Scriptural Evidence: The Immaculate Conception Of Mary

[Peter_J]

If that were the case, you would not have half the doctrines that you do.

Therein lies the disagreement.

Catholics, Orthodox and (many) Protestants agree that the Deposit of Faith does not and cannot change, but we disagree about what it contains. For example, Catholics believe that Mary’s perpetual virginity is contained in the Deposit of Faith, Protestants do not.

 

[Peter_J]

I was just pointing out that Catholic appeals to the Church Fathers are somewhat of a selective process.

I’m sure you’re familiar with the expression “Don’t throw out the baby with the bathwater”?

 

[NDfan]

In the Greek text, the angel Gabriel greets Mary by saying: “Chaire kecharitomene.” The expression ‘kecharitomene’ has to do with God’s grace, for the Greek root ‘charis’ means “grace”. To be in a state of grace is to be in God’s favour. To be in God’s favour is to be sinless. To be sinless is to be in a state of grace which is the antitode to sin.

Good Fella you are incorrect here. The root word in kecharitomene is not Charis it is Charitoo. Charis is a noun and Charitoo is a verb. Mary is not described by the Angel as being in a state of grace as the word kecharitomene describes an action GOD took. Simply that HE favored her in the past tense. Not that HE filled her with grace. Again Christ is the only one described as being full of GODs grace (pleres charis). Charitoo only appears twice in the NT and is applied to both Mary and all Christians in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians.

Charis which is used the remaining 100+ times in the NT is the grace which infills all believers of Christ to make them Holy meaning set apart. It does not make one sinless.

 

[Canto]

Quote? If you’re referring to what I think you are, his words are pretty clearly figurative.

They don’t seem figurative to me.

I remember my promise. For last night I promised you who have been baptized a sermon in which I would explain the Sacrament of the Lord’s table, which you now behold and which you became partakers of last night. You should understand what you have received, what you will receive, indeed what you should receive daily. That bread that you see on the altar and that has been sanctified by the word of God is the Body of Christ. That chalice – rather, that which the chalice contains – has been sanctified by the word of God and is the Blood of Christ. Through these things the Lord Christ wished to entrust to us his Body and his Blood, which he shed for us unto the remission of sins. If you receive them well, you are that which you receive. The Apostle says, “One bread and we, the many, are one body” (1 Cor 10:17). (Augustine, Sermo CCXXVII

Another quote of his I like, refering I think to one of the psalms of the top of my head…

And he was carried in his own hands. Now, brothers, who can understand how this can happen to a man? Who can be carried in his own hands? A man is able to be carried in the hands of others, but no one is carried in his own hands. How this is to be understood in a literal way of David himself we cannot discover; however, we can discover how this happened in the case of Christ. For Christ was carried in his own hands when, entrusting to us his own Body, he said: “This is my Body.” Indeed he was carrying that Body in his own hands. (87) Ennar. In Ps. 33, 1st sermon, 10; CCL, 38, pp. 280-81.

Ignatus says…

“They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they confess not the Eucharist to be the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ, which suffered for our sins, and which the Father, of His goodness, raised up again.” Ignatius of Antioch, Epistle to Smyrnaeans, 7,1 (c. A.D. 110).

Purgatory is not in the Bible. This has been beaten to death, but you can start another thread or we can discuss this in PM.

Beaten to death indeed and still both sides believe they are correct.

Really? Peter certainly raised the dead, but I don’t recall him praying for the dead. Reference for St. Joseph prayer?.

In Acts chapter 9 there is a dead woman (v37).They take Peter to her (v39) and he prayed for her and she arose (v40).

St Joseph reference: cwo.com/~pentrack/catholic/stjoseph.html

Me neither. …It is certainly convenient if a Church Father can be quoted as supporting Catholic doctrine…

 

[ckempston]

You just proved my point: you are not just saying that God didn’t need Mary to be immaculate.

How so? Please spell it out for me, because I’m missing something. Where exactly are you going with this?

 

[ckempston]

Therein lies the disagreement.

Catholics, Orthodox and (many) Protestants agree that the Deposit of Faith does not and cannot change, but we disagree about what it contains. For example, Catholics believe that Mary’s perpetual virginity is contained in the Deposit of Faith, Protestants do not.

