Well, it’s that time of year again. Regular church attendees are going to have to share their pews with people who have finally decided to make it out for their second service of the year. Their belief that Jesus bled and died so they can gain eternal salvation might be unshakable, but it apparently isn’t all that motivating, considering how little these believers seem to do in response. Nevertheless, they can at least be counted on to show up for a retelling of Jesus’s miraculous birth.
But what version will they hear? More than likely, they’ll hear a “Hollywood” version of the tale that incorporates the most exciting elements of the two versions that we read about in Matthew and Luke. A quick Google search turned up this one, which illustrates my point perfectly. But what if someone tried to tell the full version? A version that included every detail that both Matthew and Luke provide?
Honestly, it just can’t be done. I had wanted to attempt it here, but there’s just no practical way to do it. For example, the version I linked to above goes like this:
The Standard Tale
- Mary’s visited by an angel who tells her about the pregnancy (Luke)
- She and Joseph live in Nazareth of Galilee, but are forced to travel to Bethlehem in Judea for a census commanded by the Roman authorities (Luke)
- They’re unable to find normal accommodations and are forced to room in an area intended for livestock. Mary gives birth there and is visited by local shepherds (Luke)
- Wise men far to the east see a star that somehow signifies the birth of the Jewish Messiah (Matthew)
- They travel for an unspecified period until they reach Jerusalem, where they inquire about the child (Matthew)
- These inquiries reach Herod, the ruler of the region, and he asks the wise men to send back word to him once they find the child, so Herod himself can also pay his respects (Matthew)
- The wise men make their way to Bethlehem, find the family, bestow their gifts, and return home via a different route (Matthew)
- An angel tells Joseph to hightail it out of Bethlehem, because Herod’s sending a posse to wipe out all the children 2 years old and under in an effort to stamp out Jesus (Matthew)
- Joseph and his family flee to Egypt and remain there until an angel tells him it’s safe to return, because Herod has died (Matthew)
- Joseph intends to go back toward Bethlehem, but after finding out that Herod’s son is in charge, he takes the family to Nazareth in Galilee (Matthew)
So what’s wrong with this story? I mean, it’s very cohesive, and it makes for a compelling tale. What’s not to like? Its only real problem is that the very books of the Bible that provide its details, contradict its overall narrative.
Two Very Different Stories
Let’s go back to Luke’s version. After Jesus’s birth and the visit from the shepherds, we don’t read about wise men or Herod’s animosity. Instead, Luke 2:22 says that after the days of Mary’s purification were over, the family went to Jerusalem. The “days of purification” are referring to Leviticus 12:1-4, where the Law of Moses stated that a woman was to be considered “unclean” for 40 days after giving birth to a male child. So when Jesus was about 40 days old, Luke claims that they all traveled to Jerusalem to offer sacrifices as thanks for his birth. While there, two elderly people see Jesus and begin proclaiming praise and prophecies concerning Jesus. And there’s no indication that an effort was made to keep any of this quiet, which is very different in tone to what we read in Matthew. Finally, in Luke 2:39, we read “And when they had performed everything according to the Law of the Lord, they returned into Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth.” We’ll come back to this point in a moment.
The synopsis we looked at earlier incorporated most of Matthew’s version of the story. As we just read, his story ends very differently from Luke’s. However, it’s also significant to note that Matthew gives no indication that Joseph and Mary are from Nazareth. Matt 1:18 through the end of the chapter talks about Mary’s pregnancy, even though she and Joseph had never slept together, but it never specifies where they’re living. Chapter 2 begins with the sentence “Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, saying, ‘Where is he who has been born king of the Jews?'” Of course, it’s possible that Matthew still knew they were originally from Nazareth and just doesn’t bother to tell us that or divulge how they got to Bethlehem in the first place. But there are three context clues that point against such a possibility. First of all, regardless of how far the wise men had to journey, it likely took them quite a while to make the trip. When Matthew says “the east” he certainly doesn’t mean “east Jersualem,” and travel being what it was back then, any journey would have taken considerable time. The second clue is that Herod supposedly kills all the male children of Bethlehem who are 2 and under. So it’s unlikely that we’re supposed to still be thinking of Jesus as a newborn. Finally, Matthew says that when the family was able to leave Egypt, Joseph wanted to go back to Judea (where Bethlehem is). But after finding out Herod’s son was ruling, he became afraid and “went and lived in a city called Nazareth” (Matt 2:23). This is a very strange way to refer to Nazareth, if it’s where Joseph and Mary were already living.
