Matthew 1:23

“Behold, the virgin will be with child, and will bring forth a son, and they will call his name Immanuel,” which is, being interpreted, God with us.'

This quotation is taken from Isaiah 7:14. There the birth of an heir to the throne of David (Isaiah 9:6) was to be by a virgin (in LXX, translating ‘almah - an unmarried woman of marriageable age who can be assumed to be a virgin (see Excursus below)). The reason for this was that God had rejected the house of David in His rejection of Ahaz because of his refusal to ask for the miraculous sign that God had offered him, which was simply because he did not want to have to do what God required. Ahaz wanted rather to trust in Assyria (with no real conception of what it would involve). Thus because of his refusal a miraculous sign was thrust on him, one that he did not want, and one which would signal the doom of his house. And that was that he must now recognise that the future hopes of the house of David would no longer rest in his seed, because the Coming One would be born of a virgin. God would by-pass the then current house of David.

(‘God Himself will give you a sign' (Isaiah 7:14) meant,  ‘God will now give you a sign which is expressed in the words that He now declares to you concerning a great wonder to occur in the future, a wonder which will indicate your rejection. It will be a wonder greater even than any you could ask for in Heaven and earth, and it will later be accomplished as a result of His miraculous power and be the end of the hopes of your house, for by it the Coming King will be born of no seed of man'.  It was not intended to be a sign like the one that God had originally promised. Ahaz had forfeited that).

The virgin would bear a son without human father, thus supplanting the house of Ahaz, and this son would then be called ‘GOD WITH US', a reminder to Ahaz that, while God had by Him come among His people, He would no longer be with him. The child would bring about what by his unbelief he had lost. So the point behind the sign is not as something from which Ahaz could take hope, something for Ahaz to believe in, but as something by which he would be made to recognise his own failure and rejection. When it actually took place would therefore not be important. What mattered was Gods' emphasis on the fact that it would take place on the basis of His word, and that it could feasibly be sufficiently imminent for lessons to be drawn from it.

Now, says Matthew, we see that prophecy being filled to the full. It is being brought to completion in that now a virgin will produce a child who will truly be the indication that ‘God is with us' in a unique sense.

‘They will call.' When ‘they' is used as a vague subject, as it is here in Matthew's version of the quotation, it is a regular Semitic generalisation indicating ‘Many will call Him'. (MT has ‘she will call'. LXX has ‘you will call').

The names applied to the coming babe are important in Matthew, and are emphasised. Here He is Immanu-el, an indication of ‘God with us'. This is His prophetic name, a prophetic declaration of what He is. His given name, given by both God and man, will be ‘Jesus', an indication that He is the Saviour from sin. In these two names are summed up the Christian message. He is God, He is with us, He is our Saviour.

EXCURSUS on Isaiah 7:14.

This is a prophecy concerning Immanuel, the expected Chosen One of God. The ‘prophecy' (forth-telling) which is cited here in Matthew is, “Behold a virgin will be with child and will bring forth a son, and they will call His name Immanuel” which is being interpreted, ‘God with us'. As we have seen this is especially emphasised by Matthew as having been spoken by ‘the Lord' and it is taken from Isaiah 7:14. It need hardly be pointed out that huge discussions have resulted from a study of this verse. To examine all those views is, however, beyond the scope of what we are trying to do here and we must therefore limit ourselves to what we see as the main points that come out of it.

The first is that the verse in Matthew refers to a ‘virgin' (parthenos) who will bring forth a son, ‘conceived by the Holy Spirit' (Matthew 1:20). And we should note in this regard that Matthew 1:24 in Matthew certainly affirm that Mary had had no sexual intercourse with her husband until after the birth. So however sceptical some readers might be about his conclusion, there is no doubt that Matthew is indicating by this a ‘virgin conception and birth', and moreover is indicating by it a supernatural birth in which only one party has been involved. This last fact is important. It demonstrates that it bears no resemblance to other so-called ‘virgin births' in extant literature which are often cited as parallels. In those cases a god in the form of a man had had intercourse with a human maiden. But that idea is excluded here. It has therefore to be considered as coming from a totally different sphere and environment. Here this unique birth is seen to be the result of the working of the Holy Spirit producing a child ‘miraculously' without any hint of sexual activity whether human or divine. It is not modelled on a pagan myth.

More likely parallels than pagan myths are ‘and the Lord visited Sarah as He had said' (Genesis 21:1); and ‘and it came about that Hannah conceived and bore a son' (1 Samuel 1:20), in both cases with divine assistance. But these are more parallel with the birth of John the Baptiser than with that of Jesus, for in those cases intercourse is assumed to have taken place.

