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Scriptural View of Mary
Catholic Pages ^ | Dr. Scott Hahn

Posted on 10/08/2007 6:08:42 AM PDT by NYer

The following is the transcript of Scott Hahn's audio and video tape presentation, "Mary: Holy Mother" as it appears in the "Catholic Adult Education on Video Program" with Scott and Kimberly Hahn.

As you probably know, this is our third installment in a series of five sessions that we are spending together discussing how to answer common objections, questions regarding key tenets that are distinctive to the Catholic Church. We have focused upon the Pope and yesterday we looked at purgatory. This morning we want to focus on Mary and the Marian doctrines and devotions of the Catholic Church to see where in scripture do we see, not necessarily logical demonstrations that are brought forth from proof texts that kind of force the mind against the will to give in and to acquiesce in these beliefs, but where do we find in scripture the reflections and the illustrations and the assumptions and the conclusions that the Catholic Church affirms with regard to the Blessed Virgin Mary?

We are also going to be able to touch lightly and briefly upon some historical data, but our focus this morning will be primarily scriptural. Now non-Catholics also are concerned with historical evidences for Marian doctrines and devotions. But I would say the vast majority of non-Catholic questions and objections stem from scripture and the seeming silence from the holy writ. So that's what we are going to be focusing our attention, our energy and our time upon this morning.

Before I go on, I want to make the same admission that I do at every point and that is, we don't have time to cover everything. We don't have time to cover even half of what we need to cover. I'll do my best and you know how fast I can get going and you know how long I can go. I have to candidly concede the fact that you need to be reading scripture. You need to be asking our Lord for extra time to study, to ponder and to pray. Let me recommend some books to you, some secondary sources.

One of my favorites is by one of the top biblical scholars in France, Andre Foulier. It's entitled Jesus and His Mother, the Role of the Virgin Mary in Salvation History and the Place of Women in the Church. This, I believe, is a masterpiece, and it's published by St. Bede, and it's only about two or three years old. The other book I want to recommend, and I am not sure is in print. In fact, I suspect it might be out of print, but you can find it in libraries, and I have found it in used book stores because that's my favorite haunting place, to travel to used book stores. But this is by Max Thurien who is a reformed brother in the Taize community over in Europe. It's entitled, Mary, Mother of All Christians.

What makes this distinctive is that when he wrote this, he was a Reformed Calvinist Christians. You don't find Christians much more non-Catholic than that! I know. I was one! Now, rumor has it, and I have only heard it from two or three persons, and I've not confirmed this, that Brother Max Thurien has converted. He is considered to be one of the wisest Reformed Protestant theological sages of this century, not only for his theological depth and his scriptural understanding, but especially for his spirituality in guiding the Taize community in worship and community and in ecumenical environment.

Another classic, Joseph Duer, a Jesuit by the name of Joseph Duer. I believe it was originally written in German. It's entitled, The Glorious Assumption of the Mother of God. This goes through the biblical and the historical, the patristic and the magisterial data and evidences for the doctrine, or the dogma, I guess we could say, of the bodily assumption of our Lady. Now this is an old copy, but I was just recently informed that the book is back in print. I'm not sure who publishes it, but my suspicion is Christian Classics.

Here's another book, and I'll tell you the story behind this a little later. Remind me; I might forget. It's entitled The Assumption of Mary by Father Killiam Healey, a Carmelite theologian up in New England, in Massachusetts. This is published by Michael Glazier. I'm not sure if you can get it from them, but if you want to try, you have to contact Liturgical Press, because Glazier and Liturgical Press just merged up in Collegeville, Minnesota, which is their new address. But this is superb. This is for popular consumption. This could be like a primer, a first reader in Marian Doctrine and Devotion. He is very fair and even handed. And I might add, he's a marvelous priest. I heard him preach, right after I joined the Church, but I'll tell that story later on. It was a delight in my own life.

The real magnum opus on the subject was written by one of Great Britain's top Biblical scholars, Father John McHugh entitled, The Mother of Jesus in the New Testament, published by Doubleday, and it's in many public libraries that I have seen as well as college or high school or seminary libraries. I don't believe it's in print, but it is all around, so you could find it if you looked hard enough. This is just a copious study of all of the relevant passages in the New Testament, and McHugh looks at these from the perspective of the writers of scripture themselves, how the Fathers of the Church interpreted it, how Jewish and Rabbinic interpreters and commentators understood certain passages from the Old that were fulfilled by the New, all the way up until the present day. It's very thorough but readable, very readable. I think anybody named McHugh has something good to say. I'm buttering up my host and hostess here.

