Must we believe in the virgin birth?

interesting...

Is really the ONLY "essential/cardinal" Christian truth must affirm is that we are sinners, saved by faith alone, grace alone by God?

that a Christian SHOULD adhere to all other doctrines, but THAT one is the ONLY essential one in sense of heaven/hell?

 

I'm not always a big AM fan, but in this instance, I tend to agree with him.

I believe it is an essential.

Baptism, however, is not. Not even close. It's time Baptists grew to recognize that.

 

Well you can't dismiss Mary's statement to the angel as recorded by Luke:

Luke 1:34, KJV
Then said Mary unto the angel, How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?

 

Denial of the Virgin birth calls into question the veracity of Scripture, not a trivial matter!

 

Faulty Logic....

The Second Person of the Holy Trinity was named Jesus according to the instruction given to Joseph and Mary. The name, really Joshua, means something like God's Salvation. Jesus is the Lord's Christ in that He came into this world to be the salvation offered to man. He did this through the incarnation. God became flesh- fully God...fully man, dwelt among us, was tempted like us but without sin, died for our sins, and conquered the grave. All of those important truths show us that Jesus is the Christ and they require the incarnation...they are not possible outside of it. Thus to deny the virgin birth is to deny the incarnation. The second person of the Trinity cannot be the Jesus of Scripture if he was not fully God and fully man, nor could he fulfill the various office prophesied in Scripture.

To deny the virgin birth is to deny the Jesus who is the Christ!

 

Skandelon

I agree that any Christian can be misled. That is not the problem. The problem is that denial of the Virgin birth is becoming commonplace in some groups. That is dangerous!

 

Informal fallacy it has nothing to do with salvation by grace.

 

I agree. All doctrinal errors can become dangerous, but the question was whether or not it was essential to salvation, or if one could be a true believer and not affirm this doctrine. That is all I was addressing.

 

What other kind of salvation is there?

 

I agree.

I respectfully do not see it that way.

I believe you missed my point. But that is all right. Christ was Christ because of who Christ was ... not because of his mother. If you insist on his mother, then you are agreeing with the Catholics in their statement of Mary the mother of God. That I disagree with.

 

If Mary was not a virgin, the implications are enormous.

First, of course, it calls into question the veracity of her statement that she knew not a man.

Second, it calls into question her impregnation by the Holy Spirit.

Third, it leaves the question unanswered: who, then, is the father of Jesus? Was it Joseph? If the father is Joseph, then there is no way Jesus could have avoided inheriting a sinful nature. That's calls into question the scripture which says he was without sin.

And, when Jesus spoke of the Father, was he speaking of God the Father the same way we speak of our Father in heaven? If he is, then we have more problems.

That said, I don't think it's required to believe in the virgin birth in order to be saved because I don't find such in the scriptures. But having been taught it, it's a serious matter to reject it.

As I said, rejecting such a doctrine means you must reject other doctrines that are linked to it, including the veracity of scripture and the sinless nature of God the Son.

 

That is truly a sign--a miraculous occurence. What kind of sign is a young woman bearing a son? It happens every day. So the so called experts on Hebrew have translated something that doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

 

Well said Tom!:thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

 

And I agree!

 

Well put. Crabtownboy is dead wrong.

The Hebrew word there is almah. I have checked every single instance of the word in the Hebrew OT, and ever single time it can be easily translated as "virgin." Plus there are times when it must mean "virgin," and cannot mean just a "young woman."

Furthermore, in the NT Matthew translates almah in Isaiah with the Greek word parthenos, which must be translated as "virgin." That's all it means. The idea that the Hebrew almah means "young woman" sometimes comes from liberal scholars. Any evangelical who follows that is ignoring the linguistic evidence.

 

Wouldn't this be a case of ones theological views driving what would be acceptable to translate the passage as being?

reminds me of the old Greek lexicon by Thayers...

Even though believe that he was one who denied jesus was deity, he still gave the Greek words with those meanings in his lexocon, so that was what a real scholar would do, or a translator!

 

Yes, it is. Without the virgin birth, Jesus would be just another man and not the Son of God.

 

I agree.

Haven't used Thayer's in years since there are better ones nowadays, but I think you are right that he was a true lexical scholar, and called it like it was with little of his aberrant theology intruding.

 

John, you may be right. I said that I believed that Mary probably was a virgin. My statement was that I have heard people who know much more than I say it could be translated otherwise.

I have found the following:

 

that is why i have stayed with my ole BAGD greek lexicon 2nd edition, as read and heard that the the 3rd edition revised, BDGD greek lexicon, went off into too much accomodating to modern views on ways words should be seen as meaning!

Wished I had picked up a Bauer first edition lexicon, saw it used for 10.00!