Nativity narratives

[buffalo]

No, I see no basis for believing this was a literal event and there is certainly no historical reason for believing it. If you choose to believe it as a matter of faith, I understand but the Church does not require belief in it as a matter of doctrine or dogma.

Interpreting its symbolism and meaning is what is important, NOT arguing over whether it happened or not.

I cannot agree. You do not have support for eliminating the literal meaning from the Catechism.

Remember Didymus.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

Case closed. Since we have free-will we can choose to believe anything about anything we want. To be a faithful orthodox Catholic we must believe what has been revealed and the constant teching of the Catholic Church… Remember, there are consequences to heresy and personal interpretation.

This is very unfair. You have not proved him wrong. He has presented evidence. You infer he is heretical and given to personal interpretation. That is simply not true.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

RESPONSE:

Really? How come Catholics have to believe in one but not the others. Once again, we anxiously await you reference to catholic teachings.

Or is this only your opinion?

Because we are not fundamentalist protestants who believe every word is true literally as written. Catholic teaching is wholly against fundamentalism, and has called it “intellectual suicide”.

 

[TMC]

Not to hijack - but I think this point is related. Why are the nativity narratives so different? Luke says he is gathering up all the stories passed down. His story has the most detail (and Luke is generally more complete than the other synoptics). But he doesn’t mention the flight to Egypt or Herod’s slaughter. Matthew has the flight, but he puts Jesus and Mary in a house, not a barn.

I realize these are not contradictions, per se, but I always found it odd that Luke did not pick up the Herod story.

Traditionally John is considered the last Gospel written. Does its lack of any nativity narrative say anything about the importance the early Church put on the story? Why isn’t it included, surely the evangelist was aware of it.

 

[pete_29]

RESPONSE:

No. There are far more and far more current writings about Lincoln. There are only two vastly contradictory birth accounts of Jesus. We can be certain that he was born. Beyond that the facts get blurry.

Faith shouldn’t be confused with gullibility (ie, believe not supported by or contrary to the evidence).

I think if you read carefully you’ll find that the Gospels aren’t all that dissimilar. Do all the witings about Lincoln agree with each other. It boils down to writings, written by people we have never met, or people who never knew Lincoln or Christ. The truth in these writings can’t be proven. Their truth has to be a matter of faith.

 

[Little_Les]

Because we are not fundamentalist protestants who believe every word is true literally as written. Catholic teaching is wholly against fundamentalism, and has called it “intellectual suicide”.

RESPONSE:

Reference please.

Really? Don’t you think somebody should have told the pope and the Councils of Florence, Trent, and Vatican I that?

" For, by supernatural power, He so moved and impelled them to write – He was so present to them – that the things which He ordered, and those only, they, first, rightly understood, then willed faithfully to write down, and finally expressed in apt words and with infallible truth. Otherwise, it could not be said that He was the Author of the entire Scripture. " (P.D.)

“For all the books which the Church receives as sacred and canonical, are written wholly and entirely, with all their parts, at the dictation of the Holy Ghost; and so far is it from being possible that any error can co-exist with inspiration, that inspiration not only is essentially incompatible with error, but excludes and rejects it as absolutely and necessarily as it is impossible that God Himself, the supreme Truth, can utter that which is not true. This is the ancient and unchanging faith of the Church, solemnly defined in the Councils of Florence and of Trent, and finally confirmed and more expressly formulated by the Council of the Vatican.” (P.D.)

“We renew that decree and declare its meaning to be as follows: that in matters of faith and morals, belonging as they do to the establishing of christian doctrine, that meaning of holy scripture must be held to be the true one, which holy mother church held and holds, since it is her right to judge of the true meaning and interpretation of holy scripture.” (Vatican I)

 

[patg]

Not to hijack - but I think this point is related. Why are the nativity narratives so different?

Matthew wrote for a largely Jewish audience and Luke for a largely gentile one.

Matthew:
What is Matthew telling his audience when he includes in his infancy narrative the accounts of the star, the magi, Herod’s plot, the massacre of the babies, and the flight into Egypt? Each of these images recalls to the mind of Matthew’s largely Jewish audience something significant in their past, something that touches their minds and hearts because it reminds them of their history, their hopes, and their sense of purpose and destiny.

