A question about the dormition/assumption

[hilarycotter]

My wife was asking a question about the assumption of Mary to heaven. I thought the church taught about the dormition and then her body disappeared. Checking the catechism it talks about the bodily assumption, but nothing about the dormition (IIRC falling asleep). Can anyone help me reconcile the dormition with the assumption?

 

[Byzcat]

I think this is an East/West issue.

In the Eastern tradition, the Blessed Mother “fell asleep”, that is, died physically, then was resurrected, as Christ was, as we all will be at the end of time. Her body was not subject to corruption.

In the West, there seems to be some controversy. Some, probably most, believe that Mama did fall asleep, but there are also many who believe she was taken up alive in the fashion of Enoch and Elijah.

I subscribe to the Eastern view.

 

[mardukm]

My wife was asking a question about the assumption of Mary to heaven. I thought the church taught about the dormition and then her body disappeared. Checking the catechism it talks about the bodily assumption, but nothing about the dormition (IIRC falling asleep). Can anyone help me reconcile the dormition with the assumption?

That’s not true. The Catechism DOES recognize, as ByzCat noted, that most of the Catholic Church believes that Mary died. That is why the Assumption, according to the Catechism, specifically states that it was Mary’s participation in the RESURRECTION, not a mere bodily translation into heaven as Enoch and Elijah.

What is resurrection if not a rising FROM THE DEAD.

Blessings,
Marduk

 

[Alexius]

That’s not true. The Catechism DOES recognize, as ByzCat noted, that most of the Catholic Church believes that Mary died. That is why the Assumption, according to the Catechism, specifically states that it was Mary’s participation in the RESURRECTION, not a mere bodily translation into heaven as Enoch and Elijah.

What is resurrection if not a rising FROM THE DEAD.

Blessings,
Marduk

Does it add the term “resurrection?” I’ll have to check…

Prayers and petitions,
Alexius

 

[StRaphael]

That Our Lady died follows from Pius XII’s Munificentissimus Deus 14,17-18,20-22,28,35,40.

From the Apostolic Constitution of Pope Pius XII: Munificentissimus Deus – Defining the Dogma of the Assumption (November 1, 1950) at the Vatican.va website:
14. Christ’s faithful, through the teaching and the leadership of their pastors, have learned from the sacred books that the Virgin Mary, throughout the course of her earthly pilgrimage, led a life troubled by cares, hardships, and sorrows, and that, moreover, what the holy old man Simeon had foretold actually came to pass, that is, that a terribly sharp sword pierced her heart as she stood under the cross of her divine Son, our Redeemer. In the same way, it was not difficult for them to admit that the great Mother of God, like her only begotten Son, had actually passed from this life. But this in no way prevented them from believing and from professing openly that her sacred body had never been subject to the corruption of the tomb, and that the august tabernacle of the Divine Word had never been reduced to dust and ashes. Actually, enlightened by divine grace and moved by affection for her, God’s Mother and our own dearest Mother, they have contemplated in an ever clearer light the wonderful harmony and order of those privileges which the most provident God has lavished upon this loving associate of our Redeemer, privileges which reach such an exalted plane that, except for her, nothing created by God other than the human nature of Jesus Christ has ever reached this level.
17. In the liturgical books which deal with the feast either of the dormition or of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin there are expressions that agree in testifying that, when the Virgin Mother of God passed from this earthly exile to heaven, what happened to her sacred body was, by the decree of divine Providence, in keeping with the dignity of the Mother of the Word Incarnate, and with the other privileges she had been accorded. Thus, to cite an illustrious example, this is set forth in that sacramentary which Adrian I, our predecessor of immortal memory, sent to the Emperor Charlemagne. These words are found in this volume: “Venerable to us, O Lord, is the festivity of this day on which the holy Mother of God suffered temporal death, but still could not be kept down by the bonds of death, who has begotten your Son our Lord incarnate from herself.”(11)
18. What is here indicated in that sobriety characteristic of the Roman liturgy is presented more clearly and completely in other ancient liturgical books. To take one as an example, the Gallican sacramentary designates this privilege of Mary’s as “an ineffable mystery all the more worthy of praise as the Virgin’s Assumption is something unique among men.” And, in the Byzantine liturgy, not only is the Virgin Mary’s bodily Assumption connected time and time again with the dignity of the Mother of God, but also with the other privileges, and in particular with the virginal motherhood granted her by a singular decree of God’s Providence. “God, the King of the universe, has granted you favors that surpass nature. As he kept you a virgin in childbirth, thus he has kept your body incorrupt in the tomb and has glorified it by his divine act of transferring it from the tomb.”(12)
20. However, since the liturgy of the Church does not engender the Catholic faith, but rather springs from it, in such a way that the practices of the sacred worship proceed from the faith as the fruit comes from the tree, it follows that the holy Fathers and the great Doctors, in the homilies and sermons they gave the people on this feast day, did not draw their teaching from the feast itself as from a primary source, but rather they spoke of this doctrine as something already known and accepted by Christ’s faithful. They presented it more clearly. They offered more profound explanations of its meaning and nature, bringing out into sharper light the fact that this feast shows, not only that the dead body of the Blessed Virgin Mary remained incorrupt, but that she gained a triumph out of death, her heavenly glorification after the example of her only begotten Son, Jesus Christ-truths that the liturgical books had frequently touched upon concisely and briefly.

