As we head into Christmas Eve, I wanted to share part of a devotional I gave for a ladies’ Christmas brunch at my church. As I have mentioned previously, this Advent season has left me reflecting on Mary and the way she processes the events of her life. Because of this, I chose to focus on the song of prophetic praise that she sings in Luke 1, traditionally called the Magnificat.
At Christmas, we might be used to hearing the Magnificat as gentle and familiar. Instead, though, history can tell us how the words of this song have been read, recited, sung, whispered, and even forbidden, because the people of God have believed its words mattered.
Today, we pause to listen not only to Mary, but to the generations of voices who continued to carry her song.
The Magnificat was first spoken between two ordinary women—Mary and Elizabeth—in a private home in first-century Judea.
No religious leaders were present and no great audience of listeners were gathered. There were just two women together recognizing and rejoicing that God was at work in their bodies and their world.
From the beginning, the Magnificat was not an act of public performance but a voicing of shared faith.
By the 4th century, Christians had already begun the tradition of praying the Magnificat at sunset. [1] In Roman cities, Christian communities would gather in homes, singing psalms and canticles like the Magnificat, because most of them could not read. [2] For these believers the Magnificat was a prayer of endurance to remind them that God “lifts the lowly,” ending the day with hope. Long before grand cathedrals and basilicas were built, these words dwelled in ordinary households, much like the one where Mary first sang it.
By the 6th century, the Magnificat became fixed in the rule of St. Benedict as the evening prayer for monasteries across Europe. [3] In these monastic communities, Christians would stand each evening to sing Mary’s words as darkness fell among them. In communities like the Abbey of Fontevraud in France, one of the largest monastic communities in medieval Europe, the Magnificat was sung daily by hundred—a combination of peasants, nobles, widows, and their children who had been placed there for education. [4] For them, Mary’s words were not abstract theology. They were daily reminders that God saw their faithfulness in each of their unique positions.
In the 16th century, as Christians were dividing and fighting one another, the Magnificat remained. Martin Luther translated it into German and wrote a commentary in praise of Mary’s humility and faith. [5] In Lutheran homes, the people sang the Magnificat in their own language during evening prayer while at the same time Catholics continued to sing it in Latin during Vespers. These two opposing traditions shared the same song and trust in God despite their differences.
In the 19th and 20th centuries, the Magnificat took on new life in places of geopolitical struggle. In India and parts of Latin America, public reading and recitation of it was discouraged and even banned because the message of lifting the lowly and scattering the proud felt too dangerous for the regimes in power. Still, Christians prayed it both in secret and in protest as a declaration of hope amidst poverty and violence. [6]
At Christmas, we do not just remember Mary’s song and the people who have sung it but we are joining it. Through the ages, Christians have used the Magnificat ti remind themselves that God sees us and is still at work keeping his promises.
Mary’s Magnificat is not just gentle and soothing but strong. It has ignited centuries of Christians toward greater faith and hope because they believed that it told the truths that we celebrate this week. God has come to be with us and is coming again to make all things new. He continues to see and care for his people.
[1] https://www.christianitytoday.com/2012/12/misreading-magnificat/
[2] https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/display/document/obo-9780195393361/obo-9780195393361-0177.xml
[4] Experience Loirehttps://www.experienceloire.comFontevraud abbey
[5] Project MUSEhttps://muse.jhu.eduLuther’s 1521 Magnificat Commentary - Project MUSE
[6] Baker Publishing Grouphttps://cdn.bakerpublishinggroup.comPDFWas Mary’s Magnificat Banned in Guatemala? ; Michael Doe, “Profit and proselytism”, The Church Times 15 November 2013.