Marie de Nazareth
To Jesus, through Mary
The theology of history signifies that God had a goal when he created the world. Saint Irenaeus explained that history had a meaning. Moreover, after the first sin, God had a plan of redemption, and history became the history of salvation.
The Plan of Creation. The accomplishment of God's project when he created the world.
The Plan of Creation gives meaning to life: life exists for a reason, for a divine plan. This goal is the Incarnation: God made man so that men may participate in the divine life. And the Incarnation happened through Mary.
The Plan of redemption. Salvation after the Fall.
The Plan of redemption brings hope in the midst of spiritual warfare. Christ is there for Adam again; the cross is there for the tree of the Fall; Mary is there for Eve. What takes places is a « regeneration ».
It is also a « recapitulation » where everything finds its own meaning and orientation anew, in Christ.
We can see therefore that Mary stands at the summit of the « theology of History »*
Mary the virgin soil
« If Adam was created with the help of a virgin soil, not yet tilled, by the virtue and power of God (cf. Gn 2: 4b-7), the new Adam also must draw his origin from a virgin soil, by the same power and virtue of God. Mary is this virgin soil from whom Christ became the "first-born".»
IRENAEUS OF LYONS, Against Heresies, III 18,7 I
Mary, the mother of the New Adam
Mary transmitted to Christ the entire human reality of Adam, so that he could become the new Adam, the Son of man, the « summary» of all men from the first.
Cf. IRENAEUS OF LYONS, Demonstration of the Apostolic Predication § 32
Adam, when tempted by Satan, disobeyed and fell; Christ, when also tempted by Satan, remained faithful, so that where sin had abounded grace might be superabundant. Mary's presence and function in the work of Salvation was necessary and decisive.
Mary, the "advocate"
Irenaeus employs very strong expressions:
« Because it was necessary that Adam should be recapitulated in Christ, so that what was mortal might be engulfed by immortality; it was necessary also for Eve to be recapitulated in Mary, so that a Virgin, by becoming the advocate of a virgin, might cancel a virgin's disobedience by a Virgin's obedience. »
IRENAEUS OF LYONS, Demonstration of the Apostolic Predication § 33
When Mary spoke with the angel Gabriel at the Annunciation and proved herself obedient, she defended the human race. Being one of us, she was Eve's «advocate».
(cf. IRENAEUS OF LYONS, Against Heresies III,19,1)
Mary unties knots; she is the "cause of our salvation"
By accepting Salvation, Mary is defined as "cause of salvation" for those who had inherited of death from Eve. Mary knows how to untie the knots of disobedience and death.
« In the same way that Eve was married to Adam and yet was still a virgin - since they were both naked in the paradise but were not ashamed of it (Gn 2: 25) because they had been created just recently and had no notion of procreation: they first had to grow, and then only to multiply (Gn 1:28) - in the same way then that Eve, by disobeying, became the cause of death for herself and for all of humankind, likewise Mary, having for husband a man who had been destined for her in advance, and yet was still a Virgin, became, by her obedience, cause of salvation (cf. Heb 5:9) for herself and for all of humankind.
This is why the Law gives the woman who is betrothed to a man, even though she is still a virgin, the name of spouse of the man who betrothed her (Dt 22:23-24), signifying the reversal from Mary to Eve.
« For what has been tied cannot be untied, unless one retraces the path of the string inside the knots. »
IRENAEUS OF LYONS, Against Heresies, III,22,4
In her virginal womb, Mary gave birth to Christ and regenerated all men
As a true mother, Mary guarantees that God assumed everything in us up to becoming "Son of man", so we are entirely assumed and entirely saved. As a divinely fecund Virgin, Mary guarantees that it was God who was born of her and that he really saves: with his divine power.
(cf. IRENAEUS OF LYONS, Against Heresies V, 19,1)
In her virginal womb, Mary gave birth to Christ, the Head of the body, at a special moment in history. In Christ, Mary regenerated for God all the members of humankind, in other words her maternal womb remains the permanent source of regeneration of men in God.
« They preached Emmanuel born of the Virgin (Cf. Is 7: 14): by that they established that [...] he, the Pure one, would open in a pure manner the pure womb that regenerates men in God, which he himself made pure; that, having become what we are, he would still be the "strong God" (Is 9: 6), he who possesses an inexpressible knowledge (Is 53: 11). »
(IRENAEUS OF LYONS, Against Heresies IV 33, 11)
*Cf E. TONIOLO, S. Ireneo: la teologia della salvezza, in Riparazione mariana, LXI (1976) 5, 12-13
Françoise Breynaert
Excerpts from: Françoise BREYNAERT, A l'écoute de Marie, vol I,
(Published by Mediapaul), Brive 2007, p. 52-57