The authors of Matthew and Luke copied of of Mark, and they also copied from a common source of the sayings of Jesus known as "Q," and yet, neither the author of Mark nor this "Q" source included any narratives about Jesus's birth or the events after his resurrection (the last few verses in Mark not being found in the oldest and best manuscripts of that gospel). The authors of Matthew and Luke, however, felt a need to discuss both events before Jesus's baptism, and events after his resurrection. We will compare these by discussing the text that comes before Jesus's baptism and that which occurs after the resurrection. We will look at the genealogies, the relationship between Jesus and John the Baptist, the claim of Jesus being born of a virgin, the requirement that he be born in Bethlehem, and a contrast of the two narratives told. We conclude with a brief discussion of how some apologists attempt to harmonize these irreconcilable stories, a humorous post-baptismal issue, and then proceed to compare and contrast the post-resurrection events discussed in both gospels. These accounts will be contrasted with what appears in the Gospel of John. We will end with a post-document prediction.
1. Genealogy
Matthew's genealogy has Joseph descending from King David through a line of the Kings of Judea, although we include a few names that are missing, and these are highlighted in red.
An account of the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham.
1 Abraham was the father of Isaac, and
2 Isaac the father of Jacob, and
3 Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers, and
4 Judah the father of Perez and Zerah by Tamar, and
5 Perez the father of Hezron, and
6 Hezron the father of Aram, and
7 Aram the father of Aminadab, and
8 Aminadab the father of Nahshon, and
9 Nahshon the father of Salmon, and
10 Salmon the father of Boaz by Rahab, and
11 Boaz the father of Obed by Ruth, and
12 Obed the father of Jesse, and
13 Jesse the father of King David. And
14 David was the father of Solomon by the wife of Uriah, and
1 David was the father of Solomon by the wife of Uriah, and
2 Solomon the father of Rehoboam, and
3 Rehoboam the father of Abijah, and
4 Abijah the father of Asaph, and
5 Asaph the father of Jehoshaphat, and
6 Jehoshaphat the father of Joram, and
7 Joram the father of [Ahaziah, and
Ahaziah the father of Joash, and
Joash the father of Amaziah, and
Amaziah the father of],Uzziah, and
8 Uzziah the father of Jotham, and
9 Jotham the father of Ahaz, and
10 Ahaz the father of Hezekiah, and
11 Hezekiah the father of
12 Manasseh, and Manasseh the father of Amos, and
13 Amos the father of Josiah, and
14 Josiah the father of [Jehoiakim, and
Jehoiakim the father of] Jechoniah and his brothers, at the time of the deportation to Babylon. And after the deportation to Babylon:
1 Jechoniah was the father of Salathiel, and
2 Salathiel the father of Zerubbabel, and
3 Zerubbabel the father of Abiud, and
4 Abiud the father of Eliakim, and
5 Eliakim the father of Azor, and
6 Azor the father of Zadok, and
7 Zadok the father of Achim, and
8 Achim the father of Eliud, and
9 Eliud the father of Eleazar, and
10 Eleazar the father of Matthan, and
11 Matthan the father of Jacob, and
12 Jacob the father of
13 Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom
14 Jesus was born, who is called the Messiah.
The issues with the actual genealogy as recorded in the Chronicles are highlighted in red, where Joram is actually the great-great grandfather of Uzziah, and Josiah is the father of Jehoiakim and the grandfather of Jechoniah, and finally, the Chronicles record that the sons of Zerubbabel are Meshullam and Hannaniah, not Abiud. The purpose of leaving out specific names is to reduce the number of individuals to fourteen:
So all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations; and from David to the deportation to Babylon, fourteen generations; and from the deportation to Babylon to the Messiah, fourteen generations.
For some reason, the author of Matthew has selected individuals from the genealogy to ensure that there are groups of fourteen (14) or twice seven, but this is clearly false for two reasons: first, the author deliberately skipped numerous generations in order to reduce the number of generations to only fourteen, and Jeconiah was born prior to 600 BCE, and if Jesus was born approximately 1 CE, then the average age of this last group of 14 by the time they had their successor would be 46 years old. Such a suggestion is of course absurd, as the average age a man would have his first son might be closer to twenty than to 46, and if even one of those fathers had their son in their early twenties, that would add almost two years onto the average age of the balance of the fourteen, so 48 years old! Also it seems that Jehoiakim was simply left out as he would have made that group fifteen.
The genealogy in Luke, however, differs greatly, and returns to Adam. There are few Kings of Judea in Luke's genealogy, and instead, most of the individuals are unknowns, and therefore likely commoners and not kings. Between David and Joseph, there are only two names that overlap, and these four are highlighted in blue. There is, however, another name that does not appear in any of the Judean scriptures, and that name appears in red.
Jesus was about thirty years old when he began his work. He was the son (as was thought) of
Joseph son of
Heli, son of
Matthat, son of
Levi, son of
Melchi, son of
Jannai, son of
Joseph, son of
Mattathias, son of
Amos, son of
Nahum, son of
Esli, son of
Naggai, son of
Maath, son of
Mattathias, son of
Semein, son of
Josech, son of
Joda, son of
Joanan, son of
Rhesa, son of
Zerubbabel, son of
Shealtiel, son of
Neri, son of
Melchi, son of
Addi, son of
Cosam, son of
Elmadam, son of
Er, son of
Joshua, son of
Eliezer, son of
Jorim, son of
Matthat, son of
Levi, son of
Simeon, son of
Judah, son of
Joseph, son of
Jonam, son of
Eliakim, son of
Melea, son of
Menna, son of
Mattatha, son of
Nathan, son of
David, son of
Jesse, son of
Obed, son of
Boaz, son of
Sala, son of
Nahshon, son of
Amminadab, son of
Admin, son of
Arni, son of
Hezron, son of
Perez, son of
Judah, son of
Jacob, son of
Isaac, son of
Abraham, son of
Terah, son of
Nahor, son of
Serug, son of
Reu, son of
Peleg, son of
Eber, son of
Shelah, son of
Cainan, son of
Arphaxad, son of
Shem, son of
Noah, son of
Lamech, son of
Methuselah, son of
Enoch, son of
Jared, son of
Mahalaleel, son of
Cainan, son of
Enos, son of
Seth, son of
Adam, son of
God.
Let us review the descendants of Perez as recorded in the book of Ruth:
Now these are the descendants of Perez:
Perez became the father of Hezron,
Hezron of Ram,
Ram of Amminadab,
Amminadab of Nahshon,
Nahshon of Salmon,
Salmon of Boaz,
Boaz of Obed,
Obed of Jesse, and
Jesse of David.
This is the same as the genealogy from Perez to David as is found in Matthew, and yet Luke fails to record even this correctly, for Luke records the son of Ram, Aram or Arni (all the same person) as Admin, not Amminadab, and Amminadab becomes the son of Admin. After David, there are only four names in common between Matthew and Luke: Salathiel/Shealtiel and his son Zerubbabel, and Joseph and his son Jesus; however, the father of Salathiel is recorded as Jechoniah in Matthew (and Chronicles), but Luke lists the father as an otherwise unknown Neri. Consequently, it seems there were shared stories that these two were in Jesus's genealogy; after all, Zerubbabel in the Judean scriptures is the high priest who led the first captives back to Jerusalem from Babylon and who established the second temple.
As for the average age between generations, assuming, however, that Neri and Jeconiah where born at approximately the same time (600 BCE), Luke's genealogy would have the average age of each father being only 27 years old, and not 46 as would be required by the author of Matthew. But why would both authors be divinely inspired, and yet produce contradictory genealogies even if they had Judean scriptures to draw from? Next we look at the relationship between Jesus and John the Baptist.
In conclusion, the genealogies differ significantly, and claims that one is the genealogy of Joseph and the other of Miriam entirely ignore that both describe the text "Jacob the father of Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born" versus "He was the son (as was thought) of Joseph son of Heli..." The first explicitly states that Jacob is the father of Joseph with Mary being mentioned in the same sentence, and the second explicitly states that Joseph was not the father of Jesus, but continues to describe his father. If both authors felt the need to have Jesus descend from David, and each had to come up with their own lineage, it is very unlikely that they both would have come up with the same names.
2. Jesus and John the Baptist
The author of Luke makes a significant claim that is not repeated elsewhere in any scripture: that Jesus and John the Baptist were related through their mothers. This aligns with other changes to the gospel narrative made by the author of Luke; for example, both Mark and Matthew describe Jesus's baptism by John: "In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan," and "Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan, to be baptized by him." In Matthew, John objects to Jesus baptizing him, but that objection does not appear in Mark. In Luke, however, the baptism of Jesus is mentioned without reference to an explicit reference to John: "Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened..." Mark and Matthew both align the start of Jesus's ministry with the arrest of John the Baptist: "Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, ..." and "Now when Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew to Galilee. He left Nazareth and made his home in Capernaum by the sea, ..." In Luke, however, Jesus is tempted in the wilderness, returns to Galilee and immediately begins to teach, and goes to Nazareth only to be rejected, and it is this rejection that brought him to Capernaum: "When they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with rage. They got up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they might hurl him off the cliff. But he passed through the midst of them and went on his way. He went down to Capernaum, a city in Galilee, ..." You will note that this story, where "no prophet is accepted in the prophet’s hometown." This same story is told in Mark and Matthew, but neither has this as the seminal event that spurs Jesus to begin his ministry. This doesn't mean it was not, but both other gospels give the reason for Jesus beginning his ministry as him becoming aware that John the Baptist being arrested.
This is interesting, for if Jesus was just a human, who was, as the adoptionists would have it, adopted the Son of God at his baptism, in which case, he would had all the characteristics and failings of a human when he grew up. However, if now Jesus was to be interpreted as the son of Yahweh by birth, as is suggested in Matthew and Luke (neither suggesting Jesus preexisted his own birth), or as a divine being itself incarnate (as is suggested by the author of John or Paul), then would not the people he grew up with understand that he never sinned in all of the thirty years he lived with them? It's difficult to imagine a small village of perhaps a few hundred families not noticing that one individual seemed to be significantly different from every other human being that they had ever met. Remember, 30 years is over ten thousand days: you are interacting with your neighbor on a regular basis, and one in particular never sins? One would think that this might be noticed.
Also, another issue is that not all disciples of John immediate became disciples of Jesus. In Mark, only Jesus is reported to have seen the dove, and Yahweh speaks directly to him: "And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, 'You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.'" This suggests it is a personal message for Jesus, but in Matthew, this becomes an announcement: "And when Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water, suddenly the heavens were opened to him and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, 'This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.'" One might think that at least John, the baptizer, heard this. Finally, Luke, however, reverts back to Mark's narrative: "Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, 'You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.'" Finally, however, the author of John significantly changes the events: there is no mention what-so-ever of John baptizing Jesus, as you can read for yourself:
The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him and declared, “Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! This is he of whom I said, ‘After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me.’ I myself did not know him; but I came baptizing with water for this reason, that he might be revealed to Israel.” And John testified, “I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’ And I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God.”
You will note that here John the Baptist explicitly recognizes Jesus as the "Lamb of God." Not only that, but some of John the Baptist's disciples recognize Jesus:
The next day John again was standing with two of his disciples, and as he watched Jesus walk by, he exclaimed, “Look, here is the Lamb of God!” The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus. When Jesus turned and saw them following, he said to them, “What are you looking for?” They said to him, “Rabbi” (which translated means Teacher), “where are you staying?” He said to them, “Come and see.” They came and saw where he was staying, and they remained with him that day. It was about four o’clock in the afternoon. One of the two who heard John speak and followed him was Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother. He first found his brother Simon and said to him, “We have found the Messiah” (which is translated Anointed). He brought Simon to Jesus, who looked at him and said, “You are Simon son of John. You are to be called Cephas” (which is translated Peter).
So now we are to believe that, at the very least, Andrew was a disciple of John the Baptist (something not recorded anywhere else). Also, whereas in the other three gospels, it is Simon who first recognizes Jesus as the Messiah (see Mark 8, Matthew 16 and Luke 9), in John, it is his brother Andrew who recognizes Jesus as the Messiah, and at the very start of Jesus's ministry. All of this contrasts with the synoptic gospels, all of which suggest that Andrew and Simon were only called after Jesus came to Capernaum.
What is the issue that the authors are trying to address? Likely, it is the fact that if John the Baptist was indeed aware of Jesus, then once John the Baptist had been executed, why did the disciples of John not simply become disciples of Jesus? Would John the Baptist not have made his disciples aware of the significance of Jesus? If John the Baptist was aware of Jesus's status as the "Lamb of God," as is recorded in John, why would John the Baptist send is disciples to speak to Jesus to inquire as to the significance of Jesus:
The disciples of John reported all these things to him. So John summoned two of his disciples and sent them to the Lord to ask, “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?” When the men had come to him, they said, “John the Baptist has sent us to you to ask, ‘Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?’” Jesus had just then cured many people of diseases, plagues, and evil spirits, and had given sight to many who were blind. And he answered them, “Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have good news brought to them. And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me.”
When John heard in prison what the Messiah was doing, he sent word by his disciples and said to him, “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?” Jesus answered them, “Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me.”
This is a pericope that does not appear in Mark, and is thus likely from a shared source known as Q. However, what is important is, did John the Baptist forget what he declared? “Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! This is he of whom I said, ‘After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me.’” Why then, is John summoning two of his disciples and sending them to the Jesus to ask, “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?”
All of this demonstrates the varied attempts of the authors of the four gospels to explain, if Jesus was the Messiah, why there were still disciples of John the Baptist continuing to spread John's message of the upcoming return of the Kingdom of Yahweh and neither following Jesus teachings nor believing he was the Messiah. The authors of both Matthew and Luke have the disciples of John the Baptist visit Jesus, and the author of Luke explicitly introduces a familial relationship between Jesus and John the Baptist. The fact that Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist suggests that Jesus was spiritually subordinate to John the Baptist, and Jesus not beginning his ministry until John the Baptist is arrested, as recorded in Mark and Matthew, suggest a follower going out to continue spreading the message of his imprisoned spiritual leader; the author of Luke avoids this by having Jesus immediately begin his ministry after returning from the wilderness. For Mark, Jesus as adopted the Son of God at his baptism, and only have Jesus experience the message from Yawheh. The author of Matthew has John the Baptist objecting to baptizing Jesus, and Luke mentions the baptism, but does not explicitly state that John is the one baptizing Jesus. John's narrative does not even suggest that Jesus was baptized, and instead, only has John proclaim Jesus's status as the "Lamb of God" and that he saw a dove land on Jesus. Thus, the author of John would have one believe that John the Baptist was already aware of Jesus's final destiny, and thus, any disciples of John the Baptist who still did not follow the teachings of Jesus were simply failing to grasp the knowledge their teacher was already aware of. Next, we look at the narrative around Jesus's birth.
3. The birth of Jesus
The author of Mark, likely understanding Jesus to be nothing more than a human who was adopted the son of Yahweh at his baptism, makes no reference to Jesus being born in Nazareth: the village is never mentioned. The authors of Matthew and Luke, however, felt that not only did Jesus need to be born in Bethlehem, but he also needed to be born of a virgin: that is, Jesus was born the son of Yahweh. The problem is, everyone knew that Jesus was from Nazareth in Galilee, and not from Bethlehem, less than 7 km from the Temple in Jerusalem, and yet, verses that could be interpreted as a prophesy in Micah suggest Bethlehem as the place for a coming ruler of Israel:
But you, O Bethlehem of Ephrathah,
who are one of the little clans of Judah,
from you shall come forth for me
one who is to rule in Israel,
whose origin is from of old,
from ancient days.
3.1 Born of a virgin
That the messiah is to born of a virgin has been debunked many times before, as the translation of we Hebrew word for young woman into Greek saw the authors use the word, for almah and elem simply mean young man and woman, respectively. The word bethulah refers to a virgin. It is amah that appears in Isaiah and translating it into the Greek word for virgin, parthenos, is incorrect. Additionally, Isaiah refers to "the young woman", not "a young woman". Let us see how each gospel presents this idea:
Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly.
