i know its claimed to be a scriptural prayer but did people in the
2nd-3rd centuries pary the hail Mary?
Let me answer my own question with this quote from the New Advent which says this about its origins–“In point of fact there is little or no trace of the Hail Mary as an accepted devotional formula before about 1050. All the evidence suggests that it took its rise from certain versicles and responsories occurring in the Little Office or Cursus of the Blessed Virgin which just at that time was coming into favour among the monastic orders.”
What this clearly shows is that the Hail Mary prayer was not a part of the early church.
Here is what the New Advent says about her supposed assumption–“Regarding the day, year, and manner of Our Lady’s death, nothing certain is known. The earliest known literary reference to the Assumption is found in the Greek work De Obitu S. Dominae. Catholic faith, however, has always derived our knowledge of the mystery from Apostolic Tradition. Epiphanius (d. 403) acknowledged that he knew nothing definite about it (Haer., lxxix, 11). The dates assigned for it vary between three and fifteen years after Christ’s Ascension. Two cities claim to be the place of her departure: Jerusalem and Ephesus. Common consent favours Jerusalem, where her tomb is shown; but some argue in favour of Ephesus. The first six centuries did not know of the tomb of Mary at Jerusalem.”
I think even you would agree this was not a belief of the early church.
Okay group. Found this on
Catholic.com
catholic.com/library/rosary.asp
The word rosary comes from Latin and means a garland of roses, the rose being one of the flowers used to symbolize the Virgin Mary. If you were to ask what object is most emblematic of Catholics, people would probably say, “The rosary, of course.”
Eventually sometime around 800 AD, a practice started to develop among the laity of the church. Every day, a person who wanted to pray along with the entire church would get up before his work day began and collected 150 pebbles and put them inside a small pouch he kept on his belt. Every time he heard the bell at the local church ring to signify whatever prayer service during the day, the devoted laity would say the Lord’s Prayer for every psalm. After they said one they would pull out a pebble and toss it on the ground. When they got to the end of their pebbles, they knew they were finished. Soon this became so popular that instead of pebbles, the laity would get a large rope and tie 150 knots in it and use this to count their prayers, and eventually this was shorted even more to a rope with 50 knots they simply said 3 times each day. This shortened version originated within Celtic cultures.
As this devotion became more and more popular, the church decided to use it as well. Beginning around the 13th century, church theologians began to attribute specific psalms about the life of Christ. The theologians had always attributed the Old Testament being completely fulfilled and revealed in the New Testament of scripture. After all, the bible itself is an account of salvation history. They attributed each of the Psalms to be about the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. They then developed phrases of meditation and meaning to each of the Psalms. Around the same time, the church began to see how devotedly and special the Blessed Virgin Mary was to the prophesies within the Psalms. Mary was seen as the way the fulfillment of the prophesies of the Old Testament came about. After all the prophet Isaiah constantly said in his prophesies that Christ would be born of a virgin. Soon 150 meditations on the Blessed Virgin Mary’s life were developed as well as a further meditation in the way the Psalms were used as prayer, and when the 150 meditations of the Blessed Virgin Mary were used in prayer, the part of scripture when Mary visits Elizabeth was used (which is the first part of the prayer recited in the modern rosary): Hail Mary, full of grace. The Lord is with you. Blessed are you among women and blessed is the fruit of your womb,
It is at the time of the Albigensian heresy along St. Dominic’s journey that it is reported that the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to him. In her apparition, she told Dominic to teach people the meditations of Mary and of Christ, and if he did so, the heresy would be dispelled from France. This is exactly what occurred. What St. Dominic did was combine the prayers and the meditations of both “versions” of the “rosary.” Eventually after widespread teachings on the meditations of the life, death, and resurrection of Christ, the heresy was ignored and the church regained its original piety. This was the first widespread teaching of the rosary, and is why St. Dominic is attributed with its success and creation.
And that’s all I’ve got to say. Right now, of course.
I don’t think so. Devotions are an outworking of doctrines. When you look at the doctrines on Mary it logically follows that these devotions would follow from these doctrines.
Yes. However there are a lot of distinctions among them that must be kept in mind.
