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Rome
This is one of the few place names which can evoke a variety of events and of people; common knowledge among even many ill-educated people. A huge empire, a powerful army, a rudimentary democracy, very quickly subverted as aristocratic power increased and the wealth of the few also increased, ending with the tyrannical rule of the Caesars through a subservient parliament (Senate).
So we have the empire into which Jesus was born. The nominal rulers of the part of the empire where Jesus lived , such as Pilate, Herod and his brother Philip, enforced Roman power and - their main function - collected tribute and taxes for the imperial treasury. The primary function of the empire was to be a source of wealth with which to buy food and finance entertainment for the Romans, the entertainment being primarily the brutal 'games' which set gladiator fatally against gladiator or men (prisoners of war, trained killers) against wild animals.
Very little of this is mentioned in the New Testament. Those who recorded the history of the Gospel times presumably assumed that their readers, who lived in the Empire, would know what its society was like, so why describe it? In any event it would have been fatal for anyone who described it truthfully.
We shall shortly be hearing the Christmas story, the familiar carols, others not so familiar. A time for celebrating - but is it not also a time to reflect on much more? It is some 2000 years since the advent of Christ and the message of peace and goodwill but our world is in many ways, even in different ways, just as brutal, just as tyrannical as at the time of Christ's birth.
This does not mean, I suggest, that it is time we gave up and let the world drift on to its destruction. On the contrary, we need to celebrate even more joyfully, for it is not we who are given to the world, but Christ. To that same world of which we are a part, to which we have given or helped to give its sinful condition, Christ comes to offer us forgiveness and, in place of our world, the Kingdom of Heaven if we accept the forgiveness offered.
Bob Mclean
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