In Luke, the story is very different: Mary is told by an angel that she would become pregnant:
In the sixth month (of Elizabeth's alleged pregnancy with John the Baptist) the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. And he came to her and said, “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.” But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. The angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.” Mary said to the angel, “How can this be, since I am a virgin?” The angel said to her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God. And now, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren. For nothing will be impossible with God.” Then Mary said, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.” Then the angel departed from her.
The author of Luke does not mention anything about Joseph planning to dismiss her. Instead, in Matthew, we have that
But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” All this took place to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet: “Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,” which means, “God is with us.” When Joseph awoke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him; he took her as his wife, but had no marital relations with her until she had borne a son; and he named him Jesus.
Matthew mentions nothing about Mary being told apriori about this pregnancy, and Luke mentions nothing of Joseph wanting to dismiss Mary nor is there any mention of Joseph's dream.
3.2 Born in Bethlehem
The authors of Matthew and Luke needed to get Jesus to be born in Bethlehem. For Matthew, the solution is simple: the family begins their life in Bethlehem, and they are only later forced to flee to Nazareth. For Luke, he is aware that a census was required in Judea when the former client state ruled by Herod Archelaus was incorporated into the Roman Empire as the province of Iudaea (together with Samaria and Idumea (or Edom)). This was a local census and it only involved the new province, for as a Roman province, the governor was now responsible for taxation. Previously, as a client kingdom and then a client state, it was the ruler (King Herod, and then Herod Archelaus) who collected money and paid a tribute to Rome. A census was understood to be forbidden by the Judean scriptures (Exodus 30:12), and thus, neither King Herod nor his son would have considered such an act (given their precarious position as Idumean rulers of Judea, a people who had only been forcibly converted to Judaism a centuries before), and when the Romans did impose a census, this led to a rebellion led by Judas of Galilee and other Zealots. The Romans, however, needed a census to know how tax to impose on these denizens of a new province, and this is the story the author of Luke attached his. Luke, however, imposes an additional requirement from the Romans: that each should go "to their own towns to be registered." For Joseph, as apparently he was from the family of David, needed to return to Bethlehem. Consider the consequences of such a census: Nazareth would be completely evacuated, for it was already a new town, and thus, under these rules, none would come to Nazareth for a census imposed under such rules, and everyone in Nazareth would have to leave. What would happen to the economy? Would all of Judea be shut down for weeks while everyone goes elsewhere? Who would protect the property that was left behind? Did farmers stop attending their fields, and did they leave their animals behind, or did they take their animals with them? Did the entire economy shut down for a minimum of two weeks, and how would a shutdown of the economy help the Romans? What happened to those who did not know where their great-great-great-...-great-grandfather came from? How many descendants of the family of David would be swarming Bethlehem (after all, King Solomon alone had 700 wives of royal birth and 300 concubines, if that, too, is to be believed), and who fed them while they were there. Did the old and sick and young travel throughout the Levant to return to their ancestral homes? Did Egyptian and Phoenician immigrants return to their homes? What of those who immigrated from outside the Roman Empire? Where did they go to be registered? Additionally, it is estimated that there were upwards of 7 million Jews in the Roman Empire at that time, only 2.5 million of which lived in the the region from Galilee to Idumea. Did the remaining 4.5 million Jews charter boats and overland travel to return to their ancestral homes? Who housed these millions of people? Not only would there be no room in the inn, there would be no room at all. Also, once all these people returned to their ancestral homes, what did the Romans do with this information? Would they not just send it back to the places where they actually lived in order to correctly collect appropriate taxes? Would the censors in Bethlehem collate the names of all those Jews who lived in southern Italy and return that information to the Roman tax officers in that region? The entire process would be inefficient and counterproductive.
To hold such a census would be equivalent to a census in Canada or the United States where every person who was not of First Nations heritage needed to go to the port of entry of their ancestors, while all First Nations people would return to Alaska. In the United States, New York and Plymouth would be swamped, after all, it is estimated that there are 35 million descendants of the Mayflower pilgrims alive today (noting that the Mayflower only landed 400 years ago, while King David lived approximately one thousand years before Jesus was born). Most villages, towns and even cities would be deserted for weeks while Americans travelled to either coast to be registered for such a census. Similarly, the census suggested by Luke is equally absurd, and the Romans most certainly did not have an Imperial census with such requirements either (would all Roman citizens pack up and leave their holdings throughout the empire to return to Rome to be registered?). Consequently, if Jesus was born after the imposition of this census by the Romans, then Jesus would be born no earlier than 6 CE, when Herod Archelaus was deposed and ethnarch and the Roman province of Iudaea was established; a full decade after the death of King Herod. To even contemplate such a census occurring demonstrates how rational thinking is avoided at all cost, and instead, the claim is taken on faith and simply accepted as gospel. To believe that King Herod would impose such a census indicates that the individual has no knowledge about the precarious position he had as a king imposed by the Romans, and had he imposed such a census, not only would he have invited strife, but this sin would be added to the list of his many sins recorded by his enemies.
Unfortunately, all of this discussion misses one major point: while Bethlehem was in Iudaea, and thus subject to a Roman census, Nazareth was in Galilee, part of the client state or tetrarchy of Herod Antipas, and consequently, no denizen of this region would be subject to a Roman census: it was up to Herod Antipas to raise funds and pay tribute to the Romans, and being Jewish, Herod Antipas would never impose a census. Consequently, it seems that Joseph took part in a census he was not required to take part in, he unnecessarily travelled to a location where he would not normally be required to go for a census, all to ensure that a so-called prophesy in Judean scriptures is satisficed. One might claim that Joseph had business in Bethlehem, and thus had to travel to Bethlehem to have his activities in Bethlehem registered, but why then would he be searching for a guest room. Besides, Joseph and Jesus appear to be carpenters, for it says
Mark 6:3 “Is not this the carpenter (τέκτων or tekton), the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?”
Matthew 13:55 “Is not this the carpenter’s son (τέκτονος υἱός or tektonos yios)? Is not his mother called Mary? And are not his brothers James and Joseph and Simon and Judas?”
Additionally, Nazareth was a small settlement at the time with no major civic structures. If Joseph's business dealings were sufficiently diverse so as to have trade dealings in two such disparate locations, why is he living in a place like Nazareth?
We do have a record of censuses being held throughout the Roman empire at the time of Augustus, and this is likely where the author of Luke acquired this story, but we also know the times of these censuses directly from the writings of Augustus: in his personal records, Res Gestae Divi Augusti, he says:
When I was consul the fifth time (29 BCE), I increased the number of patricians by order of the people and senate. I read the roll of the senate three times, and in my sixth consulate (28 BCE) I made a census of the people with Marcus Agrippa as my colleague. I conducted a lustrum, after a forty-one year gap, in which lustrum were counted 4,063,000 heads of Roman citizens.
Then again, with consular imperium I conducted a lustrum alone when Gaius Censorinus and Gaius Asinius were consuls (8 BCE), in which lustrum were counted 4,233,000 heads of Roman citizens.
And the third time, with consular imperium, I conducted a lustrum with my son Tiberius Caesar as colleague, when Sextus Pompeius and Sextus Appuleius were consuls (14 CE), in which lustrum were counted 4,937,000 of the heads of Roman citizens. By new laws passed with my sponsorship, I restored many traditions of the ancestors, which were falling into disuse in our age, and myself I handed on precedents of many things to be imitated in later generations.
Thus, the three empire-wide censuses were held in 28 BCE, 8 BCE and 14 CE. None of these are even close to 4 BCE (the time of Herod's death) or 6 CE (the time of the census in Iudaea).
Thus, let us go a few verses at a time and make comments:
In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. All went to their own towns to be registered. 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. He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child.
It is clear that Joseph and Mary were from Nazareth and that they are simply travelling to Bethlehem for this so-called census. It also introduces the idea that Joseph, and therefore Jesus, is of the House of David, a claim that is subsequently reiterated when Luke gives his genealogy. Matthew, however, does not have the family starting in Nazareth. For Matthew, the family starts in Bethlehem, and as we will see, almost accidentally arrive in Nazareth.
Next in Luke comes the endearing story of a manger:
While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.
There is no mention of this in Matthew; after all, there is no suggesting by that author that the family was even travelling to Bethleham. The author of Luke continues with a story about angels:
In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.” And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favors!” When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us.” So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger. When they saw this, they made known what had been told them about this child; and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds told them. But Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart. The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.
Compare and contrast this with Matthew: in Matthew, many of the Kings of Judea are in Jesus's genealogy, while in Luke, not even Solomon is in that genealogy, Jesus instead being the descendent of Nathan the son of David. In Matthew, it is Magi who visit Jesus but in Luke it is shepherds. Also, note that instead of star guiding the shepherds, it is a sign of the poverty of Joseph and Mary (lying in a manger) that guides the shepherds. Imagine walking through a town to find one couple whose child born that night is lying in a manger? Recall that all, possibly tens if not hundreds of thousands of descendants of David are crowding the roads and buildings and inns of Bethlehem. A star might have been a better guide.
Next, eight days after Jesus's birth, he is circumcised and named:
After eight days had passed, it was time to circumcise the child; and he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb.
Finally, thirty days after Jesus's birth, they travel to Jerusalem to have Jesus presented to Yahweh:
When the time came for their purification according to the law of Moses, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord (as it is written in the law of the Lord, “Every firstborn male shall be designated as holy to the Lord”), and they offered a sacrifice according to what is stated in the law of the Lord, “a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.”
The actual requirement is from Leviticus 12:
When the days of her purification are completed, whether for a son or for a daughter, she shall bring to the priest at the entrance of the tent of meeting a lamb in its first year for a burnt offering, and a pigeon or a turtledove for a sin offering. He shall offer it before the Lord, and make atonement on her behalf; then she shall be clean from her flow of blood. This is the law for her who bears a child, male or female. If she cannot afford a sheep, she shall take two turtledoves or two pigeons, one for a burnt offering and the other for a sin offering; and the priest shall make atonement on her behalf, and she shall be clean.
Thus, once again, Luke emphasizes the poverty of the family: it is not the sacrifice of a lamb, but rather, the sacrifice of one that cannot afford a lamb. During their visit to Jerusalem, a righteous man Simon and a prophet Anna praise this infant:
Now there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon; this man was righteous and devout, looking forward to the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit rested on him. It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Messiah. Guided by the Spirit, Simeon came into the temple; and when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him what was customary under the law, Simeon took him in his arms and praised God, saying, “Master, now you are dismissing your servant in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel.” And the child’s father and mother were amazed at what was being said about him. Then Simeon blessed them and said to his mother Mary, “This child is destined for the falling and the rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be opposed so that the inner thoughts of many will be revealed—and a sword will pierce your own soul too.”
There was also a prophet, Anna the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was of a great age, having lived with her husband seven years after her marriage, then as a widow to the age of eighty-four. She never left the temple but worshiped there with fasting and prayer night and day. At that moment she came, and began to praise God and to speak about the child to all who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem.
None of this is mentioned in Matthew, who does not even see the family travel to Jerusalem. Also, who recorded this so that this could be transcribed by the author of Luke? This is what you would expect to see in a work of historical fiction, or if this was divinely revealed to the author of Luke, then perhaps that same divine entity could have guided that author to not include Admin in his genealogy.
Finally, the family simply returns to Nazareth, and that's it:
When they had finished everything required by the law of the Lord, they returned to Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth. The child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom; and the favor of God was upon him.
You may have noticed that there is no mention of King Herod, the Magi, the star or Egypt. Thus, next, we will continue to go through the narrative as it is set out in Matthew:
In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, asking, “Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage.”
Immediately we note, there is no mention of a manger, and Jesus was born while King Herod was alive. King Herod died approximately 4 BCE, which is well over a decade before Iudaea was made into a Roman province, and therefore a decade before the setting of Luke's narrative. You should recall that Iudaea was incorporated into the Roman empire after Herod Archelaus, King Herod's son, was deposed from his position as ethnarch. Next, we see that the Magi have seen a star. Normally, a "star" heralding great events may be a super nova or a comet, but in either case, the celestial event either remains fixed relative to all other stars (as in a super nova) or is moving and more transient (such as a comet). The reaction of King Herod was well known:
When King Herod heard this, he was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him; and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. They told him, “In Bethlehem of Judea; for so it has been written by the prophet: ‘And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for from you shall come a ruler who is to shepherd my people Israel.’” Then Herod secretly called for the wise men and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared. Then he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, “Go and search diligently for the child; and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage.”
Okay, Bethlehem is at most 7 km from the Temple, and if King Herod wanted, why did he not just have his spies follow these Magi? Would it be that difficult, given that these Magi are likely riding as part of a caravan? Supposing this caravan moved at 3 km/h, then it would have taken two hours to get to Bethlehem, and why did no one notice these Magi travelling through Bethlehem. One would think a threat like: "Tell me where these Magi went, or I'll kill all your children!" might be sufficient motivation for someone in Bethlehem to identify the location where these Magi went. However, we continue:
When they had heard the king, they set out; and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.
This is awkward, as how could a star ever guide anyone to a specific location. It may have been a comet, so was the sky overcast when the Magi were visiting King Herod, or what caused them to lose sight of it? Anyway, it seems with an hour of the Magi leaving Jerusalem, they found the star again to guide them to where Jesus was lying. Now, these gifts are being given to Jesus in Bethlehem, and in Luke, the family returned to Nazareth via Jerusalem within a month, apparently never to return. Why then was the offering at the Temple that of two birds instead of a lamb? Surely the gold could have paid for a lamb, and would they not have been obligated to offer a lamb if they could afford it? However, more important, King Herod is in Jerusalem, so why would the family, as described in Luke, travel the temple when the monarch seeking to kill Jesus is there? However, none of this is mentioned in Luke, and nothing of Jesus being presented at the Temple weeks after his birth is mentioned in Matthew.
The author of Matthew continues:
Now after they had left, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you; for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.” Then Joseph got up, took the child and his mother by night, and went to Egypt, and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet, “Out of Egypt I have called my son.”
So now we have the family fleeing to Egypt? Is this within the month between Jesus's birth and circumcision and the family's trip to Jerusalem in order to present Jesus at the Temple? Remember, King Herod has been dead for a decade before the story as narrated in Luke occurs, but how are these two stories to be reconciled? Luke makes no mention of any stress for the family, no Magi, no flight to Egypt, and no mention of yet again another prophesy being fulfilled. However, Matthew continues:
When Herod saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, he was infuriated, and he sent and killed all the children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had learned from the wise men. Then was fulfilled what had been spoken through the prophet Jeremiah: “A voice was heard in Ramah, wailing and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be consoled, because they are no more.”
This introduces further complications: this now suggests the "star" had been visible for two years. A star, not moving in the sky with all other stars, above one location in Bethlehem and only attracts the attention of three Magi from the East. Also, this places even more time between the birth of Jesus in the two narratives: approximately twelve years. Again, this story is told just to satisfy another so-called prophesy. Now, Bethlehem was not Nazareth: it was a significantly larger settlement, so if there were a thousand denizens, then this would mean a significant number of male infants were killed. Why is there no other record of this order? You would require hundreds of soldiers, and the outcry would be incredible. Given the resentment to King Herod (recall, he was ethnically from Idumea (or Edom), and thus his family's forced conversion to Judaism was already suspect, and he was made a client king of Rome by Augustus, so he was not even the rightful king, not from the line of David, nor from the Hasmonean dynasty). So why, given how many other evils of King Herod had been recorded, was not this one? Of course, why the author of Matthew would choose King Herod to fulfill this prophesy is obvious: King Herod was known to be "evil" by the people of Judea, so why not attribute one more evil act on him? After all, this one act allows two prophesies to be fulfilled, and King Herod has long since been dead.
So now the author of Matthew has the family returning from Egypt:
When Herod died, an angel of the Lord suddenly appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother, and go to the land of Israel, for those who were seeking the child’s life are dead.” Then Joseph got up, took the child and his mother, and went to the land of Israel.
Thus, finally, we have the family returning from Egypt in 4 BCE when King Herod dies. After King Herod died, the Romans did not replace him with any one monarch. Instead, Herod's kingdom was split into four approximately equal regions, and Herod Archelaus was given two together with the title of ethnarch, and Herod Philip and Herod Antipas, two other sons of King Herod, were given the remaining two, and given the title of tetrarch. Consequently, Bethlehem was now in the ethnarchy of Herod Archelaus.