 

[StRaphael]

1. Thus St. John Damascene, an outstanding herald of this traditional truth, spoke out with powerful eloquence when he compared the bodily Assumption of the loving Mother of God with her other prerogatives and privileges. “It was fitting that she, who had kept her virginity intact in childbirth, should keep her own body free from all corruption even after death. It was fitting that she, who had carried the Creator as a child at her breast, should dwell in the divine tabernacles. It was fitting that the spouse, whom the Father had taken to himself, should live in the divine mansions. It was fitting that she, who had seen her Son upon the cross and who had thereby received into her heart the sword of sorrow which she had escaped in the act of giving birth to him, should look upon him as he sits with the Father. It was fitting that God’s Mother should possess what belongs to her Son, and that she should be honored by every creature as the Mother and as the handmaid of God.”(17)
2. These words of St. John Damascene agree perfectly with what others have taught on this same subject. Statements no less clear and accurate are to be found in sermons delivered by Fathers of an earlier time or of the same period, particularly on the occasion of this feast. And so, to cite some other examples, St. Germanus of Constantinople considered the fact that the body of Mary, the virgin Mother of God, was incorrupt and had been taken up into heaven to be in keeping, not only with her divine motherhood, but also with the special holiness of her virginal body. “You are she who, as it is written, appears in beauty, and your virginal body is all holy, all chaste, entirely the dwelling place of God, so that it is henceforth completely exempt from dissolution into dust. Though still human, it is changed into the heavenly life of incorruptibility, truly living and glorious, undamaged and sharing in perfect life.”(18) And another very ancient writer asserts: “As the most glorious Mother of Christ, our Savior and God and the giver of life and immortality, has been endowed with life by him, she has received an eternal incorruptibility of the body together with him who has raised her up from the tomb and has taken her up to himself in a way known only to him.”(19)
3. Thus, during the earliest period of scholastic theology, that most pious man, Amadeus, Bishop of Lausarme, held that the Virgin Mary’s flesh had remained incorrupt-for it is wrong to believe that her body has seen corruption-because it was really united again to her soul and, together with it, crowned with great glory in the heavenly courts. “For she was full of grace and blessed among women. She alone merited to conceive the true God of true God, whom as a virgin, she brought forth, to whom as a virgin she gave milk, fondling him in her lap, and in all things she waited upon him with loving care.”(26)
4. In like manner St. Francis de Sales, after asserting that it is wrong to doubt that Jesus Christ has himself observed, in the most perfect way, the divine commandment by which children are ordered to honor their parents, asks this question: “What son would not bring his mother back to life and would not bring her into paradise after her death if he could?”(38) And St. Alphonsus writes that “Jesus did not wish to have the body of Mary corrupted after death, since it would have redounded to his own dishonor to have her virginal flesh, from which he himself had assumed flesh, reduced to dust.”(39)
5. Hence the revered Mother of God, from all eternity joined in a hidden way with Jesus Christ in one and the same decree of predestination,(47) immaculate in her conception, a most perfect virgin in her divine motherhood, the noble associate of the divine Redeemer who has won a complete triumph over sin and its consequences, finally obtained, as the supreme culmination of her privileges, that she should be preserved free from the corruption of the tomb and that, like her own Son, having overcome death, she might be taken up body and soul to the glory of heaven where, as Queen, she sits in splendor at the right hand of her Son, the immortal King of the Ages.(48)

