I
grew up on a dairy farm where we milked about seventy-five cows twice a day. No
adult bull ever set foot on our farm, yet, each spring, our cows delivered
about seventy-five calves—all by artificial insemination—all born to virgin
cows. According to Merriam-Wester, a virgin is “a female animal that has never
copulated,” i.e., never engaged “in sexual intercourse.” By definition, every
one of our cows was a virgin, yet each produced a calf by virgin birth roughly
annually. For me, growing up on a dairy farm, it’s not at all difficult to
believe in a virgin birth. For humans, Merriam-Webster also defines a virgin as
“a person who has not had sexual intercourse.” Therefore, by definition, Mary
gave birth to the Savior without ever having had sexual intercourse. Currently,
artificial insemination is fairly common in humans, occurring as many as 50,000
times per year (Yadegaran, Jessica, “No Mr. Right? More women start families
via artificial insemination,” Mercury News, 13 Aug. 2010. This is an
estimate, because the fertility industry is not required to report on these
statistics). Mary contributed 23 chromosomes, one of which was an “X”
chromosome, toward her son. The other 23 chromosomes, including the “Y”
chromosome, came from Jesus’s father—God. Because we believe that Mary was a
virgin, we do not believe that this occurred through sexual intercourse—but that
is not the only way 23 chromosomes from a male can combine with the 23 female
chromosomes from a male can combine with the 23 female chromosomes. If we, as
mere mortals, can figure out how to produce offspring in virgins, it is, in our
modern society, not at all difficult to believe that God could also accomplish
such a feat.
We
do know, however, that the 23 female chromosomes and 23 male chromosomes have
to be compatible and able to pair up very closely in order for mitosis (a
critical part of cell division) to occur in the developing embryo, the next
human being. The implication here is that God, being the biological father of
Jesus Christ, contributed 23 chromosomes that were enough compatible with Mary’s
23 chromosomes for mitosis to occur in Jesus’s cells. (Trent Dee Stephens, The
Immortal Messiah: The Physiology of Resurrected Beings [Springville, Utah:
CFI, 2022], 33)
