'The CVirgin 'Birth

By

REV. BERTRAND L. CONWAY, c.s.P.

New York, N. Y.

THE PAULIST PRESS

40 I West 59th Street



 



THE VIRGIN BIRTH
By REV. BERTRAND L. CONWAY, C.S.P.

JESUS
CHRIST, the Son of God and the Son of Mary, was

born miraculously, as we read in the Gospel of the Infancy
of St. Matthew and St. Luke, outside the ordinary law of hu­

man generation. The Holy Spirit, Who inthe beginning "cre­
ated heaven and earth out of the empty void" (Gen. i. 1, 2),
made the Virgin Mary conceive and bear a Son. As the angel
said to her: "The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the

power of the Most High shall overshadow thee, and there­

fore also the Holy (Being) which shall be born of thee shall
be called the Son of God" (Luke i. 35; Cf. Matt. i. 20, "that

which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost").
This dogma of the Virgin Birth-this fact of the super­

natural conception of Jesus Christ, stands out pre-eminently
in the Gospel narrative, all other facts, such as the Annuncia­

tion and the Nativity, merely bringing it out in greater relief.

That is why the rationalistic critics who deny the Virgin Birth

question all the facts connected with it, v. g., the Dreams of

Joseph, the Message of the Angel, the Story of the Shepherds,
the Coming of the Magi, the Massacre of the Innocents, and

the Census of Cyrinus. All these events are said to have been

the outcome of either Jewish legend, or of later Greek theo­

logical theorizing.
Our aim is to present to our readers a solid defense of that

article of the Apostles' Creed which reads, "Who was con­

ceived of the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary," and to
answer briefly the chief objections brought forward against
the dogma of the Virgin Birth and the happenings at Nazareth

and Bethlehem by unbelievers, from the days of the first cen­

tury Gnostics to the modernists of the twentieth century.

The dogma of the Virgin Birth was defined as an article

COPYRIGHT, 1924, BY THE MISSIONARY SOCIETY OF ST. PAUL THE ApOSTLE IN THE

STATE OF NEW YORK

PRINTED AND PU.LISHKD IN THB U. S. A. ay THB PAWLIST PRESS, NEW YORK 19, N. Y.



of Faith by the Fifth General Council (Canon 2) held at

Constantinople under Pope Vigilius in 553, and again by the
Lateran Council held by Pòpe Martin I at Rome in the year
640. It is a dogma held unanimously by the Fathers of the
Church from the very beginning, and taught explicitly in both
the Old Testament and the New.

The first one to impugn the supernatural conception of

Jesus Christ was the Jewish Gnostic, Cerinthus (100 A. D.),
who denied the reality of the Incarnation, and ascribed to
Jesus a purely human origin. According to Irenaeus,' Cerin­
thus was a Jew, trained in Greek philosophy, who taught, like
all Gnostics, that whatever was matter and body was neces­

sarily impure. Like his modernistic imitators of the twentieth

century, he made a distinction between Jesus the man and

Jesus the Son of God. He denied the real substantial unity of
the divine and human natures in Christ, and taught that He
was born of Joseph and Mary according to the ordinary law
of generation. He questioned the Virgin Birth, not in the
name of a divine tradition, but in the name of a false, a priori,
philosophical theory. The Incarnation, i. e., the communica­
tion of the divine life of Jesus, was, he said, effeoted at the

Jordan baptism, by the descent of the Holy Spirit or the
Christ' upon Jesus. The Virgin Birth was therefore "impos­
sible." 2

In the second and third centuries an obscure Jewish sect
known as the Ebionites S denied the Virgin Birth, and rejected
the first two chapters of St. Matthew's Gospel which recorded
it." Joseph, they said, was the father of Jesus, Who was born
like any other child of Adam. A certain group of them, the
Nazarene Ebionites, accepted the Virgin Birth. This heresy
was most probably a harking back to the Messianic ideas of
the Jewish Pharisees, and began about the time of Trajan,
according to Hegesippus. He refers to them as follows:
"Those who forced themselves to corrupt the true standard
of the Gospel took good care to hide themselves in obscurity;

1 Adu. Haer., I. 26, 1.

a Irenaeus, Ad», Haer., 1.26.2.

3 Duchesne, The Early History of the Christian Church, p, 91.
4 St. Epìphanius, Ad», Haer., XXX. 13, 14.

[ 2 ]



1·

but when the generation of those who had heard the divine

wisdom became extinct, their conspiracy and impious error

burst forth into the light of day."
In the Dialogue of St. Justin, Martyr (150 A. D.), the Jew

Trypho speaks of a purely human Christ, Who certainly did
not pre-exist, as the Christians taught. The prophecy of

Isaias (vii. 14) is not Messianic, the word almah meaning

"young woman" and not "a virgin." The dogma of the Vir­

gin Birth is modeled on the Greek myth of Perseus, born of

jupitér and the Virgin Danae.

The second century Voltaire, Celsus, ridiculed the legend
of the Virgin Birth, which he compared to the mythical hero­

birth of Plato. He utterly repudiated the prophecy of Isaias,
and mockingly referred to the blasphemous story of Christ

having been born of Mary and Panthera, a scurrilous tale that
survived in the pages of the Talmud."

Towards the end of the fourth century certain heretics in

Syria, Arabia, and Illyricum denied the perpetual virginity of

Mary, although they admitted the Virgin Birth. They main­

tained that virginity was no holier than marriage, and that the

Gospels proved Mary had other children after the birth of

Christ. They cited Matthew i. 18 and i. 25, and the many
passages that referred to the brethren' of Jesus (Matt. xii. 46;
xiii. 55;. Mark iii. 31; vi. 31). Three of them, Helvidius,

Jovinian, and Bonosus, were ably refuted by St. Jerome and

St. Ambrose, and condemned by Pope Siricius, and the Coun­
cils of Milan and Capua."

The modern denial of the Virgin Birth dates from the rise

of English Deism in the eighteenth century, imported by Vol­

taire into France, and the rationalistic German Higher Criti­

cism of the nineteenth century. These men divested the Gos­

pels of their divine inspiration, and reduced them to the level

of mere human documents. On the ground that because a fact

is miraculous, it cannot be historical, they reject the facts of

the Gospels, and deny the divinity of Jesus Christ and the

50rigen, Contra Celsum, II, 32, 34, 37; Sanhedrin 67.1; Schabbath 104.2;
Babyl. Chaghigah, 42; Cf. Herford, Christianity in Talmud and Midrasb, pp. 35,
348; Lagrange, Messianisme chez les luils, p. 288.

6 St. Jerome, De Perpetua Virginitate Mariae,' St. Ambrose, Adu. Helv.;
Siricius, Epistola ad Anysium,' Cf. Denzinger's Enchiridion, p. 91.

[3]



Virgin Birth. The history of their ever changing and arbi­

trary views may be studied in books like Vigouroux's Les
Livres Saints et la Critique Rationaliste and Fillion's Les

Etapes du Rationalisme.

Rationalists like Paulus 7 admitted the facts recorded in

the Gospels, but maintained they were distorted in the tell­

ing through the current superstition of supernaturalism, and
the poetical idealization of' per fervid Jewish imaginings.
Strauss in his life of Jesus, which appeared in 1835, was far
more radical. In his eyes, the Gospel was a myth, comparable
to the pagan myths of Greece and Rome. It merely dressed

up doctrines in historical fashion regardless of their objective
truth. The Messianic myth was in the air at the time the

Gospels were written, and their authors merely read into the

Gospel of the Infancy, for example, the texts of the Old Testa­
ment with which they were familiar. According to his a priori
reasoning, the Virgin Birth is borrowed from Isaias vii. 14,
the Nativity from Micheas v. 3, the Story of the Shepherds
from Psalm lxxvii. 70, the Star from Numbers xxiv. 17, the

Coming of the Magi from Isaias Ix. 5-7, the Flight into Egypt
from Osee xi. 1, etc. This false theory is ably refuted by the
Abbé de Broglie, in his Questions Bibliques, pp. 362-380.
The current theory of Baur (1853-1863) and the Ttibingen
school held the Gospels to be writings of the second century,
thus allowing ample time for the growth of the willful fiction
of the Gospel legend.

Common sense would at once declare that Strauss had

given up Christianity altogether. But no. He asserts, like
his modernist successors today, that "the essence of the Chris­
tian faith is perfectly independent of criticism. The super­
natural birth of Christ, His Miracles, His Resurrection, and
His Ascension, remain eternal truths, whatever doubts may
be cast on their reality as historical facts."

Today the second century origin of the Gospels is univer­

sally abandoned, but the destructive critics are still undaunted.
A priori the historical value of the Gospels must be denied, be­
cause they imply the miraculous and the supernatural. Paulus,

7 Life of Christ, 1828.
S Life of Iesus, p. 30.

[41



Strauss, Baur, and others of their way of thinking may be dis­
credited, but some new theory must be invented to take the
place of the old. Literary criticism is the latest word in the
denial of the Gospel of the Infancy. So the modern ration­
alists calmly tell us that the Virgin Birth was not a part of the
primitive Gospel, but the result of later editing and interpola­
tions. Originally, Matthew (i. 16) made Joseph the real
father of Jesus.

