Sunday feature: The actual story of the birth of Jesus
The Christmas Play is not a factual recount of the birth of Christ.
By James Jordan, Sumner Newscow — What many people think about the Birth of Jesus and all that was involved comes from the classic Christmas play. That’s no slight against the play. The play’s writers had to fudge a bit to make it fit into a 30-minute frame.
There are two accounts in the Bible, one in Matthew and one in Luke. When you put those stories together, along with what we know of that time and culture, a more reasonable story emerges.
James Jordan
It is a bit hard to believe Mary and Joseph showed up in Bethlehem with Mary in Labor. They could not find a room at a hotel, so they went to a barn. She has the baby, and shepherds and Wise Men show up within 20 minutes, and they all live happily ever after.
The actual story begins with an angel appearing to Mary and to her cousin, Elizabeth. Elizabeth lived in Jerusalem and gave birth to John the Baptist. Six months later, Mary is in town and gives birth to Jesus.
I am going to make the case that they were staying at Elizabeth’s house, and that is where Jesus was born.
The actual story
Mary and Joseph lived in Nazareth, but they went to Bethlehem, and Jesus was born there to fulfill the prophecy.
This is a 120-mile trip, and they traveled on foot in those days. Maybe Mary rode a camel since she was pregnant, but that isn’t any faster.
Averaging 10 miles a day would be tough, but if you could do it, it would be a two-week-long trip one way. It likely took a few days longer than that.
Roads were good, and the Pax Romana, a state of peace in the region for over 200 years, made them relatively safe. Roads were probably better than they would be for the next 1,000 years. Still, it was a tough trip. Women did not travel alone, so she probably had an entourage of some sort. This implies they were not poor people. Just think of the resources needed to make a trip that is going to take you at least two weeks one way. She made the trip more than once, too.
Now is when we get into what the Bible says.
Luke 2:39 says Mary went to see Elizabeth after she found out she was going to have a baby. Elizabeth was pregnant with John the Baptist at the time. I can’t blame Mary for skipping town. An engaged woman who is pregnant would have been scandalous beyond belief in those days.
Luke 2:56 says she stayed with Elizabeth for three months. She probably stayed there until Elizabeth had her baby.
It says she returned home, and at some point after that, she and Joseph returned to Bethlehem.
It is hard for me to believe they showed up with Mary almost in labor. What is more likely is that they returned, and she had time to get ready to have her baby and give birth to Jesus while at Elizabeth’s house.
Luke 2:6 says, “While” they were there, she gave birth to Jesus. Luke 2:4 says Joseph went to Jerusalem to register with Mary. Bethlehem was a suburb of Jerusalem.
You could take this to mean Mary was already there when he arrived. Whether she came back to Bethlehem with Joseph or whether he joined her later is not exactly clear.
Either way, Mary made this long trip twice. This means that even though travel was difficult, it was not uncommon.
This is how they got to the place where Jesus was born.
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A careful reading of the Biblical stories gives a much different picture.
The Gospel of Luke says Jesus was born while Joseph and Mary were in Bethlehem. They were likely settled in Elizabeth’s house and waiting for Mary’s baby to be born.
One thing to realize, too, is that in biblical times, there was no difference between a house and a barn. There were usually two or three rooms in a house, with a dirt floor in all of them. Animals were brought in for the night and put in one room. There was probably a manger there, which made a great crib for a newborn baby.
The Bible story says Jesus was born and laid in a manger because there was no room at the Inn. This is an unfortunate translation of the Greek.
The word translated Inn, is only used three times in the New Testament. The other two times it is used (Mark 14:14 and Luke 22:11) is when Jesus asked his disciples to go and prepare the Upper Room for the last supper. The word for “Upper Room” is the same word as “Inn” in this verse in Greek. It just means an extra room or guest room. It can also simply mean “another” room.
There was no room there, and there could have been several reasons. A lot of people were in town, so maybe other relatives were there as well.
Since the extra room had no space, Mary gave birth in the “main room.” This was where animals were brought for the night, and likely there would be a manger there. A manger is a natural crib for a baby, so it was probably the normal thing to do when you had a baby.
