What is the "immaculate conception"

The immaculate conception is mostly associated with the birth of Jesus Christ. As the Bible says, his conception took place without the participation of men, and the virgin Mary, who gave birth to the Holy spirit, was virgin. But even before that there were legends about the miraculous immaculate conception.

Immaculate conception in ancient times.

In ancient times when people still did not significantly known about the biological processes occurring in the body, conception is frequently imagined differently. In ancient myths exist about the occurrence in a woman's body of the embryo. A woman was considered pregnant and had to carry the baby. While expectant mothers are not assigned in the process of conception, the main role of men, they believed that pregnancy may occur, if they held special rituals with sacred stones, water, trees. So there were legends about the virgin birth from water, wood, thunder, sacred attributes.

In other ancient myths, particularly Greek, is the belief that a woman can conceive of a deity which he shall choose it for their intimate pleasures. So the great God of thunder and lightning Zeus would often come to ravish beautiful maidens in different guises: bull, shower of gold, a Swan. Then the girls in due time gave birth to illegitimate children of the thunder. It was also an immaculate conception.

Such cases are mentioned in Eastern mythology. For example, one of the ancient Chinese emperors, as legend has it, was conceived by his mother in that moment, when she stepped on the trail of a giant. The conception of the other emperors from the spirit of the mountains, from the flashes of lightning from the dragon from the egg of a swallow, from falling stars. Accordingly, all these conception was pure, and the causes of conception indicated that future emperors and generals - outstanding personality, talented, unique, close to divine forces.

In the legends of ancient Egypt are also present in the cases of the immaculate conception of some emperors. Even the legendary Zarathushtra's mother conceived, according to legend, from the stalk of the wild plant.

Mongol legends say that Genghis Khan was also immaculately conceived mother - from the sight of deity. The immaculate conception mothers attributed to Plato, Pythagoras, Alexander the great.

In Russian folklore there is also the theme of the immaculate conception. In some tales girls have babies from the magic seed, by the wind, bathing in a magical lake.

Is it possible the virgin birth?

Currently, medicine is disputing the fact of the immaculate conception, believing it to be impossible. I have to say that this phenomenon is not fully understood, as in the modern world there are a few cases when all the facts prove that the conception happened without the direct involvement men, that is, without intercourse.