On the Elder Simeon and His Sacred Canticle

(Translated from the Twentieth Elevation in Élévations sur la vie et la doctrine de Notre-Seigneur Jésus Christ by Charles Louis Gay [Poitiers / Paris: Oudin, 1879], 169–177.)

It is almost impossible not to be struck by the considerable role that Saint Luke assigns to the Elder Simeon in the twofold mystery of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin and the Presentation of Our Lord in the Temple. The mystery itself is recounted in but a few lines. Yet, it is so lofty, so holy, and even so important, by reason of the rights it honors, the teachings it contains, and the graces it merits. However, by its nature and its time in the life of Christ, it belongs to the series of the mysteries of His sacred infancy: a period when Jesus and Mary must remain hidden. Assuredly, as soon as they are mentioned—indeed, here, for example—we glimpse clearly what they are. Like flashes of lightning, the traits of this period burst forth from the shadows in which they are shrouded by the Evangelist’s deliberate designs. It is clear that they are the soul of everything, that everything refers to them and revolves around them, that, in sum, this child is divine and this mother incomparable. Their day, then, has dawned. But we are still in the early hours of the morning. Hence, surely, we experience the surprising brevity of the narrative telling us of their actions.

But, when Simeon comes on the scene, things change, and the sacred author no longer seems to fear to place an abundance of words upon his pen. We must know that Simeon “dwelt in Jerusalem,” that he was just and God-fearing, that he lived in expectation of the One whom, with all the prophets, he called “the consolation of Israel,” that he was filled with the Holy Spirit, and that this same Holy Spirit spoke to him and made him speak. And, we also must know that, after so many years of life and now finding himself so close the grave, he nevertheless is divinely certain that he will “not see death before, with his own eyes, he has contemplated the Messiah,” “the Anointed of the Lord,” the hope and salvation of the world (Lk. 2:25–26). Why so much narrative, with so unusual a multitude of details penned here by the sacred historian? Quite clearly, this tale is concerned with something other than a kind of paean to a saint, however eminent, and the acclamation of the consolation, however divine, experienced by an elderly man.

Simeon, whom the Spirit of God leads to the Temple to meet the God-Child, is the living figure and, as it were, the personal representative of the Old Law—or rather of that whole sacred antiquity having as its prologue the life of the patriarchs. He is the last shoot of that tree, across the millennia,¹ with Adam at its root. He is, as it were, its peak and glorious crown; he contains its sap; he is the sign and the fruit of its maturity. It was necessary that this great movement of natural and supernatural life, of religious and social life—coming from creation, had taken up its course in the earthly paradise—should now arrive at the end assigned to it by the Divine Wisdom. All things had to reach Christ, to embrace Christ, to be incorporated into Christ, so that, through Him, they might be bound to God. All things had been oriented toward the promised Messiah. All the steps truly made upon the earth were making their way toward Him.

From the moment that He appeared in the world, this “encounter”² had to take place and the joining had to be brought about. But this was especially true for that head of humanity constituted by the chosen people, the family of Abraham, the Jewish nation. Finis legis Christus: “the end of the law is Christ” (Rom. 10:4) He is its end, in the sense that He was its goal, its ultimate success, its fulfillment. But, also, He is its end in the sense that He would abolish its passing form, so that, in a new climate and under a much more perfect form, He might mature and fructify the substance of divine light and life that formed its foundation deposited within it by God Himself.

Consequently, Jesus, here in the arms of Saint Simeon, is the union of the two Testaments—and if not yet the passage from the Old to the New, then at least the supreme consecration of the Old. All the promises are fulfilled, all the pledges now completed. The Law and the Prophets bear witness to Christ, and now, in turn, Christ bears witness to the Law and the Prophets. Here, we see quite clearly that there is but one Religion. It has different phases and manifests itself over the course of diverse states. Yet, it remains one—always true, always holy, always bringing glory to God and salvation to men. It has but one end, which is the Trinity, worthy of all adoration, and but one foundation, which is Christ, the Word of God made flesh. Everything is clarified, everything is in order, everything holds together. The past is indissolubly welded to the future, antiquity has spoken its last word and has brought its work to completion, the modern era is about to begin. Behold—sings the Latin poet—behold, “the great age of the centuries is born.”³ It is clear, therefore, that this “encounter” is of capital importance. And after Mary’s public offering of her Son to God, there is nothing more considerable or more sublime in this feast.

