupcia et concepcione). "Only man, the Mediator of God and men, is free from the bonds of sinful birth, because He was born of the Virgin and because, at His birth, He did not experience the touch of sin." (St. Ambrose. Against Julian, book 2).

Another famous teacher of the Church, especially revered in the West, Blessed Augustine, writes: "As for other people, excluding Him Who is the chief cornerstone, I see no other way for them to become temples of God and to be a dwelling place for God than by spiritual rebirth, which is necessarily preceded by physical birth. Thus, whatever we may think about children in the womb of the mother, even the word of the holy Evangelist, who says of John the Baptist that he leaped for joy in his mother's womb (which happened in no other way than by the action of the Holy Spirit), or the words of the Lord Himself spoken to Jeremiah: "I sanctified you before you came out of your mother's womb" ( Jer. 1:5 ) - gave or did not give us reason to think that children in this state are capable of some sanctification; "But in any case, it is certain that that sanctification by which all of us together and each of us in particular become the temple of God is possible only for the reborn, and that rebirth always presupposes birth. Only those who have already been born can be united with Christ and be in union with this Divine Body, which makes His Church a living temple of the majesty of God" (Blessed Augustine, Letter 187).

The cited words of ancient Church teachers testify that in the West itself, the teaching now spreading there was rejected there before. Even after the Western Church's apostasy, Bernard, recognized there as a great authority, wrote:

“I am horrified to see that some of you have now desired to change the state of important things, introducing a new feast, unknown to the Church, disapproved of by reason, unjustified by ancient Tradition. Are we really more knowledgeable and more pious than our fathers? You will say that we must glorify the Mother of the Lord as much as possible. This is true; but the glorification given to the Queen of Heaven requires discernment. This Royal Virgin has no need for false glorifications, possessing true crowns of glory and signs of dignity. Glorify the purity of Her flesh and the holiness of Her life. Marvel at the abundance of gifts of this Virgin; worship Her Divine Son; exalt Her who conceived without knowing lust and gave birth without knowing pain. What else needs to be added to these virtues? They say that the conception, which preceded the glorious birth, must be honored; for if the conception had not preceded, the birth would not have been glorified. But what would one say if, for the same reason, someone were to demand the same honor for the father and mother of St. Mary? They could equally demand the same for her grandfathers and great-grandfathers—ad infinitum. Moreover, how could sin be where there was lust? Moreover, let them not say that the Holy Virgin was conceived by the Holy Spirit, and not by man? I affirmatively say that the Holy Spirit descended upon her, and not that he came with her.

“I say that the Virgin Mary could not have been sanctified before her conception, since she did not exist. If she could not have been sanctified even more so at the moment of her conception, due to sin being inseparable from conception, then it remains to be believed that she was sanctified after she was conceived in her mother’s womb. This sanctification, if it destroys sin, makes her birth holy, but not her conception. No one is given the right to be conceived in holiness. The Lord Christ alone was conceived by the Holy Spirit, and He alone is holy from his very conception. Excluding Him, what one of Adam’s descendants says of himself applies to all of them, both from a sense of humility and from an awareness of the truth: ‘For behold, I was shaped in iniquity’ ( Psalm 51:7 ). "How can one demand that this conception be holy when it was not the work of the Holy Spirit, not to mention that it resulted from lust? The Holy Virgin will, of course, reject that glory which apparently glorifies sin; She will in no way justify a novelty invented contrary to the teaching of the Church, a novelty which is the mother of imprudence, the sister of unbelief, and the daughter of frivolity" (Bernard. Epist. CLXXIV. Quoted, like the previous one (from Blessed Augustine), from Lebedev. Differences in the Teachings on the Most Holy Theotokos of the Eastern and Western Churches). The words quoted clearly reveal both the novelty and the absurdity of the new dogma of the Roman Church.

The teaching on the complete sinlessness of the Mother of God:

1) It does not correspond to the Holy Scripture , where it is repeatedly said about the sinlessness of “the only Mediator between God and men, the man Jesus Christ” ( 1 Tim. 2:5 ), “and in Him is no sin”, “who did no sin, no deceit was found in His mouth”, “tempted in every way according to His likeness, yet without sin”, “for He who knew no sin made Him sin for us ” ( 1 John 3:5 ; 1 Pet. 2:22 ; Heb. 4:15 ; 2 Cor. 5:21 ), but about other people it is said: “Who is clean from filth? No one, though he have lived but one day on earth” ( Job 14:4-5 ). “Now God demonstrates his love toward us in this : while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us... For though we were enemies and were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by his life” ( Rom. 5:8–10 ).

2) This teaching also contradicts the Holy Tradition contained in numerous patristic writings, which speak of the high holiness of the Virgin Mary from her very birth and of her purification by the Holy Spirit at her conception of Christ, but not at her own conception by Anna. “Not one is pure before you from defilement, not even for one day of his life, except you alone, our sinless Lord Jesus Christ, who appeared on earth. Through whom we all hope to receive mercy and the remission of sins,” says Basil the Great (Pentecost Vespers). “But when Christ came through a pure, virginal, unmarried, God-fearing, undefiled Mother, without marriage and without a father, and since He had to be born, He purified female nature, rejected bitter Eve, and rejected the laws of the flesh,” adds St. Gregory the Theologian (Praise of Virginity). However, even then, as Saints Basil the Great and John Chrysostom say , She was not rendered unable to sin, but continued to care for Her salvation and conquered all temptations (St. John Chrysostom. Commentary on the Gospel of John, Homily 85; St. Basil the Great. Epist. CLX).

3) The teaching that the Mother of God was purified before her birth so that the Pure Christ could be born from her is meaningless, since if the Pure Christ could only be born if the Virgin was purified in the womb of her parents, then in order for the Virgin to be born pure, it would be necessary for her parents to be pure from original sin, and they again would have to be born from purified parents, and so on, we would have to come to the conclusion that Christ could not have been incarnate if all his ancestors in the flesh, including Adam, had not previously been purified from original sin; but then there would have been no need for the incarnation of Christ itself, since Christ came to earth to destroy sin.

4) The teaching that the Mother of God was preserved from original sin, as well as that She was preserved from personal sins by the grace of God, presents God as merciless and unjust, for if God could preserve Mary from sin and purify her even before her birth, then why does He not purify other people before birth, but leaves them in sin? It also follows that God saves people against their will, predestining some to salvation even before birth.

5) This teaching, apparently intended to exalt the Mother of God, in reality completely denies all her virtues. After all, if Mary, even in her mother's womb, when she could not yet desire anything good or evil, was preserved from all impurity by God's grace, and then by that same grace was preserved from sin even after birth, then what merit does she have? If she was placed in a position of being unable to sin and did not sin, then why did God glorify her? If she remained pure without any effort or urge to sin, then why is she crowned above all others? There is no victory without an enemy.

The righteousness and holiness of the Virgin Mary were revealed in that, being "a human being like us," She so loved God and surrendered Herself to Him that by Her purity She exalted Herself far above the rest of the human race. For this reason, foreknown and pre-chosen, She was deemed worthy to be purified by the Holy Spirit who descended upon Her and to conceive from Him the very Savior of the world. The doctrine of the Virgin Mary's grace-filled sinlessness denies Her victory over temptations and, instead of being a victor deserving of being crowned with crowns of glory, makes Her a blind instrument of Divine Providence.

Not exaltation or greater glory, but rather her humiliation is the "gift" offered her by Pope Pius IX and all others who think they can glorify the Mother of God by discovering new truths. The Most Holy Mary is so glorified by God Himself, so exalted by Her life on earth and Her glory in heaven, that human inventions can add nothing to Her honor and glory. What people themselves invent only obscures Her face from their sight. "Brethren, take heed lest anyone deceive you through philosophy and vain deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the rudiments of the world, and not according to Christ ," wrote the Apostle Paul through the Holy Spirit ( Colossians 2:8 ).

This is the kind of "vain flattery" that is the teaching of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary by Anna, which at first glance exalts Her, but in fact demeans Her. Like every lie, it is the seed of the "father of lies" ( John 8:44 ), the devil, who has managed to deceive many who do not understand that they are blaspheming the Virgin Mary. Along with them, all other teachings that flow from it or are akin to it must be rejected. The desire to elevate the Most Holy Virgin to equality with Christ, giving her maternal suffering at the cross equal significance with the sufferings of Christ, so that the Redeemer and "Co-Redemptrix" suffered equally, according to the teaching of the papists, or "that the human nature of the Mother of God in heaven, together with the God-man Jesus, together reveal the full image of man" (ArchpriestS. Bulgakov . "The Burning Bush," p. 141), according to the teachings of the false Sophians (Sophia means Wisdom), is equally futile flattery and the seduction of philosophy. In Christ Jesus , "there is neither male nor female" ( Gal. 3:28 ), and Christ redeemed the entire human race, which is why, equally, at His Resurrection, " Adam rejoiced and Eve rejoiced" (Sunday Kontakia, Tones 1 and 3), and by His Ascension, the Lord exalted all human nature.

Also, that the Mother of God is “the complement of the Holy Trinity” or “the fourth hypostasis” or “the Son and Mother are the revelation of the Father through the Second and Third Hypostasis,” that the Virgin Mary is “a creature, but no longer a creature” – all this is the fruit of false reasoning, not satisfied with what the Church has contained since the times of the apostles and trying to glorify the Holy Virgin more than God glorified Her.

The words of St. Epiphanius of Cyprus are coming true : "Some who are mad in their opinions about the Holy Ever-Virgin herself have tried and continue to try to place her in the place of God" (St. Epiphanius, Against the Anti-Dicomarionites, Heresy 78). But in madness, what is offered to the Virgin, instead of praise, turns out to be blasphemy, and the Most Immaculate One rejects falsehood, being the Mother of Truth ( John 14:6 ).

VII. Orthodox Veneration of the Mother of God

The Orthodox Church preserves the knowledge of the Mother of God that Holy Tradition and Holy Scripture have revealed about Her, and glorifies Her daily in its churches, asking Her for help and protection. Knowing that She is pleased only with praises that correspond to Her true glory, the Holy Fathers and hymnographers besought Her and Her Son for guidance in how to sing Her praises: "Guard my thoughts, O my Christ, for I dare to sing of Thy pure Mother" (Ikos of the Dormition). "The Church teaches that Christ was truly born of the Ever-Virgin Mary" (St. Epiphanius of Cyprus, A True Word on Faith). "We must confess that the Holy Ever-Virgin Mary is truly the Mother of God, lest we fall into blasphemy." For those who deny that the Holy Virgin is truly the Mother of God are no longer believers, but disciples of the Pharisees and Sadducees” (St. Ephraim the Syrian . To the monk John).

