027. Addenda on the Meaning of Almah

Addenda on the Meaning of Almah

Primary Basis The Christian’s belief in the doctrine of the virgin birth is solidly based upon the clear, unequivocal, divinely inspired testimony of Matthew and Luke. This is the primary, but not the only, basis. The other evidence is corroborative. The Christian believes that the Hebrew word almah means “virgin” because he believes that Matthew was miraculously directed by the Holy Spirit in writing his narrative. Matthew’s testimony is precise. He quotes Isaiah 7:14 as the climax of the evidence he presents. He affirms that Isaiah was predicting the virgin birth of the Messiah. He translates almah by the Greek word parthenos, which is exact. Greek literature is emphatic about the fact that Athena, the patron goddess of Athens, was a virgin. The temple on the citadel above Athens was called the “Parthenon.” The Septuagint

Powerful corroborative evidence is seen in the Septuagint Version translated at Alexandria in Egypt by seventy Jewish scholars sent from Jerusalem by the high priest at the request of Ptolemy Philadelphus (285-247 b.c.). It translated almah in Isaiah 7:14 by the Greek word parthenos. There can be no question about the scholarship of these Jewish scribes and their knowledge of the Hebrew language. They frequently give (in their Greek version) a free translation of the Hebrew text before them, but the question of a paraphrase does not arise here. They translated one Hebrew word by one Greek word. They were relatively close to the time when Isaiah wrote, as compared to ancient or modern critics of the Septuagint Version. They translated nearly three centuries before the birth of Christ in Bethlehem. They could not have been moved by any sort of prejudice for or against the Christian gospel. They simply translated the text that was before them. How far they discerned the mysterious meaning of the passage we cannot tell, but they must have seen clearly that a tremendous miracle was promised to Ahaz by Isaiah and that this required almah to be translated by the specific Greek word which meant virgin. To suggest that Isaiah may have been referring to the natural birth of some child in his time is to make the passage ridiculous.

Jews Reverse Their Position

Both the Jews in the first century and the early Christians had great reverence for the Septuagint. The great reverence of the Jewish scholars for the Septuagint can be seen from the fact that Philo held that this translation was divinely inspired. The learned Hebrew scribes who wrote the Babylonian Talmud also ascribe divine inspiration to the translators. But when the Christians began to proclaim the gospel and it became evident how clearly the Septuagint substantiated the Christian doctrines, as in the translation of Isaiah 7:14, the Jews reversed themselves completely and turned in furious hatred against the Septuagint. When they had the translation of Aquila in hand to contradict the Septuagint, then they proceeded to burn and destroy all the copies of the Septuagint they could. They attempted to assail the virgin birth by two methods: (1) Foul stories they invented to charge Mary with fornication and to make Jesus an illegitimate son. These slanderous fabrications have been revived and advocated by Dr. Nels F. S. Ferré of Vanderbilt University. (2) Attempts to deny that almah meant virgin and to affirm bethulah was the Hebrew word which would have been used if this had been the meaning of Isaiah. The controversy has raged through the centuries. The early Christian scholars gave devastating rebuttals to both of these lines of attack. Since the rationalism of the last two centuries has led so many scholars to abandon the Christian faith, we find these modernists also joining the Jewish unbelievers in both of these lines of attack.

Revised Standard Version The publication of the Revised Standard Version (New Testament in 1946 and Old Testament in 1952) with its attacks upon the deity of Christ has called general attention to this controversy over the meaning of almah. They translated the word as “young woman” in Isaiah 7:14, but kept the translation “virgin” in Matthew 1:23. Thus they wielded a two-edged sword against the Scripture, affirming that Isaiah does not refer to any virgin birth of the Messiah and charging that Matthew falsified the evidence when he declared that Isaiah predicted such a virgin birth. In an official document, An Introduction to the Revised Standard Version of the Old Testament, the Old Testament committee had the unbelieving Jewish scholar, Dr. Orlinski who was a member of their committee, write their defense of their translation of Isaiah 7:14. In the most damaging admission which has come from the radical scholars who made the r.s.v. , Dr. Orlinski sets forth that their authority for translating almah as “young woman” is the translation of Aquila made in the second century a.d.

