“Also, mention when the angels said, “O Mary, indeed Allah gives you good news of a word from Him, whose name will be the Messiah, Jesus, the son of Mary – distinguished in this world and the Hereafter and among those brought near to Allah. He will speak to the people in the cradle and in maturity and will be of the righteous. “She said, “My Lord, how will I have a child when no man has touched me?” The angel said, “Such is Allah; He creates what He wills. When He decrees a matter, He only says to it, ‘Be,’ and it is. (Qur’an 3:45-47)
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“Also, mention, in the book the story of Mary, when she withdrew from her family to a place toward the east and she took, in seclusion from them, a screen. Then We sent to her Our Angel, and he represented himself to her as a well-proportioned man. She said, “Indeed, I seek refuge in the Most Merciful from you, so leave me, if you should be fearing of Allah. He said, “I am only the messenger of your Lord to give you news of a pure boy. “She said, “How can I have a boy while no man has touched me and I have not been unchaste? “He said, “Thus it will be; your Lord says, ‘it is easy for Me, and We will make him a sign to the people and a mercy from Us. And it is a matter already decreed.” (Qur’an 19:16-21)
As Shaykh Ahmed Deedat (r) has mentioned in his Pamphlet “Is the Bible God’s Word?” page 11:
We do not have the time and space to go into the tens of thousands of — grave or minor —defects that the authors of the Revised Standard Version (RSV) have attempted to revise. We leave that privilege to the Christian scholars of the Bible. Here I will endeavor to cast just a cursory glance at a “half-a-dozen” or so of those “minor” changes.
1. “Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign: Behold, a VIRGIN shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.” (Isaiah 7:14 – AV)
The indispensable “VIRGIN” in the above verse has now been replaced in the RSV with the phrase “a young woman,” which is the correct translation of the Hebrew word almah. Almah is the word that has occurred all along in the Hebrew text and NOT bethulah, which means VIRGIN. This correction is only to be found in the English language translation, as the RSV is only published in this tongue. For the African and the Afrikaner, the Arab and the Zulu, in fact, in the 1500 other languages of the world, Christians are made to continue to swallow the misnomer “VIRGIN.”
The argument goes (from the Jews) and the atheists, for that matter, that if the Gospel writer ‘Matthew’ had been inspired and directed by the Holy Spirit, then he (Matthew) would not have relied upon the Jewish Septuagint for the source of his quote.
Technically, the word almah more than not was used for a young woman that could be married. Being a young, unmarried woman, it was often understood that she was not married and thus, a virgin.
However, those who argue against this state that the word ‘bethulah’, which actually does mean virgin, should have been used in place of ‘almah’, which has the possibility of being a virgin.
The website: Jews for Jesus has the following to say:
https://jewsforjesus.org/publications/issues/issues-v09-n01/almah-virgin-or-young-maiden/
Whereas the web site Jews for Judaism as this short entry:
https://jewsforjudaism.org/knowledge/articles/almah-virgin-and-parthenos
We as Muslims could agree with our Christian apologist and say look, ‘almah’likely means ‘virgin’ and that is good enough.
The reason that it is not good enough is that the author of the ‘Gospel According to Matthew’ had made some huge blunders when being reliant upon the Greek Septuagint.
We will give a clear example: Believe us, there are many!
“When they drew near Jerusalem and came to Bethphage on the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples, saying to them, “Go into the village opposite you, and immediately you will find an ass tethered, and a colt with her. Untie them and bring them here to me. And if anyone should say anything to you, reply, ‘The master has need of them.’ Then he will send them at once. “This happened so that what had been spoken through the prophet might be fulfilled: Say to daughter Zion, ‘Behold, your king comes to you, meek and riding on an ass, and on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden.’ “The disciples went and did as Jesus had ordered them. They brought the ass and the colt and laid their cloaks over them, and he sat upon them. The huge crowd spread their cloaks on the road, while others cut branches from the trees and strewed them on the road. The crowds preceding him and those following kept crying out and saying: “Hosanna to the Son of David; blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord; hosanna in the highest.” And when he entered Jerusalem the whole city was shaken and asked, “Who is this? “And the crowds replied, “This is Jesus the prophet, from Nazareth in Galilee.” (Matthew 21:1-11)
This is disastrous. It is disastrous on several accounts. Whoever wrote the Gospel according to Matthew couldn’t have known the original Hebrew text. Instead, the Greek Septuagint was relied upon resulting in the mistaken belief that the so-called “prophecy” was about Jesus riding upon two donkeys!
Again, look at what Christian scholars have had to say about the matter.
