Hi Adam
How do you know Jesus was the Messiah? Because in the scripture it says that He will come from man and woman (young woman [the word virgin did not exist in Hebrew at that time]). It states that the Messiah is going to be human. Then also the idea of a virgin birth is not in the prophecies.
Enchanted by Judaism, Cape Town
The virgin shall conceive?
“Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.” Isaiah 7:14
There was a word for virgin in Old Testament Hebrew, but you are correct it was not used in Isaiah 7:14, the Messianic prophecy about the virgin birth. The Hebrew word used, almah (עַלְמָה), can mean young girl or virgin; only context will determine what is meant. The immediate subject of the prophecy is likely a woman known to King Ahab, to whom the prophecy was given. The point of the prophecy is that her baby will be born soon, and given a name that means God is with them, and will help them in the coming foreign invasion.
So why do our Bibles say ‘virgin’?
In the 3rd century B.C., when the Jewish Rabbis translated the Hebrew scriptures into Greek, 200 years before Jesus was born, with no vested interest in the ‘virgin birth’ debate, the Jewish translators translated Isaiah 7:14 using the Greek word that specifically means ‘virgin’, not just ‘young woman’. Other Greek words mean ‘young woman’, but the Jewish translators chose the word ‘virgin’. This gives us a strong indication of how Jewish readers understood Isaiah 7:14 before the time of Christ.
This translation, the Septuagint, was the translation Jesus and his disciples would have known. So, it is no surprise that when Matthew quotes Isaiah he says ‘virgin’ (παρθένος). This is not Christian doctrine being imposed on Biblical interpretation. The interpretation had already been provided by the Jewish translators.
Current Jewish beliefs and scholarship date from the time after Christ, after the destruction of the temple. There is, therefore, the opportunity to be revisionist, particularly when it comes to things like the virgin birth. Naturally, because they do not accept Jesus as Messiah, today, they do not teach that the virgin birth is an important sign. But it is clearly in the translation of the messianic prophecy in the Septuagint, because of what the rabbis believed before Jesus came.
This is why the New Testament says, “All this took place to fulfil what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us)” (Matthew 1:22-23).
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Adam is an Englishman living abroad, who knows this earth is not his home. Married with two children and a leader in his local church, Adam is a musician, artist, writer and teacher.
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