Richbee

Excellent point, and there may have been a tax levied on the Land in this case.

Toto

Richbee - check your PM's. Thank you.

Sven

The irony is (again!) strong in this one.

Diogenes the Cynic

Quickly addressing Richbee's protestations inasmuch there is any substance to them and ignoring irrelevancies about "apostates" etc.

1. The quoted material about John D. Crossan is both irrelevant and factually incorrect. For the record, Crossan does not claim that the disciples themselves wrote the Cross Gospel. He does not claim they wrote anything at all. Aside from that, the attack on Crossan has no relevance to the point Richbee seems to be trying to rebut. Assailing Crossan does not prove that Joseph was a Roman citizen.

2. Richbee's question about people having to research their own landholdings and birthplaces is obtuse, diversionary and off-point. Luke has Joseph returning to Bethlehem because he is ostensibly a descendant of David. The idea that anyone would have to return to their ancestral towns is not only logistically absurd (not to mention pointless), it also beggars credibility that every peasant would know where his ancesters lived hundreds of year before. I'd also like to know exactly how the Romans were able to verify any of that information for themselves. What was to keep people from cheating?

3. Joseph had an "estate" in Bethlehem? Yeah, that's it. He had his own estate but he preferred to live as a member of a starvation-level, sub-peasant class in Galilee. Richebee, why praytell did Joseph not take his wife to his estate to have her baby instead of checking her into an animal stable at a local inn? Why didn't Luke mention anything about this estate?

4. The translation question has been addressed extensively. It doesn't say "before" and it wouldn't help your case even if it did.

5. Augustus' citizen census did not have anything to do with taxes and Judea was not subject to a Roman tax before 6 CE in any case (plus Joseph wasn't even a Judean, so he wouldn't even have been subject to Quirinius' census in 6 CE).

JoeWallack

Let The Son Shine



JW:
By an Act of Providence, Peter Kirby, at this very moment, is in the process of posting to my site, ErrancyWiki , an article written for me by Richard Carrier, Luke vs. Matthew on the Year of Christ's Birth, that is a Condensed version of his Classic article The Date of the Nativity in Luke available at The Secular Web.

I believe that the Condensed version is easier to follow in order to understand Richard's main points and where he deemed beneficial he refers to the aplicable part of his full article. I asked Richard to provide an Introduction to the Article and to briefly explain Why he thinks the article is Important. Here is what he wrote:

"It is widely acknowledged that Quirinius became "governor of Syria" in 6 C.E., only then conducting a census of Judaea, and that Herod the Great died in 4 B.C.E., ten years before. Since Matthew indisputably claims Jesus was born while Herod the Great was still alive, while Luke indisputably claims Jesus was born when Quirinius was governor of Syria during a census of Judaea, Luke and Matthew are clearly in contradiction regarding when Jesus was born. They disagree by at least ten years, which entails one of them has made a historical error (or both have).

Because this contradiction is so clear and certain and strongly backed by evidence, inerrancy proponents have invented a dizzying array of attempts to remove this contradiction by reconciling the details in Matthew and Luke. I have examined and researched these efforts in thorough detail, perhaps more than anyone. I have found all of them unsuccessful, even ludicrously so. Consequently, the primary importance of this contradiction is that is one of the clearest and most irrefutable examples of historical error in the Bible, which is perhaps why it has generated so many desperate attempts to wiggle out of it.

And that is the second reason this error is so important: short of the vast and diverse "Bethlehem Star" literature, there is probably no other biblical error for which so many false, groundless, or implausible arguments have been contrived to "invent" or "revise" the historical facts of the ancient Roman world. As a teacher and a scholar, I find all this disinformation and wanton invention about the period I study quite appalling. And because there are so many such contrivances, relating to technical details of the social and political history of Rome that are difficult if not impossible for the average layman to investigate, duty demands that some impassioned expert do all the necessary research and make it available to the common reader. Otherwise, all those false claims might simply be believed and eventually become common assumptions."


JW:
In order to Prove error a Skeptic has to demonstrate that Error is Probable. Thus, a Believer could have a Possible Defense at the same time that a Skeptic had a Probable error. "Possible" here means less than 50% likelihood. My first question to you Richbee is are you arguing that it is Probable that there is no error or just Possible? (anyone is welcome to comment here except for Harvey Dubish). This question is often left unresolved in Polemics.

Since it is the Skeptic who is Asserting that Error is Probable here, the Burden of proof is on the Skeptic. Before I outline the main points of Richard's argument though I'd like to deal with the main Defense offered in this Thread so far, that "Luke" did not simply say to the effect that at this time Augustus started a Census. Above you assert:

"In the Greek Luke 2:2 can be translated as: "This enrollment (census) was before that made when Quirinius was governor of Syria." "

I specifically ask you here if you think this meaning "Probable" or just "Possible". Many Skeptics here have already indicated that the applicable Greek phrase can not yield this Translation. Carrier writes:

Did Luke Mean "Before" Quirinius?