What does Mary’s perpetual virginity have to do with my salvation? That is the point: NOTHING. Therefore, we shouldn’t make a big deal out of it either way.

 

[ckempston]

They don’t seem figurative to me.

I remember my promise. For last night I promised you who have been baptized a sermon in which I would explain the Sacrament of the Lord’s table, which you now behold and which you became partakers of last night. You should understand what you have received, what you will receive, indeed what you should receive daily. That bread that you see on the altar and that has been sanctified by the word of God is the Body of Christ. That chalice – rather, that which the chalice contains – has been sanctified by the word of God and is the Blood of Christ. Through these things the Lord Christ wished to entrust to us his Body and his Blood, which he shed for us unto the remission of sins. If you receive them well, you are that which you receive. The Apostle says, “One bread and we, the many, are one body” (1 Cor 10:17). (Augustine, Sermo CCXXVII

Another quote of his I like, refering I think to one of the psalms of the top of my head…

And he was carried in his own hands. Now, brothers, who can understand how this can happen to a man? Who can be carried in his own hands? A man is able to be carried in the hands of others, but no one is carried in his own hands. How this is to be understood in a literal way of David himself we cannot discover; however, we can discover how this happened in the case of Christ. For Christ was carried in his own hands when, entrusting to us his own Body, he said: “This is my Body.” Indeed he was carrying that Body in his own hands. (87) Ennar. In Ps. 33, 1st sermon, 10; CCL, 38, pp. 280-81.

Ignatus says…

“They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they confess not the Eucharist to be the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ, which suffered for our sins, and which the Father, of His goodness, raised up again.” Ignatius of Antioch, Epistle to Smyrnaeans, 7,1 (c. A.D. 110).

Beaten to death indeed and still both sides believe they are correct.

In Acts chapter 9 there is a dead woman (v37).They take Peter to her (v39) and he prayed for her and she arose (v40).

St Joseph reference: cwo.com/~pentrack/catholic/stjoseph.html

I would say Augustine’s quote certainly supports the Real Presence (which I happen to believe), but not Transubstantiation, which is something else entirely.

What is the purpose of praying for the dead? It is to relieve them of the temporal punishment of purgatory. This isn’t what Peter did. He raised her from the dead. This doesn’t support the Catholic doctrine of praying for the dead.

 

[NDfan]

Precisely. The way I see, you object to “kecharitomene” being translated “gratia plena” on the grounds that “that isn’t what the Greek says”, and yet you want us to instead translate it as “highly favored”, which isn’t what the Greek says either.

Peter the Greek does say highly favored. But I’m admitting the translation doesn’t encompass the entire definition. To do that the rendering would have to be something like hail to one who was/is highly favored by GOD. You’re really starting to grasp at straws here by forcing the argument in this direction. The entire NT in English doesn’t reflect the complete rendering of some of the Greek. That’s why studying the Greek can be so vital to understanding what the writers are saying.

The translation simply cannot be hail full of grace as the word kecharitomene uses the root word charitoo which is a verb. You can’t be described as a verb. The verb is an action GOD took and the conjugation of the past participle acts as a descriptor of the verb. Meaning it was an action GOD took in the past. That HE favored Mary, not filled her with grace. To have the greeting mean full of grace the Angel would have to say Hail Pleres Charitos. It does not and that’s where Jerome errored in his translation using gratia plena.

I don’t know what’s so hard to understand. I did not say that we are sinless. I fully except that I’m going to continue sinning until the day I die. What I said is that we are in the PROCESS of BECOMING sinless.

I’m not saying it’s hard to understand, I simply don’t agree with that thinking. Scripture doesn’t say we are in a process. We remain sinners until the day we die. The question is do we have propitiation for our sins before GOD. The only way to have that is to believe in Christ. Believing in Christ fills us with grace (Charis) that makes us Holy. But we can only have that grace because GOD initially took action to favor us. As a result of that favor Christ came filled with GOD’s grace as stated in John 1 so we could be made Holy by believing in HIM.

What I will say is that our relationship with Christ and our spiritual maturation is a process. I think that as we grow spiritually our lives are not characterized by sin. But you will never convince me that as Mary was growing up she never committed sin. Or when she witnessed the beating Christ took that she held contempt for those Roman soldiers.

