For bathroom pump,80 gallon hybrid electric heat pump water heater

ater on I will speak of their versions of Christs discourses Now I must confine myseFor bathroom pump,80 gallon hybrid electric heat pump water heaterf to their accounts of a very important subjectChrists supernatural birth

Up to this point I had been reading with little interest doubting whether it would not be better to pass on to the accounts of the resurrection As I have explained above my study of Pauls epistles had not led me to believe that there would be anything miraculous about the birth of Christ The phrase supernatural birth therefore came on me quite unexpectedly What followed riveted my attention Mark as you know says nothing about Christs parentage First he gives as title The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christwhere by the way old Hermas has written in my margin some add Son of God Then there is a Voice from heaven at the moment of Christs baptism heard apparently only by John the Baptist and Jesus Thou art my beloved Son A similar Voice occurs later on Mark represents a blind man as calling Jesus son of David and his fellowtownsmen say Is not this the carpenter the son of Mary This might indicate merely that Joseph the carpenter was dead But Son of Mary might be used in two other ways The enemies of Jesus might use it to sest that he was a bastard The worshippers of Jesus might use it later on to shew that he was a Son of God not born of any human father Matthew has Is not this the carpenters son This however Matthew might222 w not as his own belief but as that of Christs fellowtownsmen Luke who has Is not this Josephs son gives the whole of the narrative quite differently I should add that the first Voice from heavFor bathroom pump,80 gallon hybrid electric heat pump water heatern is differently given in some copies of Luke I examined this at once My copy had a marginal note Some have Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee

You see said Scaurus in these early divergences traces of early differences as to the time and manner in which Jesus became the Son of God Paul appears to me to have believed that the sonship preexisted in heaven God he says in the fulness of time sent forth His son born of a woman born under the law that he might redeem those that were under the law In Job born of a woman implies imperfection or mortality In Paul born of a woman and born under the law imply two selfhumiliations undergone by the Son of God Pauls view is that the Redeemer must needs make himself one with those whom he redeems Since the Jews were not only born of a woman but also born under the law the Son of God came down from heaven and placed himself under both these humiliationFor bathroom pump,80 gallon hybrid electric heat pump water heater Paul therefore seems to have regarded the divine birth as taking place in heaven from the beginning but the human birth as a selfhumbling on earth wherein the Son of God becomes incarnate in the form of the son of Joseph of the seed of David after the flesh

This had been my inference from Pauls epistles as I have said above But what followed was quite new to me You are aware from Pauls epistles that Christ is regarded by him as preeminently the Seed of Promise Isaac being merely the type Well listen to what Philo a Jew somewhat earlier than Paul declares about the birth of Isaac Philo says The Lord begot Isaac Philo describes Sarah as becoming pregnant when alone and visited by GoFor bathroom pump,80 gallon hybrid electric heat pump water heater It was God also he says who opened the womb of Leah Moses too having received Zipporah finds her pregnant by no mortal All this is of course quite distinct from our popular stories of the love affairs of Jupiter You may see this from Philos context It is fitting that God should converse in an opposite manner to that223 of men with a nature undefiled unpolluted and pure the genuine Virgin For whereas the cohabitation of men makes virgins wives lit women on the other when God begins to associate with a soul what was wife before He now makes Virgin again I could quote other instances but these will suffice Now I ask you to reflect how such language as this would be interpreted in the west not only by slaves but even by people of education unaccustomed to the language of the east but faFor bathroom pump,80 gallon hybrid electric heat pump water heateriliar with our western stories of the births of Hercules Castor and Pollux Bacchus and others

