31.] The population of Galilee was very mixed, as the very name of the country[1] indicated.

This province counted amongst its inhabitants, in the time of Jesus, many who were not Jews (Phoenicians, Syrians, Arabs, and even Greeks).[2] The conversions to Judaism were not rare in these mixed countries.

It is therefore impossible to raise here any question of race, and to seek to ascertain what blood flowed in the veins of him who has contributed most to efface the distinction of blood in humanity.
[Footnote 1: _Gelil haggoyim_, "Circle of the Gentiles."] [Footnote 2: Strabo, XVI.ii.

35; Jos., _Vita_, 12.] He proceeded from the ranks of the people.[1] His father, Joseph, and his mother, Mary, were people in humble circumstances, artisans living by their labor,[2] in the state so common in the East, which is neither ease nor poverty.

The extreme simplicity of life in such countries, by dispensing with the need of comfort, renders the privileges of wealth almost useless, and makes every one voluntarily poor.