Posted on 08/17/2015 6:07:35 PM PDT by NKP_Vet
It is that time of week again, where we talk about the Mary, the Mother of God. This is definitely the single most important title that Mary has. If someone gets this wrong, then they get the Divinity of our Lord wrong, and that means the whole plan of Salvation is just messed up. So let us look at this most important title.
Theotokos, God-bearer in Greek, is what the council of Ephesus declared in 431. It specifically says this “If anyone does not confess that God is truly Emmanuel, and that on this account the Holy Virgin is the Mother of God (for according to the flesh she gave birth to the Word of God become flesh by birth), let him be anathema.” Now just that statement alone proves the early Church believed that there was Authority given to the bishops to decide sound doctrine, Mary was a Holy Virgin her entire life, and that She bore God. However, we only have time for one today.
Now many times we will hear non-Catholics tell us that this title is nowhere found in Scripture, explicitly at least. However, they cannot themselves find a Scripture verse that says that all doctrine and dogma must be explicitly proven in Scripture. I bet they can never find that. This is a trap they set up for themselves and it is a very unfair double standard that they expect us to meet, but they do not have to. However, on top of this double standard is if we used that same standard, then the doctrine of the Trinity is thrown out, since it’s not an explicit teaching, but instead is implicit in Scripture. This double standard seems to cause more problems that it’s worth wouldn’t you say?
Here is the cold hard truth of it though, all Christians rely on some Church Tradition, as well as Scripture, to validate their doctrines, whether they admit it or not. With that being said, Scripture and Tradition can never contradict one another. The Traditions of men can contradict the Word of God, but the Traditions God left us, through Christ, in the Holy Spirit, are binding upon us, as we are to hold fast to Traditions. So then, what is the real question? The real question is, Does Scripture contradict the teaching that Mary is the Mother of God, and is that doctrine found in Scripture at least implicitly?
Let us begin with Luke 1:43, where Mary visited Elizabeth. There Elizabeth exclaimed “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb! And why is this granted me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” Because Mary was the Mother of the Lord, who is the Second part of the Holy Trinity, Mary is truly and rightfully called the Mother of God.
We also see in Isaiah 7:14 “Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call His name Emmanuel, which is interpreted God with us.” Jesus is God. He was God when He was in the womb, conceived, lived, died, buried, resurrected, in the Eucharist, and in Heaven. The Messiah, who is God, was to be born of a virgin, according to Scripture. God was born of a virgin, and it’s right there in Isaiah, who prophesied of Christ birth. That means both Old and New Testament support the Catholic Doctrine of the Mother of God.
However, this may not be enough for some non-Catholics. Some say that Elisabeth called Christ Lord, and not God, saying that Mary was only to give birth to the human child, the Lord Jesus Christ. So then the question becomes, does lord here mean divinity or just authority? Let’s look at the context.
First let us look at 1 Cor. 8:5, which states “Indeed there are many gods and many lords, yet to us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things, and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.” St. Paul makes it clear that Jesus is the one True, Lord, as opposed to all the false ones, that the pagans who converted in Corinth were probably worshiping. So then, they would understand that Jesus is God. This holds true to the Jews who converted too, who would know Deut. 6:4 “Hear, therefore, o Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord.”
So then that brings us back to Luke 1:43. Elizabeth calls Mary the mother of her Lord. The Mother…Mothers give birth to persons, not natures, let us remember that. Mary did not just give birth to the human nature of Christ, she gave birth to the person of Christ. Christ personhood is Divine, it is God the Son.
Then let us look at 2 Sam. 6:9 where the King, who was David says “How can the ark of the Lord come to me (being the ark of the covenant)” Then in 2 Samuel 616 we see King David leaping in the presence of the Ark, just as John the Baptist did. Then we yet again see another parallel, which says that the ark of the Lord abode in the house of Obededom the Gethite for three months (2 Sam. 6:11), and according to Luke 1:56 Mary remained in the house of Elizabeth about three months. Then, we see that the ark of the covenant carried three items, manna, the Ten Commandments, and Aaron’s rod. These are all types of things Christ are, the Bread of Life, Word made Flesh, and our true High Priest.
Even knowing all this though, there are still those who would deny that Mary is the Mother of God. So then we have to ask, who is Jesus Christ to them? If Mary is not the Mother of God, then who did she give birth to? Many would say it was an earthly human lord, not God. So then, what does that make Christ? If Mary did not give birth to God, then who did she give birth to? Was not Christ God when He was conceived?
If someone says Mary only gave birth to the person of Christ one of two errors, or both could happen, and that is the Denial of the divinity of Christ, and that one would have to say Christ is two distinct persons, and that he is not One. Both were considered heresy in the Early Church. Christ is one Person, with two natures, Divine and Human, which go together and are not separate of one another. If one denies that, the ultimately they are speaking about a different Christ, and St. Paul warns us about that problem, and to not to give heed to them (2 Cor. 11:4).
So then, some say that Mary is the mother of the Trinity if we take it that far, however, this is not true. Mary gave birth to the 2nd part of the Trinity, the 2nd Person, who is still God just not the Trinity. However, we must never forget that each Person in the Trinity shares the same Divine Nature and is fully God.
One thing some still point out is that Christ is eternal, so for Mary to be the Mother of God she would have to be God. However the Church does not say Mary is the source of the Divine Nature of the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity. To better understand this let’s look at humanity. Parents give birth to a person, however they are not the author of life, and certainly did not give the child it’s soul. Thus is true with Mary, she did not give Christ His Divine Nature, though she was the Mother of more than just the human form of Christ, because she gave birth to a person, who was God.
Then Jesus arrived from Galilee at the Jordan coming to John, to be baptized by him. 14But John tried to prevent Him, saying, “I have need to be baptized by You, and do You come to me?” 15But Jesus answering said to him, “Permit it at this time; for in this way it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he permitted Him. 16After being baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove and lighting on Him, 17and behold, a voice out of the heavens said, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased.”
Nothing in this passage indicates Jesus was in need of redemption.
The verse in Leviticus does say the offering brought by Mary and Joseph was a sin offering.
Leviticus 12:8
‘But if she cannot afford a lamb, then she shall take two turtledoves or two young pigeons, the one for a burnt offering and the other for a sin offering; and the priest shall make atonement for her, and she will be clean.’”
No, pigeon man, YOU are trying to discuss the half-baked syllogisms.
This is what you learned in seminary???
And that confusion is precisely why these catholic apologists keep trying to force all of us to conform to the specious title catholiciism has draped upon the Mother of Jesus.
The problem underlying all these notions is when the Diety of The Trinity entered Jesus. It should surprise no one that the same religion which claims its priests bring Jesus Christ down from Heaven at EVERY MASS, to be sacrificed continually on the catholic altar and eaten by the adherents to that religion, eating the body, blood, soul, and DIVINITY of Jesus in every mass their earthy priests conduct. It matters not a whit to these adherent apologists that the Bible gives not one verse to tell us when God came to occupy the body He prepared for His advent to be God with us.
We have clear passages which tell us Jesus IS God with us, such as the teaching Jesus gave to the disciples in John 14, and specifically to Philip. But we have not one verse which tells us when The God of the Universe took up residence in the body He prepared for Himself in Mary's willing womb. Yet these of this catholic religion insist Mary, a created being is 'the mother of God, as if from the first moment, with the body God prepared for Himself to occupy, Mary was superior to one third of the Trinity because she was gestating Jesus in her womb. If she were the Mother of God, she would be gestating all three of the ONE GOD, but she was not. She was gestating the body of her son Jesus, who we know later as The Son of God, as spoken BY GOD when He inspired the writing of 'Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee ... and that wasn't said by the Angel when the Angel visited Mary and she conceived in her womb.
Arthur, still using that false syllogism? That was discredited some time ago. It suffers from an inappropriate distribution of the middle term. As redleghunter points out, a fireman is a different kind of thing than the triune God. To distribute the middle term correctly, you would need to treat the term “god” the same way you treat fireman, like this:
Martha is the mother of Sam
Sam is a god
Therefore Martha is the mother of a god
Which of course would also be false, but not because of structure, only because one of the premises is false.
But the structural falsity is a more powerful and therefore a more dangerous error, because it is harder to detect than a blatantly false premise. For example, tell me what’s wrong with the following logic:
“I’m the most responsible person around here, because it seems I’m responsible for everything that’s going wrong.”
We recognize this as a joke, but only because we spot that the word “responsible” shifted meaning between its first use and its second. That is what an undistributed middle term is, a term that shifts meaning from one premise to the next. It invalidates the syllogism.
Remember that theotokus was never designed to be primarily about Mary. It was the burden of Chalcedon to affirm against heresy that Jesus did not acquire the divine nature at some later time, but had it from the womb. And in this we agree. It is unfortunate that Marian factionalism has hijacked the term, and even more unfortunate that it was so vulnerable to being hijacked, because the truth it was originally meant to express is sound enough. But the words of man tend to froth and error, whereas the word of God is the best and most helpful expression of God’s truth.
Peace,
SR
I doubt that that had to be taught in the seminary.
That simple logic has and is taught in most elementary classrooms: math classrooms.
If A=B, and B=C: A=C.
Most all kids get it. But there are some who just don’t get it.
I’ll stick with agreeing with the Holy Spirit in what He inspired in Scripture: *Mary, the mother of Jesus*.
That way, I KNOW I can’t be wrong.
As you wish.
I have noticed that many of the non-Catholics resort to name calling and go on the defensive when confronted with issues they can’t answer. I find that very interesting.
Your error is in ASSUMING that at any point, I was making reference to the Triune God. Not one of my syllogisms used the term “God” in the sense of “the Trinity.”
ALL the objections to the title “Mother of God” are based on the assumption that “God” always refers to the Triune God, i.e., the Trinity.
