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Bethlehem inn-keeper — Generous or greedy to lend stable to Mary and Joseph?

By: Benjamin Hodge (Diary)  |  December 27th, 2011 at 01:05 PM  | 

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First, I would like to wish readers a Merry Christmas.

Thanks to David Keating at the Club for Growth for first mentioning this recent economic newsletter from First Trust Portfolios, based in Wheaton, IL.

The Bible story of the virgin birth is at the center of much of the holiday cheer at this time of the year. The book of Luke tells us Mary and Joseph traveled to Bethlehem because Caesar Augustus decreed a census should be taken. Mary gave birth after arriving in Bethlehem and placed baby Jesus in a manger because there was “no room for them in the inn.”

Over the centuries, people have come to believe that because Jesus was born in a stable, and not in a hotel room, Mary and Joseph must have been mistreated by a greedy innkeeper. This innkeeper only cared about profits and decided the young couple was not “worth”
his best accommodations…

It may be that the stable was the only place available. Bethlehem, like other small towns, was overflowing with people who were forced to return to their ancestral homes for the census – ordered by the Romans for the purpose of levying a tax.

If there was a problem, it was caused by the unintended consequences of this government policy…

The innkeeper was generous to a fault – a hero even.  He was over-booked, but he charitably offered his stable, a facility he built with unknowing foresight. A facility he was able to offer, while the government officials who ordered the census slept in their own beds with little care for the well-being of those who had to travel regardless of their difficult life circumstances…

And this is why it’s important to favor economic and political systems that limit the use and abuse of power over others. In the story of baby Jesus, a law that requires innkeepers to always have extra rooms, or to take in anyone who asks, would “fix” the problem. But this new law would also have unintended consequences. It would create fewer hotel rooms because the costs of building would rise. A hotel big enough to handle the rare census, would be way too big in normal times.

And who would open a bed and breakfast, if the law could crack down at any time the
house became full? With fewer hotel rooms, prices would rise, and innkeepers would once again be called greedy. Government would then try to regulate prices.

Read the whole article here.

______________________

Connect with Benjamin Hodge at Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, The Kansas Progress, and LibertyLinked. Hodge is President of the State and Local Reform Group of Kansas.  He served as one of seven at-large trustees at Johnson County Community College from 2005-’09, a member of the Kansas House from 2007-’08, a delegate to the Kansas Republican Party from 2009-’10, and was founder of the Overland Park Republican Party in 2011.  His public policy record is recognized by Americans for Prosperity, the Kansas Association of Broadcasters,the Kansas Press Association, the Kansas Sunshine Coalition for Open Government, the NRA, Kansans for Life, and the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE).

 


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  • naraht

    I’ve always been fascinated by the degree to which the Innkeeper is Villainized in the Pageants I’ve seen (including one where he was basically put in Jewish Clothing right out of Fiddler on the Roof). It more or less depends on how cold people think it was during the birth. If you’ve got a picture of December 25th in Germany or Poland, it would have cruelty. If you’ve got a picture of December 25th weather in Bethlehem as it actually was, rain was *far* more of an issue. If, like some religious groups, you are looking at the weather in April. I think I’d choose the stables…

  • znjs

    And the newest NIV changed it from “inn” to “guest room”. The greek word used, “kataluma” is only used for one other location in the NT – the Upper Room where Jesus observed the Last Supper, which was also noted for being in a private residence, not an inn.

    Some scholars now believe that Joseph when to some relatives place, likely with many other relatives also crashing there. With no room for the privacy that a birth requires they used the place where the families animals were kept. But interestingly enough back at that time animals were often kept inside the house on the ground floor.

    “A small number of flock animals were housed, not in attached exterior sheds, but inside the house in one of the ground floor rooms. Here, animals, tools and agricultural produce were stored. Here, too, food was prepared and possibly consumed. Family sleeping quarters were on the second floor (an upper room). By being inside, the animals were protected from the elements and theft. In addition, their presence provided body heat for cool nights, access to milk for the daily meal and dung as a critical fuel source.”
    http://www.christiananswers.net/q-abr/abr-a012.html

    Also it’s worth noting that Luke 2:6 says “While they were there the time came…” Often shown as happening the same night they arrived – and assumed that way since they were trying to find room at an “inn” – nothing actually suggests that was the case.

    Not really sure how much any of that matters and it doesn’t add anything to your point, but I found it interesting.

  • streiff

    sleeping in barns was not uncommon in rural America in the 19th century and earlier. Often that is where seasonal laborers were bedded down.

    Keeping on livestock on the ground floor in a two story, or even a one story, dwelling was pretty common in southern Europe and the Mediterranean rim.

    On the other hand I think this kind of exegesis on a particular word is dangerous. If it had been common it would not have been remarked upon by either Luke or the subsequent commentaries and sermons by the Church Fathers. It is in the Lucan narrative for a reason, to establish the modest nature of Christ’s birth.

  • znjs

    That why we try to make Jesus’s birth more special and miraculous then it was (being a virgin birth and the son of God and all it was plenty miraculous already) we lose the point of why it happened this way – Jesus came to us in a common ordinary way, approachable by all people including the sheppards. He and his earthly family were just like us. It’s worth noting that there is no mention of the innkeeper, no mention of a stable or cave, just that he was placed in a manger. Also later during the parable of the Good Samaritan Luke uses the work greek word ‘pandocheion’ for inn (as in the place the samaritan took the injured man) instead of kataluma like he does here.

  • streiff

    had a small vocabulary or that Hellenes in 1st Century AD Israel were uneducated. A more likely explanation is that those words are wrong because of other usage is really extreme in light of how early the idea of Christ in a manger had become settled imagery. To get away from that you have to assume that a lot of people made up a story when Occam’s Razor indicates otherwise. As early as 140 AD Justn Martyr made reference to Christ being born in a cave… which were definitely used to house livestock in the region. This by a man who would have been acquainted with people only a generation removed from the Apostles.

  • jakeofalltrades

    I never knew you to be a scriptural exegete, streiff. That’s just awesome.

  • znjs

    And I don’t see how pointing out he used a different word for inn and used kataluma for a non-inn location suggests that he did.

    The point about how old the stable story is is a better argument. That said there are a lot of myths and misunderstanding that have sprung up about the early years of Jesus – the “Infancy Gospels” certainly point to that fact. The Gospel of James (which mentions the cave) but certainly isn’t real was written around 145 AD. Therefore I don’t put much stock in those stories.

  • znjs

    My bad

  • streiff

    drawing an assumption from two uses of a specific word as being anything more than chance is dangerous… unless you are fluent in Greek as it was spoken in 1st century Palestine.

    A modern writer can use the word crib twice in the same story, once being a baby’s bed and another time being the vernacular for a house.

    The dismissal of Gospels written merely a century after a monumental event, like the Crucifixion, as inaccurate has always puzzled me when there are hundreds (conservatively) of scholarly studies showing that in cultures dependent upon an oral tradition that oral recitation is very accurate for several centuries. Stories know to me, received from my grandfather, span well over an hundred years and I’ve verified many of them via newspaper accounts, death records, etc. And he wasn’t talking about know the Son of God.

    And, of course, there is the unknow unknown of what works were created shortly after the Crucifixion and have been lost to us forever. The Q Source, for instance.