As of today, I have a brand-new book out, called The Early Church was the Catholic Church. As the subtitle says, it looks as “the Catholic Witness of the Fathers in Christianity’s First Two Centuries.”
Here’s how I begin the book:
ANY CRITIQUE of Catholic teaching falls into one of two categories: either Catholics are getting blamed for believing what Jesus taught, or they’re getting blamed for straying from what Jesus taught. If you’re looking for ways to answer the first kind of argument (that Catholics shouldn’t be so faithful to Jesus), there are a lot of good books for you, but this one isn’t it. My goal is to reach those who believe that Jesus’ original teachings were good—but that the Church lost her way over time.
There are lots of people who fall into this second category, from Muslims who think that Christians corrupted the original teachings of Jesus (the Injeel)… to Mormons who claim that after the Apostles were killed, “priesthood authority—including the keys to direct and receive revelation for the Church—was taken from the earth”… to folks who believe Dan Brown’s claims (from The Da Vinci Code) that people didn’t think Jesus was the Son of God until the Council of Nicaea… to Protestants who believe that the teachings of the original Christians were slowly corrupted (eventually leading to the formation of the Catholic Church). But even those these groups may not agree with one another on much, they’re all making variations of the same argument: Jesus’ original teachings (whatever they were) were good, but somewhere along the way, corruption set in and these teachings were lost, and/or false teachings were added.
In response to these claims, I look at what the earliest Christians (up until about the year 200) had to say on four major topics:
- What does Baptism do? Is it just symbolic, or does it do something? Are we “born again” in Baptism or by making a personal commitment to Jesus Christ?
- What’s the nature of early Christian worship? In particular, what did these earliest Christians believe about the Eucharist? Did they view their worship as a Sacrifice, or did they view that idea as repugnant to Christ’s unique priesthood?
- What did the earliest churches look like? When we look at the earliest evidence (and listen to the early Christians describe the state of their churches), do they describe a diversity of church structures, or do they think that all churches should be structured in the same way? In particular, did they view the idea of a single bishop per church as a necessity, a helpful innovation, or a corruption of the apostolic structure of the Church?
- Which books count as “Gospels”? Did the early Christians have a clear sense of particular books (like Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) being “the Gospels,” or did they have more of an “open canon,” in which there was widespread disagreement about which books were truly Gospel, or truly orthodox, or truly inspired?
As I said, in looking at this, I’m looking at Christianity up until about the year 200 (in the book, I also explain why I chose this as the rough cut-off date, and use the real-life examples of St. Polycarp and St. Irenaeus to give a sense of how much “living memory” would still be operative by the close of the second century). Finally, I close the book with a chapter presenting the “stakes,” so to speak: what happens if we believe the Christians of the second century? And what happens if we think that they’re wrong (either duped or lying)?
If that sounds interesting to you, I’d encourage you to go and check it out. As of today, it’s available (and on sale!) in the Catholic Answers store, and it should be available on Amazon in about a week or so. If you do read it, it would mean a lot to me (and actually help people discover the book) if you would write a review on Amazon. Enjoy!
Will the book be released on kindle or nook?
From what I’ve seen most books are available in Kindle by default simply because they are created in digital format before printing. It’s not an extra step like it may have been years ago.
This book is not yet available in digital format. I checked on amazon since that’s my preferred method.
It will be, although I don’t know the details as to when!
Joe, I am still waiting for the kindle edition. I hope it comes out soin
Joe,
I bought your book from Catholic Answers but I think there is some problems with your footnotes!
“There were three acceptable forms of baptism: by immersion (which was the norm), by affusion (that is, pouring), or by sprinkling, with the latter two forms largely for cases of special necessity.72”
72 Talmud Vavli, The William Davidson Talmud, Yevamot 47b, available at sefaria.org.
Regards,
Justin
“It’s in Against Heresies that we find the clearest witness we have regarding
the practice of infant baptism in the early Church.” (Page 43 of 169)
I looked at Book 2, Chapter 22, Paragraph 4 and I just do not see infant baptism being taught there.
In terms of the meaning of ‘born again to God’
For He came to save all
through means of Himself
— all, I say, who
through Him
are born again to God
1) Saving is through Lord Jesus Christ
2) He is the Prince of life
3) He is sanctifying every age, by (becoming an example for) that period corresponding to it which belonged to Himself
3) He is the first-born from the dead
4) He is existing before all, and going before all
Conclusion:
We are all born again to God through Him who was not despising or evading any condition of humanity but set the example for all men (infants to old).
The Prince of life, the first-born from the dead is whom through who we are saved, we are born again to eternal life. (Born again to God from death)
Does Baptism do something? Yes but we disagree about what what it does. It gives remission of committed sins but not original sin.
What did these earliest Christians believe about the Eucharist?
Do we have any evidence on the frequency? Or that it must be celebrated on a Sunday?
Did they view their worship as a Sacrifice?
‘Worship is presenting each moment and each act of the day as an offering to God’. They viewed their entire lives as living sacrifices
Do they think that all churches should be structured in the same way?
Did they think all churches that are structured in the same way were all ultimately structured under one specific one?
Did they view the idea of a single bishop per church as a necessity?
Why does the current Catholic church not have a single bishop per church?
Did the early Christians have a clear sense of particular books (like Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) being “the Gospels,”?
Did the early Christians have a clear sense of which books belongs to the Old Testament?
Justin,
Are you giving your own answers, or are you under the impression that the early Christians viewed things this same way? I can’t tell from your comment.
As for the day of the week, there has never been a restriction that we worship ONLY on Sunday (I’ve seen that sort of thing from some SDA sources, but it’s a total myth). Daily Mass is offered all over the world, including on Saturdays. But it’s also clear from the first century that the central Christian worship was centered around the Sunday Liturgy.
Joe,
The comments I make are what I believe and what I’m under the impression the early Christian’s believed in general.
Yes Catholics have mass daily but it’s my understanding that it is taught that Sunday is the only obligatory “holy day” (not sure about the semantics between holy day and day of worship).
It is my understanding that a Sunday liturgy became prominent in the second century. I would be interested in any sources before 100AD that specifically say the Eucharist was centered on Sunday (apart from Acts 20:7 which may have been technically saturday night according to Roman timekeeping).
I also be interested in all sources that explicitly equate the Lord’s Day with Sunday (rather than assuming they are interchangeable).
Justin,
Chapter 14 of the Didache (~AD 70) orders its readers to gather together and break bread “every Lord’s Day.” It goes on to describe steps that should be taken at these gatherings to ensure that the sacrifice they offer–and it specifically uses the word “sacrifice”–is pure and not profaned.
I believe the earliest source to explicitly state that the Lord’s Day is Sunday is St. Ignatius of Antioch’s letter to the Magnesians in AD 110, which described the Lord’s Day as the day of Christ’s Resurrection, and as the day after the Jewish Sabbath.
