In the Gospels we have two descriptions of the Mother of
God. The feeling-tone of each is different. The one is described in Luke; she
is the one to whom the angelic messenger announces the coming of God’s son
through the inseminating power of the Holy Spirit. She is humble and open,
experiencing an other-worldly event.
The Mother in Matthew’s Gospel receives royal gifts. She
must flee to Egypt to save her little Son from Herod’s persecution. In John’s
Gospel she stands under the cross. Mother’s innocence has become bitter
experience. But she also partakes in her Son’s subsequent rise from death.
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| Bernhard Eyb |
At this time of the year we can picture the otherworldly
Mother. If we could see her now, in winter, we would see the moon element
spread out below the earth’s surface. From her human form, we see a heavenly
Earth-Star, raying out into the cosmos from her head. At her breast the sun’s rays, forming itself
out of the clouds, condensing into the child, all in a rainbow-hued background.
She is the woman formed out of the clouds, endowed with earthly forces under
her feet, sun radiance in the middle, head crowned with stars—the woman of Rev.
12. She is arising out of the cosmos itself. In winter, when we ourselves are
most strongly connected with the earth, we see the Mother arising in the
cosmos, in the interplay between the earth and the stars.[1]
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| Summer Imagination, Margarete Woloschin |
As we move through the course of the year, we ourselves move
between these two counter-poles—cosmic mother, earth mother. During the twelve
days and holy nights of the Christmas season, from Christmas to Epiphany, we
experience this polar movement in miniature, in the picture of the two Marys.
The Christ, the Child reconciles these two poles. In Luke the Child is born in
a cave in the earth, in midwinter (not in summer). Although he is in a cave in
the earth, he and his mother are innocent and humble. We read his gospel story
from the altar early Christmas morning.
On January 6, we read of the Matthew Mother in her regal
queenly aspect. She receives royal gifts, moves forward through experience,
grappling with Herod’s evil, fleeing to Egypt where the mysteries of death were
understood.
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| Cordoba |
In this movement
between these two poles, the two mothers represent the overall movement of the
human experience. It is a movement from humble innocence to earthly experience,
being crowned with the earth-star and at the same time finding and maintaining
(again) a connection to the starry cosmos.
Mary represents the human soul, operating between the two
poles and moving through them over and over again in the course of the years.
She also represents a kind of aggregate of all human souls, a spiritual entity
we could call the Soul of Man, as it evolves over time. From humble innocence we are born out of the
summer of stars, generated by the union of Sky Father and Earth Mother.
Gradually the Soul of Man is evolving toward becoming a being radiant with
experience, clothed with the sun, the moon under her feet, crowned with the
stars of earth winter.
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