Was jesus born in a stable because all the hotels were full what with it being christmas?
They didn’t have hotels. Despite the odd translation, they didn’t have inns as we’d know them. The Hebrew people of the time were semi-nomadic. They generally lived in houses, but were prepared to camp out, especially when they had to make long journeys. The establishment mentioned in Luke’s gospel was what we’d now call a caravanserai or secure camp site. There was a walled yard where you camped with your camel, donkey or whatever. The innkeeper would have a house on the premises and you could rent a room in his house if you were posh – but there weren’t enough rooms for all his customers. So Mary, Joseph plus donkey arrived at a caravanserai in Bethlehem and the innkeeper had let all his rooms. The “no room at the inn” in the KJV meant there wasn’t a room. Language has changed so that “no room” now means something different. Mary gave birth while they were camping in the yard, so what did they do? They laid the baby in a manger – these were folding feed holders that would have been a