9
The first chapter of St. Luke did not con­

tain verses 34 and 35. St. Luke "probably" borrowed the
idea of the supernatural conception from Matthew i. 18-25,
which he incorporated into the Judaeo-Christian document he
was using." The modernist Loisy admits the literary unity of
the Gospels and the sincerity of their writers, without, how­
ever, granting the historical reality of the events they record.
He says: "The narratives of the childhood of Christ are for

the historian only an expression and an assertion of faith in
the Messias.'?

Many rationalists have denied the Virgin Birth on ac­
count of the divergent genealogies of Matthew (i. 2-17) and
St. Luke (iii. 23-38), and on account of the many references
to the brethren of the Lord (Matt. xii. 46; xiii. 55; Mark iii.

31; vi. 3; Luke viii. 29; John ii. 12; Acts i. 14; 2 Cor. ix. 5).
In view of the discrepancies in the genealogies, they ask, how
can St. Matthew and St. Luke be considered true historians?

Again, they ask, how can Jesus be the Son of David, or of
"the seed of Abraham according to the flesh" (Rom. i. 3; iv.
13; ix. 5; xv. 12), when His father's name is not to be found

among the descendants of these two patriarchs? The men­
tion of the brothers and sisters (Matt. xiii. 56) of the Lord

they consider proof positive against the perpetual virginity of
Mary.

We have stated as briefly as possible the chief objections
that have been made from the beginning against the Virgin
Birth and the perpetual virginity of the Blessed Virgin. Most
of them were put forward and answered in the first four cen­

turies, so that the modernist of today is not so up to date as
9 Schmiedel, Encyclopedia Biblica, vol. iii., col. 2,962.
10 Harnack, Zeitschrift fur die neutest, Wissenschaft, 1901, p. 53.
11 The Gospel of the Church, p. SO.

[5]



the unthinking imagine. The Catholic is not at all disturbed

by these difficulties, for he holds with Cardinal Newman
that

"ten thousand difficulties do not make one doubt." His faith

is secure and unshaken, because it rests on the authority of

God, voiced to him by a divine, infallible authoritative Church,

established by Jesus Christ to witness to His Gospel
until the

end of the world.

I. The Prophecy of Isaias vii. 14

The first objection against the Virgin Birth is drawn from

the prophecy of Isaias (vii. 14). As early as the second cen­

tury �e find the Jew Trypho declaring
that this passage did

not refer to the Messias, but to Ezechias the son of Ahaz;

that, therefore, it had been misapplied by St. Matthew (i.

34); that the word almah meant "a young woman" of
mar­

riageable age and not "a virgin." Let us first consider
the

context. In the year 733 B. C., King Ahaz of Juda
was at­

tacked by the kings of Israel and Syria. Realizing
that he

could not withstand them alone, he determined to call upon

the King of Assyria for aid. This might mean the loss
of

Juda's independence, but at least it would save the throne
of

David from utter destruction. The prophet Isaias is sent by

the Lord to tell Ahaz not to fear, because he is certain to con­

quer his enemies if he but trust
in Jehovah. He has only to

ask a sign of the Lord. Ahaz refuses, saying: "I will not ask,

and I will not tempt the Lord." Isaias replies: "Therefore

the Lord Himself shall give you a sign. Behold a virgin shall

conceive and bear a Son, and His name shall be called Em­

manuel" (vii. 14). Isaias then tells the King that, because he

refused to trust in the Lord, the Assyrians will indeed come,

but their coming will bring ruin and desolation upon Juda.

Were the Virgin Mother of the Messias now to bring forth

her child, and call His name Emmanuel (God with us), He

would grow up in poverty; before He would
reach boyhood,

the land would be devastated by the Assyrians (Is. vii. 14-25).

In the next chapter the Prophet repeats again the story of the

devastation of Juda by the Assyrians, adding, however, that

[6]



Juda will not be utterly destroyed because of Emmanuel, the
Child Christ Jesus, Who is to be born of the Virgin Mother

(Is. viii. 6-10). In chapter ix., he again refers to the com­

ing of the Messias in a beautiful passage beginning with the
words: "The people that walked in darkness have seen a great
light; to them that dwelt in the region of the shadow of death,
light is risen" (Is. ix. 2). The reference to the Messias, the
Son of David, is clear. The child born of the Virgin Mother
"shall establish the throne of David from henceforth and for­

ever" (ix. 6, 7). The place of the Messias' birth is also fore­
told by a contemporary of Isaias, the prophet Micheas, who
sings: "And thou, Bethlehem Ephrata, art a little one among
the thousands of Juda; out of thee shall He come forth unto
me that is to be the Ruler of Israel, and His going forth is
from the beginning, from the days of eternity" (Micheas v. 2).

When, therefore, Matthew (i. 23) applied the text of Isaias
vii. 14, to the birth of the Messias, he understood perfectly
the meaning of the Old Testament prophecy.

The Hebrew word almah, in Isaias vii. 14, is correctly
translated "virgin." It is used in only six other passages of
the Old Testament, and in everyone of them it means an un­
married young woman, a virgin. The prayer of Abraham's
servant speaks of Rebecca, "the virgin" (Gen. xxiv. 43);
Exodus uses this word to refer to the sister of Moses (ii. 4);
Canticles (i. 2) reads: "Thy name is as oil poured out; there­
fore 'young maidens' have loved thee"; Canticles vi. 7, con­
trasts "young maidens," i. e., unmarried women, with queens
and concubines; Psalms lxvii. 26, refers to "young damsels"

playing on timbrels in the sanctuary of the temple; Proverbs
xxx. 19, mentions "the way of a man with a maid" as secret
and untraceable.

Moreover, the Jews themselves in their Septuagint version
of the Old Testament (286-246 B. c.), translated almah by
parthenos, the Greek equivalent for an inviolate virgin. This
version was used by the early Christians to refute the Jews,
who dishonestly retorted that it was full of errors, and did not

accurately represent the Hebrew text. They chose Aquila, an
apostate Christian, to make a new translation about' 130 A. D.

[7]



Controversy at that time was very bitter between Jews and
.

Christians, especially on the dogma of the Virgin Birth, as we
learn from the Dialogue of St. Justin with the Jew 'Trypho.
Under stress of Jewish prejudice, Aquila, of set purpose, trans­
lated almah by neanis, a young woman. It is certain, there­

fore, that the translation made some four hundred years before
was the more reliable and accurate. The Syriae text also,
written in the early part of the second century, translated
almah by bethulah, the strict word for virgin.

How did the Jews in our Lord's time regard the prophecy
of Isaias? They certainly believed He was to be a descendant
of David, and that some mystery was to be connected with
His birth. Was He to be virgin-born? The Jews objected
that Jesus could not be the Messias, because they believed He
was born in the ordinary way of a human father. They asked:
"Is not this the carpenter's Son? Is not this Jesus the Son of

Joseph? Whose father and mother we know?" (Matt. xiii.

55; John vi. 42.) The actual words of Isaias, "a virgin shall

conceive," are never applied to the Virgin Birth in extant

Jewish writings. But we must remember that the Talmud
was compiled in the third and fourth centuries at Tiberias and

Babylon by Jews who were dominantly anti-Christian. The
Mishna was codified by Judah in 219 A. D., and the Gemara

by Ashe in 365. Nevertheless, the words of Jeremias (xxxi.
22), "the Lord hath created a new thing upon the earth; a
woman shall compass a man," were understood by the Jews
as a divine promise, that as Israel fell in a virgin, so in a vir­

gin shall she be healed. Again in Bereshith Rabba 89, and in
the Midrash on Lamentations, it is taught that "the man en­

compassed is King Messias, of Whom God spake: 'This day
have I begotten Thee.'" A Midrash on Psalm ex. (cix.)
reads: "From the womb of the morning Thou hast the dew

of Thy nativity." A Midrash on Psalm lxxxv. (Ixxxiv.) 12:

"Truth is sprung out of the earth;' and justice hath looked

down from heaven," reads: "Why is it said springeth, instead

of is born? Because Messias' birth shall not be as the nativity
of creatures that are in the world, but diverse and different,
without companionship or conjunction. And none names His

[I]



Father, for He shall be hidden until He come and reveal Him-'

self to us. The word of the Eternal gives the blessing, the

earth yields the germ."
These and similar passages which we might quote prove

that the idea of the Virgin Birth was not totally excluded

by the early Jews, and that they certainly attributed to the
Messias at the very least a mysterious and a miraculous

birth."

