The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
from Juniper Carol's Mariology
The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary from Mariology edited by
Assumed Into Heaven (Popes, Magisterium, Modern History)
Present State of Belief
These words from Pope Pius XII in the Marian Year encyclical, Fulgens Corona (8 Sept 1953) describe one of the results produced by the definition of the Immaculate Conception. The Pontiff also recalls that it was his privilege to define,
What the belief of the faithful and the studies of the scholars had held and hoped for became a reality on November 1, 1950, when the Holy Father, Pope Pius XII, in his office as supreme teacher of the universal Church solemnly defined:
Munificentissimus Deus does not neglect the past history of Papal favor to the Assumption, but the theological principle invoked to justify the proclamation of the dogma is the present uniform faith of the whole Church. The Holy Father appeals, first of all, to the "concordant teaching of the Church's ordinary doctrinal authority and the concordant faith of the Christian people which the same doctrinal authority sustains and directs" as manifesting the bodily Assumption to be a revealed truth. 
The Assumption in History
The documents of the magisterium before the reign of Pius XII do not exhibit any official Papal statement clearly stating Our Lady's bodily Assumption. There has never been any doubt that her soul is in heaven. For example, Benedict XII authoritatively declared in 1336 that the souls of the saints enjoy the beatific vision.  Pope Pius XII's first express mention of Our Lady's presence, body and soul, in heaven is in the encyclical on the Mystical Body, 1943. Yet, as Munificentissimus Deus relates, "Various testimonies, indications and signs of this common belief of the Church are evident from remote times down through the course of the centuries." 
What are some of these signs? How have the popes shown their approval of belief in the Assumption in the history of the Church? Munificentissimus Deus looks first to the law of prayer (lex orandi), saying that the sacred liturgy "because it is the profession, subject to the supreme teaching authority within the Church, of heavenly truths, can supply proofs and testimonies of no small value for deciding any individual point of Catholic doctrine."  Lex orandi, lex credendi (the law of praying is the law of believing) is an old motto, based on the close connection between sound doctrine and true devotion. The Church's care of cult is not a merely disciplinary matter; in approving its liturgy the Church acts infallibly. The official prayers of the Church, particularly the Mass and Divine Office, are a practical school of Christian doctrine. The Apostolic See has used its authority to encourage the feast of the Assumption and to explain its true sense. Nor does the Pope neglect the Rosary in the attitude of the faithful, for he adds: "Nor can we pass over in silence the fact that in the Rosary of Mary, the recitation of which this Apostolic See so urgently recommends, there is one mystery proposed for pious meditation which, as all know, deals with the Blessed Virgin's Assumption into heaven." 
Many theologians were strongly in favor of the doctrine, among them
The Assumption never met the strong scholastic opposition found in the case of the Immaculate Conception.
Between the twelfth and fifteenth centuries a series of gradual changes in the Mass for the Assumption and its vigil emphasized more and more the glorious resurrection of Mary, less emphasis was placed on her death. Pope St. Pius V (1566-1572) removed from the second nocturn of Matins the lessons wrongly attributed to St. Jerome. These readings, in an excess of prudence against the apocryphal stories of Mary's death and resurrection, had counseled an attitude of reserve toward the bodily Assumption. Pius V put in their place lessons explaining the bodily Assumption. 
Pope Pius IX to the Present
From Pius IX to Pius XII, the popes have spoken more often of Mary in heaven. They have at the same time received petitions and encouraged the movement for the dogmatic definition. May we not then see in their references to Our Lady in heaven an implicit affirmation of her bodily Assumption?
Pius IX (r. 1846-78), in Ineffabilis Deus, emphasized the close bond that linked the Mother of God with her Son Jesus Christ: "from all eternity joined in a hidden way with Jesus Christ in one and the same decree of predestination."  Munificentissimus Deus connects the sinless conception and anticipated resurrection as parts of the same victory over sin and its consequences.
In 1864, Pius IX received a petition for the definition of the Assumption from Queen Isabella II of Spain. Although the Pope judged the time not yet opportune for the definition, he wrote in reply, "There is no doubt that the Assumption, in the sense commonly believed by the body of the faithful, follows from the Immaculate Conception."  A petition was presented in 1870 at the Vatican Council. 
Pope Leo XIII (r. 1878-1903) gave his explicit approval to the program of studies of the International Marian Congress held at Fribourg, Switzerland, 1902. The topics included the dogmatic study of the Assumption. Among Leo XIII's many Marian documents, especially the Rosary encyclicals, some references seem to concern the Assumption, especially those treating of Our Lady as Queen. For example, Iucunda semper (1894) thus describes the glorious mysteries of the Rosary:
Blessed (now St.) Pius X was already interested in the Assumption when he was Patriarch of Venice. He was one of the instigators of the petition sent to the Fribourg Congress. As Pope he encouraged the movement for the definition, sending congratulatory messages concerning the Congresses of 1906 at Einsiedeln, Switzerland, and Valencia, Spain. Both conventions submitted petitions for the proclamation of the Assumption as a dogma. On another occasion, in 1908, he said, "There is still need for many studies, and for serious ones."  The same year he ordered the definability thoroughly studied. Some consider that Ad diem illum of (St.) Pius X alludes to the Assumption in its interpretation of the Woman of the twelfth chapter of the Apocalypse (Revelation 12). "A great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon was under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars" (12:1). After quoting this text, (St.) Pius adds: "No one is ignorant that this woman signified the Virgin Mary, who remained inviolate when she brought forth our Head...So John saw the most holy Mother of God already enjoying happiness...." 
Benedict XV, like his two predecessors, decreed that all the petitions for the Assumption be kept. During World War I he requested that the sending of petitions be deferred until peace came again.
Pius XI encouraged the movement for the definition. On March 2, 1922, he named Our Lady under her title of the Assumption principal Patroness of France; and on May 31, 1937, gave his approval to the third-centenary celebrations of Louis XIII's solemn consecration of the kingdom to Our Lady, a vow that was annually commemorated on the feast of the Assumption.
The pontificate of Pius XII is distinguished by a whole series of statements and writings about the Assumption, before as well as after the definition. To list or attempt to analyze them would require a book. A few selected examples must suffice here. In Mystici Corporis, June 29, 1943, there is the first explicit mention in a Papal document of Our Lady's bodily Assumption into heaven:
Meantime, the Holy Father was taking active steps toward the definitions. He issued special orders commanding more advanced inquiries into the matter, and likewise ordered the publication of the petitions since Pius IX's time.  Following the same procedure which Pius IX had used before defining the Immaculate Conception, by the letter Deiparae Virginis Mariae, May 1, 1946, the Pope asked all the bishops,
The replies of the bishops shows the "outstanding agreement of the Catholic prelates and the faithful."  On November 1, 1950, in a fullest exercise of his supreme teaching authority, speaking infallibly as Vicar of Christ, the Holy Father defined the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, body and soul, into heavenly glory, as a truth revealed by God. The dogmatic definition concerns the Assumption alone:
In the precise words of the definition are mentioned, in addition to the Assumption, only the three privileges of Our Lady defined as dogmas in earlier centuries: Mother of God, ever Virgin, Immaculate. Nothing is said of when or where or in what manner the Assumption occurred. Nor does the actual formula say anything about Mary's Mediation, her Queenship, or other privileges.
