That is not baseless. God is known to use many motivations to get man to do what he is supposed to
Except we're not talking about God's motivations -- we're talking about man's vain guesses (yours and the commentators') as to His motivations.
With, it should be added, no Biblical support whatsoever.
No. Love as a motivating factor has permeated all history. A dad wanting to be there at the birth of his son is also very normal, apparently even for God!! The star of Bethlehem was likely the Father's mobile throne, as I mentioned before, overseeing the birth of His son. As for the leading of the Holy Spirit, that is a known factor in all the bible. This is solid deductive work.
It's baseless blather -- It's sad (but not surprising) that you've returned to form.
And all this time I thought that God's ways were not our ways? Apparantly He acts exactly as a human would when it suits your purpose.
"Some elements of the sacred accounts, such as their remaining in the area after Jesus' birth, "indicate that when Joseph and Mary went to Bethlehem, they were considering it a permanent move."
Such as...? Or is this baseless speculation?
On the contrary, haven't you ever moved? This is a possible suspect in the case.
baseless speculation.
The future tweak from God, that God knew was coming involved a move, so it makes sense that they would be in position and on the way already...they knew not how far...
...more baseless speculation.
It was so serious that God had to step in to tell Joe not to leave Mary. When the bible says He was despised and rejected among men, a lot of that likely was from the hometown folks! He even said a prophet has no honor in His own country. So the wagging tongues were a factor.
Jesus was referring to himself, not his family -- in fact, you deliberately omitted the rest of Jesus' line, that a prohphet has no honor even among his own family, or in his own house.
Not even Jesus had anything good to say about his family, so he's not about to preserve their reputation.
Mark 3:31-33 There came then his brethren and his mother, and, standing without, sent unto him, calling him. And the multitude sat about him, and they said unto him, Behold, thy mother and thy brethren without seek for thee. And he answered them, saying, Who is my mother, or my brethren?
It was Jesus, not the family, which was the subject of wagging tongues --coming from even his own friends:
Mark 3:21 And when his friends heard of it [Jesus' preaching], they went out to lay hold on him: for they said, He is beside himself.
Your desperate attempts to wave away reason here seem to display an ulterior motive to try and make the whole account less than what God tells us.
Now, now, dad -- you've given us the blather; here comes the bluff and bluster right on schedule.
It's all there in the Bible -- all you have to do is read it.
If so we can omit one opinion. Details?
I quoted the exact verses from Matthew -- do you bother to read these posts before you start blathering?
Educated opinions from scholars of the scripture count as more than making stuff up.
Baseless opinions are not very educated -- "educated" implies some sort of support -- which is, unsurprisingly, lacking.
We don't know that. I do notice the Inn was FULL! So a lot of folks were there. But if only those with real motivation showed up, then not all need be there. If the others were just on their way to other places that night, with so much activity, fine! We don't know. But we do know that for some reason Joesph and Mary were inspired to be in Bethlehem, and there is a connection with their relation to David.
Ignorance is a double-edged sword, dad -- see how it cuts through your own baseless speculations?
Nope. If God arranges and inspires, it is God inspired.
Except, as you yourself said, God didn't arrange this -- Joseph did.
Joseph, believing his child to be the Messiah, set out to haul his pregnant wife to Bethlehem so that the child could be born in fulfillment of the prophecies -- self-fulfilling.
Nice try, though -- a shame you've gone back to your usual style.
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