Why would Mary remain a virgin...after marriage?

[Porknpie]

That’s not a stupid question. It’s because Scripture is the Word of God, & the Word of God doesn’t support that Mary remained a virgin her whole life. It would actually contradict Scripture,

No. To contradict scripture, scripture would have to say “Mary had children with Joseph” or something to that affect. Scripture does not say that. You are adding to the text…which scripture says not to do.

since God commanded husbands & wives to “be fruitful & multiply,”

No…no no. You trying to proof text out of context. Completely out of context. Scripture also says in Mt 19:12:

For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let the one who is able to receive this receive it.”
So we can see that some men were meant to be celibate, not married and never to have children.

 

[benhur]

Do you honor Mary by calling her “blessed” as scripture says all generations will do?

Yes. Don’t know of any church that doesn’t honor her by calling her blessed.

This is the Catholic answer for your questions above. Catholics honor Mary and hold to both the written Word and what is spoken as St. Paul says that we should do.

yes we all do that .Kind of universal.

 

[Porknpie]

Well I would say 2 out of 4( just like the odds of Mary being ever virgin or not) . I would need a Lutheran perspective to say he believed Mary got “assumed bodily” into heaven. The Assumption" says "how it happened’-bodily. I believe Mary is in heaven also, just like Paul or the thief on the cross , but they did not assume, to my knowledge…

Interesting Benhur that just like her Son, no one has ever claimed to have Mary’s remains. This is in great contrast to the apostles and many saints through-out the centuries, and consistent with Tradition.

 

[vsedriver]

Thank you. Glad I deferred to a “Lutheran” for the “rest of the story”.

“The feast of the** Assumption** is totally papist, full of idolatry and without foundation in the Scriptures. But we, even though Mary has gone to heaven, should not bother how she went there. **We will not invoke her as our special advocate **as the Pope teaches.”

“He rejected the festivals of Mary’s Immaculate Conception, December 8, and her Assumption,"

Perhaps Randy will update my batting average. Maybe I am up to 5 out 6 Marion agreements with Luther .The only miss is ever -virgin.

Where in the Bible does it say that everything must have a foundation in the Scriptures?

As long as you refuse to acknowledge Sacred Tradition as equal to Sacred Scripture you will never have the fullness of the Truth.

So here we have Christians who disagree, some say Mary was not a PV and some say she is a PV. What does Sacred Scripture say they should do? I think it says they should take their disagreement to the Church.

The Church has spoken on this matter. If the Church is wrong then you can’t trust the Church on anything, including what is and isn’t Sacred Scripture.

Without Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition, and the teaching authority of the Magisterium of the Church you can’t know anything about Jesus or salvation.

Either Jesus founded a Church or he didn’t. Either it exists today or it doesn’t. If it doesn’t then Jesus was pretty incompetent or a liar and left us orphans.

 

[vsedriver]

Thank you .Yes scripture says his brethren did not believe during His ministry. Helps me to understand why Jesus would give the care of Mary to John and not His brethren because of that sword of division, enemies in the household.

But if James, the brother of the Lord was head of the Church in Jerusalem then he had one brother who believed in him. Why didn’t he tell John to take his Mother to James?

 

[vsedriver]

Yes. Don’t know of any church that doesn’t honor her by calling her blessed. yes we all do that .Kind of universal.

Do you call her the Blessed Virgin Mary or Blessed Mary? Seems kind of silly to refer to her as the Blessed Virgin if she wasn’t always a virgin.

 

[benhur]

One cannot look at prophecies in the Old Testament and stretch them too far…Nonsense…

Agreed.That is what I think you do when you use OT gate being shut as referring to Mary’s womb

Thank you for your response. It is easier to dialogue when someone can understand one’s position and even repeat it ,though disagree with it. Yes ,Psalms sometimes simultaneously speaks of a current situation with David and prophetically of what Christ would go thru, in the same psalm. That is where vs 5 is for David and 8 is for Christ . Not sure why this would be nonsense, for all agree that the temple cleansing is in the psalm. Maybe 5 speaks of Christ taking on our sins also.