Tradition tells us that Mary was the daughter of the aged Joachim and Anna, Joachim descended from the royal line of David, and Anna from a priestly family. Despite their noble origins, they were poor. However, this was not what saddened these righteous people, but the fact that they were childless and could not hope that their descendant would see the Messiah. And so, one day, despised by the Jews for their barrenness, they both offered up prayers to God in sorrow—Joachim on a mountain where he had retreated after a priest refused to offer his sacrifice in the Temple, and Anna in her garden, lamenting her barrenness—an angel appeared to them and announced that they would bear a daughter. Overjoyed, they promised to dedicate their child to God.

Nine months later, a daughter was born to them, named Mary, who from early childhood displayed the finest spiritual qualities. When she turned three, her parents, fulfilling their promise, solemnly led the little Mary to the Jerusalem Temple. She herself ascended the high steps, and by God's revelation, the High Priest who met her led her into the Holy of Holies, bringing with her the grace of God that had rested upon her into the previously graceless temple (Kontakion of the Entry. This was a newly built temple, into which the glory of God had not descended, as it had into the Tabernacle or Solomon's). She settled in the temple's existing quarters for virgins, but spent so much time in prayer in the Holy of Holies that one could say she lived there (Stichera of the Entry, on "Lord, I have cried," 2nd, and on "Glory, both now"). Adorned with all virtues, She set an example of an extraordinarily pure life. Submissive and obedient to all, She offended no one, uttered no harsh words, was kind to everyone, and did not even entertain an impure thought. (Abridged from St. Ambrose of Milan , "On the Ever-Virginity of the Virgin Mary")

“Despite the righteousness and purity of the life that the Mother of God led, sin and eternal death manifested their presence in Her. They could not help but manifest themselves: such is the precise and true teaching of the Orthodox Church on the Mother of God in relation to original sin and death” (Bishop Ignatius Brianchaninov. Exposition of the Teaching of the Orthodox Church on the Mother of God). “Strongly a stranger to the fall into sin” (St. Ambrose of Milan . Interpretation of Psalm 118 ). She was not a stranger to sinful temptations. “For God alone is without sin” (St. Ambrose of Milan. Ibid.), and a person will always have within himself what still needs to be corrected and perfected in order to fulfill God’s commandment: “Be ye holy, for I, the Lord your God, am holy” ( Lev. 19:2 ). The purer and more perfect someone is, the more he notices his imperfections and the more unworthy he considers himself.

The Virgin Mary, who gave herself entirely to God, although she repelled every urge to sin, felt the weakness of human nature more than others and ardently desired the coming of the Savior. In humility, she considered herself unworthy to be a servant to the Virgin who would give birth to Him. So that nothing would distract her from prayer and attention to herself, Mary gave God a vow of celibacy, so that her entire life she would please only Him. Betrothed to the elder Joseph, when her years no longer allowed her to remain at the temple, she settled in his house in Nazareth. Here the Virgin was honored with the visit of the Archangel Gabriel, who announced to her the birth of the Most High from her. "Rejoice, full of grace: the Lord is with thee. Blessed are you among women... The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; Therefore also the child to be born will be called Holy, the Son of God” ( Luke 1:28–35 ).

Mary humbly and submissively accepted the angelic message. “Then the Word, as He Himself knew, descended and, as He Himself willed, moved, entered Mary and dwelt within her” (St. Ephraim the Syrian. A Hymn of Praise to the Mother of God). “As lightning illuminates the hidden, so Christ purifies the hidden nature. He purified the Virgin, and then was born, to show that where Christ is, purity is manifested in all its power. He purified the Virgin, preparing her with the Holy Spirit, and then the womb, having become pure, conceived Him. He purified the Virgin in her purity, which is why, having been born, He left her a Virgin. I do not say that Mary became immortal, but that, illuminated by grace, she was not disturbed by sinful desires.” (St. Ephraim the Syrian. A Sermon on Heretics, 41). "Light entered into her, washed her mind, made her thoughts pure, made her cares chaste, sanctified her virginity" (St. Ephraim the Syrian. Mary and Eve). "He made her pure by human understanding, pure by grace" (Bishop Ignatius Brianchaninov . Exposition of the Teaching of the Orthodox Church on the Mother of God).

Mary told no one about the angel's appearance, but the angel himself announced to Joseph Mary's miraculous conception by the Holy Spirit ( Matthew 1:18–25 ), and after the birth of Christ, he brought the good news to the shepherds with a multitude of the heavenly host. The shepherds, coming to venerate the newborn, said that they had heard about Him. Having previously silently endured suspicion, Mary now listened silently and "pondered in her heart" the words of her Son's greatness ( Luke 2:8–19 ). Forty days later, she heard Simeon's prayer of praise and the prophecy of the weapon that would pierce her soul. Afterward, she saw Jesus grow in wisdom, heard Him at age 12 teaching in the temple, and "kept all things... in her heart" ( Luke 2:21–51 ).

Although full of grace, She did not yet fully understand the nature of Her Son's ministry and greatness. Jewish concepts of the Messiah were still familiar to Her, and natural feelings compelled Her to care for Him, protecting Him from seemingly excessive labors and dangers. Therefore, She involuntarily initially stood in the way of Her Son, which prompted His instruction on the superiority of spiritual kinship over physical kinship ( Matthew 12:46–49 ). "He cared for the honor of His Mother, but much more for Her spiritual salvation and the good of people, for which He also clothed Himself with flesh" (John Chrysostom, Commentary on the Gospel of John, Homily 12). Mary understood this and, "having heard the speech of God, kept it" ( Luke 11:27–28 ). Like no other person, She experienced the same feelings as Christ ( Phil. 2:5 ), meekly enduring maternal grief when She saw Her Son persecuted and suffering. Rejoicing on the day of the Resurrection, She was clothed with power from on high on the day of Pentecost ( Luke 24:49 ). The Holy Spirit who descended upon Her “taught Her all things” ( John 14:26 ) and “guided Her into all the truth” ( John 16:13 ). Enlightened, She began to labor even more zealously to put into practice what She had heard from Her Son and Redeemer, in order to ascend to Him and be with Him.

The end of the earthly life of the Most Holy Theotokos was the beginning of her greatness. "Adorned with divine glory" (Irmos of the Canon of the Dormition), she stands, and will stand on the Day of the Last Judgment and in the age to come, at the right hand of the Throne of her Son, reigning with Him and having boldness before Him, as His Mother in the flesh and as one of the same spirit, as having fulfilled the will of God and taught others ( Matt. 5:19 ). Loving and merciful, she manifests her love for her Son and her God in her love for the human race, interceding for them before the Merciful One and, wandering the earth, helping them.

Having experienced all the hardships of earthly life, the Intercessor of the Christian race sees every tear, hears every groan and prayer addressed to Her. Particularly close to Her are those who labor in the struggle against passions and strive for a God-pleasing life. But even in worldly cares, She is an indispensable helper. "Joy of all who sorrow, Intercessor of the offended, Nourisher of the hungry, Consolation of strangers, Refuge of the storm-tossed, Visitation of the sick, Protection and Protectress of the infirm, Staff of old age, Mother of God Most High, You are the Most Pure One" (Stichera of the Hodegetria). “The hope, and intercession, and refuge of Christians,” “the unceasing Mother of God in prayer” (Kontakion of the Dormition), “saving the world with Her unceasing prayer” (Theotokion of the 3rd tone), “praying for us day and night, and the scepters of the Kingdom are strengthened by Her prayers” (Daily Midnight Office).

There are no words or minds to express the greatness of Her who was born into sinful humanity and became more honorable than the Cherubim and more glorious than the Seraphim. "Seeing the grace of God's ineffable and divine mysteries manifested and clearly fulfilled in the Virgin, I rejoice, and I am perplexed to comprehend the strange and ineffable image of how the chosen and pure One alone was revealed above all creation, visible and intelligible. Therefore, although I wish to praise Her, I am exceedingly awed, yet with mind and word, I nevertheless dare to proclaim and magnify: This is the heavenly dwelling" (Ikos of the Entry into the Temple). “Every tongue is at a loss to praise you worthily, and the mind is amazed to sing to you, O Theotokos, from above the world; however, being good, accept faith, for you know our divine love: for you are the Intercessor of Christians, we magnify you” (Irmos of the 9th song of the Epiphany).

St Ignatius Brianchaninov:

The Mother of God, the Ever-Virgin Mary, is the highest being of all created rational beings, incomparably higher than the highest angels, cherubim, and seraphim, incomparably higher than all holy men. She is the Mistress and Queen of all creation, earthly and heavenly. She is the Ever-Virgin, that is, before her birth of the God-Man, she was a Virgin, at His birth, she was a Virgin, and after His birth, she was a Virgin. The name Mary was given to her by God's command, and it means Lady .

To understand the dignity of the Mother of God, to understand it in the greatness in which it is confessed by the Orthodox Church, we are guided by precise and detailed concepts about the incomprehensible act of the Almighty God: about the incarnation of God the Word.

The Eternal Word—the Son of God—by the power of His creation formed His own flesh in the womb of the Virgin: the God-Man was conceived and the God-Man was born. The Son, by divine nature, became a son also by human nature. Jesus Christ was born of the Virgin, one Person in two inseparable and unmerged natures—Divine and human. The Divine nature, despite its infinity, did not destroy human nature, and human nature, despite its unmerged existence, in no way constrained the infinity of the Divine nature. Such a wondrous union, accepted by faith and the spiritual reason it engenders , 258 incomprehensible to the mind of the flesh and the soul, was brought about by the omnipotence of the Divinity.

The incarnate Lord possessed all the attributes of a human being: spirit, soul, and body. The term spirit designates the rational part of man: his mind, his thought, his verbal, heartfelt sensations, alien to the nature of beasts and animals, but common to human and angelic nature. The soul itself is expressed in vital force; the soul is characterized by desire or will and energy, or natural anger that does not degenerate into irritability. We see these qualities in animals as well. The human spirit of Christ exercised itself through prayer and the expression of God's word in human words; the soul of Christ expressed joy, sorrow, anger, and anguish; the body of Christ was conceived, born, nourished, grew, labored, felt hunger and thirst, rested in sleep, suffered, was crucified and buried, and was resurrected. According to the inseparability of natures, in all cases where human nature was manifested as acting exclusively, the nature of God assisted it inseparably and inseparably, although not fused, acting in accordance with Itself. Thus, although man was conceived in the womb of the Virgin, he was already God at the very conception; although man was born of the Virgin, God was also born at the same time; he grew, ate food, was weary from the journey, was bound in the Garden of Gethsemane, was struck on the cheeks, struck on the head with a rod, crowned with thorns, crucified—man, but at the same time God. Thus, the apostles were eyewitnesses, disciples, messengers of God 259 ( Luke 1:2 ); Judas Iscariot betrayed God 260 ; the Jewish chief priests and Pilate are deicides 261 ; The Ever-Virgin is the Mother of God. Because of the inseparability of the natures in one Person, what happened to one nature inevitably affected the other.

