Monday

Mary, the Ultimate Jewish Mother

Mary, the Primary Caregiver Who Toilet Trained G-d, is always depicted as radiant. She's rarely depicted as a nine-month pregnant mother-to-be. In some Christmas songs, the fetus gives her orders, but that's apochryphal. Somehow slipping the notice of the gospel writers is the morning sickness and hormonal swings that afflict pregnant women. To be fair, few women are declared to have an Immaculate Conception by religious institutions. Still, one wonders whether the Spirit Made Flesh was subject to the heartache and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to. No mention is made of the cutting of the umbilical chord or whether any of the three wise men boiled some water.

One wonders what Mary and Joseph are doing in Bethlehem anyway. The New Testament is vague and inconsistent, mentioning a "census" called by a Roman governor. A few years ago, I asked The Straight Dope what were the results of this census, and Straight Dope Staff member Dex replied.

P. Sculpinius Quirinius was legate (governor) of Syria in the years 6 - 7 AD. He did order a census. However, the assumption that Jesus was born in the year of Quirinius's census (6 AD) leads to irreconcilable chronological problems in the subsequent events of his life. It is entirely unlikely that Jesus was born in the year of Quirinius's census; most scholars put Jesus' birth around 4 BC, a good ten years before Quirinius's census.

 

The remainder of Luke's account is also highly improbable (I'm being generous here), for a number of reasons:

There was no census of "all the world" (read: the entire Roman Empire) declared by Augustus; at least, if there were, it's not mentioned in any Roman documents that we've uncovered so far. The census was of Judea, Samaria, and Idumaea--not Galilee (where Luke puts Joseph and Mary). Quirinius used the opportunity to also conduct a census of Syria.
 
The notion that each male would have to register in the home town of a remote ancestor is unbelievable. The entire Roman world would have been turned upside-down. There would surely have been records of such widespread dislocations, and there are none. Augustus was arguably the most rational of the emperors, and would never have ordered such an irrational thing.
 
Ancient census-takers wanted landowners to be connected to their land, for tax purposes. The census-takers traveled, not those being taxed.

So, almost all scholars agree that it is not reasonable to think that there was ever a decree that required people to travel for purposes of tax registration.

 

Why, then, do we have Luke's account? Luke wanted to report that Jesus was born in Bethlehem, the City of David, in order to fulfill various prophetic interpretations. On the other hand, he also wanted to report that Jesus grew up in Nazareth, presumably for historic reasons. He thus reported the story of Joseph going to Bethlehem where Jesus was born, and then returning to Nazareth where Jesus was raised.

A freer interpretation of the story is warranted. Many years after the events in question took place, a rather confused set of circumstances is set forth to make it seem like the birth of Yehoshua (aka Jesus) was more humble than it might otherwise be. To fulfill prophecy, the messiah had to be born in Bethlehem (where King David was born) and it helped in the struggle against a mighty empire that their leader was born in poverty. Even though Joseph was fairly well-to-do (at minimum, a land-owner who was forced to travel to be counted and taxed and, at maximum, part of a wealthy class visiting rich relations in the Big City) the spin is on. Swift Cross Veterans for Truth tells you the story! But I digress.

"No room at the inn" didn't mean that they gave up a three-star hotel with flush toilets and room service. Chances are good that any place for travellers outside a relative's home would have a bed of straw with multiple people on a bed and animals roaming around. Even with a pregnant woman. A "manger" probably wasn't too many steps down in accommodation.

Mary is mentioned three times in the New Testament: At Yehoshua's birth, his death, and the wedding at Cana. It is not much of a leap to suggest that a Jewish Mother wanted to be there for her son's wedding, though that is not the traditional interpretation. Maybe she prodded him, "So Hosh, you can only serve the guests water? What kind of host are you already? Can't you find some wine maybe? Do you want to shame me for raising such a spiteful boychick? Be a mensch and find some wine. I don't care how, do you expect me to solve all your problems?" Historical accounts do not record Mary's actual comments, or what she said to her new daughter-in-law or whether the event was catered and who the band was.

Details of the actual birth are thankfully left out, as are details of her son's briss (the foreskin, having not ascended to heaven, would be a true relic...), dealing with a crying baby, potty-training, etc. Mom stuff just doesn't make as good an epistle. Would YOU want your mother to keep telling your baby stories?

Very little is known about Mary during her child-bearing years. It's clear that the family was leading a non-traditional life, by Roman standards, and even a bit out of the mainstream by the conservative Jewish standards of the time. They were leftists, as well as today's politics can be mapped, who believed in a smaller role for the religion in politics, feeding the poor, helping the sick, forcing the rich to live up to obligations, acceptance and forgiveness without judgment, protecting the land and rejecting materialism. Mary and family took their spirituality very seriously and extended that courtesy to all living creatures. In modern terms, Mary was an Earth Mother. Maybe Yeshoshua was a vegetarian and learned it from his hippy mother.

In any event, and no matter when the actual birthdate was, I want to wish Yehosua a Happy Birthday! And don't forget to call your mother once and a while, nu?

Junior Reid

from Bruce

'Ocean's Twelve'

from that Mad Cat, JD

Last Night