So Matthew gives no indication that Joseph and Mary were just visiting Bethlehem. He never mentions a manger; instead, he references a house that they were staying in. He never talks about the shepherds from the fields, but has wise men who visit the child. He includes a story about Herod slaughtering a town’s children, though no other historical or biblical source ever mentions this. He claims that the family flees to Egypt until Herod’s death, that they want to return to Bethlehem, but finally settle in “a city called Nazareth.”
Luke, on the other hand, says that Nazareth is their home town, and they’re only visiting Bethlehem. He has no story about wise men, but does talk about shepherds from the fields that visit the newborn Jesus. Instead of Herod attempting to hunt them down and a subsequent flight to Egypt, the family travels straight to Jerusalem, where Herod lives. And there’s no effort to keep Jesus’s identity secret while they’re there, as two elderly prophets begin proclaiming who he is. And after making their sacrifices, the family simply goes back home to Nazareth, far from Herod’s reach (not that Luke indicates Herod’s even interested).
Can These Stories Be Put Together?
The main sticking points between the stories are the flight to Egypt and the trip to Jerusalem. On the one hand, Luke is very clear about his timeline: Jesus was only about 40 days old when they went to Jerusalem and then went home to Nazareth. Matthew doesn’t give specifics on how old Jesus was when the family was forced to flee to Egypt, except that it must have occurred before he was 2 years old.
Could the trip to Egypt have happened before the trip to Jerusalem?
No. First of all, considering all the details Luke provides, why would he have left out such an important event? Secondly, this means Herod would have needed to die within the 40 day purification period, but Matthew tells us that this still wouldn’t have been good enough, because Joseph was determined to avoid all of Judea while Herod’s son was reigning. There’s simply no way he would have felt safe enough to travel directly into Jerusalem. That just makes no sense.
Could the trip to Egypt have happened after the trip to Jerusalem?
No. Luke 2:39 is clear that the family went straight back to Nazareth after their trip to Jerusalem. And considering Luke claimed that Nazareth was already their home, why would they have needed to go back to Bethlehem anyway?
In fact, Luke’s claim that the family was from Nazareth creates a lot of problems for Matthew’s account. Nazareth was far outside of Herod’s reach. So if Herod really had hunted Jesus in Bethlehem, the family could have simply gone back to Nazareth rather than flee to Egypt. But this isn’t a consideration in Matthew’s account, because for him, the family has never been to Nazareth until they simply can’t go back to Bethlehem anymore, even after Herod’s death (Matt 2:23).
Additional Problems
I don’t want to spend too much time here, but for completeness sake, I need to mention a couple of historical issues. Both Matthew and Luke say that Jesus is born during the reign of Herod the Great. Historians usually place his death in 4 BCE, which means Jesus would have been born sometime before that. However, Luke says that Mary and Joseph had traveled to Bethlehem, because Quirinius, the governor of Syria, had commanded a census. However, Quirinius didn’t become governor of Syria until 6 CE — 10 years after Herod’s death. You can find additional resources about these two issues here.
Finally, Luke’s claim is that this census required Joseph to travel back to his ancestral home of Bethlehem, since he was of King David’s lineage. But David would have lived some 1000 years before Joseph. It’s ludicrous to think that the Romans would have cared about such a thing, or that they would have wanted their empire to be so disrupted by having people move around like that for a census. It would have been an impossible feat and would have made for a highly inaccurate, and therefore useless, census.
What Do We Make of All This?
The easiest way to understand why these accounts have such major differences in detail is to understand why either writer bothered with a story about Jesus’s birth at all. You have to remember that the writers of Matthew and Luke didn’t know one another and didn’t know that they were both working on the same material. They certainly didn’t know that their books would one day show up in the same collection. Both of them were working with two basic facts: Micah 5:2 seemed to prophesy that the Messiah would come from Bethlehem; Jesus came from Nazareth (John 1:45-46).
Since those two facts were at odds with one another, it’s easy to see how both writers would have been compelled to explain how Jesus could be from Nazareth but still be from Bethlehem. Unfortunately for them, close comparison shows that both versions simply can’t be true.
How would people react if they showed up for church this weekend and were presented with the full details from both of these stories? I like to think it would spur many of them into deeper study. That it would possibly make them question some of the things they’ve been taking for granted. But 2016 has been pretty demoralizing when it comes to the number of people who seem concerned about what’s true, and I’m not sure how many of them would see this information as a call to action. I know there are people who can be changed by facts. Perhaps there aren’t as many of them as I once thought, but I know they’re out there. And with the way information spreads these days, I’m sure they’ll eventually find the facts they’re looking for.
