Ancient Traditions of the Virgin Mary's Dormition and Assumption

The ancient Dormition and Assumption traditions, a remarkably diverse collection of narratives recounting the end of the Virgin Mary's life, first emerge into historical view from an uncertain past during the fifth and sixth centuries. Initially appearing in Syria, Palestine, and Egypt, these legend...

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Autor principal: Shoemaker, Stephen J.
Format: Online
Idioma:anglès
Publicat: Oxford University Press 2023
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Accés en línia:OCN: 648344247
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author Shoemaker, Stephen J.
author_browse Shoemaker, Stephen J.
author_facet Shoemaker, Stephen J.
author_sort Shoemaker, Stephen J.
collection Directory of Open Access Books
description The ancient Dormition and Assumption traditions, a remarkably diverse collection of narratives recounting the end of the Virgin Mary's life, first emerge into historical view from an uncertain past during the fifth and sixth centuries. Initially appearing in Syria, Palestine, and Egypt, these legends spread rapidly throughout the Christian world, resulting in over 60 different narratives from before the tenth century preserved in nine ancient languages. This study presents a detailed analysis of the earliest traditions of Mary's death, including the evidence of the earliest Marian liturgical traditions and related archaeological evidence as well as the numerous narrative sources. Most of the early narratives belong to one of several distinctive literary families, whose members bear evidence of close textual relations. Many previous scholars have attempted to arrange the different narrative types in a developmental typology, according to which the story of Mary's death was transformed to reflect various developments in early Christian Mariology. Nevertheless, evidence to support these theories is wanting, and the present state of our knowledge suggests that the narrative diversity of the early Dormition traditions arose from several independent ‘origins’ rather than through ordered evolution from a single original type. Likewise, scholars have often asserted a connection between the origin of the Dormition traditions and resistance to the council of Chalcedon, but the traditions themselves make this an extremely unlikely proposal. While most of the traditions cannot be dated much before the fifth century, a few of the narratives were almost certainly in composed by the third century, if not even earlier. These narratives in particular bear evidence of contact with gnostic Christianity. Several of the most important narratives are translated in appendices, most appearing in English for the first time.
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spelling doab-20.500.12854ir-1313362025-03-20T15:41:25Z Ancient Traditions of the Virgin Mary's Dormition and Assumption Shoemaker, Stephen J. Assumption, Chalcedon, Dormition, Egypt, Gnostic Christianity, Marian Liturgical Traditions, Mariology, Palestine, Syria, Virgin Mary The ancient Dormition and Assumption traditions, a remarkably diverse collection of narratives recounting the end of the Virgin Mary's life, first emerge into historical view from an uncertain past during the fifth and sixth centuries. Initially appearing in Syria, Palestine, and Egypt, these legends spread rapidly throughout the Christian world, resulting in over 60 different narratives from before the tenth century preserved in nine ancient languages. This study presents a detailed analysis of the earliest traditions of Mary's death, including the evidence of the earliest Marian liturgical traditions and related archaeological evidence as well as the numerous narrative sources. Most of the early narratives belong to one of several distinctive literary families, whose members bear evidence of close textual relations. Many previous scholars have attempted to arrange the different narrative types in a developmental typology, according to which the story of Mary's death was transformed to reflect various developments in early Christian Mariology. Nevertheless, evidence to support these theories is wanting, and the present state of our knowledge suggests that the narrative diversity of the early Dormition traditions arose from several independent ‘origins’ rather than through ordered evolution from a single original type. Likewise, scholars have often asserted a connection between the origin of the Dormition traditions and resistance to the council of Chalcedon, but the traditions themselves make this an extremely unlikely proposal. While most of the traditions cannot be dated much before the fifth century, a few of the narratives were almost certainly in composed by the third century, if not even earlier. These narratives in particular bear evidence of contact with gnostic Christianity. Several of the most important narratives are translated in appendices, most appearing in English for the first time. 2023-12-05T04:02:42Z 2023-12-05T04:02:42Z 2023-12-04T09:44:06Z 2004 book OCN: 648344247 https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/85761 9780199210749 https://directory.doabooks.org/handle/20.500.12854/131336 eng open access image/jpeg image/jpeg image/jpeg Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/20.500.12657/85761/1/9780199210749.pdf https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/20.500.12657/85761/1/9780199210749.pdf https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/20.500.12657/85761/1/9780199210749.pdf Oxford University Press 10.1093/0199250758.001.0001 10.1093/0199250758.001.0001 db4e319f-ca9f-449a-bcf2-37d7c6f885b1 Universität Regensburg e193b12d-e02d-401c-bd21-13d5aace6a58 9780199210749 477 Oxford open access
spellingShingle Assumption, Chalcedon, Dormition, Egypt, Gnostic Christianity, Marian Liturgical Traditions, Mariology, Palestine, Syria, Virgin Mary
Shoemaker, Stephen J.
Ancient Traditions of the Virgin Mary's Dormition and Assumption
title Ancient Traditions of the Virgin Mary's Dormition and Assumption
title_full Ancient Traditions of the Virgin Mary's Dormition and Assumption
title_fullStr Ancient Traditions of the Virgin Mary's Dormition and Assumption
title_full_unstemmed Ancient Traditions of the Virgin Mary's Dormition and Assumption
title_short Ancient Traditions of the Virgin Mary's Dormition and Assumption
title_sort ancient traditions of the virgin mary s dormition and assumption
topic Assumption, Chalcedon, Dormition, Egypt, Gnostic Christianity, Marian Liturgical Traditions, Mariology, Palestine, Syria, Virgin Mary
topic_facet Assumption, Chalcedon, Dormition, Egypt, Gnostic Christianity, Marian Liturgical Traditions, Mariology, Palestine, Syria, Virgin Mary
url OCN: 648344247
work_keys_str_mv AT shoemakerstephenj ancienttraditionsofthevirginmarysdormitionandassumption