Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 13.djvu/145

* MARX. 123 MARY I. I.NTKUNATIOXALE or 1ntER>^VTI0?JAL WOKKING- ME.N's Association. MA'RY (Gk. Mapid/j., Murium, ^lapla, Maria, from Hi'b. Miri/i'iiii, uf uncertain ctyniolugy), TiiE JIoTiiKK 01'' Jesis. Apart from what is contained in till' narratives of Jesus' birth and ehildliood (JIatt. i.-ii. ; Luke i.-ii.), very little is told of Jlary in the New Testament. It the genealogy in Luke iii. 23-38 is intended to be that of Mary (which is doubtful), she was descended from David. She was also related to the priestly family to which Elisabeth, mother of John the Baptist, belonged (see Luke i. 5, 30). After her lietrothal to Joseph, a carpenter of Nazareth in Galilee, but before her marriage, she was in- formed in an angelic vision that she would through miraculous conception give birth to a son wlio shniild reign on the Davidic throne and be called the Son of the Highest (Luke i. 26-38). The marriage to Joseph took place. Jesus, her iirstljorn son, was born at Bethlehem, whither she had gone with Joseph in consequence of a census decreed by Augustus (Luke ii. 1-6). Compelled to flee into Kgy])t with the infant Jesvis, .Joseph and JIary returned to Nazareth after the death of Herod the Great (Matt. ii. 13-23). Here some have believed that other children, Jesus' brothers and sisters (cf. Mark vi. 3; Matt. xiii. 55), were born ; though the belief in her perpetual virginity has been a part of traditional theology from the earliest times. Soon after Jesus began His pub- lic ministry the family — Joseph was apparently dead — moved to Capernaum (Jolin ii. 12; cf. Matt, iv. 13, ix. 1). To what extent Mary ac- companied Jesus on His journeys we do not know. That she did not fully comprehend the mission of her son is evident from John ii. 4. if not from Mark iii. 31-35 (ef. Luke ii. 48-49). She witnessed the crucifixion and was then intrusted by Jesus to the care of John, the beloved disciple, who gave her a place in his home (John xix. 25- 27 ) . The last notice of JIary in the New Testa- ment is in Acts i. 14, where she is mentioned as one of the company of disciples who were accustomed to meet in the upper room in Jeru- salem soon after the Resurrection. No more than this is told of her in the New Testament; but the tradition of the Christian Church added considerably to it. There grew up a literature, partly apocryphal (sec Apocrypha), dealing with her infancy and childhood, with her espousal to Jo.sepli, and with the birth and in- fancy of Jesus, and with her death and assump- tion into heaven. The more her position in the scheme of redemption was meditated upon, the more im[)ortant did she appear. The frequent controversies as to the nature of her Son bore upon her own personality and history; thus the uncil of Kphesu.s (431) really summed up its I trine against Nestorius in calling Mary the 'inother of (5od' (BeordKoi). Festivals celebrated in lier honor increased in number; among the older ones, some of which date back to the fifth century, are the Purification, Februarv 2; An- nunciation, March 25; Assumption. August 15; Nativity, September 8; and Conception, Decem- ber 8. The devotion to her not simply as an historical memory, but as a living power, owing to the prevailing force of her intercession with her Son, became so marked in course of time that it was one of the things against which the re- formers of the sixteenth century strongly pro- tested. It continued to develop, however, in the Vol. XIII.— 9. Boman Catholic Cliurch, and found expression, among many other ways, in the definition in 1S54 of her conception as immaculate, or free from the taint of original sin; and the prayer in which her intercession is invoked (see Ave Maria) became second only to the Lord's Prayer in frequency of use. Many of the shrines erected in her honor, at places supposed to have been consecrated by apparitions of her presence, have become among the most celebrated pilgrim- age ))Iaces. On this aspect of the devotion see (lie articles Louhdes; Kixsiedelx; and consult Northcote, Celebrated Sanctuaries of the Ma- donna (London, 18GS) ; Budniki, Die beriilimtes- ten Wullfalirtsorte der Erde (Paderborn, 1891). For the subject in general, consult the immense collection of documents in Bourasse, Sumna Aiirea de Laudihus Beatw Marice Virginis (13 vols., Paris, 18GG et seq. ) ; SchafT, Creeds of Christendom (New York, 1890) ; Kurz, Muri- ologie (Regensburg, 1881) ; Lehner, Die Muricn- verehrung in den ersten Jalirhimderten (2d ed.. Stuttgart, 1886) ; Jameson, Legends of the Ma- donna (London, 1852) : Northcote, Mary in the (lospels (ib., 1885) ; Newman, Development of Christian Doctrine (ib., 1845). On the narratives of the infancy of Jesus in the Gospels, consult Resch, "Das Kindheitsevan- gelium," in Gebhardt and Harnack, Texte und Vniersuchungen (Leipzig, 1897); Ramsay, ITas JesKS Born in Bethlehem f (London, 1898). See also Assumption of the Virgin; Immaculate Conception; Kosaky; Madonna. MARY, of Bethany. See Martha and Mary, OF Bethany. MARY I. (1516-58). Queen of England from 1553 to 1558. Mary was born at Greenwich, February 18, 1516, and ultimately was the only surviving child of Henry VIII. by Catharine of Aragon. Her education was carefully and se- verely planned, and she learned to converse readily in Latin, French, and Spanish, and knew Italian. When two years of age she was betrothed to the Dauphin of France, afterwards to her cousin, Charles V., and finally a treaty was signed providing for her marriage to either Fran- cis I. or his second son, Henry. Numerous other proposals were made, but they were rendered futile by the rapid changes in England's for- eign relations, or by Jlary's refusal of a Protest- ant, until in the end her accession as Queen left her at liberty to choose her own consort. She was twice in danger, owing to her religious con- victions, during the period of the divorce of her mother and during the reign of her brother, Ed- ward VI. (q.v.). She was a loving child and re- fused to abandon her mother's cause when Henry VIII. divorced Catharine. In the end she Was per- suaded by her friends with the greatest difficulty to submit to Henry's demands and sign a renun- ciation of the Pope's authority and her own legitimacy. As a result of her compliance she was received into half favor and given a place in the succession to the crown. During Edward's reign she held uncompromisingly to the old faith, at the cost of much annoyance and the danger of actual persecution. In 1553 she suc- ceeded to the crown, lier popularity greatly in- creased by the attempt of the detested North- umberland to displace her with Lady Jane Grey (q.v.). Mary began her reign firmly resolved to sweep