Friday, January 10, 2014

Marian dogmas began with fiction and Gnostic accounts

My title is derived from John Bugay's article today. (see at the end of this post) Time for a reminder of basic issues we have against the Roman Catholic Church. Peter talked about writing so that he could stir up their sincere minds by reminding the believers of the truth. (2 Peter 1:12-21; 3:1)
Perpetual Virginity, Immaculate Conception, Sinlessness, and Bodily Assumption of Mary have their beginnings in fictional accounts like the Protoevangelium of James and Gnostic writings like the Odes of Solomon and the Ascension of Isaiah (James White, Mary: Another Redeemer?, Bethany, 1998, p. 33). Pious beliefs like co-Mediatrix and co-Redemptrix, that could possibly be declared dogmas in the future by a Pope, are even more later innovative corruptions. _________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Another excellent book, which we have mentioned here many times before, is worth repeating again: Who is My Mother? by Eric Svendsen, Calvary Press, 2001.
"So, for Mary’s “beginning and end”, we have fiction and the Gnostics. The process by which these “things”, as you put it, became “universal feast days” relies in tremendous measure on the popular piety of what essentially were the baptized pagans of the Roman empire. While it is true that some early things said about Mary (i.e. “theotokos”) were truly intended to say things about Christ, Mary wouldn’t have been on the radar screen (from a Scriptural perspective) if these fictitious legends were not floating about the broader culture."
from John Bugay's article, "Why I reject the Marian Dogmas" at Triablogue. Good job, John!

6 comments:

Algo said...

Nice Post Ken.
Here are some interviews of Dr. Svendsen on ISI.

http://sharpens.blogspot.com/2008/05/eric-svendsen-mary-her-role-status-in.html

http://sharpens.blogspot.com/2008/05/eric-svendsen-mary-her-role-status-in_05.html

Ken said...

Thanks Algo! I miss Svendsen's presence on the web - he had a lot of excellent articles and debates with Roman Catholic issues.

James Swan said...

It's good to see that Dr. White's book is out on Kindle. It's a good intro, but I wonder if he ever plans on revising it? I think that he could greatly expand the book and make it a much better intro to the Mary of Romanism.

I have a vague recollection of him mentioning a possible revision some day, but given his schedule, it's probably the case he doesn't have time to do it anyway.

Ken said...

Hi James,
Yes, that is a good idea - I hope Dr. White can do that someday. You are right about his schedule, etc.

Amazing how many people were hitting him with "why haven't you responded yet to such and such?" type of comments at him recently.

John Bugay said...

Hey Ken, thanks for the good word!

kalbertini said...

In Catholicism you can describe Mary^s immaculate Conception & assumption as Dogma,beyond that,its grey.There is NO AGREED UPON LIST of Dogmas.This was acknowledged by the Lutheran/catholic dialogue of 1978,as well as a icy silence from the Vatican when theologian hans Kung asked for a list of infallible teachings.Ratzinger placed Catholic infallible teachings to around a dozen or so. Bishop lucker & his theologians came up with no more than ten.Pre Vatican II books on the matter are bloated,ahistorical opinions that have long been abandoned except for ultra conservatives