The Banned said:

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Maybe I'm too zoomed in here: is there a particular aspect you're trying to wrap your head around, or just general mariology?

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Quo Vadis? said:

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I don't know if you consider St Augustine as "early church" but both Nature and Grace and Holy Virginity have a lot of information on the Virgin Mary.

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AgLiving06 said:

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I'm not looking to start a fight or debate, but looking for y'all's best sources.

I'm doing my thesis on the early church's views of Mary. Thesis statement isn't defined yet as I'm in the research phase.

Transparently, I expect to find that the modern conceptions of the Immaculate Conception and/or the Assumption of Mary are not supported by the early Church Fathers, but I'm open to where the research takes me. My eventual thesis statement will fall along those lines.

What I'm not looking for are books that are simply apologetics or polemics. Anything that appeals to early primary sources are ideal.

I'm starting with Secondary Resources to build primary sources. I've started with:

Stephen Shoemaker: Mary in Early Christian Faith and Devotion
Hilda Graef: Mary: A History of Doctrine and Devotion

Primary Resources I've identified so far are:
Origin
Tertullian
Clement
Justin Martyr
Ireneaus

Apocryphal texts identified so far for further review:
Protevangelium of James (and Gelasian Decree)
Ascension of Isaiah
Book of Mary's Repose

So for those on either side of the position. I'm curious to your best sources?

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Faithful Ag said:

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AgLiving06 said:

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I'm not looking to start a fight or debate, but looking for y'all's best sources.

I'm doing my thesis on the early church's views of Mary. Thesis statement isn't defined yet as I'm in the research phase.

Transparently, I expect to find that the modern conceptions of the Immaculate Conception and/or the Assumption of Mary are not supported by the early Church Fathers, but I'm open to where the research takes me. My eventual thesis statement will fall along those lines.

What I'm not looking for are books that are simply apologetics or polemics. Anything that appeals to early primary sources are ideal.

I'm starting with Secondary Resources to build primary sources. I've started with:

Stephen Shoemaker: Mary in Early Christian Faith and Devotion
Hilda Graef: Mary: A History of Doctrine and Devotion

Primary Resources I've identified so far are:
Origin
Tertullian
Clement
Justin Martyr
Ireneaus

Apocryphal texts identified so far for further review:
Protevangelium of James (and Gelasian Decree)
Ascension of Isaiah
Book of Mary's Repose

So for those on either side of the position. I'm curious to your best sources?

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I'm interested to see where this leads you and what you learn/find out. I hope you'll report back to the board when you reach your conclusion.

What your expectations for early Church support going into the project with regard to the other two Marian Dogmas - Mary being the mother of God and her Perpetual Virginity (in addition to the Immaculate Conception and Assumption/Dormition of Mary). Also curious as to what qualify as support that you would be willing to accept. Established Liturgical examples supporting these beliefs in Mary, writings of Church fathers, acceptance in the churches of teachings (lack of dispute in adoption), etc.

Good luck!

One point of clarification - Jesus ascended into heaven by his own power whereas Mary was assumed or taken into heaven but not of her own power.

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SpectreAg89 said:

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As to the assumption, I think one of the clearest common sense proofs is that we have no first-class relics of her. We have countless relics (bone fragments, hair, etc.) from the apostles and early martyrs and saints, but none from Mary.

One of the primary early sources you mention is St. Epiphanius. Here's what he had to say on the matter: "Like the bodies of the saints, however, she has been held in honor for her character and understanding. And if I should say anything more in her praise, she is like Elijah, who was virgin from his mother's womb, always remained so, and was taken up, but has not seen death" (Panarion 79).

Epiphanius is responding to perceived heresies of his day. For him to be correcting his fellow Christians in this matter in the 3rd century means the idea that Mary had been taken up to heaven in bodily form must have been well established in the early church. The early Christian writings were apologetic in nature. Mostly letters correcting people or groups that were seen as straying away from the truth (also passed down through oral tradition.) So if there is not a lot of focus in early writings on Mary's assumption, I would contend that is because it was an accepted universal truth of the early Church. Everyone believed it to be true.

