The Virgin Birth and God's Inexorable, Faithful Love
(avg. read time: 13–25 mins.)
The virgin birth (or, more properly, the virginal conception) of Jesus has proven to be an important theological touchstone in the history of Christianity. A lot of theological layering has been added to this event since the first century in attempts to explain its significance, and why it was necessary for Jesus to be born of a virgin. Matthew and Luke attest to it as not only something that happened in history, but, because of this, as something that is also crucial to their christological framing. But it is noteworthy that while both texts attest to it, neither is clearly dependent on the other in this regard. Matthew ties it to a particular Scripture, but Luke does not. In other words, one ties it explicitly to prophecy fulfillment, but the other does not. But despite different theological motives, they both claim it. However, there is no explicit reference to it in Mark or John, nor is there any clearly identifiable implicit reference. It is not easy to account for why this is on the basis of later theological accounts of the importance of the virginal conception, such as its relation to the notion of original sin, and so this provides part of the warrant for getting back to the roots of this belief in Jesus’s virginal conception. I suggest that one of the foundations of this belief that has been too often overlooked—which is conveyed in different ways in Mark and John—is what links the virginal conception to Jesus’s resurrection in that both are demonstrations of God’s inexorable, faithful love in making a way where there is no way and in fulfilling Scripture by doing so.
The first indication of the presence of this foundation of belief is that both Matthew and Luke stress that Jesus’s virginal conception happened by the power of the Holy Spirit (Matt 1:18, 20; Luke 1:35). This has since become a fundamental point about Jesus’s incarnation expressed in the creeds. But why is it specified that this has happened by the Holy Spirit and not by God the Father? Luke would seem to be clearer about this than Matthew, as he quotes a parallelism from Gabriel that links the Spirit with the power of God (Luke 1:35). Given the fact that the Spirit is often described in relation to the power of God as the one who brings God’s power to bear on a person or situation (and this would be especially true in Second Temple Judaism as the Spirit became more associated with immanence while God was understood more frequently in terms of transcendence), this works well enough as an initial explanation for why the Spirit is specified. But I think there is more to it in both Matthew and Luke.
Matthew
First, the description of the Holy Spirit’s activity (particularly in terms of “coming upon” someone), in both the OT and the NT, is never a description of action involving conception in any way (cf. Num 11:25; 24:2; Judg 3:10; 11:29; 1 Sam 11:6; 19:20, 23; 2 Sam 23:2; 1 Chr 12:18; 2 Chr 15:1; 20:14; Isa 42:1; 44:3; 59:21; 61:1; Ezek 11:5; 39:29). But the fact that Jesus is physically conceived by the Holy Spirit, as opposed to others born from the Spirit (John 3:6, 8; 1 John 3:24; 4:13), establishes his birth as a unique event in the history of the Spirit’s action.
Second, this conception by the Spirit establishes Jesus’s unique relationship to the Spirit (Matt 3:11, 16; 4:1; 10:18–20; 12:28, 31–32; 28:19). The fact that Jesus is conceived by the Holy Spirit anticipates how Jesus will have the Spirit descend on him at God’s declaration that he is his Son (3:16), be the one who shows his superiority to John by baptizing with the Spirit (3:11), will be led by the Spirit into the wilderness and empowered by the Spirit to overcome Satan’s temptations (4:1), and will drive out demons (and perform other miracles) by the Spirit in declaration of the coming of God’s kingdom (12:28). The Spirit is also uniquely linked with Jesus in that the Spirit gives words to those who testify to Jesus, especially in situations of persecution (10:18–20), and in that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is linked with falsely attributing the Spirit’s actions in Jesus to Beelzebul (12:31–32). This unique relationship is also shown in Jesus’s closing instruction telling his disciples to baptize other disciples in the name of the Father, himself, and the Holy Spirit (28:19). Against any impressions of adoptionism that might have arisen from the scene of Jesus’s baptism and the Holy Spirit descending upon him, Matthew insists that Jesus is not simply another great prophet who received empowerment by the Holy Spirit and consequently received exaltation. Rather, his relationship with the Holy Spirit extends beyond his ministry to his very entrance into the world and even beyond that to the interrelationship of the Godhead. As such, the reference to Jesus’s conception by the Holy Spirit is essential framing by which we should understand Jesus’s conception as the incarnation, and by which we should understand all else that Matthew conveys about Jesus and the Holy Spirit. We will consider Luke in more detail later.
