M
mercygate
Guest
Mickey said:
As the new Holy Father would say: Ausverstandlich!
- Status
As the new Holy Father would say: Ausverstandlich!
F
fcfahs
Guest
Milliardo (in Post # 62):
According to the footnotes for Revelation12, in my 1992 Saint Joseph Edition of the NAB,
“the woman adorned with the sun, the moon, and the stars (images taken from Gen. 37:9-10)
symbolizes God’s people in the Old and New Testaments.” That is, “Israel of old gave birth to
the Messiah (5) and then became the new Israel, the Church, which suffers persecution by the
dragon (6:13-17) (c.f. Is. 50:1, Is.66:7, Jer 50:12).”
Moreover, the footnotes in my 1951 standard English Catholic Douay Bible go further to say,
“the women [in Revelation.12] is not the Blessed Virgin, for the details of the prophecy do not
fit her. The prophecy pictures the Church of the Old and New Covenants. The beams of the
divine glory clothe her; the moon beneath her feet; she is crowned with a crown of twelve stars,
and she must bring forth Christ to the world. By accommodation the Church applies this verse
to the Blessed Virgin.”
Perhaps poster** John 17 3** has also read these **Catholic Bible **footnotes.
Careful here, Milliardo and Axion …
According to the footnotes for Revelation12, in my 1992 Saint Joseph Edition of the NAB,
“the woman adorned with the sun, the moon, and the stars (images taken from Gen. 37:9-10)
symbolizes God’s people in the Old and New Testaments.” That is, “Israel of old gave birth to
the Messiah (5) and then became the new Israel, the Church, which suffers persecution by the
dragon (6:13-17) (c.f. Is. 50:1, Is.66:7, Jer 50:12).”
Moreover, the footnotes in my 1951 standard English Catholic Douay Bible go further to say,
“the women [in Revelation.12] is not the Blessed Virgin, for the details of the prophecy do not
fit her. The prophecy pictures the Church of the Old and New Covenants. The beams of the
divine glory clothe her; the moon beneath her feet; she is crowned with a crown of twelve stars,
and she must bring forth Christ to the world. By accommodation the Church applies this verse
to the Blessed Virgin.”
Perhaps poster** John 17 3** has also read these **Catholic Bible **footnotes.
A
Adan
Guest
Can Virgin Mary be rightly called as “Mother of our Creator”? I read this in the Litany of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Adan
Adan
J
JimG
Guest
Yes. We are monotheists. There is only one God, in three Persons. God is Creator, and Jesus is God, and Mary is his mother. Therefore she is the mother of our Creator.
Keep in mind that motherhood doesn’t imply pre-existence, or equality, or that she ‘created’ God. It’s just that God the Son chose her as his mother.
P
Psalm45_9
Guest
From the Haydock Douay-Rheims Bible:
“CHAP. XII. Ver. 1. A woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet. By this woman, interpreters commonly understand it to be the Church of Christ, shining with the light of faith, under the protection of the sun of justice, Jesus Christ. The moon, the Church, hath all changeable things of this world under her feet, the affections of the faithful being raised above them all.–A woman: the Church of God. It may also, by allusion, be applied to our blessed Lady.”
In apocalyptic literature, things can have many symbols. The woman represents: Israel, as well as the Church. However neither one can give birth to a son, only a woman can. Mary is also included in the symbol of the Woman.
F
fcfahs
Guest
Psalm45:9:
I am accutely aware that an apocalyptic prophecy can, with the same words, validly refer
to more than one prophetic event or entity. Certainly this was understood by the theologians,
censors and editors ( of the Episcopal Comittee of the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine )
responsible for the footnotes and commentaries of my 1950 Standard English Duoay Bible.
Notwithstanding, they clearly state in their footnote for Rev 12:1, " This woman is NOT
The Blessed Virgin Mary, because the details of the prophecy do NOT fit her." (Check my
Post). What THEY realized, but apparently you do NOT, is that for a prophecy to validly
refer to more than one thing (event or entity), it must agree in all points with each of those
things. Because the Catholic Church accommodatingly applies this verse to Mary, in that
Mary was undeniably the physical mother of Jesus, it does not mean that John’s vision was
referring to her. Whereas John’s descriptives of the woman being clothed with the sun, the
moon beneath her feet, and her crown of 12 stars (images taken from Gen. 37:9-10, which
symbolize God’s people in the Old and New Testaments) fully apply to Israel of old and the
new Israel (the Church), they do NOT apply to (or fit) Mary.
