Originally Posted by doulos1
And then in Matt. 1: 20 it says But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife: for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost.
Why would God tell Joseph to take her as his wife if he intended that they remain enaged or espoused? He would not. And because they were married, after the birth of Christ they began a normal marriage relationship, a normal sexual relationhship that produced many children (Mark 6:3).
the word for “wife” is
gune, which is also used to refer to betrothed women,
as it would have to be used here, since mary and joseph were, at this point, still only betrothed.
now look at what the angel ***actually says ***in Matt 1:20:
RSV: But as he considered this, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, "Joseph, son of David,
do not fear to take Mary your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit.
KJV: But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David,
fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife: for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost.
NAB: Such was his intention when, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, "Joseph, son of David,
do not be afraid to take Mary your wife into your home. For it is through the holy Spirit that this child has been conceived in her.
the angel doesn’t say for joseph to take mary
as his wife - he just reiterates that mary
actually is jospeh’s wife - i.e. betrothed.
as the new american bible most explicitly states, the angel basically says to joseph, “don’t be afraid to take mary, to whom you are betrothed, to live with you in your house”.
which is definitively
NOT the same thing as telling him to take mary and get married to her.
If all held this view (I doubt Calvin did) then all were wrong.
this is what Calvin says on the subject:
“Helvidius displayed excessive ignorance in concluding that Mary must have had many sons, because Christ’s ‘brothers’ are sometimes mentioned.”
{
Harmony of Matthew, Mark & Luke, sec. 39 (Geneva, 1562), vol. 2 / From
Calvin’s Commentaries, tr. William Pringle, Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1949, p.215; on Matthew 13:55}
“[On Matt 1:25:] The inference he [Helvidius] drew from it was, that Mary remained a virgin no longer than till her first birth, and that afterwards she had other children by her husband . . . No just and well-grounded inference can be drawn from these words . . . as to what took place after the birth of Christ. He is called ‘first-born’; but it is for the sole purpose of informing us that he was born of a virgin . . . What took place afterwards the historian does not inform us . . . No man will obstinately keep up the argument, except from an extreme fondness for disputation.”
{Pringle,
ibid., vol. I, p. 107}
“Under the word ‘brethren’ the Hebrews include all cousins and other relations, whatever may be the degree of affinity.”
{Pringle,
ibid., vol. I, p. 283 /
Commentary on John, (7:3) }
You seem to think that Luther et al are Popes. They are not. If they held Mary to be a virgin perpetually then they were simply wrong. God tells us that she was not!
i know this question is always asked and never answered, but i’ll ask it again anyway:
how do you KNOW that’s what god tells us? there are others who are
equally convinced that god is telling them something
different than that which you think he’s telling us. how is anyone supposed to be sure what god is
really saying?
And what screen name does Watson go under?
