JC, you should put a groundhog coming out of that hole. Or how about an eyeball? That would be gnarly!
When was Jesus born?
by Anti-Christ 46 Replies latest watchtower bible
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tula
JC can you do a cliff's notes version? a summary of sorts? in a nutshell (with a box around it) for those who have lack of time and lack of concentration. Something more helpful to those of us who just want a short forthright answer? have mercy on the slow....
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JCanon
WTS DECEMBER 25TH TRIVIA: Though the Bible Students didn't have a specific date for Jesus' birth, simply sometime in the fall, they did very much consider that December 25th was the day of Annunciation; that is, the day Mary was told she would become pregnant and thus the day she was overshadowed by holy spirit. The date of Jesus' went from being in heaven to becoming one with the flesh of mankind could be considered his official "birthdate" in a way as well. I think though since generally Christ is considered the "bright morning star" and thus associated with the sun, whereas the church/anointed ones are associated with the moon, that we can draw some significance to this. After all, the two main festivals for the Jews, the week-long Passover and the week-long Festival of Booths did align with the seasons. Of course, the birthday of Mithras is said to be on December 25th, which was a date that was close to the winter solstice. I think the two are connected.
Of note, the human gestational period is nine months so Jesus would have been born close to the autumnal equinox. Just looking, in 3 BC when the Annuciation would have taken place, the winter solstice fell on the 23rd, two days prior to the 25th. Nine months later in the Fall of 2 BC the autumnal equinox falls on the 25th. Jesus would have been circumcised on the 8th day after his birth on the 22nd of September, thus three days prior to the autumnal equinox. If we presume Jesus was born exactly or close to 9 lunar months after the Annunciation, since he was born at Full Moon around the 14/15th, then of note the full moon 9 months earlier in December fell on the 21/22nd of 3 BC, just a day before the winter solstice which fell on the 23rd. So while it's a few days off from the 25th, it's much closer to the actual solstice, considered to be the time of the "birth of the sun". Interestingly, however, even though the winter solstice occurs on the 22nd of December in modern times, the actual transference of spirit of Christ from heaven to earth to combine with humanity again occurred precisely on the 25th of December. So the actual somatization of Christ occurs at precisely the same time of the year for both the first and second coming, very close to the winter soltice.
So technically, if you wanted to, you could celebrate the "birth of Christ" on the 25th of December if you wanted to. Just don't use the pagan Satantic symbol of the Christmas tree. You know, have your rum and egg nog, go out and single winter songs like "Winter wonderland" or innocent Christmas songs like "Little Drummer Boy" or something, but none of that pagan Yule Tide stuff. Then maybe there's a chance one might get by with not being thrown into the lake of fire by Christ himself who for some reason seems to keep up with all those details, especially related to Satanic paganism...
JC
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JCanon
AlphaOmega:
Thanks for this JC...
I am going to look into this - there is so much information packed into the above quote, that I couldn't possibly ignore it.
Correct. Think in terms of every aspect of the Law being fulfilled by Christ in some way. It was a forshadowing of everything. All the sacrifices representing Christ's sacrifice. The Day of Aontment representing when Christ presents his body up in heaven for the sins of mankind, the first-fruits wave offerings representing Christ at the first and second coming, etc. Also the two major festivals bookend Jesus' 3-1/2 year ministry since the festivals are six months apart. Passover is when Jesus leaves the earth in sacrifice and the Festival of Booths celebrates both the time and nature of Jesus' presentation. That is, it represents that Jesus would not be born in a house but outside the house in a booth, booths being used to shelter animals. Jesus being placed in a manger proves he was born outside the house. The full symbolism of that, of course, is that Christ as with many prophets, would not be part of the formal religious or temple system but arrive outside that system, just as prophets of old dwelt in Canaan and not in their own land. Likewise, Jesus at the second coming also is depicted as standing with one foot on land and the other in the sea, indicating he would only be generally associated with God's formal temple organization but technically on the outside of it. Christ would not be part of the formal temple system connected with God's house but would arrive outside it.
Having noted that, especially since the 8th day of the festival of Booths is made a special sabbath day, whereas the 7th day of Passover Week is made a special day, it would seem Christ would fullfill that 8th day in some way? How? Well the 8th day circumcism becomes a parallel here. 8th day of festival, 8th day circumcision! He was born in the fall so do we connect? Why not? IF we do, which is certainly an option here, however, then we can use astroscience to determine precisely within a day when Jesus was born, which would be Septemter 14/15, 2 BC. Not that there was any doubt he was born in the Fall, obviously.
The process is simple because the Jews went by the Moon for the days of the lunar month and that can be calculated by astronomy programs. The Festival of booths began on the 14/15th just like Passover does, which was the day of the Full Moon. So we just check the date for the Full Moon for September 2 BC, which was the 13th. The 13th is the technical new moon. The sighted new moon generally is counted when the 18-hour plus "new moon crescent" appears, so generally we just consider that as occurring the next day, and thus on the 14th. This happened at night so if it was say 8 p.m. or later it would have been in the latter part of the day and on the first day of the Festival of booths, etc. That corresponds with his being born on the 1st day of the Festival and being circumcised on the 8th. So we have his brithday give or take a day on September 14/15.