But when he heard that Archelaus was ruling over Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. And after being warned in a dream, he went away to the district of Galilee.
Thus, the author of Matthew got the succession correct, and there is no possibility that the author accidentally referred to Herod Archelaus as "King Herod". Indeed, the author of Mark gets the titles wrong, for Herod Antipas is referred to as king: "And King Herod heard about it, ..." and later "And although the king was very sorry, because of his oaths and his dinner guests, he was unwilling to refuse her." The author of Matthew corrects the first with "At that time Herod the ruler heard reports about Jesus, ..." but editorial fatigue causes him to miss the second: "The king was grieved, yet out of regard for his oaths and for the guests, he commanded it to be given."
Returning to Matthew's birth narrative, Joseph is guided to Galilee, but it is even awkward that he wanted to return to Bethlahem, as why would Joseph want to return to Bethlehem anyways; after all, according to the author of Luke, the family was originally from Nazareth, so would it not be natural to return to Nazareth? Fortunately, Nazareth is in Galilee and Herod Antipas was the ruler there.
There he made his home in a town called Nazareth, so that what had been spoken through the prophets might be fulfilled, “He will be called a Nazorean.”
Notice that there is absolutely no hint that they were returning to their hometown, and instead, "he made his home in a town called Nazareth." It seems almost coincidental, or accidental, except that this is now done to ensure that Jesus would have yet another title, that of a Nazorean. Now this is a prophesy that is not understood. The settlement of Nazareth was quite young at the time of Jesus, and some would (in my opinion) claim that Nazareth did not even exist when Jesus was allegedly born, so it would never be referenced in Judean scriptures. Nazirites, however, do include those who took the vow described in Numbers 26:
The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Speak to the Israelites and say to them:
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When either men or women make a special vow, the vow of a nazirite, to separate themselves to the Lord, they shall separate themselves from wine and strong drink; they shall drink no wine vinegar or other vinegar, and shall not drink any grape juice or eat grapes, fresh or dried. All their days as nazirites they shall eat nothing that is produced by the grapevine, not even the seeds or the skins.
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All the days of their nazirite vow no razor shall come upon the head; until the time is completed for which they separate themselves to the Lord, they shall be holy; they shall let the locks of the head grow long.
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All the days that they separate themselves to the Lord they shall not go near a corpse. Even if their father or mother, brother or sister, should die, they may not defile themselves; because their consecration to God is upon the head.
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All their days as nazirites they are holy to the Lord. If someone dies very suddenly nearby, defiling the consecrated head, then they shall shave the head on the day of their cleansing; on the seventh day they shall shave it. On the eighth day they shall bring two turtledoves or two young pigeons to the priest at the entrance of the tent of meeting, and the priest shall offer one as a sin offering and the other as a burnt offering, and make atonement for them, because they incurred guilt by reason of the corpse. They shall sanctify the head that same day, and separate themselves to the Lord for their days as nazirites, and bring a male lamb a year old as a guilt offering. The former time shall be void, because the consecrated head was defiled. This is the law for the nazirites when the time of their consecration has been completed: they shall be brought to the entrance of the tent of meeting, and they shall offer their gift to the Lord, one male lamb a year old without blemish as a burnt offering, one ewe lamb a year old without blemish as a sin offering, one ram without blemish as an offering of well-being, and a basket of unleavened bread, cakes of choice flour mixed with oil and unleavened wafers spread with oil, with their grain offering and their drink offerings. The priest shall present them before the Lord and offer their sin offering and burnt offering, and shall offer the ram as a sacrifice of well-being to the Lord, with the basket of unleavened bread; the priest also shall make the accompanying grain offering and drink offering. Then the nazirites shall shave the consecrated head at the entrance of the tent of meeting, and shall take the hair from the consecrated head and put it on the fire under the sacrifice of well-being. The priest shall take the shoulder of the ram, when it is boiled, and one unleavened cake out of the basket, and one unleavened wafer, and shall put them in the palms of the nazirites, after they have shaved the consecrated head. Then the priest shall elevate them as an elevation offering before the Lord; they are a holy portion for the priest, together with the breast that is elevated and the thigh that is offered. After that the nazirites may drink wine.
This is the law for the nazirites who take a vow. Their offering to the Lord must be in accordance with the nazirite vow, apart from what else they can afford. In accordance with whatever vow they take, so they shall do, following the law for their consecration.
This, however, does not seem to be linked to any prophesy of a messiah. Thus, why the author of Matthew includes this prophesy is unknown, but telling, never-the-less.
4. Jesus’s birth in Mark and John
The author of Mark does not mention Jesus's birth, but what is awkward is that it seems that Jesus's family, including Mary, do not recognize anything particularly special about Jesus. In Mark 3:21, the author says “When his family heard it, they went out to restrain him, for people were saying, ’He has gone out of his mind.’” Later in that chapter, we have the family arriving to see Jesus, in Mark 3:31-35:
Then his mother and his brothers came, and standing outside they sent to him and called him.
A crowd was sitting around him, and they said to him, “Your mother and your brothers are outside asking for you.”
And he replied, “Who are my mother and my brothers?”
And looking at those who sat around him, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.”
Does this sound like one who honors his mother? Some claim that because Mary is not mentioned explicitly in Mark 3:21 that she may not have been one of those who believed Jesus was going out of his mind, but she is certainly with her other sons when they get to Jesus. If a woman had a child while still a virgin, and according to some beliefs, was still a virgin after Jesus's birth, and if this woman had angels talking to her, and had magi from the East bring gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh, would she not recognize this child as special, and not out of his mind? Would not brothers of Jesus, who saw him grow up for decades, never once sinning, and no doubt having heard at least one or two teachings from him, not also recognize him as special? Interestingly, the authors of Matthew and Luke copy most of Mark 3 into their gospels as they plagiarized, neither copies the verse that Jesus's family has determined that Jesus was "out of his mind."
The Gospel of John presents a perplexing omission: despite an ideal opportunity to mention that Jesus was born in Bethlehem, the town is never explicitly connected to Jesus's birth in this Gospel. In John 1, after being declared the Lamb of God by John the Baptist and attracting Simon and Andrew as disciples, we encounter the following account in John 1:43-51:
The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee.
He found Philip and said to him, “Follow me.”
Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter.
Philip found Nathanael and said to him, “We have found him about whom Moses in the Law and also the Prophets wrote, Jesus son of Joseph from Nazareth.”
Nathanael said to him, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”
Philip said to him, “Come and see.”
When Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him, he said of him, “Here is truly an Israelite in whom there is no deceit!”
Nathanael asked him, “Where did you get to know me?”
Jesus answered, “I saw you under the fig tree before Philip called you.”
Nathanael replied, “Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!”
Jesus answered, “Do you believe because I told you that I saw you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than these.”
And he said to him, “Very truly, I tell you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.”
In this passage, Nathanael appears easily impressed; Jesus’s simple statement, “I saw you under the fig tree before Philip called you,” prompts Nathanael to bestow upon him the grand titles of “Son of God” and “King of Israel.” How this brief interaction merits such declarations is unclear, yet the text still omits any mention of Bethlehem. In addition, this passage also mentions that Jesus was the “son of Joseph from Nazareth,” failing to make any allusion to Jesus being born of the virgin Mary.
Bethlehem is finally referenced indirectly in John 7:37-44, where confusion about Jesus's origins arises during Sukkot (a seven-day festival falling in early autumn), and the last day is Hoshana Rabbah:
On the last day of the festival, the great day, while Jesus was standing there, he cried out, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink. As the scripture has said, ‘Out of the believer’s heart shall flow rivers of living water.’ ”
Now he said this about the Spirit, which believers in him were to receive, for as yet there was no Spirit because Jesus was not yet glorified.
When they heard these words, some in the crowd said, “This is really the prophet.”
Others said, “This is the Messiah.”
But some asked, “Surely the Messiah does not come from Galilee, does he? Has not the scripture said that the Messiah is descended from David and comes from Bethlehem, the village where David lived?”
So there was a division in the crowd because of him. Some of them wanted to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him.
Here, the crowd debates whether Jesus can truly be the Messiah, given that he appears to come from Galilee rather than Bethlehem, the prophesied birthplace of the Messiah. Later in that chapter, in John 7:50-52, we have
Nicodemus, who had gone to Jesus before and who was one of them, asked, “Our law does not judge people without first giving them a hearing to find out what they are doing, does it?”
They replied, “Surely you are not also from Galilee, are you? Search and you will see that no prophet is to arise from Galilee.”
Again, this alludes to Jesus's birth in Nazareth. Notably, the gospel does not resolve this tension, nor does it clarify Jesus’s birth in Bethlehem.
It is possible that the author of John, along with his community, was aware of the tradition that Jesus was born in Bethlehem but chose not to emphasize it. Instead, John may have sought to record the confusion among the crowd while presenting a deeply theological narrative. This approach integrates scriptural expectations with a higher, spiritual understanding of Jesus's mission, focusing on his divine identity and purpose rather than on fulfilling geographical prophecies.
One intriguing indirect reference in the Gospel of John touches on the birth of Jesus. Centuries later, the Talmud hints at rumors about Jesus's parentage, suggesting he was the offspring of Mary and a Roman soldier. For example, the Talmud refers to a Yeshu ben Panthera, with Panthera possibly being identified as the father. Some scholars speculate that this name may derive from a near-palindrome of the Greek word parthenos (meaning "virgin"), potentially reflecting a polemical play on the Christian claim of the virgin birth. It has even been suggested that the story of Jesus's virgin birth was developed to counter accusations that Jesus was conceived before Mary’s marriage to Joseph.
The Gospel of John, however, offers the most tantalizing suggestion that such rumors may have been circulating, if not during Jesus’s lifetime, then shortly afterward. In John 8:31-47, we encounter a heated exchange that could imply such allegations:
Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, “If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”
They answered him, “We are descendants of Abraham and have never been slaves to anyone. What do you mean by saying, ‘You will be made free’?”
Jesus answered them, “Very truly, I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin. The slave does not have a permanent place in the household; the son has a place there forever. So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed. I know that you are descendants of Abraham, yet you look for an opportunity to kill me because there is no place in you for my word. I declare what I have seen in the Father’s presence; as for you, you should do what you have heard from the Father.”
They answered him, “Abraham is our father.”
Jesus said to them, “If you are Abraham’s children, you would do what Abraham did, but now you are trying to kill me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God. This is not what Abraham did. You are indeed doing what your father does.”
They said to him, “We are not illegitimate children; we have one Father, God himself.”
Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God, and now I am here. I did not come on my own, but he sent me. Why do you not understand what I say? It is because you cannot accept my word. You are from your father the devil, and you choose to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks according to his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies. But because I tell the truth, you do not believe me. Which of you convicts me of sin? If I tell the truth, why do you not believe me? Whoever is from God hears the words of God. The reason you do not hear them is that you are not from God.”
In the midst of this intense exchange, the opponents of Jesus declare, “We are not illegitimate children; we have one Father—God himself” (John 8:41). This statement, when viewed in context, could be understood as a veiled attack on Jesus’s parentage, echoing rumors of illegitimacy. The Gospel’s author may have included this detail to acknowledge such claims circulating at the time, but to also allow a refutation: Jesus’s response in the following verses shifts the focus away from physical lineage to spiritual lineage, directly refuting their claims. By accusing his opponents of being "from [their] father, the devil," he undermines their assertions of moral and spiritual superiority while simultaneously deflecting any implied aspersions on his own origin.
5. Jesus’s Youth
Finally, the author of Luke includes a tale from when Jesus was twelve years old. This is not included in Matthew, and there is nothing in Matthew to contradict this, yet there is one glaring omission by the author of Luke. You may recall that the author of Luke was able to transcribe verbatim what the angel Gabriel was saying to Elizabeth, and what the angel Gabriel was saying to Mary, and the conversations between Mary and Elizabeth, and the praises of Simeon and the actions of Anna in the Temple when Jesus is presented (with everyone present seemingly forgetting that this ever happened). With such clairvoyance, one would wonder why the same author could do nothing more than say that
After three days [his parents] found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers.
Could that same author not have described some of those questions and some of what he said that demonstrated his understanding and what the answers were? If a 12-year-old prodigy showed up at a university and began amazing the professors, scientists and engineers there as to her understanding of some of the remarkable insights into particle physics, then certainly the career of that individual would have been closely followed by most of those present; did none of those teachers present think of asking who this child was, or where he lived, or take the time to follow the growth of this child? Certainly, at least some of what the child said would have been recorded, and if the author could transcribe what was said between Gabriel and various individuals, then surely the author could have transcribed a few insightful questions and responses. Notice that in all the text the author of Like claims to have transcribed from Gabriel and Simeon and Mary and Elizabeth does nothing than forward the theological beliefs of the author: Jesus was born of a virgin and he was somehow special. There was nothing presented in the first two chapters that was in any way theologically profound, and when the author had the opportunity to record something that would actually demonstrate the wisdom of Jesus, the author reverts back to simply saying that "all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers."
One may also wonder why it is at 12 years old, Jesus is able to command the attention of teachers in the Temple, but is unable to say anything equally awe inspiring back in Nazareth (who, according to the author of Luke, chased him out when he tried speaking in the synagogue). After all, Jesus was living in Nazareth for over twenty years: one would think that some of his understanding and answers that were demonstrated in the Temple in the course of a few days would have been demonstrated and recognized during the more-than-twenty-years in Nazareth. Perhaps Jesus played dumb for more than twenty years, or more realistically, Jesus was the human son of Mary and Joseph and had his faults and issues, but subsequently became enamored by the teachings of John the Baptist, and when his teacher was arrested, Jesus began spreading his version of the imminent end of the world.
6. Gospel harmonizations of the birth narrative and summary
It is not hard to find attempts to harmonize the gospels of Matthew and Luke; for example, https://www.blueletterbible.org/study/harmony/. Unfortunately, these make no attempt to reconcile the details. They simply present a narrative that allows the reader to believe that a harmonization is possible, and thus, all is good in the world of fundamentalist Christianity, or more correctly, the apologist attempts to sow doubt, any doubt, into the obvious fact that the two birth narratives are irreconcilable. The apologist never explain how Jesus can be born both at the time of King Herod and after the deposition of his son, Herod Archelaus, or why a census would be held in a client state when the only purpose of a census would be to allow the Romans to assess taxes. To sow doubt, here are some of the claims this author has seen:
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Quirinius could have been the governor of Syria twice, so that the census could have been held while King Herod was still alive. This, however, has no merit, because there still would not have been a census held in a client kingdom. King Herod and his sons paid tribute to Rome: how they raised the funds was more-or-less irrelevant to Rome.
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Jesus may have been born in a different village called Bethlehem, but in Galilee. This, too, is not supported as Galilee, as has already been pointed out, was under the rule of Herod Antipas, and not Herod Archelaus. If the family feared Archelaus, then when they returned from Egypt, they simply would have returned to Bethlehem in Galilee; however, the point is, the prophesy had to have Jesus born in Bethlehem in Judea.
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The family returned to Bethlehem after presenting Jesus at the Temple. This does not make any sense with respect to the idea of going to Bethlehem simply for the purpose of a census. Also, all Luke says is "When they had finished everything required by the law of the Lord, they returned to Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth." Why would the author leave out such dramatic events such as the family fleeing to Egypt. Also, the timelines do not align. Iudaea was incorporated into the Roman Empire as a province in 6 CE, and King Herod died in 4 BCE.
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One site suggests that there may have been an Imperial census and local customs were allowed to prescribe how the census was performed (https://crossexamined.org/was-luke-wrong-about-the-census/) . This is, of course, absurd, as censuses are not even allowed under the Jewish interpretation of the scriptures. Also, once again, suppose only those Jews living in Iudaea would be performing a census under these conditions. Except for a very few, it is unlikely that most lived in their ancestral home (David being a distant ancestor of Joseph), and thus, once again, we see millions walking all over Judea for no purpose at all. It also doesn't answer why the census applied to a client state.
