Simeon wasn't old
Leaf
Shipmate
in Kerygmania
Reading Luke 2:22-40. https://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/texts.php?id=55 Or, more accurately - maybe he was old, maybe not.
I noticed that Simeon is not noted specifically as being of advanced years. The text makes clear that Anna is older - she was "of a great age" and "eighty-four years." But not Simeon. His character is noted but not his age.
How long would it take for a man to establish himself as being righteous and devout? Maybe he was thirty, or forty, or sixty, or ninety. Young man get diagnosed and receive news about the timeline of their life too (not that this is strictly comparable, as Simeon also knows he will see the Messiah).
So much imagery and sermon content seems to make this a happy impromptu baby shower put on by two seniors. That doesn't seem right or faithful to the text. I see it as being much more nuanced and surprising. Yes, there is rejoicing at the presence of Messiah - and also recognition of release from life, rising and falling, intense psychological pain for Mary.
I wonder if there's also a tiny bit of gender role reversal: Simeon holds the baby, while Anna boldly tells all comers to the Temple about the child.
I noticed that Simeon is not noted specifically as being of advanced years. The text makes clear that Anna is older - she was "of a great age" and "eighty-four years." But not Simeon. His character is noted but not his age.
How long would it take for a man to establish himself as being righteous and devout? Maybe he was thirty, or forty, or sixty, or ninety. Young man get diagnosed and receive news about the timeline of their life too (not that this is strictly comparable, as Simeon also knows he will see the Messiah).
So much imagery and sermon content seems to make this a happy impromptu baby shower put on by two seniors. That doesn't seem right or faithful to the text. I see it as being much more nuanced and surprising. Yes, there is rejoicing at the presence of Messiah - and also recognition of release from life, rising and falling, intense psychological pain for Mary.
I wonder if there's also a tiny bit of gender role reversal: Simeon holds the baby, while Anna boldly tells all comers to the Temple about the child.
Comments
However, since the Septuagint was already over 200 years old when Jesus came along, that would be impossible.
It is seems Simeon's prayer implies he is older, because he prays, now that he has seen the child, he can depart in peace;
2:26 It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord's Messiah.
Why do you think that? The amount of time passed between that revelation and Simeon's encounter with Jesus is not indicated. Not even hinted at, AFAIC. Maybe it was years before; maybe it was immediately before. Key word is maybe.
Based on the text, it is as possible that Simeon was a righteous and devout young man who had this revelation immediately before entering the Temple, as that he was an older man who had been pondering the revelation for years.
The latter seems to me to be eisegesis, and generally says more about the person interpreting it than it opens about the text itself.
Without question, it’s not explicitly stated, but it does seem reasonable to me to read it as implied. Otherwise, Simeon’s “now you can let me die in peace” seems a bit out of left field—younger people don’t usually say “God, you can let me die now.” And by the same token, it seems odd to say it was revealed that he wouldn’t die until he’d seen the Messiah when he was going to see the Messiah when he had 20+ years left to go.
It can be interpreted that way, but it need not be. In an odd way, it makes narrative sense to me that if Simeon were younger - and also righteous and devout - an early death would be 'mitigated', for him and for the community of the faithful, by the promise that he would see the Messiah before he died.
I'm not sure that's a correct paraphrase of what Simeon was saying. "Now you are letting go your servant, Master, according to your word, in peace." (an inelegant translation) It's a recognition of what God is already doing. If Simeon was righteous and devout, hoping for the Messiah, then seeing the Messiah with his own eyes meant acceptance of all of God's plans - not just the parts he liked, in the time frame he might have preferred.
It seems to me that someone might accept their death - even one that occurred sooner than statistically likely - if they have some assurance that what is most meaningful to them will carry on.
Or maybe Simeon was old. Who knows? But those who preach with certainty that he was, are on shakier textual ground than they might think.
I don’t disagree. Though the text makes more sense to me if he is old—or perhaps young but unhealthy enough that an early death might be expected—I agree it’s not explicit in the text, and the text doesn’t require such a reading. It certainly doesn’t strike me as something worth declaring with certainty from the pulpit. At most, it might warrant a nod along the lines of “tradition says . . . .”
I'd bet on old, but nothing I'd not be prepared to lose.
A St Rumboldesque Simeon (born. sermon. heaven) would just about fit, though you'd think at that point it would be reported much differently.