But how then can the birth of Jesus be seen as the ‘fulfilment' or ‘filling full' or ‘bringing to completion' of the words taken from Isaiah, which are seen as specifically the words of YHWH?

In Isaiah the promise was of an unmarried young woman of marriageable age (‘almah in Hebrew, parthenos in LXX) who would bear a child which would reveal to Israel that God was with them, and would be a sign to Ahaz that God had rejected him and his house.

The Hebrew word used for young woman in Isaiah 7:14 (‘almah) is never, as far as is known, used of a non-virgin or a married woman. It refers to a young woman of marriageable age, with growing sexual desires, who is not yet married, and thus is assumed to be a virgin. The use of ‘almah in Song of Solomon 6:8 especially confirms this. There it is contrasted with queens and concubines and clearly describes those who are in the same situation as the loved one also being described, unmarried and virginal, and in Matthew 1:9 is associated with ‘the daughters' of their mothers, (they have not yet left their own households), the many compared with the one. It is a word containing the idea of sexual purity, without the taint that had come on the often cited word bethulah (often translated ‘virgin'). Bethulah was specifically linked with pagan deities of doubtful morality at Ugarit, and could be used to describe fertility goddesses, who were certainly not virgins. It did not strictly mean a pure virgin at the time of the prophecy, whatever it came to mean later. Compare Joel 1:8 where a bethulah mourning the husband of her youth is described where there are no grounds at all for considering that they had only been betrothed.

Some have used Proverbs 30:19 as an example of ‘almah being used of a non-virgin, when it speaks of ‘the way of a man with a maid'. But there are no real grounds at all for suggesting that that indicates sexual activity. Indeed it is the opposite that is more clearly indicated. There the writer is dealing with the movements of different creatures. Using sexual movements as an example of someone's movements, as being watched by others, would, with an innocent couple in view, have been heavily frowned on. And we only have to look at what it is being compared with to recognise that it is being paralleled with flight and directional movement which is watched by others. The thought is thus more of a couple on the move in their flirtatious activity, or even of the man's behaviour of which the young woman is not so much aware, the observers being the amused onlookers as he trails her and tries to be noticed by her. It thus rather supports the use of ‘almah for an unmarried maiden than the opposite.

We can therefore understand why here the LXX translators translated ‘almah by the word ‘virgin' (parthenos), just as they did in Genesis 24:43. They recognised the emphasis that Isaiah was placing on this woman as being unmarried and pure.

It is true that the word used for ‘virgin' (parthenos) does not always refer to what is today indicated by the term virgin, an intact virgin who has not had relations with a man, but there is nevertheless always behind it the thought of a kind of underlying purity. The term could, for example, be applied to sacred prostitutes in Greek temples, who were by no means intact virgins. But these were seen as having their own kind of ‘purity' by those who wrote of them, for they were seen as daughters of the temples and of the gods, not as common prostitutes. They were ‘holy'. On the other hand, they were certainly not technically virgins. Furthermore after Dinah had been raped in Genesis 34:2 she was still called a parthenos in Matthew 1:3 (LXX). She was seen as pure at heart even though she had been violated and was no longer an intact virgin. And in Isaiah 47 the ‘virgin daughter of Babylon' could lose her children and be brought to widowhood (Isaiah 47:1; Isaiah 47:9). In none of these cases then are parthenoi seen as intact virgins. On the other hand, the idea of purity might be seen as lying behind them all.

Nor did Hebrew at this time have a word for ‘intact virgin'. Virginity was assumed for all unmarried young women, unless there was reason to think otherwise, and then it was a shame to speak of it. The often cited ‘bethulah' did not indicate that at that time. Nor did it necessarily indicate purity. As we have seen above it was specifically linked with pagan deities of doubtful morality at Ugarit, and could be used to describe fertility goddesses, who were certainly not virgins, or even pure. They were far more lascivious and lustful than human beings. And in Joel 1:8 a bethulah mourning the husband of her youth is described. There are no grounds for thinking that she was a virgin. Indeed if she had had a husband for even one night she would not have been. (It is true that a betrothed man could be called a husband, but in a general statement like that in Joel it would not be the obvious meaning). Furthermore the word bethulah sometimes has to be accompanied by the words, ‘neither had any man known her' (Genesis 24:16; compare also Leviticus 21:3; Judges 11:39; Judges 21:12). That comparison would have been unnecessary if bethulah had specifically indicated a virgin. So a bethulah is a young woman, whether married or not, with no indication of her virginal state. An ‘alma is an unmarried young woman of marriageable age, who if pure (which she would be assumed to be) could in Israel be called a parthenos, a pure woman.

