Clever. And couldn’t agree more on the latter. Attempts to explain how the Spirit has to work, has to accommodate our understanding, when They truly can seamlessly and impossibly configure nature as They see fit, by will, by fiat, by magic, is absurd. If God is the ground of being, He can except every rule, every law of nature, because He does, has eternally from the start (i.e. from the ground up) by instantiating nature. The Spirit is the ultimate get out of jail free card.
The Protoevangeilium appears to have been taken into Catholic and Orthodox traditions as additions to the gospels but not given a NT status. Its origins are not verifiably known if it is was genuine why was it not included by the Fathers in the NT? It may well be because there was no certainty of its origin and its reliability. I can see it may have have arisen from an apologetic purpose and also deference of celibacy as a way of life, with Mary as an icon of such self dedication.
No, the Protoevangeilium is not part of Sacred Tradition for either the RC Church or the EO Church.
(Sacred Tradition is equal in authority to Sacred Scripture for the RC and EO churches.)
But I have heard and read it mentioned many times on Catholic and Orthodox sites about Mary. If it is not part of SacredTradition what is it?
Just a story. Not a part of the Deposit of Faith. There is no requirement to believe it. Just like when Protestants sing about “Three Kings” at Christmas time. (The Bible never says that Magi were three in number or kings)
Hasn’t biblical criticism told us this is also true of canonical books? In all likelihood, the majority of the details the Bible plainly narrates per a surface reading, probably did not happen as described. If we are “required to believe” what’s in the canon do we have to check our brains at the door of genuine academic research conducted by critical scholars in universities only to reside forever in the seminary echo-chambers of conservative theologians?
The gulf between NT and not NT has shrunk a lot to me to the more immersed I get into Biblical criticism. Its more of 1st century Christianities and 2nd Century Christianities.
Vinnie
When I said “There is no requirement to believe it,” what I meant is that there is no requirement to accept it as scriptural. It is not a source of doctrine.
In 1965, the Second Vatican Council held that while the Scriptures are ultimately "true," they are not necessarily to be taken as accurate in the sense we might take an Associated Press wire report about what happened at a school-board meeting as accurate. The council focused on the importance of paying attention to "literary forms" in Scripture. The Gospels are such a "literary form," and the accounts of Jesus in the canon are not history or biography in the way we use the terms.-Jon Meacham, Canon Historian of Washington National Cathedral
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@JoelHinrichs interesting options, but “not impossible” would suit me better than “absolutely feasible.” On the other hand, it seems to me there’s no need to go there.
Every healing miracle of Jesus involved the rearrangement of biological materials, and seemingly the instantiation of atoms and formation of biomolecules in locus, all of it completely compatible with the genetics and biology of the person. The removal of all leprosy mycobacterium, for example, is a miracle even without the restoration of nerves and other cells. So “overshadowing” Mary to rearrange some microbiology seems like child’s play for the Spirit, and more in keeping with the healing miracles.
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Add a little humor to the Jesus and Mary discussion.
A couple of years later, as Isaiah said, “before the boy knows enough to reject the wrong and choose the right”:
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