II. The Gospel of St. Matthew, Chapters I and II

Many rationalistic critics maintain that the primitive Gos­

pel of St. Matthew began with the mission of St. John the

Baptist, chapter iiL1S They fail to tell us that there is no sec­

ond or third century text denying the existence of these first

two chapters. St. Epiphanius (403) tells us that some of the

Jewish Ebionite heretics possessed such a mutilated Gospel,
but he adds that they had purposely omitted these two chap­
ters because of their heretical views on the human origin of

Jesus Christ. It is dishonest to cite an author for a fact that

makes in our favor, and refuse to quote his complete state­

ment when it counts against us. St. Epiphanius also declares

that the Nazarene Ebionites used the full text, as did the

heretics, Cerinthus, Carpocrates, and Symmachus.
Other critics cite the Syriae translation of the Gospels

found at Mount Sinai in 1894 as proof positive that the original

genealogy made Jesus the Son of Joseph. This was changed
later on, they add, so as to make the Gospel of the Infancy a

perfectly connected literary unity.':' In this version, Matthew

i. 16, reads as follows: "Joseph, to whom the Virgin Mary was

espoused, begot Jesus, Who is called Christ." A careful study

proves that this text is not primitive, but a mere variant of the

received text. Joseph, we observe, is not called "the husband

of Mary," but "he to whom the Virgin Mary is espoused."
In verse 21 the Angel says to Joseph, "She shall bring thee

12 A Virgin Shall Conceive, by Rev. J. P. Arendzen, "Catholic Gazette,"

January, 1924.

18 Haecker, Zeitschrift fur ioissenscha}, "Tbeologie," 1906, p. 26; Epiphanius,
Adv. Haer., xxx. 13.

] 4 JacQuier, Histoire des Llures du Nouveau Testament, vol. ìi., p. 496.

L 9 J



forth a son," which is repeated in verse 25: "She brought him

forth a son." The Syriae editor is intent on bringing out the

virginity of the Mother and the legal title of the father. Ac­

cording to the Jewish law, the Virgin Mary, on becoming a

mother, gave a son to her lawful husband.

It is difficult to see how anyone can deny that the Gospel
of the Infancy of St. Matthew is a well connected narrative.

St. Joseph's doubt occasions the visit of the angel, who re­

veals to him the mystery of the Virgin Birth (i. 18-25).
When Christ is born at Bethlehem, the Magi come from the

East to adore Him (ii. 1-12). This causes Herod to be

alarmed, and he orders the massacre of the Innocents (ii. 16).
The angel then appears again to Joseph and urges him to go to

Egypt, and remain there until Herod's death, when he is to re­

turn and live at Nazareth (ii. 19-23). St. Matthew empha­
sizes the part played by St. Joseph in the history of our Lord's
birth in direct contrast with St. Luke, who makes the Blessed

Mother of Jesus the chief personage of his narrative.
·

We are certain of the Palestinian origin of St. Matthew's

Gospel. The writer is a Jew speaking to Jews. The words

of the Angel, "Joseph, son of David" (Matt. i. 20) are closely
related to the typical Jewish genealogy of Matthew i. 1-17,
and supposes the words "Son of David" in verses 1 and 17.

The writer knows perfectly Jewish geography (Matt. xi. 1),

Jewish contemporaneous history (ii. 22), Jewish customs, v. g.,
that betrothal is juridically equivalent to marriage (i. 18),

Jewish words like Jesus, God's salvation, and Nazarene (i. 21;
ii. 23), the Old Testament prophecies of Isaias, Micheas, and

Jeremias (Is. vii. 14; Mich. v. 2; Jer. xxxi. 15).
Some critics reject the Gospel of the Infancy in St. Mat­

thew, because of the so-called myths and legends of Joseph's

Dreams, the Coming of the Magi, the Massacre of the Inno­

cents, and the Flight into Egypt. These events, they tell us,
do not agree with the usual tone of the Gospel narrative.

The only warrant for their arbitrary denial of the historicity
of St. Matthew is their unscientific, a priori rejection of the

supernatural and the miraculous. The true scholar does not

ask: How can these things be? but, What is the evidence for

[10 ]



them? Is the writer trustworthy? Is the writer deceived?
We cannot eliminate one word from the text without utterly
destroying its perfect simplicity and harmony. The four
dreams of Joseph are in perfect accord with Jewish tradition

(Num. xii. 6; Deut. xiii. 1-5; Kings xxviii. 6, 15), and are

paralleled in the history of St. Paul (Acts xvi. 9; xviii. 9; xxiii.

11; xxvii. 23). With St. Matthew and St. Luke these dreams
were possible. Their happening depended entirely upon the
trustworthiness of the witnesses who related them. Both St.

Joseph and St. Paul were able to verify their divine origin by
the events which followed them, and which agreed perfectly
with the predictions made.

The critics state, moreover, that the story of the Magi was
invented to satisfy the Messianic prophecy recorded in Num­
bers xxiv. 17, and Isaias Ix. 4, 6. But the star in both proph­
ecies refers to the Messias, and not to the star which was to
manifest His birth, as we learn from the Jewish Targums.
Indeed the Pseudo-Messias, Bar-Kokeba, the Son of the Star,
gave this interpretation himself, when he claimed to have ful­
filled Balaam's prediction. Again, if this passage in Num­
bers played so great a part in the growth of the so-called

Legend of the Star, why did not St. Matthew himself make
some reference to it? Everyone admits that he is always in­
tent on citing the fulfillment of the prophecies in Jesus Christ.

The Massacre of the Innocents is ignored, the critics tell

us, by the historian Flavius Josephus, who dwells at length on
the cruelty of Herod. This is not to be wondered at, if we re­
member that the number of children killed in Bethlehem at

Herod's command could not have been more than twenty or

thirty. Such a minor happening Josephus could readily omit,
when he had so many other facts to record. . He mentions,
for instance, Herod's murder of his wife, Mariamne; of his

mother-in-law, Alexandra; of his three sons, Aristobulus, Alex­

ander, and Antipater; of his brother-in-law, Costobar; of his

uncle, Joseph, etc.

Finally it was very natural for St. Joseph to retire into

Egypt, for we know there were many Jewish colonists at Alex­
andria and in the whole Delta of the Nile.

[11 ]



III. The Gospel of St. Luke, Chapters I, II, III, 23-28

The critics who deny the authenticity of the Gospel of the

Infancy in St. Luke, assert that it is an addition to the primi­
tive Gospel, akin to the prologue of St. John on the pre­
existence of the Logos (John i. 1-14). The only difference,
they add, is that St. John explains the divine Sonship in a

metaphysical sense, while St. Luke speaks of a material and

physical divine Sonship. The true historian, therefore, must

reject both these prologues as theological speculations of a later

date, and begin the history of Jesus at His baptism, as does
the primitive Gospel of St. Mark."

Mary, the Mother of Jesus, was, they argue, a woman like

any other woman. She is spoken of both at Nazareth (Mark
vi. 3) and at Capharnaum (Mark iii. 22) as the wife of J0-

seph. After Jesus, her first-born, she had four other sons,
James, Joseph, Simon, and Jude, and some daughters (Mark
vi. 3). Even St. Luke contradicts his own Gospel of the In­

fancy, when he represents Mary as being astonished at the
answer Jesus gave her, when she found Him in the temple ask­

ing questions of the doctors of the Law (Luke ii. 46-50). He
also mentions the unbelief of the relatives of Jesus in His spe­
cial, divine mission. How could they then have believed in
His supernatural birth (Mark iii. 21; vi. 4)?

It is not so difficult a task to answer these critics. The

first four verses of St. Luke's Gospel reveal to us a most

scholarly, painstaking and accurate historian. He tells his

convert, Theophilus, that he has verified all the events he

narrates, and that he has gathered them "all" from "eye­
witnesses," and "ministers of the word," who have preached
the Gospel "from the beginning." He alludes to "many" other

writers, who have written about the beginnings of Christianity,
and gives his correspondent notice that he attends to arrange
all the events he records "in order." He evidently aims at bet­

tering his precessors' imperfect records, and enabling Theophi­
Ius to test their historical truth.

It is very generally admitted that his careful study of
these documents, and his careful examination of eyewitnesses

15 Holtzmann, Life 01 Iesus.

[12 ]



took place during his enforced stay in Palestine, while St. Paul
was in prison at Caeserea (55-57 A. D.). His chief informants
were most likely the Blessed Virgin herself, and the holy women
who accompanied our Lord during His public ministry: Mary
Magdalen; Mary the mother of James and Joseph; Martha,
the Sister of Mary; Joanna, the wife of Herod's steward,
Chuza, etc.

St. Luke did not rely only on the testimony of eye-wit­
nesses, but he also used a primitive Hebrew or Aramaic docu­
ment in compiling his first three chapters." For both in sub­
stance and form his Gospel of the Infancy is markedly Jewish,
in direct contrast with the dominantly' Greek character of the
rest of his Gospel. The persons he describes are all inspired
by the Jewish spirit of the temple, the law and the old litur­

gical ceremonies. The scenes he pictures all point to a period
that has not yet passed the dividing line between the Old and
the New Testaments. The Jew is awaiting the coming of the

Messias, "the Orient from on high"; the "dayspring upon the
mountain" (i. 78). The temple is still standing, with no sign
or foreboding of its coming destruction.

