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I didn't say that you were. It's sad that you follow the evil RCC.
I think that you're gullible and misguided.
It's not good... for you.
The Joys of Catholicism
- Thread starter Idolater
- Start date
No, that's your position. "Mary's death isn't recorded, therefore it's possible she didn't die but was instead assumed into heaven."
No one here besides you has claimed that "because the Bible doesn't say someone died, therefore they didn't die."
In fact we've said the opposite, given scripture to support it, and even mentioned the exceptions in the Bible.
And you want us to somehow just go along with your side's claim that somehow Mary is different than every other human on earth (besides two) for..... Reasons?
Uh, no.
Jesus posed a hypothetical. Humans misunderstood His hypothetical to mean that He WOULD keep John alive. You aren't the first, nor will you be the last to do the same.
Yes, we can, because of what Scripture says.
The default position of Scripture is that ALL men die.
It gives only two exceptions to this rule, Enoch and Elijah.
The Bible does not give any more exceptions.
In order to claim that Mary is also an exception to the rule, you need strong evidence that she was.
Nothing you have given in this thread is strong evidence, just conjecture and speculation at best, and the rest is poor reasoning based on multiple different fallacies.
Question begging.
All of this begs the question that your position is true. But there is a perfectly scriptural position that is also valid that does not require any Catholic interpretation.
No. I showed it was impossible by providing the Scripture that says explicitly that all men die.
You are making the claim that because there are exceptions in the Bible, therefore there might be exceptions not in the Bible.
That doesn't follow.
You would have to establish that such exceptions exist that were not given in the Bible.
Then and only then could you use it to claim that Mary, whose death was not explicitly mentioned (like all the other deaths that were not explicitly mentioned) is POTENTIALLY an exception to the rule. But even that would be corcumstancial evidence at best, unless you could find direct evidence that she was, in fact, assumed directly into heaven.
But until you provide such evidence, all you have is a claim.
And that claim doesn't establish your position.
I showed how it wasn't so, directly after that sentence. And you ignored it.
Ripping verses out of their context isn't going to help your position.
Scripture contradicts the claim that Mary remained a virgin after giving birth to Jesus.
Let God be true, and every man a liar.
Red herring.
Answer the question:
You want us to believe that Mary just didn't need to have it stated that she was taken directly to heaven, in spite of the fundamental position shown by scripture that all men die, and the only exceptions to that rule are explicitly mentioned in scripture?
Scripture indicates otherwise.
Your premise is false, therefore anything that follows that premise is also false.
There are a number of problems with your argument.
I asked ChatGPT to explain why:
| It is poor reasoning on multiple levels, even before getting into whether the Marian doctrines are true. The biggest problem is that the conclusion does not follow from the premises. He is arguing, in effect: If Mary remained perpetually virgin, then maybe her body was glorified. Apparitions portray her as beautiful. Therefore perpetual virginity is more plausible if Mary was unattractive in earthly life, because a beautiful married woman being celibate is “unimaginable.” That chain is a mess. Here is where it breaks down: 1. “I can’t imagine it” is not an argument. The core engine of the argument is personal incredulity: “It would be unimaginable for a very beautiful woman and her husband to remain celibate.” But something being hard for him to imagine does not make it false. People abstain from sex for religious reasons, medical reasons, seasonal reasons, vows, separation, age, infertility, and other circumstances. His inability to picture it proves nothing. 2. Beauty has no logical bearing on whether a married couple could be celibate. This is the central non sequitur. Whether Mary was attractive or unattractive does not establish whether Joseph and Mary had sexual relations. Beauty does not entail sexual activity. Lack of beauty does not entail celibacy. He is treating attractiveness as if it determines moral or marital conduct. It does not. 3. He smuggles in a false dilemma. He frames it like there are only two live options: Mary was beautiful, therefore celibacy is basically unbelievable, or Mary was unattractive, therefore celibacy is easier to explain. But there is a third and far more obvious option: even a beautiful married woman and her husband could remain celibate if they had a religious reason or shared commitment. His “dog or sexually active” framing is irrational. 4. He assumes the very thing in dispute. He assumes the apparition accounts are trustworthy and that their portrayal of Mary’s beauty gives us data about her bodily state. But if the question is whether Marian apparitions support Marian doctrine, he cannot simply treat the apparitions as established evidence. That is question-begging. 