Another interesting note is that when Jesus told the story of the good Samaritan, who put up a wounded Jew at an Inn and paid the Innkeeper, the word for Inn is a different word in Greek. This is in Luke 10:34, and it is the only time the word is used in the New Testament. It is the same author, Luke, so I would guess that if Luke had meant a hotel, he would have said so.
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After Jesus’ birth, Mary and Joseph hung around Bethlehem for a while. Luke 2:21 says Jesus was circumcised on the eighth day after his birth, according to Jewish law, and was given the name Jesus. This was likely done at the temple in Jerusalem, which was only two miles away.
Luke 2:23 says when the “time of purification according to the law of Moses had been completed,” they took Jesus to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord. This would have been at the temple in Jerusalem and was about 40 days after Jesus was born. Those were two things that good Jews would have done for their babies.
Luke 2:39 says they returned to Galilee and Jesus grew up. It was a year or two later before they returned.
At some point, they fled to Egypt for a time and returned when it was safe. They likely returned to their home in Galilee.
Also, at some point in this story, Shepherds heard the story and came running to see the baby Jesus. It’s hard to say when this was. It could have been any time before they left Bethlehem.
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The play then has the Magi, or the Wise Men, showing up to worship Jesus. It was most likely at least two years after the birth of Jesus before they showed up.
Mary and Joseph must have stayed in Bethlehem for a year or two after Jesus was born, and they probably stayed with Elizabeth and her husband.
The wise men may have first seen the star the same night the Shepherds did but then had to make the journey “from the east,” which would have taken a long time.
It is believed they were related to the teachings of Daniel from the Old Testament when they had been exiled to Babylon.
The play gives us three wise men, but we don’t know how many there were. It makes sense in the play because they brought three gifts. There could have been three or thirty.
Wise men were also called Magi, which is where we get the word magician. They were not doing magic, but they were holy men, priests of some sort of religion. They knew the scriptures and the prophecy of Christ.
The Jews had been exiled to Babylon, which is recorded in the Book of Daniel in the Old Testament. Many Jews returned to Israel, but there remained a strong Jewish community in Iraq — where Babylon was — until the 1950s. These Magi may well have been part of that.
The Magi knew the Old Testament prophecies and were probably related to that Jewish community in some way. It is not clear if they still considered themselves Jews or if it was some other religion at that point.
Daniel of Magi.
Daniel rose to the position of being in charge of the Magi in ancient Babylon. This was like being the president of the university for spiritual studies. It seems there was more than one religion, and Daniel was sort of the spiritual expert in charge of them all.
Daniel is known among Muslims and the Bahai, as well as being part of the Christian and Jewish history.
Matthew 2:11 says they found the child Jesus, worshipped him and gave him gifts. That is about all that is said about them in the Christmas story in the New Testament. Does it sound like the writer may have assumed readers knew who they were?
When the wise men got to where Jesus was, he was not a baby; he was a toddler. The Greek word for Child in that verse is “Tekna” as opposed to the baby “Brephos” who was laid in the manger. Tekna refers to a small child, like a toddler.
When King Herod got word of this, he was understandably upset. He knew the prophecies and that Jesus was to be a king. This threatened his rulership, and if the Roman government found out, it might put his own life in danger.
The Romans gave people a lot of freedom, but they would not have put up with another King.
Herod gave the order to kill all babies under the age of 2 (in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi) Matt. 2:17.
By the time it happened, Joseph and Mary had fled to Egypt with Jesus, and the wise men had slipped out of town as well.
Now, this was a horrible thing, but Bethlehem was a small town, so there were probably not that many babies. This could explain why no secular or Jewish historians mention the event and Herod was notorious for all the bad things he did. If they knew about it, they probably thought there were worse atrocities to write about.
Matthew 2:15 says Mary and Joseph stayed in Egypt until Herod died when Jesus was approximately between the ages of 2 and 4. Then they went back to Galilee, where Jesus grew up. None of the gospels record much at all about Jesus growing up. From there, the Biblical stories moved to his ministry when he was around 30.
