St. Gregory of Tours: On the Dormition

dormition-3

“Finally when blessed Mary having completed the course of this life, and was to be called from the world, all the Apostles gathered to her house from their different regions. And when they had heard that she was to be taken from the world, together they kept watch with her; a lo, the Lord Jesus came with His angels. Taking her soul, He gave it the the Archangel Michael and withdrew. At dawn the Apostles raised her body with a pallet and they placed it in a vault and they guarded it awaiting the coming of the Lord. And lo, a second time the Lord stood by them and he ordered the holy body to be taken and borne to Paradise; there having rejoined the soul exultant with His elect, it enjoys the good things of eternity which shall know no end.”

+ St. Gregory of Tours, The Book of Miracles (Libri Miraculorum in PL 71, 708), quoted from The Life of the Virgin Mary, the TheotokosHoly Apostles Convent, p 484.