PEACE

 

[NDfan]

Does that mean we are going to continue sinning when we are in heaven?

No we will not. But not sinning in Heaven comes as a result of purgation and the ultimate destruction of satan. We will sin in this life until we die.

 

[Canto]

The Trinity, as it is currently understood, wasn’t a core of belief until the fourth century. If it was, there wouldn’t have been a debate. If anything, the fact that there was little written by the Apostles themselves only supports the idea that not many complicated doctrines are required to be a disciple of Christ.

They way I see it is that the Wizard of Oz is such a great film, I want to see the whole lot. I want to know the inns and outs and journey. I don’t just want the gist.

If I never knew that Mary was immaculately conceived, would God care provied I believed in Jesus and tried to do some good while on earth?

But knowing of Mary’s conception (I use this as one example) helps me love God even more and to further realise his awesomeness, and appreciate all that he does and can do.

Thinking about Mary this week (Her Solemnity in the CC this week) I though about her YESs to God

You’re a virgin but I want you to have a Son - YES
Now Herdods gonnna try kill him - YES
Life won’t be a piece of cake - YES
A sword will pierece your own soul - YES
He will be brutally butchered on a cross - YES

Mary submitted fully to God’s will in every way, knowing this God graced her in the past and when her earthly life was over he took her up into heaven. How great is God!

Anway things are complicated for some for e.g.

While some in the extreem and some in the less extreeme ends - Some say we are justified by faith alone yet some say ya gotta have good works too.

Paul says were not justfied by the law
Then he says to follow the law
He say not by works
But oodles of times he says to do good works
And he says faith with no charty = nothing
And James chimes in with not by faith alone
And a different angle than Paul on Abraham

Then there’s John ch 6 - eat flesh or no life - and all the debates nowadays over that meaning.

And these things relate to our salvation and life.

Writing stuff down after the invention of the printing press was still not that easy, due to the persecution of people who wanted to write it down by the Roman Catholic Church. Ironic, isn’t it?].

Things were a lot less civil back then than now (though sometimes I wonder) and the Protestants were not blamless either.

• Trashed monastries
• ‘torture by rack’ for the [douay]Rheims New Testament
• British Act of 1543 forbiding women (except noblewomen) and others, mainly less afluent people, from reading the Bible
• Illegal for American’s to print Bibles under British rule

The Church banned some translations too, but dodgy ones - e.g. the regional council of Toulouse (1229) banned a corrupted translation by the Albigensians, who amongst other things encouraged suicide.

Because the written word would eventually take its place.

According to whom.

Not everything is written down John 21:25 “But there are also many other things which Jesus did which, if they were written every one, the world itself. I think, would not be able to contain the books that should be written.”

 

[NDfan]

sounds reasonable to me…
it still doesn’t really answer the question fully for me,due to the fact every one is born with orginal sin even those born of baptised parents.

FBL I think you may be misunderstanding original sin. We are not born with original sin. The Catechism on this is actually quite brilliant. Original sin is the first sin committed by Man. The disobedience of Adam and Eve to not eat the forbidden fruit. The result of this original sin or first sin is a stain on our DNA that causes us to continue to commit sin. I believe the Catechism uses the wording: propensity to commit sin or tendency to commit sin.

This tendency or propensity to sin is the result of the original sin or the stain of it. We are born with this stain and baptism does not take that away. That’s why we continue to commit sin our entire lives regardless of being born of 2 baptized parents. Baptism represents a repentance of sin. Repentance meaning to turn away from. So when we are baptized we are making an appeal to GOD that we will turn from our sinful ways. It doesn’t mean that we won’t commit sin. But our lives shouldn’t be characterized by sin. Baptism into Christ gives us our forgiveness for sin. Not take away the ability to commit sin. If we read scripture I will quote right from Peter:

1 Peter 3: Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ

So when we are baptized we are telling GOD that we will turn from our sinful ways and accept Christ. That’s why many Christians hold to a believers baptism. They believe you have to choose Christ and decide to repent. Infants can’t make this decision. I’m not arguing those claims just stating that belief.

