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  • OT: Biblical Census

    From J. P. Gilliver (John)@21:1/5 to All on Tue Dec 8 14:35:55 2020
    I thought this deserved wider circulation than the "secret" newsgroup
    where I saw it ... both the serious question about why-POB, and the
    final two paragraphs:

    On Tue, 8 Dec 2020 at 13:18:38, Clive Arthur <[email protected]>
    wrote (my responses usually follow points raised):
    On 07/12/2020 23:37, Penny wrote:
    On Mon, 7 Dec 2020 22:24:08 +0000, Jenny M Benson <[email protected]> >> scrawled in the dust...

    Opening my Advent Calendar this year has prompted me to query
    something
    I've never thought about before. Why was it necessary for everyone to
    travel to their place of birth in order to be counted? Why could not
    Mary & Joseph be counted in Nazareth?
    I thought they went there to be taxed.
    If you want something to ponder upon, why was their son known as Jesus of
    Nazareth, if he was born in Bethlehem?

    The census was very inaccurate, being manual. They even made a mistake
    with Jesus' name, inscribing him as 'Harold B, thy name'. He did
    partly adopt that later to save confusion on official documents,
    choosing to sign himself 'Jesus H Christ'.

    (There are many such confusions - the disciples were originally
    referred to as 'our men' which somehow got twisted, and the whole
    'fissures of men' debacle doesn't bear thinking about.)

    HTH

    --
    J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

    Parkinson: "What caused your conversion to women - was it the love of a good one?" George Melly: "No the love of several bad ones" (Lizbuff in UMRA '01-4-25)

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  • From Ruth Wilson@21:1/5 to All on Tue Dec 8 17:48:08 2020
    On 08/12/2020 14:35, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
    I thought this deserved wider circulation than the "secret" newsgroup
    where I saw it ... both the serious question about why-POB, and the
    final two paragraphs:

    On Tue, 8 Dec 2020 at 13:18:38, Clive Arthur <[email protected]>
    wrote (my responses usually follow points raised):
    On 07/12/2020 23:37, Penny wrote:
    On Mon, 7 Dec 2020 22:24:08 +0000, Jenny M Benson
    <[email protected]>
    scrawled in the dust...

    Opening my Advent Calendar this year has prompted me to query something >>>> I've never thought about before.  Why was it necessary for everyone to >>>> travel to their place of birth in order to be counted?  Why could not >>>> Mary & Joseph be counted in Nazareth?
     I thought they went there to be taxed.
    If you want something to ponder upon, why was their son known as
    Jesus of
    Nazareth, if he was born in Bethlehem?

    The census was very inaccurate, being manual.  They even made a
    mistake with Jesus' name, inscribing him as 'Harold B, thy name'.  He
    did partly adopt that later to save confusion on official documents,
    choosing to sign himself 'Jesus H Christ'.

    (There are many such confusions - the disciples were originally
    referred to as 'our men' which somehow got twisted, and the whole
    'fissures of men' debacle doesn't bear thinking about.)

    HTH


    I like the jokes! Seriously, I think that the 'census' was made up by
    the gospel writer (Mark? off the top of my head) to explain why Jesus of Nazareth should have been born in Bethlehem (and thus fulfilled
    prophecies). There are also queries about Nazareth and whether
    "Nazarene" had been misinterpreted from a similar word in another prophecy.

    Ruth

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