The Angelus Domini: history, text and tradition of the prayer of the Incarnation

For centuries, in half of Europe, work stopped three times a day. There was a bell - three spacious touches, then a repeat - and the peasant let go of the azada, the artisan left the tool and all prayed three oars. Millet painted it in 1857 and made the scene the most reproduced picture of the 19th century. That prayer is the Ángelusand her matter is not primarily Mary: it is the Encarnación. The three verbs culminate in one, taken from St. John: "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.".

His story, however, is full of repeated statements for centuries that do not resist a collision. This page carefully separates what is contained in documents from what is a pious tradition or simply a manual-inherited error.

The text

In Latin, the versions are Angelus Domini nuntiavit Mariae - Et conceived by Spiritu Sancto; Ecce ancilla Domini - Fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum; Et Verbum caro factum est — Et habitavit in nobis, and the conclusive prayer begins Gratiam tuam, quaesumus, Domine...

In Spain there is also a somewhat different translation of the final prayer in parish leaves ("Infuse, Lord, your grace in our hearts..."). Both are legitimate; it is the Manual of indulgenceswhich is the one with normative value.

The final prayer is not a devotional composition: it comes from the liturgy

It's worth knowing, because he explains his honesty. Gratiam tuam es una oración litúrgica de la Anunciación: en el Misal actual es la 4th Sunday of Advent collectionand in the 1962 Missal was the poscomunón de la fiesta de la Anunciaciónon March 25. He joined the Angelus late, when the text was just set in the 16th and 17th centuries.

The story: what is and what is not

The reference study remains that of the Jesuit Herbert Thurston’ (1907), which worked in parallel with the Dominican T. Esser and reached almost identical conclusions. His merit is that he explicitly distinguishes the truth from the conjectural. Three points accepted by all:

• El Ángelus noon and morning are after the evening.
• The midday was not born by imitation of the other two: it has its own root, linked to the Pasión.
• La costumbre de rezar tres avemarías al atardecer was already general in Europe in the first half of the 14th century.

A prayer of monks that the laity made his

La Regularis Concordia of St Etelwoldo of Winchester, around the year 975, prescribes three orathions After Complete, with bell ring. Thurston's thesis is that the Angelus was born as imitación laical de esa oración monacal nocturnaWhere the monk prayed three prayers, the lay prayed three oars. It is the same movement that gave rise to the Rosary, with its one hundred and fifty oars instead of the one hundred and fifty psalms.

The material testimonies accompany: bells with registration Hail Mary, Grace plena, Dominus tecum in Helfta, near Eisleben, in 1234in England, dozens of medieval bells dedicated to san GabrielThe angel of the ad. In Lérida, 1308the bishop commands that after complete the bell rings three times at intervals and that the faithful kneel to pray the avemary. The first safe mention of the three avemarias at the evening touch is a decree of the Synod of Gran (Esztergom, Hungría), en 1307.

The three bells were born separately

The text we are praying today is from the 17th century

This is perhaps the most surprising fact. The medieval are the three avemarias to the bell touch; the text articulated with its three versions is very later. The three current versions appear for the first time in a Catechism printed in Venice in 1560, y the full form as today is prayed is not documented before 1612. Until then, the books of devotion assigned different content to each touch: the Resurrection in the morning, the Passion at noon, the Incarnation at sunset.

The potatoes that are quoted: what they really did

Juan XXII (1318 y 1327) I recommend lenigenci ó The custom. That is the exact formulation of the source, and the difference matters: it did not institute anything, but it supported a practice that was already widespread. Benedict XIVon 20 April 1742, he ordered that in Easter time the Regina caeli instead of the Angelus; it is the provision that remains in force and that contains the Directory of the Holy See on popular piety.

As for the Franciscans, what the source says is measured: General chapter of the time of Saint Bonaventura - 1263 or 1269, the authors disagree - sent the preachers to encourage the people to pray for the touch of Completas. It is the least debatable testimony of the 13th century, but it does not say that Buenaventura instituted the Angelus or that it composed any text.

El Regina caeli: the Angelus of Easter time

From the provision of Benedict XIV of 1742, during the fifty days of Easter the Angelus is replaced by this antiphone, which is also the one that closes Complete in Easter time:

La antífona tiene unknown author. On its date there are two dates of serious sources that should be given as: Encyclopedia Católica the track to the 12th century, while the Directory of the Holy See on popular piety probably places it in the X-XI centuries. In the first half of the 13th century it was already part of the Franciscan use, which spread it throughout the Church.

Su belleza teológica está en que links the Incarnation with Easter: "The Lord, whom you have deserved to take," looks to Nazareth; "he has risen, according to his word," looks to the empty tomb. And the invitation to the joy with which it begins is an echo of which the angel addressed to Mary: "Rejoice, full of grace" (Lc 1,28).

Cómo se reza hoy

The Directory on popular piety points out three moments: the dawn, the noon and the sunset. Six, twelve and six are custom, not standard: an English legacy of Cropredy, 1512, orders to ring the bird bell at six, at twelve and at 4: 00 afternoon.

Invulgence

El Manual of indulgences granted partial indulgence to whom the Angelus prays devout with his own verses and prayer, or the Regina caeli with his in Easter time. It should be said precisely: there is no plenary indulgence for praying the Angelus; the plenary of the same concession corresponds to the Rosary, praying in church or prayer, in family, in religious community or pious association, or joining the Pope's retransmission. For the partial it is enough to be at least repented internally, and it can be applied to the deceased.

El Ángelus del Papa

The custom that brings together thousands of people every Sunday in the square of San Pedro has a date of birth. According to the Holy See itself, the first Angelus radiated was on August 15, 1954, by concession of Pius XIIFrom Castel Gandolfo. That same autumn, back in Rome, the Pope began to pray to him at the window of his private study - the penultimate of the third floor of the Apostolic Palace, built between 1589 and 1590 - and has thus continued.

Qué se reza cuando se reza el Ángelus

The structure teaches itself. The three verbs do not stop in Mary: lead to Jn 1.14in the Word made flesh. And the conclusive prayer addressed to the Father - "Draw, Lord, your grace upon us... by Jesus Christ our Lord" - which is where Christian prayer always ends. Mary is asked of something else, and very concrete: pray for us. He does not love her: he is asked that interceda. Paul VI uses that word exactly when speaking of the "recourse to his merciful intercession."

There is also a detail that often goes unnoticed: the Angelus doesn't stay at Christmas. He begins in the Annunciation and ends up asking to come "for his passion and his cross to the glory of the resurrection." In two minutes the whole Christian mystery.

Y el fiat of Mary - "be done in me according to your word" - is in the center for something. He who prays the Angelus three times a day does not repeat a formula: he offers to say the same thing she said. The work stops for an instant, as it stopped in Millet's painting, and the whole day is sewn to that yes.