Post-pentecostal life of Mary

[One_Church]

Are there any early writings on what happened with Mary after Pentecost? I find it puzzling how there is such little written down about Mary like:

1. When was she assumed/how long did she live after Jesus died on the cross?
2. Did she stay in one place or travel with John?
3. Did John witness her assumption?

I would have thought someone (either John or someone close to him) would have recorded this information knowing the important role she played in our salvation. I found a great article about her life at newadvent.org/cathen/15464b.htm but it still doesn’t answer many questions I had.

 

[bmullins]

1. When was she assumed/how long did she live after Jesus died on the cross?

According to the article you linked, The dates assigned for it vary between three and fifteen years after Christ’s Ascension.

1. Did she stay in one place or travel with John?

It has been seen that we have no absolute certainty as to the place in which Mary lived after the day of Pentecost. Though it is more probable that she remained uninterruptedly in or near Jerusalem, she may have resided for a while in the vicinity of Ephesus. (There is also extensive mention in the article about some articles saying Mary traveled with John to Patmos, or with John to Ephesus etc)

1. Did John witness her assumption?

The belief in the corporeal assumption of Mary is founded on the apocryphal treatise De Obitu S. Dominae, bearing the name of St. John, which belongs however to the fourth or fifth century.

De Obitu S. Dominae is some very interesting reading.

And when this miracle had been done, the apostles carried the couch, and laid down her precious and holy body in Gethsemane in a new tomb. And, behold, a perfume of sweet savour came forth out of the holy sepulchre of our Lady the mother of God; and for three days the voices of invisible angels were heard glorifying Christ our God, who had been born of her. And when the third day was ended, the voices were no longer heard; and from that time forth all knew that her spotless and precious body had been transferred to paradise.

 

[One_Church]

Thanks for your reply…I still need to read that article even closer to look for things like you found with approximate dates.

Surprisingly I was listening to some old Catholic Answers Live mp3s and this one was for kids Q/A. There was a couple of questions from kids like that…when did Adam and Eve die, how many kids did they have…etc. The priest said something that rang true for my questions too. He said to think about all of the things that God has revealed to us. When we can’t find an answer it’s not that the question we asked is unimportant…it’s just not the focus that God wanted us to have compared to the things he has revealed in scripture or through the Church.

For some reason it struck a cord with me. I think there are a lot of things the Church has already discovered and revealed that I need to wrap my mind around…probably enough for several lifetimes )

 

[Hubertus]

De Obitu S. Dominae is some very interesting reading.

Whoa, wait. Concerning the quote, is it implying that Mary died and then her body was assumed? I always had the impression that she was assumed while still being alive because, since she was free from sin, she did not need to die.

 

[bmullins]

Whoa, wait. Concerning the quote, is it implying that Mary died and then her body was assumed? I always had the impression that she was assumed while still being alive because, since she was free from sin, she did not need to die.

I don’t know that I’ve ever seen it defined in doctrine whether or not she physically died before being assumed. In Munificentissimus Deus it does not say clearly, it only says she finished her earthly course before being assumed, body and soul. All I know for sure is that the church teaches she was not allowed to be corrupted by the grave, that is her body never began to decay. As to whether she ‘died’ before being assumed or not, I don’t know if there is an official teaching?

Pius XII, Munificentissimus Deus (1950)

According to this article online:

The Church has never formally defined whether she died or not, and the integrity of the doctrine of the Assumption would not be impaired if she did not in fact die, but the almost universal consensus is that she did die. Pope Pius XII, in Munificentissimus Deus (1950), defined that Mary, “after the completion of her earthly life” (note the silence regarding her death), “was assumed body and soul into the glory of heaven.”

 

[Hubertus]

I see, I see. Thank you. I guess it’s the fact that her body did not decay that I was getting confused with “dying.”