He (Aquila) incorporated the kind of Jewish interpretation which was current in his day, and he avoided the Christological elements which had been introduced in the Septuagint text. Thus Aquila rendered the Hebrew word ha almah in Isaiah 7:14 literally ‘the young woman’ in place of the word ‘virgin’ which the Christians have substituted for it.

I published three reviews of the r.s.v. : (1) An Appraisal (Feb., 1946), (2) A Reply to Dr. Clarence T. Craig (Sept., 1946), (3) The Battle of the Versions (Jan., 1953). The New Testament Committee attempted to reply to the first of these reviews. The Reply to Craig was a rejoinder. In The Battle of the Versions I published detailed evidence that “the kind of Jewish interpretation which was current in his day” was the same kind seen in the New Testament when the hostile Jews charged Jesus was a glutton and winebibber, the associate of sinners and publicans, in league with the devil and guilty of blasphemy. The evidence is overpowering that Aquila is just a Hellenized spelling of Onkelos and that this is the same man who spews forth such vulgar attacks upon Jesus in the Talmud. The list of scholars (which has grown since this brochure was published in 1953) who identify Aquila and Onkelos as the same man and the evidence upon which they rest will be found in The Battle of the Versions, pp. 15-23.

Orlinski’s Charge

It is clear that Dr. Orlinski is charging that the Christians interpolated into the Septuagint what he calls “the Christological elements” (assertions and intimations that the Messiah is to be a supernatural being). Moses Hadas also charges that the Christians interpolated into the Septuagint these Christological elements (Aristeas to Philocrates, p. 81). But why, then, did not the Jews in the second century a.d. display their more ancient copies of the Septuagint and prove that it did not say parthenos? Why go to the extreme of producing Aquila’s version to contradict the Septuagint and of destroying all the copies of the Septuagint they could secure, if the translation of Isaiah 7:14 was not so generally known for so many decades and centuries that they could not dispute the fact that the original was parthenos? Since Dr. Orlinski must face passages such as Isaiah 9:6, where the prophet reveals that this child which is to be born of a virgin is also “Mighty God, the Everlasting Father,” then it is futile for him to say that Christians had falsified the Septuagint text. The unbelieving Jews and the modernists must find some other way in which to rid themselves of these assertions of the deity of the Messiah in the Old Testament as well as the verifications in the Septuagint. They use on both the vivisection which is their universal practice in handling the Scripture; they carve Isaiah up into two, twelve, or fifty different imaginary authors and place the sections containing the “Christological elements” as late as possible. They handle any other parts of the Old Testament which get in the way of their theories in the same fashion. As for the Septuagint, they deny that there was ever such a translation made during the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus. They hold that it was translated piecemeal in various times. This gives them the desired opportunity to say “late editions” or “additions” when they strike something they would deny. The Deity of the Messiah The central proposition of the translators of the r.s.v., also their main attack upon the deity of Christ, is the contention that none of the eyewitnesses of the ministry of Jesus ever believed that He was God as well as man. This was a myth which arose later. They introduce this proposition in a most clever but omnipresent manner by using two dialects of English at once for the translation. They declare in their preface that they use the Old English “thou” in address to God and “you” in address to man in their translation. They then refuse to allow any of the eyewitnesses, as they address Jesus, to use “thou.” Those who use the r.s.v. by their continual repetition have the poison virus injected into their system that Jesus is only a man. Full discussion of this attack on the deity of Christ will be found in the reviews, An Appraisal and Reply to Dr. Craig. Highly embarrassing to the modernists’ central argument that the disciples could not possibly have understood that Jesus was claiming to be God (not even when they heard the hostile Jewish scholars charge Him with blasphemy and threaten Him with death for it) is this assertion from the Old Testament committee that these “Christological elements had been introduced in the Septuagint text.” The proof is evident that, before the time of Christ, Jewish scholars translating the Old Testament had by their translation repeated the assertions of the deity of the Messiah. It is a moot question as to how clearly the Old Testament prophecies which revealed the deity of the Messiah were understood by the Jews at the opening of the first century a.d. Certainly some individual students of the Old Testament would have had a deeper understanding than others. What did the disciples of John understand by his declaration that Jesus was “the Son of God”? (John 1:34). When they came to know about the virgin birth, this assuredly would have increased the understanding which they gained from the self-revelation Jesus gave them. We do not know at what time they learned of the virgin birth, but Luke, who gives so many details of the experiences of Mary, should have found it possible to learn the facts from her. Matthew and the other apostles were frequently in the presence of the mother of Jesus and would naturally have inquired from her information concerning His infancy and youth. We would expect the facts about the virgin birth to have been gained by Matthew in this manner. Divine inspiration would have assisted Matthew and Luke. The Letter of Aristeas Our knowledge of the translation of the Septuagint Version is dependent largely upon a document called The Letter of Aristeas which purports to have been written in the very period when the Septuagint translation was made. The fury of the radical attack on the Septuagint Version has been multiplied against The Letter of Aristeas. A great number of historical errors in the document were pointed out by radical critics who heaped ridicule upon the account. Even such a great conservative as William Henry Green of Princeton yielded to this barrage of evidence and bluntly rejected The Letter of Aristeas as a “fabrication” (General Introduction to the Old Testament, p. 85). A great change has taken place in the attitude toward this document in this century. A vast amount of papyri has been unearthed in Egypt: letters, deeds, all sorts of odds and ends of documents out of the very period in which the Septuagint was translated and The Letter of Aristeas was written. The Italian scholar Professor Lumbroso, even with the few papyri available to him, after painstaking research declared that the papyri proved the historical accuracy of The Letter of Aristeas in every detail such as court titles, institutions, laws, magistrates, technical terms, and other data. He even declares that there is not a single piece of civil history recorded by Aristeas which is not now confirmed by the papyri. The radical scholars have now been forced to yield. H. St. J. Thackeray protests rather mildly that Professor Lumbroso was a little extreme in his assertion, but be admits that the massive collection of papyri now available does bear out his statement “on the whole” (The Letter of Aristeas, pp 10, 11). He also advances the position, and quotes various authorities to sustain it, that the author by his vivid description of Jerusalem and Palestine shows he was an eyewitness of the period or the years immediately following (The Letter of Aristeas, pp. 10, 11). Moses Hadas, a Jewish scholar, in his work Aristeas to Philocrates takes a similar position. He points out some typically obscure accounts in the Talmud which parallel The Letter of Aristeas in placing the translation of the Septuagint in the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus. The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Septuagint