Scriptural View of Mary

Well, here we go. What I would like to do now is to begin to change our focus to scripture itself. Of course, the place we have to begin in order to see what the scripture says about the Blessed Virgin Mary is found all the way in the beginning of the Bible. Let's turn to Genesis, chapter 3. There we see the first Eve having been seduced and, I believe, brutally intimidated into a kind of disobedient submission. You can go back and listen to this tape that I think we made two or two-and-a-half days ago about how often we distort what really happened in the temptation narrative, because we don't know how to read Hebrew narrative. There is a literary artistry there at work that's very hard for the Western mind to grasp, understand and appreciate. But I believe, just to sum it up, that Adam was called to be a faithful covenant head in a marital covenant, and he was called to show forth, as the representative of the covenant, the love, the hessed, the loyalty of the covenant to the fullest degree. And, as our Lord says, "Greater love hath no man than to lay down his life for his beloved."

So, if he is truly going to love his covenant partner in marriage, he has to be willing to lay his life down. Now, how does God, the Father, test his son's loyalty and love? Well, that's what the serpent is there for. The serpent, nahash in Hebrew is, I believe, misunderstood to be a snake. Medieval art work, and this has been carried on into the modern tradition where you have Eve depicted as some dumb, perhaps blonde, but some dumb air-head who just basically is tricked by some little snake, hanging from a branch in a tree, to eat the apple. All right, and so all men just kind of sit back and say, "Yeah, it's still the same way." And they congratulate themselves on being so worldly wise that they wouldn't be so dumb as this air head.

Total misreading, I believe. This is my own hypothesis. This is my own interpretation. You don't have to abide by it, but my view is that the nahash, the serpent is deliberately depicted as a kind of, I'd say mythical figure but I don't want to deny the historicity of this text. It's just that Hebrew historical narrative can often use mythical imagery to communicate historical truth. In Daniel 7, I mentioned four gentile kingdoms are described as being "four beasts." So, I believe, here we have the serpent as a kind of dragon. The word is used and used and used in Hebrew to connote or denotes a dragon figure like Leviathan or Banmuth or Rehab, the monster later than Isaiah and elsewhere in the Old Testament. In Revelation 12:9 in the New Testament confirms this translation of nahash, not as serpent/snake, but as serpent/dragon, because there Satan is described as the "ancient serpent" and then it goes on to describe a seven-headed dragon.

So she is being confronted and brutally intimidated by a dragon who is intent upon producing disobedience, come hell or high water. So in the cross-examination, in the interrogation that goes back and forth, Satan uses the truth in a clever, deceptive, but intimidating way to kind of force this woman to see, in effect, that if she doesn't eat that fruit, she will die, at least in the biological, physical sense because Satan will see to it.

The question, then, as you read through this narrative is not based upon anything that is explicitly stated, but rather that which is so conspicuously unstated, and that is, where the heck is Adam in all this? By the end of the narrative you discover that he's right by the woman because she just turns and gives him the fruit to eat; but the question is, where was he all along? This loving covenant head, this loving covenant partner who is to show the great love that he's willing to lay down his life for his beloved? Well, he was probably rationalizing his silence by saying, "Well, if I oppose such a serpentile monster as this, I stand no chance."

So in Hebrews 2:14-16, the New Testament tells us that Christ had to take on our flesh and blood to free us from the devil, from Satan, who held us in life-long bondage because of the fear of death and suffering we all have. So it seems as though Adam's response, or lack of response, is due to his fear of suffering and death, which in turn subjects all of A-dam, humanity, to life-long bondage to he who holds the power of death, Satan, in this sense.

So the first Eve, then, is abandoned by her covenant partner and husband who was presumably to tell that dragon where to go, and then, in a sense, stand up for his convictions and possibly even suffer martyrdom and to lay down his life for his beloved and trust that God, his Creator, to whom he is loyal in love would raise him and vindicate him in proper covenant judgment. Which is exactly what the second Adam does on behalf of the second Eve, the Church, which is the whole dramatic encounter we read about in Revelations 12. I'm going to have to talk about that later on this day, so I'm not going to get into it too much this morning. You're all invited to that. It's at 1:30. We're going to be talking about Mary, Ark of the Covenant, focusing upon the woman of the Apocalypse who is clothed with the sun, a crown of 12 stars, and the world under her feet. I think it's the deliberate symbol of the second Eve for whom the second Adam lay down his life. Mary, the Church, Israel, and all New Testament believers in a sense.

