Did the Virgin Mary...

Lifesaver · Apr 13, 2005

Mary was a virgin and remained one.

Sadly, many Protestant sects misinterpret passages about Jesus's brothers and believe they mean to sons of the Virgin Mary and St. Joseph.

What is interesting is that even Luther and, as far as I know, Calvin agreed that she was always a virgin.

Jesus's conception was a miracle; no need for sexual relation there.
And Mary, even though truly married to Joseph, did not have sex afterward.
St. Augustine, I believe, wrote extensively on the subject.

12volt_man · Apr 13, 2005

Lifesaver said:
And Mary, even though truly married to Joseph, did not have sex afterward.

So, is this a Biblical teaching?

How do you believe Jesus' siblings were concieved?

chilehed · Apr 13, 2005

TScott said:
So the Immaculate Conception does not refer to Jesus' birth, but to Mary herself. That she was conceived without sin, full of grace, among all women to become the mother of Jesus.

That is correct.

12volt_man said:
So, is this a Biblical teaching??

Yes, in that it is not inconsitent with the biblical texts, and is consitent with the earliest beliefs of the Church as evidenced by all of the writings of the successors to the Apostles.

12volt_man said:
How do you believe Jesus' siblings were concieved?

If by "siblings" you mean what we would today refer to as brothers and sisters, he had none. He was an only child.
If you mean the "kinsmen" spoken of in the biblical texts, today we would call them "cousins". They were conceived in the usual way.

12volt_man · Apr 13, 2005

chilehed said:
Yes, in that it is not inconsitent with the biblical texts, and is consitent with the earliest beliefs of the Church as evidenced by all of the writings of the successors to the Apostles.

Let me rephrase the question:

Is there anything in scripture to indicate that the marriage between Mary and Joseph did not continue as a normal marriage after the birth of Jesus?

What is there in scripture to indicate that Mary denied Joseph a physical relationship with his wife? Or is this just another Roman Catholic teaching that can't be found in scripture?

If by "siblings" you mean what we would today refer to as brothers and sisters, he had none. He was an only child.

Did you know that the Bible tells us that Jesus had siblings?

Bizzlebin Imperatoris · Apr 13, 2005

12volt_man said:
How do you believe Jesus' siblings were concieved?

They were from Joseph's previous marriage, older step-brothers of Jesus.

12volt_man · Apr 13, 2005

Bizzlebin Imperatoris said:
They were from Joseph's previous marriage, older step-brothers of Jesus.

And you come to this conclusion....how?

TScott · Apr 13, 2005

Much of the Church tradition of Mary is found in the Protoevangelium of James.

Read it here:http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0847.htm

WarriorAngel · Apr 13, 2005

12volt_man said:
Let me rephrase the question:

Is there anything in scripture to indicate that the marriage between Mary and Joseph did not continue as a normal marriage after the birth of Jesus?

What is there in scripture to indicate that Mary denied Joseph a physical relationship with his wife? Or is this just another Roman Catholic teaching that can't be found in scripture?

Did you know that the Bible tells us that Jesus had siblings?

HUGS!

Ok, as you seemed to skip my explanation...
I will again state..
THE small but impertinent info I gave you still stands...NO where shall you find the clearest statement of fact...there is absolutely no term ...no form, no sentence of...
Mary Of Joseph.....

Also I want to point out that Tradition holds everything written and oral.
Which is written in scripture to keep both.

Crazy Liz · Apr 13, 2005

12volt_man said:
So, is this a Biblical teaching?

How do you believe Jesus' siblings were concieved?

I'm not Catholic or Orthodox, or a member of any church that has any stake in the perpetual virginity argument. But I believe they were conceived the regular way, by Joseph and his first wife. There are a number of reasons why it makes more sense that the brothers and sisters all shared the same father but not the same mother. Particularly note that those who commented on Jesus' family called him "the carpenter's son." However, since this thread is about the PV, I won't go into them. I just post this in order to say that the brothers and sisters are not a good argument against the PV of Mary.

SemStudent08 · Apr 13, 2005

WarriorAngel said:
HUGS!

Ok, as you seemed to skip my explanation...
I will again state..
THE small but impertinent info I gave you still stands...NO where shall you find the clearest statement of fact...there is absolutely no term ...no form, no sentence of...
Mary Of Joseph.....

Also I want to point out that Tradition holds everything written and oral.
Which is written in scripture to keep both.

I'm sorry but your argument about "Mary of Joseph" just doesn't really have me convinced. We DO know that it states tht Joseph is the husband of Mary which contains the "of" you seem hung up on. And as for why it is in reverse order - that would have to do with the fact that Mary is a pretty special lady, being one of the first believers and having been made to have had a child by the Holy Spirit - consequently I don't find it surprising that the emphasis may have been placed on her, and the order reversed. But in the end, understnaing the culture of the time (a highly patriarchal one) I find it HIGHLY unlikely that when Joseph "took Mary to wife" that they (especially he) would have consummated that marriage....