To say the whole Psalm, every statement, is from the mouth of Christ is going way too far.

Agreed. I am not saying that of all 36 vs are prophetic.

To prove my point, look at verse 5 which says,

“O God, it is You who knows my folly, And my wrongs are not hidden from You.”

As discussed above , this applies to David, and perhaps slimly to Christ taking on our sins at the cross. They were not hidden from the Father in that "forsaking’’ moment.

The prophecy in verse 8 is fulfilled by the fact that Jesus was rejected by his own relatives (Mark 3:21). If the “brethren” of the Lord were Joseph’s children from a prior marriage, though they were not Mary’s biological children, legally they would be considered her sons.

Well then that goes against those who for centuries, I think, postulated that Joseph was virgin also. It also goes against those who postulated “brethren” is like kin folk or fellow countrymen. Was the prophecy poetic in double viewpoints with brethren and mother’s sons ? Or was it to expand the scope of rejection, form countrymen (brethren), to the real heart wrencher, even to his own family (mother’s sons) ?

Oh but wait, Mary does have other children — it even says so in the book of Revelation:

Revelation 12:17
“So the dragon was enraged with the woman, and went off to make war with the rest of her children, who keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus.”

Mary is the woman, and we are her children!

Doesn’t fit because we, if we are indeed her spiritual offspring, do not reject our “brother/Christ” that psalms speaks of happening.

 

[Cathoholic]

Thetazlord. You said your ECF sources for DENYING the Perpetual Virginity of Mary were as follows . . . .

QUOTE:
Thanks for the reminder. Helvidius, Hegesippus, Tertillian, Eusebius, Africanus, I believe St. Melito, etc, and of course, Matthew, Mark, Luke, & John, and the apostle Paul.

NOT ONE Early Church Father ever denied our Blessed Mother’s Perpetual Virginity thetazlord. Not one.

It is only in your mind that this has occurred.

No Church Fathers deny the Perpetual Virginity of Mary (except as I said, if you want to claim the Montanist, “Tertullian” as your “father”, then do so).

Helvidius is not a “Father”. You are the first person I have ever heard refer to Helvidius as a “father” of the Church. Do you claim Simon Magus, Ebion, and Cerinthus as your “fathers” too?

In fact we have NO WRITINGS remaining from Helvidius thetazlord! Were you aware of that? What are your basing Helvidius as a “Father” of the Church upon?

The only reason we know about Helvidius at all is St. Jerome’s appropriate rebuttal of him.

The Hegesippus objection doesn’t work. Hegesippus was a convert to Christianity from Judaism.

Jews (and early Christians) call their distant families “brothers” even “brothers according to the flesh” (which merely means they were fellow Jews).

When Hegesippus says Jude is “said to have been a brother of the Saviour according to the flesh” he is alluding to Scripture, as I have already done.

MARK 6:3 3 Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?"

MATTHEW 13:55 55 Is not this the carpenter’s son? Is not his mother called Mary? And are not his brethren James and Joseph and Simon and Judas?

The only thing you can definitively say from “a brother according to the flesh” is that he is a fellow-Jew.

St. Paul (also a Jew), ALSO uses this phrase in EXACTLY the same way:

Look at how St. Paul refers to brothers in the flesh.

ROMANS 9:1-5 1 I am speaking the truth in Christ, I am not lying; my conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit, 2 that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. 3 **For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brethren (adelphos), my kinsmen by race. (sarx which is the literal Greek word for “flesh”) **4 They are Israelites, and to them belong the sonship, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises; 5 to them belong the patriarchs, and of their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ. God who is over all be blessed for ever. Amen.

This can be seen even clearer in the KJV Protestant translation.

ROMANS 9:3 (KJV) 3 For I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren (adelphos), my kinsmen according to the flesh (sarx) . . .

Are ALL Jews from the same womb thetazlord?

If you are going to be consistent (but preposterous) you must say “yes”.

But Hegesippus or any other non-heretic . . . . NEVER calls anyone else other than Jesus “children of Mary”!