Munificentissimus Deus provides a rich background for the better understanding of the newly defined dogma. The theological principle of the universal consent of the Church is explained, and new light shed on the role of the supreme magisterium. A survey is given of the belief across the ages, both in the liturgy and in patristic and theological writings. The marvelous harmony between Mary's gifts is described:
The Assumption is compared with the Immaculate Conception; with Mary's association in her Son's victory over the devil, sin, and death; with her virginity in the birth of Christ. The common fountainhead of all Mary's privileges is the divine motherhood. The scriptural foundations are examined in the light of traditional interpretation: especially the Proto-evangelium -- the Woman of Genesis 3:15; the "Full of Grace" of Luke 1:28; and "that Woman clothed with the Sun, whom John the Apostle contemplated on the island of Patmos" (Apoc or Rev 12:1ff). 
At the close, the Holy Father expressed his confidence:
(from "Mary in the Documents of the Magisterium" by Eamon R. Carroll, in Mariology edited by Juniper Carol, volume 1, pages 24-32)
As with the first moment of Our Lady's earthly existence, so with the last, theology's quest of patristic data is initially hampered by the state of the evidence. For a discouragingly long period the problem is not that the Assumption is denied; it is rather that the final lot of Mary is apparently not discussed. In consequence, scholars have come to speak of the silence , even the ignorance , of the first three centuries with respect to Mary's end. In reaction, others have retorted that the silence is sheerly relative, a surface silence which was inevitable and is actually eloquent. 
In point of fact, both claims are justified. The early Church is silent on the destiny of Mary, in the sense that no extant document deals explicitly with that destiny until a half century after Nicaea. And if in the East we must wait until 377 before St. Epiphanius of Salamis offers his three hypotheses on the manner of Mary's departure from this world ("For either the holy Virgin died and was buried...or she was killed [martyred]...or she remained alive....")  the awakening of the West is a slower process still. Even when popular faith has been quickened, there is little evidence in the West of a theological movement to rival the homiletic productions of the East. If only because it is so surprisingly slender, the explicit witness of the West deserves to be detailed.
Explicit statements or conjectures on the final lot of Mary begin with the last quarter of the fourth century -- contemporary, therefore, with Epiphanius. But the witnesses touch the problem ever so lightly, with evident uncertainty. Tychonius, a lay theologian among the Donatists, independent enough to be excommunicated by his own sect, seems to have identified Mary with the woman of Revelation 12, and to have spoken of a "great mystery" in her regard.  Ambrose is more specific but equally unsatisfactory. Discussing Simeon's sword of sorrow, he dismisses the idea that Our Lady died a violent death; such a thesis has no warrant in Scripture or history.  But Ambrose does not tell us just how Mary did leave this life. In a remarkable passage he presents, as one hypothesis, the yearning of Mary to rise with Jesus in case she was fated to die with Him.  There may be an insinuation here that the desire was not frustrated; against this conclusion is the flat statement elsewhere that Christ alone has risen once and for all. 
Paulinus, Bishop of Nola in Italy (d. 431), is anxious to learn Augustine's mind on the exegesis of Simeon's prophecy; he himself, like Ambrose, is aware of no document reporting Mary's death by violence.  In his reply, Augustine mentions a previous letter of his own on the Lucan text; it is, regrettably, lost to us, but he does tell Paulinus that their views on the scriptural passage coincide.  Elsewhere, in several striking phrases, he makes it clear that Mary did die: she died after her Son; she died a virgin; she died, like Adam, in consequence of sin. 
Finally, however his silence may be explained, the fact remains that Jerome, who knew the local traditions of the Holy Land as well as Epiphanius, gives no indication that he is aware of any historical tradition with reference to the death of Our Lady, her grave, or an assumption.  Briefly, between Nicaea (325 AD) and Ephesus (431 AD) the allusions to Mary's destiny are rare and insignificant.
Transitus Mariae literature
The first express witness in the West to a genuine assumption comes to us in an apocryphal Gospel, the Transitus beatae Mariae of Pseudo-Melito, which may stem from the middle of the sixth century.  This account is significant, in the first instance, because it affirms unequivocally the death and burial of Mary, the reunion of her soul and body without delay, and her assumption into heaven in soul and body. It is significant, in the second place, for the developed Assumption theology which links this privilege causally with Mary's Maternity and virginity, and stresses the parallelism which ought to exist between Christ and His Mother in victory over death.  The account of Pseudo-Melito, like the rest of the Transitus literature, is admittedly valueless as history, as an historical report of Mary's death and corporeal assumption; under that aspect the historian is justified in dismissing it with a critical distaste. But the account is priceless nonetheless -- historically and theologically. Historically, because it witnesses indisputably to the feeling of the faithful for Mary, a growing awareness of her dignity, even though we are unable to specify the full range of this awareness geographically or even to indicate its dawning. Theologically, because it postulates the Assumption on grounds that are valid not simply for piety but for scientific theology as well.
Gregory of Tours (c. 538 - 594 AD)
The next witness in the West is Gregory, Bishop of Tours in Gaul; the year, 590. Borrowing in all probability not from Pseudo-Melito but from a Syriac Transitus of the fifth century, Gregory states very artlessly:
In brief, Gregory affirms in sober fashion the death and burial of Our Lady, the assumption of her body into paradise with little delay, the reunion there of body with soul, and Mary's unending blessedness. He proposes no reasons for the privilege; the only inkling in that direction is the vague reference to the holiness of her body, and a later statement that she who was assumed into heaven was the Mother of Christ, virgin before and after His birth.  A formal connection, therefore, between Assumption and virginal motherhood is not made, but the suggestion seems to be there, especially if read in the light of similar apocryphal accounts. At any rate, Gregory's account influenced the development of popular belief in an anticipated resurrection of the Virgin, though it made little impression on the theologian because of the jaundiced eye which he cast on its apocryphal source. Jouassard is inclined to find Gregory's influence in some of the old Gallican Missals of the seventh and eighth centuries, e.g. the Bobbio Missal and especially the Missale Gothicum. 
Moreover, a friend of Gregory, St. Fortunatus, a native of Treviso who became Bishop of Poitiers in Gaul about 595, celebrated Mary's queenship in verse; her triumph in glory is clear; not so her glorious Assumption in body as well as soul:
Isidore of Seville (c. 560 - 636)
In the seventh century, only Isidore, Archbishop of Seville in Spain (d. 636), breaks the silence, but simply to attest our profound ignorance on the way Mary left this earth.
Isidore echoes Ambrose: we have no evidence that Mary died a martyr. He echoes Epiphanius too: we have no information at all about her death. We learn from Isidore that the thesis of Mary's martydom still persists; we learn, too, of the Jerusalem tradition on her tomb -- a tradition which leaves him quite unmoved. We learn nothing about the Assumption.
