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Pure hogwash. The Petrine authority of infallibility has undergone the scrutiny of scores of the most eminent scholars and theologians of our times over several centuries including some of the most respected authors and theologians of the Protestant world who have converted to Catholicism. THE ASSUMPTION OF MARY: A BELIEF SINCE APOSTOLIC TIMES Father Clifford Stevens The Assumption is the oldest feast day of Our Lady, but we don't know how it first came to be celebrated. Its origin is lost in those days when Jerusalem was restored as a sacred city, at the time of the Roman Emperor Constantine (c. 285-337). By then it had been a pagan city for two centuries, ever since Emperor Hadrian (76-138) had leveled it around the year 135 and rebuilt it as in honor of Jupiter. For 200 years, every memory of Jesus was obliterated from the city, and the sites made holy by His life, death and Resurrection became pagan temples. After the building of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in 336, the sacred sites began to be restored and memories of the life of Our Lord began to be celebrated by the people of Jerusalem. One of the memories about his mother centered around the "Tomb of Mary," close to Mount Zion, where the early Christian community had lived. On the hill itself was the "Place of Dormition," the spot of Mary's "falling asleep," where she had died. The "Tomb of Mary" was where she was buried. At this time, the "Memory of Mary" was being celebrated. Later it was to become our feast of the Assumption. For a time, the "Memory of Mary" was marked only in Palestine, but then it was extended by the emperor to all the churches of the East. In the seventh century, it began to be celebrated in Rome under the title of the "Falling Asleep" ("Dormitio") of the Mother of God. Soon the name was changed to the "Assumption of Mary," since there was more to the feast than her dying. It also proclaimed that she had been taken up, body and soul, into heaven. That belief was ancient, dating back to the apostles themselves. What was clear from the beginning was that there were no relics of Mary to be venerated, and that an empty tomb stood on the edge of Jerusalem near the site of her death. That location also soon became a place of pilgrimage. (Today, the Benedictine Abbey of the Dormition of Mary stands on the spot.) At the Council of Chalcedon in 451, when bishops from throughout the Mediterranean world gathered in Constantinople, Emperor Marcian asked the Patriarch of Jerusalem to bring the relics of Mary to Constantinople to be enshrined in the capitol. The patriarch explained to the emperor that there were no relics of Mary in Jerusalem, that "Mary had died in the presence of the apostles; but her tomb, when opened later . . . was found empty and so the apostles concluded that the body was taken up into heaven." In the eighth century, St. John Damascene was known for giving sermons at the holy places in Jerusalem. At the Tomb of Mary, he expressed the belief of the Church on the meaning of the feast: "Although the body was duly buried, it did not remain in the state of death, neither was it dissolved by decay. . . . You were transferred to your heavenly home, O Lady, Queen and Mother of God in truth." All the feast days of Mary mark the great mysteries of her life and her part in the work of redemption. The central mystery of her life and person is her divine motherhood, celebrated both at Christmas and a week later (Jan. 1) on the feast of the Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God. The Immaculate Conception (Dec. 8) marks the preparation for that motherhood, so that she had the fullness of grace from the first moment of her existence, completely untouched by sin. Her whole being throbbed with divine life from the very beginning, readying her for the exalted role of mother of the Savior. The Assumption completes God's work in her since it was not fitting that the flesh that had given life to God himself should ever undergo corruption. The Assumption is God's crowning of His work as Mary ends her earthly life and enters eternity. The feast turns our eyes in that direction, where we will follow when our earthly life is over. The feast days of the Church are not just the commemoration of historical events; they do not look only to the past. They look to the present and to the future and give us an insight into our own relationship with God. The Assumption looks to eternity and gives us hope that we, too, will follow Our Lady when our life is ended. The prayer for the feast reads: "All-powerful and ever-living God: You raised the sinless Virgin Mary, mother of your Son, body and soul, to the glory of heaven. May we see heaven as our final goal and come to share her glory." In 1950, in the Apostolic Constitution , Pope Pius XII proclaimed the Assumption of Mary a dogma of the Catholic Church in these words: "The Immaculate Mother of God, the ever-virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heaven." With that, an ancient belief became Catholic doctrine and the Assumption was declared a truth revealed by God.

