Inter-Faith Series: Why was the Virgin Mary preserved from Original Sin?

Question

Please confine your answer to the question.

Appreciate your answer Father K.

Great answer Misty!

Answer 1

She had to be pure completely to carry the Christ Child. She was filled with God's grace. It was a miracle

What is the miracle? It is the conception of a child between two people who should no longer be able to conceive children. What is the Immaculate Conception? It is an even more incredible miracle. Mary, the special woman who is going to give birth to Jesus, is conceived in Her mother’s womb without the stain of Original Sin.

How do we inherit Original Sin — the sin of Adam and Eve who disobeyed the Lord? We get it through our parents’ DNA! It's in our blood! And Original Sin is nothing more than the disobedient nature of mankind (Romans 5:19). We have been given free will and we can choose to do things we know God does not like or want us to do.

But on the merits of Her Son’s future salvific action on the Cross, God grants this special and great ONE-TIME gift to the woman who will say “Yes” to the Most Holy Trinity. Of Her own free will, Mary will say, “Behold, the handmaid of the Lord: be it done to me according to thy word” (Luke 1:38) when She is asked by the Archangel Gabriel if She will conceive the Savior of the world within Her womb.
She is full of God’s grace and the LORD is with Her!
With Mary, God granted — out of His own good pleasure — all of His grace to Mary.

Now why would He do this? In fact, who else in the Bible, besides Mary, was ever declared to be full of God’s grace? The answer: no one! Only Mary was declared “full of grace.”

So we need to look at the Old Covenant to understand why the Lord HAD to do this to Mary!

Do you remember the Ark of the Covenant? What was in the Ark? The 10 Commandments. Are not the 10 Commandments the Word of the Lord? What happened to people who in sinfulness touched the Ark of the Covenant with the Word of God in it? They died!

Now it is impossible to be anything but reasonable in reviewing this fact and applying it to the New Covenant. Is Jesus the Word of God? Is Jesus sinless and holy? Who is going to carry Jesus in Her womb?

If Mary has sin in Her, what will happen when God infuses His Holy Spirit in Her and the Word of God takes residence in Her womb? Wouldn’t She be consumed like those who touched the Ark of the Covenant?

Since Mary is going to carry the Word of God within Her for nine months as the New Ark of the Covenant, She CANNOT have sin within Her or She will be consumed by the Holy Spirit!

In addition, in order for Jesus NOT to inherit Original Sin, God stopped this generational process in Mary so that the Blood Jesus receives from Her is PURE and untainted with sin.

Answer 2

While it would seem that Mary could not give birth to our sinless Savior were she not conceived without sin herself, and Jesus birth was also without sin, consider this:

The immaculate conception of Jesus is rendered such not because of the blessed womb, but due to the Holy seed, which came from the holy spirit. Mary, a sweet and gentle, young woman of great faith was the perfect vessel because of her surrendered life unto God. Never have I heard, seen, or read of anyone more willing to be surrendered to God's service than our Lord Jesus' mother, Mary.
Consider the reason for the birth of our Lord. He had to be able to walk among us, as completely human as you and I. Able to feel every temptation, every pain.
So, that, at Calvary He would be the perfect vessel take our place, as kinsman redeemer, redeemng us from all penalty of sin

Answer 3

Because she was to carry the Son of God. His flesh was to come from her flesh. Her flesh should be free from original sin.

Mary is often referred to as the new Eve. Eve was free from original sin as well. It makes sense that the "new Eve" would have the same start, but where Eve said "no" to God, Mary said "yes."

Christ is the new Adam...also...both free from original sin.

This doesn't mean she wasn't fully human, she was. It was that she received the benefit of a baptism of sorts while still in the womb. Also, it was believed by the faithful for many centuries including the early fathers of the Church. They spoke and wrote of it. It became dogma much later.

Also, there is not grave for Mary. Had there been...you can be assured it would have been a spot that Christians revered. It would have been cherished and a place of devotion. It is no where and there is no record of a grave.

Consider an analogy: Suppose a man falls into a deep pit, and someone reaches down to pull him out. The man has been "saved" from the pit. Now imagine a woman walking along, and she too is about to topple into the pit, but at the very moment that she is to fall in, someone holds her back and prevents her. She too has been saved from the pit, but in an even better way: She was not simply taken out of the pit, she was prevented from getting stained by the mud in the first place. This is the illustration Christians have used for a thousand years to explain how Mary was saved by Christ. By receiving Christ’s grace at her conception, she had his grace applied to her before she was able to become mired in original sin and its stain.
http://www.catholic.com/library/Immaculate_Conception_and_Assum.asp

Answer 4

According to the doctrine of Original Sin, all human beings are born guilty of the sin of Adam. In order for Jesus to be sinless, he would have to be born free from the guilt of Original Sin. Hence the immaculate conception of the Virgin. Because she was miraculously preserved from the guilt of Adam, Jesus was born without the guilt of Adam.

