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Often, when raising opposition to the doctrine of Mary’s perpetual virginity, Christians will insist that we take Scripture at its plain meaning, that we pay attention to the “clear and unambiguous teaching of God’s Word.” The latter sentiment is a good one; the former is not.

How should we approach Scripture, hermeneutically speaking? This could make for a lengthy topic in and of itself, I suppose, and then one I don’t have much time to get into in detail. Most anti-Marian Christians that I have encountered tend to suggest that we employ a firmly literal hermeneutic when interpreting Scripture, and that (as noted above) we take what is written in the Bible at its plain meaning.

The problem with insisting on the use of literal hermeneutics, and with insisting that Scripture be taken at its “plain meaning”, is that nobody really does that with any kind of consistency. Let me put that more plainly: no Christian ever takes Scripture at its plain meaning at every opportunity — indeed, many of us are often guilty of a certain hypocrisy when we insist upon just such an approach. More often than not, what we really mean when we insist on taking things at their plain meaning is: “let us use my interpretation of Scripture; let us take it at what I say its meaning is.”

That’s a rather harsh thing to say, I admit, but let’s consider a few examples. There is not a perfect 1:1 correlation between anti-Marianism and a rejection of e.g. Eucharistic doctrine, but most of the Christians I’ve met who denounce the perpetual virginity of Mary as a flawed Catholic teaching tend to likewise denounce the Eucharist — the real, literal presence of Christ in the bread and wine — as false. And yet, if we take John 6 at its plain meaning, we should have no other choice but to assume that Christ intended for us to receive that which was literally his flesh and blood in our repetition of the Last Supper.

[53] So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you have no life in you;
[54] he who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.
[55] For my flesh is food indeed, and my blood is drink indeed.
[56] He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him.

There’s really no two ways about that: if our hermeneutic is to always take Scripture at its most obvious meaning, on a passage-by-passage basis, then we should all be Eucharistic Christians. That we are not all Eucharistic Christians means that we do not always take Scripture at its plain meaning; we only do so when it is convenient to the point we are making.

But let’s take a few more generalized examples, to better illustrate the point. Consider Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 5:

[27]“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’

[28] But I say to you that every one who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
[29] If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and throw it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into Hell.
[30] And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.

Taking this passage at its plain meaning, it would be very easy for Christians to justify, say, plucking out the eye of a person caught reading Playboy magazine. Likewise, it would be very easy for Christians to justify lopping off the hands of thieves. And yet, no legal system which as a Judeo-Christian basis to it issues such punishments; moreover, many Christians rightly denounce Islamic countries which do effect such disfiguring punishments upon convicted criminals. Here again, then, we see that we do not always take Scripture at its plain meaning; we only do so out of convenience, when it suits our point to do so.

Similarly, rare indeed is the Christian who takes the Book of Revelation at its plain meaning. The last book of the Bible is full of fantastic imagery and whimsical creatures; it simply cannot be taken at any kind of plain meaning, but is instead widely understood to be a profound metaphor, both for things to come and for things that have already transpired (Revelation is not just an eschatological prophecy; there is strong evidence to suggest that it was also intended as a message of hope to the persecuted churches of the day, using its amazing imagery to describe events happening under the reign of Nero).

In like manner, rare is the Christian who takes James 2:20-24 at its plain meaning — to do so would be to advocate for works-based salvation, which is of course incorrect. Similarly, when Christians look at the Song of Songs, we do not take it at its plain meaning, at least not directly. That book of the Bible mentions God very rarely (you can easily count the instances of His mention in it on one hand, and then probably without using all five digits), and at its most basic meaning is nothing more than page after page of erotic love poetry, a back-and-forth dialogue between two lovers. The most plain meaning at which Christians take that book’s contents is as a powerful image of the love that should bless the marital union of man and woman; more often, however, the Song of Songs is understood as a metaphorical image of the intensity of God’s love for humanity, which Paul tells us is imaged in the marital union (c.f. Ephesians 5:21-33).

To put it plainly, then, and succinctly: no Christian takes Scripture at its plain meaning at every opportunity — were we all to do so, we would all be Eucharistic in our faith practice, and we would lop the hands off of convicted thieves. Taking the plain meaning of what is written in Scripture can be an important hermeneutical step, to be sure, but it is not a valid hermeneutic on its own. Indeed, Paul confirms this when he instructs us to hold to the traditions by which we were taught (2 Thes 2:15), and to trust in the Church — the pillar and bulwark of truth (1 Timothy 3:15) — to reveal the manifold wisdom of God (Ephesians 3:10) according to those traditions.

