There was also a prophet, Anna the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was of a great age, having lived with her husband seven years after her marriage, then as a widow to the age of eighty-four. She never left the temple but worshiped there with fasting and prayer night and day. At that moment she came, and began to praise God and to speak about the child to all who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem. [Luke 2: 36-38, NRSV]
Presentation at the Temple. Stained glass window at St. Michael’s Cathedral (Toronto).
Simeon and Anna showed up at the purification ritual independently, though both have been led by divine direction (Luke 2:22-38). Directing the event was clearly the work of the Holy Spirit.
The Gospel Seeks to be Gender Inclusive
From among the people of God, Luke selects a representative from each gender to testify to what God is doing through this child. Luke is thus saying that all should rejoice at the coming of this Emmanuel – God with us.
Culturally, it is not surprising that both Simeon and Anna are advanced in years. All the more, their testimonies bear the full weight and resume of life experience.
Their prophecies share a note of hope and expectation: they declare that in this child God’s promise is moving into realization.
Anna the Prophetess
Introduced at the very end of the Birth Narrative (Luke 1:1-2:40), Anna rounds up the group of six named, pious Israelites surrounding the miraculous births of John and Jesus. The others are Zechariah, Elizabeth, Mary, Joseph and Simeon.
Luke’s depiction of Anna paints her as a most unusual woman. A pious prophetess, her advanced age and honorable behavior usher in the new covenant.
In three terse verses, Luke manages to vividly depict her as a woman deserving the honor bestowed on the elderly in the ancient Mediterranean world (v. 36-38). The original Greek text has caused a bit of ambiguity over the exact age of this woman as this story unfolds. Girls married young at the time, and she was married for seven years, then widowed. If we assume she was married at the age of 14, then she was widowed from age 21. If we take her age at 84 at the time of this story, she had lived her widowhood for 63 years by then. Some scholars have interpreted the Greek text to say that on this day of purification, she had lived her widowhood for 84 years, thus placing her great age at 105 years, the same age as Judith when she died (Judith 16:28). Besides, one may note that miracles and unusual occurrences were aplenty surrounding Jesus’ Birth Narrative, including the advanced age of Zechariah and Elizabeth when John was conceived (Luke 1:7, 13, 18, 57), and the Holy Spirit’s action of overshadowing Mary, (Luke 1:31-35).
Readers of St Luke’s narrative take with them a positive image of this woman of great age.
- The title prophetess heads Anna’s description (Luke 2:36), and points to her spiritual acuity. In this she even outranks Simeon, a man praised as righteous and devout (Luke 2:25). As a prophetess, Anna receives insight into things that normally remain hidden to ordinary people; she recognizes who this child is and tells of his significance to selected people in Jerusalem. Her actions affirm Amos 3:7: “Surely the Sovereign Lord does nothing without revealing his plans to his servants the prophets.”
- Furthermore, Anna is the New Testament’s only named female prophetess.
- Luke gives her father’s name, Phanuel, but not her husband’s. He mentions her tribe, Asher. As such, she numbers among the few New Testament characters with tribal listings. Others include Jesus, of the house and lineage of David and the tribe of Judah (Luke 2:4; Matthew 1:1-16), Saul of Benjamin (Philippians 3:5) and Barnabas, a Levite (Acts 4:36).
- Rather than being an elderly person who is grumpy and full of bitterness over life’s injustices that could come with age, she is full of hope.
- As she moves throughout the temple, Luke suggests that she is healthy in old age, walking well, seeing and hearing well, and still eager to do good.
- Together with Zechariah, Elizabeth, and Simeon, Anna ably serves the community in its transition from the old to the New Covenant.
- She never leaves the Temple (v. 37), suggesting that she resides within the Temple or on its premises.
- She worships night and day, fasting and praying. This portrays a deeply faithful person who listens to God and prays as directed. Hence her title prophetess. We recall the work of prayer as characterizing a prophet, just as God told Abimelech that Abraham was “a prophet and he will pray for you” (Gen. 20:7). Unlike David’s fasting and prayer after the death of his son, which seemed to take him nowhere, Anna’s life of fasting and prayers affirms for us the fruitfulness of such disciplines. Biblical precedents include Esther’s three-day fast before courageously approaching the king (Esther 4:15-16), and the abstinence of Daniel and his three friends regarding the delicacies of King Nebuchadnezzar’s table (Daniel 1:12).
Anna’s Prophecy
Under Luke’s pen, Simeon and Anna provide an interesting comparison.
- Simeon arrives first, and his encounter with Jesus takes up more of Luke’s ink.
- Simeon prophesies, but Anna is called a prophetess.
- Simeon praises the Lord while Anna offers thanks.
- She is full of thanksgiving at the arrival of the child who will complete God’s promise.
- She speaks about “the child to all who were looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem”.
- Unlike Simeon’s, what she prophesies is not placed in direct speech, but narrated. Still, it is powerful. While Simeon speaks of the larger and later context of the child to the Gentiles and Israel (vv. 30-32), Anna evangelizes immediately and selectively – to those “looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem” (v. 38).
Her teaching would have been heard by all who frequented the temple. Her hope, like Simeon’s, looks to the completion of what God is starting. Both of them, Anna and Simeon, join others in Luke’s gospel in recognizing this child’s great significance and wide import: the angel Gabriel (1:31-33), Elizabeth and John (in the womb) (1:42-45), Zechariah (1:76-79) and the Bethlehem shepherds who also evangelize (2:11-12, 20).
Does this great prophetess’s life of constant worship, fasting and praying drive us to reflect on what we do with and in the time God places at our disposal?
Copyright © Dr. Jeffrey & Angie Goh, March 2015. All rights reserved.
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