The Great Christ Comet (6 page)

Matthew 2:1–12: A Detailed Look

We shall now walk through Matthew 2:1–12 in a bid to understand the story of the Magi more precisely and to glean a more detailed profile of the Star.

The visit of the Magi took place in the wake of the birth of Jesus. Verse 1 states, “Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, magi from the east came to Jerusalem.” The sequence of events makes good sense, since the Magi have come to Jerusalem on account of witnessing a celestial sign that they have interpreted as announcing the birth of the King of the Jews.

Jesus's Birth: The Place

The town where Jesus was born is identified here for the first time as Bethlehem. This prepares for verses 4–6, where the chief priests inform Herod that the Messiah was, according to the prophet Micah, to be born in Bethlehem. The town had strong Davidic connections. As the book of Ruth makes plain, Bethlehem was where Boaz and Ruth, David's great-grandparents, met and married and bore David's grandfather Obed. Moreover, it was in Bethlehem that Obed fathered Jesse and that Jesse fathered David.

Matthew highlights that Bethlehem was “of Judea.” It is possible that “of Judea” is
intended to distinguish the Bethlehem just south of Jerusalem from the Bethlehem in Galilee,
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or that it is merely a stereotypical phrase. However, it is more likely that it anticipates verses 5–6, which quote Micah's prophecy to the effect that the Messiah would be born in the territory of the tribe of Judah, ultimately recalling Genesis 49:9–10 (“Judah is a lion's cub. . . . The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between his feet, until tribute comes to him; and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples”).

Jesus's Birth: The Time

The time when Jesus was born is defined as being “in the days of Herod the king” (Matt. 2:1), referring to Herod the Great. Although there is some debate, it is generally believed that Herod died in 4 BC. Coins minted under the reign of Herod's sons date to 4 BC, indicating that this was indeed the year of Herod the Great's death. Moreover, Josephus,
Ant.
17.6.4 (§§164–167), informs us that there was a lunar eclipse less than a month before the Passover that presaged Herod's death, and the only plausible candidate is the partial lunar eclipse on the night of March 12–13 in 4 BC
(during which year Passover fell on April 11). Herod, then, passed away at the end of March or beginning of April in 4 BC. In order to accommodate the events of Matthew 2:12–18, it seems best to conclude that Jesus's birth took place in either 6 BC or 5 BC. A date in either of these years would be compatible with Luke 3:23's statement that Jesus began his ministry (in the late 20s AD) when he was “about thirty years of age,” which would readily accommodate an age of up to 34.

It must be understood that the BC/AD (BCE/CE) system with which we are so familiar was built on the work of Dionysius Exiguus, a sixth-century Scythian monk. Unfortunately, in his dating of Jesus's nativity he made a couple of miscalculations which mean that, contrary to what one might have expected, the birth of Jesus does not correspond to the year 0 (zero). First, the monk did not include a year 0, so that one moves from 1 BC straight to AD 1. Second, he failed to take into consideration the four years when Caesar Augustus reigned under his original name Octavian. Consequently, even before considering the Biblical evidence, the BC/AD transition is off target by 5 years.

The Magi's Entry into Jerusalem

The use of “behold” in association with the entry of the Magi into Jerusalem (Matt. 2:1) highlights that it was a memorable marvel.