LV,
I think the Didache is more accurately dated to ~120 AD but let’s leave the dating aside.
I can tell that from the start the Greek text for both of those sources does not contain “Κυριακῇ ἡμέρᾳ” Lord’s day.
The Greek text for Didache is Κατὰ κυριακὴν δὲ Κυρίου which literally means “According to the Lord’s of the Lord”.
This makes it very difficult to translate but it could be translated as:
“But according to the Lordliness of the Lord come you together”
or another translation could be
“According to the Lord’s [command] of the Lord, after that ye have assembled together, break bread and give thanks having in addition confessed your sins that your sacrifice may be pure.”
The entire letter to Magnesians does not contain ἡμέρᾳ (day)
The part that you refer is μηκέτι σαββατίζοντες ἀλλὰ κατὰ Κυριακὴν ζῶντες.
(Note: σαββατίζοντες is a verb not a noun, well technically it is a plural present participle)
I translate that part of the letter to Magnesians as:
“If then those who had walked in ancient practices came into newness of hope, no longer lying inactively but according to Lord living, in which also our life rose through him and through his death, which certain deny,”
I translated σαββατίζοντες this way based on the longer recension (dated to the 4th century) that adds this to the text:
“Let us therefore no longer keep the Sabbath after the Jewish manner, and rejoice in days of idleness”
“But let every one of you keep the Sabbath after a spiritual manner, rejoicing in meditation on the law, not in relaxation of the body, admiring the workmanship of God,”
The first explicit reference to meeting on Sundays is Justin Martyr in his First Apology (~160 AD):
τῇ τοῦ Ἡλίου λεγομένῃ ἡμέρᾳ = Day called of the Helios (Sun)
Its interesting because he later refers to Sunday again in the paragraph and he calls it μετὰ τὴν Κρονικήν = Day after Kronos (Saturn)
[Justin Martyr never uses the phrase Lord’s Day that I know of]
———————————————————————————–
In conclusion, the Didache seems to be speaking more along the lines of the Lord’s “Do this in remembrance of Me”, for as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s DEATH until He comes.
The context of chapter 14 deals not with time, but with prerequisites to the Lord’s table.
The end of chapter 14 quotes Malachi 1:11 “In EVERY place and TIME offer to me a pure sacrifice; for I am a great King, says the Lord, and my name is wonderful among the nations. This wouldn’t match selecting a particular day at the start.
Remember the first Christians were ‘breaking bread’ daily (Acts 2:46)
St. Ignatius Letter to Magnesians makes zero references to the Lord’s day. It is talking about a legalistic pharisaical understanding of the Sabbath (work = force x displacement) vs the Lord’s understanding of the Sabbath (physical rest from your occupation, so that you may use the time to do spiritual works of goodness for the Lord). It is telling you how to properly keep the seventh-day Sabbath.
1) The sabbath is for the Lord, holy and set apart for the praise of God, his work of creation, and his saving actions on behalf of Israel.
2) The sabbath brings everyday work to a halt and provides a respite. It is a day of protest against the servitude of work and the worship of money.
3) The sabbath is the day of the Lord of mercies and a day to honor God
“The sabbath is the day of the Lord of mercies and a day to honor God”
(CCC 2173)
Who is the ‘Lord of mercies’?
The Lord [of mercies] Day is the [seventh-day] Sabbath.
Justin –
Sounds like the Church failed right out of the gate with your questions and the most logical conclusion would be Christ failed and don’t believe Catholics or Protestants. Just one big garbled historical mess of confusion.
Johnny B Free –
Which questions suggests the Church failed right out of the gate?
The first question in each paragraph comes straight from Joe Heschmeyer’s article that I expect him to answer in the affirmative then I ask questions or make comments underneath which accept that answer as correct but reframe the perspective to show that the current Catholic church is not necessarily the early church when the teachings are examined in more detailed.
How could Christ fail? He was resurrected. In addition, Christ’s teachings have been preserved for all generations in writing, if people do not follow His teachings that is not Christ’s fault. That is the fault of people.
The only historical mess is when people read the church fathers trying to cherry-pick quotations to support doctrines, because unlike the Bible the church fathers are not unanimous on everything. There was unity in the early church but not uniformity.
Also we have paucity of writings of the apostolic fathers, you couldn’t prove all the current Catholic churches doctrines from them, so there is alot of extrapolation, they taught X we teach X therefore since we teach Y and Z it must have come from the early church, even if we have no proof in their writings.
Justin,
In the book, I actually address the whole ” the church fathers are not unanimous on everything” response. It’s true, as far as it goes, but it’s a red herring. Adventists (and Protestants) reject things that the early Christians actually WERE unanimous on, so pointing out that there were other things that they were NOT unanimous on is a non sequitur.
Joe,
“Adventists (and Protestants) reject things that the early Christians actually WERE unanimous on”
Let’s say the early church father’s were unanimous on “baptismal regeneration”, then we need to specify exactly what they meant by baptismal regeneration because their definition of baptism regeneration may differ from current definitions of baptism regeneration.
To teach the specific ‘born again’ of Infant Baptism you would need to demonstrate that the baptismal regeneration in the early church fathers meant original sin, but when I watched Trent Horn’s video “Protestants should embrace this **universal** doctrine of the Church fathers” I only saw evidence for remission of committed sins (I haven’t read your book so I don’t know if you specifically address this)
Justin –
Have the guts to admit the Church failed if you reject the Mass which there was no legitimate historical dispute about until the deformers came along with their relativism and progressive interpretations of scripture.
Eastern Orthodox and Catholics have never rejected the Mass. People want Christ on their terms through their interpretations without regard to history or tradition. Being your own priest is easy.
Johnny B Good –
What do you mean reject the Mass?
I believe in Communion, I partake of unleavened bread and the drink the fruit of the vine in remembrance of Him.
I reject teachings about the Eucharist that go beyond what is taught in scripture, but I don’t reject the Eucharist itself.
I accept Baptism but I reject that baptism is equivalent to circumcision and I reject that baptism should be done on any person that doesn’t verbally ask for it. I see that as equivalent to forcing the Eucharist down someones mouth. Baptism done incorrectly brings judgement.
I accept Christ based on the undisputed words he has given that have been written down for all generations. History (tradition is merely part of history) provides a useful guide to interpretation but it is not an interpretation in itself.
What do you mean being my own priest? I never do self-communion.
So you accept the teaching that the Eucharist is the Body & Blood of Christ as Christ taught in John 6:25-69 & St. Paul taught in 1 Corinthians 11:23-34?
‘The one who munch (τρώγων) My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.’ (John 6:54)
Catholics say the flesh, is spiritual (The flesh Catholics receive cannot be gnaw, munch, crunch)
Protestants say the eating, is spiritual (Real flesh sacrificed on the cross, but this is metaphorical eaten)
I AM the bread of life; your fathers physically-ate the manna in the wilderness and they died;
this is the bread that is coming down out of Heaven, that anyone may physically-eat of it, and not die.
