Old Testament
Scripture
Psalm 132 Psalm 132:8
“Arise, O Lord, and go to thy resting place, thou and the ark of thy might.”
Short answer
The Church does not claim that Scripture narrates the Assumption, and the early written record is thin. Sermons and prayers for the feast of Mary's Dormition attest the belief by the eighth century, and it was defined as dogma in 1950. The definition says that Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory. It does not deny that she died. The Catechism calls the Assumption a share in her Son's Resurrection and an anticipation of the resurrection of other Christians.
Drafted from primary sources. Every quotation is checked against the page it links to.
14 quotations in date order
The Old Testamentbefore Christ
The Apostolic AgeAD 1 to 100
c. 55
Scripture
St. Paul 1 Corinthians 15:20-23
“But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ.”
c. 65
Scripture
Letter to the Hebrews Hebrews 11:5
“By faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death; and he was not found, because God had taken him. Now before he was taken he was attested as having pleased God.”
c. 95
Scripture
St. John Revelation 11:19, 12:1
“Then God's temple in heaven was opened, and the ark of his covenant was seen within his temple; and there were flashes of lightning, loud noises, peals of thunder, an earthquake, and heavy hail. … And a great portent appeared in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars…”
The Age of the Councils325 to 800
c. 740
Church Father
St. John Damascene Sermon II on the Assumption (Second Homily on the Dormition)
“It was fitting that the body of her, who preserved her virginity unsullied in her motherhood, should be kept from corruption even after death. She who nursed her Creator as an infant at her breast, had a right to be in the divine tabernacles. … It was fitting that she who saw her Son die on the cross, and received in her heart the sword of pain which she had not felt in childbirth, should gaze upon Him seated next to the Father.”
The Middle Ages800 to 1500
c. 1273
Doctor of the Church
St. Thomas Aquinas Summa Theologiae III, q. 27, a. 1, body
“Nothing is handed down in the canonical Scriptures concerning the sanctification of the Blessed Mary as to her being sanctified in the womb; indeed, they do not even mention her birth. But as Augustine, in his tractate on the Assumption of the Virgin, argues with reason, since her body was assumed into heaven, and yet Scripture does not relate this; so it may be reasonably argued that she was sanctified in the womb.”
The Modern Era1800 to today
1950
Magisterium
Pope Pius XII Munificentissimus Deus, 4-5
“Yet, according to the general rule, God does not will to grant to the just the full effect of the victory over death until the end of time has come. And so it is that the bodies of even the just are corrupted after death, and only on the last day will they be joined, each to its own glorious soul. … Now God has willed that the Blessed Virgin Mary should be exempted from this general rule. She, by an entirely unique privilege, completely overcame sin by her Immaculate Conception, and as a result she was not subject to the law of remaining in the corruption of the grave, and she did not have to wait until the end of time for the redemption of her body.”
1950
Magisterium
Pope Pius XII Munificentissimus Deus, 17
“Thus, to cite an illustrious example, this is set forth in that sacramentary which Adrian I, our predecessor of immortal memory, sent to the Emperor Charlemagne. These words are found in this volume: "Venerable to us, O Lord, is the festivity of this day on which the holy Mother of God suffered temporal death, but still could not be kept down by the bonds of death, who has begotten your Son our Lord incarnate from herself."”
1950
Magisterium
Pope Pius XII Munificentissimus Deus, 39
“We must remember especially that, since the second century, the Virgin Mary has been designated by the holy Fathers as the new Eve, who, although subject to the new Adam, is most intimately associated with him in that struggle against the infernal foe which, as foretold in the protoevangelium, would finally result in that most complete victory over the sin and death which are always mentioned together in the writings of the Apostle of the Gentiles. Consequently, just as the glorious resurrection of Christ was an essential part and the final sign of this victory, so that struggle which was common to the Blessed Virgin and her divine Son should be brought to a close by the glorification of her virginal body…”
1950
Magisterium
Pope Pius XII Munificentissimus Deus, 44
“…by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own authority, we pronounce, declare, and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma: that the Immaculate Mother of God, the ever Virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.”
1992
Magisterium
Catechism of the Catholic Church CCC 966
“"Finally the Immaculate Virgin, preserved free from all stain of original sin, when the course of her earthly life was finished, was taken up body and soul into heavenly glory, and exalted by the Lord as Queen over all things, so that she might be the more fully conformed to her Son, the Lord of lords and conqueror of sin and death." The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin is a singular participation in her Son's Resurrection and an anticipation of the resurrection of other Christians…”
1997
Magisterium
Pope St. John Paul II General Audience, 25 June 1997, 1
“With this formula, the Dogmatic Constitution Lumen gentium, following my Venerable Predecessor Pius XII, made no pronouncement on the question of Mary's death. Nevertheless, Pius XII did not intend to deny the fact of her death, but merely did not judge it opportune to affirm solemnly the death of the Mother of God as a truth to be accepted by all believers. … a common tradition actually exists which sees Mary's death as her entry into heavenly glory.”
1997
Magisterium
Pope St. John Paul II General Audience, 25 June 1997, 2
“One need only quote St Jacob of Sarug (†521), who wrote that when the time came for Mary "to walk on the way of all generations", the way, that is, of death, "the group of the Twelve Apostles" gathered to bury "the virginal body of the Blessed One" … St Modestus of Jerusalem (†634), after a lengthy discussion of "the most blessed dormition of the most glorious Mother of God", ends his eulogy by exalting the miraculous intervention of Christ who "raised her from the tomb", to take her up with him in glory…”
1997
Magisterium
Pope St. John Paul II General Audience, 2 July 1997, 2
“The first trace of belief in the Virgin's Assumption can be found in the apocryphal accounts entitled Transitus Mariae, whose origin dates to the second and third centuries. These are popular and sometimes romanticized depictions, which in this case, however, pick up an intuition of faith on the part of God's People. Later, there was a long period of growing reflection on Mary's destiny in the next world. This gradually led the faithful to believe in the glorious raising of the Mother of Jesus, in body and soul, and to the institution in the East of the liturgical feasts of the Dormition and Assumption of Mary.”