st.Mary`s perpetual virginity and Assumption of Mary

[mikeyseky]

was the Assumption of Mary and its perpetual Virginity were copied from Gnostic Apocryphal books ? were the fathers influenced by Gnostics ? 

[NicholasMyra]

was the Assumption of Mary and its perpetual Virginity were copied from Gnostic Apocryphal books ?

Nope. Not at all. In fact, the Gnostics didn't like the idea of physical bodies being resurrected anyway. They would have probably opposed the glorification and assumption of the Theotokos's body.

were the fathers influenced by Gnostics ?  

Often times, "gnostic" is wrongly taken to mean "Greek philosophy-influenced". The Fathers certainly were influenced by Platonism and Neo-Platonism and Aristotelianism, etc, all Greek philosophical schools.

Gnosticism, however, refers to movements that allowed non-apostolic use of Greek philosophy to actually overthrow the Gospel and the truths of Christianity. Unlike the author of St. John's Gospel, they did not use hellenistic philosophy to exegete Christ, but rather to oppose him.

The Fathers did "baptise" some Gnostic texts, like the Vision of St. Theodora. How successfully they did so is debatable.

[Asteriktos]

It's possible that the gnostics influenced the Orthodox, though perhaps not in the way that some might think. One way that such influence is talked about is that Marcion's acceptance, modification, and exclusion of various New Testament texts caused the Orthodox to react by starting to be more explicit about what they considered to be canonical. I'm not sure how much truth there is to this, however. Certainly there was some earlier scholarship going on, and a rare Christian here and there was dealing with canonicity issues (especially Origen), but it wasn't really until the mid-4th century that the ball got rolling in any significant fashion.  However, it's still possible that influence was there on some level. True, it's wasn't an influence that made Church Fathers say "Gee, we need to modify our belief about X, because the gnostics are right about that". However, when you react to a false belief and argue against it, sometimes you go overboard in the opposite direction, and sometimes just by talking about it you are contributing to an imbalance. However, over time any imbalances will be smoothed out.

[HabteSelassie]

Greetings in that Divine and Most Precious Name of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

In our writing oriented world of today perhaps we are a bit anachronistic about writings of the past.  In the past, things were generally part of oral traditions before they were codified as written documents, even during the Roman era.  So the hymns and prayers and chants were popularly sung in the Churches before the books, Gospels, and commentaries were compiled which refer to them.  So we know that both the Church and the heresies draw from the same well-spring of inspiration because they are sharing many of the same common experiences and cultures.  These stories of Mary were songs and prayers and commemorations before they were books and Gospels, and so we can trust their authenticity.  We had this discussion before.  These pseudo-Gospels themselves may not be legitimate for various historical reasons, however some of their subjects and details remain accurate because they are mutually confirmed within other accepted books, hymns, and prayers of the Tradition. The Tradition did not copy them from the pseudo-Gospels, the pseudo-Gospels are forgeries, mistranslations, and pulp versions  of copies of the stories from the Tradition such as the hymnography, Synaxarium, icons, Liturgies, and prayers.

stay blessed,
habte selassie

[Tags:]

OrthodoxChristianity.net > Moderated Forums > Faith Issues (Moderator: Michał Kalina) > Topic: st.Mary`s perpetual virginity and Assumption of Mary