To make such a subjective interpretation is like reading a computer news headline that says
“Apple, who has generated 12 awesome computer lines and has the industry beneath its feet,
now gives birth to its Machintosh operating system, which will surely crush the competion.”
And then interpreting this headline to be talking about Steve Jobs (the top engineer at Apple
and often referred to as Mr. Apple), the guy who single-handedly designed and coded gave
birth to] the Machintosh operating system, referred to in the headline. Such an interpretation,
however, is clearly erroneous, because the details of the headline do not completely fit Steve
Jobs (or any single engineer) - they only completely fit his company, Apple Computer.
If I am off target here, please show me where I’ve gone wrong. Indeed, I can be taught and
am “all ears.”
Frank
Hi Psalm45:9,
I am accutely aware that an apocalyptic prophecy can, with the same words, validly refer
to more than one prophetic event or entity. Certainly this was understood by the theologians,
censors and editors ( of the Episcopal Comittee of the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine )
responsible for the footnotes and commentaries of my 1950 Standard English Duoay Bible.
Notwithstanding, they clearly state in their footnote for Rev 12:1, " This woman is NOT
The Blessed Virgin Mary, because the details of the prophecy do NOT fit her." (Check my
Post). What THEY realized, but apparently you do NOT, is that for a prophecy to validly
refer to more than one thing (event or entity), it must agree in all points with each of those
things. Because the Catholic Church accommodatingly applies this verse to Mary, in that
Mary was undeniably the physical mother of Jesus, it does not mean that John’s vision was
referring to her. Whereas John’s descriptives of the woman being clothed with the sun, the
moon beneath her feet, and her crown of 12 stars (images taken from Gen. 37:9-10, which
symbolize God’s people in the Old and New Testaments) fully apply to Israel of old and the
new Israel (the Church), they do NOT apply to (or fit) Mary.
To make such a subjective interpretation is like reading a computer news headline that says
“Apple, who has generated 12 awesome computer lines and has the industry beneath its feet,
now gives birth to its Machintosh operating system, which will surely crush the competion.”
And then interpreting this headline to be talking about Steve Jobs (the top engineer at Apple
and often referred to as Mr. Apple), the guy who single-handedly designed and coded gave
birth to] the Machintosh operating system, referred to in the headline. Such an interpretation,
however, is clearly erroneous, because the details of the headline do not completely fit Steve
Jobs (or any single engineer) - they only completely fit his company, Apple Computer.
If I am off target here, please show me where I’ve gone wrong. Indeed, I can be taught and
am “all ears.”
Frank
P
Psalm45_9
Guest
The woman is neither Israel or the Church by that matter, she is just a woman. She is symbolic of the church, Israel, and the Blessed Mother, all at the same time. By the bishops saying the she is not the blessed mother, they are right, she’s just a woman. The woman, however is symbolic of the blessed mother, just as she is also symbolic of Israel and the Church. Revelation 12 also mentions the emnity between the woman and the dragon, an allusion to Genesis 3:15, which is a prophecy for the Blessed Mother.
F
fcfahs
Guest
Psalm45:9:
I can’t believe you read and fully understood my last post (# 160) and then come back to me with a reply such as the one above! Indeed, any Bible 101 student knows that the woman (as well as the Lamb, dragon, horses, locusts, and other imagery in John’s vision) are symbols and not to be understood in any literal sense. And, this is not what the Revelation 12:1 footnote I quoted was trying to explain, when it stated " This woman is NOT The Blessed Virgin Mary, because the details of the prophecy do NOT fit her." That the woman in John’s vision was a symbol (and not some visitation from heaven, like that professed by the Miracle of Fatima) is a given. What this footnote from my 1950 Catholic Standard English Duoay Bible was trying to explain is that this woman is NOT symbolic of The Blessed Virgin Mary, because there are details in this prophecy which simply do not fit her (i.e. being clothed with the sun [beams of divine glory], the moon beneath her feet, her crown of 12 stars [the 12 tribes of Israel], etc.), whereas they do completely fit Israel of old giving birth to the Messiah and then becoming the new Israel, the Church, which suffers persecution by the dragon (Rev. 6:13-17) (c.f. Is. 50:1, Is.66:7, Jer 50:12).
