Gundulf

Of for the love of... I certainly didn't join this forum to try to defend the Bible of all things, but I must make sure that you all, if you're going to be arguing with theists, well, I just don't want you to look foolish. You can find far, far, far more difficult things to reconcile than this.

DOES ANYONE KNOW HOW HARD IT IS EVEN IN THIS DAY AND AGE TO TRY TO TRAVEL WITH A WOMAN WHO JUST HAD A BABY?

I suppose that if Mary and Joseph were "just" going to go to Bethlehem to register for the census, they'd have gone, paid their census tax or whatever, and come straight home to Nazareth.

But when your wife gives birth while you're there, it kind of complicates things.

So as someone pointed out, Mary had to sit around and wait for some time to do the purification ritual (though I believe it was 33 days after the circumcision, not 66 - 66 would have been for a female baby).

So, you're a poor man (as suggested that they gave the poor offering), in a distant city. How far are your savings going to go as you sit there for 40 something days waiting for your wife to get purified? Chances are, you're going to find work and get settled down.

So if it in fact was the case that as they showed up in Bethlehem, Mary going into labor, and the best they could do that day was a barn...

WOULD YOU HAVE JUST CONTINUED TO LIVE IN THE FREAKIN BARN FOR ANOTHER COUPLE OF MONTHS??? (Or would you have started looking for better housing?)

So chances are Joseph would have found work, and gotten his new family settled so his baby doesn't have to sleep in a freakin feeding trough, since he's going to be there for around 45 days MINIMUM, and hey, in that day and age, once you're settled, how much do you want to pack up EVERYTHING again and take a road trip? ESPECIALLY WITH A NEW BABY?

I ask anyone who knows by experience - would you rather drive across the country with a pregnant wife, or with your wife and a newborn infant? The idea of him settling down in Bethlehem for a bit really doesn't sound too far fetched, now, does it really?

Another thing - Matthew's account would place Jesus at about 1 year old, not 2. Think about it - if The wise guys men had told Herod that the usurper was 2 years old, wouldn't he have killed all the kids aged 1 to 3?

So if you moved away from your hometown, lived somewhere else for well over a year... once you got back to your original home town, don't you think YOU would have to "make your home there"? (I mean, in the U.S., you have to apply for a drivers' license in your new state after you've been living there for just 90 days...!)


Goodness gracious. An entire Bible full of far more difficult things to reconcile that will seriously throw Christians for a loop, and this is the best you can come up with?

Tangent

in many years of arguing on the Internet I have learned that when the other side resorts to baseless and uninspired insults, you know your opponents have lost the war (that or they just realized their "religion" isn't even 100 years old yet).

I guess people who adopt make-believe as their primary belief structure have to stick together versus the evil RATIONALISTS.

gregor

Gundulf
Oh, so you're saying it's even more logical for a fellow to force his nine-month preggers wife to travel to a city they've never lived in, to register for a census? Yeah, that's the ticket. In fact, I made my wife travel to northern Germany from Texas when she was nine-months pregnant because my great-great-great-great grandfather was from Germany.

spin

I note your concern.

If you are not trying to defend the text, why do you shout out your rationalization?

I gather you are reading the Lucan version, because Joseph lived in Bethlehem in Matt.

Yes, you're correct about the 33 days (Lev 12).

Obviously you're reading the Lucan version, but there is no mention of a barn in that version. It just mentions an eating place ("fatnh"), which could be for animals or people. The Matt version has Mary having the baby where Joseph lived, which we discover in 2:1 is Bethlehem.

While you rationalize, you stop reading the text.

This is tradition, not text.

Back to reading... well, not the text.

Oh, no it doesn't. It's just not in the text.

We've just been through this on another thread. I wish you would stick to the text. Your rationalizations will only hide the text.

Fortunately our personages are not given an American context.

You're right, that it's "full of far more difficult things to reconcile", but we're dealing with the thread, so if you aren't interested in dealing with it, why force yourself?


spin

The Evil One

Here are the relevent Matthew passages:
The point is there is absolutely no mention of Nazareth or a census or travelling or a stable or anything like that. If you lay aside the preconception that Luke and Matthew MUST be telling the same story then it becomes clear that Matt. doesn't know anything about any such things. Note in particular there is absolutely no break between "[Joseph] took Mary home as his wife" and "she gave birth to a son". Implying, absent any mention to the contrary, that she gave birth in Joseph's home, which as we find out in the next chapter, is Bethlehem.

