# The biblical scene

In this painting, Brueghel uses the episode of the census recounted in the Gospel of Saint Luke (Chapter 2, verses 1 to 5) as a pretext for constructing a scene of Flemish life:

> " In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. This was the first census that took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria. And everyone went to their own town to register. So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child."

This was the moment when the emperor organized a major census of the population. Joseph is forced to travel to his home town to register with his pregnant wife, Mary. Although the actual date of Christ's birth is unknown, Christian tradition places it on the very evening of Mary and Joseph's arrival, on the night of December 24-25. That's why Brueghel places this biblical scene in winter, in the midst of the hustle and bustle of peasant life. Mary and Joseph are almost invisible in the midst of the crowd, the hustle and bustle and all the details. This anonymous arrival reveals the very essence of the Incarnation, symbolizing that the Son of God arrived on Earth humbly, as a Man among Men.