Endnotes
11. Sacramentarium Gregorianum.
12. Menaei Totius Anni.
17. St. John Damascene, Encomium in Dormitionem Dei Genetricis Semperque Virginis Mariae, Hom. II, n. 14; cf. also ibid, n. 3.
18. St. Germanus of Constantinople, In Sanctae Dei Genetricis Dormitionem, Sermo I.
19. The Encomium in Dormitionem Sanctissimae Dominae Nostrate Deiparae Semperque Virginis Mariae, attributed to St. Modestus of Jerusalem, n. 14.
26. Amadeus of Lausanne, De Beatae Virginis Obitu, Assumptione in Caelum Exaltatione ad Filii Dexteram.
38. Oeuvres de St. Francois De Sales, sermon for the Feast of the Assumption.
39. St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Glories of Mary, Part 2, d. 1.
47. The Bull Ineffabilis Deus, loc. cit., p. 599.48. I Tim 1:17.

 

[bpbasilphx]

but there are also many who believe she was taken up alive in the fashion of Enoch and Elijah.

They believe this not because of what the Western Church teaches, but in spite of it.

In the Roman office for the feast promulgated in 1950 when Pius XII dogmatized the Assumption, the fifth Matins lesson, quoting St. John of Damascus, says “But she yielded obedience to the law established by him to whom she had given birth, and, as the daughter of the old Adam, underwent the old sentence, which even her Son, who is the very Life Itself, had not refused.” [that is, death] Lex orandi, lex credendi. If it’s in the liturgical formularies of the Church, it’s the teaching of the church.

 

[mardukm]

Dearest brother bpbasilphx,

but there are also many who believe she was taken up alive in the fashion of Enoch and Elijah.

They believe this not because of what the Western Church teaches, but in spite of it.

In the Roman office for the feast promulgated in 1950 when Pius XII dogmatized the Assumption, the fifth Matins lesson, quoting St. John of Damascus, says “But she yielded obedience to the law established by him to whom she had given birth, and, as the daughter of the old Adam, underwent the old sentence, which even her Son, who is the very Life Itself, had not refused.” [that is, death] Lex orandi, lex credendi. If it’s in the liturgical formularies of the Church, it’s the teaching of the church.

Thank you for your knowledge. I am very impressed.

I would also like to express how much I appreciate that you as an Orthodox have chosen to stay with us in the new Forum.

Abundant blessings,
Marduk

 

[Ghosty]

They believe this not because of what the Western Church teaches, but in spite of it.

Amen!

Funny thing is, I’ve never heard of anyone PRIOR to the declaration of the Assumption claiming that she didn’t die. This idea seems to have come up largely afterwards due to the fact that the “dogmatic definition” portion of the text doesn’t explicitly mention her dying, and therefore belief in that is optional. This in spite of the fact that the document is filled with references to her death, and it is plainly assumed in the “dogmatic definition” portion.

I think it’s a good example of people taking “Papal Infallibility” too rigidly, making it a matter of hard lines of ink and paper rather than as a part of the Living Magisterium of the Church.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Mannyfit75]

Amen!

Funny thing is, I’ve never heard of anyone PRIOR to the declaration of the Assumption claiming that she didn’t die. This idea seems to have come up largely afterwards due to the fact that the “dogmatic definition” portion of the text doesn’t explicitly mention her dying, and therefore belief in that is optional. This in spite of the fact that the document is filled with references to her death, and it is plainly assumed in the “dogmatic definition” portion.

I think it’s a good example of people taking “Papal Infallibility” too rigidly, making it a matter of hard lines of ink and paper rather than as a part of the Living Magisterium of the Church.

Peace and God bless!

Many Catholic priests and theologians do believe that Mary did in fact died prior to her assumption, and that she was raised from the dead, and assumed into heaven.

