A reading of the holy gospel according to Matthew. The birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together, Mary was found to be with child of the Holy Spirit. And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to send Mary away quietly. But as he was considering all of this, behold, an angel of the lord appeared to Joseph in a dream saying, Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the holy spirit.
She will bear a son, and you shall call him's name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. All of this took place to fulfill what the lord had spoken by the prophet. Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel, which means god with us. When Joseph woke up from his sleep, he did exactly as the angel of the lord had commanded him, and this is the gospel of the lord. In the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit, amen.
Well, here you have it, folks. Here you have Saint Matthew's account of the birth of Jesus Christ. And this is one of the texts, one of the infant texts or the infancy texts chiefly in Matthew and Luke, which texts have come under severe criticism and rejection under the great and luminous light of we say modern scriptural criticism. Now knowledge, knowingly, willingly, and freely, I want to repeat something of what I said yesterday. Some of you aren't aren't the least bit interested in this, so that's fine.
Sit quietly and say your prayers. But if you are a little bit aware of what's going on around you these days, you are aware that these texts of the description of our lord's beginnings in this life chiefly from Matthew and Luke have come under this scathing criticism which practically eliminate them as history, and they are referred to then as myths. And this by some of our prestigious Catholic scripture scholars such as father Raymond Brown. Now in regards to this criticism, I want you to remember this. It it's what they call form criticism.
It goes back largely to a German scholar or a very good scholar named Bultman, b u l t m a n. Now, one of the aspects of Doctor. Bultman that we ought to remember is this, that he began his scriptural investigations with this proposition, hypothesis, or assumption that miracles are impossible. That it's an insult to man's intelligence in the twentieth century to expect him to accept miracles. So having eliminated miracles, he then proceeds to deal with holy scripture, especially these, among others, these infancy accounts that we have in Matthew and Luke.
And, of course, this goes for all the other miracles in the New Testament. They are all eliminated or explained away. Now this is doctor Boltman's basic assumption, and that colors his whole interpretation. If you begin by saying something is impossible, then you have to admit that in a given instance you say it couldn't have happened, if it is impossible. Now doctor Brown, father Ray Brown, follows Volkmann a lot.
All you have to do is look at look at his commentary, you'll see it. And father Ray Brown maintains that we know practically nothing about the early years of Jesus Christ, and he's giving the same stuff as you can read get get from Boldtman. And one of father Brown's following Boldtman is, how do you know about the early life of Christ? First of all, they say you can't rely on the on the new on on Matthew and Luke because they weren't in a position to know it. They they weren't around.
They didn't know this by by their own experience. We don't have any account of it in any collaborating I mean, corroborating literature. Of course, we don't have that about Caesar's Gallic Wars either, you know. Keep that in your head. And he says, finally, after giving all the reasons to explain that we do not know anything as true history about the beginnings of Jesus Christ, he says, finally, well, possibly the writers could have gotten this from Mary.
Now in con in the connection of this, keep in mind a few dates. Reliable scholars I'm no scripture scholar. I'm just giving you what I get from my reading like everyone else. It's possible. Notice I didn't say it's sure or it's even probable.
I'm saying it's possible that all four gospels were written before seventy AD. That's a very important thing to remember. Christ died in around '33. It's only thirty seven years difference. Or at the at the at the latest, they were written around a 100 AD.
Now I know I said all this yesterday, but I'm repeating it. This is important stuff to get in our heads and to keep this in mind when you read as we read in these days, especially as we approach Christmas. The the fact is we begin with these four gospels. We have them. Where did they come from?
Who wrote them? We know who wrote them. Now to say that what they put in there as the beginnings of Jesus Christ never happened, that it was just a form of a myth. No. How I don't care how you what definition you give to myth.
I know it has a new definition. But I'm saying if this is not history, then somebody's being grossly misled. Not only us, but how about the people at the time this was written? And remember this, before it was put down on black and white or on a manuscript or on papyri or on some elephant hide, whatever it was put down on, before it was put down in writing, you had an oral tradition. Now put that in the context of the of the chronology of the gospels.
How could you get away with the with that kind of stuff with people who some of whom might have had either firsthand knowledge such as the blessed mother or secondhand knowledge easily within a 100 AD? Just think about this. What I'm saying is is not to pose as a scripture scholar, not to to condemn these people. I'm merely saying there are two sides to this business. And so often when you read, you're only getting the one side.
For some reason, one side becomes popular like this whole business of artificial contraception. You think there wasn't another side. You think there were no defenders on God's earth of the Humanae Vitae. So I'm really presenting these things to you. And to say that Matthew and Mark and Luke, especially, that they were did not intend to write history.
On what do you base that? Did they tell you that I'm just I'm not writing history? When you read it and when you get at the purpose of it, can you say that they had no intention of recording facts? If so, where is the evidence? The burden of proof rests on those who say it isn't so.
That's that's the rule of any debate. The the the accepted traditional view is the one that has to be disproved. I don't have to prove it. And so as we edge into Christmas, which is not looking forward to the coming of Christ, he has already come. And personally, I cannot swallow a lot of this stuff in the liturgy these days, which gives us this whole impression that Christ is about to come.
He came. It's perfect past tense. Now you may say the second coming, but that's not what that we're talking about so often in these prayers. Now as I explained, there's a good sense in which we can understand this. Because while it is true that our blessed lord has come, nevertheless, unless I open the door on which he's knocking, he hasn't come into my house.
I have to open that door. I think that is probably the the import, the the thrust of so many of these prayers that we have during Advent, which seem to to assume that Christ never that Christ is going to come and hasn't come. Well, of course, we know there's some confusion there. Well, let us let us not be confused. We are about just a week from the day, six days from the day, We are about to celebrate the anniversary, the commemoration of Christ coming into this world as a fact, as an item of history.
That's what we're going to do. And don't be abashed by a mere 2,000. As time goes, that is nothing. Nothing. And I, for one, cannot swallow all this sentimentality.
If this is not history, I don't want any parts of it. I don't want I don't wanna be associated with it. Why should I? I don't wanna live in a sentimental emotional myth that we say, well, it's nice. It keeps it civilized, you know, and all that malarkey.
If the basic thing about religion must be its truth, not what I think about it. Is it objectively true? Did it happen? Did it happen or didn't it? And my friends, keep this in mind.
There is no reason in the world for anyone who accepts the New Testament to be in the least upset about some of the things and the criticisms they hear. They are in the strong position. There is no reason for them to be upset in the least because depending on whom you read, you can get a very different points of view. And just remember, when you do accept these texts as they are given, in a major way as embodimenting embodying a a historical fact, you are simply lining up with 2,000 of men and women the world over who accepted it. That's a pretty good company to be in.
In the name of the father, son, and holy spirit. Amen.