Matthew 2 Footnotes

2:1-2 Some interpreters deny the historicity of the wise men’s visit. One reason for doing so is a general anti-supernaturalism. Another is the alleged parallelism in form and/or content with legends or myths of great people or gods in the ancient Mediterranean world. Some take the star as purely supernatural, since it pointed the way to where Jesus lay (v. 9). Several scientific explanations have been offered to identify the star of Bethlehem, such as it being a conjunction of Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn in 7–6 BC or perhaps the appearance of a comet in 5 BC. Wise men (sometimes translated as “magi”) were originally a religious class in Media and the Persian Empire, but the word magi came to describe any student of astrology and lore. These men had probably been studying Jewish texts such as Nm 24:17 in order to correlate their astronomical observations with the birth of a Jewish king.

2:6 Matthew did not quote Mic 5:2 directly but paraphrased it to bring out the sense of the passage. Thus, while the Prophet Micah noted the smallness of Bethlehem in relation to its being the home of the Ruler, Matthew emphasized Bethlehem’s significance by calling it “by no means least” of Judah’s towns. (The reading of “rulers” for thousands predates Matthew. These terms are spelled the same in Hb.) He concluded with a quote from 2Sm 5:2 (Ezk 34:23), since the identification of Bethlehem as the ruler’s hometown set the prophecy in the stream of Davidic messianism (and was so understood in first-century Judaism). The principle of biblical inerrancy requires only that a NT paraphrase of an OT text preserves the intent of that text or expresses its implications.

2:16 No sources outside the Bible corroborate this episode, but it fits the character of Herod as reported in the writings of the historian Josephus. In addition to atrocities he had earlier perpetrated, Herod grew increasingly paranoid in his last years and committed or planned several political executions, including those of his own family. The slaughter of perhaps twenty or so babies in an insignificant village to protect his throne is thus entirely plausible and would hardly merit mention in historical sources. That Herod based his decision to kill all male children two years or younger on the timing ascertained from the wise men indicates that they had initially seen the star rise two years earlier. It is unknown whether the initial appearance corresponded to the birth (making Jesus two years old at this point) or merely foretold it (so that Jesus at this point was still a baby).

This Herod, known as Herod the Great, was different from the other three members of the Herodian dynasty mentioned in the Gospels. They are: (1) Herod Archelaus, son and successor of Herod the Great who ruled over Judea (v. 22); (2) Herod Antipas, who executed John the Baptist (Mk 6:17-29) and who returned Jesus for sentencing by Pilate (Lk 23:6-12); and (3) Herod Philip, ruler in extreme northern Galilee when Jesus began his public ministry (Lk 3:1,19-20).

2:17-18. Matthew loosely translated the Hebrew of Jr 31:15. Ramah was the staging point for the Babylonian exile (Jr 40:1-2), an event Matthew had already identified as important to Jesus’s identity (Mt 1:17). But Jr 31:16-35 also promised an end to the exile and the institution of the new covenant with Israel, events associated elsewhere with the messianic reign (Jr 30:1-9; 33:14-26; see Mt 26:28). With the birth of Jesus, the Davidic Son had arrived and the exile was ended. Thus the weeping in Bethlehem fulfilled, or culminated, Rachel’s weeping. This is the final mourning of exiled Israel.

2:23 According to Lk 1:26 and 2:4, Mary and Joseph lived in Nazareth prior to the birth of Jesus, prompting some to claim that Matthew was unaware of this and thus presented Bethlehem as their hometown. But Matthew’s focus was only the well-known fact that Nazareth was Jesus’s hometown at the start of his ministry. He was not concerned to tell the reader the hometown of Jesus’s parents. Though he first mentioned them in connection with the birth of Jesus at Bethlehem, he nowhere stated that Bethlehem was their hometown. The quote corresponds to no known passage in the OT. The best possibility is that Matthew alluded to Is 11:1 (“shoot” = Hb nezer), but others suggest that “a Nazarene” is a title of dishonor and thus alludes to those texts in which the Messiah is despised (Ps 22:6-8; Is 53:2-3). The two may go together, since Is 11:1 describes the Messiah as arising from the ignominious conditions into which David’s house had fallen and has links to the Servant of Is 49–53 (Is 11:1,10,12; 49:22; 53:2).