A Simeon who survived 40 years would lead to major questions about what he is doing later in the narrative.
Simeon being stupidly unaturally old (like the sept story given) also does make a nice story. But imo weakens the gospel message.
I'd never thought that Simeon might be younger than Anna and closer in age to Mary's generation and there is no reason to think he might not have been a young man. Though at that time, to be 35 or 40 might have been considered old, especially if health or disability limited people's lives. Is it possible that Simeon was ill and holding on in the hope of seeing this miracle before he died? That he felt free to let go and ask for a grace-filled death after holding the baby Jesus in his arms as a mother might cradle her child?
Simeon may have been something of a 'wounded healer', a young man living in obedience to a visionary promise, a troubled solitary man who showed great courage, faith and selflessness recognised by those around him. There is so much invisible disability or illness hardly ever revealed in texts. A lecturer once suggested to us that the crowds who followed Jesus in his healing ministry were themselves ill, not onlookers hoping to see a few people healed, but crowds of people who were blind from cataracts or spinal injuries, struggling with the stigma associated with 'unclean' bleeding or leprosy. The ableist tendency is to assume people are old if they show a depth of wisdom or, as women if they are childless or widowed. I'm now wondering about the pairing of Simeon and Anna and reading them as distinctive and separate. Both Simeon and Anna are filed with prophetic spirit, but it is Anna who addresses all those gathered in the temple, whereas Simeon speaks to praise God, then to the parents and then to Mary alone.
To me, both could have been Nazarites finishing their vows. Just a thought.
... and also wouldn't it have made it pretty easy for Herod to work out which baby boy he ought to have killed... assuming the historicity of that also...
... but if we do not accept it, does the question "what was Simeon's actual age" not lose somewhat of its meaning since the author does not specify?
But if the account is ahistorical, then Simeon's actual age, beyond what the text says about it (nothing) is not a thing. He doesn’t have one.
In that context, I don’t think it’s exactly accurate to say, as @TurquoiseTastic did, “that all the posts above imply that we are accepting the historicity of the account.” I wouldn’t have quibbled if it had said something more like “all the posts above imply that we are accepting, for the sake of argument in this thread, the historicity of the account.”
People may not be questioning historicity in this thread, but that doesn’t mean that some of those same people wouldn’t question the historicity of the story in a thread in Purgatory.
As far as the text saying nothing about Simeon’s age, I think that’s exactly what @leaf was getting at—the text doesn’t explicitly say anything about Simeon’s age, so why is it read as though it does?
This. Discussion of the historicity (or lack thereof) is for another thread, which someone else is welcome to start!
I found this striking and helpful. Thank you.
One of the things I think about, in addition to trying to interpret the text, is pastoral concern about erasure. If Simeon was sick but not elderly... Some younger men disappear from social awareness if they are very ill or have a disability requiring care and support. At least that seems to me to be true in our culture. They may be shunted off to the side, only reappearing socially when their obituary appears. ISTM entirely possible that this could have been Simeon too.
But Luke remembered Simeon as a righteous and devout man, who had been given an extraordinary knowledge.
I note that 'we' tend to turn a positive statement - "he would not see death before he had seen the Lord's Messiah" - into a negative: "after you see the Messiah, you shall DIE!"... as if it's a witch's curse, and not a gift of grace.
I wonder about this too. Maybe smooshing them together does a disservice to both. Forgive this terrible metaphor, but it's as if they are two acts performing at the same venue - the Temple, Luke's favourite. (The gospel begins and ends in the Temple.)
Maybe all this focus on Simeon, which began for me almost as a point of trivia, does a disservice to Anna - who is a star in her own right.
Authority and Reliability of the Bible.
Someone is going to have to explain this to me.
I accept the Bible presents certain truths about God. But years of scholarship says there are a lot of grey areas concerning the historicity of some of the stories. For instance, Job comes across as a dramatic play. Jonah reads like a fable. The first creation story seems to be an affirmation of faith, the second creation sounds very much like a myth. Did the Exodus really happen?--Some say yes, others say no. For what it is worth, I am in the yes camp, but at a paired down version.
Just what is meant here about the authority and reliability of the Bible.