Remember, Pope XII said that her assumption is a preview of the things to come for all believers. In the Last Days, our dead bodies will be resurrected, and if we are obedient to God’s law, we would be assumed body and soul into heaven.

 

[Ghosty]

Many Catholic priests and theologians do believe that Mary did in fact died prior to her assumption, and that she was raised from the dead, and assumed into heaven.

Remember, Pope XII said that her assumption is a preview of the things to come for all believers. In the Last Days, our dead bodies will be resurrected, and if we are obedient to God’s law, we would be assumed body and soul into heaven.

I agree completely. My point was that some people today claim that she didn’t die, despite the fact that the entire point of the Assumption is that she did and was Resurrected prior to the general Resurrection to come.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Alexius]

Amen!

Funny thing is, I’ve never heard of anyone PRIOR to the declaration of the Assumption claiming that she didn’t die. This idea seems to have come up largely afterwards due to the fact that the “dogmatic definition” portion of the text doesn’t explicitly mention her dying, and therefore belief in that is optional. This in spite of the fact that the document is filled with references to her death, and it is plainly assumed in the “dogmatic definition” portion.

I think it’s a good example of people taking “Papal Infallibility” too rigidly, making it a matter of hard lines of ink and paper rather than as a part of the Living Magisterium of the Church.

Peace and God bless!

Me too! Although that is mainly because I was born well after the dogma was declared, but I have not come across any Church writers who thought she did not die before the declaration… Curious though, as a child, I always saw an image of her being taken into heaven alive and thought that that was what Catholics believe…

Prayers and petitions,
Alexius

 

[mardukm]

Dear brother Alexius,

Me too! Although that is mainly because I was born well after the dogma was declared, but I have not come across any Church writers who thought she did not die before the declaration… Curious though, as a child, I always saw an image of her being taken into heaven alive and thought that that was what Catholics believe…

Do you mean Catholics in general, or just Latin Catholics (since you are also Catholic). If you meant Catholics in general, as your Eastern identity became more apparent to you, did that cause some conflict in your self-awareness as a Catholic?

Blessings,
Marduk

 

[Alexius]

Dear brother Alexius,

Do you mean Catholics in general, or just Latin Catholics (since you are also Catholic). If you meant Catholics in general, as your Eastern identity became more apparent to you, did that cause some conflict in your self-awareness as a Catholic?

Blessings,
Marduk

Well, I think specifically of paintings of Mary I saw…
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Assumption.jpg
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Tizian_041.jpg

When I came to understand the Eastern belief, I embraced it…I think the problem boils down to truth. There is ultimately one truth as to what happened to the Theotokos. For the Catholic Church to leave it open seems to say one of two things: 1) We “know” something special happened, but we don’t know the details, or 2) there are multiple “truths…”

Prayers and petitions,
Alexius

 

[mardukm]

Well, I think specifically of paintings of Mary I saw…
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Assumption.jpg
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Tizian_041.jpg

When I came to understand the Eastern belief, I embraced it…I think the problem boils down to truth. There is ultimately one truth as to what happened to the Theotokos. For the Catholic Church to leave it open is almost to say one of two things: 1) We “know” something special happened, but we don’t know the details, or 2) there are multiple “truths…”

Ahhh! Thanks for the explanation. You have a good point. In response, I would like to point out that not all de fide beliefs of the Catholic Church are a matter of dogma, or have become beliefs just because they were formally dogmatized. Just because the Catholic Church has left something UN-dogmatized does not mean she has left something open to be believed or not. In that sense, the Catholic and Orthodox Churches share the same epistemological awareness of the Truth.

As our Orthodox brother Bpbasilphx pointed out, Latin Catholics who believe Mary did not die have that belief DESPITE the magisterial [and undogmatized] teaching of the Catholic Church, not because of it.

Blessings,
Marduk

 

[bpbasilphx]

I would also like to express how much I appreciate that you as an Orthodox have chosen to stay with us in the new Forum.

The Orthodox have never doubted her Bodily Assumption. Our emphasis on 15 August is on her falling asleep–that is, dying–and her Divine Son being seen receiving her soul into His arms. The feast continues for a week afterward (corresponding to the Western Octave, most of which have now been suppressed).