A century later, the English Bede confessed his ignorance of the final disposition of Mary's body. He has read the account given by Adamnam, Iona's Abbot, of the pilgrimage undertaken by the French Bishop, Arculf, between 670 and 685.  He reproduces therefrom the data on the reputed death of Mary on St. Sion, and the empty tomb in the Valley of Josaphat, "in which holy Mary is said to have rested for a while; but who took her away, or when, we do not know."  Bede shows no awareness of an anticipated resurrection. He may well have heard of it; after all, he was familiar with Pseudo-Melito. But he attacks this apocryphal work in sharp tones. Not, it is true, on the score of the Assumption; but his general criticism could hardly have encouraged in his readers any sort of confidence in Pseudo-Melito, even on the theological level. 
With this patristic background it will not be surprising to find the first orators of the feast of August 15 in the West -- Paul the Deacon, for example -- consistently wary of pronouncing on Mary's corporeal resurrection; a far cry from (eastern Fathers) Pseudo-Modestus of Jerusalem, Germanus of Constantinople, Andrew of Crete, and John of Damascus. 
It will not be surprising to find in Spain, at the close of the eighth century, some Asturians directly denying Mary's Assumption -- the first to do so, as far as the evidence goes . It will [also] not be surprising to see develop in the ninth century, beside the tradition favorable to the Assumption represented by Pseudo-Augustine, another current of thought represented by Pseudo-Jerome and hostile, if not to the doctrine, at least to an unequivocal affirmation of the doctrine as somehow binding.  For the silence of the first three centuries has been broken in the West only by unambiguous affirmations which have the disadvantage of being tagged as apocryphal, or by genuinely patristic affirmations which reveal a regrettable indifference, uncertainty, or ignorance.
On the other hand, the silence is a relative thing and rather eloquent. Faller has undertaken to show that the early reticence is perfectly understandable, seeing that several more fundamental facets of Christian belief, such as the Trinity and Christology, had first to be confronted, before Mariology could claim attention.  Cayre, too, has indicated how the initial silence with respect to Mary is normal rather than surprising, for it goes back to her role in the early Church: "Her vocation was not to command, but to love and to pray, two functions that call for silence...."  The silence in question, theologians insist, does not reflect an absence of life; the life, the doctrine, is there in germ. The seed is discovered in the patristic thesis of recapitulation, the Eve-Mary parallelism proposed by St. Justin Martyr, St. Irenaeus, Tertullian, and St. Ambrose, the analogy which associates the New Eve with the New Adam in a total triumph over Satan.  The seed is there in the twin privileges of divine motherhood and deathless virginity. Insight into these mysteries would lead to increasing reverence for the sacredness of the body which knew only God, to a realization that this body could not fittingly know corruption. 
These and other seeds of an Assumption doctrine are discoverable in Western patristic thought, but it would be sheer unsupported theorizing to suppose that the patristic West recognized the seeds for what they were. As the age of the Fathers draws to a close, the West is on the point of confronting the problem of Mary's destiny on theological grounds. On this score the task of theological elaboration has not kept pace with the Eastern development. What Jouassard has concluded of the patristic world as a whole, must surely be said of the West:
(A word of caution is not impertinent here. The investigation of patristic documents might well lead the historian to the conclusion: In the first seven or eight centuries no trustworthy historical tradition on Mary's corporeal Assumption is extant, especially in the West. The conclusion is legitimate; if the historian stops there, few theological nerves will be touched. The historian's mistake would come in adding: therefore no proof from tradition can be adduced. The historical method is not the theological method, nor is historical tradition synonymous with dogmatic tradition.)
Not a few aspects of Marian theology with seeds in the early Christian West have inevitably been omitted from these pages. There is, for example, the complex, intriguing problem of the relationship between Mary and the Church; here it is Justin and Irenaeus and Tertullian, Ambrose and Augustine, who have had the initial significant insights.  There is a lovely concept of Mary's Queenship, exercised not by jurisdiction but by intercession.  There is the idea of Mary's universal Mediation, rooted in her function as Second Eve and suggested so vividly by Ambrose.  There is much more, but perhaps enough has been said in this study to insinuate that the treasures of patristic Mariology are not the legitimate plaything of aprioristic speculation, nor will they reveal themselves in their totality to unaided historical analysis. The thought of the Fathers on Our Lady will be mined in its purity only by theologians with a feeling for philology, and by philologists deeply rooted in theology.
(from "Mary in Western Patristic Thought" by Walter J. Burghardt, S.J. in Mariology edited by Juniper Carol, volume 1, pages 147-155 on the Assumption)
In the three centuries that followed Chalcedon, Mariology escaped the general decadence that enveloped theology. This anomalous situation was due in great measure to the institution of a cycle of feasts covering the principal mysteries of Our Lady's life:
These feasts provided orators and poets with the opportunity of singing the praises of the Virgin, with emphasis on her dignity as Mother of God and her role in the Redemption. Nevertheless, as Jugie has pointed out, even during these centuries theologians do not frame explicitly the question of the Immaculate Conception. They run the gamut of implicit testimonies, the major premises which logically demand the privilege in question; but it is only incidentally, almost accidentally, that a few theologians, such as Andrew of Crete and Sophronius of Jerusalem, formulate the prerogative in explicit or equivalent terms. The emphasis is on Our Lady's perpetual holiness rather than on her exemption from original sin.  As the patristic age draws to a close, Eastern Christianity can say with one voice to Our Lady: "You are all fair....and there is nothing to blame in you." 
Death and Assumption
With respect to the Assumption the significant literature in the patristic East comprises
As the evidence stands, the first explicit reference to a genuine Assumption of Our Lady occurs in Epiphanius, ca. 377 AD.
Note: Before Nicaea (325) the only overt reference to the close of Our Lady's earthly life is a phrase attributed to Origen: "With respect to the brethren of Jesus (John 2:12), there are many who ask how He had them, seeing that Mary remained a virgin until her death..." -- the passage is more significant as testimony to Mary's permanent virginity than as evidence for her death. True, her death is mentioned obliquely, as though it were self-evident; but this manner of speaking need not reflect a tradition; it may stem from lack of reflection on the dignity of God's Mother. In a word, we may conclude no more than that the author took Our Lady's death for granted. 
Epiphanius (c. >310 - 403 AD)
St. Epiphanius of Salamis, in a digression typical of his Medicine Chest against eighty heresies, is concerned to forestall a perilous accommodation of John 19:27 ("From that day the disciple took [Mary] into his home [or as his own]"). He is afraid that in the John-Mary relationship clerics may find a pseudo-justification for retaining in their homes the much-discussed virgines subintroductae. He insists that the case of Mary was guided by a wise providence, that this procedure is to be regarded as an exception to the common conduct obligatory in the way of God, and that once John had taken Mary into his home she did not remain with him any longer. And he continues:
Twelve chapters later Epiphanius returns briefly to the problem of Mary's end:
The testimony of Epiphanius is crucial for two reasons. Before Ephesus he alone deals expressly with the problem at issue; and he knows the Holy City and its traditions as few others of his time. It is the more regrettable, therefore, that his witness is so vague that several interpretations of his thought are possible. As a defensible exegesis I submit three points.