I saw at once that the language would be liable to be taken literally But on the other it seemed to me that no disciple of Paul could accept anything like our western stories Scaurus had cipated an objection of this kind in his next words You must not suppose however that Hebrew literature contains or that Jewish or Christian thought would tolerate such stories as those in Ovid Nor will you find anything of this kind in Matthew and Luke to whose narratives we will now pass Matthew says rather abruptly that Joseph finding Mary his betrothed but not yet his wife to be with child and intending to put her away secretly received a vision of an angel and a voice bidding him not to fear to take to himself Mary his wife for she was with child from the Holy Spirit and she will bring forth a child and thou shalt call his name Jesus Luke after a much longer introduction about which I shall speak presently says that a vision and a voice came to Maryhe does not mention one to Josephbidding her not to fear and saying Thou shalt conceive and bring forth a child and shalt call his name Jesus In theory it is of course possible that two similar visions might come one to Mary and another to Joseph bidding both not to fear But Matthew adds something that points to an entirely different explanation Now all this hath come to pass that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet saying Behold the virgin shall be with child and shall bring forth a son and they shall call his name Emmanuel

These words I had myself read in Isaiah and had taken as referring to a promise made in the context namely that in a224 short timetwo or three years just time enough for a child to be conceived and to be born and to grow up to the age when it could say father and motherthe kings of Syria and Samaria would be destroyed Accordingly Isaiah says that he himself married a wife immediately afterwards and that the prophecy was fulfilled Having recently read these words more than once I was prepared to find that Scaurus interpreted them in the same way He added that the most learned of the Jews themselves did the same and that the Hebrew does not mention virgin but young woman This said he I heard from a learned rabbi who added The LXX is full of blunders but we are hoping for a more faithful rendering from a very learned scholar named Aquila which will probably appear soon Here I may say that this translation has actually appearedit came out about ten years agoin quite unreale Greek but very faithful to the Hebrew and it renders the word not virgin but young woman as Scaurus had said

It was this very rendering that caused a coolness between me and Justin of Samaria It happened I am sorry to say shortly before he suffered for the sake of the Saviour in this present year in which I am writing I chanced to meet him coming out of the school of Diodorus in his philosophers cloak as usual but hot and flustered not looking at all like a philosopher Some peopleJews to judge by their faceswere jeering and pointing after him in mockery Justinfurious with them but also as I thought worried and uncomfortable in himselfappealed to me I have been contending for the Lord said he against these dogs They flout and mock me for demonstrating how fraudulently and profanely they have mutilated the Holy Scriptures cancelling some parts and altering others when translating them into Greek Then he instanced this very passage in which he said the Jews had vilely corrupted the rendering of the Hebrew from virgin to young woman I would have kept silence but as he pressed me to say whether I did not agree with him I was obliged to reply that I did not and I added that not only Aquila rendered it thus but other good scholars many of225 them Christians Upon this he flung away from me in disgust without one word of salutation and I never saw him again

The fact was he had committed himself in writing about ten years before to this false charge against the Jews and to many other baseless accusations There was no way out of it now but either to retract or to face it out He was a brave man and knew how to face death But he was not brave enough to allow himself to be conquered by facts Samaritan by birth he had something of the Samaritanbut not of the Good Samaritanin his hatred of the Jews Had he loved the truth as much as he hated those whom he called truths enemies he would perhaps have gone on to cease from his hate and would have become no less faithful as a Christian than as a martyr

Now I must return to Scaurus Luke said he was an educated man and saw at once that this prophecy about the virgin did not apply So he omitted it This he had a right to do It was only an evangelists opinion not a statement of anything that had actually occurred But there remained the tradition of fact namely that an angel had appeared and had announced the future birth of a child begotten from the Holy Spirit Luke regarded this announcement as made to the mother like the announcementsnot the same of course but similarmade to Sarah Rebecca and the mothers of Samson and Samuel Moreover in Matthews accountas I judge from Hermass marginal notesthere are many variations some of which leave it open to believe that the utterance to Joseph like that to Abraham before Isaacs birth referred merely to Gods spiritual generating so that Jesus though the Son of God according to the spirit was yet according to the flesh the son of David by descent from Joseph Luke expresses his disagreement from this view by giving various utterances of Mary and the angel at such length that they may be called hymns or poems And indeedif judged liberally an