She shall crush his head or He shall crush his head?

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No direct or categorical and stringent proof of the dogma can be brought forward from Scripture. But the first scriptural passage which contains the promise of the redemption, mentions also the Mother of the Redeemer. The sentence against the first parents was accompanied by the Earliest Gospel (Proto-evangelium), which put enmity between the serpent and the woman: “and I will put enmity between thee and the woman and her seed; she (he) shall crush thy head and thou shalt lie in wait for her (his) heel” (Genesis 3:15). The translation “she” of the Vulgate is interpretative; it originated after the fourth century, and cannot be defended critically. The conqueror from the seed of the woman, who should crush the serpent’s head, is Christ; the woman at enmity with the serpent is Mary. God puts enmity between her and Satan in the same manner and measure, as there is enmity between Christ and the seed of the serpent. Mary was ever to be in that exalted state of soul which the serpent had destroyed in man, i.e. in sanctifying grace. Only the continual union of Mary with grace explains sufficiently the enmity between her and Satan. The Proto-evangelium, therefore, in the original text contains a direct promise of the Redeemer, and in conjunction therewith the manifestation of the masterpiece of His Redemption, the perfect preservation of His virginal Mother from original sin. newadvent.org/cathen/07674d.htm
 
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Fiat:
If “seed” or “zera” is the key, then the translators should not have referred to the serpant in the second person singular in the last phrase. Or, perhaps you will argue that God made a grammatical eror?

Fiat
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What are you talking about? The last phrase is “And you shall bruise him on the heel.” You’re saying that “you” isn’t properly translated if we examine it in light of the sigular, masculine “seed” from the previous phrase? It seems consistent to me. Not sure your point.

David
 
This will probably muddy the waters big time but if I recall correctly in the Mystical City of God by Blessed Mary Agreda she explains how God gave Mary the power to drive a demon out of somone on her way back home from Elizabeth’s after the birth of John the baptist (I’m sure having Christ in her womb at the time was a big help :).

It goes on to say the demon reported this “woman” to the devil and he was incensed that she had the power to do this. He then gathered all his minions to tempt Mary into sin. Mary was able to thwart all his attacks through prayer, humility, and her great love of God. This “crushed” satan and his pride. He basically went back to hell with his tail between his legs.

Now I’m recalling all this from memory so I might be off on some of this, but it was fairly vividly explained in the book. Also, since this is a personal revelation nobody is forced to believe this but it has been accepted by the church as not going against its teachings.
 
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amarischuk:
No direct or categorical and stringent proof of the dogma can be brought forward from Scripture. But the first scriptural passage which contains the promise of the redemption, mentions also the Mother of the Redeemer. The sentence against the first parents was accompanied by the Earliest Gospel (Proto-evangelium), which put enmity between the serpent and the woman: “and I will put enmity between thee and the woman and her seed; she (he) shall crush thy head and thou shalt lie in wait for her (his) heel” (Genesis 3:15). The translation “she” of the Vulgate is interpretative; it originated after the fourth century, and cannot be defended critically. The conqueror from the seed of the woman, who should crush the serpent’s head, is Christ; the woman at enmity with the serpent is Mary. God puts enmity between her and Satan in the same manner and measure, as there is enmity between Christ and the seed of the serpent. Mary was ever to be in that exalted state of soul which the serpent had destroyed in man, i.e. in sanctifying grace. Only the continual union of Mary with grace explains sufficiently the enmity between her and Satan. The Proto-evangelium, therefore, in the original text contains a direct promise of the Redeemer, and in conjunction therewith the manifestation of the masterpiece of His Redemption, the perfect preservation of His virginal Mother from original sin. newadvent.org/cathen/07674d.htm
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The “she” also refers to Israel, which the serpant has always been at emnity with. Jesus was also the seed of Israel.

David
 
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HpyCatholic:
This will probably muddy the waters big time but if I recall correctly in the Mystical City of God by Blessed Mary Agreda she explains how God gave Mary the power to drive a demon out of somone on her way back home from Elizabeth’s after the birth of John the baptist (I’m sure having Christ in her womb at the time was a big help :).

It goes on to say the demon reported this “woman” to the devil and he was incensed that she had the power to do this. He then gathered all his minions to tempt Mary into sin. Mary was able to thwart all his attacks through prayer, humility, and her great love of God. This “crushed” satan and his pride. He basically went back to hell with his tail between his legs.

Now I’m recalling all this from memory so I might be off on some of this, but it was fairly vividly explained in the book. Also, since this is a personal revelation nobody is forced to believe this but it has been accepted by the church as not going against its teachings.
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Jesus gave the power to drive out demons to ALL of his disciples - see Mark 16:17. That said, this account is obviously fiction.

David
 
Are you saying Jesus didn’t have the power to drive out demons? He was in the womb at the time. Maybe it was he that drove the demon out. Not sure how you can automatically discount this as fiction from your response.
 
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DavidB:
What are you talking about? The last phrase is “And you shall bruise him on the heel.” You’re saying that “you” isn’t properly translated if we examine it in light of the sigular, masculine “seed” from the previous phrase? It seems consistent to me. Not sure your point.

David
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The KJV says: “And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel.”

At issue is the translation of the “it” after the semicolon. You said that this pronoun must refer to “seed” which is masculine singular. Why do you conclude this? If you base this on the mere fact that it is the immediate preceding referent, then the translators should also have based the “thou” in the last phrase not on a referrent which is preceded by three others. Logically, the referrent should have been the seed of the serpent, requiring a third person pronoun. Yet that is not the case. To whom do you think the “thou” in the last phrase refers?

