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Dearest Emmy, I know how good your heart is from your writings...Dear Staccato. The Bible is God talking to Man, written by God-inspired men and women. It tells us of our Saviour, Jesus Christus. Jesus left us with 2 Commandments, which contain all 10 commandments which God gave us. 1) Love God with all our hearts, with all our souls, and with all our minds. That is straightforward, God is our Creator, and He deserves all Praise and Glory. 2) Love each other as we love ourselves, which St. Paul describes in Ephesians: love and be kind to each other, forgive each other as God, for Christ`s sake has forgiven you." That is what God wants of us. That is the Message to us. Since we are all different, some translators may use different words, BUT the Message is the same. I say this humbly and with love, Staccato. Greetings from Emmy, sister in Christ.
Actually what happens today is nothing that hasn't happened before is early Judaism or Christianity. The Jewish people time and time again strayed from the Divine providence of God that he sent the Prophets to get them back on track. Finally he sent his son Jesus Christ. There is a great scripture where Jesus explains this.
Here is a great example: In church this morning, the sermon was on Matthew 2:13-23, Joseph's faithfulness in following the angel's warning to flee to Egypt (in fulfillment of the prophesy). I immediately thought of how Matthew is "obsessed" with fulfilling prophesy in much of his relating of the events in Jesus' life. Luke on the other hand in 2:21-39 tells a completely different account of the events immediately after Jesus' birth. No trip to Egypt, no warning about the murder of the innocents. He simply relates Joseph's concern to fulfill the law and have Jesus dedicated and circumcised by the 8th day in Jerusalem. Now, obviously, both accounts can not be accurate. You can't be in Jerusalem and in Egypt at the same time and they are certainly not with shouting distance of each other.
Both accounts tell of them settling eventually in Nazareth, according to Matthew to fulfill prophesy and avoid more dangers warned by the angel, and according to Luke because that was their home. (Matthew even comes right out and says that Nazareth was not their home originally, while Luke says it was.)
It is all about telling a story from one's own point of view... and therefor, interpretations by readers are done from their point view.
Jesus was not circumcised in Jerusalem. Joseph and Mary did not go to Jerusalem unitl after her purification Luke 2:22 see Leviticus 12:2-8 for the law on purification. Beyond that point The Gospels of Mark and John don't even describe the birth of Jesus. Just because Matthew and Luke give various details which the other may not have included because it was already documented does not warrant the account as inaccurate.
OK... these story are NOT compatible. In Matthew, they do not go to Jerusalem. They go to a new town because it is not safe for them to go to their home. In Luke they go to Jerusalem immediately after the eight days and RETURN to their home in Nazareth.
Good luck trying to integrate the two stories into one narrative.
I would enjoy continuing this discussion but we are going off topic from the OPs question. Start a new thread and I will be happy to reply to this post.
The reason it is going off topic is because it is no longer a dicussion between the OP and myself, but a discussion between me and you.
chosenpath KCDAD I encouraged you to look at the law of Levitius 12. [B said:Leviticus 12:2-4[/B]
Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, If a woman have conceived seed, and born a man child: then she shall be unclean seven days; according to the days of the separation for her infirmity shall she be unclean. And in the eighth day the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised. And she shall then continue in the blood of her purifying three and thirty days; she shall touch no hallowed thing, nor come into the sanctuary, until the days of her purifying be fulfilled.
Which would correspond with Luke 2:22.
Now when the days of her purification according to the law of Moses were completed, they brought Him to Jerusalem to present [Him] to the Lord
In Luke 2:21 it does not say they were in Jerusalem when Jesus was circumcised.
And when eight days were completed for the circumcision of the Child, His name was called JESUS, the name given by the angel before He was conceived in the womb.
Thirty-three days would be enough time for them to recieve word that Archelaus did not pose a threat as his father Herod. So yes they went to Nazareth and then after purification fufilled the law in Jerusalem.
Matthew covers information that Luke doesn't such as the geneaology of Jesus and the wise men. Luke covers information that Matthew doesn't such as the conception and birth of John the baptist and the announcement of the birth of Jesus by the angels to the shepherds tending their sheep.
So I take it you think that Joseph and Mary and Jesus traveled to Egypt, waited out the mass slaughter of every child in Bethlehem under two years of age... Why 2 years? Didn't Herod know when the child was born? Didn't the Wise men tell him? Anyway, Herod kills everyone, and then they wait until Herod dies, and Joseph gets word that it is safe to come back now... all in 33 or 41 days?
That is correct.
Herod did not receive a report back from the wise men so he was not certain of the time of birth or age of Jesus Christ, thus, he issued an order for every male child 2 years and younger. Jesus was around 1 years old when Herod the Great died so Joseph and Mary did not return from Eygpt with 33 to 41 days.
Matthew 2:12
Then, being divinely warned in a dream that they should not return to Herod, they departed for their own country another way.
And maybe even more unbelievable... for us 21st century people, anyway: That Joseph would travel with a 9 month pregnant wife and then a new born son... for what 2 months? 3 months? 4 months? What was he, rich? According to Matthew he never went home but instead found a new home in Nazareth and in Luke it is at back to their home in Nazareth ... so how long were they "on the road", in the winter, without any food, income or friends?
In those days it was not unusual for families to travel long distances even with infants. Look at Abraham moving his family from territory to territory or Jacob moving his whole family to Egypt during the famine, and Moses leading the Exodus into the wilderness for forty years. Many times these people had little to nothing, but God provided.
Mary was from Nazareth
Luke 1:26-27
Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin's name [was] Mary.
Joseph was from Bethlehem
Luke 2:4-5
Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed wife, who was with child.
So instead of returning to Bethlehem becuase of the order issued by Herod they settled in Nazareth Mary's hometown.
(The scholarly consensus, based on Josephus' Antiquities of the Jews is that Herod died at the end of March or early April in 4 BC.)
The scholars vary on the death of Herod the Great. Josephus calculated around 4 BCE while others such as Appianos calculated 1-2 BCE. According to the Jewish Aniquity Volume VXII Herod died after the eclipse of the full moon and 3 months before passover. Josephus's calculation was based upon a partial eclipse of the moon that occured before passover. It was discovered that there was a full eclipse of the moon that occured before passover in 1BCE. Jesus was born in 2BCE so he would be approximately one year old when Herod the Great died.
The stories do not correspond and don't make sense taken together...
It is all very well to say that one covers information the other doesn't, and if the stories fit into each other, that might be an explanation... but they don't.
They are completely different stories using the same characters.
Sorry I took so long to respond.