THE NATIVITY: DEBUNKED

Introduction

The Virgin Birth

The gospel Matthew wrote Mary, mother of Jesus, as a woman pledged to be married to Joseph who became pregnant
through the Holy Spirit before they came together (Matthew 1:18). This was highlighted in verses 22 to 23:

All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: ‘The virgin will conceive
and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel’ (which means “God with us”).”

This prophecy was taken from Isaiah 4:17:

Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son,
and will call him Immanuel.

Note that in this context the word “virgin” used in these verses was from the old Hebrew “almah” which means a nubile
young woman, better translated as a young woman of child-bearing age. This was noticeably overused in the gospel Luke.

(1:26 to 28)

In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in
Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The
virgin’s name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly
favored! The Lord is with you.”

(1:34)

“How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?”

Our response:

Now why is it so important to highlight that Mary was a virgin?

Some commentators suggest that the virgin birth claim was an answer to counter-
claims that Mary conceived illegitimately. In order to cover up this rather
embarrassing situation, a virgin birth is supposed.

In his book, The Jesus Dynasty: The Hidden History of Jesus, Hir Royal
Family, and the birth of Christianity, James Tabor claims, and similarly accused by
Roman philosopher Celsus, that Jesus’ father was actually Panthera (or Pantera or
Pandera), a Roman soldier serving in the area at the time of Jesus’ conception.
Though this is generally rejected by most mainstream scholars, looking at the mistranslation of the word virgin (almah),
alongside Jesus’ genealogy in Matthew we might see some grounds in Tabor’s claim. We will notice that Matthew wrote Jesus’
genealogy as mainly patrilineal except for women like Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, and Bathsheba who were all known adulterers and
harlots. Including Mary as a female in this list, perhaps Matthew is hinting something covertly.

However, not all of the early Christians accepted a claim of virgin birth because many sees this as a pagan influence on their
religion. Why so? Many mythical characters share the same characteristic (e.g. Hercules, Osiris, Bacchus, Mithra, Hermes,
Prometheus, Perseus, and Horus) along with the following:

 Male
 Lived in pre-Christian times
 Had a god for a father
 Had a human virgin for a mother
 Had their birth announced by a heavenly display
 Had their birth announced by celestial music
 Been born about December 25
 Had an attempt on their life by a tyrant while they were still an infant
 Met with a violent death
 Rose again from the dead

Almost all were believed to have:

 Been visited by “wise men” during infancy

 Fasted for 40 days as an adult.

Jonathan MS Pearce wrote in his book “The Nativity: A Critical Examination”,

These births break natural laws and appear impossibly wonderful, and they act as a herald
welcoming the figure into earthly existence. From a cynical point of view, in order to compete
with all of these other religions and myths, which were themselves believed to varying degrees,
and in order for Jesus to be taken seriously, a miraculous birth is simply a prerequisite.

Gospels
The gospels Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John traditionally have been known to have been written independently of each other.
However, many scholars agree that they were written as improvements of each version.

They were written in order as Mark, then Matthew, Luke, then John (although there were many other gospels in existence
that is not included in the New Testament). Upon further examination, we notice that Mark has no infancy narrative, and we
know that both Luke and Matthew used Mark as a source. Thus, it appears that the infancy narratives are later additions.
Surely if Mark had known about these miraculous accounts, and believed them, he would have included them? This appears
somewhat suspect. This suspicion is increased when we look at the writing available from Paul, the earliest Christian writer,
working around a couple of decades after the death of Jesus. There is no reference in any of Paul’s remaining writing, no
allusion even, to a virgin birth. The event represents a conspicuous absence. Although Paul did not know Jesus personally, he
did know James, the brother of Jesus (if a literal brother is implied in the text), and yet still reports no virginal mother of Jesus.
Moreover, he implies a normal birth in some of his writings as he states that Jesus was “born of a woman” (Galatians 4:4) and
was “descended from David, according to the flesh” (Romans 1:3).
The Gospel of John also implies a normal birth. The writer of John would have known about the virgin birth claims as the
circulation of Matthew and Luke would most probably have led to the writer knowing the Gospels as he wrote possibly as
much as 15 or so years later. John 1:45 claims Jesus as “the son of Joseph” and John 6:42 states “Is not this Jesus, the son of
Joseph, whose father and mother we know?”

