The story of the nativity of Jesus of Nazareth is so familiar that it is difficult to look at it afresh. However, Luke’s version may be worth looking at closely.
It begins with these familiar verses, which locate the story and place and time:
1 And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed.
2 (And this taxing was first made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria.)
3 And all went to be taxed, every one into his own city.
4 And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judaea, unto the city of David, which is called Bethlehem; (because he was of the house and lineage of David:)
5 To be taxed with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child.
6 And so it was, that, while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered.
(King James Version)
And a twentieth century translation goes as follows:
1 In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered.
2 This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria.
3 All went to their own towns to be registered.
4 Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David.
5 He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child.
6 While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child.
(New Revised Standard Version)
There are a number of perhaps interesting points about these verses.
First, there was no such decree from Emperor Augustus. The Roman imperial bureaucracy left detailed records, and if a decree had been made we would know about it. There is no evidence for such an event whatsoever.
Even if there had been such a decree, Quirinius (Cyrenius) did not become governor of Syria until 6AD, a date which would perhaps be too late for the correct birth of Jesus.
And this in turn is significant, for until 6AD Galilee (and hence Nazareth) was not part of the Roman Empire, and so would not have been subject to such a decree.
Furthermore, the principles of Roman taxation (and of the taking of censuses) would have meant Joseph would have been registered for his property in Nazareth, and not on the basis of where a distant ancestor came from. There also would have been absolutely no need for Mary to travel with him.
The nativity account of Luke is simply incorrect or incredible in every historical detail.
But so what?
None of the above information about Luke’s account is new or even particularly controversial among Biblical scholars and first century historians.
Other than a few literalists, the scholarly consensus is that the nativity account of Luke and the separate account of Matthew (with the similarly unhistorical murder of the innocents) are probably later additions to the gospel accounts. Both narratives explain (contrive) how someone known to be from Nazareth also was born (according to prophecy) in the town of David: Luke has the non-existent census, whilst Matthew has Joseph and Mary as being in Bethlehem to begin with.
And the nativity of Jesus was not especially important to early Christians. Nowhere else in the New Testament is there mention of either nativity story. Mark and John both start with Jesus’s adult ministry; and neither Luke nor Matthew mention the nativity story again. Paul (probably writing before the gospel accounts) does not mention the nativity stories in any of his letters.
For early Christians, it would appear the stories of Jesus’s ministry (with the accounts of miracles and exorcisms) and of his crucifixion and resurrection were more than enough. They had no need of the virgin birth and the star of Bethlehem.
So a critique of the nativity stories is not (and should not be taken to be) an attack on Christianity. Indeed, the very early Christians – the one who actually got the faith up and running – managed without the nativity stories.
However, later generations placed immense doctrinal and theological weight on the nativity stories. The problem with having done this is that once the historical foundation is shown to be wanting, the superstructure placed upon it can be seen as compromised.
But again, this does not mean that Christianity is false; but it does mean that human beings – even fathers of the early church – are fallible. The problem here is certainty, not Christianity.
And nor does it take away from the literary beauty of the stories (and of the artistic and musical works inspired by the stories).
Twenty years ago, reading of the works Robin Lane Fox and Geza Vermes allowed me to understand that it was possible to have an entirely secular understanding of Jesus of Nazareth and the development of the early church. This realisation – combined with reading Hume on miracles and Darwin on natural selection – in turn became part of the reason I became an atheist.
Twenty years later, I am less certain. Disproving the historical details of the nativity story of Luke (or any part of the New Testament) may well undermine a certain approach to Christianity, but it does not mean in and by itself that Christianity is wrong. It takes one so far, but not all the way.
All because it is easy to discredit the misplaced certainty of some Christians, this does not lead to the certainty of some atheists being any better founded.
23 Responses to Some thoughts on Luke’s nativity story
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Is there a simple dichotomy between the certitude of Christians and that of atheists? Or are the Christians making a series of claims based on no evidence, which the atheists see no reason to take seriously? Atheists claim nothing. They merely lack belief in one more god than Christians do. But you know that.