The next thing we note is that this unmarried and pure woman who is to bring forth a child is to be a sign to Ahaz of the rejection of him and his house (demonstrated by the coming of Assyria on them - Isaiah 7:17), and an indication that he will shortly see that God can really do what He says and can empty the lands of both his enemies, something which will also be a warning to him, for what can be done to them can also be done to him.

Who then was this son who would act as a sign in this way? A number of suggestions have been made of which we will select the three most prominent.

1) It was a child to be born of the royal house, or of Isaiah's wife, whose very birth and weaning would act as a sign.

2) It was any child born at the time, the emphasis being on the fact that before it was weaned what God had said would happen.

3) It was the child described in Matthew 9:6, the coming One Who would be greater than David, Who would be called Wonderful, Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, and would rule over the whole world.

In order to decide which one was meant we must consider the context. In context God had offered to keep Ahaz safe under his protection, and in order to give him assurance in the face of what lay before him, had offered to give him a sign of  miraculous proportions  (an example of which we find later on when the sun goes back ten degrees under Hezekiah - Isaiah 38:5). God says, ‘Ask a sign of YHWH, whether it be as high as Heaven or as deep as Sheol' (Isaiah 7:11). This was an offer which Ahaz suavely rejected, because he preferred to look to the King of Assyria. But if only he had accepted it in faith this sign once given would have been the sign that Ahaz would be ‘established'. It was thus related not only to the deliverance from the current problem, but also to the guaranteeing of the future establishment of the house of David through the line of Ahaz, protecting him from all comers.

And it is on his refusal to respond to God's offer that God says that He will nevertheless give him a sign, but that this time it will be a sign that he will not like. Rather than being a sign of God's help and protection, it will be the sign of the king of Assyria coming on him, (thus he will not be established). And the sign will be ‘that the coming child will be born of an ‘almah'.

The first thing that must be said about these words is that it suggests in context that God intends to bring before him a sign that will indeed be one of miraculous proportions, ‘as high as Heaven or as deep as Sheol', in accordance with what He has previously described, even though it is one which will not be of benefit to him at all. For only such a sign could demonstrate the certainty that the future of the house of Ahaz was no longer ensured. And if that was to be so then only a virgin birth would fit the bill. It was the virgin birth of the Coming One that guaranteed that He would not be of Ahaz' house, and that, instead of that being so, God Himself would have stepped in, in the production of a royal child.

1) The suggestion that it refers to a child to be born of the royal house, or of Isaiah's wife, whose very birth would act as a sign.

The birth of a son to the royal house in the normal course of events (Hezekiah had already been born) or to the prophetess could hardly have been such a sign as the Lord has described above. For one thing no one would have believed that the child was born of a virgin. And indeed it was not possible for the prophetess who was no longer a ‘virgin' to produce a child in this way. It is true the prophetess bears two sons, both of whom by their names will be signs to Judah/Israel, as would their father (Isaiah 8:18), but note that while the prophetess was mentioned earlier in respect of one of the sons (Isaiah 8:3), she is not mentioned in Isaiah 8:18 where we have the mention of the ‘signs and portents' referring to both sons and their father. There is therefore no emphasis on it being the prophetess who bears both sons who were ‘signs and portents in Israel' (along with their father) even though she had in fact done so. The emphasis here is on the father.

However, the argument is often that that is the point. The emphasis is in fact on her bearing one of the sons, Maher-shalal-hash-baz (Isaiah 8:3), who will be a sign of the devastation of the two kings, something which in Isaiah 7:16 was to be gathered from the sign of the ‘almah with child. But here we should note that in Isaiah 8:3 this is not in fact specifically described as a sign. It is rather seen as a prophetic acting out of what was to be, which is not quite the same thing. Of course we may accept that it was an indication of what was to be, and in that sense a sign. But it was equally certainly not the kind of sign that the Lord had originally spoken of, a sign of startling proportions. Nor is it said to relate to the now greater matters that were involved, that Ahaz's house would no longer be established, and that the king of Assyria was about to descend on him and his land because he had forfeited the Lord's protection.

We may therefore justifiably see the birth of Maher-shalal-hash-baz as a partial sign, but not as the great sign. The child's birth, through the name given to him, was indeed a sign that the kings would be destroyed from their lands within a short while, but that was all that he is described as being. But he was not born of an ‘almah, and he is not said to be a sign of the larger matter in hand, the rejection of the house of Ahaz as manifested by the coming of Assyria and devastation of Judah. Nor is he said to be the sign of the coming of a king who would achieve what Ahaz has failed to achieve (Isaiah 9:7), that is, of the fulfilment of the promises to the house of David. (A fact that will later be made even clearer by the rejection of his son Hezekiah and his seed - Isaiah 39:5). The same problems as these lie with any attempt to relate the birth of the child to the birth of any child in the house of Ahaz. The birth of such a child would hardly rank as an unusual sign, and would be even less significant than that born to the prophetess. For we must remember that the heir, Hezekiah, had already been born before this happened.

