The Virgin Birth (Redrafted)
The Christian concept of the virgin birth is derived solely from a mis-translation of a Hebrew word into Greek. The word ‘almah, from the original oracle (Isaiah 7:14) simply means, "young woman" (i.e. any nubile young woman). The Septuagint incorrectly translates this Hebrew word by the Greek word, παρθενος (virgin). Thus the New Testament writers' claim (Matthew 1: 22-23) for a fulfillment of prophecy is inaccurate.
The Hebrew language has a specific word for virgin, bethulah, but Isaiah does not employ it.
In its historical context, the Isaianic passage may be seen as a reaction to completely contemporary events. During a time of trouble and the threat of foreign invasion, the prophet urged King Ahaz to ask Yahweh for a sign and when he refused to do so, told him that Yahweh would give him a sign. This was to be the birth of a child to an anonymous young woman.
The child was to be named, Immanuel. (God is with us) and would grow up to experience the privations resulting from the Assyrian invasion of Judah by Tiglath-Pileser III, predicted by the prophet. The primary reference of the sign was to the original situation in which it was given.
The idea of the historical personage, Jesus of Nazareth (an ascetic Galilean Jewish teacher of the early 1st Century) as an anthropomorphic deity is ultimately derived from Ancient Near Eastern concepts of sacral kingship via later Hellenistic antecedents. Such notions were (and still remain) totally alien to Judaic belief and practice.
The Hellenistic-Roman world had many saviour gods and goddesses depicted in human form. Christian theology added yet another one - conflated and identified with an actual human being and defined within the linguistic terminology of concepts derived from pre-existent, Hellenistic/Jewish belief systems.
Moreover, the major factor in the popularity and growth of the (later) cult of the Virgin Mary, which must be taken into account, was the prevailing deep and wide-spread need for a female object of worship - for a Mother Goddess. Considering the antiquity and pervasion of these Goddess cults throughout the Mediterranean world and the Ancient Near East, it is not surprising that the developing Christian religion found itself unable to suppress such deeply entrenched and manifestly popular devotion.
The current existence of many myths of the divine birth of various ancient heroes such as Herakles, Alexander the Great and others is well attested and must have played an important part in the development of the idea of the virgin birth of Jesus. Pagan myths are very likely to have influenced the New Testament authors in a subtle but no less derivative way. As the ancient Hebrew writers drew on earlier Mesopotamian and Canaanite mythology when describing divine activity in creation, so the related question of the employment of myth in the New Testament when defining similar supposed supernatural intervention cannot be disregarded.
Finally, one pertinent question posed by the Neoplatonist scholar and philosopher Porphyry (232/3-c.305 CE) in his important treatise, Kata Christianōn (Against the Christians) asks how it can be maintained (by Christians) that deity cannot be held to subsist in a statue (as a cult object) but is deemed to reside in the physical body of the man Jesus. Despite the eloquent apologetics and contorted disputations of later Christian theologians, this profound inquiry appears to have found no rational determination. However, in the fifth Century, a dramatic and characteristic answer was provided by the, now predominant, Christian church and the state authorities. Porphyry’s work was condemned at the council of Ephesus in 431 CE and eventually consigned to the flames in 448 CE.
If there was no virgin birth then Christianity is just another religion and death will mean the end of everything for everyone.
The problem with modernist existential humanist theology is that it does not accept the whole Bible as the Word of God to us. They may say the Bible contains the Word of God, but it is inaccurate historically. In other words, there was no historical Jesus as described in the gospels, but it is the religious "Christ of faith" that is substituted for a historical Jesus who lived in Israel, born of a virgin, died on a cross and was resurrected all at definite points of human history. People who believe in this have just a pointless christianity that goes nowhere.
Existential humanistic philosophy is the dominant world view at this present time. Traditional Christianity is a minority world view. Existential philosophy is man's attempt to extract something positive out of the nihilistic philosophy that say that man is nothing and is going nowhere, the universe is in complete chaos, and is the result of time and chance. Therefore the reasoning on this basis results in absolute pessimism, and the social results of this are the great number of suicides in our western society.
But philosopher had a conflict, because although their philosophy said that man is just a bag of chemicals, a nothing, just a machine, what they could not deny in reality was that man was living and breathing as a real person with self consciousness and a personality, as if he is created in the image of God.
To resolve this conflict they decided to go into an "upper story" of non-reasoning, constructing a theory based on faith. But their faith is based on a belief that life does have meaning, man does have a future if he works hard to improve himself. One philosopher reasoned that the universe had to start somewhere - that someone or something had to start everything off, but that entity is a mystery. There are some who theorised that the universe was formed by some superior alien race living in another universe next door to ours; but most put down the formation of the universe through time and chance.
So, when the existential got into religious theology, they decided to call that entity 'god' who they believed must be good, but they did not know anything more about this entity called 'god'. Then they tried to find the historical Christ but failed. Albert Schweitzer detailed their quest and failure in his book "Quest for the Historical Jesus". Having failed, they decided to adopt "the christ of faith" which meant that Christ could be anyone you believed He could be, depending on your culture and your world view. Therefore, when they used the word "faith" they defined it as a belief in some kind of "god" they didn't know, and a "christ of faith" who probably was some kind of holy man who did some good things and taught that it was good to live a good moral life.
It is interesting that the modernist theologians use the same words as traditional Christians use, but their definition of those words are entirely different. The New Zealander Lloyd Geering and the American (or Canadian) Bishop Spong teach this theology.
I'll tell you what. When I get to heaven, I'll ask Bishop Spong what he thinks of his theology now that he is in eternity; and if he is not in heaven, then you can ask him!