Luther’s “take” on this:

Today the festival of our dear lady, the mother of God, is observed to celebrate her death and departure above. But how little this Gospel corresponds with this is plain. For this Gospel tells us nothing about Mary being in heaven. And even if one could draw from this text every detail about what it is like for a saint to be in heaven, it would be of little use. It is enough that we know that departed saints live in God, as Christ concludes in Matthew [Matthew 22] based on the passage in Exodus [Exodus 4] where God says to Moses, “I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob,” that God is not the God of the dead, but the God of the living.

These passages sufficiently prove that they live. But we should not try to figure out what their life is like up there for it is not necessary for us to know. It is also not necessary to discover it. Reason is incapable of it. Some great masters have understanding about some things and yet not about this. For there are three states of life. First, as a child lays in his crib he lives in God but hardly perceives it Second, when we sleep we also are alive and are scarcely aware of it. Thirdly, when we definitely are aware and experience that we are living, even then we don’t know how.

Now since here on earth God deals with us in this meager prison (that is barely half a life), in such a way that we barely perceive how we live here, how much more can He give life in heaven where it is spacious and where is true life. So we cannot set up any definite limits or establish a rule as to how the saints live there since even here dreaming and crazy people live, but we can’t imagine how. It is enough to know that they live. But it is not necessary for us to know what that life is like. That is why I have always said that our faith always must rest upon what is known. We do not make articles of faith out of what doesn’t rest squarely on Scriptures, else we would daily make up new articles of faith. For this reason, those things that are necessary to believe which you must always preserve, which Scripture clearly reveals, are to be markedly distinguished from everything else. For faith must not build itself upon what Scripture does not clearly prove. So since the Scripture clearly says here that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and all believers live, then it is necessary for you to believe that the mother of God lives. You can leave it in our gracious God’s hands what that life is like. Enough said about this festival. [Festival Sermons of Martin Luther (Michigan: Mark V Publications, 2005) pp. 145-14].

My soul magnifies the Lord,
And my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For He has regarded the low estate of His handmaiden,
For behold, henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.
For He who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is His name. And His mercy is on those who fear Him from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with His arm:
He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
He has put down the mighty from their thrones,
and exalted those of low degree.
He has filled the hungry with good things;
and the rich He has sent empty away.
He has helped His servant Israel, in remembrance of His mercy;
As He spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to His posterity forever.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.
As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen

Magníficat ánima mea Dóminum,
et exsultávit spíritus meus
in Deo salvatóre meo,
quia respéxit humilitátem
ancíllæ suæ.

Ecce enim ex hoc beátam
me dicent omnes generatiónes,
quia fecit mihi magna,
qui potens est,
et sanctum nomen eius,
et misericórdia eius in progénies
et progénies timéntibus eum.
Fecit poténtiam in bráchio suo,
dispérsit supérbos mente cordis sui;
depósuit poténtes de sede
et exaltávit húmiles.
Esuriéntes implévit bonis
et dívites dimísit inánes.
Suscépit Ísrael púerum suum,
recordátus misericórdiæ,
sicut locútus est ad patres nostros,
Ábraham et sémini eius in sæcula.

Glória Patri et Fílio
et Spirítui Sancto.
Sicut erat in princípio,
et nunc et semper,
et in sæcula sæculórum.

Amen.

She became the Mother of God, in which work so many and such great good things are bestowed on her as pass man’s understanding. For on this there follows all honor, all blessedness, and her unique place in the whole of mankind, among which she has no equal, namely, that she had a child by the Father in heaven, and such a Child . . . Hence men have crowded all her glory into a single word, calling her the Mother of God . . . None can say of her nor announce to her greater things, even though he had as many tongues as the earth possesses flowers and blades of grass: the sky, stars; and the sea, grains of sand. It needs to be pondered in the heart what it means to be the Mother of God.

