avi@pegasus.UUCP (09/15/83)
As usual, I can't really motivate myself to reply to every point Paul makes.
Some may even be valid. I am not totally impressed with his "proofs" that
"Almah" means virgin in some places.
[from Paul:]
Let me just quote part of what Nelson's Dictionary says about "almah":
"...That *almah* can mean "virgin" is quite clear in Song of Sol. 6:8:
'There are threescore queens, and fourscore concubines, and virgins [NASB
"maidens"] without number.' Thus all the women in the court are described.
The word *almah* represents those who are eligible for marriage but
are neither wives (queens) nor concubines. ... In Gen 24:43 the word
describes Rebekah, of whom it is said in Gen. 24:16 that she was a
"maiden" [*bethulah*, see above - PMD] with whom no man had had relations.
Solomon wrote that the process of wooing a woman was mysterious to him
(Prov. 30:19). Certainly in that day a man ordinarily wooed one whom he
considered a "virgin". There are several contexts, therefore, in which
the young girl's virginity is expressly in view.
[Me:]
I don't make believe I understand the above statements. Where was the word
Almah used? What makes you assume that "in that day" no man would woo only
virgins? Please try to make this point more clearly. I also did not see the
point in the rest of this long paragraph, but see no point in including huge
sections of Pauls article here. People can always use the "p" command (in
vnews) to read Pauls original article.
Paul also misunderstood my comment that nobody noticed the VIRGIN BIRTH in
the times of Christ. Yes, I know that you claim that Mary and Joseph
noticed. As we have previously discussed in this group, there is litle (if
any) evidence that supports most early Christian claims that exists outside
of Christian writings (or books that were re-edited by Christians). This
includes the virgin birth and the ressurection. The (other) Jews and the
(non-Christian) Romans did not seem to notice.
I mentioned the hypothesis that one of the early Christians mistakenly
translated Almah into Virgos. Paul responded with:
But it was the Jews who made the translation in the first place. I
find it hard to believe that a Jewish scribe would mistakingly
translate "almah" into "virgos" and have such a grave error in such
an important part of Scripture go unnoticed until the time of
Christ. If it was an error it should have stuck out. Saying that a
virgin shall conceive and bear a son is almost as unbelievable as
saying a man shall conceive and bear a son. The greek translation
had a much wider readership than the Hebrew. Yet no one who read it
caught the mistake?
I am afraid that I don't understand -- again. What "Jew" translated the Bible
after Christ died? Are we talking about the same translation? I believe it
was one of the early Christians who did it. I do agree that the concept of a
virgin conceiving is absurd. I bet that people in those days (who believed
in spirits and other supernatural things) did not find it quite as
unbelievable. What does paul mean by the last two sentences. First of all, I
doubt that the Greek translation had a MUCH WIDER readership (at that time)
than the ORIGINAL Jewish one!! In addition, how do you expect people to have
found such a mistake in a book they considered to be divinely ordained. One
did not challenge scripture with impunity in the early church. In any case,
I doubt that the average reader had any idea about the meaning of the
passage in Isaiah. They did not have the tons of explanations that have been
made widely available since that time.
Larry Bickford and I have exchanged a series of letters on a related topic.
Larry says that the Septuagint (a translation of the Bible by Jews before
Christ was "conceived" in some manner) translates Almah into Parthenos -
which does mean virgin. This struck me as a much better argument. I was
able to give Larry some amusing answers based on colloqial use of metaphor,
overstatement and idealization in the literature of the times. A young woman
would always be assumed to be chaste and virtuous in a poetic sense and
euphemisms like "virgin" and "maiden" would be used to describe her -- even
if she may not have technically been a virgin. There are other
irregularities in the Septuagint. I wish I had a better answer for Larry,
but I have not consulted anyone who might have some "answers". I am sure
someone else has asked (and responded to) this question before.
In any case, I am not really trying to defend the "Jewish" point of view. I
am sure that there are many logical gaps in the many Jewish interpretations
of the Bible. They too used much poetic and allegorical and mystical ....
technique. I honestly find it difficult to take Bible interpretation too
seriously. The recent (seemingly endless) discussions about the validity of
the Books of Mormon (much more recent history) illustrate the difficulty in
being able to prove anything in a way that a majority of people would accept.
I don't claim to have any monopoly on the truth, and resent people who claim
that they do. Did anybody save the discussions we had on most of these
topics in this group? If you do, please mail them to Paul.
As usual, this article has grown to an unreasonable length, so I will go to
sleep so I can function at my meetings tommorow. In real life, I cannot tell
people that the entire conversation is academic.
-=> Avi E. Gross @ AT&T Information Systems Laboratories (201) 576-3063
suggested paths: [ihnp4, allegra, hogpc, ...]!pegasus!avi
--
-=> Avi E. Gross @ AT&T Information Systems Laboratories (201) 576-3063
suggested paths: [ihnp4, allegra, hogpc, ...]!pegasus!avi