At least that's how I understand it - but I don't believe in Original Sin in the first place.

Answer 5

The Catholic concept that original sin has to do with anything sexual is a false doctrine. Original sin had to do with disobeying God.

Hence, Mary, like all humanity was a sinner and needed the shed blood of the Messiah to cover her sins.

Answer 6

First of all, she was not a 'virgin', that is a misinterpretation of the Torah.

It seems that there are a lot of people, who have never bothered to learn or read the Old Testament of their Holy Scriptures; in the original Hebrew.

Yeshua (Jesus) was a Jew, He never stopped being a Jew, nor did He or His Disciples proclaim any other 'religion' than Judaism.

Or don't any of you remember them celebrating the Passover??

Don't believe me, look into your Christian history and you will find that at one time it was a 'sect' of Judaism.

Actual translation of Genesis 3:15 "Enmity Deep-rooted hatred. "I will put enmity between thee and the woman, between thy seed and her seed" (Gen 3:15). The friendship of the world is "enmity with God" (Jam 4:4; Jo1 2:15, Jo1 2:16). The "carnal mind" is "enmity" against God" (Rom 8:7). By the abrogation of the Mosaic institutes the "enmity" between Jew and Gentile is removed. They are reconciled, are "made one" (Eph 2:15, Eph 2:16)."

The Hebrew word 'alma' "young woman" is used in Isaiah 7:14, not the word 'Betulah' which is "betrothed virgin"

I can't believe that Catholics would compare Mary to the "Holy Ark of the Covenant", to Jews this can be considered sacrilege. In Exodus 25:11-21; 2 Sam. 6:7; 1 Chron. 13:9-10; 1 Chron. 15 and 16 we are being told of the Ark of the Covenant. These passages in no way shape or form are talking about humans. The Ark is a Holy relic that holds the Torah, which was given to Moshe and the Israelits at Sinai. How can it possibly be speaking of a human who would some day be born and named Miriam.

Read Isaiah 66:8, if 66:7 is speaking of Mary; how do you Catholics explain this "Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children." It is because Isaiah 66 is speaking of Zion, not a human named Miriam. Unless, Mary had other children; this does not pretain to her --- does it?

Queen No explicit mention of queens is made till we read of the "queen of Sheba." The wives of the kings of Israel are not so designated. In Psa 45:9, the Hebrew for "queen" is not malkah, one actually ruling like the Queen of Sheba, but shegal, which simply means the king's wife. In Kg1 11:19, Pharaoh's wife is called "the queen," but the Hebrew word so rendered ( g'birah ) is simply a title of honour, denoting a royal lady, used sometimes for "queen-mother" (Kg1 15:13; Ch2 15:16). In Sol 6:8, Sol 6:9, the king's wives are styled "queens" (Heb. melakhoth ). In the New Testament we read of the "queen of the south", i.e., Southern Arabia, Sheba (Mat 12:42; Luk 11:31) and the "queen of the Ethiopians" (Act 8:27), Candace.

In Ezekiel 44:2 the 'gate' is a physical gate in Jerusalem, like the one He entered while on the donkey --- unless Mary has a north 'gate' and Yeshua sat and 'eat bread before the L-rd' at it.

In other words, it seems that Catholics are taking great liberty with the Word of G-d and using whatever scriptures they want to refer to Mary; regardless of whether the Tanach agrees with it or not. What do you think this is called -- when people deliberately translate scripture to mean what 'they' want it and not what G-d intended it to be?

Answer 7

Mary was a virgin, until Jesus was born, not after.

The Bible never says she was preserved from original sin.

The Bible never says she is the "mother of god".

These are all new teachings, come up with with no basis in the Bible in the last 150 years by a religion which stopped believing the Bible hundreds and hundreds of years ago.

Pastor Art

Answer 8

She was not preserved from sin, she did not know what Jesus was all about. She was sinner just like us today! Jesus denied her as a spiritual mother (Matthew 12: 46 – 50 (Jesus denies James and his mother)

Luke 2: 41 - 52 “Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?


The crowd asked Jesus to bless the womb he came out of and Jesus siad:
Luke 11: 27 - 28

27And it happened, as He spoke these things, that a certain woman from the crowd raised her voice and said to Him, “Blessed is the womb that bore You, and the breasts which nursed You!”
28But He said, “More than that, blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it!”

Marry was no more than a vessle to carry the son of God. Do not worship marry, you need to worship Jesus.

Answer 9

Because a sinful woman would be an unfit vessel for the Lord of Heaven.

Answer 10

Tebone and Misty answered perfectly, so I am going to pass!!