If your intent is to demonstrate how this woman symbolizes The Blessed Virgin Mary, please explain how each of these other details fit her (i.e. agree in all points with what we know about Mary and her position in biblical history, keeping in mind that we should and must interpret symbols in the Bible via how they are used elsewhere in the Bible and not through Sacred Tradition.)
Thanks,
Frank
** Psalm45:9**, my friend,
I can’t believe you read and fully understood my last post (# 160) and then come back to me with a reply such as the one above! Indeed, any Bible 101 student knows that the woman (as well as the Lamb, dragon, horses, locusts, and other imagery in John’s vision) are symbols and not to be understood in any literal sense. And, this is not what the Revelation 12:1 footnote I quoted was trying to explain, when it stated " This woman is NOT The Blessed Virgin Mary, because the details of the prophecy do NOT fit her." That the woman in John’s vision was a symbol (and not some visitation from heaven, like that professed by the Miracle of Fatima) is a given. What this footnote from my 1950 Catholic Standard English Duoay Bible was trying to explain is that this woman is NOT symbolic of The Blessed Virgin Mary, because there are details in this prophecy which simply do not fit her (i.e. being clothed with the sun [beams of divine glory], the moon beneath her feet, her crown of 12 stars [the 12 tribes of Israel], etc.), whereas they do completely fit Israel of old giving birth to the Messiah and then becoming the new Israel, the Church, which suffers persecution by the dragon (Rev. 6:13-17) (c.f. Is. 50:1, Is.66:7, Jer 50:12).
If your intent is to demonstrate how this woman symbolizes The Blessed Virgin Mary, please explain how each of these other details fit her (i.e. agree in all points with what we know about Mary and her position in biblical history, keeping in mind that we should and must interpret symbols in the Bible via how they are used elsewhere in the Bible and not through Sacred Tradition.)
Thanks,
Frank
F
fcfahs
Guest
An add-on to my above post…
What God was showing John in these visions of Revelation is the Big Picture of His salvation plan and NOT the details of it. The fact that Mary was the specific human being God chose to bear and give birth to the Messiah is a detail. N’est pas?
What God was showing John in these visions of Revelation is the Big Picture of His salvation plan and NOT the details of it. The fact that Mary was the specific human being God chose to bear and give birth to the Messiah is a detail. N’est pas?
P
Psalm45_9
Guest
You have your opinion, I have mine, mine is that she is also included in the symbolisim of the woman; as do countless Catholic apologists.
ewtn.com/library/ANSWERS/KEY2MARY.htm
cin.org/users/james/questions/q116.htm
ewtn.com/library/ANSWERS/KEY2MARY.htm
cin.org/users/james/questions/q116.htm
F
fcfahs
Guest
Psalm45:9:
I urge you to realize that the Rev.12:1 Bible footnote I cited (" This woman is not The Blessed Virgin Mary, because the details of the prophecy do not fit her."…) is not simply some privately contrived opinion of mine; it was the teaching of our Roman Catholic theologians (circa 1950), fully endorsed by the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine theological censors of the time. To be sure, the prophecy of Rev.12 (a prophecy of God’'s salvation plan) does make provisons for The BVM, insofar as there would have to be some Israelite virgin to physically give birth to the manchild of which the prophecy speaks. However, this prophecy is not explicitly talking about Her. And, this is precisely what this same footnote was alluding to when it later stated, “By accommodation the Church applies this verse to The Blessed Virgin Mary”
Bible prophecies are not to be read like the Daily Horoscopes, wherin we would expect some, but not all, of the pieces to fit. That is, before any interpretation of a Bible prophecy can even qualify to be considered valid, it must fit all points of the prophecy, not just a few - This is one of the basic principals of prudent Bible study. For example, it’s likely that almost any prominent harot of ancient Babylon could identify with some (but not all) aspects of the woman described by John in Rev.17. However, the woman in Rev.17 is not any human, but instead a city. Here, however, there can be no question of interpretation, because the angel explained this prophecy to John in minute detail.