Again, the goal of the apologist is not to actually present a harmonization that makes sense, but rather to simply sow doubt into the obvious: the authors of Matthew and Luke needed to get Jesus born in Bethlehem to have him fulfill a prophesy, and as neither had Mark to guide them, so they both tell amazing tales that have no basis in reality: a census that did not happen, and a slaughter of the infants of Bethlehem that also did not happen. Let us see if Matthew and Luke do better with the events after Jesus's resurrection. If your belief is that the scriptures are inerrant, this is a problem, but as with homeopathy, facts are annoying things that can be ignored.'
On Quora, one poster tries to make a number of claims in order to harmonize the accounts between Matthew and Luke. To achieve this, the apologist must demonstrate that there was a census in Judea while King Herod was still alive. To do this, he sets up a logical fallacy by suggesting that because the author of Luke was correct on certain items, the author must also be correct on others. This is, of course, incorrect, but here is what the apologist has to say about the author of Luke:
"History proves that Luke knew exactly what he was talking about."
Simply because an author does refer to actual historical events and names actual historical figures does not mean any other claims are true. For example, consider the two scenarios:
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The most common analogy is that of Spiderman and New York: the story of Spiderman does indeed have true statements about New York, including many of the actual mayors of New York, but this does give any credence to the claim that J. Jonah Jameson was once the mayor of New York.
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However, a better example are the forged diaries of Hitler by Konrad Kujau: these diaries contained many different clear facts, and history shows that Konrad "knew exactly what he was talking about." That does not, however, give any additional credence to the fictionalized personal statements that have no historical evidence supporting them.
The apologist also uses the word "prove," something that really only is used in mathematics. In history and in science, you can have overwhelming evidence, but that is not proof. However, the true believer will skim through the following alleged claims and then come away believing that this is actually a "proof" of some sort. As I have previous suggested, the true believe is not looking for truth, but simply needs claims that appear to support those believes. All the correct statements made by the author of Luke simply demonstrate that he had heard various narratives of what may have happened in the past. Having one name or place or date correct is not evidence that other names or places or dates are correct.
The apologist has the hypothesis that there must have been a census in Judea during the time of King Herod where Quirinius held some sort of official position in Syria. The apologist then supports this position with a sequence of claims, some of which have evidence to support that claim, and others which do not, but if one takes all the claims as valid, they do appear to support the hypothesis of the apologist.
Point #1: Did Caesar Augustus ever issue a decree around this time?
The first point is a claim that Augustus held a census in 2 BCE. We have in Augustus's first-person record of his achievements, Res Gestae Divi Augusti, the following paragraph:
When I was consul the fifth time (29 BCE), I increased the number of patricians by order of the people and senate. I read the roll of the senate three times, and in my sixth consulate (28 BCE) I made a census of the people with Marcus Agrippa as my colleague. I conducted a lustrum, after a forty-one year gap, in which lustrum were counted 4,063,000 heads of Roman citizens.
Then again, with consular imperium I conducted a lustrum alone when Gaius Censorinus and Gaius Asinius were consuls (8 BCE), in which lustrum were counted 4,233,000 heads of Roman citizens.
And the third time, with consular imperium, I conducted a lustrum with my son Tiberius Caesar as colleague, when Sextus Pompeius and Sextus Appuleius were consuls (14 CE), in which lustrum were counted 4,937,000 of the heads of Roman citizens. By new laws passed with my sponsorship, I restored many traditions of the ancestors, which were falling into disuse in our age, and myself I handed on precedents of many things to be imitated in later generations.
Thus, the author of Luke is correct in recording that there were empire-wide censuses held, but the closest to the time of Jesus is 8 BCE, and this was simply too early, for the author of Luke begins the story of the adult Jesus following the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, so 28-29 CE. Also, the author claims that Jesus was "about thirty years old" when he began his ministry. At a very minimum, if Jesus was born in 7 BCE, then in 28CE, he would be 35 years old. However, let us look at the evidence the author uses to demonstrate a empire-wide census. The apologist refers to part of the last paragraph of Res Gestae Divi Augusti:
When I administered my thirteenth consulate (2 BCE), the senate and Equestrian order and Roman people all called me father of the country, and voted that the same be inscribed in the vestibule of my temple, in the Julian senate-house, and in the forum of Augustus under the chario which had been placed there for me by a decision of the senate. When I wrote this I was seventy-six years old.
Unfortunately, the apologist found a slightly different quote, which the apologist truncated:
While I was administering my thirteenth consulship [2 B.C.] the senate and the equestrian order and the entire Roman people gave me the title Father of my Country
The apologist is claiming that the only way for the "entire Roman people" to give him the title "Father of [the] Country" is for there to have been a census held where, I guess, every citizen was asked if this title should be bestowed upon Caesar Augustus. This is about the most absurd claim one could imagine, especially when just a few paragraphs earlier, Augustus explicitly enumerated the three censuses he held.
Next, to support that there actually was a census held in 2 BCE, the apologist says the following:
Orosius, in the fifth century, also said that Roman records of his time revealed that a census was indeed held when Augusts was made “the first of men” —an apt description of his award “Father of the Country” —at a time when all the great nations gave an oath of obedience to Augustus (6:22, 7:2). Orosius dated the census to 3 B.C.
First, Orosius lived over four hundred years after the events described, and he was an orthodox priest and a student of Augustine of Hippo. The one historical book he wrote has the title Historiae Adversus Paganos (History against the Pagans). This author is hardly an unbiased source. Let us take the entire paragraph which the apologist quotes only one short phrase from:
At that time, that is, in the year when Caesar, by God's ordination, established the firmest and truest peace, Christ was born, whose coming that peace waited upon and at whose birth the angels joyfully sang in the hearing of men, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men of good will."
It was at this time that he who had secured universal supremacy refused to be called Lord of men, or rather dared not, when the true Lord of all mankind was born among men.
It was also in this year when God had deigned to assume the appearance and nature of man, that this same Caesar, whom God had predestined for this great mystery, for the first time ordered a census to be taken of each and every province and that all men should be enrolled.
In these days, then, Christ was born and His name was entered in the Roman census list immediately after His birth.
This is that earliest and most famous acknowledgment which designated Caesar first of all men and the Romans lords of the world;
for in the census list all men were entered individually, and in it the very Maker of all men wished to be found and enrolled as a man among men.
From the very foundation of the world and the beginning of the human race an honour of this kind had never been granted, not even to Babylon or to Macedonia, not to mention any kingdom of lesser rank. Neither is there any doubt that it is clear to everyone from his own knowledge, faith, and investigation, that it was by the will of our Lord Jesus Christ that this City prospered, was protected, and brought to such heights of power, since to her, in preference to all others, He chose to belong when He came, thereby making it certain that He was entitled to be called a Roman citizen according to the declaration made in the Roman census list.
This fifth-century author requires a census to occur just before the birth of Jesus, so without evidence, he simply posits that one existed, and then continues to make the claim that Jesus himself was a Roman citizen. While I could acknowledge that "father of [the] country" and "first of all men" are sufficiently similar titles that the reference by Orosius to the second may indeed be a reference to Augustus being given the title of "father of [the] country", this does not give any evidence that such a census was held. It is just too fantastic that this apologist could use this as a claim to support a census being held in Judea in 2 BCE, but the true believer will never go back and read the original sources, and will be placated by the pleasing and supportive claims of the apologist.
Next, the apologist makes another claim:
Josephus substantiates that an oath of obedience to Augustus was required in Judea not long before the death of Herod (Antiquities 17:41-45). This agrees nicely in a chronological sense with what Luke records.
The passage in Antiquities of the Jews, Book XVII describes an oath, not a census:
For there was a certain sect of men that were Jews, who valued themselves highly upon the exact skill they had in the law of their fathers, and made men believe they were highly favored by God, by whom this set of women [the wife of Pheroras, her mother and sister] were inveigled.
These are those that are called the sect of the Pharisees, who were in a capacity of greatly opposing kings.
A cunning sect they were, and soon elevated to a pitch of open fighting and doing mischief.
Accordingly, when all the people of the Jews gave assurance of their good-will to Caesar, and to the king's government, these very men did not swear, being above six thousand; and when the king imposed a fine upon them, Pheroras's wife paid their fine for them.
This oath, while allegedly "all the people of the Jews" almost certainly did not even refer to all peasants and workers. Such oaths were generally administered only to those with political or administrative power: local leaders, administrators, and wealthy landowners. These were the stakeholders in maintaining order and facilitating Roman policies. Ordinary citizens were rarely subjected to such measures unless they were directly involved in governance or local administration. It would not have been necessary for King Herod to have every fisherman and every day laborer to swear such an oath: if the leaders and landowners of Nazareth had sworn such allegiance, this would have sufficed.
This story continues, but relates to the familial intrigues of King Herod's family and the consequences and punishments imposed on those who conspired against King Herod:
In order to requite which kindness of hers, since they were believed to have the foreknowledge of things to come by Divine inspiration, they foretold how God had decreed that Herod's government should cease, and his posterity should be deprived of it; but that the kingdom should come to her and Pheroras, and to their children. These predictions were not concealed from Salome, but were told the king; as also how they had perverted some persons about the palace itself; so the king slew such of the Pharisees as were principally accused, and Bagoas the eunuch, and one Carus, who exceeded all men of that time in comeliness, and one that was his catamite. He slew also all those of his own family who had consented to what the Pharisees foretold; and for Bagoas, he had been puffed up by them, as though he should be named the father and the benefactor of him who, by the prediction, was foretold to be their appointed king; for that this king would have all things in his power, and would enable Bagoas to marry, and to have children of his own body begotten.
That the author would suggest that this is in any way parallels the narrative told in the gospel of Luke is yet another stretch of the apologist's fanciful imagination. There would be no value in having every Jew in Galilee, Samaria, Judea and Idumaea return to the home of their ancestors to take such an oath. This oath was imposed not by Augustus, but by King Herod who imposed the subsequent fines.
The apologist then adds another claim:
But more than that, an inscription found in Paphlagonia (eastern Turkey), also dated to 3 B.C., mentions an "oath sworn by all the people in the land at the altars of Augustus in the temples of Augustus in the various districts."
Here is Harland's translation of that stele:
In the time of emperor Caesar Augustus, son of a god, in the third year from the twelfth consulship, on the day before the Nones of March, in Gangris in . . . oath that was completed by the inhabitants of Paphlagonia and the . . . Romans . . . engaged in business (pragmateuomenoi) alongside them. By Zeus, Ge (Earth), Helios (Sun), all the gods and goddesses, Augustus himself, and all his children and descendents, I swear with word, deed, and thought to regard as friends any of those they may regard as friends and . . . to consider (?) . . . as enemies any they may judge to be enemies for my whole life. I will spare neither my body, nor my soul, nor my life, nor my children for their interests, but in every way will endure any danger for the things that involve them. Whatever I may notice or hear being spoken, planned, or done against them, I will report it and be an enemy to the one saying, planning or doing any such thing. I will pursue and defend against anyone they may judge to be enemies on land and sea using weapons and arms. But if I do anything contrary to this. . . oath (?). . . or anything not conforming to what I swore, I invoke curses of total and complete destruction against myself, my body, my soul, my life, my children, my entire family, and my interests till the end of all my successors and my descendents, and may . . . the bodies (?) . . . of my family and my descendents not be received by earth or sea, and (the earth) not bear fruit . . . for them (?). . . In the same way, everybody . . . in the land . . . swore in the Augustan temples in each . . . district (?). . . by the altars . . . of Augustus (?). . . Likewise, the Phazimoneitians who inhabit what is now called . . . Neapolis (?) swore together in the temple of Augustus by . . . the altar (?).
The dating is correct: Augustus's twelfth consulship began in 5 BCE, and thus three years thereafter is 2 BCE, but this only refers to an oath "that was completed by the inhabitants of Paphlagonia and the . . . Romans . . . engaged in business (pragmateuomenoi) alongside them." It does indicate that this oath was also taken by people in a place called Neapolis, but there is a region to the south-west of Paphlagonia given this name, so this very much sounds like a local oath, and it was an oath and not a census. The apologist is trying to conflate a census with an oath, and if this is blindly accepted by the reader, then this will support the apologist's hypothesis. The apologist, however, provides no evidence that such oaths necessarily coincided with a census.
Finally, the apologist brings forth another orthodox writer:
And dovetailing precisely with this inscription, the early (fifth century) Armenian historian, Moses of Khoren, said the census that brought Joseph and Mary to Bethlehem was conducted by Roman agents in Armenia where they set up "the image of Augustus Caesar in every temple.''
This author, too, lived centuries after the events described, and this author is also motivated to present a version of history that supports the orthodox claims. However, in the History of the Armenians, I can find no such reference to the above claims. If anyone can please point out where this text describes a census, please let me know!
Thus, the apologist presents nothing concrete once the original sources are analyzed. The one source that claims a census occurred in 2 BCE was a Christian author living centuries later, and who also called Jesus a "Roman citizen."
Point #2: Did Quirinius hold a high office in Syria at this time, such that he could be referred to as hēgemoneuontos of Syria?
We know that Quirinius was governor of Syria in 6 CE, but this would place the census in 6 CE, a decade after the death of King Herod. The apologist therefore focuses on just the word ἡγεμονεύοντος, with the claim:
Luke assigns Quirinius the position of hēgemoneuontos, often translated “governor.” Yet the word refers simply to a high office denoting a local ruler. The word is not a precise identification of which office the person held, but rather that they ruled from a high position of power in general.
To humor the apologist, Quirinius did campaign against the Homonadenses tribe in central Anatolia from 12 BCE to 1 BCE, but most of this tribe existed within the Roman province of Galatia, with the only extension into Syria being the mountainous regions of Cilicia in the north-east corner of Syria. Why would the author of Luke refer to a Roman legate who does not hold any administrative authority in Syria when it would have been more sensible to refer to the actual governor of Syria?
To be fair, here is the Koine Greek:
αὕτη ἀπογραφὴ πρώτη ἐγένετο ἡγεμονεύοντος τῆς Συρίας Κυρηνίου.
Stepping through this:
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The Koine Greek phrase αὕτη ἀπογραφὴ (haútē apographē) can be translated into English as "this registration" or "this census." The word "αὕτη" (haútē) means "this," and ἀπογραφὴ (apographē) is feminine and can refer to a registration, census, or enrollment. The context in which this phrase is used would determine the most precise translation.
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The Greek word πρώτη (prōtē) is the feminine form of the adjective πρῶτος (prōtos), which means "first" or "foremost." Therefore, a reasonable translation of πρώτη into English is "first" or "foremost," depending on the context. As this word is feminine, it must modify the word "census," so "This first census..."
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The Greek word ἐγένετο (egeneto) is a form of the verb "γίγνομαι" (ginomai), which means "to become" or "to happen." Therefore, a reasonable translation of "ἐγένετο" into English is "it happened," "it occurred," or "it became," depending on the context in which it is used.
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The Koine Greek word ἡγεμονεύοντος (hēgemoneuontos) is a present participle form of the verb ἡγεμονεύω (hēgemoneuō), which means "to lead" or "to govern." Depending on the context, a reasonable translation of ἡγεμονεύοντος into English could be "leading," "governing," or "ruling."
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The Koine Greek word τῆς (tēs) is the genitive form of the definite article "ὁ" (ho), which means "the" in English. The genitive case typically indicates possession or association. Therefore, a reasonable translation of τῆς into English is "of the" or "the" depending on the context in which it is used.
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The Koine Greek word Συρίας (Syrias) is the genitive form of "Συρία" (Syria), which refers to the country of Syria. Therefore, a reasonable translation of "Συρίας" into English is "of Syria" or "from Syria," depending on the context in which it is used.
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The name "Κυρηνίου" (Kyrēniou) is in the genitive case. In this context, it is associated with the governing official Quirinius, and the genitive case is used to indicate possession or association. The translation "of Quirinius" or "Quirinius's" would capture the genitive case relationship in English.
Thus, a reasonable, if terse, translation is
This first census happened [during the] governing of Syria of Quirinius.
To be clear, the apologist is once again misrepresenting the Greek: the word in question is not "governor", but "governing" and so it is the "ruling of Quirinius of Syria." It would make no sense to say the "ruling of Quirinius from Syria" in this context.
Point #3: Did two registrations occur under Quirinius, such that one could be said to be “the first?”
Here is the apologist's verbiage:
Indeed they did.