But having sinned, Adam and Eve were now confronted by God. You can go all the way back, I believe, to verse 8, Genesis 3:8, "They heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day and the man and his wife hid themselves." Now, this is, I think, perhaps somewhat of a mistranslation. We often have this kind of romantic, bucolic picture here of God kind of walking through the woods. You can hear the crushing of the leaves and the snapping of the twigs as he says, you know, "Adam, Eve, where are you?" Poor God, just doesn't really know what's going on!

But when you actually look at the Hebrew, what the people hear, verse 8, it says, "Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God." We're tempted to hear that as the crushing leaves and snapping twigs, this poor unwitting God is saying, "where... weren't we supposed to meet, you know. Isn't this the time? Isn't this the place?" But no. The word in Hebrew for sound is qol. Now, what kind of noise does the qol of the Lord make? Well you can find out by reading Psalm 29. Keep your finger on Genesis 3 and take a look at Psalm 29 because there we discover an entire psalm devoted to describing what Adam and Eve must have heard when they heard the qol of the Lord, the sound of the Lord.

Verse 1 of Psalm 29, "Ascribe to the Lord, O heavenly beings or sons of God. Ascribe to the Lord glory and strength. Ascribe to the Lord the glory of his name and worship the Lord in holy array. The qol of the Lord is upon the waters. The God of glory thunders. The Lord upon many waters. The qol of the Lord is powerful. The qol of the Lord is full of majesty." Verse 5, "The qol of the Lord breaks the cedars. The Lord breaks the cedars of Lebanon. He makes Lebanon to skip like a calf in Sirion, like a young wild ox. The qol of the Lord flashes forth flames of fire. The qol of the Lord shakes the wilderness. The Lord shakes the wilderness of Kadesh. The qol of the Lord makes the oak trees to whirl and strips the forest bare and all in his temple cry, 'glory'!"

What do you think they heard? It wasn't the snapping of little twigs and the crunching, you know, of leaves. They heard a thunder and shattering roar, and they hid themselves. Quite understandably. Goes on, "They heard the qol of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day." That word in Hebrew, cool, is ruah, normally translated spirit or wind, and that phrase could easily be translated as scholars have argued, "They heard the thundering, shattering roar of Yahweh Eloheim as he was coming into the garden as the spirit of the day!" What day? The day of judgment. We've got a primo parousia on our hands. The second coming in advance in a sense.

So they flee from the sound that they hear. They hide from the Lord God among the trees in the garden. "But the Lord God called to the man, 'Where are you?'" Now he doesn't talk about geographical location. The deity here, in order to meet the job description of the divinity is omniscient. He knows where they are. He's asking, "Where are you in terms of your covenant standing before me. Where are you? "He answered, ' I heard you in the garden, but I was afraid because I was naked and so I hid. Who told you that you were naked?" What does the man say? "The woman! Have you eaten of the fruit that I told you not to eat?" And what does he say? He immediately starts passing the buck. Verse 12, "The man said, 'The woman.'" But it gets worse, "The woman you gave me."

Not so subtle, huh? He's not just faulting her. Who's he really faulting? Some help, some assistant you gave me! He's not just blaming her. He's implicitly blaming God. And the Lord God said to the woman, "What is this that you've done?" The woman said, "The nahash deceived me and I ate." Now, if you go back, the serpent never actually told a lie, but what the serpent did was to use a kind of blunt, brutal intimidation to get her to submit to the evil. "So the Lord said to the serpent, 'Because you have done this cursed you above all the livestock, etc." But here we look at verse 15, "And I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed. He will crush your head and you will strike his heel."

Now some other translations render, "She will crush your head." And so we have statues of our Lady crushing the head of the serpent. That's an interesting but kind of tangential issue for us right now. At any rate, we see here the woman. "I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed." Now you don't have to be a scientist to wonder what they're talking about here. The serpent's seed, okay. But her seed? The Greek Old Testament translates this spermatos, that's the term for seed. Now so far, so good, but wait a second. What is it doing in connection with the woman? The woman's seed? Nowhere else in the Old Testament do you ever come across an expression like that. It's always the man's seed, the husband's seed, the father's seed. This is weird. The woman's seed? Yeah, God's going to elevate that woman and give to her in some unique sense perhaps a seed through which the serpent's head will be crushed. Keep that in the back of your mind because that is going to be crucial.