5. Even on his own terms, the inference to a glorified body is weak. Suppose, for the sake of argument, apparitions depict Mary as beautiful. That still would not prove she already has her glorified resurrection body. Angels are described in glorious terms without that meaning “resurrected human body.” Visionary or symbolic presentation does not equal ontological proof. 6. He confuses aesthetic beauty with resurrected glory. Being “very beautiful” is not the same thing as having the glorified body of 1 Corinthians 15. Paul’s point there is not merely cosmetic attractiveness. It concerns incorruption, glory, power, and transformation. “She looks beautiful in apparitions” is a very thin and sloppy bridge to “therefore glorified body.” 7. The argument relies on insult in place of evidence. Calling Mary a “dog” is not reasoning; it is rhetoric masking an evidentiary gap. Strip away the crude language and the argument becomes: “If she was plain-looking, then celibacy is easier for me to picture.” That is still worthless as proof. 8. It proves too much. If his logic worked, then any attractive married saint claimed to have lived celibately would be less believable merely because they were attractive. That is absurd. Holiness and self-restraint do not disappear in the presence of physical beauty. So the simplest diagnosis is: The argument is poor because it substitutes psychological plausibility for evidence. It does not show that Mary was not perpetually virgin. It only shows that the speaker finds perpetual virginity harder to imagine if Mary was attractive. |
They are all dead. According to the Bible.
You seem lost. In the post I told you Peter and James have bone boxes. They are dead. And Peter's is in Jerusalem at the Mount of Olives. He is not in Rome.
That is entirely possible. Editing is allowed, as it should be. I copy and paste, and the forum software allows it without clicking on the quote or reply button.
We have covered this. In Greek there are separate words for cousin compared to brother and sister. The gospel calls his relatives "brother" and "sister" explicitly. You have been told a lie and try to fit the evidence to support it. And the biggest irony is the evidence is the argument from silence. Joseph and Mary had other children. Mary is a sinner just like you and me.
In fact, simple logic dictates it without even looking up the translation. Is that not the carpenter's son? Mary and Joseph, his parents are mentioned. And the children are then mentioned as they don't understand his claims of deity when they know he has parents and siblings.
Idolater
Popetard
The Catholic Church is receiving 100,000 converts this Saturday, worldwide. Over 600 in Boston alone.
What's the difference between being gullible and misguided and being retarded.
There are many Joys of Catholicism.
Idolater
Popetard
That's not my position. My position is that the Blessed Virgin was assumed into Heaven. I don't know if she died or not before being assumed. And I didn't mention the Scripture at all. Nick brought up the Scripture, as if it were some sort of defeater against her being assumed into Heaven.
And John didn't say that Jesus wasn't being literal. He just pointed out literally what He did say.
I don't think He meant John wouldn't die. I'm only saying the argument can be plausibly made that one ought not expect John to die.
You disagree with that, and I do disagree with it, but you can't authoritatively foreclose that interpretation, without proving much more than I think you're comfortable trying to argue. I mean in trying to defeat Catholicism, you're opening yourself up to seeing yourself as having powers that not even Catholicism believes is vested in the whole magisterium. That's an awful lot to give away to win an argument.
It's fundamentally based on her being in some sense the ark of the New Covenant, which is taken from either a remarkable parallel, or a rank coincidence, between how the ark of the Old Covenant is talked about in the Old Testament, and how Our Lady is talked about in the Gospels.
You can totally disagree with this take, but what you cannot do, not without committing a transgression against hermeneutics that's even more grievous than what Catholics do (according to you), is dismiss the Catholic position out of hand. You don't wield that kind of interpretive power, because you claim to disbelieve that it exists at all, so why would it be vested in you? It's a self-defeat to act like you exercise that kind of power over the correct interpretation of the Bible.
Probably; but how? exactly? Do you doubt the parallel between Isaiah 22:22 and Matthew 16:18-19?
$$ Isa 22:22
And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder; so he shall open, and none shall shut; and he shall shut, and none shall open.
$$ Mt 16:18
And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
$$ Mt 16:19
And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
Or is it something else?
This isn't the Catholic interpretation, it's just the impartial, objective interpretation. It just so happens the Catholic Church endorses the impartial, objective interpretation, and everybody else just has an axe to grind. That's not my fault, nor am I obligated to surrender [to] your prior. Just because the Catholic Church holds to a view doesn't automatically mean it's a partisan view. Nothing rules out, except for prejudice, that the Catholic view or interpretation, just is the correct view or interpretation.