We must remember that when Matthew was arranging his inherited oral and written traditions into the Gospel that we now have, he was ever mindful of the needs of his Jewish audience. He was writing to people of the covenant who wanted to remain faithful to that covenant. Matthew presents Jesus to his audience as the new Moses who has authority from God to give the new law. This basic concern is reflected in both the form and the content of Matthew’s Gospel. He organizes his Gospel into five sections that reflect the Pentateuch, the five books of the old law. He pictures Jesus giving the new law on a mountain, just as Moses did. Everywhere in Matthew’s Gospel we read of Jesus against the backdrop of the history of the Jewish people, for it is only against this backdrop that Jesus’ true identity can be understood by Matthew’s largely Jewish audience.

Our goal, then, as we read Matthew’s infancy narrative, is to allow his use of Old Testament images to work, letting the imagery recall to our minds those same images that Matthew intended to recall in the minds of his audience.

Luke:
The images that Luke weaves into his account of Jesus’ birth are very different than those used by Matthew. Still, the intention behind the use of images is the same. By incorporating these images Luke is helping his audience understand the significance of the event of Jesus’ birth, a significance that was understood only in the light of the resurrection.

To understand the depths of Luke’s message we must understand the meanings behind the images of the firstborn son, wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger. When these images are explained, the appropriateness of the announcement to the shepherds will be evident. Mary gave birth to *her firstborn *(Luke 2:7). What would the word *firstborn *recall for Luke’s audience? By the time Luke is collecting material for his Gospel, around A.D. 85, the term *firstborn *had become a reference to Jesus’ divinity. To understand the significance of the word to Luke’s Gentile audience we need to know a little about the way an understanding of Jesus’ divinity had developed and had been expressed in the early church.

When Jesus was alive on earth his followers did not recognize him. They were like the people of Isaiah’s time. They too did not recognize their God. Isaiah begins his prophecy by picturing God lamenting this fact.

However, after the resurrection, and by the time the infancy narratives were taking form, Jesus’ followers did recognize their Lord, The leaders of the church, the shepherds, did recognize the food for their flock. This is why Luke pictures the angels announcing the birth of the child to the shepherds and the shepherds believing and rushing to Bethlehem to see the baby lying in the manger. Now, Israel does recognize her Lord.

Luke’s apparently simple imagery of the babe in the manger greeted by shepherds is Luke’s way of announcing to his Gentile audience that the baby Jesus, the risen Lord, is now recognized as both God and man, the source of life for his people.

(For a thorough scholarly study of the infancy narratives in Matthew and Luke see Raymond E. Brown, The Birth of the Messiah, Garden City, N.Y.: Image Books, 1977.)

 

[patg]

“For all the books which the Church receives as sacred and canonical, are written wholly and entirely, with all their parts, at the dictation of the Holy Ghost; and so far is it from being possible that any error can co-exist with inspiration, that inspiration not only is essentially incompatible with error, but excludes and rejects it as absolutely and necessarily as it is impossible that God Himself, the supreme Truth, can utter that which is not true. This is the ancient and unchanging faith of the Church, solemnly defined in the Councils of Florence and of Trent, and finally confirmed and more expressly formulated by the Council of the Vatican.” (P.D.)

Of course it is entirely possible to teach absolute inspired truth through the use of complete fiction. Nowhere does the Church state how the inspiration was accomplished or in what literary form the authors presented the truth of that inspiration.

I highly recommend you take a look at: “*Biblical Fundamentalism: What Every Catholic Should Know” *by Ronald Witherup S.S. (Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur, of course - we want that magesterial approval).

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

Is a Catholic to regard Matthew’s and Luke’s nativity narratives as historical accounts of actual events, or as an allegory or story about the legendary events surrounding Jesus’ birth?

There is nothing allegorical in either narrative - they are far closer to midrash than to allegory.​

The** event** of the birth of Jesus can be historical, without the details of the narratives about it being historical - the star in Matthew 2 is probably to be connected with Numbers 24.17, as one of many details indicating Who Jesus is, rather than as giving information about the motions of the heavenly bodies at the time of His birth. The magoi & their gifts probably come from Psalm 72. The OT is of immense importance for understanding Who He is - the Nativity narratives are not free compositions: they are full of OT meanings, which are applied to Him, in the light of the Church’s faith in Him.

