The Circumcision of Our Lord

St Luke Chapter II : Verses 21-24

Contents

• Luke ii. 21-24.  Douay-Rheims (Challoner) text & Latin text (Vulgate).
• Annotations
• Douay-Rheims : 1582 text & notes

Luke ii. 21-24.

The Circumcision. Barocci (1590).
The Louvre. Public Domain.

21 And after eight days were accomplished, that the child should be circumcised, his name was called JESUS, which was called by the angel, before he was conceived in the womb.

Et postquam consummati sunt dies octo, ut circumcideretur puer, vocatum est nomen ejus Jesus, quod vocatum est ab angelo priusquam in utero conciperetur.

22 And after the days of her purification, according to the law of Moses, were accomplished, they carried him to Jerusalem, to present him to the Lord:

Et postquam impleti sunt dies purgationis ejus secundum legem Moysi, tulerunt illum in Jerusalem, ut sisterent eum Domino,

23 As it is written in the law of the Lord: Every male opening the womb shall be called holy to the Lord:

sicut scriptum est in lege Domini : Quia omne masculinum adaperiens vulvam, sanctum Domino vocabitur :

24 And to offer a sacrifice, according as it is written in the law of the Lord, a pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons:

et ut darent hostiam secundum quod dictum est in lege Domini, par turturum, aut duos pullos columbarum.

Annotations

    21. And after eight days were accomplished, that the child should be circumcised, his name was called JESUS, which was called by the angel, before he was conceived in the womb.—after eight days were accomplished,—when the eighth day from His nativity was come. That the child should be circumcised—this indicates that He was circumcised, implying that He underwent the rite, not of obligation, but freely and of His own will. For, in the first place, He was God—the Author of the law, and, therefore, not bound by the law; and, in the second place, He was not of the common generation of men, who are procreated of the propagation of sin and conceived in iniquity, says Bede, but conceived and born of the Holy Spirit, and, therefore, without original sin, for wiping out of which circumcision was instituted. For circumcision was the sign and stigma of sin, the cautery with which it was burnt out, and in Christ there was no sin, no lust. So in His circumcision Christ humbled Himself to a still greater degree than in His nativity—in the latter He took upon Him the form of man, in the former the character of a sinner.

    Here are seven reasons why Christ would of His own accord be circumcised, drawn from the writings of S. Cyprian, S. Augustine, Bede, and others, and given by S. Thomas, (part iii., quæst. 37, art. 1):—

    First, to show the reality of His human flesh, as against Manichæus, who said that He had a phantom body, Apollinarius, who said that the body of Christ is consubstantial with the Godhead, and Valentinus, who said that He brought His body from heaven.

    Secondly, to sanction the rite which God had instituted.

    Thirdly, to show that He was of the seed of Abraham, who had received the ordinance of circumcision as a sign of the faith which He had in reference to Christ.

    Fourthly, to take away all excuse from the Jews, lest they should not accept Him if He were uncircumcised.

    Fifthly, to commend to us by His own example the virtue of obedience. Hence it was that He was circumcised on the eighth day, as the law prescribed.

    Sixthly, that, having come in the likeness of the flesh of sin, He might not seem to reject the remedy by which the flesh had been wont to be cleansed of sin.

    Seventhly, that, bearing the burden of the law Himself, He might free others from that burden, “But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent his Son, made of a woman, made under the law: That he might redeem them who were under the law: that we might receive the adoption of sons.” [Gal. iv. 4-5].

    S. Leo (Serm. 2 on the Nativity) adds as another reason that by this rite Christ’s character was hidden from the devil: 

“The merciful and Almighty Saviour, so conducting the beginning of His assumption of human nature as to hide the virtue of the Godhead inseparable from His humanity with the veil of our infirmity, eluded the craft of the enemy, who was secure in the supposition that the birth of this child, begotten for the salvation of mankind, was no less liable to His power than that of all other children who are born.”

    S. Augustine (Serm. 9 on the Nativity) gives yet another reason—that putting an end to the carnal, Christ might put in its place that spiritual circumcision which consists in the mortification and cutting away of vices and concupiscence—“Christ,” he says, “took circumcision upon Himself as about to do away with circumcision; He admitted the shadow as about to give light—the figure as He that should fulfil the verity.”