Quirinius’ well-known census occurred in 6/7 A.D. It nearly led to the Jewish people revolting, as they held that a census ran contrary to God’s commands.
A few years after the census concluded, Quirinius’ tenure as legate of Syria ended.
Where, then, is the first census?
Right in 3–2 B.C., as point #1 demonstrates.
Some have speculated that the Greek word protos should not be translated “first,” but rather “before.” Thus, instead of Luke saying that this was the first census under Quirinius, it happened before the census of Quirinius.
It’s a neat idea, but it doesn’t matter much in the end. Either way, Luke is recording that the events leading Mary and Joseph to Bethlehem occurred before the 6/7 A.D. census.
Given that Quirinius was a hēgemoneuontos in Syria during the 3-2 B.C. registration, we know exactly when Luke was referring to.
The apologist is using erroneous claims to support a claim that the census in Luke somehow refers to a census in 2 BCE. To begin, it does not say that this is the "This first census of Quirinius...", but rather it was "This first census happened..." We know that in the census in 6 CE was sufficiently offensive to many of the Jews that some even revolted, including Judas of Gamala and his zealous followers. If a census occurred either under King Herod or Herod Archelaus, one would have expected a much stronger objection, for King Herod and his son were already seen as foreign usurpers of the Judean throne (recall, they were Idumeans or Edomites, and only forcibly converted to Judaism when the Hasmonaean dynasty conquered that region). If King Herod or Herod Archelaus violated Judean law, this would have almost certainly resulted in an outcry at least as strong as against the Roman census. It is entirely reasonable to translate this phrase as meaning "the first census" in Iudaea, the census we know was overseen by Quirinius during the transition of the ethnarchy of Judea to the Roman province of Iudaea.
The apologist then claims
Some have speculated that the Greek word protos should not be translated “first,” but rather “before.” Thus, instead of Luke saying that this was the first census under Quirinius, it happened before the census of Quirinius.
True, there are sporadic cases where πρώτη (prōtē) may mean "before," but its primary sense is ordinal, indicating the initial position in a sequence. The apologist refers to "Some" without any names or references.
This census happened before the governing of Syria of Quirinius.
However, as this is now describing the relationship with "the governing", the word would have been the masculine πρώτης and not the feminine πρώτη. Thus, the only reasonable interpretation is that this is translated as "This first (f) census (f) happened..." The apologist is not even trying to be honest in this attempt. Instead, the apologist is simply throwing out as much obfuscation as possible so as to convince the fundamentalist Christian reader that there may actually be some merit to anything this apologist has said.
The apologist then repeats the hypothesis, hoping that the reader believes the claim:
Luke is recording that the events leading Mary and Joseph to Bethlehem occurred before the 6/7 A.D. census.
The last statement demonstrates how dishonest the apologist is, for he places the present participle form of the verb into a position in an English sentence where one would expect to see a noun:
Given that Quirinius was a hēgemoneuontos in Syria during the 3-2 B.C. registration, we know exactly when Luke was referring to.
The correct substitution would remove the article "a" and simply see:
Given that Quirinius was [ruling or governing] in Syria during the 3-2 B.C. registration, we know exactly when Luke was referring to.
This, however, defeats the hypothesis of the apologist, for Quirinius was neither engaged in either the ruling or governing of Syria in 2 BCE, he was leading a military campaign in central Anatolia in an area that overlapped Syria only in the northwestern mountains on the borders of this Roman province.
Point #4: Did Rome ever take a census in subject kingdoms like Israel?
The apologist begins with a meaningless and unsupported claim:
Despite the objections of many skeptics today, Rome did precisely this.
Yes, Rome did conduct censuses in client states and kingdoms like the kingdom of Judea, but that is not what is relevant here: the question is, would Augustus ever order such a census in Judea while King Herod was alive? The author then quotes Tacitus, in the Annals, Book 1, Chapter 11:
[Augustus] ordered a document to be produced and read. This contained a description of the resources of the State, of the number of citizens and allies under arms, of the fleets, subject kingdoms, provinces, taxes, direct and indirect, necessary expenses and customary bounties. All these details Augustus had written with his own hand, and had added a counsel, that the empire should be confined to its present limits, either from fear or out of jealousy." [Tacitus, Annals 1.11]
The text in bold was highlighted by the apologist. Immediately, we see that the author is either lying or simply copying from someone else, for the very first word is wrong: it is Tiberius who is ordering that the little book be brought forth, for the Latin phrase "cum proferri libellum recitarique iussit" should be translated as "when he ordered a little book to be brought forth and read aloud." Here is the entire chapter:
After this all prayers were addressed to Tiberius. He, on his part, urged various considerations, the greatness of the empire, his distrust of himself. "Only," he said, "the intellect of the Divine Augustus was equal to such a burden. Called as he had been by him to share his anxieties, he had learnt by experience how exposed to fortune's caprices was the task of universal rule. Consequently, in a state which had the support of so many great men, they should not put everything on one man, as many, by uniting their efforts would more easily discharge public functions." There was more grand sentiment than good faith in such words. Tiberius's language even in matters which he did not care to conceal, either from nature or habit, was always hesitating and obscure, and now that he was struggling to hide his feelings completely, it was all the more involved in uncertainty and doubt. The Senators, however, whose only fear was lest they might seem to understand him, burst into complaints, tears, and prayers. They raised their hands to the gods, to the statue of Augustus, and to the knees of Tiberius, when he ordered a document to be produced and read. This contained a description of the resources of the State, of the number of citizens and allies under arms, of the fleets, subject kingdoms, provinces, taxes, direct and indirect, necessary expenses and customary bounties. All these details Augustus had written with his own hand, and had added a counsel, that the empire should be confined to its present limits, either from fear or out of jealousy.
Augustus is dead, and this is being spoken by Tiberius. The apologist only copied the last few sentences and misattributes it.
What is worse, is that the apologist is trying to suggest that this text refers to a census, but that is simply not the case. You will note that the apologist only bolded the text "the number of citizens and allies" but excludes the "under arms." The actual Latin phrase is "quantum civium sociorumque in armis," which is better translated as a question of how large the armies of the Empire and its allies. This has nothing to do with taking a census of all citizens. Additionally, the apologist tries to suggest that "the number of citizens and allies" also refers to the subsequent item "subject kingdoms", but this, too, is absurd. This is a sequence of items that are being described in the little book:
This contained a description
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of the resources of the State,
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of the number of citizens and allies under arms,
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of the fleets,
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subject kingdoms,
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provinces,
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taxes imposed on people or on goods,
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necessary expenses and
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customary bounties.
Item 6 is translated above as "taxes, direct and indirect" but in my opinion, "tributa aut vectigalia" is better translated as the phrase above. In any case, the size of the military and subject kingdoms are two separate items on this list.
Next, without context as to what Schürer actually wrote, the apologist Harold Hoehner, an biblical scholar who taught at the evangelical Dallas Theological Seminary:
Schürer did not think that Augustus would have a census taken in Palestine during Herod’s reign. Certainly Herod had enough autonomy as indicated by his being allowed to mint coins. However, the Romans did take a census in vassal kingdoms. In fact, in Venice a gravestone of a Roman officer was found which states that he was ordered by P. Sulpicius Quirinius to conduct a census of Apamea, a city of 117,000 inhabitants, located on the Orontes in Syria, which was an autonomous city-state that minted its own copper coins. In A.D. 36 under Tiberius a census was imposed on the client kingdom of Archelaus of Cappadocia. Again, the powerful Nabatean kings in Petra, who had the right to mint coins were, it seems, obliged to have the Roman financial officers in their domain.
It would have been courteous to include Schürer's arguments, but this apologist does not. Instead, we see a number of claims:
Claim 1: A census was held by Quirinius in the autonomous city-state of Apamea, a city of 117,000 inhabitants, located on the Orontes in Syria.
This is apparently from a tombstone, so let us look at the text of the tombstone of
Q(uintus) Aemilius Q(uinti) f(ilius) / Pal(atina) Secundus [in] / castris divi Aug(usti) [sub] / P(ublio) Sulpi[c]io Quirinio le[g(ato) Aug(usti)] / [Ca]esaris Syriae honori/bus decoratus pr[a]efect(us) / cohort(is) Aug(usti) I pr[a]efect(us) cohort(is) II classicae idem / iussu Quirini censum egi / Apamenae civitatis mil/lium homin(um) civium CXVII / idem missu Quirini adversus / Ituraeos in Libano monte / castellum eorum cepi et ante / militi<a=E>m praefect(us) fabrum / delatus a duobus co(n)s(ulibus) ad ae/rarium et in colonia / quaestor aedil(is) II duumvir II / pontifex{s} / ibi positi sunt Q(uintus) Aemilius Q(uinti) f(ilius) Pal(atina) / Secundus f(ilius) et Aemilia Chia lib(erta) / h(oc) m(onumentum) amplius h(eredem) n(on) s(equetur)
Thus, this aspect is actually correct: The city of Apamea has 117 thousand citizens. However, unlike the client kingdom of Judea under King Herod, Apamea is a city inside a Roman province. Certain cities in the Roman Empire did have varying degrees of autonomy, depending on various circumstances, but they were all cities within Roman Provinces, so it would not be unreasonable to subject them to censuses, for taxes would still need to be collected from the citizens. Harold Hoehner seems entirely focused on the right to mint their own coins. The parallel, however, simply does not exist: he even acknowledges that all that Apamea was allowed to produce were copper coins, not the bronze or silver metals used by King Herod. What Harold does not address, however, is that the client kingdom of Judea was allied to Rome and trusted by Augustus. King Herod paid tribute to Rome as required and he maintained stability in his region. As described above, holding a census in Judea violated Judean sacred teachings, and when a census was held in 6 CE, there were revolts against the Roman state. Holding a census under King Herod's reign would have given no benefit to Rome and would have destabilized King Herod's position.
Claim 2: In A.D. 36 under Tiberius a census was imposed on the client kingdom of Archelaus of Cappadocia.
Here, Harold is misrepresenting something, and the apologist is simply copying what was said by Harold without any attempt to verify what was said. Archelaus was indeed the last king of Cappadocia, after which it was it was made a Roman province in 17 CE.
But even if one client kingdom was subject to a census, this does not mean that another would, also. For example, in 30 BCE, Herod traveled to Rhodes to meet with Octavian and sought his support. This meeting marked the beginning of a positive relationship between Herod and Octavian. Herod pledged loyalty to Rome and received confirmation of his kingship from Octavian, solidifying his position as a client king under Roman authority. As long as King Herod was loyal to Rome, there would be no need to interfere in Judean politics.
Claim 3: The powerful Nabatean kings in Petra, who had the right to mint coins were, it seems, obliged to have the Roman financial officers in their domain.
Here, again, Harold harps on minting coins, but no references are given to this claim, and this does not necessarily imply that censuses were held in Petra. Indeed, if a census was documented as being held in Petra under Roman suzerainty, one would almost be sure that Harold would mention this.
In summary, the only evidence provided that client states and client kingdoms were subject to censuses include a record that an autonomous city within a Roman province was subject to a census, a kingdom that had since been made a Roman province was subject to a census, and that there were Roman financial officers in Petra. We already know that there was no empire-wide census in 2 CE, for Augustus himself boasts of his census in 8 BCE and is completely silent about a census even close to the end of the life of King Herod. The apologist is trying to suggest that it is possible that a census may possibly be held within Judea, but there is no evidence supporting this, and the empire-wide censuses simply did not occur anywhere close to the alleged time at which Jesus was born. There was a census in Judea, that is, the Roman province of Iudaea, in 6 CE, and in response to this census, Judas of Galilee and his zealous followers led a revolt against the Romans, but that is the only reasonable time that a census might have been held in Judea.
Point #5: Did Rome require people to return to their hometowns to be registered?
The purpose of the census held in the newly formed Roman province of Iudaea was to provide the data required for imposing taxes, and it is likely the reason that most censuses were held throughout the Roman empire. The apologist gives evidence that yes, indeed, Romans may have been compelled to return home to the province in which they resided.
However, the author of Luke does not suggest that Joseph was returning to Bethlehem because he had business there. Instead, he returned there "because he was descended from the house and family of David." This is not recorded anywhere in the gospel of Mark, and this provides two supporting claims: that Jesus was from Bethlehem, and that Jesus was descended from King David (and therefore one how could hold the kingship of Judea, unlike King Herod). This supposes that Joseph and Mary spent most of their lives in Nazareth but that Joseph had some sort of significant business affairs in Bethlehem. This is however, refuted on two points:
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Joseph did not have a home in Bethlehem, for "she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth and laid him in a manger, because there was no place in the guest room."
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Joseph and Mary "offered a sacrifice according to what is stated in the law of the Lord, “a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.”" and if you Leviticus 12:6-10, the requirement is that “she shall bring to the priest at the entrance of the tent of meeting a lamb in its first year for a burnt offering and a pigeon or a turtledove for a purification offering” but if “she cannot afford a sheep, she shall take two turtledoves or two pigeons, one for a burnt offering and the other for a purification offering.”
Both of these suggest that the family was not wealthy, did not have property in Bethlehem, so does not appear to have been engaged in any form of business in Bethlehem. Another glaring point is that neither Nazareth nor Bethlehem were significantly populated centers at the time of the birth of Jesus. Why would a wealthy businessman, one sufficiently wealthy to be required to go to Bethlehem for the purposes of a census, live in a rural backwater village that had none of the amenities of even, for example, Capernaum.
Now, one might argue that Joseph had some form of business in Bethlehem and because Galilee was in the tetrarchy of Herod Antipas and not in the newly established Roman province of Iudaea, but this would have been part of the census in 6 CE, so once again would not support any claim of the apologist.
Finally, it is important to note the difference between the two accounts of Jesus's birth:
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In Luke, Joseph and Mary are recorded as living in Nazareth, and after Mary becomes pregnant, Joseph and Mary travel to Bethlehem, Jesus is born, eight days later, Jesus is circumcised, and a month after that, they travel to Jerusalem to partake in the ritual of purification at the Temple. After this, they return home to Nazareth.
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In Matthew, there is no mention of a census nor is there any mention of Nazareth. Instead, the family begins in Bethlehem, they then flee to Egypt until the time of King Herod's death, they return but fear to return to Bethlehem because they fear Herod Archelaus, so they go to Galilee not to return home, but because an angel told them to go there. Finally, they do not "return home" to Nazareth, but rather they flee to Galilee and Joseph "made his home in a town called Nazareth, so that what had been spoken through the prophets might be fulfilled, “He will be called a Nazarene.”"
The apologist does make a great deal about the benefits of having people return to their hometown for censuses, but this is all moot, as there was no Empire-wide census in 2 BCE (as the apologist wishes to demonstrate). Thus, we get to the last point:
Point #6: Did Herod die after these events?
Once again, the apologist alleges that Josephus says this or that, but does not provide any quotes. The apologist claims:
For a long time, history concluded that Herod died in 1 B.C. More recently, attempts have arisen to push Herod’s death earlier, to 4 B.C. But the evidence still favors 1 B.C. for the date of Herod’s death.
To support this claim, he quotes Josephus, so let us look at what Josephus says in Antiquities 17:
But in the tenth year of Archelaus’s government, both his brethren, and the principal men of Judea and Samaria; not being able to bear his barbarous and tyrannical usage of them; accused him before Cesar; and that especially because they knew he had broken the commands of Cesar, which obliged him to behave himself with moderation among them. Whereupon Cesar, when he heard it, was very angry; and called for Archelaus’s steward, who took care of his affairs at Rome; and whose name was Archelaus also: and thinking it beneath him to write to Archelaus, he bid him sail away as soon as possible, and bring him to us. So the man made haste in his voiage: and when he came into Judea, he found Archelaus feasting with his friends. So he told him what Cesar had sent him about: and hastened him away. And when he was come [to Rome,] Cesar, upon hearing what certain accusers of his had to say, and what reply he could make, both banished him, and appointed Vienna, a city of Gall, to be the place of his habitation, and took his money away from him.
