617. What ever happened to the Virgin Mary?

Years ago an Episcopalian professor friend of mine was considering Orthodoxy. * He told me the defining “test issue” for him would be: What does the Orthodox Church officially teach about the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary? Was she taken bodily into Heaven or was she not?

I responded: “Well, … …” which he did not find satisfying!

- No thanks to me, he was Chrismated years later on his deathbed. What a shame he waited that long. He missed so much.

However, if he was looking for an official dogma about Mary’s departure, he was looking in the wrong place,

Today we’ll cover:

1 The Orthodox Feast of the Falling Asleep of the Theotokos.

And just to give them equal time:

2 The Roman Catholic dogma of the Assumption of the Mother of God, belief in which is said to be necessary for salvation.

3 Protestant teaching about what happened to Mary after her death. This will be short.

4 How the Protestants are wrong. I think the Bible is very clear that the Virgin Mary is now in Glory.

In all this I’ll touch very little on the history of the doctrines, partly because there’s no time for it here, and partly because I’m no historian, and I’m afraid of making a serious mistake. I want to focus on what different Christians now teach.

The Orthodox Celebration of the Falling Asleep of the Theotokos: August 15

The Orthodox Church has no required doctrines, except those of the Holy Scriptures, as clarified by the Seven Ecumenical Councils, when the Church East and West was still united. What is required, then, is belief that the Virgin Mary is the “Theotokos”, the “Birthgiver of God”, loosely translated as “Mother of God”. The point is that the One to whom she gave birth is truly God, the Son of God, one of the Holy Trinity.

Beyond that, the best way to find out what Orthodox believe is to look at our iconography and at how we worship.

On August 15 each year, we celebrate the ”Falling Asleep of the Theotokos”, sometimes called her “Metastasis” (transfer). In English speaking countries we commonly title it the “Dormition of the Theotokos”. It seems very odd to me that we Orthodox use the Latin word: “Dormition”. The Greek word for “falling asleep” is “Kimisis”: Коίμησις τῆς Θεοτόκου, which means the peaceful transfer from this life to the next.

The icon for the Feast shows her body, lying in death, with Our Lord Jesus Christ receiving her holy soul into His hands like a newborn baby, to “translate” it into Heaven. Ancient tradition is depicted: the Apostles gathered ‘round. Some show an unbeliever profanely touching her, the new “Holy Ark”, as was an unbeliever killed long ago touching the original Ark of the Covenant.

Do our many hundreds of Orthodox hymns about and to the Theotokos ever speak plainly about her Body being assumed into Heaven? I have sung many of them in church and also to myself, and have searched for others. I have yet to find one that clearly mentions her bodily Assumption. (If you know of any, please comment below.)

However, at least by the Fifth Century, it appears that her Assumption had long been believed in many places. In the Eighth Century, Saint John of Damascus wrote about Mary’s Bodily Assumption as a certainty. Many Orthodox theologians today often refer to it and make use of it in their teaching. Many Orthodox churches are dedicated to her Assumption

And, without taking a survey of the 250 million Orthodox in the world, I’d guess that most Orthodox people believe in it, take it for granted – but without penalty of going to hell if they do not believe it.

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A brief interruption: A circumstantial argument for Mary’s Assumption

Where are her relics? There aren’t any. Secondary relics, her robe and her sash, yes. But of her Body, no.

This is unlike all of other early Christians. Take the Twelve Apostles, just to make the point:

St. Peter is buried beneath the high altar of St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City, Rome.

St. Paul’s tomb is beneath the altar at the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls in Rome.

The relics of St. James the Great are at the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in Spain.

St. Andrew’s relics rest in the Cathedral of Saint Andrew in Patras, Greece.

St. Philip and St. James (Son of Alphaeus) are in the crypt of the Basilica of the Twelve Holy Apostles (Santi Apostoli) in Rome.

St. Matthew is entombed at the Salerno Cathedral in Salerno, Italy.