What needs to be said for now, though, is that it is not entirely clear that this conception by the Holy Spirit necessitated that Jesus’s mother be a virgin without bringing in the factors of the identified foundation of belief (for both the virginal conception and the resurrection) and the fulfillment of Scripture. Within the framework that both Matthew and Luke operate in, where infertility was a frequent reality in their shared sacred history, it would hardly seem inappropriate for the Holy Spirit to conceive a child within the womb of a married barren woman. Nor would Mary’s virginity be necessary to remove all doubts about Jesus’s parentage (i.e., that God was his Father). Jesus having God as his Father is not predicated on the circumstances of his birth in Matthew, Luke, or the other NT texts, but on the transcendent reality of their relationship in the Godhead. Nor would this virginal conception have been considered necessary by virtue of Jesus being called God’s Son, since people who had previously been called God’s children included Israel, righteous individuals, and the king (not to mention angels), and in no case did it imply that their biological fathers were not their actual fathers (Exod 4:22; 2 Sam 7:14; Ps 2:7; 89:27; Jer 3:19; 31:9, 20; Hos 11:1; Wis 2:13, 16–18; 5:5; 9:7; 18:13; Sir 4:10; Jub 1:24–25, 28; Jos. Asen. 6:3, 5; 13:13; 18:11; 19:8; 21:4; 4QAramaic Apocalypse/4Q246 II, 1; 4QcommMal/4Q253a 1 I, 3–4; 4QDibHam[a]/4Q504 1–2 III, 5–7; 11QMelch/11Q13 II, 14; cf. Deut 32:6; Isa 63:16; 64:8; Jer 3:4; Mal 1:6; 2:10; Tob 13:4; Wis 11:10; 14:3; Sir 23:1, 4; 51:10; 3 Macc 2:21; 5:7–8, 51; 6:3–8; 2 Bar 13:9; Jos. Asen. 11:13; 12:8, 12–15; L.A.B. 53:7; Hel. Syn. Pr. 1:2; 2:6; 4:38; 9:7; Eusebius, Praep. Ev. 13.13.6). Rather, Matthew ties the significance of the virginity to a specific text: Isa 7:14 (1:22–23). By this text he shows that God making a way where there is no way demonstrates his faithful dedication to fulfilling his words spoken in Scripture.
I have already commented on this text in Matthew before, but I think it would be helpful to expand on it and its context further to illustrate why it is used here. Naturally, what establishes its relevance is the reference to a “virgin” (παρθένος). As is well known, the MT testifies to the use of a term that most naturally means “young maiden” (עלמה). The Aramaic Targum agrees with the MT (as well as Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion), while the Vulgate and the Peshitta agree with the LXX, which uses the term that appears in Matthew. Obviously, a lot has been written about this difference between terms and how the translation might have happened. But in any case, the difference can easily be overstressed. A “young maiden” was a girl who had not yet borne children, but was of marriageable age, which would mean, according to norms of the day, she would be presumed to be a virgin if she is not married. Of course, even the Greek term was not always used strictly for referring to a virgin, as it could also refer to a young woman who was not yet a mother (e.g., Gen 34:3 LXX [2x]). In neither Hebrew nor Greek is there a term reserved strictly for virgins per se (עלמה only occurs seven times in the MT anyway, including Isa 7:14, and it is translated with παρθένος in Gen 24:43, as well as Isa 7:14; in fact, the LXX uses two other terms for the five other uses). This point heads off the objection that Isaiah would have used בתולה if he meant “virgin,” since there are cases where it does not clearly refer to virgins as such (Isa 23:4; 47:1 [cf. v. 9]; Jer 31:13; 51:22; Lam 1:15 [cf. v. 19]; Ezek 9:6; Joel 1:8) and cases where the qualifier “who had not known a man” is attached (Gen 24:16; Judg 21:12), which would be unnecessary if the term only meant “virgin” and thus conveyed the point well enough on its own. In fact, it and its Greek translation are often used as parallels for “young men,” where, by the arguments of some, one might expect the word for “young maiden” (Deut 32:25; 2 Chr 36:17; Pss 78:63; 148:12; Isa 23:4; Jer 51:22; Lam 1:19; 2:21; Ezek 9:6; Amos 8:13; Zech 9:17). And none of this takes account of the other times בתולה is not corresponded with παρθένος (Esth 2:2–3, 19; Isa 23:12; Jer 14:17; Joel 1:8) or when the latter corresponds to a word other than בתולה (Gen 24:14, 16 [in the first case], 43, 55; 34:3 [as noted]; Lev 21:13).
