I started with "It's interesting at this time of year" because one of the most common "Bible myths" debunked in these lists is the Virgin Birth. Now, there are some miracles without which Christianity could not exist. I'm thinking, first and foremost, of the Resurrection. Even Paul said, "If Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is vain, your faith also is vain" (1 Cor 15:14). Absolutely essential. But what about the Virgin Birth? Is that important? I would argue it is. I would argue that it is essential. Why? First, from a logical approach, Both Old and New Testaments called for it.
Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, a virgin will be with child and bear a son, and she will call His name Immanuel. (Isa 7:14)"Now, Stan, you know that 'virgin' in that text could be translated 'maiden' and not mean a virgin at all." Okay, got it. So the claim in Isaiah that the sign that God would give would be the ordinary birth of a child to a woman. Got it. Remarkable, isn't it? No, the prophecy and promise was a sign (a common biblical term for "miracle") and a virgin, being with child, would indeed be miraculous. When Matthew quotes Isaiah (Matt 1:23), he refers to a "virgin" as well. You'd think a Jewish writer would know his Jewish Bible, wouldn't you? Another thing. If the Holy Spirit was supposed to lead His people into all truth, why is it that all Christians for all time up until the 19th century (the beginning of scientific inquiry into religion1) understood it to mean "virgin" and not "young maiden"? That would make Him either an incompetent or an ineffective God, wouldn't it? One other logical possibility: it was just wrong. It's a fairy tale made up by people. Which, then, would mean that the Bible is not reliable for truth statements and Christianity is as much a myth as its source book is. No, no, for these logical reasons and more, "born of a virgin" is essential, not optional. There is, however, another reason why it is essential. Scripture claims that sin and death came "through one man" -- Adam. Through Adam, sin passed to all people. If Christ had been fathered by a human father, He would have inherited a human nature that included sin. But Christ's Father wasn't human. As such, Christ could live a sinless life (Heb 4:15), an absolute necessity for the spotless Lamb of God to take away the sin of the world (John 1:29). In order for Christ's death to effectively pay for the sins of the world, He would have to have no sin Himself. That wouldn't be possible if He was born with a sin nature. Thus, a virgin birth where the father was not human was absolutely necessary.
Of course, not everyone agrees with this. Clearly those who deny it deny the reliability of Scripture. Those who deny it also tend to deny miracles at all. You likely will hear them shooting down Creation and Noah's Flood. They have no problem cutting and pasting their Bibles so the stuff they don't agree with is erased and new stuff is inserted to make it more palatable. But if "All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work" (2 Tim 3:16-17) and God is faithful and true, then those who deny the Virgin Birth or the rest do so at their own peril, because they are denying what God's Word declares to be true, and Jesus said, "Your word is truth" (John 17:17). It's kind of hard to be classified as a Christian -- a follower of Christ -- while telling us that Christ was wrong, isn't it?
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1 Note: Religion in general and God in particular are all about the "supernatural." That is, this by definition is outside of nature, of science. It's like using a voltmeter to measure light intensity. Science is designed to analyze the natural and is not equipped to measure the supernatural. Thus, though there might be touch points between the supernatural and the natural where the supernatural leaves an imprint on the natural, the idea that science can be used to prove or disprove religion is definitionally nonsensical.
17 comments:
Strangely enough, many would argue that The Big Bang and it's associated cosmology actually support the Biblical narrative of a singular event that began everything.
I'll give scientists credit, they've come up with some really creative fairy tales to explain away what the scientific evidence supports (a singular creation event), it's quite fanciful. "The aliens did it." is probably my favorite.
Back on topic, I do agree that there are numerous reasons why the virgin birth, but not the RC add ons, is essential to the Christian faith.
Great point about the anti supernatural bias among this group of people. They have no problem believing some pretty fanciful things without a shred of proof, but deny the Occam's Razor answer to so much.
I understand atheists and maybe deists denying the possibility of miracles, but no theist should have any thought about the impossibility of miracles. How you could say there is an imminent and transcendent God that can't intervene in nature is impossible for me to understand from a logical perspective. If God is Creator of all and keenly interested in the goings on here, of course He can suspend natural laws. It's when you try to hold to only natural laws but allow for miracles without an intelligence that miracles become ridiculous and impossible.
David,
In theory, I completely agree with you. Yet there are plenty of progressive christians who deny any supernatural events in scripture. But we see all sorts of bizarre behavior that doesn't make sense.