2) The suggestion that it refers to any child born at the time the emphasis being on the fact that before it was weaned what God had said would happen.

This suffers from even more disadvantages than the first, for it does not even have the partial support in context that the first interpretation has when related to the prophetess. It is fine as an evidence of how short a time it will be before both of Ahaz's opponents are devastated, but it has nothing to say about the non-establishment of the house of Ahaz or of the coming of the king of Assyria, nor could it possibly be seen as in any way parallel with the kind of sign that the Lord had spoken about. For the truth is that if the Lord made His great declaration about ‘a sign almost as beyond the conception of man as it could possibly be', and then gave one which was merely a birth in the usual run of things, it would appear to all that all that He had offered was a damp squib.

And this is especially so because in the past He had specialised in special births in that a number of past ‘greats' had been born miraculously (even though not from an ‘almah), and almost with the same words. Thus Isaac was born ‘miraculously' (Genesis 18:10; Genesis 18:14; Genesis 21:2 - ‘conceived and bore a son'), Samson was born ‘miraculously' (Judges 13:3 - ‘will conceive and bear a son'), Samuel was born ‘miraculously' (1 Samuel 1:5; 1 Samuel 1:20 - ‘conceived and bore a son'). And all these births would be engraved on Israelite hearts. But there is no suggestion that they were born of ‘almah's, nor was the child of the prophetess in fact born ‘miraculously', even though she ‘conceived and bore a son'. Indeed she had already previously had another son. It will be noted that the only exact parallel to ‘ will  conceive and bear a son' in the whole of the Old Testament is Judges 13:3; Judges 13:5; Judges 13:7, and that of a birth that was certainly unusual and unexpected.

3) The suggestion that it refers to the child described in Isaiah 9:6, the coming One Who would be greater than David, Who would be called Wonderful, Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, and would rule over the whole world, thus indicating that He would be miraculously born of an ‘almah (parthenos, virgin).

There can be no question that this suggestion of the virgin birth of the coming hope of the house of David has the most going for it from an Israelite's point of view and from the point of view of the context. It would tie in with the past history of conceiving and bearing a ‘miraculous child' as being signs to Israel. It would tie in with the Lord's promise that He would give a remarkable miraculous sign. It would tie in with the following description of the ‘birth of a child' in Isaiah 9:6. It would give full weight to the use of ‘almah. It would explain why it demonstrated that ‘God is with us'. It would confirm that the hope of the house of David was indeed coming, in spite of present appearances, even though Ahaz' house would be excluded. And in the context of Matthew it would explain why He would be able to save His people from their sins.

And as no one knew when the child would be born (it could be at any time) the indication that both kings would be devastated before the child could possibly grow to boyhood was a sufficient indicator of time, especially when associated with the actual example of the birth of the son to the prophetess. Indeed the only question that it might raise is, how could such a birth in the future possibly be a sign to Ahaz?

The answer to this question lies in the nature of the sign. It should be noted that it was no longer intended to be a sign to Ahaz that he was to be established (Isaiah 7:9). But what it certainly was, was a sign of the fact that he would not be established, and while that did not really require a great present miracle at the time then current, God was determined that the one who had refused a miraculous sign would be given a miraculous sign which would demonstrate the fact in an inescapable way. Ahaz lived at a time when all hopes were on the coming of the future triumphant son of David, who would be of the line of David, and who would rule the world (Psalms 2). And Ahaz would pride himself in the fact that it would be of his seed. Thus to inform Ahaz that he was now receiving God's words as a sign that this coming David would actually in fact be born of a virgin, and not be of his seed, was indeed a sign that he would not be established, and was an unwelcome sign indeed. It was an indication vouchsafed by the word of YHWH that the future throne would go to one not born of Ahaz's seed. The sign was thus now not a matter of when the child would be born, but of what his birth would signify as regards the hopes for the future. Furthermore we have a good example in the past of precisely such an idea of a sign that was given as a sign to its recipient, with the actual working out of the sign being a future event. For such an example see Exodus 3:12. There the sign that Moses had been sent would be the fact that the people to whom he went would one day ‘serve God on this mountain'. The sign was a promise of a better future that had to be believed in, and that they could hold on to, and in which they had to continue to believe. It was a sign that had to be accepted on the basis of God's promise. It was a sign of a future which would actually be the result of their response of faith, just as this sign in Isaiah 7:14 was a similar promise of a better future in which the people were called on to believe, in contrast to Ahaz (Isaiah 7:9).