This linguistic ambiguity works well as a reminder that a young maiden is not necessarily the same as a virgin, but there is major overlap between these categories and the latter is certainly more definite than the former. And in any case, the original prophecy was clearly not understood in its original context as meaning that a young woman/virgin will conceive without engaging in sex. The fact that it functions as a sign associated with a prophecy does not mean it is in itself a miraculous action. Rather, I think Matthew is engaging in typological interpretation here in order to link this text to Jesus. After all, given that Jesus’s virginal conception appears in Luke as well, it is not that Matthew constructed an account of a virginal conception out of this text; it is that Matthew has used this text as a way to understand and convey the significance of something that was a preexisting story about Jesus’s life.
The bases for Matthew making a typological link here, beyond the reference to a virgin conceiving, include that the prophecy is addressed to the house of David (specifically, King Ahaz; Isa 7:2, 13), that there is promised deliverance (Isa 7:3–7; 8:4; Matt 1:21), and that both children signify God being “with us.” In the original context of Isa 7:1–17, Isaiah gives a promise to Ahaz that his kingdom will be delivered from the attacks of the northern kingdom of Israel and Aram, although they will be replaced by the threat that is Assyria (hence, this passage is not entirely hopeful). Even though Ahaz refused to ask for a sign of this, Isaiah gives him one anyway: a designated young maiden/virgin will conceive—although the future sense is not unambiguous in the Hebrew—and give birth to a son who will not even mature before God brings deliverance by Assyria (as noted throughout the following text). Given how the text plays out after this prophecy, it is most likely that it originally referred to Isaiah’s son Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz. His birth is also connected to the defeat of Israel and Aram as indicating that the time is short for the oracle’s fulfillment (Isa 8:4; 7:15–16), it is connected with the coming of Assyria and the danger it poses to Judah (8:7–8; 7:17–25), and he himself is associated with the name Immanuel (8:8, 10; 7:14). Furthermore, Isaiah declares in 8:18 that his sons were given to him for signs and wonders (cf. 7:11, 14).
However, the story does not end with the replacement of two enemy kingdoms with a larger one that will yet be hostile. Chapter 7 belongs to a larger unit that includes ch. 9. Ironically, for all that Isa 9:6 is a widely used text for the Church during Advent, it is not cited in Matthew or Luke’s Christmas account, but I would argue that it is still relevant for the analysis of this story, and Matthew obviously knew about it (4:13–17). After all, Isaiah seems to be operating on the basis of an inherent typology in 7–9. Between the reference to the birth of Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz and 9:6, there have been no other references to a child being born, but obviously Isaiah’s son is not the one to fulfill the words of Isa 9:6, since his birth relates to the judgment on Israel and Aram, as well as the coming of Assyria to trouble Judah. The child of 9:6 points to a time and condition beyond that. This child’s birth will surpass that of the one previously called Immanuel, for he will have an even more glorious four-part name: Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. While the house and throne of David were not in any way improved in the previous promise, they are improved by being established in everlasting peace here (9:7). The judgment on Israel and Aram is recapitulated in the subsequent text (9:8–10:4) and judgment eventually comes against Assyria as well (10:5–19), which brings us beyond the original horizon of chs. 7 and 8 to ch. 11 with the ruler who comes from the “stump of Jesse.” This child’s birth thus brings about an even better state in relation to these three entities than was the case with the original Immanuel, and so it is reasonable to say that Isaiah sets up a typology within his own text in expectation of the child of 9:6.
