As for sources older than the gospel of James, the great difficulty is that the persecution of Christians during the early Christian era leaves us with relatively few documents. However, Jerome for instance cites as his authority for the perpetual virginity of Mary, Ignatius who, in context, appears to refer to the 1st century bishop of Antioch, who reigned even during the lifetime of John the disciple. he also cites a number of other extremely ancient Church Fathers as his source. While we don’t have the writings that he cites, how could anyone in his day have taken him seriously where are they not well known?
As a matter of proper citation Jerome misses the mark and leaves us guessing as to what quality and how germane his sources are in regard to the alleged perpetual virginity of Mary.
He doesn’t even pass the FR Poster test. How would it go here if someone posted, “and a bunch of early Christian writers agree with me that the ark was painted blue, so I’m really right about that?” Would you take that poster seriously? Now let’s up the ante: “You have to believe the ark was painted blue or you are denying the faith.”
Hmmmm ...
Nope, sorry, not good enough. Which is why this is not really about ancient sources at all. This is about whether one has made an a priori commitment to Roman Catholic epistemology, and that’s getting the chariot in front of the horse, and we all know how unstable rear-hoof drive is. :)
Peace,
SR