Do not agree that atheists are simply ‘without belief’. In the absence of certainty they are relying on faith when they assert that there is no god. They may claim that they SHOULD take this position without evidence, but they cannot ‘know’ that this is the right approach. Empiricism cannot prove itself.
If someone puts the proposition to me: ‘we must go to Church this Sunday or we will go to hell’ I must take a position on it, I cannot remain neutral. I cannot escape using an element of faith in deciding which position to take.
I don’t think it is a case of absolute empiricism, more a case of why there should be a special sort of empiricism for this specific belief which doesn’t apply to Vishnu or Santa Claus.
I can’t speak for all atheists or anti-theists, but most of the ones I know think that people should have the freedom, as a personal faith, to believe what they wish, however unlikely it may be as long as, as Jefferson said “it neither breaks my leg nor picks my pocket”
The element of “proof” only becomes important when the religious wish to modify everyones behaviour based on their own beliefs.
“My God does not wish me to eat meat on a Friday” is a personal statement which a free society must uphold ones right to make regardless of what level of evidence you have for that, however “We cannot legally allow homosexuals to marry, because my God considers them an abomination” is surely a statement that begs some empirical proof of the asserters position, as they expect others, not of their faith, to follow it.
Empiricism has no place in faith, as you say. But it *does* have a place in polictics and jurisprudence. Where religion decided it is sufficiently comfortable in it’s faith to cross the boundary into these areas, or indeed biology or physics, then I don’t think it is unfair that it should be required to “up its game” empirically.
Or remain in its own backyard, I’m happy with either option
The bible is the foundation of Christianity, it is so full of contradictions and factual errors that it is easy to dismiss christianity as it is to dismiss Mormonism or scientology. As our knowledge of the world and of the universe expands the myths of the bible are exposed, but some people will still distort the facts to fit the bible, we call them ‘Young Earth Creationists’ or just Creationists.
Take Christmas for instance, Jesus wasn’t even born in December, the celebration of his birth was created to usurp the Pagan season of giving and celebration of the winter solstice and the advent of longer daylight hours.
Christianity is a falsehood from it’s very beginning.
Much of made of Joseph’s lineage but then we are told that he is not the Father of Jesus. Parenthogenesis was popular in the Roman Empire as a story of divinity, early Church leaders were to vote against it. Star of Bethlehem? 4 BC.
Well balanced blog Jack. Peter , Jesus is the foundation of Christianity not the bible. His spirit communicates with me thru the centuries and guides my life.My earthly father also although dead also lives in me and guides me. Incidentally so does everyone I have met living and “dead” Books are written by men some some more enspired by God than others. Athiests often have a simplistic understanding of the Creator and often they have an infantile idea of belief and Christianity. I existed in the beginning and when I die I will continue to exist. I do not worry about how conscious I am. I will be with God and all creation.
Do atheists have a lack of belief in God or a deeply held belief that God doesn’t exist?
Not believing in God is one thing. Being certain God doesn’t exist and is man-made is quite another.
Indeed so fervent are some in the belief that there is no God that it is almost like a faith.
Ironic?
From my perspective as an atheist, the problem with Christianity (along with other religions) is the complete lack of evidence for the supernatural.
I’m not sure, then, what would take you “all the way” unless you are referring to looking at the other discrepancies such as the elements of “disagreement” on the resurrection for example.
I think atheists are often asked to “prove that God/Jesus does not exist” by the religious [and to a certain extent for our own sanity] and I know of only two ways of proving the non-existence of something, that would be by exhaustion, or by contradiction.
Obviously, one cannot disprove the existence of God by exhaustion, like checking for the existence of a can of paint in your garage, because we are told, rather cleverly by those who would have us believe, that the places we should look for God to exist in any real sense are not available to us until after we die. That only leaves contradiction, and those tools that, by defintion the religious leave us [as it surely must be up to them to define the tenets of their belief].
Thus, the creator God is difficult to disprove as an entity unconnected to any particular religious persuasion, however to be a Christian [as opposed to a Hindu, say] one imbues this God with certain characteristics which are, themselves capable of contradiction.
