Part 1: Like No One Else | Part 2: Deity 1 | Part 3: Deity 2 | Part 4: Deity 3 | Part 5: Deity 4 | Part 6: Deity 5 | Part 7: Deity 6 | Part 8: Deity 7 | Part 9: Deity 8 | Part 10: Deity 9 | Part 11: Humanity 1 | Part 12: Humanity 2
In the previous two posts we’ve established that Jesus’ existence as a historical person is a reasonable belief. We turn now to the biblical evidences for his humanity—that is, that he is just as human as you and I are.
We note that he began his earthly existence in the normal human way: he was gestated for nine months in the womb of his mother, and he was born through the normal process, through the birth canal. Paul writes that he was “born of a woman” (Ga 4.4), and we have multiple accounts of his mother’s pregnancy and delivery (Mt 1.18-25; Lk 1.26-56; 2.1-7).
It’s worth noting that this is very different from the “birth” accounts of some of the gods or founders of other religions. He did not arrive, like Athena, fully grown, from Zeus’s forehead (Hesiod, Theogony, 929a), or, like Aphrodite, from sea foam (ibid, 176), or, like Dionysus, from Zeus’s thigh, or, like the Japanese Momotaro, from a giant peach. His birth was normal.
But, as we all know, his birth was abnormal as well; he was born of a virgin. That abnormality was prophesied, first and obliquely in Genesis 3.15, where he is called “the seed of the woman” (a very unusual phrasing), and then directly in Isaiah 7.14, which reads, “A virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.”
Skeptics have alleged that the Hebrew word translated “virgin” here actually means just “young woman,” and on that basis the RSV famously translated it that way. Without going into all the technical details (there is some breadth to the Hebrew word), I would note that the translators of the Septuagint about 250 BC rendered the Hebrew word with the Greek parthenos (as in “Parthenon”), which unambiguously means “virgin,” and their professional knowledge should be worth something. (As Jewish scholars before the time of Christ, they were clearly not trying to set the stage for Jesus’ birth.) Further, Matthew, writing under inspiration, chose to use the Septuagint’s rendering, rather than translating the allegedly ambiguous Hebrew word directly so that he could correct the alleged error in the Septuagint. Matthew’s account, I would argue, settles the question.
By the way, there’s one more prophecy of the virgin birth, given by an angel to Mary just before she agreed to the conception (Lk 1.34-37). Mary asserts her virginity and asks how she could become pregnant, and the angel ascribes the conception to a miraculous work of the Holy Spirit.
So yes, Jesus was born of a virgin. But everything else about his acquired nature is completely human. Like other humans, he has human ancestors; we have two genealogies, one of Joseph, his stepfather (and thus only Jesus’ legal ancestors [Mt 1.1-17]), and the other of Mary, his biological mother (Lk 3.23-38). And long after his death, his “beloved disciple,” John, pauses to make the point emphatically that he was not a phantom:
That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life; 2 (For the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us;) (1J 1.1-2).
We touched him, he says. And as he writes, sixty years after Jesus’ death, he remembers that touch as though it were yesterday.
Human. Entirely, completely, comprehensively. Just like you and me.
One further point.
I would suggest that he is more human than you and I are, because he is sinless.
Wait. Doesn’t that make him less human?
I can see how we might feel that way, but a little further thought supports my claim.
We, sinful humans, are not the original design; we’re defective copies. Adam, the original, was created sinless, as was Eve, his wife. That’s the original blueprint. Sinfulness is not inherent to full humanity.
We’re busted. But Jesus, the sinless one, is the way humans were designed to be. More human, if you will.
Now, all this raises a question.
Why did Jesus become a human?
We’ll address that next time.
Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash
Part 14: Humanity 4 | Part 15: Unity 1 | Part 16: Unity 2 | Part 17: Unity 3
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