Isaiah 7:14

We're going to move on now to, of course, what is probably the second most famous Old Testament passage for understanding our Lady, Isaiah 7, verse 14. Isaiah 7, verse 14: here we have an interesting episode between Isaiah and King Ahas who is king of Judah, and he's worrying about the national stability of his people in his country of Judah, his kingdom, because he is surrounded by stronger neighbors and so he's toying with the idea of entering into all kinds of wrong- headed alliances. So, through Isaiah the Lord says to King Ahas who's always beginning to kind of stumble with doubts, he's beginning to wonder with fear who he should rely upon, Verse 3, "Then the Lord said to Isaiah, 'go out'" and it goes on in verses 3 through 10, where the Lord speaks to Ahas through Isaiah and says, "Ask of me and I will give you a sign."

In other words, let's admit it. Your faith is weak. You need to have it shored up and strengthened. That's what signs are for. Go ahead and ask me for a sign. Verse 12, with false modesty Ahas says, "Oh, I won't ask. I will not put the Lord to the test." Give me a break! Isaiah said, "Hear now, you House of David, is it not enough to try the patience of men. Will you try the patience of my God also?" He sees your need. He's got the gift that you need. Now don't play strong. You're weak, admit it and receive the gift that he's got in this sign." "Therefore, the Lord himself will give you a sign. The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son and will call him Emmanuel."

That word, almah in Hebrew translated by the Greek Septuagint parthenos has been the subject of incredible debate. Is it young woman or is it virgin? You could stack up scholars who advocate either position, but I am persuaded, not only by the targums, that is the ancient Jewish interpretation of this was decidedly in favor of "virgin." They saw it as some kind of Messianic prophecy in the targums, these ancient Aramaic paraphrases of the Old Testament.

Now there are a lot of scholars who debate, "Well, are the targums before Christ or after Christ or whatever?" But I think there's a lot of evidence for them being before Christ, but even if they were a little bit after Christ, the fact remains that Jews from earliest times saw a Messianic reference with regard to parthenos, a virgin. A recent scholar whose article I just read by the name of Professor Wyatt argues that the Alexandrian Jews who rendered almah by parthenos were being entirely faithful to the Herogamic tradition. He goes on to talk about how Isaiah borrows all his pagan mythical imagery, only then historicizes it with reference to the coming Messiah, as the ritual technical term for an embodiment of a divine mother, who is both a fecund mother, a fruitful mother, as well as a perpetual virgin.

In other words, Isaiah in using this language is tapping into a well-known ancient outlook on what humanity needs for deliverance, that is, God is going to have to send an incredible figure, the likes of which humans have never seen, a creature, a human but in a sense possessed by God in an absolutely unique way. And this, by the way, is not unique to the Hebrew tradition. It's shared throughout. Now maybe it's because Genesis 3:15 was channeled out throughout the world as the human race spread, whatever you want to believe.

There are other ways to explain it, but the fact remains that this translation, this rendering of almah as virgin is strong and sure and is very reliable. At any rate, we know one thing for sure, the New Testament applies it to Mary and the virginal birth of Jesus. So in terms of the inspired narrative, what do we have? In Matthew, we have in a sense, the answer in the back of the book really, or at least we can treat it that way for this morning's time together.

What is going on here? The Davidic line is almost at an end and the only way out for King Ahas in his own mind is to begin to move away from Yahweh and to begin to trust in all of these pagan neighbors who want to form alliances with him. Only, in order to form those alliances he's going to have to submit as a kind of vassal. So Isaiah says, "Don't do it. If you are weakening in your faith, ask him for a sign. He has one ready." The problem is the Davidic line could be crushed. Well, the faithful were saying, "But God has sworn an oath: there will always be an heir on the Davidic throne."

But now what happens if the king is deposed and if the royal family is murdered? Well, God will take a virgin and produce a son of David. In other words, we're not dependent exclusively upon human resources, political power, economic wealth and all of the rest. So Isaiah 7:14 stands in line with Genesis 3:15 as in a sense the second key text with regards to the Blessed Virgin Mary.



TOPICS: Apologetics; Catholic; Prayer
KEYWORDS: bible; bvm; mary; scripture
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To: NYer
Luk 2:22 And after the days of her purification, according to the law of Moses, were accomplished, they carried him to Jerusalem, to present him to the Lord:

Your church Father, Jerome, didn't believe you or your pope either...This is what he wrote for your church...

You people really think you can change YOUR traditions over time and it will affect the Holy Word of God???

You have made the word of God of none effect for Catholics, but it doesn't mean a thing to Christians who have a one on one personal relationship with the God who wrote the words in the Bible...

God says Mary had to get purified regardless of what your modern religion claims...That's the end of the conversation...Anything else is jibberish...