It is not difficult to see in him the first theologian of the Assumption, in the sense that he had an intuition of the mystery and was fascinated by it. 
Ephraem of Syria (c. 306 - 373 AD)
This rather conservative interpretation of Epiphanius, which emphasizes the absence of a fixed historical tradition on the final lot of Mary, is not shaken by other extant pre-Ephesus evidence, specifically that of Ephraem of Syria, Gregory of Nyssa, Severian of Gabala, and the so-called Timothy of Jerusalem. It is true, Ephraem sees Our Lady lifted on the wings of Christ and carried through the air; she has received a garmant of glory sufficient to cover the nakedness of all men; Christ has clothed her with a new garment; she has put on His grandeur and magnificence; He who is of heaven has introduced her to heaven.  Ephraem has her say:
Regrettably, Ephraem's language is too general to find in it a bodily glorification. He believes that Mary died; he maintains that she lives in glory.  More than that he does not specify. In Ephraem's works there is no express declaration of Our Lady's glorious resurrection; on this point his remarks are consistently vague. 
Gregory of Nyssa (c. 335 - 394 AD)
In an unusual passage Gregory of Nyssa compares the Virgin with other virgins, to illustrate the victory of virginity over bodily death. Ordinary virgins destroy death's power by refusing to give it new victims.
The passage is not perlucid. What Gregory has in view, however, is the triumph of Mary's Son over death. Death has approached Mary by attacking the fruit of her womb. In the assault death has been smashed, because Christ rose from the dead, escaped the tomb's corruption. Gregory neither affirms nor denies Our Lady's death or her share in her Son's triumph by a glorious resurrection. 
Severian of Gabala (d. >408 AD)
Severian of Gabala pictures Eve hearing herself constantly called a sorry, pitiful thing, while Mary each day hears herself called blessed:
Severian's thought is obscure. It may be argued that "the mother of salvation" ought herself to be utterly saved, that "the source of sensible Light" should be in the land of the living in her sensible frame, that she who is "in every way pronounced blessed" hears the felicitations with ears as well as mind, that "life in the flesh" means simply life here on earth. But Severian does not say so. He seems to assume that Mary died; he has not confronted the problem of her glorious resurrection. 
Timothy of Jerusalem (c. 400 AD)
A passage frequently adduced to bolster the testimony of Epiphanius derives from a homily on Simeon by a certain Timothy, who is styled by the best manuscripts "a priest of Jerusalem" and on internal evidence was located by Jugie toward the end of the fourth century or at the beginning of the fifth.  From the text as reconstituted by Faller we gather that
Despite the unsatisfactory state of the text, and the ambiguities inherent in the significant adjective [Greek], the conclusion seems justified that the author holds for a translation of Mary, body and soul, to a supraterrestrial region. Scholars cannot agree, however, whether the phrase "immortal to this day," (a) implies that Mary did not die, and (b) presents her immortality as a provisory, temporary thing.  The text and its problems have lost some of their pertinence and fascination ever since Capelle argued so convincingly that "Timothy of Jerusalem" is an unknown author of the Byzantine world who wrote between the sixth and eighth centuries. 
To sum up: Before Ephesus the scant evidence suggests strongly (a) that a widespread ignorance prevailed relative to Our Lady's destiny, and (b) that, save for isolated instances, Eastern Christianity had not yet confronted the problem.
Transitus Mariae literature
An intriguing corpus of literature on the final lot of Mary is formed by the apocryphal Transitus Mariae.  The genesis of these accounts is shrouded in history's mist. They apparently originated before the close of the fifth century, perhaps in Egypt, perhaps in Syria, in consequence of the stimulus given Marian devotion by the definition of the divine Maternity at Ephesus. The period of proliferation is the sixth century. At least a score of Transitus accounts are extant, in Coptic, Greek, Latin, Syriac, Arabic, Ethiopic, and Armenian. Not all are prototypes, for many are simply variations on more ancient models.
What do the Transitus Mariae stories say? In point of fact, the divergences are so pronounced that the accounts cannot be reduced to a genuine unity.
The interval between death and prodigy varies from some moments to seven months. The locale is now the Mount of Olives, now the Valley of Josaphat, now Gethsemane.
A splendid example of this literary genus lies in the fragments of a Syriac account entitled Obsequies of the Holy Virgin, which may well be the oldest of the Transitus narratives. In this account the Apostles are keeping a three-day vigil at Mary's tomb when Christ descends from heaven with Michael and sits among them:
In the second half of the fifth century, therefore, an original Syrian apocryphon, emanating perhaps from Jacobite circles, teaches explicitly the anticipated resurrection of Mary -- the oldest unmistakable affirmation. 
What is the value of these witnesses? As historical accounts of an actual event -- Mary's death, her translation, her Assumption -- by individuals who were personally present, or else were in contact with the events through unimpeachable sources, the Transitus literature is valueless.  But theologically the tales are priceless. They reveal the reaction of early Christian piety when confronted with the apparent fact of Our Lady's death; they evidence the first unequivocal solutions to the problem of Mary's destiny. The solutions, though divergent, disclose a genuinely Christian insight: it was not fitting that the body of Mary should see corruption. More importantly, the solution is given, incorruption is postulated, on theological lines: the principles of solution are the divine Maternity, Mary's unimpaired virginity, her unrivaled holiness. Finally, the more ancient of these apocrypha exercised a perceptible influence on the establishment of the Eastern feast of the Dormition or of the Migration of the Mother of God.  The feast, once established, gave rise to new Transitus accounts and occasioned the Greek homiletic literature which blossomed from the seventh to the ninth centuries -- the fairest flowering of patristic thought on the final lot of Mary. 
Greek theology seventh century and beyond
The earliest extant Byzantine discourse on the August 15th feast, the first monument of genuine Greek theology affirming the Assumption in categorical terms, is dated by Jugie at the end of the seventh century or the beginning of the eighth.
Modestus of Jerusalem (d. 634)
This Panegyric on the Falling Asleep of the Mother of God, long attributed to Modestus, Patriarch of Jerusalem (d. 634), is remarkable for its doctrinal content, its independence of the apocrypha (which it does use), its reasonable conjectures, and its repeated, unhestitating affirmation of the Assumption.  Mary died, yes:
Why did she die? "As His Mother all-holy, she followed Him...."  What happened to her body in the tomb? The Mother of God, "after childbirth ever virgin, in the grave suffered not corruption of the body that held Life, preserved by the omnipotent Saviour Christ who came forth from her."  A genuine Assumption, preceded by a glorious resurrection and postulated by the divine Maternity, is reiterated again and again:
(The expression "concorporate in incorruption" is peculiar to Modestus, is repeated several times, and means that, as the bodies of Jesus and Mary were similar on earth in passibility and mortality, so He wanted His Mother's body to resemble His in her risen state.) The same idea is summed up in a strikingly lovely sentence:
(Modestus likewise insists on Mary's mediatorial role in glory -- a common possession of Byzantine Mariology in this period. She intercedes with her Son and makes Him propitious to us.) It has been asserted -- and I incline to agree -- that Modestus' affirmation of Mary's incorruption, resurrection, and Assumption, so serene, categorical, free from all hesitation and any palliation, gives the impression that the author is not defending a disputable thesis but expounding an admitted truth. 
