II Mystery: The Angel's annunciation to the Blessed Virgin Mary

In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. And he came to her and said, ‘Greetings, favoured one! The Lord is with you.’ But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be.

The angel said to her, ‘Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favour with God. And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.’

Mary said to the angel, ‘How can this be since I am a virgin?’ The angel said to her, ‘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 holy; he will be called Son of God. And now, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren. For nothing will be impossible with God.’ Then Mary said, ‘Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.’ Then the angel departed from her. Luke 1:26-38

This second mystery is known as the first Joyful Mystery. However, we are in the context of the prehistory of Jesus of Nazareth, so it is a mystery that is profoundly Marian. The angel Gabriel is the herald of the New Age that is about to begin. God will visit his people again as he did in Egypt, but this time the deliverance is more spiritual than physical and more encompassing, that is, not only for his people, but for all peoples. The dream and prophecy of Isaiah (25:6) of a banquet for all peoples in Jerusalem is coming true.

Gabriel and the nature of angels
In the beginning, Hashem made three types of creatures, the angels, the beasts, and the human beings. The angels, He made from His pure word. The angels have no will to do evil. They cannot deviate for one moment from His purpose. The beasts have only their instincts to guide them. They, too, follow the commands of their maker. The Torah states that Hashem spent almost six whole days of creation fashioning these creatures.

Then, just before sunset, He took a small quantity of earth and from it He fashioned man and woman. An afterthought? Or His crowning achievement? So, what is this thing? Man? Woman? It is a being with the power to disobey. Alone among all the creatures we have free will. We hang suspended between the clarity of the angels and the desires of the beasts. Hashem gave us choice, which is both a privilege and a burden. We must then accept the tangled life we live.  Anton Lesser: Rav Krushka in the movie: Disobedience (2017)

The words cited above are put in the mouth of an old rabbi. Hebrew theology does not grant angels freedom, or freewill, they are not free to choose good or evil. They live like animals, beyond good and evil. The difference is that unlike animals, angels have no desires because they do not have a physical body like the animals. Being purely spiritual beings, they only possess a form of thought from which freewill has been removed, that is, the difference between good and evil. They are a pure extension of God's thought, and cannot deviate from these thoughts.

They have some of God’s attributes, they are God’s companions in Heaven, they relate to God and God to them as a master to his beloved dog or cat, or any other pet, not like, as we have said, beings with a physical body, but beings with a spiritual body.

Angels by not having freewill, then the extra-biblical story of the genesis of the devil or demon makes no sense. There has never been an angel who disobeyed God's plans, because angels, an extension of God's thought, live happily subjugated to their creator, like a pet to its owner, without the ability to diverge, discern, choose or say no. Therefore, Gabriel, God’s messenger, presents himself with a message addressed to Mary, that he cannot change, a human being, who has power to say yes or no to God's plans.

A virgin will give birth...
Ask a sign of the Lord your God; let it be deep as Sheol or high as heaven. But Ahaz said, I will not ask, and I will not put the Lord to the test. Then Isaiah said: ‘Hear then, O house of David! Is it too little for you to weary mortals, that you weary my God also? Therefore, the Lord himself will give you a sign. Look, the young woman is with child and shall bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel.  Isaiah 7:11-14

Context of the original prophecy
In the 8th century B.C., the kingdom of Judah was about to be invaded by the northern kingdom (Israel) and Syria in order to force King Ahaz of Judah into an alliance with these two kingdoms against the powerful Assyria.  

In Isaiah 7:10-12, God, through the prophet, exhorts King Ahaz to ask Him for a sign. King Ahaz, fearing that God's will was different from his own, since he had already thought of forging an alliance with the mighty Assyria, refuses to ask God for a sign, citing Deuteronomy 6:16 as an excuse.

God, on his own initiative, gives the sign anyway, but the recipient is no longer the individual person of King Ahaz, but the dynasty to which he belongs, the house of David. Proof of this is that this dynasty is mentioned in verse 13, which means that the "you" in the following verse 14 does not refer to the king as a person, but to the dynasty to which he belongs, the house of David. The Hebrew term, "lakem", translated as "to you" is in the plural form and it means that the sign is "given to you, but not you as a singular person, that is, it will not be fulfilled during your reign, but much later".

Trying to interpret "you" as referring to the person of King Ahaz, some rabbis stated that this character, Immanuel, was Hezekiah, the son of King Ahaz himself. However, done properly using the reigns of the contemporary neighboring kingdoms, when the prophecy was announced Hezekiah was already between 12 to 14 years old so the “you” cannot be him.

Prophecies have no date of fulfillment, nor do they have a label where the expiration date is stipulated. They are the Word of God which is eternal and they can be announced long before they are fulfilled. This is implied in the enigmatic and unusual characteristic of this prophecy, as well as in the ambiguity of the term "virgin".

The term "Virgin"
The Greek language translated "almah" which in Hebrew means maiden (a young girl) as "párthenos" which means "Virgin". In Hebrew culture, virginity is not generally a value, and if it is, it is at the service of motherhood. However, it is correct to use the term "virgin" as best fitting this message the prophet wants to convey.

That is, if it is a divine sign, it must necessarily be extraordinary; in the case of a maiden giving birth, there is nothing extraordinary about it; it has always been and always will be normal and routine. On the other hand, the one to be born is not just any human person, but Emmanuel, that is, a person through whom God is with us. Finally, the text speaks and only mentions Emmanuel’s mother, not the father, so it is assumed to be God himself.

Conclusion: The angel of the Lord announced to Mary that she was the custodian and the fulfillment of the promise that God made to King Ahaz eight centuries earlier, through the mouth of the prophet Isaiah (7:14). A virgin shall conceive and bear a son, whose name shall be Emmanuel, God with us.

                                            Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC