BMEV, or “Blessed Mary Ever-Virgin,” should not be an issue for any Protestant today, but clamor from various quarters means that we need once again to “get real” with the Biblical data here. Herewith is a reworking of a recent essay on the subject originally published in Biblical Horizons.
Early on in the church it was decided that Joseph must have kept Mary a virgin all her life. Unquestionably this is because sex was considered dirty — we need only peruse the Church “Fathers” to see this over and over. The mother of Jesus could not possibly have engaged in such a disgusting, sweaty, stinky enterprise.
This abysmal notion is ferociously defended by those given over to this idea. It is clear from the Bible that the pleasures of marital intercourse are to be enjoyed, and it would have been sinful for Joseph to deny it to her. There is nothing dirty about sex in marriage. Theologian John Murray, once asked if Mary stayed a virgin, replied to the effect: “Of course not! She was a Godly woman.”
Jephthah’s daughter wept because she was consigned to perpetual virginity. Are we to believe that God rewarded Mary’s faithfulness with a curse!? — denying her the pleasures of a husband and the joys of more children?
Matthew 1:25 is quite clear: Joseph “was not knowing her until she gave birth to a son.” It does not say “never knew her.” The “imperfect” status verb here indicates routine continual activity.
And we may ask why Joseph would have felt any need to keep Mary a virgin. Neither he nor anyone else knew that Jesus was the incarnation of God. Often we hear from the ignorant in certain churches that “Well, if my wife had given birth to God Himself, I don’t think I could touch her sexually after that.” Well, in fact nobody knew Jesus was God incarnate. They knew that he was the promised Messiah, son of David, and savior of the world. They did not know and could not possibly have known that He was God on earth. How could Mary and Joseph ever have dealt with him growing up? How could the disciples possibly have had any kind of relationship with him if they had known He was God on earth?
When Jesus calmed the seas, the disciples wondered, saying, “Who is this that even the wind and waves obey him?” Clearly they did not think Jesus was God. He was a kind of super-Moses, who like Moses could command the sea. It is only after His resurrection that the disciples realized that He was God incarnate.
When Peter confessed, “You are the Messiah, the son of the Living God,” he only meant that Jesus was the promised seed of David, the Messiah. In Psalm 2, the Davidic king is “son of God.” It is only after the resurrection that anyone said, “My Lord and my God!”
So, since all Mary and Joseph knew was that Jesus was a man destined for great things, there is no reason on earth they would have refrained from the joys of sex.
Now, even at the time of the Reformation the hold that this evil superstition had on people was so great that the Reformers did not touch it. I read on silly and uninformed blogs that Calvin believed in the perpetual virginity of Mary. That is not true. A glance at Calvin’s commentaries shows that he says, in Matthew 1:25, that it is impossible to know one way or another [he’s wrong about that — JBJ] and that it is best not to worry about it.
Matthew 12:46-50, Luke 8:19-21, and Mark 3:31-35 record that Jesus’ mother and His brothers arrived to see him. We are assured that “brothers” might mean “relatives,” and though a pointless assertion (since Jesus surely did have brothers), this is indeed lexically possible. In Mark 3:32, however, the multitude reports to Jesus, “your mother and your brothers and your sisters are outside looking for you.” Now, “and your sisters” is absent from some ancient manuscripts. It was the consensus of the United Bible Societies Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament (3rd ed., 1971), that “and your sisters” is most likely original. If it had been added later, they argue, it would also have been added in verse 31, where it is only “his mother and his brothers arrived.” Now, “brothers” might mean “relatives,” but “sisters” cannot. “Sisters” means sisters.
Whatever the case may be in Mark 3, we can be absolutely certain that Mary and Joseph began to enjoy sex after her purification from childbirth, and that this pleasure was part of God’s gift to them for their faithfulness and obedience, and that they had other children together. Any other opinion is simply an impossibility from a Biblical and consistent Christian point of view.
It is my hope that the Roman Catholic Church, as it rethinks various issues today, will begin to think more clearly and Biblically about this. They rightly seek to honor Mary, but they do so in a very sadly wrong way.
I think the story of Hannah and Samuel also fits with this whole theme; and of course the Gospels make clear connections between the two events. (The description of Jesus in the temple at 12 has strong echoes of the Samuel story, and of course the Magnificat is essentially a re-formation of the song of Hannah.) Samuel was the first, given to Yahweh in a special way – “and Yahweh visited Hannah (came to her in terms of His covenant faithfulness) and she conceived and bore three sons and two daughters” (1 Sam 2.21 ESV).
The Catholic Church upholds both marriage and marital relations to be very good. Virginity for the sake of the Kingdom is also very good.
Luther and Zwingli unabashedly believed in Mary’s perpetual virginity. Calvin was neutral to favorable toward it:
“[On Matt 1:25:] The inference he [Helvidius] drew from it was, that Mary remained a virgin no longer than till her first birth, and that afterwards she had other children by her husband . . . No just and well-grounded inference can be drawn from these words . . . as to what took place after the birth of Christ. He is called ‘first-born’; but it is for the sole purpose of informing us that he was born of a virgin . . . What took place afterwards the historian does not inform us . . . No man will obstinately keep up the argument, except from an extreme fondness for disputation.”
“Under the word ‘brethren’ the Hebrews include all cousins and other relations, whatever may be the degree of affinity.”
I’ll stick with what the early Church, Luther, Zwingli (and possibly Calvin) believed over what you believe.
I’ll stick with God. And note that your quotation from Calvin proves my point.
Without taking a side on the issue whatsoever:
Having tread the waters of these arguments so many times before, the only dismay I have at reading them again is the strange presumption that these arguments have not been presented over and again to those who hold to the ever-virginity and that thoughtful responses have not been carefully presented. I’m waiting for the responses to *those responses*.
From as brilliant, innovative and articulate a theolgian as Jim Jordan, the nature of this piece is especially baffling. Jordan is never loathe to make massive doctrinal claims and back them up with beautiful and microscopically nuanced typologies. The doctrine of the ever-virginity of Mary is one that is upheld by many fine theologians with typological, symbolic and historic evidence. I’d like to see a response to typological/symbolic defenses of the ever-virginity of Mary. I feel this would be richly beneficial to Catholic and Protestant readers alike… If the doctrine of ever-virginity were wholly founded on something as flimsy as “because sex is dirty,” what careful theologian wouldn’t reject it out of hand?
The notion that Mary abstained from sex because “Sex is dirty” is no more a fair representation of the doctrine of ever-virginity than “Everybody has a right to say whatever they think the Bible means” is a fair representation of the Protestant doctrine of the priesthood of all believers.
Straw-men arguments not only galvanize opposition, but also create disillusionment down the road when those fed on straw find meaty reasoning elsewhere.
I’m looking forward to another article that responds to typological defenses for ever-virginity. It would be greatly helpful!
Best,
Josh
Josh,
What “typological/symbolic defenses of the ever-virginity of Mary” are you talking about? Cite something substantive to interact with?
I did not intend “sex is dirty” as a fair representation of the doctrine as presented by the best Roman theologians today. I intended it as an explanation for the origin of the doctrine. By Ratranmus’s day it was widely believed that Jesus could not have travelled through Mary’s vagina to be born, and was born by passing through her stomach wall — with Ratranmus had to refute.
What is the point in refuting “typological defenses” for this notion when the text of the Bible is clear, and so is Biblical theology? For what it’s worth, typology points to Hannah.
I suppose it might be that Mary is a type of the Church, which will be presented as the virgin bride of Christ. But then, so again is Jael, “most blessed of women.” Being a type of the Church is never something absolute, since it’s a type and not an identity. It is only in certain respects that Mary, Jael, Rebekah, Esther, or anyone else is a “type of the Church.” And in Mary’s case, that certainly does not mean some kind of perpetual virginity. Quite the reverse. The Church, as mother, is to be fruitful. And Mary was.
Barrenness is a manifestation of being under the general curse, as we know from the whole Bible. If Mary is a type of the church, she was not barren! Let me put this another way: If the salvific work of Jesus was applied to Mary before her conception, so that she was immaculately conceived, then NO aspect of the curse could have been present with her and she MUST have had children.
Being a “eunuch for the Kingdom’s sake” is the exception, not the norm. So here again, if Mary is a type of the church, she represents the norm, not the exception.
If typology is done inside the Bible, and not by admixture of philosophical fantasies arising from non-Biblical sources, there is no hint that Mary would be kept a virgin, or that she is to be prayed to, or that she had any authority in the apostolic church.
Finally, whatever Mary as type of the Church means, it does not mean we are in union with Mary. We are in union with Christ. Jesus is the fulness of the type of the Church, not Mary. Mary was a Godly woman, who enjoyed sex with her husband and was blessed with children.
The argument that I don’t get is that EV apparently means Mary’s hymen never broke for any reason whatsoever, including having the head of Jesus proceed through her birth canal.
That boggles the mind and seems rather docetist. Jesus had a normal birth, and physics didn’t change for him.
Rev. Jordan writes: “If typology is done inside the Bible, and not by admixture of philosophical fantasies arising from non-Biblical sources…” No offense intended, but how familiar with your own critics are you? While I tend to disagree with them, I’ve heard plenty of Christians dismiss the manner of hermeneutics suggested in “Through New Eyes” by claiming it was smoke and mirrors and games.
Rev. Jordan writes: “What is the point in refuting “typological defenses” for this notion when the text of the Bible is clear, and so is Biblical theology?” I believe I’ve heard the same claims made against infant baptism and sprinkling. I suppose “the point” would be this: granting the same kind of grace and time to takes-a-while-to-explain doctrines that your own takes-a-while-to-explain doctrines require. Rev. Jordan couldn’t really expect to win many over to a number of his ideas if his skeptics refused to tackle typological defenses for matters they thought were “clear[ly]” not Biblical.
Rev. Jordan writes: “I suppose it might be that Mary is a type of the Church…” doesn’t strongly suggest he’s encountered typological/symbolic defenses of the doctrine of ever-virgnity. Is this true?
Best,
Josh
Augustine didn’t defend her virginity because it would have been dirty for her to have sex.
As to your question “Are we to believe that God rewarded Mary’s faithfulness with a curse?” I reply “Are we to believe that God rewarded Jesus’s faithfulness with a curse?”
And it isn’t quite honest to say Calvin didn’t believe in the perpetual virginity. He didn’t aspouse it, but that is different from saying he didn’t believe it. But be that as it may, both the Augsburg Confession and the Second Helvetic Confession contain statements of the perpetual virginity; as does Turretin, and even Wesley.
Josh,
Where’s the typological argument? I’m still waiting for some specific argument from Scripture that shows Mary’s perpetual virginity. You write as if there is one. What is it?
Does Rome consider an unconsummated marriage to be valid? Did the Jews?
To Mr. Petersen: Reformation era statements about the virginity of Mary need to be read in context. The Helvetic, for instance, only means that she stayed a virgin until after the birth of Jesus, as all believe. Beyond this, the fact that the early Reformers did not get everything correct is hardly a surprise, and no Protestant has ever thought they did. Their interpretations of the book of Revelation are pretty much all wrong, for instance — and they were leaning on Medieval tradition in their errors at this point (that a bad Pope was the antichrist). So, if some did not think it important to settle whether Joseph and Mary had children or not, so what?
Turretin, for instance, in his sad statement on this matter, is clearly arguing (as he virtually says) in favor of a nice idea. His discussion of Matthew 1:25 completely misses the action of the verb, and hence is useless. Moreover, his notion that Joseph or Mary thought of her womb as sanctified because it contained God is obviously impossible, as it was the whole point of my essay to prove. They had no idea that Jesus was God.
Moreover, just think about this argument: Because Mary’s womb was “sanctified” by containing God, therefore she should never have sex and never have any other children. Think about it. This is a TOTALLY PAGAN VIEW of holiness and sanctity. In terms of Biblical religion, there is no contradiction between holiness and sex and children. The High Priest married and had children!!
It is sad to see a good thinker like Turretin rehearsing this kind of pagan notion about holiness, but once again, that is why the Church is ever-reforming and ever-progressing.
As to your other question, Jesus’ faithfulness was “rewarded” (gifted) with enthronement. He took the curse as our savior and substitute. Mary is not our savior and substitute, and so to make the situation parallel is pretty blasphemous.
To Josh: I’ve read enough RC and EO materials over the years to be aware of some of the ways their typological Marian arguments work. The problem is that these arguments are props for something the Holy Spirit has completely contradicted in the Word. Internal Biblical typology and theology points to the fruitfulness of the marriage of Joseph and Mary. And, read without prejudice, so does the explicit statement of Matthew 1:25. The action of the verb is clear.
There is nothing about “endless virginity” in the rest of the Bible, or in the Apostolic Fathers or Justin Martyr or Irenaeus, etc. In fact, Irenaeus is the big-time typological theologian, and he does compare Mary with Eve, and says absolutely nothing about perpetual virginity.
It is quite clear that this notion arose later and has no foundation in the Bible and the immediate post-Biblical church.
Mr. Jordan,
“Because Mary’s womb was “sanctified” by containing God, therefore she should never have sex and never have any other children. Think about it. This is a TOTALLY PAGAN VIEW of holiness and sanctity.”
I have thought about and I’m having trouble seeing it. A totally pagan view would be to say she was holly, and thus should be a prostitute. I suppose you could be referring to the Vestal Virgins, but even then there is merely a conjunction. Am I to believe that the idea of a resurrecting god is a wholly Pagan view as the Atheists would have me believe?
Or do you mean that the idea that the king should not enter the holy of holies is a pagan notion? Or that Mary’s womb was not the Holy of Holies?
My point regarding the reformers is that you should simply say “yes, they all believed this, and our belief wasn’t believed anywhere in the Church till the rise of higher criticism; but nevertheless, the debunkers did get this much correct.”
I’m not sure I understand your comparison between Jesus and His Mother. Was she somehow exempt from the command to take up her cross?
1. The notion that sex and holiness are in conflict is pagan and grounded in taboo. Holiness is neither sexual nor anti-sexual in Biblical religion. Holiness is sex-neutral.
As I wrote, and you did not deal with, the most holy person in the Law was the High Priest, and he had sex with his wife. If you want to say that Mary was made holy by carrying Jesus — and that is completely wrong; holiness in the Biblical sense has nothing to do with it — then that fact does not imply or even hint that she would not have sex with Joseph after she was cleansed from uncleanness. And the Bible says that she did, so that settles it.
2. According to John 1, Jesus is the Holy of Holies (Word, Debir) made flesh, and his own body is the tabernacle. So, no, Mary’s womb is not the holy of holies nor is her body the tabernacle around it. That is a fantasy projected onto the text in contradiction to what the text actually states.
http://www.biblicalhorizons.com/biblical-horizons/no-73-and-the-holy-of-holies-became-flesh/
3. You need to learn a bit of church history if you think all the Reformers believed Joseph and Mary definitely did not have sex and children, and if you actually think that it was only with the rise of higher criticism that anyone thought otherwise. Matthew Poole, 1685, is agnostic on the matter. Matthew Henry (1706) is pretty sure Joseph obeyed Exodus 21:10, and Mary, as a righteous woman obedient to God, also obeyed it.
4. When we take up our cross we are not taking up the curse in the sense that Jesus did on the cross. I don’t think anyone in the history of the church, in any branch of it, has ever suggested such a thing.
Re: Josh
There’s smoke (incense) and mirrors (the laver) in the Tabernacle, but no games.
Re: Mary
Re Mary as a type of the church, surely Mary is only a type of the faithful OLD Covenant church, the final “barren woman” made fruitful. If anyone is a type of the New Covenant church it is the Mary who had seven demons. For me, at least, this gets things around the right way. Mary’s virginity after the birth of Christ is as unimportant as that of all her typological predecessors.
I have a post that might be of interest:
http://www.bullartistry.com.au/wp/2009/04/22/behold-your-mother/
Kind regards,
Mike
1) I didn’t say sex and holiness are linked. I said that in this particular case sex and holiness are linked, precisely because Mary’s womb is holy, and so for Joseph to enter it would be like Uzziah entering the Holy of Holies. Which brings us to the second point.
2) That is a fantasy projected onto the text in contradiction to what the text actually states. My goodness. I have been respectful from the get-go, and have not been antagonistic. This is unnecessary. Your opponents are perhaps wrong, but there is no need too belittle them.
But I’m having trouble understanding how Mary’s womb wouldn’t be the Holy of Holies–or the Arc of the Covenant. Yes, it is quite thre that Scripture says Jesus is the Temple, but at the same time, Jesus is not the place of the presence of God, He is the presence of God. The manna and the rod which budded and the tablets are not inside Jesus’s flesh, they are Jesus, the flesh and blood man. But they were inside Mary’s womb. By the presence of Jesus, who is God, Mary’s womb was sanctified, for sanctity precisely is being in God’s presence. As the blood of God which washes sins was Mary’s blood. Etc.
3) Ok, fine. Say “it was a distinctly minority position till the debunkers came along. So distinctly minority Wesley could tell a Catholic it was a point of agreement between Protestants and Catholics. But the debunkers got this right.” Don’t try and manufacture evidence that isn’t there.
4) When we take up our cross we are not taking up the curse in the sense that Jesus did on the cross. I don’t think anyone in the history of the church, in any branch of it, has ever suggested such a thing.
Well, neither did I. I said that you don’t reward someone by dividing their portion between God and another. You replied that marriage is a good thing–thus seemingly saying that we should expect our palpable blessings now, rather than in the resurrection. I pointed out that that wasn’t true of Christ. You seemed to deny that we should bear in our body the death of Christ, so I pointed out that we too are to bear the death of Christ. I never said anything about the vicarious suffering of Christ. I said our reward is resurrection reward, and now we are called to make Christ our only portion.
I could respect your position if you said “while it is true that God would have blessed her more if he had made Jesus her only portion, he did not, and he divided her portion between Jesus and Joseph.”
But as it stands, I have trouble seeing how you aren’t denying Christ Alone. Christ alone is our portion, even in the land of the living, and anything which divides us, that spreads us out thin from him, is not a blessing.
But a couple other points to consider:
1) Mary isn’t a baren woman, she is a virgin. A virgin bride.
2) Mary is, like the New Church, at the foot of the Cross.
3) Mary was the first to receive Pentecost.
4) God is the Fruit of Mary. That’s something not even any of us can say. (Don’t object to saying God is the Fruit of Mary. It’s practically a translation of theotokos. And it is quite Scriptural. Elizabeth says it.)
Matthew
I appreciate your comments, but to my mind it seems you concentrate on only certain facets of Mary as a type (the ones which might lend support to an unbiblical exaltation) and ignore others.
Yes, Mary was a virgin, but she is linked to those barren women by having a miraculous birth. Her faithfulness parallels that of Hannah, making a new beginning possible.
Mary, at the foot of the cross, is the old church bowing to a new beginning, bowing to a death and resurrection, unlike Rome when called to repent by holy men of God (a long post on this here: http://www.bullartistry.com.au/wp/2009/11/18/schism-or-resurrection ) She was not the new church, hence my reference to her being put in the care of John.
“Mary was the first to receive Pentecost.” Not sure what you mean by this but I’ve never heard that before! Her reception of the Spirit, besides the conception, was not like Pentecost because the Spirit enabled her as an individual, like David, like John. Pentecost is a plural filling, a plural anointing. It is the Lampstand, not the Ark. It is lights (Day 4), not light (Day 1). Mary’s anointing was a Day 1. Hope this makes sense. It is a pattern found throughout the OT.
The Son of God was the fruit of Mary in His incarnation but I don’t think we can hijack Elizabeth’s words to support an unbiblical exaltation of this faithful woman. Mary was good soil. She was a fruitful Land, and Jesus was a good crop, a tree of life instead of a ground-crawling thorn. And then, He substituted himself for the bad crop of Israel as a thorny tree. You need to get your fruit theology sorted out. To use Leithart’s term, this idea of fruit is lot “rounder” than the single facet used to support adoration of Mary. Mary was an Eve who finally DIDN’T give birth to a Cain, a son of man Who opened the womb but didn’t require a substitutionary payment of animal’s blood or cold hard cash.
But Mister Petersen, why should I accept any of this? The text of the Bible quite clearly states that Joseph was not sleeping with her sexually UNTIL after she was cleansed. There’s no question what that means.
Look, if the Spirit had wanted to tell us that Joseph never slept with Mary sexually, he only needed to say something like, “And after her purification, Joseph kept her a virgin all her days.”
Or, “And Joseph never slept with her.”
Or, “And Joseph did not sleep with her before her purification was finished, nor did he sleep with her thereafter.”
But that’s not what the Spirit says. Not at all.
To the womb as Most Holy: You have not dealt with the text of John 1. Moreover, the tomb of Jesus “in which no one had been laid” is a virgin tomb and from it Jesus was born “from adamah, from the earth” as a virgin birth, as a new Adam. He led Nicodemus to see this, and that’s why Nick is at the tomb. Adam must be born again. So, are you going to tell me that Jesus’ tomb is some super-holy site that no one may enter? Because if you do, I’ll point out that first Peter and then John entered it.
Beyond this, you are still projecting onto Joseph and Mary information that they did not have. They had no idea that Jesus was Yahweh incarnate. They had no idea that what had been in Mary’s womb (and was now GONE!!) had been God Himself. This is really bad theology. I’m sorry you are unhappy with my calling it fantasy, but that is in fact what it is.
To your later points:
1. Hannah was not kept intact after God miraculously opened her womb. Elkanah was not superstitious about entering her body thereafter, and she had other children. Nor, in my opinion, was Abraham or Isaac superstitious about entering their wives after God miraculously opened their wombs. We know that Jacob had no such superstitions, because Rachel bore Benjamin after Joseph.
Yes, it’s true that after Yahweh struck Jacob on the socket of the thigh, Israelites considered that muscle too holy to be eaten. But there is no such equivalent notion as regards Yahweh’s miraculously opening a woman’s womb. And surely you see that the virgin birth is in a typological line with the closed wombs of the patriarchs and of the three permanent nazirites in the Bible. I reiterate: Jacob did not stay away from Rachel, and Elkanah did not stay away from Hannah. Nor did Joseph stay away from Mary. And she would not have wanted him to!
2. You’re in trouble here, since Mary Magdelene is the new Eve in the Garden, not Mary wife of Joseph. Moreover, the centurion and John were at the “foot of the cross” (an expression I’m not recalling from Biblical theology, though I may be wrong). Don’t confuse the sequence Stabat Mater, fine though most of it is, with the Biblical presentations.
3. Where did you get the notion that Mary was the first to receive Pentecost? It appears to me to have been the centurion.
4. God is not the “fruit” of Mary. Jesus is. The God-man. I totally affirm “God-bearer” (theotokos), but not what you write; not without clarification.
And Elizabeth said nothing of the sort. “My Lord” means Messiah, son of David. That’s all she knew or could have known at that point in history.
Hmmm. I suppose someone might think that the overshadowing of Mary by the Spirit is the “first pentecost,” but that would be bad theology. The fullness of pentecost happens when the Spirit is sent from heaven from the glorified HUMANITY of the God-man, Jesus the Messiah. That is why baptisms prior to this event are not the same baptisms, and people baptized by John are baptized anew after pentecost.
And I’ll add a question: If Mary knew Jesus was God, why did she show up at the tomb to embalm him and bury him for good? Evidently she did NOT have the faith of resurrection that Abraham had in Genesis 22:5 (“WE will return”). Moreover, why was she terrified and afraid? Whe did she initially fail to bear witness? These actions, recorded in Mark 16:1-8, do not indicate a lively faith at this point.
Did you think my most recent post was addressed to you? It was a reply to Mike Bull, giving him points to consider regarding whether the Theotokos was “only a type of the faithful OLD Covenant church.” I suppose one could come up with more, and if I wanted to I could actually argue that the catholic tradition of the Church, that Mary is a type of the Christian Church is in fact correct. But it was only offered to him as points to consider. I’d appreciate responses in a similar spirit.
Regarding your questions at the end: I imagine that for Mary and for everyone else at that time, they were in the state Jesus was in when he said “my God my God why have you forsaken me.” Death is final. Everyone knows that. Everything had been lost. “Abraham did not in fact kill Isaac, yet now he is dead.” I can’t imagine that they could have had a sanguine expectation of a resurrection any more than Jesus on the Cross would have. And they were doing precisely what they ought to have, showing respect for Jesus. Moreover, precisely in this, they were remaining loyal to Jesus. How else should they have behaved? (It seems that if they were heartbroken and confused, but yet loyal to Jesus, possesing hope, but hope covered and submerged beneath the waters of death, they would have behaved precisely as they did. For the fact that they went to the tomb to anoint Jesus to be a point against them, we must assume that they should have had a sanguine hope of the resurrection.)
I am also curious why anointing Jesus for his burial before hsi burial is good, but afterwards is bad.
But, as the point in dispute is precisely whether Mary the Mother of James is the Theotokos, it is not good to presume she is.
Though, if it were a debate about whether Mary were sineless (which it is not) and if we had already agreed that Mary the mother of James was Mary the mother of Jesus (which we have not) the point about her not telling any man would be a point. Not, perhaps, a conclusive one, but a point.
I am not catching your point regarding the distinction between Jesus and God. I am not adoptionist, nor am I saying that Mary exists before all ages. That should go without saying. With that qualification, if you will call it such, God is the fruit of Mary. The Word which was with God in the beginning has become the fruit of Mary.
Matthew: Jordan was responding to the arguments in your comments. It’s his right to do so. He wrote the original post. Goodness. And you have not even begun to address his arguments.
Yes, he surely has a right to respond to them. I wasn’t sure whether he thought they were references to my discussion with him, or to the post I commented on.
And I was frustrated that my points were treated as arguments, rather than points for consideration. And they were particularly difficult to respond to because they weren’t directed to any arguments I even remotely had in mind.
I surely haven’t ignored his points: I tried at first to make a quite limited comment, and all my comments have been limited in scope. I’m not angling for a whole scale rebuttle of his position. I think some of his arguments are problematic.
Yes, I agree Mary is in the line of the Old Testemant women. And Jesus is in the line of Old Testemant men. The New is in continuity with the Old. My point isn’t that Mary should be exalted, or anything like that, but merely that she doesn’t belong to the Old Covenant, but the New–at least after the Annunciation. In that line, I think the change from barenness to virginity is significant. But also, she doesn’t belong to Moses and the veil and the shadow; but to Christ, and the unveiling, and the Reality. What she works is not slavery, but Life. She is the (or a) new Eve.
(I’m having trouble finding your reference to Mary as in the care of John.)
If we wanted to talk about what sort of veneration she should have, we’d have to have a different discussion entirely. And I’m not sure exactly how much we’d disagree.
Mr. Peterson,
1. I’ll have to second Jeff Meyers here. This blog is an open discussion and anyone can answer anyone else.
2. As to the spirit of the discussion, well, you come here and make assertions about the “catholic tradition of the church” and wildly inaccurate statements about the Reformers and post-Reformation theologians. So, don’t be upset if replies are equally assertive.
3. You have not, in fact, addressed anything I wrote in the original essay.
4. “Mary is a type of the Christian church.” In fact, however often this is asserted, it is rather questionable. Mike Bull is quite correct: She is more a type of the Old Creation church. There is nothing about her in the Bible after Pentecost. One might make a case that when Jesus gives her over to John, He is shifting her position into the New Creation by anticipation. But what does this mean, exactly? On the face of it, it appears to mean no more than that John should take care of Mary.
5. Are you trying to say that Jesus on the cross had no expection of resurrection? That is flatly contradicted by Hebrews 12:2. Consider more generally John 10:17-18.
6. You say “death is final. Everyone knows that.” I certainly don’t, and neither does anyone in the Bible history. A seed of grain falls into the ground IN ORDER THAT it might rise again and bear fruit. Death is NEVER final in the Biblical history. In Biblical theology, death is the necessary transformative dissolution that leads to a new creation. This has been clear every since the building of Eve from Adam’s side by ripping him apart while he was in death-sleep.
I can certainly agree that Mary and the disciples went through a sense of abandonment and dark-night when Jesus died. But unlike Job, and unlike Jesus, they seem to have despaired. As I pointed out, that’s clear from Mark 16, and also as regards the disciples, Luke 24:21, 25. None of them, including Mary, went through WITH Jesus, because they did not hold out for the joy set before Him, as He did.
7. And no, Mary believed Jesus was dead and gone, and came to finish the job by enbalming Him. She was also fearful when learning that He had risen. I pointed this out earlier, and you once again completely fail to deal with the text of the Word of God.
8. You write: “I am also curious why anointing Jesus for his burial before his burial is good, but afterwards is bad.” That’s a good question, and I should say that the answer is that Nicodemus’s spices were with a view to resurrection. Jesus had clearly taught Nicodemus about His coming resurrection, and one need only consider the book of Esther to see the positive and anticipatory aspect of this initial anointing. The reason I don’t think that Mary’s coming to do more on Sunday is (a) because it had already been done, so something more was involved, and (b) she had no anticipation of the resurrection and instead of being joyful was terrified. In this, of course, she was no different from anyone else; but to try to make this reaction out to be one of BELIEF is something that beggars the imagination.
9. You write, “But, as the point in dispute is precisely whether Mary the Mother of James is the Theotokos, it is not good to presume she is.” Well, whoever has ever suggested this? It as as mother of Jesus that she is Theotokos. It is as wife of Joseph that she is mother of James, and not M(cap)other of James. She stopped being Theotokos the moment Jesus was born!
10. I’m happy with your clarified statement about God being the fruit of Mary. As far as it goes. It’s the Word of God, the second person, who becomes the fruit of Mary.
11. Look Mr. Petersen, I’m happy to keep this up, but I’m not interested in “traditions” that the Holy Spirit long ago discarded. The authentic Bible-believing Church, led by the Spirit, long ago gave up this stuff, just as she gave up iconic adulations, and she returned to the beliefs of the Apostolic and post-Apostolic church. The churches that cling to this stuff are not One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic. They are not One or Catholic because they reject the holy baptisms of and deny holy communion to other Christians. They are not Holy because they wink at all kinds of sins that Protestants do not tolerate. They are not Apostolic because their Marian doctrines contradict the clear writings of the Apostles, and their iconic practices contradict the Second Word of the Torah.
So, I invite you to deal with the text.
Amazing, I did not know about this topic up to the present. Thanx.
First, you aren’t dealing honestly with me if you refuse to post my comments that deal with issues I you continue to raise after I posted the comments. Post my comments, or at least don’t pretend I’m not dealing with the issues you raise.
1) I already addressed this. For you to suppress my comment, and then bring the issue back up is simply dishonest.
2) They are however, true statements. If you want to go against the tradition, that’s fine, but at least show some respect to it.
3) Nor have I claimed to. I addressed this already. It’s fine if you don’t post my comments, but don’t suppress them, and then pretend like they don’t exist.
4) Josh’s comment is telling here. Are there no typological arguments you can interact with? “The fact that the rivers flowed from the garden is interesting. But what does this mean, exactly? On the face of it, it appears to mean no more than that four rivers flowed from the garden.” Don’t treat the Orthodox and Catholics as you would not have the Evangelicals treat you.
5) I said nothing of the sort. If you want to interact with me, you’ll have to actually read what I write.
6) Yes, we know intellectually that death is not final. But that doesn’t mean we really know it. It would take nearly superhuman powers to have a sanguine hope of imminent resurrection. (Note the adjective.) But if you’d understood my point on (5) maybe this would make more sense.
7) This is a completely pagan understanding of burial practices. It is nothing but a fantasy you are imposing on the text in spite of its obvious meaning.
8) I already conceded that not telling them would be a point in your favor were we arguing whether she ever sinned. What more do you want?
9) You know exactly what I mean. Stop quibbling. It just engenders strife.
10) Then by the same argument you are not part of the Church since you do not accept as Christian the Catholics and Orthodox.
And also, the OPC is not an authentic Church, nor the LCMS, or the WELS, etc. I mean, if we keep this up, we’ll end up with only the CREC as authentic Church, though not even that, because some recite the Heidelburg catechism during worship, thus excluding those Christians who disagree with it. Which is simply ridiculous. Yes, there are problems in the Catholic and Orthodox Churches. There are also problems in the PCA, the OPC, the LCMS, the CREC, the the Evangelical Free denomination, the Nazarenes, etc. “As many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ.” And again, the Orthodox and Catholics are baptized in the Holy Spirit. Stop doubting their baptisms.
I have interacted with Scripture.
Or maybe you missed my earlier comments and I should just say: please post my earlier comments that deal with those concerns.
Relax, Matthew. This aint my full time job. I approve the comments when I’m notified by WP (which is pretty flakey). I’ve been out of town all weekend and didn’t see your last couple of comments.
Oh…so it was a different person approving comments than making them. That makes sense. You can delete the last two comments if you’d like. I should have been more willing to assume something was wrong that to take offense. Sorry about that.
Mr. Petersen,
Let’s try to tone this down a bit, shall we? I’m happy to accept that you only intended to make a few points and not deal with the arguments I set forth. I also understand that you were frustrated that your posts did not appear in a timely manner. I can say that your briefly expressed points certainly appeared to be arguments to me, but if you now wish to add nuance to them, feel free to do so. But understand that I’ll be away for a few days and may not answer you in a timely fashion.
You, however, should know that I attended Roman mass and stations not infrequently in the 1950s, though I of course did not commune. This was pre-Vatican II. I wrote a study guide for Schmemann’s For the Life of the World in 1983. So you see, at age 59, I’ve been around these issues for a long time. How and in what ways I respect Christians in other traditions is not something I’ve only recently come to consider.
What you speak of my “going against the tradition,” that’s all a matter of what tradition, is it not? Neither the Bible nor the early fathers knew anything about a supposed perpetual virginity of Mary. And the fact that it took a generation or two for this notion to be scoured out of Protestantism is not particularly surprising. True tradition of the Spirit is what the Bible says it is.
As regards typology and Josh’s comments, I tried to answer that above. I’ll try and be clearer here. Typology exists INSIDE the text of the Bible. When a system of typology is erected that is in contradiction to the Bible, that system is wrong. Wrong in the same way that the systematic theology of Jehovah’s Witnesses is wrong. There is plenty of typology that moves toward the virgin conception and virgin birth of Jesus. It comes from inside the Bible, however, and all of it points to Mary’s moving into a normal marriage with Joseph and having children with him, AS THE TEXT EXPLICITLY STATES.
Now, as regards #5 if our conversation, I’ll have to ask you to explain yourself. You wrote this, and I quote, “I can’t imagine that they could have had a sanguine expectation of a resurrection any more than Jesus on the Cross would have.”
I replied, “5. Are you trying to say that Jesus on the cross had no expection of resurrection? That is flatly contradicted by Hebrews 12:2. Consider more generally John 10:17-18.”
Now you write, “5) I said nothing of the sort. If you want to interact with me, you’ll have to actually read what I write.”
I trust you can see that your prior statement appears for all the world as saying that Jesus had no expectation of resurrection while on the cross.
Continuing with the numbers, on #6 you write that “It would take nearly superhuman powers to have a sanguine hope of imminent resurrection.” But the point of Jesus mild rebuke in Luke 24 is that they should have had exactly that hope. It was not a lack of “superhuman powers” that was the problem. It was a blindness to clear revelation caused by the general malaise of sin — what the Law calls a “sin of inadvertency.”
I want to reiterate: My point in bring up Mary’s doubts is not to argue against Roman notions of her sinlessness. I’m not imputing that to you. My point is that they did not know that Jesus was God. Not until after the Resurrection. And if neither she nor Joseph knew that Jesus was God, they could not have thought of her womb as a Holy of Holies or anything else. And they would have had absolutely no reason not to live as normal man and wife. That was the whole point of my essay, and I really don’t think you have addressed it yet.
And that’s my point under #8. I’m not arguing whether Mary was a sinner or not, but whether she knew Jesus was God incarnate or not.
Now, as regards #9, you wrote: “But, as the point in dispute is precisely whether Mary the Mother of James is the Theotokos, it is not good to presume she is.” I don’t know what you intended your readers to take from this. I took it that you meant that if Mary was (had been) the God-bearer (theo-tokos) she could not have been the mother of James, since that would somehow make James divine. If you did not mean this, please say what you DID mean.
Mary as God-bearer (not “Mother of God,” which as you know is not what “theotokos” means) ceased to be God-bearer when Jesus was born. And if you want to go to typology, please consider that IF her womb had been a “holy of holies” environment — and I won’t argue that point right now — it CEASED to be such. When Yahweh vacated the Tabernacle and the Temple, these buildings ceased to be holy and were just pieces of wood and gold.
Now, IF (and I write IF) you are wanting to say, with many others, that there is some kind of holy “residue” that hangs around after God leaves, that is indeed a pagan view of holiness. Biblical holiness is not a mana-force that imbues created substances and makes them taboo.
So, I say again: If Mary’s womb was in some sense “holy” because God was in it, then (a) she had no idea that this was the case, and (b) it ceased to be “holy” when Jesus was born.
Finally, you write: “10) Then by the same argument you are not part of the Church since you do not accept as Christian the Catholics and Orthodox.”
Now there you are quite in error. With the Protestant Reformers I say that these are false churches IN THE SENSE THAT they “play false” with the gospel, not in the sense that they are not churches at all. With the Reformers I accept their baptisms and their ordinations, and have always argued that they are to be received at communion. I don’t doubt their baptisms at all. I am functionally a member of the One Catholic church. But they are NOT.
Sure, you can find Protestant sects that are equally uncatholic. You may know that as a “federal visionist” I’m at “war” with these sectarians. But so would have been Samuel Rutherford, Martin Bucer, and plenty of others.
I’m going to have to say this: While you can find uncatholic sects in Protestant lands, you find nothing but uncatholic practices in so-called Orthodoxy and so-called Catholicism. These churches are NEVER catholic in their practices.
Let me say in closing that if you wish to continue the discussion of the theses of my essay, please take up the text of Matthew and also the question of whether Mary and Joseph could possibly have thought Jesus was God and acted accordingly. Otherwise I see no point in continuing this, and wish you well.
JBJordan
So quickly,
I was confused because I thought you were the one who approved comments. And because another comment got in ahead of mine. So it seemed that I was addressing issues, my posts weren’t posted, and then you were acting as if I hadn’t addressed the issues. Anyway, I understand now, and am not upset, (and have apologized) but it is perhaps more understandable than they just weren’t published real quickly.
Here’s a couple of confusions that maybe could be straightened out. I’m not bothered that you’re going against tradition, it just seemed you weren’t playing quite fair about the Reformers. In the original post it sounded (at least to me) like the Reformers were indifferent to it, or like they thought there were more important matters to be addressed. And that’s not accurate. Something like you have here “And the fact that it took a generation or two for this notion to be scoured out of Protestantism is not particularly surprising.” would have been much preferable.
The one time I did mention tradition was with reference to Mary being a type of the New Covenant Church. It seems that there the burden of proof should be on those who wish to show she isn’t a type of the Church. That idea comes from the Apostolic Fathers (if not from St. Paul in I Corinthians and I Timothy and St. John), and is something held by those who have much Mariology at all. And there is at least the prima facie argument that she is New Covenant that she works not the Old Law, but the New. The New Law precisely is her work.
My apologies for not being clearer or gentler regarding their hope. The key word was sanguine. I think it’s pretty obvious that Christ did not have a sanguine hope of the resurrection, at least while he was on the Cross. I dont’ know we could say he was sanguine at all.
I’m not sure we can say that Jesus’ rebuke applies to all the disciples. Surely John believed when he first entered the tomb. I’m not sure we have to believe that Mary Magdalene and the others didn’t believe, at least after the initial terror. The text doesn’t say they did, but then neither does it say they didn’t. It doesn’t say either way.
I think you have a point regarding their knowledge, so I haven’t disputed the point.
I meant that the dispute at hand is whether, as most modern Protestants believe, the mother of James and the mother of Jesus are the same person; or whether as Jerome asserts, they are not. And therefore it is circular to appeal to passages about the mother of James as if they were in reference to the mother of Jesus. I picked up from my Orthodox friends the habit of calling Mary the Theotokos.
Sorry I was a bit too feisty regarding the position of the Catholics at the end of my last post. I was bothered by the word “authentic” in “The authentic Bible-believing Church, led by the Spirit, long ago gave up this stuff…” and what followed. The Orthodox and Catholics may be mistaken, but if we say that the only “authentic” Churches are the ones that do not tolerate sin, and that are truly open to all Christians etc. we will end up defining away all Christians. They aren’t authentically the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, but they are a part of Her.
My biggest concerns regarding the Perpetual Virginity are as follows: We need to be strictly Christ-centered, and when we say of Mary that she was blessed with fruitfulness, and therefore she must have had more children; we essentially state that the infinite fruitfulness in her first Child is not sufficient. And second, if we revere Mary as having more children, and particularly as being blessed with more children, we rever her for not being exclusively devoted to her Son, and thus, through our “worship” (for lack of a better word) state that we should not make Christ our only part.
There also may be a rhyme between Christ as only child of His mother and of His Father, see for instance J. Pelican’s essay in Mary the Mother of God (Jenson’s and Yeago’s articles are also excellent).
Particularly since the real reason mariolotry (or some sort, not necessarily like the Catholics or Orthodox have) is that she is an icon 1) of the Incarnation of Christ and 2) of the relation between man and Christ. (Thus by venerating Mary for her nearness to Christ, as the Orthodox do, we venerate Christ; and we also see the sheer nonsense inherent in statements about the inability of Spirit-filled creation to effect anything. The Mother of God effected much–even, in a sense, your salvation.) But if in our liturgical statement of how we relate to Christ we state we should relate not only to Christ but to others, we make a particularly damaging statement about the all-sufficiency of Christ.
I understand the argument “but if Scripture says otherwise, we should believe otherwise, even if it were evil.” I’m not exactly arguing for the position, so much as showing why it seems to be a good position, or a desirable one. There are typologies (like the famous passage from Ezekiel) but also others, that seem to suggest that Mary was ever-virgin, and for a very long period in Church history it was not at all obvious that Scripture said Mary had other children. And it seems one of our data points in interpretation should be “but other ages with whom it isn’t quite possible to have dialogue understood this differently.” That should weaken our confidence in our own interpretation and make us wonder if we make it because of our own cultural assumptions.
Some nebulous thoughts.
Mary is very clearly Old Covenant. She is a type of the woman with 12 stars (sons) as a crown, a fruitful tree in the garden. But Mary is only part of the picture. She typifies one facet of first century Judah and only one. There is also the cursed tree with only leaves and no fruit.
The Old Covenant people is typified by other women, too. What about Herodias, who, like Athaliah, like Jezebel, formed false alliances and executed the faithful?
The Temple was still a Holy Place until the crucifixion, or even until Pentecost. At Pentecost, the glory moved from ‘Saul’ to ‘David’, from Jesus’ mother Mary to Mary freed from seven demons, filled with a new Spirit.
Then the Holy of Holies womb deliberately became a tomb. It refused to partake of Jesus’ death and denied His resurrection. But it was a womb opened by Christ for the very purpose of having more children. With Israel being divided in two by the creative Word, the unfaithful became a separate woman, a harlot who rejected the head and then rejected the body as if they were unclean things. Like Athaliah, she wanted nothing to do with Covenant succession and would wipe out this new Messianic line. She was holding onto it tooth and claw. In rebellion, she even gave birth to an army of false brothers, Judaisers (unholy Nazirites), as contenders for the throne. Then, get this, to end her harlotry, God actually “commanded” her to be truly fruitful one last time. Because she had become a new Egypt, He called His children to “come out of her” so they might avoid her plagues. She died in childbirth and there was no resurrection.
The point being, the womb is opened miraculously for the very purpose of having more kids, raising an army. Even the ‘harlot’ side of Israel bore children as a synagogue for Satan. Eternal virginity has Onan and Ichabod written all over it, just like Rome.
God wants Covenant heirs to take dominion. Why wouldn’t Joseph and Mary’s life typify this, like every other marriage in Israel?
Matthew writes: “There are typologies (like the famous passage from Ezekiel) but also others, that seem to suggest that Mary was ever-virgin. . .”
This keeps coming up. But I have yet to see anything more than “suggestions” about typologies that support Mary’s perpetual virginity. Flesh them out. Connect the dots. How does this passage from Ezekiel “seem to suggest that Mary was ever-virgin”? What in the text suggests such a thing? Let me see the biblical theological argument.
Where are all of these suggestive typologies? Types that are fulfilled in Mary as the mother of the Savior have been brought forth. But where are the OT types that support a story line that has her never having sex or children after the birth of the Messiah? Show me the Old and New Testament texts. Where are they?
Mr. Petersen,
Thank you for your two latest postings. A couple of comments:
1. “In the original post it sounded (at least to me) like the Reformers were indifferent to it, or like they thought there were more important matters to be addressed. And that’s not accurate.” — Well, I think it is accurate. I don’t see anyone making a strong case for it, only saying that it is a possibility and they (some) favor it.
2. I see you meant that Jesus had a cheerful hope (I take it that’s how you’re using “sanguine”) of resurrection while on the cross. Well, I don’t know that hope, in the strong sense, is ever cheerful (sanguine). Hope if what you have when you are going through tough times. Hope is through tears. Job had hope. The text is clear, however, that Jesus did know of his coming resurrection, and I think it’s also clear that Mary and the disciples did not.
It’s a good question WHY they were blind to this, and I think the reason is that the Spirit had not yet come in such a way as to bring them to a full knowledge of it. That is, the Spirit as he begins to proceed from the resurrected Jesus is needed, so Jesus needs to appear to them.
3. “My biggest concerns regarding the Perpetual Virginity are as follows: We need to be strictly Christ-centered, and when we say of Mary that she was blessed with fruitfulness, and therefore she must have had more children; we essentially state that the infinite fruitfulness in her first Child is not sufficient. And second, if we revere Mary as having more children, and particularly as being blessed with more children, we revere her for not being exclusively devoted to her Son, and thus, through our “worship” (for lack of a better word) state that we should not make Christ our only part.”
Reply: 1) Why should we “revere” Mary at all? There’s no hint of it in the NT text or in the early Fathers. And why should Mary be exclusively devoted to Jesus? 2) I agree: It’s not necessary to believe she had more children. It’s only that the text, read simply, states that she did. Hence, given that this is a fact, we reflect upon it and its parallel with Hannah — a parallel that is super-explicit in the text.
I’ll have to close with this. If I read in the Bible that Jesse was not having knowledge with his wife until she had completed her rites of uncleanness, I think I’d know exactly what that meant, and it would never occur to me to make it mean Jesse never slept with her again! If I read that the mother and brothers and sisters of David came to visit him, it would never occur to me that this means “cousins.” If I read about James, David’s brother, it would never occur to me that this means “cousin.” The ONLY, and I stress ONLY reason that these passages are twisted out of their obvious meaning is because of a preconceived and wholly baseless belief in the perpetual virginity of Mary.
If these are “cousins,” why does the Spirit not write “suggenes”? That’s the word for “cousin.” It was completely available to the Spirit. The Spirit says “brother,” and that’s what He means.
Look, I don’t want to make you upset, but what Turretin and Calvin do on this matter is about as twisted as what the Jehovah’s Witnesses do with “the Word was God.” Find an extremely unlikely way to get around the text, and do it over and over in varying places until you get the text to say what you want it to say.
Gotta go. Write back if and when you want.
I think Schmemann has written things on this, there’s stuff in Theology of the Body, and it wouldn’t surprise me if Redemptoris Mater contains some. But here’s a link to Aquinas. I don’t know if Jenson has written on the perpetual virginity, but I think J. Pelikan has.
Mary is very clearly Old Covenant.
But she is the greatest of all prophets priests and kings who have preceeded her, or come after her, save only her Son. She is a prophet because she speaks not only a partial word of God, but the Word of God in Person; and is the presence of God for the Word of God. She is the priest because she is the attendent in the house of YHVH made flesh. She is the king because she is the Lord not only of Israel, but of the Son of David. All our prophesies and priestings and lordships are merely shadows of that which shall find their full realization on the New Earth. But hers, in a particular way, exceeded even ours, Christ still needed glorified, but her Son was God. This isn’t an Old Covenant activity.
Well, St. Paul says that virginity is better than marriage. If we’re on the topic of hiding from the plain meaning of Scripture… But I’m still having trouble seeing how you can say she needed to be more fruitful. In bearing her Son she has bourn the Lord of Hosts, and thus has born all Israel. She can’t become more fruitful. Now, I’ll grant she didn’t realize this, but it isn’t like those who claim she did not have more children claim she is only sorta fruitful. And in fact, it seems to me, that if we claim more is added by further children, we diminish the One Child.
Where’s the biblical theological argument from typology? Not there. I’m familiar with these works. Aquinas’s arguments are particularly bad and have nothing to do with biblical typology.
9_9. (That’s an emoticon for rolling eyes.)
Ok, here’s an easy one: Mary is the archtypical prophet, priest and king. As the one who speaks Christ to Israel, as the container of the untainable, as the one who ministers in the house of Jesus, she should be wholly devoted to Jesus. To have her minister to other children would be like ministering in the temple, and in pagan temples. Or again, she is therefore the whole company of the saints; and thus the prophesies about Israel mourning over Jesus as over an only Son have their concrete realization in the Theotokos at the Cross.
At the very least, you should admit that if she was the mother of other children, this is a dimmunition of her glory. That’s easy to show. Just read the Akathist hymn.
“Well, I think it is accurate. I don’t see anyone making a strong case for it, only saying that it is a possibility and they (some) favor it.”
Well, but Luther and Zwingli, while objecting to prayers to the saints, intentionally retained a good deal of Marian piety. Turretin says Helvatius (or whatever his name was) was rightly condemned. And even by the 1700’s, Wesley said it was a point of agreement between Protestants and Catholics. It isn’t something that Luther and Zwingli just didn’t turn their attention toward, and it isn’t something that died out quickly. It seems it was either pietism or higher criticism that did away with it.
“The text is clear, however, that Jesus did know of his coming resurrection, and I think it’s also clear that Mary and the disciples did not.”
But see I’m not seeing that. I doubt it would have been an articulable knowledge. But that’s different from not having any hope.
“And why should Mary be exclusively devoted to Jesus?”
Did you really ask that???
You are rolling your eyes at my asking for specific examples of biblical theological arguments? And then you provide THIS? Look, I’m trying hard to be nice here, Matthew. But there are no dots to connect here.
Where is the BIBLICAL typology here, Matthew? Nothing that you have said here has anything bearing on her perpetual virginity. You made some assertions but provided no biblical rationale for her perpetual virginity. None.
I will NOT admit that her being the mother of other children would take away from her glory. Why should I? Where do you get that idea from the Bible? Where’s your biblical typological arguments for that? I don’t see any. I just see a lot of authentic theological gibberish, as Mel Brooks would say. The “archtypical [sic] prophet, priest, and king”? What in the world does that mean?
I don’t think you mean you haven’t seen any. You have seen several. You just don’t think highly of them. But you were merely demanding some. I linked to some, and you objected “well that’s just trash.” I would have rolled my eyes at you if I were in person. Or glared at you, or some such. I gave you what you asked for. I did provide biblical theological arguments. You may not like them, but I provided them. Posturing that I haven’t is just rude and obnoxious.
Do you have any intention of hearing your opposition at all?
A longer, fuller argument could perhaps be produced, but you can’t seriously expect it to show up in a com-box?
:S
I’ll say it again, Matthew. You have not provided a biblical TYPOLOGICAL rational for the PERPETUAL virginity of Mary. You’ve given us some theological gibberish about her as prophet, priest, and king – something the Bible never talks about. You made theological statements about venerating her and honoring her, etc. You have asserted that her having children would denigrate her glory, which is entirely extra-biblical. But what you have NOT done is given us a biblical rational based on typology for her NOT conceiving and bearing any children after Jesus.
The link to Aquinas does not contain an argument based on biblical typology.
Once again: where are the OT types that support a story line that has her never having sex or children after the birth of the Messiah? Show me the Old and New Testament texts. Where are they?
“Blessed are the peacemakers.” Please. I repeatedly try and give gentle responses. When I don’t I apologize. I try and gently tell you you’re not treating me well, which just brings about a ratcheting up of your rhetoric. Back down a little! For Christ’s sake! I enjoy respectful discussions, I despise being bludgeoned over the head. And you and yours are really hurting me. I have been showed little to no respect, I have consistently worked to give polite wrapping up comments, and have consistently received inflammatory replies. That your (pl) tone could be offensive has been pointed out to you several times, and not only by me. I have not received an apology, but only baiting into more argument and more attacks. Did you want to just mock me when I linked to an argument? I really don’t want to have an argument about the perpetual virginity. I was baited into it. And all I offered at first was a link to arguments you could peruse. I then came up with a couple of arguments off the top of my head. If you want them filled in better, rather than insulting me, you could read what I have said elsewhere in this discussion, or you could read this article. But please. Enough with the attacks!
My rhetoric is really not inflammatory. I’m just being direct and asking pointed questions. There’s no disrespect in my last post. I’m only pointing to the absence of any genuine biblical typology for Mary’s perpetual virginity. That still stands. Maybe you don’t want to argue for that. If so, just say so. I’ll stop.
No one has made any comments about my “tone.” Did I miss a comment? I’ve not mocked you. I’ve not insulted you. I’m simply trying to keep the argument on track. Jordan’s post is about the myth of the perpetual virginity of Mary. It’s not about the proper honor due to her, which we all acknowledge.
If you are not interested in defending the perpetual virginity of Mary, just say so. No problem at all. But you have in fact made statements defending that myth, and so I was pressing you to make the case with biblical typology.
Mr. Petersen,
Uh, everyone is to be “exclusively devoted to Jesus.” In the sense that He is first and must come before all others. It does not diminish my devotion to Jesus to be also devoted to my wife, my children, friends, job, etc. In fact, that’s what Jesus wants for me. Your bizarre assertion means Mary had no devotion to Joseph or to any other human being. This is gnosticism, not Christianity. It denies the fact that God is both all glorious yet we can also glorify Him. It means that devotion to God excludes devotion to all else. You are denying that Joseph and Jesus’ brother and sisters were living and moving and having their being in God, and therefore Mary’s devotion to them WAS devotion to God and to Jesus.
As for Jesus’ active expectation of His own resurrection and glory while suffering on the cross, you may not see this but the author of Hebrews clearly did, as I showed you.
So far you have not dealt with any of the texts that prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Mary and Joseph had sex and other children. Luther, etc., were just wrong about that. Big deal. They were also all pretty much completely wrong about the book of Revelation, and they wrote those errors into their confessional statements. At least they did not put their Marian notions into their confessions.
Deal with the text. Explain to me why, if James was Jesus’ cousin, the Spirit calls him His brother and NOT his cousin.
Paul only says that not marrying is better for the present distress, which in context means the Apostolic age and the time of tribulation. Moreover, even if this somehow means the incredible notion that in the New Covenant age virginity is preferable, Mary did not live with Joseph in the New Covenant age. She lived in the Old Covenant age, when marriage and children were blessings.
Lose the gnosticism, friend. Time and history are real. Mary did not give birth to Jesus in some idealistic New Covenant. He was born precisely as the last ADAM. She lived in the Old Covenant.
Meyers is right: You have so far provided no Biblical arguments that I can see. Consider: If Mary were the greatest prophet, priest, and king, as you assert (contrary to Jesus, by the way, who said John was the greatest prophet), then why does Mary disappear from the Bible after Acts 1? Why is she never mentioned, let alone consulted, by the post-Pentecostal church?
You may roll your eyes, but unless you are in your 50s, that is not the way to deal with men who are twice your age and who are ordained by the Holy Spirit as elders in the Church. We’re happy to have a discussion about what the Bible says with you or anyone else, but don’t complain that you’ve been mistreated. You have not been. You’ve been asked to back up your assertions, and thus far, you have not done so.
Deal with the text. We’re all ears.
I’ll add this: The comments in Calvin and Turretin show us that there were indeed people in their circles who believed that Mary had other children by Joseph. That’s why they thought they needed to try and defuse the issue. So, clearly there was no universality on this matter in Reformation and post-Reformation circles.
It’s very much like the paedocommunion issue. Calvin barks and scoffs at the notion, but he does so because a few men like Musculus and earlier the Hussites favored it. In fact, Calvin was wrong, and the church had been wrong for centuries before him.
So, please, no more nonsense about what Calvin said. The question is what the Bible says. You can line up 1000 Calvinist and Lutheran theologians who deny paedocommunion. You can say that this is the Tradition, and goes way back into the middle ages. And, every last one of them was completely wrong on this matter.
As regards perpetual virginity, you can only find a few Protestants who want to affirm it, and even they are not dogmatic about it. It’s in no Reformation confessions.
And just as the early church practised paedocommunion, so also the early church knew nothing about Mary’s perpetual virginity, her “typological place” as “mother of the church” or anything else like that.
So, I’m just standing with the early church. But more importantly, I want to stand with the Bible.
So, again, Biblical arguments, please.
Like I said before, it’s a historical point. Like I have repeatedly said, if you want to go against the tradition, that’s fine. But be honest with the history. As I have repeatedly said, that’s my only point about the history. Here’s Smacald, and here’s the Helvetic Confession. As you can see, Smacald says “holy [and always] Virgin Mary” (I can’t figure out what the brackets mean, my guess would be that it’s in the Latin, but not the German) and the Helvetic Confession says “But was most chastely conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the ever virgin Mary.” That’s two Reformation confessions. It wasn’t a just glossed aside as unimportant. They may have been wrong, but they were wrong. They didn’t just look to other battles.
And even by Wesley’s time it was, according to Wesley, a point of agreement between Protestants and Catholics. “A true Protestant may express his belief in these or the like words…I believe that He was…born of the blessed Virgin Mary, who, as well after as before she brought Him forth, continued a pure and unspotted virgin.” It isn’t something that a few Protestants here and there assented to. You can say they were wrong if you like, but be honest with the evidence.
So far you have not dealt with any of the texts that prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Mary and Joseph had sex and other children.
And as I have said repeatedly I have no intention to. I’m not even trying to address that, or prove you wrong or anything like that.
Other than that, you have not dealt with anything I have said, save to tell me it’s totally pagan, or absolutely worthless, or completely unfounded. Even when I provided (sketches–this is a blog!) of Biblical arguments, your only response has been to shout me down. While others may be persuaded–it’s all in Girard–I am not going to play a willing victim. You have not addressed my concerns, you have not begun to interact with what I have said, and the only response I have received is shouting and insults.
Yes, I rolled my eyes at you. I was being baited into a conflict I did not want, and I respectfully directed him to resources he could look at if he wanted. Rather than a polite response, I was yelled at. I don’t know how else to communicate “this is ridiculous. I respectfully gave you what you asked for, and rather than replying with kindness he replied with rudeness. Even pagans know better than to treat their guests like this. I feel like I’m visiting the Laestrygonians.
I probably shouldn’t have rolled my eyes like that. I was trying to communicate frustration, but given the difficulties of Internet conversation I probably should have realized it would be misunderstood. Sorry.
Regarding whether Mary is Old Covenant or New:
St. Paul talks about Mary in I Corinthians 11:11-12, and I Timothy 2:15.
You haven’t addressed my argument that she is the greatest prophet priest and king. She enters into the presence of God and determines the very person of God. She speaks the Word of God Himself into the world. And she is the presence of God before God Himself. These are prophetic roles, in their fullness. Other prophets speak God’s word; Mary, God’s Word. Other prophets determine the council of God; Mary, God’s person. If you want to see more flesh on this, read Jenson’s article I linked to above. Or buy the volume and read Yeago’s article (Google books doesn’t contain the whole article). (Just for the record, I disagree with Jenson regarding prayers to the saints.) They both present lengthy Scriptural arguments, that really don’t fit well in a com-box, save in outline (which is about all I have been able to provide).
You may have a point regarding Jesus’ comment about John the Baptist; but isn’t Christ saying that the baptized are greater than John? And if so, and if Mary is New Covenant, that argument doesn’t prove anything. But since the question is precisely whether she is Old or New, it’s circular to appeal to that passage.
I’m confused about your claim that I’m gnostic. I believe in One God the Father Almighty maker of heaven and earth and of all things visible and invisible. Jesus is the new Tabernacle, so Mary is the new Bezaleel the craftsman filled with the Spirit to build the Tabernacle. Would you say Bezaleel is not part of the Law, since he builds the temple? Similarly, Mary is part of the New Law.
Christ is the New Law, Mary is the one who ascends into New Sinai, the Holy Spirit, and brings forth the New Law. But just as Moses belongs to Moses, so Mary, the new Moses, belongs to Christ.
Jesus is the New Temple, and Mary is clothed with His Priestly garments, the Spirit, and as Aaron is a temple, so too, Mary is a temple. But she is a temple containing the True Manna, and the True Law, and the True Rod which Budded, therefore, she is the New Temple.
How can this be before Christ comes? It cannot be. Prior to the Annunciation none of this is true. Prior to the Annunciation, she is just a Jewish girl. But in the Annunciation the Spirit and the Son come upon her, and her flesh is no longer merely her flesh, but is Christ’s flesh. Her humanity is not mere humanity, but is part of Christ’s assumed humanity, and therefore, she, first of all, is in the New Covenant.
Matthew: if you think that direct, forceful questions are rude and insulting, if they “hurt” you, then you better avoid theological discussions altogether.
[…] Blessed Mary Ever-Virgin BMEV, or “Blessed Mary Ever-Virgin,” should not be an issue for any Protestant today, but clamor from various quarters means that we need once again to “get real” with the Biblical data here. Herewith is a reworking of a recent essay on the subject originally published in Biblical Horizons. […]
I don’t mean that you ARE a gnostic, but that you have gnostic elements in your thinking. As for Mary’s place in covenant history, I’ll direct you to the next essay in this series. Here I’ll just say that the New Covenant is in the resurrection of Jesus. Neither Mary nor Jesus were in the New Covenant before that time. And in whatever sense Mary’s body might have been a temple, it ceased to be one when Jesus left it — except in the sense that all of us are temples of God.
Quickly: Neither Smalcald nor Helvetic mean that Mary continued to be a virgin after her purification. They only mean that Mary remained a virgin until Jesus was born.
The 1 Cor passage is about Adam and Eve. The 1 Tim may allude to Jesus’ birth, but there’s no “theology of Mary” there.
But look: If all you were interested in doing by entering this conversation is to make historical points, you’ve made them and they’ve been answered. I’m sorry if you feel you’ve been drawn into a conflict. You did, in fact, make other statements about Mary along the way, and thereby invited responses. But there is no need to continue any longer.
Best wishes.
JBJordan
Thanks. Again, sorry I got frustrated. Internet communication is really hard, and I think we were missing each other. No, I really don’t want a conflict. I believe pretty strongly that Mary belongs to the New and not the Old, but I’ll leave it there. Other than that, I have some reservations concerning a denial of the perpetual virginity. Some questions are raised by Orthodox devotion, that are not answered by merely stating that Mary had other children. And I don’t think you have answered those questions. That doesn’t mean you are wrong that Mary had other children, only that your position needs more flesh.
In Charitate Christi,
Matt
James,
I think your argument goes wrong in the second paragraph, through a deconstruction presupposing ecclesial deism. I recommend Luigi Gambero’s Mary and the Fathers of the Church: The Blessed Virgin in Patristic Thought. It gives a more accurate presentation of how the early Church Fathers understood Mary and her virginity.
In the peace of Christ,
– Bryan
Not sure what “ecclesial deism” means. I suspect you mean that it does not diminish from Jesus’ glory for us to ask others to pray for us. I agree with that, of course. But of course, Mary cannot hear me ask her to do anything any more than a saint in China can hear my unaided voice. And there is no hint in the Bible that we should ask departed people for anything, and in fact much prohibition against it.
As for the reasons for Mary’s perpetual virginity: I stand by what I wrote. Read Jerome’s book. It all boils down to virginity is better than sex. Nobody comes out and says it, but that’s the bottom line.
Pax nobiscum.
jbj
A final remark about perpetual virginity and Mary’s other children. One argument made above was that if Mary had other children, her attention would be divided and less attention paid to Jesus. The point was made against this that such would be an argument against any of us having any relations with any other people.
A friend who wishes to remain anonymous writes to make this point: Since the text pretty much states that Joseph and Mary had regular relations after her purification, one might say that they enjoyed God’s gift of marriage but did not have children together. They enjoyed each other in bed, and devoted all their waking hours to Jesus.
The point is that any argument against Jesus’ having brothers and sisters is not in itself an argument in favor of the perpetual virginity of Mary.
James,
Regarding ecclesial deism, I have written about that. As for your assumption about formal sufficiency, that’s a presupposition you’re bringing to Scripture.
St. Jerome is not claiming that virginity per se is better than sexual intercourse. That would misrepresent what he says. He (in agreement with St. Paul in 1 Cor) teaches that consecrated virginity is a greater vocation than is sexual intercourse within marriage. Both vocations are sexual, because our sexuality is not limited to our bodies. (The notion that sexuality is limited to our bodies lies beyond the contemporary notion that surgery can effect a ‘sex-change’.)
In the peace of Christ,
– Bryan
Bryan,
Why do you assume St. Paul’s comments on celibacy (a person could be a celibate after a terminated marriage and fit the bill) in 1 Cor. are timeless precepts? Verse 20 only speaks of the condition in which one finds themselves when called. It seems that chapter 7:26 makes his statements highly contextualized:
“I think that in view of the present distress it is good for a person to remain as he is.” (ESV)
I think one’s view of the context will cause this verse to bear (or not) on celibacy (or indirectly on virginity).
Pax.
Garrett,
First, the burden of proof is always on the one claiming that a biblical precept is not timeless. We shouldn’t assume that 1 Cor 7:26 makes the [chapter] only applicable to St. Paul’s time. Another possibility is that the principle St. Paul is explaining (about consecrated virginity being a better calling) is timeless, *and* also that the “present distress” makes choosing this path more prudent than if there were no present distress. What St. Paul says in 7:32-35 *is* timelessly true. The one who is married cannot be singularly devoted to the Lord, but the one who chooses consecrated virginity can be singularly focused on things of the Lord and remaining holy “both in body and spirit.” So, St. Paul provides a timeless basis for the conclusion that while the one who chooses marriage “does well,” (vs. 37) and “has not sinned” (vs. 28), the one who chooses consecrated virginity does “better” (vs. 38).
And this is how the Church Fathers understood that consecrated virginity is a higher calling; their testimony and witness on this matter should give pause to anyone claiming otherwise.
In the peace of Christ,
– Bryan
Bryan,
You wrote: “consecrated virginity is a higher calling.” What do you mean by “higher calling”?
Bryan,
You wrote:
“First, the burden of proof is always on the one claiming that a biblical precept is not timeless.”
I believe it’s just the opposite. The burden of proof is always on the one claiming that a biblical precept is a timeless law. Jesus didn’t go around uttering timeless truths and context-free-floating precepts. Neither did Paul. Paul spoke to specific churches about concrete situations that do not exist in the same way today. The challenge of biblical interpretation is to recognize that and to know how to apply what Jesus and Paul said to our context and world.
Paul is very clear that in 1 Cor. 7 that his advice is given in the thick of their “present crisis.” That qualification comes at the head of his discussion about marriage and virginity. The present crisis is all about “the present form of the world passing away” (v. 31). Tribulations will arise because they are living in a transition period when the old humanity (“the flesh,” v. 28) is giving way to the new man in the kingdom of Jesus. Nothing in the NT is written *directly* to us. We have to interpret and carefully apply everything to our significantly different situation.
Jeff,
Consecrated virginity is a higher calling in the sense that it is a greater gift to Christ, because one is sacrificing the great good of marriage in order to serve Christ single-heartedly, without the concern for the “things of the world” and pleasing one’s spouse. (1 Cor 7) Aquinas, following St. Paul, said, the use of marriage “keeps the soul from full abandon to the service of God.” But giving up the good of marriage is a sacrifice. This is why Jesus says of consecrated virginity [i.e. virginity “for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven”]: “He who is able to accept this, let him accept it.” (Matt 19:12) St. Ignatius already commends the consecrated virgins at the end of the first century, and St. Justin also speaks of them in the middle of the second century. We find treatises on consecrated virginity written by St. Cyprian, St. Athanasius, St. Ambrose, St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. John Chrysostom, St. Jerome, and St. Augustine. The same bishops and doctors who pulled together the Canon and the Creed, and fought down all the early heresies, believed and taught that consecrated virginity is a higher calling than marriage. And this is why the Council of Trent (Session 24 Can. 10) defended the Church’s perpetual belief and teaching that consecrated virginity excels the married state. To deny the superiority of consecrated virginity to marriage is to claim that the Church universally got this wrong for 1500 years.
As for your claim that “The burden of proof is always on the one claiming that a biblical precept is a timeless law”, this is precisely why the Anglicans are in such deep difficulty regarding female bishops and homosexuality. The whole bible is rendered outdated until proven otherwise; that’s liberalism in a nutshell.
In the peace of Christ,
– Bryan
Sorry Bryan,
I’m not buying it. 1 Corinthians is clearly written to a specific group of Christians (just like all the other unique epistles) and clearly sets out a unique context. If Paul’s statements weren’t qualified (and they are big time) then I could see where you’re coming from.
Also, the trajectory you set forth on ecclesial maturity would seem to dictate the death of humanity as more become Christian and grasp holy maturity (the higher calling you posit) and live as celibates. Seems directly contradictory of the creation mandates. Only one is set forth as an ideal virgin (and thus, celibate), Jesus, because he is the only man yet glorified.
Of course, the issue here is Mary. Even if this view of 1 Cor were correct, it would not apply to Mary, because she lived and had her marriage to Joseph before Pentecost. If virginity is a “higher” calling now, it was not then. Mary and Joseph had lots of kids — THAT was the blessing before Pentecost — and afterward also, for that matter.
I’m not disputing whether Mary had other children, nor whether more children is a blessing in general. But in this specific it isn’t. More children is not, for Mary, more fruit. The Orthodox and Catholics say Mary is no less fruitful than you do. And actually, since they recognize this fact, they say she is more fruitful. Nothing can be added to God.
If we Protestants could grapple with the issues raised by the fact that Mary is Theotokos, as explored in Catholic and Orthodox devotion to her, we could perhaps make a good case that she had other children. As it is, our Mariology comes dangerously close to denying the Incarnation. Mary with other children is not greater than Mary with just Christ, unless Christ is “just another man child.” Mary with other children is not more fruitful than Mary with only Christ as fruit, unless God is comparable with us.
Or let me put it this way: If Mary with more children is more fruitful than Mary with only God as her child, God is not all sufficient. If Mary without other children is baren, God is nothing.
In other words, God could not have created the universe, because nothing can be added to God.
This is theological rubbish.
Who is colinclout12?
Well, I see that Jim answered your question pretty bluntly. I was going to respond with something a little kinder like: that’s just crazy! Why the Lord would be so niggardly as to deny Mary the blessings of more children besides his Son is beyond me. Why Mary having more children would have been a challenge to God’s sufficiency makes no sense at all.
We have already made it clear that we affirm Mary as Theotokos. That affirmation is about the divine Son uniting himself to our humanity in the womb of the virgin Mary and then being born of her. God the Son was pleased to be born of the virgin Mary!
But what is the logic that demands Mary afterwards avoid intimacy with her husband and bearing children in order to protect the sufficiency of God? That if she were to enjoy intimacy with her husband and love the children born to her after Jesus, she would be guilty of making God nothing? Explain that to me.
Colinclout is Matthew P.
Theotokos is a phrase which means that the person born in Mary’s womb was divine. It does not do away with the proper person/nature distinctions of Chalcedon, however.
When speaking of Mary’s fruitfulness, we are dealing with human nature, not divine.
So “adding to God” is not an issue, because the addition Mary is making is the human nature.
Colin Clout is Edmund Spenser. I’m at TRC. I’m Matt Petersen.
No; in other words, God could create the universe, but doing so doesn’t add to Him in any way.
I didn’t say that Mary having more children is a challenge to God’s sufficency. I said that the claim that Mary is more fruitful with more children is a denial of God’s sufficiency. She may have had more children. But if so, they didn’t make her more fruitful. Creation is good, and exists; but it doesn’t add to God.
Please explain this phrase:”bessings of more children besides his Son.” Are you going to be telling me that the Father was lonely with just the Son with Him, and that’s why He created? The Father thought His Son needed to get out more and have more friends than the Spirit?
That’s what the claim that Mary was barren without more children amounts to. God alone is not sufficient, He must have creation to fil Him out. (It is, of course, shifted to us; God alone is not sufficient for us. He’s good, but not good enough.)
Yes, God can create. No, that doesn’t add to God. Having God alone is sufficient.
Steven,
As mother of Jesus, who was Mary the mother of? If she was in fact the mother of just God’s human nature, either you must embrace Nestorianism, and say that she was the mother of a human hypostasis; or you must say that she was the mother of no one. In which case she isn’t rightly Theotokos or Christotokos, but oudenotokos. Mother of nothing.
And anyway, that directly contradicts Chalcedon. “One and the Same God the Word.” If you want to object that theotokos is not literally true, fine. But then you must say that Mary is literally logotokos. Which can be no less than being theotokos.
Also, our only hope is that you are wrong. Otherwise the blood of Jesus is just the blood of his humanity, and we are not cleansed by God, and thus are still in our sins.
Matt: Maybe I’m just dense. But I’ve read your next to last post 3 times and I can’t make any sense of what you are saying. Are we talking about the same thing here?
Having God alone is sufficient, you assert. But what problem are you addressing here? Are you suggesting that for Mary to have enjoyed the blessing of more children after the birth of Jesus would amount to her denying the sufficiency of God? Does “having God alone is sufficient” mean Mary could not enjoy any other blessing besides Jesus? You are not making any sense.
I’m not disputing that Mary had more children. But if we are to affirm that Mary had more children, we must make sure we don’t say that she was in any way increased by further children.
Is Mary mother of God and mother of James any more fruitful than Mary mother of God, and not of James?
To get at the answer, look at Abraham. Abraham is blessed as father of many nations. But we miss the point if we say Abraham will have many seeds. Abraham has one Seed, but in that one Seed are all. We don’t say “Abraham was the father not only of Christ, but also of Edom and Moab and…” These other nations that Abraham is father of are not part of the promise, and increase the honor due Abraham, and increase Abraham’s fruitfulness, not a jot. It is only in the Seed that the promise to Abraham is realized, and from thence it extends to all.
Now look at Mary. If Mary had more children, they are like Moab, or Edom. Faithful Moab, or faithful Edom, perhaps, if they joined her Seed. But they don’t make her any more fruitful. They don’t make her any more blessed. Just Abraham’s many seeds add nothing beyond the glory of having one Seed; so Mary’s many seeds add nothing to the glory of having one Seed. As Abraham is father of many nations, precisely in being the father of One Man, and all his other children add nothing to his fruitfulness; so Mary is fruitful precisely in being the mother of One Man, and all her other children add nothing to her fruitfulness.
Matt,
The correct answer is communicatio idiomatum.
Matt: this is not any clearer. Are we just playing word games here? We can’t call Mary’s post-Jesus children “fruit”? We can’t say that she was blessed with being more fruitful because of her other children? Why not? Why must this be a zero-sum game? Jesus was the fruit of her womb. But then other children were also the fruit of her womb after Jesus. So she who was fruitful with Jesus had more fruit afterwords. Ergo, she was more fruitful. What’s the problem?
BTW, Abraham was not the Father of Edom and Moab, that was Lot.
You say that the fact that Abraham becomes not only the father of the Seed but also through the Seed many nations does not “increase the honor due to Abraham, and increase Abraham’s fruitfulness not a jot”? What’s the worry here? It’s both. This is a false dilemma.
You conclude: “So Mary is fruitful precisely in being the mother of One Man, and all her other children add nothing to her fruitfulness.” Really? This sounds real pious, but what’s the point? All her children add nothing to her? I’m at a loss to see what is at stake here. What do you think you are safeguarding? Why can’t Mary have the blessing of Jesus as well as the blessing of other children? Why does it have to be either/or? Is there some biblical support for your assertions? I find them puzzling at best.
You are quite wrong about Abraham, and Abraham is a perfect illustration of Mary’s having other children. By Keturah, Abraham had six other sons, and Jethro was one of their descendants. After Sarah was gone, and after Isaac moved Rebekah into Sarah’s tent, Abraham went on to have other seed. This is a good analogy with Mary. After she was purified, and the process of giving birth to the God-man was finished, she went on to have other children by Joseph.
Abraham was father of the seed who would save the world, but he was also father of some seed who would need to be saved. The same is true of Mary.
My point was that Abraham had other children. Yes, I got Midian and Moab backwards. Other than that, you haven’t interacted with me. You don’t contradict me by reiterating something I already said.
And as I have said, repeatedly, she may have had other children. I’m not disputing that. But it’s a denail of Christ Alone, and of the Incarnation to talk as if Catholics and Orthodox say Mary is less fruitful than you do–or worse, that they say she was barren.
“Ergo, she was more fruitful. What’s the problem?”
sarcasm/ I guess you’re right. She was more fruitful. Before she had just been the mother of God. But God decided the Word wasn’t sufficient, and so added to her even more. She is mother of the Word, and mother of James, and mother of Jude, and mother of others! More and more and more fruit! Not just God! God and more! And the Word is very happy the Father decided to create! I mean before creation he just had God. Now he is further blessed! He has God, and more! /end sarcasm.
NO! He who has God and nothing else has no less than he who has God and the whole universe. God is all sufficient. Christ is all sufficient. You cannot add to God. You cannot add to Christ. Stop denying Christ alone. Stop denying the Incarnation.
Give me a break. In Christ are hid all the terasures of wisdom and knowledge, and in him we live and move and have our being. Other children may be, but they do not add to Christ. They only are at all because they are in Him. They only are good because they are in Him. And they add nothing to Him. Let Christ be faithful, and the whole world a liar.
Or again: sarcasm/ Catholics say we have more merit to draw from than Protestants do. “We can’t say that the Church was blessed with more righteousness than just Christ’s? Why not? Why must this be a zero-sum game? Jesus was righteous. But then so are other saints. So she who was fruitful with Jesus had more fruit afterwords. Ergo, she was more fruitful. What’s the problem?” I mean, none that I see. Christ’s merits, and the saint’s merits. That’s why the treasury of merits is important. Catholics say we have more merit to draw from than Protestants do. /end sarcasm
No. That’s nonsense. Yes, the saints do good things, but only in Christ. The chrism is applied to the head, and all in Him receive it. Christ doesn’t win our righteousness, Christ is our righteousness. Christ doesn’t add to our fruitfulness, Christ is our fruitfulness.
I’m making a very Pauline argument. Galatians 3:16,29 “Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ…and if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” Abraham was not promised many seeds, He was promised one Seed. The blessing of many nations does not mean that Abraham will have many seeds. The One Seed, Christ, is many nations, but the many is only in the one Christ.
The promise to Abraham is fulfilled in the Incarnation, and in Pentecost. It is only foreshadowed with his other children. As St. Paul says, the fact that Abraham is the father of many nations does not mean he has many seeds. It means he has One Seed, and in that one Seed are many.
Yes, as I said (though I got the names confused), Abraham had other children. And yes, Genesis 21 “And also of the son of the bondwoman will I make a nation, because he is thy seed.” But “In Isaac shall thy seed be reckoned.” Ishmael is not the child of the promise, whether or no he is ultimately a member of Abraham’s Seed. Likewise the other children Abraham had by Keturah are not the children of the promise, and do not add to Abraham. There may be many in Midian and Ishmael and the other nations who are in Christ, and hence are Abraham’s Seed. But they do not add to Christ. The promise is not that there would be many, but One, and that One would be many.
Similarly with Mary. She may have other children. I’m not disputing it. But they don’t add anything. In Mary’s Fruit all the world is contained, including any other children she may have had. It is only in Him that they exist. They add nothing to Him.
Matt: I’m through with this argument. I’ll let the readers decide if you’ve proved your point. I’m still not sure what your point is.
Dear colinclout12,
I think you are falling into the logical error of equivocation on the term “add.” If you mean that Mary’s other children do not “add” to her place in the history of salvation, strictly considered, then we all agree. If you mean that these other children did not “add” to her life and her joys and sorrows, then we disagree. But I don’t think you mean that.
I should say that in terms of the history of salvation, more broadly considered, Mary’s other children do play a role in advancing the kingdom, as we see with James. But that is not the messianic role. James’s role was “in Christ,” not “added” to him in any sense of being apart from him.
Mary was “blessed among women” in sense A by giving birth to Jesus, and since that was unique, she cannot be blessed more, since there are no other Jesuses.
Mary was blessed, like other women, in sense B by giving birth to other sons and daughters.