@Leaf, an insight I had into my own prevailing assumptions about biblical characters came when I did an Ignatian retreat where we were asked to imagine ourselves in a scene from the gospels (Luke 5: 17-26 the healing of the paralytic) as if we were onlookers observing Jesus healing a man lowered down on a stretcher through a hole in the roof. We were to let the scene speak to us and imagine it as if we were present.
This was a new approach to me. Luke was a text I had read and reflected on many times before, but when I began to 'see' it as if watching a film, it was very cliched and unreal. Everyone wore long pristine white robes. Jesus had shoulder-length brown hair and a trimmed beard, blue eyes, and seemed taller than everyone else. The men had beards, the women had head coverings and carried well-behaved babies; everyone was acting as if they were in church, standing around Jesus and listening in awe. They were all fairly young (I was 26 at the time) and the room had reed mats, modern windows and doors. There was a neat oval gap in the ceiling and the paralysed man on the stretcher, once healed, jumped up and smiled at everyone. He too was young, looked very fit, and had on a white toga and sandals. Not in the least like a man who had been paralysed for 38 years and utterly dependent on the kindness of his friends, unable to care for himself.
Afterwards, it struck me that I was drawing on the coloured picture books I had looked at as a child in Sunday School or catechism classes, showing a smiling and handsome Jesus in the gospels sitting under unidentifiable trees or beside little stone wells, surrounded by anonymous people wearing the kinds of Roman robes and togas I had seen in the film Ben Hur. All I had to use were generic stereotypes for a visual recreation of a scene that would have been altogether different in first-century Palestine and the 'thin' quality of my imagining related to an obliviousness to issues around poverty, age and illness. This is how erasure works, not noticing or paying attention to what is marginal or overlooked by society.
If I had watched Pasolini's The Gospel According to St Matthew beforehand, that might have inspired a much stranger and more powerful contemporary recreation of any gospel scene. Each time I go on retreat now, I draw on the people I know from my context, the invisible queues at crowded rural clinics, the elderly unable to walk far and needing aluminum crutches, the stray dogs barking in the street, the children running around with unwiped noses, all the gritty revealing stuff of daily life. Anna might be any one of the stoic grandmothers I know, with a lifetime of surviving losses and hardships. There she is, passionate and outspoken, unstoppable when witnessing or preaching at a revival meeting.
A star in her own right, as you say.
FWIW, the full text of the guideline I partially quoted is:
I haven’t been participating on this thread because my presence invites this kind of derailment. But i have been reading it. And lo, it happened anyway.
Amen!!
I believe we have quite enough to deal with - the text (Greek or English) in front of us, eisegesis, imagery and its gifts and deficits, erasure and pastoral care and homiletical responsibility, ageism and ableism - without delving into people's perceptions about historicity. Please, for the love of sweet Baby Jesus, could we Just. Not. on this thread?!
I 100% support the idea of another thread dedicated to people's perceptions about historicity, because that's a huge enough topic on its own.
ISTM that until we develop the insight that you had about imagery, we are trapped in it. Sunday school book illustrations and posters, felt puppets, animations and movies, the people around us; all both illuminate and hide those to whom we are introduced in the gospels.
When we impose the limitations of our imagery on the text, we do it a disservice. I suppose we all do this to a degree, but maybe we're here to acknowledge such limitations and perhaps show each other different and faithful pathways of considering the text.
Simeon is not necessarily a kindly old Jewish grandpa, which is certainly the kind of image I've seen. But the text doesn't give any indication of his age! Simeon could just as well be your middle-aged neighbour guy who needed to receive home care or nursing home care. He could be a young dad, who had already established a reputation in his community as being "a good guy", living his best life with a terminal diagnosis.
In all my maunderings about Simeon, I don't want to lose sight of Anna. It seems like Temple life infused her. She was brave to go up to people in the Temple and talk about Jesus. ISTM that one of the gifts of advanced age (possibly this is a form of ableism on my part) is no longer being inhibited about what one says. I would have put that in a much cruder way, tbh, but thought it might be problematic for some readers.
I will move this over to Styx for more clarification
My searches in that area have not proven all that fruitful, to be honest. But then I came upon "The Oration on Simeon and Anna", attributed to St. Methodius of Olympus. St. Meth died in the early 300s (I think ca. 311) and, admittedly, although the Oration is attributed to him, that is not wholly without doubt.
