"Maria mater Domini": What is the history of the three-word phrase?
Posted: Sun Feb 14, 2021 5:08 am
The three-word Latin phrase "Maria mater Domini" was not common before its appearance in Pseudo-Papias Fragment X, but I have found one additional usage and it is significantly different.
Two lists of Marys headed by the phrase "Maria mater Domini":
One that allows for the possibility that "Mary mother of the Lord" was also mother of "James brother of the Lord"
and one that explicitly eliminates that possibility.
From Pseudo-Papias Fragment X
Attributed to Papias of Lombardy (1040s–1060s) by JB Lightfoot.
Mary the mother of the Lord.
Mary the wife of Cleophas or Alphaeus,
who was the mother of James the bishop and apostle, and of Simon and Thaddeus, and of one Joseph.
Mary Salome, wife of Zebedee, mother of John the evangelist and James.
‘Maria mater Domini:
Maria Cleophae, sive Alphei uxor,
quae fuit mater Jacobi episcopi et apostolic et Symonis et Thadei et cujusdam Joseph:
Maria Salome uxor Zebedei mater Joannis evangelistae et Jacobi:
http://www.textexcavation.com/papias.html
From Homilies of Aelfric c. 955 – c. 1010
Maria mater Domini ,
et Maria mater Jacobi , fratris Domini ,
et Maria [ mater Jacobi ] fratris Joannis evangelistä ,
https://www.google.com/search?safe=acti ... nt=gws-wiz
Unlike the Pseudo-Papias list, the list from Homilies of Aelfric distinguishes Mary "mother of the Lord" from "Mary mother of James, brother of the Lord" (Jacobum fratrem Domini Vulgate Galatians 1:12).
Although recorded later, I think Fragment X preserved a more ancient list--A list that fails to eliminate the possibility that James, "brother of the Lord" might have been another uterine son of Mary, "mother of the Lord."
Thoughts?
Two lists of Marys headed by the phrase "Maria mater Domini":
One that allows for the possibility that "Mary mother of the Lord" was also mother of "James brother of the Lord"
and one that explicitly eliminates that possibility.
From Pseudo-Papias Fragment X
Attributed to Papias of Lombardy (1040s–1060s) by JB Lightfoot.
Mary the mother of the Lord.
Mary the wife of Cleophas or Alphaeus,
who was the mother of James the bishop and apostle, and of Simon and Thaddeus, and of one Joseph.
Mary Salome, wife of Zebedee, mother of John the evangelist and James.
‘Maria mater Domini:
Maria Cleophae, sive Alphei uxor,
quae fuit mater Jacobi episcopi et apostolic et Symonis et Thadei et cujusdam Joseph:
Maria Salome uxor Zebedei mater Joannis evangelistae et Jacobi:
http://www.textexcavation.com/papias.html
From Homilies of Aelfric c. 955 – c. 1010
Maria mater Domini ,
et Maria mater Jacobi , fratris Domini ,
et Maria [ mater Jacobi ] fratris Joannis evangelistä ,
https://www.google.com/search?safe=acti ... nt=gws-wiz
Unlike the Pseudo-Papias list, the list from Homilies of Aelfric distinguishes Mary "mother of the Lord" from "Mary mother of James, brother of the Lord" (Jacobum fratrem Domini Vulgate Galatians 1:12).
Although recorded later, I think Fragment X preserved a more ancient list--A list that fails to eliminate the possibility that James, "brother of the Lord" might have been another uterine son of Mary, "mother of the Lord."
Thoughts?