While later critics following the sixteenth-century reformers have tended to see in this practice either a superstitious dependence on the e cacy of sheer repetition or, more sympathetically, a powerful if nevertheless some- what mindless or mechanical form of self-hypnosis, medieval commentaries on the text--not to mention the Virgin's own plea that her devotees not say her
too fast--make it clear that, like the Virgin herself, Gabriel's greet- ing was pregnant with God.
Mary and the Art of Prayer_Ave Maria
