— ca. 100 A.D., Death of Saint John, the last of the Apostles —
ca. 107 A.D., Saint Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, Disciple of the Apostle John, Letter to the Ephesians
— Virginity before birth —
19:1 The virginity of Mary, her giving birth, and also the death of the Lord, were hidden from the prince of this world:—three mysteries loudly proclaimed, but wrought in the silence of God.
ca. 125 A.D., Aristides of Athens, Apology
— Virginity before birth; sinlessness; incorruptibility —
15 He was born of a holy Virgin without seed of man, and took flesh without defilement.
ca. 125 A.D., Letter to Diognetus
— Virginity before birth; New Eve (incorruptibility) —
12:7-9 Let your heart be knowledge, and your life the true teaching that your heart contains. If you bear the tree of this teaching and pluck its fruit, you will always be gathering in the things that are desirable in the sight of God, things that the serpent cannot touch and deceit cannot defile. Then Eve is not seduced, but a Virgin is found trustworthy.
ca. 155 A.D., Saint Justin the Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho the Jew
— Virginity before birth; New Eve (freedom from original sin; incorruptibility) —
100 [Justin:] “[Jesus] became Man by the Virgin so that the course which was taken by disobedience in the beginning through the agency of the serpent, might be also the very course by which it would be put down. For Eve, a virgin and undefiled, conceived the word of the serpent, and bore disobedience and death. But the Virgin Mary received faith and joy when the angel Gabriel announced to her the glad tidings that the Spirit of the Lord would come upon her and the power of the Most High would overshadow her, for which reason the Holy One being born of her is the Son of God. And she replied: ‘Be it done unto me according to thy word’ (Lk. 1:38)."
ca. 170 A.D., Saint Melito, Bishop of Sardis, Easter Homily
— Virginity before birth; New Eve (sinlessness; incorruptibility) —
[H]e clothed himself in man’s flesh
in the womb of a Virgin from whom he came forth as a man … .
[H]e is born of Mary, the fair ewe. …
He it is who made heaven and earth, …
who became incarnate in a Virgin.
ca. 185 A.D., Saint Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons and disciple of Saint Polycarp, Against Heresies
— Virginity before birth; New Eve (freedom from original sin; incorruptibility) —
3:22:4 Consequently, then, Mary the Virgin is found to be obedient, saying: "Behold, O Lord, your handmaid; be it done to me according to your word" (Luke 1:38). Eve, however, was disobedient; and when yet a virgin, she did not obey. Just as she … having become disobedient, was made the cause of death for herself and for the whole human race; so also Mary, betrothed to a man but nevertheless still a virgin, being obedient, was made the cause of salvation for herself and for the whole human race. … Thus, the knot of Eve’s disobedience was loosed by the obedience of Mary. What the virgin Eve had bound in unbelief, the Virgin Mary loosed through faith.
ca. 195 A.D., Saint Irenaeus of Lyons, The Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching
— Virginity during birth; sinlessness; incorruptibility; childbirth without pain —
54 [Isaias] says, “Behold, the Virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and He, being God, is going to be with us” (Isa. 7:14). And whilst, as it were, astonished at this thing, he makes known what will come about, that God will be with us. And concerning His birth, the same prophet says in another place, “Before she who was in labour gave birth, and before the birth pains came on, she was delivered of a male [child]” (Isa. 66:7); [thus] he indicated the unexpected and extraordinary birth from the Virgin.
ca. 200 A.D., Saint Hippolytus of Rome, Bishop of Pontus, disciple of Irenaeus, Treatise on Christ and Antichrist
— Virginity during birth; sinlessness; incorruptibility —
4 For whereas the Word of God was without flesh, He took upon Himself the holy flesh by the holy Virgin.
ca. 203 A.D., Saint Clement of Alexandria, The Instructor of the Children
— Virginity during birth; sinlessness; incorruptibility —
1:6:42:1 When the loving and benevolent Father had rained down the Word, that Word then became the spiritual nourishment of those who have good sense. O mystic wonder! The Father of all is indeed one, one also is the universal Word, and the Holy Spirit is one and the same everywhere; and one is the Virgin Mother. I love to call her the Church. This Mother alone was without milk, because she alone did not become a wife. She is at once both Virgin and Mother: as a Virgin, undefiled; as a Mother full of love.
ca. 203 A.D., Clement of Alexandria, Stromateis or Miscellanies
— Virginity during birth; sinlessness; incorruptibility; childbirth without pain
7:16 But, as appears, many even down to our own time regard Mary, on account of the birth of her child, as having been in the puerperal state, although she was not. For some say that, after she brought forth, she was found, when examined, to be a virgin.
Now such to us are the Scriptures of the Lord, which gave birth to the truth and continue virgin, in the concealment of the mysteries of the truth. “And she brought forth, and yet brought not forth,” says the Scripture; as having conceived of herself, and not from conjunction. Wherefore the Scriptures have conceived to Gnostics; but the heresies, not having learned them, dismissed them as not having conceived.
ca. 215 A.D., Saint Hippolytus of Rome, Bishop of Pontus, disciple of Irenaeus of Lyons, Discourse On the End of the World
— Sinlessness; incorruptibility; Mother of God —
1 [The prophets] preached of the advent of God in the flesh to the world, His advent by the spotless and God-bearing Mary.
ca. 230 A.D., Origen, disciple of Clement of Alexandria, Commentaries on John
— Virginity after birth —
1:6 For if Mary, as those declare who with sound mind extol her, had no other son but Jesus, and yet Jesus says to His mother, “Woman, behold thy son” (John 19:26), and not “Behold you have this son also,” then He virtually said to her, “Lo, this is Jesus, whom thou didst bear.” Is it not the case that every one who is perfect lives himself no longer, but Christ lives in him; and if Christ lives in him, then it is said of him to Mary, “Behold thy son Christ.” What a mind, then, must we have to enable us to interpret in a worthy manner this work, though it be committed to the earthly treasure-house of common speech, of writing which any passer-by can read, and which can be heard when read aloud by any one who lends to it his bodily ears?
ca. 234, Hippolytus, Commentary on Psalm 22
— Sinlessness; incorruptibility —
The ark which was made of incorruptible timber (Ex. 25:10) was the Savior. The ark symbolized the tabernacle of His body, which was impervious to decay and engendered no sinful corruption. … The Lord was sinless, because, in His humanity, He was fashioned out of incorruptible wood, that is, out of the Virgin and the Holy Ghost, lined within and without as with the purest gold of the Word of God.
ca. 250 A.D., Sub Tuum Praesidium
— Earliest extant prayer to Mary; sinlessness; incorruptibility; Mother of God —
Under your mercy we take refuge, O Mother of God. Do not reject our supplications in necessity, but deliver us from danger, [O you] alone pure and alone blessed.