Trained in the Greek schools of either Tarsus or Antioch,
St. Luke would naturally be unfamiliar with the intimate de­
tails of the Jewish ceremonial, and the special duties of the
temple priests. And yet he speaks most accurately of Zachary
performing his ministry in the temple according to the weekly
course of Abia (i. 5); he knows the hour of incense, when the

priest goes within the Holy Place while the people pray with­
out (i. 9, 10); he mentions details that bespeak an intimate

knowledge of Jewish customs and family intimacies, as is evi­
dent in his description of the prophetess Anna (i. 36, 37).
That his genealogy of Jesus (iii. 23-28) is copied verbatim
from a written Hebrew document is admitted by all the critics.

Is it not reasonable also to believe that the extraordinary
events related in St. Luke's Gospel of the Infancy were fairly
well known even outside the circle of the immediate families

concerned in them? The story of Zachary's dumbness; the
birth of John the Baptist in his parents' old age; his father's

16 Rose, Studies on the Gospels, pp. 73-75.

ru,



cure; the beautiful story of the Bethlehem shepherds; the pre­
diction of Simeon; the finding of the Child Jesus in the temple

teaching the doctors- the news of all these happenings was

likely to spread abroad among the people. Even if they had

been rather obscured by the thirty years of Jesus' hidden life,

they would easily be recalled once St. John the Baptist and
later on Jesus Himself began to preach to the people of Judea
and Galilee.

Catholic scholars call attention to the fact that the Mes­

sianic hope, voiced in the canticle of Zachary (i. 68-74), is

primitive in its coloring, and differs considerably from the lan­

guage used in the apostolic age. Lepin writes: "Judging from

the discourses of the Acts and from the Epistles of St. Paul, it

does not seem that after Pentecost the followers of Jesus con­

tinued to use language more or less encumbered with temporal
and national elements-an inheritance from the pre-Christian
tradition. On this account St. Luke's first chapters should be
dated from the very beginnings of Christianity.!"

We have only to compare St. Luke with the apocryphal
Gospels to understand at once the difference between authen­
tic history and the myths and legends of an imaginative falsi­
fier. The Proto-evangelium of St. James, for example, pictures
Mary as the daughter of a wealthy Jew; fed by angels' hands,
she spends all her childhood in the temple; she refuses to

marry until flowers spring from Joseph's staff; her virginity is

questioned by the midwife, Salome, who is at once punished
for her unbelief. The Gospel of Thomas also is full of silly
tales. It describes the Child Jesus making birds out of clay.
When questioned concerning His right to make them on the
Sabbath day, He commands them to flyaway, while He glee­
fully claps His hands. The Arabian Gospel of the Infancy

speaks of a youth, changed into a mule, who resumes his for­
mer state when Mary places the Child Jesus on his backI In

the temple, we find the Child Jesus asking the Doctors of the

Law interminable questions on the Scriptures, astronomy.

medicine, physics, metaphysics, etc."

17 Lepin, Jésus, Messie et Fils de Dieu, p, 62.

18 Lepin, Revue Pratique d'Apologétique, Dec. 1, 1905, P. 100

[ 14]



A comparison of St. Luke with the myths of Greek and
Roman mythology, likewise brings out clearly the difference
between historical truth and legend. Plummer writes: "It is
well to remember that there are stories, more or less analogous
to what is told by the two Evanelists, in heathen mythologies.
The historic probability is not weakened but strengthened by
such comparison. St. Luke's Gentile readers must have felt
the unspeakable difference between the coarse impurity of im­

agined intercourse between mortals and divinities, in the relig­
ious legends of paganism, and the dignity and delicacy of the

spiritual narrative, which St. Luke laid before them."
19

Men like Vivian (The Churches and Modern Thought) and

Robertson (Pagan Christs) vainly attempt to trace the Virgin
birth to the legendary virgin births of Greece, Rome, India,
Persia, and Egypt. This may be popular polemics with the

unthinking and unscrupulous anti-Christian, but a careful stu­
dent of comparative religions soon learns that the Gospel
narrative borrowed nothing from the contradictory, frivolous,
and licentious fables of the pagans.

Harnack rejects this false theory as "not demonstrable."
He writes: "The conjecture of Usener

20 that the idea of birth

from a virgin is a heathen myth which was received by the

Christians, contradicts the entire earliest development of Chris­
tian tradition." 21

Among the Greeks and Romans the legend often refers to
a mythical person like Herakles or Perseus; or is invented out
of whole cloth to flatter some great philosopher, or ruler, as
in the hero-births of Plato, Alexander, and Augustus. Mithra
has three fathers, Cynyras, Phoenix, and King Theias; Attis
is the son of Nana and the monster Agdestis. What impu­
dence to compare these licentious and abnormal myths with
the delicate beauty of the Gospels' Virgin Birth, and to pre­
tend that they are the basis of the Evangelist's narrative.

The earliest traditions of Buddha's birth do not speak of
the virginity of his mother, Maya. When later Indian mythol­
ogy does mention her virginity in the Mahavastu, the Buddha

19 Dictionary of Christ and the Gospels, vol. i., pp. 74, 75.

20 Ency, Bibl. vol. iii.

21 History of Dogma, I., p. 100.

[ 15]



is represented by a mere phantom self; the birth has ceased
to be real." The virgin mother of the Indian god, Krishna,
in the Hindi version of the tale, is accredited with seven chil­
dren before he was born. Krishna, too, with his sixteen thou­
sand wives and one hundred and eighty thousand sons, all of
whom finally killed one another or were murdered by their
father, would hardly be taken as a model for the Christ, by
a writer of the Gospels. At any rate, the story of Krishna

post-dates the Gospel by some centuries. JThe "pagan Christs" of Persia and Egypt are not virgin
lborn. Zoroaster is, according to the Avesta, the son of l

Pòurushaspa; his mother's name is not mentioned. Later

legends make him the third of five brothers.
The Osiris myths are manifold and contradictory. He is

at one time born of the heart of Atùm, the first of the gods,
and again he is the son of Seb (Earth) and Nùit (Sky), mar­
ried before his birth to his sister, Isis. Horus, the son of Isis,
is the offspring of her incestuous marriage. The Pharaohs
have a god for father, but the god is said to be incarnate in the
Pharaoh's human father."

IV. The Silence of St. Mark, St. John,
and St. Paul

One favorite argument of the critics to discredit the his­
torical value of the Gospel of the Infancy is the silence of St.
Mark, St. John, and St. Paul, which they say is fatal to the
historical character of the dogma of the Virgin Birth. Some '1
go even further, and cite certain texts in these three New Tes- J
tament writers, which prove that they actually denied it

(Mark iii. 21; vi. 1-5; John vi. 43; vii. 42-52; Rom. i. 3; iv.

13; ix. 5; Gal. iii. 16) .24
A careful study of the passages they cite, however, prove

conclusively that their arbitrary dogmatism is utterly un­
founded. They first make the unscholarly mistake of consid�

22 Aiken, The Dhamma of Gotama the Buddha.
28 Martindale, "The Virgin Birth," The History of Religions; 6 volumes, Cath­

olic Truth Society of London.

24 Cf. Lobstein, Die Lehre 'Von der ilbernatialichen Geburt Christi, p. 116.

[16 ]



ering an evangelist the same as a biographer of Jesus Christ.
The life of Jesus is one thing; the Gospel of Jesus is another.
In the opening verse of his Gospel, St. Mark makes this dis­
tinction clear: "The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ,
the Son of God" (Mark i. 1). The Gospel is the preaching of
the Kingdom of God by Jesus Christ, and this preaching began
with His baptism. When the Christians at Rome asked St.
Mark to put in writing the preaching of St. Peter, he satisfied
their desire, and that preaching included the sayings of the

Lord, and the chief facts of His public life, His miracles, His

Passion, and His Resurrection. The Gospel of the Infancy
did not enter into the plan of St. Mark's Gospel. Even if he
wrote after the other synoptics, he could readily have omitted
it without thereby implying that he rejected it.

We notice, too, that he never calls St. Joseph the father of

Jesus as do St. Matthew and St. Luke, but always cautiously
speaks of Him as the "Son of Mary," the Son of Man (14
times), the Son of David (4 times), thus preventing any pos­
sible misunderstanding on the part of his readers. Does he
not also presuppose the Virgin Birth when he continuously
calls Jesus the "Son of God"? (Mark i. 1, 11; iii. 2; v. 7;
ix. 7; xiv, 61; xv. 39.) Does not his exact dividing of the

family of Nazareth into two distinct groups-James and Jo­
seph; Jude and Simon-show that he regarded Jesus as Mary's
only Child?

