II. To the Initial Arguments

53. To the first argument [n.33] I say that the authority must be understood of those who want to marry according to the common law, for whom, of course, it is not settled with certitude that the use consequent to such act would never be asked for.

54. As to the second [n.34] it can be said that that law was given because of the daughters of Salphaad, and this, it is plain from Numbers 36.6-10, so that property not be transferred from tribe to tribe. Therefore, it only obligates those women on whom the inheritance devolved (as the paternal inheritance had devolved on those women, because their father was dead). But Mary was not an heiress, therefore it was licit for her to marry someone of another tribe.

55. It can also be said in another way that Mary was of both tribes, both Judah and Levi: of the tribe of Judah on the part of her father, of the tribe of Levi on the part of her mother. For indeed Joachim was descended from Nathan, the son of David, as is plain from Damascene Orthodox Faith ch.90, where he sets down the generation of the holy Mother of God. But Anna, the mother of Mary, is presumed to have been of the tribe of Levi, so that Elizabeth through her would be Mary’s kinswoman. The first point, too, that Mary was of the tribe and kinship of Judah, can be proved by the fact that the Gospel deduces that Christ was of the tribe of Judah by deducing that Joseph was of that tribe, which would only be the case if Mary were of that tribe, because Christ was not of the tribe of Judah on account of Joseph but on account of Mary. And this reason Jerome touches on at the beginning of Matthew [Commentary on Matthew 1.1.18]

56. To the final argument [n.35] the answer is plain in the solution of the question, the second article [n.48], that this consent lies in the handing over of the mutual power of bodies for procreating offspring, and consequently for use if it be asked for; but there was certitude here that this use would never be asked for by her spouse, namely Joseph.