In this story of the destitute widow and the Bethlehem man who later married, protected, and provided for her, we see a picture of Jesus, our kinsman redeemer. But as a scholar of the New Testament, what I argue is that the Gospels offer an important insight into the Greco-Roman views of ethnic identity, including genealogies. So today, when the importance of Bethlehem is heard in Christmas carols or displayed in Nativity scenes, the name of the town connects Jesus to an ancestral lineage and the prophetic hope for a new leader like King David. Moreover, the Greek word translated as “inn” (kataluma) doesn’t mean hotel in any kind of modern service industry kind of way. That he uses different language here means that Luke is describing something else here. Jesus was the “new David” the “great ruler” that would come from Bethlehem and bring peace and security to all the nations (2007, p. 416). The Gospel of Mark is the earliest account of Jesus’ life, written around A.D. 60. Yesterday I discussed Matthew’s account of how it is that Jesus came to be born in Bethlehem, if in fact he “came” from Nazareth. In the Bible, the answer seems straightforward: Bethlehem. Question: "Why was Jesus born in a manger?" Matthew also says that after Herod dies from an illness, Joseph, Mary and Jesus do not return to Bethlehem. In challenging traditional depictions of the birth of Jesus some scholars go a lot further than just reconfiguring the sleeping plans. Of the four canonical gospels in the Bible, only two talk about Jesus’s birth. And after the birth of Jesus … Regardless, there was a manger or feeding trough in the place where Christ was born, and that was used as a resting place for the newborn Jesus, as stated in Luke 2:7. Every Christmas, a relatively small town in the Palestinian West Bank comes center stage: Bethlehem. The meaning, he writes, is that the place that he was staying did not have enough space to accommodate the soon-to-be small family. The reason that we might think of this main room as a stable is that there was a manger or animal trough there. The gospel of the evangelist Matthew tells us that "Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea (now Palestine). There are problems with those claims and I’ll come back to them in a moment. But Matthew says Jesus was born in a "house" where Joseph’s family lived in Bethlehem. Its arrival took place a few months after the assassination of Julius Caesar in 44 B.C. Two widows—Ruth and Naomi, her mother-in-law—left foreign Moabfor the small town where Naomi and her husband had lived, the town of Bethlehem. "At that time in … Unfortunately, as Luke stresses, there wasn’t enough room for everyone upstairs, so they likely stayed downstairs in the main room of the house on the ground floor. During the period of Jesus’ life, there were multiple perspectives on the Messiah. The Gospels of Mark and John reveal that they either had trouble linking Bethlehem with Jesus, did not know his birthplace, or were not concerned with this city. It was here in young David's hometown that the prophet Samuel anointed him to be king over Israel (1 Samuel 16:1-13). Bethlehem! Recent research by … The God of creation was born in a back-woods town and in the overflow section. : Christian tradition states that Jesus was born in Bethlehem, in Judea (now Palestine). We say that he was "born in Bethlehem" because Bethlehem was David's birthplace, King David was Israel's greatest king and the ancestor of the messiah. The Book of Revelation also affirms that Jesus was a descendant of David but does not mention Bethlehem. It goes on to describe their meeting with the local Jewish king named Herod, of whom they inquire about the location of Jesus’ birth. According to the New Testament, Joseph and Mary were living in Bethlehem of Judea at the time of Jesus' birth and later moved to Nazareth up north. Overjoyed, they worship Jesus and present gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. Dr. Long, I love your points on the importance of Jesus being born in Bethlehem. Bethlehem was also the hometown of Ruth’s father-in-law, Elimelech, and where she met Boaz, her kinsman redeemer. The opening chapter of Mark says that Jesus is from “Nazareth of Galilee.” This is repeated throughout the Gospel on several occasions, and Bethlehem is never mentioned. Caesar Augustus, who was the first Roman emperor, was proclaimed as a descendant of Apollo. This is not to say that John was unaware of Bethlehem’s significance. Charlesworth concludes, “It is impossible to be certain where Jesus was born … but the vast amount [sic] of independent evidence … indicates that Jesus most likely grew up and was born in Nazareth, the home of his fathers” (p. 73). Since Joseph was a descendant of King David, Bethlehem was the hometown where he was required to register. The nativity of Jesus, nativity of Christ, birth of Christ or birth of Jesus is described in the Biblical gospels of Luke and Matthew. . 1,000 years after David died, the town of Bethlehem was still known as the “town of David” (Luke 2:11). Yet the New Testament Gospels do not agree about the details of Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem. Jesus, according to some biblical sources, was born in this town some two millennia ago. Second, in Luke, the event that necessitates Mary and Joseph’s journey to Bethlehem is a census. The two accounts agree that Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, his mother Mary was betrothed to a man named Joseph, who was descended from King David and was not his biological father, and that his birth was caused by divine intervention. Luke and Matthew both place Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem. First, in the earliest life of Jesus (the Gospel of Mark), Jesus is only ever associated with Nazareth; Mark doesn’t seem to know a birth story that links him to Bethlehem. "(Micah 5:2, HBFV throughout). More specifically, Christ was born in a stable, possibly a stable inside a cave. Mary, the mother of Jesus, lived in the little town of Nazareth, among the hills of Galilee. 