As for the silence of St. John, Rose writes: "For our part,
we hold that this silence can only be interpreted in the con­

trary sense. It is beyond all doubt that the author of the
fourth Gospel knew the Gospels of St. Matthew and St.
Luke. If his belief had been contrary to that of the two writ­
ers of the Gospel of the Infancy of Jesus, why, we ask, did he
not emphaatically assert his own faith in opposition to the
new dogma which was beginning to creep into the churches?
Would silence have sufficed to vindicate his orthodoxy? Are
we not justified then in interpreting the silence of St. John as

really favorable to our thesis, and in believing that St. John
accepted unreservedly the fact of the supernatural birth?" 25

25 Studies on the Gospels, p. 60.

J

[17 ]



Granting Holtzmann's thesis that the two prologues of St.

John and St. Luke are parallel, it would prove nothing against
the historical verity of the Virgin Birth. On the contrary, it
would merely prove that St. John elaborated the sketch drawn

by his predecessor, St. Luke. The same critic cites three
texts (John i. 45; vi. 42; vii. 28) as implying Christ's human

origin, but we can cite a dozen other passages in St. John that

explain these three texts in the sense of the Virgin Birth (John
i. 14; iii. 13; vi. 38, 44, 51, 62; viii. 38, 46, 58; x. 28-31;
xi. 25). A variant of John i. 14, cited by writers of the second

century, like Tertullian, St. Ignatius, Martyr, St. Irenaeus,
and Hippolytus, reads as follows: "( In His name), Who was

born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will
of man, but of God." We do not find any apodictic argument
on a variant that has found its way into only one manuscript,
the Code Veronensis, but how the critics would have harped
upon this reading had it helped them prove their thesis.

St. John was under no necessity of insisting upon the Vir­

gin Birth, for his evident purpose was to write the Gospel of

the Incarnate Word-to prove that the union of the Word with

human nature was substantial. He certainly knew full well

the three synoptic Gospels, and it is beyond question that his

disciples in the East, who drew their doctrine and inspiration
from him, all believed unreservedly in the Virgin Birth.

The silence of St. Paul regarding the Virgin Birth is easily
understood, once we grasp the fact that he writes as a theolo­

gian and a moralist, not as a historian. Like St. Mark, he has
no intention of writing a life of Jesus. Indeed he alludes to

only three facts in the life of Jesus-the institution of the

Eucharist, the Passion, and the Resurrection-and they are
mentioned only on account of their dogmatic interest.

However, St. Paul has not written one word which pre­
cludes the Virgin Birth. He seems to have taken it for granted
in more than one passage. St. Irenaeus sees in the words,
"God sent His Son, made of a woman", (Gal. iv. 7), a clear
statement of the Virgin Birth, and commenting on the first and
Second Adam (1 Cor. xv. 45), he deduces from the text the

[ 18 ]



same teaching: "As Adam was drawn from the virgin earth, so

Jesus Christ must have been born of a virgin mother."
26

The close and intimate relations between St. Paul and St.

Luke, who traveled with him on his missionary journeys, and
was his faithful companion in the first and second captivities
(Caesarea 55-57, A. D.; Rome 58-60; Acts xxi. 27-30; and
xxiv. 27; xxviii. 30), would certainly lead us to infer that St.
Paul was acquainted with the Gospel of the Infancy. Irenaeus

says that St. Luke wrote the Gospel preached by the Apostle,"
and Tertullian calls St. Paul the "illuminator of St. Luke." 28

If St. Luke had therefore heard St. Paul teach that Jesus was
the Son of Joseph, it is reasonable to suppose that he would
have so flatly contradicted the teaching he had listened to for

years, and taught so unequivocably the dogma of the Virgin
Birth?

Many scholars have also pointed out the literary affinity
between St. Luke and St. Paul. The Gospel of the Infancy is
a good historical commentary on Galatians iv. 7, and Luke i.

15, which re-echo the words of Ephesians v. 18: "And be not I.drunk with wine, wherein is luxury; but be ye filled with the
Holy Ghost."

Finally, keeping in mind the words of St. Irenaeus cited

above, we ask with Rose: "Could St. Paul have regarded the

Holy One of God as a Son of sinful Adam, who was the source
of sin for all his descendants? If the first Adam was of God,
should not the Second, for better reasons, be born of God

directly?"
29

v. The Genealogies (Matthew i. 1-17i Luke iii. 23-38)

The Gospel of the Infancy is rejected by rationalist critics,
because, they assert, the two genealogies of Christ in St. Mat­
thew and St. Luke are totally different and irreconcilable. Not

only that, but they show evident traces of deliberate adapta­
tion. For while they have been painly interpolated into the

primitive text to prove that Jesus was the Messias, descending

26 Adv. Haer., III. 21.10; V. 1.3.
21 Adv. Haer., III.I.
28 Adsi. Marclon, V. 5.
29 Rose, Studies on the Gospels p. 60.

[ 19]



in the male' line from David, their very purpose is not ob­
tained. They are so poorly put together that they prove the
exact contrary of what they start out to demonstrate. How
can Jesus be the Son of David, when Joseph, by whom He is
of the blood of David, is not His Father?

Even granted that this objection may be met by the theory
of the Davidic rights coming through Joseph 'to Jesus (St.
Matthew), how again, they ask, can Jesus be connected with
David through two lines of ancestors in which but three iden­
tical names occur: Joseph, Zorobabel, and Salathiel?

One theory, held by Julius Africanus (221 A. D.), and cited
in Eusebius' Ecclesiastical History (i. 7), holds that Jacob is
the real father of Joseph (Matt. i. 16), and Heli his legal
father, according to the Jewish law of the levirate (Luke iii.
23) . For when a childless widow married her deceased hus­
band's brother, the children were called by the name of the
first husband (Deut. xxv. 5). This interpretation was com­
monly held up to the fifteenth century on the authority of
Eusebius. The chief objection to it rises from the fact that it
necessitates the acceptance of two other levirate marriages to
explain Salathiel, the son of Jechonias (Matt. i. 12), and of
Neri (Luke iii. 27), and Mathan (Mathat), the son of Eleazar
(Matt. i. 15), and of Levi (Luke iii. 29).

A second theory, proposed by Annius of Viterbo in 1490,
declares that St. Matthew gives the genealogy of St. Joseph,
and St. Luke the genealogy of the Blessed Virgin. This view
is held today by Bishop Le Camus in his Life of Christ (Vol.
I, p. 151) and by Rose in his Studies on the Gospels (p. 69)
but their arguments fail to convince us. We cannot accept it,
for it goes counter to the constant tradition of the early Fathers
of the Church, and the Jewish custom of drawing up the gene­
alogies of only paternal ancestors.

A third theory, commonly held today, asserts that St. Mat­
thew gives us the legitimate succession, whereby the Davidic
rights came through St. Joseph to Jesus, while St. Luke gives
us the real and legal ancestors, who, through St. Joseph, con­
nect Jesus with David.

The Jews of our Lord's time believed that the Messias was

[20 ]



descended from David (Matt. xv. 22; xx. 30; xxii. 41-46), a
fact that is taken for granted by St. Paul in his preaching
(Rom. i. 3; xv. 12; Acts xiii. 23; Cf. Apoc. v. 6; xxii. 16).
The Rabbis disputed whether the Messias was to come from
David through Solomon or through Nathan. The defenders
of the Nathan line argued that Solomon had died in idolatry,
and that his last descendant before the captivity, Jechonias,
had been rejected by God (Jer. xxii. 30).

The genealogies of St. Matthew and St. Luke satisfy both

points of view. The Davidic rights descended to Joseph and
his legal Son Jesus through Solomon (Matt. i. 6, 7), whereas

Jesus' true Davidic ancestry was traced through Nathan

(Luke iii. 31).

According to this theory, St. Matthew's genealogy has but
a conventional value." It consists of three groups of four­

teen names, because the three Hebrew letters of David's name

represent a numerical value of fourteen. To obtain this arti­

ficial symmetry, many names had to be omitted, as we see by
comparing the forty-two generations summed up in verse 17
with the parallel genealogies of the Old Testament.

Whatever theory we hold-and we admit that no theory �Q

absolutely satisfactory-Catholics accept the two genealogies
as part of the Sacred Scriptures, guaranteed them by the di­
vine infallible voice of an authoritative teaching Church. The
rationalist critic is unscholarly and unfair, because he starts
out with the set purpose of denying the historical value of a
document which goes counter to his personal views.

VI. The Brethren of the Lord

The four Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, and St. Paul
all mention the "brethren of the Lord." They have been cited

against the perpetual virginity of Mary from the time of
Helvidius (380) and Jovinian (385).

There are three possible interpretations of these words.
30 Father Pesch, s.]., says of the genealogy of St. Luke: "I do not blame the

sentiment of those who believe that St. Luke merely records the genealogy which
the Gentile Christians used to read in the LXX, without in any way detracting from
or adding to the authority of the statements that are contained in it. Few indeed
are those who, within the last centuries. have upheld that view. but still they are
no mean interpreters and theologians" (De Inspiratione Sacrae Scripture, 1906,
p. 547).