I AM the living bread that came down out of Heaven; if anyone may physically-eat of this bread he will live —throughout the age; and the bread also that I will give is My flesh, that I will give for the life of the world.
The Jews, therefore, were striving with one another, saying, “How is this One able to give us flesh to physically-eat?”
Jesus, therefore, said to them,
Truly, truly, I say to you,
if you may not physically-eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and may not drink His blood, you have no life in yourselves;
he who is spiritually-eating My flesh, and is drinking My blood, has continuous life,
and I will raise him up in the last day;
for My flesh is truly food, and My blood is truly drink;
he who is spiritually-eating My flesh, and is drinking My blood, remains in Me, and I in him.
According as the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father,
he also who is spiritually-eating Me, even that one will live because of Me;
this is the bread that came down out of Heaven; not as your fathers physically-ate the manna, and died;
he who is spiritually-eating this bread will live —throughout the age
The event of Christ offering himself as the paschal lamb in the Last Supper is what the celebration of the Eucharist became for the New Covenant believers. That night of the Jewish Passover, Jesus transformed the traditional sacrificial meal of the Passover lamb. For us to see how this happened, we must examine the course of our Lord’s supper in the traditional manner. Jesus is celebrating or presides over the Passover Seder meal with his apostles which requires them to drink four cups of wine. Matthew, however, begins his narrative at the serving of the third cup (Berekah) or the “Cup of Salvation” since Our Lord is looking towards his own immolation as the Passover lamb (Mt 26:29; Mk 14:25). Paul uses the “Cup of Blessing” to refer to the Eucharist, connecting the Seder meal to the Eucharistic sacrifice (1 Cor 10:16). The third cup actually makes present the Paschal sacrifice of Christ, the Lamb who was slain for our sins (Isa 53:7; Jn 1:29).
Yet Jesus omits the serving of the fourth cup (Hallel) or “Cup of Consummation.” This is a significant omission that joins the Eucharistic sacrifice being offered in the Seder meal to Christ’s sacrifice on the cross. In other words, they comprise one single sacrifice. The Last Supper, therefore, is a pre-presentation of our Lord’s sacrifice on the cross which is made present in the Seder meal. This one and the same sacrifice isn’t completed until Jesus partakes of the fourth cup of wine just before he dies on the cross after saying, “It is consummated” (Jn 19:29, 30; cf. Mt 27:48; Mk 15:36).
Jesus was given sour wine on a “hyssop” branch that was used to sprinkle the lamb’s blood on the doorposts on the night of the first Passover (Ex 12:22) and by the priests in the sacrificial offerings of the Old Covenant. This joins Christ’s sacrifice of himself to the lambs that were slaughtered and consumed by the Jews in the Seder meal which was ceremonially completed by drinking the wine in the Cup of Consummation. Thus, Christ’s sacrifice began in the upper room and was completed on Golgotha.
Hence, the Lord’s Supper isn’t just a symbolic memorial meal, as most Protestants contend, but a marriage feast that marks God’s establishment of the New Covenant in which the Eucharist makes Christ’s one eternal sacrifice present. Scripture confirms this truth in the words of consecration – “Do this in remembrance of me” – used by Jesus in the Last Supper: touto poieite tan eman anamnasin (Lk 22:19; cf. 1 Cor 11:24-25). What our Lord literally says is, “Offer this as a memorial sacrifice.” The Greek verb poiein (ποιεῖν) or “do” is used in the context of offering a sacrifice where, for instance, in the Septuagint, God uses the same word poieseis (ποιέω) regarding the sacrifice of the lambs on the altar (Ex 29:38-39). The noun anamnesis (ἀνάμνησις) or “remembrance” also refers to a sacrifice that is really or actually made present in real-time by the power of God in the Holy Spirit, as it reminds us of the actual event (Heb 10:3; Num 10:10).
We read in Leviticus 24:7: ‘By each stack put some pure incense as a memorial portion to represent the bread and to be a food offering presented to the LORD.’ The word “memorial” in Hebrew in the sacrificial sense is the feminine noun azkarah ( אַזְכָּרָה )which means “to actually make present.” There are many instances in the Old Testament where azkarah refers to sacrifices that are currently being offered and so are present in time (Lev 2:2,9, 6:5; 16; 5-12; Num 5:26; 10:10). These are one and the same sacrifices that are memorially being offered in time. Jesus’ command for us to offer the bread and wine (transubstantiated into his body and blood) as a memorial offering shows that the sacrificial offering of his body and blood is made present in time over and over again while serving as a reminder of what he has accomplished for us through his one, single sacrifice of himself. Thus, the Holy sacrifice of the Mass is sacramentally a re-presentation of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross that began at the Last Supper and historically occurred on Calvary.
Sadly, Protestants argue in disbelief that Jesus is speaking metaphorically about eating his flesh and that the bread only symbolizes his body. But the Greek verbs used in John 6 (The Bread of Life Discourse) render their interpretation implausible. Throughout John 6:23-53, the Greek text uses the verb phago (φάγω) nine times. This verb means to literally “eat” or physically “consume.” Jesus repeated himself this often because of the Jews’ disbelief. He was, in a sense, challenging their faith in him while driving an important point home. In fact, many of his disciples deserted him since they knew he was speaking literally. So, Jesus uses an even more literal verb that describes the process of consuming food (Jn 6: 54, 55, 56, 57). This is the verb trogo (τρώγω) which means to “gnaw” “chew” or “crunch.” Though phago may be used in a metaphorical sense, trogo is never applied symbolically.
In Judaism, the ritual of circumcision ( Heb. בְּרִית מִילָה / brit milah) is a symbol of one’s partnership with God. This partnership with YWHW is a mysterious covenant that surpasses human comprehension. It is a pledge of unconditional devotion, no matter what may transpire between God and an individual. It is a bond that is absolute and immutable. For this reason, a Jew is circumcised as an infant, although it hasn’t yet developed its capacity for reasoning or making moral judgments since the covenant of circumcision is not an intellectual or calculated partnership. The circumcision of an infant demonstrates that the connection between the Jews and YHWH is beyond human rationale.
In Genesis 17, God gives no reason for circumcision other than it shall be a sign of the eternal covenant between God and Abraham and all of his descendants. God clearly commands that circumcision must occur on the eighth day of life for every Jewish male. Since Biblical times, male infants have been circumcised on the eighth day of life for it had been given since the time of Abraham and Isaac that each newly born son should be brought into the Covenant just as their fathers, grandfathers, and so on, had been before them. Ritual circumcision was originally a defining act for the young Israelite nation and continued to distinguish the Israelites (including infants) from other peoples.
