Question re timing of Jesus birth

Every time I look at you I don't understand
Why you let the things you did get so out of your hand
You'd have managed better if you'd had it planned
Why'd you choose such a backward time and such a strange land?
If you'd come today you would have reached a whole nation
Israel in 4 BC had no mass communication
Don't you get me wrong - I only wanna know

Super double plus cool frank.

Jesus Christ, superstar.

One of my very top favorites!

The timing has everything to do with the Roman Empire and its all-pervasive political power over almost all of Europe, North Africa and what we call the Near East. It has nothing whatever to do with God. The development of Christianity was spurred, in part at least, by the fact that a whole lot of very disparate cultures were now more or less united under one banner, i.e. the war eagle and the fasces of imperial Rome. Coincidentally, Judea was one of those outlying Roman territories and the creed of its population of Hebrews had evolved into a monotheistic belief, akin to an ancient Egyptian belief, which posited the coming of a Messiah who would bring the kingdom of Heaven down here to earth. Another coincidence -- one of the people to pick up on this whole notion of spreading the word of an obscure Rabbi from Nazareth beyond the borders of Judea happened to be a super-salesman. That was Saul of Tarsus, a Roman citizen of Jewish extraction whom we now call Saint Paul. The time and the place were ideal for a message of love, peace and redemption and Saul sold it well.

Please refer all other questions to Frank.

The simple answer is: he didn't. There likely is no God. There very much likely iit a god that concerns itself with humans.

Nothing gets by you, does it?

You make a good point, mp. Even if we stipulate that there is a God, why would we assume that the timing of that God's acts has anything at all to do with human technological development? What does the printing press or the internet have to do with a religious message delivered at a time and place where such a message stood a chance of being favorably received? Those who believe in such a God would say that things happen on God's terms, not according to human will.

But, why would a God with any type of intelligence choose such an ineffectual time?

Why not? If we posit an omniscient and omnipotent god, we have to also assume that the 'thought-processes' (for lack of a better term) are quite incomprehensible to the puny human mind.

Good point, Andrew,

In fact, even if it were a not especially omniscient or omnipotent god...might it not be that we humans are unable to comprehend its thought processes.

Suppose what we call "our universe" is just the design of some being in a megaverse...some chemistry student in a megaverse university...not omniscient or omnipotent...but pretty goddam powerful...

...we humans might be unable to comprehend its thought process.

Merry Christmas! To you and everyone.

Hypothetically, maybe a few thousand years is like the blink of an eye to him and he has motives you don't understand. If you were talking about extraterrestrial aliens, you would probably concede that they might have motives which you don't understand, so why is that less likely with an infinite intelligence? I should make it very clear that I think the whole thing is mostly fiction and am only playing the devil's advocate.

MA has the best response here. Without Saul of Tarsus, this was an insignificant cult which was going nowhere and would likely have faded away in a generation or two.