The Feast of the Immaculate Conception of Mary causes difficulties for this biblical scholar, for though biblical passages are read on the feast day, none of them clearly support the doctrine as promulgated by the Church. This is not to say that the Church, through its Tradition, does not have access to other means of revelatory support,  that which has been revealed to the Church through its history, theology and  reflection on the ancient and apostolic tradition, but what does one make of the scriptural readings for the Immaculate Conception?

First of all, none of the readings for the Immaculate Conception make reference to Mary’s conception, and no passage in the Old or New Testament does so either. The first reading, from Genesis 3, was thought in the past to reference Mary’s sinlessness directly, especially 3:15:

“I will put enmity between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and hers;
he will strike at your head,
while you strike at his heel” (Genesis 3:15, NAB; similar in NRSV)

The locus for the use of this text in establishing Mary’s sinlessness was found in the Vulgate’s (mis)translation of “he” for “she”: she will strike at your head. Translators today are of one accord that the reference is to “her offspring,” and so should be translated as “he.” Yet, even if the traditional understanding of this passage was maintained, there is no direct path from it to the Immaculate Conception.

What of the Gospel reading? The key line is in Luke 1:28, in which the NAB translates Gabriel’s greeting to Mary as “Hail, full of grace! The Lord is with you”. Questions about the traditional rendering of this verse abound, as seen in the NRSV translation, “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.” While I do not like the NRSV translation at all – a Greetings Mary, for instance, just does not have the proper connotations for prayer or last second football heaves –the NRSV translation raises issues as to how much theological weight should be placed on a simple Greek participle. I think that the term “grace” should appear in the translation, but what does “full of grace” mean? It does not clearly indicate on its own, and cannot be pressed to indicate, that Mary has been free of the stain of original sin.

The Feast of the Immaculate Conception develops throughout the history of the Church not simply from Scripture, but from the faithful in the Church and, only after I would argue, from the writings of the theologians reflecting on Scripture and the Tradition of the Church. This took place over many, many centuries before being promulgated as a doctrine of the Church. It arose from a reflection on the requisite holiness necessary for the task to which Mary had been called, and the sinlessness of Mary and the challenges to the teaching of the doctrine on original sin which this teaching posed were considered. Theologians both accepted and rejected aspects of the doctrine throughout its development.

One last question: what does all this mean as you reflect on these Scriptures? The teaching of Mary’s Immaculate Conception developed in the living Tradition of the Church as it reflected on the holiness necessary for the vocation to which she had been called and prepared and the Scriptures which occasioned this reflection. We should continue to reflect on her holiness too, as we prepare for the coming of Jesus, for we are a part of this same, living Tradition.

John W. Martens

John W. Martens is an associate professor of theology at the University of St. Thomas, St. Paul, Minn,where he teaches early Christianity and Judaism. He also directs the Master of Arts in Theology program at the St. Paul Seminary School of Divinity. He was born in Vancouver, B.C. into a Mennonite family that had decided to confront modernity in an urban setting. His post-secondary education began at Tabor College, Hillsboro, Kansas, came to an abrupt stop, then started again at Vancouver Community College, where his interest in Judaism and Christianity in the earliest centuries emerged. He then studied at St. Michael's College, University of Toronto, and McMaster University, with stops at University of Haifa and University of Tubingen. His writing often explores the intersection of Jewish, Christian and Greco-Roman culture and belief, such as in "let the little children come to me: Children and Childhood in Early Christianity" (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2009), but he is not beyond jumping into the intersection of modernity and ancient religion, as in "The End of the World: The Apocalyptic Imagination in Film and Television" (Winnipeg: J. Gordon Shillingford Press, 2003). He blogs at  www.biblejunkies.com and at www.americamagazine.org for "The Good Word." You can follow him on Twitter @biblejunkies, where he would be excited to welcome you to his random and obscure interests, which range from the Vancouver Canucks and Minnesota Timberwolves, to his dog, and 70s punk, pop and rock. When he can, he brings students to Greece, Turkey and Rome to explore the artifacts and landscape of the ancient world. He lives in St. Paul with his wife and has two sons. He is certain that the world will not end until the Vancouver Canucks have won the Stanley Cup, as evidence has emerged from the Revelation of John, 1 Enoch, 2 Baruch, and 4 Ezra which all point in this direction.