Blessings

 

[Canto]

The translation simply cannot be hail full of grace as the word kecharitomene uses the root word charitoo which is a verb.

That HE favored Mary, not filled her with grace.

To have the greeting mean full of grace the Angel would have to say Hail Pleres Charitos. It does not and that’s where Jerome errored in his translation using gratia plena.

Does not Kechartiomene take on noun qualities ?
The Greek is voctiave - a title, aren’t titles usally nouns and not verbs.

Charitoo means to grace. Some say to fill with grace (French Bible De Jerusalem transaltes filled with grace) or endue with grace (Amplified Bible says endued with grace.)

If Luke said Hail Pleres Charitos it would not illustrate that Mary was graced in the past. It would not illustrate that it was permanent either. It would only imply these things. Therefore he uses Kecharitomene a perfect passive participle that is yet vocaitve, in order to be more specific.

Luke could have used Pleres Charitos or have said that Mary was merely favoured, he instead uses a word found nowhere else in the entire Bible which becomes God’s very name for Mary and the first glad tidings of our redemption through her son Christ.

Greek words don’t always translated properly into English let alone Latin. Using Latin’s resources as best he could, as chartioo means to grace but the Greek shows as Father Mateo says an amplitude and completeness, he said full of grace.

Full of grace is vocative - again so is the Greek
Full of grace assumes she was filled in the past.
Full asumes the grace is permanent
v.30 shows Mary’s passivity
Thus the perfect passive participle

 

[ckempston]

They way I see it is that the Wizard of Oz is such a great film, I want to see the whole lot. I want to know the inns and outs and journey. I don’t just want the gist.

There are a lot of things I want to know as well. I sometimes wonder what happened to Aragorn son of Arathorn following the War of the Ring, but JRR Tolkien didn’t give us all that much information. Using my imagination, and reading what others imagine may have happened is quite enjoyable. The problem is JRR Tolkien is dead, and anything we imagine may or may not be what he may have actually written or thought about the matter. While this is all in good fun, and enjoyable, it wouldn’t make much sense for me to persecute Tolkien fans who wanted to stick strictly to what he wrote.

If I never knew that Mary was immaculately conceived, would God care provied I believed in Jesus and tried to do some good while on earth?

No.

But knowing of Mary’s conception (I use this as one example) helps me love God even more and to further realise his awesomeness, and appreciate all that he does and can do.

The Catholic church doesn’t just realize his awesomeness and appreciate all he can do. It says, “If you don’t believe what we’ve imagined to be true, you are anathema.”

Thinking about Mary this week (Her Solemnity in the CC this week) I though about her YESs to God

You’re a virgin but I want you to have a Son - YES
Now Herdods gonnna try kill him - YES
Life won’t be a piece of cake - YES
A sword will pierece your own soul - YES
He will be brutally butchered on a cross - YES

Well, that’s all good, and Mary was certainly a specially chosen person. However, she had no control over Jesus being brutally butchered, as she didn’t know this would be the nature of his redemption.

Mary submitted fully to God’s will in every way, knowing this God graced her in the past and when her earthly life was over he took her up into heaven. How great is God!

God is great regardless of whether Mary was Assumed.

Anway things are complicated for some for e.g.

While some in the extreem and some in the less extreeme ends - Some say we are justified by faith alone yet some say ya gotta have good works too.

Paul says were not justfied by the law
Then he says to follow the law
He say not by works
But oodles of times he says to do good works
And he says faith with no charty = nothing
And James chimes in with not by faith alone
And a different angle than Paul on Abraham

Then there’s John ch 6 - eat flesh or no life - and all the debates nowadays over that meaning.

And these things relate to our salvation and life.

The debates are mostly over semantics. Most Christians believe exactly the same things in regard to salvation issues.

Things were a lot less civil back then than now (though sometimes I wonder) and the Protestants were not blamless either.

• Trashed monastries
• ‘torture by rack’ for the [douay]Rheims New Testament
• British Act of 1543 forbiding women (except noblewomen) and others, mainly less afluent people, from reading the Bible
• Illegal for American’s to print Bibles under British rule

The Church banned some translations too, but dodgy ones - e.g. the regional council of Toulouse (1229) banned a corrupted translation by the Albigensians, who amongst other things encouraged suicide.

