A Christian Blog on the Story of the First Christians Christmas

Do you ever wonder why St. Mark, St. John and St. Paul did not write anything about Christmas? Well, perhaps the simple answer could be that Jesus’ birth was not actually as in the first Christmas story.

St. Matthew and St. Luke were writing using the same source hence it will not be surprising if both of them related the story of the first Christmas.

St. Matthew’s account was obviously trying to prove that Jesus was indeed the most awaited messiah by the Jews. In order for him to sound credible, St. Matthew therefore has to write his story in a manner that is acceptable to the Jews. Since the Jews believe that what they were waiting for is someone who has been foretold by the prophets therefore St. Matthew has to write a story in which the prophecies in the Old Testament were fulfilled in the life of Jesus. Hence every significant event in his account of Jesus story is being concluded by a phrase which reads like, this is so in order that what has been written by the prophet is fulfilled. It is very likely that St. Matthew was just making up stories, but still in Theological context this is not considered as a lie. He knows absolutely that Jesus is the Son of God, the messiah, the Saviour and the like and as an evangelist it is his duty to write an account of Jesus that will bring people to believe and to have faith and during his time, the only way to do it was to prove that Jesus is the one that has been written about by the prophets.

St. Luke on the other hand could have been facing a different situation. Perhaps he was writing for an audience who are no longer querying whether Jesus was the one written about by the prophets but rather asking whether Jesus was a historical figure. Hence we read in St. Luke’s account about the socio-cultural context during the time of his birth. His story of the first Christmas commenced with the tax census required by the Roman Empire:

1In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. 2(This was the first census that took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria.) 3And everyone went to his own town to register.
4So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. 5He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. 6While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, 7and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.

However, by placing the time of Jesus birth with this census, St. Luke contradicted St. Matthew’s account in which the birth of Jesus was placed during the time of King Herod which took place ten years earlier. While many believe that it was St. Luke who could have been mistaken but taking a closer look at the context of their writings, it is very likely that St. Luke’s account is more credible than St. Matthew (or perhaps both of them were wrong.) St. Matthew might have made use of King Herod as the prophecies in the old testaments that he used could be more fitting in Herod’s story.