Musings on Isaiah 7 and the Virgin Birth

Not long ago, I wrote about Hosea 11 and what is actually meant by how the NT uses this passage.  I would like to do the same thing with the virgin birth as many people think this passage is just wrenched out of context by Matthew.  There is actually a very rich context to explore and this passage actually shows how the Son is eternal.

When one reads Isaiah 7:1-9, we see that Judah was facing a military threat from foreign rulers.  When we go to the golden passage of Isaiah 7:14 we read:

Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.

This is the prophecy of Mary giving birth to Jesus Christ.  When we read the next verses it’s quite interesting.

He will be eating curds and honey when he knows enough to reject the wrong and choose the right, for before the boy knows enough to reject the wrong and choose the right, the land of the two kings you dread will be laid waste.

– Isaiah 7:15-16

My interpretation is that these nations going up against Judah were never a threat.  When did Jesus Christ know how to choose right and reject wrong?  He always knew that since he’s the eternal Son of God.  Since Christ is the eternal Son of God, he always knew how to choose the right and reject the wrong, so the text is using a metaphor to say that these kingdoms opposing Judah were never a threat.  The eternal nature and divinity of the Son is hinted at a few chapters later in Isaiah 9:6 so the context fits well.

Proof of this is in the first verse of the chapter.

When Ahaz son of Jotham, the son of Uzziah, was king of Judah, King Rezin of Aram and Pekah son of Remaliah king of Israel marched up to fight against Jerusalem, but they could not overpower it.

The attacks by these groups against Jerusalem were useless.  They weren’t a danger.  They weren’t a danger in Isaiah 7:1 anymore than they were a danger hundreds of years later when Jesus Christ was living, or hundreds of years before Isaiah 7 was written.  They posed no threat whatsoever and never did.

Verse 17 is when the sobering bad news comes.  They learn about their real immediate enemy which is Assyria.  This nation is bad news for Judah and poses an immediate threat; something the other two kingdoms never did.

Now, there is a disagreement on how to translate the Hebrew word almah.  Is it virgin or young woman?  The most natural translation of this word is young woman but like all languages, words are defined by their context.  For example, here are two sentences.

I’m eating an apple.

You’re the apple of my eye.

Both of these sentences use the word apple but they mean different things.  We need to look at almah in the same way.  About 200 years before Jesus Christ, this verse was translated into Greek for the first time.  Why was the word virgin used inserted?  It’s because this birth is a sign and its obviously miraculous.  Over a thousand years later, the great Jewish Bible scholar Rashi noticed how some of his fellow Jews were interpreting this passage.

And some interpret that this is the sign, that she was a young girl and incapable of giving birth.

Mary was incapable of giving birth because she was a virgin.  That is why God had to make this happen.  Hence it is obvious that almah refers to a virgin in this case and should be properly be translated as such.