And History Is Notoriously Slap-Dash In Its Plots.

[I was reading the introduction to a copy of John Buchan's The Thirty-Nine Steps this morning and that sentence from Michael F. Gilbert's introduction to the book struck me hard. And as I begin to work on this Bible study of the birth of Jesus -- specifically, the story we call the Nativity, appearing in Luke 2:1-20 -- it occurs to me that THAT is very true indeed. Relying on incredible coincidences and yet somehow it all comes together. David]

And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed.

The first thing we need to see about what Christians call the Nativity that Luke records is that it IS history; that is, it is a specific account of a past event. Perhaps it emphasizes some versions more than others, some characters more than others, but still it is the story that not only got passed down to Luke -- the physician who also wrote Acts, the early account of the beginnings of Christianity (for more details on that, see my other book Unto The Brethren) -- and inspired, most Christians claim, by the Holy Spirit as is all Scripture but still gets read every December in most Western churches and, though I hear this doesn't happen as much as it used to, in front of the fireside by families associating the birth of Jesus with the day of Christmas, December 25 in most of the world. Unlikely to be the actual date, as this celebration of Jesus' birth was superimposed over the Roman feast day honoring an agricultural god in the early fourth century by church edict.

Caesar Augustus, the man who came out on top after a brutal civil war that turned the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire, certainly could not tax "all the world" -- China and Mesoamerica among others being out of his reach -- but could issue orders within the purview of all the lands Rome ruled or occupied, pretty much all the land surrounding and within the Mediterranean up to present-day Germany in the north, present-day Saudi Arabia and Iraq in the east, and a strip of present-day Africa. And within the last decade of pre-Christian or BC (or pre-Common Era or BCE) time, taxes were raised for roughly the same reasons that they are raised today in every nation on Earth -- to support public works, to provide for common defense, to promote the general welfare (no matter what you thought of those you occupied, you wouldn't be able to raise much revenue if they were all dead!), and to maintain a social order allowing people some measure of prosperity.

I am trying to avoid using dates too much in telling this story -- for like all accounts of the past, the New Testament book of Luke IS a story; part of history, yes, but still a story -- because it is easy to get confused by them. Even events from a few years, months, or even DAYS ago, if we don't take account of them right then and fix them in some permanent media (e.g. write them down) get muddled in our memories. While there IS a date generally agreed upon for the rule of Caesar Augustus (27 BC to AD 14, if you're interested) the birth of Jesus ... not so much. After all, He's just one child being born on the outskirts of the Roman Empire, and not as big a to-do was made about His birth, ministry, life, and death until decades later. It is very easy from our twenty-first century perspective to look back and say we would not do what we read and see people in our past do to lead to the current situation and world we find ourselves in. But we deceive ourselves doing that.