You wrote:
“That’s an opinion, not a fact.”
Nope. It’s a fact. All orthodox Christians know it too.
“You need a verse that says something like: “And Joseph knew her not before OR after the birth of Christ”.”
Nope. Not all truths are contained in the Bible. Not all truths are explicitly stated in the Bible.
“But, Joseph knew her not TILL she had her firstborn.”
Anyone who has ever studied foreign languages - especially Biblical languages - knows that “till” doesn’t mean how the same thing we always assume it does in English.
“The gospels point to Jesus Christ; Mary is a sidenote (a greatly blessed one), but a sidenote to the salvation message.”
Actually, no. Mary is not a “sidenote to the salvation message.” She is really the first one saved by Christ.
“What Mary mothered was flesh, which suffered and died.”
Women do not give birth to flesh. They give birth to persons. Jesus was a person. He was not just flesh. Nestorianism is not orthodox.
“The soul and spirit came from God the Father alone, who raised that flesh back up from the dead (divinity doesn’t die, or it isn’t divine. You can’t kill the eternal, not even for a minute).”
As someone said elsewhere:
“unless you deny the divinity of Jesus which then would be a very different discussion, you have to see that God died. But again, what death did he die? Death is basically the separation of body and soul; a person dies when such separation happens. The soul goes to God and the body goes to the grave till the resurrection of the body at the end of time. But death is that separation.
“Jesus Christ as a person was divine: God in the flesh. He was not just human nor just God nor two distinct persons. He was one person with two natures. The person of Jesus was the Second Person of the Trinity in the flesh. At death, that Jesus experienced such separation of flesh and soul. Thus, God died. To say God died is not to say that God ceased to exist in the absolute as the death of NO ONE implies that! Unless you believe in anihilationism.”
It's argued that Joseph "knew" Mary at some point because Matthew 1:25 reads, "And knew her not till she had brought forth her firstborn son..." But, once again, language clouds the issue. "Until" is used to mean "up to that point, and with no intimations that things changed after that point." Example, 2 Samuel 6:23 reads, "Therefore Michal the daughter of Saul had no child unto the day of her death." Would Protestants say she had children after the day of her death because the use of the word "unto" proves it? What about 1 Samuel 15:35? "And Samuel came no more to see Saul until the day of his death: nevertheless Samuel mourned for Saul: and the Lord repented that he had made Saul king over Israel." I really doubt Samuel and Saul hooked up after his death, either! 1 Timothy 6:14 says, "That thou keep this commandment without spot, unrebukable, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ." What? After that it's going to be one big orgy? I don't think so! And the same goes for:
Genesis 8:7: "the raven "did not return until the waters were dried up" (the raven never returned even after the waters were dried up);
Deuteronomy 34:6: "and no one knows his [Moses'] grave until this day." (Moses' grave was never found)
Luke 1:80: "[St. John the Baptist] was in the deserts until the day of his manifestation to Israel." (St. John stayed in the desert afterwards, too)
1 Corinthians 15:25: "For He must reign until He has put all enemies under His feet" (Christ will reign forever and ever!)
1 Timothy 4:13: "until I come, give attention to reading, to exhortation, to doctrine" (Trust me, St. Paul gave a lot of attention to doctrine after he came!)
Revelation 2:25-26: "But hold fast what you have until I come. And he who overcomes and keeps My works until the end, to him I will give power" (we should hold fast and obey even after Jesus returns)
And there are more examples. See what Origen (A.D. 185-232) had to say about the use of the word "until" in his Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew. In this work, he refutes those who think "that the promise of the Saviour prescribes a limit of time to their not tasting of death, namely, that they will not taste of death "until" they see the Son of man coming in His own kingdom." Read also what St. Jerome (A.D. 340-430) wrote on the same topic.
**Nope. It’s a fact.**
So you guys had a security cam in their bedroom everynight after Jesus was born?
**Women do not give birth to flesh. They give birth to persons. Jesus was a person. He was not just flesh.**
I used the term flesh since the Christ used it so often to describe the physical part of man. Mary did not create the soul that lived in that body, nor the divine Spirit that performed the miracles. The body that Mary’s soul lived in was designed by God to give natural, physical birth. All she had to do was eat, sleep, and take generally good care of herself.
We that believe Mark 6:3 to mention 4 brothers and at least 2 sisters would understand how, in Luke where, “TEMPLE ALONE” happened: Mary and Joseph may have possibly had 6 or more children by that time, maybe two that couldn’t even walk yet. Traveling with a crowd with all those kids, the keeping track of everybody may have been a hard thing to do. Jesus was 12 and responsible I’m sure; so for him to be out of sight wasn’t that much cause for alarm when there were the young ones that needed to be handled and herded. BUT:
According to forever a virgin theory, Mary and Joseph traveled a DAY’S journey WITHOUT missing their ONLY child......ONLY the MOST IMPORTANT child EVER born on the planet. They would have been visited by DCFS nowadays for not being able to keep track of ONE child for a full day. My wife says that, nomatter if her only son had been 12 and responsible, she’d have had one eye on her one and only child, and one on everything else.
The juggling of definitions of words, and the relying on traditions of vain men, do not prove that Joseph and Mary slept in separate beds for their entire married lives. The word seems to strongly point otherwise.
To this ‘always a virgin’ matter, I believe Paul would say: “Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith; so do”. 1 Tim. 1:4