At the conception of the God-man, one half of humanity—the Virgin—was borrowed; the seed of man, which usually fertilizes the womb of a woman, was rejected. The reason for this is clear. The human race, immediately after the creation of the first humans, received the ability to reproduce ( Gen. 1:28 ). This ability, along with other abilities, is defiled by sin at its very root—in the forefathers; consequently, in producing people, it imparts to them, in the very rite of production, the poison of sin, as the prophet David, inspired by the Holy Spirit, confessed on behalf of all humanity: "I was shaped in iniquity" ( Ps. 51:7 ). A method of conception that imparted sinfulness to life could not be used in the conception of the God-man, destined as the atoning Sacrifice for humanity. A sacrifice for the sinfulness of humanity had to be free from sin, completely immaculate. This is not enough: it had to be of immeasurable value, so that it could redeem humanity, guilty before the infinite God, and therefore unredeemable by any finite price, no matter how great. Human nature made the God-Man capable of being a Sacrifice, and Divine nature gave this Sacrifice immeasurable value.

To assume humanity, God the Word replaced the action of male seed with the creative power of God. "The Son of God," says Saint John of Damascus , "from the most pure and virginal blood formed for Himself the beginning of our nature, flesh, animated by a rational and rational soul, but He formed it not from seed, but creatively." 262 The Virgin was also prepared for a worthy conception.

The Virgin, whose conception was announced by an angel to her praying parents, mourning their barrenness; who became the fruit of tearful prayers and fasting; who was the daughter of the righteous, dedicated by them to God from birth, and who, by the disposition of her spirit, dedicated herself entirely to God's service—the Virgin was already, in herself, a most pure vessel. The Virgin's purity was all the more inviolable to sensory perceptions because her mind, constantly directed and cleaving to God, did not even wander to thoughts of marriage. This she bore witness to the archangel who announced to her the conception and birth of her Son ( Luke 1:34 ). A pure vessel, prepared by God through the agency of holy men and holy angels, a pure vessel, prepared by her own disposition, was further purified by the Holy Spirit to receive the all-holy, immaterial seed—the Word. When the Virgin asked the Archangel about the manner of conception and birth for an unmarried woman, he explained it to her thus: "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you" ( Luke 1:35 ). The Word is called "Power." The Word of God is both the Power of God and the Wisdom of God ( 1 Cor. 1:24 ): "All things were made by him —the Word; and without him nothing was made that was made" ( John 1:3 ). The Holy Spirit descended upon the pure Virgin and further purified her. Pure in her own state of body and spirit, she became purer through the creative, all-powerful action wrought within her by the life-giving, purifying, renewing, changing, and transforming Spirit of God. The Pure Virgin became the Most Pure, free from all impurity, thought and felt; she became a grace-filled, pure, spirit-bearing, divine Virgin. Into such a renewed and God-adorned vessel, having acquired through the action of the Holy Spirit the ability and dignity to receive God the Word, the Word God descended, became both seed and fruit in the Virgin's womb, and became man . 263 "The Holy Spirit," says John Damascene , "descended upon her, purified her, and granted her the ability both to receive the Divinity of the Word and to give birth. Then the Son of God overshadowed her, as if she were divine seed. " 264

The Most Pure Virgin brought her purest blood as a gift from all mankind to the Seed-Word for the conception of the God-Man.

The Virgin, having conceived and given birth to God and man in one person, became the Mother of God in the strictest sense, because the one born of Her was God, although also man. "How could She not be the Mother of God," exclaims Saint John of Damascus , "who gave birth to God incarnate from Her?" 265 . The Virgin, having become the Mother of God, already naturally became the Lady, Queen, and Mistress of all rational creation, earthly and heavenly; but at the same time, She remains a creature and servant of Her Son and God. Having given birth to the Sacrifice for all humanity, She also gave birth to this Sacrifice for Herself, as one belonging to humanity. Her Son is God, Creator, Lord, Redeemer, and Savior 266 .

When God pronounced judgment on the fallen first two humans in Paradise, He also uttered the promise that the Seed of the woman would crush the serpent's head ( Gen. 3:15 ). The Seed of the man is silent in the promise; the destruction of sin's dominion over humanity is ascribed exclusively to the Seed of the woman. As the time approached when the Redeemer was to appear on earth, the prophecy regarding the manner of His appearance was made more clear. "The Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and you shall call His name Immanuel" ( Is. 7:14 ), the prophet Isaiah foretold the event of the incarnation seven centuries before the event. Indeed: a wondrous sign, a God-given sign, which no man could have imagined! A supernatural sign, invented and given by the Lord and Creator of human nature Himself, by changing the laws of nature, making the Virgin the Mother, and Himself, the Lord and Creator of all visible and invisible creatures, the Fruit of Her womb! Carried away by pride, Adam dreamed of becoming God in Paradise. He attempted to stealthily and violently snatch Divinity from Divinity, to appropriate the infinite to the finite through the cunning and effort of a feeble creature. Creation perished in its attempt to carry out this daring, foolish plan. It failed to comprehend the infinite goodness of God, capable of bestowing upon creation not only the prerogatives of angelic and human natures, but also His very Divinity, to the extent that creation is capable of receiving such a gift. Futile and murderous were the plans and attempts of the forefathers: God Himself, having become incarnate from the Virgin, having taken the form of a slave and a creature, having partaken of the nature of rational creatures, bestows His Divinity upon humanity, which desired Divinity, in order to make them capable of partaking of the Divine nature . 267 Accept what is given without envy; accept what is given by ineffable goodness; accept what is incapable of being stolen either by theft or by predatory violence! Because of that pride which made you want to steal and appropriate to yourself, by your own efforts and shameless cunning, the inviolable and unapproachable Deity, do not reject the great honor, do not renounce, for the sake of the dignity of beasts and devils, the dignity of gods, which God Himself, humbled to the flesh and born of the Virgin, brought to you on earth, into the woeful vale of your exile.

The God-man had a human nature that was completely blameless, but limited. It was limited: limited not only by the limitation with which man was created, but also by that which manifested itself to a much greater degree in man’s nature after his fall . 268 The God-man had no sin, was completely free from sin, even in its most slight forms; His natural properties were not changed, as in us, by passion . 269 These properties were in Him in a natural order, in constant submission to the spirit, under the control of the spirit, and the spirit was under the constant control of the Divinity united with humanity. The God-man had the ability to grieve and mourn; but sorrow never took possession of Him, as happens to us, but was constantly controlled by the spirit. The Lord was grieved by the death of Lazarus and shed tears at his tomb ( John 11:33, 35, 38 ); The Lord wept over Jerusalem, foretelling its destruction for its rejection of the Messiah ( Luke 19:41 ); the Lord allowed Himself to experience such pre-death languor in the Garden of Gethsemane that this state of His soul is called in the Gospel a feat and mortal sorrow. It was accompanied by such painful tension of the body that the body gave out and poured out sweat on the ground, the drops of which were like drops of blood ( Matt. 26:38–39 ; cf. Luke 22:43–44 ). But even with this intensified feat, the grievous sorrow was in submission to the spirit, which, expressing both the weight of the sorrow and its power over sorrow, said: “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me : however not as I will, but as You will” ( Matt. 26:39 ). The God-man had the quality of anger; But anger acted in Him as a holy spiritual force, as a character, as energy, constantly preserving the dignity of man, never revealing any infatuation. The Lord expressed His indignation at those who did not allow children to come to Him ( Mark 10:14 ); He was moved by anger at the hardened and blinded Pharisees who dared to blaspheme an obvious miracle of God ( Mark 3:5 ). The extraordinary, astounding mastery of anger in putting this force into action is contemplated in those terrible denunciations which the Lord pronounced upon the Jews ( Matt. 23 ; John 5:7–8, 10).). The human qualities of Christ during His suffering for humanity present a majestic spiritual spectacle: the Lord, throughout these sufferings, remains constantly true to Himself; not for a moment did either the ardor or the rapture that usually animates earthly heroes appear in Him; not for a moment did the verbosity and eloquence of these heroes appear in Him; not for a moment did any fickleness appear in Him; an unwavering, equal force constantly acted in Him, without weakening or straining; this force constantly expressed both its might and its subordination to the holy authority that guided it. If anyone penetrates into the character of Jesus Christ through a reasonable reading of the Gospel, he will confess Jesus as God by this character alone, as the Apostle Peter confessed Him as God solely for His word of life ( John 6:68 ). Such a character, constantly and completely free and open, constantly the same, never carried away, unchanging by either reproach or praise, nor in the face of murderers and death—such a character among human beings—is not found. The God-man was completely alien to one of the qualities of our fallen nature; He was completely alien—not in the structure of His body, but in the sensations of His soul and body—to that quality which was completely unperceived before the fall, was felt immediately after the fall, then developed, and became natural to fallen nature. Adam, created dispassionately from the earth, Eve, impassively borrowed from Adam, in accordance with the dispassionate beginning of their being, were dispassionate. They were so dispassionate and innocent that, in their closest companionship and constant interaction with one another, they had no need of clothing, and did not even understand their nakedness, despite constantly seeing it ( Gen. 2:25 ). The God-man was conceived by the action of the Holy Spirit! The Word formed His flesh in the womb of the Most Pure Virgin! God made His flesh divine at its very conception, capable of only spiritual sensations. 270and Divine. Although the properties of the God-man's flesh were human, they were all deified, as belonging to one Person, God and man. For this same reason, the human properties of the God-man were simultaneously natural and supernatural in relation to human nature. The holiness of the flesh of God and Lord was infinitely superior to the holiness in which the flesh of a creature—Adam—was created. Clearly, the contagion that the human fall infects all humans through the humiliating conception in the likeness of beasts and cattle, a conception in sin, could have no place here, because the very method of conception—that is, the means by which the sinful contagion is transmitted—was absent. On the contrary, just as the conception was Divine, so too were all its consequences Divine. The God-Man, as the atoning Victim, took upon Himself all human weaknesses—the consequences of the Fall—except sin, so that, having redeemed humanity, He might free it from the burden of these weaknesses, reveal it in a renewed state, reveal it without the weaknesses brought upon our nature by the Fall. The God-Man voluntarily assumed and bore our weaknesses, and was by no means subjugated to them by the necessity of nature. Being a perfect man, He was also a perfect God, the Creator of human nature, the unlimited Master of this nature. For this reason, He revealed His humanity as He pleased. Sometimes He revealed His humanity in the weakness of fallen nature: He toiled, He thirsted, He found rest in sleep, He was seized and bound in the Garden of Gethsemane, He endured scourging and humiliation, He was crucified and buried. Sometimes He revealed His humanity in the rights of the nature with which it was created: He walked on the waters; He rode into Jerusalem on an unbroken stallion, on which no man had yet sat; this power was originally the property of Adam . 271 Sometimes the Lord revealed His human nature in that state of glory and majesty which He bestowed upon human nature, uniting in Himself, in one Person, Divinity and humanity, which it by no means possessed after creation, in the very state of innocence and immortality: He revealed this state of majesty and glory by wondrous signs, and especially revealed it to the chosen disciples at His transfiguration, revealed it in the degree to which they were capable of seeing, 272 and not in what it is. The divinity of the God-man is united without fusion, but completely united with His humanity: the divinity of the God-man is united with His human spirit, with His soul, with His body. When the soul of Christ was separated from the body of Christ through death, the divinity of Christ remained inseparable from both His soul and His body. The Holy Church proclaims : "In the tomb in the flesh, in Hades with the soul as God, in Paradise with the thief, and on the throne You were, O Christ, with the Father and the Spirit, filling all things, the Indescribable One . "