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Quote:

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23,8 And there have been many such things to mislead the deluded, though the saints are not responsible for anyone's stumbling; the human mind finds no rest, but is perverted to evils. (9) The holy virgin may have died and been buriedher falling asleep was with honor, her death in purity, her crown in virginity. Or she may have been put to deathas the scripture says, "And a sword shall pierce through her soul" 96her fame is among the martyrs and her holy body, by which light rose on the world, [rests] amid blessings. Or she may have remained alive, for God is not incapable of doing whatever he wills. No one knows her end.

But we must not honor the saints to excess; we must honor their Master. (10) It is time for the error of those who have gone astray to cease. Mary is not God and does not have her body from heaven but by human conception, though, like Isaac, she was provided by promise. (11) And no one should make offerings in her name, for he is destroying his own soul. But neither, in turn, should he be insolent and offer insult to the holy Virgin. Heaven forbid, she had no sexual relations after or before the Savior's conception.

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Faithful Ag said:

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Yes. Thanks for sharing your updates. I recently read a great book about St. Joseph called "The man closest to Christ". The author makes the case that Joseph was NOT an older, caretaker type figure for many reasons. It was a fascinating perspective about the important role of Joseph as the protector of the Holy Family and therefore the Church. It was a very quick read and might help as you formalize your thesis topic.

Good Luck and keep us posted. Thanks.

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AgLiving06 said:

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What I didn't mention above is there is quite a bit of language with Eve and Mary. While not necessarily direct Scriptural language, there is certainly some typological understandings that are interesting to explore.

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Zobel said:

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But the Theotokos is ever and always a type of the church. So there's either / or here.

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AgLiving06 said:

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Here's the problem.

Even the Roman Catholic scholars agree that Revelation 12 was universally seen as not being about Mary.

Hilda Graef on page 22 says of Revelation 12:

"The early patristic tradition unanimously regards this woman as a symbol of the Church, whether of the New Testament or of the Old and New Testament combined. The Marian interpretation appears first in the fifth century in a dubious Epiphanius passage in the east, in St. Augustine's disciple Quodvultdeus in the West"

So if you rely on it for comfort, that's awesome, but from a historical standpoint, the Church did not see it this as being about Mary. They did not believe we were children of Mary, but children of His Church.

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FTACo88-FDT24dad said:

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AgLiving06 said:

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Zobel said:

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But the Theotokos is ever and always a type of the church. So there's either / or here.

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That's your argument. That's not the argument of the Fathers who don't attempt that claim.

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Do we see those fathers explicitly rejecting the Marian interpretation of Revelation in favor of the church interpretation or are they silent?

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BluHorseShu said:

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AgLiving06 said:

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Here's the problem.

Even the Roman Catholic scholars agree that Revelation 12 was universally seen as not being about Mary.

Hilda Graef on page 22 says of Revelation 12:

"The early patristic tradition unanimously regards this woman as a symbol of the Church, whether of the New Testament or of the Old and New Testament combined. The Marian interpretation appears first in the fifth century in a dubious Epiphanius passage in the east, in St. Augustine's disciple Quodvultdeus in the West"

So if you rely on it for comfort, that's awesome, but from a historical standpoint, the Church did not see it this as being about Mary. They did not believe we were children of Mary, but children of His Church.

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Even protestant scholars agree that ""Most of Revelation's symbols have multiple associations or meanings and … the interpreter can never be sure that all the multiple meanings of a symbol have been discovered". So while true that Catholic Scholars agree that Rev 12 isn't a slam dunk...It doesn't have to be in and of itself. As Catholics we also do no believe in Sola Scriptura, and those that do are forced to twist meaning from scripture without support from the early Church Fathers or a magisterium. There are protestants who do believe Rev 12 is about Mary and those that do not. The early church did not need scripture alone to believe and at the beginning only had the oral teachings (and thus interpretations).

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