Reflections on Candlemas

Today is Candlemas, also known by various other names including the Feast of the Presentation  of Christ in the Temple.

That's why I posted "When to the temple Mary went" by Johannes Eccard as my Sunday music spot this morning.

Candlemas is usually celebrated in the Anglican church on the nearest Sunday to the second of February, and marks when Joseph and Mary took the infant Jesus to the temple to be dedicated to God, forty days after his birth.

This date is also half way between the winter solstice and the Spring Equinox, and thus marks that we have passed the deepest part of winter and re on the way towards Spring..

Some people may be thinking at this point,  "Hang on - didn't the Holy Family flee to Egypt after Jesus was born to avoid the hit squad sent to Bethlehem to kill all infant boys under the age of two by King Herod?"

The usual answer to this from Christian scholars is that Jesus, Mary and Joseph did not have to seek refuge in Egypt until the Wise Men or Astronomers from the East arrived in Jerusalem and inadvertently tipped off Herod that a new King had been born in Bethlehem.

If the Star of Bethlehem appeared at the time Jesus was born, and the Wise men set out immediately, it is likely that they would not have arrived until several months after Jesus was born.

Having found out from the Astronomers when the star appeared, King Herod ordered his men to kill every male child less than two years old who had been born in the vicinity of Bethlehem. This suggests that Herod suspected the child he wanted to eliminate as a potential rival might not be a newborn, though admittedly there is plenty of evidence from various historical sources that Herod was paranoid and ruthless enough to order the deaths of all the male infants in an entire town, and capable of setting the criteria for those murders broadly to make sure they included the individual he wanted.

According to the bible, when Joseph and Mary took Jesus to the temple, they encountered an elderly man called Simeon and an elderly female prophet called Anna. Simeon had been promised that he would not die until he had seen the Messiah, and on seeing Jesus Simeon immediately recognised this as the fulfilment of that promise. He uttered the prayer which is now know as the Nunc Dimittis:

"Lord, now let your servant depart in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, to be a light to lighten the Gentiles, and to be the glory of your people Israel".

Luke's Gospel adds that Anna also recognised the child, offered prayers and praise to God for Jesus, and spoke to everyone there of his importance to redemption in Jerusalem.

The lyrics of Eccard's beautiful anthem about the event are as follows:

When to the temple Mary went,        And brought the Holy Child,

Him did the aged Simeon see,           As it had been revealed.

He took up Jesus in his arms ,           And blessing God he said:

In peace I now depart, my Saviour having seen,

The Hope of Israel, the Light of men.


Help now thy servants, gracious Lord, That we may ever be

As once the faithful Simeon was, Rejoicing but in Thee;

And when we must from earth departure take,

May gently fall asleep and with Thee wake.


Amen.

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