Who Says Mary Was a Virgin?

Episode Outline:
0:00 Why did early Christians tell the story of Jesus’ virgin birth?
0:56 Bart and Megan on Christmas chaos, books, and holiday reading plans
3:07 Are there true virgin births in other ancient religions?
4:56 Which New Testament writings actually mention the virgin birth?
6:25 Is Mary’s conception presented as physical or spiritual?
8:14 Why Matthew says Jesus had to be born of a virgin
10:27 Isaiah 7:14, the Septuagint, and why Matthew reads prophecy this way
15:16 Why Luke includes the virgin birth and how his reason differs from Matthew’s
17:19 Why it matters that neither Mark nor John includes the virgin birth
19:52 Why the rest of the New Testament is silent about it
22:38 Later Christian texts, the Proto-Gospel of James, and proving Mary’s virginity
24:53 Virgin conception, virgin birth, perpetual virginity, and Jesus’ siblings
30:42 When and why the virgin birth became a major Christian doctrine
36:42 Weekly Update: Bart’s upcoming course on whether Joseph was Jesus’ father
39:42 Listener Q&A: how Gospel stories develop, passion predictions, and why the creeds don’t mention Scripture
52:51 Final summary: what the virgin birth means in Matthew and Luke, and why later Christianity made so much of it

Episode Description
Almost anyone who knows anything about Christianity knows that Jesus was born of a virgin. But was he? This miraculous event is found in only two passages of the entire New Testament (in Matthew and Luke). Did the other New Testament authors know about it? If so, why didn't they mention it? If not, how could they not? And where did the idea of a virgin birth even come from? If it is not a major concern for the twenty-five other books of the New Testament, why did it come to be so important in the Christian tradition -- so much so that many people today assume that anyone who does not believe in it cannot be a Christian? In this episode we deal with these and other intriguing issues highly relevant to the Christmas season.

Also watch these episodes:
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The Omnipresent Fear of Death

Was Jesus Literate?
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He's a Very Naughty Boy: The Infancy Gospel of Thomas
He's a Very Naughty Boy: The Infancy Gospel of Thomas

-In the New Testament, Jesus’ mother is said to be a virgin. Are there other religions from the time that describe virgin births?

-Do all of the canonical gospels portray Mary as having been a virgin?

-Are readers supposed to understand that God physically impregnated Mary, or is it more of a spiritual occurrence?

-What do scholars think is the significance of this depiction? Why would Matthew want to describe Jesus’ mother as being a virgin?

-In his account of the virgin conception and birth, Matthew quotes Isaiah 7:14 - “Behold, the virgin will conceive and bear a son, and they will call his name Emmanuel”. He’s not quoting the original Hebrew text of Isaiah, but rather the Greek translation known as the Septuagent…and there’s a pretty crucial difference between the Hebrew and the Greek. Could you talk a little bit about this?

-How about the Gospel of Luke? It also shows a virgin birth, but is the significance of it different to in the Gospel of Matthew?

-Is it significant that neither Mark, the earliest synoptic gospel, nor John, the latest, seem to know about the virgin birth?

-What about the other NT writings?

-Do any of the non-canonical writings talk about Mary as a virgin, or explicitly state that she wasn’t a virgin?

-If Mary is still a virgin after Jesus’s birth, does that relate to her being a perpetual virgin? What is that, and how does it work with Jesus’ having siblings?

-Once the idea of perpetual virginity came into play, how does the church account for Jesus’ siblings?

-When does the virgin birth appear to become a central tenet of Christianity, and why do you think it became so important?