(Commentary on the Magnificat, 1521; in Luther’s Works, Pelikan et al, vol. 21, 326)

But if some think us mistaken, let them search the Scriptures. They will not find Mary’s death; they will not find whether she died or did not die; they will not find whether she was buried or was not buried ... Scripture is absolutely silent [on the end of Mary] ... For my own part, I do not dare to speak, but I keep my own thoughts and I practice silence ... The fact is, Scripture has outstripped the human mind and left [this matter] uncertain ... Did she die, we do not know ... Either the holy Virgin died and was buried ... Or she was killed ... Or she remained alive, since nothing is impossible with God and He can do whatever He desires; for her end no-one knows.’ (Epiphanius, Panarion, Haer. 78.10-11, 23. Cited by juniper Carol, O.F.M. ed., Mariology, Vol. II (Milwaukee: Bruce, 1957), pp. 139-40)

Interestingly, in your rush to discredit the Assumption of Mary, you have quoted someone who calls her the holy Virgin. Epiphanius states 3 possibilities in this quote. The first is that she died and was buried, the second is that she was killed [no comment on burial] or she is still alive (about 400 years after her birth). So this does not disprove the Assumption, all it says is that no one knows what happened to her. It would be completely logical to claim that she was definitely dead after 400 years; however, we are already talking about a woman who conceived as a virgin by the power of God. So we are back to Epiphanius's statement "nothing is impossible with God and He can do whatever He desires". However, Epiphanius does not appear to argue against the

The next Church Father mentioned is Jerome In addition to Epiphanius, there is Jerome who also lived in Palestine and does not report any tradition of an assumption.

Interesting choice since Jerome wrote a treatise Against Helvidius which supports the Perpetual Virginity of Mary.

Isidore of Seville, in the seventh century, echoes Epiphanius by saying that no one has any information at all about Mary’s death.

At best this means one is free to believe what one chooses.

Pope Gelasius explicitly condemns the authors as well as their writings and the teachings which they promote and all who follow them. And significantly, this entire decree and its condemnation was reaffirmed by Pope Hormisdas in the sixth century around A.D. 520. (Migne Vol. 62. Col. 537-542). These facts prove that the early Church viewed the assumption teaching, not as a legitimate expression of the pious belief of the faithful but as a heresy worthy of condemnation.

I do not see how you arrive at the conclusion (on the basis of cited paragraphs) that the Assumption was considered a Heresy.

Tertullian says that we can know if God has done something by validating it from Scripture. Not to be able to do so invalidates any claim that a teaching has been revealed by God. This comes back again to the patristic principle of sola scriptura, a principle universally adhered to in the eaerly Church.

Something I find perplexing about the claims that the early Church adhered to Sola Scriptura, is that the Sola Scriptura branches of Judaism and Christianity never do particularly well. The branches are Sadducees, Karaites, Protestants, and this supposed Patristic Sola Scriptura group. The Sadducees died off after the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 A.D. The Karaites did fairly well for a few centuries but are now down to less than 100,000 adherents. There are fewer Protestants than Catholics. And this supposed Patristic Sola Scriptura belief appears to have died out by about 600 A.D. I can never get a date on when the Catholic Church was supposedly founded. On the one hand, Constantine is usually cited; however, Protestants typically cite people after this date.

