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From: avi@pegasus.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Paul Dubuc and rationalizations about the meaning of "virginity"
Message-ID: <510@pegasus.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 2-Sep-83 01:14:36 EDT
Article-I.D.: pegasus.510
Posted: Fri Sep  2 01:14:36 1983
Date-Received: Sat, 3-Sep-83 04:10:24 EDT
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Organization: AT&T Information Systems, Lincroft NJ
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This is a response to just one statement by Paul in a ~460 line article.
I will first quote a quote that Paul was responding to, then Paul's statement,
and then my comments:

    [Author not known to me]
	"The Jewish religion and Christian have argued about the phrase in
	the Old Testament predicting the savior would be born of a virgin (the
	Rabbis translating it as young woman).  Young woman implies Virgin more
	or less, depending on your point of view."

    [Pauls response]
	"At the time of Christ, "virgin" seemed to be the accepted translation.
	It seems to me that the motivation to reconsider this translation may
	have been composed largely from the Jews' rejection of Jesus as the
	Messiah.  It wasn't an issue until the Christ was born of a virgin.
	I have no problems with "young woman" being used here because it does
	not exclude the young woman being a virgin.  But its use as an
	alternate to "virgin" raises some questions in my mind.

	1) Are there distinct O.T. Hebrew words for "virgin" and "young woman"
	   (who is not a virgin)?

	2) If Isaiah meant "young married woman", what is the significance of
	   even mentioning the conception?  It seems superfluous to prophecy.
 	   Aren't all men born of a woman?  Why even mention that she was
	   young?"

[ME]
Paul (obviously) does not know Hebrew. The passage being referred to is
(roughly - I have only read it in the original Hebrew):
	A "young woman" shall be with child, and she shall call his name
	Emanu-El ("with-us-is-the-lord").
The word used is "Almah" which means YOUNG woman. There is a separate word
"Bethulah" (hard to really spell in English) that invariably is used to
describe a "virgin".

Paul seems to imply that the Jews "covered up" after Christ was born of a
virgin (which I deny) by changing the meaning of the word Almah. BULL!!!
Where does he get his information about "Virgin" being the accepted meaning
during  the time of Christ? I think Paul is the one trying to cover up by
rationalizing about things.

As far as I can gather, nobody noticed any such thing as the "VIRGIN BIRTH"
while Christ was alive. Many people (including myself) believe that the
virginity of Mary was rationalized after the fact because of this passage in
Issaiah. (sp) The early Christians were reading a translation of the Bible into
Greek that mistakenly translated Almah into "virgos". I have always been
puzzled about the very concept of Mary being a virgin. She was married to
Joseph and was supposed to have had other children. Did god divorce her?

As far as Paul's questions are concerned, I believe I answered the first. The
second question is relatively superfluous. CONCEPTION was NOT mentioned. The
sentence merely says that a young woman (as compared to an old woman) shall
have a child AND you can infer that this child will be the Messiah. Much of the
so-called prophecy in the Bible is just rambling talk and prose/poetry. Trying
to attach much significance to why the author said things is not always
fruitful. How would you suggest that he say it? Should he have said:
	"The Messiah will exist"
and leave out any other details?

I have known many "young women" who were not virgins -- including a 12 year old
who came to me for a checkup of her and her 9 month old daughter. I have also
met many "old women" who were virgins. If Paul insists on a "reason" for
mentioning "young woman", here is a stab at an explanation. Let us assume that
the "young woman" represents the Jews and the child represents the "Messiah"
(although not necessarily Jesus - according to non-christians). The YOUNG part
could be used to represent the rejuvenation of the Jews caused by the arrival
of the Messiah.

Enough flaming for now. I thought we discussed this topic to death months ago.
DISCLAIMER: I do not really believe that the sentence in Issaiah really means
anything whatsoever. I do not particularly believe in the Messiah (either
version). I do hate generalizations that are not based on facts. If you have
any comments or corrections to my statements, please do NOT send them to
/dev/null. My machine throws it away. Posting it or sending me mail works
better.
-- 
===Avi E. Gross~~AT&T Information Systems Labs~~pegasus!avi~~(201) 576-3063