Strictly speaking in fact Ahaz did not want or merit a sign. He had refused it. He had already made up his mind to look to Assyria. Thus the point here is that he was now to receive a verbal sign that he did not want, which demonstrated the very opposite of what the original promised sign would have indicated. And that sign was God's own word that the Coming One would now be born of a virgin, and not of the seed of Ahaz. It demonstrated his rejection by God. Meanwhile Israel could indeed be confident that one day it would receive its promised king Whose coming would prove that God was with them, but they would now know that He would not be born of the seed of Ahaz, but would rather be born of a virgin. We should also note that while this might cause problems to our scientific age, it would have caused no problems to Israelites, nor indeed to Matthew. They would not be looking for some interpretation that avoided the ‘miraculous'. They would have seen no difficulty in the idea of the Creator bringing about a virgin birth.

This being so it is quite reasonable to see that to Matthew Isaiah was seen as promising that the great Son of David would be born of a virgin, and that it therefore directly related to what had happened in the case of Jesus, Who, as that Son of David had indeed been born of a virgin. He thus saw His birth from a virgin as ‘filling in full' the prophecy which had only partly been fulfilled by Maher-shalal-hash-baz.

End of EXCURSUS.

EXCURSUS on Isaiah 7:14.

This is a prophecy concerning Immanuel, the expected Chosen One of God. The ‘prophecy' (forth-telling) which is cited here in Matthew is, “Behold a virgin will be with child and will bring forth a son, and they will call His name Immanuel” which is being interpreted, ‘God with us'. As we have seen this is especially emphasised by Matthew as having been spoken by ‘the Lord' and it is taken from Isaiah 7:14. It need hardly be pointed out that huge discussions have resulted from a study of this verse. To examine all those views is, however, beyond the scope of what we are trying to do here and we must therefore limit ourselves to what we see as the main points that come out of it.

The first is that the verse in Matthew refers to a ‘virgin' (parthenos) who will bring forth a son, ‘conceived by the Holy Spirit' (Matthew 1:20). And we should note in this regard that Matthew 1:24 in Matthew certainly affirm that Mary had had no sexual intercourse with her husband until after the birth. So however sceptical some readers might be about his conclusion, there is no doubt that Matthew is indicating by this a ‘virgin conception and birth', and moreover is indicating by it a supernatural birth in which only one party has been involved. This last fact is important. It demonstrates that it bears no resemblance to other so-called ‘virgin births' in extant literature which are often cited as parallels. In those cases a god in the form of a man had had intercourse with a human maiden. But that idea is excluded here. It has therefore to be considered as coming from a totally different sphere and environment. Here this unique birth is seen to be the result of the working of the Holy Spirit producing a child ‘miraculously' without any hint of sexual activity whether human or divine. It is not modelled on a pagan myth.

More likely parallels than pagan myths are ‘and the Lord visited Sarah as He had said' (Genesis 21:1); and ‘and it came about that Hannah conceived and bore a son' (1 Samuel 1:20), in both cases with divine assistance. But these are more parallel with the birth of John the Baptiser than with that of Jesus, for in those cases intercourse is assumed to have taken place.

But how then can the birth of Jesus be seen as the ‘fulfilment' or ‘filling full' or ‘bringing to completion' of the words taken from Isaiah, which are seen as specifically the words of YHWH?

In Isaiah the promise was of an unmarried young woman of marriageable age (‘almah in Hebrew, parthenos in LXX) who would bear a child which would reveal to Israel that God was with them, and would be a sign to Ahaz that God had rejected him and his house.

The Hebrew word used for young woman in Isaiah 7:14 (‘almah) is never, as far as is known, used of a non-virgin or a married woman. It refers to a young woman of marriageable age, with growing sexual desires, who is not yet married, and thus is assumed to be a virgin. The use of ‘almah in Song of Solomon 6:8 especially confirms this. There it is contrasted with queens and concubines and clearly describes those who are in the same situation as the loved one also being described, unmarried and virginal, and in Matthew 1:9 is associated with ‘the daughters' of their mothers, (they have not yet left their own households), the many compared with the one. It is a word containing the idea of sexual purity, without the taint that had come on the often cited word bethulah (often translated ‘virgin'). Bethulah was specifically linked with pagan deities of doubtful morality at Ugarit, and could be used to describe fertility goddesses, who were certainly not virgins. It did not strictly mean a pure virgin at the time of the prophecy, whatever it came to mean later. Compare Joel 1:8 where a bethulah mourning the husband of her youth is described where there are no grounds at all for considering that they had only been betrothed.

