Word Pictures in the New Testament - David Cox

Word Pictures in the NT [Matthew: Chapter 2]
born while Herod was king, the Herod sometimes called Herod the
Great. Josephus makes it plain that Herod died B.C. 4. He was
first Governor of Galilee, but had been king of Judaea since B.C.
40 (by Antony and Octavius). I call him "Herod the Great Pervert"
in _Some Minor Characters in the New Testament_. He was great in
sin and in cruelty and had won the favour of the Emperor. The
story in Josephus is a tragedy. It is not made plain by Matthew
how long before the death of Herod Jesus was born. Our
traditional date A.D. 1, is certainly wrong as Matthew shows. It
seems plain that the birth of Jesus cannot be put later than B.C.
5. The data supplied by Luke probably call for B.C. 6 or 7.
{Wise men from the east} (\magoi apo anatol•n\). The etymology of
\Magi\ is quite uncertain. It may come from the same
Indo-European root as _(megas) magnus_, though some find it of
Babylonian origin. Herodotus speaks of a tribe of Magi among the
Medians. Among the Persians there was a priestly caste of Magi
like the Chaldeans in Babylon (Da 1:4). Daniel was head of such
an order (Da 2:48). It is the same word as our "magician" and
it sometimes carried that idea as in the case of Simon Magus (Ac
8:9,11) and of Elymas Barjesus (Ac 13:6,8). But here in
Matthew the idea seems to be rather that of astrologers. Babylon
was the home of astrology, but we only know that the men were
from the east whether Arabia, Babylon, Persia, or elsewhere. The
notion that they were kings arose from an interpretation of Is
60:3; Re 21:24. The idea that they were three in number is due
to the mention of three kinds of gifts (gold, frankincense,
myrrh), but that is no proof at all. Legend has added to the
story that the names were Caspar, Balthasar, and Melchior as in
_Ben Hur_ and also that they represent Shem, Ham, and Japhet. A
casket in the Cologne Cathedral actually is supposed to contain
the skulls of these three Magi. The word for east (\apo
anatol•n\) means "from the risings" of the sun.
2:2 {For we saw his star in the east} (\eidomen gar autou ton
astera en t•i anatol•i\). This does not mean that they saw the
star which was in the east. That would make them go east to
follow it instead of west from the east. The words "in the east"
are probably to be taken with "we saw" i.e. we were in the east
when we saw it, or still more probably "we saw his star at its
rising" or "when it rose" as Moffatt puts it. The singular form
here (\t•i anatol•i\) does sometimes mean "east" (Re 21:13),
though the plural is more common as in Mt 2:1. In Lu 1:78 the
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