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The Places of the Assumption

1951; Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception; Volume: 14; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1353/tho.1951.0038

2473-3725

Francesc Abel,

Biblical Studies and Interpretation

THE PLACES OF THE ASSUMPTION SAINT Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis in Cyprus, was the first Christian author to approach forthrightly the question of the destiny of the Mother of the Savior in the period subsequent to that depicted in the Gospels. He did not settle the question, because ·the arguments which he considered did not seem to hiin to be decisive. He was deeply moved, nevertheless, by the grandeur of the marvel suggested to his mind by Luke 2: 35· and Apocalyse 12: 14.1 "It is possible ," the holy doctor added, "that that was accomplished in Mary. I do not assert this absolutely, nor do I say that she remained immortal, but neither do I conclude that she has died." The close of Mary's life on earth, therefore, was envisaged as a glorious passage from earth to heaven, untrammeled by death or as a more or less prolonged departure surrounded with extraordinary honors. Epiphanius concluded that if Sacred Scripture has maintained a complete silence concerning the fact, as to whether it was in the one manner or the other, it was due to the grandeur of the miracle. He also declined to fix the ·site where the glorious passage of Our Lady to heaven occurred. A contemporary of Saint Epiphanius, Timothy, priest of Jerusalem takes a more positive stand. He would have Mary, while remaining immortal, transported into the Elysian Fields, whose gates Jesus had opened on the µay of His Ascension. This rapprochement between the Assumption and the Ascension has, perhaps, in:Huenced the general localization of the triumph of 1 Ed. Note: Luke 2: 85-" And thy own soul a sword shall pierce, that, out of many hearts thoughts m~y be revealed." Apoc. 12: 14-" And there were given to the woman two wings of a great eagle, that she might fly into the desert, unto her place, where she is nourished for a time and times and half a time, from the face of the serpent." 109 110 F. M. ABEL Mary verified throughout the chain of tradition.2 This tradition is linked to the Gospel fact by the following analogy presented to us by the Acta Joannis, attributed to Prochorus. St. Peter, the central figure in the scene, recalls to his colleagues the command of the Master regarding the preaching of the Gospel: "Now," says he, "that the grace of the Holy Spirit has descended upon us 'all, let us seek naught but to fulfill the order of the Master, especially since the Mother of us all has passed from this life to another." With the Syrian poet, James of Saroug (451-521) it seems that we hit upon a more precise localization. The poet seems to situate the obsequies of the Virgin upon the Mount of Olives, " on the Mount of the Galileans in a grotto of rock," provided that the Galilee of Mount Olivet be a reality admissible in Jerusalem 's topography. At any rate, it is apparently at the base or upon the slopes of the mountain rising to the east of Jerusalem that one of the variants of the Acta Joannis fixes as the residence of Mary: "Sometime after Our Lord Jesus Christ had ascended into heaven, it came to pass that all the Apostles assembled at Gethsemani, where His Immaculate and all Holy Mother resided." In the light of these texts, one would be led to believe that the Blessed Virgin, after the Ascension and the dispersal of the Apostles, had chosen an abode in the eastern sector of the Holy City, comprising the rural locale of Gethsemani and the slope of the Mount of Olives. The most ancient descriptions, however, do not insist upon the proximity of a tomb relative to the dwelling of the Mother of Jesus. With the account of Pseudo-Meliton known by the title Transitus Mariae, composed about 550, we meet a more crystallized form of the account which hitherto had been ·somewhat subject to the fluctuations of popular imagination. In this account, particularly, topographical precisions receive some sharply defined support. In the home of the relatives of the Apostle Saint John on the Mo~t of Olives, an angel bestows • Ed.. note...