Book Note: The Book of Mary by Michael P. Closs

March 16, 2017 by Tony

Michael P. Closs. The Book of Mary: A Commentary on the Protevangelium of James. Victoria, BC: Friesen Press, 2016.

This self-published commentary by retired University of Ottawa professor Michael Closs is a welcome tool for study of Prot. Jas., as there are few other commentaries available on the text—indeed, there are few available on any apocryphal texts! It is presented as a refutation of Émile Amann’s classic study, Le Protévangile de Jacques et ses remaniements latins: Introduction, textes, traduction et commentaire (1910). Closs opens page 1 with the statement: “This commentary will show that Amann’s work is seriously flawed and that later assessments of the Protevangelium are equally incorrect. The Protevangelium is a very different type of document than has been envisaged and its contents shed light on the earliest theological developments in marian dogma.” Closs claims instead that, “the intent of the author is to write a theological narrative with the goal of understanding Mary in relationship to her son. Its purpose is not so much to defend Mary as to reveal who she is, given that she is the mother of Jesus” (8).

The study works through the text chapter-by-chapter in English, providing along the way a paraphrase of Amann’s commentary with critique and additional comments, and his own explanatory notes. The book’s layout is a model of clarity, with HB/OT parallels in yellow callouts, NT in pink, patristic authors in green, rabbinic texts in orange, and large quotations from scholars in blue. Closs’s notes at …

Cursing in the Apocryphal Acts of the Apostles

March 16, 2017 by Tony

I will be presenting a paper at the Spring 2017 meeting of the Westar Institute next week (March 22-25) in sunny Santa Rosa, California (further information HERE). The paper, “Cursing and the Apostle: The Fight for Authority in Early Christianity,” will be read during the Christianity Seminar (papers available online HERE). It features a lengthy introduction on cursing in the ancient world, including the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament. The final section covers cursing in the canonical Acts and Paul’s letters and then turns to the apocryphal acts. For those interested in Christian Apocrypha (and why else would you be here?), I have excerpted here, with some changes, the portion of the paper focusing on Acts and apocryphal acts.

The canonical book of Acts is a treasure trove of curse stories. Several of these are perpetrated by God: the fatal punishment of Judas (Acts 1:15–20), the death of Herod Agrippa (12:20–23; cf. Josephus, Ant. 19.8.2, where Agrippa’s death is also seen as divine retribution), and the blinding of Paul (9:3–9). In two other curse stories, an apostle is given an active role. The first of these is the story of Ananias and Sapphira (5:1–11; influenced perhaps by the story of Achan who misappropriated what had been dedicated to God and was killed along with his family; see Josh 7:1–26). As the story goes, the community in Jerusalem shares its resources so that “no one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned was held in …