Biblical Mary

[Taken]

God has no Queen! That is a gross reinterpretation of SCripture. If it was important as Romanism makes it, It wouldn't be left to one passage of Scripture allegorically reinterpreted by some and not known until the late fourth century based on reinterpreting Scripture! Especially when Christianity was the unofficial "favoured religion of the empire, and the church was gorwing with enormous amounts of nominal people.

Yup.

Men establish QUEENS...
God "remakes" willing men into SAINTS...

Glory to God,
Taken

 

[Illuminator]

Pope Pius XII effectively summarized the core reasons Christians ought to honor Mary with the title of Queen of Heaven and Earth:

According to ancient tradition and the sacred liturgy the main principle on which the royal dignity of Mary rests is without doubt her divine motherhood. In holy writ, concerning the son whom Mary will conceive, we read this sentence: “He shall be called the son of the most high, and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of David his father, and he shall reign in the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end,” and in addition Mary is called “Mother of the Lord,” from this it is easily concluded that she is a queen, since she bore a son who, at the very moment of his conception, because of the hypostatic union of the human nature with the Word, was also as man, king and lord of all things. So with complete justice St. John Damascene could write: “When she became mother of the creator, she truly became queen of every creature.” Likewise, it can be said that the heavenly voice of the Archangel Gabriel was the first to proclaim Mary’s royal office (Ad Caeli Reginam, 34).​

In a future blog post, I will give more positive reasons for faith in Mary as Queen of Heaven and Earth, but many Protestants I speak to cannot get past one biblical text from the Old Testament that casts a shadow over this topic like none other. In Roman Catholics and Evangelicals—Agreements and Differences, Norman Geisler and Ralph MacKenzie present that text along with their commentary that represents the misguided faith of millions. And that text is Jeremiah 7:18:

Do you not see what they are doing in the streets of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? The children gather wood, the fathers kindle fire, and the women knead dough, to make cakes for the queen of heaven; and they pour out drink offerings to other gods, to provoke me to anger.​

Geisler and MacKenzie comment:

To call Mary “Queen of Heaven,” knowing that this very phrase comes from an old pagan idolatrous cult condemned in the Bible (cf. Jer. 7:18), only invites the charge of Mariolatry. And Mariolatry is idolatry (p. 322).​

I can certainly sympathize with their thinking here. I once thought the same. But the truth is: this text has absolutely nothing to do with the Blessed Mother as Queen of Heaven for at least three reasons:

1. Jeremiah here condemns the adoration of the Mesopotamian goddess Astarte (see Raymond Brown, S.S., Joseph Fitzmeyer, S.J., Roland E. Murphy, editors, The Jerome Biblical Commentary, Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1968, p. 310). She is in no way related to Mary. In fact, “she” did not and does not exist in reality. Mary, on the other hand, was a real historical person who was—and is—a queen by virtue of the fact that her son was—and is—the king.
2. Jeremiah condemned offering sacrifice to “the queen of heaven.” In Scripture, we have many examples of the proper way we should honor great members of the kingdom of God. We give “double honor” to “elders who rule well” in the Church (1 Tim. 5:17). St. Paul tells us we should “esteem very highly” those who are “over [us] in the Lord” (1 Thess. 5:12-13). We sing praises to great members of the family of God who have gone before us (Psalm 45:17). We bow down to them with reverence (1 Kings 2:19). We carry out the work of the Lord in their names (Matt. 10:40-42, DRV), and more. But there is one thing we ought never to do: offer sacrifice to them. Offering sacrifice is tantamount to the adoration that is due God alone. And this is precisely what Jeremiah was condemning. The Catholic Church does not teach—and has never taught—that we should adore Mary (see CCC 2110-2114; Lumen Gentium 66-67; CCC 971). Catholics offer sacrifice exclusively to God.
3. To the Evangelical and Fundamentalist, the mere fact that worshipping someone called “queen of heaven” is condemned in Jeremiah 7 eliminates the possibility of Mary being the true Queen of Heaven and Earth. This simply does not follow. The existence of a counterfeit queen does not mean there can’t be an authentic one. This reasoning followed to its logical end would lead to abandoning the entire Christian Faith! We could not have a Bible because Hinduism, Islam, and many other false religions have “holy books.” We could not call Jesus Son of God because Zeus and Hera had Apollo, Isis and Osiris had Horus, etc. The fact that there was a false “queen of heaven” worshipped in ancient Mesopotamia does not negate the reality of the true queen who is honored as such in the kingdom of God.