But if you glance at it, starting around section VI, Simeon is referred to as aged--and several other comments refer to his old age. Of course, the oration also goes on to give a HUGE speaking role to Simeon and Mary--which makes one wonder where St. Meth got all that from (apart from his vivid imagination) (assuming, for argument's sake, that St. Meth in fact wrote the oration).
Still, it is some evidence that the belief that Simeon was old had taken firm hold by at least the 4th c.
Oh, and tying in to the other conversation in this thread, St. Meth gives Anna very little commentary. Luke gave her more of a role than Meth does!
I had noticed the same point--that Simeon isn't explicitly called old--though of course we can't be sure he isn't. I don't know how much I'd build on that, though. I mean, you can't say he isn't "old" in the usual sense of the term.
It might be better to look at him as a faithful person along with Anna, both of whom greeted the Christ child in their own ways. You could even argue that both of them in some sense represent the old days that were passing away with the coming of the Dayspring from on high--Simeon because he has that very straightforward promise that guarantees the coming of Messiah within a single human lifespan; Anna because she is a living example of the dedicated women who gave so much to worship and ministry at the temple, and that, too, was soon to pass away (with the temple itself destroyed). And yet, here they are, still around and eager to greet the Lord himself, so suddenly come to his temple--the messenger of the covenant, whom ye desireth. (Sorry, got Messiah on the brain right now). It's a proper bridge from OT to new.
@Gramps49 is right about Tradition (or tradition?) holding that St Simeon was one of the translators of the Septuagint.
That would make him around 360 years old when the events Luke describes occurred.
From what I can gather from a book of daily Advent reflections it seems that some conservative Orthodox don't have a problem with that. I presume the argument runs that if Methusalah and other characters in the Hebrew scriptures could attain unfeasible longevity then why couldn't Simeon?
The story goes that Simeon was wondering whether to translate the term used in Isaiah 7:14 as 'young woman' or 'virgin' - the Hebrew term can mean both - an angel appeared and told him the 'correct' translation.
Hence, he recognised that the promise had been fulfilled when Mary arrived with the infant Jesus. Anna, according to Tradition, knew Mary from when she was growing up in the Temple and so could have given him the low down.
All this, of course, is highly convenient and if we wanted to get all 'Protestant' about it we could argue that it's another example of legendary material concocted by the Early Church to fill tantalising gaps in the scriptural record.
Some Orthodox, and presumably conservative Roman Catholics can be just as fundamentalist about Holy Tradition as some highly conservative Protestants are about issues like scriptural inerrancy and infallibility.
It's a kind of 'Church' fundamentalism rather than a scriptural fundamentalism.
As a convert to Orthodoxy from an evangelical/post-evangelical background, I find it fascinating to navigate all of this. I've come across Orthodox who can offer insightful critiques of conservative evangelical approaches to scripture who, in the next breath will say, 'Of course the stories of Joachim and Anna the "ancestors of God" are true and of course the Theotokos was brought up in the Temple. Holy Tradition tells us ...'
I've seen it asserted that new evidence suggests that young girls were admitted to the Temple and raised there as Mary is said to have been.
But not chapter and verse or historical or archaeological evidence to back that up.
None of this bothers me unduly as I'm less inclined these days to mither over what might be figurative, legendary or allegorical and what might be historical fact. I would certainly contend for the historicity of the Incarnation and the Resurrection although can't 'prove' either of course.
Anyhow, for the reasons other posters have stated, 'now let thy servant depart in peace' does imply to me that Simeon was old.
That doesn't necessarily mean he was hundreds of years old and was one of the translators of the Septuagint of course.
We could have numerous threads on topics like this.
Tradition asserts that the 'Syro-Phoenician' woman that our Lord encountered in the famous exchange about the little dogs and the crumbs, later ended up martyred in Rome with her family.
How do we know whether that is the case or whether it's pious legend?
I have not previously heard of the notion of Mary being raised in the temple. What is the basis for this?
I've not read it, I must confess.
Although it's not regarded as canonical scripture it's very popular with Orthodox Christians and often cited almost as if it is Holy Writ.
But then, in Orthodoxy Tradition is wider than canonical scripture. The Bible is part of Holy Tradition alongside hymnody, liturgy, canons, iconography and Ecumenical Councils of course.
It can mess with your head if you come from a highly Protestant background as you'll find scriptural quotations alongside snippets of hagiography and non-New Testament stories all at the same time.
