Virgin births happen to mythological figures! Speculating on the sex of specific mythological charecters makes about as much sense as looking for Unicorns in the forest or searching for a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow!
For example, the story of Isis and Osiris coming from Egyptian mythology is the same archetype of the dying and resurrecting God found throughout the mythologies of the middle east. The early Chistian story of the resurrection of Jesus is this same universal archetype being told from within the specific Judeo- Christian cultural context.
The closer cultures live in proximity to one another, the more they share the symbols and images which give content to the archetype. The archetype stays the same but its expression changes from culture to culture, hence why the study of comparative mythology is important.
Here are some prime examples of dying and resurrecting Gods, many of whom had virgin births or other miraculous conceptions like jesus and the Buddha:
Osiris (Egypt): Tricked and murdered by his brother Set, Osiris was reassembled and resurrected by his wife, Isis, becoming the god of the afterlife and agricultural regeneration.
Ishtar (Sumer/Babylonia): goddess of love and war who descended into the underworld, died, and was resurrected three days later.
Adonis (Greece/Babylonia): A vegetation god who was killed by a wild boar and, according to myth, resurrects annually in the spring.
Dionysus (Greece): Associated with wine and fertility, Dionysus was torn apart as a baby but brought back to life, representing the seasonal cycle of nature.
Odin (Norse): In a self-sacrifice, Odin hanged himself from the tree Yggdrasil and pierced his side with a spear to gain wisdom, effectively dying and rising again.
Quetzalcoatl (Mesoamerica): The Toltec god who died by self-immolation but rose again after several days in the underworld.
Baal (Phoenicia/Canaan): An ancient storm and fertility god whose death and resurrection cycles are central to Ugaritic mythology.
Persephone (Greece): Represented the seasonal cycle by spending part of the year in the underworld and returning to the earth.
Mithra (Persia/Rome): A god whose story, according to some studies, involves a birth, death, and resurrection story popular before the spread of Christianity.
Attis (Phrygia): A vegetation god associated with Cybele, who was mourned and then celebrated in his resurrection.
Zalmoxis (Thrace): A deity whose resurrection was worshipped by the Thracians.
As human consciousness evolves (cultural evolution) the archetypes are expressed through new emergent forms of cosmology. The truth of the resurrection of the Christ expresses itself quite differently in a heliocentric universe than a geocentric one. By reducing the meaning of an archetype to a particular cultural interpretation emerging from archaic and antiquated cosmologies, the archetype is rendered effete and incapable of future creative interpretation.
Christianity would be much more powerful and interesting if it would not only see the resurrection of the Christ from within its own specific Judeo-Christan context but would also seek its meaning within a multi-cultural perspective, by comparing and contrasting its archetypal appearance throughout human history.
Herein lies the origin of the immense fallacy of Orthodox Christianity: its unwillingness to understand the Resurrection of Christ as a manifestation of a religious Archetype rather than a fact of history.
Also, consider what Tillich ( one of your own Lutheran Theologians) had to say about religious symbols:
“Broken symbols are symbols that are recognized as symbols. Religious symbols refer to the ultimate or the transcendent. They use finite, worldly images to invoke something beyond.
Religious symbols are stories, rituals and practices that drive us beyond the symbol to ultimate meaning… The danger in dealing with symbols is that sometimes the symbol, rather than the reality to which the symbol points, becomes the object of worship or loyalty.
It is good that a symbol is broken, then, so that the meaning of the symbol is no longer imprisoned in the symbol. The symbol points beyond itself to a reality that cannot be contained in the symbol.” Paul Tillich, The Dynamics of Faith
I would suggest that mistaking the symbol for the reality to which it points is the primary error of biblical literalism. By reifying the symbolic content of scripture, literalism deprives the symbols of their “symbolic content.". In other words, the symbol ceases being a symbol. It no longer points to a transcendent reality, whose truth can only be expressed symbolically. Instead, the symbol is interpreted as a proposition of fact whose meaning lies in its historicity.
This “imprisons” the meaning of the symbol in the symbol itself. The symbol has ceased to be symbolic, it has lost its context, its “transcendent” referent.
When religious symbols are understood as “facts” they are robbed of their meaning, their ability to evoke novel insights into the nature of the ineffable. Biblical literalism is the “imprisonment” of the symbol, by refusing to acknowledge the symbolic nature of biblical content.
There is a Confucian proverb that states: “When the wise man points to the Moon, the imbecilic examines the finger.”
Although I believe much theology can be done in fruitful conversation with other religions and even other myths (a favorite of mine being Tolkien) I think it is part of the genius of Christianity that when invited to look at the moon we also consider the incarnation and beauty and reality of the finger.