This, then, begins to point us in new direction by which we should attempt to understand Scripture and its teachings, and it is this direction which I propose to use in the analysis that follows: let us take Scripture at its intended meaning.

Of course, this is a difficult proposition. Living as we do nearly 2,000 years after the authors of the New Testament, and many additional centuries after the authors of the Old Testament, it is impossible for us to fully know the minds, or the intent, of those who wrote the various books of the Bible. We can only see in a mirror dimly, and can know only in part.

But we are not totally blind, either. The Spirit wove its breath and intent through the whole of Scripture (c.f. 2 Timothy 3:16-17), and one truth cannot contradict another. Therefore, it must be the case that there exists a coherency between the teaching of any one particular part of Scripture and the whole of Scripture.

Jesus actually gives us an example of this principle in action, when he met Cleopas and the other disciple on the road to Emmaus (c.f. Luke 24:13-31). He opened the Scriptures to the two men and, beginning with Moses and all the prophets, interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself. He didn’t just enumerate His own teachings, or his own acts, but tied all of those things into the broader picture of history and prophecy, demonstrating the consistency of the whole of Scripture as it pertained to His own life, death, and resurrection.

That’s a lesson for us, in our own attempts to make sense of Scripture and its teachings; it is the model for our own hermeneutics. We should take care to consider each passage and teaching in Scripture in the context of the whole of the Bible. This helps us form an understanding not only of the intent of the authors of any particular part of Scripture (who would, of course, have been mindful of other, pre-existing written texts that eventually became the books of the Bible), but of the intent of the Spirit when and as it inspired them.

So, as we turn now to the formal matter of Mary’s perpetual virginity, let us attempt to take Scripture not at its most plain meaning, but at its intended meaning. To do that, we must first journey into the Old Testament, to help us understand a few things about Judaism, the law of Moses, sex and marriage within that paradigm, and celibacy.

Let’s begin with the Book of Leviticus.

Within several Christian denominations, but especially Catholicism, the Blessed Virgin Mary is known by several different titles, one of which is “the New Ark”. In fact, within Catholic theology, Mary’s revelation as the New Ark of the Covenant forms an integral piece of the justification for the Catholic belief in her perpetual virginity, as well as for her unique place and role within Christ’s plan of salvation for all people.

Brant Pitre, over at Singing in the Reign, has an excellent article up concerning some of the symbolism within the Bible, drawn from both the Old Testament and the New Testament that demonstrates that Scripture itself justifies this belief: the language used to describe Mary during her pregnancy with the Lord very neatly parallels the language used to describe the Ark of the Covenant.

When the New Testament is read in light of the Old, a case can be made that the Ark is in fact an Old Covenant type that points forward to a new Ark, and that this new Ark of the Covenant is the Virgin Mary. Although we don’t have the space to go into detail here, suffice it to say that numerous Catholic commentators have noted that Luke’s account of the Annunciation bears striking parallels with the Old Testament accounts of the consecration of the Ark (Exodus 40) and the bringing of the Ark by David into Jerusalem (2 Samuel 6; 1 Chronicles 15). Compare the following:

1. The Descent of the Glory Cloud
The glory of the Lord and the cloud cover the Tabernacle (containing the Ark) and “overshadow” (episkiazen) them (Exod 40:34-35, cf. v. 3).

The Holy Spirit comes upon Mary and the power of the Most High “overshadows” (episkiasei) her (Luke 1:35).

2. The Ark Goes into the Hill Country
David “arose and went” to the hill country of Judah to bring up “the ark of God” (2 Samuel 6:2).

Mary “arose and went” into the hill country of Judah to visit Elizabeth (Luke 1:39).

3. How Can the Ark Come to Me?
David admits his unworthiness to receive the Ark by exclaiming: “How can the ark of the Lord come to me?” (2 Samuel 6:9)

Elizabeth admits her unworthiness to receive Mary by exclaiming: “And why is this granted to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” (Luke 1:43)

4. Leaping and Shouting Before the Ark
David “leaped” before the Ark as it was brought in “with shouting” (2 Samuel 6:15-16)

John “leapt” in Elizabeth’s womb at the sound of Mary’s voice and Elizabeth cried “with a loud shout”: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed in the fruit of your womb!” (Luke 1:41-42)

5. The Ark Stays for 3 Months
The Ark remained in the hill country, in the house of Obed-Edom, for “three months” (2 Samuel 6:11)

Mary remained in the hill country, in Elizabeth’s house, “three months” (Luke 1:56)

In light of these startling parallels, it is reasonable to conclude that Luke is highlighting the parallels between Mary and the old Ark of the Covenant to suggest that she is New Ark. Just as glory cloud had overshadowed the Tabernacle in the Old Testament, so that God might dwell among men, so now the Holy Spirit overshadows Mary, so that the Word becomes flesh and “tabernacles” among us (John 1:14). The New Ark is Mary’s body. Just as the old Ark housed the 10 Commandments, the Manna, and the Priestly Rod of Aaron, so too the New Ark houses the Word of God, the Bread of Life, the True Priest.