    Lastly, by this act He began that suffering by which He became the Redeemer and Saviour of the world. So it was that in this rite the name of “Jesus” was given Him, because He healed not our infirmities with drugs, as the physicians do, but by taking them upon Himself and making satisfaction for them to God, so earning the power of healing all the diseases of soul and of body, all our passions, temptations, sorrows, and afflictions, whether in this life or in the life to come. Art thou afflicted, then, with fear or over-scrupulousness, with anger or bitterness, with sorrow or poverty? Call upon Jesus, and thou shalt feel that He is thy Consoler and thy Saviour.

    Christ was circumcised in the cave where He was born by some priest or Levite, and felt greater pain than other infants, in that He had the use of reason which other infants lack, and possessed a more delicate and active sense of touch.

    His name was called Jesus. The name of Jesus signifies the function of Saviour in its greatest fulness, inasmuch as He not only saved men Himself, but gave to His apostles and to those like them the power of saving. This is what is implied by the word Josue, or, as the Hebrews say, Jehosua. Let the faithful then remember that they are children of Jesus, and that they ought therefore to imitate Him in bringing about the salvation of souls.

    which was called by the angel, before he was conceived in the womb. (when Gabriel announced to the Blessed Virgin His conception, ch. i. ver. 31). For Christ was conceived at the end of the Annunciation, when the Blessed Virgin answered, “Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it unto me according to Thy word.” In this sentence S. Luke gives us to understand that the name of Jesus had been decreed by God for this Child from all eternity, to signify that He was to be the Saviour of the world.

    Observe here how God joins and couples in Christ the humble with the sublime, the human with the divine, the poison with the antidote, to show that in Him human nature was joined to the Divine Majesty. Christ would be circumcised, so taking on Him the appearance of sin, but presently, when He wipes away this appearance He gives Him the name of Jesus—the Saviour that heals all sins. So, too, He would have Christ born in a stable and laid in a manger, as being poor and abject; but soon He summoned by the star the three kings, and by the angel the shepherds to adore Him. So, again, He would have Him suffer, be crucified, and die; but at the same time He darkened the sun and the moon, rent the rocks and shook the earth, that all the elements might testify of, and mourn for, the ignominious murder of their Creator. The more, then, Christ humbled Himself, the more the Father exalted Him. To thee, Christian, He will do the same; wherefore fear not to be humbled, knowing for certain that by this means thou art to be exalted. For the road to glory is humiliation, according to that promise of Christ, “Because every one that exalteth himself, shall be humbled; and he that humbleth himself, shall be exalted.” [Luke xiv. 11]

    22. And after the days of her purification, according to the law of Moses, were accomplished, they carried him to Jerusalem, to present him to the Lord: Observe that here three different ordinances are intertwined and joined together. 

    The first is that of Lev. xii. 2, et seq., that a woman, if she have borne a male child, shall remain unclean for forty days, and then be purified in the temple legally, that is by the sacrificial rite prescribed by the law. 

    The second, that the mother offer to God a lamb, as a holocaust for her own purification (not that of her child, as S. Augustine would have it), and a young turtle-dove or pigeon as a sin-offering, if she be rich; but if poor, only a pair of turtle-doves or two young pigeons (Lev. xii. 6, 7). 

    And the third, that if the offspring be a male, and the firstborn, it be set before God, and offered to Him as His due, and holy, that is, consecrated on account of the immunity of the firstborn of the Hebrews granted them by God, when the firstborn of Pharaoh and the Egyptians were smitten by the angel in the time of Moses (Exod. xiii.1). The child, however, so offered might be redeemed by his parents for five shekels (Num. iii. 47). Symbolically, these five shekels stood for the five wounds of Christ, with which, as with a price, He redeems the human race.

    the days of her purification. In the old law the woman bearing a child was unclean, with a natural, a legal, and a moral uncleanness; but especially because she bore a child whom she conceived in original sin. The natural uncleanness was that physically incidental to her gestation and delivery; and the legal defilement was consequent upon this, for the law, on account of these impurities, regarded her as impure, and directed that she be kept away from the temple, and be held, as it were, “unclean” for forty days, until, on the fortieth day, she was purified by the prescribed rite.

