Virgin birth of Jesus

For the biological phenomenon of female-only reproduction, see Parthenogenesis.

In religious belief, a Virgin Birth is a miraculous birth of a child to a woman who is a virgin.

Although there were some prior beliefs about virgin birth, the concept is best known from Christianity. In that faith, the Virgin Birth is the theological doctrine which asserts that Jesus was conceived in the womb of his mother, the Virgin Mary, without the participation of a human father. It is a key doctrine of the Christian faith, and is also held by Muslims (Qur'an 3.47).

Modern biology finds that although parthenogenesis, or conception by the female of a species without fertilization by a male, is possible in some vertebrates it cannot happen in mammals because of genomic imprinting, and in those species in which it does occur the offspring are always female.

The belief is formulated by the Apostle's Creed - a confession of faith shared by many Christian denominations - as follows: "I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth. I believe in Jesus Christ, God's only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary..."

The doctrine is based on a passage in the nativity narrative of the Gospel of Luke, that Mary, the mother of Jesus, was "overshadowed" by the Holy Spirit (Luke 1:35), and reached its final formulation in the fourth century in the context of the debates which characterised the church following its adoption as the State religion of the late Roman and early Byzantine empires. From a theological perspective, the doctrine of the Virgin Birth showed Jesus' divine and human natures at once united, paving the way for all of humanity to be united with God.

Polls indicate that contemporary belief in central tenets of the Christian faith, including the Virgin Birth, is highly variable among both the clergy and the laity, in all branches of Christianity. Nevertheless, the belief in the Virgin Birth remains central to Christianity, and those conservative Christians who continue to hold it, do so as a supernatural event outside the laws of science.

Although they believe in the Virgin Birth, Muslims do not call Jesus "Son of God", rather "Servant of God". In the Qur'an, Jesus (Isa in Arabic) is consistently termed "Isa ibn Maryam" - a matronymic - because, in Muslim belief, he had no biological father.

In the New Testament

The gospels

The virgin birth does not appear in the Gospel of Mark. The other three gospels describe it as follows:

Matthew 1:23, "a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us." [1]

In Luke chapter 1 Mary asks how this can happen, since she is a virgin, and is told it will be by the power of God. [2]

In John 8:41-42 is seen the clear contrast between what Jesus claimed and accusations some Jews had against Him. [3] He claimed God to be His Father (i.e. virgin birth), whereas Jews instead accused the thing of being a sham suggesting it was instead by fornication (i.e. sex outside of marriage). That the Gospel writer would include such an accusation certainly speaks to his belief that the virgin birth was indeed defensible.

The epistles of Paul

Some claim the Pauline epistles void of reference to the virgin birth as well, while others claim Galatians 4:4 shows differently. [4]

Many of the letters of Paul are considered the earliest works of the New Testament, and some claim Paul does not refer to the virgin birth . They believe he misses an opportunity to refer to Mary as a virgin when he describes the birth of Jesus:

Galatians 4:4 But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law...

The phrase in Greek is γενόμενον ἐκ γυναικός, genomenon ek gunaikos, "having-become of a-woman", not γενόμενον ἐκ παρθένου, genomenon ek parthenou, "having-become of a-virgin".

Christian apologists point out the phrase "made of a woman" is unique. They question the use of a word translated "made" rather than "born" resulting in "born of a woman" as applied to John the Baptist in Matthew 11:11. [5] They also point out the emphasis of Paul on the mother rather than of both parents, when in Hebrew genealogy it is the other way around, and the father is often the only one referenced. [6] Others point to the curse upon Jeconiah as evidence of God's miraculous working.[7] Only by a virgin birth could Christ have Joseph as a legal father, inheriting the promises through David, while avoiding the curse through Jechoniah that none of his descendants would prosper and sit on the throne of David (Jeremiah 22:30). [8]

Skeptics argue that like the resurrection appearances, the virgin birth may be an example of the gradual supernaturalization of the Christian story. Some scholars have argued that early Christians did not claim that Joseph was not the biological father of Jesus. They point to the geneaologies in Matthew 1-2, and Luke 1-2, which use descent through Joseph to demonstrate that Jesus was the heir to King David. Moreover, the Ebionites (an early group of proclaimed Jewish Christians, considered heretical by other Christians) maintained that Jesus was naturally conceived.