The body of the God-Man was of extraordinary harmony and beauty, as His forefather, the holy prophet David, prophesied of Him: "He was more comely in beauty than the sons of men" ( Psalm 44:3 ). But the physical beauty of the God-Man by no means produced the impression on women that the beauty of men usually produces. Let such an abominable and blasphemous thought, which was nevertheless accepted and uttered by heretics, be rejected and cursed . 274 On the contrary, the body of Christ healed all passions, both spiritual and physical. Whatever property it was imbued with, it imparted. It abundantly imparted divine grace to all who looked upon it, to all who touched it, both men and women. "Power proceeded from Him, the Gospel testifies, and He healed all" ( Luke 6:19 ). "As many as touched Him were saved" ( Mark 6:56 ). This is the Divine Body of which the Lord Himself testified: "Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life" ( John 6:54 ). "Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him" ( John 6:56 ). Let every Orthodox and pious Christian imagine the inconceivable greatness of the Mother of God, who carried such a body in her womb, then carried it in her arms, and was for a long time in close relationship with this body. Because of the Divinity of the Body of Christ, it is infallible to recognize and call the greatness of the Mother of God Divine.

The body of Christ, at His burial, was placed in a narrow, artificial cave, hewn out of the rock, that is, in a mound formed of solid rock. The cave is so narrow that it is called a tomb in the Gospel. The entrance is so low that one must crawl through it, assuming a very hunched position. After the body of Christ was carried into the tomb, a stone of considerable size was rolled against the entrance to the tomb ( Matthew 27:60 ). The Jewish high priests, fearing the resurrection foretold by the Lord and thinking that the body of Christ was subject to the same laws to which human bodies are usually subject, sealed the stone blocking the entrance to the cave to the outside of the cave; moreover, they posted a guard at the entrance. Thus, according to human reason, all obstacles were invariably combined and arranged to hinder the resurrection. All measures were taken to ensure that, in the event of a resurrection, the resurrected one would be immediately destroyed by violent death. But the Divine Body was resurrected, leaving both natural obstacles and human precautions inviolate. It penetrated the thick, solid, and hard substance of the cave: the stone remained rolled in, the seal unbroken; the cave did not crack for the free passage of the resurrected body; the guards posted for supervision and violence were not deemed worthy either to sense the resurrection or to see the resurrected one. Already after the resurrection of Christ, an angel descended, broke the seal, rolled away the stone, and proclaimed the resurrection that had taken place; the guards, at the mere sight of the angel, fell dead to the ground ( Matt. 28:2, 4 ). The Divine Body, after the resurrection, penetrated through the closed door to the assembled apostles ( John 20:19 ). It was not recognized by the two disciples walking to Emmaus; When they recognized it at the breaking of bread, it suddenly became invisible ( Luke 24:31 ). This body, in the sight of all the apostles, separated from the earth, began to rise and penetrate the air like a winged thing, disappeared from the eyes of the apostles at an inaccessible height, and entered heaven ( Acts 1:9 ). The first martyr Stephen saw it in heaven, having been raised to such a vision by the action of the Holy Spirit, and exclaimed: “Behold! I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God” ( Acts 7:56 ). With such supernatural advantages the God-man revealed, continually revealed, and reveals His human body after the resurrection. These advantages are the incorruptible, spiritual crown with which the body of the God-man is justly crowned by Him, as having conquered and trampled death by death 275 .

It should not be thought that the body of Christ received such properties only after the resurrection 276 . No! As the body of the all-perfect God, it always had them, and after the resurrection it only continually manifested them. The following events prove this. Once, in the temple in Jerusalem, the Lord Jesus Christ indicated His pre-eternity according to Divinity; the Jews took up stones to stone the God-man, who had so openly declared Himself to them. But the Lord suddenly became invisible among them; and departed from the temple, passing through the multitude of His enemies 277 . Another time, enraged residents of the city of Nazareth seized the Lord, who was teaching in their synagogue, and led him to the top of the mountain on which the city was built, in order to throw him down from there and kill him; but the Lord became invisible and, coming out from among them, departed ( Luke 4:29-30 ). The Lord did exactly the same at His birth: He came forth from the Virgin's womb without breaking the seals of virginity, without opening the doors of this wondrous temple of His, as the prophet foretold in the rapture of his vision: "These gates shall be shut, and shall not be opened, and no one shall pass through them; and they shall be shut, and no one shall pass through them: for the Lord God of Israel shall enter through them, and they shall be shut" ( Ezek . 44:2 ). The Holy Church sings in her hymns to the Lord: "Our Creator appeared without seed from the Virgin, incarnate, rose from the tomb unbroken, and entered in the flesh through the closed doors of the apostles. " "Having preserved the signs (seals) of Christ, You rose from the tomb, the keys of the Virgin unharmed at Your birth." 279. "All beyond reason, all your most glorious mysteries, O Theotokos, sealed with purity and preserved virginity, You were truly recognized as the Mother, having given birth to the true God." 280. "Before birth a Virgin, and at birth a Virgin, and after birth You remain a Virgin." 281. "To those who dare to say that the most pure Virgin Mary was not a Virgin before birth, at birth, and after birth: anathema." 282 .

The divine body of the God-Man was divinely conceived and divinely born. The Virgin performed the birth, being filled with spiritual, most holy joy . 283 No illnesses accompanied this birth, just as no illnesses accompanied the removal of Eve from Adam. They could not have occurred here, being one of the plagues for original sin, and this sin had no place here, because the conception occurred not only without the participation of male seed, not only without any sensation of carnal pleasure, but, in contrast to ordinary conception, by the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Virgin, by the indwelling of the All-Holy God the Word within the Virgin's womb. The Virgin's painlessness at the birth of the God-Man is clearly evident from the simple and humble account we read in the Gospel: "She brought forth her firstborn Son ," the Gospel tells us of the Mother of God, " and swaddled Him, and laid Him in a manger" ( Luke 2:7 ). The Virgin gave birth and immediately began her ministry! She swaddled the newborn and laid Him in a manger, requiring no outside help in her ministry, for she felt no illness or exhaustion, such as are so common to women who bear children in sin, conceived in iniquity, who give birth to them already slain by eternal death and for eternal death. The Mother of God gave birth to Life and the Giver of Life ( John 14:6 ).

The Mother of God, having conceived and given birth to the God-Man, became supreme among all holy men and holy angels. According to the explanation of St. Gregory of Sinai , the Mother of God was the sole rational vessel in which God dwelt with His very being. Other holy men, although they become partakers of the Divine nature ( 2 Pet. 1:4 ) and dwelling places of the Triune God ( John 14:23 ) through the action of the Holy Spirit , do so in a completely different manner than the Mother of God , who alone received God the Word within herself for His incarnation. Such reception of God within herself is clearly unique, exceptional, unparalleled, inaccessible to either holy men or holy angels, and belongs only to the Mother of God. Just as the God-Man replaced Adam for the race of the chosen ones who were being saved and became their progenitor, so the Mother of God replaced Eve for them and became their mother. Just as the God-Man is the King of Heaven, the King of all men and angels, so the Mother of God is the Queen of Heaven, the Queen of both men and angels.

The Mother of God was born to holy and righteous parents, Joachim and Anna, and was the only child of their marriage, requested through many prayers and tears. She was born after her parents' prolonged infertility, born having been announced to them by an angel, born when her parents were already quite advanced in years. The circumstances of the Mother of God's birth are very similar to those of the birth of St. John the Baptist, described in the first chapter of the Gospel of Luke. The Holy Orthodox Church sings of the birth of John thus: "Let us now praise the Lord's Forerunner, whom the priest Elizabeth bore, from a barren womb, yet not without seed. For Christ alone passed through the impassable container without seed. She bare John, but without a husband she did not bear this child. But Jesus, by the overshadowing of the Father and the Spirit of God, the pure Virgin gave birth to. "But to the seedless one, from the barren, appeared a prophet and preacher, and also a forerunner." 285 The Holy Church conceives and confesses something similar concerning the Mother of God. The barren and aged Anna bore Joachim a daughter and a Mother to God, but she did not bear without seed: she received seed from her husband, the righteous and aged Joachim. Born of the holy spouses, the Virgin became the chosen and divinely sanctified vessel into which God the Word dwelt, in whom this Word—the Creator of all things visible and invisible—by the good pleasure of the Father, with the assistance of the Spirit, served as seed through His creative power and became human. The God-Man, born of Mary, made the Virgin a Mother, and preserved the Mother a Virgin. The Virgin's God and Creator became her Son, remaining her God and Creator; having become her Son, He became her Redeemer and Savior. The first Adam, without the participation of a woman, produced a woman; the Ever-Virgin, without the participation of a man, conceived and gave birth to the New Adam. Despite the greatness of the Mother of God, her conception and birth occurred according to the general law of humanity; therefore, the common confession of the human race regarding conception in lawlessness and birth in sin belongs also to the Mother of God. The humble and gracious Mary pronounced this confession for the hearing of the universe! Feeling the presence of the longed-for Savior in her womb, She, from the action of spiritual, gracious joy, uttered a confession in the following wondrous and remarkable words: “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior: for He has looked upon the lowliness of His servant: for behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed” ( Luke 1:46–48).). The Mother of God confesses before all mankind in the Gospel, read by all men, that the God born of Her is also Her Savior. If God is Her Savior, then She was conceived and born in sin, according to the general law of fallen humanity. God is the Creator of both angels and men: but He is the Savior of men alone; with regard to the angels, who have not undergone the Fall, He is their Lord, but not their Redeemer or Savior. The recognition of God as the Savior by rational creation is simultaneously the recognition by this creation of its own destruction. The Virgin Mary was conceived and born in destruction, in the Fall, in the bonds of eternal death and sin; She was born in a state common to all mankind. Her birth of God, Her Savior and that of all men, granted Her a greatness surpassing that of the sinless angels, who had not tasted spiritual death and had no need of a Savior.

