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Is it likely that a poor working family like Mary and Joseph would have packed up all their belongings and property to travel for days to another city, just to report to the government census?
Would long genealogies have been kept for such people?
The "miraculous conception/birth" story of Christ is a literary technique used in antiquity to display the "greatness" or divinity of a person. Pagan writers used this technique frequently to grand-ize their subjects, often rulers, emperors, etc, to a very faithful, illiterate, and relatively uneducated population of ancient times. Biblical authors were no different. It is an allegorical story to introduce Christ and set him up as a figure of great, divine importance in the same way as any of the other figures written about in this fashion. The literal historical truth of what the story says was certainly not the point of the authors at the time, much less now looking back.
I agree, but I think there is a theological element to it rather than the political- literary device of making demigods of humans. When the Synoptic account was written, Jesus was a messiah driven about like a quad -bike by the spirit of God. There was a gradual development of this meat -puppet Jesus (through the battery -healing Jesus whose miraculous power can be accessed without his consent just by touching the hem of his cloak and the Jesus of Luke who prays to be let off crucifixion to himself, who says 'No') into god incarnate such as we see in John, though this Jesus still cannot do anything by himself but it is the god who inhabits him who does these things.
But the need in Matthew and Luke to have Jesus touch all bases, prophetic, messianic and line-of-Davidic, means that to receive the spirit of God that makes him messiah he has to be sinless himself and so does his mother, like a test tube needs to be sterilized in order to clone a test -tube babe without spot or blemish. This course means that the conception had to be without any nasty sex, let alone it being necessary to scupper any suggestion that Joseph could have been the father, which is why we get all the trashditions of old buffer Joseph or 'guardian' Joseph, even though Matthew makes it clear that, after Jesus was born of indisputable miraculous birth, Joe was aboard her like a cowpoke on a bucking bronco.
Luke's requirement was that Joseph not be the father, Matthew also has to do this, but, rummaging through the Greek -language Septuagint (because he couldn't actually read hebrew), in search of prophecies of Jesus, he came across the infamous Isiah 'parthenos' passage(1) . Well, there was proof positive of a miraculous birth, because Jesus was actually born of a mother who hadn't been Had. It said so right there in Isaiah.
Of course the prophecy relates to the pounding Judea was taking at the hands of Assyria or Babylon at the time and just meant a young woman rather than a parthenos as the Greek had it. Like the other prophecies of jesus, it is nothing whatever to do with him.
(1) I'll check me notes, (2) but, if memory serves, parthenos (virgo intacta) was the only handy Greek word to translate hebrew 'Alma' which means a young woman, virgin or not while 'bethulah' is the hebrew term that should be used to signify a virgo intacta.
(2) yep..looks like the ol' stodge hasn't let me down this time.
Last edited by TRANSPONDER; 12-02-2014 at 07:52 AM..
Well, of course it is all myth. It is a symbolic story, written to justify Jesus as the mythic Jewish Messiah.
And it is rich in symbolism. Virgin Birth (purity), star of Bethlehem (astrology) tax and census (a convenient way to have the character born in Bethlehem, in accordance with ancient prophecy). Not to mention the birth in a stable (humility) the gifts of the magi (knowledge and wealth) the wise guys (knowledge) King Herod (selfishness/egotism) the list goes on.
Oh, and there is no evidence whatsoever, and I mean NONE that king Herod ordered the slaughter of the innocents. But there is overwhelming evidence that he never did, that this is just another embellishment which draws the allusion of Jesus to Moses, and serves to vilify Herod, who was hated by the Jews because he held the throne with no entitlement to it. Plenty of evidence that he DID not od it, further making the story in the Bible into a pure myth, or , as some would say, just plain wrong. Amen.
Actually, the virgin birth of a male offspring in humans is biologically impossible. Any of you scientific types can know why, hint it has to do with xy chromosomes. A virgin birth would always be female, as a y chromosome would have to be present from a male.
Is it likely that a poor working family like Mary and Joseph would have packed up all their belongings and property to travel for days to another city, just to report to the government census?
Would long genealogies have been kept for such people?
Is there any literal truth to the story of Jesus?
From what I understand a census was done every 7 or so years and was very important. Joseph planned on going by himself but Mary insisted that she go with him. I don't think he packed all his belongings, just a few things he needed for the trip. The town they had to go to was not that far, and traveling 4 or 5 days was not a big deal for people during that time. I think the reason all the inns were full was because other people were in town for the census as well.
From what I understand a census was done every 7 or so years and was very important. Joseph planned on going by himself but Mary insisted that she go with him. I don't think he packed all his belongings, just a few things he needed for the trip. The town they had to go to was not that far, and traveling 4 or 5 days was not a big deal for people during that time. I think the reason all the inns were full was because other people were in town for the census as well.
I find this part of the story believable.
LOL. Walking that far for that long when you're that pregnant isn't a big deal?
You'd go just for the fun of it?
OK. If you say so.
And guess what? 4 or days then was as long as 4 or 5 days now. They may have been more accustomed to having to do it but the 'deal' was the same.
LOL. Walking that far for that long when you're that pregnant isn't a big deal?
You'd go just for the fun of it?
OK. If you say so.
And guess what? 4 or days then was as long as 4 or 5 days now. They may have been more accustomed to having to do it but the 'deal' was the same.
She didn't walk, she rode on a donkey. Maybe she didn't go for the fun of it, but instead did not want to be without Joseph in case she gave birth or for other reasons.
No, if you are accustomed to doing something than it is not such a big deal.
Is it likely that a poor working family like Mary and Joseph would have packed up all their belongings and property to travel for days to another city, just to report to the government census?
Jesus of Nazareth was likely born in Nazareth. The only reason Bethlehem is in the narrative is because it was the birthplace of King David. That was important to the later tellers of Jesus' story because Jesus was held (among others) to be the messiah. In 1st century Palestine the Jewish messiah was defined as the liberator of the Jews and the bringer of the "Kingdom of God" to Earth. That didn't mean a messiah was some heavenly deity ... The Kingdom of God meant the establishment on Earth of an independent Jewish state where God could was freely worshipped according to Jewish law. King David was held to be the previous messiah because he liberated the Jews and created a state goverened by Jewish law. Associating Jesus story line with that of King David gave him more of the look and feel of a messiah.
Quote:
Originally Posted by OzzyRules
Is there any literal truth to the story of Jesus?
Historical record? Very little. I think the only real non-biblical reference to Jesus appears in the historian Josephus' writings where he refers to Jesus' brother James as the brother of the messiah. As accurate historical records, the cannonical gospels of Mark, Mathew, Luke and John should probably be taken with a huge grain of salt as they were very likely not written by the people they were attributed to (with the possible exception of Mark). Mathew, Luke and John were written 80-120 yrs after Jesus' death. That's a long time for an oral history to get distorted before it's finally written down.
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