Finding Truth 
nate , i sent a comment to bart ehrman, i wrote :
Dr ,
the apologists want to smash the narratives together to create one account.
the baby is taken to palestine.
the magi find the child in a house in BETHLEHEM
how old is the child?
quote :
Herod asked when the star appeared. Then he had children who were up to two years old executed — based on the time of the star’s appearing. If the star appeared as an omen, then Jesus was born two years before. This is not hard.
end quote
so between infant jesus and 2 year old jesus, we can expect that religious jew like joseph did attend the yearly passover, right?
after all, bethlehem is 7.1 km from jerusalem
luke says :
41 Now every year his parents went to Jerusalem for the festival of the Passover. 42 And when he was twelve years old, they went up as usual for the festival.
“they WENT UP AS USUAL”
are the words “as USUAL ” in the greek? the translation came from the NRSV
“as usual” implies a habit which was practised BEFORE the child reached 12 years of age, right?
so my understanding is that between 2-12 age range of jesus, joseph had to miss the annual TRIPS to jerusalem. ANYTIME between these years there must have been a danger in visiting JUDEA.
do you agree?
when the text says, “he was afraid to go there,” then what sense would it make that he did go there to celebrate passover? if someone is afraid to go there, but still goes there ,then do we write , “he was afraid to go there” ?
does that make any sense?
btw ehrman clearly thinks there are problems :
Yes, that’s obvoiusly a problem — but Luke doesn’t have that business with Archelaus. That’s in Matthew. If Matthew is right about Archelaus then it’s hard to see how Luke can be right about an annual pilgrimage.
LikeLiked by 1 person
correction*
so between the age of infant jesus and 2 year old jesus, we can expect that religious jew like joseph did attend the yearly passover, right?
LikeLike
ColorStorm,
you said,
“The word of God has no competitor, and maybe you have not noticed, believers are not instructed to cut off the heads of ‘enemies,’ such as the bastard religion aka is-lam.”
Depends on which believers you’re referring to. Like nate mentioned, the OT directed believers to execute infidels on occasion. And I guess it depends on which god and which divine text you grow up around too, right? Now, if you want to show how your god and your divine are different, better, and better yet, actually divine, then I’d be interested to listen. Merely saying, “it’s the best,” is just a claim that anyone can make – now support that claim, if you can.
you also said,
“There are also no long standing issues with Daniel.”
Hm, that’s an interesting take for someone who’s routinely criticized others for being lazy and not doing their research. To start, you can check out nate’s series on it and you can just google, “issues with the book of daniel.”
LikeLiked by 2 people
@CS
”The word of God has no competitor, and maybe you have not noticed, believers are not instructed to cut off the heads of ‘enemies,’ such as the bastard religion aka is-lam.”
Here is undeniable proof from this contemporary documentary smuggled out of 1st century Palestine. I think you owe Nate an apology.
LikeLiked by 1 person
A few assorted responses to various people.
CS: You are precious. Don’t ever change. Terrible apologists who can’t make a straightforward argument or address straightforward criticisms, but who nevertheless act condescending towards people who raise those issues are terrific for making new atheists. I am somewhat confused about why a self-professed Christian thinks this is Christ-like behavior, but perhaps being “prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect,” (1 Peter) and letting “your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person” (Colossians) just aren’t that important to you.
I think this link sums up the conversation others have attempted to have with you.
Gary and Unklee and Nate: To add a bit to what you have all said about the resurrection belief…
This has always seemed to me to be an extraordinarily weak argument, for a few reasons.
First, apart from the OT reference to resurrections, there are also numerous NT reference to resurrections. Lazarus (John 11), the widow’s son (Luke 7), Jairus’ daughter (Matthew 9), Tabitha (Acts 9), Eutychus (Acts 20).
Second, even if the concept of a resurrection would not have been normal for 1st century Jews, I think it’s strange to suggest that they could not have come up with the concept. Innovation is a pretty routine aspect of religions. I doubt 7th century Arabs believed horses could fly, and yet they came up with the idea that Mohammed regularly rode a winged horse. Polygamy was reviled by 19th century Americans, but Joseph Smith managed to make it a religious doctrine for Mormons.
And third, in Corinthians 15, Paul describes Jesus as “raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.” Remember, many Jews at the time (apart from, I believe, the Sadducees) did believe there would be a resurrection of some sort at the end of the age. Acts 23 specifically says the Pharisees believed in the idea of a resurrection. And the Jesus movement was an apocalyptic one. They believed the end times were upon them and the resurrection of the dead would happen very soon. So believing that Jesus was resurrected would fit perfectly with their belief that the larger resurrection was about to happen. They would have just believed it was the beginning of the resurrection that many (or perhaps most) Jews expected.