The Procession of Magi in AD 66.
As noted at the beginning of this chapter, the journey of the Magi in Matthew's account was similar to a journey by another group of magi some seven decades later—the procession of Tiridates and the magi to Nero in Italy in AD 66. Tiridates, the king of Armenia, his royal court, a train of servants, three Parthian royal sons, and 3,000 Parthian horsemen made “a quasi-triumphal procession through the whole country west from the Euphrates” to Italy (Cassius Dio 63.1–2).
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The presence of magi is mentioned by Pliny the Elder,
Natural History
30.6.16–17. The procession lasted nine months in total, and the traveling party was greeted with fanfare and acclamations as it passed through various towns and cities (Cassius Dio 63.2). Upon meeting Nero, Tiridates “knelt down upon the ground, and with arms crossed called him master and did obeisance” (63.2).
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Later on, at a public celebration at the Forum, Tiridates repeated his gesture of obeisance to Nero, as the emperor
was seated on his curule chair on the Rostra, wearing triumphal dress (Suetonius,
Nero
13; Cassius Dio 63.2). Then Tiridates formally addressed Nero: “Master, I am the descendant of Arsaces, brother of the princes Vologaesus and Pacorus, and your slave. And I have come to you, my deity, to worship you as I do Mithra. The destiny you spin for me shall be mine; for you are my Fortune and my Fate” (63.4–5).
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We would not expect the procession of the Magi at the time of Jesus's birth to be anywhere near as large or dramatic as that of Tiridates in AD 66. At the same time, there may well have been more than three Magi in the visiting party. Regardless of how many Magi there were, the extraordinary sight of them entering Jerusalem must have lived long in the memories of all who witnessed it.

What Were “Magi”?
Matthew refers to the visitors as “magi.” As Brown puts it, “the term ‘magi' refers to those engaged in occult arts and covers a wide range of astronomers, fortune tellers, priestly augurers, and magicians of varying plausibility.”
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The Greek version of Daniel by Theodotion uses the word to translate Hebrew and Aramaic terms for “enchanters” (NIV, ESV), “conjurers” (NASB), or “astrologers” (KJV; NET) (Dan. 1:20; 2:2, 10, 27; 4:7; 5:7, 11, 15). In Matthew 2, where the focus is so strongly on a star's behavior, it is clear that the “magi” in view are first and foremost professional astronomers and astrologers.
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Their lives were dedicated to gleaning from the heavens insights concerning human affairs. It was evidently as they were making their normal astronomical observations that they saw the Star.

There can be no serious doubt that the Magi were Gentiles.
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The fact that the visitors are described as “magi” does not necessitate that the celestial phenomenon they witnessed was astrological in nature. It only suggests that they were in the habit of examining the heavens for astrological information. What precisely they saw and its interpretation cannot be prejudged on the basis of the identity of the beholding eyes. Certainly, as Plummer highlighted, “There is not one word in the narrative to indicate that the Magi did wrong in drawing inferences from what they saw in the heavens, or that their knowledge of the birth of the Messiah was obtained from evil spirits or by the practice of any black art.”
25
Astrology is condemned in the Hebrew Scriptures (Jer. 10:1–2; cf. Deut. 18:9–14; Isa. 47:13). If we assume, as would seem wise, that Matthew adhered to the established Scriptural and official Jewish stance toward astrology,
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then he could hardly have believed that the sign witnessed by the Magi was fundamentally astrological in nature. It may have had meaning to astrologers, but its correct interpretation probably did not require astrological knowledge. This, of course, begs the question,
What could they have seen that so impacted them but did not require astrological training to understand?

The East.
The Magi hailed from “the east” (Matt. 2:1). The country from which the Magi came is much debated, with scholars suggesting Arabia, Persia/Parthia, and Bab­ylon.

