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There is a document available on the network about Isaiah 7:14. It is written by Israel Silverberg on behalf of the Jerusalem Institute of Biblical Polemics. It is cited below. Every quotation begins with <quote>. The purpose of this document is "to present rational answers refuting missionary teachings".

One commitment of the Jerusalem Institute of Biblical Polemics is "to present rational answers refuting missionary teachings". When I read this, a question arises. Are they blindly refuting missionary teachings, without studying the possible biblical truth of it? It seems that this is the case. It seems that they are convinced that their fathers could not have been wrong in rejecting the Messiah. Therefore every Christian teaching that shows that Jesus of Nazareth is the promised Messiah, must be wrong in advance. This seems also to be the background of this document: the prejudice that Judaism is right, and that everything else is wrong.

However, let we not be influenced by their prejudice. But let we continue in proving from the Old Testament that Jesus is the Messiah, and that none else is to be expected.

This expression viable alternatives to dogmas and creed also astonishes me. Are the dogmas and creeds of the Scriptures no longer viable? And therefore should new ones be invented? Do men no longer subject themselves to the truth of God?

To relate this to the dogma we are discussing, the dogma of the virgin birth of our Lord Jesus Christ, it seems that this is an unacceptable dogma for Judaism. Since they do not believe the virgin birth of Jesus, they try everything to refute it.

It is no wonder that two Jewish translations (the JPS and the Koren Jerusalem Bible) translate the Hebrew word almah as young woman, since translation as virgin would seem to favour Christianity too much. Remain three Christian translations. Two of them, the KJV and the NIV translate as virgin, and only one, the RSV as young woman.

The author says that the Hebrew dictionary translates almah as a child of marriageable age, or as a childless young woman. However, how many Hebrew dictionaries did the author consult? And which one? In either case, let also we consult some.

First we take the Hebrew concordance of Mandelkern. He gives as the meaning of the Hebrew word almah: puella nubilis, virgo matura (Solomon Mandelkern, Konkordantziah laTanach or Veteris Testamenti Concordantiae, Tel Aviv, 1978, p. 881). The translation of puella nubilis is marriageable child; the translation of virgo matura is mature virgin. We see that this dictionary gives as meaning a marriageable child, (of which it is expected in Israel that she is virgin); and it also gives as express meaning a virgin of mature age.

Secondly we consult Geseniusí Handwörterbuch über das Alte Testament. On page 594 it says that almah means a marriageable child or a mature virgin. It also says that the word almah merely indicates that the girl is marriageable; it does not indicate whether she is a virgin, nor that she is married or unmarried.

Look how Silverberg begins to handle this. He looks at the text of these verses to see if it requires the word virgin. Note that he only allows a translation as virgin, when the text requires it. But one can also reason the other way round: does it require the word young woman?

The meaning the dictionary gave was marriageable girl, and mature virgin. Now a Jew should give some evidence that the word almah refers also to married women. This is a thing they will be unable to do. Nowhere appears that almah is used for married women. Also in the verse we have just seen, there is no matter of married women.

Agreed. This means that the threescore queens were married. Also that the fourscore concubines were married, though they had not the same rights as the queens; for they are but concubines. We have here women with three kinds of marital status. The first group was married; the second ones were concubines; remains the unmarried status. This means that the alamot (translated as virgins) are unmarried. The important conclusion is then that the word almah does not refer to married women in this text. It refers to unmarried young girls.

Here are the texts:

Regarding the word almah as used in Genesis 24:43, we may draw some conclusions:

1. In this case almah refers to an unmarried woman.
2. We have still no instance where almah refers to married women.

This also is not a proof that the almah refers only to a young woman. Of course, the woman referred to is a young woman. But the term "young woman" may refer to married as well as unmarried young women. The point is that almah never refers to married women. Even in Isaiah 7:14 nothing points to marriage of this woman.

There is no indication that there is a fulfillment for the prophecy of Isaiah, that a woman had conceived and had brought forth a son. In the whole Old Testament there is no fulfillment. The first one we find in the New Testament. Mary, being a virgin, brought forth Jesus.

I donít know which missionaries tell you that. But in the case there are really such people, I have to agree with you that the Hebrew word betulah means a virgin.

Agreed.

Agreed.

Agreed.

Not necessarily. One can also explain that Dinah was still a virgin (parthenos) in the eyes of everybody that knew here, since they all had known her as a virgin. Further, the dictionaries are clear enough when they say that parthenos means virgin.

Without doubt the word parthenos means a virgin. The translators of the Septuagint deliberately used the word parthenos (virgin) in the translation of Isaiah 7:14.

