How can this be resolved?“This passage has long been considered problematic by Biblical scholars, since it appears to place the birth of Jesus around the time of the census in AD 6, whereas the Gospel of Matthew indicates a birth during or just after the reign of Herod the Great, who died in 4 BC, ten years earlier.”
Is the one mentioned in 6AD then the first or the second or even one of many? We don’t know.*Now it happened that at this time Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be made of the whole inhabited world. This census—the first—took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria, and everyone went to be registered, each to his own town.
You might want to avoid casting aspersions on historians you are unwilling to name in favor of actual facts. I am not much interested in “tradition” if that is some phrase that means ignore the historical facts in favor of long held myths about historical events. No one is served by claiming truth where it is disproved. You might read the post after yours to see a more reasoned explanation on the subject. In any event, don’t be afraid of the truth, it will almost certainly set you free and enable you to understand your faith more clearly and more deeply. You are deeply wrong in claiming that truth is taught to undermine faith. It is in fact to help faith to see clearly what it faith is based upon.The Historian Warren H. Carroll in his book The Founding of Christendom pg 309 explains that Jesus birth probably took place in 06 BC.
On pages 313-314 he discusses the census. He provides ample evidence of Quirinius that is the universally accepted view that he was governor from 11 BC to 1 AD and that a census was taken as referenced in Marcionem IV. That there was not a census is presented by modernist historians who choose to dismiss tradition and supplant it with their suppositions usually made to undermine faith.
Thanks for some excellent work! I don’t know as I agree with your conclusion,but you certainly have made a good case. The problem for Luke was to get Joseph and Mary to Bethlehem for the birth as required by the OT prophets. Matthew avoided the problem by having them living in bethlehem at the time instead of moving from Nazareth as Luke did. Luke may well have simply borrowed the later census as a convenient mode of moving the story to Bethlehem. It surely still befuddles biblical experts. Reading the Gospels as extraordinarlily well thought out and planned writings to effect particular theological positions help much in this pursuit. I would recommend a fine book called, "The First Christmas, by Marcus Borg and Dominick Crossan. It really is an excellent source for understanding the purposes of Luke and Matthew in their very different birth stories.My understanding of this is:
There was a census by Quirinius, who was “governor of Syria”, in 6AD. This was famous because there were incidents and uprisings caused by the ill will of the people towards this.
Clearly, this census was much too late to be the one Luke refers to, as scholarship has well fixed the date of the death of Herod the Great in 4BC and scripture is clear Our Lord was born before his death.
The odd part here is that Luke is a superb historian, and in both his Gospel and in Acts is very, very careful to provide historical references, which check out with extra-biblical sources to a very high degree.
So it seems the key, as NotWorthy has pointed out, is that St. Luke refers to this as the “First census”, clearly implying more than one.
Also note that St. Luke doesn’t say that Quirinius **called **for the census, just that it took place during his reign as “Governor of Syria”; its not clear if it was actually called for by Caesar (which would probably be recorded somewhere but isn’t) or by someone acting in his name as a local ruler.
This is problematic in that Quirinius, to the best of our knowledge, wasn’t governor of Syria in 4BC. He was in the region as a military leader, and had been sent by Rome at that time to wipe out a rebellion in the area. But another man was Governor - I cant find my notes on that right now, but Im pretty sure Im right.
So the best explanation to square with Luke for me would be that a census was called in 4BC, by someone, in the name of Caesar. At that time, Quirinius, as a powerful military leader, might have held a “governorship” over some Syrian lands he was busy subduing. Luke refers to this, and to highlight the differences, is careful to say the “first census” to differentiate it from the more famous census of 6AD.
It is a mystery tho, and one that folks argue about, no doubt.
Yes this is in line with what Dr Carroll concludes in his history. He proposes two solutions one I have already mentioned the otherThere seems to be no consensus among Biblical chronologists as to when Christ was born, nor about Quirinius and the census, nor about the date of the death of Herod.
He mentions that some scholars believe that Quirinius was twice governor of Syria (based on an ancient inscription). Also, Luke calls Pilate ‘governor’ even though his title was Procurator, so the term governor is used by Luke as a descriptor, not as a title. This line of reasoning broadens the possible roles that Quirinius may have had that would give him authority over Syria and a census.
Syria was lumped together with the holy land by the Romans, which is why the governor of Syria would have authority over the census in question.
There is an ancient inscription on a tombstone (Lapis Venetus) that mentions a census of Syria under Quirinius, controversially dated to year one of the consulship of PSQuirini by Vardaman. This would establish an ealier census, in the years B.C., prior to the second census under Quirinius.
my article on the subject:
biblicalchronology.com/census.htm
That the principle governor was assisted from time to time by a second high official for specific purposes such as census taking, and that Quirinius was that second offficial in this case.