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 IMMACULATE

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IMMACULATE

tion, by a singular privilege and grace granted by God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the human race, was preserved exempt from all stain of original sin" (Denzinger, "Enchiridion", 10th ed., n. 1641). The subject of this immunity from original sin is the person of Mary at the moment of the creation of her soul and its infusion into her body. The term conception does not mean the active or generative con- ception by her parents. Her body was formed in the womb of the mother, and the father had the usual share in its formation. The question does not con- cern the immaculateness of the generative activity of her parents. Neither does it concern the passive conception absolutely and simply (conceptio seminis, carnis, inchoata), which, according to the order of nature, precedes the infusion of the rational soul. The person is truly conceived when the soul is created and infused into the body. Mary was preserved exempt from all stain of original sin at the first moment of her animation, and sanctifying grace was given to her before sin could have taken effect in her soul. The formal active essence of original sin was not removed from her soul, as it is removed from others by baptism; it was excluded, it never was in her soul. Simultaneously with the exclusion of sin, the state of original sanctity, innocence, and justice, as opposed to original sin, was conferred upon her, by which gift every stain and fault, all depraved emo- tions, passions, and debilities, essentially pertaining to original sin, were excluded. But she was not made exempt from the temporal penalties of Adam — from sorrow, bodily infirmities, and death. The immunity from original sin was given to Mary by a singular exemption from a universal law through the same merits of Christ, by which other men are cleansed from sin by baptism. Mary needed the redeeming Saviour to obtain this exemption, and to be delivered from the universal necessity and debt (debitum) of being subject to original sin. The person of Mary, in consequence of her origin from Adam, should have been subject to sin, but, being the new Eve who was to be the mother of the new Adam, she was, by the eternal counsel of God and by the merits of Christ, withdrawn from the general law of original sin. Her redemption was the very masterpiece of Christ's redeeming wisdom. He is a greater redeemer who pays the debt that it may not be incurred, than he who pays after it has fallen on the debtor (Ullathorne, "Immac. Conception", p. 89). Such is the meaning of the term " Immaculate Conception ".

The Holy Scripture. — No direct or categorical and stringent proof of the dogma can be brought forward from Scripture. But the first scriptural pass- age which contains the promise of the redemption, mentions also the Mother of the Redeemer. The sentence against the first parents was accompanied by the Earliest Gospel [Proto-evangelium), which put enmity between the serpent and the woma n : " and I will put enmity between thee and the woman and her seed ; she (he) shall crush thy head and thou shalt lie in wait for her (his) heel" (Gen., iii, 15). The translation "she" of the Vulgate is interpretative; it originated after the fourth century ("Katholik", 1S93, 425), and cannot be defended critically. The conqueror from the seed of the woman, who should crush the serpent's head, is Christ; the woman at enmity with the serpent is Mary (Hoberg, "Genes.", p. 50; cf. Leimbach, "Messianische Weissagungen ", 1909, pp. 5 sq.). God puts enmity between her and Satan in the same manner and measure, as there is enmity between Christ and the seed of the serpent. Mary was ever to be in that exalted state of soul which the serpent had destroyed in man, i. e. in sanctifying grace. Only the continuous union of Mary with God by grace explains sufficiently the enmity be- tween her and Satan. The Proto-evangelium, there- fore, in the original text contains a direct promise

of the Redeemer, and in conjunction therewith the manifestation of the masterpiece of His Redemption, the perfect preservation of His virginal Mother from origmal sin. The salutation of the angel Gabriel— xotpe )cexnp"'WAi^»''), Hail, full of grace (Luke, i, 28; cf. Bardenhewer, "Maria Verkilndigung", 95 sq.) — indicates a unique abundance of grace, a supernatural, godlike state of soul, which finds its e.xplanation only in the Immaculate Conception of Mary. But the term KexaptToifi^vT] (full of grace) serves only as an illustra- tion, not as a proof of the dogma. From the texts Prov., viii, and Ecclus., xxiv, which exalt the Wisdom of God and which in the liturgy are applied to Mary, the most beautiful work of God's Wisdom, or from the Canticle of Canticles (iv, 7, "Thou art all fair, O my love, and there is not a spot in thee "), no theo- logical conclusion can be drawn. These passages, applied to the Mother of God, may be readily under- stood by those who know the privilege of Mary, but do not avail to prove the doctrine dogmatically, and are therefore omitted from the Constitution "In- effabilis Deus". For the theologian it is a matter of conscience not to take an extreme position by applying to a creature texts which might imply the preroga- tives of God.

Tradition. — In regard to the sinlessness of Mary the older Fathers are very cautious: some of them even seem to have been in error on this matter. Ori- gen, although he ascribed to Mary high spiritual prerogatives, thought that, at the time of Christ's passion, the sword of disl^elief pierced Mary's soul; that she was struck by the poniard of doubt; and that for her sins also Christ died (Origen, " In Luc. hom. xvii"; Lehner, " Marienverehrung in den ersten Jahrh.", Stuttgart, 1886, p. 150). Exactly in the same manner St. Basil writes in the fourth century: he sees in the sword, of which Simeon speaks, the doubt which pierced Mary's soul (Basil, Ep. cclix; Lehner, op. cit., p. 1.52). St. Chrysostora accuses her of ambition, and of putting herself forward unduly, when she sought to speak to Jesus at Capharnaum (Matt., xii, 46; Chyrsostom, Hom. xliv; cf. also "In Matt.", hom. iv; Lehner, pp. 152 sq.; E. Lucius, "Anfange des Heiligenkultus", Tubingen, 1904, p. 439; Hunter, "Dogmatic Theol.", II, p. 565). But these stray private opinions merely serve to show that theology is a progressive science. If we were to at- tempt to set fortii the full doctrine of the Fathers on the sanctity of the Blessed Virgin, which includes particularly the implicit belief in the immaculateness of her conception, we should be forced to transcribe a multitude of passages. In the testimony of the Fathers two points are insisted upon: her absolute purity and her position as the second Eve (cfr. I Cor., XV, 22). This celebrated comparison between Eve, while yet immaculate and incorrupt — that is to say, not subject to original sin — and the Blessed Virgin is developed by Justin (Dialog, cum Tryphone, 100), Irenseus (Contra Hsereses, III, xxii, 4), Tertullian (De carne Christi, xvii), Julius Firmicus Maternus (De errore prolan, relig., xxvi), Cyril of Jerusalem (Catecheses, xii, 29), Epiphanius (Hsres., Lxxviii, IS), Theodotus of Ancyra (Or. in S. Deip., n. 11), Sedulius (Carmen paschale, II, 2S). The Fathers call Mary the tabernacle exempt from defilement and corruption (Hippolytus, "Orat. in illud, Dominus pascit me", in Gallandl, " Bibl. patrum", II, 496); worthy of God, immaculate of the immaculate, most complete sanc- tity, perfect justice, neither deceived by the persua- sion of the serpent, nor infected with his poisonous breathings (Origen, "Hom. i in diversa"); incorrupt, a virgin immime through grace from every stain of sin (Ambrose, "Sermo xxii in Ps. cxviii); a dwelling fit for Christ, not because of her habit of body, but because of original grace (Maximus of Turin, "Hom. viii de Natali Domini"); a virgin innocent, without spot, void of culpability, holy in body and in soul, a