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To whom did the angel announcing the miraculous conception appear?
Matthew: To Joseph ([i, 20, 21]).
Luke: To Mary ([i, 26–38]).
“An angel did not appear, first to Mary, and also afterwards to Joseph; he can only have appeared either to the one or to the other. Consequently, it is only the one or the other relation which can be regarded as historical. And here different considerations would conduct to opposite decisions.... Every criticism which might determine the adoption of the one, and the rejection of the other, disappears; and we find ourselves, in reference to both accounts, driven back by necessity to the mythical view.”—Strauss.