A Christmas Story

The story surrounding the birth of Jesus on December 25 in Bethlehem is occasionally worth a second look, as part of one's own maturation process, because so much of what we take for granted about the story is based on childhood impressions that, for one reason or another, we never bother to disturb with later reading. The birth is described in what Christians call the "New Testament" and what Jewish scholars call "Mishagoss."  

I suppose it's actually unlikely that Jesus was born on December 25; one factor often cited is that the weather would not have been conducive to shepherds tending their flocks in the field.  But let's check today's weather in the West Bank and see:  It's 54 degrees, with an overnight low predicted of 40. Light rain.  C'mon: shepherds could hack that.  Other objections include the contention that Christians borrowed the birthdate of Mithra, a pagan character who was born on the Solstice of the old Julian calendar, which happens to be December 25.  Coincidences happen, I say.

Only Matthew and Luke actually write about the birth of Jesus. Mark & John shine it on, and pick up the story later.  Matthew goes into a lot of detail about Herod's role in the story.  Herod was a local despot and Roman puppet who heard about this birth and was a little worried about his sinecure being disturbed by the upstart.  So he convened a council of scribes and the rest of his cabinet to talk it over.  He's the one, according to Matthew, who sent the Magi to track down the newborn.  "Bring him to me, " he said, "so I can worship him too."  Heh heh.  That crafty Herod.  The Three Wise Men "followed a star" to Bethlehem, which was a neat trick, in a way, because Jerusalem was only about 8 kilometers from Bethlehem. Plus, stars tend to move east to west in the night sky, and Bethlehem is south of Jerusalem. Anyway, this star shone on one particular house in the West Bank and the Magi knew they had arrived. Matthew says it was just a house, by the way, not a manger.  Luke's story has the manger, which was fortunate because a lot of Christmas carols would not work without a manger.  Try singing "Away in a house..." if you don't believe me.

Never mind.  Matthew's always been a little sloppy, but what I like about him is his vivid imagination.  He came up with names for the gifts they gave to Jesus, and he also added the part where another angel comes to Joseph & Mary and tells them to go to Egypt to avoid Herod's ethnic cleansing, another in an apparently endless series of pogroms to which Jesus's people have been subjected.  So they decamp for several years, and Herod's slaughter of the innocents (all kids under two years old) rages through the Holy Land.

Herod's reputation would suffer more but for the historical game-changer that he died in 4 B.C.  I chalk this minor error up to Matthew's lack of access to Google.  It's easy to take potshots at Matthew now, because that looks like a huge blunder.  But keep it in context.  Anyway, Joseph & Mary return home after a few years.

Luke places J&M in Bethlehem to respond to a census ordered by the Roman Emperor.  They move from Nazareth to Bethlehem, which is odd since a census usually records where you live.  One must applaud Joseph's courage; to move his pregnant Jewish wife on a four-day journey.  "Hey!" she says.  "I'm about to blow here!"  "It's not my kid," Joseph retorts.  That's why the alter kakers liked Joseph at the card tables.  Always quick with a retort.

Although he knew it was his kid.  Matthew wasn't too good at translating Hebrew either, or maybe he was led astray by relying on a second-rate Greek translation. (How did Matt even get the job writing the first Gospel?  Where did he get his history degree, Oral Roberts?  Was he on a basketball scholarship?)  The ancient Hebrew word found in Isaiah 7:14 was "almah," which means a young woman of marriageable age, not a virgin.  "Bethulah" means virgin, but the Greek Septuagint translation renders "almah" as "parthenos," which indicates virginity.

Luke never has the doughty couple and their heralded offspring flee to Egypt.  They just go home after the "census," although maybe that didn't happen either, since there was no direct Roman rule over Nazareth or Bethlehem at the time of Jesus's birth.  I'm getting confused now, since I think this part of the history is screwed up by Luke, not Matthew.  Also, these census operations only applied to Roman citizens, and Joseph was a Galilean.  Other than that...What I will commend Luke for is that he doesn't libel the already-dead Herod by accusing him of mass murder.  The slaughter of the innocents is only in Matthew.

Yeah, there are other problems.  Matthew & Luke don't even agree on the name of Joseph's father, how many generations there were between David & Jesus, or even whether Jesus was within the "royal succession."  Jesus himself didn't seem to care and I commend him for it.  I commend him for a lot of things.  He doesn't need to be God for me to appreciate him as an extraordinary Jew born to a nice Jewish couple, and to honor his deep wisdom about ways that humans ought to conduct their lives and treat each other.  All this from a humble man, the son of a carpenter, a Jewish man, in other words, who made his living by being good with his hands -- now there's your Christmas Miracle.