 that do talk about the early Christians' view that Mary had taken some sort of a vow. Now, not everybody buys into this, but I think there's an interesting clue here in Luke's Gospel. The Proto-Evangelium of James, this early Christian work, says that Mary was kind of consecrated to God and that Joseph simply married her to be her protector, her guardian. You couldn't just sort of live on your own in the first century as a woman.