Mary: Virgin or Minx?

[Furrowed Brow]

"How will this be," Mary asked the angel, "since I am a virgin?" Luke 1:34

Which is more likely: That the whole natural order is suspended or that a Jewish minx should tell a lie?

Why is the virgin birth not a lie?

[Flail]

a lie at worst...a mythical story never intended as truth at best.

[Flail]

The Bible has very little info about Mary and she is unknown otherwise...it is claimed that she had an angelic vision(after she became pregnant without her husband) that she would give birth to a God...and later her husband(who doubted her and wanted to hide her away) then had a similar visitation from an angel....but as to her character and reputation and life we have nothing much at all...despite this,Catholics have made her a 'lesser God'...they commune with her,pray to her,seek guidance from her and have devoted an entire portion of their repetitive daily ornament rituals to her.

[PhiloKGB]

Where in the Bible does it say that Mary became pregnant without her husband? Note that I am talking about details, not controversial translations of a single word.

[Flail]

I think in Luke or Matthew it says something to the effect that she became pregnant before being 'together with Joseph"...

[McCulloch]

Where in the Bible does it say that Mary became pregnant without her husband? Note that I am talking about details, not controversial translations of a single word.

Why not look it up?

Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows: when His mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit.

And Joseph her husband, being a righteous man and not wanting to disgrace her, planned to send her away secretly. But when he had considered this, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, "Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife; for the Child who has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. She will bear a Son; and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins."

[...]

And Joseph awoke from his sleep and did as the angel of the Lord commanded him, and took Mary as his wife, but kept her a virgin until she gave birth to a Son; and he called His name Jesus.

[PhiloKGB]

Man, I really did word my question poorly. The Gospel mentions of the virgin birth are all, AFAIK, contingent upon the Greek Bible and its questionable translation of the Hebrew "almah." It was presumably the Greek Bible to which Matthew had access, and upon which he based his further commentary about Mary's description.

In any case, my question was rhetorical.

[Heterodoxus]

"How will this be," Mary asked the angel, "since I am a virgin?" Luke 1:34

Which is more likely: That the whole natural order is suspended or that a Jewish minx should tell a lie?

Why is the virgin birth not a lie?

Jewish family tradition being as it was in the 1st century CE, it's more likely that Mary was a virgin rather than a promiscuous teenage or pre-teen girl. The issue of her virginity is moot. More important, IMU, is the knowledge that although parthenogenesis (virgin birth) is known in the insect world and in some invertebrates, there has (TBOMK) never been such a birth among humans except for the one reported in Matthew 1:18-25; Luke 1:26-38.

Historically, parthenogenesis is a claim frequently made by a group of people who so revered someone within their group or culture that they also claimed "virgin birth" as evidence of their hero's right to deification. Within early pagan groups, this claim was likely based on an ignorance of human conception.

IMO, to attribute parthenogenesis (virgin birth) to Jesus likens him to a primitive god-figure created in the minds of ignorant people.

[Flail]

Mary is good marketing for Catholics, who need the female customer base for their otherwise all male review....its all about profits and avoiding taxation.

[Cephus]

Man, I really did word my question poorly. The Gospel mentions of the virgin birth are all, AFAIK, contingent upon the Greek Bible and its questionable translation of the Hebrew "almah." It was presumably the Greek Bible to which Matthew had access, and upon which he based his further commentary about Mary's description.

It's not a questionable translation, it's an absolutely bad one. In Hebrew, "almah" means "young woman", as opposed to other words that are absolutely used in the Bible to refer to virginity. When it was translated into Greek, it was translated to "parthenos" which does mean virgin, a bad translation by anyone's gauge. Matthew, of course, was desperately scouring the OT looking for anything he could use as a prophecy, whether it existed or not. The passage in Isaiah 7:14 absolutely does not refer to Jesus, it is a self-fulfilling prophecy that is fulfilled just a few verses later by Isaiah himself.

The writer of Matthew was a man with an agenda, nothing more.