Why was Mary a virgin?

[drkitten]

Yes, but not necessarily "in the olden days". So powerful were the social stigma of premarital sex -- especially for a woman, that calling someone a "maiden", technically without reference to her virginal status, may just simply be presumed that she still was.

Er, that's my point.

And I think a writer might very well double-imply virginity. "She was a virgin, who had never had sex" may be redundant, but also drives the point home. Which is the point of such a passage.

Why would that point need special emphasis in that passage, though?

 

[Marc L]

After all, we at least have evidence that Billy the Fish saves...

Which reminds me of the line from "Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?":

George Nelson is robbing a bank and quips on his way out, "Remember folks, Jesus saves, but George Nelson withdraws!"

Marc

 

[scotth]

Mary was a virgin because being born of a virgin was an extremely common theme among that type of hero cult at the time.

 

[scotth]

Both sides trace back to David. Does it matter which of the two sons of David the ultimate person came from? The ultimate fact that Christ was a decendent of David is the quintessence of the prohpecy, not the exact path.

How does tracing the ancestry to the non-father help at all?

 

[drkitten]

How does tracing the ancestry to the non-father help at all?

Notice that Blutarsky has evidently decided to cash in his chips and go home.

Apparently he recognizes a losing hand when he sees one.

 

[Marc L]

How does tracing the ancestry to the non-father help at all?

One could argue that Jesus was Joseph's adopted son, and designated as his legal heir (refuting the idea that James et. al. are children from his first marriage), but the text doesn't make any mention of it.

The usual retort is that one of the two lineages is Mary's, which doesn't make sense, since she is from the tribe of Levi, not Judah.

Marc

 

[writerdd]

In case no-one has said this yet, Mary was a viring because of a mistranslation of an Old Testament prophecy. The prophecy said the messiah would be born of a young woman. This was mistranslated as virgin. The virgin mythology was prevalent in the time that the New Testament was written. Presto! A new Christian myth.

 

[rwp]

I think you can definately make the case that the infancy narratives were written with this specifically in mind. For RWP and others defending these narratives, it's important to note that they are written in an entirely different voice, and are probably the product of a different author.

I have no idea who wrote what or when they wrote it, so it is not my intention to defend the narratives.

 

[ceo_esq]

Mary was a virgin because being born of a virgin was an extremely common theme among that type of hero cult at the time.

We've examined that claim on this forum in the past. When actually investigated, the supposed analogues to the Jesus birth story are less than compelling, and the characteristics of the Jesus birth myth begin to appear more distinctive.

 

[triadboy]

We've examined that claim on this forum in the past. When actually investigated, the supposed analogues to the Jesus birth story are less than compelling, and the characteristics of the Jesus birth myth begin to appear more distinctive.

http://www.religioustolerance.org/virgin_b1.htm

Livy, a famous Roman historian, had written a very popular book on the history of Rome that was widely circulated in the first decades of the 1st century CE. In it, he explained that Mars, the Roman God of war, fathered twins Romulus and Remus, the original mythical founders of the city of Rome. Their mother was Silvia, a Vestal Virgin.

Buddha was born of the virgin Maya after the Holy Ghost descended upon her.

The Egyptian God Horus was born of the virgin Isis; as an infant, he was visited by three kings.

In Phrygia, Attis was born of the virgin Nama.

A Roman savior Quirrnus was born of a virgin.

In Tibet, Indra was born of a virgin. He ascended into heaven after death.

The Greek deity Adonis was born of the virgin Myrrha, many centuries before the birth of Jesus. He was born "at Bethlehem, in the same sacred cave that Christians later claimed as the birthplace of Jesus." 4

In Persia, the god Mithra was born of a virgin on DEC-25. An alternative myth is that he emerged from a rock.

Also in Persia, Zoroaster was also born of a virgin.

In India, there are two main stories of the birth of Krishna, one of the incarnations of Vishnu, and the second person within the Hindu Trinity. In one story, Krishna was said to have been born to his mother Devaki while she was still a virgin. In the other, he had a normal conception and birth.

Virgin births were claimed for many Egyptian pharaohs, Greek emperors and for Alexander the Great of Greece.

 

[ceo_esq]

http://www.religioustolerance.org/virgin_b1.htm

Yes, I recognize most of these as the same candidates we've reviewed in the past.

What typically happens is something along the following lines.

Maya was married for a while before she gave birth to Buddha, so it's unlikely that she was a virgin. At any rate, I've never seen a pre-Christian source that suggested she was.

There's no reason to think Isis (who was not even a human being) was a virgin either. For one thing, she was also married well before Horus was born. For another, if I recall correctly, it was necessary for her to bodily raise Osiris from the dead for the purpose of conceiving Horus, so I think we can assume that Horus was conceived in something approximating the conventional manner.

That's just the first two on your list. We could go on like this, but it just gets boring after a while, as we've seen in several other threads devoted to the same topic.

 

[This Guy]

Maybe it's because she... um... had a great personality.

My thoughts were that perhaps she really didn't look as appealing as all those statues and pictures we see of her today.

I mean lets face it, with state of the art makeup and hygienic standards of the time, is it more likely that she looked like her modern day representations, or more like the wicked witch in the wizard of Oz?

I would suspect the latter.

 

[Beerina]

Why would that point need special emphasis in that passage, though?

Because of the massive hangups on sexuality, the virginity is a key point of the story. In any event, I wouldn't conclude that the lack of use of a virgin-specific word was indicative of some earlier or modified story where she wasn't a virgin.

 

[merentha]

The Isaiah passage is somewhat redundant anyways. Why mention that the child will be born of a young maiden? You mean as opposed to an old lady or a man?

I think the virginity was implied in the prophecy. Doesn't necessarily mean that Mary was a virgin when she had Jesus, if they both even existed.

 

[This Guy]

The Isaiah passage is somewhat redundant anyways. Why mention that the child will be born of a young maiden? You mean as opposed to an old lady or a man?

I think the virginity was implied in the prophecy. Doesn't necessarily mean that Mary was a virgin when she had Jesus, if they both even existed.

Not putting words in your mouth, but to say it was implied in the prophecy implies there was a prophecy.

From my reading of Isaiah it's talking about an event that was more relevant to the time it was written than it was to some future time.

Did the Jews of that time see it as a prophesy? Did it apply to events that were current or near the time of it's writing?

It's easy to go back, and find prophesy in old literature, just refer to the Nostradamus hype. I think in many (most?) cases, OT prophesy cited by Christians can easier be explained as current events around the time of their writing.

 

[qayak]

. . . ,"Slut, let's break the engagement."

You say that like there is something wrong with sluts!

Do you know the difference between a b*tch and a slut?

A slut will have sex with anyone. A b*tch will have sex with anyone BUT YOU!

 

[triadboy]

The Isaiah passage is somewhat redundant anyways. Why mention that the child will be born of a young maiden? You mean as opposed to an old lady or a man?

I think Isaiah was giving the King a timeline. "This is going to happen before this young woman has a child."

 

[Darth Rotor]

Just about the same evidence that exists of many historical figures and events of that time that we take as fact without skepticism.

IIRC, the Peloponesian War, Thucydides, is one such single source document, though there may be references to it in some old ancient Persian texts that I am unaware of.

DR

 

[Ausmerican]

This is all very well but no-one has touched on the important matter. Does anyone know the name of the GENIUS guy that was getting about the area at the time, boffing virgins and lying to their betrothed and the virgins themselves that he was an angel?

 

[SezMe]

Arnold Schwaren.... its late.