    With reference to the question whether the Blessed Virgin suffered this impurity, S. Jerome (Ep. 22 ud Eustochium), John of Avila, commenting on Lev. xii, and Erasmus on this same passage, affirm that she did. All other authorities, however, agree in the contrary view, since the Virgin’s parturition was perfectly pure. See S. Augustine (de Quinque hæresibus, ch. v). This point has been treated in what has been said on v. 7 of the present chapter. Hence the Blessed Virgin incurred no defilement, and therefore was not bound by the law of purification. Yet, in her zeal for humility, in order to make herself like other women who bear children, that she might not give scandal in seeming to be singular, and that she might conceal her virginity and her conception by the Holy Ghost, the Blessed Virgin was willing to be purified, even as Christ, for similar reasons, was willing to be circumcised. Hence S. Bernard (Serm. 3 on the Purification) says: 

“In this conception, and in this child-birth, there was nothing impure, nothing sinful, nothing that had to be purged, for this offspring is the fount of purity, and is come to make a cleansing of sins. What is there in me for a legal observance to purify—in me, who, by this immaculate parturition, am become most pure? Truly, O Blessed Virgin, thou hadst no need for purification; but had thy Son need of circumcision? Be thou among women as one of them, for so too is thy Son among men.”

    Tropologically, the purification of the soul is penance, and this the Blessed Virgin underwent, not for her own sins, seeing that she had none, but for those of others, as Christ did. Still she did not undergo the Sacrament of Penance, because she had no sins of her own to confess. See S. Chrysostom, Tertullian, S. Augustine, and S. Ambrose in his book “On Penance.”

    To present Him to the Lord. The Syriac version has “in the presence of the Lord.” The Blessed Virgin, holding Christ in her hands, on bended knee, offered Him to God with the greatest reverence and devotion, saying, “Behold, O Eternal Father, this is Thy Son whom Thou hast wished to take flesh from me for the salvation of men. To Thee I render Him, and to Thee I offer Him entirely, that Thou mayest do with Him and with me as it shall please Thee, and by Him mayest redeem the world.” So saying, she presented Him to the priest as to the representative of God; and then she redeemed Him with five shekels, as the law prescribed.

    23. As it is written in the law of the Lord: Every male opening the womb shall be called holy to the Lord: (Exod. xiii.12)—that is, shall be offered and consecrated to God as a thing dedicated and holy. Christ was not bound by this law, both because He subsisted in the Person of the Word, which is bound by no laws, and also because He did not open His mother’s womb, but came forth while it remained closed. So Cyril (Hom. De Occurs. Dom.), Pope Hormisdas (Ep. i. ch. iii.), Bede, and others.

    Rupertus, John of Avila, Jansenius, and Maldonatus, therefore, who take the phrase “that openeth the womb” as merely equivalent to “first-born,” and suppose, on this ground, that Christ was included by these words, but otherwise excepted from the law as being God and the Son of God, are incorrect in their view. Lastly, I quote the following from S. Bernard’s “Sermon on the Purification”—

“Very slight, brethren, does this oblation seem, in which He is but presented to the Lord, redeemed with birds, and straightway taken back. The time shall come when He shall be offered up not in the temple, nor within the arms of Simeon, but outside the city in the arms of the Cross. The time shall come when He shall not be redeemed with blood not his own, but with His own blood shall redeem others, because God the Father hath sent him to be the redemption of His people. That shall be an evening sacrifice, this is a morning sacrifice—this is the more joyous, that shall be the fuller.”

    24. And to offer a sacrifice, according as it is written in the law of the Lord, a pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons: because they were poor; for the rich were obliged to give in addition to this a lamb for a holocaust. Although the three kings had offered to Christ a great quantity of gold, still the Blessed Virgin, zealously affected towards poverty, accepted but little of it, that she might show her contempt of all earthly things, and what she took she spent in a short time, says John of Avila, on S. Matt. ii. Quest. 47; or, if she took much, say S. Bonaventure and Dionysius, she distributed it among the poor. And, lastly, because she was by her condition poor, she would be reckoned among the poor, and offer the gift of the poor.