Gundulf

Logical, no. What you would do if you wanted to avoid going to prison, yes.

Gundulf

Well, no break except, "he had no union with her until..."

which, if it was two days, it probably would have been hardly worth noting. But he wasn't "gettin any" for a while, then that may have been noteworthy...

Gundulf

Doesn't know anything about such things, or these things are totally irrelevant for him.

Yes, I find myself defending this text (of all things), though I'd rather discuss anything else. My only point is that I have argued these things with inerrantist Christians, as honestly and charitably as I can, with as open a mind as I can, so I can understand their argument and thoughts fully. Now, the way they defend various things as reconcilable is important to understand (and there are some valid arguments), if you want to get anywhere with them.

OK, let's say we lived 2,000 years from now, and we unearth two copies of an account of a sports game.

The first speaks of scores and plays, injuries and maneuvers and how the game was won.

The second, while not specifically denying that any of the above took place, makes the ludicrous claim that halfway in the middle of this contest, everyone stopped the competition so that musicians could take to the field and sing and dance.

In all fairness, the way that people often argue against two things being in the Bible sounds similar to this - "The first never mentions anything about dancing and music being involved," "The second didn't even mention who won..." "Obviously the writer of the first had no knowledge about some musical ceremony made up by the second..."

And so on, and so on... Present arguments like this to an inerrantist Christian, and they will claim that shepherds at a barn (OK, it wasn't painted red with bales of hay and wasn't in Iowa. But work with me here - it animal housing...) was unimportant to Matthew's purpose in writing - just like the half-time show was probably unimportant to the play-by-play review found in the Newspaper...


Now I am certainly not arguing these stories are true, or they happened, or are historical, etc., etc., but I do find a consistency to them, so I'm just warning that you are on very weak footing to ever try to use this particular story to convince a Christian of a contradiction in the Bible's accounts.

spin

Why so desperate?

Knock of the pretence.

Uh-huh. Pull the other leg: it plays jingle bells.

What is your fixation about what you think should be discussed here??

You mean invent a modern explanation for ancient literature? That usually gets called retrojection. It's not very useful.

Fairness?...

They're supposed to be on the same team, , so you'll need a better analogy. Try some other modern retrojection. Or perhaps you might like to deal with the text.

Ok, what other purpose might you like to devise that explains Matt's totally different story for his literary effort to give the nativity of the writers' hero? The writers are clearly working from literary sources with Mark as the major source. Given that both Matt and Luke were obviously composed after the time of Mark, were their nativity sources oral or written? If oral, where did they come from given a conservative estimate of the writing of Mark to the fall of the temple, ie 70 years after the supposed time of the birth?

Thanks for the warning.

If you like consistency so much, try to tell us exactly what the stories have in common other than protagonists and basic event and town (which make about 5% of the stories). (See my synopsis of the differences early in this thread as a starter.)

If you are being serious, you will need to learn to read the bible for what it says, not for what you can make it say.


spin

Gundulf

Of course there's nothing else in common, but why would it? I think, theist, Jew, Muslim, atheist, whatever - you read the event in Matthew, it sounds like it takes place well 10 months, at least, after the events recorded in Luke.

If I may be so bold, then, might you explain to me why you (seem to) think that regarding the events in Matthew, Jesus can possibly be perceived as a newborn?

I mean:

-Wise men saw the star when they were in the east and followed it, presumably for some months.

-Herod killed the babies based on when the star was first seen by the wise men.

-So HEROD, at least, believed the Baby to have been born at least some months before, right?

Hey, I'd have no issue if you wanted to say that the stories are fanciful, sound totally like someone made them up, pointed out that no one else in history records a wandering star, the whole virgin birth thing to cover up the fact that Jesus' mother was not as pure as she should have been, I mean, there are all kinds of criticisms of even these birth stories which are far more damaging.

But making a big deal that one story which takes place at Jesus actual birth is different than a story that takes place around age 1...?

You might as well point out that the birth story in Luke is different than the crucifixion in Matthew...

But your point is well taken, there are more important things to discuss.