341 posted on 10/12/2007 5:32:05 AM PDT by Iscool (REMEMBER all mushrooms are edible, some of them only once!)
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To: stfassisi
Nuptials on the cross

You guys really need to cut that apocryphal pseudoepigraphical Protoevangelium of James out of your required reading list, along with the works of those church fathers who had been taken in by it.

342 posted on 10/12/2007 6:17:51 AM PDT by Uncle Chip (TRUTH : Ignore it. Deride it. Allegorize it. Interpret it. But you can't ESCAPE it.)
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To: Uncle Chip; DallasMike; blue-duncan; stfassisi; Iscool

Mary’s sin offering (Luk 2:22), is like Jesus being circumcised, baptised and celebrating Passover: submitting to the law because it is the fitting thing to do.


343 posted on 10/12/2007 6:26:01 AM PDT by NYer ("Where the bishop is present, there is the Catholic Church" - Ignatius of Antioch)
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To: NYer; Iscool
Mary’s sin offering (Luk 2:22), is like Jesus being circumcised, baptised and celebrating Passover: submitting to the law because it is the fitting thing to do.

But not exactly, right? Circumcision was the seal of the Abrahamic Covenant requiring no sin offering. Passover was a remembrance dinner of a one time event that happened in Egypt, not a sin offering. Baptism was not required by the Law, and while everyone else was baptized as sinners, Jesus was baptized as the Lamb that would be those sinners' sin offering.

There was only one sin offering that Jesus offered and that was Himself at the cross of Calvary and not for Himself but for everyone else, including His mother. The sin offering that Mary offered at her purification was for herself and herself alone and no one else -- for purification from the curse of sin that she carried in her blood like every other Jewish mother.

344 posted on 10/12/2007 7:23:09 AM PDT by Uncle Chip (TRUTH : Ignore it. Deride it. Allegorize it. Interpret it. But you can't ESCAPE it.)
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To: Uncle Chip
The sin offering that Mary offered at her purification was for herself and herself alone and no one else -- for purification from the curse of sin that she carried in her blood like every other Jewish mother.

I will repeat. The Virgin Mary observed this Law not because She believed Herself to be defiled by giving birth to Christ, but to give an example of humility and obedience by fulfilling all outward observances. For the Virgin Mary was not subject to this particular law by virtue of what God Himself had laid down in prefacing it: "If a woman having received seed shall bear a man child, she shall be unclean seven days..." (v. 2 [Douai]). The conception and birth of Christ was not due to the reception of male seed but rather to the power of the Holy Spirit. In no way can it be claimed that in conceiving, bearing and delivering Christ the Virgin Mary was made "unclean."

She did it out of respect for the law ... period ... end of the discussion.

345 posted on 10/12/2007 10:19:59 AM PDT by NYer ("Where the bishop is present, there is the Catholic Church" - Ignatius of Antioch)
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To: Uncle Chip; NYer; Dr. Eckleburg; suzyjaruki
How you guys can take one word and stretch it to mean so many things at one time that it never meant is beyond the realm of even Humpty Dumpty and the Twilight Zone.

How else could they come up with such wonky reinventions such as 'less gifted'?

346 posted on 10/12/2007 10:35:09 AM PDT by Athena1
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To: NYer; suzyjaruki; Dr. Eckleburg
Let's clarify, first of all, the meaning of "immaculate conception'. It means that Mary, whose conception was brought about the normal way, was conceived without original sin or its stain—that’s what "immaculate" means: without stain. The essence of original sin consists in the deprivation of sanctifying grace, and its stain is a corrupt nature. Mary was preserved from these defects by God’s grace; from the first instant of her existence she was in the state of sanctifying grace and was free from the corrupt nature original sin brings.

The clarification is that Christ IS THE Imaculate Conception, not Mary. She was 'full of Grace' meaning full of the spirit of God Himself. She had been predestined for this role as The mother of God begotten of the Spirit of God. Again, the seed of Original Sin IS transferred by way of sexual conception from the man. Mary's father gave her original sin...Mary was in need of Christ as are all men born of Original Sin. Christ was the ONLY second Adam, born or begotten without sin. The bible makes this very clear. The bible also makes very clear that we are to pray through and to him alone. Where in the bible does it tell us to pray through or to anyone else? Please answer with a scripture reference so I can read it.

Thank you, Athena

347 posted on 10/12/2007 10:56:01 AM PDT by Athena1
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To: Athena1
The clarification is that Christ IS THE Immaculate Conception, not Mary. She was 'full of Grace' meaning full of the spirit of God Himself. She had been predestined for this role as The mother of God begotten of the Spirit of God.