 

[Cathoholic]

The real issue is, what Hegesippus means by “brothers in the flesh?” And the evidence says the author means extended family of varying degrees. That’s all.

The other real issue is **where does Hegesippus call anyone other than Jesus a son of Mary? The answer is nowhere. **

---

The Eusebius objection is likewise pointless since Eusebius is merely talking about Hegesippus’s writings and you apply the same erroneous interpretation to both.

---

Why do many deniers of the Perpetual Virginity of Mary not say ALL of what Eusebius has Hegesippus saying (or at least more) about Symeon?

Because as soon as they do, you find out that Symeon who is explicitly described as Jesus’ “brother” in the Gospels, is described just as explicitly as the son of Clopas, which confirms our earlier Biblical text comparison concerning “the other Mary” along with “James” of “James, Joses, Simon (Symeon) and Jude.”

This raises questions about all the “brothers” of Jesus such as, “If one or two of their (James, Joses, Simon, and Jude) mothers were different from the Blessed Virgin Mary, why would Mark 6 and Matthew 13 lump them all together? That would suggest they ALL have different mothers, not just Symeon”.

Let’s review an extended quote from Eusebius (who is quoting Hegesippus) and see if we can’t get a little more insight into all of this.

Eusebius quoting Hegesippus: Certain of these heretics brought accusation against Symeon, the son of Clopas, on the ground that he was a descendant of David and a Christian; and thus he suffered martyrdom, at the age of one hundred and twenty years, while Trajan was emperor and Atticus governor.

1. And the same writer says that his accusers also, when search was made for the descendants of David, were arrested as belonging to that family. And it might be reasonably assumed that Symeon was one of those that saw and heard the Lord, judging from the length of his life, and from the fact that the Gospel makes mention of Mary, the wife of Clopas, who was the father of Symeon, as has been already shown.

Symeon was called to the Emperors court precisely because of his relation to Jesus (descendants of David). Yet Eusebius tells us who Symeon’s father is, **and it is NOT St. Joseph. **

If Symeon was a “brother” of Jesus, but was not the uterine brother of Jesus, it stands to reason that Jude ALSO was not a uterine brother of Jesus either.

Once you admit to one of these four “brothers” as not being uterine brothers, you must explicitly show at least one of the others to be a child of Mary’s—and you cannot do this because it is not true therefore this is not out there except by people who were considered enemies of the Church.

When Hegesippus, who was almost certainly an ethnic Jew, refers quite naturally to Jude as being a brother of Jesus according to the flesh, you latch on to that part (“brother according to the flesh”) all the while ignoring all the other data.

If you read Hegesippus in Eusebius, brother Symeon is actually “COUSIN” Symeon and NOT BROTHER at all.

The deniers of the Perpetual Virginity of Mary frequently ignore this part of Eusebius quoting of Hegesippus.

Your appeal to the Protoevangelium is pointless too. Why?

Because Catholics do not hold to the Blessed Virgin’s Perpetual Virginity on account of the Protoevangelium.

So bringing in the Protoevangelium is a non-sequitur.

Your complaint about Augustine differing on other Fathers about WHY James and Joseph and Simon and Judas are not uterine siblings of Jesus ignores the fact that they all agree . . . . they were not uterine siblings of Jesus.

Something you deviate from thetazlord. And you deviate from this with NO evidence.

ST. AUGUSTINE “Heretics called Antidicomarites are those who contradict the perpetual virginity of Mary and affirm that after Christ was born she was joined as one with her husband”

— St. Augustine Heresies section 56. A.D. 428.​

NOT ONE Early Church Father denied the Perpetual Virginity of the Blessed Virgin Mary thetazlord. NOT ONE.

You are unfortunately aligning yourself with a cadre of heretics thetazlord.

 

[ericc]

Actually, both James & Jude that wrote the epistles are part of this “foursome.”

Another view is that this is James of Alphaeus aka James the Just and his brother Jude and NOT of the foursome… Alphaeus married (the other)Mary, sister or sis-in-law of Mary Mother of Jesus. (Since it is unlikely that parents would name both daughters Mary.)