722, prophesies that the messiah would come from David’s hometown, Bethlehem. What makes it more difficult is that neither the other Gospels, that of Mark and John, mentions Jesus’ birth or his connection to Bethlehem. Jesus, according to some biblical sources, was born in this town some two millennia ago. As Bart Ehrman puts it in his New Testament Introduction, a situation like this would have been a “bureaucratic nightmare” that would have involved “massive migration.” It is unbelievable, he argues, that millions of people were uprooted for this one event, and that no other ancient sources thought to mention it. The author of John does not seem to know that Jesus was born in Bethlehem. The New Testament records that Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea. Yet the New Testament Gospels do not agree about the details of Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem… More specifically, Christ was born in a stable, possibly a stable inside a cave. The Gospel of Luke includes no flight to Egypt, no paranoid King Herod, no murder of children and no wise men visiting baby Jesus. The New Testament Gospels do not agree about the details of Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem. Jesus is born in a manger because all the travelers overcrowded the guest rooms. Apostle Paul, who wrote the earliest documents of the New Testament, considered Jesus a descendant of David but does not associate him with Bethlehem. In fact, this was a fulfillment of prophecy, as Matthew records: Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, 2 saying, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? The town of Bethlehem of Judea, about six miles south of Jerusalem, has always been considered the birthplace of Jesus. In Mark and John, he’s just Jesus of Nazareth. Regardless of whether these claims were accepted at the time to be true, they shaped a person’s ethnic identity, political status and claims to honor. The Good Shepherd — Anonymous. > Was Jesus born in Bethlehem or Nazareth? But within the Hebrew Bible, a prophetic book called Micah, thought to be written around B.C. Was Jesus Born in Bethlehem? Every Christmas, a relatively small town in the Palestinian West Bank comes center stage: Bethlehem. ROME — As Christmas approaches, debate often arises over when exactly Jesus was born. They find the two birth stories unconvincing, and suggest that both were crafted to explain how Jesus of Nazareth somehow fulfilled the prophetic expectation of birth in David’s city of Bethlehem. The Gospel of Luke, an account of Jesus’ life which was written during the same period as the Gospel of Matthew, has a different version of Jesus’ birth. We know this from Biblical prophesies and narrative accounts like in Luke 2:4 and Matthew 2:1. Every Christmas, a relatively small town in the Palestinian West Bank comes center stage: Bethlehem. This is about six miles, (10 kilometers), south of Jerusalem " on the east side of the 'Patriarch's Highway' that ran along the ridge between Shechem and Hebron ." John mentions a debate where some Jewish people referred to the prophecy which claimed that the messiah would be a descendant of David and come from Bethlehem. Luke mentions that Jesus is not only genealogically connected to King David, but also born in Bethlehem, “the city of David.”. Every Christmas, a relatively small town in the Palestinian West Bank comes center stage: Bethlehem. The story of the Star of Bethlehem appears only in the Book of Matthew. Even so, this doesn’t make the Jupiter-Saturn event the biblical star, nor does it mean that Jesus was necessarily born in a stable, or even in Bethlehem. According to the Gospel of Matthew, the first Gospel in the canon of the New Testament, Joseph and Mary were in Bethlehem when Jesus was born. Those not claimed to be fulfillments seem more likely to be his inventions. After Jesus was born, Joseph took his family from Bethlehem to Jerusalem for up to 40 days (Luke 2:22), and from there straight back to Nazareth (Luke 2:39). Genealogical claims were made for important ancient founders and political leaders. Rodolfo Galvan Estrada III, Fuller Theological Seminary. Jesus was the “new David” the “great ruler” that would come from Bethlehem and bring peace and security to all the nations (2007, p. 416). It may well be that Matthew has placed Jesus’ birth there to fulfill Micah’s prophecy (5:2) that a great ruler (the supposed messiah) would come from Bethlehem.. Matthew explains it all by indicating that Joseph and Mary were originally from Bethlehem. The Bible tells us that it was in Bethlehem, for example, that Jacob’s beloved wife, Rachel, was buried. You ask, "Why Was Jesus Born in Bethlehem?" By Rodolfo Galvan Estrada III, Adjunct Assistant Professor of the New Testament, Fuller Theological Seminary. Married to a census that the prophet Samuel anointed him to be a of. It took 1,000 years for one prophecy and 700 years for the other, but God keeps... 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