Now, should there be any doubt that these parallels between the Old and New Testaments in the Gospel of Luke are drawing a connection between Mary and the Ark of the Covenant, it should be recalled that these are not the only texts in the New Testament that connect the Ark and Mary. In another famous text, the revelation of the location of the Ark — in heaven — is juxtaposed with a vision of the Mother of the Messiah — also in heaven:

Then God’s temple in heaven was opened, and the ark of his covenant was seen within his temple; and there were flashes of lightning, loud noises, peals of thunder, an earthquake, and heavy hail. And a great portent appeared in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars… (Revelation 11:19-12:2)

Clearly, there appears to be some connection between these two figures: both the Ark and the Woman appear in God’s Temple “in heaven.” Moreover, a strong case can be made that the woman — who is an individual, just like the “child” (Jesus) and the “dragon” (Satan) mentioned in the same passage are (Rev 12:3-4)—is indeed Mary, the Mother of the Messiah.

In light of passages such as these, Mary was revered in the ancient Church — and continues to be revered today in the Catholic Church — as the new “Ark” of the Covenant.

It would take a very deliberately blinded person to deny that the woman, clothed in the Sun and giving birth to the child within the apocalyptic vision that is the Book of Revelation, is in fact Mary, the Theotokos, the mother of Christ who is God enfleshed.

Indeed, I have always rather enjoyed Mark Shea’s take on the matter: “As an Evangelical, my own tradition found it remarkably easy to detect bar codes, Soviet helicopters, the European Common Market, and the Beatles encoded into the narrative of Revelation. But when Catholics suggested that the woman of Revelation might have something to do with the Blessed Virgin occupying a place of cosmic importance in the grand scheme of things, this was dismissed as incredible. Everyone knew that the woman of Revelation was really the symbolic Virgin Daughter of Zion giving birth to the Church. A Jewish girl who stood at the pinnacle of the Old Covenant, summed up the entirety of Israel’s mission and gave flesh to the Head of the Church saying, “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word” — what could she possibly have to do with those images? Why, that would suggest that she was the Virgin Daughter of Zion and the Flower of her People, the Model Disciple, the Icon of the Church, the Mother of Jesus and of all those who are united with Him by faith and…”

Oh, wait.

Now, as I noted, the belief that Mary is in fact the Ark of the New Covenant, the New Ark, is an integral piece of the Catholic belief that Mary remained perpetually virginal unto the day of her Assumption into Heaven. The significance is that Joseph, being a faithful Jew, would certainly have understood the significance of Mary’s pregnancy, for he was specifically told by the angel that the child within her womb was holy, and from the Holy Spirit (c.f Matthew 1:20). Out of his earnest Jewish faith, it is likely that Joseph would have immediately grasped to deeper significance of what he was being told, and would have understood that the womb of his wife was a dwelling place of the Lord — the holiest of holies, akin to the innermost area of the Temple.

Now, here we have to take a foray into the Book of Leviticus, specifically to the fifteenth chapter. Verse 18 reads thusly: “If a man lies with a woman and has an emission of semen, both of them shall bathe themselves in water, and be unclean until the evening.”

Now, given that elsewhere in the Levitical Law, adultery is condemned in the harshest possible terms, the passage above can safely be assumed to refer to legitimate sexual intimacy between a husband and his wife. Bearing that in mind, let’s state plainly what the above law means: normal sexual relations between a husband and his wife, under the Law of Moses, render husband and wife temporarily unclean (”until the evening”). Within the Jewish law, there is an implied defilement in the sexual act.

Good Reader, given that Joseph was a faithful Jew, he was likely mindful of this law of Moses, as surely as he was mindful of all such laws. Thus, I ask you: approximately how anxious do you, O Reader, suppose that Joseph would be to defile, even if only until the evening, the woman standing before him with a holy child from the Lord within her womb? How anxious do you suppose Joseph would be to defile that which was as holy as the very Ark itself?

Now, I also mentioned the Assumption of Mary, which was the feast celebrated last Friday, August 15th. Brant Pitre goes on to explain the connection between Mary’s being the New Ark and the belief that she was assumed, bodily, into Heaven.

