The silence on the Virgin-Birth can
occasion, one would think, no real difficulty. His Gospel is a
supplementary record, and he does not, for the most part, repeat
historical statements already made by the other Evangelists. It
seems altogether impossible to suppose that St. John was ignorant
of the Virgin-Birth. Ignatius, who was Bishop of Antioch quite at
the beginning of the second century, and therefore only a few
years after the writing of this Gospel, calls it (the
Virgin-Birth) a mystery of open proclamation in the Church.
(Eph., 19.) Indeed, on any theory of the date or authorship of
this Gospel, there is every reason for believing that the
Virgin-Birth was, at the time it was compiled, part and parcel of
the tradition of the Church. But when St. John does speak of the
Incarnation, in the prologue to his Gospel, when he says, "The
Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us," (St. John i. 14.) there
is nothing in these words to suggest anything inconsistent with
the miraculous story related by St. Matthew and St. Luke. In fact,
we may say more than this. We may say that his teaching about the
Pre-existent Divine Logos who "was made flesh, and dwelt among
us," is felt to be a natural explanation of St. Matthew's
narrative as well as of St. Luke's; for, as we shall see, it is
the question of the Divine Pre-existence of the Logos on which the
reasonableness of the doctrine of the Virgin-Birth really turns.
St. John does, in fact, in connection with this mystery of the
Virgin-Birth, what he does in the case of Baptism and the Holy
Eucharist, "he supplies the justifying principle--in this case the
principle of the Incarnation--without supplying what was
already current and well known, the record of the fact."*

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* Gore, Dissertations, p. 8, seq.
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And it may be added, further, that Mary's word at Cana of Galilee:
"They have no wine," and her subsequent order to the servants:
"Whatsoever He saith unto you, do it," (St. John ii. 3, 5.)
are a clear indication that in the view of St. John she regarded
Him as a miraculous Person, and expected of Him miraculous action.+
I think that, in regard to the Gospels, their relationship to
one another may be summed up in the words of Bishop Alexander:
"The fact of the Incarnation is recorded by St. Matthew and
St. Luke; it is assumed by St. Mark; the idea which vitalizes
the fact is dominant in St. John."^

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+ Gore, loc. cit.
^ Bishop Alexander's Leading Ideas, Introd.