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The Great Feasts of the Church
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THE ENTRY
OF THE
THEOTOKOS INTO THE TEMPLE
November
21/December 4
By Fr.
Panagiotes Carras
The oikonomia
of
our salvation began with the very creation of the world. It is not by
chance
that the fourth Gospel does not commence with a genealogy of our Lord
but takes
us back to the very beginning. All
things from the beginning to the end, from the alpha to the omega are
part of
God’s oikonomia for our salvation,
God’s providential ordering of our salvation.
Man was created that he may participate in the Divinity of his
Creator
by first participating in
his own perfection. We are taught by the
Fathers that man was created for perfection. Adam
was offered perfection but fell victim to
the guile of the serpent. God's plan
could not be frustrated and the Lord prepared the world for another
Adam who
would rescue the offspring of the first Adam.
St. Paul tells us that Adam is a type of the future Adam (Romans 5:
14). All Christians are descendants
of both the first Adam and the last Adam.
From the first we inherited death, from the last we inherited life. (1
Corinthians
15: 45-50). It is this Apostolic teaching of the two Adams
which was developed by the Fathers and formed the nucleus of the
Church's teaching
on the salvation of mankind.
Mankind, which
had its beginning in the first Adam, had to
be given a new beginning. A new Adam was needed to become the Head of
the New
Humanity, the Head of the body, the
Church, which is His body (Ephesians 1:22-23).
However, just as in the creation of the Old Humanity, mankind was given
the
freedom to choose sonship; similarly in the creation of the New
Humanity,
mankind was granted the opportunity to choose. The first Adam was from the earth, a man of dust, the
second is from Heaven (1 Corinthians 15: 47). The first could
choose sin
because he was not yet perfect, the second Adam, our Lord Jesus Christ,
being
God by nature, was totally alien to sin. It is because God's oikonomia
required
a member of the human race who was able to prove himself free from
every sin
that the time had fully come (Galatians
4:4) for God to send forth His
Son, since mankind was able to bring forth the All-Holy Virgin.
This is
precisely why Theotokos
is the key-word of the Christological teaching of the fourth
Ecumenical Council
or as St. John of Damascus says, This
name contains the whole mystery of the Oikonomia (On the
Orthodox Faith, 3, 12). It is for this reason that the traditional
Orthodox
icon of the Mother of God is an icon of the Incarnation, the Virgin is
always
with the Child.
The Church's
teaching of the Theotokos is an extension of
what is believed concerning the person of Christ. The Son of God was
born of a
woman and in this case the Mother is not just a mere physical
instrument but an
active participant who has found favour
with God (Luke 1, 30). The faith
of the Church is aptly expressed in the words of Nicholas Cabasilas in
his Homily
on the Annunciation: The
incarnation was not only the work of the Father and of His Power and
His
Spirit, it was also the work of the will and the faith of the Virgin (On the Annunciation, 4).
It is the
teaching of the Church, attested to from the
earliest date, that the Virgin Mother of the Incarnate Lord had found favour with God (Luke 1:30) and
that she was chosen and
ordained to participate in the Mystery of the Incarnation, in the
Oikonomia of
Salvation. The ancient Church understood the typological
relationship between
the first Adam and the last Adam, and by extension it was able to see
that the
first Eve prefigured the second Eve. We find that as early as the
Second
Century St. Justin and St. Irenaeus had a developed teaching of the
Theotokos as
the second Eve who through her obedience remedied the disobedience
of the
first Eve. And so the knot of Eve's disobedience
received its unloosing through the obedience of Mary; for what Eve, a
virgin,
bound by unbelief, that, Mary, a Virgin, unloosed by faith (Against Heresies, III, 22, 4.) Mary... by
yielding obedience, became the
cause of salvation, both to herself and the whole human race. (Against Heresies, III, 22, 4). Mary alone
cooperating with the economy (Against
Heresies, III, 21, 7).
The Church has
proclaimed this great Mystery of our
salvation not only through the teaching of the Fathers but also through
the
festal celebration of the acts which worked our salvation, chief of
which is
the Holy Resurrection of our Lord. On the 21st of November the
Church
celebrates the Feast of the Entry of the
Theotokos into the Temple.
It is at this time that the faithful chant Today
is the prelude of God’s Good-Will and the heralding of the salvation of
mankind.
(Dismissal Hymn).
Throughout the
whole service the hymns proclaim the exalted
place which the Entry has in the
history of Salvation. The Entry marks
the closing of the Old Covenant, whereas the Annunciation marks the
beginning
of the New. With the Entry the most
Holy Virgin is passing from the Old Covenant to the New, and this
transition in
the person of the Mother of God shows us how the New Covenant is the
fulfillment of the Old.