Some have used Proverbs 30:19 as an example of ‘almah being used of a non-virgin, when it speaks of ‘the way of a man with a maid'. But there are no real grounds at all for suggesting that that indicates sexual activity. Indeed it is the opposite that is more clearly indicated. There the writer is dealing with the movements of different creatures. Using sexual movements as an example of someone's movements, as being watched by others, would, with an innocent couple in view, have been heavily frowned on. And we only have to look at what it is being compared with to recognise that it is being paralleled with flight and directional movement which is watched by others. The thought is thus more of a couple on the move in their flirtatious activity, or even of the man's behaviour of which the young woman is not so much aware, the observers being the amused onlookers as he trails her and tries to be noticed by her. It thus rather supports the use of ‘almah for an unmarried maiden than the opposite.

We can therefore understand why here the LXX translators translated ‘almah by the word ‘virgin' (parthenos), just as they did in Genesis 24:43. They recognised the emphasis that Isaiah was placing on this woman as being unmarried and pure.

It is true that the word used for ‘virgin' (parthenos) does not always refer to what is today indicated by the term virgin, an intact virgin who has not had relations with a man, but there is nevertheless always behind it the thought of a kind of underlying purity. The term could, for example, be applied to sacred prostitutes in Greek temples, who were by no means intact virgins. But these were seen as having their own kind of ‘purity' by those who wrote of them, for they were seen as daughters of the temples and of the gods, not as common prostitutes. They were ‘holy'. On the other hand, they were certainly not technically virgins. Furthermore after Dinah had been raped in Genesis 34:2 she was still called a parthenos in Matthew 1:3 (LXX). She was seen as pure at heart even though she had been violated and was no longer an intact virgin. And in Isaiah 47 the ‘virgin daughter of Babylon' could lose her children and be brought to widowhood (Isaiah 47:1; Isaiah 47:9). In none of these cases then are parthenoi seen as intact virgins. On the other hand, the idea of purity might be seen as lying behind them all.

Nor did Hebrew at this time have a word for ‘intact virgin'. Virginity was assumed for all unmarried young women, unless there was reason to think otherwise, and then it was a shame to speak of it. The often cited ‘bethulah' did not indicate that at that time. Nor did it necessarily indicate purity. As we have seen above it was specifically linked with pagan deities of doubtful morality at Ugarit, and could be used to describe fertility goddesses, who were certainly not virgins, or even pure. They were far more lascivious and lustful than human beings. And in Joel 1:8 a bethulah mourning the husband of her youth is described. There are no grounds for thinking that she was a virgin. Indeed if she had had a husband for even one night she would not have been. (It is true that a betrothed man could be called a husband, but in a general statement like that in Joel it would not be the obvious meaning). Furthermore the word bethulah sometimes has to be accompanied by the words, ‘neither had any man known her' (Genesis 24:16; compare also Leviticus 21:3; Judges 11:39; Judges 21:12). That comparison would have been unnecessary if bethulah had specifically indicated a virgin. So a bethulah is a young woman, whether married or not, with no indication of her virginal state. An ‘alma is an unmarried young woman of marriageable age, who if pure (which she would be assumed to be) could in Israel be called a parthenos, a pure woman.

The next thing we note is that this unmarried and pure woman who is to bring forth a child is to be a sign to Ahaz of the rejection of him and his house (demonstrated by the coming of Assyria on them - Isaiah 7:17), and an indication that he will shortly see that God can really do what He says and can empty the lands of both his enemies, something which will also be a warning to him, for what can be done to them can also be done to him.

Who then was this son who would act as a sign in this way? A number of suggestions have been made of which we will select the three most prominent.

1) It was a child to be born of the royal house, or of Isaiah's wife, whose very birth and weaning would act as a sign.

2) It was any child born at the time, the emphasis being on the fact that before it was weaned what God had said would happen.

3) It was the child described in Matthew 9:6, the coming One Who would be greater than David, Who would be called Wonderful, Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, and would rule over the whole world.

In order to decide which one was meant we must consider the context. In context God had offered to keep Ahaz safe under his protection, and in order to give him assurance in the face of what lay before him, had offered to give him a sign of  miraculous proportions  (an example of which we find later on when the sun goes back ten degrees under Hezekiah - Isaiah 38:5). God says, ‘Ask a sign of YHWH, whether it be as high as Heaven or as deep as Sheol' (Matthew 7:11). This was an offer which Ahaz suavely rejected, because he preferred to look to the King of Assyria. But if only he had accepted it in faith this sign once given would have been the sign that Ahaz would be ‘established'. It was thus related not only to the deliverance from the current problem, but also to the guaranteeing of the future establishment of the house of David through the line of Ahaz, protecting him from all comers.