If you enjoyed this and want to know more, click here.
The Jer. 7:18 argument collapses into a heap.

 

[Taken]

The elevation that Mary gets from the Catholic religion is weird.

I know the scriptures say this of her:

"…Hail, thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women." (Luke 1:28)

But to go ahead with images of her and the Hail Mary prayers… none of this is scriptural.

Catholic doctrine has redefined" Highly Favored (to mean never having had sin).
* with a weird twisted concocted double talk explanation ...


Scripture itself reveals precisely WHY, Mary was "highly favored"...
(THE highly WHY never includes SINLESS.
(THE favored WHY never bestows Natural Mary excepted from SIN

Very weird...
To: preach Mary was defiant,
(Failing as God said to man and wife..
multiply
Then; After preaching her defiance;
(Preach to exalt her, sitting on a throne of heaven, pray to her, she an intercessory, bow to her, etc. etc.)

A great dis-Service to her memory, corrupt MEN have DONE...when Scripture simply says;
Among WOMEN Mary would be called Blessed.

 

[Taken]

Pope Pius XII effectively summarized the core reasons Christians ought to honor Mary with the title of Queen of Heaven and Earth:

According to ancient tradition ...
​

According to Scripture;

Mark 7:13
Making the word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things do ye.

According to Scripture;

Col 2:8
Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.
​

Glory to God,
Taken

 

[Illuminator]

Amen!

Same practice, different names.

A stupid insult does not refute post #757. It's called cognitive dissonance.

 

[Brakelite]

Rubbish. I don't where you get stuff like that from.

History. The second council of Ephesus, the events which led up to it, the character and behaviors of the principle persons involved.
Quite...The war with Chrysostom was ended, yet the roots of bitterness and seeds of strife still remained between Alexandria and Constantinople. And though the two men who were bishops of these two cities were in harmony so far as the confusion about Chrysostom was concerned, the same jealousy as to the dignity of their respective sees still existed, and soon broke out more violently than ever before. The subject of the next dispute was a question of doctrine, and, like that over the Homoousion, was so illusive, and the disputants believed so nearly alike and yet were so determined not to believe alike, and the men who led in it were so arrogant and cruel, that from the beginning the contention was more violent than any that had yet been. In A. D. 412, Cyril, the nephew of Theophilus, became bishop of Alexandria. He was one of the very worst men of his time. He began his episcopacy by shutting up the churches of the Novatians, "the most innocent and harmless of the sectaries," and taking possession of all their ecclesiastical ornaments and consecrated vessels, and stripping their bishop, Theopemptus, of all his possessions. Nor was Cyril content with the exercise of such strictly episcopal functions as these: he aspired to absolute authority, civil as well as ecclesiastical. He drove out the Jews, forty thousand in number, destroyed their synagogues, and allowed his followers to strip them of all their possessions. Orestes, the prefect of Egypt, displeased at the loss of such a large number of wealthy and industrious people, entered a protest, and sent up a report to the emperor. Cyril likewise wrote to the emperor. No answer came from the court, and the people urged Cryil to come to a reconciliation with the prefect, but his advances were made in such a way that the prefect would not receive them. The monks poured in from the desert to the number of about five hundred, to champion the cause of Cyril. Orestes was passing through the streets in his chariot. The monks flocked around him, insulted him, and denounced him as a heathen and an idolater. Orestes, thinking that perhaps they thought this was so, and knowing his life to be in danger, called out that he was a Christian, and had been baptized by Atticus, bishop of Constantinople. His defense was in vain. In answer, one of the monks threw a big stone which struck him on the head, and wounded him so that his face was covered with blood. At this all his guards fled for their lives; but the populace came to the rescue, and drove off the monks, and captured the one who threw the stone. His name was Ammonius, and the prefect punished him so severely that shortly afterward he died. "Cyril commanded his body to be taken up; the honors of a Christian martyr were prostituted on this insolent ruffian, his panegyric was pronounced in the church, and he was named Thaumasius -- the wonderful." -- Milman.

But the party of Cyril proceeded to yet greater violence than this. At that time there was in Alexandria a teacher of philosophy, a woman, Hypatia by name. She gave public lectures which were so largely attended by the chief people of the city, that Cyril grew jealous that more people went to hear her lecture than came to hear him preach. She was a friend of Orestes, and it was also charged that she, more than any other, was the cause why Orestes would not be reconciled to Cyril. One day as Hypatia was passing through the street in a chariot, she was attacked by a crowd of Cyril's partisans, whose ring-leader was Peter the Reader. She was torn from her chariot, stripped naked in the street, dragged into a church, and there beaten to death with a club, by Peter the Reader. Then they tore her limb from limb, and with shells scraped the flesh from her bones, and threw the remnants into the fire, March, A. D. 414. This was Cyril, -- now Saint Cyril, -- bishop of Alexandria. And in addition to his naturally tyrannical and murderous disposition, "jealousy and animosity toward the bishop of Constantinople was a sacred legacy bequeathed by Theophilus to his nephew, and Cyril faithfully administered the fatal trust." -- Milman.

This was the character common to numerous bishops and prelates throughout the empire. Stories such as the above abound. And worse. These are the men who decided in the council regarding the status of Mary. These are the so called 'fathers' so friended on by your church for truth and guidance. And you dare say, they are just sinners... They don't represent the church which record truth and truth only??? Your common sense you dispose of whenever you put finger to keyboard.

 

[farouk]

Strange way of arriving at truth... Like the declaration that Mary was mother of God, through fisticuffs and several riots in the home of Diana of Ephesus. Sinners? Bishops on both sides of the argument were profligate, violent, power hungry, pleasure seeking, boot licking, lackeys to whoever was winning the argument. They were worse than the heathen.

@Backlit Shows what happens when Scripture ceases to be the yardstick...

(Great header text from Jeremiah 20.9...)

 

[Brakelite]

Ummmmm, such as?

Ooooh, where shall I start? Perhaps the miracle of Pilates staircase now supposedly residing in Rome?
Or the nails of the cross that at one time adorned the head of Constantine atop the body of the statue of Hercules? But they weren't doctrines of councils were they.
How about the acceptance of the myth of Mary's bodily resurrection? How about the assumed right of the Catholic Church to steal the property of those she deems heretics? Not to mention the assumed right to require the state to kill them. How about the assumed right to alter and change God's Commandments?

 

[Brakelite]

@Backlit Shows what happens when Scripture ceases to be the yardstick...

(Great header text from Jeremiah 20.9...)

Yes, absolutely. A later example was the council of Chalcedon which was called to decide on the nature of Christ...a dispute over a minute difference in two Greek words which basically meant the same, but the resulting curses and anathemas and persecutions against the losers meant expulsion, death, loss of property and land, and exile. And the final decision was not based on scripture, but on a letter from the bishop of Rome, Leo, to the emperor... In other words Leo's interpretation of scripture... Not scripture itself. It was but a small step from that to papal infallibility.

 

[Mungo]

That they were just people in a church, not Jesus, not God, not THE Apostles. And read on for that "basis".

You ducked my question just as you ducked the previous one.

The people who discerned and agreed which books to canonise were 'just people in a Church'.
How do you know these 'people in a church' picked the right books?
Then
If you dismiss them as 'just people in a Church' then what basis do you have for your beliefs?

Please give a straight answer and not dodge them.

Seemed to me you were minimizing the terrible thing they did by saying we all sin, when the fact is, we are not all pedophiles, or, we don't all do that. So now you should see, and you'll have to forgive me for how I feel about some "People in a Church".

I said
Yes the Catholic Church, as other churches, is full of sinners. Jesus didn't promise His Church would be impeccable but he did promise the lead it into all truth (John 16:16).
You replied
Yet theirs were some of the worst of sins you are making excuses for.
How was what I said making excuses?
As I said
I haven't made excuses for anyone.
Now you say
Seemed to me you were minimizing the terrible thing they did by saying we all sin, when the fact is, we are not all pedophiles, or, we don't all do that.
How as I minismising anyone?
Where did I say all were paedophiles?
I just said
Yes the Catholic Church, as other churches, is full of sinners.
I didn't say Everyopne in all churches are sinners,
I didn't say all people in all churches are paedophiles.
You should stop these false accusations.

 

[Mungo]

History. The second council of Ephesus, the events which led up to it, the character and behaviors of the principle persons involved.
Quite...The war with Chrysostom was ended, yet the roots of bitterness and seeds of strife still remained between Alexandria and Constantinople. And though the two men who were bishops of these two cities were in harmony so far as the confusion about Chrysostom was concerned, the same jealousy as to the dignity of their respective sees still existed, and soon broke out more violently than ever before. The subject of the next dispute was a question of doctrine, and, like that over the Homoousion, was so illusive, and the disputants believed so nearly alike and yet were so determined not to believe alike, and the men who led in it were so arrogant and cruel, that from the beginning the contention was more violent than any that had yet been. In A. D. 412, Cyril, the nephew of Theophilus, became bishop of Alexandria. He was one of the very worst men of his time. He began his episcopacy by shutting up the churches of the Novatians, "the most innocent and harmless of the sectaries," and taking possession of all their ecclesiastical ornaments and consecrated vessels, and stripping their bishop, Theopemptus, of all his possessions. Nor was Cyril content with the exercise of such strictly episcopal functions as these: he aspired to absolute authority, civil as well as ecclesiastical. He drove out the Jews, forty thousand in number, destroyed their synagogues, and allowed his followers to strip them of all their possessions. Orestes, the prefect of Egypt, displeased at the loss of such a large number of wealthy and industrious people, entered a protest, and sent up a report to the emperor. Cyril likewise wrote to the emperor. No answer came from the court, and the people urged Cryil to come to a reconciliation with the prefect, but his advances were made in such a way that the prefect would not receive them. The monks poured in from the desert to the number of about five hundred, to champion the cause of Cyril. Orestes was passing through the streets in his chariot. The monks flocked around him, insulted him, and denounced him as a heathen and an idolater. Orestes, thinking that perhaps they thought this was so, and knowing his life to be in danger, called out that he was a Christian, and had been baptized by Atticus, bishop of Constantinople. His defense was in vain. In answer, one of the monks threw a big stone which struck him on the head, and wounded him so that his face was covered with blood. At this all his guards fled for their lives; but the populace came to the rescue, and drove off the monks, and captured the one who threw the stone. His name was Ammonius, and the prefect punished him so severely that shortly afterward he died. "Cyril commanded his body to be taken up; the honors of a Christian martyr were prostituted on this insolent ruffian, his panegyric was pronounced in the church, and he was named Thaumasius -- the wonderful." -- Milman.

But the party of Cyril proceeded to yet greater violence than this. At that time there was in Alexandria a teacher of philosophy, a woman, Hypatia by name. She gave public lectures which were so largely attended by the chief people of the city, that Cyril grew jealous that more people went to hear her lecture than came to hear him preach. She was a friend of Orestes, and it was also charged that she, more than any other, was the cause why Orestes would not be reconciled to Cyril. One day as Hypatia was passing through the street in a chariot, she was attacked by a crowd of Cyril's partisans, whose ring-leader was Peter the Reader. She was torn from her chariot, stripped naked in the street, dragged into a church, and there beaten to death with a club, by Peter the Reader. Then they tore her limb from limb, and with shells scraped the flesh from her bones, and threw the remnants into the fire, March, A. D. 414. This was Cyril, -- now Saint Cyril, -- bishop of Alexandria. And in addition to his naturally tyrannical and murderous disposition, "jealousy and animosity toward the bishop of Constantinople was a sacred legacy bequeathed by Theophilus to his nephew, and Cyril faithfully administered the fatal trust." -- Milman.

This was the character common to numerous bishops and prelates throughout the empire. Stories such as the above abound. And worse. These are the men who decided in the council regarding the status of Mary. These are the so called 'fathers' so friended on by your church for truth and guidance. And you dare say, they are just sinners... They don't represent the church which record truth and truth only??? Your common sense you dispose of whenever you put finger to keyboard.

Who was "Milman" and why should I believe anything he wrote?

 

[Ronald Nolette]

Yup.

Men establish QUEENS...
God "remakes" willing men into SAINTS...

Glory to God,
Taken

He takes puffed up dirt like us and makes us princes and princesses- never kings or queens- not even His earthly momma.

 

[Taken]

He takes puffed up dirt like us and makes us princes and princesses- never kings or queens- not even His earthly momma.

Mary was a godly women...(herself humble and in praise unto God)

Men elevate her to the position of equality TO the Lord God...(making idols of Mary, bowing down to the idols, praising her, praying to her, declaring her sinless, making her the intercessory to God, making her Gods queen of heaven... )

Mary herself did no such thing.
Nor did Men do such thing TO HER FACE, when she was bodily alive ON this Earth.

AFTER, Mary, bodily passed away ON this earth...(without her ability to say to a mans face) to NOT do what they DO...
results in:
* Men tarnishing her reputation, (in a manner they call good), and she herself having NO SAY, to reject men exalting her in the manner they DO.

Devious.

 

[Michiah-Imla]

A stupid insult does not refute post #757. It's called cognitive dissonance.

I don’t operate with a carnal mind.

"For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." (Romans 8:6-7)

 

[Brakelite]

Who was "Milman" and why should I believe anything he wrote?

Because he agrees with numerous other historians of the period, revealing constant strife, debates, arguments, violent riots, and vociferous disagreements on the formulas on the Trinity, Easter, and other controversial issues. The side closest to the emperors invariably won, with the losers losing their positions, the homes, the countries, possessions, and sometimes their heads. The freedom of conscience so hard fought for under pagan Rome, was obliterated under papal Rome. The contentious issues became so heated and the sides in the debates so violently and vehement in their arguing, there were 11 church councils called to decide the matters in one decade. These were not Bible studies to decide truth. The Catholic Church was created through coercion and the state sponsored persecution against anyone who dared to disagree.

 

[Michiah-Imla]

Post# 757

Mary is the preeminent Christian, there’s nothing wrong with giving her the title which Christ

You make good scriptural points.

But the images/statues and Hail Mary prayers are not scriptural at all.

There is no scripture that tells Christians to do these things; certainly none of the inspired Apostles ever wrote about these things.

The Bible is crystal clear that God hates images; so why does the Catholic Church disobey the scriptures? Are they above the Bible?

"Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth" (Exodus 20:4)

"Neither shalt thou set thee up any image; which the LORD thy God hateth." (Deuteronomy 16:22)

 

[Brakelite]

Post# 757



You make good scriptural points.

But the images/statues and Hail Mary prayers are not scriptural at all.

