Born of a Virgin (Isaiah 7:14)
Matthew 1:22-23 Now all this was done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.
Isaiah 7:14 Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.
This is a fairly famous prophecy, which the New Testament claims was fulfilled in the birth of Jesus to Mary, a virgin. In fact, a cursory examination of the context of Isaiah 7:14 will quickly reveal that it was not intended to be a Messianic prophecy at all.
The first point to note is that Isaiah did not use the word "virgin" in his prophecy. He actually used the Hebrew word almah, which simply indicates a young women. Actually there is one case where almah is used to refer to an adulteress:
Proverbs 30:19-20 ...the way of an eagle in the sky, the way of a snake on a rock, the way of a ship on the high seas, and the way of a man with a maiden [almah]. "This is the way of an adulteress: She eats and wipes her mouth and says, `I've done nothing wrong.'
If she is an adulteress, then how could this almah be a virgin? Since an adulteress cannot be a virgin then this word Almah cannot refer to a virgin (except in Christian dictionaries).
The RSV correctly translates Isaiah 7:14 as "Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, a young woman shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanu-el." The New Jerusalem Bible also correctly translates Isaiah 7:14 as "The Lord will give you a sign in any case: It is this: the young woman is with child and will give birth to a son whom she will call Immanuel."
If Isaiah really intended to unambiguously designate the woman as sexually pure, he would have used the word bethulah, which does denote a sexually pure woman. Actually, Isaiah did use this word in 23:12, where he refers to the "virgin daughter of Zidon". To verify that bethulah indeed denotes a virgin, compare it's use in passages such as Genesis 24:16 and Judges 21:12. A longer passage from Deuteronomy will show that bethulah had the narrow sense of "virgin", which Christians claim for almah. (This passage uses the word bethulim, the masculine form of bethulah to denote the adjective "virginity").
Deuteronomy 22:13-21 (NIV) If a man takes a wife and, after lying with her, dislikes her and slanders her and gives her a bad name, saying, "I married this woman, but when I approached her, I did not find proof of her virginity [bethulim] ," then the girl's father and mother shall bring proof that she was a virgin [bethulim] to the town elders at the gate. The girl's father will say to the elders, "I gave my daughter in marriage to this man, but he dislikes her. Now he has slandered her and said, `I did not find your daughter to be a virgin [bethulim].' But here is the proof of my daughter's virginity [bethulim]." Then her parents shall display the cloth before the elders of the town, and the elders shall take the man and punish him. They shall fine him a hundred shekels of silver and give them to the girl's father, because this man has given an Israelite virgin [bethulah] a bad name. She shall continue to be his wife; he must not divorce her as long as he lives. If, however, the charge is true and no proof of the girl's virginity [bethulim] can be found, she shall be brought to the door of her father's house and there the men of her town shall stone her to death. She has done a disgraceful thing in Israel by being promiscuous while still in her father's house. You must purge the evil from among you.
The Greek translation of the Old Testament, the Septuagint, mistranslated Isaiah 7:14 with the Greek word parthenos, which does denote a virgin. It seems that 'Matthew' used this Greek scriptures and did not recognize that this is a translation error. If 'Matthew' were really inspired by the Holy Spirit, then he would not have made this mistake.
If Isaiah did not refer to a virgin, then what was the "sign" of his prophecy? As Isaiah himself explains, the sign was the child who was to be born. This was a favorite literary device of Isaiah. He would introduce a child into his story, and then use the name of the child to elaborate upon his theme. In chapter 8, Isaiah introduces a child with the unlikely name of Maher-shalal-hash-baz. (Some commentators note that this child may in fact be the same as Immanuel of 7:14, but this point is debatable). Loosely translated, the name means "speed the spoil, hasten the booty" in Hebrew, and Isaiah uses it to pronounce his prophecy of impending doom upon Damascus and Samaria at the hands of the Assyrians (8:4). In chapter 9, Isaiah introduces another child with an even longer name (9:6), which is translated "God is wonderful, a counselor, mighty, the father of eternity, the prince of peace". Isaiah uses this name to introduce his theme of the eventual restoration of the Davidic kingdom (9:7).
And so it is in chapter 7 that Isaiah introduces a child with the name of Immanuel. This name means "God is with us", and Isaiah used it in the sense of "God is on our side" to predict that the alliance between Syria and Israel formed against Judah (7:1) would fail. In fact, Isaiah even put a time limit on his prophecy. In verse 16, he states that "...before the child shall know to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land that you dread will be forsaken by both her kings." The Jews put the age of accountability at about eight years, so we may therefore assume that Isaiah expected his prediction to be fulfilled within this time limit. (It is also not clear that Isaiah's prophecy came true. II Chronicles 28 seems to indicate that Azah was indeed defeated by the kings of Israel and Syria).
To summarize: Isaiah does not refer to a virgin, nor does he expect his prophecy to be fulfilled centuries in the future. He gave his sign at a specific time for a specific purpose. That epoch had long since passed by the time that Matthew thought to use Isaiah out of context to lend credibility to his Messiah.
As for fulfilling that prophecy (if it were a prophecy); Jesus was not named Immanuel nor God is with us. His name was Yehoshua after his uncle. Later degenerated into Yeshua, then Yeshu.
Moreover, everybody knew that Jesus was the son of Joseph and not born from the Holy Spirit by a virgin:
(Jn 6:42) and they said, Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph? Do we not know his father and mother? Then how can he say, I have come down from heaven?
For the first thirty years, the Jews knew that this man was born from Mary and Joseph. It was only later when Jesus declared himself the Messiah and Son of God that he lied to his disciples that he was born from the Holy Spirit by a virgin.
(Jn 1:45) Philip found Nathanael and told him, "We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote--Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph."
So, even his own disciples knew that he was the son of Joseph and from Nazareth. But when they saw his hoaxes, they believed his claims and fell for the virgin birth. The virginity story shocked the Jews when he was already thirty! Even his own brothers did not believe that their mother was a virgin nor believed his fake miracles:
(Jn 7:3-5) Jesus' brothers said to him, "You ought to leave here and go to Judea, so that your disciples may see the miracles you do. No one who wants to become a public figure acts in secret. Since you are doing these things, show yourself to the world." For even his own brothers did not believe in him.
His brothers knew that he was eager to become famous and did not believe him. The priests believed his brothers and discarded the virginity story. How could the Rabbis verify the virginity of his mother thirty years later and after she gave birth to seven other normally conceived brothers?
Centuries before Jesus: According to Hindu literature, Krishna, the eighth incarnation of the god Vishnu, was born to the virgin Devaki in fulfillment of prophecy and was visited by wise men who had been guided to him by a star. Angels also announced the birth to herdsmen in the nearby countryside. When King Kansa heard about the miraculous birth of this child, he sent men to "kill all the infants in the neighboring places," but a "heavenly voice" whispered to the foster father of Krishna (who, incidentally, was a carpenter) and warned him to take the child and flee across the Jumna river. In this Hindu legend, we can recognize many parallels to the infancy of Jesus other than the virgin birth element.