That others do evil does not excuse anyone else.

According to whom.

According to common sense. If someone heard it verbally from an apostle, and didn’t write it down but told someone else, etc., it eventually becomes completely unreliable.

Not everything is written down John 21:25 “But there are also many other things which Jesus did which, if they were written every one, the world itself. I think, would not be able to contain the books that should be written.”

It’s my claim that everything that is necessary was likely written down very early in the church’s history. John 21:25 creates no problem.

 

[Canto]

The problem is JRR Tolkien is dead, and anything we imagine may or may not be what he may have actually written or thought about the matter. While this is all in good fun, and enjoyable, it wouldn’t make much sense for me to persecute Tolkien fans who wanted to stick strictly to what he wrote.

The Holy Spirit of course is alive
The Holy Spirit guides the Church and she follows
The Church sometimes speaks of Traditon as living
The Church the pillar and found of truth not error
And the gates of hell never prevailing aginst the Church

The Catholic church doesn’t just realize his awesomeness and appreciate all he can do. It says, “If you don’t believe what we’ve imagined to be true, you are anathema.”.

The Church belives it teaches the word of God - so in away if you disagree with a dogma of the Church you are disagreeing with the word of God, so obviosuly the Church will take a strong stance.

The debate becomes however as to what constitues the word of God of course.

Well, that’s all good, and Mary was certainly a specially chosen person. However, she had no control over Jesus being brutally butchered, as she didn’t know this would be the nature of his redemption…

If a sword would pierece her own soul what was to happen to Jesus must be greater and being well versed in the OT (c.f. magnificat) she may well have know that he would suffer a brutal fate. But rather than hide under a blanket she submitted her self entirely to God and his plan - whatever was to follow.

God is great regardless of whether Mary was Assumed.".

But the assumption is yet another reminder and with the ills in society at the moment its good to be reminded as often as possible of Gods greatness and like Mary to submit to him.

That others do evil does not excuse anyone else.".

Just pointing out that there was bad stuff on both sides

According to common sense. If someone heard it verbally from an apostle, and didn’t write it down but told someone else, etc., it eventually becomes completely unreliable…

Unreliable unless the Holy Spirit and Pillar and Foundation of truth step in.

It’s my claim that everything that is necessary was likely written down very early in the church’s history. John 21:25 creates no problem.

Some may say than, what exactly is necessary and how does one define such a word.

 

[ckempston]

The Holy Spirit of course is alive
The Holy Spirit guides the Church and she follows
The Church sometimes speaks of Traditon as living
The Church the pillar and found of truth not error
And the gates of hell never prevailing aginst the Church

You are the one who started with the fictional example of wanting to know about the Wizard of Oz. I simply demonstrated where that parallel falls apart and does not support your argument.

Of course the HOly Spirit is alive. Doesn’t mean it can contradict Jesus, though: you will be led into all truth.

Either Jesus lied or was mistaken IF truth continues to be revealed to this day.

The Church belives it teaches the word of God - so in away if you disagree with a dogma of the Church you are disagreeing with the word of God, so obviosuly the Church will take a strong stance.

I don’t believe the church teaches the Word of God when it says anyone who denies that Mary is the Queen of Heaven (or some other similar thing), that person is anathema.

The debate becomes however as to what constitues the word of God of course.

If a sword would pierece her own soul what was to happen to Jesus must be greater and being well versed in the OT (c.f. magnificat) she may well have know that he would suffer a brutal fate. But rather than hide under a blanket she submitted her self entirely to God and his plan - whatever was to follow.

Great. And you should stop there.

But the assumption is yet another reminder and with the ills in society at the moment its good to be reminded as often as possible of Gods greatness and like Mary to submit to him.

Ok. We don’t need Mary to be sinless to learn from her example.

Just pointing out that there was bad stuff on both sides

I’m not a big fan of the Reformation.

Unreliable unless the Holy Spirit and Pillar and Foundation of truth step in.

If the Holy Spirit and the Pillar and Foundation of Truth step in, we would expect them to be entirely consistent with what was originally taught.

Some may say than, what exactly is necessary and how does one define such a word.