It is unclear if Matthew himself specifically purposed to establish a typological relationship that was quite this wide-ranging, but the links between his text beyond the citation of 7:14 and this larger complex lend credibility to this reading. On this reading, Matthew places Jesus in typological relationship not only to 7:14, but to 9:6 (and 8:8, 10 in between) as well. After all, Jesus brings both 7:14 and 9:6 to fulfillment, even if they originally applied to two different figures. But now he has incorporated both figures into himself and brought them both to their promised goal. He is the anti-type that goes beyond the original type and even the original anti-type in Isaiah’s text. He is not only the sign of God’s deliverance; he is the agent of God’s salvation. He has not come to save the people from Roman oppression by military overthrow (as one might be inclined to take from Isa 9), but from their greatest enemies: the evil spiritual powers and the sin that controls both those powers and the people (as shown by the particular sins that manifest in their lives). He will not only receive the throne of his father David; he will receive all power in heaven and on earth and take his position at the right hand of God the Father, whence he will continue as he has done in the Gospel, bringing judgment and salvation to all nations. He is the one that the rest of Matthew’s narrative will demonstrate embodies both the identities of the child of Isa 7:14 and the child of Isa 9:6. Indeed, Matthew will show that Jesus embodies the essence of the name Immanuel in a way that no one has before, since Jesus is truly God with us always, who has come to act as Redeemer and Deliverer (cf. the book-ends of Matt 1:23 and 28:20). That he conveys this point is especially clear in light of the fact that the angel instructed Joseph to name the baby “Jesus,” while the prophecy he cites says that he will be named Immanuel. He does not fulfill the prophecy in respect to the name he went by in everyday life, but in respect to fulfilling what the name means.
In all of these ways, we see how the Christmas story is tied with the Easter story, as Jesus’s birth foreshadows his death, resurrection, and exaltation, by which he inaugurates God’s heavenly kingdom. And it was by these major gospel events that Jesus fulfilled Scripture (though Luke will make more of a point of this in his resurrection narrative) and demonstrated God’s inexorable, faithful love. In every telling of the Christmas story, it is essential not only to understand the larger narrative context from which it emerged, but also to understand it through the lens of the gospel events that confirmed God’s revelation of who Jesus is: his death, resurrection, and exaltation. This is why he is described as being of David’s lineage in anticipation of his exaltation beyond David to the right hand of God the Father. This is why his name is a description of his mission, to save people from their sins, which will be accomplished at the climax of the story. This is why he is described as “God with us” in anticipation of the climactic events that show he will always be with us. And this is why he is described as fulfilling Scripture by his very conception in anticipation of his fulfillment of Scripture in the events of his death, resurrection, and exaltation (21:37–44; 26:23–24, 31–32, 54–56; 27:9–10). And we are introduced to the one who accomplished all this by his virginal conception, wherein God made a way for him to be born into the world where there was once no way.
Luke
Now let us consider the virginal conception in Luke. First, as I noted earlier, Luke, like Matthew, connects Jesus’s resurrection to the power of God exercised through the Holy Spirit. The Spirit is more prevalently referenced in Luke than in Matthew, not least because Luke is cognizant of his task of writing about early Church history and the action of the Spirit in it. The Spirit is first mentioned as filling John the Baptist while he is still in the womb (1:15), but this filling is predicated on the fact that John is to be Jesus’s forerunner. It is to Jesus, the one who is the executor of God’s will, that the Spirit is linked most intricately, as we see throughout Luke’s two volumes (Luke 1:15–17, 35, 41, 67–79; 2:25–35, 36–38; 3:16–17, 22; 4:1, 14, 18; 5:17; 6:19; 9:1; 10:21; 11:13; 24:49; Acts 1:2, 5, 8; 2:1–4, 14–38; 3:21–22; 4:8, 31; 5:3, 9, 32; 6:3, 5, 10; 7:51, 55; 8:15–17, 29, 39; 9:17, 31; 10:19, 38, 44–47; 11:24, 28; 13:2, 4, 9, 52; 15:8, 28; 16:6; 19:6, 21; 20:22–23, 28; 21:4, 11; 28:25). The presence of the same Holy Spirit in Jesus’s disciples who was in Jesus during his life on earth establishes the deepest level of continuity between Jesus and his disciples, ensuring a sense of continuing Jesus’s mission after his ascension. The primary actions of the Holy Spirit in the Gospel and Acts are performed for the sake of the proclamation of the gospel of Jesus Christ, whether in terms of empowering people to speak or empowering them to respond. The most obvious exception to this tendency is the Holy Spirit coming upon Mary and overshadowing her (1:35), which matches more closely the vocabulary of the cases noted earlier of the Holy Spirit coming upon people for special tasks. In addition to its resonance with OT stories, this language also anticipates the dual description of the disciples’ Pentecost experience as being clothed with divine power (Luke 24:49) and having the Holy Spirit come upon them (Acts 1:8, using the same verb). The presence of the Holy Spirit here is significant for how it anticipates the rest of the Gospel-and-Acts story, and for how it signifies the eschatological import of the Christmas story, linking it to the complex of major gospel events of death, resurrection, and exaltation. After all, the inauguration of Jesus’s public ministry in Luke 4:16–30 and the inauguration of the ministry of the Church post-resurrection are both predicated upon the Spirit’s anointing in fulfillment of eschatological prophecies (Isa 61 in Luke 4 and Joel 2:28–32 in Acts 2).
