Feast of the Presentation of the Theotokos to the Temple | November 21

In the name of God the Father, Christ Jesus His Son and the Holy Spirit, One True God. Amen.

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus

As the Indian Orthodox Church and along with all the other churches around the world prepare for the celebration of the Nativity of our Saviour Jesus Christ, on November 21 we commemorate the Entry of the Blessed Mother of our God, Most Holy Theotokos Mother Mary into the Temple in Jerusalem. The Feast commemorates when as a young child, the Virgin Mary entered the Temple in Jerusalem.

The birth and life of the Virgin Mary is not recorded in the Gospels or other books of the New Testament, but this information can be found in a work dating from the 2nd century known as the ‘Book of James’ or ‘Protoevangelion’.

Before we look at the reason why we commemorate this feast, we need to understand the life of her parents, Saints Joachim and Anna.

Life of the righteous Joachim and Anna

St. Joachim was of the lineage of Judah and a descendant of King David. Anna was the daughter of Matthan the priest, from the lineage of Levi, as was Aaron the high priest. Matthan had three daughters: Mary, Sophia and Anna. Mary married, lived in Bethlehem, and gave birth to Salome; Sophia married, also lived in Bethlehem, and gave birth to Elizabeth, the mother of St. John the Forerunner; Anna married Joachim in Nazareth, and in old age gave birth to Mary, the Most-Holy Theotokos.

Joachim and Anna had lived together in marriage for fifty years and yet they remained barren. They were devout and pious people who followed all the regulations of the Jewish law and was willing to go more and above than what was asked for. Of their total income, they gave one third to the Temple, distributed one third to the poor and the needy and the balance one third they spent on themselves, and they found that they were well provided within that one third of their income.

Once when in their old age they came to Jerusalem to offer a sacrifice to God, the high priest Issachar reprimanded Joachim, saying: “You are not worthy that a gift be accepted from your hands, for you are childless.” Others who were present at that time and who had children of their own also pushed Joachim behind them as one who was unworthy. This greatly grieved the two aged souls and they returned home in great sorrow.

After reaching home, they fell down before God in prayer and asked Him to bless them with a miracle in their lives as He had once blessed Abraham and Sarah, and give them a child as a comfort in their old age. They promised God that they would dedicate the child, no matter the gender, to the service of God in His temple in Jerusalem. Then God sent His angel, who announced to them the birth of “a daughter most-blessed, by whom all nations on earth will be blessed and through whom the salvation of the world will come.” Anna straightway conceived, and in nine months gave birth to the Holy Virgin Mary.

Presentation of the Theotokos

When Mary was three years old, Joachim and Anna decided that the time had come to fulfill their promise to the Lord and dedicate Mary to His service in the Temple. Joachim gathered the young girls of the neighborhood to form an escort, and he made them go in front of Mary, carrying torches. Captivated by the torches, the young child followed joyfully to the Temple, not once looking back at her parents nor weeping as she was parted from them.

As she neared the Temple, young Mary ran toward the Temple, overtaking her attending maidens and threw herself into the arms of the High Priest Zacharias, who was waiting for her at the gate of the Temple with the elders. Zacharias blessed her saying, 

It is in you that He has glorified your name in every generation. It is in you that He will reveal the Redemption that He has prepared for His people in the last days.”

Then, Zacharias brought the child into the Holy of Holies—a place where only the High Priest was permitted to enter once a year on the Day of Atonement. He placed her on the steps of the altar, and the grace of the Lord descended upon her. She arose and expressed her joy in a dance as wonder seized all who saw this happen.

The Virgin Mary dwelt in the Temple for nine years until, reaching an age for marriage. Saint Joachim died a few years later at the age of 80 after his daughter went to live in the Temple. Saint Anna died at the age of 70, two years after her husband. Mary, after completing nine years in the Temple was taken from the Temple by the priests and elders and bethrothed to Joseph as the guardian of her virginity.

Contemplation

As we move to the fourth Sunday of the season of the Advent when we commemorate the Annunciation to Mary by Angel Gabriel about the birth of the Messiah, the feast of the The Entrance of the Theotokos into the Temple calls us to contemplate on the life of Mother Mary, specifically, particularly, in what she herself is and cannot be denied. And then we also contemplate, by extension, what we believe should also be our situation. In other words, what should happen to us? What has happened to us in Christ?

The life of our Most Holy Mother signifies her total dedication to God and her readiness for her future vocation as the Mother of the Incarnate Lord. This is a feast of anticipation on not only how Mary prepared herself, but how we, who are called to be the living Temples of the Almighty God can prepare ourselves to become a dwelling place for the Most Holy God.

The feast of the Presentation is a prelude to the fulfillment of the prophesies made by the prophets of the Old Testament where God resides in man. It is the prelude of the goodness, the proclamation of the salvation of humanity, of mankind.  Mary is called the fulfillment, the fulfiller of the plan of God, because through her, Christ comes. Through her, God is with us. Through her, the Word becomes flesh. Through her, the Son of God becomes the Son of Man. That’s what is celebrated.

Just as Mary was called to bear God in her womb for nine months, we, who are called the followers of Christ, are also called to bear God within us through the partaking of the Divine Mysteries and become a living Temple of God and the body of Christ.

Today is the prelude of the good-will of God, the first preaching of the coming of grace, the Virgin appears in the Temple of God. In anticipation, proclaiming Christ to all. Let us come and sing to her: Rejoice, O abode of heaven. Rejoice, O Temple of the living God who is our Savior, Jesus Christ.

May the intercessions of our Most Holy Mother, the Theotokos be a stronghold for us and may her life be an example to lead our lives.

Your brother in Christ Jesus

Jobin George

Source

• https://www.goarch.org/entrance-theotokos
• https://greekcitytimes.com/2020/09/09/synaxis-of-the-holy-righteous-ancestors-of-god-joachim-and-anna/
• The Synaxarion: The Lives of the Saints of the Orthodox Church, Vol. 2, compiled by Hieromonk Makarios of Simonos Petra and translated from the French by Christopher Hookway (Chalkidike, Greece: Holy Convent of the Annunciation of Our Lady, 1999) pp. 193-196.
• The Incarnate God: The Feasts of Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary, Catherine Aslanoff, editor and Paul Meyendorff, translator (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1995)