I’d agree that is a legitimate question. However, you can, with certainty determine that a new doctrine, developed and expounded upon hundreds or thousands of years after Christ, is certainly not necessary.

 

[NDfan]

His grace in which he graced us - says my translation. i.e. God has graced us including the Ephesians in the Beloved - Christ. My understanding is that with this verse there is no implication that those graced were graced in the past or will remain graced. If we recieve grace and sin, can we expect to remain in grace? The implication of Luke 1:28 is that Mary remained graced from the gracing throughout her entire life.

Canto that’s not true. The verb used in the letter to the Ephesians just uses a present tense conjugation. This makes sense in that it fits with the purpose of Paul’s letter. He tells the Ephesians they were a sinful people but that now currently because of GOD’s grace we have Christ. The implication of echaritosen is not that we can fall out of favor or that it’s not lasting. Remember we are talking about a verb here that represents an action GOD took not us. Your implication is that Mary could never fall out of favor but we could. If we fell out of favor that would mean the new covenant of Christ is no longer applicable.

Grace saves us from sin. If we sin we cannot expect to get into heaven.

Rom 6:14:For sin shall not have dominion over you: for you are not under the law, but under grace.

Rom 6:15 What then? Shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid!

Canto grace itself doesn’t save us from sin. It’s because of GOD’s grace that we have Christ. Through Christ we have forgiveness of sin. What Paul is saying in Romans is that following the law is not what gets us to GOD. We are under GOD’s grace which provides forgiveness through Christ. In other words as a result of GOD’s grace he sent Christ to us. But Paul is saying that just because we are under GOD’s grace doesn’t mean that we continue to live in sin. As if sin doesn’t matter.

In purgatory we are cleansed of our sins so that we are fit to enter into the heavnely kingdom.

Yes the purgation process is what the church teaches that ultimately takes away the sinful ways of our soul. No argument here.

The Greek literally says highly?
The Greek says favoured?

Kecharti****omene pleres charitos (full of grace) chariti (justified by grace)

The Greek from what I’ve read has verb and noun qualities.

No let’s be very careful here. Charis is a noun that means grace. The grace that GOD infills in us to make us holy or set apart. This is the predominant form that is used in the NT. Charitoo is a verb which means to favor. It represents an action that GOD took. The verb charitoo is only used twice in the NT and is conjugated 2 ways, past and present tense.

Mary is never described as being full of grace: Pleres Charitos in the noun form. Only Christ is.

Tyndale, the so-called ‘father of the English Bible’ doesn’t understand Greek?

Not having read it cover to cover I was under the impression Tyndale’s was literal and the Syriac too.

I didn’t say Tyndale didn’t understand Greek. I said he used more of a thought-based translation. He was the first to draw directly from the Greek and Hebrew scriptures but he still used his own wording in many areas. Remember he introduced the word Jehovah which many scholars say is an incorrect translation of the letters YHWH. The Jews don’t say Jehovah.

The Latin is indeed a literal translation.

LAT he did not know her…
NASB he kept her a virgin…

You’re writing the English equivalent of what the Latin states. The Latin is not a literal translation. When Jerome wrote the vulgate he interpreted many words himself.

The Church has never approved the NASB. The Amplified Bible by the same company says lit. endued with grace. The heretical Recovery version says you who have been graced. The 1935 Westiminster (lit trans of Greek) says full of grace so does the Catholic edition of the RSV with many changes used in supsequent printings of regular editions.

One version the RC just approved uses highly favored. I thought it was the NASB. Please keep in mind the full of grace English is a thought-based interpretation. Not a literal translation. Again a verb simply does not describe someone. Charitoo refers to an action GOD took. It seems you are failing to recognize this.

Present tense meaning that they are graced with no implication they will remain graced.
Paul doesn’t use a pefect passive participle Luke does
Paul as you noted has chartioo but no Ke and mene

Canto no disrespect but you’re not understanding what the conjugation actually means. It becomes a descriptor for the verb charitoo. Meaning it was a past action GOD took. That it was already complete when the Angel visited Mary. Not that it was due to take place. Other perfect participles are used in the NT. When Jesus told the gentlemen to get up from his mat the perfect past participle for the word lye was used. According to you after he was healed he would never have gotten up from the mat. We know that is not true.