When God told Israel, ” Therefore circumcise the foreskin of your heart, and be stiff-necked no longer ” (Deut 10:16), it meant that they were to remove their obstinate sinful thoughts from their minds. In other words, they were to purge sin from their lives and be obedient to the laws of God. The covenant God established between Him and the Israelites was essentially meant to be a relationship of reciprocal love and fidelity. The Israelites were to have no false gods before YHWH. This covenantal relationship contributed to a communal self-understanding and encouraged the Israelites to examine who they were as consecrated people in relation to God and how they ought to behave towards each other in their common relation to God as children of Abraham.
Thus, the Old Covenant served to remind the nation of how God desired the people should live in relation to each other: compassionately, generously, and righteously. It also served to remind the Israelites that they mustn’t place false gods or idols before Him. The false gods of the surrounding nations represented unruly and disordered human passions. The eight-day-old male infants were consecrated to God by their circumcision to enter this covenant of holiness. Infant girls were welcomed into the covenant through a naming ceremony. Now, the infant boys of the covenant were to be circumcised on the eighth day of their birth because this is the day of newness in Judaic tradition.
If there are seven days in a week, the eighth day is the first day of a new week. The performance of circumcision on the eighth day represents God’s promise of newness to His covenant children who had formerly lived profane lives among the pagan nations. This rite ultimately points forward to the eighth day (the first day of a new week) on which Christ arose from the dead in the newness of life and, thereby, the sacrament of Baptism. In the Catholic Church, infants and adults are baptized on a Sunday – the eighth day of the week or the new ‘Day of the Lord.’
Baptism proceeds from the rite of circumcision, as to how God intended that a spiritual circumcision must take place, which the physical aspect of circumcision represented in the Old Covenant. Baptism, therefore, is a sign of inward, spiritual “circumcision.” Baptism is a rebirth to a new life with God and being reborn from above. Although circumcision isn’t a sacrament but a symbolic ritual in Judaism, there are significant parallels between the two that show how baptism fulfills circumcision, as the Old Covenant finds its fulfillment in the New that has been established by Christ through the outpouring of his blood.
By baptism, we gain entry into the kingdom of God. Infants must be included as members of the body of Christ just as infants and young children were members of God’s chosen people in the Old Covenant. “We are members one of another.” Baptism not only purifies us from all sins but makes the neophyte a “new creature” and adopted child of God. “From the baptismal fonts is born the one people of God of the New Covenant” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1265). The Old Covenant was designed as a means to impart holiness to a newly restored people who were chosen to serve God by observing His statutes. It served as an instrument of grace. In the New Covenant, we become God’s own people, “a chosen race,” and “a holy nation” by our common baptism. We “become living stones to be built up into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood” (1 Pet 2:5; 9) through the graces and spiritual gifts we receive by being baptized.
Thus, the key benefits of baptism demand that infants should be baptized but not simply as an act of defining what it means to be God’s chosen people of the New Covenant. Infants are baptized in water to reap the spiritual benefits that have been merited for all of us through the blood of Christ. Blood and water flowed from our Savior’s side as he hung upon the cross. Infants should be baptized because through the sacrament they, too, receive the “grace of sanctification or justification” to have eternal life with God. This grace shall “enable them [as members of God’s kingdom] to believe in God, to hope in Him, and to love Him through the theological virtues [Faith, Hope, and Charity].” This grace will give them “the power to live and act under the prompting of the Holy Spirit through the gifts of the Holy Spirit” allowing them to “grow in goodness through the moral virtues” (CCC, 1266). The infant, meanwhile, is separated from all the people who haven’t yet been reborn from above or from heaven as it enters into the New Covenant in the kingdom of God.
St. Paul points out that baptism has replaced circumcision. He refers to the sacrament as “the circumcision of Christ” and “the circumcision made without hands” (Col 2:11-12). The latter reference recalls the passage above taken from the Book of Deuteronomy which refers to the physical ritual as essentially being a circumcision of the heart of all the Israelites including the circumcised male infants who will eventually grow into manhood expected to abide by God’s covenant. When a Jewish boy reaches the age of thirteen, the family celebrates his Bar Mitzvah, on which occasion he is regarded as ready to observe religious moral precepts and eligible to participate in public worship at the synagogue. The boy’s father offers a prayer of thanksgiving to God for relieving him of being morally responsible for his son’s actions, because he is primarily held accountable for the boy’s religious and spiritual nurturing until he has reached adolescence.
“For He came to save all through means of Himself–all, I say, who through Him
are born again to God–infants, and children, and boys, and youths, and old
men.”
St. Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 2,22:4
(A.D. 180)
“And they shall baptize the little children first. And if they can answer for
themselves, let them answer. But if they cannot, let their parents answer or
someone from their family.”
St. Hippolytus, Apostolic Tradition, 21
(c. A.D. 215)
Justin –
You cannot have “communion” without a priest or you destroy the entire meaning of the Mass and reject history. It was a hard saying for a reason which is why when Christ said this is his blood and body he meant it literally.
If Christ said the sky was blue I am convinced many would interpret that as green if it allowed them to have Christ on their terms.
Good day! I want to start studying the early Church, is this book a good place to start or should I do something else before diving into this one? Thanks in advance.
Jennifer, you should read the ‘Faith of Our Fathers’ by Leroy Froom, first
Thanks, I’ll look it up!
Jennifer, you should first read ‘Faith of Our Fathers’ by Leroy Froom
+ I’ve got Joe Heschmeyer’s “The Early Church was the Catholic Church” in digital format and am reading it on my iPhone and iPad. I’m about halfway through and am very favorably impressed with it.
+ It may be a bit or even far too much, but I learned quite a lot from Fr. William A. Jurgens’ three-volume set, “The Faith of the Early Fathers.”
+ Catholic Culture has a series of several dozen videos on YouTube, “Way of the Fathers with Mike Aquilina” that is also very good. I’m about 51 videos into the currently 66 video series. They run from about 14 minutes to 37 minutes.
Thank you so much, I didn’t know about the videos so I just subscribed and will start listening.
I want to add one note about Fr. William A. Jurgens’ wonderful three-volume set, “The Faith of the Early Fathers.” Fr. Jurgens had a sense of humor and could turn a good phrase as when he wrote about St. Irenaeus of Lyons (circa AD 140 – circa AD 202) as follows:
“He was a native of Asia Minor, probably of Smyrna, where in his youth he had been a pupil of St. Polycarp. His passage to Gaul, where we meet him as an esteemed presbyter of the Church of Lyons immediately before the death of his episcopal predecessor, is one of history’s mysteries. To exchange figs for frogs is incredible.”
Hey Joe – Are there plans to get your books on Audible?
Yet another article going on and on and on with this perpetual obsession with claiming sole authority! For goodness sake, what did Christ tell us to do? It wasn’t engage in doctrinal disputes; the apostles specifically enjoined against them. Perhaps that means those of us who are not Roman Catholics should as we now can, ignore such stuff and get on as best we can with what Christ told us to do, but this ridiculous pretension and fixation , out of which sprang so many abuses and atrocities, to say nothing of divisions; can’t you let it go? It is truly the stumbling block to Christian unity in the West, along with one or two other pretentious doctrinal inventions such a papal “infallibility”, the Council of Trent’s slap-up Apocrypha etc. etc. It’s not that I want to attack you, it’s just so sad, silly, and tragic this fostering of useless division.