Eventually, that belief in an end times resurrection had to evolve in order to accommodate the fact that the resurrection of the dead that Jews did believe in was not happening. But nothing about the belief is inconsistent with what Jews at the time believed.
And fourth, even if we take the Gospel stories at face value, it’s clear that people who did not see Jesus did believe. Heck, Jesus even said “blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.” (gJohn 20). So, it’s difficult to make the argument that people would not believe in a resurrection if they had not seen it themselves.
Heathcliff I appreciate the discrepancy you point out and I agree that both stories cannot be perfectly accurate. However, I would note that Archelaus was only the ruler of Judea until about 6 CE, at which point he was deposed and banished. So it could be plausible (within the narrative of the story) for Jesus parents to be comfortable traveling to Jerusalem every year at that point, and one could argue that the “every year” referred to their behavior from 6 CE onward. Or one could argue that Joseph was afraid to go to Judea for a period, but that he was comfortable in later years since presumably nobody in Jerusalem would recognize them at that point.
Of course, the more likely answer is that these are two very different stories and there’s no point in trying to reconcile them because they don’t purport to tell the same story. The gMatthew story is just a typological contrivance to make Jesus fit various Old Testament stories, and the gLuke version is his own, less typologically driven, invention. In fact, it seems to me that the attempts to reconcile these stories only detract from understanding the theological points each author was trying to make. These harmonizations flatten the stories and make the Bible less interesting than it really is.
Gary Regarding your insult, I couldn’t guess, but I could Google it! But that feels like cheating, so I’ll leave the reveal to you. 🙂
LikeLiked by 4 people
my questions
if joseph was in BETHLEHEM and the CHILD was 2 years old, then between the age 0-2 would a jewish father like joseph go to the passover considering that jerusalem would be 7 km away?
LikeLike
Hi Jon, just a brief comment. I don’t have any strong commitment to how unique the christian belief in resurrection was. I have reported my general understanding of what Wright says, but I don’t know enough to comment further either way. But I do think we need to recognise the difference between resuscitation, where people are brought back to this life and will one day die again, and resurrection, where people go on to a new life and don’t have to die again. I think all the examples you have given were resuscitation.
LikeLike
Probably so. I think trying to match probability with the specific narratives in the gospels is a fool’s errand, though. Neither gLuke nor gMatt are particularly likely in their particulars and certainly not both of them. So, from a “what really happened” perspective, the answer is probably “we don’t know, but definitely not everything claimed by the gospels.” But if your purpose is to argue against apologists for the Christian narrative, then probability doesn’t enter their equation. They operate on the “it could have happened, therefore it happened” hermeneutic.
LikeLike
i am asking from theoretically perspective.
if it is argued that herod died soon after joseph left, then his sons rule would have been in its early days, right?
if it is argued that herod’ sons rule was in rule long after the death of herod, then joseph would have been in egypt for a long time,right?
LikeLike
I appreciate that distinction, Unklee, but I don’t see it’s relevance. Further, it definitely would not be relevant if they (as Paul said) believed that Jesus was simply the first to be raised. The end-times resurrection had them resurrected into their eternal bodies and so it would be strange indeed for Jews to believe Jesus was the first resurrection of the end times without believing his new body was eternal.
My point is only that a resurrection belief was not a novelty. There was plenty of precedent of various sorts, and the zeitgeist (apocalypticism) would have made them very receptive to the idea that it had begun and it did so with the resurrection of their leader.
LikeLiked by 4 people
UnkelE,
Does the difference between resuscitation and Resurrection really mean that much in terms of proving anything?
I thought one of the Greek gods died and came back to life again and again, but I don’t even think that’s the point – like Jon pointed out, people are innovative, so a new take or detail in some story or belief doesn’t mean “Must be True,” or else the creatures in every sci-fi story would be true, because they hadn’t been thought of before. “No man would have dreamed those up.”
Uniqueness and innovation do not equate “from god” or “true” or else all that would mean is that there are many gods and many true religions and superstitions. But we know that isn’t so.
Plus, what about the things in Christianity that are similar (some even say borrowed) from places? Does the opposite of uniqueness and innovation implyanything?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Heathcliff
I don’t recall off-hand how long Jesus was said to have been in Egypt. Regardless, Herod the Great died in 4 BCE, and Archelaus reigned from 4 BCE to 6 CE. I don’t think there’s much dispute about those dates. So if Joseph returned while Archelaus was still in charge of Judea, then it would have been sometime before 6 CE.
