Mary Matters (Dr. Walter Martin on disbelief in the Mother of God)

Catholic Exchange ^ | JULY 26, 2014 | Tim Staples

[NYer]

In my new book, Behold Your Mother: A Biblical and Historical Defense of the Marian Doctrines, , I spend most of its pages in classic apologetic defense of Mary as Mother of God, defending her immaculate conception, perpetual virginity, assumption into heaven, her Queenship, and her role in God’s plan of salvation as Co-redemptrix and Mediatrix. But perhaps my most important contributions in the book may well be how I demonstrate each of these doctrines to be crucial for our spiritual lives and even our salvation.

And I should note that this applies to all of the Marian doctrines. Not only Protestants, but many Catholics will be surprised to see how the Perpetual Virginity of Mary, for example, is crucial for all Christians to understand lest they misapprehend the truth concerning the sacred, marriage, sacraments, the consecrated life, and more.

I won’t attempt to re-produce the entire book in this post, but I will choose one example among examples I use to demonstrate why Mary as Mother of God not only matters, but how denying this dogma of the Faith can end in the loss of understanding of “the one true God and Jesus Christ whom [God] has sent” (John 17:3). It doesn’t get any more serious than that!  

In my book, I use the teaching of the late, well-known, and beloved Protestant Apologist, Dr. Walter Martin, as one of my examples. In his classic apologetics work, Kingdom of the Cults, Dr. Martin, gives us keen insight into why the dogma of the Theotokos (“God-bearer,” a synonym with “Mother of God”) is such a “big deal.” But first some background information.

 Truth and Consequences

It is very easy to state what it is that you don’t believe. That has been the history of Protestantism. Protestantism itself began as a… you guessed it… “protest.” “We are against this, this, this, and this.” It was a “protest” against Catholicism. However, the movement could not continue to exist as a protestant against something. It had to stand for something. And that is when the trouble began. When groups of non-infallible men attempted to agree, the result ended up being the thousands of Protestant sects we see today.

Dr. Walter Martin was a good Protestant. He certainly and boldly proclaimed, “I do not believe Mary is the Mother of God.” That’s fine and good. The hard part came when he had to build a theology congruent with his denial. With Dr. Martin, it is difficult to know for sure whether his bad Christology came before or after his bad Mariology—I argue it was probably bad Christology that came first—but let’s just say for now that in the process of theologizing about both Jesus and Mary, he ended up claiming Mary was “the mother of Jesus’ body,” and not the Mother of God. He claimed Mary “gave Jesus his human nature alone,” so that we cannot say she is the Mother of God; she is the mother of the man, Jesus Christ.

This radical division of humanity and divinity manifests itself in various ways in Dr. Martin’s theology. He claimed, for example, that “sonship” in Christ has nothing at all to do with God in his eternal relations within the Blessed Trinity. In Martin’s Christology, divinity and humanity are so sharply divided that he concluded “eternal sonship” to be an unbiblical Catholic invention. On page 103 of his 1977 edition of The Kingdom of the Cults, he wrote:

[T]here cannot be any such thing as eternal Sonship, for there is a logical contradiction of terminology due to the fact that the word “Son” predicates time and the involvement of creativity. Christ, the Scripture tells us, as the Logos, is timeless, “…the Word was in the beginning” not the Son!

From Martin’s perspective then, Mary as “Mother of God” is a non-starter. If “Son of God” refers to Christ as the eternal son, then there would be no denying that Mary is the mother of the Son of God, who is God; hence, Mother of God would be an inescapable conclusion. But if sonship only applies to “time and creativity,” then references to Mary’s “son” would not refer to divinity at all.

But there is just a little problem here. Beyond the fact that you don’t even need the term “Son” at all to determine Mary is the Mother God because John 1:14 tells us “the Word was made flesh,” and John 1:1 tells us “the Word was God;” thus, Mary is the mother of the Word and so she is the Mother of God anyway, the sad fact is that in the process of Martin’s theologizing he ended up losing the real Jesus. Notice, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity is no longer the Eternal Son! And it gets worse from here, if that is possible! Martin would go on:

The term “Son” itself is a functional term, as is the term “Father” and has no meaning apart from time. The term “Father” incidentally never carries the descriptive adjective “eternal” in Scripture; as a matter of fact, only the Spirit is called eternal (“the eternal Spirit”—Hebrews 9:14), emphasizing the fact that the words Father and Son are purely functional as previously stated.

It would be difficult to overstate the importance of what we are saying here. Jesus revealed to us the essential truth that God exists eternally as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in his inner life. For Martin, God would be father by analogy in relation to the humanity of Christ, but not in the eternal divine relations; hence, he is not the eternal Father. So, not only did Dr. Martin end up losing Jesus, the eternal Son; he lost the Father as well! This compels us to ask the question: Who then is God, the Blessed Trinity, in eternity, according to Dr. Walter Martin and all those who agree with his theology? He is not Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. He must be the eternal … Blah… the Word, and the Holy Spirit (Martin did teach Christ to be the Eternal Word, just not the Eternal Son). He would become a father by analogy when he created the universe and again by analogy at the incarnation of the Word and through the adoption of all Christians as “sons of God.” But he would not be the eternal Father. The metaphysical problems begin here and continue to eternity… literally. Let us now summarize Dr. Martin’s teaching and some of the problems it presents:

1. Fatherhood and Sonship would not be intrinsic to God. The Catholic Church understands that an essential aspect of Christ’s mission was to reveal God to us as he is in his inner life as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Jews already understood God to be father by analogy, but they had no knowledge of God as eternal Father in relation to the Eternal Son. In Jesus’ great high priestly prayer in John 17, he declared his Father was Father “before the world was made” and thus, to quote CCC 239, in “an unheard-of sense.” In fact, Christ revealed God’s name as Father. Names in Hebrew culture reveal something about the character of the one named. Thus, he reveals God to be Father, not just that he is like a father. God never becomes Father; he is the eternal Father

2. If Sonship applies only to humanity and time, the “the Son” would also be extrinsic, or outside, if you will, of the Second Divine Person of the Blessed Trinity. Thus, as much as he would have denied it, Dr. Martin effectively creates two persons to represent Christ—one divine and one human. This theology leads to the logical conclusion that the person who died on the cross 2,000 years ago would have been merely a man. If that were so, he would have no power to save us. Scripture reveals Christ as the savior, not merely a delegate of God the savior. He was fully man in order to make fitting atonement for us. He was fully God in order to have the power to save us.

3. This theology completely reduces the revelation of God in the New Covenant that separates Christianity from all religions of the world. Jesus revealed God as he is from all eternity as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Dr. Martin reduces this to mere function. Thus, “Father” does not tell us who God is, only what God does. Radical feminists do something similar when they refuse to acknowledge God as “Father.” God becomes reduced to that which he does as “Creator, Redeeemer, and Sanctifier” and int he process where is a truly tragic loss of the knowledge of who God is. In the case of Dr. Walter Martin, it was bad theology that lead to a similar loss.

4. There is a basic metaphysical principle found, for example, in Malachi 3:6, that comes into play here as well: “For I the Lord do not change.” In defense of Dr. Martin, he did seem to realize that one cannot posit change in the divine persons. As stated above, “fatherhood” and “sonship” wold not relate to divinity at all in his way of thinking. Thus, he became a proper Nestorian (though he would never have admitted that) that divides Christ into two persons. And that is bad enough. However, one must be very careful here because when one posits the first person of the Blessed Trinity became the Father, and the second person of the Blessed Trinity became the Son, it becomes very easy to slip into another heresy that would admit change into the divine persons. Later in Behold Your Mother, I employ the case of a modern Protestant apologist who regrettably takes that next step. But you’ll have to get the book to read about that one.