It might be argued, given he asserts the divinity of Jesus Christ in his writings and refers to him as υιος Θεου, Huios Theou ("Son of God"), Paul's failure to reflect upon the nature of Jesus' birth could suggest that neither he nor his readers felt the need to confront the issue, possibly because they took the divinity of the Virgin Birth for granted (much as they might take the direction of sunset for granted in Ephesians 4:26, when Paul does not specify that it occurs in the West - which appears to be correctly referenced in Isaiah 45:6).

However, the precise direction of the sunset has no obvious theological relevance, while the Virgin Birth certainly does; and, given Paul writes expansively about the theological significance of Jesus' death and resurrection, one might ask why he neglects this aspect of Jesus' life. Examine, for example, Paul's words at the very beginning of Romans:

1:1 Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God,

2 (Which he had promised afore by his prophets in the holy scriptures,)

3 Concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh;

4 And declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead.

This seems to say that Jesus was human by the flesh and divine by the spirit: he was the "seed of David" by descent in the male line through Joseph. Furthermore, he was declared to be the Son of God by his virgin birth as well as by his resurrection from the dead, and later in Romans Paul says this:

Romans 8:3 For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh

4 That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

Why is a body begotten of a virgin by the Holy Spirit called a ὁμοιώματι σαρκὸς ἁμαρτίας, homoiomati sarkos hamartias, a "likeness of sinful flesh"? These and similar references may suggest that Paul does not mention the Virgin Birth because it had not yet been created as a way of honoring Jesus or overcoming the difficulties of reconciling human flesh and divine spirit, and although Paul refers to Jesus as "Son of God" after his death, Jesus repeatedly refers to himself in life as υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου, Huion tou Anthropou, "Son of Man" (Matthew 8:20 etc; Mark 2:10 etc; Luke 5:24 etc; John 1:51 etc).

In light of this, most recent scholars of the infancy narratives have argued that the theological significance of Jesus' Birth did not become a Christian concern until later in the 1st century (See R.E. Brown, Birth of the Messiah - J.A. Fitzmyer Gospel of Luke). That is, the early Church seems to have "worked backwards" in its theology - focusing initially on the death and resurrection of Christ (see nearly all of Paul's letters), then becoming concerned with his life (Gospel of Mark), and later faced with addressing his birth (Matthew and Luke).

Luke's gospel

Some scholars argue from grammar and style that the first two chapters of Luke, describing the virgin birth, were a later addition to the Gospel, which may originally have begun at 3:1:

2:51 And he went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject unto them: but his mother kept all these sayings in her heart.

52 And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man.

3:1 Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judaea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of Ituraea and of the region of Trachonitis, and Lysanias the tetrarch of Abilene,

2 Annas and Caiaphas being the high priests, the word of God came unto John the son of Zacharias in the wilderness.

At 3:1 there is an abrupt change of subject and the story begins again. Nevertheless, this is characteristic of many stories in the Gospels and the author of Luke may simply be beginning a new segment of his narrative. Arguments regarding the addition of material to a narrative (Redaction and Form criticism), especially when the material in question is present in the earliest manuscripts, have received significant criticism in the last 20 years and are now regarded as dubious by some textual critics.

Double attestation

Two separate gospels attest to the virgin birth, although their details vary.

The Virgin conception and birth is a tradition that fits within the criterion of multiple attestation, that is, the same event appears in two independent traditions (most scholars argue that the authors of Matthew and Luke worked independent of one another). For many historians, independent testimony is a significant evidence for the historical validity of a said event. Matthew and Luke are testifying to an event, the birth, about which there was a tradition, namely, that it resulted from a miraculous conception. That the conception itself was indeed miraculous appears to rest on a "single attestation", that of the Virgin Mary. The attestation of the angel to St Joseph on the miraculous nature of the conception would not be accepted by many scholars as historiographically valid.

