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History


           In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. So 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. He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. (Luke 2:1, 4-5)

          One complaint meant to discredit Scripture that I’ve heard is that the Romans didn’t require that people to go their ancestral home in order to register for a census, or to pay a tax (which was one reason a census was taken.) I’m not going to suggest that the Romans made an exception when it came to Israel. 
          What I do know is that for the ancient Jews, being able to trace one’s lineage was critical. One needed to be able to prove from which tribe one descended, and when censuses were taken, they were taken by family line, not residence. So, the Jewish census takers would have had a choice, to register everyone wherever they lived, which would be convenient for the people but potentially require years to then sort by hand into their proper tribes, or to hire lots of extra census takers so that there were twelve in every city and town, or to inconvenience the people by requiring them to go to centralized census locations to register by tribe. 
          Today, it’s a social crime to inconvenience any but the richest and most powerful. Back then, it wasn’t unusual to be required to drop what you were doing and carry something for a mile (or, I suspect, more) so I doubt this really raised an eyebrow. 
          This is just one of the threads used to make the tapestry of prophecies and acts that together are the birth of Jesus, This is why I love history.

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