Most of the Christian apologists I have heard debate this is public usually [in fact I can't off-hand think of any that haven't] use various aspects of their understanding of Jesus gleaned from the “contemporary” reports to support the character as the son of God, and not just one of the many itnerant rabbis of the time who happened to be particualrly charimatic, and therefore gained some sort of popular ascendancy.
Unless you are suggesting that somehow it is not necessary to believe that Jesus was the Son of God in order to be a Christian, in which case I think that all one is left with is the vaguely numinous feelings that Bren sort of began to express above, which seems to me to be directly contradictory to the central religious position, which is that not only does a creator god exist but that he has revealed, though direct revelation, his requirements in terms of who we should sleep with and how, what we should eat and when, and all the other elements of the religious totalitarianism which helped to form a lot of my Atheistic [or I suppose more correctly anti-theistic] opinions in the first place.
Surely the question that Christians must be able to answer if they wish to be taken seriously in terms of how their beliefs should effect society as a whole is not “How does Christianity stack against atheism” but rather “What is it about Christianity that allows them to dismiss the atheistic arguement *whilst themselves maintaining an atheistic postion with respect to the other religions*? The only arguements I have heard all reference back to the original material, the virgin birth, the miracles, the resurrection etc..
In this respect I find it difficult to understand in what way the outilining of the conradictions in the bible are insufficient as a refutation of christianiity.
After all, if what Bren says is true, and Atheists have a simplistic understanding of the Creator, can that be for any reason except that the definition that they have been given, to “analyse” for logical contradictions, is itself simplistic and infantile?
Ask a bunch of witnesses to any real-life event for an account of it, and you will get multiple versions, complete with contradictions. This is a well known phenomenon. One cannot dismiss the New Testament due to internal contradiction.
“Proving” or “disproving” God by contradiction is an intellectual game for undergraduates whilst hanging around the cafeteria or the pub. The act itself is artful and somewhat dishonest. It all comes down to faith, either way.
(from a fellow agnostic)
Atheists always go on about lack of evidence and proof, but it is more consistent from an internal logic of religion perspective that such ‘proof’ does not exist.
Where would be the challenge and hence the virtue in choosing right if we ‘knew’ what we should do?
Atheisim and Agnostisim are not necessarily different positions. Theisim is about belief, Gnostasism is about knowledge.
I am Agnostic about the existence of God(s) as I do not know one way or the other.
I am Atheist as I do not beleive in the existence of God(s), all the evedence we have seems to explain the world without the imput of a god (particularly the personal type) and there seems to be no real reason to suppose that a god would exist.
I do not though think you can have a pick and choose aproach to religions. Well you can, you can do what you like of course. But the bible is scripture, divinely inspired work, supposedly. The bible claims that every word is as true as every other. By what authority do people decide which bits are true and which not? Keep the bits that fit our modern sensiblities but reget the bronze age bits? Keep the parts that don’t directly oppose science but reget the bits that are just silly? This is why fudamentalists, whilst crazy, at least have an internal logic that some of the more wishy washy ones lack.
And (taking off my glasses and pinching the top of my nose to counteract the headache I always get over this confusion) Atheist do not, do not, have faith. The scientific mindset changes its views to fit the evideince, the faith mindset maintains its beilfs in contradiction to the avaible evidence.
I think the key here is that the gospels don’t necessarily relate historical facts as such, they reflect how believers understand Jesus. The canonical gospels we have reflect the understanding that won out – both because it was closer to the original message and because it fit with the way in which Christianity developed.
In Scripting Jesus, LM White argues that Luke’s gospel in particular portrays Jesus using the divine man tradition, a set of conventions that were used to write biographies of important historical figures.
These details are important, because you can’t get to any sort of “testable evidence” unless you know how people in the first and second centuries wrote history.
I would say that the discrepancies in the Nativity account are relevant in three different ways.
First they demonstrate that the Gospels are not entirely reliable.
Second, they expose the gap between an informed understanding of the Bible and the common beliefs of the average church-goer.