As for the virginal conception more specifically, Luke does not quote Gabriel as citing any prophecy that Jesus fulfilled by this conception. As such, Luke’s description is not attached to a sense of prophetic necessity, that it happened this way because it needed to happen this way to fulfill God’s promises through the prophets. Rather, the point seems to be primarily about the power of God and how this conception will be an even more vivid display of that power than what Elizabeth had received (1:34–36). Indeed, the final clause of Gabriel’s statement is that nothing will be impossible with God (1:37). Naturally, the question of how something will happen appears frequently in the traditional stories of Israel, which are fundamentally questions about the power of God to express his faithful love in fulfilling his word. And this episode introduces a motif that will recur many times in Luke-Acts, specifically the type of power that refers to strength or power that one exerts (as opposed to the exercise of authority, which also recurs in Luke-Acts). Jesus operates with the power of the Spirit (4:14), he exorcizes demons with power (4:36), he heals by God’s power (5:17; 6:19; 8:46), he transmits this same power to his disciples (9:1; 10:19), these deeds of power demonstrate divine support for his message and his call to repentance (10:13; cf. 19:37; Acts 2:22; 10:38), and Jesus promises that the disciples will be clothed with power from on high after his ascension (Luke 24:49; Acts 1:8). Just as Jesus came into the world, he anticipates that he will depart to sit at the right hand of the power of God (Luke 22:69) and that he will come with that power (Luke 21:27). In Acts, just as the Holy Spirit is given to the disciples, so too is the power implied by his presence, which they invoke by the name of Jesus in connection with proclaiming his gospel (3:12–16; 4:7–12, 33; 6:8; 8:13; 19:11). Luke’s emphasis on the power of God in Jesus’s virginal conception thus communicates that God’s power to enact his inexorable, faithful love was in Jesus’s life from its very inception, and that same power characterizes his life and the life of the Church. The Christmas story, and the virginal conception that was part of it, thus laid the foundation for a new era of expression for God’s power among God’s people. Of course, while this power produced some extraordinary deeds and wonderous displays, one must remember that this power was expressed in the birth of a child in lowly circumstances, in a man who stored no earthly treasures, in a man who was crucified, and in a Church that knew both great suffering in persecution and temporary triumph in anticipation of God’s eschatological victory in Christ. This new era of power did not mean that the Church could avoid such troubles; it meant that God would bring them to victory through those by his inexorable, faithful love, which he demonstrated in his bringing his Son into the world through a virgin and by bringing him up out of the dead.
