Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

THE MISSION OF JESUS §11.1
11.1. Why Not 'Beginning from Bethlehem'?
If John's baptism of Jesus is a possible starting point, why not follow Matthew
and Luke in pushing back to Jesus' birth? A 'life', whether conceived as a modern
or an ancient biography, should at least say what is known of the subject's origins.
There are several reasons why we do not follow that option.
a. Our whole procedure is based on the recognition that Jesus made an impact
on those who became his disciples, an impact which is still evident in the
traditions which have come down to us. We cannot say the same about the birth
of Jesus or about the birth narratives. There is no hint, for example, that the shepherds
of Luke 2.8-20 or the magi of Matt. 2.1-12 became disciples. Luke reports
that Mary, Jesus' mother, 'kept all these things in her heart' (2.19; also 2.51). So
'impact' is certainly envisaged, but hardly in terms of a tradition told and retold
in the thirty years before Jesus' mission began.
b. What about the birth narratives themselves? Do they not constitute the
impact made on Mary? That is hardly likely. 4 It is not only that they are stories
told about Mary (and others) rather than by Mary. More weighty is the evidence
of the accounts themselves, that they have been in considerable measure contrived
to bring out various significant allusions and theological emphases, not
least by Matthew and Luke themselves.
I have in mind, in particular, in Matthew's case, the fulfilment quotations
so characteristic of his Gospel, 5 the magis' star (2.2, 7-10) no doubt intended to
evoke Num. 24.17 ('A star will come forth out of Jacob, and a sceptre shall arise
out of Israel'), 6 the recognition of the significance of Jesus' birth by Gentiles
(2.2, 11), and the evident parallelism between Jesus and Moses, Herod and Pharaoh,
not least in the 'slaughter of the innocents' (2.16; Exodus 1-2). 7 This is not
4. Pace Riesner, who suggests that Luke 1-2 go back in part to Mary's reminiscences
(Jesus als Lehrer 210); Byrskog, who in his assembly of eyewitnesses as the source of the Jesus
tradition argues that Luke wants his hearers/readers to believe that 'Mary was his informant
concerning certain episodes of Jesus' birth'; 'It is entirely plausible that the Jerusalem community
entertained a certain interest in Mary's intimate memories concerning the birth of the risen
Lord' (Story as History 89-90).
5. Matt. 1.22-23; 2.15, 17-18, 23; 4.14-16; 8.17; 12.17-21; 13.35; 21.4-5; 27.9-10. See
further R. E. Brown, The Birth of the Messiah: A Commentary on the Infancy Narratives in the
Gospels of Matthew and Luke (New York: Doubleday, 1977, 2 1993) 96-104; Luz, Matthäus
1.134-41.
6. Num. 24.17 was a popular source of speculation and hope in Jewish thought of the
time, not least at Qumran (CD 7.18-26 = 4QD a frag. 3 3.7-10 = 4QD d frag. 5 2-4; 4QTest
[4Q175] 9-13; 1QM 11.6); note also T. Levi 18.3, and the change of Bar Kosiba's name to Bar
Kokhba ('son of the star') (see further Davies and Allison, Matthew 1.233-35).
7. See again Brown, Birth 114-15; Davies and Allison, Matthew 1.192, 264-65. I have
already speculated on memories of the destruction of Sepphoris (or of the surrounding villages)
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