Luke 2:1. In those days. Indefinite; about the time of the birth of John the Baptist.

There went out a decree, an authoritative edict. When it was issued is not of primary importance; it affected Joseph and Mary ‘in those days.'

All the world, i.e., the Roman world. We should not, to avoid difficulty, limit it to Palestine.

Should be enrolled. Such an enrolment was like a modem census; but as the ultimate purpose was taxation, there was a record of property. The word here used, it is claimed by some, has always a reference to tax-lists, as distinguished from a mere census with a view to recruiting the army. Luke, therefore, might properly use this term, even though at the time there was no avowal of the proposed taxing. Afterwards when a regular registration for taxation took place, according to Josephus, an uproar occurred (alluded to by Luke in Acts 5:37); hence an avowal of the purpose at an earlier date, while Herod was still king, would have occasioned a disturbance; but of such a disturbance about this time there is no record. If we accept the enrolment as resembling a modern census, all difficulty vanishes, for Augustus ordered such an enrolment at least three times during his reign, and in statistics prepared by him, as we certainly know, there was a record of the population of countries ruled by dependent kings, such as Herod. It is true, the date of no one of these enrolments corresponds with that assigned to the birth of Christ, but some time would elapse before Judea would be subjected to the provisions of such an edict. At the death of Augustus a paper prepared by him, containing full statistics of the empire, was read before the Roman Senate. This implies a census of the population of Judea some time before the death of Augustus (A. D. 14). The later census under Quirinius (A. D. 6), which seems to have been specifically for the purpose of taxation, probably did not furnish the statistics from Judea for the paper of the emperor. Augustus ordered his first census of the Roman people in the year of Rome 726, and he would scarcely leave this important kingdom out of view until U.C. 759 (the date of the census of Judea under Quirinius, mentioned by Josephus). During the whole of this period it was dependent upon Rome (under Herod and Archelaus).

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Old Testament