This week the bit player is Caesar, who does not really make an appearance, but his demand that Joseph come to Bethlehem to register sets the stage for Jesus being born there.
Why in the midst of the narrative of Jesus' birth, why the focus on historical details? Every storyteller knows that some concrete details lends credibility to the story, so perhaps Luke wants to give Jesus' story a credible setting? Or maybe Luke is trying to clarify why Jesus ended up in Bethlehem?
It certainly establishes the fact that Jesus begins his life among the displaced people, who are strangers to the place where they are, and subject oo the whims of the world.
it also reminds us that the Roman Empire was the big dog in the neighborhood
It also sets up the symbolism: Caesar controls Rome; Quirinius controls Syria; no one controls God. God can arrive anywhere, even in a manger.
Thomas Long describes Mary and Joseph in this way: "They are faceless nobodies under the boot of an uncaring empire. Their only hope -- if have any hope at all -- is not in Caesar Augustus, who commands their trek, but in the God of Israel, who accompanies them even when they walk through the valley of the shadow of death" (12/10/14 Christian Century, 21).
I think Long's reference to walking through the valley of the shadow of death plays off of Psalm 23 (obviously), but also references the fact that the walk to Bethlehem would have been difficult with challenges along the way.
By placing the story of Jesus in a concrete historical time, Luke reminds us that God intrudes in history -- Jesus' story is not a fairy tale; not a fable; but an historical event.
Psalm 126 recalls a specific time when God acted in history and calls on God to do so again.
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