Germanus of Constantinople (c. 634 - 733)
Germanus, Patriarch of Constantinople in the early eighth century, is as categorical as Modestus with reference to the Assumption.  In a rather fictitious historical framework he affirms the fact of Mary's death:
Mary died (a) because her Son Himself willed to die, (b) because her nature is no different from our own, and (c) because her death was intended as confirmation of the reality of the Incarnation. She rose from the dead, was taken up to her Son, in the integrity of her human nature, because it was impossible for the vessel that had held God to be dissolved in dust.
This, Germanus implies, is what the Christian sense imperiously demands. The bodily Assumption is a consequence of the divine Maternity.
Andrew of Crete (c. 660 - 740 )
Andrew, contemporary of Germanus and Metropolitan of Gortyna on the Island of Crete, consecrated a trilogy of sermons to the Dormition. He tells the Cretans that the object of the feast is the Dormition of God's Mother, a mystery "celebrated hitherto by a few, but now lovingly honored by all."  His basic ideas on the final lot of Mary include her death, the reunion of her soul and body, her glorious entrance into heaven, and the premises which postulate such a destiny, i.e. holiness, virginity, Maternity:
John of Damascus (c. 676 - 749)
Another trilogy of sermons for the feast of the Dormition was delivered by John Damascene (of Damascus), very probably at Gethsemane on August 14th and 15th, about the year 740. Like Germanus, but with great discretion, he makes use of apocrypha, especially John of Thessalonica. With the candor of Andrew he confesses that the circumstances surrounding his account of Mary's end are conjecture or rhetoric.
As Damascene sees it, Mary dies because she is human; moreover, it is through death's crucible that mortality gives place to immortality.  More accurately still, "she yields to the law of her own Son." Though she gave life to all, as daughter of Adam she is subject to the hereditary debt; for even her Son, Life itself, did not refuse to die.  Though Homily 3 contains Damascene's clearest affirmations of Mary's glorification in soul and body, it is in Homily 2 that he enumerates, in one of the most moving of patristic texts, Our Lady's titles to the Assumption:
Two remarks are in order. First, Damascene's (Greek "there was need") seems to be more than sheer appropriateness; there is in this a certain exigence. Second, Damascene's arguments for the Assumption are derived not primarily from Scripture (which serves him rather for illustration)  and only in general from tradition.  They are drawn principally from the analogy of faith; he plays the theologian, not the exegete or historian. The Assumption is for him a postulate of Mary's other prerogatives: to some extent her virginity and holiness, but more than all else her divine Motherhood. 
At the end of the patristic period in the East the doctrine of the Assumption has reached the level of theological elaboration. It is not simply that the basic truth, Our Lady's glorification in soul and body, is accepted as indisputable by the outstanding orators of the Dormition feast, and apparently by the main body of the faithful as well. Still more significant is the fact that the Assumption is postulated on theological premises.  Not that the whole structure of Assumption theology, as expounded in early Byzantine homiletic literature, will be recognized as solid by succeeding centuries; modern doubts on Mary's death are a case in point. But the heart of the matter has been touched; the task of the future will be to sift incontestable Christian doctrine from probable opinion and illegitimate speculation. 
(from "Mary in Eastern Patristic Thought" by Walter J. Burghardt, S.J. in Mariology edited by Juniper Carol, volume 2, pages 138-153 on the Assumption)
Says who? Pius XII states the dogma is based on the Sacred Writings (Scripture): "All these proofs and considerations of the holy Fathers and the theologians are based upon the Sacred Writings as their ultimate foundation." (Pius XII, Munificentissimus Deus)
And not "amazing" if one considers in Scripture that Enoch and Elijah were "assumed" to heaven, body and soul; and perhaps Moses if we interpret Jude's mention with the apocryphal literature (Assumption or Testament of Moses) as an "assumption" of the body of Moses. Jesus ascended to heaven on his own power, body and soul, and it is only fitting that His own Mother, the holy Mother of God, would also not see corruption. All true Christians will eventually be sinless and bodily assumed (resurrected and glorified) in heaven. The Blessed Virgin Mary, being a type of the Church as all the Fathers taught, is an example of the perfected Christian in heaven (cf. the holy, stainless, blameless Church mentioned in Ephesians 5:25-33; Heb 12:22ff; Rev 21:1ff). Mary received that perfected state (in soul and body) before the rest of Christ's Church by the grace of God.
As for biblical evidence for the belief, Pius XII refers to several texts and Marian types: the holy Ark of the Covenant; Psalm 132(131):8; Psalm 45(44):10-14; Song of Songs 3:6; 4:8; 6:9; Rev 12:1ff (cf. 11:19); Luke 1:28. If the "Ark" of Psalm 132:8 or the "Woman" of Revelation 12 is the Blessed Mary, then the Scriptures directly "prove" the Assumption. But scholars interpret these texts different ways. As Pius XII explained, the Church Fathers were "rather free in their use of events and expressions" taken from Scripture. But neither Pius XII nor the Fathers ignored the Scriptures when speaking of Mary's Assumption into heaven:
The Scriptures are the ultimate theological foundation for the dogma, according to Pius XII.
What Catholic historians admit (see Burghardt's articles above) is that the Fathers are "silent" on the final lot of Mary through the 4th century. And some Catholic theologians argue this silence is "relative," and "was inevitable and is actually eloquent" (Carol Mariology, volume 1, page 147-148). The Church had to decide the doctrines of Christology and the Holy Trinity before the doctrines of Mariology could develop and flourish. This theological development occurred shortly after the Councils of Ephesus (431) and Chalcedon (451) which declared Mary Theotokos (Mother of God or God-bearer). This is when the so-called Transitus literature "exploded" unto the scene. Pius XII also mentions an indirect historical proof of the Assumption: "Finally, since the Church has never looked for the bodily relics of the Blessed Virgin nor proposed them for the veneration of the people, we have a proof on the order of a sensible experience." (Munificentissimus Deus)
As a reminder for sola scriptura (Scripture alone) believers, the 27-book New Testament canon itself wasn't recognized by the Catholic Church until the late fourth century as well (first with St. Athanasius, 367 AD, then later Councils of Hippo/Carthage in 393/397/419 AD, and Popes Boniface I and Innocent I confirmed this same canon).
They did not originate "from one source." Both Shoemaker (Ancient Traditions of the Virgin Mary's Dormition and Assumption) and Burghardt (Carol's Mariology articles above) tell us there are many strands of these Transitus traditions, and that the beliefs and traditions existed prior to the literature.
Shoemaker in fact lays out several different types of these Transitus stories: the "Palm of the Tree of Life" traditions, the "Bethlehem" traditions, the Coptic traditions, "Atypical" traditions, "Late Apostle" traditions, traditions of Constantinople and Ephesus (Shoemaker, page 32ff).