“[T]his fostering of useless division” – hmmm. I first encountered “fissiparous” – which means giving birth to division – as an adjective for Protestantism.
Joe Heschmeyer’s “The Early Church was the Catholic Church” has a few things to say about papal infallibility that indicate it is not an “invention” and, as I recall, that the Jews long before the birth of Christ recognized something very similar in their high priest.
Put aside if you can the mental habits of doctrinal hair splitting and your dear “traditions” and read the Gospels for yourself and ask with all sincerity to be shown the truth therein. “Infallibility” ain’t there!
Division? Yes, out of error, pretension, arrogance, corruption, cruelty and murder sprang division! Surprise! What did Christ say, about cutting off those members that offend us, or leaving if necessary our families for his sake?
Bearing those injunctions in mind, I wonder if it would be reasonable to conclude that a man should likewise cut himself off from a body of purported believers that he sees are in error, or worse are merely mendacious, worldly careerists, cynics and sensualists.
Personally I don’t have to think long about that one – you?
I’ve no problem whatsoever keeping the manifold man-made traditions of Protestantism classified as inventions. Protestantism, to me, is good only insofar as it agrees with Catholic doctrine.
As a graduate student I had a Protestant roommate who was angered at the Protestant minister who performed a second marriage of my roommate’s ex-wife. Protestants seem rather casual about that yet some are obdurate that annulment – a declaration that what appears to have been a marriage but in fact was not – is no different. Yet I am reminded of the Episcopalian minister who happily volunteered to me that half of his congregation consisted of divorced ex-Catholics who sought re-marriage in the Catholic Church, but could not convince any Catholic tribunal that their marriages in the Catholic Church were somehow null, and jumped ship for Episcopalianism.
I am astonished how casual many Protestant are about the numerous reversals of doctrine in their ecclesial communities: prohibitions against artificial contraception perhaps everywhere before 1930 became approbations of artificial contraception, even of abortifacient birth control; Luther, Calvin, and Zwingli not only agreed with the Catholics and Orthodox that Mary remained a virgin her whole life but more amazingly with each other on that point, yet many Protestant apologists on the Internet today deny what the leaders of the Reformation affirmed.
I’ve many other disappointments with Protestantism. But perhaps Protestantism’s biggest problem is not so much that it lacks the pope but that it has thousands of infallible super-popes who effect these reversals of doctrine. There is a litany of other things I object to in Protestantism, but I will not write a tome here. I am grateful for authors such as Karl Keating who long ago pointed me to a solid understanding of the early Church and Joe Heschmeyer who has advanced many probable arguments in favor of Catholic doctrines which Protestants hold in contempt.
You will not prove the convolutions and abstraction of RC doctrine and papal pronunciamentos by criticizing Protestant doctrine. Authority rests with God in His Word and where men cannot agree on that, they had best leave it aside.
As for your Protestant roommate and the remarriage of the divorced etc., what did Christ say? “All men cannot receive this saying, save they to whom it is given.” Why would it be acceptable for Moses to give the Israelites a law permitting divorce, “…for the hardness of [their] hearts.”? Did Moses disobey God in doing so? If he did not, what does that tell us? Yes, it seems some careful thought will be needed about this one!
“Luther, Calvin, and Zwingli not only agreed with the Catholics and Orthodox that Mary remained a virgin her whole life but more amazingly with each other on that point, yet many Protestant apologists on the Internet today deny what the leaders of the Reformation affirmed.”
So, the half brothers and sisters of Christ, born of the Virgin Mary, whom the Gospels clearly tell us about, were conceived without intercourse? Luther, Calvin and Zwingli were raised in the RC doctrines, and had no more infallibility than your average pope – surprise! So when it says Joseph “knew her not till she had brought forth her firstborn. son and he called his name Jesus”, that seems to be quite clear doesn’t it? Was there a Marianne Cult in the early church? We all know the popularity of goddess worship and fertility cults, and having a “Christian” equivalent to offer the pagan converts was so very useful wasn’t it?
That cult has reached obscene, blasphemous heights, and without a scrap of scriptural authority. “There is but one mediator between God and men: the man Christ Jesus” Or do you have something that trumps the Apostle to the Gentiles?
Can you name a few of these Protestant “super-popes”? Can you show us where any of them make the kind of statement of claim that for example Cardinal Manning made, which I have quoted elsewhere on this site? It should tell you something that C.S. Lewis is apparently one of the favourite authors of Mr. Heschmeyer. Hilaire Belloc is one of mine!
So, according to you, the Gospels “clearly” tells us about the brothers of Jesus. Well, 1 Corinthians 15:5-6 is an epistle and not one of the canonical gospels, but it tells us this:
“5 That he was seen by Cephas, then by the eleven apostles, 6 and afterwards by more than five hundred of the brethren at once, most of whom are alive at this day, though some have gone to their rest.”
I guess Mary must have given birth to about 500 children then.
There are numerous instances in the Bible of other family members being identified as “brothers.” St. Jerome goes on at length about that in his “Against Helvidius.” Jerome even cites the example of Abraham marrying his “sister” Sarah, though she is the “daughter of his brother.”
And it is quite a hoot to insist as you do that the Reformers were too Catholic to object to belief in Mary’s ever-virginity while objecting to so much else in Catholicism.
Again, I refer you to Joe Heschmeyer’s “The Early Church Was the Catholic Church” for a discussion of the unlikelihood that the Church went off the rails in the earliest centuries.
I’ve not time now to respond to much else in your post.
Oh my, I didn’t know it was as bad as that!
46 While Jesus was still talking to the crowd, his mother and brothers stood outside, wanting to speak to him. 47 Someone told him, “Your mother and brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you.”
48 He replied to him, “Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?” 49 Pointing to his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers. 50 For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.”
Who were “his brothers” in this verse do you think?
53 When Jesus had finished these parables, he moved on from there. 54 Coming to his hometown, he began teaching the people in their synagogue, and they were amazed. “Where did this man get this wisdom and these miraculous powers?” they asked. 55 “Isn’t this the carpenter’s son? Isn’t his mother’s name Mary, and aren’t his brothers James, Joseph, Simon and Judas? 56 Aren’t all his sisters with us? Where then did this man get all these things?” 57 And they took offense at him.
Who were “his brothers” in this verse do you think?
The problem is you have built a rotten patchwork of “traditions” on the rock of Scripture. And such a house will not stand. It was easy when the laity were forbidden to read Scripture and the few literates could be bribed or bullied into silence, but those days are long gone, and will never come again.
Luther for example apparently believed in the most literal interpretation of transubstantiation. Another “vain doctrine having no foundation in Scripture” as the Articles of Religion so well describe such things.
“Transubstantiation (or the change of the substance of bread and wine) in the Supper of the Lord, cannot be proved by Holy Writ, but is repugnant to the plain words of Scripture, overthroweth the nature of a Sacrament, and hath given occasion to many superstitions.”
Calvin had someone burned at the stake and believed in the most literal and therefore the most silly form of pre-destination.
They were nothing but mortal men, prey as we all are to every error, vanity, pretension and delusion that humankind indulges in.
Sorry, but, as I noted in my previous post, there are many biblical references to “brothers” who are not children of the same mother. St. Jerome cited numerous examples circa 383 in “Against Helvidius.” And as I wrote in my previous post, Jerome even showed an example of a niece also described as a sister. You failed to address any of that, but dismissed these reasonable points, and instead attributed Catholic beliefs to diabolical “traditions” as you often do.
There are other excellent reasons I believe Mary never had other children, but the points already adduced are enough in my mind to refute you.
Yes, we are all aware that the term in English at least, can be in some cases ambiguous. Whether it is so in the Aramaic or the Greek I have not researched – have you? Personally I never saw the need as even with those ambiguities the meaning is clear enough from the text.
Where did I use the word “diabolical”?
So do you accept that the text clearly states that Joseph had intercourse with Mary after Christ’s birth? Are we to debate the meaning of “knew” in this context? Remember what the men of Sodom demanded of Lot’s guests? “Bring them out that we may know them.” They didn’t mean “get acquainted” did they?
And you think that intercourse – a perfectly right and proper occurrence between a duly married couple in Christian tradition – and arguably even more so in Jewish tradition – you think this did not result in the birth of any children?
So you think Joseph was required to remain a celibate by God, or do you think he got a dispensation for some “relief” elsewhere?
You think it was the mercy of God to deprive both Joseph and Mary of further children?
Sorry, if we want to follow Christ we have to follow what He said, not the dearly beloved “traditions” of whatever church we happen to have been raised in. What we “like”, what is “convenient” etc. etc.
Eyes, limbs, family members or familiar fables: we may have to cut them off – or be cut off ourselves. There is no debate about that Scripture I assume?
St. Jerome this, St. whoever that – what of it? We can read as well as they could. They were pious and often learned men, but they were still just men, prey to the pressures of their times and all the usual human foibles. THEIR OPINIONS DO NOT TRUMP SCRIPTURE.
If you want to choose the comfortable and familiar over God’s Word that’s up to every person to decide for themselves. We know what it will cost most who do so.
Umm, Mary conceived a child – a child with a human nature and a divine nature – with the Holy Spirit. She did not have an ordinary marriage, yet your posts show zero appreciation of that.
I have before me Fr. Michael O’Carroll’s “Theotokos: A Theological Encyclopedia of the Blessed Virgin Mary.” Under the entry for SPOUSE OF GOD (BRIDE OF GOD), MARY AS it states “a comparative study of the Annunciation scene and certain OT passages discovers sponsal connotations in the dialogue between the archangel and Mary.” In the following paragraph, we read that a “vague terminology which does not specify the divine person to whom Mary is espoused occurs in many of the Greek Fathers; she is spoken of as ‘God-wed’ (Theonymphos).”
“I’ve never understood why Catholics claim that Mary was a virgin her entire life. The Bible says that Jesus had brothers. Matthew 13:55 settles the matter for me: ‘Is not this the carpenter’s son? Is not his mother called Mary? And are not his brethren James and Joseph and Simon and Judas? And are not all his sisters with us?’”
In answering any biblical objection to the faith, step number one is putting the other at ease by agreeing that if a teaching contradicts Scripture, the teaching must be wrong.Next, examine the biblical evidence. In the case of Mary’s perpetual virginity, the key to explaining Matthew 13:55 is understanding the Greek word for “brethren” (adelphoi) and its feminine counterpart (adelphe). If the Greek words used in this passage connote only siblings, then the Catholic dogma of Mary’s perpetual virginity is false.However, the word adelphoi has a much broader meaning. It may refer to male relatives that one is not a descendant of and that are not descendant from one (such as a blood brother, step-brother, nephew, uncle, cousin, etc.) or non-relatives such as neighbors, fellow workers, co-religionists, and friends.
Because of this broad usage, we can be sure that the 120 “brothers” in Acts 1:15 did not have the same mother. Neither did Lot and his uncle Abraham, who were called “brothers” (Gen. 11:26-28, 29:15).
The reason relatives were called brothers or sisters was because in Hebrew, there was no word for cousin, nephew, or uncle. So the person was referred to as simply a “brother.” Linguistically, this was far easier than calling the person the son of a mother’s sister. Since the New Testament was written in a dialect of Greek that was heavily influenced by the Semitic culture, many of the Hebrew idioms (like “brother” having multiple meanings) intrude into the Greek text. So, the fact that Jesus had adelphoi does not mean that Mary had other children.
“But there was a Greek word for cousin, anepsios. If the brothers of the Lord were really his cousins, why wasn’t that word used?”
Here is a common misconception to be on the lookout for: “Catholics teach that the brothers were actually cousins.” That’s not the Catholic position. In fact, we can’t tell if any of the “brothers” were cousins. All the Church affirms is that they were not children of Mary. They could have been children of Joseph from a prior marriage. But the specific word for cousin (anepsios) probably would not have been used in Matthew 13:55 unless all the “brothers” were cousins. If even one of them was not a cousin, the more general term ” adelphoi” covers the situation. Even if all of them were cousins, the term “brother” could still be used by Matthew to appropriately describe them.These things were taken for granted by the early Christians, who were familiar with the biblical languages and who knew that Mary was a lifelong virgin. In A.D. 380, Helvidius proposed that Mary had other children because of the “brothers” in Matthew 13:55. He was rebutted by Jerome, who was arguably the greatest biblical scholar of the day. The Protestant reformer John Calvin seconded Jerome: “Helvidius has shown himself too ignorant, in saying that Mary had several sons, because mention is made in some passages to the brothers of Christ” [quoted by Bernard Leeming, Protestants and Our Lady, 9]. Martin Luther agreed with Calvin that Mary was always a virgin, as did Ulrich Zwingli: “I esteem immensely the Mother of God, the ever chaste, immaculate Virgin Mary” [E. Stakemeier, De Mariologia et Oecumenismo, K. Balic, ed., 456].
“But Matthew 1:25 states that Joseph had no relations with Mary until she bore a son. Wouldn’t that imply that he knew her afterward?”