 

[Little_Les]

There is nothing allegorical in either narrative - they are far closer to midrash than to allegory.​

The** event** of the birth of Jesus can be historical, without the details of the narratives about it being historical - the star in Matthew 2 is probably to be connected with Numbers 24.17, as one of many details indicating Who Jesus is, rather than as giving information about the motions of the heavenly bodies at the time of His birth. The magoi & their gifts probably come from Psalm 72. The OT is of immense importance for understanding Who He is - the Nativity narratives are not free compositions: they are full of OT meanings, which are applied to Him, in the light of the Church’s faith in Him.

RESPONSE:

So aside from the historical fact that Jesus was born, you are saying that the rest of the nativity narratives are in essence just folklore, not historical fact. Is that it?

 

[Little_Les]

Of course it is entirely possible to teach absolute inspired truth through the use of complete fiction. Nowhere does the Church state how the inspiration was accomplished or in what literary form the authors presented the truth of that inspiration.

I highly recommend you take a look at: “*Biblical Fundamentalism: What Every Catholic Should Know” *by Ronald Witherup S.S. (Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur, of course - we want that magesterial approval).

RESPONSE

I’m afraid that you are in error. The Church’s teaching is that events related in scripture as historical actually happened.

Spiritus Paracletus (1920) Pope Benedict XV

1. Those, too, who hold that the historical portions of Scripture do not rest on the absolute truth of the facts but merely upon what they are pleased to term their relative truth, namely, what people then commonly thought, are – no less than are the aforementioned critics – out of harmony with the Church’s teaching,

 

[Little_Les]

Patg says,

Matthew:
What is Matthew telling his audience when he includes in his infancy narrative the accounts of the star, the magi, Herod’s plot, the massacre of the babies, and the flight into Egypt? Each of these images recalls to the mind of Matthew’s largely Jewish audience something significant in their past, something that touches their minds and hearts because it reminds them of their history, their hopes, and their sense of purpose and destiny.<<

RESPONSE:

So Matthew is creating a fiction including four “prophecy” fulfillments: The virgin birth, Rachael’s "weeping for her children, "Jesus being "called out of Egypt (just like Moses), and Jesus being from Nazaras all to make people believe his story?

 

[Little_Les]

PatG says,

Luke:
The images that Luke weaves into his account of Jesus’ birth are very different than those used by Matthew. Still, the intention behind the use of images is the same. By incorporating these images Luke is helping his audience understand the significance of the event of Jesus’ birth, a significance that was understood only in the light of the resurrection.

To understand the depths of Luke’s message we must understand the meanings behind the images of the firstborn son, wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger.""

RESPONSE:

So these are not actual events only fictions to make believers, is that it?

What about the Resurrection? Is that the same thing too?

 

[Little_Les]

Bufflo says,

Mary was assumed body and soul into Heaven. (De fide.) <<

RESPONSE:

Wasn’t that a fifth century legend that grew to become an “infallible” teaching in 1950?

Even the late Fr. William Most admits:

"Evidence for the Assumption

There had been a problem of how the Pope could define the Assumption. There seemed to be nothing in Scripture on it, and what things there were in the Tradition of the Fathers seemed to come not from an apostolic origin, but from some apocryphal stories that circulated chiefly beginning in the fourth century."

And the Catholic Encyclopedia admits:

“The belief in the corporeal assumption of Mary is founded on the apocryphal treatise De Obitu S. Dominae , bearing the name of St. John , which belongs however to the fourth or fifth century. It is also found in the book De Transitu Virginis , falsely ascribed to St. Melito of Sardis, and in a spurious letter attributed to St. Denis the Areopagite.”

So the story appeared in spurious (false) writings in the fourth or fifth century and became “De Fide” in 1950.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

RESPONSE:

Reference please.

**Reference to what, that we are not protestants? I suggest you read the Pontifical Biblical Commissions, “Interpretation of the Bible in the Church” 1994 in full. You can find it on my blog under Church documents. **

Really? Don’t you think somebody should have told the pope and the Councils of Florence, Trent, and Vatican I that?

**They have…as you will see. **

" For, by supernatural power, He so moved and impelled them to write – He was so present to them – that the things which He ordered, and those only, they, first, rightly understood, then willed faithfully to write down, and finally expressed in apt words and with infallible truth. Otherwise, it could not be said that He was the Author of the entire Scripture. " (P.D.)

