Then said Mary unto the angel, How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?
And Mary said unto the angel, How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?
And Mary said unto the messenger, `How shall this be, seeing a husband I do not know?'
But Mary said to the angel, How shall this be, since I know not a man?
Luke — Luke's 'orderly account' (1:3) follows Jesus from Bethlehem through the long travel narrative to Jerusalem and the Emmaus road.
Rare words are the text's own signal of a deliberate thread — the fewer the occurrences, the more the places it appears belong together.
The walk5
Follow this verse’s cross-references two steps out. Each card is a verse this one points to, and beneath it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several different paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first — the text keeps returning to it. Every stop shows its own words, and every stop is a page.
Through
Acts 9:6“Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.”
leads to
Then I asked, ‘What should I do, Lord?’ ‘Get up and go into Damascus,’ He told me. ‘There you will be told all that you have been appointed to do.’
‘But get up and stand on your feet. For I have appeared to you to appoint you as a servant and as a witness of what you have seen from Me and what I…
And the grace of our Lord overflowed to me, along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.
Because they were ignorant of God’s righteousness and sought to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness.
Therefore send to Joppa for Simon, who is called Peter. He is a guest in the home of Simon the tanner, by the sea.’
The whole web at once: see the Arc.
The verses this one reaches11
But Abram replied, “Lord GOD, how can I know that I will possess it?”
“How can this be?” Nicodemus asked.
“Please, my Lord,” Gideon replied, “how can I save Israel? Indeed, my clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the youngest in my father’s house.”
“How can I be sure of this?” Zechariah asked the angel. “I am an old man, and my wife is well along in years.”
How long will you wander, O faithless daughter? For the LORD has created a new thing in the land— a woman will shelter a man.”
So she laughed to herself, saying, “After I am worn out and my master is old, will I now have this pleasure?”
But Paul said to the centurion and the soldiers, “Unless these men remain with the ship, you cannot be saved.”
If all our flocks and herds were slaughtered for them, would they have enough? Or if all the fish in the sea were caught for them, would they have enough?”
“How can I go?” Samuel asked. “Saul will hear of it and kill me!” The LORD answered, “Take a heifer with you and say, ‘I have come to sacrifice to the LORD.’
Then Manoah prayed to the LORD, “Please, O Lord, let the man of God You sent us come to us again to teach us how to raise the boy who is to be born.”
“Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.”
Voices5
(Ep. ad Epictetum.) For we confess that which then was taken up from Mary to be of the nature of man and a most real body, the very same also according to nature with our own body. For Mary is our sister, seeing we have all descended from Adam.
Athanasius of Alexandria· Catena Aurea by Aquinas, 373patristic
Then said Mary to the angel, how shall this be,....
John Gill· Exposition of the New Testament (1746-1748)reformed
Seeing I know not a man - Or, husband. As she was only contracted to Joseph, and not as yet married, she knew that this conception could not have yet taken place; and she modestly inquires by what means the promise of the angel is to be fulfilled in order to regulate her conduct accordingly.
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible, 1832evangelical
How, &c.--not the unbelief of Zacharias, "Whereby shall I know this?" but, taking the fact for granted, "How is it to be, so contrary to the unbroken law of human birth?" Instead of reproof, therefore, her question is answered in mysterious detail.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, 1871reformed
The interview between Mary the mother of Jesus and Elisabeth the mother of John, when they were both with child of those pregnant births, and the prophecies they both uttered upon that occasion,
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710puritan