Some have tried to argue that the Greek of Luke actually might mean a census "before" the reign of Quirinius rather than the "first" census in his reign. As to this, even Sherwin-White remarks that he has "no space to bother with the more fantastic theories...such as that of W. Heichelheim's (and others') suggestion (Roman Syria, 161) that prôtê in Luke iii.2 means proteron, [which] could only be accepted if supported by a parallel in Luke himself."[10.1] He would no doubt have elaborated if he thought it worthwhile to refute such a "fantastic" conjecture. For in fact this argument is completely disallowed by the rules of Greek grammar. First of all, the basic meaning is clear and unambiguous, so there is no reason even to look for another meaning. The passage says autê apographê prôtê egeneto hêgemoneuontos tês Syrias Kyrêniou, or with interlinear translation, autê(this) apographê(census) prôtê[the] (first) egeneto(happened to be) hêgemoneuontos[while] (governing) tês Syrias(Syria) Kyrêniou[was] (Quirinius). The correct word order, in English, is "this happened to be the first census while Quirinius was governing Syria." This is very straightforward, and all translations render it in such a manner.

It does not matter if Luke meant that he knew of a second census under Quirinius, since we have already shown that if there were one it would have occurred some time after 6 A.D. Nevertheless, the passage almost certainly does not mean this. We have no reason to believe Quirinius served as governor again, or long enough to conduct another census, and the Greek does not require such a reading. The use of the genitive absolute (see below) means one can legitimately put a comma between the main clause and the Quirinius clause (since an absolute construction is by definition grammatically independent): thus, this was the first census ever, which just happened to occur when Quirinius was governor. The fact that Luke refers to the census from the start as the outcome of a decree of Augustus clearly supports this reading: this was the first Augustan census in Judaea since the decree. Another observation is made by Klaus Rosen, who compares Luke's passage with an actual census return from Roman Arabia in 127 A.D. and finds that he gets the order of key features of such a document correct: first the name of the Caesar (Augustus), then the year since the province's creation (first), and then the name of the provincial governor (Quirinius). Luke even uses the same word as the census return does for "governed" (hêgemoneuein), and the real census return also states this in the genitive absolute exactly as Luke does.[10.2] This would seem an unlikely coincidence, making it reasonable that Luke is dating the census the way he knows censuses are dated. The only fault with Rosen's thesis (apart from the fact that Luke's passage lacks a lot of other typical features of a census return, e.g. the year of the emperor) is that he assumes the prôtê refers to a year since every province begins with a census. Instead of adopting such an assumption, it is simply more reasonable to take the language at its plain meaning: the first Augustan census, which happened under Quirinius.

But even if one wanted to render it differently, the basic rules of Greek ensure that there is absolutely no way this can mean "before" Quirinius in this construction. What is usually argued is that prôtê can sometimes mean "before," even though it is actually the superlative of "before" (proteros), just as "most" is the superlative of "more." Of course, if "before" were really meant, Luke would have used the correct adjective (in this case, proterê), as Sherwin-White implies, since we have no precedent in Luke for such a diversion of style. But there is a deeper issue involved. The word prôtê can only be rendered as "before" in English when "first" would have the same meaning--in other words, the context must require such a meaning. For in reality the word never really means "before" in Greek. It always means "first," but sometimes in English (just as in Greek) the words "first" and "before" are interchangeable, when "before" means the same thing as "first." For example, "in the first books" can mean the same thing as "in the earlier books" (Aristotle, Physics 263.a.11). Likewise, "the earth came first in relation to the sea" can mean the same thing as "the earth came before the sea" (Heraclitus 31).[10.3]

Nevertheless, what is usually offered in support of a "reinterpretation" of the word is the fact that when prôtos can be rendered "before" it is followed by a noun in the genitive (the genitive of comparison), and in this passage the entire clause hêgemoneuontos tês Syrias Kyrêniou is in the genitive. But this does not work grammatically. The word hêgemoneuontos is not a noun, but a present participle (e.g. "jogging," "saying," "filing," hence "ruling") in the genitive case with a subject (Kyrêniou) also in the genitive. Whenever we see that we know that it is something called a "genitive absolute" construction, and thus it does not make sense to regard it as a genitive connected to the "census" clause. In fact, that is ruled out immediately by the fact that the verb (egeneto) stands between the census clause and the ruling clause--in order for the ruling clause to be in comparison with the census clause, it would have to immediately follow the adjective "first," but since it doesn't, but the entire clause is distinct from the rest of the sentence, it can only be an absolute construction. A genitive absolute does have many possible renderings, e.g. it can mean "while" or "although" or "after" or "because" or "since," but none allow the desired reinterpretation here.[10.4]