We also must consider Mary’s faithful response to Gabriel in light of the rest of the Gospel. Once Gabriel has reassured Mary that God is able to do what he has promised without Mary knowing a man—that he can make a way where there is no way—she accepts what she has been told by calling herself a servant of the Lord, and says to let it be done according to the word she was given (1:38). There are multiple words that can be translated as “servant” in Luke-Acts. This one (δοῦλος) often has the sense of one who is bound in service to another, hence why it can also be translated as “slave” (in Luke alone, see 7:1–10; 14:16–24; 17:7–10; 20:10–11). It is thus a statement of absolute submission to God’s will, and it is the first of its kind in the Gospel according to Luke. In her celebratory song, she identifies herself in this way again (1:48). Simeon, a righteous and devout man on whom the Spirit came, likewise describes himself this way when he says his Master can now dismiss him, since he has seen the one in whom is the hope of Israel (2:29). Jesus exhorts his followers to be as faithful servants dutifully carrying out their master’s will, with the master’s resources (i.e., his teachings, his Scripture, and the same Holy Spirit that was in him), until he returns (12:35–48; 19:11–27). In Acts, Peter cites the prophecy from Joel that refers to the Spirit being poured out, among others, on men-servants and maid-servants (2:18). He again describes himself and his fellow believers with this terminology in a prayer to God that he would empower them to speak his word with boldness (4:29). A slave-girl with a spirit of divination proclaims that Paul and his fellows are the servants of the Most High God who proclaim his gospel (16:17). In this context, we can see that Mary’s response, while impossible to duplicate (since no one will ever again be asked to bear the Messiah, the Son of the Most High), is a paradigm to emulate. This consummate submission to God’s will should characterize all God’s people in response to God’s promises and God’s commands.
The next part of Mary’s response that we should consider is the Magnificat. Again, I have addressed the rich OT and Second Temple Jewish literature background for this song, but now we must consider it in its later Christian context. This song makes sense as one sung by a Jew in response to ancient promises, repeated through tradition, coming to fruition. But it has been preserved by Christians and sung by Christians, even before the emergence of the celebration of Advent and Christmas. There are multiple reasons, besides its obvious association with Jesus’s birth, that it became a traditional Advent and Christmas hymn, of which we will examine two here.
One, many of the verbs in the Magnificat are in the aorist tense, especially all the verbs in vv. 51–55. The aorist is not strictly the past tense—although it can often be properly translated that way—but is simply referring to the action of the verb as a whole (meaning that the form itself does not indicate if the action is complete/incomplete at the present time, though it most often has a past-tense reference in the indicative). What is especially interesting here and in the Benedictus is that the aorists tend to refer to events still in the future. Mary rejoices that she has already received a taste of these fulfillments before Christmas has even arrived. The aorist tenses also fit in this context given the confidence in future expectations based on past performance (a point that still rings true in the Advent season). It is a proper reflection of how Christians should react to these promises and Jesus’s fulfillment of them in the Advent season and outside of it, particularly since eschatology properly colors Christian theology more generally. After all, the future is as settled as if it has already come to pass (i.e., the futuristic/proleptic aorist) because the means of redemption are already at work in Jesus’s incarnation. The aorists, which were translated as perfects in Latin and either perfects or pasts in English, also fit the perspective of those singing the Magnificat after Mary who have looked back at Jesus’s birth in the past. But with the text using the aorist to refer to things that are still future in the narrative, there is also a sense of continuity with the later Christians, looking to the future with hope motivated by the confidence that the God who has promised is faithful and will do it.
Two, it is not only a paradigmatic response to the hope provided by Jesus’s birth; it is also a paradigmatic response to the hope of Jesus’s return. As Advent is simultaneously characterized by both remembrance looking back to Jesus’s First Coming and hope looking forward to Jesus’s Second Coming, this song serves both purposes. The fact that we continue reciting this song shows that we know that God’s will has been enacted in Jesus, but that his purposes for Christmas have not yet been consummated. We do not yet know when these purposes will be consummated, but because of the story of Christmas, we know that they will be consummated and who will accomplish this. This is why we also magnify the Lord and exult in our Savior as we await the future tense of our salvation to become the present (1:46–47). This is why we also celebrate how God has exalted his humble servants while bringing down the rulers of this age and expect that day when he will do so once and for all (1:48, 52–53; 13:30; 14:8–11; 18:14). This is why we can declare that the Mighty One has done great things for us and will yet do great things for his holy name (1:49), in accordance with how we pray for his name to be hallowed (11:2). This is why we can proclaim his mercy as something that our ancestors experienced, that we experience, and that all of God’s people will yet experience (1:50, 72, 78; 6:36; 18:13). This is why we can declare the mighty works that we remember as part of our tradition and that we hope for in God’s promised eschatological future (1:51–52). This is why we can declare that God has provided for his destitute people and that he will provide for them on the day of consummation (1:53). This is why we can proclaim God’s past actions of help in faithfulness to his promises—climactically in Jesus—in anticipation of his help for us that will faithfully bring the rest of his promises to pass (1:54–55).