Google it. There's a Wikipedia entry on 'The Presentation of Mary' and you'll find plenty about it, of varying quality, on Orthodox websites.
It falls on 21st November during the Nativity Fast, the Orthodox Advent, and the fasting stipulations are generally relaxed for it to some extent - although the fasting requirements are more relaxed than they are for Lent anyway.
We could get into a Kerygmaniac or Purgatorial discussion on the role or use of uncanonical scriptural material alongside the canonical NT I suppose.
Essentially, we are talking about a 'midrash' or expansion/development of incidents and themes within the canonical Gospels. A kind of riffing on themes and motifs within the canonical texts which then become accepted within the Tradition.
Variants on this particular 'infancy gospel' persisted in the West although the Proto-Evangelium of James fell out of favour and was condemned by Pope Innocent I.
Nevertheless, Rome preserved some of the same stories and themes with some medieval embellishments. If I understand it correctly, Rome now accepts these stories as a 'venerable tradition originating in the eastern churches' but not something that's binding, as it were.
From a Protestant perspective it all looks very iffy of course as this strand of Tradition emphases the Perpetual Virginity of Mary and maintains that our Lord's brothers and sisters were cousins rather than siblings.
So, there's my 'midrash' on my original one word answer.
Anyway I did find one thing: Ephrem the Syrian (†373) in "Homily on Our Lord" refers to Simeon as "the old man".
It must be right, then 🤔...
Mind you, rumour has it not everything attributed to St Ephrem the Syrian was written by St Ephrem the Syrian.
Topol voice: 'Tradition ...'
And the Apostle Peter too, it would seem ...
Paul?
I have been wondering about connection between Simeon and Anna, not so much the pairing that comes up in many commentaries (two faithful visionaries representing the last of the Old Testament prophets) as the different but complementary roles they play in the Presentation at the Temple and how their witness gestures towards the hoped-for messianic future without merging or twinning them.
Tangent
I have a different volume in that series and find the exact same thing
You reap what you sow.
'Many will say to me on that day, Lord did we not theologise and pontificate in your name, engage in online fights in your name ... ?'
I see how the thread title could indicate a belief in the historicity of the text. I chose it to be provocative, in the sense of drawing attention and provoking discussion. While I continue to believe that "historicity of Scripture" should be its own separate thread all the way over there -> I wanted to clarify that was not my intent nor position in this thread.
Thanks for the notes on Tradition.
Something about the emphasis on the pairing of Simeon and Anna feels like "forced teaming" to me. I don't know why. They are mentioned as being at the Temple at the same time, and speaking things about Jesus. But they seem very different to me, with different audiences and emphases (and potentially ages
It also seems to me difficult to balance the bitter and the sweet in homiletical proclamation of this text. IME there's overemphasis on sweetness: peace, light, glory. But it's much more nuanced. Communities in which there's no observation of St Stephen or the Holy Innocents can be subject to the temptation to try to overextend the happy feelings of Christmas, and gloss over what Simeon is saying in verses 34, 35.
It's interesting how the celebration of Christ's Nativity in the Orthodox tradition is followed immediately by the commemoration of the martyrdom of Stephen and the '20,000 martyrs of Nicodemia' and the Massacre of the Innocents.
Lots of blood and martyrdom condensed into three days.
Whether that makes any difference to the way the faithful live their lives is a moot point, but it's there for us to reflect on and observe in whatever way we mark these things.
More broadly, it's often said of course that Christmas is a tough time for many people, at least here in the northern hemisphere where winter bereavements may be particularly prominent in people's minds. Of course, bereavements at other times of year may be called to mind too, Christmas being traditionally a time fir family gatherings.
As Christmas becomes more secularised and as the observance of ecclesial calendars becomes more erratic or elastic in many churches, other landmarks seem to be emerging.
'To the Law and to The Testimony!
Every man (everyone?) to their tents, O Israel!' 😉
On the 'pairing' of Simeon and Anna. It may be 'neat' but that's often the nature of literary devices.
There will be a reason why these two witnesses were selected for the text. I imagine they represent different or complementary emphases which NT scholars would be able to tell us more about.
I imagine the nearest Sunday may be the date adopted by RCs, Anglicans and some Lutherans.
Apparently it's commemorated on 27th in some Syriac traditions and on 10th January in others.