    The purification of the Blessed Virgin is commemorated by the Church on the second day of February, in order, Baronius says, to abolish the Lupercalia, which used to be celebrated at Rome on that day. The order of the rite of purification was as follows:—First, the woman came into the “court of the unclean”—she being unclean until her purification. Next, she offered a sin-offering of a turtle-dove or a young pigeon. It is probable that she was also sprinkled with water mixed with the ashes of the red heifer, this water being, as it were, an “aqua lustralis” used in all purifications.

    Then she offered the infant to God, and redeemed him. And, lastly, she offered to God as a whole burnt-offering of thanksgiving a lamb, or else a turtle-dove, or a pair of young pigeons. These last two acts were performed by the woman (by this time purified) standing in the “court of the clean;” there she would offer the infant at the door of the tabernacle; and there watch from afar off her holocaust being offered in the “court of the priests”—for between the court of the priests and that of the people there was a wall or a partition three feet high, so that the people could, from their court, watch the offerings, and all that was being done in the court of the priests.

    Tropologically, the turtle-doves and the pigeons which the woman used to offer for her sin, i.e., her defilement or legal uncleanness, signified the groaning or compunction of the penitent by which sins are expiated, especially when they accompany the sacrament of expiation. Moreover, the Blessed Virgin, having no sin, needed no sacrament to expiate it, but she received the Sacrament of Baptism as a profession of the Christian religion, that of Confirmation, the Eucharist, and perhaps also Extreme Unction. She entered into the state of matrimony with Joseph, but this was not a sacrament in the old law. She never confessed her sins or received absolution from a priest, in that she had no sins. It may be said, however, that the Blessed Virgin had reason to fear lest she had been guilty of some distraction in prayer, some venial negligence in word or thought, and that she might have confessed such as these, since, as S. Gregory says, “It is the characteristic of good souls to acknowledge fault where there is no fault.” And this is true in the case of sinners and those in the state of original sin, but not for those who are innocent and unspotted as the Blessed Virgin was. Wherefore, as the angels see clearly all their own actions, and the defects—even the most trifling—in them, and as Adam, too, saw his own actions when he was in the state of innocence—in accordance with the perfection which belongs to this state—so the Blessed Virgin in like manner saw all her own acts in the past and in the future, and knew that they were most pure and most holy, and altogether without any defect, even venial, and for this reason she could not confess them as sins. She did not, however, lift herself up on that account, but humbled herself the more, knowing this to be the gift of God and not her own merit. Hence the opinion of Sylvester, in the “Golden Rose” (tit. 3, ch. 53), to the effect that the Blessed Virgin received the Sacrament of Penance and was accustomed to confess venial sins conditionally to S. John, must be flatly rejected, especially as absolution cannot be given on uncertain matter, but the penitent, to be capable of it, must confess some particular sin—Vasquez (part iii., disp. 119, ch. 7).

Douay-Rheims : 1582 text

21. And after eight daies were expired, that the childe should be circunciſed: his name was called IESVS, which was called by the Angel, before that he was conceiued in the wombe.

22. And after the daies were fully ended of her purification according to the law of Moyses, they caried him into Hie­ſalem, to present him to our Lord 

23. aſ it is written in the law of our Lord, That euery male opening the matrice, shal be called holy to the Lord. 

24. and to giue a ſacrifice according as it is writ­ten in the law of our Lord, a paire of turtles, or tvvo yong pigeons.

[Ed. 23.  matrice: matrix, womb. a1400 Þe matris of wymmen]

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The Vladimirskaya Icon. >12th century.

SUB tuum præsidium confugimus, Sancta Dei Genitrix. Nostras deprecationes ne despicias in necessitatibus, sed a periculis cunctis libera nos semper, Virgo gloriosa et benedicta. Amen.

 

Totus tuus ego sum

Et omnia mea tua sunt;

Tecum semper tutus sum:

Ad Jesum per Mariam.