After a sojourn of about three months with Elisabeth, Mary returned to Nazareth, and Joseph perceived that she was with child. Being a just man, he resolved on privately giving her a bill of divorcement, instead of making her a _public example_ (Mtt. i. 19). But as in deep perplexity he pondered on these things, he too was visited by an Angel in a dream, and bidden not to be afraid to take to him Mary as his wife. That which was conceived in her was _not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man_, but of the Holy Ghost, and the SON, to whom she would give birth, he was to name JESUS, for _He should save His people from their sins_ (Mtt. i. 21). Meanwhile the event announced in the Temple to the aged Zacharias had taken place, and Elisabeth brought forth a son. Such an event in the East is always an occasion of unbounded joy. In the present instance it would be still more so, and the relatives and neighbours of Elisabeth came together with no ordinary feelings to rejoice with her. On the eighth day, the child was brought to the priest for circumcision, and the relatives proposed that it should be named after his father, but Elisabeth demurred, and declared that it should be called JOHN (_the grace of God_). Marvelling at her wishing for a name, which had no precedent in the family, they appealed by signs to the speechless Zacharias. The aged priest called for a writing tablet, and wrote _His name is John_, and then, while all were lost in astonishment, his mouth, which had been closed for nine months, was opened, and he too burst forth into an inspired Psalm of exultant thanksgiving, in which he acknowledged the faithfulness of God in the birth of his son, and foretold his future greatness as the forerunner of the Messiah (Lk. i. 61–79). Born as _one out of due time_ the child grew, _waxed strong in spirit_ (Lk. i. 80), and, in accordance with the words of the Angel, adhered steadfastly to the Nazarite vow[193]. Like Samson, like Samuel, no razor was suffered to come near his head. Drinking _neither wine nor strong drink_, he systematically denied himself all the pleasures and indulgences of ordinary life. The son of a priest, he doubtless received a strict religious education, and at some period, though when we are not told, retired to the dreary deserts west of the Dead Sea. Here, like Moses in Midian, he prepared himself by solitary communion with God for his high emprise, assumed the garb of one of the old prophets, the robe of camel’s hair fastened round the body by a leathern girdle (2 K. i. 8), and subsisted on such fare as the desert afforded, eating _locusts[194] and wild honey_ (Mtt. iii. 4). CHAPTER II. _THE NATIVITY OF CHRIST._ A.U.C. 750, B.C. 4.