Juniper Carol does not state that. Fr. Burghardt, who wrote the articles on the western and eastern Fathers, does not use the words "complete fabrication" or even "fabrication." What he says is although they are "valueless" as strict history, they are nonetheless "significant," and "priceless" both historically and theologically. These Transitus accounts reveal a genuine Christian insight that it was not fitting that the body of Mary should see corruption. This argument is the same made on theological lines by the Fathers, Catholic theologians, and Pius XII in his definition of the Assumption.
Again, Fr. Burghardt does not say the "real source" of the Assumption is the Transitus. He says the "first express [written] witness in the West" to the Assumption is from the late fifth-century Transitus. In the East we have the statements in the fourth century from St. Epiphanius of Salamis that perhaps (he is unsure about the death or final lot of Mary): "her holy body from which light shone forth for all the world, dwells among those who enjoy the repose of the blessed" (Panarion 78:23, 377 AD; PG 42:737, translation by Fr. Luigi Gambero). Fr. Burghardt also implies Christians believed the doctrine prior to the literature.
Again, the belief was already in place, the Transitus reflected the belief of pious Christians. As Fr. Mateo notes, the supposed "historical uselessness" of the apocrypha or Transitus literature is irrelevant since Pius XII made no mention of this material in his definition. He writes in Refuting the Attack on Mary: "The Assumption is a theological datum and must be proved or disproved on theological, not historical grounds..." And those are the grounds that the early Fathers used for their belief in the Assumption: "...Modestus, Germanus, Andrew, and Damascene...primary reasons for asserting an Assumption of Mary are not pseudo-historical but theological..." (Carol Mariology, volume 2, page 152, note 310). And Burghardt: "It is not simply that the basic truth, Our Lady's glorification in soul and body, is accepted as indisputable by the outstanding orators of the Dormition feast, and apparently by the main body of the faithful as well. Still more significant is the fact that the Assumption is postulated on theological premises." (Carol Mariology, volume 2, page 152, see above, emphasis added)
This has already been refuted above. The objection confuses the Transitus "literature" with the Assumption teaching. The mistake is suggesting the Assumption itself was ever condemned, even if some of the Transitus literature was. A true belief can be contained in non-canonical or apocryphal material (e.g. the NT book of Jude quotes the apocryphal Book of Enoch). The doctrine of the Assumption was believed quite explicitly from the 6th and 7th century forward by noted saints and doctors of the Catholic Church, east and west: St. Gregory of Tours, St. John Damascene, St. Germanus of Constantinople, St. Andrew of Crete, Amadeus [bishop of Lausarme], St. Anthony of Padua, St. Albert the Great, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Bonaventure, St. Bernardine of Siena, St. Robert Bellarmine, St. Francis of Sales, St. Alphonsus, St. Peter Canisius, etc. They weren't aware the belief was supposedly rejected by a Pope in the fifth century. According to Fr. Burghardt, the first Christians to dispute the Assumption were some "Asturians" from Spain in the eighth century, "the first to do so, as far as the evidence goes." (Carol Mariology, volume 1, page 153).
There is a single Transitus writing which was labeled "apocryphus" by (supposedly) "Pope Gelasius" in the late fifth century. The "Pope Gelasian Decree" or Decretum Gelasianum de Libris Recipiendis et non Recipiendis is online here: (ENGLISH) (ENGLISH) (LATIN)
Read it for yourself. Is the Assumption of Mary itself anywhere condemned, rejected, or declared heretical in this writing? The answer is NO. What we have here is a delineation of the OT and NT canonical books from the apocryphal books, such as
And so on.... Also there is indeed one named "the book which is called the Assumption of holy Mary -- apocryphus"
Again, the Assumption itself is not condemned, only the book with that particular title is labeled "apocryphus." The doctrine of the Assumption is nowhere mentioned. The Gelasian decree has nothing to do with Mariology or the Assumption. It simply concerns the list of correct canonical vs. non-canonical writings received by the Church, with various heretics condemned at the end. That's it. There is no mention of this in Carol's Mariology as even relevant to the Assumption teaching, which it is not. If there was a writing that contained some apocryphal stories about Jesus, and that writing was titled "The Ascension of Jesus" -- we would not reject the Ascension because of this. As Catholic apologist Art Sippo notes: "The mere fact that a book supporting the Assumption is declared to be a pious fiction does not mean that the Assumption is itself denied. The Catholic Legion of Decency condemned the film 'King of Kings' in 1961 because of its Protestant biases. Did that mean that it condemned the story of Christ? No, just that particular telling of it." (from Patrick Madrid's Envoy Magazine discussion boards, Aug 2007).
Speaking of "apocryphal" : "The proof that the document is not a real Decretal of Gelasius or any other Pope is almost as decisive, if not quite so startling....Thus these famous Lists represent no Papal ordinance, but are the production of an anonymous scholar of the sixth century. He must have been a fairly well-read man for that time and shews a good acquaintance with the writings of St Jerome, but v. Dobschütz does not believe that he had read, or even seen, most of the 'Apocryphal' books which he condemns..." (F. C. Burkitt, Journal of Theological Studies 14 , pages 469-471, on The Decretum Gelasianum, see this short commentary)
So the "Decree of Gelasius" might not be authored by Pope Gelasius. Shoemaker in his recent book on the Assumption traditions, agrees it is NOT Pope Gelasius (see his book, page 17, note 27) : "Although these theologians invest the decree with Papal authority, its author was not Pope Gelasius, but an otherwise unknown Christian of sixth-century Gaul." (he then notes Schneemelcher, New Testament Apocrypha, and Ernst von Dobschutz, Das Decretum Gelasianum, from 1912, also Jugie, La Mort, p. 167-171).
False. The grounds are both biblical and theological (see above). The Catholic Church, through the Papacy of Pius XII, only put its final and infallible "stamp of approval" after centuries of Marian development and theological reflection by the Fathers, Doctors, Popes, and Catholic faithful who already believed the doctrine for over a thousand years. The Orthodox, who split with Catholics in the 11th century, also clearly affirm the dogma. The theological argument from Pius XII: "She, by an entirely unique privilege, completely overcame sin by her Immaculate Conception, and as a result she was not subject to the law of remaining in the corruption of the grave, and she did not have to wait until the end of time for the redemption of her body." The Assumption follows from the complete sinlessness (Immaculate Conception) of the Mother of God. The Greek Fathers believed the Assumption based on Mary as Theotokos, her perpetual virginity, and her all-holiness (Panagia or All-Holy One).
