Fourth Sunday of Advent (Year B)
2 Sam 7:1-5, 8b-12, 14a, 16;
Ps 88;
Rom 16:25-27;
Lk 1:26-38
BIBLICAL-MISSIONARY COMMENTARY
“In the sixth month” - The Peculiar Beginning of the Mission of the Word Made Flesh
As the Homiletic Directory points out, “with the Fourth Sunday of Advent, Christmas is now at hand. The atmosphere of the liturgy, from the heartfelt appeals to conversion, shifts to the events that closely surround the birth of Jesus” (DO 96). Thus, today’s Gospel invites us to meditate anew on the beautiful and well-known Gospel account of the Angel’s Annunciation to Mary. Even if it is a passage that has been listened to and read and meditated on many times, if we reread it again under the guidance of the Spirit and with particular attention to some apparently insignificant and often overlooked details, we can better understand the spiritual message that the Word of God wants to teach us today in order to have the right attitudes to welcome the divine child. “He Who Comes” to save the world.
1. “In the sixth month.” The Fundamental Temporal Coordinates of the Incarnation of the Son of God
When did the event of the Annunciation and then of the Incarnation of God in Mary’s womb take place? The Latin liturgical lectionary, followed by many translations into various languages, offers the usual generic temporal indication at the beginning of the story: In illo tempore “at that time”. However, if we read the narrative as it is in the Gospel of St. Luke, it all begins with a precise note on the time: “In the sixth month.” This reference, apparently insignificant and therefore ignorable, is actually very interesting and important, because it helps us to further understand the theological significance of the event in question.
In this regard, it should be pointed out immediately that on the literary level the expression “In the sixth month” clearly refers to the time of Elizabeth’s expectation, because it is connected with the phrases earlier in the Gospel of Luke that close the episode of the angel’s annunciation to Zechariah: “After those days Elizabeth, his wife, conceived and hid herself for five months” (Lk 1:24). And then, later, “In the sixth month, the angel Gabriel was sent by God...” (Lk 1:26). Moreover, the reference to Elizabeth’s gestation time will later be recalled again in the angel’s words to Mary: “This is the sixth month for her [Elizabeth], who was called barren” (Lk 1:26).
The repetition of the temporal context of Jesus’ incarnation seems to go beyond a simple news item and goes beyond the reference to Elizabeth’s concrete situation. So much so that St. Luke himself wanted to remain in the generic with the initial indication of the time without any clarification: “In the sixth month.” Thus, theologically and spiritually, one can “grasp” a hidden theological and spiritual message (I would say “subliminal”!): at the moment of the Annunciation and therefore of the Incarnation of God, not only Elizabeth, but also and above all the whole world is in its “sixth” month. Here, let us remember that if in the Bible the number seven symbolizes completeness and perfection (because in the beginning God created everything in seven days), the number six is the symbol of imperfection and incompleteness. In this way, we can understand the highly symbolic value of the “sixth month” time when Jesus the Son of God became incarnate in Mary. He entered the world, when everything is immersed in its imperfection of the “sixth month,” to bring it to the next stage, the “seventh” month of the perfection and completeness of God’s creation. With him, in other words, the new time of humanity is inaugurated, the definitive “seventh” in which all are invited, called to enter into the perfect peace and joy of God.
2. Further clarification of the mission of the Son of God which is to inaugurate the era of perfection for humanity
But is this whole interpretation of the temporal significance of Jesus’ incarnation true? Isn’t it all spiritual science fiction based on (rather weak) numerical symbolism? Some might argue so. In this regard, it should be emphasized that the same vision of Jesus’ entry into the world as the beginning of the time of perfection is also found in the two genealogies of Jesus in the Gospels, Matthew and Luke, with particular emphasis on the symbolic numbers of the generations up to Jesus. The first, St. Matthew, reckons 42 generations from Abraham to Jesus, that is, 6x7, and so with Jesus everything enters the period of 7x7. The Evangelist Luke, on the other hand, while offering a genealogy very different from that of Matthew in form and names, indicates a total of 77 generations from Jesus to Adam, the first man and “son of God” (Lk 3:38). Thus it always remains on the symbolism of the number seven to characterize the time of Jesus’ generation. Moreover, the first public proclamation of Jesus according to Mark’s Gospel will concern precisely the completeness of humanity’s time and therefore the inauguration of the definitive time of the Kingdom of God: “The time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand [literally: it has drawn near]” (Mk 1:15).
Precisely from this point of view, in announcing to Mary, the angel Gabriel explains first of all the identity of the unborn child in her and by her. He is “great” and “holy,” “the son of God Most High,” to whom God will now give his kingdom forever. He will then be God’s true “firstborn,” the beloved and perfect Son. In Him God is totally pleased, and with Him the whole of humanity will be brought back to perfection in His kingdom in the fullness of time. Thus we glimpse in the angel’s annunciation the beginning of the formation of the perfect Man who will fulfill the divine mission of recalling and restoring every man and woman to the splendour of being holy and immaculate in love before God (cf. Col 1:22). So much so that he himself exhorted all his listeners: “Be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Mt 5:48).
3. Mary’s humble attitude that made God’s mission “possible” in her and with her.
On the basis of our reflection so far, we can see in a different light the meaning of Mary’s words to the angel. Like the whole world, immersed in its “sixth” month waiting for “the One who comes” to bring it to perfection in God, Mary too is in this incomplete “state” of creature, even though she is already “full of grace” according to what the angel affirms. And she recognizes with all simplicity her own state of incompleteness in the face of God’s plan for her: “How shall this be, since I know no man?”
It will not be appropriate to see in this “I know no man” of Mary a kind of declaration of the secret vow of perpetual chastity for God (as for a consecrated person in our Christian tradition), because it did not exist in the Jewish tradition. Rather, it is an observation of Mary’s current state that will have a double meaning. On the one hand, Mary confirms a real physical fact that she is a virgin, Joseph’s fiancée but before the official marriage to “get to know” each other as husband and wife. On the other hand, spiritually speaking, Mary’s words humbly manifest her own incomplete existential condition in order to realize the divine plan just announced to her. It is an act of acknowledging one’s own limitations and at the same time of opening oneself to further divine revelation and action, without ever doubting the plan that God wants to accomplish. Thus, Mary’s final response to God after the angel’s subsequent explanation does not mean that she has understood the whole divine mystery, but rather expresses a total adherence to God’s unheard-of plan with and in her on the basis of the unconditional trust of a “handmaid” in her Lord: “Behold, the handmaid of the Lord: let it be done to me according to your word”.
Mary’s humble attitude made God’s mission “possible” in her and with her. It will also be an expression of the intelligence of faith that is in this Woman, although young in age but already “full of grace” by God’s singular operation. Today too, on the eve of the Nativity of the Lord, all of us, the faithful, are called to humbly put ourselves back in our “sixth” month, recognizing our poor, imperfect and incomplete human condition, in order to let the Lord enter into us with His grace, to allow ourselves to be led by Him to the state of divine perfection in His Kingdom.
O Emmanuel, Rex et legifer noster,expectatio gentium, et Salvator earum:veni ad salvandum nos, Domine, Deus noster.
O Immanuel, our king and lawgiver, the hope of the Gentiles, and their Saviour: come, and save us, O Lord our God.