There is no scripture that tells Christians to do these things; certainly none of the inspired Apostles ever wrote about these things.

The Bible is crystal clear that God hates images; so why does the Catholic Church disobey the scriptures? Are they above the Bible?

"Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth" (Exodus 20:4)

"Neither shalt thou set thee up any image; which the LORD thy God hateth." (Deuteronomy 16:22)

Yeah, that's all true. But Catholicism isn't a Bible religion. It's a quasi Christian religion based on tradition and the decrees and creeds of men.

 

[Mungo]

Because he agrees with numerous other historians of the period, revealing constant strife, debates, arguments, violent riots, and vociferous disagreements on the formulas on the Trinity, Easter, and other controversial issues. The side closest to the emperors invariably won, with the losers losing their positions, the homes, the countries, possessions, and sometimes their heads. The freedom of conscience so hard fought for under pagan Rome, was obliterated under papal Rome. The contentious issues became so heated and the sides in the debates so violently and vehement in their arguing, there were 11 church councils called to decide the matters in one decade. These were not Bible studies to decide truth. The Catholic Church was created through coercion and the state sponsored persecution against anyone who dared to disagree.

Why are belligerently anti-Catholics pathologically incapable of giving a straight answer to a simple question asked by a Catholic?

That is a rhetorical question. You needn't bother not answering it.

 

[Mungo]

Post# 757



You make good scriptural points.

But the images/statues and Hail Mary prayers are not scriptural at all.

There is no scripture that tells Christians to do these things; certainly none of the inspired Apostles ever wrote about these things.

The Bible is crystal clear that God hates images; so why does the Catholic Church disobey the scriptures? Are they above the Bible?

"Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth" (Exodus 20:4)

"Neither shalt thou set thee up any image; which the LORD thy God hateth." (Deuteronomy 16:22)

If God hates images so much why did he order the Jews to make them?

Make two cherubim of beaten gold for the two ends of the propitiatory, fastening them so that one cherub springs direct from each end. cherubim shall have their wings spread out above, covering the propitiatory with them; they shall be turned toward each other, but with their faces looking toward the propitiatory. (Ex 25:18-20)

In the sanctuary were two cherubim, each ten cubits high, made of olive wood. …….The cherubim were placed in the inmost part of the temple, with their wings spread wide, so that one wing of each cherub touched a side wall while the other wing, pointing toward the middle of the room, touched the corresponding wing of the second cherub (1Kg 6:23, 27)

The walls on all sides of both the inner and the outer rooms had carved figures of cherubim, palm trees, and open flowers (1Kg 6:29)

The sea was then cast; it was made with a circular rim, and measured ten cubits across, five in height, and thirty in circumference. Under the brim, gourds encircled it, ten to the cubit all the way around; the gourds were in two rows and were cast in one mold with the sea. This rested on twelve oxen, three facing north, three facing west, three facing south, and three facing east, with their haunches all toward the centre, where the sea was set upon them. (1Kg 7:23-25)

On the surfaces of the supports and on the panels, wherever there was a clear space, cherubim, lions, and palm trees were carved, as well as wreaths all around. (1Kg 7:36)

the Lord said to Moses, “Make a saraph and mount it on a pole, and if anyone who has been bitten looks at it, he will recover.” Moses accordingly made a bronze serpent and mounted it on a pole, and whenever anyone who had been bitten by a serpent looked at the bronze serpent, he recovered.(Num 21:8-9)

 

[Michiah-Imla]

If God hates images so much why did he order the Jews to make them?

1. These images were in the holiest place of the sanctuary where only the high priest entered in once a year.

2. They weren’t to be worshipped and bowed down to.

3. The people were forbidden to make them for themselves.

"Cursed be the man that maketh any graven or molten image, an abomination unto the LORD, the work of the hands of the craftsman, and putteth it in a secret place." (Deuteronomy 27:15)