The “Mary” that was married to Alphaeus is the same Mary of Clopas. Clopas (‘Klōpas’ – ‘my exchanges’) is the same person as ‘Alphaeus’ (‘Alphaios’ – ‘changing’).

Conjecture without evidence. I also did that in my answer at the top.

The Catholic church is in agreement they are the same person, or a second husband of this “other” Mary since John’s Gospel was written much later (assuming Alphaeus had died by the time John wrote his Gospel).

Which catholic source told you that they are the same person? Is this conclusive or just one of the views out there?And who is the “other” Mary and the who is the second husband. You are throwing out a lot of statements which I can’t follow how that would lead to the conclusion that Mary is NOT EV.

James son of Alphaeus had a brother named Joseph, but not Jude, which is supported in Mark Ch.15 & 16. So, the “James & Joseph” who are sons of Alphaeus are not the same “James & Jude” who are Jesus’ brothers, who are also brothers with Simon & Joseph, and at least two unnamed sisters. So, they aren’t Jesus’ cousins or close relatives, but His half-brothers. This is more evident by realizing, Scripturally, there are four women at the cross, not just three.

You have not scripturally supported that James son of Alphaeus had a brother named Joseph or that James of Alphaeus is of the foursome. Actually the Bible say that Levi/Matthew is a son of Alphaeus (Mk 2:14) but did not say which Alphaeus. I have asked for that proof a few times how did you ascertain from the Bible that Alphaeus is Clopas. If you can not , please just admit it. If you need to resort to extra-biblical sources, then just declare it that it is non-biblical and we can still have a decent discussion. You keep on asserting it is scriptural but you refuse to provide the scriptural evidence. If you claim these brothers of the Lord are half brothers, for Mary to be NOT EV, these have to be maternal half brothers, her biological children. But Eusebius/Hegesippus that you quoted is saying these are paternal half brothers or cousins So do you agree with Eusebius/Hesippus or not? If not, why are you quoting them then?

Yes , it is possible that there are 4 women at the cross (Jn 19:25) but that itself is not conclusive due to Greek not having any commas. It could go either way.

Thanks for the reminder. Helvidius, Hegesippus, Tertillian, Eusebius, Africanus, I believe St. Melito, etc, and of course, Matthew, Mark, Luke, & John, and the apostle Paul.

You need to provide actual sources to prove it. Quoting names is not enough.
1)Who said Helvidius is ECF? Jerome wrote against him. Perhaps Helvidius is on the Protestant list of ECF but definitely not on ours.
2)Eusibius/Hegesippus- where did they say that these are maternal half brothers? Eusebius quote Hegesippus that Clopas is uncle of the Lord i.e. Joseph’s brother and James the Just as Joseph’s son before betrothal with Mary. So how did you derived that these are maternal half-brothers. Why are you not considering the cousin argument that he proferred?
3)Tertullian. Prolific writer unfortunately went renegade. Which writings of his did he claim Mary being NOT EV? Please quote.
4) Africanus. Is this Julius Africanus? Which writings of his did he claim Mary being NOT EV? I didn’t find anything on Mary EV. You must have a more complete source.
5) St Melito. I don’t see his name on my list of ECF. Which writings of his did he claim Mary being NOT EV?
(6)Matthew/Mark/Luke/John/Paul- and your scriptural evidence to prove they denied Mary EV? Chapters/verses please. Hope you are not falling back to the adelphos argument again.

What about ECFs that believed Mary’s EV? Why don’t you given their writings any weight? How did you decide which ECFs to side with?

At a minimum please prove that these are Mary’s biological children. Paternal half brothers would not help your case. You are either suggesting Mary remarried or committed adultery. So you have to decide which one you are championing.

You really need to provide evidence and not just viewpoints. it would be good if you can list your line of reasoning to lead to Mary being NOT EV with supporting evidence for each line of reasoning. Even if the evidence is extra-biblical, it is alright . We just want to see if these evidence are solid or not.

 

[benhur]

The real issue is, what Hegesippus means by “brothers in the flesh?” And the evidence says the author means extended family of varying degrees. That’s all.

