Ruminations

The Virgin Birth – REALLY?

WARNING: Many people, especially Christians, may find this post offensive or damn right heresy. I do not apologise for sharing my truth, my belief, my opinion, but I do sincerely apologise for any un-ease that reading this could cause; all I can suggest is that you read it with an open mind! My intentions here are not to ridicule your beliefs, but to shine a light on them, so that if you choose to, you may be able to either see them in a different light, or at least be willing to take a deeper look at the beliefs, stories, and doctrines that have been passed down to you through the generations from family, society, and institutions. Although we are all free to believe in what we want to believe in, I have found over the years as a Christian, that your beliefs can and are, often curtailed in order to correspond with the church’s beliefs. Anyone who does not believe the same as the church, is often, (but not always), viewed as problematic to say the least, and at times segregated from the church family. This series of posts is aimed at enabling individuals, not just Christians, to re-access what they have been told that the scriptures mean, or any other spiritual text. I sincerely ask that with courage, and through prayer, contemplation, and with an open heart, that you will take the time you need to personally seek God/The Divine/It, and ask for yourself what the true meaning is for you – Kenzo

The virgin birth is a major part of Christianity, of the New Testament; it is an account told over and over again and is the central and defining aspect of Christmas. It is said that through the virgin birth of Jesus we are offered a saviour, an atoning sacrifice for our sins. If this is just a story, then all is well, we can all find our own spiritual meaning for it, but if we are going to say that it is not just a story, a fable, or folk lore, and that it is, and was a real event, and that it should be taken literally, then we need to look a little deeper into what went on historically.

“And the angel said to her: Fear not, Mary: for thou hast found favour with God. And, behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name JESUS. Then said Mary unto the angel, how shall this be, seeing that I know not a man? And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost will come upon thee, and the power of the highest will overshadow thee..” – Luke 1:26-28

So what is generally viewed within Christianity as a non-human male God, or male deity, miraculously impregnated a woman with what must have been divine semen (because we all know that to birth a baby we need an egg and we need semen) a woman whom, 1) He was not married to, and 2) He did so WITHOUT asking her permission first, as she was told what was going to happen to her, as if her body was not her own but the possession of a male, or in this case a male deity! So through this male deity (and divine semen), a baby was born, and not a baby deity, but a baby human was born! So if women can get pregnant by a non-human entity/deity, this shines a whole new light on future fertility treatment; this would be considered an assisted conception method!

On a more serious note, it begs the question: Is the virgin birth not a reflection of patriarchal hierarchy? Is this not a reflection of women as second class citizens, not deserving of the same rights as a male – such as freedom of choice? Is this not a reflection of history, and the dis-service shown to the female population?

If He/God (I won’t say The Divine because this isn’t the Divine I know) is against sex before marriage which many churches believe, why would God do this to Mary, or any woman, knowing full well that she could be stoned to death if her pregnancy was found out, as it would be assumed that she had engaged in pre-marital sex? If God had waited until Mary was married to Joseph before He made her pregnant then at least it would have been covered up to some extent, but that would have caused Mary to be an adulterer, despite how miraculous it was supposed to be; but according to Matthew’s gospel Mary was pregnant before she was living with Joseph. Why would God do that? What sort of God are we/you being led to believe in? talk about double standards! Is this because God can set the rules but break them Himself? I fear not, this is just another reflection of a patriarchal hierarchy mindset, where those that set the rules think they are exempt from keeping them? We only have to look to politics to see the truth there.

If scripture is to be taken literally then you have to take biology into account when considering the virgin birth, if it is just a representation, a story, fable, or folk lore, then we can look deeper into the spiritual message that it may bring, and we can do that with all scripture.

For me, the virgin birth is just a prefabricated chapter in a long winded story, designed to bind together, (often through fear but sometimes through hope) the people who are willing to accept the story at face value. I was one of those people for ten years! until The Divine drew me out of religion/the church to widen my view on spirituality; it is called spiritual growth. It is called growing up spiritually, and moving on from the church that I now see as a spiritual kindergarten, and I don’t say that disrespectfully, I have already said that I do believe that the church has a place in life. However, in order to be able to grow and evolve and to be more like Jesus we must be willing to let go of the crutches that the church offers us, and learn to stand on our own two feet through a personal relationship with The Divine, which is what Jesus had. We just need to remember and relearn how to do that, and that takes time, practice, desire, and commitment.

I realize that the virgin birth signifies the divine nature of Jesus and his unique relationship with The Divine. I can even accept his dual nature as both divine and human because we are all divine and human and we can all have a unique relationship with that same Divine Source; it is just that many of us have forgotten that we are divine/spirit as well as human. So if you want to take a spiritual message from the virgin birth, then take that, take it as a reminder that we are all born part human and part spirit and just like Jesus we can all have a direct relationship with The Divine. I can even happily agree that Jesus was a messiah and/or saviour, a liberator of people, but not because he was born of a virgin, or because he was crucified, but because of his spiritual walk, his spiritual life. Jesus showed us what we can accomplish if only we realized and believed that we really have been given the same gifts that he had. For me, Jesus was a normal human being, conceived and born of humans, a normal man who had an amazing relationship with The Divine. Jesus knew he had a divine calling, so he raised his level of consciousness through self-discipline, self-belief, right thinking, and an unshakable commitment to his path. We too can raise our own consciousness and have that same one on one relationship with The Divine, it is more a question of whether we can be bothered to put the work in, after-all, for some of us it is so much easier to remain a Sunday saint!!!

John Shelby Spong a charismatic Episcopal Bishop, in his book Born of A Woman states: “For most of the two thousand years of history since the birth of our Lord, the Christian church has participated in and supported the oppression of women. This oppression has been both overt and covert, conscious and unconscious. It has come primarily through the church’s ability in the name of God to define a woman and to make that definition stick. It was grounded in a literalistic understanding of Holy Scripture thought of as the infallible word of God and produced in a patriarchal era.

Patriarchy and God have been so deeply and uncritically linked to gender by the all-male church hierarchy that men have little understood how this alliance has been used to the detriment of all women. In a unique and intriguing sense, the parts of the bible that have contributed most to this negativity has been the birth narratives of Mathew and Luke. These stories, far more than is generally realized, assisted in the development of the ecclesiastical stereotype of the ideal woman against which all women came to be judged. The power of these birth narratives over women lies in their subtle illusions and romantic imagery…..Since she (Mary) is known as ‘the virgin’ she has contributed to that peculiar Christian pattern of viewing women primarily in terms of sexual function.”

There has been many biblical scholars, churchmen, and theologians over the centuries who have notably rejected the virgin birth, it isn’t just me. The virgin birth has major ramifications for women. This patriarchal hierarchy, which is rampant within the church must stop, it must change in order to fully accept and embrace women as equal and deserving of recognition. If taken literally, the story of the virgin birth sounds lovely, but it is more than just a Christmas story about a virgin who gave birth to a son, it reflects a direct attack on women in order to remind us of our subservient place in church to say the least.

If nothing else, I encourage you all to take time out to personally connect with The Divine and ask to be shown what the real meaning is for you at this time in your life.

Always Walk in Peace – Kenzo