The holy parents of the Mother of God, advanced in years and having humbled their flesh through many and prolonged ascetic struggles, were therefore not subjected during marital union to those intense passionate sensations inevitable for people in the prime of life and strength, in a state of mind far removed from the pious frame of mind of the righteous Joachim and Anna. However, their union took place according to the general order of human union, the order that emerged after and in the aftermath of the Fall. By her conception and birth, the Mother of God became a partaker of original sin and the sinful poison with which the entire human race had been infected in the forefathers. Born of righteous parents, the Mother of God herself led a most righteous life. Purity and humility were her chief virtues. She occupied herself ceaselessly with contemplation, prayer, reading, and the study of Holy Scripture. Not only was she innocent of all mortal sins, but also of any deed or word clearly contrary to the Law of God, in which she had been raised, which she had studied, and which she continually pored over. Despite the righteousness and purity of the life the Mother of God led before receiving the Holy Spirit with the apostles, who granted her Christian perfection, sin and eternal death manifested their presence and dominion in her. We see evidence of this in the Gospel. Thus, before the illumination of the Holy Spirit, her mind, like that of the holy apostles, remained darkened, and she did not comprehend the words of the twelve-year-old Savior spoken to her in the temple ( Luke 2:49–50 ). Saint John Chrysostom , explaining the Gospels of Matthew ( Matt. 12:46–49 ) and John ( John 2:1–11 ), satisfactorily demonstrates how the old man was revealed and acted in the Mother of God . 286 Eternal death and sin, implanted in human nature, could not but manifest themselves. This is the precise and correct teaching of the Orthodox Church regarding the Mother of God in relation to original sin and eternal death, which have infected and encompassed the entire human race.

The descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Ever-Virgin occurred twice. The first time, the Holy Spirit descended upon Her after the good news delivered by the Archangel Gabriel, cleansing Her, pure in human understanding, making Her pure through grace, capable of receiving God the Word and becoming His Mother. Her virginity was sealed by the Spirit: She, who had hitherto kept herself free from every thought and sensation of lust, became inaccessible to such thoughts and sensations. Such was the nature of the Virgin, appointed to the service of God, incomparably closer to that of the Cherubim and Seraphim. She was to not only conceive and give birth to the God-Man, but also to spend her entire life in the closest relationship with Him. She nursed Him at her breast; In her arms He spent His infancy and childhood, and with her He spent His youth until His full manhood, until the age of thirty, when He revealed Himself to the world as the promised Redeemer of the world. But even during the three and a half years during which the Lord proclaimed salvation to mankind, the Mother of God was often with Him, as can be seen from the Gospel. The Holy Spirit, when He first descended upon the Most Holy Virgin, made Her capable of such a sublime service, worthy of this sublime service. The second time the Holy Spirit descended upon the Virgin was on the day of Pentecost, when He descended upon the holy apostles, with whom the Mother of God abode inseparably after the Lord's ascension into heaven ( Acts 1:14 ). Then the Holy Spirit destroyed in Her the dominion of eternal death and original sin, raised Her to a high degree of Christian perfection, and made Her a new person in the image of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord, having trampled death by death and resurrected the human race in and with Himself, first granted the resurrection of soul to His most pure Mother and His apostles on the day of Pentecost. This resurrection of soul is called the first resurrection by Saint John the Theologian (from the first mortification, the mortification of sin, over which the second death, that is, eternal destruction, no longer has power ( Rev. 20:6 )). Perhaps it will seem incomprehensible to some why, at the first coming of the Holy Spirit upon the Virgin, the destruction of eternal death in her was not accomplished? We answer: this destruction of eternal death was the fruit of redemption; before redemption was accomplished, it could not take place. So also the holy apostles, although they received various gifts of grace before their renewal, such as: healing of illnesses, casting out demons and raising the dead, but the destruction of eternal death, the transition from the old man to the new, from the state of the soul to the spiritual, was accomplished for them on the day of Pentecost, was a consequence of the atonement ( John 7:39 ).

From all of the above, the absurdity of the two opposing Western teachings is evident. The Papist teaching ascribes to the Mother of God a conception outside of original sin, similar to the conception of the Savior, while the Protestant teaching does not recognize the Virgin as Ever-Virgin. Truth is free from all exaggerations and diminutions: it gives everything its proper measure and place.

It should not be thought that the dogma of the conception of the Mother of God without original sin (immaculata conceptio) is a modern novelty among the Latins. At present, the dogma has only been officially accepted, proclaimed by the Pope. Bergier, a writer of the 18th century, says: “According to the general belief of Catholics (Papists, Latins), Mary is innocent of any sin. With the word conception immaculee (immaculate conception), we explained that although the Church has not formally decided that Mary is innocent of original sin, this is nevertheless a belief based on Holy Scripture and on constant (church) Tradition.” 288 With the word conception immaculee, Bergier expresses the same teaching even more decisively. He says: “According to the general opinion of Catholic theologians, the Holy Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, was preserved from original sin ‘when she was conceived in her mother’s womb.’” This belief is based on the opinions of the Holy Fathers, most worthy of respect." Which Fathers does the Latin writer cite? Only the Latin ones, belonging to the West, which had already fallen away from the East. He cites the Council of Trent, which determined in its fifth session that all children of Adam are born defiled by original sin, but that this definition does not apply to the Holy Virgin; he cites the Council of Basel in 1439 and the Council of Avignon in 1457, which recognized this teaching as infallible and belonging to the Church. The definition of the Council of Basel was accepted by the University of Paris, as a result of which the university's theological faculty issued a decree in 1497 stating that no one could be awarded a doctorate unless they first bound themselves by oath to profess the accepted dogma regarding the Mother of God. These facts, while in no way confirming the papist teachings for the sons of the Orthodox Church, merely demonstrate that the heretical doctrine of the Mother of God, along with many others, crept into the Western Church more than four centuries before our time. In his articles, Bergier cites two writers belonging to the primordial universal Church— Origen and St. Augustine —to support the new dogma. However, neither of them said a word about the new dogma. Origen, in his sixth homily on Luke, states that the expression "full of grace" is used only once in Scripture, in reference to Mary alone. But this in no way concerns the new dogma of the papists; it is recognized by the entire Church. The grace of God, as we have set forth and explained above, received by the Ever-Virgin, incomparably surpasses in both quality and abundance the grace bestowed upon other holy people and upon the holy angels. Blessed Augustine (Liber de Natura et Gratia) says: "We know that she (the Mother of God) received abundant grace for the conquest of sin in all its forms." 289And these words in no way confirm the papist dogma! They contradict it: only those who have sin living and active within themselves need and can receive the abundant grace-filled power to conquer sin. The Holy Orthodox Church , as stated above, has always confessed and continues to confess that the Holy Spirit descended upon the pure Virgin, descended upon the unwedded bride—as the Church calls the Mother of God—and made the pure most pure, pure by nature, pure beyond nature, pure by grace—graceful, having received the grace of the Holy Spirit for her nourishment and enjoyment. Abundantly partaking of Divine grace alienated the Virgin from carnal pleasures, instilling a complete and decisive aversion to them. Such was the proper state of the rational temple of God, the spiritual heaven, the throne of God, His Holy of Holies. A false thought usually leads to a chain of other false thoughts. The Papists, having recognized the Mother of God as free from original sin, declared her to be free from all sin, completely sinless , and therefore in need of neither redemption nor a Redeemer. The ever-gracious Mother of God herself silences the minds of blinded heretics and fanatics, confessing the God born of her as her Savior. The Papists, by ascribing sinlessness to the Mother of God, thereby demonstrate their distrust of God's omnipotence. But the Orthodox Church glorifies the omnipotence and majesty of God, who made Her conceived and born in sin incomparably higher than the cherubim and incomparably more glorious than the seraphim, who never knew sin, steadfast in holiness. "My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Savior ," said the blessed Virgin in response to Elizabeth, when Elizabeth, inspired by the Holy Spirit, proclaimed with a loud voice that the Ever-Virgin is the Mother of God ( Luke 1:43 ). With her words, the Most Holy Mary not only silences the papists, who would deprive her of God's significance as Savior, but also silences the Protestants, who ascribe to her spirit delight not in God, but in carnal lust. In contrast to the Papist dogma, Protestants, sworn enemies of New Testament virginity, assert that the most holy vessel and temple of God, the Mother of God, after giving birth to the God-Man, violated her virginity, became a vessel for human lust, entered into a relationship with Joseph, and had other children. The thought is horrific; a thought both bestial and demonic; a blasphemous thought! It could only have been born in the depths of profound depravity! It could have been uttered, and can be uttered, only by a desperate and abject adulterer! It can only be accepted and assimilated by those who have descended so far from the image and likeness of God to the likeness of beasts that they have and can have no conception of human nature except in its debased, bestial state. To confirm this monstrous thought, ignorant and wretched blasphemers cite the Gospel.

