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Chapter v.
BIRTH OF JESUS CHRIST.
[Luke 2, 1—7.]
IN those days a decree went forth from the Roman emperor, Caesar Augustus[1], commanding that all the people of the empire should be enrolled. Each one had to give in his name “in his own city,”[2] i.e. in the tribe and city to which he belonged. So Joseph and Mary went to Bethlehem[3] (Fig. 63), the city of David, because they were of the family of that king.
- ↑ 1 Augustus. He was ruler of the vast empire to which Judaea now belonged (Old Test. LXXXVI). Herod was not an independent sovereign, but governed in the name of the Roman emperor, to whom he had to pay part of the taxes as tribute. The enrolment of the subjects of the empire had, therefore, to take place in Judaea as well as elsewhere; and, according to the Jewish custom, it was made by tribes and families.
- ↑ In his own city. i. e. the town where his family originated, and in which the public register was kept.
- ↑ Bethlehem. Bethlehem was the town to which David had belonged (Old Test. L), and as Mary and Joseph were descended from him, their names had to be inscribed at Bethlehem. This town lay about five miles to the south of Jerusalem (see Map). The journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem was one of seventy miles, and full of difficulties. The town of Bethlehem stood on the ridge of a hill a little higher than Mount Sion, which was the highest part of ancient Jerusalem, and about 2300 feet high. It still exists, and is chiefly inhabited by Christians to the number of between three and four thousand, though in all the other towns of the Holy Land the Turks, in whose possession Palestine is, outnumber all other creeds.
