The Great Christ Comet
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Herod’s Meeting with the Magi
Matthew 2:7–9a relates the story of Herod’s meeting with the Magi: “Then Herod summoned the Magi secretly and ascertained from them what time the star had appeared. And he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, ‘Go and search diligently for the child, and when you have found him, bring me word, that I too may come and worship him.’ After listening to the king, they went on their way.” This meeting between Herod and the Magi (see fig. 3.1) was apparently the first and only one of its kind.
FIG. 3.1 A watercolor, “Les rois mages chez Hérode” (“The Magi in the House of Herod”), by James Tissot. Image credit: Brooklyn Museum, New York.
Secrecy. The fact that Herod summoned the Magi “secretly” demands explanation. Why did Herod not want the people of Jerusalem to know about his meeting with the Magi? Most likely he had at least two main motives for his secrecy. First, he would not have wanted to lend credence to the Magi’s announcement that the Messiah had been born.89 Second and more important, Herod did not want to endanger his dastardly secret plan to kill the Messiah.90 The Magi were ignorant of Herod’s scheming ways, but the people of Jerusalem and Judea were not. Herod would have realized that some in Judea would have been enthusiastic about the announcement of the Magi concerning the arrival of the Messiah on the earthly scene. Were word to get out that Herod had told the Magi to report back to him regarding the precise location of the Messiah so that he could go and worship the newborn King of the Jews, some pro-Messiah Judeans would undoubtedly have alerted the Magi to the king’s obviously malign agenda.
Herod’s Agenda. Herod treated the Magi’s report with deadly earnestness. He wanted to know from them two critical pieces of information: the maximum age of the Messiah, and where exactly within Bethlehem he resided. Armed with these facts, he would be in an excellent position to strike down the infant King.
Discovering the Messiah’s age. Herod acquired from the Magi accurate information concerning the precise time at which the Star had appeared (Matt. 2:7). Whether they knew this off the top of their heads or had written records of this is not stated. However, since record-keeping was very important to Babylonian astronomers, and since one would expect them to bring with them copies of pertinent records to show interested parties, we should probably envision the Magi consulting these in order to answer Herod’s question.
Before the Magi arrived in Jerusalem, Herod may well have known about the Star’s behavior in recent weeks or months, but he did not know when the Star had first appeared. How much of the Star’s history he was aware of since that first appearance, we simply cannot know for sure.
In the wake of the Magi’s arrival in Jerusalem but prior to Herod’s meeting with them, the king only knew that the Magi were claiming that recent astronomical events had revealed that the Messiah had just been born.
At the covert discussion, Herod presumably got a more complete account of the Star. Most importantly, he discovered the particular day and month that the star had appeared in the sky—then, as nowadays, only professional astronomers could have been expected to have such information. Herod evidently figured that, if he knew this, he would know the maximum age of the Messiah.
Since Herod was providing the Magi with the key piece of information that they needed to complete their mission to worship the Messiah—the place of the Messiah’s birth—and was even effectively commissioning them to find the newborn Messiah, the Magi had every reason to think that they could trust him. No doubt they attributed his curiosity to a spirit of joyful awe and wonder.
Discovering the Messiah’s location. The half-Jewish king requested that the Magi, after finding the Messiah, bring back word to Jerusalem, claiming that he himself wanted to go and worship him. He obviously judged that these foreign magi had no inkling of his true agenda: to discover where precisely within Bethlehem the Messiah was located, so that he could assassinate him.
Evidently, Herod had a Plan A and a Plan B: Plan A was targeted assassination of the messianic baby, and Plan B was mass infanticide in Bethlehem. He clearly preferred the “cleaner” Plan A, which would entail only a short wait until the gullible Magi returned to his palace with detailed information regarding the precise whereabouts of the messianic child. However, the evil king had an atrocious backup plan that could be implemented if, for any reason, the favored plan failed.
