Ascension of Christ

[smoothmoniker]

Originally Posted by Bullitt

… since that was the closest major city to Nazareth and vwala.

They had to go to Bethlehem because the census was organized by family lineage, and Joseph (and Mary, for that matter) was from the lineage of King David, whose hometown was Bethlehem.

From the time David took the throne until the first exportation of the Jews to Babylon, there were at least 13 recorded generations. From the time of the exportation until the time of the census, there were about another 13 generations. And all of those people from all of those family lines were all crammed back into Bethlehem for the census. It probably explains why there was “no room at the inn” for Mary – they were probably lucky to get a barn!

-sm