And then you showed two exceptions literally within the Scripture. That was actually making my case, not yours.
Nope. Therefore there might be exceptions, period. In or not in the Bible, had nothing to do with it. I'm just talking about reality. Whether or not some facet of reality is recorded in the Bible has no bearing on whether it is real, it is only refuted if it's literally logically inconsistent with what the Bible records. And the Blessed Virgin Mary's perpetual virginity, immaculate conception, and assumption into Heaven, isn't refuted by anything in the Bible. It's also not recorded in the Bible. See above.
THAT doesn't follow. In the Bible there are exceptions. How am I supposed to prove outside the Bible, in the Bible, that something outside the Bible happened, using the Bible? How is that supposed to work in your mind?
We don't have direct evidence of Christ's Resurrection, just testimony. Again in your mission to destroy Catholicism, you're leaving yourself open to devastating criticisms of your own view of yourself.
Because it didn't make any sense:
“ And we know it didn't happen because the Bible doesn't say she was, even though men who were arguably less important than her, at least according to your position, were stated to have been taken up into heaven, and in fact says that "all men" die once. ”
For one thing, this happened very late, Our Lady outlived all the Apostles except John, is the story. So that John didn't record it, can't be a strong reason to disbelieve it.
The whole argument therefore remains c. ""all men" die once", which is already answered by the two exceptions to the rule in the Bible, which you yourself have already provided, Enoch and Elijah.
So I would say, No, you didn't show it. Saying it doesn't make it so.
No it doesn't.
Matthew 13:55, Mark 6:3, His "brothers" are James, Joses, Simon, and Juda(s).
Matthew 27:56, Mark 15:40, the mother of James and Joses is named Mary.
Mark 16:1, Luke 24:10, the mother of James is named Mary.
This Mary is wife of Clopas or Cleophas, who is Joseph's brother.
The only time His brothers are actually named, so that we can inspect what "brother" means directly, is in Matthew 13:55 and Mark 6:3. These "brothers" are traced to "the other Mary" of Matthew 28:1, who is the wife of Clopas (John 19:25). They are His cousins.
What premise? You broke right into the middle of a premise, and now you're talking about a premise; which one are you talking about?
OK.
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Right Divider
Body part
Appeal to popularity is a fallacy. After all these years on TOL, you should know that all too well.
If you really "believed in the numbers", you'd become a Sunni Muslim (1.5 billion VS 1.3 Catholics).
For you, not much.
Joys now, sorrows for all eternity.
Based on what evidence?
We know. That's the point.
Because it is.
Yes I can, based on the context.
The context is this:
Then Peter, turning around, saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following, who also had leaned on His breast at the supper, and said, “Lord, who is the one who betrays You?” Peter, seeing him, said to Jesus, “But Lord, what about this man?” Jesus said to him, “If I will that he remain till I come, what is that to you? You follow Me.” Then this saying went out among the brethren that this disciple would not die. Yet Jesus did not say to him that he would not die, but, “If I will that he remain till I come, what is that to you?” This is the disciple who testifies of these things, and wrote these things; and we know that his testimony is true.
Bible Gateway passage: John 21:20-24 - New King James Version
The Beloved Disciple and His Book - Then Peter, turning around, saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following, who also had leaned on His breast at the supper, and said, “Lord, who is the one who betrays You?” Peter, seeing him, said to Jesus, “But Lord, what about this man?” Jesus said to him...
The context is that Jesus said He would return before they made it through all the cities of Israel, and that they would face persecution even unto death.
Jesus COULD have kept John alive. Yes. But that requires Jesus to have returned within John's lifetime.
That's not the argument you were trying to make, however.
The point Nick was making, that you seem to have intentionally misunderstood, was that "no evidence of death" does not mean "evidence of Mary's assumption."
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YOU, @Idolater, are the one who made the argument that "According to this standard Mary is still alive since we have no Biblical record of her ever dying. Same goes for Peter, Paul, John etc. Even Lazarus must still be around here somewhere."
We're not the ones making that argument.
You are.
We've said multiple times now that just because something isn't recorded doesn't make it a possibility for your position. In order for it to be so, you need to provide evidence for it. Something you STILL have not done.
That argument has no power here because I think that this "magisterium" you're appealing to has stolen it's authority from the Bible.