And there is also my previous argument that stating the Greek term for brother actually means cousin is entirely arbitrairy, and it could just as well have been brother in those instances. (in the most literal sense of the term 'adelphoi' means 'male relative who came from the same womb as I did' = brother)

Bizzlebin Imperatoris · Apr 13, 2005

12volt_man said:
And you come to this conclusion....how?

Holy Tradition. Same place we get the Bible

chilehed · Apr 13, 2005

12volt_man said:
Let me rephrase the question:

12volt_man said:
Is there anything in scripture to indicate that the marriage between Mary and Joseph did not continue as a normal marriage after the birth of Jesus?

Yes, there is, we've already discussed some of it at length in this thread.

12volt_man said:
What is there in scripture to indicate that Mary denied Joseph a physical relationship with his wife?

Who said this was Mary imposing something on Joseph?

12volt_man said:
Or is this just another Roman Catholic teaching that can't be found in scripture??

Well, I knew that this thread would end up mired in the question of authority, its the root of every disagreement between Catholic and Proteatant doctrine. Since the threads been moved the rules are different, so Ill go there now.

If you read my earlier posts, youll see that I supported them from scripture quite well. At the very least one could say that a reasonable person could come to either conclusion, in which case there is no reason why someone who insists that all revelation is contained in scripture (or that all valid evidence is contained in scripture) should claim to know the correct answer.

People can insist that Mary must have had other children only if they rely on extra-biblical sources. They learned it from their parents or pastor, or they got a variety of commentaries written by various people and decided who had the best credentials and made the most sense. But thats not relying on scripture, its relying on their own understanding, both of what constitutes valid credentials and what seems most in line with scripture. So while Protestants claim to rely on the bible alone, in reality none do; its impossible.

And after 42 years of believing that my Protestant instructors had the best credentials and made the most sense, I began to read the writings of the men who learned the gospel at the very feet of the Apostles themselves: Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch, Polycarp of Smyrna, men who beyond a doubt have vastly superior credentials than R.C. Sproul, John MacArthur, J. Vernon McGee, Charles Wesley, John Calvin, Martin Luther, or any other Protestant you care to name.

And yknow, they were all Catholics. Not a Protestant in the bunch.

12volt_man said:
Did you know that the Bible tells us that Jesus had siblings?

The bible does not say this anywhere. It says that he had kinsmen, which includes cousins. We already talked about this earlier in the thread.

SemStudent08 · Apr 13, 2005

Bizzlebin Imperatoris said:
Holy Tradition. Same place we get the Bible

Actually we get the Bible from scraps of papyri and fragments of scrolls dating back to the 1st and 2nd Century CE. Whereas Tradition has been open to influence and change for 2000 years. Need I mention indulgences??? Or the changed definitions concerning purgatory??? Traditions of the Church that have been recognized as not Scripturally based and have ben set aside or changed drastically...

Bizzlebin Imperatoris · Apr 13, 2005

SemStudent08 said:
Actually we get the Bible from scraps of papyri and fragments of scrolls dating back to the 1st and 2nd Century CE. Whereas Tradition has been open to influence and change for 2000 years. Need I mention indulgences??? Or the changed definitions concerning purgatory??? Traditions of the Church that have been recognized as not Scripturally based and have ben set aside or changed drastically...

And where do we get the Canon for that Bible? (We get some traditions from the 1st and 2nd century as well.) Orthodoxy does not have indulgences or purgatory. Lots of things aren't "scriptually based" so to speak because scripture doesn't claim to be a one stop manual on Church life. But nothing in Orthodoxy contradicts scripture.

Scripture is part of a whole. Take it out of its place and it can be interpretted in any which way. Take the rest of Holy Tradition away from scripture, and it can be changed as to contradict the Bible. They work together, they compliment each other, they protect and guard each other.

chilehed · Apr 13, 2005

SemStudent08 said:
Actually we get the Bible from scraps of papyri and fragments of scrolls dating back to the 1st and 2nd Century CE. Whereas Tradition has been open to influence and change for 2000 years. Need I mention indulgences??? Or the changed definitions concerning purgatory??? Traditions of the Church that have been recognized as not Scripturally based and have ben set aside or changed drastically...

SemStudent08,
I'm sorry, you're quite wrong on this. Sacred Tradition hasn't changed a whit, neither in the definition of Purgatory, nor indulgences, or in any other way.

Bizzelbin's point (if I may be so bold as to speak for you, Biz, and keeping in mind as best I can our own doctrinal differences)) is that no book of scripture has the table of contents for the bible. The very fact that a canon exists at all is because the Catholic Church infallibly defined it based on Sacred Tradition, as far back as the 5th Century.

12volt_man · Apr 13, 2005

WarriorAngel said:
Ok, as you seemed to skip my explanation... I will again state..THE small but impertinent info I gave you still stands...NO where shall you find the clearest statement of fact...there is absolutely no term ...no form, no sentence of...Mary Of Joseph.....Also I want to point out that Tradition holds everything written and oral.Which is written in scripture to keep both.