[21 J

ill
I



[22 ]

The "brethren of the Lord" were children of the Blessed Vir­

gin; they were children of Joseph by a former marriage; they
were cousins of Jesus.

Towards the end of the fourth century the perpetual vir­

ginity of Mary was denied during a most bitter controversy
on the comparative merits of virginity and marriage. The op­

ponents of monachism and Christian asceticism in their en­

deavor to extol marriage, quoted the passages referring to the

"brethren of the Lord" as proof positive that after the Virgin

Birth, Mary had other children. This heresy began in Syria."
and finally reached Rome. Helvidius, who taught it in 380,
was refuted by St. Jerome; Jovinian followed soon after, and
was answered by St. Jerome and St. Ambrose. He was also

condemned by the Synod of Milan, and excommunicated by
Pope Siricius."

Helvidius cites three texts (Matt. i. i8; i. 3S; Luke ii. 7)
to prove his contention. The words "Before they came to­

gether" and "Till she brought forth her first-born Son," both

prove, he maintained, that the union was consummated later

on; again the text: "She brought forth her first-born Son,"

implies there were at least two children. St. Jerome's familiar­

ity with the Sacred Scriptures enabled him to answer these

sophisms easily. He cited many passages of the Bible in which

the words before and till did not imply the subsequent occur­

rence of the thing which is said not to have occurred as yet at

a particular time. For instance: "And no man hath known of

his sepulcher until this present day" (Deut. xxxiv. 6); no one

has ever held that the tomb of Moses was afterwards found

by the Jews.
Again he says it is false to assert that the words "the first­

born Son" imply that the Blessed Virgin had other children.

The Mosaic law of the first-born (Exodus xxxiv. 19, 20) held

as soon as the mother had given birth to a son, whether he

was the only one, or whether he was succeeded by other chil­
dren. The Jews frequently spoke of a mother dying, when

bringing forth her first-born.

81 St. Epiphanius, Ad», Haer., LXXVIIL!.

82 Jerome, De Pu,elUtI Vlrtlnltate Mariae; Ambrose, De Instit. VirI.; Siricius,
Epis. IX., in Denzinger, p. 41.



A second theory held that the "brethren of the Lord" were
children of Joseph by a former marriage. This view was held

by St. Epiphanius (Adv. Haer. LXXXVIII. 7), St. Gregory
of Nyssa (in Christi Resur. II), St. Cyril of Alexandria (in
Joan vii. 5), Origen (in Matt. xiii. 55), and St. Hilary (in
Matt. i. 3, 4). St. Jerome tells us that this opinion origi­
nated in "the ravings of the apocryphal Gospels of St. James
and St. Peter" (in Matt. xii. 49, 50). He himself firmly held

that St. Joseph was a virgin, "so that from a virgin wedlock a

virgin Son was born."
83

St. Jerome's teaching on this point is

now a commonplace of Catholic teaching, St. Thomas Aquinas

characterizing the opposite view as false."
84

The third theory which is suggested by many passages of
the Gospels, and agrees with the Church's dogmatic and his­

torical tradition, maintains that the "brethren of the Lord"

were cousins of Jesus. The Greek adelphos of the New Tes­

tament is a translation of the Hebrew ah (Aramaic, aha), the

specific word for brother. But this word had a much wider

meaning among the Jews, as is clear from many passages of the

Old Testament. It is used for relatives in general (Job xlii. 2;
xix. 13, 14), nephews (Abraham and Lot; Gen. xiii. 8; xiv.

14; Laban and Jacob; Gen. xxix. 15), distant cousins (Lev. x.

4), first cousins (1 Par. xxiii. 21, 22) . Moreover, there was

no word in Hebrew or Aramaic for cousin, so that the Old

Testament writers were forced to use the word ah, brother,
to describe different degrees of kindred. For example, Jacob,

speaking to his cousin, Rachel, calls himself her father's

brother, rather than style himself the son of her father's sis­

ter, the only other way he could describe in Hebrew his real

relationship (Gen. xxix. 12). It is certain, therefore, that if

Jesus had cousins, especially if they were not born of the

same mother, they must needs be called in the Aramaic tongue,
His brethren."

As the word "brother" in itself proves nothing, we must

study, singly and together, the various texts of the New Tes­
tament that refer to the "brethren of the Lord," in order to

83 Ad», na«, 19.
84 In Epist. ad Gal. i. 3.
35 Gesenius, Thesaurus, pp. 63, 64. Buhl Gesenius' Handworterbuch, p. 24.

[ 231.



:{

:r

.�

; ..

determine their real relationship to Him. St. John, the Acts
of the Apostles, and St. Paul tell us nothing, for they simply
mention vaguely that some of Jesus' followers were called His
brethren. St. Paul (1 Cor. ix. 5) groups them with the Apos­
tles ("the rest of the Apostles and the brethren of the Lord"),

implying that they were fairly numerous. St. Luke in the
Acts (i. 14) expressly separates them from the Blessed Vir­

gin (the Apostles, "the women and Mary, the mother of Jesus,
and His brethren"). St. John speaks of Jesus staying at

Capharnaum with "His Mother, His brethren, and the disci­

ples" (John ii. 12).
St. Matthew and St. Luke help us considerably in solving

this complicated problem. As they expressly teach the Virgin
Birth, they cannot possibly attribute to Jesus any older
brothers and sisters. They also exclude the possibility of St.
Joseph having had children of a former marriage, by their
manner of narrating the childhood of Jesus. In the Gospel of
the Infancy, there is no mention of any other brothers or sis­
ters (Matt. ii. 13, 14, 20, 21; Luke ii. 16-19, 22, 27, 33, 39);
the finding of the Child Jesus in the Temple proves clearly that
the twelve-year-old Jesus was Mary's only Son (Luke ii. 41-

52). This fact is all the more striking when we compare the

genuine with the apocryphal Gospels. The Gospel of St.

James, for example, mentions without warrant the children of
St. Joseph accompanying him on the road to Bethlehem, and
of their being enrolled in the Census of Cyrinus (ix. 1; xvii.
1, 2; xviii. 1).

It is noteworthy that the "brethren of the Lord" do not ap­
pear at all in the home life of Jesus at Nazareth, but are men­
tioned only during the course of His public ministry. They
are mentioned twice in St. Mark (iii. 21, 31-35; vi. 3).

In the first instance, His "friends" seek to lay hold on

Him, saying, "He is mad"; then His "mother and His breth­
ren appear, calling Him." The word "brethren" is necessary
in this passage, for our Saviour wishes to bring out clearly the
contrast between a carnal and a spiritual relationship (Mark
iii. 34). Although St. Mark does not expressly mention the

Virgin Birth, we have no right to assume that he was ignorant

[24 ]

I
�



of it, for he repeatedly calls Jesus the Son of God (Mark i. 1;
iii. 12; xii. 6 ; xiv. 62) . No proof, therefore, can be adduced
from this text that the brethren of Jesus were His brethren in
blood.

The second text reads: "Is not this the carpenter, the Son
of Mary, the brother of James and Joseph, and Jude and
Simon? Are not also His sisters here with us?" (Mark vi. 3.)
We note, first of all, that Jesus is called "the Son of Mary,"
and not the Son of Joseph. St. Matthew and St. Luke, who
have set forth in detail the doctrine of the Virgin Birth, do not

scruple about calling Joseph the father of Jesus (Matt. xiii. 55;
Luke iv. 22), but St. Mark never does so. Jesus in His Gospel

,

is always the Son of God and the Son of Mary. Mary, there­

fore, had no other children. Moreover, in a later passage
(Mark xv. 40), St. Mark speaks of another Mary as the mother
of James and Joseph. (Cf. "Mary, the mother of Joseph,"
Mark xv. 47; "Mary, the mother of James," Mark xvi. 1;
Luke xxiv. 10; "Mary, the mother of James and Joseph,"
(Matt. xxvii. 56.) If James and Joseph are not then the chil­
dren of the Blessed Virgin, surely Jude and Simon are not, for

they are named after the others. The mother of Jude and
Simon is not mentioned, but we can certainly infer that she
was neither the Blessed Virgin, nor the mother of James and

joseph." These two events recorded by St. Mark are also
mentioned by St. Matthew and St. Luke, but they do not help
in determining who the "brethren of the Lord" really were.

(Cf. Matt. xii. 46-50; Luke viii. 19-21; Matt. xiii. 52-58;
Luke iv. 22, 23.)

If we compare all the passages of the Gospels which men­
tion the "brethren of the Lord," we can show that they were
most probably our Saviour's cousins. St. John tells us that the
Blessed Virgin had a sister, Mary, who was married (?) to

Cleophas or Clopas (John xix. 25). We learn from Hegesip­
pus

31 that Simon or Simeon, the second Bishop of Jerusalem,
was a son of Clopas, who in turn was a brother of St. Joseph.
This gives us an uncle of Jesus with one child, and an aunt
with probably other children.