Amen!

When we have what could be seen as different interpretations, we should always chose the answer that...

1) does not contradict Scripture, and

2) glorifies God most clearly.

Falling down to the stock of a tree, regardless of which human being that tree has been chiseled to resemble, is still and always glorifying the creature and not the Creator.

No small error.

348 posted on 10/12/2007 11:02:30 AM PDT by Dr. Eckleburg ("I don't think they want my respect; I think they want my submission." - Flemming Rose)
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To: Uncle Chip; Athena1
If the RCC and OC are going to stretch this Greek word to mean: "immaculately conceived without sin" for Mary, then it must also be stretched to mean the same thing for the Church at Ephesus. All the people in the Church at Ephesus, by your Humpty Dumpty linguistics, must have therefore also been "immaculately conceived without sin" as well. Were they all therefore also Perpetual Virgins, Assumed into Heaven, and Co-Redemptrixes. It sure must be getting busy up there in that Co-Redemptrix chair.

AMEN! Exactly!

Correcting the RCC's "Greek references" is a job in itself.

How much clearer are the admonitions against idolatry? Against falling down to the stock of a tree? Against silver and gold idols made with the hands of men?

"For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus" -- 1 Timothy 2:5

In English, Greek, Latin, Portuguese or Braille, that one line contains more truth than all the errors of mariology put together.

349 posted on 10/12/2007 11:11:47 AM PDT by Dr. Eckleburg ("I don't think they want my respect; I think they want my submission." - Flemming Rose)
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To: Athena1; suzyjaruki; Dr. Eckleburg
She was 'full of Grace' meaning full of the spirit of God Himself.

The basis for the belief in the Immaculate Conception of Mary can be found in the Biblical revelation of holiness and the opposite of that state, sinfulness.

God is revealed as perfect interior holiness.

Is 6:3
"Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts!" they (the Seraphim) cried one to the other.

No sin or anything tainted with sin can stand in the face of the holiness of God. "Enmity" is that mutual hatred between Mary and sin, between Christ and sin.

Gen 3:15
I will put enmity between you (the serpent, Satan) and the woman (Mary), and between your offspring (minions of Satan) and hers (Jesus); He will strike at your head, while you strike at his heel.

For the birth of God as a human being, God was interested in the condition of the mother's womb. For even a great, but imperfect, judge of Israel, Samson, God was directive about the state of the mother during the pregnancy. The request for the mother to be pure is repeated for emphasis.

Judges 13:3-4
An angel of the LORD appeared to the woman and said to her, "Though you are barren and have had no children, yet you will conceive and bear a son. Now, then, be careful to take no wine or strong drink and to eat nothing unclean."
Judges 13:7
"But he (the angel) said to me, 'You will be with child and will bear a son. So take neither wine nor strong drink, and eat nothing unclean. For the boy shall be consecrated to God from the womb, until the day of his death.' "
Judges 13:13-14
The angel of the LORD answered Manoah, "Your wife is to abstain from all the things of which I spoke to her. She must not eat anything that comes from the vine, nor take wine or strong drink, nor eat anything unclean. Let her observe all that I have commanded her."

How much more would God be interested in the state of His own mother's womb!

The salutation of the Angel Gabriel is different from the usual angelic greeting. It indicates that Mary was exceptionally "highly favored with grace" (Greek: charitoo, used twice in the New Testament, in Lk 1:28 for Mary - before Christ's redemption; and Eph 1:6 for Christ's grace to us - after Christ's redemption).

Lk 1:28
And coming to her (Mary), he (the angel Gabriel) said, "Hail, favored one (kecharitomene)"
Eph 1:4-6
(God) chose us in him (Jesus), before the foundation of the world, to be holy and without blemish before him. In love he destined us for adoption to himself through Jesus Christ, in accord with the favor of his will, for the praise of the glory of his grace (echaritosen) that he granted us in the beloved.

Note that the angel's salutation preceded Mary's acquiescence. Mary was already highly favored. God's grace was not given in time after Mary accepted the angel's word. The Church believes that this grace was given from the very beginning of Mary's life. It is clearly grace because at the time of Mary's conception she could have done nothing to earn it.

Why is this so difficult for you to understand?

350 posted on 10/12/2007 11:44:18 AM PDT by NYer ("Where the bishop is present, there is the Catholic Church" - Ignatius of Antioch)
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To: NYer
Dear Nyer.... and anyone with ears to hear

Our separated brothers and sisters don’t seem to realize that original or any sin in The Blessed Virgin Mary brings dishonor to Christ.