Now what's really FUN about this is when Jesus gets baptized. He has to still be 29 years of age 40 days before the 8th day of the festival of booths, presumably. For 29 CE that works out just fine as you can see from the chart below. The 8th day of the FOB would have fallen on October 19 and 40 days earlier would have been September 9, just 6 days shy of Jesus' birthday on September 15. So he was "as if" meaning almost 30 shy a few days of his baptism. Even so, he would have begun his ministry after turning 30, whether he begins it on September 26, which is exactly 1290 days from his death, which has symbolic meaning, or whether the 1290 days is symbolic from his officially ministry beginning just before the sabbath day of the 8th day of the FOB on the 21st, and ending officially on the day before the 21st of Nisan. This allows for the fulfillment of Pentecost as the "1335 days"; that is 45 days after the death of Jesus. Of course, the earlier you push back his ministry the younger he gets, our only historical criteria here being that he is still 29 at the time of his baptism.
You can get the calendar all the way back to ancient times here:
http://www.timeanddate.com/calendar/index.html?year=33&country=1
It is accurate because it shows the full moon and an eclipse on a Friday, April 3rd in 33 CE.
If you're into day counting, you can use the Julian Calendar on line here:
http://aa.usno.navy.mil/data/docs/JulianDate.php
Both very useful tools for trying to see what is what!
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JCanon
God RAPED Mary? Mary was asked politely for permission before this happened. She had a lot of challenges, being an unmarried pregnant woman in those days. But how could anybody say no to the angel Gabriel? Have you ever tried winning an argument with him? Nevemind!!! Ignore I asked that!
JC
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Barbie Doll
"He is everywhere"?????? There is NO GOD and NO HELL . PEOPLE wrote the bible. Mary was a prostitute and she had other children, you make her like a GOD. If you want to believe, go ahead, but there is nothing there. Its like talking to nothing.
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Homerovah the Almighty
OK it's well established that Christendom has the actual date wrong why doesn't God send a message by virtue of his holly spirit to correct the situation
And secondly why was the son of God born in a dirty manger/barn with allot of donkey and goat shit all over the place, doesn't sound very sanitary
You think the son of God would be born in a cleaner and better environment, like in a nice house on a Ikea mattress, something like that
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Anti-Christ
Herod died on Shebat 2, 1 AD. The eclipse mentioned by Josephus is only possible on a single date, December 29, 1 BC. (Note that because there was no zero year in the Roman calendar,
Thank you very much for your explanation JCanon, I read every thing and very impressive you are the only one so far that made an attempt to reconcile history and the bible so thank you again. I have one little problem with what you said about Herod's death you see there was an other eclipse and it was in 5 B.C. and Josephus said it was after the eclipse that he died so there is an other possible date and that is 4 B.C. and I will cut and paste the rest that proves that these dates are accurate because you offered a lot of speculation and there is more then just Josephus writings to collaborate these dates
the physical evidence from coins of the region leave little room for disputing that Herod ceased his reign in 4 B.C.E., Archelaus then succeeded him, then ceased his own reign ten years later in 5 C.E., and Roman control of Judaea began in the year 6 (the year the earliest Roman coins struck for Judaea begin).
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Anti-Christ
It's not simply a Matthew-Luke contradiction inasmuch as Luke also situates his Nativity story (involving both John and Jesus within a 6-months time span) "in the days of King Herod of Judea" (1:5). Iow the Herod / Quirinius discrepancy is internal to Luke as well as with Matthew.
One of the biggest differences between Matthew and Luke here, imo, lies in the narrative connection of the places involved. When you read the stories separately without trying to knit them together, you have:
Matthew: Mary and Joseph live in Bethlehem in Judea; they leave for Egypt; because they can't go back to Bethlehem they finally move to Galilee and settle in Nazareth (2:22f).
Luke: Mary and Joseph live in Nazareth in Galilee; they travel to Bethlehem in Judea because of the (anachronistic) census; when the Judean episodes (involving especially the temple in Jerusalem) are over they simply go back to Nazareth.
Thank you for the information Nark.
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Anti-Christ
Jesus was not born on the 25th of December...that is another thing by itself.
It does not really matter when Jesus was born...the point is HE was born.
"He was born to this earth through a virgin, it was told this way centries before,
He opened the entrance to Heaven so sinners could pass through its doors.
A few men would listen and less would believe....."
Jesus was probably born around October. I've heard that somewhere.
hibiscusfire
I'm sorry Hibiscusfire( cool alias btw ) I was not clear in my point, I just mention the 25 Dec. thing ( I know the bible does not specify ) I was just saying that the JW put a lot a importance on the "fact" that he was not born on the 25 of Dec. but I don't remember hearing any thing about the difference between Mat. and Luke.