The other real issue is **where does Hegesippus call anyone other than Jesus a son of Mary? The answer is nowhere. **

---

The Eusebius objection is likewise pointless since Eusebius is merely talking about Hegesippus’s writings and you apply the same erroneous interpretation to both.

---

Why do many deniers of the Perpetual Virginity of Mary not say ALL of what Eusebius has Hegesippus saying (or at least more) about Symeon?

Because as soon as they do, you find out that Symeon who is explicitly described as Jesus’ “brother” in the Gospels, is described just as explicitly as the son of Clopas, which confirms our earlier Biblical text comparison concerning “the other Mary” along with “James” of “James, Joses, Simon (Symeon) and Jude.”

This raises questions about all the “brothers” of Jesus such as, “If one or two of their (James, Joses, Simon, and Jude) mothers were different from the Blessed Virgin Mary, why would Mark 6 and Matthew 13 lump them all together? That would suggest they ALL have different mothers, not just Symeon”.

Let’s review an extended quote from Eusebius (who is quoting Hegesippus) and see if we can’t get a little more insight into all of this.

Eusebius quoting Hegesippus: Certain of these heretics brought accusation against Symeon, the son of Clopas, on the ground that he was a descendant of David and a Christian; and thus he suffered martyrdom, at the age of one hundred and twenty years, while Trajan was emperor and Atticus governor.

1. And the same writer says that his accusers also, when search was made for the descendants of David, were arrested as belonging to that family. And it might be reasonably assumed that Symeon was one of those that saw and heard the Lord, judging from the length of his life, and from the fact that the Gospel makes mention of Mary, the wife of Clopas, who was the father of Symeon, as has been already shown.

Symeon was called to the Emperors court precisely because of his relation to Jesus (descendants of David). Yet Eusebius tells us who Symeon’s father is, **and it is NOT St. Joseph. **

If Symeon was a “brother” of Jesus, but was not the uterine brother of Jesus, it stands to reason that Jude ALSO was not a uterine brother of Jesus either.

Once you admit to one of these four “brothers” as not being uterine brothers, you must explicitly show at least one of the others to be a child of Mary’s—and you cannot do this because it is not true therefore this is not out there except by people who were considered enemies of the Church.

When Hegesippus, who was almost certainly an ethnic Jew, refers quite naturally to Jude as being a brother of Jesus according to the flesh, you latch on to that part (“brother according to the flesh”) all the while ignoring all the other data.

If you read Hegesippus in Eusebius, brother Symeon is actually “COUSIN” Symeon and NOT BROTHER at all.

The deniers of the Perpetual Virginity of Mary frequently ignore this part of Eusebius quoting of Hegesippus.

Your appeal to the Protoevangelium is pointless too. Why?

Because Catholics do not hold to the Blessed Virgin’s Perpetual Virginity on account of the Protoevangelium.

So bringing in the Protoevangelium is a non-sequitur.

Your complaint about Augustine differing on other Fathers about WHY James and Joseph and Simon and Judas are not uterine siblings of Jesus ignores the fact that they all agree . . . . they were not uterine siblings of Jesus.

Something you deviate from thetazlord. And you deviate from this with NO evidence.

ST. AUGUSTINE “Heretics called Antidicomarites are those who contradict the perpetual virginity of Mary and affirm that after Christ was born she was joined as one with her husband”

— St. Augustine Heresies section 56. A.D. 428.​

NOT ONE Early Church Father denied the Perpetual Virginity of the Blessed Virgin Mary thetazlord. NOT ONE.

You are unfortunately aligning yourself with a cadre of heretics thetazlord.

Wow .Two posts just to say brothers does not mean brothers , nor sisters sisters. but thank you lot of passionate work.

 

[benhur]

Do you call her the Blessed Virgin Mary or Blessed Mary? Seems kind of silly to refer to her as the Blessed Virgin if she wasn’t always a virgin.

I think we call her Blessed Virgin when talking of the incarnation, or of the Christmas story, otherwise , Mary was “blessed amongst women”. But no, as an example, we wouldn’t say the Blessed Virgin came to Jesus at Capernaum to take Jesus back home to rest.

