Mary Untier of Knots

Painting

The painting, executed in the Baroque style by Johann Georg Melchior Schmidtner (1625-1707), shows the Blessed Virgin Mary standing on the crescent moon (the usual way of depicting Mary under her title of the Immaculate Conception), surrounded by angels and with the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove hovering above her circle of stars as she unties knots into a long strip and at the same time rests her foot on the head of a "knotted" snake. The serpent represents the devil, and her treatment of him fulfills the prophecy in Genesis 3:15: "I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; he shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.."§

Below are shown a human figure and his dog accompanying a much smaller angel. This scene is often interpreted as Tobias with his dog and the Archangel Raphael traveling to ask Sara to be his wife.

The concept of Mary untying knots is derived from a work by St. Irenaeus of Lyons, Adversus haereses (Against Heresies). In Book III, Chapter 22, he presents a parallel between Eve and Mary, describing how "the knot of Eve's disobedience was loosed by the obedience of Mary. For what the virgin Eve had bound fast through unbelief, this did the virgin Mary set free through faith."

The two small figures have also been interpreted as a representation of Wolfgang Langenmantel, the grandfather of the benefactor, guided in his distress by a guardian angel to Father Jakob Rem in Ingolstadt.

History

The painting was donated around 1700 by Hieronymus Ambrosius Langenmantel (1641-1718), a canon of the Monastery of Saint Peter in Augsburg. The donation is said to be connected with an event in his family. His grandfather Wolfgang Langenmantel (1586-1637) was on the verge of the separation from his wife Sophia Rentz (1590-1649) and therefore sought help from Jakob Rem, the Jesuit priest in Ingolstadt. Father Rem prayed to the Blessed Virgin Mary and said: "In diesem religiösen Akt erhebe ich das Band der Ehe, löse alle Knoten und glätte es [In this religious act, I raise the bonds of matrimony, to untie all knots and smoothen them]". Immediately peace was restored between the husband and wife, and the separation did not happen. In the memory of this event, their grandson commissioned the painting of the "Untier of Knots".

Devotion

The first Chapel to be named "Mary, Untier of Knots" was completed in 1989 in Styria, Austria, inspired as a supplication in response to the Chernobyl Nuclear Tragedy. The image of "Mary, Undoer of Knots" is especially venerated in Argentina and Brazil, where churches have been named for her and devotion to her has become widespread and which the Guardian called a "religious craze".

This Catholic devotion has grown since Jorge Mario Bergoglio, S.J. (who would later become Pope Francis, after a tenure as Archbishop of Buenos Aires), brought a postcard of the painting to Argentina in the 1980s after seeing the original while studying in Germany. The devotion reached Brazil near the end of the 20th century. According to Regina Novaes, of the Institute of Religious Studies in Rio de Janeiro, Mary, Untier of Knots "attracts people with small problems". Bergoglio had this image of Mary engraved on a chalice he presented to Pope Benedict XVI and another chalice bearing her image, the work of the same silversmith, is to be presented to Pope Francis on behalf of the Argentine people.

In Buenos Aires, a copy of the icon was made and left by the artist, Dr. Ana de Betta Berti, for the Church of San José del Talar, which has had it since 8 December 1996. On the 8th of each month, thousands of people make the pilgrimage to this church.

Religious sites

The devotion to Mary, the Untier of Knots, can be found at numerous religious sites around the world, including the following:

Title in other languages

Mary, Untier of Knots, has different names in other languages: