The Dormition of Mary

The Dormition of Mary

fiction
edward w pritchard

Accept no authority instead think through every issue logically for yourself as far as your own reason can take you. Gather facts, document probable cause then conclude and speak the truth and fear not censure for your reasonable opinions.

Born a protestant Mary Mother of Jesus was not venerated in our childhood religious instruction. Yet all mankind has a mythological need to worship Motherhood. Hence different religions of The Book have different interpretations of the death of Mary Mother of Jesus. All of the interpretations are based on little evidence as there is scanty mention of Mary in New testament writings and next to none in the writings of independent Roman writers at the time of the birth and death of Jesus.

However any independent judgement based on reason and experience would cause one to conclude that if Jesus in fact existed and was born and died then his Mother would have done the same. Anything otherwise would be miraculous. Still it must be noted that the idea of the assumption of Mary's, Mother of Jesus's, death by assumption is beautiful and majestic. The art produced on the subject can be sublime. 

As this author has stated elsewhere in his writings the foremost authority on "Miracles" David Hume former British skeptic also born and now died is unavailable for comment on the question of Mary's, Mother of Jesus' dormition [ death ]. However it is assumed based on a review of David Hume's writings that he would conclude on the question of Mary's death and assumption that who ever is born must die.

Seeking the highest authority on the subject among verified and credible sources I quote Pope John Paul the second speaking to a general audience June 25th 1997

" Without a preliminary death, how could the Resurrection have taken place?” (Antijulianistica, Beirut 1931, 194f.). To share in Christ’s Resurrection, Mary had first to share in his death. The New Testament provides no information on the circumstances of Mary’s death. This silence leads one to suppose that it happened naturally, with no detail particularly worthy of mention. If this were not the case, how could the information about it have remained hidden from her contemporaries and not have been passed down to us in some way? As to the cause of Mary’s death, the opinions that wish to exclude her from death by natural causes seem groundless. It is more important to look for the Blessed Virgin’s spiritual attitude at the moment of her departure from this world. In this regard, St Francis de Sales maintains that Mary’s death was due to a transport of love. He speaks of a dying “in love, from love and through love”, going so far as to say that the Mother of God died of love for her Son Jesus (Treatise on the Love of God, bk. 7, ch. XIII-XIV). Whatever from the physical point of view was the organic, biological cause of the end of her bodily life, it can be said that for Mary the passage from this life to the next was the full development of grace in glory, so that no death can ever be so fittingly described as a “dormition” as hers."

Therefore without accepting Pope John Paul's belief on Jesus' or Mary's resurrection one still can accept as reasonable his belief that if Mary Mother of Jesus was born she would have died in the normal way.