Original Sin resulted in the subjection of fallen man to sin, death, and Satan. The Early Christians understood that the Blessed Virgin could never, even for an instant,have been subject to sin and the power of the devil because she was to be united with Christ. This should make perfect sense to any Christian.Typology bears this out.Mary is greater than Adam and Eve without a doubt.

The Blessed Ever-Virgin Mary was “preserved from all stain of original sin” and this in her very conception as a human person. This was an utterly unique privilege granted her by her Redeemer Son since she was to be the All-Holy Mother of her All-Holy Divine Son. It was Christ Himself who chose her to be His Mother and chose to grant her this privilege of exemption from the stain of It is important to realize that Mary was not cleansed from the contracted stain of Original Sin as are all others needing to be cleansed and purified by the waters of Baptism (the sacrament instituted by Christ to remove the stain or guilt of original sin). She was rather PRESERVED from all stain of original sin at her creation so that she would be a “New Creation”, the “New Eve” who could and would cooperate synergistically with her Divine Son in both the Redemption of the human race, and in the Salvation of the human race from Sin.

The Blessed Virgin Mary cooperated in the Redemption and Salvation of mankind - as manifestations of Synergism. However, in her being preserved from original sin by a singular act of Christ the Redeemer, this involved no cooperation by the Blessed Virgin because there could be no “Yes” on her part as in her consent to the Incarnation at the Annunciation. There was no Synergism in the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin because she did not yet exist to give consent to the Redeemer’s preserving her from the stain of original sin.
The Blessed Mother is rightly termed Coredemptrix because of her unique participation in the redemptive work of her Divine Son. One cannot ignore the the rich biblical themes and import of her being the “Woman” of Genesis, the “Woman” at Cana, the “Woman” at the Foot of the Cross, and the “Woman” of the Apocalypse. No other creature was completely united with Christ in the Holy Spirit and no member of the Church cooperated fully with Christ in His work of Redemption and in the salvation of the human race for which she continually intercedes as our Mother in the order of supernatural grace.

I wish you a Blessed weekend!

351 posted on 10/12/2007 12:18:54 PM PDT by stfassisi ("Above all gifts that Christ gives his beloved is that of overcoming self"St Francis Assisi)
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To: NYer; Athena1; suzyjaruki; Uncle Chip
Your entire post is founded on an error...

No sin or anything tainted with sin can stand in the face of the holiness of God

Does the Holy Spirit indwell you? Have you stopped committing all sin in your life? Are you sinless today, or have you been forgiven of today's, yesterday's and tomorrow's sins through Christ on the cross?

"Even the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his saints:

To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you, the hope of glory" -- Colossians 1:26-27

Mary was a human being, a sinner in need of a Savior just like the rest of us. She was graced by God to be the human means for Christ's physical birth.

And once Christ was born, she had "Christ within her" in exactly the same manner you and I and all Christians have, by the grace of God alone.

Fini.

352 posted on 10/12/2007 12:27:18 PM PDT by Dr. Eckleburg ("I don't think they want my respect; I think they want my submission." - Flemming Rose)
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To: Dr. Eckleburg
They have to believe in Mary's immaculate birth, her bodily assumption into heaven, her salvation of souls and all the rest of it, as declared in the old tradition of 1950 Munificentissimus Deus by pope Pius XII:, or be labeled heretics and kicked out of the Catholic church. Believe the Pope, not God. Hmmm, the pope or God? the Pope or God? What part of this do you not understand, lol
353 posted on 10/12/2007 12:37:43 PM PDT by 1000 silverlings
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To: NYer
Why is this so difficult for you to understand?

Because you make extreme, unbiblical leaps of logic. Sorry to be so blunt. Just because Mary was highly-favored does not mean that she was born without sin.

The Bible clearly says that Jesus had brothers and sisters, as does the historian Josephus, yet you let your preconceived notions of Mary lead you to pretend that what the Bible clearly states is not true. Matthew 12:46, Luke 8:19, and Mark 3:31 say that Jesus’ mother and brothers came to see Him. The Bible even gives names to the four brothers of Jesus: James, Joseph, Simon, and Judas (Matthew 13:55). The Bible also tells us that Jesus had sisters, but do not give names or numbers (Matthew 13:56). Luke 2:7 says that Mary gave birth to her firstborn son. If I were an only child, my parents would not call me their firstborn. Yes, I am very aware that Jesus is described as the "firstborn" in other ways as well, but Luke specifically describes Jesus as Mary's firstborn son. In John 7:1-10, His brothers go on to the festival while Jesus stays behind. In Acts 1:14, His brothers and mother are described as praying with the disciples. Later, in Galatians 1:19, it mentions that James was Jesus’ brother.

