of exalted feeling and give us a vision of truth too great for
prosaic statement. Christianity would be poorer by the loss of them,
but they are not indigenous to Christianity. They have their parallels
in other religions, some of them much older than the advent of Jesus.
The beautiful legends surrounding the infancy of Gautama, for example,
are startlingly similar to those contained in the first and third
gospels. Like Jesus, the Buddhist messiah is stated to have been of
royal descent and was born of a virgin mother. At his birth a
supernatural radiance illuminated the whole district, and a troop of
heavenly beings sang the praises of the holy child. Later on a wise
man, guided by special portents, recognised him as the long-expected
and divinely appointed light-bringer and life-giver of mankind. When
but a youth he was lost for a time and was found by his father in the
midst of a circle of holy men, sunk in rapt contemplation of the great
mystery of existence. The parallel between these legends and the
Christian version of the marvels attending the birth of Jesus is so
close as to preclude the possibility of its being altogether
accidental. There must have been a connection somewhere, and indeed
there is no need to think otherwise, for nothing is to be gained or
lost by admitting it.

+Christianity not dependent on a virgin birth.+--But why hesitate about
the question? The greatness of Jesus and the value of His revelation
to mankind are in no way either assisted or diminished by the manner of
His entry into the world. Every birth is just as wonderful as a virgin
birth could possibly be, and just as much a direct act of God. A
supernatural conception bears no relation whatever to the moral and
spiritual worth of the person who is supposed to enter the world in
this abnormal way. The credibility and significance of Christianity
are in no way affected by the doctrine of the virgin birth otherwise
than that the belief tends to put a barrier between Jesus and the race
and to make Him something which cannot properly be called human. Those
who insist on the doctrine will find themselves in danger of proving
too much, for, pressed to its logical conclusion, it removes Jesus
altogether from the category of humanity in any real sense. Like many
others, I used to take the position that acceptance or non-acceptance
of the doctrine of the virgin birth was immaterial because Christianity
was quite independent of it