St. Thomas’ relics are divided between San Tommaso Apostolo in Ortona, Italy, and Mylapore, India.

St. Simon and St. Jude Thaddeus are together beneath the St. Joseph altar in St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome.

St. Matthias is buried at St. Matthias’ Abbey in Trier, Germany.

St. Bartholomew’s tomb is in the Cathedral of Benevento, Italy.

St. John the Apostle? Tradition says he was originally buried beneath what is now the ruins of the Basilica of St. John in Ephesus (Selçuk), Turkey, but that his body quickly turned to dust, so there are no relics. *

- Despite that, a person from another tradition once gave me a supposed relic of John the Apostle. Did you know that you can buy… uh, “relics” on e-bay? Don’t.

What about the Theotokos? Tradition tells us she was buried in a cave not far from the Garden of Gethsemane. After the end of persecution, a chapel was built there; where the eleborate Church of the Sepulchre of Saint Mary now stands.

Early Christians certainly would have treasured and guarded her mortal body above all others, the body that gave birth to their Lord and Savior. But where are her relics? There are none. No one has ever claimed to have any. Why not? Early tradition says three days after her burial her tomb was found empty.

I”ll leave it to you to reach the reasonable conclusion.

Which brings us to the Roman Catholic Church.

The Roman Catholic Dogma of the Assumption

celebrated on August 15

Roman Catholic theology and piety took Our Lady’s Assumption for granted for many centuries. However, the Roman Catholic dogma regarding Mary’s departure was promulgated as recently as November 1, 1950.

After quoting many Church Fathers, both West and East, this is the core statement:

...by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own authority, we pronounce, declare, and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma: that the Immaculate Mother of God, the ever Virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory…

It is forbidden to any man to change this, our declaration, pronouncement, and definition or, by rash attempt, to oppose and counter it. If any man should presume to make such an attempt, let him know that he will incur the wrath of Almighty God and of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul.

Given at Rome, at St. Peter’s, in the year of the great Jubilee, 1950, on the first day of the month of November, on the Feast of All Saints, in the twelfth year of our pontificate.

PIUS XII

A Brief Orthodox Reaction

Do I understand this right? that on October 31, 1950, a member of the Roman Catholic Church could disbelieve in the Assumption of Our Lady and still be saved, but on November 2, 1950, disbelief in the Assumption would send down the wrath of God?

The first thing to say is that we Orthodox don’t do things like that. As to who God’s wrath will fall upon, we leave that for Jesus Christ to decide, not the Pope.

Furthermore, we do not understand why the Latin Church, all by itself, has felt the need in recent times to proclaim new dogmas necessary for salvation: the Immaculate Conception of the Mother of God (1854), Papal Infallibility (1870), and now her Assumption. The first two of these we reject on principle – but let’s not get into that now.

These recent dogmas, as they stand, have made the reunion of Christians, East and West, far more difficult, if not impossible.

Protestant teaching regarding what happened to Mary after her death:

[ ]

That’s right. They don’t have any, because their guiding principle is “Sola Scriptura /Scriptures alone”, and they believe the Bible doesn’t speak to the subject.

That’s where they’re wrong.

However, it should be noted that in recent times some Anglicans and Lutherans have added a general “Feast of the Virgin Mary” to their calendar on August 15. To what extent it is celebrated I do not know, since most Protestants are still pretty “skittish” about her.

However, they should not be:

Scriptural Teaching about the present Glory of the Virgin Mary

Let’s begin with the premise that Mary died. Though the New Testament doesn’t mention it (and a few Roman Catholics have debated it) I think we can agree about that.

Next: Please turn to the end of the Bible, to the Book of the Revelation (the “Apocalypse”), chapter twelve.

However, before going into that, let’s clear up a bit of “deadwood”.

Who wrote the Revelation?

Orthodox Tradition says it was Saint John the Apostle, Evangelist and Theologian, written while he was held in exile on the island of Patmos. Some modern scholars doubt this, because the rough Greek in the Revelation is so different from the sophisticated Greek in his Gospel account and Epistles. Good point.