The Star’s First Appearance. Herod “ascertained the exact time”91 (akriboō ton chronon) that the star had “appeared” (phainomai) (Matt. 2:7). The verb Matthew chose to describe the star’s behavior has been interpreted by some to be synonymous with “rising” (vv. 2, 9) and hence to refer to “the time when the star came up over the horizon, the year, the month, and the day.”92 However, there is no reason to assume that “appeared” in verse 7 is equated with “rising” in verses 2 and 9. Indeed if the two are equated, the fact that Herod based his massacre of baby boys in their second year or under on the date of the first appearing of the Star would mean that the Magi had taken at least twelve lunar months to get to Jerusalem, which is completely implausible, or that the wonder in the eastern sky associated with the Star’s heliacal rising lasted a ridiculously long time. It is much more natural to believe that the first appearance preceded the rising by many months. That is, after being visible in the sky for a long time, the Star was in conjunction with the Sun and then rose in the eastern sky in advance of the Sun.
Herod was obviously of the opinion that the child might have been born at some stage of the Star’s apparition prior to its heliacal rising. The king, who was apparently influenced by astrology (see, for example, Josephus, Ant. 17.6.4 [§167]) and undoubtedly would have been knowledgeable about astronomy, may have wondered if the first appearance of the Star itself had coincided with the birth of the Messiah. The Magi clearly were convinced that what they had seen the Star do in connection with its heliacal rising marked the occasion of the birth, but Herod was eager to allow for an alternative interpretation.
Herod’s Commissioning of the Magi. The magnitude of the task facing the Magi at Bethlehem is highlighted in what Herod says to them: “Go and search diligently for the child, and when you have found him . . .” (v. 8). Herod has told them that the Messiah’s birthplace is Bethlehem, and the short (5–6 miles) journey to Bethlehem would not pose any problems. However, Herod does not know where precisely within Bethlehem the child is. The city of Bethlehem (and environs) was large enough to present a formidable challenge to the Magi as they sought to locate the newborn Messiah. The Magi would have had no choice but to move from door to door, asking for information. Moreover, how would they know which baby was the Messiah? Would the people of Bethlehem be as clueless as the people of Jerusalem? If the Bethlehemites did know, would they cooperate with the foreigners in their quest? Since the holy family was evidently keeping information out of the public domain, would they make themselves known to the Magi? The Magi faced an incredibly daunting task on the last phase of their journey to worship the Messiah.
The Star’s Ushering of the Magi to Bethlehem and Jesus
In Matthew 2:9b–10 we read, “And behold, the star that they had seen at its rising went before them until it came and stood over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy.”
Traveling around Sunset. From what Matthew writes, it would seem that, on that day, the Star was not visible prior to the Magi’s meeting with Herod but became visible during their journey from Jerusalem to Bethlehem. Therefore it is likely that they traveled in the evening, when the stars were emerging around the time of the Sun’s setting.93 The text is not explicit regarding when precisely during their journey to Bethlehem the Star appeared, but the implication seems to be that it accompanied them for the majority of their short trip. Therefore they probably saw the Star near the start of their trek southward. Travel by night in Judea was uncommon, but a relatively short journey by camel caravan in the evening would have been safe. Certainly the Magi would not have wished to d
elay the fulfillment of their urgent mission. Accordingly, the Magi’s meeting with Herod most likely occurred in the late afternoon.94
Going ahead of the Magi to Bethlehem. The Star went before the Magi until it pinpointed the very house where baby Jesus was. Strictly speaking, of course, the Star’s guidance was not needed to get the Magi to Bethlehem (Herod presumably informed the Magi where the town was), but only to direct them within Bethlehem. However, it seems that the Star ushered them to the town of David before pinpointing the particular house where the Messiah and his mother were.95 The Star’s going “before” or “ahead of” them (ESV; NIV) need not entail movement within the backdrop of the fixed stars and constellations. Most celestial entities (other than meteors, and comets very close to Earth), of course, have a natural daily westward course through the heavens.
Descending. Having reached Bethlehem within a couple of hours, the Magi would have seen the Star in the now-dark sky. At this point the Star is described as “coming” (“came”; v. 9). Since the Star had just led them to Bethlehem in the south and hence was at its highest point in the sky (its “culmination” at the meridian [the great imaginary circle that passes through the zenith, the celestial poles, and the horizon’s north and south]) and was now straight in front of them, its “coming” must refer to the Star’s drop in altitude as it moved on its course toward the western horizon. The Star was preparing to point out for the Magi the place where the messianic baby was located.
