The nativity traditions in the synoptic gospels are interesting for their reliance on OT exegetical traditions. Most of the narratives of Jesus in the gospels are based on such interpretive traditions, modeling events of Jesus' life on various texts of the Greek OT. Jesus' multiplication of the loaves (cf. Matthew 14:13-21, 15:32-38) is based on Elisha's similar miracle in 2 Kings 4:42-44. The story of Jesus' temptation in the wilderness (cf. Matthew 4:1-11) represents a complex tapestry of Israelite wilderness traditions from the Pentateuch (see my post on this: http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/10/69783/1.ashx), and the passion narratives are similarly based on a tissue of OT texts (see JD Crossan's work).
Another good example of this can be found in the early chapters of John, which repeatedly show a close affinity in the Greek with the story of Moses in Exodus. The gospel repeatedly compared Jesus to Moses: "For the Law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ" (John 1:17/em>), "Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up (3:14), "If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me" (5:46), "It was not Moses who has given you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven" (6:32), "Has not Moses given you the Law? Yet not one of you keeps the law. Why are you trying to kill me?" (7:19), "You are this fellow's disciple! We are disciples of Moses!" (9:28), "We know God spoke to Moses, for as for this man, we don't know where he comes from" (9:29), etc.
In the Wedding story of ch. 2, Jesus provides wine (the offer of grace and Spirit) whereas Moses provided the old system of the Law. The water Jesus changes into wine is held in six jars "for the ablutions that are customary among the Jews" (2:6); his act is therefore symbolic of the transformation of the Law into the "Law of grace". The theme of Jesus as a new Law-giver also appears in John 13:34; 14:15; 15:12, 14. As for verbal echoes, the Wedding story has fingerprints from Exodus all over it. Not only is water symbolic of the Law, it also symbolizes Moses. In John 2:8, Jesus tells the servants: "Fill the waterpots with water (hudatos)...Draw out (antlesate) some now and take it to the steward." This statement reminds one of Moses' name: "When the child grew old, she took him to Pharaoh's daughter and he became her son. She named him Moses saying, 'I drew (mosheh) him out of the water' " (Exodus 2:10). In the miracle that follows, Jesus turns the water into red wine just as Moses turned the water in Egypt into blood. In Exodus 7:17, 19-21 (LXX), the water even in the water jars were turned to blood so that it was impossible to "drink its water" (piein hudor), which recalls the head waiter who "tasted the water" (egeusato to hudor) in John 2:7-9. In Jesus? miraculous sign, he alleviates a shortage of liquid drink and produces something even tastier than the original drink. Moses does the exact opposite: he creates a shortage of water and produces liquid so foul that it could not be drunk. The type of miracle however is strikingly similar: the transformation of water into a liquid either symbolic of blood or literally blood. The reaction to the signs performed by Jesus and Moses is also strikingly similar:
"He also performed (epoiese) the signs (ta semeia) before the people, and they believed (episteusen). And when they heard that the Lord was concerned about them and had seen their misery, they bowed down and worshipped.... And when the Israelites saw the great power of the Lord displayed (epoiese) against the Egyptians, the people feared the Lord and believed in him (episteusan eis auton) and in Moses his servant." (Exodus 4:30-31; 14:31)"This was the first of the signs (ton semeion) Jesus performed (epoiesen) in Cana of Galilee, and manifested his glory, and his disciples believed in him (episteusan eis auton).... Many other signs (semeia) Jesus also performed (epoiesen) in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book; but these have been written that you may believe (pisteuete) that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God." (John 2:11; 20:30-31)
The "Woman at the Well" story in ch. 4, on the other hand, is heavily dependent on the story of Isaac's servant's meeting of Rebekah in Genesis 24, yet it also closely follows the Moses story in Exodus as well:
"When Pharaoh (Pharao) heard (ekouse) of this, he tried to kill (ezetei anelein) Moses, but Moses fled from Pharaoh and went (elthon) to live in Midian, where he sat down (ekathisen) by a well (epi tou phreatos). Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters. They came to draw water (entloun) and fill the troughs to water their father's sheep. Shepherds came and drove them away, but Moses came to their defense and watered their sheep for them.... So Moses settled with this man, who gave him his daughter Zipporah in marriage." (Exodus 2:15-17, 21)."The Pharisees (Pharisaio) heard (ekousan) that Jesus was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John, although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, but his disciples. When the Lord learned of this, he left Judea and went back (apelthen) once more to Galilee. Now he had to go through Samaria. So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the parcel of ground Jacob gave to his son Joseph, and Jacob's well was there. Jesus, being weary from his journey, sat down (ekathezeto) by the well (epi te pege). It was about the sixth hour. There came a woman of Samaria to draw water (antlesai hudor)." "For this reason the Jews tried harder to kill (mallon ezetoun apokteinai) him." (John 4:1-7; 5:18)
We find a similar dependence on OT traditions in the nativity traditions of Jesus. As a general rule, Matthew depends on OT and extracanonical traditions about Moses, whereas Lukedepends heavily on OT birth traditions about the prophet Samuel.
