Posted on 11/30/2012 3:00:48 PM PST by NYer
The Pope’s new book, Infancy Narratives, was released on November 21. The day’s headline of the Daily Mail? “Killjoy Pope crushes Christmas nativity traditions: New Jesus book reveals there were no donkeys beside crib, no lowing oxen and definitely no carols.” CNN’s online story followed suit. The New York Daily News repeated the claim about the animals, adding not that the pope agreed with some historians on an earlier dating of the birth of Christ but that “the Christian calendar has Jesus’ birth year wrong, Pope Benedict XVI claims in a new book.”
But those who have read Pope Benedict at length know that such conclusions would be uncharacteristic of his thought. Had they even held the book? My curiosity was particularly stirred when I noticed the following quotation in the Time story, which they apparently took from the Telegraph (U.K.) rather than from the book: “No one will give up the oxen and the donkey in their [sic] Nativity scenes.”
Any book editor worth his or her salt would notice the obvious pronoun disagreement. “No way is that in the English edition,” I thought. In comparing the stories, I noticed that the Daily Mail and others instead rendered the quotation: “No nativity scene will give up its ox and donkey.” In the book, the sentence in question seems to be on page 69: “No presentation of the crib is complete without the ox and the ass.” This is different from both representations. Which was it? I sought to find out for myself. Random House confirmed via email that neither of the first two quotations listed is in the book; rather they are poor translations from the Italian. Not only have they misquoted the book, perhaps hastily translating the work from Italian, but these unofficial quotations have circulated among multiple publications—secular and religious.
Likely a select few misread the sense of the pope’s text and informed the journalistic community, who then informed the world how they misread the text. A Reuters story published Wednesday helped clarify things a bit. An excellent headline—“Read all about it: Pope has not cancelled Christmas”—should help this necessary corrective analysis gain exposure. Nonetheless, there remains much to clean up.
Back to that Daily Mail headline: “. . . no donkeys beside crib, no lowing oxen and definitely no carols.” Let’s have a look.
First of all, what did the pope actually say about the nativity scene animals? He wrote, “The manger, as we have seen, indicates animals, who come to it for their food. In the Gospel there is no reference to animals at this point. But prayerful reflection, reading Old and New Testaments in light of one another, filled this lacuna at a very early stage by pointing to Isaiah 1:3: ‘The ox knows its owner, and the ass its master’s crib; but Israel does not know, my people does not understand.’”
Benedict actually affirms the image of the ox and the donkey present at the manger by pointing to Old Testament imagery and, later, to iconographic tradition that complement the Gospel source. His words justify, rather than call into question, the presence of the animals in the manger scene. This is the beauty of Benedict’s writing, and why he is perhaps better read in the study or in the adoration chapel than in the newsroom. On the one hand, he points out what is obvious: the absence of the animals in the Gospel narrative. On the other, he shows why Christians came to understand that the animals were there, adding, “No representation of the crib is complete without the ox and the ass.”
And those talking, non-singing angels? What did the Pope actually say? He writes concerning the gloria, “According to the evangelist, the angels ‘said’ this.” That must be about as far as some in the secular press read, because the very next sentence is: “But Christianity has always understood that the speech of angels is actually song, in which all the glory of the great joy that they proclaim becomes tangibly present. And so, from that moment, the angels’ song of praise has never gone silent” (p. 73). To paraphrase, the pope is saying that when one reads Luke and sees that the angels “said” their glorious words, the angels were of course singing (because that is what angels do).
As for the calendar, well, compare the brusque way in which the New York Daily News says it: “Jesus’ birth year is wrong: Pope” with the way in which the pope actually wrote it: “One initial problem can be solved quite easily: the census took place at the time of King Herod the Great, who actually died in the year 4 B.C. The starting point for our reckoning of time—the calculation of Jesus’ date of birth—goes back to the monk Dionysius Exiguus (+ c. 550), who evidently miscalculated by a few years. The historical date of the birth of Jesus is therefore to be placed a few years earlier.” I used to write headlines for a living, and so I am on the one hand sympathetic to the challenge; nonetheless, I can also spot an unsympathetic rendering of Vatican news.
As should be painfully evident, there is a big difference between what the media says that the Pope says and what the Pope himself actually says. Each time the waves settle from their slipshod coverage, the media should find that it has displaced a bit more of the public trust, trust that they will deliver the truth about Vatican news. They forfeited my trust a while ago. If anyone were to ask me, “How should I read news about the Vatican from the secular press?” I would say, “It can be useful for information, but must be read with a fundamental principle of uniformly applied suspicion and doubt. In other words, read it in the same way in which they would have us read the Bible.”
Did Pope mention that there were no wise men, either? The wise men showed up at Jesus’ home (not a manger) when Jesus was a child (not a baby), about 2 years old. Their trip following the star from Point A to Point B would’ve taken about two years.
This study argues (IMO quite persuasively) that the whole sequence of events began at Tabernacles, which would make December 25, 5 BC, a plausible date for the Nativity.