…the evidence suggests to me — others may differ — that one reason ancient Christians may have believed in the bodily Assumption of Mary into heaven is that they recognized her as the New Ark of the Covenant.

The Church continues to teach that “The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin is a singular participation in her Son’s Resurrection and anticipation of the resurrection of other Christians” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 966). The resurrection, our hope, is at the heart of this dogma. If ancient Christians identified Mary as the Ark and knew about the Jewish tradition that the Ark would be the first to be “resurrected,” then it may have provided theological support for their belief in Mary’s bodily Assumption into the heavenly Temple. In fact, they would not even have had to know the Jewish tradition, since the Psalms themselves describe the “ascent” of the Ark into the Temple alongside a prophecy that was interpreted by ancient Christians as referring to the resurrection of Jesus:

Arise, O Lord, and go to your resting place,
You and the Ark of your might…
For your servant David’s sake,
Do not turn away the face of your messiah. (Psalm 132:8-9)

With these words, our reflection comes full circle: Where else could the Ark belong, but in the Heavenly Temple?

I sometimes get impatient with those who attack the Catholic faith as pagan and/or un-Biblical, and when I do I sometimes challenge them to come up with one paragraph from the Catechism — one doctrine or teaching of the Church — which cannot be defended biblically. It’s kind of a trick question, but there is ultimately only one direct answer which is possible, and paragraph 966 of the Catechism is it. Of all Catholic doctrine, only the belief in the bodily Assumption of Mary cannot be directly constructed from Scripture.

That’s not to say that the Church just invented the belief, of course. Though the Assumption was “dogmatically proclaimed” (that is: formally confirmed to be a part of Catholic doctrine) only last century, the actual origins of the belief can be traced back to the very earliest days of the Church, even to before the formal canonization of Scripture in 390 A.D.

And even though there is no place in the Bible which states a confirmation of Mary’s assumption, the doctrine itself is not indefensible from Scripture, as Pitre has shown. Scripture doesn’t tell us directly what fate ultimately befell Mary, but it presents us with a number of distinct clues and hints as to her role in God’s ultimate plan, and as to her significance. She was the New Ark, and all nations should rightly call her blessed.

Catholics are often accused of focusing too much attention on Mary, but I wonder if perhaps the reciprocal question shouldn’t be asked: is it possible that non-Catholics focus too little attention on her, given how obviously significant she is not only as the mother of Jesus, but as a unique outward sign of God’s New Covenant with humanity, as the new and first tabernacle, and as the New Ark…the resurrected Ark?

Well, I have to say that this was one of the best episodes of the current season of Battlestar Galactica to date, and certainly one of the better ones in the whole series. Not only did it take a very reasonable look at the twin concepts of death and dying, but it did so in a way that certainly hammers home just how much of a departure the show’s themes are from what could be called the “traditional” treatment of Religion in science fiction. And unlike Babylon 5, in BSG it seems to be the case, more and more, that God is real and, what is more, that He is actively involved in the Universe.

Barb Nicolosi has an excellent analysis of this and a few other themes, and I will probably borrow some of the structure of her post in my own reflections.

> Theology

I think it’s clear that the producers and writers of Battlestar are attempting to communicate the reality of God within the show; He exists and, what is more, is very personal and present. The theme of “I am with you” resonates throughout the show, with the line being uttered by several different characters (always in relation to death, and in particular in relation to consolation in times of suffering and fear of what lies “beyond”). The experience of God’s “I am with you” is described (by Nana Visitor, who turns in one heck of a guest performance) as being accompanied by a sense of being warm and safe. That same sense resonates at the end of the episode when Samuel Anders consoles the dying Number Eight, and then with the same words.

This also speaks to the agentic actions of God in the series; not only does he address people directly, as in the case of Emily Kowalski, but He speaks through other people (as in the case of Anders). Of course, God’s speaking through other characters had been alluded to in previous episodes, in reference to the Cylon Hybrids, and it serves to note that once again a basestar’s Hybrid serves in a prophetic role. More on that later.

Also, I can’t help but observe that this is another instance in the series in which impending death and the passage between death and life has been abstracted with imagery involving water. In Faith, the imagery involves a ship crossing a river, where lost loved ones await the arrival of the recently deceased with open arms in an air of joy and celebration. (Grace noted that she’d heard a similar analogy of the passage between life and death from a priest at her church in Vermilion.) In Resurrection Ship, Part II, when Lee Adama is slowly dying of oxygen deprivation in the cold of space, the imagery invovles him at first floating, and then slowly sinking, into a dark abyss of water.