Radical critics still attempt to escape the force of the Book of Isaiah as translated in 285 b.c by putting forth the theory that this was not the entire Old Testament which was translated at that time, but only the Pentateuch. Detailed proof that it was the entire Old Testament will be found in The Battle of the Versions, pp. 34-41. The evidence is so overpowering that they had the Septuagint in its entirety in 130 b.c. that even the radical scholars find themselves compelled to admit this date.

Now comes the explosive evidence of the Dead Sea Scrolls to upset their veteran theories of the late date of such books as Daniel and of sections of other books such as Isaiah. Great was the excitement to learn whether the two scrolls of Isaiah (how strange that two copies of the very book which has the greatest wealth of Messianic predictions should have been found) contained the text of Isaiah 7:14 and of Isaiah 9:6, Isaiah 9:7 just as our text of today. If the Dead Sea Scrolls had contained beulah (married woman) instead of almah, what a shout of triumph would have gone up from the radicals! But the text is identical throughout so far as doctrinal matters are concerned, with only slight grammatical variations. Now observe the dilemma of the radicals as the traffic jam of the second century b.c. unfolds according to their radical theories (cf. The Battle of the Versions, pp 25-47). They are compelled to admit that we now have manuscripts of Isaiah older than the date which they admit for the Septuagint. Their theories of the late writings of sections of Old Testament books and of parts of the Septuagint collide in mid-air in the close confines of the time now available. As Dr. Albright has pointed out, the reason so many scholars are so excited about the Dead Sea Scrolls and are fighting so fiercely to deny their antiquity and merit is because they realize that the lives of so many of their “sacred theories” are imperilled. He declares that the impact of this archaeological find sounds the death knell for long revered theories of very late composition of various books. He boldly predicts that these theories will now have to be abandoned (The American Scholar, Jan., 1953).

