The Virgin birth

The virgin birth refers to Jesus’s conception through the Holy Spirit rather than through normal human reproduction, with Mary remaining a virgin at the time of his conception. (Matt 1:18–25; Luke 1:26–38) According to Matthew’s account, an angel assured Joseph that “what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.” (Matt 1:18–25) When Mary asked how this could occur since she was a virgin, the angel responded that “the Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.” (Luke 1:26–38)

The theological significance of this doctrine centers on two critical affirmations about Jesus’s identity. The virgin birth guaranteed Jesus’s sinlessness, since the work of the Holy Spirit ensured he was born without sin.[1] Because all humans inherit sin through Adam, Jesus needed to come as “the second man, the last Adam” to begin a new humanity.[1] For Jesus to function as the world’s Savior, he had to be fully human yet without sin—a problem the virgin birth solves.[1]

Beyond sinlessness, the doctrine addressed two opposing heresies: it affirmed Jesus’s genuine humanity against those denying it, and his true divinity against those claiming he was merely human, expressing both divine grace and God’s self-limitation.[2] From Christianity’s earliest centuries, the virgin birth became foundational to high Christology, with church fathers emphasizing it as proof of the incarnation and Christ’s deity.[3] The doctrine functions as a living symbol of Christ’s twofold nature—born of the Holy Spirit and of a woman—uniting the human and divine in the incarnate God-man.[3]

[1] A. T. B. McGowan, Cdhp: Person and Work of Christ (Crownhill, Milton Keynes: Paternoster, 2012). [See here, here, here, here.]
[2] Joel B. Green, “Virgin Birth,” in The New Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, ed. Katharine Doob Sakenfeld (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 2006–2009), 5:791.
[3] Walter A. Elwell and Barry J. Beitzel, “Virgin Birth of Jesus,” in Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1988), 2:2126.