Anna / Hannah .

• Saint Anne. According to apocryphal Christian and Islamic tradition, Saint Anne was the mother of Mary and grandmother of Jesus. Mary's mother is not named in the canonical gospels, but is mentioned as the daughter of Faqud in Quran. In writing, Anne's name and that of her husband Joachim come only from New Testament apocrypha, of which the Gospel of James (see text in Sources), written perhaps around 150, seems to be the earliest that mentions them.

The story bears a similarity to that of the birth of Samuel, whose mother Hannah (Hebrew: חַנָּה‬‎ Ḥannāh "favour, grace"; etymologically the same name as Anne) had also been childless. Although Anne receives little attention in the Latin Church prior to the late 12th century,[3] dedications to Anne in Eastern Christianity occur as early as the 6th century.[4] In the Eastern Orthodox Churches and Eastern Catholic Churches, she is revered as Hannah. In the Eastern Orthodox tradition, Hannah is ascribed the title Forebear of God, and both the Nativity of Mary and the Presentation of Mary are celebrated as two of the twelve Great Feasts of the Orthodox Church. The Dormition of Hannah is also a minor feast in Eastern Christianity. In Lutheran Protestantism, it is held that Martin Luther chose to enter religious life as an Augustinian friar after crying out to St. Anne while endangered by lightning

Anne (Arabic: حنة Ḥannah) is also revered in Islam, recognised as a highly spiritual woman and as the mother of Mary. The Qur'an describes her as the daughter of Faqud who remained childless until her old age. One day, Hannah saw a bird feeding its young while sitting in the shade of a tree, which awakened her desire to have children of her own. She prayed for a child and eventually conceived; her husband, Imran, died before the child was born. Expecting the child to be male, Hannah vowed to dedicate him to isolation and service in the Second Temple.[N 1][7][8]

However, Hannah bore a daughter instead, and named her Mary. Her words upon delivering Mary reflect her status as a great mystic, realising that while she had wanted a son, this daughter was God's gift to her:[7][8]

Then, when she brought forth she said: My Lord! Truly, I brought her forth, a female. And God is greater in knowledge of what she brought forth. And the male is not like the female. [...] So her Lord received her with the very best acceptance. And her bringing forth caused the very best to develop in her

Although the canonical books of the New Testament never mention the mother of the Virgin Mary, traditions about her family, childhood, education, and eventual betrothal to Joseph developed very early in the history of the church. The oldest and most influential source for these is the apocryphal Gospel of James, first written in Koine Greek around the middle of the second century AD. In the West, the Gospel of James fell under a cloud in the fourth and fifth centuries when it was accused of "absurdities" by Jerome and condemned as untrustworthy by Pope Damasus I, Pope Innocent I, and Pope Gelasius I.[9]

Ancient belief, attested to by a sermon of John of Damascus, was that Anne married once. In late medieval times, legend held that Anne was married three times first to Joachim, then to Clopas and finally to a man named Solomas and that each marriage produced one daughter: Mary, mother of Jesus, Mary of Clopas, and Mary Salomæ, respectively.[10] The sister of Saint Anne was Sobe, mother of Elizabeth.

Similarly, in the 4th century and then much later in the 15th century, a belief arose that Mary was born of Anne by virgin birth, preserving Anne's body and soul intact as distinct from the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception that preserved her daughter's body and soul intact and sinless from the first moment of existence.[11] Adherents included the 16th-century Lutheran mystic Valentin Weigel, who claimed Anne conceived Mary by the power of the Holy Spirit rather than conventional conjugal relations. This belief was condemned as an error by the Catholic Church in 1677. In the fifteenth century, the Catholic cleric Johann Eck related in a sermon that St Anne's parents were named Stollanus and Emerentia. The Catholic Encyclopedia (1907) regards this genealogy as spurious

For the figure of Luke 2, see Anna the Prophetess. For other uses, see Saint Anne (disambiguation).

"There was also a certain prophetess, Anna by name, daughter of Phanuel of the tribe of Asher. She had seen many days, having lived seven years with her husband after her marriage and then as a widow until she was eighty-four. She was constantly in the temple, worshipping day and night in fasting and prayer. Coming on the scene at this moment, she gave thanks to God and talked about the Child to all who looked forward to the deliverance of Jerusalem. (From the Bible, the Book of Luke, Chapter 2, Verses 22-38)

In the 3rd century, Clement of Alexandra (c. 150-c. 215) and Origen Adamantius (c. 185-254) identified the prophetess Anna as the mother of St. Mary. Luke 2.36-8 says she was daughter of Phanuel, a member of the tribe of Asher, and a widow of great age, about 88, at the time of Jesus' birth. According to St. Hippolytus of Rome (c. 170-c. 236), Anna was the youngest daughter of High Priest Phanuel and his wife Mary.