Against Immaculate Conception & Marian Dogma
In this article, I aim to show the error in the West and Rome for attempting to make Mary more than what she was destined to be and in the same vein, how Rome has once again pulled a thread of our unified “blanket” to unravel mystery (poorly).
The Immaculate Conception is something Rome devised as dogma in the 1800s, yes 1700 years after the early church was firmly rooted. We’re still, somehow, creating doctrine, which Catholics boast in, but we know from Scripture why this is a poor idea (potentially, I don’t know everything…).
The Immaculate Conception is the belief that the Virgin Mary was free of original sin from the moment of her conception. It is one of the four Marian dogmas of the Catholic Church. Debated by medieval theologians, it was not defined as a dogma until 1854, by Pope Pius IX in the papal bull Ineffabilis Deus. While the Immaculate Conception asserts Mary's freedom from original sin, the Council of Trent, held between 1545 and 1563, had previously affirmed her freedom from personal sin.
You then, within history, have various apocrypha (no, not the ones included in canon), that try and suggest Mary too was born of a virgin as to avoid the blatant objection here of Original sin.
Catholics seem to skeet by the very concept that God laid out here with Jesus being born of a virgin, NOT A MAN seed, but of God’s own self and wrapped in humanity. “Through one man sin entered…” hence why Jesus was born of a virgin.
But back to the Historical context of Rome’s decision, (ROME… I mean…c’mon people, it’s staring you in the face), you have the Pope (an entirely different issue) inserting his “infallibility” to ensure that this dogma is noted as equal to God’s own divine word.
You’ll then see Rome, like many protestants too, try and assert the Early Church Fathers into the discussion to show their support, that ancient christianity is surely on their side.
I’ve pointed this out before, it’s never a good idea to insert the views of Early Church Fathers as authority, unless they were direct disciples of the Apostles. This rule of thumb, that I suppose I may be early on, is in coherence with Textucal Criticism which states the closer you are to the origin “the earliest manuscript” the more reliable it will be.
Now, the Catholics, love to hold that Tertullian, Origen, Ambrose, all were on their side about this and not just with this topic, but many others. The issue here is that each of these Early Church Fathers, and others, held to some pretty obsure views within their theology that I’m not sure the Catholic church wants to own. In fact, many of these fathers disagreed with eachother without knowing it, or while knowing it.
For example, Tertullian held to what was then a Montanism heresy, even if he did it on the basis of wanting to hold to sure morals. If you don’t know what the Montanism heresy is, it’s essentially what we have today in Pentecostalism, and I know many Catholics today trying to breed the two together (shaking Holy Spirit experience, tongues without interpretation, visions, apostles and fortune prophets, etc.).
Therefore, if the Catholic’s wants to use one of the views of these fathers, let them take on all their theology. Though, I know Catholics will retort with “chew the meat, spit out the bone, we have infallibility so we can do that”. This is a thin veil to say “we too get to pick what theology stays” — when in actuality it’s one man, the Pope, who gets to pick and choose. Unlike the HISTORICAL CHURCH, much like the Eastern Orthodox, who held synods and councils (yes, Rome still does this but ultimately, not in the same vein).
Back to Mary
Here, I’ve found three of the main arguments used by Catholics to make their case for the Immaculate Conception. However, before I begin, I would like to say that this should in NO way bestow stones upon Mary. She was, and is, the Mother of our Lord. She cared for, fed, changed, raised, and loved our Lord as a Mother loves their son, maybe more than we can comprehend. To suggest what occurred was not miraculous, amazing, and awe striking through Mary, is to also downplay Yeshua.
Argument #1 Mary is Full of Grace
Luke 1:28: “And he came to her and said, ‘Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you!'”
The term traditionally translated “full of grace” or “highly favored” is κεχαριτωμένη or kecharitomene. This perfect passive participle form denotes something that happened in the past and continues into the present. She was perfectly graced in the past and continues in that state. Luke 1:28 has served as the locus classicus for the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of Our Lady.
Rejection/Counterpoint:
This is really poor Greek, I don’t know what else to say.
According to searching the early text, we have access to…the only examples of the active perfect adverbial participle in the New Testament are Luke 1:3, John 4:6,45, 6:19, 7:15, 12:37, 13:2, 18:18, Acts 16:24,34, 25:7, Eph 4:19, 1 Pet 1:22, 2 Pet 2:6
This word we look at is only once used elsewhere (Eph 1:6, “made accepted”) the Greek Literal Dictionary states: χαριτόω charitoō; from 5485; to make graceful, endow with grace.
Robert L. Thomas, New American Standard Hebrew-Aramaic and Greek Dictionaries : Updated Edition (Anaheim: Foundation Publications, Inc., 1998).
The earliest manuscripts we have render: χαριτόω (charitoō). vb. to bestow favor on someone { Forms of χαριτόω ἐχαρίτωσεν VAAI3S(2) χαριτόω κεχαριτωμένη VRPP- } and doesn’t contain “full of grace”. I can’t fault the Catholics too much, as they essentially only rely on transliteration (Latin) instead of the early manuscripts we do have.
Now, I would ask, what is she being favored with? Is she favored on her own will? No, the text doesn’t allow for that. It shows that God is favoring her, much like Moses, by choosing her. What FAVOR we have as being chosen by God (1 peter 2:9; Eph 1:4).
In fact, we get this in the very next verse: for you have found favor with God.