 

[PRmerger]

I think we call her Blessed Virgin when talking of the incarnation, or of the Christmas story, otherwise , Mary was “blessed amongst women”. But no, as an example, we wouldn’t say the Blessed Virgin came to Jesus at Capernaum to take Jesus back home to rest.

“All generations shall call me blessed, when talking of the incarnation or of the Christmas story, but not on any other reference”–Luke 1…???

 

[benhur]

But if James, the brother of the Lord was head of the Church in Jerusalem then he had one brother who believed in him. Why didn’t he tell John to take his Mother to James?

Good thinking. It is indeed part of the fascinating story. Scripture tells us his brethren believed not. “For neither did his brethren believe in him.” John 7:5. It was not till after the resurrection as recorded in Acts that we see the brethren being with Mary and the apostles as believers.

As with David having his adulterous, murderous sin forgiven, he still carried “consequences” as a marker of His grace, not punishment. So to the brethren had to later endure the fact that Mary would remain with John. That is probably why Jesus ,who had foreknowledge of James’s future conversion, still awarded Mary to John (not too mention the immediate consolation of Mary, not having to wait weeks or months for brethren to convert). Who knows, perhaps this was the heart breaker that helped them finally believe, your mother being given to a beloved apostle because of your unbelief! Can you imagine, being separated from a as gracious and loving mother as Mary?

Much forgiven, much loved. They (James and brethren) understood. Apparently quite a conversion.

 

[benhur]

“All generations shall call me blessed, when talking of the incarnation or of the Christmas story, but not on any other reference”–Luke 1…???

http://media.tumblr.com/6a27b285f5b36df3f539a929d577e396/tumblr_inline_n2jpzc2m8h1rcrw1m.gif

Back at you for WHAT are you saying PR ? You mumbled my phrases to an almost incoherent, changed meaning.???

Originally Posted by benhur View Post
I think we call her Blessed Virgin when talking of the incarnation, or of the Christmas story, otherwise , Mary was “blessed amongst women”. But no, as an example, we wouldn’t say the Blessed Virgin came to Jesus at Capernaum to take Jesus back home to rest.

 

[LaughingBoy1503]

What make this significant is the large number of non-Catholic Christians who say, “Oh, those poor Catholics…if only their church would allow them to read the Bible for themselves they would see that Jesus had brothers and sisters.”

To which knowledgeable Catholics reply, "Oh, these ignorant “Bible Christians”…if only they knew that the Bible wasn’t written in King James English, they would understand that the Jews had no word for “cousin” in Aramaic, so all non-nuclear family members, such as cousins, were called “brothers”…even Abraham’s nephew, Lot, was referred to as Abraham’s “brother’ in the OT.”

I pointed out that exact thing to my aunt, who is a protestant ministers wife and herself a “Bible Christian” after she tried to say that Jesus had brothers because it was “Biblical” When I explained the Catholic understanding of why Jesus had no brothers, the look on her face was priceless lol. Don’t mess with a Biblical Catholic

I don’t get why some protestants seem to think the fact that we believe Mary remained a virgin even after marriage is some kind of a big conspiracy to elevate Mary’s status or something. The Catholic Church was actually around during Mary’s lifetime. I doubt the Church would just make something like that up for the heck of it. What good would come of it? What would the Church gain? Even if Mary did not remain a Virgin, what would it change?

 

[Randy_Carson]

Actually, both James & Jude that wrote the epistles are part of this “foursome.” The “Mary” that was married to Alphaeus is the same Mary of Clopas. Clopas (‘Klōpas’ – ‘my exchanges’) is the same person as ‘Alphaeus’ (‘Alphaios’ – ‘changing’). The Catholic church is in agreement they are the same person, or a second husband of this “other” Mary since John’s Gospel was written much later (assuming Alphaeus had died by the time John wrote his Gospel).

Joseph had a brother names Clopas/Alpheus.

Joseph and Clopas both married girls named Mary.