And it is on his refusal to respond to God's offer that God says that He will nevertheless give him a sign, but that this time it will be a sign that he will not like. Rather than being a sign of God's help and protection, it will be the sign of the king of Assyria coming on him, (thus he will not be established). And the sign will be ‘that the coming child will be born of an ‘almah'.

The first thing that must be said about these words is that it suggests in context that God intends to bring before him a sign that will indeed be one of miraculous proportions, ‘as high as Heaven or as deep as Sheol', in accordance with what He has previously described, even though it is one which will not be of benefit to him at all. For only such a sign could demonstrate the certainty that the future of the house of Ahaz was no longer ensured. And if that was to be so then only a virgin birth would fit the bill. It was the virgin birth of the Coming One that guaranteed that He would not be of Ahaz' house, and that, instead of that being so, God Himself would have stepped in, in the production of a royal child.

1) The suggestion that it refers to a child to be born of the royal house, or of Isaiah's wife, whose very birth would act as a sign.

The birth of a son to the royal house in the normal course of events (Hezekiah had already been born) or to the prophetess could hardly have been such a sign as the Lord has described above. For one thing no one would have believed that the child was born of a virgin. And indeed it was not possible for the prophetess who was no longer a ‘virgin' to produce a child in this way. It is true the prophetess bears two sons, both of whom by their names will be signs to Judah/Israel, as would their father (Matthew 8:18), but note that while the prophetess was mentioned earlier in respect of one of the sons (Matthew 8:3), she is not mentioned in Matthew 1:18 where we have the mention of the ‘signs and portents' referring to both sons and their father. There is therefore no emphasis on it being the prophetess who bears both sons who were ‘signs and portents in Israel' (along with their father) even though she had in fact done so. The emphasis here is on the father.

However, the argument is often that that is the point. The emphasis is in fact on her bearing one of the sons, Maher-shalal-hash-baz (Matthew 8:3), who will be a sign of the devastation of the two kings, something which in Matthew 7:16 was to be gathered from the sign of the ‘almah with child. But here we should note that in Matthew 8:3 this is not in fact specifically described as a sign. It is rather seen as a prophetic acting out of what was to be, which is not quite the same thing. Of course we may accept that it was an indication of what was to be, and in that sense a sign. But it was equally certainly not the kind of sign that the Lord had originally spoken of, a sign of startling proportions. Nor is it said to relate to the now greater matters that were involved, that Ahaz's house would no longer be established, and that the king of Assyria was about to descend on him and his land because he had forfeited the Lord's protection.

We may therefore justifiably see the birth of Maher-shalal-hash-baz as a partial sign, but not as the great sign. The child's birth, through the name given to him, was indeed a sign that the kings would be destroyed from their lands within a short while, but that was all that he is described as being. But he was not born of an ‘almah, and he is not said to be a sign of the larger matter in hand, the rejection of the house of Ahaz as manifested by the coming of Assyria and devastation of Judah. Nor is he said to be the sign of the coming of a king who would achieve what Ahaz has failed to achieve (Isaiah 9:7), that is, of the fulfilment of the promises to the house of David. (A fact that will later be made even clearer by the rejection of his son Hezekiah and his seed - Isaiah 39:5). The same problems as these lie with any attempt to relate the birth of the child to the birth of any child in the house of Ahaz. The birth of such a child would hardly rank as an unusual sign, and would be even less significant than that born to the prophetess. For we must remember that the heir, Hezekiah, had already been born before this happened.

2) The suggestion that it refers to any child born at the time the emphasis being on the fact that before it was weaned what God had said would happen.

This suffers from even more disadvantages than the first, for it does not even have the partial support in context that the first interpretation has when related to the prophetess. It is fine as an evidence of how short a time it will be before both of Ahaz's opponents are devastated, but it has nothing to say about the non-establishment of the house of Ahaz or of the coming of the king of Assyria, nor could it possibly be seen as in any way parallel with the kind of sign that the Lord had spoken about. For the truth is that if the Lord made His great declaration about ‘a sign almost as beyond the conception of man as it could possibly be', and then gave one which was merely a birth in the usual run of things, it would appear to all that all that He had offered was a damp squib.

