Altlutheraner

I have previously argued that there is nothing in the Smalcald Articles that necessitates believing in the semper virgo. However, I also said in that article that I would never “dare to assert that, according to Scripture, the Virgin Mary must have had children other than Jesus.” But I said that I would “let it remain an open question, as Scripture does.” This attitude which I take towards this curious question is the same that the fathers of the Missouri Synod took. As proof of this, I present F. Pieper’s section in his Christliche Dogmatik (Vol. I, pp. 366 ff.) on the semper virgo:

Here also the semper virgo is to be addressed, that is, the question whether Mary, after having become the mother of the Savior of the world as a virgo through the action of the Holy Spirit, had now become the mother of other children while still married to Joseph. The old Church answered the question with a No. So did Luther and the Lutheran teachers. The more recent theologians are divided. Otherwise, if Christology is orthodox with a theologian, he will not yet be counted among heretics because he gives Mary other bodily children after the birth of the Son of God. But it is to be firmly rejected when those who advocate bodily brothers vote for a sharpened “exegetical conscience” and look down somewhat disparagingly on those who take the opposite view. . . . One can have other reasons for wanting to give Mary other bodily children besides Christ. But a proof from the Scriptures cannot be given for this. Least of all from the ἕως οὗ, Matt. 1:25, and the πρωτότοκος, Luke 2:7. But also not from the Scriptures in which “brothers” and “sisters” of Christ are mentioned.

Pieper also has a footnote at the end of this paragraph, which reads as follows:

Matt. 12:46 ff.; 13:55 f.; Joh. 2:12; 7:3 ff.; Gal. 1:19 — Matt. 13:55: “Is not this one the son of the carpenter? Is not His mother’s name Mary? And His brothers Jacob and Joses (Jospeh) and Simon and Judas? And His sisters, are they not all with us?” The question now is whether the “exegetical conscience” leads us to understand here by “brothers” and “sisters” bodily brothers and sisters. The principle that every word should be taken first in its proper and first meaning is correct. But the same applies to the word “son” in the text: “Is He not the carpenter’s son (νίός)?” Therefore, all Anti-Ebionites, because they understand by νίός in this passage not a natural son but an adopted son, can without all exegetical problems of conscience also include the adjacent αδελφοί and άδελφαί as adopted brothers and sisters. In the same way they also understand “father” as an adoptive father in the words Luke 2:48: “Behold, Your father and I have sought You anxiously.” If one objects that Scripture itself offers this definition of “son” and “father,” it should be pointed out that the same is the case with regard to the “brothers.” Gal. 1:19, the apostle James is called “the brother of the Lord,” Ἰάκωβον τὸν ἀδελφὸν. But the apostle James (minor) is not a son of Joseph but of Alphaeus according to the apostles (Matt. 10:3), Ἰάκωβος ὁ τοῦ Ἁλφαίου. Those who nevertheless want to give bodily brothers to Christ must resort to very dubious “exegetical means.” They have to claim that the James mentioned in Gal. 1:19 does not belong to the apostles at all. The words: “I saw not another of the apostles but James the brother of the Lord” are to be interpreted as follows: “I saw not another apostle, but I saw James the brother of the Lord.” Fritzsche refers to a “notus Graecismus” (Ev. Matt., p. 482). Meyer rejects this. According to Gal. 1:19, one has to grant James, the “brother of the Lord,” the predicate “apostle”; only he was an apostle in a broader sense and therefore not identical with the son of Alphaeus in the list of apostles. But that Meyer himself does not trust this assertion is shown by the fact that he finally falls back on the “firstborn” (Matt. 1:25; Luke 2:7) to prove the bodily brotherhood.

It has been further objected that none of the brothers of the Lord, not even the one mentioned in Gal. 1:19, could have belonged to the twelve apostles, because it says in John 7:5: “Even His brothers did not believe in Him.” It also seems to Dummelow to be an “established” fact, “that none of the brothers were included among the twelve apostles.” Only in Matthew 17:17 Christ also calls the twelve an “unbelieving and perverse generation,” and in v. 20 He explicitly attributes “unbelief” (ἄπιστος) to them (see Bengel and Meyer). Just as here with the twelve only relative unbelief is meant, namely weakness of faith with regard to the healing of the lunatic, so also by the context John 7:5 is expressed what the unbelief of the brothers Jesus consisted in, namely in their dissatisfaction with the fact that Christ did not want to go to Jerusalem in a parade of feasts. In short, the safest thing to do is to make the apostle James, called in Gal. 1:19 a brother of the Lord, be identical with the apostle James, called in Matt. 10:3 a son of Alphaeus. One will have to keep with Chemnitz who (l. c.) following Jerome comes to the result: Mariam post partum (Matt. 1:25) aut cum Ioseph concubuisse aut filios ex ipso sustulisse non credimus, quia non legimus, namely in the Scriptures.

According to one of the old traditions (cf. Eusebius III, 11 according to Hegesippus), the family relationship of the brothers to Jesus is as follows: Alphaeus (Cleophas) was a brother of Joseph, the foster father of Jesus. Alphaeus died early, and Joseph took the family to himself by adopting the children. Thus the children of Alphaeus became Jesus’ adoptive brothers, His brothers par excellence in the legal sense. As Jesus Himself is called in Matt. 13:55 Joseph’s son, although He was admittedly only an adopted son, so are James, Joseph etc., brothers of Jesus, even though they were only adopted brothers. The fact that adopted brothers are called brothers par excellence not only corresponds to the “Jewish use of language,” but is still a common custom in America and elsewhere. . . .

I have always advised not to spend much time and energy on the discussion of the question. But as has already been noted, it is to be firmly rejected when those who advocate bodily brothers try to give the impression that they represent the more exact view of history and exegesis. Such behavior lacks justification.