To summarize Pius XII's encyclical on the definition:
Pius XII simply perfected the doctrine by making it a Catholic dogma (de fide) in 1950. I'll conclude my answer to these anti-Catholic objections with Shoemaker's own conclusion to his scholarly book on the Assumption:
NOTES (some footnotes abbreviated for brevity)
 AAS (Acta apostolicae sedis [Vatican City, 1909- ]), Vol 45, 1953, p. 568.  ibid, p. 583.  ibid, Vol 42, 1950, p. 769. English of the NCWC trans, No. 44, also Palmer, p. 113.  AAS, Vol 42, 1950, p. 756, NCWC trans No. 12, cf. Bishop Wright, "The Dogma of the Assumption" in The American Eccl Review, Vol 124, 1951, p. 81-96.  D.E., 530.  AAS, Vol 42, 1950, p. 757; NCWC, No. 13.  ibid, p. 758.  ibid, p. 758.  ibid, p. 760.  This prayer now occurs as a Collect in the Assumption Mass of the Dominican, Carmelite, and other rites.  AAS, Vol 42, 1950, p. 760.  G. Geenen, OP, L'Assumption et les Souverains Pontifes... in Angelicum, Vol 17, 1950, p. 327-355. Fr. Geenen has gathered his facts from M. Jugie, AA, La Mort et l'Assomption de la Sainte Vierge (1944).  William O'Shea, SS, "The History of the Feast of the Assumption," in The Thomist, Vol 14, 1951, p. 127-128.  quoted in Munificentissimus Deus, AAS, Vol 42, 1950, p. 768.  AAS, Vol 42, 1950, p. 754. On the relationship between the IC and the Assumption, cf. Roschini, "The Assumption and the Immaculate Conception," in The Thomist, Vol 14, 1951, p. 59-71; and K. Healy, O.Carm., "The Assumption among Mary's Privileges," ibid, p. 77-81.  Geenen, p. 337-338; Healy, p. 78.  AAS, Vol 42, 1950, p. 755.  Tondini, 158; Lawler, 116 (The Rosary of Mary, ed. Wm. Lawler, OP (1944).  Geenen, p. 339.  Unger, Mary Mediatrix, p. 16-17.  AAS, Vol 35, 1943, p. 247-248. There is also a connection between the doctrine of the Immaculate Heart, to which the Pope here refers, and the bodily Assumption, for Our Lady's Most Pure Heart is her physical heart. Cf. Remigius De Roo, Regina in Coelum Assumpta, in Les Tracts Marials, Nos. 37-38, 1953.  AAS, Vol 42, 1950, p. 756.  ibid, p. 782-783.  ibid, p. 756.  ibid, p. 769.  ibid, p. 754, 758.  ibid, p. 763.  ibid, p. 769-770.
 M. Jugie, La mort et l'Assomption de la sainte Vierge (1944).  G. Jouassard, L'Assumption corporelle de la sainte Vierge et la patristique in Assomption de Marie (Paris, 1949), p. 102.  O. Faller, De priorum saeculorum silentio circa Assumptionem b. Mariae Virginis (Rome, 1946), p. 129.  Epiphanius, Panarion, haer. 78, cap. 23. Cf. Jugie, p. 77-81; Faller, p. 33-43; Altaner in Theologische Revue, Vol 44, 1948, p. 131-133.  Tychonius view is transmitted by Cassiodorus, Complexiones in Apocalypsin, n. 16, PL 70:1411.  Ambrose, Exposit evang secun Lucam, lib 2, n. 61.  Ambrose, De instit virg, cap 7, n. 49; PL 16:333.  Ambrose, De interpell lob et David, lib I, cap 7, n. 25.  Paulinus, Epist 50, n. 17-18. Same in Augustine, Epist 121.  Augustine, Epist 149, n. 33.  Augustine, In evang Ioannis, tr 8, n. 9, PL 35:1456; De catechiz rudibus, cap 22, n. 40, PL 40:339; Enarratio in ps 34, Serm 2, n. 3, PL 36:335.  Altaner, Theologische Revue, Vol 44, 1948, p. 133-134.
 The Transitus Mariae literature attempts to fill up the lacunae of the canonical books on the life, death, and final lot of Mary. Perhaps the oldest is a fifth-century Syriac Transitus, which made its way into the West, probably in a Latin translation, and caused such scandal that it was listed in the books proscribed by the Decretum Gelasianum (so-called Decree of Pope Gelasius) at the beginning of the sixth century. cf. A. Thiel, Epistolae Romanorum Pontificum genuinae, Vol 1, 1868, p. 465; A.C. Rush, "Assumption Theology in the Transitus Mariae," in The American Eccl Review, Vol 123, 1950, p. 93-110, esp 101. Jugie would date it about 550, while Faller argues for the fourth century AD. For the text, see Tischendorff, Apocalypses apocryphae (Leipzig, 1866), p. 124-136, English trans by M.R. James, The Apocryphal NT (Oxford, 1924), p. 209-216.
 Pseudo-Melito, Transitus beatae Mariae, cap 15, n. 2ff; Tischendorf, p. 134ff.  Gregory of Tours, Lib 1 miraculorum: In gloria martyrum, cap 4, PL 71:708; on the date, W.C. McDermott, Gregory of Tours: Selections (1949), p. 9; on fifth-century Syriac Transitus, which Jugie regards as oldest, cf. W. Wright, Contrib to Apoc Lit of NT (1865), p. 46f; Jugie and Altaner believe it likely Gregory borrowed from an early Latin translation.  Gregory, cap. 9; PL 71:713.  Jouassard, L'Assomption corporelle, p. 111-112.  (translated by Edwin [Contarini], Envoy Magazine boards), the lines are found in Miscellanea, lib 3, cap 7, PL 88:282; the poem belongs before 576, there is some doubt as to authorship, but H. Weisweiler, in Scholastik, Vol 28, 1953, p. 520.  Isidore, De ortu et obitu patrum, cap 67, n. 112, PL 83:148-49. Later redaction presents the existence of the Jerusalem tomb as certain, PL 83:1285-1286.  Adamnan, De locis sacris, lib 1, cap 12.  Bede, Liber de locis sanetis, cap 2 & 5.  Bede, Liber retractationis in Actus apostol, cap 8, PL 92:1014-1015.  Jugie, p. 272-274.  correspondence between Bishop Ascarius and his friend, Tuscaredus, PL 99:1233-1235. The Asturians believed Mary died like anyone else, but her body was still in the tomb awaiting resurrection; the thesis scandalized Ascarius; Tuscaredus replied that we have no evidence of a violent death, or any death. It would seem Tuscaredus believed in Mary's glorious immortality.  Pseudo-Jerome, Epist 9, Ad Paulam et Eustoch de assump BMV, n. 2, PL 30:127-128; Pseudo-Augustine, De assump BMV, n. 2-9, PL 40:1143-1148; on authorship cf. Jugie, p. 278, 290-291.  Faller, p. 69-76.  F. Cayre, L'Assomption aux quatre premiers... in Studia Mariana, Vol 4 (1948), p. 135ff.  C.F. De Vine, "The Fathers of the Church and the Assumption," in Vers le dogma de l'Assomption, p. 408-410.  Faller has developed these and other principles at length, p. 77-128.  Jouassard, L'Assomption corporelle, p. 115-116; W.J. Burghardt, "The Catholic Concept of Tradition in the Light of Modern Theological Thought," in Proceedings of the Sixth Annual Convention (Catholic Theological Society of America, 1951), p. 73-75.  A. Muller, Ecclesia-Maria: Die Einheit Marias und der Kirche (1951); G. Montague, "The Concept of Mary and the Church in the Fathers," in The American Eccl Review, Vol 123, 1950, p. 331-337; K. Dalahaye, Maria, Typus der Kirche, in Wissen & Weis Vol 12, 1949, p. 79-92.  H. Barre, La royaute de Maria pendant les neuf premiers siecles, in Recherches de science religieuse, Vol 29, 1939, p. 129-162, 303-334; A. Luis, La realeza Patristic Period, in Marian Studies, Vol 4, 1953, p. 82-108.  the articles of Bover in a previous note.
