Who Is the Woman Clothed with the Sun?

Who is the woman clothed with the sun in Revelation 12? Many say the Virgin Mary—and Jimmy Akin agrees—but he shows that’s not the whole story. Tracing the imagery back to Joseph’s dream in Genesis and through the rest of Revelation 12, Jimmy explains how one symbol can point to Mary, Israel, and the Church at once, and why Pope Benedict XVI read it the same way. He also shows how this reading explains a puzzling detail: the woman’s birth pangs.

 

TRANSCRIPT:

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Revelation 12 describes a woman clothed with the sun, who gives birth to a male child that will rule the nations with a rod of iron.

Many people identify the woman as the Virgin Mary, and she is, but . . . is that the whole story?

Let’s get into it!

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The Woman as Mary

We first meet the woman in Revelation 12.

At this point, the 7 trumpets have sounded, and John writes:

Revelation 12:1-2, 5

And a great sign appeared in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars; she was with child, and she cried out in her pangs of birth, in anguish for delivery. She brought forth a male child, one who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron, but her child was caught up to God and to his throne.

So who is this woman?

We can begin with her child as a clue to who she is.

He’s a male child who is to rule the nations with a rod of iron—and that’s a reference to a messianic prophecy in Psalm 2.

In the literal sense, Psalm 2 is about the Davidic king, but in the spiritual sense it applies to the Messiah.

The psalm says:

Psalm 2:7-9

I will tell of the decree of the Lord: He said to me, “You are my son, today I have begotten you. Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage, and the ends of the earth your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.”

In the spiritual sense of the text, the statement you are my son is a reference to the Messiah as the Son of God, and the reference to the rod of iron is a reference to his lordship over all the nations.

The fact that the child is caught up to the throne of God is a reference to Jesus’ Ascension into heaven.

So the child is clearly Jesus—which would make the woman his mother, the Virgin Mary.

 

The Woman as Israel

But we need to be careful, because the imagery around the woman points somewhere else, too.

The sun, the moon, and the 12 stars come straight out of the book of Genesis, where the patriarch Joseph has a dream.

According to Genesis 37:

Genesis 37:9-10

Then [Joseph] dreamed another dream, and told it to his brothers, and said, “Behold, I have dreamed another dream; and behold, the sun, the moon, and eleven stars were bowing down to me.” But when he told it to his father and to his brothers, his father rebuked him, and said to him, “What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall I and your mother and your brothers indeed come to bow ourselves to the ground before you?”

So in the dream, the sun and moon are Joseph’s father and mother, and the stars are his brothers.

That means that in Revelation the sun, moon, and 12 stars represent the family of Israel, and that suggests that the woman is Israel.

 

The Woman as the Church

But there is another direction that the image of the woman points in. Later in the chapter, a great red dragon tries to devour her child, and Revelation 12:17 says this:

Revelation 12:17

Then the dragon was angry with the woman and went off to make war on the rest of her offspring, on those who keep the commandments of God and bear testimony to Jesus.

So the woman’s other children are those who keep the commandments of God and bear testimony to Jesus—in other words, they are Christians. And that suggests she’s the Church.

 

One Symbol, Three Meanings?

So which is it—is the woman Mary, Israel, or the Church?

One of the things that you find when you study the book of Revelation is that some of its symbols consciously refer to more than one thing.

Later in the book, John describes a beast with 7 heads, and in Revelation 17 we are told:

Revelation 17:9-10

The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman [the great harlot] is seated; they are also seven kings, five of whom have fallen, one is, the other has not yet come, and when he comes, he must remain only a little while.

So the 7 heads are 7 mountains, and they are also 7 kings.

We thus have one symbol—the 7 heads—referring to more than one thing—the 7 mountains and the 7 kings.

So when we see a symbol in Revelation that points more than one way, we shouldn’t think that it can refer to only one thing.

And when we see clear signs—like the ones we’ve looked at for the woman—that suggest the image points in 3 directions, we can go with that.

So we don’t have to choose. John—and God—may mean the image in more than one way.

We thus have evidence that the woman in heaven represents Mary and Israel and the Church.

 

Confirmation from Pope Benedict

Pope Benedict XVI agreed that the woman represents more than one thing and wrote:

Jesus of Nazareth: Holy Week, p. 222

When the Book of Revelation speaks of the great sign of a Woman appearing in heaven, she is understood to represent all Israel, indeed, the whole Church. . . . On the basis of the “corporate personality” model—in keeping with biblical thought—the early Church had no difficulty recognizing in the Woman, on the one hand, Mary herself and, on the other hand, transcending time, the Church, bride and mother, in which the mystery of Mary spreads out into history.

On another occasion, he put it this way:

General Audience, Aug. 23, 2006

This Woman [of Revelation 12] represents Mary, the Mother of the Redeemer, but at the same time she also represents the whole Church, the People of God of all times, the Church which in all ages, with great suffering, brings forth Christ ever anew.

And reading her this way actually helps with some of the details.

For example, the woman cries out in the pangs of childbirth—yet Mary is traditionally thought to have had a painless delivery.

But if the woman is also Israel, those birth pangs may point to the national pain Israel was suffering at the time of Christ’s birth, under the Roman occupation.

 

Conclusion

So, to pull all this together: the woman clothed with the sun is, all at once, Mary, Israel, and the Church—a rich symbol that doesn’t reduce to just one meaning.

If you’d like to learn more about this, you can get a copy of my booklet 20 Answers: Revelation.

In a future episode, we’ll look at the other figures in Revelation 12 and 13—the great red dragon and the 2 beasts.

 

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