I. MATTHEW AND THE NATIVITY TRADITIONS OF MOSES
The narrative in Matthew 1:18-2:23 is indebted to extracanonical haggada on Exodus 1-2 which concerned the slaughter of the innocents by Pharaoh. In both cases, we have the birth of a savior-figure which was heralded by a divine omen, a tyrant committing mass infanticide to kill this threat to his power, a Mary-figure, the father of the savior-figure divorcing his wife, and the dream vision by the father concerning his son.
When Moses was born, Pharaoh had given a command to kill every male Hebrew (Exodus 1:15-22), just as Herod had ordered the slaughter of the under-twos in Bethlehem (Matthew 2:16-18). Herod had learned that Christ was to be born from the "chief priests" and the "scribes" (grammateis), just as Pharaoh learned of the coming savior-figure from his "sacred scribes" (hierogrammateón) according to Josephus (Antiquities 2.205, 234). Josephus goes further than the OT in claiming that purpose of Pharaoh?s infanticide was to kill one single child who was prophesied to "abase the sovereignty of the Egyptians"; in the OT, the massacre was simply to reduce the population of the Hebrews who were filling the land. In the Sefer ha-Zikronot, the legend of Pharaoh's murder plot is closely similar to that of Herod in Matthew, consisting of three scenes: (1) a divine omen, (2) the ruler panics, (3) the ruler consults with his advisors, and (4) the ruler commands infanticide to kill the child announced by the omen:
"Pharaoh dreamed that he was sitting on the throne of his kingdom. He looked up and saw an old man standing before him with a balance like those of a merchant in his hand. The old man grasped the scales and held them up before Pharaoh. Then he took all the elders of Egypt, her princes, and her nobles and put them on one scale of the balance. After that he took a tender lamb and put it on the second scale and the lamb outweighed them all. Pharaoh wondered at this terrible vision, how the lamb outweighed them all and then Pharaoh awoke to find it was only a dream.Next morning, Pharaoh arose and when he had summoned all his courtiers and narrated his dream they were extremely frightened. Then one of the royal princes answered. 'This can only mean that a great evil shall come on Egypt at the end of days.' 'And what is that?' the king asked the eunuch. So the eunuch replied to the king. 'A child will be born in Israel who will destroy all the land of Egypt. If it pleases the king, let a royal statute be written here and promulgated throughout all the land to kill every newborn male of the Hebrews so that this evil be averted from the land of Egypt.' And the king did so and he sent to call the midwives of the Hebrews" (Sefer ha-Zikronot, 38b).
Compare with Matthew: "After Jesus had been born at Bethlehem in Judea during the reign of King Herod, some wise men came to Jerusalem from the east. 'Where is the king of the Jews?' they asked. 'We saw his star as it rose and have come to do him homage.' When King Herod heard this he was frightened, and all of Jerusalem with him. He called together all the chief priests and the scribes of the people and enquired of them where the Christ was to be born. 'At Bethlehem in Judea,' they told him?When Herod saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, he was infuriated and he sent and killed all the children in and near Bethlehem who were two years old or younger" (2:1-5, 16).
