No virgin birth means basically denying the divinity of Jesus Christ and reducing Jesus to along the lines of "wise man/good man/philosopher" status
Would you consider the evangelists Mark and John to be Christians? Both set out to say the most important things about Jesus, neither mentions the virgin birth.
Mark and especially John are very clear on Jesus' divinity, but neither requires Mary's virginity to do so.
Argument from silence? Really? Since neither Mark nor John gave ANY kind of birth narrative, are we to assume they thought that Jesus materialized on Earth as a grown adult?
Yeah, because if it mattered to the extent you believe, they would not have been silent on the question. The reality is that Joseph and Mary were getting it on pre-marriage, and when this became inconvenient to the story, the virgin birth myth was added in. Anytime there is something that is said to be important in one of the later scriptural texts but not mentioned in earlier writings, I believe suspicion is in order.
It's a foundational, and therefore fundamental, point of doctrine of the Christian religion. It's one of several sine qua non of the faith, along with such things as the divinity of Christ and the doctrine of the Trinity.
The guys who wrote the Gospels knew each other, ya know. And the guys who wrote the later Gospels were well aware of knew what was in the earlier Gospels. Therefore I don't see any pressing reason why Mark and John MUST duplicate Matthew (or Luke for that matter). And yes, in case someone in inclined to bring it up, I reject Markan Priority and the Q Document Hypothesis. I hold to the orthodox, historical view that the Gospels were written in the canonical order: Matthew, then Mark, then Luke, then John.
To the secular mind, that MUST be what happened, and no evidence is needed. Obviously there is no such thing as the supernatural and all this talk of miracles and stuff can clearly be ignored outright. [/sarcasm]
I agree. I also agree with the belief that the writings of Mark were very heavily based on accounts of Peter the acknowledged leader of the apostles and that Mark's own appearance during the arrest of Jesus is alluded to in his gospel where he refers to a young man fleeing and tearing himself out of his clothes to escape.
Ironic isn't it? Most atheists and agnostics that I'm familiar with seem to pride themselves on being open minded. Yet this is a topic they REFUSE to be open minded about.
Because there is evidence that the order Chaos listed is not the order in which it was written, those of us open to the Q theory are close minded?
No matter gul. I looked it up. It sounds like BS to me because it seeks to resolve problems that do not exist. The problem people seem to claim is "why aren't all four gospels identical" which to me is patently ridiculous. If they were identical I would think that would indicate simple copying from a single early source. But it seems to me that when you have four different men giving accounts of the same events no matter what you're going to get different accounts. Would four men involved in the D-Day landings all write identical accounts of the event? Of course not.
This right here is why people think religious people are crazy. Thank you for perfectly summing it up for me and closing the case.
@Dayton: I don't expect them to be identical, or necessarily even logically consistent. But if there is something fundamental to Christianity, it should be mentioned in all of the gospels. That it is not is rather revealing.
It's a concern. Then there's the problem that Jesus is said to be a direct patrilineal descendant of David. How does that work if Joseph is not the father?
Legally, Joseph was considered the father of Jesus by anyone concerned. Physically he was still a descendant of David given Mary's background IIRC.
What if there was a wacky mix-up (God gets busy) and full sized Jesus was born in the natural manner? His mother would NEVER let him forget that! And imagine if it was a breach delivery?
Not exactly foundational. It wasn't codified until the Council of Nicea. Before then, there wasn't a concensus on the issue of Jesus' divinity.
Even if it is proven the divine birth wasn't real, it will rationalized as "that was just symbolism and metafore. It wasn't meant to be taken literally." Love those moving goal posts!
Really? Somewhat like the universe moving from being 20 billion years old when I was in grade school to 13-14 billion today?
That's not necessarily moving the goal posts. Some Christians think The Bible is literal, and some think some of it is symbolic. In the end, I don't think it makes much difference one way or the other. No...not anywhat like that.
You know to whom the details of Jesus' birth and parentage didn't seem to matter all that much? Jesus.
But that would be fine. The bible as metaphor is a good book with a lot to offer. The bible as literal truth? Not so much.
