Magnificat, Luke 1:46 Wall Art

A table set for prayer

There are no figures here. A thick leather Bible, reddish brown with worn gilt bands on the spine and a gold cross on the cover, lies closed on a plank table. Beside it a rosary of round wooden beads curls in a loose spiral and ends in a small wooden crucifix at the front edge. Behind them, a broad cream candle stands in a brass dish, not yet lit.

An olive sprig with green fruit reaches across from the left, and a linen cloth with blue stripes hangs over the corner of the table. Everything is painted in warm browns and soft whites. At the top, in flowing script lettering: “My soul doth magnify the Lord”, and beneath it Luke 1:46.

Where does the Magnificat come from?

After the angel's visit, Mary travels to the hill country of Judea to see her cousin Elizabeth, who is expecting John the Baptist. Elizabeth greets her as blessed among women, and Mary answers with a hymn that fills verses 46 to 55. Its name comes from the first word in the Latin Bible, Magnificat, meaning “magnifies”. In the next line, her spirit rejoices in God her savior.

To magnify here does not mean to make God bigger, but to make him seen as great, the way a lens brings something into view. The song then turns outward: Mary says all generations will call her blessed, and she praises a God who scatters the proud, puts down the mighty and exalts the lowly, fills the hungry and sends the rich away empty. Many readers hear in it the song of Hannah from 1 Samuel 2, sung by another woman who received a son she had not expected.

The Magnificat has been prayed every evening for centuries: at Vespers in the Catholic Liturgy of the Hours, at Evensong in the Anglican tradition, and in Lutheran evening prayer. In the rosary, the visit to Elizabeth is the second Joyful Mystery, which is why the beads and the verse sit so naturally together in this painting.

Gift ideas: confirmation, and the women in your life

This print is a gentle choice for a young woman's confirmation, a godmother, a mother or a grandmother with a lifelong habit of prayer. In the home it fits a bedroom wall, a reading nook or the shelf where the family Bible is kept. Its neutral palette sits well next to wood and linen.