Critics of the "double attestation" argument cite many "inconsistencies" between the accounts of Matthew and Luke regarding Jesus' birth. According to Matthew, Joseph was forewarned of the virgin birth by an unnamed angel; in Luke it is Mary who is notified of this by the angel Gabriel. Matthew tells us that Joseph and Mary were residents of Bethlehem who moved to Nazareth after Jesus' birth in order to avoid living under Archelaus: according to the better-known story in Luke the couple lived in Nazareth and only traveled to Bethlehem in order to comply with a Roman census. Luke mentions that Mary was the relative (cousin) of Elizabeth, mother of John the Baptist, has the new-born Jesus visited by shepherds, and mentions several long hymns uttered by various characters, such as Mary's Magnificat. None of this is mentioned by Matthew, who instead tells us of the visit of the Magi, the massacre of the innocents by Herod, and the flight into Egypt.

There are thus two rival explanations for the "double attestation" of Matthew and Luke regarding the virgin birth of Jesus:

1. The virgin birth was a historical event, and the stories of Matthew and Luke are based on different aspects and witnesses' accounts of it.
2. Matthew and Luke both wanted to make Jesus fit prophecies from Hebrew scripture. Both authors were aware of the prophecies concerning virgin birth and Bethlehem, and therefore these elements of their stories match. But each author wove these prophecies into the overall narrative in a different way. For example, both authors had to explain how Jesus was born in Bethlehem when he was known to be from Nazareth (as mentioned in Mark's gospel) -- and each came up with a totally different explanation.

Dispute regarding Isaiah 7:14

In the past two millennia, there has been controversy among scholars about the translation and the meaning of a small section of Isaiah concerning the word : עלמה, almah, translated variously as young woman or as virgin.

In the King James Version of the Bible, a traditional Protestant translation, the verses in question run like this:

7:14 Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.

15 Butter and honey shall he eat, that he may know to refuse the evil, and choose the good.

16 For before the child shall know to refuse the evil, and choose the good, the land that thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of both her kings.

Some newer translations also use the word "virgin": The New King James, The English Standard Version, The Contemporary English Version, Young's Literal Translation, among others. Many modern translations concede that the word in the Hebrew does not mean "virgin", including The Revised Standard Version, The New Jerusalem Bible, The Revised English Bible, The Good News Bible, The New Revised Standard Version, among others. This demonstrates that some Christian scholars, both Protestant and Catholic, prefer the traditional translation of the Hebrew in the context of Isaiah 7:14, while others do not.

Skeptics argue that this is not a very clear prophecy of the birth of Jesus. In addition to the objection that Jesus was not in fact named "Immanuel" there are other problems: for example, (1) what does the "butter and honey" refer to? (One possible response to the "butter and honey" problem: it is a reference to one who, metaphorically, "has eaten good meat his entire life in order to spit out the bad meat if it ever touched his lips". Note that the "butter and honey" reference is immediately followed by the comment on an ability to choose between good and evil; this may suggest that they are related.) (2) Why is Jesus, who was sinless from birth in the traditional Christian understanding, described as having to learn to refuse the evil and choose the good? Christian apologists respond that the passage is a double reference— a sign both to Ahaz that the alliance against him would be destroyed, and to the house of David as a whole that was threatened with extinction. This is shown by the Hebrew which uses "singular you" for the former and "plural you' for the latter. With the former, Isaiah reassures Ahaz that the alliance would be destroyed before his own son Shear Jashub, who was present (v. 3), would "learn to refuse the evil and choose the good".

