The Fate of Israel as the Cross of Our Lady

The incarnation of the Son of God - “the Word became flesh” (John 1:14) - united Him with the entire human race without any limitation or exception. However, it took place in history, in a certain place and time, through the “chosen” people prepared for this in the Church of the Old Testament. Christ is “the son of David, the son of Abraham,” whose genealogy is, according to Matthew, from Abraham to “Joseph, the husband of Mary, from whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ” (Matthew 1:1,16). The same genealogy is presented in Luke in ascending order: “Jesus... was, as they thought, the son of Joseph... of Adam, of God” (Luke 3:23, 38). And this blood connection with Israel, embodied in the genealogy, is revealed in the Gospels as the initial appeal of Christ specifically to Israel: “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Matthew 15:24). He preached the Kingdom of God to them, performed miracles in their midst and taught them himself and through his disciples. He “came to his own, and his own did not receive him” (John 1:11). An internal rift is brewing between Him and Israel, which ends in open hostility with His betrayal to death, cries of “Crucify Him, crucify Him.” This gap causes deep suffering to the Lord, as He Himself testifies, along with the call of righteous judgment on him: “may all the righteous blood shed on earth come upon you, from the blood of righteous Abel to Zechariah the son of Barachi, whom you killed between the church and the altar. Truly I say to you, (that) all these things will come against this generation, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to you! how many times have I wanted to gather your children together, as a bird gathers its chicks under its wings, and you did not want to. Behold, your house is left desolate” (Matthew 23:35–38; Luke 13:34–35). Therefore, this grief of Christ for his people is also included in the struggle of Gethsemane, but as if in response to it, that terrible, fatal word of frenzy, always memorable, is heard: Pilate said: “I am innocent of the blood of this Righteous One, look you. And all the people answered and said, “His blood be on us and on our children” (Matthew 27:24, 25). And as if in response to this word, on the way of the cross, when “a great multitude of people and women followed him, weeping and lamenting for Him. Jesus turned to them and said: Daughters of Jerusalem! Do not weep for Me, but weep for yourself and for your children, for the days are coming in which they will say: Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that have not given birth, and the breasts that have not nursed. Then they will begin to say to the mountains: fall on us! and the hills: cover us! (Luke 23:27, 30). It was a mournful farewell to His people, who had doomed themselves to great trials throughout their entire historical journey until the arrival of that longed-for hour, which was then prophesied by Christ: “I tell you: you will not see Me from now on until you cry: Blessed is He who comes in the Name of the Lord!” (Matthew 23:39; Luke 13:35). 0b in the same prophecy. Paul, himself a Jew from among the Jews, an Israelite from the seed of Abraham: “I do not want you, brothers, to be ignorant of this mystery... that a hardening has happened in Israel in part (until the time) until the full number of the Gentiles has come in. And so all Israel will be saved... for the gifts and calling of God are irrevocable” (Rom. 11:25–26:29). But She, the great Silent One, who spiritually shared with Christ His languor in Gethsemane and the exhaustion of the cross, did She share with Him this sorrow for a stiff-necked people and Christ-killing rage even to the point of self-denial: “His blood is on us and on our children”? Is it even possible to ask about this? She belonged no less, but even more than He, to this Christ-bearing and Christ-killing chosen people of God. For if She gave human nature to Her Son, was the “Matter from which Jesus was born,” then it was still a “semless conception” from the Holy Spirit, while Mary herself was the daughter of Abraham, “betrothed to a husband named Joseph, from the house of David” (Luke 1:27). She had in Her not only all the fullness of created humanity, but the daughter of Israel, his flesh and blood, had all her power. She was raised in his faith and piety, according to the beliefs of the church, at the church from childhood, in the edification of prophecies - according to legend, Gabriel, the Archangel of the Annunciation, found Her reading Isaiah. She lived a common life with Her people, and not only before Her Motherhood, but also after Him. To testify to this, only one feature preserved in the Gospel is sufficient (Luke 2:41, 42): “Every year His parents went to Jerusalem for the Easter holiday. And when He was twelve years old, they also came, according to custom, to Jerusalem for the feast.” It was natural and destined for the Lord Himself to feel Himself sent to the children of Israel, to choose His disciples and apostles from among them, but His Mother could not help but share this same feeling with Him, as something taken for granted. She was called to rejoice in this joy with those about whom it is said: “Blessed are your eyes for seeing, and your ears for hearing” (Matthew 13:16; Luke 10:23). And this is only confirmed by the story (Matthew 12:46, 50; Mark 3:31, 35; Luke 8:19, 21), where Christ, pointing to His disciples, said: “Behold My Mother and My brothers.” This saying can be equally applied to both, but it, in any case, does not contain an opposition between the mother and the brothers and the disciples; on the contrary, it brings them closer together, as if to the point of identification. But it is all the more clear what suffering must have been caused to Mary’s heart by the beginning and ever-deepening divergence between Jesus and the Jews, which ended in a complete rupture and their Christ-killing bitterness. She suffered not only for Her Son and together with Him, but also for this people, one-blooded and of the same tribe, chosen by God and rejecting Christ. How heavy could the Lord’s angry words (Matthew 23:1, 39) fall on Her heart with his condemnation and rejection! What sadness this sounded to Her: “behold now your house is left empty.” The Apostle Paul testified to this sorrow of his: “I have great sorrow and unceasing torment of my heart: I myself would like to be excommunicated from Christ for my brothers who are related to me according to the flesh, that is, the Israelites...” (Rom. 9:2, 4). And if he felt it this way, then what can be said about Her, the Silent One, accustomed to compose the words of Christ in Her heart (Luke 2:51), now that they have become so sad and terrible? After all, if everyone around heard them, then was it really only She who remained unknown to her, on the sole basis that this was not said, hidden in the Gospel? What torment, not only for the Son, but also for the embittered people, crying “Crucify, crucify Him,” finding in themselves only words of reproach and malice even at the cross, Her heart must have been torn apart! It was Her deliberate cross not only as a Mother, but also as a Daughter of Her people, for the sake of whose birth He was chosen and called, “to whom belongs adoption and glory, and covenants, and statutes, and worship, and promises, theirs and the fathers, and from them Christ according to the flesh” (Rom. 9: 4, 5). And over all this the judgment of God's rejection is pronounced. This is the cross of the Mother of God, who is inseparable from Her people not only in blessing, but also in rejection, loves Him with Paul’s love, the love of a daughter and Mother, His only begotten. The Most Pure One was resurrected and ascended to heaven at the right hand of Her Son, but in Her Assumption She “did not leave the world.” She overshadows him with Her prayerful omophorion, has compassion with him, and is the consolation of “all who mourn.” The crucifixion of the Mother of God did not stop in Her glory. This belief constitutes the great Christian hope, but it must necessarily include Her compassionate love for Her people, despite their continued stiff-necked attitude towards Christ, in the tragic destinies of their history. Both are the sorrow of the Mother of God on the cross. Some of its features, in fairness, may, of course, not evoke sympathy, for the time has not yet come for its Christian revival, but we must always remember that Israel gave the church patriarchs, prophets, apostles, that is, all those who were its foundation, were sent by Christ to teach and baptize “all languages.” And this people not only were, but also remain chosen, for “the gifts and election of God are immutable,” according to the words of the apostle. Paul (Rom.11:29). His current detractors should remember and know this, unless they themselves deny faith in Christ and veneration of His Most Pure Mother. Here we are approaching the last secret that the ap talks about. Paul, - to the conversion of Israel (Rom. 11:26). What is this secret? It is not open to us. However, pious conjectures remain, which have a certain persuasiveness and even obviousness. This evidence is connected with our common hope in the intercession of the Mother of God. Can the work of “salvation of all Israel,” its spiritual resurrection, be accomplished apart from She for whose sake his election took place in order to serve the cause of incarnation? “The Mother of God, who did not leave the world,” leaves with prayerful help and care the tree from which She Herself grew on earth in order to ascend into heaven? Is there any effective help from Her? It is enough just to pose such a question to see that it is exactly this way and cannot be otherwise. If the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, of all the Old Testament forefathers and prophets, the Forerunner and the Apostles, heeds the prayer they say among their people, then at the head of this prayer host stands before God “the never-sleeping Mother of God in prayer,” and by this intercession the still unknown mystery of “the salvation of all Israel in its conversion to Christ” is accomplished. For this is how the apostle concludes his prophetic promise - “they are now disobedient, so that you may show mercy, so that they themselves may also receive mercy. For God imprisoned everyone in disobedience in order to have mercy on everyone. Oh, the abyss of wealth and wisdom and the mind of God! How incomprehensible are His destinies and unsearchable His ways!” (Rom.11:31, 33).