“Behold, the Virgin…”
Richard ‘Aharon’ Chaimberlin, Litt.D. |
O |
NE of the
most remarkable events in the history of mankind is the coming of Messiah to
Planet Earth. The Messiah was Co-Creator of the world.[1]
He left the glory that he had with the Father (Yochanan—John 17:5) to come into
this world, take on human flesh[2]
as part of a persecuted ethnic group (the Jews, of course), where he was rejected
by his own people according to prophecy (Isaiah 53:1, 13), and eventually
suffer a terrible, painful, and humiliating death for the sins of the world.[3]
It might not have been so bad if he had
come to Planet Earth as a full-grown adult, and then begun to reign over the
adoring masses as King Messiah. Instead, he came into the world via a simple
Jewish virgin named Miriam, who was betrothed to a Jewish carpenter named
Joseph. Betrothal in Jewish tradition meant that a divorce would be
needed to break the arrangement, much as would be the case for the actual
marriage. However, betrothal was a pre-marriage tradition, and did not
carry with it any of the sexual privileges of marriage. Therefore when Miriam[4]
became pregnant “by the Holy Spirit,” [5] Joseph knew that he didn’t do it,
and suspected his “betrothed” of unfaithfulness. He could have subjected her to
public humiliation, even death by stoning. However, being a good guy, he merely
desired to divorce her quietly.[6]
An angel, whom we presume to be Gabriel
(see Luke
Isaiah
Source |
Translation |
ArtScroll
Tanach (Stone Edition;
AST)* |
Therefore, my Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the maiden will become pregnant and
bear a son, and she will name him Immanuel. |
* AST
Commentary: Either Isaiah’s (RASHI) or Ahaz’
(RADAQ) young wife will bear a son and, through prophetic inspiration, will
give him the name Immanuel, which means “God is With Us.”
thus in effect prophesying that
An Orthodox Jewish Perspective on Isaiah 7:14:
The seventh chapter in the
Book of Isaiah begins by describing the military crisis that was confronting
King Ahaz of the
It is clear from the
narrative in this chapter, that Isaiah’s declaration (Is
Applications
of (“sign”) in
The Hebrew Bible:
Term |
(Pronun-ciation) |
Meaning |
# |
Reference |
|
|
ot (As in Boat) |
a visible sign, a signal |
32 |
Isaiah 38:22 |
|
an exemplary model, a marvelous
deed |
36 |
Isaiah 44:25 |
|||
an example |
9 |
Isaiah 19:20 |
|||
a sign to determine times of
festivals |
1 |
Genesis 1:14 |
|||
a military insignia |
1 |
Numbers 2:2 |
|||
|
Total |
79 |
|
Well, that is the “Orthodox” Jewish perspective. Sometimes the word (ot or “sign”) is a supernatural sign. In the example of Isaiah 44:25, it is an occult counterfeit sign of false prophets, who nonetheless are able to produce supernatural manifestations. But it can simply a signal for certain events, such as the moon which is used as a sign or signal, such as to determine the timings for the various festivals of the Bible, as in Genesis 1:14. The word for “sign” has various uses in the Hebrew text.
In context, Isaiah was prophesying about 200 years after the
breakup of the
It was at this time that God spoke to Ahaz
via the prophet Isaiah saying, “Ask a sign of YHWH your God. Make it deep as Sheol or as high as heaven.” Ahaz
refused, saying, I will not ask, nor will I put YHWH to the test.” At that
time, God seemed to lose patience, not only with Ahaz,
but with the entire House of David that Ahaz was
descended from. Isaiah (
Then at this time we receive the prophecy, given as a sign, not just to Ahaz, but to the entire house of David, past, present, and future: “Behold, the virgin (“almah”) shall conceive, and shall bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.”
The Orthodox Jewish perspective is that the “sign” in Isaiah
In Messianic interpretation, the (“sign”) isn’t regarding the name of the child, but the fact that this child is born of a virgin. Both Messianic Jews and Christians translate Isaiah 7:14 as something like: “Behold, the virgin (almah) shall conceive, and shall bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.”
I happen to believe that this is one of those verses of prophecy that has dual fulfillment. It no doubt had a fulfillment that occurred in the days of Ahaz, but it also had a supernatural fulfillment with the birth of Yeshua the Messiah. This is disputed among Orthodox Jews, because they say that the word “almah” actually means “young woman,” and that any translation of it as “virgin” is incorrectly done by those who don’t know Hebrew very well, or (even worse) is a deliberate mistranslation.
Megillah (Scroll) of Esther |
The word used in Isaiah 7:14 is hmlu (“almah”). Most Jewish interpreters say that the Hebrew word for “virgin” is betulah, and that if Isaiah meant to refer to a virgin, he would have used the word betulah instead of almah. Of course, if almah was only a young woman, it wouldn’t have been much of a sign, since it is fairly common practice that young women give birth to children! However, when a virgin gives birth… Well, that is something out of the ordinary.
About 200
years before the Common Era,[8]
the Greek-speaking rulers of
“Almah”
and “Betulah”
It helps
to see how the words almah and betulah are used in other places
in Scripture. In every case where the term almah is used, it is apparent
that the woman referred to is a virgin. The young woman sought as a wife for
Isaac was to be an almah, which is the word used in Genesis 24:43.
Another Scripture reference using the word almah is Song of Solomon 6:8.
Contrary to popular Rabbinic
opinion, the term betulah is used in the Tanakh to simply mean “young
woman.” Occasionally, this young woman may be a virgin, and occasionally this
term is used for a woman who most definitely is not a virgin, much as the term
“young woman” in English tells us nothing about whether a woman is (or is not)
a virgin. Curiously, the King James translators liked to translate both almah
and betulah with the English translation “virgin” in most instances. In
some cases, this simply doesn’t fit when the word being translated is betulah.
An example of this is Joel 1:8: “Lament like a virgin (betulah) girded
with sackcloth for the husband of her youth.” I haven’t taken any surveys, but
I suspect that there are very few married women who are virgins. Also, in Judaism,
the marriage would be considered null and void if it wasn’t consummated.
Another instance in which the term betulah
is used is in Esther 2:17: “And the king loved Esther above all the women, and
she obtained grace and favor in his sight more than all the virgins (betulot – plural form), so that he set the royal crown upon
her head, and made her queen instead of Vashti.” These are young women who had
slept with King Ahasuerus. I am willing to concede that they might have been
virgins prior to sleeping with the king, but I doubt that many remained virgins
afterwards.
Job prays, “I have made a covenant with my
eyes. How then could I gaze at upon a maid (betulah)?” During an era in which
men often had more than one wife, it would not have been considered a sin to
gaze at a virgin, although it would have been considered sinful to gaze upon another
man’s wife.
The term betulah is also used in
Ezekiel 23:3: “And they played the harlot in
Because of Matthew’s use
of Isaiah 7:14, our interpretation of almah takes on added significance.
Was Matthew correct or wrong in quoting this verse as a Messianic prophecy?
Since most Jewish scholars, in their zeal to “debunk” prophecies relating to Yeshua,
claim that betulah is the correct word for “virgin,” it becomes
important for us to study the contexts, further demonstrating (from the Hebrew!)
that Yeshua is, indeed, the Messiah. Miriam supernaturally conceived a child
without the benefit of a man or the sperm of a man. Yeshua is what He claimed
to be – the Son of God.