THE PROTOEVANGELIUM

The Protoevangelium (First Gospel) was written in the second century BCE in Syria and it testifies to the early devotion to Mary. Protoevangelium is also applied to the promise of a Redeemer after the Fall. Speaking to the serpent, God said: "I will make you enemies of each other; you and the woman; your offspring and her offspring. It will crush your head and you will strike its heel" (Genesis 3:15). Traditionally the woman and her offspring have been understood to mean Mary and her Son (Hardon 1999). If we examine the Protoevangelium, it is evident that Mary is glorified as a virgin and her perpetual virginity is defended (Smid 1965: 57-103). We read of Mary's own Immaculate Conception by Anna and the birth of Jesus as bearing witness to the purity of virginity and the Parthenos (Virgin). Mary's own conception is described as a direct act of God's providence (Protoevangelium 1.2 - 4.4). Mary is described as a consecrated virgin from six months of age and her bedroom is made a Hagiasma or holy sanctuary into which nothing unclean or unholy may enter. From the age of three Mary is raised by priests in the temple and she marries Joseph at the age of twelve. Joseph is a widower with a few sons from his earlier marriage. Joseph does however not "live with her" but only protects her (Protoevangelium 9.1-2). So in the Protoevangelium Mary's total purity and chastity are the primary concerns. Virginity is a return to the Paradise that Adam and Eve blemished. Marian dogma and the theology of sexual abstinence assumed greater prominence in the writings of Ambrose and others. There was, however, great resistance to the notions expressed by Ambrose on the part of Jovinianus and also Helvidius. The latter throw outs the doctrine of Mary's virginitas post partum while the former rejects her virginitas in partu. (Hunter 1993: 47-71). It was Jovinianus, a monk, who in particular reacted to the movement towards asceticism and all the doctrines associated with it. He attacked the ideas of monasticism and its associated moral and ethical principles. He stated that virgins as well as those who are married, once baptised as Christians, have the same merit depending on their conduct. Jovinianus also denied the notion of the perpetual virginity of the Virgin Mary (Healy 1910). He and explains his stance on virginity as stated below:

I do you no wrong, Virgin: you have chosen a life of chastity on account of the present distress: you determined on the course in order to be holy in body and spirit: be not proud: you and your married sisters are members of the same Church... Now concerning virgins I have no commandment of the Lord: but I give my judgement, as one that hath obtained mercy of the Lord to be faithful. I think therefore that this is good by reason of the present distress, namely, that it is good for a man to be as he is... See, the Apostle confesses that as regards virgins he has no commandment of the Lord, and he who had with authority laid down the law respecting husbands and wives, does not dare to command what the Lord has not enjoined. And rightly too. For what is enjoined is commanded, what is commanded must be done, and that which must be done implies punishment if it be not done. For it is useless to order a thing to be done and yet leave the individual free to do it or not do it. If the Lord had commanded virginity He would have seemed to condemn marriage, and to do away with the seed-plot of mankind, of which virginity itself is a growth. If He had cut off the root, how was He to expect fruit? If the foundations were not first laid, how was He to build the edifice, and put on the roof to cover all! Excavators toil hard to remove mountains; the bowels of the earth are pierced in the search for gold. And, when the tiny particles, first by the blast of the furnace, then by the hand of the cunning workman have been fashioned into an ornament, men do not call him blessed who has separated the gold from the dross but him who wears the beautiful gold. Do not marvel then if, placed as we are, amid temptations of the flesh and incentives to vice, the angelic life be not exacted of us, but merely recommended. If advice be given, a man is free to proffer obedience; if there be a command, he is a servant bound to compliance (Hunter 2007).