Discrepancies In the Nativity Story

[Enlil-An]

Originally posted by Hemidakota
What is the point of this thread beside 12 pages of arguments?

No one has yet addressed the original point I brought up. Everyone just wanted to agrue about the premise instead. Maybe once others accept the premise, my original question may get answered...but so far it looks like that's not going to happen.

[Enlil-An]

Originally posted by Johnny Rudick
If someone was to quote me and 1000 years down the road the reader was to find
that I was not exactly broke I am sure he would find fault with the chronicler.

Anything's possible. But only some things are probable.

[JohnnyRudick]

Originally Posted by Enlil-An

Anything's possible. But only some things are probable.

This was in response to your finding fault with Johns account.

John 8:33 - "They answered him, We be Abraham’s seed, and were never in bondage to any man: how sayest thou, Ye shall be made free?"

Which is an outgrowth to the rest of this thread of trying to discredit part of the Standard Works of the Church.

(I guess you have to start somewhere but even saying that the author was making it up?)


I made the statement that If I wrote;

"I ain't got no money."

If someone was to quote me and 1000 years down the road the reader was to find
that I was not exactly broke I am sure he would find fault with the chronicler.


Yes

"Anything's possible. But only some things are probable."

That is very true.

But it skirts the point I in my clumsy way am trying to make.

People say things all the time and will say things that in no
way is even close to what they meant.

They are quoted.

That does not make the person doing the quoting wrong.

They were arrogant people boasting in their pride.

They were wrong in their boasting.

That does not make John wrong nor the Scripture.

Matthew wrote of the events of the birth acording to what the Spirit had him write as did Luke.

Read in the Spirit, it is easily decoded.

Don't blame the author if you don't possess the key.


Bro. Rudick

[volgadon]

Originally Posted by Enlil-An

The scripture doesn't say that. It says, " And he arose, and took the young child and his mother, and came into the land of Israel." His journey from Egypt to Israel would have been on the trade route from Pelusium to Gaza which would put him in the Idumea province which was governed by Herod the Great's sister, Salome I, not Herod Archelaus. The scripture then says, "But when he heard that Archelaus did reign in Judaea in the room of his father Herod, he was afraid to go thither..." The phrase "go thither" means he was afraid to go into the land of Judea which wouldn't make sense if he was in that land already as you claim. The scripture then says, "notwithstanding, being warned of God in a dream, he turned aside into the parts of Galilee..." To do this, all Joseph needed to do was travel up the Palestinian coast through the terrirtory Salome until he got to Samaria and then from Samaria to Galille thus avoiding the heart of Judea.

Right, except that the small part of the coastal road given to Salome came under Archelaus's control. Samaria suffered just as much as the heart of Judaea.
Josephus Wars, book II, chp 6-7.

Those towns given Salome were considered as Judah by Jewish writers, not as Idumaea.
I have yet to see a reference in the Mishna and Talmud to Jamniah being Idumaea.

You are basing your arguments on the KJV. I'm still waiting for someone who knows Koine Greek to tell me that it doesn't say going in or through where the English has thither and that the word is warned, as you claim and not commanded or instructed.


[QUOTE]Which are irrelevent to the wording in Matthew and Luke.

Matthew "And he came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth..."

Luke "...they returned into Galilee, to their own city Nazareth." [emphasis added]

How are they irelevant? Let us say you read one post where I say I worked in a factory in Hatzor, my own city, and then read another where I say I live in Livnim but work in a factory in Hatzor. Which account is wrong?

As you can't be bothered to look those up, you expect me to take the time to translate them into English?

I'm sorry, but you haven't. As for the scholarly works, I've read many over many years, and quite a bit of that isn't in English. I'll try and post a short bibliography.