Aquila’s Translation That the Septuagint translates almah as parthenos is a piece of confirming evidence which is further strengthened by these recent discoveries establishing the early date of the Septuagint (285 b.c.), the date which the early Christian scholars maintained and which the Christian world has held through the centuries. The early Christian scholars denounced Aquila’s translation as a deliberate attempt to attack the Christian gospel by denying the validity of the Septuagint translation. Irenaeus denounces Aquila as one of the bitter enemies of the Christian religion whose false teaching would destroy the truth of God: “God, then, was made man, and the Lord did Himself save us, giving us the token of the virgin. But not as some allege, among those now presuming to expound the Scripture, (thus): ‘Behold, a young woman shall conceive, and bring forth a son,’ as Theodotion the Ephesian has interpreted, and Aquila of Pontus, both Jewish proselytes. The Ebionites, following these, assert that he was begotten by Joseph; thus destroying, as far as in them lies, such a marvelous dispensation of God, and setting aside the testimony of the prophets which proceeded from God” (Against Heresies, Chapter XXI).

Meaning of Almah A study of passages in the Old Testament where almah is used (Genesis 24:43; Exodus 2:8; Psalms 68:25; Proverbs 30:19; Song of Solomon 1:3; Song of Solomon 6:8; Isaiah 7:14) will show that the context strongly supports the meaning “virgin.” The word means “young woman” as well as “virgin.” Of course, an old woman might be a virgin. That this is not the meaning of almah is quite clear from these Old Testament passages. The word carries the meaning, of “young woman,” but as between “young woman” and “virgin,” it is not a case of either/or, but of both/and.

Meaning of Bethulah

Professor Solomon Bimbaum, formerly of Moody Bible Institute, Chicago, had an interesting article in the November-December, 1953, issue of The Messianic Witness, a magazine devoted to carrying the Christian gospel to the Jewish population of America. He repudiates the r.s.v. translation of almah as “young woman” in Isaiah 7:14. He points out that bethulah, the Hebrew word which the radicals claim is the specific word in the Old Testament for “virgin,” actually is used in the sense of “married woman” in Joel 1:8 : “Lament like a bethulah over the husband of her youth.” The translators of the r.s.v. try desperately to save their theory by translating: “Lament like a virgin girded with sackcloth for the bridegroom of her youth.” In other words, the translators claim that the bridegroom falls dead or is killed just as the wedding service is concluded, and the marriage is not consummated. Such straining to imagine some sort of conceivable situation which would enable them to deny the obvious meaning of the passage as it pictures a widow looking back and lamenting “the husband of her youth” underscores the demise of their theory. It is self-evident that Joel gives an illustration common enough to be understandable to his readers, such as the untimely death of a husband during the early years of married life of a young couple, and not some fantastic circumstances that might conceivably be imagined. Professor Bimbaum also cites Jeremiah 18:13 : “The virgin of Israel has done a very horrible thing,” where the word bethulah is used in comparison with Israel in a state of marriage relationship with Jehovah, from whom she had gone astray. Here is a “wife” who has left or lost her husband, but is called a bethulah. Dr. E. J. Young of the Westminster Theological Seminary declares that as between the words almah and bethulah the very fact that bethulah was being used of a married woman makes the word unsuitable for the powerful affirmation of Isaiah in Isaiah 7:14(Studies in Isaiah, pp. 178-185). This brings us back to the challenge of Martin Luther that no one has ever been able to produce a passage in which almah is used of a married woman. The Old TestamentPassages In the Old Testament passages where almah occurs, the word is translated in the following manner by the Authorized Version, the American Standard Version, and the Septuagint.

Of these seven passages, four times the a.v. gives “virgin,” and the a.s.v. gives three times the emphatic translation “virgin.” In the Septuagint version parthenos is used twice; in the other passages where there is no emphasis on virginity the translation is colorless, “maid” or “damsel.” In other words the translators were not publishing a dictionary, but a smooth, vivid translation which fitted the particular context. It is most interesting to observe that in Isaiah 7:14 the precise content of the word is emphasized. The Greek words neanis and neotes have the colorless meaning of “maid” or “young woman”; but when one studies the passages, it is clear that “married woman” does not fit the context. It is made very plain in Genesis 24:43 that Rebecca was a virgin. Both words, almah and bethulah, are used in the passage; but when bethulah is used (Genesis 24:16), the explanatory phrase is added: “And the damsel was very fair to look upon, a virgin, neither had any man known her.” If the word bethulah had carried the precise content of “virgin,” this would have been sufficient and no additional phrase would have been needed. In Exodus 2:8, where Miriam is a little girl, the content “virgin” is so plain it does not need to be emphasized in the translation and so “maid” is the fitting translation. In Proverbs 30:19, where Solomon ponders four things which he cannot understand, he mentions as the last of these “the way of a man with a maid.” Instead of accepting the ordinary interpretation that Solomon means “The way of true love never runs smooth,” some critics have tried to insinuate evil content into the passage as if fornication is the ordinary course of courtship. It may have been with the very purpose of directing the reader away from such a monstrous misinterpretation that the translators of both the a.v. and a.s.v. did not use the word “virgin,” but the colorless “maid” in their versions. In Psalms 68:25 the solemn procession of thanksgiving in the assembly for worship is described with the singers, the musicians, and then “the damsels playing with timbrels.” There is no emphasis upon the precise meaning of almah; and the general meaning is given. But certainly it is in harmony with the passages that the damsels were virgins.