The father of Moses was Amram, and in Josephus (Antiquities, 2.210-16), Amram was fearful and unsure what to do about his wife's pregnancy, fearing Pharaoh's command, and God appeared to him in a dream and told him not to worry. Pseudo-Philo (first century AD) described this event but attributed the dream to Miriam. What is significant in this tradition is that Amram and the other Israelite men were supposed to separate themselves from their wives -- just as Joseph divorced Mary in Matthew:
"Then the elders of the people gathered the people together in mourning, and they mourned and groaned, saying, 'The wombs of our wives have suffered miscarriage; our fruit is delivered to our enemies. And now we are lost, and let us set up for ourselves that a man should not approach his wife lest the fruit of their wombs be defiled and our offspring serve idols. For it is better to die without sons until we know what God may do.' And Amram answered and said, 'It will sooner happen that this age will be divided forever or the world will sink into the immeasurable deep or the heart of the abyss will touch the stars than that the race of the sons of Israel will be ended...Now therefore I will not abide by what you decree, but I will go in and take my wife and produce sons so that we may be made many on the earth...I will go and take my wife, and I will not consent to the command of the king; and if it is right in your eyes, let us all act in this way. For when our wives conceive, they will not be recognized as pregnant until three months have passed.'...And Amram of the tribe of Levi went out and took a wife from his own tribe. When he had taken her, others followed him and took their own wives. And this man had one son and one daughter; their names were Aaron and Miriam. And the spirit of God came upon Miriam one night, and she saw a dream and told it to her parents in the morning, saying, 'I have seen this night, and behold a man in a linen garment stood and said to me, "Go and say to your parents, 'Behold he who will be born from you will be born from you will be cast forth into the water; likewise through him the water will be dried up. And I will work signs through him and save my people, and he will exercise leadership always.' " ' And when Miriam told of her dream , her parents did not believe her" (Pseudo-Philo, LAB 9:1-10).
The closest resemblance, however, is with the Sefer ha-Zikronot, in which Amram himself acts on Miriam's dream vision and who had joined in with the widespread divorcing:
"When the Israelites heard the decree ordained by Pharaoh that their male children be thrown into the river, part of the people divorced their wives but the rest stayed married to them.... And then at the end of three years the Spirit of God descended on Miriam and she went and prophesied in the center of the house saying: 'Behold, the son will be born to my father and my mother at this time who will save Israel from the power of Egypt.' So when Amram had heard the words of the child he went and remarried his wife whom he had divorced after the decree of Pharaoh ordering the destruction of every male of the house of Jacob. And in the third year of the divorce he slept with her and she conceived by him" (Sefer ha-Zikronot, 38b).
In the above text, the narrative includes a (1) divorce, (2) divine reassurance, and (3) remarriage. This is exactly what is found in Matthew: Joseph first divorced Mary discreetly, then was reassured by an angel in a dream (cf. the angel appearing in Miriam's dream in Pseudo-Philo), and then took Mary again as a wife.
Then Jesus escapes to Egypt in the account in Matthew, in an interesting reversal of the exodus traditions: Jesus must flee to Egypt rather than away from it. The episode in Exodus 2:15 is also significant, as Moses is similarly sought by Pharaoh and must leave his homeland to another country (Midian) to hide from him. When Pharaoh dies and is succeeded by another king, Moses returned to Egypt. Similarly, when Herod dies, Jesus and his family return to Galilee. In both instances, God commands both Jesus' parents and Moses to return to their homeland:
Matthew 2:19-20: "After Herod's death, the angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, 'Get up, take the child and his mother with you and go back to the land of Israel, for those who wanted to kill the child are dead (tethnékasin gar hoi zétountes ten psukhén tou paidiou).' "Exodus 4:19 (LXX): "The Lord said to Moses in Midian, 'Go, return to Egypt, for all those who wanted to kill you are dead (tethnékasin gar pantes hoi zétountes sou tén psukhén).' "
Not only is the resemblance almost verbatim in the Greek, but the phrasing is awkward in Matthew because the logical antecedent for the plural "those who wanted to kill the child" is the singular "Herod," indicating that the phrasing has been adopted from the OT without even smoothing the phrasing into the new context.