36 Lagrange, Euangile selon Saint Marc, pp. 72-89.
ST Eusebius, tu«. Ecel., IV., 22.4.

[ 25 ]



•

According to St. Paul (Gal. i. 19), St. James, the brother
of the Lord, seems to be identical (?) with St. James the

Apostle, and according to St. Jerome, this Apostle is St. James
the Less (Mark xv. 40), the son of Alphaeus (Mark iii. 18).
Is the name Alphaeus the same as Cleophas or Clopas? (John
xix. 25; Luke xxiv. �8.) It is philologically impossible to

identify these two names, as some have pretended, but it is

possible to hold the hypothesis of a double name, Alphaeus­
Clopas. Thus, for example, Chimeon could transcribe his
name Simeon or use the Greek Simon; Jeschoua could tran­

scribe his name Jesus or use the Greek Jason.as
We observe that Eusebius does not call Simeon the brother

of James, whom he succeeded as Bishop of Jerusalem, which

he certainly would have done had they really been brothers.

Since then James and Joseph are mentioned together, and simi­

larly Simon and Jude; and since we know that James was the
son of Mary, the wife of Clopas, and Simon was the son of

Clopas, the brother of St. Joseph, it seems reasonable to con­

clude that all four had the same father, but not the same

mother.

If we suppose that Simeon and Jude were the sons of Clopas

by a former wife, and James and Joseph his sons by Mary, the
sister of the Blessed Virgin, we have as a result a double

cousinship, two brothers having married two sisters.

The following table will make this clear:

St. Joseph (brother of Clopas).

+- I
The Blessed Virgin. M? (unknown).

r---"-----.
Simon Jude

The Blessed Virgin (sister of Mary of Clopas).

I
M. Clopas, as second wife.

r---"-----.
Joseph James

According to this hypothesis, the sons of Clopas and Mary
are doubly cousins of Jesus; the sons of Clopas by an un­
known mother are cousins on their father's side only.t"

We can never know to a certainty the exact relationship of

the four brothers, James, Joseph, Simon, and Jude. It will al­

ways remain doubtful whether "Mary of Clopas" (Cleophas)

38 Lagrange, Euangile seton Saint Marc, p. 79.

39 Pope, The Catholic Students' Aids to the Bible. vol. iii., p. 407.

[ 26 ]



meant the wife of Clopas or his sister. In either case her chil­

dren, James and Joseph, were cousins of Jesus, either on the
mother's or the father's side. It is doubtful also whether

James, the brother of the Lord, is James, the Apostle, the son
of Alphaeus; and again, whether his father, Alpheus, is the
same as Clopas (Alphaeus-Clopas), the brother of St. Joseph.
If both hypotheses are true, and we think they are, his brother,
Jude, was a cousin of Jesus on both his mother's and his
father's side.

Whatever the precise relationship may be, this problem of
the "brethren of the Lord" is perfectly distinct from the dçc­
trine of the Virgin Birth. We have proved that it is certainly
unfair to cite the brethren of the Lord as an argument against
the perpetual virginity of Mary.

We have now to consider the dogmatic and historical tra­
dition concerning the "brethren of the Lord." In the first

place, the heresy that makes them the brothers of Jesus, born
of the same mother, is incompatible with the universally held

dogma of Mary's perpetual virginity. St. Jerome cites against
Helvidius 40 writers of the second century such as St. Ignatius,
Martyr, Bishop of Antioch, and St. Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons.
The first groups together three great mysteries of the Gospel,
"the virginity of Mary, her child-bearing, and the death of
our Lord." 41 The second writer, summing up the faith of
the churches of both East and West, mentions the Virgin
Birth, together with the Lord's Passion and Resurrection."

Aristides of Athens in his Apology, addressed to the Em­

peror Hadrian in 124 A. D., mentions the striking events of our
Lord's life; His Virgin Birth, His Crucifixion by the Jews, His
Death and Burial, His Resurrection, and His Ascension. St.

Justin is another witness to the Virgin Birth both in his Apol­

ogy (31, 46) and in his famous Dialogue with the Jew Trypho
(85) . The very fact of this unanimous, universal consent of
the Apostolic Churches is conclusive evidence that the dogma
of the Virgin Birth is of apostolic origin.

The only ecclesiastical writer to whom HeIvidius could

40Adv. na«. 17.
41 Ad. Eph. XIX.
42 Ad», ss«; I. X. I; Cf. V. 19.

r 27]



rightly appeal as a denier of the dogma was Tertullian. St.

Jerome with Origen dismissed Tertullian as a heretic, who had
abandoned the Catholic faith on this and on other dogmas."
Tertullian did not pretend to be a witness to the divine tradi­
tion of the Church Catholic in this instance, but denied the

Virgin Birth under stress of a particular controversy with
Marcion and Apelles.v

The Jewish convert, Hegesippus (1 74-189), speaking of
the brethren of the Lord, tells us that Simeon was chosen to
succeed James as Bishop of Jerusalem because he was "another
cousin" of the Lord. As Hegesippus in another passage calls

James the brother of the Lord, we can safely argue that, in
his mind, the two words, brother and cousin, were equivalent."
He also adds that Simeon was the cousin of Jesus through His

father, Clopas, whom he knows to the brother of St. Jo­
seph." Had Jude been a brother in the strict sense of the

word, Hegesippus would not have used the phrase, "He is said
to have been the brother of the Lord according to the flesh."

47

The words, "according to the flesh," emphasize the fact that

Jude, unlike the Apostles and disciples in general, was not the
brother of Jesus merely according to the spirit.

Clement of Alexandria (216) in a passage of the Hypo­

typoses, commentaries on the Sacred Scriptures," identifies

James, the brother of the Lord, with the Apostle James, the
son of Alphaeus (Alphaeus-Clopas). In another fragment of
the same book, which we possess in a Latin translation (re­
garded as authentic by Harnack), he calls Jude "the author of
the Catholic Epistle," brother of James and the son of Joseph.
This may be explained either on the hypothesis that he fol­
lowed the teaching of the apocryphal Gospels, which made the
brethren of Jesus children of Joseph by a former marriage, or
that James and Jude were merely the nephews of St. Joseph,
committed to his care by their dying father, Alphaeus-Clopas,
St. Joseph's brother.

43 St. Jerome, Adv. Helv., 17; Origen, Hom. VII. in Lucam.
44 Cont. Marcion, IV. 19; De Carne Christi, VII. Cf. D'Ales, La Théologie de

Tertullien, 1905, pp. 196, 197.
45 Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. IV., 22, 4.
46 uu., IlL, 11, l.
41 rue; III., 20, 1.
48 Eusebius, Hist. Eccles., II., 1.

[28 ]



[29] .

Origen (254) speaks of Tertullian as a heretic who believed

that after the birth of Jesus, Mary had other children, "the

brethren of the Lord"; and that for this reason Jesus publicly
disowned her as His mother (Mark iii. 33, 34). Origen him­
self held that the "brethren of the Lord" were children of

Joseph's former marriage."
St. Hilary (356), a hundred years later, holds the same

view, and rebukes the opponents of the virginity of Mary as

irreligious and presumptuous men, who, do not know who the

brethren of the Lord really were (in Matt. i. 3, 4); St.

Epiphanias calls them "rash, blasphemous, and insane."
50

St. Ambrose (3�7) and St. Jerome (420) were both strong
defenders of the virginity of Mary, and considered the brethren
of the Lord as His first cousins. St. Chrysostom (407) and St.

Augustine (430) both maintained at first that the brethren of

the Lord were Joseph's children by a former marriage (in
Matt. v. 3; Quaest. XVII., in Matt. iii.), but they later on

adopted the view of St. Jerome (in Epist. ad Gal.; in Joan
x. 2).

The early Fathers, especially St. Jerome, gave four rea­
sons for their assertion that the "brethren of the Lord" were

not Mary's children. In the first place, they held that her vir­

ginity was implied in the answer she made to the angel's salu­

tation: "How shall this be done, because I know not man?"
51

Her objection has no sense whatever, unless we believe that
she had made a vow of virginity in marriage. Even Loisy is
unconvinced by the arguments that Harnack advances against
the authenticity of the two verses of Luke i. 34, 35/2 and the
Abbé Lagrange has ably answered Harnack's every objection;"
Negative criticism is certainly pretty much at a loss when it

arbitrarily suppresses texts it cannot explain. This is, however,
a common method with the critics. When they find themselves

unable to untie a knot, they do not hesitate to cut it.

Secondly, they argued, if Mary had other children, why
49 Hom. VII. in Lucam; Contra Celsum, 1.47; in Matt. xiii. 55.

