Introduction
In his Gospel, St John tells us that Mary’s child was actually God himself. From early times, the shock of this simple proposition was too much, even for very senior clergy, and they retreated into hair-splitting qualifications to escape it. The eighth-century English monk Bede, in a Christmas sermon, reminded his brethren of what happened to that child later.
“And we beheld his glory, glory as of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.”* Christ’s glory, which men could not see before his incarnation, they did see afterwards: they watched his humanity flash back with miracles, and understood the divinity hidden within — and those who understood it best of all were those judged worthy to behold his brightness when, before his Passion, he was transfigured on the holy mountain, and a voice came down upon him from out of this magnificent glory, saying ‘This is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased’.* And after the Passion, when the glory of his resurrection and ascension had passed before their eyes, they were wonderfully refreshed by the gift of his Spirit. By all of this, they recognised clearly that a glory of this order belonged not to one of the holy men, but only to that man who was in divinity the only-begotten of the Father.
Full of grace and truth. This same man Christ Jesus was full of grace, to whom a singular gift was given above all other mortals: that, immediately from the moment he was conceived in the womb of a virgin and began to be man, he was also true God; whence the same glorious ever-virgin Mary is to be rightly believed and confessed as birth-giver* not only of the man Christ, but also of God.
Translated for Clay Lane.
Freely translated from ‘A Sermon for High Mass on Christmas Day’, by St Bede of Jarrow (?632-735).
* Bede is expounding the well-known opening to St John’s Gospel. See John 1:1-14. ‘We’ here means above all John and his fellow Apostles, who are eyewitnesses testifying to all that will follow in the Gospel: see also 1 John 1:1-4
* See Matthew 17:1-9.
* Genitrix. Not the same word as mater (mother). Bede has chosen this word to emphasise that Mary was not just Jesus’s mother — and therefore God’s mother — by family relationship alone, but actually the one who gave birth to him. It was a word that brought with it all the blood, sinew and passage implied by it, all the constraint in space and time: ‘Our God contracted to a span / Incomprehensibly made man’, as Charles Wesley put it in Let Earth and Heaven Combine. Many struggled with the whole mental picture: that is why the early hymn Te Deum Laudamus insisted that God did not “abhor the virgin’s womb”.
Précis
When Jesus Christ grew to manhood, said eighth-century monk Bede in a Christmas sermon, he displayed through his miracles, his transfiguration and his gift of the Holy Spirit a power that nobody could mistake for the deeds a mere holy man. Such a glory revealed that the human child born of Mary must be God himself. (56 / 60 words)
When Jesus Christ grew to manhood, said eighth-century monk Bede in a Christmas sermon, he displayed through his miracles, his transfiguration and his gift of the Holy Spirit a power that nobody could mistake for the deeds a mere holy man. Such a glory revealed that the human child born of Mary must be God himself.
Variations: 1.increase the length of this precis to exactly 60 words. 2.reduce the length of this precis to exactly 50 words. 3.introduce one of the following words into the precis: about, despite, if, or, since, until, whereas, whether.
Archive
Word Games
Sevens Based on this passage
Suggest answers to this question. See if you can limit one answer to exactly seven words.
Variations: 1.expand your answer to exactly fourteen words. 2.expand your answer further, to exactly twenty-one words. 3.include one of the following words in your answer: if, but, despite, because, (al)though, unless.
Jigsaws Based on this passage
Express the ideas below in a single sentence, using different words as much as possible. Do not be satisfied with the first answer you think of; think of several, and choose the best.
Spinners Find in Think and Speak
For each group of words, compose a sentence that uses all three. You can use any form of the word: for example, cat → cats, go → went, or quick → quickly, though neigh → neighbour is stretching it a bit.
This exercise uses words found in the accompanying passage.
1 Belong. Magnificent. Son.
2 Back. Giver. Truth.
3 Give. Transfigure. Upon.
Variations: 1. include direct and indirect speech 2. include one or more of these words: although, because, despite, either/or, if, unless, until, when, whether, which, who 3. use negatives (not, isn’t, neither/nor, never, nobody etc.)
Add Vowels Find in Think and Speak
Make words by adding vowels to each group of consonants below. You may add as many vowels as you like before, between or after the consonants, but you may not add any consonants or change the order of those you have been given. See if you can beat our target of common words.
mlt (6+2)
amulet. emulate. malt. melt. militia. omelet.
moult. umlaut.
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