4-5] The prophet: this fulfillment citation is actually composed of two distinct Old Testament texts, Isaiah 62:11 (Say to daughter Zion) and Zechariah 9:9. The ass and the colt are the same animal in the prophecy, mentioned twice in different ways, the common Hebrew literary device of poetic parallelism. Matthew takes them as two is one of the reasons why some scholars think that he was a Gentile rather than a Jewish Christian who would presumably not make that mistake (see Introduction).
7] Upon them: upon the two animals; an awkward picture resulting from Matthew’s misunderstanding of the prophecy.
The source is from: (http://www.usccb.org/nab/bible/matthew/matthew28.htm)
So why could this be a Jewish contention against the Qur’an?
The Core of the Critique.
The criticism, as we’ve laid out, follows this logic:
The Christian Doctrine is Based on a Mistranslation: The Christian belief in a virgin birth prophecy in Isaiah 7:14 relies on the Greek Septuagint’s translation of the Hebrew word almah (young woman) as parthenos (virgin), rather than the more precise Hebrew word for virgin, bethulah.
Matthew’s Error Demonstrates Human Authorship: The author of the Gospel of Matthew (who used the Septuagint) further demonstrates his human fallibility by misreading Zechariah 9:9, thinking it describes two animals (an ass and a colt) instead of one animal described with poetic parallelism.
The Qur’an is Therefore Derivative and Human: Since the Qur’an also affirms the virgin birth, the critic argues that its author simply borrowed this “mistaken” Christian doctrine, which itself is based on a Greek mistranslation of a Hebrew text. This, they claim, proves the Qur’an is a human document from the 7th century, not a divine revelation.
The assumption that the Jew could make is that because Muslims believe in the virgin birth of Mary (May Allah honour her) that the “author of the Qur’an” simply copied the Christian doctrine — which in turn is based upon the Greek Septuagint and has no knowledge of the Hebrew text. Presumably, this makes the Qur’an all too human and not of divine authorship.
The Qur’an is Independent and Authoritative, Not Derivative.
This is the most critical point. The Qur’an does not seek to prove the virgin birth by referencing the Hebrew Bible. It does not say, “And this happened to fulfill what was said by the prophet Isaiah…” as Matthew does.
Instead, the Qur’an narrates the event as a direct, fact revealed by Allah.
We as Muslims have a straightforward response to this. That is that whoever wrote the ‘Gospel according to Matthew’ was quote-mining the Jewish sacred text to get legitimacy for Jesus as the Messiah. Whereas, for us as Muslims, the Qur’an stands independent of any justification for the miraculous birth of Christ Jesus.
Muslims could agree with Christian apologists that almah can imply virginity. However, the Islamic position is stronger: We have no theological need to enter that debate. Our belief is not contingent on the interpretation of a single word in a text that could have been altered. Our belief is based solely on the clear, unambiguous words of the Qur’an:
“She said, ‘How can I have a boy while no man has touched me and I have not been unchaste?’ He said, ‘Thus [it will be]; your Lord says, ‘It is easy for Me…”” (Qur’an 19:20-21)
The Qur’an uses the phrase “while no man has touched me” (وَلَمْ يَمْسَسْنِي بَشَرٌ), which is an explicit, clear statement of virginity that avoids the ambiguity of the Hebrew almah altogether
In other words, Christ Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary. This is our belief as Muslims who believe in the words of the Qur’an.
This was a real event that took place. Where we part with the Christians is this:
The Christians in particular whoever wrote the ‘Gospel according to Matthew’ felt a need to justify this event by reference to the Hebrew scriptures albeit reliance upon the Greek Septuagint.
Conclusion:
The mistakes of Matthew highlight the human process of trying to fit Jesus into Old Testament prophecies, sometimes through forced interpretations and errors from using a translation.
The Qur’an, by contrast, displays none of this. It is entirely self-contained and authoritative. It does not make interpretive errors about Zechariah or Isaiah because it does not reference them in the first place. It simply states the truth of the event as revealed by Allah.
Therefore, the argument that the Qur’an “copied” a mistake actually proves the opposite: its independence from the textual corruptions and human errors that affected the previous scriptures. The Qur’an’s account of the virgin birth is not evidence of its human origin but rather of its divine origin, as it provides a pristine, uncorrupted narrative free from the dilemmas of biblical scholarship.
As Muslims, our belief in this stands apart from needing any proof text or citation from previous scriptures. With Allah is the success!
May Allah (swt) guide the sincere among them so that they do not perish in ever lasting hellfire!
May Allah Guide the Ummah.
May Allah Forgive the Ummah.
Prima Quran 