The doctrine of the virgin birth is essential to the divinity of our Lord. It is also essential for his qualification to fulfill the Davidic Covenant. Some theologians have denied the virgin birth. To deny it is to deny that Jesus is God. The nature of Jesus' birth has been a point of controversy from the beginning. The apostle John reports a heated debate (John 8:12-59) between Jesus and the Pharisees in which his birth is a subject. In the passage, Jesus claims that God is his father; the Pharisees say he is a bastard. They said, "We were not born of fornication; we have one Father, even God" (John 8.41). They were certainly unaware that they were speaking to YHVH himself at the time. Because of this they continued to reject him and eventually had him crucified. Later rabbis have persisted in rejecting the Messiah and have completely failed to understand the nature and necessity of the the virgin birth and the implications of the genealogies of Matthew and Luke.
Some theologians have dismissed the doctrine of the virgin birth and the genealogies recorded by Matthew and Luke as fanciful creations. In response, other theologians have provided various explanations, answering these objections. These explanations are theories but so are the objections. No one knows for certain whether the genealogies in Matthew and Luke are genealogies of Joseph and Mary respectively or whether they are both of Joseph. The important thing to know is that for every objection to the genealogies there are several reasonable replies to the objections.
There are two genealogies of Jesus in the gospels--Matt. 1.1-16 and Luke 3.23-38. It is noteworthy that neither Matthew (("and to Jacob was born Joseph the husband of Mary, by whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ" (Mt. 1.16)) nor Luke (("and when He began His ministry, Jesus Himself was about thirty years of age, being supposedly the son of Joseph, the son of Eli" (Lk. 3.23)) say that Joseph begat Jesus. Grammatical strength is lent to the doctrine of the virgin birth in Matthew 1.16 with the Greek feminine singular relative pronoun e0c h[j "by whom" that can only refer to Mary.
The doctrine of the virgin birth of Christ is critical to the divinity of the Messiah. According to Isaiah 9, the Son would be God himself. This was prophesied by the angel of the Lord to Joseph (Matt. 1.18-25) and to Mary (Luke 1.26-35) regarding the birth of Jesus. Matthew quotes Isaiah 7.14, "Behold, a virgin will be with child and bear a son, and she will call his name Immanuel." "Immanuel" means "God with us". In Luke's account the angel tells Mary, "He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David; and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever; and His kingdom will have no end" (Lk. 1.32-33). This is the direct fulfillment of the Davidic Covenant.
Another aspect of Jesus' divinity was his being born free from sin. For this to be, it was necessary for him to be born of a virgin. Paul writes in 1 Cor. 15.22 "For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive." In Rom. 5.12 he says, "Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned". Paul continues his argument and states in Rom. 5.17, "For if by the transgression of the one, death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ". What Paul is saying is that everyone since Adam has been "in Adam" and since God sees us "in Adam", he sees us as sinners. But Jesus was not "in Adam" since he did not have a human father. His father was God. Thus, he was not "in Adam" but "in God the Father". In his life and death he fulfilled all the requirements of righteousness before a holy God. He met the qualifications for Saviorhood. He is the only one, born free of sin since Adam, who has met God's righteousness. For this reason Jesus is the only Savior. We are born naturally "in Adam" but born spiritually "in Christ". To experience spiritual birth, we must be "born again" or "born from above" as John writes in the third chapter of his gospel. This new birth is experienced by putting one's trust in Jesus as one's Savior from sin. If we put our trust in Christ God sees us "in Christ", hence righteous.
tw~| a)gapw~nti h(ma~j kai\ lu/santi h(ma~j e)k tw~n a(martiw~n h(mw~n e)n tw|~ a(i/mati au)tou~.
©1998 Don Samdahl. Anyone is free to reproduce this material and distribute it, but it may not be sold.
Updated Monday, November 04, 2002