Joel 1:8

What translation does the Septuagint Version offer for bethulah in Joel 1:8? Both the a.v. and the a.s.v. translate “virgin,” which is certainly inconsistent with the fact that the passage is plainly speaking of a married woman. The Septuagint does not make this mistake. It translates bethulah with the Greek word numphe, which means: “a bride, any married woman, a young woman.” A derivative of parthenos (parthenikos) is used in the passage, but it is used of the state of this married woman before she was married. The passage in the Septuagint is as follows: “Lament to me concerning a numphe [a bride, any married woman, a young woman] girded with sackcloth for the husband of her virgin youth.”

They saw clearly that bethulah meant a married woman in this passage. They were near enough to the time to have an adequate understanding of the usage of the word. They knew that bethulah usually meant “virgin” so they gave recognition to this translation by adding on the word parthenikos referring to her virgin youth before she was married. But they translated bethulah by numphe, which means a married woman.

Young’s Reply

Dr. Young quotes Orlinski as making the charge in the Introduction to the Revised Standard Version that Christians tampered with the text of the Septuagint to introduce the idea of a virgin-born Messiah.

There is no evidence whatever that Christians tampered with the Septuagint at this point. As Allis says: ‘This is an old calumny which red-blooded Christians in the past have not hesitated to brand as malicious and false.’ One of the blackest clouds which has attended the publication of the r.s.v. is the publication of the above-quoted statement. It is therefore the more refreshing to see one of the most informed and competent Jewish scholars of the day, Cyrus H. Gordon, write, ‘Therefore, the New Testament rendering of “almah” as “virgin” of Isaiah 7:14, rests on the older Jewish interpretation, i.e., the lxx, which in turn is now borne out, for precisely this annunciation formula by a text that is not only pre-Mosaic, but is pre-Mosaic in the form we now have it on a clay tablet’ (Introduction to the Revised Standard Version, p. 177).

Gordon’s Discovery

Dr. Young is quoting from a brief article (it does not even cover one-half page) in The Journal of Bible and Religion, XXI, April, 1953, p. 106. This is the organ of the radical scholars who make up the Society of Biblical Literature and Exegesis. It must have been a bitter pill for them to swallow to publish such a statement from a Jewish scholar declaring the Jews had been wrong and the Christians had been right all along in the controversy over the meaning of almah. Dr. Gordon declares that the archaeological discoveries he has made at Ugarit in Syria now have settled the discussion and should bring the controversy to an end. He has unearthed clay tablets which plainly use the word almah in the parallel Semitic language as meaning “virgin.” Dr. Gordon deserves the tribute to his scholarship and his generosity which Dr. Young gives to him. But Dr. Gordon is entirely too optimistic as to the decisive results he expects from his discovery. Prejudice is often impervious to historic facts. He would have shown more scholarship and more humility if he had not claimed such unique and solitary character for the archaeological discovery he had made. Similar evidence has been unearthed before, and the Jewish scholars and the modernists have resolutely closed their eyes to the facts and continued their repetition of outworn and disproved arguments. Witness the similar procedure in the advocates of Form Criticism. Their imaginary development of “sources” requires a vast amount of time. But archaeological discoveries such as the Rylands fragment prove the early Christians correct in placing the writing of the Gospel of John in the closing years of the first century (p. 140). This has clinched the evidence, putting the writing of the Synoptic narratives back to within two or three decades after the crucifixion and resurrection. But has the fact that there is no time left for a theory which demands a vast amount of time had any appreciable effect upon the Form Criticism theorists? It has not. They close their eyes to the facts and continue with their weird imaginations.

