Matthew 2:1-12
In a sermon given last year, Rev. Dr. Howard Edington summarized some of the traditions that have accumulated on the wise men from the Eastern Kingdoms. “Most of what we know about the wise men actually does not arise from the Bible but rather arises from tradition and legend. Tradition tells us, for example, that there were three of them; that their names were Casper, Melchior, and Balthasar; that they were each one of a different race, thus comprising the three great racial strains that make up the human family; that ultimately, they were baptized by the disciple Thomas as he carried the gospel message to the Far East; and that when they died, they were buried first in Constantinople, today’s Istanbul, and then later on, their remains were removed to the Cologne Cathedral in Germany where you can see their purported tomb to this very day. I am convinced that if we dig just a bit deeper into the Bible, we can actually come to something of a better understanding of who they really were.”
I agree with Pastor Eddington. While these traditions make for interesting fiction and are not entirely impossible, we find more useful information if we stick as closely as possible to the Scriptures.
The Eastern Kingdoms symbolize what God can do with things respected by the world.
1. The Eastern Kingdoms were.
Names = Parthia, Media, Babylonia, Persia, Bactria.
Location = east of Judea, in modern day Iraq and Iran. This area has been called the “Fertile Crescent” and the “cradle of civilization.”
Reputation = these were ancient civilizations by the time of Jesus’ birth. They were no longer the most powerful nations; the center of civilization had shifted to Rome. But the Parthians had conquered and assimilated the wealth and cultures of Media, Babylonia, Persia, and Bactria. They were the only serious rival to Rome’s empire.
Role in Jesus’ life. God used people who had worldly influence validate Jesus’ identity and to provide financial means for the family to hide safely in Egypt. While they might not have been “kings” as tradition asserts, the Magi were clearly people of influence. This is evidenced in the fact that King Herod not only granted them an audience but took what they said so seriously that he was DEEPLY DISTURBED by the news. The city was in an uproar over this momentous news.
2. God directed the Magi to the newborn King of the Jews. (Matthew 2:1-12)
Verse one fixes the date and place of Jesus’ birth in history. This kind of specificity would be gratuitous in a mere folktale.
Matthew told us several things about the wise men/magi. First, that they were from the Eastern lands. For this reason, it has been assumed that they were pagans who were into astrology. This assumption is also based on the testimony of ancient historians Herodotus and Josephus, who identified the Magi as members of a Persian priestly caste who used various means of divination. It was believed by some that they wielded supernatural powers.
I wonder why courtly pagan officials would undertake a length, arduous journey to meet a newborn Jewish baby, even a prince. Alternatively, they may’ve been persons with a Israelite or Jewish heritage. We need to remember that the Assyrians had scattered Jews across that part of the world when they sacked Samaria. The Babylonians had sacked Jerusalem and taken Jews captive to that part of the world. Not all of them chose to return to Judea. The book of Daniel relates how some Jewish exiles served the royal courts in roles similar to these Magi.
Astrology was widely practiced in ancient cultures and it had some role even in Judaism, as evidenced in their writings and the discovery of ancient synagogues with the signs of the zodiac painted on their walls. Therefore, there would’ve been descendants of Israelites and Jews in that part of the world. This would more easily explain their long journey to see a new King on David’s throne but their uncertainty of how to find them.
A third option is that the Magi were local peoples who were exposed to, even influenced by Judaism during the 70 years the Jews lived among them. Having that experience may have created a deeper interest in events in Samaria and Judea.
Whatever their ethnicity, it’s clear that they’d seen a star they believed heralded the birth of a King of the Jews. That information got them as far as Jerusalem, where they would naturally expect to find a new King of the Jews. To refine their search, they would need the help of King Herod’s advisers to zero in on Bethlehem and an “angel/star” to point out the precise spot.
We read about the kind of help Herod offered them in verses three through eight. You can imagine the stir caused by some foreign court officials just showing up and asking around for a new king of the Jews. That must’ve sounded threatening to King Herod, who zealously guarded his throne, as we see in his deceit in these verses and his murderous action in vs. 14-18.