The virginal conception of Jesus was truly supernatural--and an event that is evidently hard for many people to accept. However, we observe a miracle every time God creates a brand-new human being from the union of a woman’s egg and a man’s sperm; to me, it’s not a big leap of faith to believe that God “tweaked” that incredible process a bit to bring about the Incarnation. Nothing is impossible for God (Matt. 19:26), so the supernatural should not really surprise us! “Expect the unexpected!”
I too encounter a good number of attempts to debunk the Bible through science. Fortunately for me--since I love both science and God--it is easy these days to find credible material (like that available through Creation Ministries International, Answers in Genesis, the Institute for Creation Research, and others) that can build up both one’s knowledge of the world and faith in God. In my mind, the natural and the supernatural are not mutually exclusive but equally valid and interconnected (and of course I believe that a Supernatural Being created and superintends the entire natural world). It seems that every branch of science--from astrophysics to zoology--requires a supernatural essence at its core; secular scientists are studying God and His creative work, whether they recognize it or not. And those “touch points between the supernatural and the natural” that you mention in your postscript are becoming more apparent as time passes, too.
P.S. This was one of your longer posts, Stan, but I for one am glad I did not skip reading it! :)
As far as I've seen, most progressive christians are deists, not theists.
Purely a technicality, Lorna, but the dictionary defines "miracle" as "a surprising and welcome event that is not explicable by natural or scientific laws." We commonly refer to the "miracle of birth," but since it occurs by natural and scientific laws, we're exaggerating. On the other hand, the intricacies of the reproductive system along with the fact that anyone has ever conceived a child is truly plain and simple undeniable evidence for the existence of God. That kind of stuff doesn't happen "by chance."
OK, then, make that, “we observe a near miracle….” (My children’s births were certainly “surprising and welcome events” and sure seemed like real miracles to us--even if not to the dictionary :)
For Mormons there was no miracle. Their god-man had sex with Mary to provide a body for the spiritual Jesus to inhabit. When asked how Mary could be called a virgin if she had sex, I was told (as a newish Mormon) that "God" is an immortal man but Mary was still a vlrgin to mortal man. I said immortal or mortal, if she's had sex she's no longer a virgin and the birth wasn't miraculous. This was the doctrine which set me to researching Mormonism beyond the Book of Mormon, Doctrines & Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price so that by the time I had been a Mormon for two years I left the LDS.
Of course for Mormons, they declared the yearly visit from the seagulls to eat the bugs attacking their crops as a miracle, so there's that.
There is another, modern-day type of “virgin birth,” of course: when women are “artificially inseminated” or conceive through “in vitro fertilization.” Both these procedures can be performed on a virgin, i.e. a woman who has not had sexual intercourse. Lesbians, for example, often have their children this way, as do many sexually inactive women wishing to be mothers. Since these options (not technically “miracles” but certainly amazing) weren’t possible until recent times, I wonder if soon some lesbian woman especially will claim to be the true “virgin”--rather than Mary--predicted to bring forth the Messiah (perhaps birthing a brand-new cult). It wouldn’t surprise me, in these crazy times! (Those knowledgeable of Scripture will know the other “signs” for the Messiah’s coming are not there, but the spiritually blind would fall for it.)
Lorna, I might put that in the "lying signs and wonders" category.
For sure, David. But it does expand the "born of a virgin" options, doesn't it? Not something remotely possible until modern times. Of course, the Holy Spirit wouldn't be involved in this scenario (so the child would not be born without a sinful nature, of course), but the end-times will bring all manner of crazy claims, I am sure.
Maybe, but so far, at least for heterosexual couples, you can't just go in and get invitro. You have to try naturally for a time. And while it may technically be true, I don't imagine there are any lesbians that haven't had intercourse that would consider themselves virgins. And while the technology is amazing, it still requires a male's input.
David, please note I was referring specifically to technical virgins and sexually inactive women for these procedures. I think you might be overthinking my original point--how we could interpret “born of a virgin” in these modern times (not even knowing what’s ahead in the scientific realm, i.e. human cloning, etc.).
I have a tendency to do that, just ask Stan:)
As for cloning, I don't see that happening ever. The only reason it is even an idea is because humanity has accepted the idea that we are only material beings with no soul or spirit. Could possibly clone body parts, but not life.
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