As for context, that is easy. Read the chapter. If that doesn't help, where was the Aramean and Assyrian invasion route? Through the northern end of the Sea of Galilee, the area described by Isaiah, and this is backed up by archaeology (such as at Bethsaida, which my brother dug at and found Assyrian arrowheads and bits of scale).
I would tell you to take a look at Yair Hoffman's comments in the Isaiah volume of Olam HaTanakh (which he edited), but you couldn't read it. Yair Hoffman is one of the eminent Israeli biblical scholars.

Here are your words. "Professional historians agree with me on this. I'm not just referring to one of Matthew's prophecies. I'm talking about all of them. All of them are bogus." (where is the exact reference BTW).
"For example, Matthew quotes Isaiah 7:14 to show that the virgin birth was predicted in scripture. The problem is that the scripture he quotes is the Greek translation which uses the word parthenos (an ambiguous Greek word meaning either "young girl" or "virgin"). The original Hebrew reading uses the word aalmah which simply means "young girl" (the Hebrew word for "virgin" is betulah) and would not be construed by anyone reading Hebrew to mean that a baby would be born from a virgin."

Corruption accounts for most of the errors and contradictory statements in ancient texts.

I was going off of what you said.

Assuming that your reading is correct, it still doesn't support your conclusion. Their statement is the height of arrogance and wilful ignorance and contrasts with the Saviour's teachings. It does not mean that whoever wrote John was ignorant of the captivity. No, it is chauvinism in its fullest sense.

Or you could use the table of contents or index to find those sections which fit the time-frame.
Search engines make that even easier.
Try Antiquities, book XVIII, chp I, 6.
Wars, book II, chp VIII, section 1, chp XVII, 8.
And yes, it would help if you would read all of Josephus, to get an idea of the political and social backdrop to the Gospels.

Before making such pronouncements on the authenticity of the Gospels I would hope you would at least acquaint yourself with other contemporary or near-contemporary materials.

[QUOTE}How long are you going to play these games, volgadon? Everytime I've used a source to back up one of my arguements, I've quoted the source and precisely where it's located so that everyone can see it in the context of my arguement and can prove it for themselves by finding it quickly. The more you neglect to do this also, the more shakey your arguements look. Why don't you provide us with the exact quotes for your claims? Are you hoping that by not doing so, we'll just take your word for it and be too discouraged or lazy to check it out ourselves - kind of like Matthew does when using the vague assertion "spoken by the prophets" in reference to Jesus being a Nazarene?

Where have you quoted an exact source and precisely where it is located?

[JohnnyRudick]

Actually I believe Jesus had to reenter the land, crossing the
Jorden from East to West for symbolical reasons and
God made them have to do it.

If they went up the coast it would not have been done that way.


Just what I believe

[volgadon]

Johnny, that kind of route doesn't make any sense. They would have had to travel due east through some very rough and barren territory, then travel up through some even rougher in order to cross back west, all the time with a very young child. Brutal, barren hills with little water or shelter along the way, through an area infested by highwaymen and marauding nomads, exorbitant Nabataean tolls, murderous sun for half the year and devastating flash floods the other half, and so on. The coastal road was farily safe and had settlements and roadside facilities at convenient intervals.
The only trouble in Joseph's mind was Archelaus.

[JohnnyRudick]

Originally Posted by volgadon

Johnny, that kind of route doesn't make any sense. They would have had to travel due east through some very rough and barren territory, then travel up through some even rougher in order to cross back west, all the time with a very young child. Brutal, barren hills with little water or shelter along the way, through an area infested by highwaymen and marauding nomads, exorbitant Nabataean tolls, murderous sun for half the year and devastating flash floods the other half, and so on. The coastal road was farily safe and had settlements and roadside facilities at convenient intervals.
The only trouble in Joseph's mind was Archelaus.

OK, You seem to be a lot more familiar with this area.

And this you believe to be the condition of the area at the time of the early years of Jesus?


The only reason I say this is the Old Testament in many places seem to lay a parallel
with Jesus birth in Bethlehem, Harrods murderous assault on the young males, the flight
into Egypt and the return with that of Israel the Children of Jacob.

