Retelling the Bible

1.5 A Stark Warning

Mary and Joseph, on their way to Bethlehem, pass through a village that has been recently destroyed. As they search through the rubble and ruins, trying to understand what has taken place, they are confronted with a frightening truth and realize how dangerous this journey of theirs may prove to be.

1.4 The Stranger

A stranger comes to the village of Nazareth in this retelling of the Christmas Story (specifically the story of the Annunciation) that will help you understand both the historical context of Luke's nativity story and the use he is making of Old Testament imagery and ideas.

1.3 The Betrothal

The formal betrothal of Mary and Joseph is something alluded to in the gospels but it is never described. First-century readers and listeners would have had some clear ideas of what such a betrothal would have looked like so I have taken the opportunity to fill in the background with a relatable story of how Mary and Joseph came to be engaged.

Music:

“AhDah” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

"Ascending the Vale” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

1.2 The Region between Samaria and Galilee

Mary and Joseph are traveling toward their goal in Bethlehem when they come into a region -- the region between Galilee and Samaria -- that highlights the volatile political times in which they are living. This episode will help you to understand the historical circumstances in which the Gospel of Luke describes the birth of Jesus taking place.

Episode 1: The Journey as it is usually seen

This is the first episode in the new "Retelling the Bible" Podcast.

We will spend the first season retelling the story of the birth of Jesus as it is told in the Gospel of Luke, focussing specifically on the journey that Luke says that Mary and Joseph took from Nazareth to Bethlehem. This story raises all kinds of historical questions and makes me wonder how its author really meant for people to understand it. I suspect that we have largely missed many of the points that Luke was trying to make.

We start out in this episode by looking at the ways in which the story has traditionally been understood and seeing some of the problems with that traditional understanding.