Fiat
 
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DavidB:
The “she” also refers to Israel, which the serpant has always been at emnity with. Jesus was also the seed of Israel.
David
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David, could you please explain why you beleive the “she” to refer to Israel?

Thank you!
 
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DavidB:
Jesus gave the power to drive out demons to ALL of his disciples - see Mark 16:17. That said, this account is obviously fiction.

David
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DavidB:

Could you please explain why Mark 16:17 is “obviously fiction”? Thank you.

Fiat
 
Fiat,
Not to muddy the waters, and I should let David speak for himself, but I am pretty sure he was referring to the account from Blessed Mary Agreda as posted above, not the scriptural account in Mark.
 
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HpyCatholic:
Are you saying Jesus didn’t have the power to drive out demons? He was in the womb at the time. Maybe it was he that drove the demon out. Not sure how you can automatically discount this as fiction from your response.
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Huh?? I view the entire account as a fiction. Sorry, but I don’t believe in such private revelations. My point about the power to drive out demons was to reduce the fascination within the story as if Mary had some sort of special gift to drive out demons that every other Christian does not have.

David
 
Verbum Caro:
Fiat,
Not to muddy the waters, and I should let David speak for himself, but I am pretty sure he was referring to the account from Blessed Mary Agreda as posted above, not the scriptural account in Mark.
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Thank you for the correction. I hope you are right.

Fiat
 
DavidB,
Now that we have got that settled (Blessed Mary Agreda), could you explain why you view “she” as Israel?

Thanks!
 
Verbum Caro:
David, could you please explain why you beleive the “she” to refer to Israel?

Thank you!
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It ties in with an understanding of the woman in Revelations 12:1. The woman who gave birth to the seed - that woman is Israel. This is not my own interpretation, but has been the most common interpretation of those verses for most of history. The “woman” was usually not interpreted as a single individual, but the collective people she was intended to symbolize in the scripture.

Here’s a footnote from the Catholic New American Bible to show that even Catholic theologians agree:

2 [1] The woman adorned with the sun, the moon, and the stars (images taken from Genesis 37:9-10) symbolizes God’s people in the Old and the New Testament. The Israel of old gave birth to the Messiah (Rev 12:5) and then became the new Israel, the church, which suffers persecution by the dragon (Rev 12:6, 13-17); cf Isaiah 50:1; 66:7; Jeremiah 50:12. This corresponds to a widespread myth throughout the ancient world that a goddess pregnant with a savior was pursued by a horrible monster; by miraculous intervention, she bore a son who then killed the monster.

David
 
Verbum Caro:
Fiat,
Not to muddy the waters, and I should let David speak for himself, but I am pretty sure he was referring to the account from Blessed Mary Agreda as posted above, not the scriptural account in Mark.
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Exactly, thanks.

David
 
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Fiat:
The KJV says: “And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel.”

At issue is the translation of the “it” after the semicolon. You said that this pronoun must refer to “seed” which is masculine singular. Why do you conclude this? If you base this on the mere fact that it is the immediate preceding referent, then the translators should also have based the “thou” in the last phrase not on a referrent which is preceded by three others. Logically, the referrent should have been the seed of the serpent, requiring a third person pronoun. Yet that is not the case. To whom do you think the “thou” in the last phrase refers?

Fiat
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Who is God talking to? The serpent. Thus, “thou” refers to the serpent. The context defines “thou” clearly.

David
 
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DavidB:
Who is God talking to? The serpent. Thus, “thou” refers to the serpent. The context defines “thou” clearly.

David
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Thanks for the clarification. I now understand you to say that context is what is necessary in parsing this text and not necessarily rules of grammar. If rules of grammar were necessary, then you would see how the pronoun used in the last phrase must not and COULD NOT be the “thou” in reference to Satan, but instead must refer to his seed, requiring at minimum a POSSESSIVE pronoun (i.e., thy seed, your seed). Now, because context is what is required, under your rules, then what in the context forbids the first pronoun proceeding the semicolon from referring to the woman. After all, the phrase following the semi colon attempts to establishes a parallelism. If it is so clear that the “thou” refers to Satan, then the parallelism is thrown off kilter when the pronoun “it” or “he” is used.

Frankly, this discussion is somewhat fruitless. The Catholic position is and always has been that the grace Our Lady has is from Christ and Christ alone. You admit that all disciples may cast out demons. Therefore, whether there is a picture of Our Lady stomping the Demon or St. Peter stomping the Demon, or whomever, we still recognize this as Christ’s grace. I don’t see how the miraculous medal or other images showing Mary trampling a snake is so contradictory to the Christian message. If you choose not to believe in these private revelations, then that is your business. Go in peace and be grateful that these images have brought others into a closer relationship with Jesus Christ!

Fiat

Fiat
 
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piety101:
I already quoted that Church Militant. But that DR is in error, because the pronoun in the Hebrew is Masculine and not feminine.It should correctly be translated, “HE shall crush his head.” Only Christ crushed the head of Satan and not Mary.
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You did not quote the entire passage…Church Militant points out the use of the word “woman” in the passage. Even in a passive sense, therefore, the importance of woman to deliver the Word Incarnate, and thereby crush the head of evil is demonstrated.

Reading the Bible in a literal sense, instead of the literalist sense, can help you in understanding.
 
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piety101:
Mary never was or is powerful enough to overcome Satan in his power.
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Mary’s power to crush the head of the serpent is derived from her role as the New Eve - receiving the strength to overcome evil from perfect obedience to the Will of the Word.
 
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