II. LUKE AND THE NATIVITY TRADITIONS OF SAMUEL
The case of Luke is more complex because it narrates two nativity stories regarding both John the Baptist and Jesus. I have already discussed in earlier threads in this forum why the virgin-birth story of Jesus is secondary to the infertility-birth of John the Baptist, and how it likely represents an earlier Jewish-Christian tradition that Jesus was born naturally from an infertile couple, which was later adapted to the virgin-birth tradition (attested not only by Matthew but also by Ignatius of Antioch in the early second century AD), resulting in a paralleled story for John the Baptist. We may thus note doublets, such as between v. 18 and 34 ("And Mary said to the angel, 'How shall this be, since I have not had sex with a man?' And the angel said to her....""And Zechariah said to the angel, 'How shall I know this, for I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years?' And the angel answered him..."). Verse 34 is awkward in its present context (Why is Mary wondering how she will be pregnant if she is already betrothed?) and is transparently based on v. 18; it is either a later addition or an indication that the author somewhat clumsily constructed a new narrative about Mary and Jesus out of an earlier tradition that is also employed in the story about Elizabeth and Zechariah.
In either case, it is quite apparent that Luke is dependent in both stories on the nativity traditions of Samuel. Like Elizabeth, Samuel's mother Hannah was barren and wished for a son. Hannah?s husband was a pious man named Elkanah who went to the sanctuary at Shiloh to worship and offer sacrifice (1 Samuel 1:3-4). Similarly, Elizabeth?s husband Zechariah was a priest serving at the "Lord's sanctuary" (Luke 1:5-10). The Magnificat in Luke 1:46-53 is literarily dependent on Hannah?s hymn in 1 Samuel:
"My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord and my spirit exults in God my savior; because he has looked down upon his lowly handmaid. Yes, from this day forward all generations will call me blessed, for the Almighty has done great things for me. Holy is his name, and his mercy reaches from age to age for those who fear him. He has shown the power of his arm, he has routed the proud of heart. He has pulled down princes from their thrones and exalted the lowly.The hungry he has filled with good things, the rich sent empty away" (Luke 1:46-53)."My heart exults in the Lord, my horn is exalted in my God, my mouth derides my foes, for I rejoice in your power of saving...Do not speak and speak with haughty words and let not arrogance come from your mouth...The bow of the mighty is broken, but the feeble have girded themselves with strength.The sated hire themselves out for bread, but the famished cease from labor; the barren woman bears sevenfold but the mother of many is desolate... He raises the poor from the dust, he lifts the needy from the dunghill to give them a place with princes, and to assign them a seat of honor. " (1 Samuel 2:1-8).
The narrative in 1 Samuel thus provided the bare plot of the story and the model of the Magnificat. Moreover, the Benedictus of Zechariah in Luke 1:67-79 is also similar to the song of Hannah in its expression of praise for God for his mercy and acts. The parallels extend also into the notices about Jesus' childhood. The story about Jesus being presented to the Temple in v. 22-28 recalls the consecration of Samuel in 1 Samuel 1:21-28. The prophetess Anna in Luke 2:36-38 also resembles the consecrated Samuel (as she is said to have "never left the Temple, serving God night and day with fasting and prayer") who was given over to live at the sanctuary in service of God, and her very name echoes that of Hannah. The description of the growth of Jesus in Luke also is likely modeled on that of Samuel:
"The child grew to maturity and he was filled with wisdom and God?s favor was with him....And Jesus increased in wisdom, in stature, and in favor with God and men (para theo kai anthropois)" (Luke 2:40, 52)"Meanwhile the boy Samuel went on growing in stature and in favor both with Yahweh and with men (meta kuriou kai meta anthrópón)" (1 Samuel 2:26; LXX).
Thus the narrative in Luke exhibits numerous parallels with the traditional story of Samuel in the OT.