The bottom line here is this: It appears Dr. Walter Martin’s bad Christology led to a bad Mariology. But I argue in Behold Your Mother that if he would have understood Mary as Theotokos, it would have been impossible for him to lose his Christological bearings. The moment the thought of sonship as only applying to humanity in Christ would have arisen, a Catholic Dr. Walter Martin would have known that Mary is Mother of God. He would have lost neither the eternal Son nor the eternal Father because Theotokos would have guarded him from error. The prophetic words of Lumen Gentium 65 immediately come to mind: “Mary… unites in her person and re-echoes the most important doctrines of the faith.” A true Mariology serves as a guarantor against bad Christology.

[I-ambush]

Just hypothetically, if you were to know God did will, through His divine providence, to create a woman free of original sin, so as to be a worthy mother for his Son, what would your reaction be? Praise to God for his power? Hope that we may one day be like the woman?
Suppose that Son of the woman, as one of his last acts while dying on the cross for our sins, gave her to the members of His church to be their own mother, just as we were to be His brothers. Would you love the woman as your own mother?

[Salvation]

Mayr always directs everyone to her son: Her last words in the Bible are "Do whatever he tells you."

[metmom]

her role in God’s plan of salvation as Co-redemptrix and Mediatrix...

I'd be interested in the Scripture references, chapter and verse, where those terms are found in relation to Mary.

And here is what the Holy Spirit says about Mary.....

The Holy Spirit is clear in Scripture in calling Mary *the mother of Jesus*.

John 2:1 On the third day there was a wedding at Cana in Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there.

John 2:3 When the wine ran out, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.”

Acts 1:14 All these with one accord were devoting themselves to prayer, together with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.

[ADSUM]

Your comment: “Brilliant. I still find tremendous comfort and sustenance in the Bible today partly due to Luther.”

You may find comfort, but will you find salavation for rejecting God’s Word and the teachings of His Church?

[terycarl]

Muslims, Mormons, and many others believe in false religions also. That doesn’t make it correct.

I thought that the discussion here concerned various discrepencies WITHIN the Christian religion...who the he** cares what muslims believe???

[metmom]

Catholics know as well as anybody else that no creature can be God, because no creature is uncreated, eternal, and infinite. Catholics would have to be LITERAL low-grade morons to make an intellectual blunder like that.

Before you go off the rails at someone, you ought to know what your own CCC says about that topic.

http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p122a3p1.htm

460 The Word became flesh to make us "partakers of the divine nature":78 "For this is why the Word became man, and the Son of God became the Son of man: so that man, by entering into communion with the Word and thus receiving divine sonship, might become a son of God."79 "For the Son of God became man so that we might become God."80 "The only-begotten Son of God, wanting to make us sharers in his divinity, assumed our nature, so that he, made man, might make men gods."81

CCC 795, Christ and his Church thus together make up the "whole Christ" (Christus totus). The Church is one with Christ. The saints are acutely aware of this unity:
Let us rejoice then and give thanks that we have become not only Christians, but Christ himself. Do you understand and grasp, brethren, God's grace toward us? Marvel and rejoice: we have become Christ. For if he is the head, we are the members; he and we together are the whole man. . . . The fullness of Christ then is the head and the members. But what does "head and members" mean? Christ and the Church.230

Our redeemer has shown himself to be one person with the holy Church whom he has taken to himself.231

Head and members form as it were one and the same mystical person.232

A reply of St. Joan of Arc to her judges sums up the faith of the holy doctors and the good sense of the believer: "About Jesus Christ and the Church, I simply know they're just one thing, and we shouldn't complicate the matter."233

Looks like some low-grade morons are running the RCC and writing its catechism.

[metmom]

Catholics don’t seem to understand that we are not only saved from the consequences of the sin we choose to do, but we are saved from our sin nature as well.

When we accept Christ, that sin nature has been crucified with Him, and we no longer live but Christ lives in us. The life we live in the body we live by faith in the son of God who loved us and gave His life for us.

The new birth in a nutshell.

[metmom]

Mary sitting in the place of God on the Ark of the Covenant, St. Stanislaus Kostka, Chicago

What blasphemy!

[Gamecock]

A former Catholic who knows the RCC catechism. Wasn’t counting on that!