Arabia?
Arabia has often been proposed,
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largely due to the fact that it was sometimes said to be in the east (Gen. 10:30; Judg. 6:3; Job 1:3; Isa. 11:14; Ezek. 25:4, 10) and because of the reference in Isaiah 60:6 (cf. Ps. 72:10, 15) to people from the Arabian Peninsula (Midian, Ephah, and Sheba) in the eschatological era making a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, during which they bring “gold and frankincense.” However, while Matthew may well have Isaiah 60:6 in view as he writes, he is hardly claiming that this prophecy was completely fulfilled by the Magi who visited Jesus at his birth; consequently, it is unwise to read Isaiah's mention of Arabia into Matthew 2:1. At most, Matthew is presenting the Magi's coming as an anticipation of what would take place in the future. Moreover, as Keener points out, “In most accounts Magi hail from Persia or Bab­ylon (e.g., Cic.
De Leg.
2.10.26; Philo,
Spec.
3.100;
Prob
. 74; Dio Chrys.
Or.
36; Lucian,
Runaways
8; Diog Laert. 8.1.3; Char.
Chaer
. 5.9.4; Philost.
V.A.
1.24).”
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Persia?
A number of scholars have favored Persia as the place from which the Magi set out on their journey.
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Certainly Persia is located in the east and was associated with astrology and astronomy, although we know next to nothing about astronomy/astrology in Persia in that period.
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Bab­ylon?
The other possibility is Bab­ylon.
31
Bab­ylon is to the east of Judea and was described as being so by ancients (for example,
Assumption of Moses
3:13, where “the land of the east” is Bab­ylon). Moreover, the fact that the Magi seem to have been familiar with Jewish prophecies and traditions is more readily explicable if they hailed from Bab­ylonia, since there was a significant population of Diaspora Jews there. In addition, as the book of Daniel makes abundantly clear, magi had long been associated with Bab­ylon (Dan. 2:2, 10). Bab­ylon was an important Parthian city and a renowned international center of astronomy.
32
We have many Bab­ylo­nian astronomical almanacs from the third century BC to the first century AD. They reflect an excellent knowledge of the celestial realm. Also in favor of Bab­ylon as the home of the Magi is the fact that, as Eric Bishop points out, the formidable trio of Origen, Jerome, and Augustine all believed this.
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The opinions of Origen and Jerome are especially weighty, since these men spent a lot of time in Palestine and Jerome even lived in Bethlehem for more than thirty years.
34

I suggest, therefore, that the Magi may well have come from Bab­ylon.

Bab­ylon at the Turn of the Era.
What can we say about Bab­ylon at the turn of the era?

First, the city was still very much inhabited. As T. Boiy points out, “All miscellaneous sources concerning Bab­ylon after 60 BC together clearly prove that there still
was habitation in Bab­ylon until at least the third century AD.”
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Second, it had a sizable Jewish population. Josephus,
Ant
. 15.2.2 (§14), referring to Parthian king Phraates IV's decision to let Hyrcanus II (an old ally of Herod the Great) establish his residence in Bab­ylon around 40 BC, comments that it was “a place where many Jews lived.”
36
Josephus also mentions that at times Jews in Bab­ylon suffered persecution, leading some to emigrate to Seleucia (
Ant
. 18.9.8 [§373]). Philo (
Legatio ad Gaium
31, line 216) states that, in the days of Emperor Caligula (AD 37–41), “Bab­ylon and many other satrapies were inhabited by Jews.”
37
Furthermore, the Bab­ylo­nian Talmud makes frequent references to Jewish rabbis visiting the city's extensive Jewish community as late as the third and fourth century AD (e.g.,
Megillah
22a;
Ta'anit
28b;
Baba Batra
22a and
Eruvin
63a;
Berakot
31a, 57b).
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Third, the city remained socioeconomically vibrant. It withstood a siege in the middle of the first century BC, and its theatre was repaired in the second century AD.
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Moreover, an important trade station was located there until at least AD 25 and the city continued to exercise key municipal roles within the general region.
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Fourth, with respect to religion, Bab­ylon contained the famous Esagil, the temple of Bel Marduk, together with its priests,
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and it maintained the ancient system of rituals and offerings and festivals, including the very ancient New Year Festival.
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Astronomy in Bab­ylon.
Bab­ylon continued to maintain its longstanding and strong commitment to astronomy.

Astronomy.
Of all the sciences, none was more closely identified with Bab­ylon or Mesopotamia
than astronomy.
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We have astronomical tablets from the city from as late as AD 74/75.
44
The temple of Bel-Marduk presumably remained the hub of observational and theoretical astronomical activity and record-keeping that it had been in previous centuries.
45
This link to the temple was the main reason why astronomy persisted in Bab­ylon for so long, even after it ceased to have political importance.
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Astrology.
The astronomy done in Bab­ylon was largely in the service of astrology. As Boiy highlights, the most important means of divination in the Greco-Roman era was astrology, and it necessitated astronomical know-how and indeed astronomical records.
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Teukros.
The one famous Bab­ylo­nian astronomer from the turn of the ages about whom we know is Teukros (Teucros/Teucer),
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who did much to promote Bab­ylo­nian astronomy and astrology across the ancient world.