III. THE INFANCY GOSPEL OF JAMES AND OT NATIVITY TRADITIONS
The second century AD Infancy Gospel of James is another early witness of the use of OT exegetical traditions in the composition of Christian nativity stories. It is clearly dependent on both Matthew and Luke; for instance, it attempts to resolve the ill fit between the Zechariah-Elizabeth-John thread from Luke with the slaughter of the innocents from Matthew (e.g. why didn't John, born only months apart from Jesus, fall victim to Herod's infanticide). It also significantly develops the theme of Mary's spontaneous generation of Jesus, with guidance from the Holy Spirit.
But it isn't just derivative of the present text of Matthew and Luke. It also draws on independent traditions (such as the birth of Jesus in a cave, which reflects Mithraism), and significantly, it betrays an acquaintance with the exegetical traditions that underlie the narratives in Matthew and Luke. Matthew depends on the Moses-Amram-Miriam haggada of Exodus 1-2 to develop the story of the slaughter of the innocents, Joseph's dream vision about Mary, and his divorce of Mary, whereas Luke depends on the Samuel-Hannah traditions of 1 Samuel. Well, there are more details in the Infancy Gospel of James that parallel both these traditions.
In the haggada tradition on Exodus 1-2, Mary is the daughter of Amram, the father-figure (who fathers the Savior-figure, Moses). Mary is thus the sister, not the mother of Moses. In the Infancy Gospel of James, Joseph is an old man with grown sons who adopts young Mary and takes care of her (9:11). When the time comes for the census, Joseph agonizes over his ambiguous relationship with the girl -- is she his daughter or his wife?
"And Joseph wondered, 'I'll enroll my sons, but what am I going to do with this girl? How will I enroll her? As my wife? I'm ashamed to do that. As my daughter? The people of Israel know she's not my daughter" (Infancy Gospel of James 17:2-3).
This tension between roles may thus arise from Matthew's casting a daughter-figure from the source traditions into the role of a wife. Another motif that seems cognate to the exegetical tradition of Exodus 1-2 is that of how Jesus is saved from infanticide. In Matthew, the family merely escapes to Egypt (an interesting reversal of the exodus traditions). But like Jochebed, Mary in the Infancy Gospel saves her son from the slaughter by hiding him in a water course:
"When she saw that he was a fine child, she hid him for three months. But when she could hide him no longer, she got a papyrus basket for him and coated it with tar and pitch. Then she placed the child in it and put it among the reeds along the bank of the Nile" (Exodus 2:2-3).
"When Mary heard that the infants were being killed, she was frightened and took her child, wrapped him in strips of cloth, and hid him in a trough used by cattle" (Infancy Gospel of James 22:3-4).
The parallels between 1 Samuel and the first portion of the Gospel (dealing with Mary's birth) are even more striking. Here, the material from 1 Samuel is appropriated again to construct yet another miraculous birth story -- this time concerning Mary. The name of Mary's mother in the story is Anna -- surely derived from the OT Hannah (Infancy Gospel of James 2:1). Like Hannah, she is barren and mourns and laments her infertility, wearing mourning clothes and praying to God for his help. She is taunted by her servant in a similar manner to Hannah, and her daughter Mary is sent to live in the Temple in God's service, as God's gift, just as Hannah's son Samuel did. In all these respects, the story in the Infancy Gospel is closer to that of 1 Samuel than the older narrative in Luke. Here are some of the more salient parallels:
"Now [Joachim's] wife Anna was mourning and lamenting on two counts: 'I lament my widowhood and I lament my childlessness....And Juthine the slave replied, 'Should I curse you just because you haven't paid attention to me? The Lord God has made your womb sterile so you won't bear any children for Israel. Anna too became very upset....Anna began to lament, saying to herself: 'Poor me! Who gave birth to me? What soft of womb bore me? For I was born under a curse in the eyes of the people of Israel.'....Suddenly a messenger of the Lord appeared to her and said: 'Anna, Anna, the Lord God has heard your prayer. You will conceive and give birth, and your child will be talked about all over the world.' And Anna said, 'As the Lord God lives, whether I give birth to a boy or a girl, I'll offer it as a gift to the Lord my God, and it will serve him its whole life'....Many months passed, but when the child reached two years of age, Joachim said: 'Let's take her up to the temple of the Lord, so that we can keep the promise we made, or else the Lord will be angry with us and our gift will be unacceptable' " (Infancy Gospel of James 2:1, 6; 4:1-2; 7:1).
