Biblical Hebrew Forum

["JAMES CHRISTIAN READ" <JCR128 AT student.anglia.ac.uk>]

Yigal wrote
I think that Kevin's comment is right to the point. The "prophecy" involved 
is not about the birth of the boy, but about the fact that within a fairly 
short time God will make the threat posed by the kings of Israel and Aram go 
away. The message is really, "have faith, life will go on as usual, all will 
be okay". And as part of the normalcy, I would assume that the 'almah in 
question was one of the (young) women of the court, whose pregnancy was not 
to be considered out of the ordinary: "See, that there girl is pregnant and 
will have a boy...". That considered, I would assume that she would have 
been married, although if someone WAS to show that the term 'almah always 
refers to an unmarried young woman (I don't think that this has yet been 
proven) that would be fine with me as well.
END QUOTE


I agree that the prophecy is in connection with an act 
of salvation. And I agree that the girls pregnancy was 
a sign that this salvation would be coming quickly.

However, any speculation about who the woman was is
exactly that, pure speculation.

The context talks about a sign. We usually believe a
prophets ability to predict salvation if he can also
predict another event. Isaiah's ability to predict a
'alma' getting pregnant out of the blue proved his
ability to predict the salvation which would quickly
follow.

The sign would have no meaning if it were merely 'some
random woman who is already married will get pregnant'
to which you can imagine the sarcastic reaction of
critics would be 'Wow! Fancy that! A married woman
getting pregnant? Never before have I heard of such a
miraculous sign. You truly are god's spokesman Isaiah.
I can't believe I doubted you for a minute.'