Justin's account of the removal of Joseph to Bethlehem is peculiar, and evidently is derived from a distinct un-canonical source. It may be well to present his account and that of Luke side by side:
Attention has already been drawn to the systematic manner in which the Davidic descent of Jesus is traced by Justin through Mary, and to the suppression in this passage of all that might seem to indicate a claim of descent through Joseph. As the continuation of a peculiar representation of the history of the infancy of Jesus, differing materially from that of the Synoptics, it is impossible to regard this, with its remarkable variations, as an arbitrary correction by Justin of the canonical text, and we must hold it to be derived from a different source, perhaps, indeed, one of those from which Luke's Gospel itself first drew the elements of the narrative, and this persuasion increases as further variations in the earlier history, presently to be considered, are taken into account. It is not necessary to enter into the question of the correctness of the date of this census, but it is evident that Justin's Memoirs clearly and deliberately modify the canonical narrative. The limitation of the census to Judæa, instead of extending it to the whole Roman Empire; the designation of Cyrenius as [——]—] of Judaea instead of [——]—] of Syria; and the careful suppression of the Davidic element in connection with Joseph indicate a peculiar written source different from the Synoptics.(1)
Had Justin departed from the account in Luke with the view of correcting inaccurate statements, the matter might have seemed more consistent with the use of the third Gospel, although at the same time it might have evinced but little reverence for it as a canonical
work. On the contrary, however, the statements of Justin are still more inconsistent with history than those in Luke, inasmuch as, so far from being the first procurator of Judsea, as Justin's narrative states in opposition to the third Gospel, Cyrenius never held that office, but was really, later, the imperial proconsul over Syria, and as such, when Judaea became a Roman province after the banishment of Archelaus, had the power to enrol the inhabitants, and instituted Coponius as first Procurator of Judaea. Justin's statement involves the position that at one and the same time Herod was the King, and Cyrenius the Roman Procurator of Judsea.(1) In the same spirit, and departing from the usual narrative of the Synoptics, which couples the birth of Jesus with "the days of Herod the King," Justin in another place states that Christ was born "under Cyrenius."(2) Justin evidently adopts without criticism a narrative which he found in his Memoirs, and does not merely correct and remodel a passage of the third Gospel, but, on the contrary, seems altogether ignorant of it.(3)
The genealogies of Jesus in the first and third Gospels differ irreconcileably from each other. Justin differs from both. In this passage another discrepancy arises. While Luke seems to represent Nazareth as the dwelling-place of Joseph and Mary, and Bethlehem as the city to which they went solely on account of the census,(4)
Matthew, who seems to know nothing of the census, makes Bethlehem, on the contrary, the place of residence of Joseph,(1) and on coming back from Egypt, with the evident intention of returning to Bethlehem, Joseph is warned by a dream to turn aside into Galilee, and he goes and dwells, apparently for the first time, "in a city called Nazareth, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets: He shall be called a Nazarene."(2) Justin, however, goes still further than the third Gospel in his departure from the data of Matthew, and where Luke merely infers, Justin distinctly asserts Nazareth to have been the dwelling-place of Joseph [——]—], and Bethlehem, in contradistinction, the place from which he derived his origin [——]—].3
The same view is to be found in several apocryphal Gospels still extant. In the Protevangelium of James again, we find Joseph journeying to Bethlehem with Mary before the birth of Jesus.(4) The census here is ordered by Augustus, who commands: "That all who were in Bethlehem of Judeæ, should be enrolled."(5) a limitation worthy of notice in comparison with that of Justin. In like manner the Gospel of the Nativity. This Gospel represents the parents of Mary as living in Nazareth, in