Early Church Fathers #

St. Jursin Martyr (100-165): “He [the Son] became man by the Virgin, in order that the disobedience which proceeded from the serpent might receive its destruction in the same manner in which it derived its origin. For Eve, who was a virgin and undefiled, having conceived the word of the serpent, brought forth disobedience and death. But the Virgin Mary, received faith and joy, when the angel Gabriel announced the good tidings” (Ch. 100i,Dialogue with Trypho)

St. Irenaeus (130-202): “The knot of Eve’s disobedience was loosed by the obedience of Mary. For what the virgin Eve had bound fast through unbelief, this did the virgin Mary set free through faith”; “and thus, as the human race fell into bondage to death by means of a Virgin, so it is rescued by a virgin; virginal disobedience having been balanced in the opposite scale by virginal obedience.” (Johannes Quasten, Patrology, vol. 1, *The Beginnings of Patristic Literature: From the Apostles Creed to Irenaeus, 298 and 299)

St. Gregory of Nyssa (335–395): “‘In the age of Mary, the Mother of God, he [death] who had reigned from Adam to her time, found, when he came to her and dashed his forces against the fruit of her virginity as against a rock, that he was shattered to pieces upon her.’” Quasten, Patrology, vol. III, 289, quoting St. Gregory of Nyssa.

More: The Early Church Fathers’ Understanding of Mary - Word on Fire