Mary, did you know?

A criticism and a second try

As I’ve prepared to preach this Sunday on the Annunciation and Visitation, I revisited an old project of mine that rewrote “Mary, did you know?”

I rewrote the original text because I have two struggles with it.

My first struggle is that it's not clear what the implied answers to the rhetorical questions are. Did Mary know that (Q.1) her son would walk on water? 

Maybe. Job describes the Almighty God as “treading over waters” (9:8) and, oddly, Genesis describes Noah's ark as “walking” (halakh), rather than the more conventional “floating” or “moving” (7:18). Daniel 12:5-7 depicts a “man clothed in linen who was above the waters of the river.” In the light of these texts, an ancient Jewish commentary on Genesis (mid. ber. rabb. 1:2) identifies the Spirit moving over the waters in creation as the Spirit of the Messiah. 

Mary knew a lot because she was a faithful first century Jew who had vast stretches of Scripture memorized and participated in a religious community the content of whose imagination was full of disciplined, spiritual reflection about, among other things, the Messiah.

Contemporary Christians, proud of having rediscovered “the Old Testament” and its “prophecies,” have, in general, satisfied ourselves with identifying Jesus with many lines from, for example, Isaiah. But we usually stop, show off the connection, and then don’t know what to do with it because we are less interested than first century Jews in reading the Scriptures spiritually or imaginatively.

The song’s notion of knowing feels flat because of its propositional poetics. The apposition of Q.3 asks whether Mary knows that “this child that you delivered, will soon deliver you.”

Propositionally, the answer is Yes. The angel told Joseph that the boy would save his people from his sins (Matt. 1:18-25). Gabriel told Mary that the boy would inherit the throne of David and occupy it forever (Luke 1:32-33).

Poetically, the pun would have been lost on her. In English, the word “deliver” has two meanings. In Greek, for example, the words for delivering a child, e.g., tikto, and deliver, e.g., rhuomai, have nothing in common. There are other puns, like “release” (aphesis), which Luke uses to describe both slave manumission, debt cancellation and sin forgiveness. (Luke should have written a son, “Christian, did you know?” that showed us the conceptual relationship between those acts of redemption and restoration.)

My point is that this is a silly question to have asked Mary, which depends on her having known English, and is mostly about showing off the semantic range of the word, “deliver.”

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My second struggle is that it’s not clear to me what the organizing principle of these rhetorically uneven questions is. There’s some signs and wonders stuff (“walk on water”; “calm the storm”), some incarnation stuff (“kiss the face of God”; “is the great I AM”), and some Messianic signs that conflate the Magnificat with his ministry proclamation (“the blind will see, the deaf will hear…” Luke 4:18-19; cf. Isa. 61:1-3).

One of the organizing principles, which is, I suppose, necessary, is the rhyme. He got “walk on water” and “sons and daughters” next to each other, which is fine. Better, I think, is the pair of heaven-located concepts, “has walked where angels trod” with “kiss the face of God.”

In light of these criticism of a song with, perhaps, an unredeemable premise, here’s my shot at a rewrite. My text offers three verses, each one reflecting on a particular mystery.

The first locates Mary’s Yes within salvation history, contrasting her first with Eve, and then with Hagar/the Law, like Sarah in Gal. 4. I'm proud of lines 3-4.

The second discusses the Visitation, and especially the effect her words had on the pre-born John the Baptist and his mother. Again, I’m proud of lines 3-4. Lines 1-2 are still wooden. The through line so far is Mary’s words.

For a bridge, I tripled the length to approximate the length of the Magnificat (again, Mary’s words) and to focus the content on the content of Mary’s song, and not on lines from Luke 4/Isa. 61. Nothing really distinguishes these lines from any other metric setting of the Magnificat. I just find that it's a good spiritual exercise to rewrite canticles metrically.

The third stanza picks up Jesus’ discussion of family and the moment at which he gives Mary and John to one another. Lines 3-4 are stronger than Lines 1-2 yet again, and I feel that I’ve succeeded in making each stanza a reflection on a Christian mystery: Mary’s Yes in salvation history, the interaction between the preborn children, and Mary’s relationship to the Trinity. 

I've been persuaded lately, by Matthew, that Jesus is concerned with his students’ apprehension of the “mysteries of the kingdom,” and that these are the “talents” that accrue interest upon the master's return (Matt. 25). Of course, there’s a sense in which we “know” the mysteries, and a sense in which we don't comprehend them. So, for two reasons, namely that it’s important to focus on the mysteries, and that the historical Mary didn’t fully comprehend the mysteries, my text seems like an update to a song which, frankly, probably shouldn’t be sung in church anyway.

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Mary, did you know, that when Gabriel came, and spoke of heaven’s myst’ries—
Mary, did you know, that the Yes you gave, fulfilled our faithless hist’ry?
That your “Yes, be it unto me” reversed our mother’s “No”?
That you’re Jerusalem above us, and not the Law below?
Mary, did you know?

Mary, did you know, the depth of joy in your cousin’s veneration?
Mary, did you know that your pregnant words were full of Life from Heaven?
At your voice, the Baptist leapt; Elizabeth was sown
With the seed that you had planted, from the Fruit that God had grown.
Mary, did you know?

The mighty men He’s toppled from
the thrones which once they filled,
And set his humble martyr band
atop his Holy Hill.

He’s scattered all the haughty hearts
and burst their thoughts like sand,
And Abram’s little mustard seed
He’s planted in the land.

The wealthy ones, who cut in line,
He’s sent away unfed,
While those who hunger for a meal
are filled with Heaven’s Bread

Mary, did you know what Jesus meant, in calling you his mother?
Mary, did you know, whoever serves the Lord will be his brother?
Did you know, when Jesus hung, and John was made your son,
The Mystical Communion of God, the Three-in-One?
Mary, did you know?