Greek translation

Is it accurate to translate עלמה (`almah) as virgin? The Greek version of the Book of Isaiah 7:14 (see below and the articles on Biblical canon, Tanakh, Septuagint and Old Testament) translates עלמה (`almah) as παρθένος (parthenos). Parthenos is conventionally translated into English as virgin. Furthermore, the Gospel of Matthew 1:22–23 explicitly links the Isaiah prophecy to the birth of Jesus. Accordingly, many Christians understand the Isaiah prophecy as referring to Mary and the birth of Jesus. Unlike the Masoretic Text, the Septuagint is known to have existed before the birth of Jesus, and was considered a divinely inspired translation by several patristic writers, notably Augustine of Hippo. The New Testament references to the Old Testament often follow the Septuagint rather than the Masoretic Text as well. However, Jerome, whose Latin translation has been declared to be singularly authoritative in Roman Catholicism, believed it to be an inferior translation of the Hebrew in many places and so used Origen's corrected edition for his first two editions of the Vulgate before using mainly the Hebrew in his third edition. Jerome rendered the Hebrew as virgo, the Latin equivalent of parthenos.

Bethulah and 'Almah

There are two important words in Hebrew that can be translated into English as "virgin": בתולה, bethulah, and עלמה, `almah. Isaiah uses `almah in the Masoretic Text, and so conservative Christians have tried to demonstrate that the word unambiguously means "virgin", while other scholars, Christian, Jewish and otherwise, have tried to demonstrate that the word means simply "young woman", without any necessary connotation of virginity. `Almah occurs seven times in the Hebrew Bible and usually seems to mean a young woman of marriageable age (e.g. Genesis 24:43), and is used specifically in Proverbs 30:19 to refer to a married woman; bethulah is accepted in modern Hebrew usage as the characteristic Hebrew word for virgin. However, it is qualified by a statement ‘neither had any man known her’ in Gen. 24:16, and is used of a widow in Joel 1:8 (although not necessarily one who had relations with her husband, as betrothal historically preceded cohabitation in Jewish family life). In the Ugaritic tablets, btlt was used of the goddess Anath who was a consort of Baal; and in other records, the Aramaic counterpart of betûlah is used of a married woman.

Some Christians would point out in response that the word Bethulah is clearly used in ways that can not mean virgin (Joel 1:8)[9], making the scholars who suggest Bethulah to be a suitable alternative to Almah seem ill-learned in their Biblical knowledge.

Parthenos

The fact that there is no Hebrew tradition of virgin birth — Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, and Hannah were infertile women who miraculously gave birth late in life — is consistent with the view that the Messiah would be unique, and Christian apologists argue that many first century Jews, including Jewish converts to Christianity, used the Septuagint, which explicitly uses the word παρθένος (parthenos) to mean "virgin": the root from which we derive words such as parthenogenesis.

Some scholars, however, claim that the Septuagint does not use parthenos very precisely, as it translates at least three different Hebrew words by it: bethulah, "maiden/virgin"; `almah, "maiden/virgin"; and נערה, na`arah, "maiden, young woman, servant". The meaning of the word parthenos in the Septuagint is sometimes expanded in a way not seen in the Isaiah of the (albeit centuries younger) Masoretic texts:

Genesis 24:16 And the damsel [parthenos = Hebrew na`arah] was very fair to look upon, a virgin [parthenos = Hebrew bethulah], neither had any man known her: and she went down to the well, and filled her pitcher, and came up.

Judges 21:12 And they found among the inhabitants of Jabeshgilead four hundred young virgins [parthenous = Hebrew bethulah], that had known no man by lying with any male: and they brought them unto the camp to Shiloh, which is in the land of Canaan.

Additionally, the Greek-English Lexicon edited by Henry George Liddell and Robert Scott lists other meanings for the word:

παρθένος [parthenos], I. 1. maiden, girl; virgin, opp. γυνή [gynē], "woman". 2. of unmarried women who are not virgins, Iliad 2.514, etc. 3. παρθένος, ἡ [parthenos, hē], the Virgin Goddess, as a title of Athena at Athens. 4. the constellation Virgo. II. as adj., maiden, chaste. III. as masc., παρθένος, ὁ [parthenos, ho], unmarried man, Apocalypse 14.4.

