Early last week, I was in the library when my computer decided to upload all the new updates. Finding myself waiting (an Advent occupation) I found a current copy of Biblical Archeology Review. I haven't read a copy in years, and picked it up, flipping through it and scanning it for interesting articles. The following title jumped out at me "How Babies Were Made in Jesus' Time" (Andrew Lincoln, author). This couldn't really be any different from now, could it? Turns out ... no. But our understanding of the process has changed radically in the last couple of centuries. With this coming Sundays' Lectionary Readings being about the visitation of the Angle to Mary, I thought it might prove interesting to review the article a bit.
Our modern ears/eyes/thinking look at the father and the mother each providing half the DNA to the child in the womb. But that is not how the ancient hearer/readers/thinkers would have thought about it. In the ancient understanding (especially in patriarchal cultures), "the male semen provides the formative principle of life. The female menstrual blood supplies the matter for the fetus, and the womb the medium for the semen's nurture. The man's seed transmits his logos (rational cause) and pneuma (vital heat/animating spirit), for which the woman's body is the receptacle. In this way the male functions as the active, efficient cause of reproduction, and the female functions as the provider of the matter to which the male seed give definition. In short, the bodily substance necessary for a human fetus comes from the mother, while the life force originates with the father" (BAR, Nov-Dec 2014. 44).
With such an understanding, no wonder the defenders of the faith, in arguing that Jesus was both fully human and fully divine, appealed to these birth stories for proof. For the ancients, simply pointing to Mary as the mother was enough to prove Jesus' humanity. Lincoln points out that this view now "produces the irony that, while on ancient views of biology the virginal conception was thought to safeguard the humanity of Jesus, present-day biological understanding of such a conception undermines the notion of Jesus' being fully human. We no longer think that a mother's genetic input alone is sufficient to produces a fully human male. For Jesus to be fully human, he would need to have had both a human father and mother. A Jesus without complete human DNA would now actually be the sort of docetic figure the patristic writers refused to accept - a simi-divine or a wholly divine special creation that only appeared to be human" (BAR, Nov-Dec 2014.45).
Lincoln goes on to discuss how the Jewish understanding would often see child-birth as a three way process (and as such theology and biology go together, rather than being separated). In essence, with special biblical "heroes" and "heroines" God is seen as taking an active role (opening up the womb, etc.). Lincoln invites us to look at the stories of David's birth, or even Rachel pleading with Jacob to give her children, and even as far back as Eve's conception of Cain.
These stories appear to be different, however, for they also draw upon Greek-style biographies of famous people (who often pull in divine favor in the form of being demi-gods).
I found the article helpful. It was a good reminder to see the texts in the cultural light and understanding of the authors. Two questions/thoughts stick with me.
One: using our own modern understanding, how would we write a Gospel today? What would it look like? What things would be included? How would we tell the tale?
Two: I'm reminded of a saying a friend of mine often used: "All stories are True, some have even happened."
As Advent progresses and we near the birth, may you continue to find yourself blessed.
Blessed Be,
Joel
Lincoln, Andrew. "How Babies Were Made in Jesus' Time." Biblical Archeology Review. Nov-Dec 2014 (Vol 40 No 6). 42ff.
[Apparently you need to be a member to read the article at the link.]
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