In his article regarding aphids and parthenogenesis
Cecil tries one of his all too common attempts to uphold established prejudices with no regard for facts. His claim that “Parthenogenesis, also known as virgin birth, is rare in humans (one known case)…” is incorrect, no matter what perspective one takes on the matter.
There are basically three ways to look at it:
Jesus and Mary are fictional characters in a fictional story. Ergo, the fictional plots they engage in are, well, fictional.
Jesus was the “Son of God” which requires God to be his father. In this case, Mary got knocked up by God, so she wasn’t a virgin. She apparently just had a fairly high standard regarding whom she would sleep with.
Pivoting off of Point #2, if this was the case it was in no way unique. In fact, it was not even uncommon. As Justin Martyr pointed out, the story of the “virgin birth” was “…nothing different from what you believe regarding those whom you esteem sons of Jupiter.”
Taking Point #1 to be true (since there isn’t a shread of evidence that Jesus was ever a real, live person), we are still left with the reality of Point #3. Unlike Jesus, many Sons of Jupiter were real people with extensive documentation proving their existance. In addition to his labors, Herakles and Iolaus both left tombs which were well documented and well visitied. Theseus left a ship that sat in the harbor at Piraeus for centuries and was the official ship of state for Athens. The list can go on and on. Unquestionably, many young women finding themselves pregnant out of wedlock were the recipients of an Immaculate Conception.
(Besides, there’s plenty of indirect and circumstantial evidence that Jesus existed. Books about him and his followers and everything. Evidence does not mean proof.)
Certainly the non-Christians who wrote about him in the years following his putative death did not doubt he had once lived. The Roman historian Tacitus, writing in his Annals around 110 AD, mentions one “Christ, whom the procurator Pontius Pilate had executed in the reign of Tiberius.” The Jewish historian Josephus remarks on the stoning of “James, the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ.” The Talmud, a collection of Jewish writings, also refers to Christ, although it says he was the illegitimate son of a Roman soldier called Panther. Doubts about the historicity of Christ did not surface until the 18th century. In short, whether or not JC was truly the Son of God, he was probably the son of somebody.
Every time this column gets re-posted, somebody with the same lack of humor posts exactly the same complaint. (And this time adds a misunderstanding of Immaculate Conception.)
And then somebody posts exactly the same ridiculous counter-argument, that because references to Jesus existed decades or centuries after his supposed death he therefore must have existed.
And we even get the infuriating pedanticism that “not a shred of evidence” doesn’t mean what every user of the English language agrees it means.
Low-level thinking all around. My advice is to lock this thread and lock up the original column as well.
My grandfather, who was a pediatrician back in the 30’s (through the 80’s) told a story of virgin birth, which happened before his time. The explanation was related to a rural bathing practice of reusing bathwater, and led to the advice to always wash the girls before the boys, if you weren’t going to supervise the whole process.
Of course, that’s beside the OP’s point, but related to the topic, and I thought I’d at least bring something of some possible interest into the thread.
If I remember my mythology correctly, when Jupiter/Zeus impregnated a woman, he did it the old-fashioned way: by having sex with them, while he was in the form of a human or animal.
In the case of Mary’s impregnation, all the Bible explicitly says is
[QUOTE=Luke 1:34-35, 37]
Then said Mary unto the angel, How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?
And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.
…
For with God nothing shall be impossible.
[/QUOTE]
You can speculate about what “shall come upon thee” or “shall overshadow me” means, but actual sexual intercourse is neither the standard Christian, nor the only possible, way to understand it.
