Of course nothing, Musicmic. The God angle was slipped in following the crucifixion. Until then Jesus had been followed as a descendent in the royal bloodline, with an ancestry going back to Abraham, through David. And going back through.... not Mary but Joseph, with whom Jesus was unrelated according to anyone who thinks he was the son of God.

You're right that the Romans at that time didn't give a toss about which gods got worshipped. (Christianity was the first truly intolerant creed, which was specifically why the Roman empire later found it so useful to embrace: see for instance "Decline & Fall of the Roman Empire" by Gibbon, chapters 15 & 16.) But they gave short shrift to countless thousands who got in their way, and especially to anyone who looked like being a focal point for insurrection.

Remember that the new church had to establish itself under that Roman occupancy. Developing the cult of Jesus, King of the Jews, would not have been a good bet. Jesus, son of God, was always likely to play better with the occupying forces. Look at the story of the last supper. The first recorded mention of it came some 30 years after the event, and not from anyone who was there, but in a letter attributed to Paul. Paul had spent the years since the supper in the company of apostles, including Peter, proselytising Christianity. Yet not a single eye-witness disciple had ever thought to mention the bread-and-wine ritual. Paul eventually heard about it not from any one of them, but directly from God, in a vision!

If you don't know the bible, Musicmic, take my word: it may be tosh, but it's calculated tosh. And so far as the new testament goes, anti-semeticism and misogyny are part of the calculation. Read the synoptic gospels - or at least Luke - on the Ciaphas/Pilate stuff and the stereotyping couldn't be plainer: the Romans are sweet reason and the Jews are a baying, vengeful lynch mob.

It's just fortunate that wherever they ran up again history, the writers didn't bother doing their homework, and their yarns quickly unravel. Thus there is no historical reason that could have taken Mary and Joseph from home to Bethlehem; no such Roman custom as that whereby Barabbas was released from detention, etc, etc......

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John Hindsill, thanks so much for that learned critique of Chomsky's works, or at least those unspecified ones that you've read. Beats me how I ever saw them any other way.