Show us this from scripture.
Watch me.
Claims made without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.
I have a brain don't I? One that God Himself gave me to use? And even the ability to reason?
You sound like the medieval churches, prohibiting even reading the Bible by the layperson.
And which is the "correct" interpretation, Idolater? Yours? Because you say so?
Do you not see how that's problematic?
You said:
It begs the question because your conclusion is already built into your reading of the text.
Matthew 16 does not explicitly say "vicar," does not identify Peter as the royal steward of Isaiah 22, does not say this office continues by succession, and does not identify Rome as its seat.
So when you say Jesus is referring to the "vicar of the king" in Isaiah 22 and making Peter "that guy," you are assuming the very interpretive framework that must first be proved. That is why I called it question begging.
I have no problem drawing a parallel between the two passages.
And I don't need to deny the parallel in order to deny your conclusion.
You still have to prove that Matthew 16 is applying Isaiah 22 the way you claim, and that this entails a continuing papal office. That is the part you are assuming rather than demonstrating.
A parallel is not the same thing as an identity, and it certainly is not the same thing as proving a continuing papal office.
To get from Isaiah 22 and Matthew 16 to the papacy, you still have to prove several things, not merely assume them:
1) that Jesus is intentionally invoking Isaiah 22 in the specific royal-steward sense you claim,
2) that Peter is therefore being established as a singular vicar in that sense,
3) that this office is perpetual and transferable to successors, and
4) that Rome is the seat of that continuing office.
None of that follows automatically from the mere presence of "keys" language.
So the issue is not "Do I doubt there is any parallel at all?" The issue is that you are treating a possible parallel as though it proves the whole Catholic system. That is the unsupported leap.
Saying it doesn't make it so!
An interpretation does not become "impartial" or "objective" simply because you label it that way. You still have to show, from the text itself, that your reading follows from what is actually written rather than from the framework you are bringing to it.
So the issue is not whether you call your interpretation objective. The issue is whether you can demonstrate that it is.
That is not an argument for your interpretation. It is just a way of dismissing everyone who disagrees with you as biased.
If your reading is truly the objective one, then it should be able to stand on its own exegetical merits without needing to explain away all disagreement as prejudice or ulterior motive.
Simply asserting that "everyone else has an axe to grind" is poisoning the well.
Try actually proving your case.
True, but irrelevant. The question is not whether the Catholic interpretation could be right. The question is whether you have actually proven it from the text.
Wrong. What rules it out is that your reading is disputed on textual grounds, not merely on emotional or sectarian grounds. You do not get to reduce disagreement to prejudice just because others reject your conclusions.
If that's what you think, then you completely missed my point.
Here it is again:
The BIBLE's default position is that all men die.
- "It is appointed unto men once to die..."
- The general pattern of Scripture is that, ordinarily, human beings die unless God explicitly reveals otherwise.
The Bible gives ONLY TWO EXCEPTIONS to that position, Enoch and Elijah.
- When Scripture gives a general rule, and then gives explicit exceptions, we are NOT FREE to multiply further exceptions without explicit warrant.
- Enoch and Elijah are identified as extraordinary departures from the ordinary pattern. They are not inferred from silence. They are stated.
Therefore it is perfectly reasonable to assume that all other humans, whether their deaths are recorded in the Bible or not, have died or will die at some point.
- Apply the above principle to Mary: there is no text stating that mary was taken bodily into heaven, nor is there text stating that she was "assumed" (whatever you think that means). The claim that she was is not derived from Scripture, but from reading an additional exception into silence.
Conclusion: Since Scripture teaches death as the norm for mankind, and since the only biblical exceptions are explicitly identified, it is illegitimate to create an additional exception for Mary from silence. That is special pleading because Mary is being exempted from the rule without the kind of textual warrant required in every other case.
And you think I'm not taking about reality?
Do you think the Bible isn't?
Again, the Bible presents a general rule, and then gives explicit exceptions to that rule.
No one has the authority to carte blanche add exceptions into where the Bible is silent.
Thus, there is no warrant to treat Mary as an exception to this rule.
What IS in the Bible refutes these things.
Perpetual virginity is refuted by the Scripture stating that Jesus had brothers and sisters.
Immaculate conception is refuted by the Scripture stating that "all have sinned and fallen short of God's glory."
Assumption into heaven is refuted by "it is appointment until men to die once..."