Mary is the mother of Jesus.
Jesus is the incarnate Second Person of the Trinity.
Mary is the mother of the incarnate Second Person of the Trinity.
That is what is meant by saying that Mary is the “Mother of God.” It is what has ALWAYS been meant by saying that Mary is the “Mother of God.”
No Catholic has ever said that Mary is the mother, or the origin, or the Trinity.
Therefore: The objection that Mary is NOT the mother of the Trinity is NOT an objection to anything that any Catholic has ever said or believed.
You will also note ( by reading beyond the first sentence) that there is scriptural proof.
Please remember that Catholics are not naïve enough to believe in the man made myth of Sola Scriptura.
Real answer: Because She is.
I knew that was coming, but that prognosis is as they say, "intellectually dishonest" for a variety of reasons.
The problem is, that you are by way of open-ended innuendo, appearing to be attributing some dark, or ill-motive (which automatically leads to yet something else yet further) to my refusal to go along with the line of questioning as you presented it, which is the same line of questioning you have been presenting in serial fashion to other persons here.
I inquired of you as to your own motive for doing so, when uninvited you directed that same to me.
I asked you ---- where are you going with this?
Yet you did not address that pre-condition, the price I had set before you, as what would be required from you in form of good-faith payment before I answered the questions as presented, and presented in context of this thread.
At this point I owe you nothing. Nor can anything much be made of my present resistance to your line of questioning, for I do have just cause & reasons for being suspicious of your own motives.
Your here last comment towards me, is as like the man with the 'Free Candy' van telling a child who avoids him, that he (the child) is a bad kid, doing so while hollering out to the neighborhood, "See!?!" , "I knew you were one of the bad kids around here!" trying to get the neighborhood to look at "the bad kid".
I have already, far too many times to count, "publicly affirmed" that which you sought after, even using words to that same (limited) effect in the comment to which you addressed the query.
My only failure here, was refusal to dance to your own tune, upon command.
Now it's your turn.
Where were you intending to go with your line of questioning, next?
That you've been unwilling to divulge that, tells us all we would need to know? Or does it not, since everyone must still guess at it, virtually forcing everyone else who is paying any attention and would have any interest in the where that line of questioning is going, to engage in form of mind-reading.
I invite you to go work out whatever inner conflicts you may have, and need to prove whatever it is you think you may be proving, upon somebody else, and somewhere else than on the pages of religion forum of FreeRepublic.
We have far too much of that sort of useless nonsense here on this forum already.
The salutation of the angel Gabriel -- chaire kecharitomene , Hail, full of grace ( Luke 1:28 ) indicates a unique abundance of grace, a supernatural, godlike state of soul (these comments are mine: that catholics believe this is scary and explains a lot of the basis for their elevation of Mary to what she is not accorded in the Word), which finds its explanation only in the Immaculate Conception of Mary. But the term kecharitomene (full of grace ) serves only as an illustration, not as a proof of the dogma.
(The Vulgate has mistranslated the passage in Luke 1:28 regarding "full of grace". The major translations agree on this. Comments mine)
From the texts Proverbs 8 and Ecclesiasticus 24 (which exalt the Wisdom of God and which in the liturgy are applied to Mary, the most beautiful work of God's Wisdom), or from the Canticle of Canticles ( 4:7 , "Thou art all fair, O my love, and there is not a spot in thee"), no theological conclusion can be drawn. These passages, applied to the Mother of God , may be readily understood by those who know the privilege of Mary, but do not avail to prove the doctrine dogmatically, and are therefore omitted from the Constitution "Ineffabilis Deus".
You've got nothing from the Word to substantiate the catholic claim on this.
Gee, thanks for the in-depth answer.
The little word of *a* makes your whole argument meaningless.
Dorothy is the mother of Sam.
Sam is a fireman.
Dorothy is the mother of a fireman.
This would be more comparable.
Mary is the mother of Jesus.
Jesus is *a* god.
Mary is the mother of *a* god.
According to who?
Not God because HE never uses that term to identify her.
That’s very desperate on your part. And pathetic. Your little suggestion changes the meanings of the propositions, but it absolutely does not touch upon the VALIDITY of the syllogism.
You don’t seem to know what the science of Logic is actually about.
Mary is the mother of Jesus.
Jesus is God, i.e., the incarnate Word, i.e., the Second Person of the Trinity.
Mary is the mother of God, i.e., the incarnate Word, i.e., the Second Person of the Trinity.
Mary is the mother of Jesus. As with all mothers and children, whatever the child IS, the mother is the mother of THAT. I.e., if the child is a pianist, and blond, and a Methodist, his mother is the mother of a blond, and the mother of a Methodist, and the mother of a pianist.
Jesus is a man, who is Jewish, who is God. Thus, Mary is the mother of a man, and the mother of a Jew, and the mother of God.
I agree 100%
Do the two of you deny Jesus Christ is God?
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