There is, however, some evidence, more or less cir- cumstantial, in conKrmation of Luke's statement. (I.) The inference drawn from the silence of historians may be legitimately met by an inference drawn from the
silence of objectors. It never occurred to Celsus or Lu- cian or Porphyry, each questioning all that he could in the Gospel histor}', to question this. (2.) A remarkable passage in Suidas (s. v. ' Airoypacpi]) mentions a census, obviously differing from the three of the Ancyran mon- ument, and agreeing, in some respects, with that of Luke. It was made by Augustus, not as censor, but by his own imperial authority (Oo^ai^ aunp; comp. i|()\.&£ Soji-ia, Luke ii, 1). The returns were collected by twenty commissioners of high rank. They included property as well as population, and extended over the whole empire. (3.) TertuUian, incitlentally, writing controversiallv, not against a heathen, but against Mar- cion, appeals to the returns of tlie census for Syria un- der Sentius Saturninus as accessible to all who cared to search them, and proving the birth of Jesus in the city of David (TertuU. A dv. Marc, iv, 19). Whatever difficul- ty the difference of names may present [see CviiENius], here is, at any rate, a strong indication of the fact of a census of population, cir. A.U.C. 749, and therefore in harmony with Luke's narrative. (4.) Greswell {Harm. i, 476; iv, 6) has pointed to some circumstances men- tioned by Josephus in the last year of Herod's life, and therefore coinciding with the time of the Nativity, which imply some special action of the Roman govern- ment in Syria, the nature of which the historian care- lessly or deliberately suppresses. When Herod attends the council at Berytus there are mentioned as present, besides Saturninus and the procurator, oi ntpi Htcdviov ■jrp'tajiuc, as if the officer thus named had come, ac- companied by other commissioners, for some purpose which gave him for the time almost co-ordinate influ- ence with the governor of Syria himself ( War, i, 27, 2). Just after this again, Herod, for some unexplained rea- son, found it necessary to administer to the whole peo- ple an oath, not of allegiance to himself, but of good-will to the emperor; and this oath six thousand of the Pharisees refused to take (Josephus, Ant. xvii, 2, 4; War, i, 29, 2). This statement implies, it is urged, some disturbing cause affecting the public tranquillity, a formal appearance of all citizens before the king's officers, and lastly, some measure specially distasteful to the Pharisees. The narrative of Luke offers an unde- signed explanation of these phenomena.
2. As a further objection, it is urged that Palestine was, at this time, an independent kingdom under Herod, and therefore would not have come under the operation of an imperial edict.
This objection admits of as satisfactory an answer as the foregoing. The statistical document already re- ferred to included subject kingdoms and allies, no less than the provinces (Sueton. foe. ciV.). If Augustus had any desire to know the resources of Jud;Ba, the position of Herod made him neither willing nor able to resist. From first to last we meet with repeated instances of subservience. He does not dare to try or punish his sons, but refers their cause to the emperor's cognizance (Josephus, Ant. xvi, 4, 1 ; xvii, 5, 8). He holds his kingdom on condition of paying a fixed tribute. Per- mission is ostentatiously given him to dispose of the succession to his throne as he likes best {ihid. xvi, 4, 5). He binds his people, as we have seen, by an oath of allegiance to the emperor (ibid, xvii, 2, 4). The threat of Augustus that he would treat Herod no longer as an ally, but as a subject {ibid, xvi, 9, 3), would be followed naturally enough by some such step as this, and tlie de- sire of Herod to regain his favor would lead him to ac- quiesce in it.
3. Another objection alleged is that if such a meas- ure, involving the recognition of Koman sovereignty, had been attempted under Herod, it would have roused the same resistance as the undisputed census under Quirinus did at a later period.
In reply to this, we may say that we need not won- der that the measure should have been carried into ef- fect without any popular outbreak. It was a return of the population only, not a valuation of property; tbere
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was no immediate taxation as the consequence. It might oftend a parly like the Pharisees; it was not likely to excite tlie multitude. Kven if it seemed to some the prognosticatimi of a coming change, and of direct government by the Homan emperor, we know that there was a large and iiitliR'iitial party ready to welcome tliat cliaiigc as the best tiling that could hap- pen for its country (.(o.sephus. Ant. xvii, 11, 2).
4. The stateuR'nt of Luke that "all went to be taxed, every one into his own city," is said to be inconsistent with the rules of the lioman census, which took cogni- zance of the place of residence only, not of the place of birth.
Oil the other hand, this afiparent inconsistency of what Luke narrates is precisely what might be expected un- der the known circumstances of the case. The census, though Roman in origin, was effected by Jewish instru- mentality, and was in harmony, therefore, with Jewish customs. The alleged practice is, however, doubtful; and it has been maintained (Huschke, Ueber den Census, etc., in Winer, s. v. " Schatzung") that the inhabitants of the provinces were, as far as possible, registered in their /orum orir/inig — not in the place in which they were only residents. It may be noticed incidentally that the journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem belongs to a time when Galilee and Jud;ea were under the same ruler, and would therefore have been out of the question (as the subject of one prince would certainly not be regis- tered as belonging to another) after the death of Herod the Great. The circumstances of the Nativity indicate, if they do not prove, that Joseph went there only for personal enrolment, not because he was the possessor of house or land.