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Francis of Osuna

1492 - 1540 AD

in Pars Occidentalis, Evangeliorum Quadragesimorum Expositiones, Antwerp 1536.

Text quoted in French by Réné Laurentin (in Maria, Ecclesia, Sacerdotium, Nouvelles Éditions Latines, Paris 1952, pp. 180) and translated into English by John Wijngaards.

Page 36 verso.Mariginal title: ‘Mary is a priest and vests the priest [=Christ?]’ (Latin: Maria est sacerdos et induit sacerdotem.
Text: ‘The second privilege of the first born was the splendidly decorated priestly vestment; for in early times when there was not yet a priest for the whole community, everyone had in his house a specific priest chosen from among the children: it was the first born, and one gave him a priestly vestment. That is why the commentary on Genesis 25,32: “Who will give me my right of firstborn?”, says as follows: “The right of the firstborn was the priestly vestment, for the firstborn was vested in it with the blessing of his father and he offered to God the victims, as a high priest. Nothing applies more to Mary, for no one should be ignorant in which way Mary, fulfilling a priestly function when standing upright before the altar of the cross, offered for us to God the Father a living victim who was no one else than her son. She did not “spare him” but delivered him up for all of us.’
‘Reflect more profoundly and you will find that the Son of God, without the vestment of humanity, could not offer the sacrifice to God. This vestment was Mary who gave it to him. ’

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