Starting on 17 August, there are references to her Bodily Assumption.

As Met. Kallistos (Ware) said, this has never been a subject of a council, but the Orthodox church holds it with an “unruffled unanimity [his phrase].” Without insisting on the details of the legend, she firmly holds that the Holy Theotokos has passed beyond death and judgement and lives fully in the Age to Come–which is the true destiny of all Christians.

 

[Alexius]

I would also like to express how much I appreciate that you as an Orthodox have chosen to stay with us in the new Forum.

The Orthodox have never doubted her Bodily Assumption. Our emphasis on 15 August is on her falling asleep–that is, dying–and her Divine Son being seen receiving her soul into His arms. The feast continues for a week afterward (corresponding to the Western Octave, most of which have now been suppressed).

Starting on 17 August, there are references to her Bodily Assumption.

As Met. Kallistos (Ware) said, this has never been a subject of a council, but the Orthodox church holds it with an “unruffled unanimity [his phrase].” Without insisting on the details of the legend, she firmly holds that the Holy Theotokos has passed beyond death and judgement and lives fully in the Age to Come–which is the true destiny of all Christians.

Yes, I never understood why so many say that Orthodox deny the Bodily Assumption of the Theotokos…

Prayers and petitions,
Alexius

 

[bpbasilphx]

Yes, I never understood why so many say that Orthodox deny the Bodily Assumption of the Theotokos.

For the same reason that many Latins deny that she actually died.

They just don’t know any better.

 

[ronyodish]

Here is what goarch.org says:​

Following her repose, the body of the Theotokos was taken in procession and laid in a tomb near the Garden of Gethsemane. When the Apostle Thomas arrived three days after her repose and desired to see her body, the tomb was found to be empty. The bodily assumption of the Theotokos was confirmed by the message of an angel and by her appearance to the Apostles.​

In The Book of the Bee, here is how Solomon of Akhlat, 13th century bishop of the Church of the East, puts it:​

She was not buried on earth, but the angels carried her to Paradise, and angels bore her bier. On the day of her death all the apostles were gathered together, and they prayed over her and were blessed by her. Thomas was in India, and an angel took him up and brought him, and he found the angels carrying her bier through the air; and they brought it nigh to Thomas, and he also prayed and was blessed by her.​

By the way, in the Semitic mindset, corruption of the corpse occurred 4 days after death (see John 11:39, Acts 2:31). God did not allow Mary’s body to be corrupted after death

God bless,

Rony

 

[peary]

Why doesn’t anyone type the actual words that Pius XII used when making the Assumption a dogma of Faith?

**17. "In the liturgical books which deal with the feast either of the dormition or of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin there are expressions that agree in testifying that, when the Virgin Mother of God passed from this earthly exile to heaven, what happened to her sacred body was, by the decree of divine Providence, in keeping with the dignity of the Mother of the Word Incarnate, and with the other privileges she had been accorded. Thus, to cite an illustrious example, this is set forth in that sacramentary which Adrian I, our predecessor of immortal memory, sent to the Emperor Charlemagne. These words are found in this volume: “Venerable to us, O Lord, is the festivity of this day on which the holy Mother of God suffered temporal death, but still could not be kept down by the bonds of death, who has begotten your Son our Lord incarnate from herself.”

40.“Hence the revered Mother of God, from all eternity joined in a hidden way with Jesus Christ in one and the same decree of predestination,[47] immaculate in her conception, a most perfect virgin in her divine motherhood, the noble associate of the divine Redeemer who has won a complete triumph over sin and its consequences, finally obtained, as the supreme culmination of her privileges, that she should be preserved free from the corruption of the tomb and that, like her own Son, having overcome death, she might be taken up body and soul to the glory of heaven where, as Queen, she sits in splendor at the right hand of her Son, the immortal King of the Ages.”

1. For which reason, after we have poured forth prayers of supplication again and again to God, and have invoked the light of the Spirit of Truth, for the glory of Almighty God who has lavished his special affection upon the Virgin Mary, for the honor of her Son, the immortal King of the Ages and the Victor over sin and death, for the increase of the glory of that same august Mother, and for the joy and exultation of the entire Church; 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.