I didn't skip your explanation.

As a Christian, the final authority for me is the Bible, not the Roman Catholic church.

If it can't be supported by scripture, then I'm not buying it.

SemStudent08 · Apr 13, 2005

Bizzlebin Imperatoris said:
And where do we get the Canon for that Bible? (We get some traditions from the 1st and 2nd century as well.) Orthodoxy does not have indulgences or purgatory. Lots of things aren't "scriptually based" so to speak because scripture doesn't claim to be a one stop manual on Church life. But nothing in Orthodoxy contradicts scripture.

Scripture is part of a whole. Take it out of its place and it can be interpretted in any which way. Take the rest of Holy Tradition away from scripture, and it can be changed as to contradict the Bible. They work together, they compliment each other, they protect and guard each other.

We may just have to agree to disagree on this one. As a Lutheran (hence the Luther Rose under my name ) I believe in Scripture alone. As for the canon, and more importantly to my mind, the books left out of it, they are held up to and based on each other and must Proclaim the same message of God's amazing depth of love and compassion for us. And as for the ones left out they do not fall into one or both of these categories. Ultimately Tradition is subordinate to Scripture and if it cannot be backed up by Scripture then Tradition must be regarded as only tradition and consequently of human reality and subject to the same fallacies as we are. But hey, thats just me...sola scriptura all the way...

SemStudent08 · Apr 13, 2005

chilehed said:
SemStudent08,
I'm sorry, you're quite wrong on this. Sacred Tradition hasn't changed a whit, neither in the definition of Purgatory, nor indulgences, or in any other way.

Bizzelbin's point (if I may be so bold as to speak for you, Biz, and keeping in mind as best I can our own doctrinal differences)) is that no book of scripture has the table of contents for the bible. The very fact that a canon exists at all is because the Catholic Church infallibly defined it based on Sacred Tradition, as far back as the 5th Century.

Indulgences and purgatory have never been changed???? What sparked the Reformation then??? In every history I have ever read it was the selling of indulgences, to my knowledge that tradition has been stopped entirely. As for the definition of purgatory read Vatican 1 then 2 and compare them to the teaching on purgatory during the middle ages and then tell me they haven't changed....

As for the canon it is based on the earliest writings we have (ie Ignatius' letters in the 2nd century CE ~11CE actually) and quotations of Scripture therein as a basis for knowing what Scripture can be pin-pointed and then we copare writing styles to establish authorship and then compare the messages comtained in the Scripture in order to check them against one another. Saying that it is based entirely upon traditin is almost a slap in the face of Church Historians throughout history who have pain-stakingly gone through this process in order to represent the most accurate Scripture that can be represented....

12volt_man · Apr 13, 2005

chilehed said:
Yes, there is, we've already discussed some of it at length in this thread.

OK. Refresh my memory.

Where does the Bible tell us this?

Who said this was Mary imposing something on Joseph?

So then, they did have normal marital relations?

Well, I knew that this thread would end up mired in the question of authority, its the root of every disagreement between Catholic and Proteatant doctrine.

Of course it is. It's a matter of who we're going to follow: Christ or Rome.

At the very least one could say that a reasonable person could come to either conclusion, in which case there is no reason why someone who insists that all revelation is contained in scripture (or that all valid evidence is contained in scripture) should claim to know the correct answer.

I don't see how. The Bible tells us that Mary and Joseph had other children and there's no reason to assume that the others weren't concieved in the normal way.

People can insist that Mary must have had other children only if they rely on extra-biblical sources. They learned it from their parents or pastor, or they got a variety of commentaries written by various people and decided who had the best credentials and made the most sense. But thats not relying on scripture, its relying on their own understanding, both of what constitutes valid credentials and what seems most in line with scripture. So while Protestants claim to rely on the bible alone, in reality none do; its impossible.

That's an awfully bold statement from someone who's religion has abandoned the sufficiency of scripture for the traditions of men.

And after 42 years of believing that my Protestant instructors had the best credentials and made the most sense, I began to read the writings of the men who learned the gospel at the very feet of the Apostles themselves: Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch, Polycarp of Smyrna, men who beyond a doubt have vastly superior credentials than R.C. Sproul, John MacArthur, J. Vernon McGee, Charles Wesley, John Calvin, Martin Luther, or any other Protestant you care to name.

And what were their credentials, other than that they agree with you, of course?

The bible does not say this anywhere. It says that he had kinsmen, which includes cousins. We already talked about this earlier in the thread.

Could you please show me where in NT Greek the word, adelphos, which refers to Jesus' fraternal relationship with His siblings, is ever translated as "cousins"?

Serapha · Apr 13, 2005

WarriorAngel said:
Someone also quoted previously from scripture...'Mother of our Lord'
Either she is or she is not. Either Christ is God or He is not.

.

Using YOUR logic....

Either Jesus (God) died or he didn't.... again you can't have it both ways.

~serapha~

Did the Virgin Mary...

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