The scholar Josephus, who wrote in the first century, says this:

Festus was now dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the sanhedrin of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ [or, in some versions, the so-called Christ], whose name was James, and some others, [or, some of his companions]; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned...

You ignore what the Bible plainly says but read all sorts of things that aren't there into other parts of the Bible.

Why are the plain words of the Bible so difficult for you to understand?


354 posted on 10/12/2007 12:47:17 PM PDT by DallasMike
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To: DallasMike; Dr. Eckleburg
Pope Pius xii in 1950,declared Mary was conceived without sin,and reading the proclamation it appears that she did it on her own too, as well as maintained her virginity in spite of being pregnant. He also declared that her body went with her soul into heaven and the 4-fold "curse of Eve" was never upon her. She became Christ's mother through her own merits.

The Pope states that these ideas had been floating around in Catholics minds for so long that they must be true, and apparently a poll was taken and everybody voted unanimously that it was all true. All agreed raised their hands and any dissenting could get the heck out, meeting adjourned.

355 posted on 10/12/2007 12:55:25 PM PDT by 1000 silverlings
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To: 1000 silverlings; DallasMike; Athena1; suzyjaruki; Uncle Chip; HarleyD; Forest Keeper; wmfights; ...
Pope Pius xii in 1950,declared Mary was conceived without sin,and reading the proclamation it appears that she did it on her own too, as well as maintained her virginity in spite of being pregnant. He also declared that her body went with her soul into heaven and the 4-fold "curse of Eve" was never upon her. She became Christ's mother through her own merits.

The Pope states that these ideas had been floating around in Catholics minds for so long that they must be true, and apparently a poll was taken and everybody voted unanimously that it was all true. All agreed raised their hands and any dissenting could get the heck out, meeting adjourned.

You just know there are men sitting around a table in a dark room somewhere saying, "If they believe this, they'll believe anything."

356 posted on 10/12/2007 1:08:37 PM PDT by Dr. Eckleburg ("I don't think they want my respect; I think they want my submission." - Flemming Rose)
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To: Dr. Eckleburg; DallasMike; xzins; Quix
Seriously, can you imagine a pastor of a Protestant church, finding, say a black Mayan statue of a child in a lake, would say "Oh look I've found the Baby Jesus,let's build it a shrine!"

Not only would we think him daft, we'd all leave his church and go somewhere else, and when he excommunicated us, we'd laugh or get him help.

357 posted on 10/12/2007 1:15:45 PM PDT by 1000 silverlings
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To: 1000 silverlings
Not only would we think him daft, we'd all leave his church and go somewhere else.

LOL. In these parts, he'd be the one to leave. 8~)

358 posted on 10/12/2007 1:21:53 PM PDT by Dr. Eckleburg ("I don't think they want my respect; I think they want my submission." - Flemming Rose)
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To: Dr. Eckleburg; stfassisi; Athena1; suzyjaruki; Uncle Chip
Mary was a human being, a sinner in need of a Savior just like the rest of us.

Like all other descendants of Adam, she was subject to the necessity of contracting original sin. But by a special intervention of God, undertaken at the instant she was conceived, she was preserved from the stain of original sin and its consequences. She was therefore redeemed by the grace of Christ, but in a special way—by anticipation. The essence of original sin consists in the deprivation of sanctifying grace, and its stain is a corrupt nature. Mary was preserved from these defects by God’s grace; from the first instant of her existence she was in the state of sanctifying grace and was free from the corrupt nature original sin brings. Hence, the angel's greeting: "Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you" (Luke 1:28).

359 posted on 10/12/2007 1:48:58 PM PDT by NYer ("Where the bishop is present, there is the Catholic Church" - Ignatius of Antioch)
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To: NYer
But by a special intervention of God, undertaken at the instant she was conceived, she was preserved from the stain of original sin and its consequences. She was therefore redeemed by the grace of Christ, but in a special way—by anticipation.

May God give you eyes to see the fiction of this statement and the heresy within it which has NO Scriptural support, although there are plenty of admonitions against such errors.

360 posted on 10/12/2007 1:55:00 PM PDT by Dr. Eckleburg ("I don't think they want my respect; I think they want my submission." - Flemming Rose)
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