Jerome’s Against Helvidius and the Struggle to Preserve the Perpetual Virginity of Mary

Michelle Hayman
6 hours ago
3 min read

Toward the end of the fourth century, Jerome entered into a furious controversy with a man named Helvidius. The subject was Mary, the mother of Jesus, and one question which would eventually become enormously important in Christian tradition: did Mary remain a virgin for the rest of her life, or did she afterwards live with Joseph as his wife and have other children?

For Jerome, this was not a minor disagreement.

His Against Helvidius is passionate, combative and at times astonishingly personal. Helvidius is mocked for his education, his writing, his intelligence and even his audacity in daring to challenge what Jerome considers sacred. He is accused of ignorance, madness, impiety and blasphemy. Jerome compares his offence to desecrating a temple and speaks as though the very honour of Mary is under attack.

But beneath all the anger lies a surprisingly simple question:

What does Scripture actually say?

Jerome himself sets that standard. At the beginning of his defence he promises to bring forward “the actual words of Scripture.” That makes Against Helvidius unusually valuable, because Jerome does not merely tell us what Christians ought to believe. He attempts to demonstrate why they ought to believe it from the biblical text itself.

Helvidius, meanwhile, points to some of the most familiar words in the Gospels: Joseph “knew her not till” Jesus was born; Jesus is called Mary's “firstborn son”; the Gospels repeatedly speak of His “brethren”; four of them are even named—James, Joses, Simon and Judas—and His sisters are mentioned as well. Paul later refers to “James the Lord's brother.”

Jerome insists that none of this means what Helvidius thinks it means.

And so begins a remarkable argument involving Greek and biblical language, Old Testament family relationships, several different women named Mary, two or possibly three men named James, Alphaeus and Clopas, the meaning of firstborn, the meaning of until, the identity of the Lord's brethren, Joseph's relationship with Mary, and eventually the very question of whether virginity should be considered spiritually superior to marriage.

At times Jerome's reasoning is formidable. At other times his confidence seems considerably greater than the evidence he has produced. And as the argument progresses, something else begins to emerge: the dispute is not only about the interpretation of several Gospel verses. It becomes a dispute about holiness, sexuality, marriage, virginity and what Christians are permitted to believe about Mary at all.

That is why this work deserves to be read carefully rather than simply quoted as an ancient authority.

This examination will therefore do something very simple. It will follow Against Helvidius from beginning to end and allow Jerome to make his own case. His arguments will be examined in their context, Helvidius's objections will be considered fairly, and the biblical passages upon which both men rely will be tested closely. Where a Greek, Hebrew or Latin word matters, we will look at it. Where an identification has been assumed, we will ask whether Scripture actually establishes it. Where Jerome is right, we will say so. Where Helvidius overstates his case, we will say so too.

But there will be no assumption in advance that an interpretation must be correct because it later became doctrine.

Nor will an argument become stronger because its defender was Jerome and its opponent was an obscure man whom Jerome considered beneath him.

There is only one question that ultimately matters:

Can the perpetual virginity of Mary actually be demonstrated from the Scriptures Jerome himself appealed to?

Jerome should be allowed to make his case first.

And that is exactly what we are going to let him do.

For those who want to see exactly where Jerome’s case fails to establish perpetual virginity from Scripture, see the attached companion study: