Q: What is the Protoevangelium of Mary, the story of the virgin Mary’s birth, and how authentic is it?
A: This is not the sort of question I get every day, but it is a real one put to me by a woman who is very interested in women’s issues in the church. And the answer depends on what you mean by authentic. And at the outset, it should be noted that the term Protoevangelium, or early or first gospel, is used in two very different ways.
The first way this term is used is to refer to the verse in the Book of Genesis where we read that the Lord God said to the seductive serpent who beguiled Adam and Eve, “And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.” (Genesis 3:15.)
The early Christian fathers, such as St. Irenaeus or Justin Martyr in the second century A.D., regarded this verse as the first prophecy of the birth of Jesus of Nazareth, who would descend from Mary and would undo the works of the evil one, represented in the serpent.
For this reason, in Christian art, images of the Virgin Mary often depict her crushing a serpent under her food while she holds the Christ Child. This very ancient interpretation of the verse in Genesis was reaffirmed by Pope St. John Paul II in a general audience on Dec. 17, 1986.
The more detailed definition of the term Protoevangelium, however, refers to another document, called the Protoevangelium of James, a document written around A.D. 145. It is also called the Gospel of James or the Infancy Gospel.
It was almost certainly not written by the James, the “brother” or“kinsman” of Jesus mentioned in the Bible. The earliest reference to the book appears in a third-century document and it was probably written in the middle of the second century A.D.
No Christian church today regards it as scriptural, and it is agreed to be apocryphal. That said, it is relatively early as Christian documents go, and it has some very interesting stuff in it.
The relatively short document is written in Greek, and it apparently was quite interesting to the early church communities, as more than 130 copies of it have survived, suggesting a wide readership for a day when handwriting was the only way to disseminate texts.
It was translated very early on into a number of other languages, including Latin, Syriac, Coptic and a number of other ancient tongues, which again suggests a wide interest.
The manuscript has three sections. They contain considerable material that is in the canonical gospels, but it also adds a number of colorful details, otherwise unknown and perhaps contrived.
In the first section, the birth of the Virgin Mary to Anna and Joachim is described and the story of how Mary was presented and dedicated as a virgin in the temple in Jerusalem. This is the first reference we have to the traditional names of Mary’s parents.
The second part says that when Mary was 12 years old, Joseph was selected as her husband. We are also told that Joseph was an aged widower, a widespread belief even today, which might explain the existence of “brothers and sisters” of Jesus, but again, Joseph’s early life is not mentioned in the canonical gospels.
The third part describes the birth of Jesus, and it is similar to the texts of the canonical gospels, but it goes on to say that Mary remained a perpetual virgin before, during and after the birth of Jesus, and that the midwives, including one Salome who attended the birth, attested to this, after a careful examination. There are no midwives mentioned in the canonical gospels.
There are significant historical and theological issues raised by the text, not the least of which is the question of how accurate this kind of information is and for which we have no certain idea. Certainly, the Catholic understanding of the perpetual virginity of Mary has its roots in this text, or perhaps, the tradition that lies behind the manuscript.
We have no contemporary evidence that young Jewish virgins were ever dedicated in the Jerusalem temple, and the suggestion appears to reflect the pagan Roman practice of the Vestal Virgin priestesses of Vesta in Rome.
The manuscript contains one very beautiful story, which does tend to strain the credulity, of young Mary being selected to weave a new veil for the temple.
The text tells us that the priests in Jerusalem wanted a new veil to be made, presumably to section off the Holy of Holies, the inner sanctum. When they summoned the consecrated virgins of the temple, they cast lots to see who would get which fabric to sew, and of course Mary’s lot awarded her the finest cloth, made of purple and scarlet.
Mary then took these home and was working on her fabric when the angel of the Lord came to her with the news of the future birth of Jesus, as is described in the gospels. Mary then returned the beautiful fabric she wove to the priests, who, of course, blessed her efforts.
She then went to visit her kinswoman Elizabeth, now also with child, as described in the Bible. The story is a wonderful compounding of both the biblical story with what is most likely early Christian folklore.
From a historical perspective, it is perhaps best to place the Protevangelium in the same category as other noncanonical gospels which began to flourish in the days of the Roman Empire. From the second to fifth centuries, “gospels” were written and attributed to various biblical names, including Thomas, Nicodemus, Bartholomew, Peter and even Pontius Pilate.
Their contents range from the devotional to the preposterous. Contrary to some authors, they have never been suppressed by the church, and in some cases, such as the Protoevangelium, probably had a significant influence on formal dogma. Almost certainly they were written and shared by people fascinated with what the Bible does not tell us about the personal lives of the Holy Family and the disciples.
I am grateful for this question. An online version of the Protoevangelium of James can be found at the following link: http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0847.htm
How much of it one should believe, I leave to holier and wiser souls than I.
Gregory Elder, a Redlands resident, is a professor of history and humanities at Moreno Valley College and a Roman Catholic priest. Write to him at Professing Faith, P.O. Box 8102, Redlands, CA 92375-1302, email him at firstname.lastname@example.org or follow him on Twitter at Fatherelder.