Question on Isaiah 7:14 -- was the Messianic prophecy referring to a 'young woman' or 'virgin'?

I have a questions to all of you knowledgable Biblical Scholars out there and it relates to the so-called Messianic Prophecy in the Book of the Prophet Isaiah. It is relevant as we celebrate the Christmas Season.

Some suggest that Isaiah’s statement should be correctly translated as a ‘young woman’ (not necessarily a ‘virgin’) of his day, who would conceive and give birth to a child, and that this event would be a sign to Hezekiah.

It is then further said that Matthew took that text and applied it to Jesus’ birth, though, allegedly, this was not the meaning of the passage originally. How do we respond to this assertion?”

Your problem is that you are making St. Jerome’s mistake of presuming that the “Masoretic” Hebrew version is necessarily the correct version. The Masoretic text is younger than the birth of Christ, and excludes whole books which were deemed to refer to directly to Christianity.

Before the birth of Christ, before there existed a political unity among the Jews to even agree on which books should be in the canon, the Old Testament was translated into Greek, for the benefit of the Jews living dispersed throughout the Roman empire. At the time, the Sadducees only held the Pentateuch (”the Law”) to be divinely inpired, the Pharisees also held “the Prophets” (which included Psalms and some books you might think of historical). Many other groups also included the Khetuvim (”the Scrolls”) (Chronicles, Proverbs, Ruth, Job, Ezra, etc.), which neither the Pharisees nor Sadducees regarded authentic. Only long after Christ, the Jews agreed to include all three groups into the TaNaKh, forming the Masoretic Text.

The oldest extant version of the Old Testament found comes from the Qumran caves. Where the wording between the Septuagint and the Masoretic text differ (ie., the Septuagint doesn’t seem to be an obvious translation of the Masoretic Text), the Septuagint agrees with the Qumran more than 90% of the time.

Both the Septuagint and the Qumran refer to “virgin.”

But it’s not even reasonable to assert that the word in the Masoretic text, “Alma” doesn’t refer to a virgin. The word means “maiden.” Technically, a maiden isn’t necessarily a virgin, true. After all, what portion of unmarried, adult women in America are virgins? But then again, how many such women would call themselves, “maidens?” The word “Alma” connotes “virgin,” even if it doesn’t denote “virgin.” This is particularly true in contexts which presume the virtues of the subject. After all, what are those who deny that Isaiah refers to a Virgin insisting on? That the Messiah, the child born as a sign from God, is born of a fornicator?

Don’t forget that the prophet is declaring that the virgin giving birth shall be a miraculous sign from God to Israel, signaling the arrival of a savior. How could a fornicator giving birth signify such an ultimate miracle? It happens all the time. Only a virgin birth would be so obviously extraordinary.

End of discussion for Catholics!

Only for those who do not wish to consult their own scholars.

Jacob Jensen [O.S.B., S.S.L., S.T.D., Associate Professor, Faculty of Theology, Catholic University of America, Executive Secretary of the Catholic Biblical Association] whose analysis appears in The New Jerome Biblical Commentary [Dust jacket says, "The three editors have all served as president of the Catholic Biblical Association and of the Society of Biblical Literature. They are well-known for their contributions to Catholic and non-Catholic biblical journals."] says of Isaiah 7:14:

The sign now to be given is no longer to persuade Ahaz but will, in the future, confirm the truth of what the prophet has spoken. the young woman: Ha'alma is not the technical term for a virgin (betula). This is best understood as the wife of Ahaz; the child promsed will guarantee the dynasty's future (note again "the house of David" in v 13; cf. v 2) and for this reason can be called Immanual ("with us is G-d"). [Emphasis in original]

And BTW, I do not know what those initials mean in Jensen's brief bio which I copied.

ML/NJ

How is that referring to the Masoretic text? The three parts of the Masoretic text are the Law, the Prophets, and the Scrolls. The Scrolls (Ketuvim) include Job, Daniel, Ezra, Nehemiah, Chronicles and Ruth... books which can’t possibly be translated as “Psalms.”

My best guess as to why Jesus chose to refer to those parts of the scripture is because those are the sections which the Pharisees held to be scripture, the Law and the Prophets. (Although the Tanakh classifies the Psalms as Ketuvim, Samuel was considered part of the books of Prophets (Nevi’im), so the Davidic Psalms would be considered from the Nevi’im.)

What Jews are you speaking about? I know many Jews who believe that Isaiah 53 is speaking about a *virgin* birth

Plenty of scriptures that identify women who were of ill-repute and mary was not one of them she was young she was jewish and she was a virgin...

Wether a Jew or Gentile if you do the research, pray and seek scriptures either one might come to the conclusion they are now a person who embraces a Christian Message of Good News, from a Jew named Jesus Christ who came to the Jew first then the gentile- In other words for every earth dweller then and now...

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