Are you not able to read?
That's not what I said.
You are claiming an extra-biblical event that is directly refuted by a principle given in the Bible, arguing that because the Bible doesn't say what happened to Mary at the end of her earthly existence, therefore it's possible that she was assumed into heaven, and even go so far as to say that that's actually what happened.
You have not supported this claim with any evidence, biblical or otherwise.
You have to do that in order to establish your claim.
Otherwise we can, in fact, dismiss your claim out of hand, without any opposing evidence, because the onus falls upon you to support your claim.
The Bible does not distinguish between "direct evidence" and "testimony."
The standard the Bible gives is that "two or three witnesses shall establish a matter" and "one witness shall not be enough."
The "witnesses" here includes direct evidence and testimony, including historical testimony, and even sound reasoning.
The Bible is the compilation of evidence for the resurrection of Christ.
The evidence it contains is sufficient to establish that Christ died, was buried, androse from the grave on the third day.
You keep saying this, but I have yet to see you actually demonstrate it.
It made sense just fine. And I have since refined the argument.
1) This doesn't help your case at all.
If anything it makes it worse!
If the alleged event happened so late, after nearly all the Apostolic witnesses had died, that means fewer apostolic witnesses remained to give such an account, thus less direct testimony would be available, and so the claim becomes more vulnerable to later tradition and embellishment.
"It happened very late" is not a strength for your postion. It increases the evidentiary problem.
2) The basic problem here is this: you're not providing any evidence. You're only trying to blunt one objection. You're shifting the discussion from "where is the evidence for it?" to "you can't prove John would have recorded it." Those aren't the same thing.
John not having recorded the event (silence) may not itself disprove the claim, sure. But silence not disproving a claim is not the same as silence supporting it. The question remains, where is your POSITIVE EVIDENCE?
3) The burden of proof is still upon you who is claiming a special exception. Claiming Mary was assumed bodily into heaven, especially as an exception to the ordinary human condition, the burden is on you to show where that is revealed. "John might not have written it down" is not evidence that it happened.
4) If this was a major public miracle, we would expect some early, clear apostolic testimony, not necessarily from John alone, but from the church's foundational witnesses generally. Such a bodily assumption of Mary wouldn't be some minor private detail, but instead a massive redemptive-historical event, and the lack of clear Apostolic testimony is therefore significant.
5) You're arguing from possibility, not probability. "John may not have recorded it because of timing." Sure, maybe. But lots of things are possible. Doctrine isn't built on bare possibilities. It needs warrant.
6) You still haven't answered the main issue, which is that Scripture gives no explicit revelation of Mary as an exception. Even granting everything you've said, you still habe not shown that Mary did not die, that she was assumed bodily, or that God revealed this as doctrine. You've only argued that one particular silence is not conclusive, which is a much smaller claim.
Long story short, not being disproven by John's silence is not even remotely the same thing as being proven by Apostolic testimony.
You're trying to lower the standard from "where is this revealed?" to "well, John's silence doesn't refute it." But doctrines are not established by the fact that silence fails to disprove them.
Supra.
There's a few problems with this:
First, "they are His cousins" is not something the text explicitly says. That is your harmonization, not a plain statement of Scripture.
Second, your conclusion depends on a whole chain of assumptions that would themselves need to be proved, not merely asserted. You have to assume that these Marys are all being identified the way you say, that the James and Joses in those passages are the same individuals, that the relationship to Clopas works exactly as you claim, and then from there infer that "brothers" must mean "cousins." That is a lot of disputed baggage to smuggle in and then present as though the text just says it outright.
Third, even if your harmonization were possible, possible is not the same thing as proven. At most, you would have shown that someone already committed to perpetual virginity can try to reconcile the passages that way. But that is a far cry from showing that Scripture teaches perpetual virginity.
Fourth, the ordinary reading still matters. When Scripture refers to His mother, His brothers, and His sisters, the default reading is family in the ordinary sense unless the text gives us a reason to take it otherwise. You do not get to replace the plain sense with a more complicated reconstruction and then act as though the reconstruction is the obvious meaning.
So no, you have not shown that Scripture teaches these were cousins. You have only offered a theological harmonization designed to protect a prior doctrine.
This one:
It's false.
And?
Did you read it?
Or did you just ignore it?
Did any of the points made move you even an inch off of your position? They should have.