Are the New
Testament’s Birth of Jesus Stories True?
It’s Christmas time. At least out in the world it’s
Christmas time. In the church as I write this on December 12 it’s Advent not
Christmas, but never mind. For a great many of us a big, much loved part of
Christmas is hearing the stories of Jesus’ birth all over again. Especially
Luke’s version, but sometimes we hear part of Matthew’s version too, at least
the part about the visit of the Magi. We always conflate the two stories of
course. We set up creches with both Magi and angels and shepherds, never mind
that there is no birth of Jesus story in the Bible that has both Magi (from
Matthew) and angels and shepherds (from Luke). That conflation is theologically
and historically questionable at best, but it’s how we all grew up with the
Christmas stories, so I won’t quibble about it here. We love the Christmas
stories, even if we’re more likely to say Christmas story than Christmas
stories.
I lead a Bible study group at the local retirement home. We
meet on Wednesday mornings. We usually look at lectionary readings for the
coming Sunday, but this week we didn’t. I suggested that since we had only
today’s meeting and next week’s before we miss two weeks because Christmas Day
and New Year’s Day are on Wednesdays this year that we spend those two sessions
looking at the New Testament’s two birth stories.[1]
Today we considered Matthew’s story. Next week’s we’ll consider Luke’s. And
here’s an undeniable truth about those two stories: They’re not the same story.
They have some significant similarities—birth in Bethlehem, virgin conception,
earthly parents named Mary and Joseph—but otherwise they are radically
different. In Matthew the Annunciation, such as it is, comes to Joseph in a
dream. In Luke it comes to Mary while she’s awake. In Matthew Mary and Joseph
live in Bethlehem. In Luke they live in Nazareth and have to travel to
Bethlehem. In Matthew Jesus is born in a house where Mary and Joseph live. In
Luke he’s born in a stable and laid in a manger because there was not room for
them at an inn. In Matthew the first revelation of the birth of the Messiah
comes not to any Jews to but Gentile sages from the east (the Magi, who, by the
way, Matthew never calls kings). In Luke it comes to Jewish shepherds. In
Matthew there’s a miraculous star associated with Jesus’ birth. In Luke there
isn’t. In Matthew no one sees angels while awake. In Luke both Mary and the
shepherds do. In Matthew the Holy Family flees to Egypt to escape the murderous
King Herod. In Luke they just go back to Nazareth, and Herod plays no role in
the story. In Matthew they leave Egypt and move to Nazareth where, as far as we
know, they’ve never been before. In Luke they don’t have to do anything like
that because Nazareth is where they already live. At this level of the details
of the narrative the two stories are radically different.
Which raises an important question: Are the birth stories
about Jesus in Matthew and Luke true? When we raise that question we
immediately run into a big problem. These stories can’t both be factually true.
Mary and Joseph live either in Bethlehem or in Nazareth but not in both. They
either had to travel to Bethlehem or they didn’t. I suppose the Annunciation
could have come to both Joseph and Mary in different ways, but no biblical
story says it did. There either was a miraculous star or there wasn’t. The Holy
Family either fled to Egypt to escape Herod or they didn’t. The first to hear
of the wondrous birth are either Gentile Magi or Jewish shepherds, but not
both. It simply is undeniable that the stories of Jesus’ birth in Matthew and
Luke cannot both be factually true.
So does that mean they aren’t true at all? Should we just
chuck them and forget about them? A great many people today would answer those
questions by saying that if they aren’t factually true they aren’t true at all
and that yes, we should just chuck them and forget about them. Most Christians
however would abhor those answers. We all grew up with these stories. We all
love these stories, even if we conflate them into one story and actually prefer
Luke’s story to Matthew’s. We don’t even want to think about a year without
Christmas even if we aren’t retailers who depend on the Christmas trade to make
ends meet. Our souls cry out: These stories must be true! They can’t not be
true! But if their facts conflict, how can they be true?
Well, here’s the great good news. They are true. Both of
them. They just aren’t factually true, or at least not all of the facts in them
are accurate. These stories are true in a much more powerful way than being
mere facts. They are deeply, powerfully true even if the things in them that
sound like facts to us never really happened. These stories are symbolically
true. They are mythically true. They bring us truth in the way in which the
ancient culture that produced them conveyed truth, not by writing theological
essays but by telling stories. They point beyond themselves to truths that are
deeper than words. They point to truths about who Christians confess Jesus
Christ to be, who God is, and how God relates to us and wants us to relate to
God. They are true in ways that mere facts can never be.
Christians have been living with and into those truths for
nearly two thousand years. These stories are alive for us so long after they
were written not because they give us facts but because we keep discovering new
truths in them, or at least truths that are new to us. It would be presumptuous
to try to list all of those truths here, but here are some of them:
·
Jesus Christ has a relationship with God that is
closer and more intimate than the relationship any of the rest of us has with
God. He is in a direct and immediate way the Son of God. That’s the truth to
which the stories of Jesus’ virginal conception, usually wrongly called his
virginal birth, point.
·
The Good News of Jesus Christ is not only for
the Jews, and it is mostly for the poor and outcast. Matthew’s story of the
Magi points to that first truth. The Magi were Gentile wise men from the east,
probably Persia. They were the ones to whom Matthew has the first revelation of
the birth of the Messiah come. Luke’s story of the shepherds points to the
second truth. In first century Israel shepherds were despised and outcast,
considered dishonest just because they were shepherds. They were poor. They
almost certainly did not own the sheep they tended or the land on which the
sheep grazed. Luke has the first revelation of the birth of the Messiah come
not to the wealthy and powerful but to these poor, despised shepherds.
·
The Good News of Jesus Christ is a threat to worldly
power. That’s the truth to which Matthew’s story of King Herod and the “massacre
of the innocents” points. Herod was right to be afraid of this newborn king of
the Jews, for Jesus would be a very different kind of king than Herod or most
any other earthly ruler was or is; and he would call people to a new way of
living, a new way of being that rejects and condemns the violence and
oppression by which most earthly rulers rule.
·
Jesus is both king and priest, that is, he has
immense significance both temporally and spiritually. That’s the truth to which
the Magi’s gifts of gold and frankincense point. But he is also mortal and will
die. That’s the truth to which the Magi’s gift of myrrh points.
·
Jesus will save God’s people from their sin, and
that salvation is for everyone. The name Jesus, from the Greek form of the
Hebrew name Joshua (Yeshua in Aramaic, Jesus’ native language) means “God
saves.” God saves Jews and Gentiles. God saves the poor and lowly. God saves
the wise and the unlettered. Jesus is for everyone.
Matthew’s story and Luke’s story of Jesus’ birth taken
together like we always take them point to these truths. They invite us to live
into these truths. They are mostly not factually accurate, and that fact
bothers us modern fact fundamentalists who think only facts are true. We need
to get over it, and our culture is moving in the direction of getting over it. God
invites us not into historical facts but into divine truths. The New Testament’s
stories of Jesus birth point to those truths. So let’s not worry about the
facts. Let’s open ourselves the truths to which these stories point. Are the
New Testament birth stories true? Yes. They are deeply, powerfully true. May we
open our hearts this Christmas season to those deep, powerful truths.
[1] I
hope I don’t really have to say it here, but the Bible has four Gospels but
only two stories of Jesus’ birth. Matthew has one, and Luke has one. Neither
Mark nor John does. Mark says nothing that even suggests anything about Jesus’
birth. John says “the Word became flesh” (John 1:14), but that Gospel has no
interest whatsoever in how that happened, only that it did. You might spend
some time thinking about what that truth means for the necessity to Christian
faith of birth stories about Jesus.
No comments:
Post a Comment