Luther, who abandoned monasticism and took as his concubine a nun who had also abandoned monasticism—Luther's union with Catherine de Borre cannot be understood otherwise, since it is not clear that the vows of chastity they had given to God were ever returned—cries out against Christian virginity. All Protestants cry out against it with Luther. They call virginity unnatural, contrary to the will, blessing, and command of God, Who, after the creation of the first two humans, immediately said to them: "Increase and multiply and fill the earth" ( Genesis 1:28 ). Protestants can be answered with the words of the Savior, spoken to the Sadducees: "You are deceived, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God" ( Matthew 22:29 ). Protestants, citing the above words, failed to notice that following them in the Book of Genesis is described the virginity of the first two humans, in which they remained before the fall, not even understanding their nakedness, that they understood this nakedness and felt shame, a sign of the lust that appeared after the fall, that the real relationship of the wife to her husband and her illnesses during childbirth are spoken of as punishment for the transgression of God's commandment ( Gen. 1 , Genesis 2 , Genesis 3 ). The Orthodox Church recognizes virginity as natural for humanity 291 , recognizing as human nature itself the nature in which he was created. The state of the fall, in which all humanity now finds itself, is an unnatural, subnatural, contrary state. But since all humanity is embraced by the illness of the fall, this state of general illness can be called natural for fallen humanity. Thus, the properties of illness are natural to the state of illness; They are unnatural to a state of health. In that case—we agree—virginity is already unnatural to humanity. For this reason, there were very, very few virgins among the righteous of the Old Testament: both the patriarchs and most of the prophets had to submit to the yoke of matrimony. Our Lord Jesus Christ, having restored fallen human nature, also restored virginity. He Himself was, in His humanity, an all-holy virgin; His Mother was the Most Pure Virgin, full of grace. Virginity, natural to human nature in its primordial state, unnatural to fallen nature, was returned as a gift to nature renewed by the Savior. "The gift of God in Christ Jesus our Lord is everything by which our eternal salvation, our dignity, our perfection—all of which is called by the common name of eternal life" ( Rom. 6:23 ). And New Testament virginity is a gift of God, bestowed by the Lord, as the Lord Himself said about virginity: “Not all can accept this word, but only those to whom it has been given” ( Matthew 19:11).). The gift of holiness (i.e., a moral state most similar to that manifested by our Lord Jesus Christ) is given to those who desire it with all their hearts and ask the Lord for it with the most fervent prayers . 292 Virginity is unnatural for fallen humanity, and therefore it cannot be obtained by one's own efforts alone: ​​one's own efforts tame the flesh, but true virginity is a gift from God as a result of constant, fervent, and often very lengthy prayer. True virginity does not consist in physical purity alone; but primarily it consists in the alienation of the mind from lustful thoughts and dreams. The mind is not capable of renouncing sin on its own unless divine power overshadows it . 293 The mind's struggle with sin constitutes that most glorious labor, during which the ascetic sheds many bitter tears, utters many deep and heavy sighs, imploring help and intercession from Above. Only when the heart tastes spiritual sweetness can it be torn away from the pleasures of carnal pleasures; without pleasure it cannot exist. "Love is reflected by love, and fire is quenched by immaterial fire," said St. John Climacus . 294 The New Testament Church is filled with countless virgins and virgins by the mercy and compassion of our Savior; but they passed to the state of virginity, demonstrating their sincere desire for it through a constant, arduous, and prolonged struggle with the lusts of the flesh. This can be seen from the lives of St. Anthony the Great , Pachomius the Great , Simeon the Fool for Christ, and many other of God's greatest saints. But the Mother of God did not experience or know the struggle with carnal desires: before lust could act upon her, the Holy Spirit descended upon her, sealed her purity, granted her grace-filled purity, and granted her spiritual delight, to which her heart clung and from which it never again departed. The Holy Church calls the Mother of God Christ's living book, sealed by the Spirit .

Protestants see the foundation of their teaching in the Gospel. They believe that the Evangelist Matthew, in recounting the relationship between the Mother of God and Joseph, the Mother of God's betrothed, says of Joseph that he did not have intercourse with the Virgin until after she gave birth to the God-Man, indicating that intercourse occurred later. The Evangelist's actual words, cited by Protestants to support their opinion, are as follows: "And [Joseph] knew her [Mary] not until she brought forth her firstborn son" ( Matthew 1:25 ). The detractors base their conclusion on the word "dondezhe ," which, in their opinion, expresses urgent abstinence from intercourse and the idea of ​​intercourse following the birth of the firstborn, as well as on the word " perbornets ," which suggests further childbearing: due to the nature of the Russian language, the above-cited verse of the Gospel can be accurately translated as follows: "Now Joseph did not know her, and she gave birth to her firstborn son." Obviously, the words "Now Joseph did not know her" refer to the entire time the Mother of God spent in Joseph's house.

If we examine carefully the narrative of the Evangelist Matthew about the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ ( Matt. 1:18-25 ), it becomes immediately obvious that the Evangelist used all diligence to show with clarity and precision the birth of the God-man from the Virgin, without male seed. For this, the Evangelist explains that the Virgin, betrothed to a man, without having known a man, was found with child in her womb from the Holy Spirit; for this, the Evangelist cites the testimony of the angel who appeared to Joseph in a dream and confirmed that the fruit in the Virgin's womb was from the Holy Spirit; for this, the Evangelist cites the prophet who foretold that the Virgin would conceive and the Virgin would bear a Son, the Savior of the world; For this reason, when speaking of the birth of the God-Man itself, the Evangelist shows that Mary gave birth to Him as a Virgin, just as she conceived Him as a Virgin. Circumstances concerning the person of the Mother of God and not constituting the main subject described by the Evangelist are left unexplained. The Evangelist Luke's account of the birth of Christ is of a similar nature. Silent about Joseph's bewilderment and the angel's appearance to him in a dream, Saint Luke recounts the arrival of the Archangel Gabriel to the Mother of God with the joyful good news from God of her conception and birth of the Son of God. He recounts how Elizabeth, through the action of the Holy Spirit, recognized Mary as the Mother of God. Saint Luke, like Matthew, calls Mary a Virgin betrothed to a husband ( Luke 1:27 ), and the God-man born of her is her Son, her Firstborn ( Luke 2:7 ). Saint Luke makes no similar exposition of the circumstances concerning the Virgin herself; only indirectly, as stated above, is it evident from his account that the Virgin was painless at the birth of the God-man. And so in vain do Protestants seek support for their blasphemy in the Gospel!

The Holy Fathers of the Orthodox Church see in the above words of the Evangelist Matthew a thought completely opposed to that of the Protestants—they see evidence that the Mother of God, having conceived the God-Man as a Virgin, remained a Virgin after conception, gave birth as a Virgin, remained a Virgin after birth, and remained a Virgin forever . 296 "The Ever-Virgin," says Saint John Damascene , "remains a Virgin even after birth, having had no communication with a husband until death. Although it is written: "And Joseph knew her not until he brought forth his firstborn son ," it should nevertheless be understood that "firstborn" refers to the firstborn, even if he were the only begotten. The name firstborn signifies the one who was born first and does not necessarily indicate the birth of others. And the word "until ," although it denotes a specific period of time, does not exclude the time that follows. Thus, the Lord's words: "And lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age" ( Matthew 28:20 ) do not mean that the Lord will part from us at the end of the age, for the divine apostle says: "And so shall we always be with the Lord" ( 1 Thessalonians 4:17 ), that is, after the resurrection. Here the word "until ," although in itself denoting a specific period, has a completely opposite meaning according to the usual use of this word in Holy Scripture. The Lord said: "You shall not depart from there (from the hellish prison) until you have paid the last farthing" ( Matthew 5:26 ). It is known that the torments of hell are eternal: the urgent word "until " used here means that the one imprisoned in hell will never leave it, without the opportunity to repay the sinful debt, the payment of which is made only during earthly life through good deeds in Christ and the cleansing of sins through repentance. Of the raven that Noah released from the ark, it is said: "And it went out and did not return until the water was dried up from the ground" ( Gen. 8:7 ); the raven never returned to the ark. Holy Scripture says: "The Lord said to my Lord, 'Sit at my right hand , until I make your enemies your footstool'" ( Ps. 110:1 ); here the word "until," meaning a period, is again used to denote an indefinite, endless time. It is obvious that the presence of the incarnate Son at the right hand of the Father in humanity, which signifies the highest state of glory, will not be limited to the time that will be used to overthrow the enemies of the God-man, the fallen angels and wicked men, but will continue indefinitely forever and ever. The Word"Until" has the same meaning in relation to the Virgin as it has in relation to the written law given by God. "One jot, " said the Lord, " or one tittle, shall not pass from the law, until all are fulfilled" ( Matthew 5:18 ). The law is sealed by its fulfillment and will remain sealed forever as fulfilled: the Virgin sealed her virginity with the birth of God the Word and remained forever a Virgin, being sealed with the birth of God. "And Joseph knew her not until he brought forth his firstborn son." "This means," says Blessed Theophylact of Bulgaria , "he never touched her, neither before her birth nor after her birth did he know her."

Both evangelists, with obvious and special purpose, point out that the God-man was the "Firstborn ." The Jews, to whom the Messiah was promised, for this reason especially revered childbearing and despised the barrenness of women. For the same reason, they especially honored the firstborn among children, since one of the firstborn, in their opinion, was destined to be the awaited Messiah. Here is that longed-for and glorious "Firstborn," say the evangelists, who satisfied their desires and expectations! After His birth, a woman's barrenness no longer dishonors her, nor the firstborn born from then on enjoy special significance. Henceforth, glory passes from marriage to virginity, for the awaited Firstborn is a Virgin, and was born of a Virgin, preserving her as a Virgin both at birth and after birth.

The Holy Gospel is silent about the parents of the Mother of God; it presents the righteous Joseph as her guardian and the Infant God-man. It seems that the parents of the Mother of God, having produced their priceless child in their advanced years, died soon after. "God," says Saint John Damascene , "arranged it so that the Maiden (the Mother of God is called the Maiden because of her youth) was betrothed to Joseph by the priests, and the New Book was entrusted to the 'recipient of the Scriptures' ( Isaiah 29:11 ). This betrothal protected the Virgin." 297 Righteous Joseph was eighty years old 298 when the fourteen-year-old Virgin was betrothed to him. According to Jewish law, she was betrothed to him as a person belonging to the tribe of Judah and the tribe of David, to which the Mother of God also belonged. Having stayed in his house for four months, She heard the good news from the lips of the Archangel and conceived the God-Man. The humble Mary did not dare tell her betrothed that a great Archangel had appeared to Her, that She had become a wondrous temple of God. When Joseph learned from the angel who appeared to him in a dream the great significance of the Virgin betrothed to him, he understood the full significance of his duty toward Her and became Her servant, fulfilling his holy service with reverence and fear, as Blessed Theophylact of Bulgaria says . He received a feeling of profound respect for Her, similar to that felt and expressed by Saint Elizabeth, having been honored with a visit from the Mother of God. "Whence came this to me?" she exclaimed, "whence this greatest honor, this greatest happiness, 'that the Mother of my Lord may come to me?'" ( Luke 1:43 ). Not only were righteous men filled with reverence for the Mother of God—the Archangel Gabriel himself, delivering the good news, stood before Her with reverence. He treated Saint Zacharias quite differently when announcing the birth of John, the greatest of the prophets. So! Holy angels and holy men revere the Ever-Virgin; bold and blasphemous judgments about Her are characteristic only of reprobate spirits, who have filled both heaven and paradise with blasphemy; they are characteristic of corrupted men who have entered into communion with reprobate spirits. Saint John of Damascus very rightly observes., that not only the deed, but the very thought of corrupting virginity by the Ever-Virgin can belong only to the most immoral, depraved mind. How could righteous Joseph, having heard from an angel the great testimony of the Mother of God, who had seen the wondrous miracles performed at the birth of the God-man, attempt such gross lawlessness, such a terrible crime, attributed to him by Protestants! How could a righteous eighty-year-old elder be carried away by youthful lust and, in the eyes of the God-man, corrupt His Mother! No, no! Such terrible debauchery and wickedness are impossible for a holy elder. Righteous Joseph was granted divine revelations, which are granted only to those pure in heart and body. When he was perplexed about the Mother of God, an angel appeared to him in a dream and said: "Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife" ( Matthew 1:20 ). The angel directly responds to Joseph's thoughts. Joseph, suspicious of Mary, wanted to secretly send her away. The angel, testifying to her chastity, commands him to keep her with him, without any doubt, as having not violated marital duty; then he reveals that she conceived by the Holy Spirit. When the Son of God was about to depart to Egypt from the murderous hand of Herod, the angel again appears to Joseph and no longer calls Mary his wife, but the Mother of the Child. The Gospel recounts the angel's appearance to Joseph twice more. In the more detailed appearance, in which the return to the land of Israel was commanded, the angel again refers to Mary solely as the Mother of the Child ( Matthew 2:13, 20 ).