“For all the books which the Church receives as sacred and canonical, are written wholly and entirely, with all their parts, at the dictation of the Holy Ghost; and so far is it from being possible that any error can co-exist with inspiration, that inspiration not only is essentially incompatible with error, but excludes and rejects it as absolutely and necessarily as it is impossible that God Himself, the supreme Truth, can utter that which is not true. This is the ancient and unchanging faith of the Church, solemnly defined in the Councils of Florence and of Trent, and finally confirmed and more expressly formulated by the Council of the Vatican.” (P.D.)

“We renew that decree and declare its meaning to be as follows: that in matters of faith and morals, belonging as they do to the establishing of christian doctrine, that meaning of holy scripture must be held to be the true one, which holy mother church held and holds, since it is her right to judge of the true meaning and interpretation of holy scripture.” (Vatican I)

**See, read the second line FAITH and MORAL…that is where the church declares the bible is not in err. **

RESPONSE

I’m afraid that you are in error. The Church’s teaching is that events related in scripture as historical actually happened.

Spiritus Paracletus (1920) Pope Benedict XV

1. Those, too, who hold that the historical portions of Scripture do not rest on the absolute truth of the facts but merely upon what they are pleased to term their relative truth, namely, what people then commonly thought, are – no less than are the aforementioned critics – out of harmony with the Church’s teaching,

You must get a good deal more modern that that. Please read the above I sited you to.

 

[patg]

What about the Resurrection? Is that the same thing too?

Belief in the resurrection is a matter of faith. There were no witnesses, no stories about the actual resurrection, and there are only very conflicting third-party accounts of post-resurrection appearances.

Please note: I am not saying it didn’t happen - I am saying that there is very little real evidence for it and, as a supernatural event it is beyond human proof and beyond human understanding. This puts it squarely in the realm of faith.

 

[patg]

So these are not actual events only fictions to make believers, is that it?

We don’t really know the answer to that question. We do know that the stories were structured in a specific manner to teach who Jesus was to the intended audiences in a matter they would most clearly relate to.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

RESPONSE

I’m afraid that you are in error. The Church’s teaching is that events related in scripture as historical actually happened.

Spiritus Paracletus (1920) Pope Benedict XV

1. Those, too, who hold that the historical portions of Scripture do not rest on the absolute truth of the facts but merely upon what they are pleased to term their relative truth, namely, what people then commonly thought, are – no less than are the aforementioned critics – out of harmony with the Church’s teaching,

Again, please read more modern statements. You are missing that the Church has always taught that the bible is inerrent ONLY as to matters of faith and salvation.

Patg says,

Matthew:
What is Matthew telling his audience when he includes in his infancy narrative the accounts of the star, the magi, Herod’s plot, the massacre of the babies, and the flight into Egypt? Each of these images recalls to the mind of Matthew’s largely Jewish audience something significant in their past, something that touches their minds and hearts because it reminds them of their history, their hopes, and their sense of purpose and destiny.<<

Matthew is trying to relate to his audience. You miss the point if you assume the Gospels were meant to be historical tracts about the events of that time. The are meant as either teaching tools or as evangelical tools. Material is added, deleted, reshaped, moved, with some degree of creativitiy added to make what comes out relevent to the people to whom it was addressed. I would read a good commentary of these Gospels, Anchor has a wonderful and highly rated series on the entire bible book by book. There are literally hundreds to choose from though.

 

[Little_Les]

Spirit Meadow says:

"See, read the second line FAITH and MORAL…that is where the church declares the bible is not in err. "

RESPONSE

But the Catholic Church has taught:

" For the system of those who, in order to rid themselves of these difficulties, do not hesitate to concede that divine inspiration regards the things of faith and morals, and nothing beyond, because (as they wrongly think) in a question of the truth or falsehood of a passage, we should consider not so much what God has said as the reason and purpose which He had in mind in saying it – this system cannot be tolerated." (Providentissimus deus).

and,

"He also teaches that Divine inspiration extends to every part of the Bible without the slightest exception, and that no error can occur in the inspired text: “It would be wholly impious to limit inspiration to certain portions only of Scripture or to concede that the sacred authors themselves could have erred.” (Spiritus Paracletus)

 

[Little_Les]

Spirit Meadow says,

Again, please read more modern statements. You are missing that the Church has always taught that the bible is inerrent ONLY as to matters of faith and salvation. <<

RESPONSE:

1. No. That is not the case. See post above.
2. “read more modern statements” So you are admitting that Church teachings change and need updating?