"He [Elkanah] had two wives; one was called Hannah and the other Peninnah. Peninnah had children, but Hannah had none....And because Yahweh had closed her womb, her rival kept provoking her in order to irritate her. This went on year after year. Whenever Hannah went up to the house of Yahweh, her rival provoked her till she wept and would not eat. Elkanah her husband would say to her, 'Hannah, why are you weeping? Why don't you eat? Why are you downhearted? Don't I mean more to you than ten sons?'....In bitterness of soul Hannah wept much and prayed to Yahweh. And she made a vow, saying, 'O Yahweh Almighty, if you will only look upon your servant's misery and remember me, and not forget your servant but give her a son, then I will give him to the Yahweh for all the days of his life, and no razor will ever be used on his head'....When the man Elkanah went up with all his family to offer the annual sacrifice to Yahweh and to fulfill his vow, Hannah did not go. She said to her husband, 'After the boy is weaned, I will take him and present him before Yahweh, and he will live there always' (1 Samuel 1:2, 6-8, 10-11, 21-22).
So it looks like there was more to the exegetical traditions underlying the nativity stories of Matthew and Luke that crop up in other writings. I also wonder if the story of the presentation of Jesus to the Temple in Luke 2:21-40 is a remnant of an older story modeled on that of Samuel, in which Jesus was consecrated as a gift to God (note also how the name "Anna" pops up in v. 36, as someone who had consecrated herself to Temple service).
Another early nativity story is that of the Ascension of Isaiah, which dates likely to the early second century:
"And I indeed saw a woman of the family of David the prophet, named Mary, and Virgin, and she was espoused to a man named Joseph, a carpenter, and he also was of the seed and family of the righteous David of Bethlehem Judah. And he came into his lot. And when she was espoused, she was found with child, and Joseph the carpenter was desirous to put her away. But the angel of the Spirit appeared in this world, and after that Joseph did not put her away, but kept Mary and did not reveal this matter to any one. And he did not approach May, but kept her as a holy virgin, though with child. And he did not live with her for two months. And after two months of days while Joseph was in his house, and Mary his wife, but both alone. It came to pass that when they were alone that Mary straight-way looked with her eyes and saw a small babe, and she was astonished. And after she had been astonished, her womb was found as formerly before she had conceived. And when her husband Joseph said unto her: "What has astonished thee?" his eyes were opened and he saw the infant and praised God, because into his portion God had come. And a voice came to them: "Tell this vision to no one." And the story regarding the infant was noised broad in Bethlehem. Some said: "The Virgin Mary hath borne a child, before she was married two months." And many said: "She has not borne a child, nor has a midwife gone up (to her), nor have we heard the cries of (labour) pains." And they were all blinded respecting him and they all knew regarding him, though they knew not whence He was. And they took Him, and went to Nazareth in Galilee....In Nazareth he sucked the breast as a babe and as is customary in order that He might not be recognized" (Ascension of Isaiah 11:2-17).
This version seems to be totally independent of the idiosyncracies of Luke, and knows some of the features of Matthew's plot (such as Joseph's desire to "put Mary away," the appearance of the angel to him, and the lack of union between Joseph and Mary before the birth), yet it seems totally ignorant of other features of Matthew's story such as the slaughter of the innocents and the family's residence in Egypt. The birth itself is also miraculous -- as a birth without childbearing (a motif absent in the two canonical stories). Moreover, there is direct mention to rumors and confusion among the residents of Bethlehem....possibly evoking the Jewish rumors on Jesus' questionable parentage. This part of the story seems to reflect the heifer from the Apocryphon of Ezekiel.
The early birth traditions of Jesus thus appear to have been pliable, amorphous, complex, and drew on different exegetical traditions.