And I think that these scenes not only communicate the reality of God and His actions in the Universe in BSG, but also the realities of heaven and hell. One observes that William Adama is an atheist, and certainly Lee Adama has shown no religious sentiments in any episode of the series so far (and in fact, it could be argued that the way in which he discusses sacramentality with Starbuck in this episode demonstrates an “outside looking in” perspective).

The connection is tenuous, I realize, but the sense that one comes away with is that there is a connection between these different bits of visual imagery that relates to the people having them. For the secular Lee, the passage across the water is despairing and doomed. For the religious Emily, it is a time of joy and hopefulness.

At any rate, the existence of both a personal and present God and an afterlife is quite clearly communicated. There is a supernatural dimension to the Universe in BSG, and what is perhaps most impressive about it is that it is being demonstrated, more and more, in such a way that shows that the existence of the supernatural is an idea which is compatible with empirical realities, albeit in ways that at times require understanding things in ways that could be termed “outside the box.”

> Prophecy and Kara Thrace’s destiny

“The destiny” is back with a vengeance in this episode, especially with the Hybrid’s prophecy as she is being disconnected: “Thus will it come to pass. A dying leader will know the truth of the Opera House. The missing Three will give you the Five who come from the home of the Thirteenth. You are the harbinger of death, Kara Thrace. You will lead them all to their end. End of Line.”

The prophecy would seem to start out by referring to Laura Roslin, who has made forays into the Opera House before. In light of Roslin’s experiences with Emily Kowalski in this episode, the “truth” of the Opera House could possibly refer to a future repudiation of the Colonial religion by Roslin (which would mean the claims of Gaius Baltar’s “Head Six” back on Kobol, in which she claimed that the Colonial Scriptures are lies, fabricated to cover up the reality of life on Kobol, which included ritual human sacrifice).

Alternatively, it could mean that Roslin will be the one to whom the identity of the fifth Cylon is first revealed.
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James McGrath writes in to provide some alternative commentary on the issue of Battlestar Galactica’s Theology, which I discussed in this article.

I thought I’d draw attention to some of the posts on my blog about BSG and theology (I’m a religion professor who is also a fan), such as :

http://exploringourmatrix.blogspot.com/2008/05/gospel- according-to-gaius.html

http://exploringourmatrix.blogspot.com/2008/04/bartlestar- theodica.html

I’d welcome your comments!

While I could say more for Professor McGrath’s opinions regarding Bart Ehrman (my own views on the “problem” of evil and theodicy are well known; I don’t see the existence of evil and/or suffering in the world as any kind of challenge to the Christian conception of God, and regard those who use said issue(s) as an objection to Religion as being, shall we say, rather deluded themselves), some of his views on BSG and the theology of Gaius Baltar’s new religious movement (itself a derivation of the Cylon religion) are rather interesting.

For example, McGrath remarks thusly concerning the first episode of the latest, and final, season of BSG:

In the BSG Season 4 premiere, entitled “He That Believeth In Me“, a more relevant verse would seem to be “Whosoever seeks to save his life will lose it…” Gaius Baltar moves from an unwilling Messiah disgusted by the gaudy Hindu-style flashing votive lights surrounding his picture, to one who seems genuinely willing to give up his life to save another. The “one true God” has yet to be explored fully as a concept on the show, but in the mean time, interesting questions continue to be asked about how we live our lives and what matters most to us.

I observed to my wife, while we were watching the latest episode of the series to date, that Baltar seems unable to avoid some manner of beating in each and every episode he has been in this season. I’d have to go over all the episodes again (we have them on tape), but I can’t recall yet a time when Baltar has not been pistol-whipped, choked, or punched during the course of an episode since the fleet departed the Ionian Nebula

And in each and every case, Baltar’s personal sufferings have been intimately relevant to the narrative of the show. Indeed, through examples as varied as the knife attack on Baltar in the head to Galen Tyrol attempting to choke him, the series has demonstrated in almost every episode this season that the God whom Baltar is preaching effects His plan for humanity in part through human suffering.
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Powerful reflection from Scott Hahn:

“We don’t have to die to go to heaven,” author and speaker Scott Hahn told more than 800 people packed into Ottawa’s St. Patrick’s Basilica April 12.

“All we have to do is go to Mass.”

The former Presbyterian minister, who now teaches Theology and Scripture at Franciscan University of Steubenville, shared how he slowly came to understand how the Catholics are standing in Heaven during the Eucharist and sharing in the marriage supper of the Lamb as described in the Book of Revelation.

If one really thinks about it, he’s exactly right: in the Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist, the Catholic faithful stand in the direct presence of Christ, in all His glory. Where else could we be, then, but in Heaven itself, to witness such glory?