50 Adu, Haer., LXXVII!., 1-7.

51 Schanz, Comm. ùber das Evang. Lukas, p. 88.

52 Revue d'Hlst . et de Lltt . religleuses, 1903, p. 291.

58 Evangile selon Saint Lue., pp. 31-36.



should Jesus, dying on the Cross, have intrusted His Mother

to the care of St. John? (John xix. 26, 27.)

Thirdly, if Mary had other children, why is Jesus called so

emphatically "the son of Mary" (Mark vi. 3), and why is

Mary never called the mother of the brethren of the Lord?

Why again is she always called "the Virgin" in the creeds from

the earliest antiquity?
Fourthly, the Gospel texts all imply that the brethren of

the Lord were older than Jesus. They were jealous of His

popularity; they criticized Him and gave. Him advice; they
endeavored to lay hold of Him on the supposition that He was

mad (Mark vi. 4; John vii. 1 et seq.; Mark iii. 31). This is

hardly the attitude of young brothers, especially if we take

into account the customs of the East."

The tradition of the Church, therefore, is certainly clear

and explicit that the brethren of the Lord were His cousins.

The only dissentient voice in antiquity is that of the heretic

Tertullian. The opinion of a few Fathers, who considered

them the children of St. Joseph by a former marriage, seems

to have been invented as an easy way out of a difficulty, and

clearly contradicts the witness of both St. Matthew and St.

Luke.

We have considered briefly the chief objections that have

been brought against the Virgin Birth and the perpetual vir­

ginity of the Blessed Virgin. We have set forth the mean­

ing of the prophecy of Isaias, outlined the arguments for the

genuinity and authenticity of the Gospel of the Infancy, ex­

plained the silence of St. Mark, St. Paul, and St. John, and

shown that the divergencies in the genealogies and the uncer­

tainty about the true relationship of the brethren of the Lord

to Jesus do not disprove the Catholic dogma.

We cannot emphasize too strongly the fact that Jesus is not

the Son of God because He is Virgin-born, nor does His pre­

existence necessitate Virgin Birth, as some critics vainly imag­
Ine." The dogma is based, as we have seen, not on a priori

suppositions, but on the clear, explicit teaching of both the Old

and New Testaments, and on the constant tradition of a di-

54 Durand, The Childhood of Jesus Christ, p. 294.
55 St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theol., part iii., Q. 29, a. 1, ad 2.

[30 ]



vine, infallible teaching Church. From Isaias in the eighth cen­

tury before Christ, to the Gospels of St. Matthew and St.

Luke; from St. Ignatius Martyr, in the second century, to
Durand and Lagrange, the latest twentieth century commen­

tators on the Gospel of the Infancy, the Catholic Church has
ever taught the dogma of the Virgin Birth, and condemned as

heretics all who impugned her teaching. With the Council of

Toledo, held on November 17, 675/6 the Catholic Church

declares:

"If anyone does not, according to the Holy Fathers, and

according to the truth of God, confess that the ever Virgin and
Immaculate Mary, the Mother of God, conceived in time,
truly and in special manner, without seed, of the Holy Spirit,
the Very Word of God, Who was born of all ages of God the

Father, and that she begot Him without corruption, remaining
a Virgin after her child-bearing, let him be condemned."

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Aiken-The Dhamma of Gotama the Buddha, Boston, 1900.

Arendzen-"A Virgin Shall Conceive," The Catholic Gazette, London,

January, 1924.

Bardenhewer-"Die Geburt Christi aus der Jungfrau," Monatsbliiiter

fur den Katholischen Religionsunterricht, 1907, pp. 84-91.

Bardenhewer-"Maria Verkiìndigung," Biblische Studien, vol. x., 1905,
fasc. 5, pp. 74-82.

Calmes-Evangile selon Saint Jean, 1904.

Camerlynck-VanderHeeren-Comm. in Act. Apostolarum, Bruges, 1924.

Camuset-"La Conception Virginale du Christ," Revue Pratique

d'Apologétique, 1907, pp. 701-709.

Corluy-Etudes, 1878, vol. i., p. 15.

Comely-Comma in Episi, ad Galatas, p. 412.

D'Alès-La Théologie de Tertullien, 1905.

De Broglie-Question Bibliques, Paris, 1897.

De Grandmaison-Etudes, May 20, 1907, p. 503.

De la Vallée-Poussin-"Le Bouddhisme et les Evangiles Canoniques,"
Revue Biblique, 1906, p. 353.

Denzinger-Enchiridion, Nos. 1-14, 19, 91, 143, 256, 282, 327, 993.

Didon-Jesus Christ, 2 vols., Herder, St. Louis.

Durand-L'Evangile de l'Enfance (English translation, The Childhood

of Jesus Christ, Philadelphia, 1910.

56 Hefele, Histoire des Conciles, vol. iii., part i., p. 66.

[31 ]



Dictionnaire de Théologie Catholique, On the Apostles' Creed. Vol. i.,

cols. 166'0-1680.

Fillion-Les Etapes du Rationalisme, Paris, 1915.

Funk-Patres Apostolici (The Apostolic Fathers).

Hall-The Miraculous Birth oj Christ, Catholic Truth Society, London.

Hefele-Histoire des Conciles.

Jacquier-Histoire des Livres du Nouveau Testament, 4 vols., J. Ga­

balda, Paris, 1920.

Jacquier-Le Nouveau Testament dans L'Eglise Chrétienne, 2 vols., J.

Gabalda, Paris, 1920.

Jacquier-Etudes de Critique et de Philogie du Nouveau Testament,

Paris, 1922.

Lagrange-Evangile selon Saint Matthieu, Saint Marc et Saint Luc., 3

vols., Paris, 1920, 1921, 1922.

Lagrange-Epitre aux Remains; Epitre aux Galatas, 2 vols., Paris, 1920.

Lagrange-Messianisme chez les Juijs, Paris, 1920.

Lagrange-La Vie de Jésus d'après Renon, Paris, 1924.

LaCamus-Life oj Christ (English translation), 3 vols., Herder, St.

Louis.

Lepin-Jésus, Messie el Fils de Dieu, Paris, 1904.

Lepin-Revue Pratique d'Apol., Dec. 1, 1905, p. 199. On the Apocry­

phal Gospels of St. James and St. Thomas.

Lesètre=v'La Vierge Mère," Revue du Clergé Français, July 15, 1907,

pp. 113-130.

McNabb-"St. Mark's Witness to the Virgin Birth," Journal oj Theo­

logical Studies, April, 1907.

Mangenot-e/'La Conception Virginale de Jésus," Revue de l'Institut

Catholique de Paris, May-June, 1907.

Martindale-The History oj Religions, 6 vols., Herder, St. Louis.

Martindale-The Virgin Birth, Catholic Truth Society, London.

Pesch-De Inspiratione Sacrae Scripturae, 1906, p. 547.

Pope-The Catholic Students' Aids to the Bible, vol. iii. pp. 405-409.

Prat-La Théologie de Saint Paul, 2 vols., Beauchesne, Paris.

Protin-"La Conception Virginale du Christ," (Revue Augustin, July

15, 1907, p.S.
Rose--Studies on the Gospels (English translation), Longmans, Green

& Co., New York, 1903.

Schanz-Comm. tiber das Evang. des heil. Lukas, p. 88.

St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theol., part iii., q.29, art. 1, ad. 2.

Tillemont-Mémoires pour servir a l'Hist. Ecclés., 1693, vol. i., p. 505.

Tixeront-Histoire des Dogmes; 3 vols. (English translation, The His-

tory oj Dogmas, Herder, St. Louis.

Vacandard-"Saint Marc et la Conception Virginale," Revue Pratique

d'Apologétique, July, 1907, pp. 412-418.

Vigouroux-Dictionnaire de la Bible, vol. iv., cols. 1386-1414.

Vigouroux-Les Liures Saints et la Critique Rationaliste, Paris, 1900.

Wilhelm-Scannell-Manual oj Catholic Theology, vol. ii., pp. 208-212.

[ 32 ] 11�



 



THE MASS BOOK

For the man's pocket and the

woman's purse
- a compact,

popular little Mass Book.

2,000,000 have been sold.

A VEST-POCKET PRAYER BOOK

The purpose of this MASS BOOK is to pre­
sent in the simplest form the Prayers that

are the most useful in the devotional life of

a Catholic. It gives the Mass Prayers al­

most exactly as they are said by the Priest
at the altar. It adds, moreover, such rubri­

cal di rections as are needful for one who is

not thoroughly familiar with the Mass to

follow the Priest intelligently and with de­

votion. The explanations of the essential

Doctrines of the Church, and the ordinary
devotional practices that are interspersed
throughout the book, may be found of very

great value to non-Catholics, as well as to

all classes of Catholics. Both prayers and

explanations have been drawn only from

authorized sources.

Paper binding, lOci $8.00 the 100,

$67.00 the 1,000 postpaid

Leatherette bi.nding, 50ci $45.00 the 100

THE PAULIST PRESS

401 West 59th Street New York 19, N. Y.