Charitoo - Mary
Chartios - Jesus

And Mary is the only one in scripture called Kecharitomene.

Luke could have called her merely favoured or even full of grace in a non permanant sense like St Stephen but instead he uses a word exculusivly for Mary and it becomes God’s very name for her.
The word is charin which else where is translated as grace for e.g. John 1:16

Luke was calling her favored. By using the word charitoo. He conjugated it in the female perfect past tense to show GOD took a previous action. But it has no permanence to it at all. Stephen is not valid here because he was not described with a verb. The noun form is used there. And there are differences among the manuscripts for that verse in Acts. Some say full of faith, while others say full of grace.

 

[Peter_J]

How so? Please spell it out for me, because I’m missing something.

This is really getting annoying.

You are not just saying that God didn’t need Mary to be immaculate (which is something that Catholics can agree with). You are also saying that:

Scripture does not explicitly (I would also argue, implicitly) supports that Mary was Immaculately Conceived.

Where exactly are you going with this?

Are you just trying to difficult, or what?

 

[NDfan]

They don’t seem figurative to me.

I remember my promise. For last night I promised you who have been baptized a sermon in which I would explain the Sacrament of the Lord’s table, which you now behold and which you became partakers of last night. You should understand what you have received, what you will receive, indeed what you should receive daily. That bread that you see on the altar and that has been sanctified by the word of God is the Body of Christ. That chalice – rather, that which the chalice contains – has been sanctified by the word of God and is the Blood of Christ. Through these things the Lord Christ wished to entrust to us his Body and his Blood, which he shed for us unto the remission of sins. If you receive them well, you are that which you receive. The Apostle says, “One bread and we, the many, are one body” (1 Cor 10:17). (Augustine, Sermo CCXXVII

Ignatus says…

“They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they confess not the Eucharist to be the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ, which suffered for our sins, and which the Father, of His goodness, raised up again.” Ignatius of Antioch, Epistle to Smyrnaeans, 7,1 (c. A.D. 110).

Canto sorry to barge in here but I’ve seen these quotes used so many times and they are taken way out of context. I suggest you read Augustine’s commentary on John 6 to understand his position on the literal body and blood of Christ.

Augustine states that when Christ spoke HE many times spoke figuratively. He goes on to say that Christ would never tell HIS disciples to commit a sin or crime. So therefore if Christ preached what seemed to literally be a crime or sin HE must have been speaking figuratively. In his commentary on John 6 which is used by the church to support transubstantiation Augustine references the eating of flesh and blood as being a crime. Understanding this to be figurative language Augustine plainly states that Christ was simply telling HIS followers that they needed to believe in HIM.

As far as Ignatius, again this is badly misunderstood. Ignatius was referring to the heretical teachings of the gnostics in this letter who were infiltrating the true Christian churches. The Gnostics did not believe Christ was the incarnate GOD because they viewed all material things as being evil. If Christ was a real man HE would have sinned and been evil. They would not partake in communion because the church used the bread and wine as symbols for the body and blood of Christ. They rejected this because they held to the belief that the bread and wine were evil material things of this world and could not represent Christ.

If Ignatius was teaching transubstantiation the gnostics would have agreed with him. Ignatius would have said what you see is not really bread and wine but the literal body and blood of Christ to which the gnostics would have replied: yes that’s right just like the man who died on the cross was not really GOD incarnate. The gnostics would have no problem with transubstantiation because it would have supported their beliefs. This could not have been the case so therefore Ignatius must have seen communion as symbolic.

I’m not trying to derail the thread as we can create a separate discussion for this. But it’s amazing how folks will use ECF quotes when they really don’t understand church history.

In Acts chapter 9 there is a dead woman (v37).They take Peter to her (v39) and he prayed for her and she arose (v40).

St Joseph reference: cwo.com/~pentrack/catholic/stjoseph.html

Peter prayed for GOD to bring her back to life. He did not pray for GOD to take her to Heaven or to get her out of purgatory. I don’t see a justification here for praying for the dead. Jesus prayed that GOD would bring Lazarus back to life.

 

[NDfan]

Does not Kechartiomene take on noun qualities ?
The Greek is voctiave - a title, aren’t titles usally nouns and not verbs.

