Did Mary always know she was sinless?

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Did Mary always know she was sinless? If she didn’t even have imperfections, what could she have possibly doubted herself of?
 
I think she knew, but she wouldn’t make a big deal of it. She was a very humble woman.
 
Mary knew how good the Lord was and that she was chosen to serve him. She knew that her will was perfectly aligned with His that it was all that mattered.

How could sin and preoccupation with sin be on her radar? Those worries are for us, who suffer from concupiscence. Actually, this question reflects not on Mary, but rather on our fallen state.
 
Mary’s family knew she had a special vocation, which is why she was sent to live as a consecrated virgin under Joseph’s care.

She would certainly know that she was unaware of any sin, but did not necessarily know that she was blessed to avoid sin altogether.

Like Eve, she was capable of sin. However, at every moment of her life, she chose to serve the Lord.
 
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I have always wondered about Mary’s relation to sin, i.e., how similar was she to Adam and Eve before the fall, and how was she different? In short, was she able to be tempted? And would it have been the type of powerful temptations that we as the faithful sometimes experience?

Let me explain. She had no original sin in her, so does this mean she didn’t even have the inclination to sin? Could she have been tempted to choose sin over God, as Eve was? And could she (even though she did not) have chosen sin and thus lost her immaculate-ness? Before the Incarnation? Afterwards?
 
HomeschoolDad said:
She had no original sin in her, so does this mean she didn’t even have the inclination to sin? Could she have been tempted to choose sin over God, as Eve was? And could she (even though she did not) have chosen sin and thus lost her immaculate-ness? Before the Incarnation? Afterwards?
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I think that is what the Immaculate Conception implies - no inclination to sin. However, I don’t think this means that she could not be tempted. Both pre-fall Eve and Our Lord were tempted (although I’m not 100% sure that these two temptation incidents can be categorized the same way). Neither would have had the inclination to sin.
 
In my opinion, yes, she did know she was sinless, and probably that she would never sin. That is part and parcel of her knowledge that she was the Mother of God. Because she was perfectly virtuous, including perfectly humble, this knowledge would not have been a spiritual impediment to her. I’m not a qualified theologian, so anyone feel free to correct me.
 
Socrates92 said:
Both pre-fall Eve and Our Lord were tempted… Neither would have had the inclination to sin.
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Eve? No inclination to sin? If that were the case, then how did she fall for Satan’s temptation? Both she and Adam had been told “don’t do this”. They did it.

It seems to me that the mere fact that Adam and Eve committed the sin in the first place proves that they both had an “inclination to sin”. If that is the case, then Mary had this inclination too, she just never succumbed to it.

Perhaps the real question is “were Adam and Eve created without sin and then fell, whereas Mary was created without sin and did not fall”. Or was there something about the immaculate conception of Mary that was “over and above” Adam and Eve’s creation? Eve, after all, was not being prepared to conceive the Lord God, and Mary was.

(A literal interpretation of Genesis tells us that neither Adam nor Eve were “conceived”, so “immaculately ensouled” might be a better way to describe their creation.)
 
Well, Jesus was tempted in the desert, so temptation of even the sinless seems inevitable. One key difference: the Devil doesn’t fear God; he does fear Mary.

If Mary were to sin, it would be to curse God when her only son w’re nailed to a tree, as Job had done when the Lord had taken everything from him. Instead, she offered her son up, trusting in the Father.
 
I guess my language might be a bit imprecise. It might be more accurate to say they didn’t have a disordered attachment to sin. But even so, I’m not so sure. Saying that we are, as humans, inclined to sin, even without the effects of original sin weighing in would seem to imply a defect in God’s creation itself. Which contradicts that statement that “It was good”.

I mean, it’s possible to do all kinds of things that you aren’t strictly speaking inclined towards. Typically, overcoming your inclinations has more of a positive ring to it, at least in our current fallen state, as we are mostly inclined towards evil/weakness. But I see no reason why it couldn’t go the other direction

How philosophical do you want to get about this? Sin is an act of the will. Inclinations are in the appetites. So say that someone is not inclined to evil simply means that their appetites don’t automatically gravitate towards things that are evil. It does not mean that can’t be acted upon by some outside force (temptation), and choose to succumb to it.

Another point: saying that someone has no inclination to evil is not quite the same thing as saying someone has perfect virtue. Virtue is a habit, and is attained only through difficult practise. Hence, Adam and Eve wouldn’t have necessarily had a great deal of virtue at the time of the fall. (But then, I’m sure how the absence of suffering plays into this dynamic.) But then, there’s future complications when you start talking about natural virtues vs. supernatural (infused) virtues, which I don’t totally understand… (Did Mary always have perfect supernatural virtue? What about Eve pre-fall?)

Come to think of it, I’m not even 100% sure that the normal mechanism of attaining virtue (ie: work and suffering) applied pre-Fall… Could it be that pre-Fall man was by default virtuous, and therefore didn’t really have to work at it? So yeah… a lot of questions… and I’m tired.
 
WannabeSaint said:
Did Mary always know she was sinless? If she didn’t even have imperfections, what could she have possibly doubted herself of?
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We have to be aware that the whole concept of Original Sin wasn’t a defined ‘thing’ until Augustine of Hippo expounded on it at the beginning of the 5th century. It did not rate as ‘doctrine’ until the Council of Trent in the 16th century.

The Scriptures record Mary’s realisation that she was ‘blessed’ but it’s not really likely that she interpreted that as ‘sinless’ at the time. She most probably recognised herself as being ‘chosen’ by God in the way God had ‘chosen’ His people and His prophets gone before her. Our understanding of a sinful nature was a development that came centuries after the time of Mary.
 
If she was not capable of sinning, it would seem she would not be truly human.

She chose not to sin.
 
JimmyTolder said:
I don’t believe Mary ever was tempted. I don’t think God would allow her to be tempted
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But Jesus was tempted. There must have many times when she faced ridicule or insulting language, such as while living among pagans in Egypt or in Jerusalem during our Lord’s passion the same Jews who shouted crucify him! would have seen her and said something to her. She chose not to get angry and sin. May we practice that self-restraint too and not give in to the temptations of the enemy.
 
HomeschoolDad said:
In short, was she able to be tempted? And would it have been the type of powerful temptations that we as the faithful sometimes experience?
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If Jesus (fully human and fully divine) was able to be tempted, Mary (fully human, not at all divine) was able to be tempted.

I have heard it said that the Devil probably tempted her when Jesus was hanging on the cross before her eyes and dying, “So this is the son that was going to rule the world and his kingdom would never end? Yeah right…he looks pretty dead right now!”

I am also sure she must have been tempted when the angel arrived at the Annunciation. Mary was young, she was scared, she was just married, it would have been easy for her to have doubt in God at that point. If she hadn’t been tempted, then her saying “Yes” to God wouldn’t have been a big deal as there would have been no potential for her to say No.
 
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Tis_Bearself said:
I have heard it said that the Devil probably tempted her when Jesus was hanging on the cross before her eyes and dying, “So this is the son that was going to rule the world and his kingdom would never end? Yeah right…he looks pretty dead right now!”
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She also must have been tempted to rage against us, who put Him there.
 
And Jesus’ friends and followers, who with the exception of John and a handful of women, were nowhere to be seen while this was going on.
 
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