From Newsweek, Dec, 13, 2004
From Mary to the manger, how the Gospels mix faith and history to tell
the Christmas story and make the case for Christ.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6653824/site/newsweek/
Dec. 13 issue - The news was unwelcome, baffling, frightening; nothing
about it was expected or explicable. Roughly 2,000 years ago,
according to the Gospel of Luke, in Nazareth of Galilee, a young woman
found herself in the presence of Gabriel, the angelic messenger of the
Lord whose name was known to Jews of the day as the mysterious figure
who had granted Daniel his prophetic visions. The woman, Luke writes,
was "a virgin espoused to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of
David," and her name was Mary, Luke's Greek form of the Hebrew Miriam,
the sister of Moses and the first great prophetess of Israel. "Hail,
thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee," Gabriel said,
"blessed art thou amongst women"-terrifying Mary, who "was troubled at
his saying." Stunned and confused, Mary made no reply, her face
apparently betraying anxiety and awe. Sensing her confusion and fear,
Gabriel was reassuring: "Fear not, Mary: for thou hast found favour
with God."
Then the angel said: "And, behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb,
and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name JESUS. He shall be
great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest ... and of his
kingdom there shall be no end." In other words, Mary was to bear the
Messiah, the fabled and long-promised figure who, in the words of the
prophet Jeremiah, would "reign as king and deal wisely, and shall
execute justice and righteousness in the land." Mary was silent, then
finally found her voice: "How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?"
Gabriel's reply-that "the Holy Ghost shall come upon thee"-raised more
questions than it answered, not only for Mary but for Joseph, for the
early Christians and, two millennia later, for us. In Luke's account,
Mary absorbed the tidings of her child's miraculous origin and mission
and "pondered them in her heart," still puzzled, still overwhelmed. In
the Gospel of Matthew, Joseph, knowing nothing about Gabriel's
appearance, is humiliated by the news that his future wife is
pregnant, and "was minded to put her away privily." In later years
Christians had to contend with charges that their Lord was
illegitimate, perhaps the illicit offspring of Mary and a Roman
soldier. Now, at the beginning of the 21st century, some scholars
treat the Christmas narratives as first-century inventions designed to
strengthen the seemingly tenuous claim that Jesus was the Messiah.
And so the story of the birth of Jesus of Nazareth is, fittingly, as
riven with complexity and controversy as Christianity itself. This
month more than a billion Christians will commemorate their Lord's
Nativity. Amid candlelight, carols and the commingled smells of cedar
and incense, the old tale will unfold again: Gabriel's visitation, the
journey to Bethlehem, the arrival of the baby in a stable, the
glorious announcement to the shepherds in the night, the star in the
East, the mission of the Magi.
Yet, as with so many other elements of faith, the Nativity narratives
are the subject of ongoing scholarly debate over their historical
accuracy, their theological meaning and whether some of the central
images and words of the Christian religion owe as much to the pagan
culture of the Roman Empire as they do to apostolic revelation.
The rest of the article can be found here:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6653824/site/newsweek/
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