Clopas and Mary had sons named. Simon/Symeon, James the Lesser (future Bishop of Jerusalem), Jude, and Joses/Joseph. They also had a daughter named Salome who married Zebedee and was the mother of James and John.

Here’s where things get tough for you, theta, because you have just admitted that two of the four “brothers” in Matthew 13:55 are not uterine siblings of Jesus.

Matthew 13:54-56
54 Coming to his hometown, he began teaching the people in their synagogue, and they were amazed. “Where did this man get this wisdom and these miraculous powers?” they asked. 55 “Isn’t this the carpenter’s son? Isn’t his mother’s name Mary, and aren’t his brothers (Gr. adelphoi) James, Joseph, Simon and Judas? 56 Aren’t all his sisters (Gr. adelphai) with us? Where then did this man get all these things?”

Once you open the door to the idea that some of the four were not Mary’s sons, the rest of the “brothers” are subject to this same uncertainty.

Thus, you cannot disprove the Perpetual Virginity of Mary from scripture because reasonable doubt has been established.

Case dismissed.

James son of Alphaeus had a brother named Joseph, but not Jude, which is supported in Mark Ch.15 & 16.

This is vague. Can you be more specific?

Jude/Judas is not a uterine brother of Jesus, either, because he is the son of James.

“When they arrived, they went upstairs to the room where they were staying. Those present were Peter, John, James and Andrew; Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew; James son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot, and Judas son of James.” (Acts 1:13)

If correct, that’s three of the four in Mt. 13:55 accounted. They were not brothers of Jesus.

 

[vsedriver]

Good thinking. It is indeed part of the fascinating story. Scripture tells us his brethren believed not. “For neither did his brethren believe in him.” John 7:5. It was not till after the resurrection as recorded in Acts that we see the brethren being with Mary and the apostles as believers.

As with David having his adulterous, murderous sin forgiven, he still carried “consequences” as a marker of His grace, not punishment. So to the brethren had to later endure the fact that Mary would remain with John. That is probably why Jesus ,who had foreknowledge of James’s future conversion, still awarded Mary to John (not too mention the immediate consolation of Mary, not having to wait weeks or months for brethren to convert). Who knows, perhaps this was the heart breaker that helped them finally believe, your mother being given to a beloved apostle because of your unbelief! Can you imagine, being separated from a as gracious and loving mother as Mary?

Much forgiven, much loved. They (James and brethren) understood. Apparently quite a conversion.

wow, talk about spinning a tale out of thin air. There is not a single line of scripture that would back this up.

 

[benhur]

wow, talk about spinning a tale out of thin air. There is not a single line of scripture that would back this up.

Those are my pearls so be careful what you are…

But I would say the same in your shoes.

You certainly can not agree.

 

[benhur]

As long as you refuse to acknowledge Sacred Tradition as equal to Sacred Scripture you will never have the fullness of the Truth.

Totally unbiblical.

So here we have Christians who disagree, some say Mary was not a PV and some say she is a PV. What does Sacred Scripture say they should do? I think it says they should take their disagreement to the Church.

Sorry, that is just to scary to put all my faith in the holy men of a church overriding what one sees as right from all sources thru the Father’s eyes. With your rule Peter never would have listened to the Father, and would have sided with the one true magisterium/church of his time, and never would have said, “Thou art the Christ”.

The Church has spoken on this matter. If the Church is wrong then you can’t trust the Church on anything, including what is and isn’t Sacred Scripture.

I was just posting with PR on this matter of “either /or” vs “both /and”. The allegation is that P’s are “either or” in their arguments. I this case , you are saying either the CC is right on ever-virginity or she is not right on anything. That is a bit extreme .

Without Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition, and the teaching authority of the Magisterium of the Church you can’t know anything about Jesus or salvation.

Agreed, but you must add the unction of the HS, who illuminates the Truth in all of the above, and nothing but the truth.

Either Jesus founded a Church or he didn’t. Either it exists today or it doesn’t. If it doesn’t then Jesus was pretty incompetent or a liar and left us orphans.

Where are you PR ? Another either/or argument.