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Jesus Born Of A Virgin
The
Virgin Birth
By Kevin
DeYoung
“Behold the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall
call His name Immanuel.”
–Matthew 1:23, ESV
Jesus’s
birth was not ordinary. The Biblical accounts of His birth are clear and
unequivocal:
He
was not an ordinary child, and His conception did not come about in the
ordinary way.
His
mother, Mary, was a virgin, having had no intercourse prior to conception and
birth.
By
the Holy Spirit, Mary’s womb became the cradle of the Son’s incarnation (Matthew 1:20; Luke 1:35).
With God, All Things Are Possible, or
Not?
It’s no secret that in recent
history, the doctrine of the virgin birth (or more precisely, the virginal
conception) has been ridiculed as fairytale make-believe by many outside the
church, and more than a few voices inside the church.
Two
arguments are usually mentioned.
First,
the prophecy about a virgin birth in Isaiah 7:14, it is argued, speaks simply
of a young woman and not a virgin.
Many
have pointed out that the Hebrew word in Isaiah is “almah” and not the
technical term for virgin, “bethula.”
It
is true that “almah” has a wider
semantic range than “bethula” but almah occurs nine times in the Old Testament, and
wherever the context makes its meaning clear, the word refers to a virgin.
More
important, the Septuagint translates “almah” with
the Greek word “parthenos” (the same word used in Matthew 1:23 where Isaiah
7:14 is quoted), and everyone agrees that parthenos means “virgin.”
The
Jewish translators of the Septuagint would not have used a clear Greek word for
virgin if they understood Isaiah 7:14 to refer to nothing more than a young
woman.
Second,
many have objected to the virgin birth because they see it as a fairly typical
bit of pagan mythologizing.
“Star Wars has
a virgin birth. Mithraism had a virgin birth. Christianity has a virgin birth.
Big deal. They are all just fables.”
This
is a popular argument, and it sounds plausible at first glance, but there are a
number of problems with it.
For
starters, the assumption that there was a prototypical God-Man who had certain
titles, did certain miracles, was born of a virgin, saved His people and then
got resurrected is not well-founded.
No
such prototypical “hero” existed before the rise of Christianity.
Besides,
it would have been unthinkable for a Jewish sect (which is what Christianity
was initially) to try to win new converts by adding pagan elements to their
Gospel story.
However,
the virgin birth parallels are not as strong as we might think. Consider some
of the usual suspects.
Alexander
the Great: His most reliable ancient biographer (several centuries after his
death) makes no mention of a virgin birth.
Besides,
the story that began to circulate (after the rise of Christianity, it’s worth
mentioning) is about an unusual conception, not a virgin birth. Alexander’s
parents were already married.
Dionysus:
Like so many of the supposed pagan “parallels,” he was born when Zeus disguised
himself as a human and impregnated a human princess. This is not a virgin birth
and not like the Holy Spirit’s role we read about in the Gospels.
Mithra:
He’s a popular parallel. But he was born of a rock, not a virgin. Moreover, the
cult of Mithra in the Roman Empire dates to after the time of Christ, so any
dependence is Mithraism on Christianity and not the other way around.
You
get the drift. The so-called parallels always occur well after the life in
question, well into the Christian era, and they are not really stories of
virginal conceptions.
Does it Really Matter?
But even for those who believe in the
virgin birth, some question whether the doctrine is really that important. The
answer is a resounding “Yes!”
First,
the virgin birth is essential to Christianity because it has been essential to
Christianity.
That
may sound like weak reasoning, but only if we care nothing about the history
and universality of the church. Granted, the church can get things wrong,
sometimes even for a long time.
But
if Christians, of all stripes in all places, have professed belief in the
virgin birth for two millennia, maybe we should be slow to discount it as
inconsequential.
Second,
the Gospel writers clearly affirmed the Biblical truth that Mary was a virgin
when Jesus was conceived.
We don’t know precisely how the Christ child came to be in
Mary’s womb, except that the conception was “from
the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 1:20).
But we do know that Mary understood the miraculous nature
of this conception, having asked the angel “How
will this be, since I am a virgin?” (Luke
1:34).
The
Gospels do not present the virgin birth as some prehistoric myth or pagan
copycat, but as “an orderly account” of actual history from eyewitnesses (Luke 1:1-4).
If
the virgin birth is false, the historical reliability of the Gospels is
seriously undermined.
Third,
the virgin birth shows that Jesus was truly human and truly divine.
How
can the virgin birth be inconsequential when it establishes the identity of our
Lord and Savior?
If
Jesus had not been born of a human, we could not believe in His full humanity.
But
if His birth were like any other human birth—through the union of a man and
woman—we would question His full divinity.
The
virgin birth is necessary to secure both a real human nature and also a completely
divine nature.
Fourth,
the virgin birth is essential because it means Jesus did not inherit the curse
of depravity that clings to Adam’s race.
Jesus
was made like us in every way except for sin (Hebrews
4:15; 7:26-27).
Every
human father begets a son or daughter with his sin nature.
We
may not understand completely how this works, but this is the way of the world
after the fall. Sinners beget sinners (Psalm
51:5). Always.
So
if Joseph was the real father of Jesus, or if Mary was sleeping around, Jesus is
not spotless, not innocent, not perfectly holy.
And
as a result, we have no mediator, no imputation of Christ’s righteousness(because
He has no righteousness to impute to us) and no salvation.
Yes,
the virgin birth is essential.
Scripture quotations are taken from The Holy Bible,
English Standard Version.
Kevin DeYoung is
senior pastor of Christ Covenant Church in Matthews, N.C.
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