In the above, Epiphanius' Panarion is cited. This is a work that lists large numbers of heresies. Concerning Heresy 26 (Gnostics) in Paragraph 7.5, he refers to Jesus born of the ever-virgin Mary. Had Mary and Joseph had normal marital relations, she would not be ever-virgin, only Virgin. This is also repeated in Heresy 29 (Nazareans) paragraph 6.7. In his section on Antidicomarians, he comments that the Antidicomarians disbelieve in the perpetual Virginity of Mary and then proceeds to explain how the Lord had brothers even though his mother was a perpetual Virgin. In addition he also connects Mary with Eve. He also comments that he who honors the Lord also honors his Vessel and continues with "Leave Mary the holy vessel, the holy Virgin, alone! "

The next heresy he goes after is the Collyridian heresy. Some of my summary has to do with the modern heresy of attempting to ordain women.

This sect is interesting as they actually practiced Mary Worship. This sect offered bread to Mary through the use of priestesses. Epiphanius states that if any female should be priest, it would be Mary because "She was counted worthy to bear the king of all in her own womb". Interestingly he comments John the Baptist practiced baptism for the remission of sins. His baptisms took place using water. Proceeding, even though there are prophetesses, they are not priestesses. So he appears to oppose female ordination not because he has a problem with it, but because he can find no basis for it. He does comment that there are deaconesses who exist to preserve the modesty of women.

He proceeds to mention that there are deacons who help administer, but not celebrate, any mysteries. Interesting to note, Epiphanius has no problem citing the Protoevangelium of James. He proceeds to say that Mary should be honored but not worshipped (which is the Catholic statement). He concludes that since it is not appropriate to offer the Eucharist to men (only to God), it is inappropriate to offer it to women. He then states that not even angels have this glory.

There are two people who were translated to Heaven without enduring death - Elijah, the old Testament prophet, and the somewhat obscure antediluvian prophet Enoch. The Holy Spirit decided it was important that both events were recorded in scripture in the Old Testament. Most are familiar with the references to Elijah in the New Testament - comparison to John the Baptist, and his appearance at the transfiguration. And then there is Enoch, as random as his mention in the OT, Jude links him to an End Times prophesy, and Paul makes a point to elaborate on his translation in Hebrews.

Hebrews 11:5-6 (AMP)
5 Because of faith Enoch was caught up and transferred to heaven, so that he did not have a glimpse of death; and he was not found, because God had translated him. For even before he was taken to heaven, he received testimony [still on record] that he had pleased and been satisfactory to God.
6 But without faith it is impossible to please and be satisfactory to Him. For whoever would come near to God must [necessarily] believe that God exists and that He is the rewarder of those who earnestly and diligently seek Him [out].

You would expect if the Holy Spirit felt compelled to record these two translations, that any trip to Heaven by someone in the New Testament would be faithfully recorded as well, especially if it was the mother of Jesus.

Now we turn our attention to the New Testament, specifically the books attributed to Luke. No other writer was so meticulous, recording every detail - names, places, dates, events, many of which seemingly had no relevance to the narrative - they all do have a divine purpose. Based on the details recorded in Luke about the Nativity, one would assume he had interviewed Mary, had extensive Holy Spirit assistance, and/or eyewitness testimony. If Mary was in any special way translated into Heaven, he would have mentioned it. Had she had an elevated position in the Early Church, this would have been made clear in Acts. This is not the case at all. Her last appearance, Acts 1:14, she is merely listed along with the other women and the disciples who were waiting on the Holy Spirit in prayer. After this mention, she disappears from the New Testament. It is highly likely she would have died (or the assumption occurred) within the lifetime of EVERY NT writer. But not a single writer was inspired to provide one shred of evidence to her elevated status, role in worship, or assumption.

In the Pauline Epistles, where the revelation of the Church is fully explained, made up of neither Jews or Gentiles with Jesus as the HEAD of the Body of Christ, she is nowhere to be found. In Hebrews, written by someone well acquainted with the Old Testament and the Law, who carefully proves the superiority of of the New Covenant with Jesus as the Savior and Eternal High Priest, the mother of Jesus gets no mention whatsoever. Same story from Peter, James, Jude, John, all contemporaries, not a mention of Mary, or any supernatural trip to Heaven. And if not for the most extreme religious contortions, attempting to “discover” Mary in Revelation 12, ignoring almost 4,000 years of religious types and prophecies concerning God’s chosen people Israel, she makes no appearance in the last book in the Bible either.