Herod ordered his version of the wise men to search the Scriptures for predictions of where a baby king would be born. The king attempted to trick the wiser men into giving away the location of the child. When he told them the Messiah was to be born in Bethlehem, he asked them to return and tell him the child’s location, ostensibly so he could also worship the child. This was his means of finding out the location of the child without drawing attention to the child or himself.
From there, God helped with a star/angel. (v. 9) The star they saw while they lived out east got them to the right country and its capital. King Herod’s advisors zeroed in on a particular village in that country. The remaining missing information was the exact place where the child could be found within the village of Bethlehem. For that kind of specificity, divine assistance was needed.
The text says the same star that began their journey ended it, leading them to the newborn King. It is not the usual behavior of stars to move ahead of a group of humans, guiding them to a specific spot on the earth’s surface. One commentator imagined that the glorious light was an angel masquerading as the star. This is clearly a divine event that I believe was intended to lead the wise men and them only, to the home where the holy family lived.
Their reaction was to worship him. Though they’d come in search of a newborn king, the Magi had found much more. They understood enough of the divine nature of the baby to realize that they needed to worship Him. Again, if these men were descended from Israelites or Jews, they would have some familiarity with the promises made about the Messiah. Perhaps they recognized Jesus as God’s Anointed One and worshiped Him for that reason.
They responded obediently to God’s direction in a dream. God foiled Herod’s scheme to get his hands on the baby: He WARNED THEM IN A DREAM NOT TO RETURN TO HEROD.
- God WARNED THEM. Was this a warning of Herod’s true, murderous intentions? It’s an odd choice of words if the message was anything else.
- NOT TO RETURN TO HEROD. Herod’s anger and willingness to kill are obvious in Matthew, so the warning might’ve been to save their own lives by returning to their homes by a route that did not include Jerusalem.
- IN A DREAM. Ancient peoples put as much stock in dreams as they did in the stars as sources of information. When the Magi awoke the next morning and compared dreams with one another, they would’ve had no doubt that God had told them something important and they would heed the directions in the dream. Whether concerned for the child or themselves or both, the Magi were obedient to God and found another route upon which they returned home. In this way they demonstrated that they really were WISE MEN!
The Eastern Kingdoms symbolize what God can do with things respected by the world.
Someone joked that the wise men couldn’t possibly be men, they must have been women. This inference is made because the Bible says they stopped to ask directions, something men are never willing to do. I think we can set that theory aside as prejudice.
Here’s another non-biblical story: The three wise men walk into a barn and see Joseph, Mary, and Jesus. Joseph asks why they are disturbing them, as his wife had just given birth and needed rest.
The first wise man said, "I have brought gold for the child."
Joseph replied, “Wow. That will be very helpful for our expenses. Thank you.”
“The second wise man said, "I have brought frankincense for the child."
Again, Joseph was thankful and said, “In a barn like this, the beautiful scent is much appreciated. Still, he was getting annoyed as they were interrupting a special moment between him and his wife. He asked them to leave.
The third wise man interrupted Joseph and said, "But wait there's myrrh!"
Someone else joked that if the wise men had GPS, it wouldn’t have taken them two years to find Jesus. My response was that they DID have GPS, God’s Positioning System! The Bible makes that point very clear.
The process of trying to separate fact and fiction regarding Christmas personalities is an ongoing process. But what we learn along the way is useful to us, promoting our spiritual maturity.
For example, what we learn from the Magi is God uses things that the world disrespects and the things the world respects to accomplish His will. We also learn the value of long-term commitment from their lengthy journey and search for the newborn King of the Jews.
RESOURCES:
Howard Edington, https://thewordmadefresh.org/sermons/the-story-we-thought-we-knew-the-wise-men-we-ought-to-know/, retrieved on 6 December 2024.
https://www.bibletools.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Topical.show/RTD/cgg/ID/2470/Eastern-Regions.htm, retrieved on 4 December 2024.
W.W. Buehler, International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, Vol. 4, Wise Men, 1988, pp. 1084-1085.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/5oo0w1/the_three_wise_men_walk_into_a_barn/, retrieved on 6 December 2024.
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