Oh, and BTW, Zechariah was not High Priest. We have the list of High Priests from that time, and his name isn't on it.
Per what religion? Either Christ died for my sins or he didn't - and, since I repented of my sins and accepted Him as my Savior, either I am saved or He and Scripture cannot be believed. I have faith that He has opened His arms and God's promise from the Old Covenant, about the New Covenant are also lies:
From Jeremiah 31
31 “The days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah.
32 It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to[d] them,[e]” declares the Lord.
33 “This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel after that time,” declares the Lord. “I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.
34 No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest,” declares the Lord. “For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.”
I realize it specifies Israel, but we are told in the New Testament that all fall under the cleansing shedding of Jesus' Blood.
I was under the impression that the Romans collected taxes anytime.
Has it been established that there was a temple flock year round? The established practice in that area was to move the flocks from pasture to pasture in nomadic fashion. Given that there were buyers and sellers (according to one of my theology professors in the gallery of the gentiles) it appears that the animals used for sacrifices weren’t kept by the temple but were brought there by merchants who sold them to individuals following the law.
It was a census, not a normal tax.
the shepherds were part of the lowest memebers of society. the merchants were somewhat higher. It would make sense that the merchants hired them to tend those same flocks.
Traditionally flocks were owned by a family and the job of shepherd was given to a family member but what you say is possible. However, it doesn’t follow that the flocks were there year round in an area doesn’t support year round grazing.
Oh, and BTW, Zechariah was not High Priest. We have the list of High Priests from that time, and his name isn't on it.
Zacharias served as a high priest [fn](1:14) Or, tabernacled; i.e. lived temporarily The verse also provides illumination as to Shekhinah means the dwelling or settling, and denotes the dwelling And now to your offered citation. The first word of the article raises red flags "John Chrysostom" John Chrysostom was a rabid anti-semite and thus someone The rest of the article is a masterful display of Eisegesis Here is a very visual source: Just based on scripture. Again the first clue to the birth of Yah'shua is John 1:14 as cited above. OBTW Important events in the life of Yah'shua occurred Conceived as the light entering the temple (John 10:22 / John 8:12) Who knows if the final trump will occur on the Feast of Trumpets Seek YHvH in His WORD. Zacharias was not THE HIGH PRIEST, but
shalom b'SHEM Yah'shua HaMashiach Luke 1:9 according to the custom of the priestly office,
I start by reading John 1:14 under the illumination of the Ru'ach HaKodesh.
he was chosen by lot to enter the temple of the Lord and burn incense. John 1:14 And the WORD became flesh,
The word for Tabernacle, mishkan, is a derivative of the
and [fn]dwelt among us,
and we saw His glory,
glory as of the only begotten from the Father,
full of grace and truth. σκηνόω Strong's G4637 - skēnoō
1) to fix one's tabernacle,
have one's tabernacle,
abide (or live) in a tabernacle (or tent),
tabernacle
2) to dwell
same root and is used in the sense of dwelling-place in the Bible
Yah'shua being the Shekhinah glory.
or settling of the divine presence of God, especially in the Temple in Jerusalem.
Excerpt from: Kenneth F. Doig, New Testament Chronology,
who would have hated Yah'shua the JEWISH MESSIAH
and coming King on the throne of David in Jerusalem.
ju-jitsu from many extra-scriptural sources.
Jesus' date of birth
on YHvH commanded Feast days as metaphors of the feast.
Born on the Feast of Tabernacles.(John 1:14)
Circumcised on the Feast of Simchat Torah ( Joy of the WORD)
Bread and wine of the Pesach.
Death as the Lamb of G-d on Hag Matzoh.
Rising on the Feast of First Fruits.
Sending the Ru'ach HaKodesh on the Feast of Shavuot(Pentecost).
Hope you had a peaceful Shabbat
Perhaps you're confusing a combination of things. While Jesus walked the earth, we were still under the Old Covenant. Just crying out to the Lord is not the same as repenting of your sins and accepting Jesus as your Savior. Jesus was the only Man to walk the Earth that could "do God's will as far as conforming to the Commandments, else (once again) there was no reason for Him to die for our sins.
Then how is it that some were told by Jesus that they were saved, even before He died for their sins and they had the chance of accepting Him as their Savior?
Then how is it that some were told by Jesus that they were saved, even before He died for their sins and they had the chance of accepting Him as their Savior?
In the hebrew scriptures YHvH exists Yah'shua (Jesus) NAME in Hebrew See: 1 Ki. 18:24; 2 Ki. 5:11; Isa. 12:4; 44:5; 48:2; Zeph. 3:9; Zech. 13:9; Rom. 10:13; 1 Co. 1:2 Also see: Joel 2:32 & Acts 2:21 specifically. Call on the NAME of YHvH for salvation.
shalom b'SHEM Yah'shua HaMashiach
where the word LORD is used in translation.
means "YHvH is/be my salvation".
Jesus was probably born in the summer. >>
that would hurt the retail industry. Jesus was born during the census, whenever that was.
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