No it does not take on noun qualities. This is where you are mistaken. The conjugation acts as a descriptor for the verb. The verb Charitoo means to favor. An action taken by someone. So I favor red wine over white wine as an example. The descriptor indicates a past completed action and can then be used as an attribute. So she had long hair, brown eyes, was favored etc. etc. That is not a noun though. It’s an attribute similar to Paul telling the Ephesians they are now favored. Being favored is now an attribute of us all which resulted in GOD sending Christ to us.

Charitoo means to grace. Some say to fill with grace (French Bible De Jerusalem transaltes filled with grace) or endue with grace (Amplified Bible says endued with grace.)

If Luke said Hail Pleres Charitos it would not illustrate that Mary was graced in the past. It would not illustrate that it was permanent either. It would only imply these things. Therefore he uses Kecharitomene a perfect passive participle that is yet vocaitve, in order to be more specific.

No no no. That is not true. Christ is said to be literally full of grace in John 1. By your implication here Christ then would not be permanently full of grace. The word Pleres literally means to be complete, to be perfect, lacking nothing. If Luke wanted to communicate that Mary had this quality then he would have used this very description. Kecharitomene does not represent a completeness of Mary. It represents a completed action by GOD.

Luke could have used Pleres Charitos or have said that Mary was merely favoured, he instead uses a word found nowhere else in the entire Bible which becomes God’s very name for Mary and the first glad tidings of our redemption through her son Christ.

Luke IS saying that Mary is favored. That’s why he uses the verb charitoo instead of charis. Mary was favored to bring forth the Messiah. Not to be sinless. The greeting wasn’t to announce Mary’s sinless nature, it was to announce that the birth of the messiah was at hand and Mary was favored in the past by GOD to perform this task. We’re going in circles here

Greek words don’t always translated properly into English let alone Latin. Using Latin’s resources as best he could, as chartioo means to grace but the Greek shows as Father Mateo says an amplitude and completeness, he said full of grace.

Full of grace is vocative - again so is the Greek
Full of grace assumes she was filled in the past.
Full asumes the grace is permanent
v.30 shows Mary’s passivity
Thus the perfect passive participle

I agree Greek doesn’t always translate properly into English. Matter of fact there is no English equivalent for kecharitomene. We have to piece together what the word means by looking at the root word which is Charitoo, the gender, and the conjugation. In this case the feminine perfect past participle. So then the question is how do you put a perfect past participle of being favored into English.

The problem with Mateo is the word Pleres is not used by Luke at all nor by anyone to describe Mary. Only Christ has this permanence and fullness you describe. Kecharitomene has no fullness or completeness associated with it. Again I will refer to the example of the gentleman Christ healed and was told to get up from his mat. The same conjugation was applied there. Why? To show that an action had taken place in the past. In this case the man was confined to his mat and always has been. But that doesn’t mean he would always be confined as we know Christ told him to get up. By your implications to Mary this could never have happened. Again I feel like we’re starting to repeat ourselves. If you are that convinced Mary was sinless it certainly is not my place to say you are wrong. But you simply cannot glean this from scripture. You are forced as you are doing to cite other interpretations that agree with you, and place meaning into words that do not belong.

PEACE

 

[NDfan]

This is really getting annoying.

You are not just saying that God didn’t need Mary to be immaculate (which is something that Catholics can agree with). You are also saying that:

Are you just trying to difficult, or what?

Peter sorry to barge in here. I think what happened was the 2 of you seemed to agree previously but then somehow thought you were disagreeing. The point of this whole discussion is that if Mary was sinless it’s not found in scripture and certainly cannot be gleaned from Luke 1:28. I’m sure we could debate this for months but we would start to repeat ourselves which it appears is happening now.

It seems we agree that GOD did not need Mary to be sinless to bring forth the messiah. That seemed to be the point that brought you both into agreement. Not sure where it re-deviated.

We’ve had some great discussion and I appreciate everyone’s feedback. Let’s keep it as cordial as it has been so we don’t start to look like what other topics become about 9 pages into the OP.

I’m going to go run about 7 miles to get rid of some of this holiday weight Talk to everyone later on.

PEACE and Blessings.