[ p. 222 ]
BEFORE faith in Jesus had reached the point of describing and addressing him directly as “God,” Palestinian Christians were hearing from teachers of high authority a new and strange fact about their Master. As his manner of leaving the world had been like that of no other man, so had been his manner of entering the world. Jesus had no human father.
Critical investigation makes clear that this teaching was first given in Palestine at a relatively early date. It comes to us in two sources, the opening chapters of our First and Third Gospels. The Jewish character of the First Evangelist is evident. As to the Third Gospel, while Luke himself was a Gentile, his infancy narrative is the most Jewish part of the entire New Testament. The Messianic doctrine of the opening chapters of his Gospel is not only purely Jewish; [1] it belongs to a stage when expectations of Israel’s temporal prosperity had not yet been shaken off. “God shall give him the throne of his father David, and he shall reign over the house of Jacob forever.” “That he might remember mercy toward Abraham and his seed forever.” “In the house of his servant David [ p. 223 ] salvation from our enemies.” “Good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all the people.” “Looking for the redemption of Jerusalem.” [2] The “atmosphere” is wholly Hebraic. The birth-stories cannot, therefore, be explained by parallels from Greek myths which tell of the birth of a demigod from a god and a mortal. From such stories Jews would shrink in horror.
Of course, there were no such legends in Israel. After belief in Jesus’ supernatural birth had been established, Christians in search of prophetic corroboration seized on Isaiah vii: 14, and in the First Gospel this verse is regarded (perhaps only by way of devotional interpretation for Jewish readers) as a prediction that the Messiah would be born of a virgin. But, quite apart from the question of what Isaiah actually meant, [3] the Jews of pre-New Testament days never regarded the passage either as indicating a virgin birth or, indeed, as a prediction about the Messiah. In all Jewish Messianic literature there is no suggestion anywhere that the Messiah—if a man at all—should be born in any other way than are other men.
Nor could the new teaching have been due to any depreciation of marriage in favor of an ascetic regard for celibacy. Such a doctrine was likewise unknown in Palestinian Judaism. [4] Chastity before marriage was, of course, a stringent precept, but for a girl to die [ p. 224 ] while still a virgin was regarded as a great calamity. To this day, Jews, when they visit a new-born child, pray that it may be brought “to the marriage canopy.”
In other words, the reasons commonly assigned for the appearance of the virgin-birth teaching in Christianity, when carefully and honestly examined, break down. If the stories had originated in, say, Corinth, there would have been just ground for grave suspicion. But the stories originated in Palestine.
It is needless for us to retell these stories at any length. Nothing is more familiar. The scene of the Annunciation is one of the most exquisitely beautiful that has ever been painted. We see a lovely Jewish maiden—Mary of Nazareth. To her appears a heavenly visitant. As in the heart of every other Jewish woman, so hope sang in her heart that some day she might be the mother of the Lord’s anointed representative, the Messiah-King who would come to restore again its old place and power to the Jewish nation. The angel tells Mary that she has found favor with God and that he has chosen her for this high and holy task. Mary cannot understand. She is betrothed—not yet married—and the angel declares that the child will soon be hers. She believes, though she cannot understand; therefore to her comes the explanation. The Spirit of God shall rest upon her; the power of the Highest shall overshadow her; the child is to have no earthly father; “the holy thing” to be born of her shall be called, therefore, the Son of God.
Grant for a moment that the story is true, and never [ p. 225 ] woman spoke a nobler or braver word than Mary’s, when she said, “Be it unto me according to thy word.” She gave her consent, with all that it meant of suspicion, misunderstanding, gossip, suffering—anguish so great that “a sword pierced her heart.”
Equally perfect is the story of the birth itself: the pilgrimage to Bethlehem, where Joseph and Mary journeyed to be enrolled in the census; the rest in the stable cave; the manger cradle; how the child was born in the stable where they had found lodgment when the mother’s hour drew near, because the crowds that had come up for the enrollment filled the little town so that there was found “no room for them in the inn”; the contrast of humility and glory; the lowly birth and the divine majesty of the new-born child, the song the shepherds heard, when an angel voice announced, “Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all the people, for unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord”; and the glory that “shone round about them,” while a chorus of other angelic voices sang, “Glory to God in the highest; and on earth, peace, good will to men”; the visit of the shepherds to the mother and child.
Most people love these stories dearly, and will not let them go, unless in all honesty they feel that they must. If they must be dropped, at least we may ask that those who would give them up show sufficient reverence not to go about the task with thoughtless haste and loud declamation. There are people who [ p. 226 ] are already sufficiently disturbed, confused, and grieved by the threatened loss of what they hold dear, without doubling their anguish through crudely flippant denial. In any investigation of these stories, it should always be borne in mind that they tell with a direct simplicity, worth volumes upon volumes of scholarly treatises, the significance to the world of the birth of Jesus. Let us also bear in mind that, if it should appear that some elements are of later accretion, the story of the supernatural birth must already have been in existence in order to become the center of such accretions.
Nor is the fact that the Birth Story is not mentioned directly elsewhere in the New Testament any argument against it. One cannot suppose that it ever became known to the apostles until long after their faith in Christ had become fixed. Of course it was not generally told. One can readily see why it would not have been told by Jesus himself. It is equally obvious that it could not have been made generally known during the lifetime of his mother. We could therefore hardly expect to find the doctrine explicitly in St. Paul. Neither is it surprising to meet bits of synoptic Gospel tradition referring to Joseph as Jesus’ “father.” There is, perhaps, some significance in the fact that these are all in St. Luke and St. Matthew, whose opening chapters make clear the sense in which “father” is used. [5] St. Mark, whose plan of commencing with [ p. 227 ] Jesus’ baptism obliges him to omit a description of the birth, avoids all mention of Joseph.
Moreover, the supernatural birth could not, in the nature of the case, have formed part of the first apostolic preaching. That rested on public events, to which the apostles could bear testimony from their own experience. “Whereof we all are witnesses” was the invariable formula. Let it be repeated, then: belief in the miraculous birth and acceptance of the deity of Christ are two separate and distinct matters of faith. John, although his Gospel is a passionate defense of the latter doctrine, never finds it necessary to mention the former, * 1 and even allows two references to Joseph as Jesus’ “father” to stand without explicit correction. 2
And is it not a fact that the story fits, with most extraordinary congruity, into the whole drama of the Incarnation? God was making a new start for the human race. In nothing was there—in nothing is there still—such desperate need of a new beginning as in the matter of sex. The instinct of earlier days, which accepted the story in childlike faith and found in it childlike delight, is a right instinct; certainly, it is not lightly to be disregarded.
In the only reference to non-Jews (ii: 32) the Gentilei receive “light,” but Israel receives “glory.” ↩︎
i: 32-33. 54-55. 69-71; ii: 10.38. ↩︎
Old Testament scholars universally agree that the prophet had no such idea in mind. ↩︎
It appears, indeed, in Christianity, but only under Gentile influence and at a very much later date. Paul’s arguments in I Corinthians vii rest entirely on apocalyptic considerations of expediency. ↩︎
Jews were familiar with a strictly legal but non-physical use of “father.” The child of a man’s wife was legally the child of the man, and he could not disinherit it even when its paternity was notoriously not his; his only remedy was to divorce his wife before the child was born. This explains the genealogies, which trace Jesus descent through Joseph. In one case, the child of a living man was legally the child of the man who might have been dead for years (Deuteronomy xxv: 5-6; cited in St. Mark xii: 19). The Old Testament custom was continued for some centuries into the Christian era. The practice finally was prohibited by the rabbis, although the law still stands and the alternative “release” ceremony is still continued. ↩︎