The Gospel mentions the brothers of the God-man ( John 7:3 ; Matthew 13:55 ); this circumstance is pointed out by the blasphemers of the Ever-Virgin as confirmation of their opinion. But the reliable Tradition of the Orthodox Church explains that the name of brothers of the Lord was borne by the sons of righteous Joseph, the betrothed of the Mother of God, from his first wife. They were called brothers of the Lord in exactly the same respect in which Joseph was called His father. The Mother of God herself called Joseph this. Having found the twelve-year-old Lord in the Jerusalem temple, she said to Him: “Son, what has he done to us? Behold, thy father, and I have been grieved, and have sought Thee” ( Luke 2:48 ; cf. Luke 4:22 ; John 6:42 ). Contemporary Jews, ignorant of the conception by the Holy Spirit and the birth of the Virgin, recognized the God-man as the son of Joseph ( Luke 3:23 ). However, the Mother of God, the disciples, and the Lord's companions concealed this great mystery from the hardened Jews, who never hesitated to blaspheme the obvious signs. What blasphemous outcry would they have raised if the conception by the Spirit and the birth of the Virgin had been revealed to them? This remained unknown to them, and, according to popular belief, Joseph was considered and called the father; consequently, his sons were considered and called the Lord's brothers. They were much older in years than the God-man, who, therefore, could not have been their firstborn.

The accusation against Saint Joseph of attempting to corrupt the virginity of the Mother of God is absurd; even more absurd is such an accusation against the Mother of God. A thousand thousand virgins were betrothed to Christ, keeping the seals of virginity unbroken. Could not this be done by the greatest of virgins, the Bride and at the same time the Mother of God? A thousand thousand virgins preserved their virginity with the assistance of the grace of the Holy Spirit. Could not this be done by the greatest of virgins, into whose womb the Almighty God dwelt not by the action of grace, but by His very being? Could not this be done by She who was constantly in close communion with God? If the Cherubim and Seraphim, due to their closeness to God, have their minds and hearts constantly fixed on Him and are unable to tear them away from Him, could it be that She who is incomparably higher than the Cherubim and Seraphim—She who conceived and carried God in her womb, who painlessly gave birth to God, who nursed Him with her breasts, carried Him in her arms, who spent her entire earthly life with Him—did She not have Her mind and heart cleaved to Him? Could it be that She has descended to carnal lust? No! Such a thought can be born and accepted only by those who have always groveled and continue to grovel in carnal lust, never having emerged from it! May this blasphemous thought be banished from us to the dark hell and eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels! We confess our Lady, the Mother of our God, as a Virgin before her birth, a Virgin at her birth, a Virgin after her birth, and Ever-Virgin. Knowing and confessing the greatness of the Mother of God, we direct our hearts to her with unwavering faith, with the deepest reverence, and, in succession from the holy apostles, we prayerfully cry out to her: "Most Holy Theotokos, help us! " 299

From certain passages in the Gospel, it is evident that the Lord's response to the Mother of God, by human judgment, is cold and stern; this again serves as a stumbling block for carnal minds. The injustice of this stumbling block is exposed by a spiritual examination of the actions and words of our Lord. Spiritual things must be judged spiritually, said the holy Apostle Paul ( 1 Cor. 2:14 ). The Lord's deeds and words "are spirit, and they are life" ( John 6:63 ). Just as the old Adam was carried away by tenderness for the old Eve and in this infatuation transgressed God's commandment, so the New Adam—the Lord—reveals Himself as having in mind only the fulfillment of God's will, and therefore shows no infatuation with the tenderness of the New Testament Eve, who cared for Him. He does not even show any sympathy for this tenderness! In doing so, He redeems the forefather's passion with His dispassion, redeems the acceptance of tenderness that led to sin by rejecting sinless and natural tenderness; He teaches us to guard against passions and the guidance of feelings even on the most plausible occasions. The Law of God must be our lamp and guide in the field of our activity ( Ps. 119:105 ).

The Lord's parents—as the Gospel calls the Mother of God and Joseph, speaking in this instance according to the custom of modern society—had a pious custom of coming to Jerusalem annually for the Feast of Passover. When the Lord was twelve years old, they came to Jerusalem, taking with them the Child-God-Man. After spending the days of the feast in the holy city, Mary and Joseph returned to their place of residence, Nazareth, while the Child-Lord remained in Jerusalem. The Mother of God did not notice this at first, nor did Joseph: they assumed the Lord was traveling with other worshipers. Having already spent the entire day on the road, having likely reached a lodging for the night, they began to search for Him among relatives and acquaintances, but finding Him not, they returned to Jerusalem. There, after three days, they found the Lord in the temple among the teachers of the law, perplexed and terrified by the word of God coming from the lips of the Child-God. The Ever-Virgin, seeing Him, uttered the tender words we have already quoted: "Son, what has He done to us? Behold, Your Father, and I have been grieving for You ." To this the Lord replied: "Why have you sought Me? Know you not that I must be among them who are My Father?" ( Luke 2:41-50 ). In the Lord's answer, it is evident that His thought, will, and love are entirely devoted to His duty toward God; His duty toward man is given its proper place, as is evident from the events that followed His answer ( Luke 2:51 ). When a person does not properly arrange his duties, does not give each of them the proper measure, then their fulfillment cannot bear the fruit of virtue; the fruit will be sins and errors, all the more dangerous because their outward appearance is illusory.

While the Lord was already preaching the Gospel, a wedding was taking place in Cana, a small town in Galilee, to which the Lord, His disciples, and the Mother of God were invited ( John 2 ). The Lord sanctified the wedding and the wedding feast with His coming. In the midst of the feast, there was a shortage of wine. The Mother of God said to the Lord, "They have no wine ." The Lord answered her, "Woman, what is there between me and you? My hour has not yet come ." A wondrous answer regarding the fruit of the vine, which has such a powerful influence on people! This is the answer Adam should have given to Eve when she offered him the fruit forbidden by God, a deadly tasting that infected the human race with the poison of eternal death. "What is there between me and you, woman?" —such could have been Adam's words. "You were created to be my helper: do not be a slanderer." I am united to you by the covenant of marriage into one flesh; but if you have disobeyed God, I separate myself from you as one united to serve God, and not to oppose Him." The second half of the Lord's answer contains a deep, mysterious meaning.

The Mother of God takes pity on a banqueting company, who, in the midst of the feast, have run short of wine, and desires to remedy this shortage with the divine power of His Son. God the Word, in His ineffable mercy, descending in human form to fallen humanity, perishing on earth from a lack of spiritual food and drink, bringing humanity daily bread and a new drink—His Body and Blood. Ready in His love for humanity to immediately grant this nourishment, He hints at the meal prepared by God and already very near, saying: "My hour has not come . " "My hour has not come!" the hour of saving suffering has not come, the hour of the shedding of life-giving Blood, destined to heal humanity from the intoxication of eternal death. This hour the Lord desired as the hour of salvation for mankind, as the hour in which He would reveal all the abundance of His love, as the hour for which He came into the world ( John 12:27 ). The request of the Mother of God, in itself, did not contain anything reprehensible and was fulfilled; from this it is evident that the initial rejection of the philanthropic intercession of the New Testament Eve only atoned for Adam’s consent to the sinful proposal of the Old Testament Eve. The meaning of the Lord’s words can be interpreted thus: “You care for the perishable food of men, but I have loved them with an incomprehensible Divine love. Guided by this love, I am ready and willing to give them My very Body and My very Blood as food and drink; but this too will be accomplished in its own hour, that is, in its own time, established and determined by the incomprehensible counsel of God.” The Holy Evangelist Matthew narrates that one day the Lord was teaching the people in a house: The Mother of God with the sons of Joseph, who were called the brothers of the God-man, came and waited for Him outside the house, wanting to talk with Him about something. This was reported to the Lord: but He answered: “Who is My mother and who are My brothers? Then, pointing with his hand to His disciples, He added: Behold My mother and My brothers: for whoever does the will of My Father who is in heaven, the same is My brother, and sister, and mother” ( Matthew 12:46-50 ) . 300 Likewise, when a certain woman, hearing the wondrous teaching of the Lord, said to Him: “Blessed is the womb that bore You, and the paps which You have sucked ,” the Lord answered: “Blessed is he who hears the word of God and keeps it” ( Luke 11:27-28 ).

