Tuesday, March 14, 2023

The Ebionites did not venerate Mary

Epiphanius claimed in Panarion ch.30 that the "Gospel of the Ebionites" (which he sometimes conflated with "of the Hebrews") omitted Matthew's genealogy of Christ from that gospel's start. This looks more like what one might find in a physical copy of Matthew, not in some marginalia somewhere. Maybe a sheet or two fell off some Matthew's front, like some argue the postresurrection fell off Mark's back. Maybe.

In mainstream Christology Matthew's genealogy presents a Problematic: inasmuch as it culminates at Joseph. This implies Joseph as the natural father of Jesus. Justin didn't use it, preferring Luke's which ends up at Mary. Mark Goodacre would have us believe that Luke consciously rejected Matthew here, including his Marian genealogy as alternative. But.

How is Matthew's son-of-man a problem for Hebrews? Coogan last year pointed out that some Christians did insist upon the human parents of Christ. But not the Ebionites.

One might bring up analogies from elsewhere. Certain Nestorians and perhaps Jerome himself - and certain Muslims - insisted on a piety of Mary; as some means to assure the Believers that they were no Jews who intended any disrespect for the Vessel of the Christ. Nestorius just could not beg the intercession of the "Mother of God".

In this reading, the Ebionites might have dropped Matthew's genealogy in appeal to a growing consensus on the miracle of Jesus' Divine conception. The Muslims will insist upon this much as well; putting these together, the Muslims implicitly endorse Luke's family line.

I conclude that the Ebionites did not care for Our Lady as these Muslims do.

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