[Arthur McGowan]

All those references to our “becoming God” and “becoming Christ” are analogical. They mean that we PARTICIPATE in the divine nature, precisely because CHARITY is WHAT GOD IS.

All of the “transcendentals” (Being, truth, good, unity, beauty, holiness, etc.) are always used analogically. That is a rock-bottom basic for understanding any Catholic theological discourse.

None of the cited texts means that any creature literally turns into the (or an) eternal, infinite God.

[terycarl]

I suppose if your into sick jokes.

Oh please, it has been around forever and it is funny!!!

[metmom]

Even if it said "full of grace" I really don't get how there's a jump from that to Mary being sinless.

It can't be because if there's no sin, there's no need for grace.

Where sin abounds, grace much more abounds.

If there was no sin in Mary, she would not need grace, therefore couldn't be *full of grace*.

[metmom]

I am interested to learn that Protestant thought on grace does not include the implication of freedom from original and personal sin.

Grace in Scripture never indicates sinlessness.

[GeronL]

bump

[metmom]

The Holy Spirit is clear in Scripture in calling Mary *the mother of Jesus*.

John 2:1 On the third day there was a wedding at Cana in Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there.

John 2:3 When the wine ran out, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.”

Acts 1:14 All these with one accord were devoting themselves to prayer, together with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.

I'll stick with the Holy Spirit over the opinion of an anonymous internet poster about what to call Mary.

[terycarl]

Not so. He paved the way for millions to find riches in the Word of God. Brilliant. I still find tremendous comfort and sustenance in the Bible today partly due to Luther.

Yeah, right...for one thousand six hundred years Christ ignored His church....let her fall into apostasy and luckily Luther (a Catholic) came along to save the eternal church.....how lucky can we get??? and by the way, the Bible that you find comfort in was brought to you through the courtesy of the Roman Catholic Church....even if you are reading the EDITED ..KJV!

[metmom]

I am aware that many Protestant scholars study scripture in the language of origin, and that there are many and varied opinions on scripture in the multitude of Protestant sects. However, I have been told by some Protestants, including one of my teachers in high school, that only the KJV was inspired.

Add all of that to your wrong list as well.

Did anyone ever give you examples of the *many and varied* interpretations of Scripture that Protestants are supposed to have?

And some fringe groups consider the KJV inspired but they probably also believe the earth is flat.

The original Greek is inspired as well as the Hebrew, and there are plenty of online resources available to go to to look up anything you wish to investigate and find out the Greek and Hebrew word meanings.

[metmom]

It doesn't matter what you might think the sentence means or what you might WISH it means, it's what it SAYS and it SAYS....

"For the Son of God became man so that we might become God.

It is clearly stating that men are to become God.

[delchiante]

You are not dumb..

We have all been deceived.. the whole world.. christian, jew, muslim, secular humanist, atheists, etc..you name the group, they have accepted too much that just isn’t truth...

And scripture says it happens..

And when I realized, as a protestant, that I had my faith in exactly the same thing that the Mary of the catholic church pointed to, I sought to defend my ‘faith’...

And everything pointed in the direction that I just wasn’t taught Truth., I had just accepted inherited lies that people long since dead accepted and passed off as truth.

The Holy Spirit will lead us to all Truth. And I met the savior like we all do, as Jesus.,. He didn’t let me stay ‘there’..

And I didn’t know why at first... but I know why now...and why I don’t consider myself a christian anymore..

But not because my faith is gone. It has been strengthened...

I truly believe the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.. and He is coming back... and I don’t call Him Jesus anymore..

I don’t accept December 25, good friday or easter either as truth... I don’t live my life by the world’s calendar (named after a pope) anymore either.

It has opened my eyes to what sola scriptura can really be when one rejects the world and turns to His Holy Word for all instruction..

[Mark17]

I thought only the King James Version of the Bible was considered authoritative by Protestants.

I have used the KJV, NKJV, Amplified and ASV. I prefer the ASV best. Amplified is good, if you are really trying to get a deeper meaning, such as in Eph 2:8-9. Read those two verses in the Amplified.