Third they expose the absurdity of Biblical inerrancy, as preached by the fundamentalists.
I do not and would not claim that those discrepancies invalidate Christianity as such, but they should open the mind to taking a more skeptical look at the rest of Christian belief, and I do not think that it can easily bear such scrutiny.
Take for example Frank’s views above – I know that Frank claims to be an agnostic but I’ve heard similar claims for Christians. He talks about the “internal logic” of religion but he gets it wrong.
If faith is simply assent to doctrinal views, such as the existence of a single God, where is the virtue in that ? If there is any virtue at all, surely it is in seeking the truth by the best means available to us rather than simply making a lucky guess. And the book of James tells us that mere belief is far from sufficient. So even by the internal logic of Christianity we cannot say that belief without adequate evidence is an overriding virtue.
If the virtue is in moral action, without hope of reward, then surely a firm belief gets in the way whether it is founded in faith or factual knowledge. So by the internal logic of Christianity – which encourages the spreading of belief – it can’t be that either.
So where is the virtue in belief without adequate evidence ?
Atheists have no need to prove or disprove anything whatsoever. Look up Bertrand Russell’s celestial teapot.
It’s somewhat disingenuous to talk of the “certainty” of some atheists. We can say “No gods exist” in exactly the same way we say “Santa Claus doesn’t exist”, or “the tooth fairy doesn’t exist”. It can surely be left understood that “yes, there might be some infinitesimally tiny possibility that that statement is wrong” without going through the tedious and pedantic need to repeat it every single time. If challenged, it’s perfectly acceptable to say “If you provide me with some convincing evidence to the contrary, I will certainly admit my mistake and change my opinion”.
Personally, I’d be quite pleased if Santa Claus existed.
Yes Ken. It’s like having to say ‘In my oppinion’ everytime you voice an oppinion or ‘i’m joking’ everytime you tell a joke.
But Maria I still don’t understand how the gospels are supposed to be seen as being written for their audience and yet true at the same time? The same text that says Jesus was the son of god also has know historical inaccuracsies. How does the second not devalue the first? If I told you I was an elephant (which I doubt you would beleive) why would you then beleive me when I tell you i am the Duke of Wellington reborn? If you know one of these is false wouldn/t you assume the other was given that you’ve been presented with them as both being as true as the other?
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“However, later generations placed immense doctrinal and theological weight on the nativity stories. The problem with having done this is that once the historical foundation is shown to be wanting, the superstructure placed upon it can be seen as compromised.
…… The problem here is certainty, not Christianity.”
The problem of certainty does not necessarily revolve around the logical gate ‘true or false’. It pertains to efficacy i.e. the question: Does it work? This is what Alan Turing was alluding to when he said that “Mechanical Engineering and writing are almost synonymous.”
The Bible is fabricated. That is simply to say: it was written and it was compiled. I would actually go so far as to say that The Bible is a piece of engineering! Of course there are fundamental laws that govern what is possible in the field of structural and electrical engineering. Similarly there are foundational conventions that govern what we understand to be literature. Indeed as ‘literature’ The Bible is remarkably conservative in form with many antecedents. (The characteristic juxtaposition of historical context with verse, anecdote, song and ‘vision’).
When buying a computer or crossing a bridge we don’t first ask whether the object is true or false. We ask (again) – does it work? Is it stable? And this is the certainty that Christians speak of, or perhaps aspire to. (At least so I think. They are perhaps unlikely to word it this way!)
Considered as a piece of engineering, The Bible is one of the greatest structures that the world has ever seen. It’s propositions are True (in their entirety!) only in so far as the book is able to act as something like a vector that can facilitate a creative advance (either personal or social).
Democracy, Law and Human Rights are similarly engineered to try and stand as the ‘true’ vectors of order and advancement. Truth here melds with what is found to be efficacious. Truth is, in a very real sense, process. Every time The Bible is consulted it is tested (like feet across a bridge…like law?). The ‘certainty’ of its truth is ultimately judged by just one consideration: has it helped?
Does Christianity continue to help? Did it ever help? Personally, I don’t feel so privileged as to hazard an answer to that. I’m neither a Christian nor an Apostate, neither theist nor atheist. So how could I know?
The Bible, as a bridge, has advanced solace and ‘healing’ throughout centuries of upheaval. It has also facilitated the use of weapons and the unfolding of atrocity.
The same can be said of science: it advances medicines, it advances bombs.
But just think of such a book! Such a vector!!
Whatever it’s perceived relationship to science (and there is *no* relationship in practice), and whatever it’s relationship to history (which is tenuous), The Bible is neither falsehood nor delusion. It is a collection of words that are finely engineered (as vectors) in order facilitate change in the lives of those who receive it and order within the state/church. Nothing could be more empirical, less “supernatural”.
Anyway, Happy New Year!
The Pope recently wrote a book about the nativity. He admitted that the ox and the ass are made up traditions. But this is a case of literalism, not maturity of textural criticism: the ox and ass aren’t mentioned in the core 4 gospels. It would be a much larger step he has not yet made to admit that the entire nativity story is a later appended just-so story.
I think most biblical historians accept that the calculation that set our 1 AD was a mistake. To the extent that Jesus actually existed, most would argue he must have been born sometime in the range 7-12AD. So arguments about “but this all happened 6AD or later” aren’t very interesting. Nevertheless, there is sufficient evidence that the entire nativity story is a just-so story, and thus the debate about the historicity of Jesus needs to look elsewhere.
As a somewhat church damaged Christian who was privileged to preach and lead worship (lead the singing) at many if not most of the denominations in England, I have listened to every argument put forward about the Bible, its infallibility etc. I’ve been welcomed (in a Roman Catholic church) as a member of another faith and heard every kind of sermon all putting forward their interpretation or spin. I’ve also read the Bible almost from cover to cover many times. I think I may be qualified to speak (Paul used this same approach many time BTW)
My understanding is that Matthew wrote his gospel for the benefit of the Jews. He wanted to show that Jesus was indeed the Messiah as prophesied. Matthew got a lot of his information from Jesus’ mother Mary.
Mark’s account concentrates on what he did. Mark was the young man who fell asleep and fell out of the window in Acts. He travelled with Peter who was his source material.
Luke wrote an account for a rich Roman Theophilus. His account reads like investigative journalism.
John wrote about the Jesus he knew. It records what Jesus said rather than what he did and does not speak about his early life at all.
All the accounts are different because they were written for different people, different purposes and used different source material. I beleive they all contain truth, in the same way that witnesses to a road accident all tell the truth, even if they all saw it differently.
I was once a witness in a trial. My friend had been accused of assault. His accusers’ accounts were all exactly the same, without deviation. It was as if they’d got together to agree their story, which was a pack of lies.
The defence acounts were all slightly different. We had all witnessed the event and had not spoken about it. Our accounts were believeable because they were different. The jury agreed without hesitation.
While it’s true that “seeing is believing”, in matters of faith the converse is also true
You do see it when you believe it.
Dave
Atheism is a position of doubt, a lack of certainty does not render it untenable, it is its foundation. It sounds like you may have reversed your burden of proof.
Others have said it better, but atheism is certainly not a ‘fundamentalist’ belief in rationalism and science. One can look at the universe and see it as essentially absurd – or as a work in progress by some wondrous superior intellect. What I can’t do is look at the universe science shows us, and conclude that it must be the creation of a foul-tempered Bronze Age deity with a livestock fixation.
Re: the New Testament, isn’t one of the really dodgy bits where Jesus appoints Peter his ‘first officer’ and says he will ‘build upon this rock’? That assumes Jesus (and all his disciples) spoke Greek, which seems wildly improbable given Jesus’ stated origins. Yet that bit of word-play is, pretty much, the basis of the presumed authority of the Roman Catholic church.
Anyway, I really just commented to thank you for all the excellent posts and tweets.
Hi David. For a better understanding of how and why the New Testament was written, see this book. It’s excellent.
Who Wrote The New Testament?