To conclude the discussion of the word almah meaning virgin, let me quote from Brooks:

<begin quote>

Much of the controversy surrounding Isaiah 7:14 revolves around the meaning of almah: specifically as to her virginity and marital status. The derivation of the noun almah is not known. It is suggested that it originates from either the Hebrew verb 'lm ("to conceal or hide") or from the Aramaic 'lm ("to be strong"). In sexual connotations, the former verb suggests "virgin" because literally and physically, as a woman she had not been uncovered - she had not known man. The latter verb leads to the meaning of sexual maturity and youthful vigor.

In addition to Isaiah 7:14, almah was used eight other times in the Old Testament. In 1 Chronicles 15:20 and Psalm 46:1 (BHS), the plural was used as a technical musical term; Psalm 68:26 gives no indication of the moral character or marital status of the almaoth. The plural was again used in Canticles 1:3 and 6:8. In both, almaoth referred to women who are unmarried. Proverbs 30:19 seems to have referred to the pre-marriage courting of a young man toward his prospective bride.

The remaining two passages shed considerable light on the meaning of almah. In Exodus 2:8, Moses' sister, Miriam, was called an almah. Not only is it assumed she was sexually chaste, "it is [also] very difficult to think that at this time she was a married woman." Rebekah was called an almah in Genesis 24:43. Scripture took great effort to give a full picture of her character: not only was she unmarried, she was also, in Genesis 24:16, given the threefold description of nahar ("girl"), betulah ("virgin") and w'sh lo' ydh ("and not knowing a man"). In recounting to Laban the details of this well-known story, the servant, in 24:43, summed up Rebekah's moral and marital status with one word: almah. After his detailed examination of almah in the Old Testament, Niessen concludes:

While the terms lmt and almah consistently referred to unmarried women and sometimes - as in the case of Rebekah - to women who were on the verge of marriage, the moral character of the biblical almah needs to be addressed. Does parthenos adequately translate almah or is it merely an interpretational preference rather than a linguistic necessity? The LXX ignored almaoth in Psalm 46:1; transliterated it as alaimoth in 1 Chronicles 15:20; used neates ("young woman") in Exodus 2:8; Psalm 68:26; Canticles 1:3; 6:8; and neotes ("youthful girl") in Proverbs 30:19. Other than Isaiah 7:14, the only other instance of parthenos translating almah was in Genesis 24:43 of Rebekah. The translation of almah in Isaiah 7:14 by parthenos, then, was surely not by accident, but was a conscious choice of the translator. In the biblical world, chaste behavior was expected, indeed demanded, of an unmarried woman. Deuteronomy 22:13-21 detailed two scenarios for a newly married couple. If the husband falsely charged his new wife with premarital sexual activity, he was to pay a fine to his father-in-law for the trouble he caused (22:13-19). If, however, the charge proved to be true, the woman was to be stoned to death in order to "purge the evil from Israel" (22:20-21, NASB). Although almah was not a technical term for virginity, "the presumption in common law was and is, that every `alma is virgin and virtuous, until she is proven not to be, we have a right to assume that Rebecca and the `alma of Is. vii 14 and all other `almas were virgin, until and unless it shall be proven that they were not."

Gray, who demurs that almah naturally incorporates the notion of virginity, expresses an often stated criticism: "Where stress needed to be laid on a woman's virginity even more unambiguous phraseology was employed." Other words and expressions were available for Isaiah's use but none would have succinctly conveyed the same meaning as almah. Yldh was used to refer to a very young girl of unmarriageable age. N'rh was the generic word for a female and referred to young girls, unmarried women, concubines and evil women - its range of meaning was too broad and indefinite. Btlh was the usual and technical term for virgin. The words n'rh and btlh were used to qualify one another four times in the Old Testament. The former word referred to a young woman whose chastity was unknown, the latter to a virgin whose age was unknown. Niessen observes:

This survey, which establishes the intended meaning of almah as a young, unmarried virgin of marriageable age, avers with Young: "one is tempted to wish that those who repeat the old assertion that [almah] may be used of a woman, whether married or not [and whether virgin or not], would produce some evidence for their statement."

<end quote>

Since then no Jew can ever give evidence that the Hebrew word almah can apply to married women, we necessarily conclude that it refers to an unmarried woman. When we translate the word almah as unmarried young woman, then would the text in Isaiah 7:14 become:

But since this translation required three words, the Hebrew original has only one word, and an unmarried young woman is expected to be a virgin, a better translation is:

After all, history proved this translation right: Mary was a virgin, was pregnant, and was about to bear a Son, and called His Name 'Immanuel', that is, God with us.

End of the document.

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