The Lord is constantly and equally faithful to His all-holy service under all circumstances. "I came down from heaven ," He said, " not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me" ( John 6:38 ). Such divine behavior of the Lord and His divine words regarding the Mother of God in no way diminish the dignity of the Mother of God; they exalt it. The Ever-Virgin is above all holy people both because She became the Mother of the God-Man and because She was the most constant, most attentive hearer and fulfiller of the teachings proclaimed by the God-Man. The first of these dignity is sealed by the second, and therefore the dignity of the Mother of God became the greatest dignity. The Holy Gospel testifies of the Mother of God: "But Mary kept all these things, pondering them in her heart" ( Luke 2:19 ). This is said in connection with the account of the shepherds, to whom an angel appeared on the night of Christ's birth and announced the birth of the Savior. This has the following meaning: the Mother of God closely followed all the events pertaining to the God-Man from His very birth, noting them, and imprinting them in her memory. Her heart served as a book for recording these events. The Gospel subsequently repeats its testimony: "His mother kept all these words in her heart" ( Luke 2:51 ). This has already been said about the words of the Lord. Not only did she meticulously note the events pertaining to the Lord, but she also noted His very words, storing them in her heart, keeping them in her heart, like priceless treasures in an ark, which itself became priceless because of the pricelessness of the treasures. It is impossible not to mention that the Gospel speaks of these words of the Lord, words which were incomprehensible to the Mother of God in her then-spiritual state and which were later explained to her after her renewal by the Spirit. What hearing of the word of God can be more powerful than that in which the word of God is placed in the heart and preserved therein? The holy prophet David said: "I desired to do Thy will, O my God, and Thy law within my womb" ( Psalm 40:9 ) ., that is, in the midst of my heart. What the greatest saints of God desired to fulfill, the Mother of God, by the divine grace given to her, actually fulfilled. And how did she fulfill it? First, her heart and womb were overshadowed by the Holy Spirit; then her womb became the temple of the Lord who had essentially taken up His abode; spiritual joy from the Lord's presence within her embraced her entire being, as she herself testified. Holy joy usually embraces those who have been granted the action of the Holy Spirit, so even more so was the Mother of God filled with divine joy. After the birth of the God-Man, she was in close contact with Him. In her arms and embrace He spent His infancy. He was inseparable from her not only in his adolescence, but also in his youth and manhood, until his entry into divine service, which lasted three and a half years. No one else was such a close hearer of the word of God and for such a long time as the Mother of God; no one followed the words and deeds of the God-man with such deep and constant attention, no one preserved them with such care and love. We have contemplated the behavior of the Lord with regard to the Mother of God at the wedding in Cana of Galilee; let us also turn our attention to the behavior of the Mother of God with regard to the God-man. Having received a stern answer to her request, she understood it quite differently from how those who were offended by it understand it. She did not see in this answer a rejection of her intercession and therefore turns to those serving at the feast and says to them: "Whatever [ the Lord] tells you , do" ( John 2:5 ). This command of the Mother of God was followed by the transformation of water into wine by the God-man.

During the last three and a half years of the Lord's sojourn on earth, the Mother of God was unable to be constantly with Him. The Lord used this time to wander through the land of Judea, proclaiming the Gospel to the people. But even during this time, the Mother of God often saw Him, often following Him among His disciples, listening to His all-holy teaching, for which she acquired an insatiable thirst. She was especially persistent during His Passion. The Mother of God shared in the sufferings of the God-man, participating in them most vividly and effectively. Just as the old Eve in Paradise made the old Adam a participant in her own transgression, so the New Adam made the new Eve a participant in the sufferings that atoned for the transgression of the forefathers. During the Lord's Passion and because of these sufferings, the Mother of God was permitted to experience the most terrible sorrow. Her heart was stricken with sorrow, as with a deadly weapon ( Luke 2:35 ).

When the Lord had accomplished the redemption of the human race and was about to seal the redemptive feat with His voluntary death, hanging on the cross, the Mother of God stood beside the Lord and His cross, together with the Lord's beloved disciple, John. The Lord had already accomplished the redemption of humanity; He had already given birth to humanity into a new life through His pre-mortal suffering; He was already prepared to accomplish this birth through His death. Having thus become the Forefather of renewed humanity, replacing the forefather, who, because of the fall, was incapable of bearing children for salvation, but who begot them solely for destruction, the Lord suddenly turns to the Mother of God standing before Him, to the sharer of His redemptive suffering for humanity, introducing her to her rights with respect to humanity, to the rights granted to her by the God-man and by all her relationships to the God-man. He declares her the Mother of the beloved disciple, and in him, of all renewed humanity, according to the understanding and explanation of the Fathers . Just as the Lord replaced Adam with Himself, so He replaced Eve with the Mother of God. Eve, being created a virgin, transgressed God's commandment and could not retain within herself the sacred feeling of virginity; her submission to her husband was declared to be among her punishments. The Mother of God, being conceived and born in the sin of her forefathers, prepared herself to be a vessel of God through a chaste and God-pleasing life. Having become a vessel of God, She remained alien to thoughts and sympathy for the lust of her husband, to the bestial coupling to which, as Scripture teaches us, wives submitted as a result of the Fall. Unceasing communion with God, Who was also the Son of the Ever-Virgin, continually nourished her with heavenly, spiritual, holy thoughts and feelings. The Apostle Paul said: "He that cleaveth unto the Lord, thou art one spirit with the Lord" ( 1 Cor. 6:17 ). These words were fulfilled in their fullness in the Mother of God, fulfilled in her more abundantly and abundantly than in all the holy virgins of chosen humanity. The Mother of God—the Virgin—was a Virgin before she gave birth to the God-Man, remained a Virgin during her birth, and remained a Virgin after her birth. She knew no attraction to a husband, for she was wholly and completely drawn to God, united with God.

After the Lord's Ascension, the Mother of God, as we see from the Book of Acts of the Apostles, was already living inseparably with the Apostles in the same house, constantly practicing prayer. The Holy Evangelist Luke calls these prayers "prayers and supplications" ( Acts 1:14 ), thereby depicting that all the activities of the Mother of God and the Apostles were centered in various forms of prayer, that their entire time was devoted to prayer. In the midst of this practice and way of life, on the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit descended upon the disciples of the God-Man. He always requires preparation through the most diligent and unceasing prayer from a disciple of Christ before descending upon them and overshadowing them. At this time, the Mother of God received the abundant gift of the Holy Spirit, which enlightened not only her soul but also her body. Her soul and her body themselves became sources of light. Thus testifies the Holy Spirit, thus testifies the Holy Church , thus testifies the spiritual mind! For those who wish to hear historical testimony, we offer here the testimony of the Mother of God from her contemporary in earthly life, Saint Dionysius the Areopagite., a renowned and learned Athenian converted to Christianity by the holy Apostle Paul. Three years after the Areopagite's embrace of the Redeemer, he visited the Mother of God, who, after the Lord's Ascension, had taken up permanent residence in Jerusalem, in the house of the Evangelist John. We quote the following from the Epistle of Saint Dionysius to the Apostle Paul: "It seemed incredible to me, as I confessed before God, O our excellent leader and master, that anyone other than the Most High God should be filled with divine power and wondrous grace. No human being can comprehend what I have seen and comprehended, not only with the eyes of the soul, but also with the eyes of the body." I saw with my eyes the most divine and, above all heavenly spirits, the most holy Mother of Christ Jesus, our Lord, whom I was granted to see by the grace of God, the condescension of the supreme apostle (John) and the inscrutable goodness and mercy of the most merciful Virgin. Again and again I confess before the omnipotence of God, before the grace of the Savior and before the glorious honor of the Virgin, His Mother, that when I was brought before the face of the God-like, most holy Virgin by John, the head of the evangelists and prophets, who, living in the flesh, shines like the sun in heaven, then such a great and immeasurable divine radiance shone around me, not only from without, but even more enlightened within, and I was filled with such a wondrous and varied fragrance that neither my weak body nor spirit could bear such and such signs and beginnings of eternal bliss and glory: my heart grew faint, my spirit within me grew faint from her Divine glory and grace. "I bear witness by God, who dwelt in the most honorable womb of the Virgin, that if I had not retained in my memory and newly enlightened mind your divine teachings and commandments, I would have recognized the Virgin as God and honored her with the worship due to the one true God, for the mind cannot conceive of a greater honor and glory for a man glorified by God than the blessedness which I, unworthy as I am, was deemed worthy to taste, having then become completely blessed and prosperous. I thank my highest and most gracious God, the divine Virgin, the most excellent Apostle John, and also you, the supreme and triumphant head of the Church, who graciously showed me such a blessing." 303 The gracious gifts of the Holy Spirit, which the Apostles abounded with, were possessed by the Mother of God in greater abundance and greater numbers. She possessed the gift of prophecy, the gift of clairvoyance, the gift of miracles, and countless other gifts known to the Giver of gifts and the recipient. Touching her healed incurable ailments. Her virgin body, sanctified by God, became the receptacle and source of miracles. Just as the icon of the Apostle Peter, depicted on earth by his shadow, worked miracles ( Acts 5:15) .), so icons of the Mother of God work miracles throughout the earth, preaching, bearing witness, and sealing with signs the truth of Christ's teaching. The painters of the miraculous icons of the apostle were rays of the sun; the painters of the miraculous icons of the Mother of God were the intelligent rays of the Sun of Truth, God and the Son of the Ever-Virgin – His apostles and His holy saints.

On the third day after her blessed Dormition, the Mother of God was resurrected and now dwells in heaven in soul and body. She not only dwells in heaven—she reigns in heaven. As the Mother of the Heavenly King, she is declared the Queen of Heaven, Queen of both holy angels and holy men. She has been given special authority and special boldness to intercede before God for humanity. The Holy Church , addressing petitions to all the greatest saints of God, to all the angels and archangels, says to them: "Pray to God for us"; to the Mother of God alone, she uses the words: "Save us." The Mother of God is the greatest intercessor and helper of all who labor to please God, of all who have dedicated their earthly lives to serving God. Appearing to a certain holy monk, She healed him of a grave illness and named him as belonging to her lineage . 304 She is the swift consolation of the grieving and weeping; She is the intercessor of the repentant; She is a hopeful refuge for sinners who desire to turn to God; She is the warmest intercessor for them before God. Standing before the Mother of God in profound reverence for her greatness, in sacred bewilderment and wonder, in the rapture of faith and love, the children of the Orthodox Church offer the Ever-Virgin all-joyful praise. Accept, O Lady, these infant voices, this infant babble, intensified by the warmth of heart to define your greatness, which cannot be defined by the weakness of reason, by the weakness of speech, by the immensity of your greatness. Rejoice, abode of God the Word! Rejoice, Holy of Holies! Rejoice, throne of the Almighty! Rejoice, container of the uncontainable God! Rejoice, chariot of Him who sits and walks upon the cherubim! Rejoice, temple of Him who is worshiped and hymned by the seraphim! Rejoice, height, inaccessible to human thoughts! Rejoice, depth, inaccessible to angelic minds! Rejoice, doubtful hearing of the unbelievers! Rejoice, known and reliable praise of the faithful; Rejoice, you who reveal the wise as unwise; and take away both cunning and speech from the cunning-tongued! Rejoice, you who put to shame the curious, shameless, foolish, all-malicious seekers! Rejoice, you who filled the fishermen's nets of faith with spiritual knowledge! 305. Most Holy Theotokos, glory to you! Holy Mother of God, save us! Amen.

Sources:

1. https://azbyka.ru/otechnik/Ioann_Maksimovich/kak-svjataja-pravoslavnaja-tserkov-chtila-i-chtit-bozhiju-mater/

2. https://azbyka.ru/otechnik/Ignatij_Brjanchaninov/asketicheskaya_propoved/54