Gospel of James

The Gospel of James (or the Protoevangelium of James) is a second-century infancy gospel telling of the miraculous conception of Mary, the mother of Jesus, her upbringing and marriage to Joseph, the journey of the couple to Bethlehem, the birth of Jesus, and events immediately following. It is the earliest surviving assertion of the perpetual virginity of Mary, meaning her virginity not just prior to the birth of Jesus, but during and afterwards, and despite being condemned by Pope Innocent I in 405 and classified as apocryphal by the Gelasian Decree around AD 500, became a widely influential source for Mariology.

Composition

Dating

The Gospel of James was well known to Origen in the early third century and probably to Clement of Alexandria at the end of the second, so is assumed to have been in circulation soon after circa 150 AD. The earliest manuscript of the text (Papyrus Bodmer 5) dates to the third or fourth century.

The author claims to be James the brother of Jesus by an earlier marriage of Joseph, but his identity is unknown.

Historical context

Early family studies assumed a Jewish milieu, largely because of its frequent use and knowledge of the Septuagint (a Greek translation of the Jewish scriptures); further investigation demonstrated that it misunderstands and/or misrepresents many Jewish practices, but Judaism at this time was highly diverse, and recent trends in scholarship do not entirely dismiss a Jewish connection. In fact, it has been argued that Mary’s temple service reflects real practices allowing women such access, such as accused adulteresses, veil-weavers, and Nazirites. The “weavers of the veil,” known from Jewish sources like the Apocalypse of Baruch (“the virgins who spin fine linen”), were virgin girls, matching Mary’s role in the text. There is Scriptural evidence of young women working at the tabernacle and each of the temples (1 Samuel 2:22, Exodus 38:8, Ezra 2:65), certainly living nearby if not on premises. It is likely that they were unmarried.

Its origin is probably Syrian, and it possibly derives from a sect called the Encratites, whose founder, Tatian, taught that sex and marriage were symptoms of original sin.