Christmas Story Mulling
By Tom Slattery
In the fifth century (400s AD) Pope Theophilus gave a detailed account of
the Holy Family's stay in Egypt to prevent their boy whom we have come to
know by the Greek-derived name of Jesus from being murdered by King Herod.
The account may have been based on distantly remembered facts or it may have
been an invented itinerary for purposes of allowing the faithful to have a
touch and a grasp of the trials of the event.
The account is of an apparent overland journey out of Herod's domain and
into Egypt. A journey by ship would have been easier, but probably more
expensive. For whatever reasons, Theophilus gives us a geographically
detailed overland journey, and an overland journey that avoided the main
road to enter Egypt at what is now Rafah. They go from there to what is now
Al-Arish and then follow the old Horus Road to a fortified town that is now
called Al-Zaraniq. From there they went to what is now called Al-Kalse and
then to what is now Al-Mohamedieh.
In the Nile Delta they followed the old Pelusiac branch of the Nile River,
which is now dried up, possibly by boat. They stayed in the city of
Bubastis, now a ruin called Tell Al-Basta near the modern Egyptian city of
Zagizig.
They went from there to what is now Al-Mahma, where Mary is fabled to have
bathed her baby Jesus.
At this point we may begin to wonder what the destination may have been. The
three family members would seem to have been free of the arbitrary lethal
power of King Herod at this point if not before. Egypt had been recently
taken over by the Roman government, not quite yet the "Roman Empite." But
the Romans would not have bowed to Herod. It would have been the reverse. So
why would the account have many, many more pages of this kind of
geographical detail and lead the family deep into the south of Egypt,
perhaps even over the border into Nubia?
There was another heavy-handed baby killing episode not too far into the
region's past. This was the effort by Octavian, otherwise known to us as
Augustus Caesar, to kill a baby who was a threat to a "throne." This was the
baby Caesareon, child of Cleopatra and Julius Caesar.
His Roman soldiers successfully killed the baby in 30 BC. The baby's mother,
the "queen" of Egypt, the descendant of up to 5000 years of effective
pharoanic governmental and institutional continuity, Cleopatra, had already
committed suicide by snakebite on August 9, 30 BC. Because the baby was a
kid of Julius, the killing was apparently done to prevent a succession not
only to the Egyptian throne but to end any claim by, as it were, and
Egyptian to any Roman government inheritance. It was as important to avoid
Greek-system claims as to avoid Ancient Egyptian ones.
This was a time of turmoil. Greek-influenced civilization was fading. The
Romans were beginning to assert their power. The Mideast was, until then,
dominated by Greek influence. The business language and the economy were
Greek. Governments throughout the area descended from the conquest by
Alexander the Great (336-323 BC) conducted government business in Greek.
Coins were standardized Greek coins and minted with Greek language on them.
The Greek language was prevalent. The surviving New Testament is primarily
derived from Greek language texts. The very name "Jesus" is a corrupted
Greek word that we would call "Joshua" if it had been preserved from its
Hebrew original and translated into English. In short, throughout the
eastern Mediterranean and beyond the Greek system, its culture, and its
language -- that had been brought by Alexander the Great -- prevailed.
Into this the Romans had come, and had come amid a civil war of their own.
After Brutus and Cassius assassinated Julius Caesar in 44 BC they received
tacit support from the Greek-system Parthians for their effort to restore
the Republican government. Mark Anthony, who had put down the Republican
effort by Brutus and Cassius, became involved with another branch of
Alexander's old Greek-dominated empire, Ptolemaic Egypt and it's descendant
of both Greek conquerors and ancient Egyptian pharaohs, Cleopatra.
But this was not the only turmoil. In an age before modern astronomy when
intellectuals were versed in astrology and followed the movements of the sky
in that framework, a 2000-year-old age was coming to an end. The Age of
Aries was becoming the Age of Pisces. Now, 2000 years later, that age is
also about to end (in 2012 AD). But if we more or less do not care because
we know about the wobble of the planet earth that causes the slow
26,000-year movement, they did care very much back then before anyone really
knew. It was all-important to people back then.
So every intellectual of the time, and these would have been mostly
religious intellectuals since government and business did not subsidize
science, was focused on movements in the night sky. And there was probably
something to focus on. There were things going on. The Chinese recorded an
apparent and long-lasting supernova in 5 BC. There were rare conjunctions of
planets, especially the "powerful" planets Jupiter and Saturn, taking place.
And into this came the magi, the so-called "Three Kings of Orient."
They were apparently Zoroastrians from the Parthian Empire remnant of
Alexander's Greek-system empire. The thought may go through many minds. If
this kid we call Jesus was born to the wife of a lowly carpenter, why (other
than of course the storied religious reasoning) would high-level religious
intellectuals, make a long and dangerous journey and bring some of the most
valuable items of the time?
And one might speculate. "Mary" is an Egyptian-derived name. In Egyptian it
is "Merit" literally meaning "Beloved." Joseph would seem to be, too. The
Joseph (Yusef) of the Old Testament may have been the powerful New Kingdom
prime minister Yuya. Perhaps taking the first syllable of his name and a
syllable from one of his government office titles makes "Yusef" (Joseph)?
Cleopatra is said to have had three children by both Julius Caesar and Mark
Anthony. Only one, Caesarion, seems to have been murdered by Roman military
people. If one or both of the other two children were girls this would be
very important. Egyptian inheritance of the pharaoh's throne was
matrilineal. It would have been through the female that the next legitimate
pharaoh would have come.
Mary would have been about the right age to have been a female child of
Cleopatra. And then her first – and apparently only at that time – son might
have legitimately claimed the Egyptian throne. This certainly would have
bothered not only the Imperial Romans but all of those locals who had gained
wealth and/or power from association with the Romans.
So one may wonder. Mary, Joseph, and Jesus stopped at Heliopolis, just
outside modern Cairo, the old ancient Egyptian location of the temple of the
sun, long associated with the pharaoh's claim to religious power. Was this
just a stop along the way?
If Matthew's story of the magi might have some historical significance –
other than its well-known religious significance – it would only make sense
if some intellectuals knew something quite significant about the baby. Who
knows now? We all might find out something if we might know where to look.
© Tom Slattery 2005 Published by Karisable.com