Before you move on to this objection, notice that the verse in question has changed. You have presented scriptural and historical evidence to support the Church’s interpretation. If the person that you are speaking with leaves Matthew 13:55 to rest, it may be a sign that he sees the incompleteness of the “brethren of the Lord” argument. This is a good sign, so follow his lead—so long as the conversation stays on topic. Zealous Protestants will have any number of objections to the faith, and, if you hope to make any progress, take only one topic at a time.Now, does Matthew’s use of “until” mean what your friend says it does? Not necessarily. The Greek word for “until” (heos) does not imply that Mary had marital relations after the birth of Christ. In 2 Samuel 6:23, we read that Michal, the daughter of Saul, had no child “until” the day of her death. (Rest assured that she didn’t have any children after that day, either.) Hebrews 1:13 and 1 Timothy 4:13 are similar examples.When we interpret any passage, we must consider what the author was trying to say. Matthew’s intent here is not to explain what happened after the birth of Christ. He is only concerned with the fact that Joseph and Mary had no relations before then. It is the virgin birth, not later siblings, that Matthew is concerned with.
“What about Psalm 69:8? It prophesied that Mary would have children when it says in regard to Jesus, ‘I have been a stranger to my brethren, an alien to my mother’s sons.’”
If your friend takes this Psalm to be a literal prophecy of Christ, he runs into bigger problems. Look three verses earlier, “O God, thou knowest my folly; the wrongs I have done are not hidden from thee” (emphasis added). Since Jesus did no wrong and had no follies, it seems clear we shouldn’t take this passage literally.The prophecy in verse 8 is fulfilled by the fact that Jesus was rejected by his own relatives (Mark 3:21). Besides, if the “brethren” of the Lord were Joseph’s children from a prior marriage, though they were not Mary’s biological children, legally they would be considered her sons.
“But how could an unconsummated marriage have been a valid one for Mary and Joseph? It would be so unnatural.”
At the end of a wedding, the minister announces that the couple has become man and wife. They exchanged vows, and so they are married—without having consummated the marriage yet. When the marriage is consummated, the marriage—which was already valid—becomes indissoluble. So Joseph and Mary’s marriage was a real marriage, even if it was never consummated.In regard to it not being natural, the prophet Isaiah said that God’s ways are not like our ways (Is. 55:8–9). When the Second Person of the Trinity is in your wife’s womb, you can expect to have a different marriage than most folks!
“But it’s not a sin for a married couple to have marital relations.”
True, ordinarily. But even in the Old Testament God asked married couples to refrain from intercourse for various reasons. For example, the priests of the temple had to refrain from intimacy with their wives during the time of their service. Likewise, Moses had the Israelites abstain from intercourse as he ascended Mount Sinai (Ex. 20:15). There is a theme here of refraining from marital rights because of the presence of something very holy.The Church Fathers knew that there was something greater than the temple in Mary’s womb, comparing it to the Eastern Gate mentioned in Ezekiel 44: “This gate shall remain shut; it shall not be opened, and no one shall enter by it; for the Lord, the God of Israel, has entered by it; therefore it shall remain shut.” Mary had become the dwelling place of the Almighty, like the Ark of the Covenant in the Old Testament.Now, if Uzzah was struck dead for touching the Ark (2 Sam. 6:6–8), should it be surprising that Joseph understood that Mary was a vessel consecrated to God alone? The idea that Joseph assumed normal marital relations with Mary after the birth of Christ was an irreverence that even the Protestant reformers rejected.
Interestingly, according to Jewish law, if a man was betrothed to a woman and she became pregnant from another, he could never have relations with her. The man had to put her away privately or condemn her in public and put her to death. Joseph chose the more merciful option.
Then, the angel told him to lead her into the house as a wife (paralambano gunaika), but the language that describes marital relations is not used here. It was used, however, in Luke 1:35: “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.” To “overshadow” a woman was a euphemism for having a marital relationship, as was the phrase “to lay one’s power” over a woman. The Holy Spirit had espoused Mary, and she had been consecrated, set apart for God.
Also, it appears that Mary had made a vow of virginity. When the angel said that she would conceive and bear a son, she asked, “How can this be, since I do not know man?” She knew how babies were made, and she was about to be married. “How can this be?” would seem like a pretty silly question unless she had made a prior vow of virginity.
“Why is she betrothed to Joseph if she made a vow of virginity?”
Consecrated virginity was not common among first century Jews, but it did exist. According to some early Christian documents, such as the Protoevangelium of James (written around A.D. 120), Mary was a consecrated virgin. As such, when she reached puberty, her monthly cycle would render her ceremonially unclean and thus unable to dwell in the temple without defiling it under the Mosaic Law. At this time, she would be entrusted to a male guardian. However, since it was forbidden for a man to live with a woman he was not married or related to, the virgin would be wed to the guardian, and they would have no marital relations.
Yes, we can read as well as the early Fathers could (at least, some of us can), but the early Fathers were much closer to the event than we are, and much of what was lost in memory in later times, was then still preserved in living memory.
But let me ask you a question: where do your Scriptures come from? Who decided that it was these Scriptures, and these alone, that would have such an important authority for the Church? It is not written in Scripture itself which Scriptures are to be treated with divine authority. Is the final decision about the exact Canon of Scripture you hold to based upon the same “pious and often learned men” who nevertheless, “were still just men, prey to the pressures of their times and all the usual human foibles”? Apparently so. So how do you account for the authority of Scripture if you don’t trust the very authority that defined this Canon?
And for some further reading regarding one of the points you are concerned about:
https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/the-case-for-marys-perpetual-virginity
https://www.catholic.com/magazine/online-edition/proof-of-marys-perpetual-virginity-in-john-19
https://www.catholic.com/magazine/online-edition/why-marys-perpetual-virginity-matters
“The Early Church Was the Catholic Church”
Indeed, it just wasn’t the Roman Church.
He will decide who is acceptable to Him, not your popes or priests.
Pharisaical nonsense.
Oh, Brother!
First, we must understand that the term brother has a wide semantic range in Scripture. It can mean a uterine brother, an extended relative, or even a spiritual brother. In Genesis 13:8 and 14:12, we read of one example of brother being used to describe an extended relationship: Abraham and Lot. Though they were actually uncle and nephew, they called one another “brother.” Moreover, in the New Testament, Jesus told us to call one another “brothers” in Matthew 23:8. The passage obviously does not mean to suggest that all Christians have the same physical mother.
Second, if we examine more closely the example of James, one of these four “brothers of the Lord” mentioned in Matthew 13:55, we discover him to be a cousin or some other relative of Jesus rather than a uterine brother. For example, Galatians 1:18-19 informs us: “Then after three years I [Paul] went up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas, and remained with him fifteen days. But I saw none of the other apostles except James the Lord’s brother.”
Notice, the “James” of whom Paul was speaking was both a “brother of the Lord” and an “apostle.” There are two apostles named James among the 12. The first James is revealed to be a “son of Zebedee.” He most likely would not be the “James” referred to because according to Acts 12:1-2 he was martyred very early on. Even if it was him, his father was named Zebedee, not Joseph.
