Passage

Isaiah 7.14

Book: Isaiah · NASB95

Verse

"Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, a virgin will be with child and bear a son, and she will call His name Immanuel." (Isaiah 7:14, NASB95)

Immediate context (±2 verses)

NASB95 (NASB95)

"12. But Ahaz said, 'I will not ask, nor will I test the Lord!'"

"13. Then he said, 'Listen now, O house of David! Is it too slight a thing for you to try the patience of men, that you will try the patience of my God as well?'"

"14. Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, a virgin will be with child and bear a son, and she will call His name Immanuel."

"15. He will eat curds and honey at the time He knows enough to refuse evil and choose good."

"16. For before the boy will know enough to refuse evil and choose good, the land whose two kings you dread will be forsaken." (Isaiah 7:12-16, NASB95)

Setting

Speaker: Isaiah the prophet, addressing King Ahaz of Judah on behalf of YHWH.
Audience: "the house of David", Ahaz specifically, by extension the Davidic dynasty as a whole.
Location: Jerusalem, at "the conduit of the upper pool, on the highway to the fuller's field" (Isaiah 7:3).
Time period: the Syro-Ephraimite War, c. 734-732 BC. Pekah of Israel and Rezin of Aram (Syria) had allied against Judah, attempting to depose Ahaz and replace him with a puppet king. Ahaz, against Isaiah's counsel, was preparing to seek aid from Tiglath-Pileser III of Assyria.

Theological reading

The verse is one of the most contested Christological prophecies in the OT, central to the Christian apologetic for the virgin birth and central to Jewish-Christian disputes over translation and fulfillment.

The lexical question, almah vs bethulah:

The Hebrew is ha-almah (הָעַלְמָה, H5959, "the almah"). Two competing translations:

"Virgin" (LXX parthenos, traditional Christian): the almah is sexually inviolate.
"Young woman" (modern critical / Jewish): almah simply means a young woman of marriageable age, with virginity implied but not lexically required, Hebrew has another word for "virgin" specifically: bethulah (H1330).

The case for "virgin":

LXX (c. 250 BC), Jewish translators chose parthenos (the unambiguous Greek word for virgin), pre-Christian, pre-controversy. The LXX is the strongest early witness.
Every other OT use of almah (Genesis 24:43; Exodus 2:8; Psalm 68:25; Proverbs 30:19; Song 1:3; 6:8) is consistent with virginity, there is no clear case where almah names a non-virgin.
The "sign" demanded by the context: a sign from God to the house of David would be unimpressive if it were merely "a young woman will get pregnant" (which happens daily). The sign requires something exceptional, a virgin conceiving.

The case for "young woman":

Almah is not the technical term for "virgin" (bethulah is). If virginity were the point, bethulah would be expected.
The original 8th-century context required a near-fulfillment in Ahaz's lifetime, the boy must reach age-of-discernment before the threat is removed (v. 16, fulfilled c. 732 BC). A miraculous virgin birth doesn't fit the timeline.

The Christian harmonization: dual fulfillment (typological / sensus plenior). Isaiah 7 has a near-term fulfillment (perhaps Isaiah's own son in Isaiah 8:3, Maher-shalal-hash-baz, or Ahaz's son Hezekiah), and a far-term, fuller fulfillment in Christ. Matthew 1:23 explicitly identifies Christ as Isaiah 7:14's fulfillment, citing the LXX parthenos. The pattern of dual fulfillment is well-attested in OT-NT use (e.g., Hosea 11:1 quoted in Matthew 2:15).

Patristic. Justin Martyr (Dialogue with Trypho 67-68, 84, c. AD 160) writes one of the earliest Christian-Jewish exchanges on this verse. Trypho argues that almah doesn't mean parthenos; Justin appeals to the LXX and to the demand of "a sign" from God. The patristic majority (Tertullian Against the Jews 9; Eusebius Demonstration of the Gospel VII.1) follows Justin: the LXX parthenos is decisive, and Matthew's NT use confirms the Christian reading.

Reformed. Calvin (Isaiah commentary, ad loc.) treats the prophecy as primarily and ultimately Christological: "let us know that Isaiah here points out something more than what was usual… he proclaims a striking miracle." Modern evangelical scholarship (J. A. Motyer, The Prophecy of Isaiah, 1993; John Oswalt, Isaiah NICOT, 1986) defends the dual-fulfillment / Christological reading against the purely-near-fulfillment alternative.

Modern apologetic. Michael Brown (Answering Jewish Objections to Jesus, vol. 3, 2003), Mitch Glaser, and the apologetic tradition develop the lexical and contextual case for the virgin reading. Key argument: the LXX translators were Jewish, pre-Christian, and chose parthenos, a translation choice they could have avoided if "young woman" had been the obvious sense.

"Immanuel", God with us

The name itself: Immanu El (עִמָּנוּ אֵל), with us + God. The name is not merely a title but a theological claim. Whoever this child is, His very name asserts that God is with His people. Matthew 1:23 makes the connection explicit: "they shall call His name Immanuel, which translated means, 'God with us.'" Christ as Immanuel is the substantial fulfillment, God incarnate, present with humanity in flesh. The dual-fulfillment near-context name is signifying God's presence; Christ is the reality God-with-us in person.

Key words

H5959 - almah, almah (young woman / virgin)
H1330 - bethulah, bethulah (the technical term for virgin), the contrasting term
H6005 - immanuel (pending), Immanu El (God with us), composite name
H4899 - mashiach, mashiach (anointed), broader messianic vocabulary