I did visited your two links and was particularly disenchanted by the first one. This James Akin, former Protestant and now Catholic, was terribly of target in his interpretation of Rev.12 (with regard to issues discussed heretofore), where he says “In Revelation12, when we see Mary in heaven, clothed with the sun and standing on the moon, notice that she is wearing a crown of twelve stars on her head. How much more clearly could one signify that someone is the Queen of Heaven than by having them wear a heavenly crown made up of stars?”
As for your second link, the answer given to the question “How could the Woman in Rev.12 be Mary, since she cries out in pain of childbirth, meaning she was under the curse of original sin.” actually reaffirms the fact that Mary does not fit all points of the prophecy of Rev.12 - As the apologist explains, “The crying out in the pain of childbirth does not refer to Mary, but to Israel, which underwent the emergence of the Messiah in great trauma.”
The bottom line here seems to be that you and the apologists you have cited feel that prophecy in apocalyptic scripture was inspired by God so as to reference anyone who (or anything that) can identify with at least some (if not all) of its details. This is clearly not the conviction of those Catholic theologians who wrote the Rev.12:1 footnote I’ve cited so many times, but if it is your conviction, then I have no further argument.
Dear Psalm45:9:
I urge you to realize that the Rev.12:1 Bible footnote I cited (" This woman is not The Blessed Virgin Mary, because the details of the prophecy do not fit her."…) is not simply some privately contrived opinion of mine; it was the teaching of our Roman Catholic theologians (circa 1950), fully endorsed by the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine theological censors of the time. To be sure, the prophecy of Rev.12 (a prophecy of God’'s salvation plan) does make provisons for The BVM, insofar as there would have to be some Israelite virgin to physically give birth to the manchild of which the prophecy speaks. However, this prophecy is not explicitly talking about Her. And, this is precisely what this same footnote was alluding to when it later stated, “By accommodation the Church applies this verse to The Blessed Virgin Mary”
Bible prophecies are not to be read like the Daily Horoscopes, wherin we would expect some, but not all, of the pieces to fit. That is, before any interpretation of a Bible prophecy can even qualify to be considered valid, it must fit all points of the prophecy, not just a few - This is one of the basic principals of prudent Bible study. For example, it’s likely that almost any prominent harot of ancient Babylon could identify with some (but not all) aspects of the woman described by John in Rev.17. However, the woman in Rev.17 is not any human, but instead a city. Here, however, there can be no question of interpretation, because the angel explained this prophecy to John in minute detail.
I did visited your two links and was particularly disenchanted by the first one. This James Akin, former Protestant and now Catholic, was terribly of target in his interpretation of Rev.12 (with regard to issues discussed heretofore), where he says “In Revelation12, when we see Mary in heaven, clothed with the sun and standing on the moon, notice that she is wearing a crown of twelve stars on her head. How much more clearly could one signify that someone is the Queen of Heaven than by having them wear a heavenly crown made up of stars?”
As for your second link, the answer given to the question “How could the Woman in Rev.12 be Mary, since she cries out in pain of childbirth, meaning she was under the curse of original sin.” actually reaffirms the fact that Mary does not fit all points of the prophecy of Rev.12 - As the apologist explains, “The crying out in the pain of childbirth does not refer to Mary, but to Israel, which underwent the emergence of the Messiah in great trauma.”
The bottom line here seems to be that you and the apologists you have cited feel that prophecy in apocalyptic scripture was inspired by God so as to reference anyone who (or anything that) can identify with at least some (if not all) of its details. This is clearly not the conviction of those Catholic theologians who wrote the Rev.12:1 footnote I’ve cited so many times, but if it is your conviction, then I have no further argument.
P
Psalm45_9
Guest
I agree with those theologians, the woman is not Mary, the woman is symbolic of Mary. Just as she is symbolic of the Church and Israel.
catholic.com/thisrock/1997/9705chap.asp
A
Axion
Guest
fcfahs said:
No. It is the personal opinion of the writers of the footnotes - which is something very different. Just because a bible has an imprimatur definately does not mean that every word in its notes and other material is Catholic doctrine. You will see this reading the NAB notes - which most of the time are directly contrary to Catholic doctrine. Unfortunately the trend of Liberal theologians putting their own beliefs into Catholic books is one of the chief problems today.