Paul more likely is referring to the second James who was an apostle, according to Luke 6:15-16. This James is revealed to have a father named Alphaeus, not Joseph. Thus, James the apostle and Jesus were not uterine brothers. Easy enough. Some will argue, however, that this “James” was not an apostle or that he was not one of the original 12. Though this is a possibility—others in the New Testament, such as Barnabas in Acts 14, are referred to as “apostles” in a looser sense—the argument from Scripture is weak. When Paul wrote about going “up to Jerusalem” to see Peter, he was writing about an event that occurred many years earlier, shortly after he had converted. He was basically going up to the apostles to receive approval lest he “should be running or had run in vain.” It would be more likely he would have here been speaking about “apostles” (proper), or “the twelve.”
But for those inclined to argue the point, the Catechism of the Catholic Church uses another line of reasoning:
The Church has always understood these passages as not referring to other children of the Virgin Mary. In fact James and Joseph, “brothers of Jesus,” are the sons of another Mary, a disciple of Christ, whom St. Matthew significantly calls “the other Mary.” They are close relations of Jesus, according to an Old Testament expression. (CCC 500)
The Catechism here refers to the fact that 14 chapters after we find the “brothers” of the Lord listed as “James, Joseph, Simon and Judas,” we find “James and Joseph” mentioned again, but this time their mother is revealed as being named Mary, but not Mary, the Mother of Jesus. We can conclude that “James and Joseph” are “brothers” of Jesus, but they are not uterine brothers.
But what about Matthew 1:24-25, and the claim Jesus was Mary’s “firstborn son” and that Joseph “knew her not until” Christ was born? Does Matthew here teach that Mary had other children?
Exodus 13:1-2 reveals something very important about the firstborn in Israel: “The Lord said to Moses, ‘Consecrate to me all the firstborn; whatever is the first to open the womb among the people of Israel, both of man and beast, is mine.’”
The “firstborn” were not given the title because there was a “second-born.” They were called “firstborn” at birth. Jesus being “firstborn” does not require that more siblings be born after him.
Until Then
Scripture’s statement that Joseph “knew [Mary] not until she brought forth her firstborn” would not necessarily mean they did “know” each other after she brought forth Jesus. Until is often used in Scripture as part of an idiomatic expression similar to our own usage in English. I may say to you, “Until we meet again, God bless you.” Does that necessarily mean after we meet again, God curse you? By no means. A phrase like this is used to emphasize what is being described before the until is fulfilled. It is not intended to say anything about the future beyond that point. Here are some biblical examples:
2 Samuel 6:23: And Michal the daughter of Saul had no child to (until) the day of her death. (Does this mean she had children after she died?)
1 Timothy 4:13: Until I come, attend to the public reading of scripture, to preaching, to teaching. (Does this mean Timothy should stop teaching after Paul comes?)
1 Corinthians 15:25: For he (Christ) must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. (Does this mean Christ’s reign will end? By no means! Luke 1:33 says, “he will reign over the house of Jacob forever and of his kingdom there shall be no end.”)
In recent years, some have argued that because Matthew 1:25 uses the Greek words heos hou for “until” whereas the texts I mentioned above from the New Testament use heos alone, there is a difference in meaning. The argument goes that Heos hou indicates the action of the first clause does not continue. Thus, Mary and Joseph “not having come together” would have ended after Jesus was born.
The problems with this theory begin with the fact that no available scholarship concurs with it. In fact, the evidence proves the contrary. Heos hou and heos are used interchangeably and have the same meaning. Acts 25:21 should suffice to clear up the matter: “But when Paul had appealed to be kept in custody for the decision of the emperor, I commanded him to be held until (Gk. heos hou) I could send him to Caesar.”
Does this text mean that Paul would not be held in custody after he was “sent” to Caesar? Not according to the biblical record. He would be held in custody while in transit (see Acts 27:1) and after he arrived in Rome for a time (see Acts 29:16). The action of the main clause did not cease with heos hou.
The Affirmative Argument
Now let’s look at some reasons to believe in Mary’s perpetual virginity. Among the many we could examine, we will briefly consider three:
1. In Luke 1:34, when Mary was told by the angel Gabriel that she was chosen to be the Mother of the Messiah, she asked the question, literally translated from the Greek, “How shall this be since I know not man?” This question makes no sense unless Mary had a vow of virginity.
When we consider that Mary and Joseph were already “espoused,” according to verse 27 of this same chapter, we understand Mary and Joseph already have what would be akin to a ratified marriage in the New Covenant. They were married. That would mean Joseph would have had the right to the marriage bed. Normally, after the espousal the husband would go off and prepare a home for his new bride and then come and receive her into his home where the union would be consummated. This is precisely why Joseph intended to “divorce her quietly” (Mt 1:19) when he later discovered she was pregnant.
This background is significant because a newly married woman would not ask the question “How shall this be?” She would know—unless, of course, that woman had taken a vow of virginity. Mary believed the message, but wanted to know how this was going to be accomplished. This indicates she was not planning on the normal course of events for her future with Joseph.
2. In John 19:26, Jesus gave his Mother to the care of John even though by law the next eldest sibling would have the responsibility to care for her. It is unthinkable that Jesus would take his Mother away from his family in disobedience to the law.
Some claim Jesus did this because his brothers and sisters were not there. They had left him. Thus, Jesus committed his Mother to John, who was faithful and present at the foot of the cross. This claim betrays a very low and unbiblical Christology. As John tells us, Jesus “knew all men” (cf. Jn 2:25). If James were his uterine brother, Jesus would have known he would be faithful along with his “brother” Jude. The fact is Jesus had no brothers and sisters, so he had the responsibility, on a human level, to take care of his Mother.
3. Mary is depicted as the spouse of the Holy Spirit in Scripture. In Luke 1:34, when Mary asks the angel how she will conceive a child, the angel responds: “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God.”
This is nuptial language hearkening back to Ruth 3:8, where Ruth said to Boaz “spread your skirt over me” when she revealed to him his duty to marry her according to the law of Deuteronomy 25. When Mary became pregnant, Joseph would have been required to divorce her because she would then belong to another (see Dt 24:1-4; Jer 3:1). But when Joseph found out that “the other” was the Holy Spirit, the idea of his having conjugal relations with Mary was not a consideration.
Mary’s Protector
An obvious question remains: Why did St. Joseph then “take [Mary] his wife” according to Matthew 1:24 if she belonged to the Holy Spirit?
The Holy Spirit is Mary’s spouse, but Joseph was her spouse and protector on this earth for at least two obvious reasons. First, as Matthew points out in his genealogy in chapter 1, Joseph was in line to be a successor of David as King of Israel. Thus, if Jesus was to be the true “son of David” and king of Israel (see 2 Sm 7:14, Heb 1:5, Rv 19:16, 22:16), he needed to be the son of Joseph. As the only son of Joseph, even though adopted, he would have been in line for the throne.
Also, in a culture that did not take too kindly to espoused women getting pregnant by someone other than their spouse, Mary would have been in mortal danger. So Joseph became Mary’s earthly spouse and protector as well as the protector of the child Jesus.