Further to this, the Gospel of Thomas, a non-canonical Gospel, gives no indication either that there was a virgin birth, as well
as there being no mention in what has been thought to be Q (from various textual analyses of Matthew and Luke).

Traveling for a Census? Not on my watch!

Matthew says Jesus was born in Bethlehem and Mary and Joseph already lived in Bethlehem.

However, Luke says Mary and Joseph actually lived in Nazareth and so when the census was going on, they had to travel to
Bethlehem to register. For a census, you only had to register in the town of your residence and not have to travel.

Also, only the male heads of household had to register and not the women. Why would Mary have to take the journey in the
first place? And even if they did had to travel, why in the world would Joseph put a woman in the advanced stages of
pregnancy on a donkey for what would be a dangerous journey

Quirinius vs Herod
Luke 2:1-3

In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire
Roman world. (This was the first census that took place while[a] Quirinius was governor of
Syria.) And everyone went to their own town to register.

This seems to be a fairly explicit statement that Quirinius is alive and well, governor of Syria, and ordering a census that came
directly from Rome and the Emperor Caesar Augustus. Matthew, on the other hand, claims this

After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi[a] from the
east came to Jerusalem and asked, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We
saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.”

When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. When he had called
together all the people’s chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the
Messiah was to be born.

This, too, is an explicit statement that Herod was in charge of Judea at the time of Jesus’ birth. Thus, using simple logic, we can
deduct that, at the time of Jesus’ birth, both the census of Quirinius took place and Herod lived.

However, this is extremely problematic since we know that the census took place in 6 CE and Herod died in 4 (0r 5) BCE. This is
a gap of at least ten years! It is at least ten years since if Herod was alive at the time of Jesus’ birth and we know he ordered a
massacre and suchlike (all of which would have taken some time), then we know he would have survived for some time
around this moment and after the birth. This is quite a long period of time to have as some anomaly. On the face of it, either
one or both Gospel authors are lying. They are simply claiming things as facts that are impossible.
With regard to Matthew’s reference to Herod, it must be noted that Herod had three sons; all called Herod—Herod Archelaus,
Herod Antipas and Herod Philip (as well as many other sons). We are sure that Matthew was referring to Herod the Great (the
father) because he later states, after the death of Herod, when Joseph and family have fled to Egypt and look to come back:

But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning over Judea in place of his father Herod, he was
afraid to go there.

This means that Matthew was definitely referring to Herod the Great being ruler during Jesus’ birth. The standard Christian
response here is to question the sources for our knowledge of when Herod died and for who was in charge for the census and
when it was ordered. Let us look, then, at how we have come to think that Herod died in 4 BCE. The famous contemporary
Jewish historian Josephus provides much of the evidence for the timing of Herod’s death. He claims that Herod came into
power in 37 BCE and that he ruled for 34 years until his death, therefore making his death in around 4 BCE. In his Jewish
Antiquities Book XXVII Chapter 6, he declares that shortly before he died there was a lunar eclipse. This eclipse was originally
thought to be the one of 13th March 4 BCE that would put Jesus as being born before that. A lunar eclipse in 5 BCE allows
more realistic time for events claimed in historian Josephus’ writing to take place and is possibly a more likely scenario. This
eclipse was also total instead of partial, which the one of 4 BCE was. Some scholars now argue that the eclipse could have
been later[29] and conclude that Herod actually died closer to 1 BCE, but these are in the great minority, the motivation of
which seems to be to try to get Matthew out of this issue. It must be noted that eclipses were often used to signify important
events and may not have been entirely accurate.