But once the Law has received the salvation and the kiss of Jesus, it receives its leave and bids farewell to the world—a farewell full of consolation, love, and serenity. It is no surprise that this Canticle of the elderly prophet has become the consecrated formula of all holy departures, and, as it were, the conclusion of all missions brought to their end. Nunc dimittis servum tuum, Domine, secundum verbum tuum in pace: “Now, according to your word, O Lord, you dismiss your servant in peace.” “Now,” at this precise moment, marked out by you amid all the countless instants that compose the long succession of the ages. “Now” that eternity fills time, now that everything soon to be done in time quite decisively bears an eternal import. “Now,” faithful God who never is false to himself, who pledge your word and keep your promises unfailingly. “Now,” according to your word, you give leave to your servant and let him go in peace. “Your servant”: this is indeed the proper and characteristic name of those who lived under the Law. Established by a Master, its specific end was to form servants for Him (Jn. 15:15; Rom. 8:15), while awaiting the time when grace would give Him children. Obviously, this does not mean that God did not already have true sons under the Old Covenant. Yet, during that time, fear took precedence over love, and service over filial devotion. Henceforth, however, man will live under a new regime: “The kindness of God had appeared; grace had been given” (Tit. 3:4; Jn. 1:17). Love, consequently, will now take the lead. Every soul of good would now receive that gentle “Spirit who makes us cry: My Father! My Father!” (Rom. 8:15)—every soul without exception, without distinction, and this from birth, through holy baptism. The Law, then, was departing, as Simeon declares, but “in profound peace,” having in his hands, all that that had been awaited, and, moreover, honored and filled with joy. This Law lived for only one thing: to announce and prepare the way for Christ. Now, Christ was there, in its hands, like fruit upon its stem, like a lamp upon its lampstand. Now, after so long a time, filled with such great sighs, seeking Him, crying out for Him, invoked Him, it at long last holds Him, embraces Him, kisses Him. Therefore, it could depart in peace, content with God because God was content with it. Its day had come to a close. It had completed its task. The shadows of evening now were descending. The head of the household was settling His accounts and placing the promised denarius into the hand of his dear laborer (Mt. 20:9). What denarius? The Word made flesh! He whom the Law had received through its ears, as a revealed and transmitted word, it now contemplated with its eyes. It was “the salvation of God,” the salvation that God was sending into the world, the true Jesus belonging to the Father, who was becoming the Jesus belonging to every creature.

But this Jesus, whom God gave to the Jews by placing Him in the hands of Simeon, He began to expose to the face of all nations, so that He might at long last reveal the heretofore-hidden mystery of the divine adoption of the Gentiles, thus fulfilling the glory of the people of Israel. Simeon had to proclaim it, and his words expressed a solemn message. As Rachel, dying, brought forth her son Benjamin, a son of love and of sorrow (Gen. 35:18), so too Judaism, now disappearing, gave way to Christianity, the final and definitive form of the Eternal Religion. The family of Abraham, so restricted in its scope, despite the incalculable number of those who belong to it, was now becoming the universal city of that God of whom it is written: “He loves all that exists and abandons none of the beings He has created” (Wis. 11:25). The Synagogue was becoming the Catholic Church.

But, this was only a merely apparent death, for, still subsisting in her immortal substance, she was now being raised to a loftier and more extensive order of life. This people, first set apart and placed in a chosen land, like a precious root that God reserved to protect and cultivate Himself, was about to blossom like an immense tree and to be called the whole of mankind. As soon as the Gentiles enter, through faith, into the sphere of grace, as soon as they participate in the promises and take their place among the heirs, they prove to be “the glory” of that dear and venerated and indispensable Jewish nation, which is “the trunk,” says Saint Paul, “onto which they are grafted” (Rm. 11:17). Confidant in the God who had instituted it, the Law (that is, the whole Mosaic religion) had known this for a long time, and none of those who, with upright hearts and pious spirits, had merited to grasp its meaning and possess its spirit, were unaware of this fact. But today, in this “encounter,” this Law borrows the voice of Simeon so that, here in the Temple, it might publicly confess what it had known. Jesus, born in Judea, born of a Jewish woman and, therefore, himself a Jew, comes here below for all and belongs to all. “Salvation comes from the Jews” (Jn. 4:22): such is the order. The Gentiles in their turn—yes, most assuredly, the Gentiles, whether Greeks, or Romans, or barbarians—but first of all the Jews. They are the true ancestors, and we lean upon them, just as they themselves lean upon the patriarchs, who themselves go back to God through Adam. Therefore, it is the imperishable honor of that Hebrew land to have provided the bread that will be the life and nourishment of the whole world. As the wellspring finds its glory in host of streams that receive its flow and in the vastness of the regions imbued by its water, so too the glory of Israel is the multitude of those peoples whom it enriches divinely, enlightens, enlivens, and saves, by giving them its fruit, who is Jesus the Savior.