Earlier Discoveries

Robert Dick Wilson cited the discovery in 1926 at this same Ugarit in Phoenicia (the modern Ras Shamra) of texts that show clearly that the parallel word for almah is used of a woman before she was married, but after her marriage the text uses another word. Moreover, the early Christian scholars, such as Jerome, knew these basic facts that the related Semitic languages used the parallel word of almah in the sense of virgin. They used these facts against the Jewish scholars who urged that bethulah, and not almah, meant virgin.

Tregelles’ Citation The standard Hebrew lexicon has been the work of Gesenius. Like all the Jewish lexicons of the middle ages and on, it reflects the bitter Jewish prejudice against the Christian gospel. In 1846 Tregelles, Christian scholar and world-famous textual critic, published a revision of the Hebrew and English Lexicon of Gesenius. After recording Gesenius’ definition of almah, which gave the customary Jewish claim, “young woman” rather than “virgin,” Tregelles added his own rebuttal, citing this decisive proof from the basic origin of the word: almah in the Punic languages signified virgin, as Gesenius rightly states on the authority of Jerome. The absolute authority of the New Testament is, however, quite sufficient to settle the question to a Christian.” We are familiar with the title “Punic Wars” as signifying wars between Rome and Carthage. The city of Carthage was a colony of Phoenicia. The Phoenician language was spoken at Carthage, as was Latin at Rome. Punic languages would then mean the Semitic languages, such as Phoenician and the related tongues.

Positive Prediction

It is sometimes said that the only evidence for giving virgin” as the meaning of almah is negative evidence. This holds that Martin Luther exhausted the evidence when he issued his challenge for any one to show a passage where almah was ever used of a married woman. But it is immediately evident that this is not true. The context of Isaiah 7:14 which affirms a stupendous miracle and which shows that Isaiah chose the word almah to denote this miracle is not negative. This is positive evidence.

Dr. J. G. Machen argues powerfully that Isaiah 7:14 affirms a miracle: The truth is that all these interpretations which find in the child-bearing of the almah only an ordinary birth are opposed by the way in which the promise is introduced. Why should an ordinary birth be regarded as a ‘sign’? But it is not merely the use of this one word which would lead us to expect something miraculous in that which the prophet proceeds to announce. Equally suggestive is the elaborate way in which the ‘sign’ is introduced. The whole passage is couched in such terms as to induce in the reader or hearer a sense of profound mystery as he contemplates the young woman and her child (The Virgin Birth of Christ, p. 291).

Dr. Machen cites the effective use made of this argument by Justin Martyr in his Dialogue with Trypho and declares that Justin’s argument has never really been invalidated (Dialogue with Trypho, p. 291). Dr. Machen also calls attention to the use of the definite article in the Hebrew text and the Septuagint translation, “the virgin”: “the important word in the passage has the article; it is the almah, not an Almah….The margin of the American Standard Version, which substitutes ‘the’ for ‘a’, is therefore clearly to be preferred to the translation in the text” (Dialogue with Trypho, p. 289, footnote). Dr. Young argues that the definite article cannot mean in this verse “the well-known virgin,” some such person in Isaiah’s time who was well known. “More natural, however, is the generic usage in which the article serves to denote some particular unknown person ….‘Behold! It is an almah which is with child.’ The generic usage of the article thus serves to focus particular attention upon the subject introduced, the almah” (Young, Studies in Isaiah, p. 164).

Those who deny the possibility of miracles have no hesitation in laying violent hands upon the text and emasculating it. If the references to “a sign” are removed from Isaiah 7:11 and Isaiah 7:14 and almah is declared to be only a colorless word — “young woman” — that could refer to any married woman, then the entire passage could be reduced to a meaningless generality. Dr. Young gives a careful study and refutation of the attempts of Duhm and Kraeling to emasculate this passage in Isaiah and remove Isaiah 7:15, Isaiah 7:16, and Isaiah 7:17(Dialogue with Trypho, pp. 185-191). This is the very method the modernists use in emasculating the texts of Matthew and Luke. By laying violent hands upon the text and removing the decisive clauses such as “before they came together” in Matthew 1:18; and “and knew her not until” in Matthew 1:25; and “of the Holy Spirit” in Matthew 1:18 and Matthew 1:20, they then are able to declare: “See! Matthew really does not record a virgin birth.” They would have Matthew 1:18 read: “When his mother had been betrothed to Joseph, she was found with child.” But they still would have to remove Matthew 1:19, and the entire account also would be left in a state of utter confusion.

