November Synaxarion
November 21

Entrance into the Temple of our Most Holy Lady,
the Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary

The origin of the feast is found in an account in the apocryphal Protoevangelium of Saint James. According to this document, after Saint Ann's miraculous birth-giving, the Most Holy Virgin having completed her second year, Joachim said to his wife: "Let us lead her to the Lord's Temple, as we promised Him." Ann said: "Let us yet wait until her third year, so that the child will not clamor for her father or mother, thus she will not walk straight before the Lord." When the child was three years old, Joachim said: "Let us call from among the daughters of the Hebrews those who are undefiled, and let them each take a lamp and let these lamps be lit, that the child not turn to look backward and her heart be not held captive outside the Lord's Temple." They did thusly. Zachary the priest received her and said to her: "May the Lord crown your name with glory!", and he set her down on the altar step. There, Mary was nourished by an angel until she was twelve years old. When the time came for her to marry, Joseph received her from the priests' hands, and took her from the Lord's Temple.
Whatever the foundations of this gracious legend may be, the Church invites us above all to meditate on the mystery of the internal preparation of Mary for her vocation as Theotokos. This preparation is a total self-commitment, in the "immaculate victim," "as a most holy vessel" which must receive the body of the Word incarnate, "a living temple and throne of the King, elected to be his Mother," "the spiritual ark enclosing the incomprehensible Word." The miracle of her subsistance by the hand of the Archangel is the symbol of her spiritual life entirely nourished by the will of God.
Historically, this feast had its origin in the dedication of the Church of Saint Mary the New in Jerusalem (November, 543). It was spread throughout the whole East in the Seventh century. Pope Gregory XI introduced it at Avignon at the end of the Fourteenth century. Then it was generalized in the Roman Church in 1585 by Sixtus V.
Second Class Feast. Antiphons of the Feast. Ordinary Isodikon. Troparion of the Feast (three times). Kondakion of the Feast. Epistle, Gospel, Hirmos, and Kinonikon of the Feast.
In occurence with a Sunday: Antiphons (the refrain of the Second Antiphon is that of Sunday). Isodikon of the Sunday. Troparia: of the Resurrection (once) and of the Feast. Epistle and Gospel of the Feast (Epistle and Gospel of the Sunday are read on the following day). Hirmos and Kinonikon of the Feast.