John 1:15 (and 1:30) is a case in point: the verb emprosthen is already used (the first "before" found in English translations of the verse) in order to establish the context, and then comes hoti prôton mou ên, "because he was first [in relation] to me." So here we have an example of when prôtos means "before," yet all the grammatical requirements are met for such a meaning, which are not met in Luke 2.2: the genitive here is not a participle with subject, but a lone pronoun (thus in the genitive of comparison); the genitive follows immediately after the adjective; and the previous use of emprosthen establishes the required context. Thus, this is clearly not the same construction as appears in Luke 2.2. Another example is the use of this construction in Acts 16:12, where again the sentence can be rendered "first in relation to" and only then can it be simplified in English to "before." No such license is allowable in Luke 2.2. As a genitive absolute the Quirinius clause cannot have any grammatical connection with prôtê, and "first in relation to the reign of Quirinius" would not produce the meaning "before" anyway."


JW:
Your fellow Believer here, Stephen Carlson, who probably is as Respected by the Unfaithful here as much as any Christian Bible scholar, has posted here his agreement that the Greek can not have the meaning you want to give it. What they are saying is that prwth can have a meaning of "before" depending on the grammatical construction of the phrase. But with the phrase here it can not. In other words, there would be no clear example of a meaning of "before" with this phrase in the applicable Greek literature not to mention that "Luke" is considered to have most excellent grammatical skills. Do you understand, ferschtayundzee, wakarimassoo Richbee? We have Detailed analysis by Greek authority that prwth can not mean "before" in this instance. You have appealed to authority that it can but have not given related detail. Until you do, the detailed argument must outweigh your mere Appeal.

In Summary than Richbee, I have the following questions for you at this point:

1) Do you think it Probable that there is no Error here or just Possible?

2) Do you think it Probable that prwth here means "before" or just Possible?



Joseph

ErrancyWiki

Gamera

[QUOTE=Doug Shaver]Critical thinking is a re-creation of historical events, in this case ones that occurred 2000 years ago. Presumably, those who were only a few generations removed from the event would have access to witnesses, traditions and other sources of information lost to us that might explain the oddness of Luke narrative in very simple ways.

Of course, though many prominent bibilical historians do in fact accuse Luke of outright lies.

This is basically Crossan's position in looking at the gospels as non-historical hagiography. This is a tough row to hoe given the framework of the work, which purports to be historical. But if you think it's fiction from the start, there really isn't much reason to investigate the historicity of the birth narrative since you must assume it's nonfactual from the start. Indeed, you must find it remarkable that in Luke's fictive work his language is ambiguous enough to arguably blunder into a reference to an actual historical event, the Augustan census.

Also it's kind of funny that Luke wrote the fiction so badly (or well) that the audience for the past 2000 thought he was being serious, and didn't take it as fiction, until smart guys figured it out in the 19th century. A unique literary event as far as I know. Nobody took Beowulf for history.

Gamera

[QUOTE=Amaleq13]Except the inconvenient fact that Luke's audience, being only a few generations removed from the event of the Augustan census, might actually know something about it.

Maybe, but it's odd it's so ambiguous then. Luke could presumably had said in a clearcut way what you just said. His language is unclear, allowing for the possibility that he was refering to the Augustan census, an actual historial event around Jesus' birth.

Actually, the gospels were of course used then as now to convert NON-Christians, so they must be included in the audience, and they would presumably be skeptical. Presumably, outrageously false historical statements just 4 generations removed from the text would not be a very effective tool for prosletizing.

Amaleq13

This speculative "fact" is irrelevant rather than inconvenient. There is no reference to this clearly fictional requirement at e-Catena. Apparently, this particular bit of stupid fiction was ignored by early Christians.

The requirement is clearly fiction regardless of the census to which it is attributed.

Only if they were recognized as such and I know of no evidence that this blatantly idiotic requirement was the focus of any early criticism or Christian commentary. The notion that the failure of early Christians and their opponents to recognize the idiocy of the requirement somehow suggests it is not idiotic is, itself, entirely ridiculous.

yummyfur

As far as the "before" meaning, wouldn't we also have to believe that proficient Greek readers of the time "misread" this as well. Like Julian the Apostate who states.

"Even Jesus, who was proclaimed among you, was one of Caesar's subjects. And if you do not believe me I will prove it a little later, or rather let me simply assert it now. However, you admit that with his father and mother he registered his name in the governorship of Cyrenius."

It's fairly clear he is getting this from Luke, which he is thouroughly familiar with.

Richbee

You bring it on oh Mod' of unbelief.

I never posted anything about a canard referring to Joseph as a Roman citizen.

J.D. Crossan is a fraud and off his rocker, as he has no other historical record than the New Testament.

Why don't you come back after you figure out the Roman concerns of taxes and War(s).