Course, Luke also has Jesus born during the census of Quirinius, which began in 6 CE when Rome took over the Judean territory directly, so perhaps Jesus was born again!
I think there’s a decent argument that this is the most impossible-to-reconcile discrepancy in the Bible. But I think most Christians would just wave it away with “I’m sure it’s correct, even if I don’t understand how.”
LikeLiked by 1 person
how many years between
4 BCE to 6 CE.
?
about 10 years?
LikeLike
It depends on how you count it (what part of the year? do you count 4 and 6? Do you count partial years? etc), but I’d say it’s either 9 or 10 years.
LikeLike
Jon, I just wanted to say that I love the bunny-puzzle analogy you posted! I’d never seen that before, but it’s perfect. 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hi William, I’m afraid I don’t have answers to most of your questions. I just think there is a clear difference between resuscitation and resurrection, whether that tells us anything else or not.
LikeLike
‘how many years between
4 BCE to 6 CE.’
The interesting trivia point is that there is no year zero, so we go straight from 1 BC to 1 AD. Actually shame on me I am using the old reference system and not the Before Common Era and Common Era terminology. This change in terminology annoyed me when still a Christian, but post faith I can see why the people of other faiths would have found BC a bit problematic.
Of course it becomes a bit silly now with all scholars admitting that Jesus must have born around 6BC. Apparently it is the fault of Dionysius Exiguus.
LikeLike
Hello unkleE. The people who are mentioned in Matthew 27:51-53 were in their tombs, some for possibly a long time. Are you saying in some cases their bones were resuscitated ? Also v52 seems to indicate this happened the moment Jesus died while v53 states they walked around after his resurrection. Do we know what happened to these people ? Do we know they died again ?
“Mt 26: 51 At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split 52 and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. 53 They came out of the tombs after Jesus’ resurrection and[e] went into the holy city and appeared to many people.”
LikeLike
Jon I agree with Nate, the bunny analogy you posted is the perfect description of how ColorStorm argues.
LikeLiked by 2 people
CS: You rush forward as an ass under the pelt of a lion.
LikeLike
Tks to all of you for confirming the impeccable and excellent word of God. But me argue?
Ha, now that is funny, as if God’s word needs defended. I say it slowly, repeatedly, and often.
‘He made the stars also.’ All of your Godforsaken guesses and opinions on how, when, and where life began, is laughable.
How do bones grow was a fine question asked and in which the godless mind has not a clue. How did blood infuse itself into a living being apart from intelligence, is a fine question in which the godless mind has not a clue. How did the first baby survive apart from parents is a fine question in which the godless mind has not a clue.
And the attempt at humor by putting your cartoon characters together to make a point simply reveals the disingenuous and lack of sobriety needed to consider the Creator in all His excellence.
The ruling on the field stands. God’s word is good, and this includes the accounts of Luke, Matthew, John, and Mark. Their word is far better than a thousand misinformed so called scholars.
LikeLike
@ CS, “How did the first baby survive apart from parents is a fine question in which the godless mind has not a clue.”
I think CS could very well be Ken Ham
LikeLiked by 1 person
Maybe he borrowed it from me if he said such a thing.???
Apparently chief, the implication of this truth escapes you.
But I suppose coyotes would love such small treats………..
LikeLike
Ken Ham, Ken Lamb, Ken Beef, Ken Turkey, Ken Pork ….. seriously, we are dealing with a meat-head, so who cares what joint Colorstorm is cut from?
LikeLike
I was interested to see that ColorStorm has a post on his sight that refers to this discussion. Given his heavy moderation hand I will refrain from commenting there. William made some contributions (well done).
It seems that we are leeches destroying what is “decent, good and honorable”.
It is just a pity that ColorStorm refuses to address any of the direct issues we raise.
When I first lost faith I ventured onto blogs, such as that of ColorStorms seeking to engage with learned Christians with a view to confirming address my issues. I either wanted to confirm that my concerns were valid or to find sound arguments countering them. Oh how disappointed I was!
But looking back it was a good experience as I found such folk had no reasonable argument in response so it meant I was rapidly reinforced in my loss of faith.
For the benefit of CS, I noticed you said in a response to Wally:
‘do you ever notice how the former decons stay away from doctrine?’
To which I respond, you are very much mistaken. Given We are the Dark Side I think this response is best:
LikeLiked by 2 people