1 - A rational response to the dogma of the virgin birth

Christians (2.200 billion) and Muslims (1.6 billion) believe that Jesus was born of a virgin. Sceptics reject this idea because it contradicts science, and therefore they consider that Christians and Muslims, who together make up almost half of the world’s population, are ignorant. Settling the matter of Jesus’ virgin birth in this way makes sceptics feel good, because it allows them to think of themselves as superior. However, they should ask themselves whether it is a good idea to let so many people continue to believe in something that they assume to be a lie, and also whether considering believers to be ignorant might not in fact be a major cause of mutual animosity, something which, in the long run, could create problems for everyone concerned.
 
How can believers accept an idea that science has proved to be false? Believers respond by saying: “It is a matter of faith”. This reply, which is basically the same as saying ‘we believe it because we believe it’, is unanswerable, but it doesn’t explain anything and is very similar to the reply ‘that’s just the way things are’ which adults tend to give their little children when, fed up with their constant questions, they can’t find the right answers.

Believers claim to have faith, but it is not the dogma of Jesus’ virgin birth or other similar ideas that they have faith in, but in the religious authorities that defend those ideas. Therefore, when we try to convince believers that some of the ideas of their religion go against science, we should not address them, but instead the religious authorities in question. However, the problem is that when we talk to them about Jesus’ virgin birth they also tend to say: “It is a matter of faith”, which means that the only thing we can do to make believers change their mind about the dogma of Jesus’ virginal conception is to investigate its origin.

A study of early Christianity shows that the first Christians did not believe in this idea. So where does it come from? What made the religious authorities –so many decades after Jesus’ death– believe that he was born of a virgin?

When we consult the New Testament we find that Jesus never claimed to have been born of a virgin, and that only two of the four gospels refer to Jesus’ mysterious birth. If Jesus really was born of a virgin, why do the other two gospels not mention this at all? And why does Saint Paul, who wrote 13 of the 27 books that form the New Testament, not mention it either?

When we look for the answers to these questions we see that it is logical to assume that the dogma of Jesus’ virgin birth must have something to do with the two gospels that do associate this event with a mystery. It just so happens that these two gospels are also the only ones that offer genealogies for Jesus, but as these lists do not coincide, neither in all the names nor in the number of generations, they add even more mystery to Jesus’ birth.

 

All this mystery may surprise those who think that a sacred book tells nothing but the truth, but not those who know that calling a book ‘sacred’ originally meant recognizing that it held secrets. Therefore, the existence of these mysteries in the Bible simply confirms that it is indeed a sacred book.