The most ancient Fathers and teachers of the Church, who mention the year of the Nativity of Christ (Justin Martyr and Tertullian), speak of this in general vaguely. The Roman monk Dionysius, who lived in the VI century, nicknamed the Lesser, considers the year of birth of Jesus Christ to be the 754th year from the foundation of Rome; This year was accepted by Christians as the beginning of a new chronology. Later research, however, proved that Dionysius was mistaken. According to the testimony of the Jewish historian Josephus, a contemporary of the destruction of Jerusalem, Herod the Great, in whose reign Jesus Christ was born, was appointed to the throne by decree of the Roman Senate in the year 714 from the founding of Rome and died 37 years later, 8 days before Easter, shortly after the lunar eclipse (Antiquities of the Jews, Book 17), but since the 37th year of Herod's reign corresponded to the year 750, According to astronomical calculations, the lunar eclipse occurred on the night of March 13-14, 750, and the Jewish Passover in that year fell on April 12, then it must be recognized that Herod, king of the Jews, died at the beginning of April, 750 from the foundation of Rome, and that, consequently, Jesus Christ was born before the year 750. For a more accurate determination of the year of birth of Jesus Christ, the following data are used:

a) The Evangelist Luke testifies that the Baptism of Jesus Christ by John took place on the fifteenth... the year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, and that at that time Jesus was about thirty years old (Luke 3:1, 23); but since Augustus accepted Tiberius as co-emperor two years before his death, in January 765, and, consequently, the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius began in January 779, and Jesus Christ was then, according to the expression of the Evangelist, thirty years old, it must be admitted that the birth of Jesus Christ should have followed no earlier than 748 and no later than 749; and

b) all the Evangelists testify that Jesus Christ was crucified on Friday, the day of the Jewish Passover; and since, according to astronomical calculations, the year 783 was the only one at which the Jewish Passover (always celebrated from the evening of the 14th day of the first spring lunar month of Nisan) was to fall on Friday, April 7, it must be admitted that Jesus Christ was crucified on April 7, 783. If He was then thirty-four years old, then He was born in the year 748, and if He was then only thirty-three years old or thirty-four years old, then He was born in the year 749 from the foundation of Rome. Therefore, some researchers consider the 748th, while others consider the 749th year from the foundation of Rome to be the year of the birth of Jesus Christ. Thus, the Dionysian chronology lags behind the more accurate one by at least five and no more than six years.

At the time of the birth of Jesus Christ, Palestine was part of the Roman Empire, and it was ruled by the Edomite Herod, who was called the king of the Jews, by appointment of the Roman emperor. Thus, the scepter (royal power) departed from the descendants of Judah, and, therefore, according to the prediction of Jacob, the time came for the coming of the Mediator (Gen. 49:1, 10); it also came because the weeks of Daniel were coming to an end (see Introduction, pp. 71-74). Everything spoke for the imminent appearance of the promised Deliverer-Christ-Messiah, and the Jews were waiting for Him to appear and deliver them from the hated Roman yoke.

At that time, among the priests serving at the temple of Jerusalem, was the aged Zachariah. Probably, there were many priests of the same name, because the Evangelist Luke, speaking about him, considered it necessary to add that he was from the Abian family (Luke 1:5). At first only the descendants of Eleazar and Ithamar, the sons of Aaron, were appointed to serve at the tabernacle, but when these descendants multiplied and, as a result, it was necessary to establish a queue between the priests in the performance of their duties, David divided them into 24 sections, so that they would perform the service every week; These queues were observed even after the construction of the temple, to which the tabernacle was transferred.

Although Zachariah and his aged wife Elizabeth were distinguished not only by their strict observance of all the commandments and statutes, but also by their highly moral life and true righteousness, they were childless, and this was considered God's punishment for sins among the Jews.

Once, when Zachariah was serving at the temple, he had to go out to burn incense in the Sanctuary of the temple.

The Structure of the Jerusalem Temple

The Temple of Jerusalem was originally built by Solomon, but was destroyed during the conquest of Judah by Nebuchadnezzar. After the return of the Jews from the Babylonian captivity, another temple of the same size was built on the same site, but of a smaller size. This second temple consisted of two parts, separated by a veil: the Holy of Holies, to which the high priest entered once a year on the feast of purification, and the Holy or Sanctuary, into which the priest entered daily, morning and evening, for incense, chosen by lot from among all the priests of the next order. This church stood on a vast quadrangular square, surrounded on all sides by a high wall; inside, galleries or narthexes covered on marble columns were attached to the outer walls; the narthex on the eastern side was called the narthex of Solomon. The square on which the temple stood was divided by low walls into courtyards: for women, for Israelites, and for priests; all the space between these courtyards and narthexes was called the court of the pagans, since the pagans were not allowed to go further than this court. The women's court was so called because it was intended exclusively for Jewish women, who were not allowed either in the courtyard of the Israelites or in the courtyard of the priests. The court of the Israelites, which could only be entered, was separated by a low wall from the court of the priests. The priests' courtyard surrounded the temple building itself on three sides; In this courtyard there was an altar on which the established sacrifices were offered. Thus, all those who came to the Temple in Jerusalem prayed outside the temple, in various courtyards surrounding it; even the priests were outside the church during the service and entered it only for a short time to burn incense.

It was into this church, or rather into one of its two sections, the Holy Temple, that Zachariah was to enter for incense. There was an altar on which the priest lit fragrant smoking powder; in the position and ignition of the powder consisted of incense.

When Zechariah entered the Holy Place and began to perform his duties, he saw an angel.

The appearance of the angel to the priest Zachariah; About angels in general

Those who do not believe in the existence of angels, and consequently in the possibility of their appearance to people, say that the imagination of people with shattered nerves sometimes presents themselves with objects which, although they do not exist in reality, nevertheless seem to them to exist. They call the appearance of the angel Zechariah the same seeming vision.

Without denying that the imagination of people suffering from nervous disorders may present pictures that do not correspond to reality, we believe, however, that the question of angels is not exhausted by such an objection. Thinking about the creation of man, endowed with the spark of divine Reason, one involuntarily asks the question: did God stop in His creative activity at the creation of man as a being above whom nothing can be? No matter how great the mind of a true man is, however, even between a man of genius and God there is a great, immeasurable abyss. Are there really no other beings who would stand between man and God? Both the mind and the heart prompt us to answer this question: there must be beings more God-like than man, who stand closer to God than man is placed, and who comprehend the essence of God more than is accessible to us. In addition to reason, man is given free will and the divine voice of conscience. With these qualities of the soul, he can strive for the perfection available to him, a certain likeness to God. But no matter what degree of perfection he has attained, even the highest, he still remains a being bound by his bodily shell, chained to his earthly lot. Must there be other, higher beings, standing outside the laws of gravitation and space, those laws to which the human body, as well as all animals and all inanimate objects, are equally subject? The study of nature leads to the inevitable conclusion that the strict sequence in the creation of living creatures, beginning with the plant cell (biblical greenery) and reaching man, must have continued even further and stopped at the creation of the world of spirits [3].