And if all that was not sufficient, consider Hebrews 11 - the faith heroes of the Bible. If there was ever a time to recognize Mary, the sinless eternal virgin who flew to Heaven, THIS would be the place. In this wonderful chapter listing how men and women through faith in God were mightily used, Mary is ignored. There is Sarah, and the birth of Isaac, and even Rahab the harlot of Jericho, but no mother of Jesus. In his closing remarks the writer makes it clear the focus should always remain on the Living Word, Jesus.

Hebrews 12:1-2 (AMP)
1 THEREFORE THEN, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses [who have borne testimony to the Truth], let us strip off and throw aside every encumbrance (unnecessary weight) and that sin which so readily (deftly and cleverly) clings to and entangles us, and let us run with patient endurance and steady and active persistence the appointed course of the race that is set before us,
2 Looking away [from all that will distract] to Jesus, Who is the Leader and the Source of our faith [giving the first incentive for our belief] and is also its Finisher [bringing it to maturity and perfection]. He, for the joy [of obtaining the prize] that was set before Him, endured the cross, despising and ignoring the shame, and is now seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

If this “assumption” was so critical to Christianity, why did the Holy Spirit neglect to record it in scripture? You cannot look to man, myth, legends, or a denomination for an answer. You must rely on God’s Word - The Truth. If He neglected to record it in His Word, it did not happen, or is not relevant for Believers. It is most likely the reasoning of men or religious fabrication, and should be dismissed. And you certainly don’t build a religious tradition around a legend, and then attempt to force scripture to confirm it.

The entire scope of God’s Word, from Genesis to Revelation, is revealing Jesus to the world. He is the Incorruptible Seed, He is the Living Word. He is the Head (and only Head) of the Body. He is the Last Adam. He is the Alpha and the Omega. He is Savior and Lord. Jesus is ALL you need. Let these words settle in your heart and renew your mind. The Truth makes you free.

2 Timothy 3:15-17 (KJV)
15 And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.
16 All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
17 That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.

John 5:37-47 (AMP)
37 And the Father Who sent Me has Himself testified concerning Me. Not one of you has ever given ear to His voice or seen His form (His face—what He is like). [You have always been deaf to His voice and blind to the vision of Him.]
38 And you have not His word (His thought) living in your hearts, because you do not believe and adhere to and trust in and rely on Him Whom He has sent. [That is why you do not keep His message living in you, because you do not believe in the Messenger Whom He has sent.]
39 You search and investigate and pore over the Scriptures diligently, because you suppose and trust that you have eternal life through them. And these [very Scriptures] testify about Me!
40 And still you are not willing [but refuse] to come to Me, so that you might have life.
41 I receive not glory from men [I crave no human honor, I look for no mortal fame],
42 But I know you and recognize and understand that you have not the love of God in you.
43 I have come in My Father’s name and with His power, and you do not receive Me [your hearts are not open to Me, you give Me no welcome]; but if another comes in his own name and his own power and with no other authority but himself, you will receive him and give him your approval.
44 How is it possible for you to believe [how can you learn to believe], you who [are content to seek and] receive praise and honor and glory from one another, and yet do not seek the praise and honor and glory which come from Him Who alone is God?
45 Put out of your minds the thought and do not suppose [as some of you are supposing] that I will accuse you before the Father. There is one who accuses you—it is Moses, the very one on whom you have built your hopes [in whom you trust].
46 For if you believed and relied on Moses, you would believe and rely on Me, for he wrote about Me [personally].
47 But if you do not believe and trust his writings, how then will you believe and trust My teachings? [How shall you cleave to and rely on My words?]

A Roman Catholic Dogma Originating with Heretics