Smith's Bible Dictionary.pdf - Online Christian Library

Smith's Bible Dictionary
25, is not far from the real date of Christ’s birth. Since the 25th of December comes when the
longest night gives way to the returning sun on his triumphant march, it makes an appropriate
anniversary to make the birth of him who appeared in the darkest night of error and sin as the true
Light of the world. At the time of Christ’s birth Augustus Caesar was emperor of Rome, and Herod
the Great king of Judea, but subject of Rome. God’s providence had prepared the world for the
coming of Christ, and this was the fittest time in all its history.
•All the world was subject to one government, so that the apostles could travel everywhere: the
door of every land was open for the gospel.
•The world was at peace, so that the gospel could have free course.
•The Greek language was spoken everywhere with their other languages.
•The Jews were scattered everywhere with synagogues and Bibles. III. EARLY LIFE.—Jesus,
having a manger at Bethlehem for his cradle, received a visit of adoration from the three wise men
of the East. At forty days old he was taken to the temple at Jerusalem; and returning to Bethlehem,
was soon taken to Egypt to escape Herod’s massacre of the infants there. After a few months stay
there, Herod having died in April, B.C. 4, the family returned to their Nazareth home, where Jesus
lived till he was about thirty years old, subject to his parent, and increasing “in wisdom and stature,
and in favor with God and man.” The only incident recorded of his early life is his going up to
Jerusalem to attend the passover when he was twelve years old, and his conversation with the
learned men in the temple. But we can understand the childhood and youth of Jesus better when
we remember the surrounding influences amid which he grew.
•The natural scenery was rugged and mountainous, but full of beauty. He breathed the pure air. He
lived in a village, not in a city.
•The Roman dominion was irksome and galling. The people of God were subject to a foreign yoke.
The taxes were heavy. Roman soldiers, laws, money, every reminded them of their subjection,
when they ought to be free and themselves the rulers of the world. When Jesus was ten years old,
there was a great insurrection, (Acts 5:37) in Galilee. He who was to be King of the Jews heard
and felt all this.
•The Jewish hopes of a Redeemer, of throwing off their bondage, of becoming the glorious nation
promised in the prophet, were in the very air he breathed. The conversation at home and in the
streets was full of them.
•Within his view, and his boyish excursions, were many remarkable historic places,—rivers, hills,
cities, plains,—that would keep in mind the history of his people and God’s dealings with them.
•His school training. Mr. Deutsch, in the Quarterly Review, says, “Eighty years before Christ,
schools flourished throughout the length and the breadth of the land: education had been made
compulsory. While there is not a single term for ’school’ to be found before the captivity, there
were by that time about a dozen in common usage. Here are a few of the innumerable popular
sayings of the period: ’Jerusalem was destroyed because the instruction of the young was neglected.’
’The world is only saved by the breath of the school-children.’ ’Even for the rebuilding of the
temple the schools must not be interrupted.’”
•His home training. According to Ellicott, the stages of Jewish childhood were marked as follows:
“At three the boy was weaned, and word for the first time the fringed or tasselled garment prescribed
by (Numbers 15:38-41) and Deuteronomy 22:12 His education began at first under the mother’s
care. At five he was to learn the law, at first by extracts written on scrolls of the more important
passages, the Shema or creed of (2:4) the Hallel or festival psalms, Psal 114, 118, 136, and by
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William Smith