If this is not what you’re getting at, I suggest we just leave it here. Since you’re at TPC, maybe you can chat with PJL and the two of you can get clear what it is you’re concerned about.
By the way, looking at “Church father quotations” on the web, I’m surprised at how many don’t even mention the question about subsequent sex but are concerned to say that the birth of Jesus did not “violate” her “virginity.”
It reads like a bunch of guys who could not deal with bloody reality and wanted to shield Jesus and Mary from it.
But I’m sure there is some great theological principle at stake, and after all, I might not be able to *prove* from the Bible that Jesus passed through a birth canal.
I think some of it may be linguistic. I got the impression reading Augustine that he and his contemporaries used “virgin” to mean what we would mean by “technical virgin” (though without the negative connotations). Thus when they said “Jesus was born of a virgin” they meant “Jesus was born of a technical virgin” rather than what we would mean by “Jesus was born of a virgin.”
I thought about this again today, and I think I can succinctly phrase my chief concern.
“It was a very bright day, for both the sun and the moon were shining.”
I suppose no none would be silly enough to actually write this, but if they were, they would not communicate so much the brightness of the day, as the dimness of the sun.
Statements like (and I’m not quoting you) “God blessed Mary and Joseph with Jesus, but continued to bless them, increasing their honor with more children.” makes the same mistake as the above quote. It does not so much honor Mary and childbearing, as minimize the honor which is Christ Himself.
Similarly, consider the following (rather silly) statement “Though Aristotle had many great writings, though he nearly single handedly founded the study of Rhetoric, literary criticism, metaphysics, science, astronomy, and many other disciplines; the honor in these hardly deserves mention next to his greatest honor: he was the tutor of Alexander the Great.” Though this statement superficially purports to praise Aristotle, in fact, it is (rather clearly) over the top praise of Alexander the Great.
But if we change it slightly, substituting Mary for Aristotle, and Jesus for Alexander the Great, it is no longer excessive, but a fitting praise for Jesus. And Orthodox praise of Mary, in which the praise of her as ever-virgin plays a large part, has become such praise of Christ. As such, we must be very careful that in correcting errors they have made, we do not make them say something like “Aristotle is chiefly to be honored for tutoring Alexander, but aside from this he has many other great accomplishments, including the founding of the disciplines of…” which, though more fitting praise of Alexander, is nearly blasphemous when made praise of Christ.
And my concern with what you have written about Mary here, though it is in many ways admirable, is that it falls into these two traps. In the first place, while attempting to honor childbearing, it in fact dims Christ; and while attempting to correct Orthodox errors, in fact, treats Christ as just another man.
In Charitate Christi,
Matthew N. Petersen
1. Jesus was indeed just another man, though without sin. He was also the incarnation of the Word. Any denial that Jesus was “just another man” is docetism and heresy, and has long been condemned by all branches of the Church.
2. Jesus’ honor is not dimmed by the glory of His bride; it is rather increased thereby. That fact that He came to “bring many sons to glory” does not dim His own glory. The fact that Mary had other children, as the Word explicitly states she did, cannot detract from the glory of Jesus. Rather, His salvation of those initially recalcitrant brothers and sisters is an aspect of His glorification.
1. No. Jesus was not just another man. He is a man. Yes. But that’s completely different from saying he was just another man. My language is not unclear, and is not objectionable. In the context, to claim that Christ is just another man is to claim that knowing Christ is no better than knowing another man, that Christ should be no more central to us than any other man is etc. Christ is a man. But he most definitely is not just another man.
Or, if you want it in theological language: Jesus is not a human person. Asserting he is is, at best, Nestorianism–if not Monarchianism or Arianism–and heresy, and has long been condemned by all branches of the Church. Statements like yours, which claim that without more children Mary would have been unfruitful, treat Jesus as a human person.
2. You aren’t interacting with what I said. Yes, Jesus should be glorified for saving his brothers and sisters. But: Mary does not gain additional honor by having more children. We do not praise her or childbearing by saying she does. Rather, we dishonor Christ Jesus. We have changed “Though Mary would ordinarily have much to be honored for, though she bore many children, though she was a faithful Jewess; the honor in these deserves no mention next to her greatest honor: she is the mother of God.” into “Mary is chiefly to be honored as the Mother of God, but aside from this she has many other great honors, including…” The first treats Christ the Divine Person, the Second Adam, in whom all things cohere. The second treats him as a creature. As a human person.
Regarding the first point: The council of Chalcedon says:
Far from being a universally acknowledged fact that Jesus was just a man, this doctrine was condemned by an Ecumenical Council. It is, as Chalcedon says, Nestorian to claim Jesus is just another man.
Mr. Colinclout: You aren’t paying attention, and hence are not worth answering.
It seems to me if I make a point and you give me an answer that is not at all on point, you’re the one who is not paying attention. Surely if I point this out to you, it doesn’t mean I’m not paying attention.
Or maybe you weren’t sure where the comment was where you said Mary would have been unfruitful without further children. This one.
My point was and is that perpetual virginity is not an honor or a blessing but a cross and perhaps a judgment. That is the Biblical perspective.
Since we know for an absolutely certain fact that Joseph and Mary did have children, and we know that children are a blessing from the Lord, then we know that these children were an additional blessing. I fail to see how it is unfitting to say that God honored Mary’s faithfulness by blessing her with children.
What the church condemns is the notion that Jesus was a man only and not also God. What the church affirms is that His humanity was exactly the same as ours, but without sin. It did not occur to me that you were implying that I deny His divinity.
You said: “Since we know for an absolutely certain fact that Joseph and Mary did have children, and we know that children are a blessing from the Lord, then we know that these children were an additional blessing. I fail to see how it is unfitting to say that God honored Mary’s faithfulness by blessing her with children.”
My claim is that this treats Mary’s first born as a human person. And second, if we want to say sex is good, which we should, we must be very careful when we speak of Mary, because it is very easy to accidentally claim Jesus is a human person.
So no, I don’t think creedally you deny Chalcedon. But functionally you have here. The logical consequent of your position is, in my view, a denial of the divinity of Jesus. And thus, having reduced to absurdity, your view is wrong. (And I believe you would agree that if what you said implies Jesus is not God it should be abandoned. You’d just, of course, disagree that it implies Mary’s first born is a mere man.)
I get at my point two ways. First, consider the statement “It was a very bright day, for both the sun and moon were shining.” This statement, if it were written seriously, would either be ironic, or would leave us wondering how dark the sun must be.
But we are like the moon to Christ’s sun. He is the source, we reflect Him. So the statement “Mary is very glorious, for she is the mother of Christ, and of others.” likewise does not praise childbearing but diminishes Christ. Specifically, it treats Christ as a creature.
When we say children are a blessing, and Mary had many children, we must be absolutely sure we don’t say anything remotely like this. Specifically, we must avoid statements like “we know that these children were an additional blessing.” For all its good intentions, it’s blasphemous.
Similarly, consider the following two statements:
“Though Aristotle had many great writings, though he nearly single handedly founded the study of Rhetoric, literary criticism, metaphysics, science, astronomy, and many other disciplines; the honor in these hardly deserves mention next to his greatest honor: he was the tutor of Alexander the Great.”
“Aristotle is chiefly to be honored for tutoring Alexander, but aside from this he has many other great accomplishments, including the founding of the disciplines of…”
Rather obviously, the first acts as if only Alexander matters, whereas the second acts as if Alexander is important, but not all important. Take then the following two statements:
“Though Mary’s life was not a continual fast, though she received many things that would ordinarily be called blessings, though indeed she was the mother of many faithful children, all this is as dung next to her greatest blessing. She is the Mother of God.”
“Mary is chiefly to be honored as the mother of God, but aside from this she has many other great honors, including being the mother of many other faithful children.”
The first treats Christ as all important, as the center in whom all things cohere, and without whom there is no good. The second treats Christ as very important, but not all important. And we must, again, be very careful we do not say anything resembling the second. It treats Jesus as a creature. And again, statements like “we know that these children were an additional blessing.” make precisely that mistake. Though confessionally you believe Mary is the mother of God, functionally, you seem to be denying it.
Matt
Matt,
Glory is not a zero sum game. Your “logic” is torturous.
I’m sorry, Matt, but I cannot grasp what you see as a problem. I see no problem. The Logos was enhypostatically incarnated as the man Jesus in Mary’s womb. Joseph was not His father. After Mary’s purification, Mary and Joseph lived as man and wife and she had other children.
Let me try this: The greatest blessing you and I have is that we are justified and glorified in union with Jesus. But don’t you also enjoy a good meal? If you’re married, don’t you enjoy the company of your wife? If you get a raise, is that not also a blessing? If YOU have children, are they not blessings?
Obviously Mary’s greatest privilege and blessing was to be the theotokos. That does not mean her other children were not also blessings.
Sorry, dude, but I’m baffled at why you don’t like this idea.
Paragraph 1: That would perhaps be on topic if I hadn’t asserted they had other children.
Paragraph 2: That isn’t what David or St. Paul said.
“Whom have I in heaven but thee? and there is none upon earth that I desire beside thee. My flesh and my heart faileth: but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion for ever.”
“Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ”
Paragraph 3: Like I said, you’re treating Jesus as a creature. You’re saying “Mary is chiefly to be honored as the mother of God, but aside from this she has many other great honors, including being the mother of many other faithful children.”
But the fact is “Though Mary’s life was not a continual fast, though she received many things that would ordinarily be called blessings, though indeed she was the mother of many faithful children, all this is as dung next to her greatest blessing. She is the Mother of God.”
Sorry, dude, but I’m baffled at why you don’t like this idea.
Matt: please stop. You are not making any sense.
What Paul counts as dung are the privileges of the Old Creation. He does not treat God’s good gifts as dung. To do so would be an insult to the Giver.
You might look at Ps. 127:3.
Mr Meyers: You may disagree with me. You may have trouble following what I’m saying. But please be respectful.
Mr. Jordan: I haven’t ever denied that creation is good, in fact, I’ve asserted it many times. But created gifts cannot be put alongside God in any way. Yes, we should be thankful for them when they come, but they aren’t comparable to the Good which is Christ. He who has Christ and nothing else has no more than he who has Christ and the whole universe. The ungodly prosper in the world, and receive great wealth as an inheritance. But as for me, my inheritance is thee, O Christ, beside thee I care for nothing in heaven, nor on earth.
Anyway, put aside theories, and look at the linguistics. Does the statement “It was a particularly bright day, as both the sun and the moon were shining.” Make any sense at all?
And which praises Alexander more highly:
“Though Aristotle had many great writings, though he nearly single handedly founded the study of Rhetoric, literary criticism, metaphysics, science, astronomy, and many other disciplines; the honor in these hardly deserves mention next to his greatest honor: he was the tutor of Alexander the Great.”
or “ Aristotle is chiefly to be honored for tutoring Alexander, but aside from this he has many other great accomplishments, including the founding of the disciplines of…”
But honestly, pointing me to Psalm 127 is just insulting. As if I haven’t said in nearly every post that my point is not that childbearing is not good–indeed as if I have not asserted in nearly every post that childbearing is good–but rather that though they are good, they are not comparable to Christ.
Here are quotes from every post but the first.
“Though Mary would ordinarily have much to be honored for, though she bore many children…” “if we want to say sex is good, which we should…” “though she received many things that would ordinarily be called blessings, though indeed she was the mother of many faithful children…” And in my next post, I said the same thing again.
You aren’t paying attention, and hence are not worth answering. One does wonder though, why you are so much more zealous to give honor to childbearing than to Christ.
“One does wonder though, why you are so much more zealous to give honor to childbearing than to Christ.”
Mr. Petersen: You are hereby banned from making further comments on this blog. Titus 3:9-10.
James B. Jordan