Destroying the Evidence In the Gospel of Luke they remove such clauses as “seeing I know not a man” (Luke 1:34) and insist that Luke 1:35 be given a figurative meaning. They then solemnly declare that Luke does not record a virgin birth. This is the clever process of the r.s.v. which mistranslates Luke 1:34 “since I have no husband.”

Dr. John A. Scott, the eminent Greek scholar of Northwestern University, gave the most scathing denunciation to the translators, declaring they did not even intend to translate the text. “Luke 1:34 : When the angel told Mary that she was to bear a son, this Version makes her reply: ‘How can this be, since I have no husband?’ Mary gave no such reply; she said: ‘How can this be, since I know not a man?’ Many an unmarried girl or woman has become a mother. Mary knew this” (Classical Weekly, Jan. 6, 1947). The Greek word aner can mean either “man” or “husband,” but the verbs gignosko (know) and echo (have) are absolutely different. It was a deliberate violation of the text. As Dr. Scott says further, on Luke 1:3, “To translate the fine Greek word meaning ‘from the beginning’ with the tame ‘for some time past’ seems irony, not intended translation.”

Suppose a person received a letter from a man who disclaimed any involvement in and knowledge of a certain matter and the letter read: “I was not present. I know nothing of the matter.” The recipient of the letter proceeded to cut out the two negatives, not and nothing. He then reported that the man said, “I was present. I know of the matter.” How much of common, ordinary honesty and truthfulness could the recipient of the letter claim to possess? In language not so blunt but very forceful, Dr. Scott says, “The thing in this Version which distresses me most is the irreverent disregard for the simple meaning of the original, and while reading it I feel as Hamlet felt, when he chanced upon the jovial gravediggers: ‘Has this fellow no feeling of his business that he sings at grave making?”

Further Positive Evidence

All of the evidence from parallel words in related Semitic languages is also positive evidence. The parallel words to almah far back in the languages mean “virgin.” Furthermore the parallel words to bethulah show that it was at times used of a married woman. Dr. Young declares that if Isaiah had used bethulah in Isaiah 7:14 it would have been hard to make clear the meaning. He would have had to add some explanatory word or phrase to show that in this case bethulah was being used to mean “virgin.” He says of bethulah, “It is used of one who is truly a virgin, it is employed of one who is engaged or betrothed, and it is also used of one who has actually been married.” After quoting Joel 1:8 he says, “That this bethulah is married is not open to question.” He then cites evidence from other Semitic languages that the parallel words for bethulah are used of a married woman. He quotes Aramaic incantations to show that betulta, the Aramaic equivalent of bethulah, is used for a married woman. The Hittite-Arab batul is used of a married woman. Dr. Young concludes, “If Isaiah had employed the word bethulah to designate the mother of the child, he would have been using a most ambiguous word.”

Almah vs.Bethulah

Dr. Young declares further, “This word parthenos is a far more accurate rendering of almah than is the neanis of Aquila, Symmachus and Theodotion. At this particular point the lxx translators of Isaiah showed remarkable insight into the true meaning of the text” (Studies in Isaiah, p. 177). Dr. Machen declares, “But as a matter of fact there is no place among the seven occurrences of almah in the Old Testament where the word is clearly used of a woman who was not a virgin” (The Virgin Birth of Christ, p. 288). Dr. Young declares repeatedly that almah is a word never used of a married woman. He affirms that of all the words listed above, almah alone seems to have this distinction (Studies in Isaiah, pp. 77, 184). This brings us back to the fine summary of Tregelles. The elemental meaning of the word almah in the Semitic languages is “virgin.” But the faith of a Christian rests solidly on the inspired accounts of Isaiah, Matthew, and Luke. The fact that the word bethulah had been used of a married woman made it a misfit for Isaiah 7:14. “The absolute authority of the New Testament is, however, quite sufficient to settle the question to a Christian.”