Gateway to Heaven: Marian Doctrine and Devotion, Image and Typology in the Patristic and Medieval Periods, Vol. 1:Doctrine and Devotion by Brian K. Reynolds (review)

This is an excellent book that should be owned by anyone interested in the history of Marian doctrine and devotion, and it is terrific that New City Press has now made it so easily and affordably available. The book was originally published under the title Porta Paradisi (Taipei, 2009), and it was long extremely difficult to acquire. This was most unfortunate, since Gateway to Heaven surpasses Hilda Graef’s excellent earlier survey of Marian theology and piety in early Christianity and the medieval West, Mary: A History of Doctrine and Devotion (New York, 1963); however, Graef’s volume still remains valuable especially for its broader chronological scope and for its superior attention to post-Patristic developments in the Byzantine world.

The work is presented as the first volume of a two-volume study, although it is not clear when the second volume will be issued. This first volume concentrates, as the title indicates, on the development of Marian doctrine and devotion, whereas the second will consider the history of Mary’s various “attributes” and—something that will be most welcome—the history of Marian typology. In the present volume, the focus lies decidedly more on the development of Marian doctrine than devotion, an emphasis that the author explains in the light of the fact that several recent studies have appeared on the history of Marian piety. Nevertheless, the author’s contribution to this topic also is significant.

Gateway to Heaven is primarily a work of synthesis that combines the most recent scholarship with a thematic and chronological survey of Marian literature from early and medieval Western Christianity. The chapters are organized around the following topics: (1) Divine Motherhood; (2) Virginity; (3) Mary Co-Redemptrix: Remote Co-Operation; (4) Intercession, Mediation and Devotion; (5) Mary Co-Redemptrix: Immediate Co-Operation; (6) the Assumption; and (7) the Immaculate Conception. Each topic is explored first during the Patristic period, proceeding in chronological fashion and noting developments in both Greek and Latin literature (as well as in works by a few important Syriac writers such as Ephrem and Jacob of Serug). Reynolds limits the Patristic period to the beginning of the eighth century, at which point he abandons the Christian East. The sections on the medieval period then begin with the Carolingian period and conclude with the beginning of the fourteenth century. The reasoning given for these limits is that by these points Marian doctrine and devotion had reached their peaks in East and West respectively.

This volume is especially valuable for the numerous translations that it provides from the primary sources, many of which have not otherwise been translated into English. The presentation of these sources according to topic and chronology in the context of the most recent scholarship marks an invaluable contribution to Marian studies. No less important is the care with which Reynolds notes the development of Marian piety in the medieval West in relation to earlier precedents from the East—such connections are often overlooked in much scholarship on Mary in the Middle Ages. Likewise, Reynolds is to be commended for resisting and correcting the tendency of much Roman Catholic scholarship to read later doctrinal developments in the West (i.e., the Immaculate Conception; Immediate Co-Operation) back into the Greek Patristic sources. The main shortcoming of the work, however, is that many of its translations appear to derive from the Italian collection by Georges Gharib, Testi mariani del primo Millennio (Rome, 1989), rather than from the original languages. One also wishes that more attention had been given to later Byzantine writers, and there also is a fair amount of repetition among and within the various chapters (e.g., the same passage from Romanos is cited on p. 335 and then again as...