Finally, there is archaeological evidence that Jewish speakers of Greek used the word parthenos elastically; Jewish catacombs in Rome identify married men and women as "virgins," and some have suggested that in this case the word was used to call attention to the fact that the deceased was someone's first spouse (although it is notable that this usage is from several centuries before the translation of the Septuagint ). Certainly, Jews stopped using the more explicit Septuagint translation as Christianity spread, and post-Christian Jewish translations into Greek use νεᾶνις, neanis, meaning "young (juvenile) woman", rather than parthenos.

Pre-Christian References

Virgin Birth occurs frequently in pre-Christian mysticism, the impregnation of mortal women by gods is common in pagan mythology, including the then well-known story of Hercules, born to Alkmene by the god Zeus.

A pagan myth of virgin birth may also underlie the disputed verses from Isaiah:

It all boils down to this: the distinctive Hebrew word for 'virgin' is betulah, whereas `almah means a 'young woman' who may be a virgin, but is not necessarily so. The aim of this note is rather to call attention to a source that has not yet been brought into the discussion. From Ugarit of around 1400 B.C. comes a text celebrating the marriage of the male and female lunar deities. It is there predicted that the goddess will bear a son ... The terminology is remarkably close to that in Isaiah 7:14. However, the Ugaritic statement that the bride will bear a son is fortunately given in parallelistic form; in 77:7 she is called by the exact etymological counterpart of Hebrew `almah 'young woman'; in 77:5 she is called by the exact etymological counterpart of Hebrew betulah 'virgin'. Therefore, the New Testament rendering of `almah as 'virgin' for Isaiah 7:14 rests on the older Jewish interpretation, which in turn is now borne out for precisely this annunciation formula by a text that is not only pre-Isaianic but is pre-Mosaic in the form that we now have it on a clay tablet. (Feinberg, BibSac, July 62; the citation to Gordon is: C. H. Gordon, "`Almah in Isaiah 7:14", Journal of Bible and Religion, XXI, 2 (April, 1953), p. 106.)

This philological reasoning seems to raise four possibilities: virgin birth is a pagan concept that Christianity has 1) taken from contemporary paganism; 2) taken from pre-Mosaic paganism through Isaiah; 3) taken from contemporary paganism and justified from Isaiah, who took it from pre-Mosaic paganism; 4) produced independently of all forms of paganism, though sharing similar vocabulary. If pre-Mosaic paganism supports Isaiah, and Isaiah supports Matthew and Mark, paganism has anticipated Christianity, perhaps because God was preparing the way for Christianity or because, as some Church Fathers argued, the Devil was blasphemously imitating Christianity. On the other hand, if paganism does not underlie Isaiah, there are several possibilities. Perhaps virgin birth was invented separately, first in paganism, then in Christianity. Perhaps the idea of asexual conception was so different from the idea of conception through sexual intercourse with a deity that there was little or no borrowing in either direction. Or perhaps, despite the earlier date of the Ugaritic text, virgin birth existed first in Judaism, without any other instances than this one, and was borrowed by paganism. The obvious difficulty with this idea is that virgin birth was much more prominent in paganism, where it occurs in many myths in many different areas, than it was in Judaism, where it occurs (if at all) in a single verse late in the Old Testament. Nevertheless, the argument that virgin birth was a Jewish concept first borrowed by paganism and later incorporated into Christianity was first made by Justin Martyr in The First Apology of Justin, written in the second century. Justin also made this argument in his Dialog with Trypho, in which he debates with a Jew called Trypho:

"Be well assured, then, Trypho," I continued, "that I am established in the knowledge of and faith in the Scriptures by those counterfeits which he who is called the Devil is said to have performed among the Greeks; just as some were wrought by the Magi in Egypt, and others by the false prophets in Elijah's days. For when they tell that Bacchus, son of Jupiter, was begotten by Jupiter's intercourse with Semele, and that he was the discoverer of the vine; and when they relate, that being torn in pieces, and having died, he rose again, and ascended to heaven; and when they introduce wine into his mysteries, do I not perceive that the Devil has imitated the prophecy announced by the patriarch Jacob, and recorded by Moses? ..." [10]