Thus, as the census of Quirinius was in 6 CE, we can therefore assume that 6 CE was the last year of Herod Archelaus's rule, and if that was his tenth year of his rule, then that would make 4 BCE the first year of his reign. No amount of generosity can push it to 2 BCE, for if he became the ethnarch early in 2 BCE, then the tenth year of his government would be 8 CE, long after Iudaea was incorporated into the Roman empire as a province. Similarly, Josephus says:
About this time it was that Philip, Herod's brother, departed this life, in the twentieth year of the reign of Tiberius, after he had been tetrarch of Trachonitis and Gaulanitis, and of the nation of the Bataneans also, thirty-seven years.
Reigns are usually inclusive. Thus, if Tiberius began his reign on August 19, 14 CE and twenty years after that would place Philip's death between August 19, 33 CE and August 18, 34 CE. For Philip to be said to reign for 37 years generally means any time between 36 years and a day and 37 years. Thus, this gives a two-year range during which Philip began his reign spanning 5 BCE to 3 BCE, a range that perfectly brackets 4 BCE, with 1 BCE far too late for the start of Philip's reign. King Herod was declared to be king by the Roman Senate in 40 BCE, and according to Josephus,
When he had done these things, he died, ... having reigned, since he had procured Antigonus to be slain, thirty-four years; but since he had been declared king by the Romans, thirty-seven.
Once again, 36 years and a day up to 37 years starting at some point between January 1, 40 BCE and December 31, 40 BCE places the year of his death either in 4 BCE or 3 BCE, still bracketing 4 BCE and nowhere near 1 BCE.
It is not surprising that the apologist makes one claim, and yet completely ignores contrary evidence in the exact same source. We will, however, look at the evidence that was given:
Josephus records that a lunar eclipse preceded Herod’s death, while Passover followed it. This gives us two clear bookends with which to locate the time of his passing.
Reading Antiquities 17, we see that this is indeed correct. Thus, we have a lunar eclipse, Herod's death, and the Passover. At this point, the apologist is clearly referencing, for here are the lunar eclipses in the given range of years. The apologist then makes the most bizarre and easily refutable claims. First, the author makes the claim:
There was a partial eclipse in March 13 of 4 B.C, occurring 29 days before Passover. Those who hold to the 4 B.C. date for Herod’s death hold this to be the eclipse Josephus mentioned, yet two problems swiftly arise:
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The eclipse was barely visible in Israel. It was most visible in Africa.
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Josephus records a wealth of activity occurring after the eclipse and before Herod’s death, which cannot fit in a mere 29 days.
The claim that this would be "barely visible in Israel" suggests the author knows nothing about astronomy. You can see where the lunar eclipse is at a maximum in this image provided by NASA. The distance between the Ivory Coast and Israel does not affect the size of the Moon, for the distance to the moon is sixty times the radius of the Earth. The only affect of this distance is where in the sky people would have observed this eclipse. The angle between the Ivory Coast and Judea is slightly less than 45° and thus this partial eclipse would have been fullest when the moon was slightly more than 45° in the sky. The apologist seems to be conflating solar eclipses, which are much more localized, as the Moon's shadow is much smaller than the Earth's shadow. Later, the apologist seems to be suggesting this eclipse was so minor as to not be worth mentioning; however, the context is what is important, not the totality of the lunar eclipse:
But Herod deprived this Matthias of the high priesthood, and burnt the other Matthias, who had raised the sedition, with his companions, alive. And that very night there was an eclipse of the moon.
What is humorous here is that it says that Matthias was "deprived" of his high priesthood, as opposed to being forced to step down. Leviticus 21:16-20 makes it clear that eunuchs are not permitted to serve as priests,
The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to Aaron and say: No one of your offspring throughout their generations who has a blemish may approach to offer the food of his God. Indeed, no one who has a blemish shall draw near, one who is blind or lame, ... or a man with ... crushed testicles.”
Did King Herod deprive Matthias of his testicles, and thus, make him ineligible for the role of high priest? While this is unlikely, it is nevertheless a potential source of humor. However, to the point: it was not that it was a total lunar eclipse that was being recorded, but that a lunar eclipse even occurred on the night immediately following the deposition of one Matthias and the burning of the other Matthias and his companions. Any celestial event coinciding with such a show of force by King Herod would have been noted.
The apologist, however, then makes a different claim:
In January 10 of 1 B.C., Israel observed a dramatic full eclipse. This means:
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Everyone in Israel witnessed it, unlike the eclipse in 4 B.C.
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It occurred early enough in the year for all of the events Josephus records to occur before Passover
Other details can be mentioned, but the heart of the matter is established clearly by these bookends, as we can verify them with precision.
Herod did indeed die in 1 B.C., allowing full time for a census to occur before his death in 3/2 B.C., Joseph and Mary to travel to Egypt with Jesus, and dwell there for a time before returning after Herod’s death.
Yes, there was a total lunar eclipse on January 10, 1 BCE and it would have been visible to all in Judea; however, the apologist then tries to throw in a fictional census that occurs in either 3 BCE or 2 BCE, when the censuses of Augustus were held in 28 BCE, 8 BCE and 14 CE, none of which come even close to either 4 BCE or 1 BCE. He is simply desperate to push the death of Herod later to coincide with a fictional census held in Judea prior to the census held in 6 CE.
Thus, to reemphasize, the apologist is simply making unsupported claims, all in a vain effort to make the true believer "know" that it is possible for the two irreconcilable accounts recorded in Matthew and Luke be be actually harmonious in some bizarre manner.
There is one other claim that could be made, and that is that King Herod allowed his sons to rule in his place prior to his death. After all, not only does the 10-year reign of Herod Archelaus coincide with 4 BCE, but also does the 37-year reign of Philip the Tetrarch who reigned until the 20th year of Tiberius, or 34 CE. While Herod Archelaus may have had some authority to speak on behalf of his father before his father's death, it is after the eclipse that Josephus records:
And now Herod altered his testament, upon the alteration of his mind.
For he appointed Antipas, to whom he had before left the Kingdom, to be tetrarch of Galilee and Perea: and
granted the Kingdom to Archelaus.
He also gave Gaulonitis, and Trachonitis, and Paneas to Philip, who was his son; but own brother to Archelaus; by the name of a tetrarchy:
and bequeathed Jamnia, and Ashdod, and Phasaelis, to Salome, his sister,
with five hundred thousand drachmæ of silver, that was coined.
Thus, Herod Archelaus seems to have only had an opportunity to rule on behalf of his father following the aforementioned eclipse.
As a summary, referring back to the apologist's initial claim:
For a long time, history concluded that Herod died in 1 B.C. More recently, attempts have arisen to push Herod’s death earlier, to 4 B.C.
There appears to be consensus that King Herod died in 4 BCE. Historians did not conclude that King Herod died in 1 BCE, but rather, Dionysius Exiguus created a calendar whereby he chose A.D. 1 to be the year Jesus was born. This was based on the reference to the 15th year of Tiberius's reign when Jesus was approximately 30 years old in the gospel of Luke 3:1-2:
In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, ... the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness.
The reign of Tiberius began on 19 August 14 CE, and thus the fifteenth year would extend from 19 August 28 CE to 18 August 29 CE. This is when John the Baptist began his ministry, and then some time after that, Jesus was baptized and began his ministry as recorded in Luke 3:21:
Jesus was about thirty years old when he began his work.
If Herod died in early 4 BCE before the Passover, and if Herod had queried the magi as to when they saw the star appear, as recorded in Matthew 2:7,
Then Herod secretly called for the magi and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared.
and if Herod then killed all the infants younger than two years old, as recorded in Matthew 2:16:
When Herod saw that he had been tricked by the magi, he was infuriated, and he sent and killed all the children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had learned from the magi.
This would suggest that Jesus was born, at the latest, in early 4 BCE. However, according to Luke 2:8,
Now in that same region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night.
In first-century Judea, sheep were typically kept out overnight only during the warmer months, from spring through early autumn, because the weather allowed for safe grazing and comfortable conditions. During the cooler, rainier months, flocks were generally brought indoors to protect them from the elements. Thus, the latest Jesus could have been born is early autumn in 5 BCE, and if the author of Matthew is to be believed, he would have been born in 6 BCE. If we choose the later date, autumn of 5 BCE, then Jesus would have been close to 32 years old when John the Baptist started his ministry. If we move Jesus's birthday to spring 6 BCE to account for Matthew, Jesus would have been closer to 34 years old when John began his ministry. None of the narratives describe how long John the Baptist had been engaged in his ministry, but given that he already had many disciples, it would seem implausible to believe that Jesus was baptized within a year of the start of John's ministry, but if you wish to believe this, that would put Jesus between 32 and 34 years old, which one may assume is close enough to "about thirty years old." Thus, while the original calendar had Jesus born on December 25, A.D. 1, the overwhelming evidence that this was a miscalculation (you think a god that could divinely inspire scripture could divinely inspire the persons responsible for the calendar that would be used for almost two thousand years) forces apologists such as this individual to push the date of Jesus's birth to 2 or 3 BCE in order to have Jesus be "around thirty" in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius, which forces these believers to prescribe, despite overwhelming evidence, Herod's death in 1 BCE.
Summary of evidence for 4 BCE
The evidence for King Herod’s death in 4 BCE comes from historical accounts, astronomical data, and archaeological findings. The primary source is Flavius Josephus, who provides a detailed narrative of Herod’s final days and the events following his death. Josephus describes Herod dying shortly after a lunar eclipse and before Passover. The March 13, 4 BCE lunar eclipse aligns with this account, as it was visible in Judea, and Passover fell on April 11, 4 BCE, giving a plausible timeline for the intervening events such as Herod’s illness, the execution of his son Antipater, and his funeral.
The reigns of Herod’s successors also strongly support the 4 BCE date. Herod’s son Archelaus ruled Judea for 10 years before being deposed in 6 CE, placing the start of his reign in 4 BCE. Similarly, Philip the Tetrarch ruled for 37 years until his death in 34 CE, confirming his rule began in 4 BCE. These reign lengths match Josephus’ account that Herod’s will was implemented immediately after his death, with his kingdom divided among his sons.
Roman administrative records and actions further corroborate this timeline. After Herod’s death, Caesar Augustus confirmed Herod’s will and divided his kingdom, a process documented to have occurred in 4 BCE. Additionally, archaeological evidence, such as the cessation of Herod’s monumental building projects and coinage bearing his name, indicates that his rule ended around this time. Coins minted by his successors begin circulating in 4 BCE, further supporting this transition.
The strongest evidence against a 1 BCE death for King Herod lies in the documented reigns of his successors, Roman administrative actions, and archaeological findings. Herod’s son Archelaus ruled Judea for 10 years before being deposed in 6 CE, placing the start of his reign in 4 BCE. Similarly, Philip the Tetrarch ruled for 37 years until his death in 34 CE, also indicating 4 BCE as the start of his rule. A 1 BCE death would require retroactively adjusting these reign lengths, which contradicts well-established records.
Additionally, after Herod’s death, Caesar Augustus confirmed his will and divided his kingdom among Archelaus, Antipas, and Philip, actions securely dated to 4 BCE. Coins bearing Herod’s name cease around this time, with those of his successors appearing immediately afterward. Furthermore, Herod’s monumental building projects show no evidence of activity beyond 4 BCE. A 1 BCE death creates gaps in the historical and archaeological record that lack credible explanation, making 4 BCE the far more consistent and widely accepted date.
The apologist's summary
The apologist concludes with a self-aggrandizing claim:
Herod did indeed die in 1 B.C., allowing full time for a census to occur before his death in 3/2 B.C., Joseph and Mary to travel to Egypt with Jesus, and dwell there for a time before returning after Herod’s death.
The apologist is desperate for there to be a census that occurred in Judea prior to the death of King Herod, and thus generates a census out of whole cloth, a census not coinciding with the closest known imperial census of 8 BCE. The author claims that oaths to Augustus somehow count as censuses, even though they would not, and then claim that this non-existent census could have extended to the client kingdom of King Herod, even though this would have destabilized Herod's successful rule over this region of the world. The apologist then claims that there would have been some reason for Joseph to return to Bethlehem for this non-existent census, even though both him and Jesus were carpenters, and this does not explain the justification for this journey given in Luke as being because Joseph was "was descended from the house and family of David." If anyone had sufficient business interests in Bethlehem to return there for a census, why would they not have accommodations in that town? Finally, while there may be disputes as to when King Herod actually did die, the claims of there being a "dramatic full eclipse" in 1 BCE are made from the same whole cloth as the non-existent census.
Sad, and yet, the true believers will read this post and come out feeling self assured in their faith that Joseph and Mary started in Nazareth, even though the author of Matthew mentions nothing of this, to see Jesus born in Bethlehem so that he could fulfill an alleged prophesy. Then, while the author of Luke describes nothing but Gemütlichkeit in that after ten days Jesus is circumsized and a month thereafter, the family goes to Jerusalem after which they return to Nazareth; the author of Matthew has them fleeing for fear of their lives (or at least Jesus's life) to Egypt, waiting for King Herod to die, and not wanting to return to Bethlehem because of Herod Archelaus, so instead they are directed to go to Galilee, where they almost seem to stumble across Nazareth:
But when he heard that Archelaus was ruling Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there.
And after being warned in a dream, he went away to the district of Galilee.
There he made his home in a town called Nazareth, so that what had been spoken through the prophets might be fulfilled, “He will be called a Nazarene.”
He made his home in Nazareth, he did not return to his home in Nazareth.
7. But there is no "contradiction"!
One common—and often humorous—apologetic trope is the claim that no "true" contradiction exists between the accounts of Matthew and Luke. The reasoning is that, for a contradiction to occur, Matthew would have to explicitly assert "X" while Luke simultaneously asserts "not X." On this technical point, I am willing to concede that no such direct contradiction exists. However, this narrow definition of contradiction overlooks a much broader and more substantive issue: the logical contortions required to harmonize the two accounts.
This approach to resolving contradictions relies on an illusory standard of consistency, where the absence of direct negation is mistaken for the presence of harmony. While it is true that Matthew and Luke do not explicitly negate one another, their respective narratives diverge in ways that create an irreconcilable tension. Apologists often lean on speculative possibilities, proposing scenarios that, while logically possible, strain plausibility. This is where the human psyche’s inclination toward cognitive dissonance reduction and motivated reasoning becomes apparent. By redefining "contradiction" as narrowly as possible, they carve out conceptual space for imaginative harmonizations, even if those harmonizations lack direct textual support. To appreciate the lengths to which apologists must go to maintain this claim, let us consider the narrative they propose.
Now in those days, a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This first registration took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria. And Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to the region of Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, for he was of the house and family line of David. He went there to be registered with Mary, to whom he was betrothed, and she was with child.
While they were there, the time came for her to give birth, and she bore her firstborn son. She wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the guest room. On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise the child, he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb. Now, as the days passed, Joseph sought out work to support his growing family. Being a skilled craftsman, he found employment among the people of Bethlehem, and so they remained in that place for a time.
When the time came for their purification according to the law of Moses, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord, as it is written in the law of the Lord, "Every firstborn male shall be designated as holy to the Lord," and to offer a sacrifice according to what is said in the law of the Lord, "a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons." Now there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon, and this man was righteous and devout, looking for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord's Messiah. Guided by the Spirit, he came into the temple. And when the parents brought in the child Jesus to do for him what was customary under the law, Simeon took him in his arms and blessed God, saying,
"Master, now you are dismissing your servant in peace,
according to your word;
for my eyes have seen your salvation,
which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples,
a light for revelation to the Gentiles
and for glory to your people Israel."
And his father and mother were amazed at what was being said about him. Then Simeon blessed them and said to Mary, his mother, "This child is destined for the falling and the rising of many in Israel and to be a sign that will be opposed so that the inner thoughts of many will be revealed—and a sword will pierce your own soul too." There was also a prophet, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was of great age, having lived with her husband seven years after her marriage and then as a widow to the age of eighty-four. She never left the temple but worshiped there with fasting and prayer night and day. At that moment, she came and began to praise God and to speak about the child to all who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem.
After completing everything required by the law of the Lord, they returned to Bethlehem. There, Joseph continued his work as a craftsman, and so the family remained in that place. In time, they settled into the rhythms of daily life, and the child grew strong, filled with wisdom, and the favor of God was upon him.