 Jugie, p. 95-146; Jouassard, Marie a travers la patristique, p. 139-147.  Andrew of Crete, Oratio 4: In nativ b. Mariae, PG 97:872.  The authenticity of the passage is suspect.  Epiphanius, Panarion haer 78, n. 10-11;  ibid, n. 23.  see same solution of M. Jugie, Le mort et l'Assomption de la sainte Vierge (1944), p. 77-81; a more benign interpretation is offered by O. Faller, De priorum saeculorum silentio circa Assumptionem b. Mariae virginis (1946), p. 33-43.  F. Cayre, L'Assomption aux quatre premiers... in Studia Mariana, Vol 4 (1948), p. 144-145.  Ephraem, De nativitate domini sermo 12, 11, 4; Opera omnia syriace et latine, Vol 2, p. 415.  Ephraem, Sermo 1 de diversis; Opera omnia, Vol 3, p. 600; Jugie finds this sentence an early patristic idea which located the temporary abode of just souls in an earthly paradise, cf. La mort, p. 60.  Ephraem, Hymni de beata Maria, 15, n. 2.  Ephraem, Sedra de probis et iustis.  Gregory of Nyssa, De virginitate, cap 14 (13); Cavarnos, p. 306.  Jugie, La mort, p. 63.  Severian of Gabala, In mundi creationem oratio 6, n. 10, PG 56:498.  Jugie, La mort, p. 64-65.  ibid, p. 73-74;  In prophetam Simeonem, ed. Faller, p. 26, PG 86:245.  For two well-reasoned interpretations: Jugie, La mort, p. 74-76; and Faller, p. 30-31.  B. Capelle, Les homelies liturgiques du pretendu Timothee de Jerusalem, in Ephemerides Liturgicae, Vol 63, 1949, p. 5-26; Jugie considers Timothy a contemporary of Epiphanius.  Jugie, La mort, p. 101-171; A.C. Rush, "The Assumption in the Apocrypha," in The American Eccl Review, Vol 116, 1947, p. 5-31; "Assumption Theology in the Transitus Mariae," ibid, Vol 123, 1950, p. 93-110.  Obsequies of the Holy Virgin, W. Wright, Contrib to Apoc Lit of NT (1865), p. 46f; on dates, Jugie, La mort, p. 107-109.
 Another pertinent but controverted document is in John Damascene's Hom 2 in dormit Mariae where an unknown author has Juvenal, Archbishop of Jerusalem, narrate at the time of Chalcedon what he has learned about Mary's passing "from an ancient and utterly unerring tradition." This embraces her death, the arrival of the Apostles, the vision of angels, the commitment of Mary's soul to God's hands, the burial in Gethsemane, the discovery after three days of a coffin empty save for burial shrouds, the Apostles' conclusion that Christ wanted to honor His Mother's immaculate body "with incorruption and transposition before the common, universal resurrection." The Historia of which this is an exract has not been recovered. Many scholars consider the extract an interpolation in Damascene's homily. Euthymiaca historia, lib 3, cap 40, in John Damascene's Hom 2 in dormit Mariae, n. 18, PG 96:748-752; Jugie calls the Juvenal narration sheer legend and insists it should not be dated much before 890, cf. La mort, p. 160-167; while Gordillo follows Kekelidze, Abel, Baldi in admitting its historicity, pointing to the temperate narrative and its similarity to Epiphanius' approach, cf. Mariologia orientalis (Rome, 1954), p. 222, note 45.
 Altaner: "...no tradition underlies the Transitus which is to be taken seriously from a historical point of view...", col 135.  The influence of the apocrypha is evident in a pastoral letter, The Dormition of Our Lady (c. 620) in which John, Archbishop of Thessalonica, introduced the Dormition feast into his diocese shortly after Emperor Maurice prescribed it for the Empire; cf. Jugie, Patrologia Orientalis, Vol 19, 1926, p. 344-438. Rest of long footnote omitted.  According to Jugie, the first traces of a special solemnity that makes express mention of Mary's death and Assumption do not go back beyond the second half of the sixth century. In many churches, however, this feast of the Dormition was an outgrowth of the primitive Marian feast, the Commemoration of the Blessed Mary, which celebrated in general fashion Mary's entry into the Church Triumphant. Rest of long footnote omitted.
 Encomium in dormitionem sanct dominae nostrae semp virginis Mariae, PG 86:3277-3312; on authorship, Jugie, La mort, p. 215-218; L. Carli, 1940, p. 387.  Encomium, n. 11, PG 86:3308;  ibid, n. 12.  ibid, n. 7, PG 86:3293.  ibid, n. 14, PG 86:3312; cf. Jugie, La mort, p. 222.  ibid, n. 5-6, PG 86:3289, 3292-3293.  Jugie, La mort, p. 223.  The three homilies in PG 98:340-372 are actually but two, the first two are two parts of one homily.  Germanus, Hom 3 in dormit, PG 98:368.  Germanus, Hom 1 in dormit, PG 98:348.  Andrew of Crete, Hom 2 in dormit, PG 97:1072; order of first two homilies are reversed.  ibid, Hom 1, PG 97:1080-1; Rest of footnote omitted.  John Damascene, Hom 3 in dormit Mariae, n. 2-3, PG 96:753-757.  ibid, Hom 1, n. 2, PG 96:725.  ibid, Hom 2, n. 14, PG 96:740-741.  ibid, Hom 2, n. 2, PG 96:724.  ibid, Hom 2, n. 4, PG 96:729.  Mention should be made of Cosmas Vestitor, an orator of moderate ability, who apparently lived in Constantinople c. 750 AD, whose four discourses on the Dormition reveal an Assumption theology remarkably sound. Rest of footnote omitted.
 R.L.P. Milburn, Early Christian Interpretations of History (1952) devotes an Appendix and part of a chapter on the historical background of the Assumption, p. 134-141, 161-192. There is "no means of disproving the doctrine of the Assumption, for, in the absence of historical data, it is not given to mankind lightly to confine the power of a God 'whose judgments are unsearchable and whose ways are past finding out...' " (p. 139). He is less than fair as an historian, however, to Modestus, Germanus, Andrew, and Damascene when he does not reveal that their primary reasons for asserting an Assumption of Mary are not pseudo-historical but theological. Rest of long footnote omitted.  see the splendid brief survey of the patristic period by G. Jouassard, L'Assomption corporelle de la sainte Vierge et la patristique, in Assomption de Maria (Paris, 1949), p. 99-117.
Juniper Carol, editor, Mariology, 3 volumes (1955-1961)
FEAST OF THE ASSUMPTION -- AUGUST 15, 2007
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