Chapter IV · The Place Of The Virgin Birth In The Third Gospel

In the present chapter we must formulate a theory which shall do justice to the results obtained in the last two chapters. We have argued that the Virgin Birth is not an original element in the Third Gospel, that several passages in it are inconsistent with the doctrine, and that Lk. i. 34 f. is a later insertion. On the other hand we have given reasons for our belief that St. Luke really did write the passage just mentioned, and that in consequence he taught the Virgin Birth. It is useless, we think, to set these results against one another; they are not contradictory. The argument from the linguistic and textual facts will not make one iota of difference to those derived from the treatment and subject-matter of Lk. i, ii, and the latter will not in any way impair the former. Writers who hold fast to the view that St. Luke wrote i. 34 f. have not, in that one contention, answered their opponents, and critics who plead for the hypothesis of non-Lukan interpolation travel much too fast. The final theory must take all the facts into account.