Like other
human beings the Holy Virgin was born under the
law of original sin but the sinful heritage of the fall had no mastery
over
her. She was without sin under the universal sovereignty of sin, pure
from every
seduction and yet part of a humanity enslaved by the devil. This is the
victory
which the Feast of the Entry joyfully
celebrates. St. Photius praises the Holy Virgin as the great
and God-carved ornament of human kind" who " made her
whole soul a holy shrine of meekness... never allowing any of her wares
as much
as to touch for a moment the brine of evil. (On the
Annunciation, 4). This theme constantly appears in the
hymns of the Feast of the Entry. Thy
Miracle, 0 Pure Theotokos, transcends
the power of words; for I comprehend that thine is a body transcending
description, not receptive to the flow of sin. (Third
Magnification of the ninth Ode). Nicholas Cabasilas expanded
this teaching and dealt with it extensively in his Homily on the Birth of the Theotokos
where we read: The Virgin remained
from the beginning to the end free from every evil because of her
vigilant
attention, firm will, and magnitude of wisdom. (Chapter 15).
The
sinlessness and purity of the Theotokos along with the
fact that the Lord was preparing Her to become His chamber
overshadowed the
sanctity of the Old Testament temple. The All-Pure Virgin is allowed to
enter
the Holy of Holies precisely because she is to become the living temple of God. St. Tarasios in his Homily of the Entry has Saint Anne
exclaiming: Receive Zacharias, the pure
tabernacle; receive 0 priest, the immaculate chamber of the Word ...
have her
dwell in the temple made by hands, she who has become a living
temple of the
Word (Migne, 98:1489). Zacharias
in turn speaks to the Virgin, You are the
loosing of the curse of Adam, you are the payment of the debt of Eve
and he
continues to recall all the types and prophecies of the Old Testament
which
refer to the Theotokos. (Migne,
98:1492-93).
In the Minea of St. Dimitry of Rostov we read, Thus with the honor and glory not only of
men, but also of angels, the most Immaculate Maiden was led into the
temple of
the Lord. And it was meet: for if the ark of the Old Testament, bearing
manna
in itself, which served only as a prototype of the Most Holy Virgin,
was
carried into the temple with great honor, with the assembling of all
Israel,
then with how much greater honor, with the assembling of angels and
men, had to
take place the entry into the temple of that same living ark, which had
manna —
Christ — in it, the Most Blessed Virgin, fore-ordained to be the Mother
of God.
The Feast of
the Entry
celebrates the sanctity of the All-Holy Virgin and glorifies the Lord
who
placed her in the inaccessible Holies like
some treasure of God's, to be used in due time (even as came to pass)
for the
enrichment of, and as an ornament transcending, as well as common
to, all the
world. (St. Gregory Palamas, Homily
on the Entry, IX).
Teachings
From the Service of the Feast
In the Orthodox Church
services we participate in the saving events of the Oikonomia of Salvation. This
is why, during these services we hear the word Today
quite often. This is why in the first Sticheron of the Lord I have Cried begins, Come let us faithful dance for joy on this day. The second
Sticheron begins with In the temple of the Law today is the living temple. During
Vespers, Matins and the Divine Liturgy we enter into the Mystery of the
Entry of the Theotokos. When we enter into the Mystery we are not
simple witnesses as the maidens who accompanied theTheotokos but rather
participants in the eternal mystery.
The first two Old Testament readings of Vespers speak of the Divine
establishment of the Tabernacle and the Temple (Exodus 40:1-5, 9-10, 34-35 and IIIKings 8:1, 3-4, 6-7, 9,
10-11). The third reading, taken from the Prophecy to Prophet
Ezekiel ( Ezekiel 43:27-44:4)
speaks of the Theotokos as the living Temple of God.
During the Divine Liturgy, in the reading of the Epistle of Saint Paul
to the Hebrews (9:1-7), we
are taught that all things which were done in the Temple of the Old
Testament were a Prophecy of what would be fulfilled by our
Saviour. In the Gospel of Saint
Luke (10:38-42, 11:27-28), which is read at every Feast of the
Mother of God, we hear: Blessed is
the womb that bare thee, and the paps which thou hast sucked.
We are reminded to glorify our Lord and bless His mother, who brought
us our salvation.
Icon
of the Feast
The Orthodox
teaching on the The Entry of the
Theotokos into the Temple as the
heralding of the salvation of
mankind is seen in the Icon of the Feast. The central theme
of the icon is the Holy of Holies (1) in the Temple which is about to
receive a blessing far
superior to any of its former blessings. The priest Zacharias,
the father of St. John the Baptist, receives Panagia at the gates of
the Temple (3) and in this way
prophesies that the Virgin Mary is the New Ark of the Covenant.
Saints Joachim and Anna (4), accompanied by virgins of Jerusalem,
carrying torches in procession, bring Panagia as a well-pleasing sacrifice.
The Theotokos is brought to the gates and ascends to the Holy of Holies where she is cared
for by angels (2). Notice that the young virgins do not have
their heads covered but that the Theotokos has her head covered.
Also the garments of the Mother of God resemble those of Saint Anna and
not of the young virgins. The Theotokos, although a child, is
already a perfected woman that has reached full spiritual
maturity. She who in body is
but three years old, and yet in the spirit is full of years (Ode
three of the Second Canon).



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1.
The Holy of Holies
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2. The
Theotokos is cared for by angels in the Temple of Solomon.
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3.
The High Priest Zacharias received the Mother of God
into the Temple.
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4.
Saints Joachim and Anna bring Panagia to the Temple as they had vowed.
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Acknowledgements
The Menaion - Volume
Three,
Holy Transfiguration Monastery, Boston, Massachusetts, 2005