The Old Testament seems to have the same events in Chronological order so I figured that it would be that Joseph would have headed through Judea, but learning what he did was forced to follow the same route of Joshuah.

All I have to go by is the Scriptures.


I try to not use much else.



Guess I was wrong again.


Maybe you can send me more info on this
to study as I can.



Bro. Rudick

[volgadon]

Bro Rudick, I really enjoy reading your posts, You have a way of making your points simple yet clear. They've given me a lot to think about.

This was the condition of the area, and it was also the wilderness which John and Jesus later frequented.

I'll see what I've got, what sort of thing did you have in mind?

[rameumptom]

Originally Posted by Enlil-An

It recently came to my attention that the birth narratives of Jesus in the gospels of Matthew and Luke are irreconcilably contradictary. According to Matthew, the Savior and his parents are from Bethlehem, stay there for two years after Jesus' birth, fly to Egypt to escape King Herod, and arrive at Nazareth for the first time once Herod is dead. In Luke, Mary and Joseph are from Nazareth, travel to Bethlehem for the census, stay there only a month during her purification according to Levitical law, and then return back home to Nazareth. There is no flight to Egypt, no wise men following a star, no death decree by Herod.

After reading these narratives closely, it becomes obvious that Matthew and Luke are telling two totally different, contradicting stories. Both of them can't be true. The prophet, Nephi, prophesied that Jesus' mother would be from Nazareth but only says that Jesus would be born in "the land of Jerusalem". There are no other places in the standard works that specify where Jesus was born or how he got there.

My question is, has anyone else here noticed this and how do we reconcile it with the Church's position that the Bible is the word of God (originally written by inspired men) and that the only errors in it are mistranlations and interpolations here and there?

I'll try and answer your original question. Yes there are irreconcilable differences in the two nativity stories. Just reading Ehrman's "Jesus, Interrupted" will help many see these differences.

However, the Church does not worry about which stories are historically accurate, but which are inspirational and give us a decent understanding of the Christ.

We also realize that the story of the Garden of Eden goes against modern science. We do not worry about it. In fact, the Church's official stance on evolution is one of neutrality, rendering to Caesar that which is Caesar's.

We believe the Bible, "insofar as it is translated correctly." Joseph Smith was bold enough to claim that the Song of Solomon was "not inspired." That doesn't mean the SoS isn't of any value or ancient, it just wasn't inspired of God.

And the view of the Church concerning the Apocrypha (see D&C 91) is that there is much inspiration and true in it, and much of the interpolations of mankind. So it is with all the scriptures to one extent or another. Even Peter warns us about Paul's writings being difficult to understand, and those not led by the Spirit can wrest them to their own destruction (2 Peter 3:16). Moroni opines about the weakness in writing his people have (Ether 12), and Joseph Smith was virtually illiterate when he began translating the Book of Mormon.

Of course there are errors in the scriptures. The story of the nativity was written down decades after the death of Christ, and obviously there were at least two oral versions that were available at the time.

But as Davis Bitton, Church historian, once taught, "I don't have a testimony of the history of the Church." I personally do not have a testimony of the history of the scriptures, either.

I DO have a testimony of the divinity of Jesus Christ, and his atonement. I also have a testimony of the Restored Church, etc.

[JohnnyRudick]

Originally Posted by volgadon

Bro Rudick, I really enjoy reading your posts, You have a way of making your points simple yet clear. They've given me a lot to think about.

This was the condition of the area, and it was also the wilderness which John and Jesus later frequented.

I'll see what I've got, what sort of thing did you have in mind?

Well, as I said.

When God Called His Son out of Egypt they came in across south of the Southern Desert across he bottom
of the Dead sea and up the west side of the Jordan and crossed into Judeas northern area.

This would take Jesus and His family through Harod Antipas' area instead of through where
Archelaus held power.


I know it was a tough road, but sometimes things have to be fulfilled a certain way to fulfill Scripture.

Is there anything that shows what would have made it impossible for them to follow Joshua's route?


Bro. Rudick