The first thing these scholars should do is visit the island of Patmos and the cave of Saint John, the place where he received the Revelation and dictated it there to his scribe Prochorus – probably the Prochorus who was one of the first seven deacons. This was in the late First Century, so John was in his late eighties or early nineties at the time.

Why the inelegant Greek?

Try this explanation: John was dictating very rapidly as he received this strange revelation, so it was difficult for Prochorus to keep up. We do not know Prochorus’ skill in writing. He also must have been old by then. It was winter; the cave was dank, and his fingers were stiff. That, I think, is a reasonable theory. There could be many other possible explanations which we cannot imagine. In any event, I’ll go with ancient tradition before modern guesswork, including my own. C.S.Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien remarked that when people tried to explain why they wrote what they did, they were almost always wrong.

So Saint John the Apostle, Evangelist and Theologian wrote the Book of Revelation.

Now, in the Revelation chapter one, John has a vision of Christ in glory: “His countenance like the sun shining in its strength. And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. But He laid His right hand on me, saying to me, “Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last. I am He who lives, and was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore. Amen. And I have the keys of Hades and of Death.”

Then in chapter twelve, we see “a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a garland with twelve stars… who bore a male Child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron.. and her Child was caught up to God and His throne…” That Child whom she bore and has ascended can only be Jesus Christ.

Read the full passage for yourself. As in the entire book, the imagery is complex, likely referring to events understood by John and his audience, but which are no longer known to us, or are matters expressed in symbol. We cannot know, and there’s no point in our speculating much about it.

The essential point: Who is the Woman who gave birth to the Male Child who is to rule the world?

Remember now that our Lord Jesus, from the Cross, gave His Mother into the care of John: “Woman, behold your son”, and to John, “Behold your Mother.”

John from that moment on surely had Mary at the center of His thoughts, continually in His mind. This had been a “commission” directly from His Lord.

Earliest tradition tells us that for some years Mary lived near John in Ephesus, where he was stationed. There he had got to know her well. * Then she returned to Jerusalem and spent much time in the Garden of Gethsemane, where she died.

- In 1891 a German mystic, Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, received detailed revelations about the House of Mary in Ephesus – where to dig and exactly what it would be like. Archaeologists found the spot, dug, and indeed it was just as she said. It has since become a place of pilgrimage.

Can you imagine that John wrote these words in Revelation 12 without thinking first of Mary? the holy Woman whom His Lord Jesus had given into his care, to be his Mother, and he her son? whom he had come to know so intimately.

So what does this passage tell us about Mary the Mother of God? That she is not the source of the Light as Christ is in chapter one. However, she is “clothed” with light, in Glory like His, but which is not of her own making. That “the moon”, the world is under her feet. Her “garland of twelve stars” tells that Mary is Queen of the Apostles, and of the Twelve Tribes of Israel.

That tells how the Apostle John saw his mother Mary.

There is also a double symbolism here. The Woman in Revelation is also the Church who forever presents her Son to the world. This is shown in icons of Theotokos usually found above the altar in Orthodox churches. There she is both the Mother of Jesus presenting her Son to the world, and also she is Mother Church presenting Christ to us in the Holy Eucharist.

The symbolism unites in her: The Virgin Mary is Mother of Jesus Christ, and therefore also Mother of the Church, of all people who are baptized into the Body of her Son.

So: The Holy Scriptures do tell us what has happened to the Virgin Mary. She is now radiant in Heavenly Glory, the reflected Glory of her Son – as someday, by His grace, we all can be.

Kontakion of the Feast of the Dormition

Neither the tomb, nor death had power over the Theotokos, who is unsleeping in her intercessions and an unchanging hope in her protection.

For as the Mother of Life, she was translated into life by Him who dwelt in her ever-virginal womb.

Next Week and the Week after:

Down with theology! Down with social teachings! Down with politics! It’s time to take a break and Go to Greece in September 2001. I hope you’ll come along. There will be a lot to see and think and talk about.