Wise men

“Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem,

Saying, Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him.” (Matt. 2:1)

In the previous piece the year of birth of Jesus was described. According to Matthew Jesus was born 2 years before Herod died, so in 6 AD. Wise men from the East asked Herod where the King was born, because they had seen his star and wanted to worship him.

The child had to be born in Bethlehem.

The wise men went to Bethlehem and worshipped the child. Warned by an angel Joseph went with wife and child to Egypt; according the tradition he stayed there for two years. Matthew does not mention those two years explicitly.

The wise men did not go back to Herod, but directly to their own country. Herod massacred in Bethlehem all children younger than 2 years, as described by Matthew in chapter 2.

The Wise men from the East.

They must have been Magi, astrologers. At that time there were many astrologers, and they usually claimed to come from the East. Chaldeans they were called.

They were forbidden in the Thora whatever it was called (Deut. 18:10b-12). "There shall not be found among you .... , or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch.

Or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer

For all that do these things are an abomination unto the LORD: and because of these abominations the LORD thy God doth drive them out from before thee."

We may assume that pious Jews did not consult them.

The Romans on the other hand were very superstitious. It started with trying to find out whether the gods agreed with certain plans (wars etc.). For this purpose that had a special college, the augurs.

However, David asks in a comparable way Gods opinion, using the Urim and the Thummim (I Sam. 23:2, 4, 11-12)

The Romans performed it a.o. studying the behaviour of birds like chickens.

If a chicken refused food or drinking offered to them this was considered a bad omen.

Sometimes that was hard to bear for a commander ready to attack. Consul Claudius Pulcher, commander of a fleet, threw chickens who refused to drink in the sea with the remark: “Now they will drink”.

When he lost the battle he was accused of blaphemy.

When Augustus became emperor, many people remembered special events that happened in his year of birth that predicted a glorious future.

But sometimes a prediction was done in advance, and did come true.

So the murder of Julius Caesar was predicted, with the day accurate.

But maybe the predictor had “inside information”.

So in the time Jesus was born many astrologers etc. were present in Rome. They predicted the future, in ways comparable to present-day astrologers. Emperors often tried to prevent astrology. Then they were banned from Rome. It never lasted long.

And if you asked an astrologer during the reign of Nero how long Nero would live that was considered high-treason, and you might be executed for it.

Tradition has added many details about the wise men from the East. There should have been three of them, each with a gift, called Caspar, Balthasar and Melchior, and they were called kings.

They were seen as representatives of the three continents known by then.

Outside the Bible the visit of the wise men nothing can be found. Neither about the massacre of the Innocents.

Quite a few years following Jesus' birth a queen came from the East, from Adiabene, in the current Iraq. She was called Helena, was converted to Jewism, and brought gold to Judea for the poor, because there was a famine. Paul collected for the same poor of Judea, see Rom. 15:25-27, Gal. 2:10.

WikiCommons devoted a category to the Wise men. The following images are derived from it.