Christmas Conversation Starter

Here's a common depiction of the first Christmas - three wise men riding camels and visiting Jesus who was born in a stable:

That's the story Christians like to tell but it's not the story we read in the bible. The gospel of Matthew, for example, refers only to "wise men"; not three of them and not riding on camels either. There may have been dozens of wise men and they might have been riding in coaches pulled by horses for all we know (or they may have been travelling on foot).

Also you can search through the New Testament as carefully as you like, but you will find no mention of Jesus being born in a stable. In fact Matthew is most emphatic when he tells us that the wise men arrived in Bethlehem and, "On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage." (Matthew 2:11)

What happened next? Did Mary and Joseph wait eight days in Bethlehem before going to the Temple in Jerusalem and then heading straight back to Nazareth? (Luke 2:21-39)

Or did the family immediately leave Bethlehem and travel down to Egypt where they stayed until Herod was dead? (Matthew 2:13-15)

When was Jesus born? In about 6 BCE while Herod was alive? (Matthew 2:1)

Or ten years later in 6 CE when Quirinius was governor of Syria? (Luke 2:2)

Maybe it was somewhere in between those two dates because Luke also tells us (in Luke 3:1-23) that John started baptising in 29AD, “in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar,” when Jesus was “about thirty” – which means that Jesus was born in about 1BCE.

Or maybe it was none of those dates because, in John 8:57, during his early ministry, “The Jews said unto him, Thou art not yet fifty years old.” It’s a fairly vague statement, but surely they’ve got to be talking about someone over forty (and probably closer to forty-five), in which case Jesus could have been born as early as 15BCE.

A little Socratic Questioning during this year's Christmas dinner and you can turn it into a really memorable event.