Anna

For the List of "Women of the Bible", click Blog Archive, 2008 December

13 Questions & Answers
Read Scripture Reference: Lk 2:22-38
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#1. Who is this Anna appears only in the 3 verses of the Bible(Lk 2:36-38)?

#1. A widow and prophetess who at the age of 84 recognized and proclaimed, the infant Jesus as the Messiah when he was brought in to be dedicated to the Lord at the Temple. This brief reference of Anna carries many implications. She was the daughter of Phanuel of the tribe of Asher.
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#2. How long Anna had been a widow?

#2. Considering the typical early age of marriage, at 84, probably she had been a widow for at least 60 years. After 7 years of married life her husband died.
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#3. What was Anna's hope according to Lk 2:38?

#3. The redemption of Jerusalem.
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#4. What unusual course of life Anna had chosen after she became a widow?

#4. Rather than remarry, something the Apostle Paul later advised for young widows in 1 Tim 5:11-15, Anna committed herself to a life of prayer and fasting at the Jerusalem Temple. She never left the temple but worshiped night and day.
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#5. What was the most striking thing happened during Anna's life?

#5. After 6 decades of dedicated life Anna was blessed and granted the privilege of viewing the infant Savior.
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#6. True or False. The evidence of Anna's devotion was the fact that she spent all those years in the temple.

#6. False. The evidence of her devotion was that she recognized the Christ.
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#7. How the widows in the OT were regarded?

#7. Widows in the OT were regarded as being under God's special care.
Three quotes in agreement are given below.
a)Ps 68:5 A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in his holy dwelling.
b)Ps 146:9 The LORD watches over the alien and sustains the fatherless and the widow,
but he frustrates the ways of the wicked.
c)Prov 15:25 The LORD tears down the proud man's house but he keeps the widow's boundaries intact.
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#8. What were the conditions laid in N.T. about the poor widows?

#8. The church looked after poor widows (4 Verses are cited below):
a)Acts 6:1 In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Grecian Jews among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food.

b)James 1:27 Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.

c)1 Tim 5:4 But if a widow has children or grandchildren, these should learn first of all to put their religion into practice by caring for their own family and so repaying their parents and grandparents, for this is pleasing to God.

d)1Tim 5:9-10 No widow may be put on the list of widows unless she is over sixty, has been faithful to her husband, 10and is well known for her good deeds, such as bringing up children, showing hospitality, washing the feet of the saints, helping those in trouble and devoting herself to all kinds of good deeds.
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#9. What is the role of Prophets, according to Paul?

#9. Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God's people and members of God's household, 20built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. 21In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. 22And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit (Gal 2:19-22).

Therefore, Christianity as a faith is firmly rooted in the ministry of Israel's Prophets, whose vision of a Messiah, Jesus completes.
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#10. In the presence of Anna, what were the words of praise and thanks to God, Old Simeon uttered when he saw 40 days old Jesus in the Temple Courts?

#10. Lk 2:28-32 Simeon took him in his arms and praised God, saying:
“Sovereign Lord, as you have promised,you now dismiss your servant in peace.
For my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of
all people, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel.
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#11. How many beneficiaries are highlighted in Simeon's praise and thanks due to the advent of the newborn, the future Christ the Savior?

#11. Three. (Read the above quiz(#10 for this answer).
a)all people, b)Gentiles, and c)Israel.
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#12. How hard were the restrictions for Anna to overcome the life in the Temple Courts with a full devotion to God and what were the examples of her life style for others to be called "Be an Anna"?

#12. Even though Anna had relinquished a normal lifestyle, spent hours of every day in prayer to her God, and went without food as a sign of devotion, she was still not allowed access to the actual temple. However, despite being in a court less important status for women, she never let that restriction squeeze her heart or strangle her love to God. The customs of her time may have restricted the physical location of Anna's worship, but no earthly regulation or life situation could bind her actual worship or devotion.

Solomon had built the 1st temple very elaborate. Zerubbabel built the 2nd temple when the Jews returned from captivity in Babylon. Those who had seen Solomon's temple wept when they saw the foundation for the new temple(Ezra 3:12-13). Herod the Great, the tireless builder, built the temple where Anna worshipped. Herod's temple had 4 successive courts, each more exclusive than the one before it. The outer court was known as the Court of the Gentiles. This was the only place where non-Jews were allowed. This court was also the place where Jesus later cleared the temple of those buying and selling. The inner court was divided into two sections: the Women's Court, where Anna worshipped, and the Court of Israel. Both Jewish women and men could enter the Women's Court, but only Jewish men were allowed into the Court of Israel. The Court of the Priests surrounded the actual temple building itself was accessible only to those of the Levitical Priesthood.
Anna never failed to notice the warning inscribed in its walls in both Greek and Latin: "No stranger is to enter within the balustrade around the temple and the enclosure. Whoever is caught will be responsible to himself for his death, which will ensue".

Anna bowed her head while rocking back and forth to the rhythm of her prayers:

How lovely is your dwelling place, O LORD Almighty!
2 My soul yearns, even faints, for the courts of the LORD; my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.
3 Even the sparrow has found a home, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may have her young— a place near your altar, O LORD Almighty, my King and my God.
4 Blessed are those who dwell in your house; they are ever praising you.
5 Blessed are those whose strength is in you, who have set their hearts on pilgrimage.
6 As they pass through the Valley of Baca, they make it a place of springs; the autumn rains also cover it with pools.
7 They go from strength to strength, till each appears before God in Zion.
8 Hear my prayer, O LORD God Almighty; listen to me, O God of Jacob.
9 Look upon our shield, O God; look with favor on your anointed one.
10 Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere; I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked.
11 For the LORD God is a sun and shield; the LORD bestows favor and honor;
no good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless.
12 O LORD Almighty, blessed is the man who trusts in you.(Psalm 84)

#13. What is the term Anna, a monetary unit?

#13. A former monetary unit(a coin representing one Anna) of India, Pakistan, and Burma, equal to 1⁄16th ofr a Rupee.
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