The simple fact is that Revelation 12 is one of the official readings of the Catholic Church for the feast of the Assumption. It has been mentioned in encyclicals, and the imagery has been used in catholic Official art for centuries.
(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)
The Woman is the Mother of Jesus. the primary interpretation must be Mary. Set not your trust in footnote-writers.
By this theorem, the Woman can’t be the Church either, since the Church did not give birth to Jesus - it is the other way round.
Yes. If there is anything doubtful or difficult or obscure about the symbolism in Revelation, the symbol is always explained in the text. This does not happen with Revelation 12 because the symbolism is crystal clear. The Woman is the Mother of Jesus - Mary.
A
Axion
Guest
So Jesus is not literal. the dragon is not literal, the angels are not literal??? They all stand for something else - taxi cabs perhaps?
is NOT symbolic of The Blessed Virgin Mary, because there are details in this prophecy which simply do not fit her (i.e. being clothed with the sun [beams of divine glory], the moon beneath her feet, her crown of 12 stars [the 12 tribes of Israel], etc.), whereas they do completely fit Israel of old giving birth to the Messiah and then becoming the new Israel, the Church, which suffers persecution by the dragon (Rev. 6:13-17) (c.f. Is. 50:1, Is.66:7, Jer 50:12).
The 12 stars are NOT the Woman. They are attached to the Woman. They together with the Sun and Moon represent Israel. The woman is Mary.
F
fcfahs
Guest
Hi Axion,
I have no choice but to respect you distrust of theologians (Catholic or otherwise), for there are probably as many good ones as there are bad ones. However, I thought we could depend on the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine theological censors to control this, such that what is stated in our Catholic Bible footnotes would be in 100% agreement with Roman Catholic Doctrine. If I may ask, what do YOU use as a guide to Bible verse interpretation, in lieu of Bible footnotes and the chapter commentaries?
Perhaps you will more respect a commentary on Rev.12:1, by the Catholic Encyclopedia…
The Catholic Encyclopedia’s Commentary on Revelation 12:1
Catholic Encyclopedia Commentary on REVELATION 12:1
- “And there was seen a great sign in heaven. A woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars. And being with child, she cried out travailing, and bearing torments that she might bring forth.”] The woman clothed with the sun, and having the moon under her feet, and wearing a crown of twelve stars upon her head, and travailing in her pains, is the ancient Church of fathers, and prophets, and saints, and apostles, which had the groans and torments of its longing until it saw that Christ, the fruit of its people according to the flesh long promised to it, had taken flesh out of the selfsame people. Moreover, being clothed with the sun intimates the hope of resurrection and the glory of the promise. And the moon intimates the fall of the bodies of the saints under the obligation of death, which never can fail. For even as life is diminished, so also it is increased. Nor is the hope of those that sleep extinguished absolutely, as some think, but they have in their darkness a light such as the moon. And the crown of twelve stars signifies the choir of fathers, according to the fleshly birth, of whom Christ was to take flesh.
F
fcfahs
Guest
Hi again Axion,
My assertion that “the woman (as well as the Lamb, dragon, horses, locusts, and other imagery in John’s vision) are symbols and not to be understood in any literal sense.” didn’t include “Jesus” or “angels” in the list, so you obviously must have “taken off” on my words “and other imagery.” As for the “dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his heads,” this surely is a symbol of Satan and was defined as such in Rev.12:9… “And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan.” Furthermore, if you read Rev.12 closely, you’ll find that Jesus is not part of John’s Rev.12 imagery - John’s only Rev.12 reference to Jesus is found in verse 17, where he says “And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.” Of course, the “Lamb” in Rev.12:11 is symbolic of Jesus, but this is not the place for a course in apocalyptic symbolism. Notwithstanding, I apologize for an confusion I may have set up by my words “and other imagery.”
Peace brother.
