Tag Archives: Salus Populi Romani

Mother of God as Fortress and Incense

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This icon, similar to the icon in Rome of the Mother of God known as “Health/Salvation of the Roman People,” illustrates the Song of Songs 4:4, which reads, “Like the Tower of David is your neck … a thousand shields hang upon it, all arrows of the mighty.”

“Who is she that goes up from the desert, as a pillar of smoke of aromatic spices–of myrrh and frankincense and all the perfumer’s powders?” (Song of Songs 3:6)

The friends of the groom are surprised by what they see, St. Gregory of Nyssa tells us. They know she is beautiful more splendid than gold or silver. But now they see her ascending and are struck with amazement and compare her beauty and virtue to not just a simple, single variety of incense but to a mixture of frankincense and myrrh together.

“One aspect of their praise is derived from the association of these two perfumes: myrrh is used for burying the dead and frankincense is used in divine worship…. a person must first become myrrh before being dedicated to the worship of God. That is, a person must be buried with Christ who assumed death for our sake and must mortify themselves with the myrrh–understood as repentance–which was used in the Lord’s burial.” (St. Gregory of Nyssa, On the Song of Songs)

A person must embrace ongoing self-examination and repentance; only then is it possible to then possible to enter the presence of God as the frankincense which is offered by the angels before the throne of God (Rev. 8:4).

Another of the spices used by perfumers was cinnamon. It was thought to have several remarkable properties, such as stopping putrefaction or infection and would cause a sleeping person to answer questions truthfully. So the application of “spiritual cinnamon” would stop anger, induce honest/truthful self-examination, and calm the anxious.

Myrrh and cinnamon were therefore metaphors for attitudes and practices that would protect a person from sin. In the Song, the bride–who was a type of the Mother of God–was not only myrrh and cinnamon but a protective fortress as well. The bride–in patristic sermons, the Mother of God–is a fortress with shields hanging from the battlements. The walls of the fortress are impervious to spears. The early fathers took this to mean that the prayers of the Mother of God could protect Christians from the darts and arrows of temptation. The fortress could also be seen as the Church herself, steadfast and immoveable on the rock of faith.

There were 18th century icons to illustrate this idea of the Mother of God as fortress; the inscription at the top of these icons was commonly:

“Like the Tower of David is your neck, built on courses of stone; a thousand shields hang upon it, all arrows of the mighty.” (Song of Songs 4:4)

In the example of this kind of icon seen above, the two saints appearing at the sides are additions generally not found in other versions.  They are the Martyr Adrian and the Martyr Natalia.  Some examples have instead the military saints such Alexander Nevsky at left, and George at right, but many have no saints added to the main image.

Much thanks to the Icons and Their Interpretation blog for information about this icon.

“Pleasing is the fragrance of your perfumes….”

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This image of the Mother of God, “Health/Salvation of the Roman People,” dates from the 6th century and is kept in a chapel of the St. Mary Major basilica in Rome. The Mother of God is frequently identified with the bride in the Song of Songs; just as this image is reputed to bring health and salvation to those who venerate it, the fragrance which the bride shares with her companions also brings health and salvation.

“Even though one may gather every perfume and every flower of fragrance from all the different meadows of virtue and is able to make one’s whole life fragrant with the scent of all these virtuous actions … still one could not look steadily upon the Bridegroom, the Word of God, any more than one could look directly at the sun.”

St. Gregory of Nyssa is commenting on a verse from the Song of Songs:

“Pleasing is the fragrance of your perfumes;
    your name is like perfume poured out.” (Song of Songs 1:3)

St. Gregory goes on to quote St. Paul the Apostle, who said that he was “the good fragrance of Christ” (2 Cor. 2:15). St. Gregory points out that the apostle “inhaled the fragrance of that inaccessible and transcendent grace, offering himself to others as a kind of incense for them to partake of according to their ability….” St. Gregory urges us to treasure this fragrance in our hearts, as the bride does in the Song of Songs. The bride makes a sachet of this fragrant perfume and keeps it between her breasts; the warmth of her heart enables all her actions to spread the beautiful scent of the perfume.

Some manuscripts specify that this perfume is frankincense or myrrh. In the medical theory of the ancient world, these scents strengthened and energized certain animals but acted as poison to others. The effect of these scents on humans, however, was the result of human choice: a person could choose to be energized and invigorated by the scent or to be weakened and debilitated by the scent.

The choice is up to us.

Our Lady of Good Health

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The icon of Salus Populi Romani is found in the Lady Chapel of the basilica known as St. Mary Major in Rome and has long been considered a wonderworking image, especially in times of plague or epidemics.

Pope Gregory the Great welcomed the image now known as Salus Populi Romani (“Salvation/Health of the Roman People”) in AD 593 and placed it in the basilica known as St. Mary Major. He had the icon carried throughout Rome and prayed for an end to the Black Plague. Pope Gregory XVI also venerated the image in 1837 to pray for the end of a cholera epidemic.

The Mother of God is shown with a ceremonial embroidered handkercheif in her right hand, an indication that she is the Queen of Heaven (another popular title for the image). For several centuries, both she and Christ also wore metal crowns which were attached to the icon but which have been removed and are now kept in the sacristy of St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican. The stars on the cloak of the Mother of God also indicate that she was a vrigin before-during-after the birth of her Son (the stars said to be the last glimmers of heavenly light that filled the cave in Bethlehem when Christ was born, seen in the folds of her cloak by the midwives when they finally arrived–too late).

The image of Salus Populi Romani is related to the church in Venice, Our Lady of Good Health, which was built in thanksgiving for the end of a plague there. You can read more about the church in Venice here.