Now after about two years had passed, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, saying, "Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we have observed his star at its rising and have come to pay him homage." When King Herod heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. Calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. They told him, "In Bethlehem of Judea, for so it has been written by the prophet:
'And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,
are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;
for from you shall come a ruler
who is to shepherd my people Israel.'"
Then Herod secretly called for the wise men and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared. He sent them to Bethlehem, saying, "Go and search diligently for the child, and when you have found him, bring me word so that I too may go and pay him homage." After listening to the king, they set out, and there ahead of them went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.
When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, "Get up, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the child to destroy him." Then Joseph got up, took the child and his mother by night, and went to Egypt, where they remained until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet, "Out of Egypt I have called my son."
When Herod saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, he was infuriated, and he sent and killed all the children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had learned from the wise men. Then was fulfilled what had been spoken through the prophet Jeremiah:
"A voice was heard in Ramah,
wailing and loud lamentation,
Rachel weeping for her children;
she refused to be consoled,
because they are no more."
When Herod died, an angel of the Lord suddenly appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, "Get up, take the child and his mother, and go to the land of Israel, for those who were seeking the child's life are dead." Then Joseph got up, took the child and his mother, and went to the land of Israel. But when he heard that Archelaus was ruling over Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. After being warned in a dream, he withdrew to the region of Galilee and returned to their home in the town of Nazareth, where they had lived before the census. so that what had been spoken through the prophets might be fulfilled, "He will be called a Nazarene."
While it is true that there are no formal "logical contradictions" between Matthew and Luke — in the sense that Matthew never explicitly states "X" while Luke simultaneously asserts "not X" — the narrative required to harmonize the two accounts is so far-fetched as to be essentially impossible. While logical possibility might suffice for abstract philosophical arguments, it is an insufficient standard for historical plausibility. The story that must be constructed to align Matthew and Luke is riddled with improbabilities so extreme that it fails to satisfy even the most basic historical scrutiny.
There are, however, so many issues with this approach that it becomes untenable:
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There is simply too much unwarranted complexity. The harmonized narrative requires an implausible series of events, including the family's prolonged stay there despite having a home in Nazareth, and multiple trips between Bethlehem, Jerusalem, Egypt, and finally Galilee. To align Matthew and Luke, Joseph and Mary must follow a path that is not only inconvenient but also inexplicable. If they already had a home in Nazareth, why remain in Bethlehem for two years after the birth of Jesus? If they were returning from Egypt, if there was any concern about returning to Bethlehem, why would they not simply return to their original home in Nazareth?
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There is silence where clarity should be easy to append. If the events in Matthew truly followed the events in Luke, then Luke 2:39 would have to summarize a series of monumental events—including the family's return to Bethlehem, the visit of the Magi, the flight to Egypt, the death of Herod, and the family's return—in a single, passing statement: "When they had finished everything required by the law of the Lord, they returned to Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth." This silence is inexplicable. If these extraordinary events had occurred, why would Luke compress them into one vague sentence? The omission is especially glaring considering that Luke devotes significant detail to less dramatic events, such as the shepherds and the presentation of Jesus at the temple and the encounter with Simeon and Anna.
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There is simply too much chronological strain. According to Luke, after presenting Jesus at the temple, Joseph and Mary "returned to Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth." However, under the harmonized account, they instead return to Bethlehem, remain there for about two years, flee to Egypt to escape Herod's massacre, and only later return to Nazareth. This means Luke 2:39 would have to be interpreted as a highly compressed summary of this entire saga—a literary choice that seems implausible given the detail Luke provides in the surrounding verses. Moreover, if Jesus was born during the 8 BCE census (the only nearby census held across the empire), then he would have been at least 34 by the time John the Baptist began his ministry in 28-29 CE (the fifteenth year of Tiberius’s reign). Luke 3:23 states that Jesus was "about thirty years old" when he began his ministry, but this harmonized timeline requires Jesus to be several years older than "about thirty." This is not an issue of interpretive nuance; it is a direct chronological inconsistency. This is why apologists cannot rely on the imperial census of 8 BCE and instead try to insert a hypothetical census closer to 1 BCE.
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Historicity of the census is non-existent. Luke claims that Joseph traveled to Bethlehem because of a census ordered while Quirinius was governor of Syria. This creates several major historical problems, and if the census mentioned by Luke never occurred in Judea or Galilee under these conditions, then the entire premise of Joseph and Mary's journey to Bethlehem is built on a historical fiction. This makes it all the more difficult to defend a harmonized account of Matthew and Luke:
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Quirinius was not governor in 8 BCE nor in 1 BCE. Quirinius only became governor of Syria in 6 CE, around a decade after the events in question. Moreover, Quirinius was appointed governor in part to oversee the incorporation of Iudaea into the Roman Empire as a province, not to conduct a census of Galilee.
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While there was an empire-wide census under Augustus in 8 BCE, there is no evidence that it applied to Judea or Galilee. Herod was a client king of Rome, and as such, it would have been unnecessary—and politically disruptive—for Rome to interfere with Herod's internal governance by ordering a census. Additionally, no census would have been required for Galilee even in 6 CE, for it was in the tetrarch of Antipas and was not being incorporated into a Roman province as occurred to Samaria, Judea and Iudaea.
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The alleged census is logistical absurd. No known Roman census required people to return to the hometown of their distant ancestors, especially not the poor. Such a policy would have been logistically impossible, as it would require massive population displacements throughout the empire. It is far more likely that people were registered in their place of residence, as was standard Roman practice.
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In any harmonization, the motivation of the characters becomes unnatural. The harmonized narrative requires Joseph and Mary to make several bizarre choices. If Bethlehem was not their home (as Luke implies), why would they remain there for two years after Jesus's birth? If they were financially destitute, as Luke 2:24 suggests (when they offered two birds as a sacrifice instead of the lamb prescribed for wealthier families), how could they afford to remain in Bethlehem for two years? Bethlehem was a small town and much further from Jerusalem than Nazareth was from Sepphoris. Some have proposed that Joseph found work there, but this is speculative and unsupported by either gospel. And if he did not have stable employment, why not simply return to Nazareth as soon as possible?
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The author of Matthew appears to be unaware that Joseph and Mary had a home in Nazareth. After Herod's death, the angel tells Joseph to return to the "land of Israel"—a strange instruction if Nazareth had always been his home. Joseph then plans to return to Judea but, fearing Archelaus, is instead directed to Galilee: "Then Joseph got up, ..., and went to the land of Israel. But when he heard that Archelaus was ruling over Judea..., he was afraid to go there. And after being warned in a dream, he went away to the district of Galilee. There he made his home in a town called Nazareth, ...'”
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Luke makes it clear that Mary and Joseph were poor, as they offered the sacrifice prescribed for the poor: two birds instead of a lamb and a bird (Luke 2:24). Yet, to remain in Bethlehem for two years—as required by the harmonized narrative—Joseph would need some form of stable employment, suggesting an ability to support the family financially. The idea that they might have owned a house in Bethlehem further conflicts with Luke’s presentation of their poverty. How could they afford a house in Bethlehem while offering the sacrifices of the poor? The logical disconnect between the family's socioeconomic status and the actions required by the harmonized narrative is difficult to resolve.
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The entire effort to harmonize Matthew and Luke appears more theological than historical. It prioritizes the preservation of biblical inerrancy over historical plausibility. While logical possibility is often sufficient for abstract theological arguments, it is not enough for a historical claim. The resulting story is not a history of real events but a theological narrative designed to "fit" the text. By reducing the definition of "contradiction" to its narrowest possible form (X vs. not X), apologists allow themselves to construct wildly speculative explanations to preserve the inerrancy of scripture.
While it is technically true that Matthew and Luke do not present a formal "logical contradiction" (i.e., Matthew does not explicitly say "X" while Luke says "not X"), the narrative required to harmonize their accounts is riddled with logical leaps, historical improbabilities, and textual inconsistencies. It requires the reader to accept that:
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A Roman census forced people to return to their ancestral homes.
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Quirinius was somehow governor before he was actually governor.
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Joseph and Mary, though impoverished, remained in Bethlehem for two years.
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Luke omitted mention of the Magi, the massacre of infants, the flight to Egypt, and the return from Egypt in a single verse (Luke 2:39).
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Joseph, already living in Nazareth, needed angelic guidance to "settle" in his own home.
Each of these elements, on its own, stretches plausibility. Taken together, they render the harmonized narrative all but impossible. Logical possibility is a poor defense for historical plausibility, and in this case, the harmonized story requires too much suspension of disbelief to be taken seriously. It is, at best, an exercise in theological storytelling, not historical analysis.
The true believer seeks to maintain faith in the scriptures, and as such, any story like the one above serves to placate them by offering hope that harmony exists between the accounts of Matthew and Luke. For such individuals, real evidence or a concrete narrative is unnecessary; they require only the possibility—however tenuous—that the stories are not as contradictory as they may initially seem. It is not essential that they have proof of this harmony, only that a plausible framework exists to sustain the hope that the contradictions are reconcilable, even if no definitive reconciliation has yet been found.
This psychological tendency is supported by several well-documented characteristics of the human mind. Chief among them is cognitive dissonance reduction, the drive to resolve inconsistencies between beliefs and new information in a way that preserves existing convictions. Rather than abandoning long-held beliefs, people often seek narratives that maintain internal coherence, even if those narratives are speculative. Additionally, motivated reasoning plays a role, as individuals are more likely to accept information that supports their prior beliefs and to dismiss evidence that challenges them. Pattern-seeking behavior, an evolutionary trait that enables humans to detect order in chaos, also contributes, as people are naturally inclined to find connections and explanations, even when none exist. Finally, the illusion of explanatory depth—he belief that one understands something more fully than they actually do—allows people to feel satisfied with vague or incomplete explanations, provided they offer a sense of resolution. Together, these elements of human psychology create fertile ground for the acceptance of harmonizing narratives, no matter how speculative they may be.
8. Post-baptism addendum
As one humorous post-baptism event, Mark mentions that Jesus went to the wilderness to be tested, and the authors of both Matthew and Luke copied this story, but they both included. Remember, if the author of Luke can transcribe the words spoken between Mary and the angel Gabriel, and the words spoken between Mary and Elizabeth, and the words spoken by Simeon and Anna in the Temple (who recorded these, and how did the author acquire these narratives?). The author of Matthew was able to describe the dreams of Joseph on four separate occasions. Never did the author of Luke describe any of these dreams, and never did the author of Matthew transcribe the spoken words by Gabriel, Elizabeth, Simeon or Anna. When it came to describing the temptations of Satan, they cannot even get them in the right order:
Then the devil took him to the holy city and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple... Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor; ...
That was the author of Matthew, but what about the author of Luke?
Then the devil led him up and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world... Then the devil took him to Jerusalem, and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, ...
So which was it? The kingdoms first and then the Temple, or the Temple first and then the kingdoms? God knows, I don't. The point is, if they are able to so perfectly transcribe discussions or dreams, why cannot they at least get the order of actual events (not recorded in Mark) in the correct order?
While Mark, Matthew and Luke all describe Jesus going into the wilderness, with the author of Mark clearly indicating this was immediately following Jesus's baptism.
And a voice came from the heavens, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”
And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness.
He was in the wilderness forty days, tested by Satan, and he was with the wild beasts, and the angels waited on him.
The author of John, however, has Jesus hang around for a few days, get his first four disciples, go north to Galilee, turn water into wine, and then proceed to go to Capernaum, with the events of the week following Jesus's baptism carefully recorded on a day-by-day basis with no mention of a 40-day excursion into the wildeness.
9. Post-resurrection events
Like events prior to Jesus's baptism, Mark makes no mention of what happened after his resurrection. It is now actually much easier to compare and contrast the post resurrection narratives of Matthew and Luke.
In Matthew, following the women leaving the tomb, we have:
Suddenly Jesus met them and said, “Greetings!” And they came to him, took hold of his feet, and worshiped him. Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me.”
This is followed by a story explaining why Jesus's body was missing:
While they were going, some of the guard went into the city and told the chief priests everything that had happened. After the priests had assembled with the elders, they devised a plan to give a large sum of money to the soldiers, telling them, “You must say, ‘His disciples came by night and stole him away while we were asleep.’ If this comes to the governor’s ears, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble.” So they took the money and did as they were directed. And this story is still told among the Jews to this day.
Finally, the disciples join Jesus in Galilee, where Jesus proclaims the great commission:
Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
Surely the gospel of Luke would have a similar narrative of Jesus speaking to the women, telling them to tell the disciples to meet Jesus in Galilee, and then the disciples gathering there to hear what Jesus says. Unfortunately, this is not the case: in Luke, all post-resurrection events occur in the vicinity of Jerusalem, and the disciples never ever are reported as having visited Galilee. Let us go through Luke's post-resurrection events.
First, in Luke, Jesus meets two of his followers on the road to Emmaus. At first Jesus hides his identity, but then he reveals himself and disappears. The followers return to Jerusalem to tell the disciples.
That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem; and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together. They were saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!” Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.
Thus, we are in Jerusalem, and not Galilee, and now Jesus appears to them:
While they were talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.” They were startled and terrified, and thought that they were seeing a ghost. He said to them, “Why are you frightened, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? Look at my hands and my feet; see that it is I myself. Touch me and see; for a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. While in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering, he said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and ate in their presence. Then he said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you—that everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled.” Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures, and he said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Messiah is to suffer and to rise from the dead on the third day, and that repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. And see, I am sending upon you what my Father promised; so stay here in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.”
Finally, Jesus ascends into heaven, and Bethany, which is close to Jerusalem, is not in Galilee:
Then he led them out as far as Bethany, and, lifting up his hands, he blessed them. While he was blessing them, he withdrew from them and was carried up into heaven. And they worshiped him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy; and they were continually in the temple blessing God.
As with the birth narrative, where neither author had access to a shared narrative in Mark, the authors of Matthew and Luke came up with very different post-resurrection narratives.
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In Matthew, the disciples are told to meet Jesus in Galilee, and it would take a number of days to get there. They go there, and they meet him, but nothing is said after that; there is no comment as to what happened to Jesus thereafter.
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In Luke, Jesus plays games with his followers: hiding his identity, suddenly appearing amongst the disciples in Jerusalem, going to Bethany and ascending into heaven, but most importantly, all of this happened on the same day the women visited the tomb. Also, in Acts, we find out that Jesus told the disciples to not leave Jerusalem, so they could not have travelled to Galilee to see him a second time.
Like the birth narratives, the two are irreconcilable, but such a reality would never disturb the faith of a true believer. Indeed, it is unlikely that most true believers are aware of any of these issues.
Unfortunately, it gets worse, for the author of Luke is also the author of Acts, yet the author seems to have forgotten, or wanted to rewrite, what he had written in the gospel called Luke, for in the first chapter of Acts, we have:
...to be concluded.
10. The death of Judas
Like the post-resurrection stories, the authors of Matthew and Luke did not have a template to copy from, as Mark does not mention anything at all about post-resurrection events, and so coming from different communities, their stories diverge. To emphasize this, we will look at another story that appears in Matthew and Luke, but not in Mark. We will compare these two stories:
When Judas, his betrayer, saw that Jesus was condemned, he repented and brought back the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and the elders. He said, “I have sinned by betraying innocent blood.” But they said, “What is that to us? See to it yourself.” Throwing down the pieces of silver in the temple, he departed; and he went and hanged himself.
So, Judas throws the silver in the temple, departs and hangs himself. Consider what the author of Luke (in Acts) says:
Now this man acquired a field with the reward of his wickedness; and falling headlong, he burst open in the middle and all his bowels gushed out.
So, did he throw down the reward, or did he purchase a field? Did he hang himself, or did he fall headlong and have is bowels "gush out"? Matthew then describes what was done with the money, but interestingly enough, it doesn't say anything about Judas either dying, or even being buried there. Instead, the purchase of the field was to fulfill a prophesy. The field was called the "Field of Blood" because it was purchased with "blood money":
But the chief priests, taking the pieces of silver, said, “It is not lawful to put them into the treasury, since they are blood money.” After conferring together, they used them to buy the potter’s field as a place to bury foreigners. For this reason that field has been called the Field of Blood to this day. Then was fulfilled what had been spoken through the prophet Jeremiah, “And they took the thirty pieces of silver, the price of the one on whom a price had been set, on whom some of the people of Israel had set a price, and they gave them for the potter’s field, as the Lord commanded me.”