T
TheGarg
Guest
John 17 3:
Personally I think you are a troll, and your arguments are ridicualous and you have deeper issues. I dare you to take on CM, he will grind you up and spit you out. He has lived your lies, and found his way back to the Truth.
Peace of the Lord be with you!
What makes you think Mary is Dead? Do you believe People in Heaven are dead?..
Personally I think you are a troll, and your arguments are ridicualous and you have deeper issues. I dare you to take on CM, he will grind you up and spit you out. He has lived your lies, and found his way back to the Truth.
Peace of the Lord be with you!
R
RyanL
Guest
old axiom proved yet again: “if you lose it on Mary, you’ll lose it on Jesus”.
when you start to deny who mary was, you wind up denying who Jesus was. if you deny “mother of God”, you lose “Jesus is God”. if you deny the immaculate conception, you end up losing how Jesus conquers satan. such is the case with all marian dogmas…they are essential for our understanding of who Christ was and who, as christians, we are called to be.
right. the Son of the woman, who would rule all nations and is now seated at the right hand of the Father couldn’t have **anything **to do with Jesus, could it?!?
pure butchering of sacred scripture.
may the Lord cause the scales to fall from your eyes,
RyanL
A
Axion
Guest
But as you will see from the NAB notes, this doesn’t happen. The NAB notes are full of the historical-critical theories that are condemned by the Church.
It is disappointing not to be able to trust supposedly Catholic bible footnotes. And commentaries depend on the viewpoint of the author. But there are plenty of books and resources like the Liturgy and the Catechism that define true Catholic teaching. I tend to like to look at multiple references and compare.
The commentary is taken word-for-word from a writing of St Victorinus (sp) which it has obviously been copied from. It takes the interpretation that the Woman represents the Church. And the passage has historically been interpreted on two levels - that the Woman is the Church and that she is Mary. Since mary is a type of the Church, those interpretations coincide.
What I was objecting to was not the idea that an interpretation that the Woman can be seen as the Church exists, but to the dogmatic statement in your bible note that the Woman is **not ** Mary!
In fact many more important voices have said she is…
Paul VI, Signum Magnum, May 13, 1967 AAS 59: “The great sign which the Apostle John saw in heaven, ‘a woman clothed with the sun’ is interpreted by the sacred liturgy, not without foundation, as referring to the most Blessed Mary, the Mother of all men by the grace of Christ the Redeemer.”
John Paul II, Redemptoris Mater, March 15, 1987. “… she who was the one ‘full of grace’ was brought into the mystery of Christ in order to be his Mother and thus the Holy Mother of God, through the Church remains in that mystery as ‘the woman’ spoken of by the Book of Genesis (3:15) at the beginning and by the Apocalypse (12:1) at the end of the history of salvation.”
St. Pius X, Ad diem illum. *** 36. 458 - 59: “No one of us does not know that that woman signifies the Virgin Mary, who brought forth our Head with her virginity intact. But the Apostle continues: 'And being with child, she cried out, laboring in birth, and was in pain to be delivered. ’ Therefore John saw the Most Holy Mother of God already enjoying eternal happiness, and yet laboring from some hidden birth. With what birth? Surely ours, we who, being yet detained in exile, are still to be brought forth to the perfect love of God and eternal happiness.”
Pius XII, Munificentissimus Deus. : “…the Scholastic doctors have considered the Assumption of the Virgin Mother of God as signified not only in the various figures of the Old Testament, but also in that woman clothed with the sun, whom the Apostle John contemplated on the island of Patmos.”
A
Axion
Guest
I have to admit I was a little irritable when I wrote the post about the symbolism. I must apologise for that. I’ve heard the “symbolic figure” argument so many times from fundamentalists who refuse to see Mary in the Woman, and come up with a dozen excuses for her to be anyone but Mary.
I think it’s clear from revelation that the child is Jesus, the Dragon is Satan, and the angel is Michael, so to me it appears as crystal clear that the woman is Mary (at least as the most straightforward and consistent primary interpretation).
Also we have to look at the comparable symbolism of Gen.3:15, I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring (or seed) and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel… here again we have the Serpent (Satan), the offspring (Jesus), and the woman, mother of Jesus (Mary.) The parallels are too great to be coincidence, and the passages are traditionally regarded as being linked.
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