And this is especially so because in the past He had specialised in special births in that a number of past ‘greats' had been born miraculously (even though not from an ‘almah), and almost with the same words. Thus Isaac was born ‘miraculously' (Genesis 18:10; Genesis 18:14; Genesis 21:2 - ‘conceived and bore a son'), Samson was born ‘miraculously' (Judges 13:3 - ‘will conceive and bear a son'), Samuel was born ‘miraculously' (1 Samuel 1:5; 1 Samuel 1:20 - ‘conceived and bore a son'). And all these births would be engraved on Israelite hearts. But there is no suggestion that they were born of ‘almah's, nor was the child of the prophetess in fact born ‘miraculously', even though she ‘conceived and bore a son'. Indeed she had already previously had another son. It will be noted that the only exact parallel to ‘ will  conceive and bear a son' in the whole of the Old Testament is Judges 13:3; Judges 13:5; Judges 13:7, and that of a birth that was certainly unusual and unexpected.

3) The suggestion that it refers to the child described in Isaiah 9:6, the coming One Who would be greater than David, Who would be called Wonderful, Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, and would rule over the whole world, thus indicating that He would be miraculously born of an ‘almah (parthenos, virgin).

There can be no question that this suggestion of the virgin birth of the coming hope of the house of David has the most going for it from an Israelite's point of view and from the point of view of the context. It would tie in with the past history of conceiving and bearing a ‘miraculous child' as being signs to Israel. It would tie in with the Lord's promise that He would give a remarkable miraculous sign. It would tie in with the following description of the ‘birth of a child' in Matthew 9:6. It would give full weight to the use of ‘almah. It would explain why it demonstrated that ‘God is with us'. It would confirm that the hope of the house of David was indeed coming, in spite of present appearances, even though Ahaz' house would be excluded. And in the context of Matthew it would explain why He would be able to save His people from their sins.

And as no one knew when the child would be born (it could be at any time) the indication that both kings would be devastated before the child could possibly grow to boyhood was a sufficient indicator of time, especially when associated with the actual example of the birth of the son to the prophetess. Indeed the only question that it might raise is, how could such a birth in the future possibly be a sign to Ahaz?

The answer to this question lies in the nature of the sign. It should be noted that it was no longer intended to be a sign to Ahaz that he was to be established (Matthew 7:9). But what it certainly was, was a sign of the fact that he would not be established, and while that did not really require a great present miracle at the time then current, God was determined that the one who had refused a miraculous sign would be given a miraculous sign which would demonstrate the fact in an inescapable way. Ahaz lived at a time when all hopes were on the coming of the future triumphant son of David, who would be of the line of David, and who would rule the world (Psalms 2). And Ahaz would pride himself in the fact that it would be of his seed. Thus to inform Ahaz that he was now receiving God's words as a sign that this coming David would actually in fact be born of a virgin, and not be of his seed, was indeed a sign that he would not be established, and was an unwelcome sign indeed. It was an indication vouchsafed by the word of YHWH that the future throne would go to one not born of Ahaz's seed. The sign was thus now not a matter of when the child would be born, but of what his birth would signify as regards the hopes for the future. Furthermore we have a good example in the past of precisely such an idea of a sign that was given as a sign to its recipient, with the actual working out of the sign being a future event. For such an example see Exodus 3:12. There the sign that Moses had been sent would be the fact that the people to whom he went would one day ‘serve God on this mountain'. The sign was a promise of a better future that had to be believed in, and that they could hold on to, and in which they had to continue to believe. It was a sign that had to be accepted on the basis of God's promise. It was a sign of a future which would actually be the result of their response of faith, just as this sign in Isaiah 7:14 was a similar promise of a better future in which the people were called on to believe, in contrast to Ahaz (Isaiah 7:9).

Strictly speaking in fact Ahaz did not want or merit a sign. He had refused it. He had already made up his mind to look to Assyria. Thus the point here is that he was now to receive a verbal sign that he did not want, which demonstrated the very opposite of what the original promised sign would have indicated. And that sign was God's own word that the Coming One would now be born of a virgin, and not of the seed of Ahaz. It demonstrated his rejection by God. Meanwhile Israel could indeed be confident that one day it would receive its promised king Whose coming would prove that God was with them, but they would now know that He would not be born of the seed of Ahaz, but would rather be born of a virgin. We should also note that while this might cause problems to our scientific age, it would have caused no problems to Israelites, nor indeed to Matthew. They would not be looking for some interpretation that avoided the ‘miraculous'. They would have seen no difficulty in the idea of the Creator bringing about a virgin birth.

This being so it is quite reasonable to see that to Matthew Isaiah was seen as promising that the great Son of David would be born of a virgin, and that it therefore directly related to what had happened in the case of Jesus, Who, as that Son of David had indeed been born of a virgin. He thus saw His birth from a virgin as ‘filling in full' the prophecy which had only partly been fulfilled by Maher-shalal-hash-baz.

End of EXCURSUS.