Let us see what the author of Luke has to say about this field:
This became known to all the residents of Jerusalem, so that the field was called in their language Hakeldama, that is, Field of Blood.
There is no mention of the field being used to bury foreigners, and is instead called that because it was stained by the blood of Judas. It is interesting: if Judas was so distraught at having revealed that Jesus had had himself anointed, why would he go to so much effort to kill himself? In Matthew, it is straight-forward: Judas hung himself. According to the author of Luke, he first engages in a transaction where he purchases a field and then goes to that field and decides that he will kill himself there by "falling headlong."
There are many stories that have been told to try to create a harmony between these two narratives. For example, Judas hung himself, and the rope magically broke, and he fell on the ground and his guts burst open and spilled out. The issue is that Judas fell "headlong", or in other words, falling with the head foremost. If you hung yourself, then no matter what, the tension is at your neck, so if the rope broke, then gravity would continue to pull you down and your feet would land first. How can the author of Luke so perfectly transcribe the discussions between Mary and Gabriel and between Mary and Elizabeth, and so closely parallel Matthew everywhere that they copied Mark or Q, but then fail so miserably at describing an event that allegedly occurred? The believer does not have to understand why a person can hang themselves and then fall "headlong", but rather, the believer need only be told this is possible, and this belief will be included in the myriad of other beliefs that Jesus was anything other than an itinerant preacher who prophesized the coming of the kingdom of Yahweh. However, in the greater context that none of the pre-baptism or post-resurrection narratives line up, this is just one more line of evidence that the authors of Matthew and Luke simply had different stories about Jesus following his resurrection. Apologists will tackle one inconsistency at a time, in each case trying to sow doubt into what should be clear: the narratives diverge and are irreconcilable. However, when one observes that all the pre-baptism and post-resurrection narratives diverge, this makes it much more difficult to explain away the differences. Why do all the gospels diverge? To emphasize this, let us look at the last gospel, which also refers to post-resurrection events.
11. What does John have to say?
The Gospels of Matthew, Luke, and John each offer a distinct portrayal of the events following Jesus's resurrection. Upon closer inspection, these narratives present a series of inconsistencies that are difficult to reconcile. “‘’”
To begin, consider the narrative control exhibited by the authors of Matthew and Luke. The author of Matthew demonstrates an intimate knowledge of Joseph's dreams, recounting their content and impact on Joseph's decisions in precise detail. Similarly, the author of Luke provides extensive transcriptions of private speeches and discussions between individuals and angels, including conversations involving Mary, Zechariah, and Elizabeth. Despite this narrative insight, Matthew and Luke diverge significantly on the events following Jesus's resurrection.
In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus explicitly tells the women at the tomb to instruct his disciples to meet him in Galilee in Matthew 28:10:
Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me.”
This instruction is clear and direct, and it frames the entire post-resurrection story in Matthew. The implication is that Jesus's reunion with his disciples is meant to occur in Galilee. There is no ambiguity here. Yet, in Luke’s Gospel, the story unfolds very differently. Instead of Jesus directing his disciples to Galilee, he remains in and around Jerusalem. He even plays what could be described as “games” with his disciples and followers. For example, Jesus appears to two followers on the road to Emmaus, concealing his identity until he reveals himself during the breaking of bread (Luke 24:13-31). Later, when he appears to the group of disciples, it is again in Jerusalem, and he tells them to stay in the city until they receive "power from on high" in Luke 24:49:
“And see, I am sending upon you what my Father promised, so stay here in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.”
Unlike in Matthew, Jesus never tells his disciples to go to Galilee. Instead, he explicitly tells them to remain in Jerusalem. This is not a subtle difference — it is a direct contradiction. If Jesus told them to go to Galilee, as Matthew claims, why would Luke have him insist they remain in Jerusalem? This contradiction becomes even more glaring when we examine the Gospel of John.
The Gospel of John, like Luke, describes Jesus’s first post-resurrection appearance as taking place in Jerusalem. John 20:19 says:
When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.”
Unlike Matthew, John has Jesus appear in Jerusalem, not Galilee. Like Luke, Jesus materializes inside a locked house, and unlike Matthew, the author of John provides a clear explanation for why the doors are locked — the disciples are afraid of the Jewish authorities. This detail offers an explanation for Jesus's sudden appearance, but it also reflects an understanding of the disciples' emotional state, a feature absent from both Matthew and Luke. John introduces another point of divergence in the characters present during Jesus's first appearance. While Matthew and Luke both imply that all eleven remaining disciples are present (since Judas has already died), John introduces Thomas as notably absent. In Luke 24:33, it states:
That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem; and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together.”
Here, Luke explicitly identifies “the eleven”—a clear reference to the eleven remaining disciples after Judas’s death. Luke even describes how, soon after this gathering, Jesus appears among them, eats food in their presence, and teaches them before ascending into heaven.
By contrast, in John 20:24-25, we learn that Thomas was not present for this encounter:
But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came.
So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.”
But he said to them, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”
This introduces several narrative difficulties. Luke’s account seems to imply that all of the remaining eleven disciples, including Thomas, were present when Jesus appeared. John, however, tells us Thomas was not there. John also repeatedly refers to “the twelve,” even though Judas is already gone, which further muddles the characterization of the group. The scene with Thomas is unique to John, and it shifts the focus away from Jesus’s initial appearance to a dramatic encounter that occurs a full week later. This is at odds with Luke, where Jesus’s first appearance is closely followed by his ascension.
After the week-long delay with Thomas, John’s narrative shifts once again. Unlike Luke, who has Jesus's appearances centered around Jerusalem, John 21 has Jesus reappear at the Sea of Galilee (called the Sea of Tiberias in the text) in John 21:1:
After these things Jesus showed himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberias; and he showed himself in this way.
Seven disciples are present for this scene. This moment might seem to align with Matthew's account of Jesus meeting his disciples in Galilee, but the problem is that the disciples’ reason for being in Galilee is unclear. Luke, after all, says Jesus told them to remain in Jerusalem. Yet in John, they are back in Galilee, which appears to correspond with the instruction given in Matthew (although the motivations and context differ).
This scene also features the story of a miraculous catch of fish. Here, Peter, James, and John are fishing but catch nothing until Jesus (whose identity they do not recognize) tells them to cast their nets on the other side of the boat, at which point they haul in a miraculous number of fish. This parallels a story told earlier in Luke (Luke 5:1-11), except Luke places it at the beginning of Jesus’s ministry, not after the resurrection. It is striking that John effectively recycles this story at the end of his gospel, perhaps intending to symbolically “bookend” Jesus's ministry. However, this narrative reuse raises the question of whether this is an independent memory or a reimagined version of the earlier fishing story found in Luke.
This brings up another point: The post-resurrection narratives in Matthew, Luke, and John exhibit distinct differences in tone, style, and theological emphasis. In Matthew and John, Jesus’s interactions with his disciples remain casual, familiar, and personal, much like his interactions with them before his crucifixion. By contrast, Luke’s account is far more formal and liturgical, emphasizing the transfer of divine authority through the Holy Spirit and marking a clear shift from Jesus’s earthly ministry to the mission of the Church.
In Matthew, Jesus meets the women at the tomb and greets them with a simple, familiar “Greetings!” He later instructs the disciples to meet him in Galilee, where he delivers the “Great Commission” (Matthew 28:18-20), granting them authority to baptize and teach all nations. This moment is direct and informal, resembling a teacher sending students on a final mission. John takes a similar approach, with Jesus appearing to his disciples in Jerusalem, sharing meals with them, and personally commissioning Peter with the pastoral charge to “feed my sheep.” Jesus’s actions are relational, personal, and restorative, reflecting his role as a friend and shepherd rather than as a formal king or priest.
Luke, however, presents a much more ceremonial and liturgical vision of Jesus’s post-resurrection activity. Instead of sending the disciples to Galilee, Jesus orders them to stay in Jerusalem to await the arrival of the Holy Spirit — a moment that becomes the defining event of Pentecost in Acts 2. Luke portrays this as a formal transfer of divine authority, with Jesus instructing the disciples to remain in place until they are “clothed with power from on high.” The ascension of Jesus is also unique to Luke’s account, symbolizing Jesus’s departure from the earthly realm and his exaltation as a heavenly king. In this sense, Luke’s Jesus acts as a priest-king, formally transferring his authority to his disciples through the Spirit, unlike Matthew’s Jesus, who remains spiritually present, and John’s Jesus, who interacts with his disciples in a more personal and intimate manner.
These differences highlight each gospel writer’s distinct theological agenda. Matthew emphasizes Jesus as a master and teacher who commissions his students to spread his teachings. John emphasizes Jesus as a personal shepherd and friend, highlighting forgiveness and reconciliation. Luke emphasizes Jesus as a priest-king who departs from the world but sends the Holy Spirit to empower the Church. The result is not just a difference in tone but a difference in theological message. In Matthew and John, Jesus remains “with” his disciples through his ongoing presence, while in Luke, Jesus’s departure and the coming of the Holy Spirit mark a formal shift in divine authority from Jesus to the apostles, heralding the start of the Church’s mission.
Finally, Mary Magdalene’s experience at the tomb also reflects significant differences between the gospels. In Matthew, she encounters Jesus himself and speaks directly with him in Matthew 28:9:
Suddenly Jesus met them and said, “Greetings!” And they came to him, took hold of his feet, and worshiped him.
By contrast, in John, Mary does not immediately recognize Jesus. Instead, she mistakes him for a gardener in John 20:14-15:
She turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus.
Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?”
Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.”
This narrative shift is difficult to explain. Why would Mary recognize Jesus in Matthew but mistake him for a gardener in John? These differences are not easily attributable to different “perspectives” or “emphases” but instead reveal deeper narrative divergences. The gospel writers are not simply providing different perspectives on the same event; they are recounting substantially different events with little evidence of interdependence.
While defenders of gospel harmonization may argue that there is no “logical contradiction” between Matthew and Luke, the differences between their accounts are too numerous, too fundamental, and too significant to ignore. The contradictions are already difficult to reconcile, but the introduction of the post-resurrection narrative in John only compounds the problem. Instead of clarifying or bridging the gap between Matthew and Luke, John presents an entirely different sequence of events with distinct theological emphases and narrative details.
The account of the author of John introduces new characters, locations, and actions that neither Matthew nor Luke mention. For instance, while Matthew has Jesus instructing the disciples to meet him in Galilee, and Luke insists they remain in Jerusalem, John initially places Jesus in Jerusalem but later has him appear by the Sea of Galilee. Similarly, while Luke depicts Jesus’s appearance to the “eleven” disciples as a single event culminating in the ascension, John portrays multiple appearances, including the well-known encounter with “doubting Thomas” a week later and a later scene with seven disciples fishing in Galilee.
Far from resolving the contradictions between Matthew and Luke, the narrative in John only introduces new discrepancies. It becomes clear that, rather than providing clarity, the inclusion of John’s gospel highlights the irreconcilable nature of the resurrection accounts. Harmonizing all three requires a speculative, convoluted, and improbable narrative that goes well beyond anything written in the text. Logical possibility is one thing, but historical plausibility is another. When we look at the resurrection stories in Matthew, Luke, and John together, the contradictions are undeniable.
Summary and conclusions
As my other article discusses, it is clear that the authors of Matthew and Luke copied from Mark, and editorial fatigue demonstrates that those authors copied from Mark and not the other way around. The amount of copying from Mark is extensive, and yet Mark does not make any mention of events prior to Jesus's baptism or after his resurrection (the last few verses not appearing in the oldest manuscripts). Thus, neither author had a sequence of events to base their narratives on, so each made up their own stories, and as it seems that neither had access to the others, their stories diverged significantly to the point of both stories being irreconcilable. Matthew's birth narrative is one of kings and riches together with suffering, while Luke's is one emphasizing poverty and commonality but also a sense of Gemütlichkeit. Matthew's post-resurrection narrative has the disciples travel to Galilee to meet Jesus where they were told to meet him, while Luke's post-resurrection narrative has Jesus appear unannounced within the midst of the disciples in Jerusalem, after which he ascends into heaven. There is one other possibility, and that is that the author of Luke may have had access to Matthew, but deliberately chose to diverge from the narratives in Matthew, but this does not explain why so many other stories shared between the two gospels are so similar. In conclusion, the likeliest case is that both authors had access to Mark, and where they had access to Mark, they had a common narrative, but when they went to tell their birth narrative or post-resurrection narrative, as they had no basis, they used the stories they were familiar with, and these stories ended up being irreconcilable with the other author's stories. Another critical point is that while numerous passages are common between Matthew and Luke (either derived from sayings and teachings documents labeled Q or Mark), there are no overlaps what-so-ever with any events prior to Jesus's baptism or after Jesus's resurrection. If the authors did not have text to copy from, they did came up with their own stories.
Post-document prediction
I predict that if any apologist or Christian fundamentalist responds to this, that they are very likely to simply find one detail that is wrong, and subsequently dismiss out of hand the balance of the document. They will not address each point, but rather, find one point that they can address. This is in line with the sowing of doubt, and as long as the true-believer has some hope of believing a reconciliation is possible, that is sufficient.
A few narratives
Consider the following narratives, and ask yourself if it is reasonable that both are simultaneously true.
Jim and his friends were living in the Boston area and it was an exceptionally mild winter one year, so for a New Year's celebration, they decided to go to New York City; specifically, Times Square. They arrived in New York a week before (where Jim did a stunt of riding two motorcycles at the same time), and one day during that week, Jim got drunk in public, and among other actions, poured a bottle of vodka over his head. Surveillance and Facial Recognition (Safer) software, however, recorded his actions and led to his arrest. Thus, he was caught and put into jail New Year's Eve, and he missed on the New Year's Day celebrations. On January 2nd, some of the women with him tried to visit him in jail. The guards told them that he was no longer there, as he had arranged bail, but one did pass on a message: Jim asked one of police officers if he could pass on the message that he'd see them again in Boston at Bunker Hill. Thus, all the friends returned to Boston, where they met with Jim at Bunker Hill, and had a great party where Jim passed out some high-quality meth he had acquired since, and all were happy.
Jim and his friends were living in the Boston area and it was an exceptionally mild winter one year, so for a New Year's celebrations, they decided to go to New York City; specifically, Times Square. Prior to this, however, Jim had recently been in New York, and while there, Jim and his friends got drunk in public, and among other actions, Jim poured a bottle of vodka over his feet. This, was, however, observed by Safer, and an arrest warrant was put out for him and his friends. Jim and his friends arrived in New York a week before, with Jim riding on a motorcycle, and on New Year's Eve, Safer recognized him, and the police caught up with him, putting him into jail, so he missed on the New Year's Day celebrations. On January 2nd, some of the women with him tried to visit him in jail, but he had already posted bail. The women went back, but Perry (one of Jim's best friends) didn't believe them (Jim would have most certainly contacted him had he gotten out), so Perry went to the jail himself to find he wasn't there. Now all the friends were getting worried: where was Jim? Also, they were worried about getting arrested themselves: they would have preferred to have been returning to Boston by now. Now, two of Jim's friends went to visit the World Trade Center, which was about seven miles from Times Square. There, they ran into Jim, but he was disheveled, so they didn't recognize him. They talked for a while, as Jim was quite aware of what would keep them interested, and so they kept talking and as the evening came, they decided to go to a restaurant. At dinner, Jim finally revealed who he was, and had a good laugh. He excused himself to go to the washroom, but then slipped out. The friends were rather surprised at this behavior, and returned to the hotel where Jim's friends were staying, and they were in a room, which they kept locked, just in case the police came calling. While talking about this, Jim, with a key, let himself in, but some didn't believe it was Jim, and insisted on seeing his prison-release forms. While there, Jim passed out some high-quality meth, and after everyone was high, Jim once again, gave them the slip. Jim's friends went out and partied throughout Times Square that night. Now, before Jim gave them the slip, he told them to stay in New York and not to return to Boston: "wait until I return with some top-quality heroin". He left his credit card, and his friends partied in New York for the entire month of January and half of February, before Jim came back with that heroin, and all were happy.