Mary, then, found favor with God because God is acting, not because Mary has acted, she hasn’t even obeyed yet. This indication that she’s done something in the past, that she was sinless her whole life, cannot be drawn from the Greek or any text. She found favor with God because God is presenting it to her, as the word “charitoo” suggests.
When she visits Elizabeth, what does she say?
Verse 45: “Indeed you are blessed (why?), because you have trusted that the promise of Adonai has made to you will be fulfilled”.
Argument #2 Mary as New Eve, Having Enmity with Satan
Gen 3:15 “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall crush your head, and you shall strike at His heel.”
In this verse, God addresses Satan. The Seed here is Christ. The Woman is His Mother, that is, Mary. Thus, Satan has perfect enmity with Christ and with His Mother. The Catholic Church has interpreted this as indicating the sinlessness of Christ and Mary. If either actually committed sin, then they would not be at enmity with Satan but actually a cooperator with Satan at times.
Rejection:
So, my first reaction to this is “what…?” maybe, I’ll post the Michael Scott GIF here. However, let’s just simply first look at the Scripture and the Context by which Genesis 3 sits.
14 Then Yahweh God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, you will be cursed more than any domesticated animal and more than any wild animal. On your belly you shall go and dust you shall eat all the days of your life. 15 And I will put hostility between you and between the woman, and between your offspring and between her offspring; he will strike you on the head, and you will strike him on the heel.” 16 To the woman he said, “I will greatly increase ⌊your pain in childbearing⌋; in pain you shall bear children. And to your husband shall be your desire. And he shall rule over you.” 17 And to Adam he said, “Because you listened to the voice of your wife and you ate from the tree ⌊from which I forbade you to eat⌋, the ground shall be cursed on your account. In pain you shall eat from it all the days of your life. 18 And thorns and thistles shall sprout for you, and you shall eat the plants of the field. 19 By the sweat of your brow you shall eat bread, until your return to the ground. For from it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”
The first issue is that Rome takes figuratively or ‘in shadow’ only to that which is said to the Serpent, not to the other two humans. Now, can we ask a glaring question, since many believe this serpent to be the Satan… God’s cursing a physical serpent here stating “you are cursed more than any other domesticated animal” — if Satan is hearing this, I have to imagine a sidebar happened, “Psst…YHWH, you know I’m not actually a serpent right? Like, I’m an angel… I can just take a different form”…
Now, I have some unhinged theories as to what this actually means, who the serpent actually was, and so forth, but that’s for another time — fallen seraphim, it was fallen serpahim, okay anyway.
Either way, piecing together the figurative and literal for what you desire it to connect to in the New Testament is far-reaching.
A Careful Critique of Mary
Mary, the Blessed Mother of our Lord, who obeyed and found favor with Adonai…I aim not to dismount her of her obedience, her blessedness, her grandeur, her favor or anything but rather the aim is to point out what Jesus’ does in reaction to, well in reaction I am sure if He were to see the Cathedrals mounted by Mary statues.
48 And when they* saw him, they were astounded and his mother said to him, “Child, why have you done this to us? Look, your father and I have been searching for you anxiously!” 49 And he said to them, “⌊Why⌋ were you searching for me? Did you not know that it was necessary for me to be in the house of my Father?” 50 And they did not understand the statement that he spoke to them.
Here we get a glimpse into Jesus’ childhood. We see Him already seeking out fulfillment of His Father’s will, which you would ASSUME, the “ever-sinless” Mary would understand as the same author of the arguments above (Taylor Marshall) suggest “Mary is the greatest theologian to ever exist”. Yet, “they did not understand the statement that he spoke to them.”
Thereby suggesting that even Jesus’ parents did not fully grasp what was to come, or really, even remotely understand that He was not of them, He was of the Father. They didn’t give birth to Jesus and become knowledgable of what was coming. They didn’t give birth to Jesus and grasp that He was greater, He was the son of God, not them.
They were [potentially] ignorant to these things.
31 And his mother and his brothers arrived, and standing outside, they sent word to him to summon him. 32 And a crowd was sitting around him, and they told him, “Behold, your mother and your brothers are outside looking for you.” 33 And he answered them and* said, “Who is my mother or my brothers?” 34 And looking around at those who were sitting around him in a circle, he said, “Behold, my mother and my brothers! 35 For whoever does the will of God, this person is my brother and sister and mother.”
A Catholic today would have most likely bowed and said “HAIL MARY!” but what does Jesus do (the one we must partake in imitating)? He says, you are equal to them, equal to my mother, my father, my brother and my sisters if you do the will of God.
End of argument.
27 Now it happened that as he said these things, a certain woman from the crowd raised her voice and* said to him, “Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts at which you nursed!” 28 But he said, “On the contrary, blessed are those who hear the word of God and follow it!”*
Reinforcing the argument in point 2. We read that Christ says “Rather, the one who does the will of my Father is blessed”. That would include Mary by the way, as she did the will of the Father. However, does Christ elevate her? Nein, He quite literally reinforces that anyone who does the will of the Father is equal.
Last thoughts
Any chance Christ had to elevate His family or mother, he declined it and did the opposite. Not once in the Letters of Paul, the Gospels, the letters of the Peter or James or John — do we see Mary elevated, spoken of, or even remotely mentioned in any special way.
Again, this is NOT to suggest Mary is less than, but rather what Jesus says, YOU too can play the same role Mary did in all of this by hearing my words and obeying them.
This is why I do not hold to the Church Dogma of Mary.