Tony Sinclair, I don’t believe the narrative was fiction. The criticisms you raise all boil down to ‘people behaving in unusual ways’. People behave in unusual ways all the time, though, and Christians believe that, in particular, the first century was an era of unusual happenings.
I do think that the idea of trying to find astronomical explanations for the Star of Bethlehem is a fool’s errand. I accept the Gospel narratives as true history, and I think the Star of Bethlehem was a miracle, that doesn’t correspond to any kind of astronomical phenomenon (star, planet, comet, etc.). It’s worth mentioning in this context that the New Testament writers, for example in Revelation, occasionally use ‘star’ as a metaphor for angelic beings. If you take a naturalistic, secular approach to reading the Gospels, on the other hand, it makes sense to treat the whole infancy narrative as fiction, the star included.
Theologically, I agree with you. It makes no more sense to try to find a natural explanation for the Star than it does to try to explain Mary’s virgin birth by naturalistic means, which could get very awkward. If you believe in virgin birth and angelic choirs and walking on water, than you may as well believe in a magic star. IMO it’s more intellectually honest than what Larson does with the bad science on his webpage.
I also agree that although some of the characters’ actions in Matthew’s infancy narrative don’t make much sense, there are no absolute inconsistencies, if we accept the supernatural stuff.
Unfortunately, there is another birth narrative (by Luke) that directly contradicts Matthew’s account.
Matthew says that Herod, “and all Jerusalem with him,” was upset to learn that a possible Messiah had been born, to the point that he had all of Bethlehem’s male infants murdered, just on the chance that what these total strangers told him might be true. It makes no sense that a 70-year old man who was about to die would feel threatened by a newborn babe, but it’s not impossible.
But Luke says that the angels told the shepherds that the Savior was born, and that the shepherds came into Bethlehem and told everyone about it, and everyone who heard it was amazed. If Joseph was there to comply with that ridiculous census, then surely there were many people from Jerusalem there, too, so they must have heard about it, and carried it back to Jerusalem with them. A paranoid like Herod would have employed spies to listen for any kind of gossip like that.
But as it happens, there was no need, because Luke goes on to say that six weeks after Jesus was born, Mary and Joseph brought him to the Temple in Jerusalem, and publicly presented him, and that various holy denizens there immediately proclaimed him the Messiah. The prophetess Anna “spake of him to all them that looked for redemption in Jerusalem.” All of this was in public, right under Herod’s nose! The Temple priests had to know about it, and of course they would tell Herod, even if the rumors didn’t sweep the city, which was aching for the Messiah to come and expel the Romans.
This is already impossible to reconcile with Matthew, but it gets worse. Luke says that after all this clamor in the Temple, Mary and Joseph go home to Nazareth, completely unmolested, but they returned to Jerusalem every year for Passover.
That is a flat contradiction of Matthew, because Matthew has Mary and Joseph, who in his version apparently had always lived in Bethlehem, flee to Egypt to escape Herod’s assassins. They stay there an unspecified time, until Herod dies — maybe a few months, maybe a few years. We don’t know, because even though we have fairly detailed accounts of Herod’s decadent actions inside his private chambers, the only first century author who ever heard of the very public massacre of an entire town’s male infants is Matthew, and he didn’t give a date for it.
At any rate, after Herod dies, they head back to Judaea — maybe to their home in Bethlehem, or maybe to the Temple in Jerusalem. But whichever it was, they don’t get there, because God warns them that Herod’s son now rules in Judaea, so they are not safe in that province. That is when they turn away from Judaea and go to Nazareth instead, apparently for the first time.
Herod’s son is known to have reigned in Judaea for ten years, from 4 BC to 6 AD, so that (plus however many years they were in Egypt) is how long Mary and Joseph had to say away from Jerusalem. Yet Luke says they came to Jerusalem every year for Passover.
