patricius79
Called to Jesus Through Mary
I will never know a man amounts to saying I know not a man. A non-smoker who says: "I don't smoke" (Present Indicative Active) means that he never smokes and is not smoking now. If he were to ask a fortune teller after receiving a grim forecast: How will I die of lung cancer, since I don't smoke,? he further means that he has no intention of ever smoking. If he intended to start smoking,he wouldn't ask the question How. The thought of eventually consuming tobacco would certainly cross his mind if he intended to start smoking. He could even ask himself whether he might start smoking after all. But presently he affirms that he is a non-smoker. He never smokes and is not smoking now. He does not smoke. Because he doesn't smoke, how shall he die of lung cancer? Similarly, because (epei) Mary doesn't know man, how shall she conceive Jesus? Shall Mary no longer intend not to have marital relations with Joseph? Not at all! She will conceive Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Allow me to make this verse clearer to you. The original Greek text reads: andra ou ginosko, which literally is "man not I know" or in English "I know not man." The Greek verb ginosko (PIA) is in the continuous present which shows a permanent disposition with regard to the verb in question: to not know man. Mary has a permanent disposition to not know man, just as the man who says "I don't smoke" has a permanent disposition not to smoke. The verb "to know" in the Gospel is a Jewish idiom which has to do with sexual relations between a man and a woman. So idiomatically, Mary is actually telling the angel: "I don't have sex with man." Now this Jewish idiom for sexual relations is subject to the same rules of grammar as any other verb is. The verb "to know" may be conjugated in the past tense. We read in Genesis 4:1: 'And Adam knew Eve his wife who conceived and brought forth Cain.' In other words, "Adam had sex with Eve who conceived and brought forth Cain." Eve conceived Cain because she had sex with Adam. But Mary does not have sex with man, so she wonders how she will conceive Jesus. She tells the angel: "I don't have sex with man." She never has sex, and she is not having sex at the present time. Mary is no different from the non-smoker. She has a permanent disposition to not have sex, just as the non-smoker has a permanent disposition not to smoke. It is Mary's permanent disposition and will not to have sex, which explains why she asks the angel how she could possibly ever conceive a child.
The KJV is right in that the verb "to know" is in the Present Indicative Active, but it is wrong with the insertion of the indefinite article "a" before "man", which we don't have in Jerome's Latin Vulgate. The inclusion of this grammatical exponent can create a misunderstanding of God's written word. The object in Mary's statement is andra, which means "man", or more precisely the genre of the male sex. What it does not signify is an individual male, who in this case would be Joseph. The KJV mistranslation has led to readings like this one: "I do not have a husband." However, we read in Luke 1:27 that Mary was betrothed (espoused) to Joseph at the appointed time. The couple were already legally married, having observed the first marriage ceremony (Kiddushin). They were in fact husband and wife at the time of the Annunciation, which explains why Joseph was in a position to divorce Mary as soon as he discovered she was pregnant. Andra can mean "husband" (John 4:17), but Mary does not say: "I have no husband," since she has one already.
Neither does Mary say: "I am a virgin," which I've found in a Protestant Bible. Being a virgin (parthenos) does not signify a permanent disposition and intention in and of itself. A woman who has no intention of having sexual relations with any man could still lose her virginity by being raped. But once she has been raped and has lost her virginity, she could still intend not having sex with any man if that were her original intention. A virgin may also intend to have sexual relations with a man, but only once she has been married. As we know, Mary was wed to Joseph, so if she had intended to conceive children with her husband upon consummating their marriage, she would not have asked the angel how she will become pregnant.. She asks her question, not because she is a virgin, but because she does not have sexual relations with the male sex:"I do not know man." "I do not have sex with man." What Mary doesn't say is "I haven't had sex with my husband yet" or either "I don't have sex with my husband." Grammatically and semantically, the statement andra ou ginosko doesn't allow such interpretations. The object noun andra does not refer to individual males. There is another word for individual men, which is anthropos. It refers to the entire human race or an individual male (Matthew 8:9). So the indefinite article does precede anthropos when referring to an individual man.Many Protestants claim that the dogma of the PVM either contradicts the Scriptures (the feeble "brothers of Jesus" supposition) or is unsupported by them (no explicit evidence), but that's only because they have drawn inferences based on mistranslated texts. When reading Luke 1:34, we must strictly keep to the grammar and vocabulary of the text, heed the Hebrew colloquialism in Mary's speech, and observe the whole context of the dialogue between Mary and the angel.
A garden enclosed is my sister, my spouse; a spring dried up, a fountain sealed.
Songs of Solomon 4, 12
Thank you for providing such beautiful images of our Lady with your learned posts. She is so lovable!
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