I appreciate Dr Hubbard's reply. It reminds me of "La Trahison des images" - the surrealist painting of a tobacco pipe with the saying below it "Ceci n'est pas une pipe". Metaphor and symbol easily become obstacles.
But I want to pause before too quickly collapsing the New Testament into archetypal forms. They are there but something particular is being down with them.
By most scholarly accounts the stories of Jesus's conception and birth arise in the generations after his life and death as testaments to his divinity and not as proofs of them. The archetype is being applied, if you will, not revivified. What I mean is that it is being opened up to cosmic proportions. The gospel of John is not shy about its cosmic effect. The ancient world thought of the womb as nursery of male seed, not as modernity knows it as the laboratory of life. It matters that Jesus is not begot by male human seed, embued with the imperfections of history. Jesus is conceived with the Logos - the very essence of existence. This is meta-chromosomal. In his resurrection and ascension, he becomes the Jubilee community. His divine being becomes incarnated in the collective consciousness of people assembled to participate fully in the sharing of the abundance of creation, without hoarding or othering. This is where the NT Christ moves beyond the archetypes and symbols of the mystery cults and societies. The challenge of realizing Beloved Community with a Beloved Economy in a Beloved Creation continues to inspire more intentional collective consciousness. May the church lean into it.
If you use the estimate that about 1.7% of people worldwide are intersex, then in a world of roughly 8.3 billion people, that comes out to about 141 million people worldwide. That’s about one out of every 59 people, about as common as red heads. If all of these people lived in the United States they would be equal in number to the population of red states Texas, Florida, Ohio, Georgia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Indiana, Missouri, South Carolina, Alabama, and Louisiana together. The combined population of these Trump states is about 141.1 million which is basically the same as the estimated global intersex population. But, of course, the last place an intersex person (or LGBTQIA+ person) would want to live is in a MAGA Land state. Let’s pray that the next child of Usha and J.D. Vance is LGBTQIA+. Maybe this will teach them some empathy and compassion.
This makes a hell of a lot of sense. If we categorize the Incarnation in into one fore then we miss the point and the miracle of the Incarnation. That's what drew me to the ELCA, the fact we can say what if? and be fine with the grey on the edges. In the Creeds we say that Jesus is fully God, fully human so you have as valid point for debate.
Virgin births happen to mythological figures! Speculating on the sex of specific mythological charecters makes about as much sense as looking for Unicorns in the forest or searching for a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow!
For example, the story of Isis and Osiris coming from Egyptian mythology is the same archetype of the dying and resurrecting God found throughout the mythologies of the middle east. The early Chistian story of the resurrection of Jesus is this same universal archetype being told from within the specific Judeo- Christian cultural context.
The closer cultures live in proximity to one another, the more they share the symbols and images which give content to the archetype. The archetype stays the same but its expression changes from culture to culture, hence why the study of comparative mythology is important.
Here are some prime examples of dying and resurrecting Gods, many of whom had virgin births or other miraculous conceptions like jesus and the Buddha:
Osiris (Egypt): Tricked and murdered by his brother Set, Osiris was reassembled and resurrected by his wife, Isis, becoming the god of the afterlife and agricultural regeneration.
Ishtar (Sumer/Babylonia): goddess of love and war who descended into the underworld, died, and was resurrected three days later.
Adonis (Greece/Babylonia): A vegetation god who was killed by a wild boar and, according to myth, resurrects annually in the spring.
Dionysus (Greece): Associated with wine and fertility, Dionysus was torn apart as a baby but brought back to life, representing the seasonal cycle of nature.
Odin (Norse): In a self-sacrifice, Odin hanged himself from the tree Yggdrasil and pierced his side with a spear to gain wisdom, effectively dying and rising again.
Quetzalcoatl (Mesoamerica): The Toltec god who died by self-immolation but rose again after several days in the underworld.
Baal (Phoenicia/Canaan): An ancient storm and fertility god whose death and resurrection cycles are central to Ugaritic mythology.
Persephone (Greece): Represented the seasonal cycle by spending part of the year in the underworld and returning to the earth.
Mithra (Persia/Rome): A god whose story, according to some studies, involves a birth, death, and resurrection story popular before the spread of Christianity.
Attis (Phrygia): A vegetation god associated with Cybele, who was mourned and then celebrated in his resurrection.
Zalmoxis (Thrace): A deity whose resurrection was worshipped by the Thracians.
As human consciousness evolves (cultural evolution) the archetypes are expressed through new emergent forms of cosmology. The truth of the resurrection of the Christ expresses itself quite differently in a heliocentric universe than a geocentric one. By reducing the meaning of an archetype to a particular cultural interpretation emerging from archaic and antiquated cosmologies, the archetype is rendered effete and incapable of future creative interpretation.