You cannot reconcile these stories. They are completely different, and contradictory. Luke says that Jesus was presented in the Temple six weeks after he was born, so it’s impossible that the Slaughter, the Flight, the waiting in Egypt for Herod to die, and the staying out of Judaea for ten years after that occurred before that. But if the presentation occurred before the magi came, then many people in Jerusalem would already know about Jesus, and the Star would have to lead the magi to Nazareth, not Bethlehem. And even if it was the Star of Nazareth, you still can’t have Mary and Joseph coming to Jerusalem every Passover while simultaneously staying out of Judaea for at least ten years.
You have a real problem right there. Many biblical stories have been shown to be flat-out false; others have been seriously inflated; very few have been verified as true; and those that have been verified tend to be place names, not miraculous events or historical figures. The contradictions alone are insurmountable. If you believe that fanciful tales told by unknown, religiously-oriented writers are “true history,” you are squarely in the pious/religious camp and are arguing theology without being burdened by facts.
Actually the Bible has been shown to be at least as accurate as the general run of “histories” from the ancient period. It’s true, as you get back further and further, the % of Myth vs fact gets higher, but since the stories of Geo Washington from just over 200 years ago have significant myth to them, this should not be surprising. In fact, I’d take anything from King Omri on as “historical”- given the usual biases and inaccuracies in period documents.
Look at the NT- other than a issue with two somewhat different birth stories and a issue with what is meant by “And it came to pass in those days…”, the issues are minor or arguable.
Hell, we don’t even know who was Governor of Syria in or around 4 BC (Gaius Sentius Saturninus was governor between 9-7/6 AD
Lucius Volusius Saturninus was governor between 4-5 AD
Publius Sulpicius Quirinius was governor between 6-12 AD
Gnaeus Sentius Saturninus was governor between 19-21 AD). Nor does Luke give the full name of “Governor” Quirinius. But Publius Sulpicius Quirinius was alive, in the East and active during 4BC-4 AD. He had been named Consul in 12 BC, so had plenty of politcal clout.
or, Luke screwed up. Or we’re taking too literally “in those days”.
There are some other issues with the early days of Jesus, none are major.
Certainly those who try to argue the Bible as in-errant are wrong. But as far as a ‘historical document” the Bible is about as accurate as other period histories.
Re: You cannot reconcile these stories. They are completely different, and contradictory. Luke says that Jesus was presented in the Temple six weeks after he was born, so it’s impossible that the Slaughter, the Flight, the waiting in Egypt for Herod to die, and the staying out of Judaea for ten years after that occurred before that. But if the presentation occurred before the magi came, then many people in Jerusalem would already know about Jesus, and the Star would have to lead the magi to Nazareth, not Bethlehem. And even if it was the Star of Nazareth, you still can’t have Mary and Joseph coming to Jerusalem every Passover while simultaneously staying out of Judaea for at least ten years.
Tony Sinclair I should have been more specific. I believe that the events of the Gospels are, generally, historical, but I don’t think every detail of chronology, place, etc. is accurate. In other words, I think that the appearance to the shepherds, to the Magi, the Presentation, the Slaughter, Flight, etc. happened (and I can definitely believe Luke and Matthew chose to focus on different events), but I can believe that there are some errors of chronology or even location. And I definitely think Luke was wrong about coming to Jerusalem ‘every Passover’, though he might have meant that they made a yearly habit of it once they returned to Palestine.
I think the best way to harmonize the two accounts, is to say that Jesus was born and was visited by the shepherds, was presented in the temple, was visited by the Magi some time after that, then was taken to Egypt with his family, and returned some time later. Maybe they didn’t start coming to Jerusalem until after the death of Herod Archelaus, but it’s also possible that after a few years they decided that they were safe and that Archelaus had forgotten about them. Or maybe they figured that making short trips to Jerusalem once a year was safe, but actually living in Judea wasn’t.
In any case, I was mostly criticizing the idea that we should look to astronomical explanations for the Star (which as you point out should perhaps be called the Star of Nazareth).