No doubt, alas, as a result of human perversity—here further increased by the malice of hell—the harmony of this beautiful design will be, in part and deplorably, disturbed upon earth. Tearfully, Saint Paul attests to this: this entry of the Gentiles into grace, which was to be the triumph of the Jews and their joy, becomes a cause of scandal for the majority of them and the occasion of their divorce, still subsisting after all these centuries (Rom 9:3ff).⁴ Nonetheless, the design remains. The losses concern only individuals. With the course of time, new shoots replace the shoots torn out or cut off. In the end, the divine tree will possess all its branches; it will have all its flowers; it will give to God all its fruits. And it will be eternally true that Christians have the Jews for their root. This is why, speaking in the name of the true Israelites, Simeon sings aloud this great work brought about by God’s right hand, namely the catholicity of the Church, founded on the universality of Christ’s mission and on God’s gift of Christ to all humanity.

After this confession in honor of the Savior—discharging every debt, as befits a just man, and completing his testimony to the truth, as befits a witness—Simeon blesses Joseph and Mary. Then, addressing Mary alone—doubtless because the Spirit of God teaches him the mystery hidden beneath the veil of the virginal marriage that binds these two spouses, as well as the principal part that God assigns to this Virgin in the work of our redemption—he says to her: “Behold, this child is set for the fall and the rising of many in Israel, and as a sign that will be contradicted; and your own soul shall be pierced by a sword” (Lk. 2:34–5).

Just a moment ago, he was expressing the peaceful counsel of God and the plan by which, first, the Jews and Gentiles were bound to each other, and, then, all men were to be bound together in a most perfect unity. Now, he looks upon the earth and, in the form of a prophecy, recounts its sad history. This divine child is “peace” (Mic. 5:5), yet He will give occasion for a dreadful war. This child comes to reconcile all, yet men will be divided because of him. He comes to give life—a sublime, blessed, inexhaustible, eternal life—yet men will Him into an occasion for death. He is personally the substance of all truth. He is every dogma. He declares God in full, along with all His works—in short, all that will be seen in heaven after it has been believed on earth. He will be the perpetual theme of all disputes, the object of every contradiction, the point of departure for all errors and heresies, and, in the end, the occasion for all ruin. And this is why Mary’s heart will be “pierced by a sword.”

Scripture speaks of Mary from its very first pages. The patriarchs knew of her. She is prefigured in their own household. Through their own wives they see her and love her. The prophets announce her. All the just await her. The Law and its worship are filled with her. It was impossible that Simeon, here summing up this whole past, should not render special testimony to Mary. By celebrating her divine Son, he implicitly praised her in her divine motherhood. But more is required: in the name of the centuries that have passed, she must be solemnly designated for future ages, in such a way that one can neither omit her nor fail to recognize her. Now, the sign with which Simeon marks her—or, rather, the sign that he declares, seeing that it is divinely marked upon her—is that she enters, as an active party, into Jesus’s sacrifice, that she is his cooperator, and truly our co-redeemer.⁵ The sword that will kill the Son will pierce the heart of the Mother; and this is above all what “the Law and the prophets” come to, as regards her.

With that, the Law falls silent. A prophetess still appears, Anna, holy and venerable, who continues the testimony rendered by Simeon. As it were, we here have, on the one hand, the Adam and the Eve of the New Covenant, who are the object of this testimony, and on the other, Simeon and Anna, a Jewish man and a Jewish woman, a son of Adam and a daughter of Eve, who, in the name of the Old Testament, present themselves as witnesses. And thus, everything is complete. Not a single stroke is missing from this magnificent scene traced out by the Divine Wisdom.

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1. Trans. note: Literally, “four thousand years old.”↩︎

2. The reader knows that the term “encounter” or “meeting” is used by the Greeks in the celebration of this feast. [Trans. note: Comment in the original.]↩︎

3. Virgil, Eclogues, 4: “Magus… saeclorum nascitur ordo.”↩︎

4. Trans. note: Literally, “nineteen centuries.”↩︎

5. Trans. note: In view of the 2025 DDF declaration “Mater Populi Fidelis,” this translation faithfully submits itself to the authority of the Church in such matters. On the sound notion of co-redemption, see Charles Journet, The Church of the Word Incarnate, vol. 2, trans. Matthew K. Minerd (Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Academic, 2025), 329–345, 417–442. Presuming my submission to the concerns voiced by the public authorities of the Church, the positions in Journet represent my own, and I believe they can be harmonized with those expressed by the DDF.↩︎