Justin was clearly not referring to any Ugaritic texts, as these texts were not known in his day; he was referring to Greek paganism. That the Devil is responsible for the similarities between paganism and Judaism is not generally accepted by modern scholars, partly because the Devil's influence would be impossible to disprove. The Devil could not, for example, imitate Christianity or Judaism before either existed, without violating the generally accepted historical rule that a culture cannot be influenced by a culture that does not yet exist; even though in point of fact it is likely that if "the patriarch Jacob" existed, he was contemporary with the inscriptions at Ugarit. In a similar vein, it might also be argued that God had chosen to out-do these earlier human myths, all as part of his Plan.

Christian writers point out that if in fact the writer of Isaiah intended to borrow the idea of a virgin birth from an older pagan tradition, we might expect to find Isaiah using more explicit language to indicate that a virgin was meant. However, if Isaiah had borrowed the story from pagans, he might be expected to speak in the same way as the pagans, and that is what he does, according to the scholar quoted, who notes the "remarkable" similarity of the Ugaritic and the Hebrew. However, Isaiah may speak the same way as the pagans simply because he came from a similar sociological and semantic context. If Isaiah received a new prophecy direct from God, on the other hand, he had no tradition to conform to, and he could have expanded the meaning to make it completely unambiguous. That he did not choose to make it unambiguous is thus an apparent difficulty for the Christian interpretation of the text, though the ambiguity could be seen as being intended, if one supposes that God had a dual purpose for the text (i.e., to serve one function in Isaiah's time and another function later). Isaiah's prophecy departs from the Ugaritic version of the virgin birth by having the female be entirely human, whereas in the Ugaritic culture, the virgin was another deity, on par with the male; but this is exactly what might be expected if the myth were borrowed from paganism, since Judaism has only one male deity; a female deity in a borrowed myth might thus conceivably become a female human.

In Mithraism, a precursor and rival religion to early Christianity, Mithras was born of a virgin on December 25. In 320 AD, Christians declared by decree December 25th as the birth date of Christ. Due to their similarities, Mithraism is often referenced as a likely origin for many Christian rituals and beliefs.

Mary's Immaculate Conception

The virgin conception of Jesus is often referred to as the "Immaculate Conception." However, this is contrary to the term's original meaning. The doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, taught by the Roman Catholic Church, states that Mary was conceived "without the stain of original sin". Mary, however, unlike many people's views of Jesus, was conceived in the ordinary way: i.e. she had a human father as well as a human mother (whose names, according to Catholic and Orthodox tradition, were 'Joachim' and 'Anna'/'Anne' - or 'Jehoiakim' and 'Hannah' in Hebrew).

Whilst Protestant denominations adhere to the doctrine of the Virgin Birth, they do not adhere to the idea of Mary's Immaculate Conception, nor of her perpetual virginity (see below).

Insurance to cover a virgin birth

In June 2006, it was revealed that a British insurer, britishinsurance.com, had provided a £1 million insurance policy to three Scottish women to provide cover in the event of one of them having a virgin birth. The payout was to cover the costs of bringing up the Christ. The policy was cancelled following pressure from the Catholic Church. [11].

See also

• Perpetual virginity of Mary
• Christology
• Incarnation (Christianity)
• Adoptionism
• Ebionites
• Parthenogenesis
• List of virgin births
• Almah

External links

• Vocabulary in Isaiah 7:14 (1) — Essay arguing that bethulah does not mean "virgin" while `almah does.
• Vocabulary in Isaiah 7:14 (2) — Essay arguing that `almah does not mean "virgin" while bethulah does.
• What Does Almah Mean? By William F. Beck
• Fundamentals: The Virgin Birth of Christ — Analysis of the question from a doctrinally orthodox Christian perspective.
• The Virgin Birth Analysis of the question from a skeptic perspective.
•  Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "Virgin Birth of Christ". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company.

Further reading

• Spong, John Shelby. Born of a Woman: A Bishop Rethinks the Virgin Birth. San Francisco : Harper, 1994.