Christianity would be much more powerful and interesting if it would not only see the resurrection of the Christ from within its own specific Judeo-Christan context but would also seek its meaning within a multi-cultural perspective, by comparing and contrasting its archetypal appearance throughout human history.
Herein lies the origin of the immense fallacy of Orthodox Christianity: its unwillingness to understand the Resurrection of Christ as a manifestation of a religious Archetype rather than a fact of history.
Also, consider what Tillich ( one of your own Lutheran Theologians) had to say about religious symbols:
“Broken symbols are symbols that are recognized as symbols. Religious symbols refer to the ultimate or the transcendent. They use finite, worldly images to invoke something beyond.
Religious symbols are stories, rituals and practices that drive us beyond the symbol to ultimate meaning… The danger in dealing with symbols is that sometimes the symbol, rather than the reality to which the symbol points, becomes the object of worship or loyalty.
It is good that a symbol is broken, then, so that the meaning of the symbol is no longer imprisoned in the symbol. The symbol points beyond itself to a reality that cannot be contained in the symbol.” Paul Tillich, The Dynamics of Faith
I would suggest that mistaking the symbol for the reality to which it points is the primary error of biblical literalism. By reifying the symbolic content of scripture, literalism deprives the symbols of their “symbolic content.". In other words, the symbol ceases being a symbol. It no longer points to a transcendent reality, whose truth can only be expressed symbolically. Instead, the symbol is interpreted as a proposition of fact whose meaning lies in its historicity.
This “imprisons” the meaning of the symbol in the symbol itself. The symbol has ceased to be symbolic, it has lost its context, its “transcendent” referent.
When religious symbols are understood as “facts” they are robbed of their meaning, their ability to evoke novel insights into the nature of the ineffable. Biblical literalism is the “imprisonment” of the symbol, by refusing to acknowledge the symbolic nature of biblical content.
There is a Confucian proverb that states: “When the wise man points to the Moon, the imbecilic examines the finger.”
Although I believe much theology can be done in fruitful conversation with other religions and even other myths (a favorite of mine being Tolkien) I think it is part of the genius of Christianity that when invited to look at the moon we also consider the incarnation and beauty and reality of the finger.
I appreciate Dr Hubbard's reply. It reminds me of "La Trahison des images" - the surrealist painting of a tobacco pipe with the saying below it "Ceci n'est pas une pipe". Metaphor and symbol easily become obstacles.
But I want to pause before too quickly collapsing the New Testament into archetypal forms. They are there but something particular is being down with them.
By most scholarly accounts the stories of Jesus's conception and birth arise in the generations after his life and death as testaments to his divinity and not as proofs of them. The archetype is being applied, if you will, not revivified. What I mean is that it is being opened up to cosmic proportions. The gospel of John is not shy about its cosmic effect. The ancient world thought of the womb as nursery of male seed, not as modernity knows it as the laboratory of life. It matters that Jesus is not begot by male human seed, embued with the imperfections of history. Jesus is conceived with the Logos - the very essence of existence. This is meta-chromosomal. In his resurrection and ascension, he becomes the Jubilee community. His divine being becomes incarnated in the collective consciousness of people assembled to participate fully in the sharing of the abundance of creation, without hoarding or othering. This is where the NT Christ moves beyond the archetypes and symbols of the mystery cults and societies. The challenge of realizing Beloved Community with a Beloved Economy in a Beloved Creation continues to inspire more intentional collective consciousness. May the church lean into it.
Of all the things I'd like to know more about Jesus, this wouldn't crack my top ten.
To get a conclusive answer, I would do these three things:
pray,
ask the Holy Spirit for guidance,
wait, and find out when you get to heaven.
But, as a friend, I wouldn't start with that. Start with something like:
"What's your favorite apple?"
"Tell me a good joke."
"Is putting ketchup on a hot dog a sin?" (BTW, it's not.)
If you use the estimate that about 1.7% of people worldwide are intersex, then in a world of roughly 8.3 billion people, that comes out to about 141 million people worldwide. That’s about one out of every 59 people, about as common as red heads. If all of these people lived in the United States they would be equal in number to the population of red states Texas, Florida, Ohio, Georgia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Indiana, Missouri, South Carolina, Alabama, and Louisiana together. The combined population of these Trump states is about 141.1 million which is basically the same as the estimated global intersex population. But, of course, the last place an intersex person (or LGBTQIA+ person) would want to live is in a MAGA Land state. Let’s pray that the next child of Usha and J.D. Vance is LGBTQIA+. Maybe this will teach them some empathy and compassion.
This makes a hell of a lot of sense. If we categorize the Incarnation in into one fore then we miss the point and the miracle of the Incarnation. That's what drew me to the ELCA, the fact we can say what if? and be fine with the grey on the edges. In the Creeds we say that Jesus is fully God, fully human so you have as valid point for debate.