Standing over the House. The text is rather clear in its description: from the perspective of the Magi, the Star eventually came to “stand”96 over the place where the messianic child was. Many scholars, often in a bid to rescue the account from sheer implausibility, have insisted that the place over which the Star stood was the town of Bethlehem as a whole. Carson, for example, comments, “The Greek text does not imply that the star pointed out the house where Jesus was . . . ; it may simply have hovered over Bethlehem as the Magi approached it. They would then have found the exact house through discrete inquiry. . . .”97 Hagner claims that verse 9 renders “difficult” any attempted explanation of the Star in terms of an astronomical phenomenon.98
Appreciating that the verse is the chief stumbling block for many Bethlehem Star hypotheses, Hughes maintains that verse 9 was not intended to be taken at face value or literally, as though the Star guided them as they went from Jerusalem to Bethlehem and then pinpointed the particular dwelling where Mary and Jesus were. According to Hughes, if Matthew’s description is in accord with reality to any extent, the Star’s leading could only have been general.99 However, it is surely preferable to revise or abandon one’s hypothesis rather than resort to special pleading in order to escape the natural force of the single most important description of the Star’s behavior in Matthew’s account.
The Magi did not need help finding Bethlehem. As verse 8 (“Go and search diligently for the child, and when you have found him . . .”) makes abundantly clear, the challenge was in locating the infant within Bethlehem. R. T. France put it well:
They already knew from Herod that Bethlehem (a mere five or six miles from Jerusalem) was their destination, so that they did not need the star to tell them that; their extravagantly expressed joy . . . is hard to explain unless the star somehow indicated the actual house rather than just the village as a whole. It seems, then, that the star’s movement gave them the final supernatural direction they needed to the specific house “where the child was.”100
That the Star stood over the individual building where the infant was is clearly implied in verse 11: “And going into the house they saw the child with Mary his mother.” The “house” here most naturally picks up on verse 9b’s “place where the child was.”
The suggestion that no astronomical entity could pinpoint a house101 is inaccurate. It could, depending on what it looks like, where the observers are located, and where the house is relative to the visible horizon. If a house is located on the visible horizon, an astronomical entity that is notably bright and large can seem to onlookers to be standing over it.
In having the Star go before the Magi to the very house where the infant Messiah was, God was, Matthew implies, intervening to confirm them in their sacred mission and enable them to complete it. The star’s presence at this point in the Magi’s journey makes for beautiful symmetry. Just as the Star had marked the start of their mission, so it also marked its conclusion. More than this, the Star itself was now pointing out the precise whereabouts on the earth of the child whose birth it had earlier announced in the heavens.
Three Phases of the Star’s Ushering. It is important to appreciate that there is a fundamental continuity between the Star’s guidance of the Magi to Bethlehem and its standing over the house: “The star . . . went before them until, having come,102 it stood over the place where the child was” (v. 9). This indicates that the Star guided them first to Bethlehem and then, after coming (that is, down in altitude, toward the horizon), to the very house where baby Jesus was. The Star, then, did three things that night: (a) It seemed to travel toward Bethlehem ahead of the Magi. (b) After the Star had led them to Bethlehem, the Star then entered a phase of descending in altitude. (c) As the Star descended to just above the visible horizon that night, it “stood” over the place where the Messiah was. From what Matthew writes, we can deduce the following: having left their homeland shortly after the completion of the sign in the eastern sky, and having traveled some 28–37 days (the length of a camel caravan trip from Babylon to Jerusalem) to Judea, the Magi saw the Star appear in the south-southeastern sky in the evening and then, along with the rest of the stars, over a couple of hours move to the south-southwest (the direction of Bethlehem from Jerusalem). From that point it descended toward the horizon and finally “stood.”
The Magi’s Joy. Verse 10 is somewhat ambiguous and could be interpreted in one of two ways: as revealing the response of the Magi to the appearance of the Star as they traveled from Jerusalem to Bethlehem,103 or as indicating their reaction to the standing of the Star over one particular house.104 The former interpretation fits with the “behold” of verse 9 but interrupts the narrative flow and would make verse 10 parenthetical. It would probably imply that the Magi had assumed that the Star, having guided them to Jerusalem, would not reappear. The latter interpretation fits the sequence of the story better—verse 9 has just climaxed with the Star standing over the particular location where the baby Messiah is, and verse 11 reports that they entered the house. I suggest that verse 10 is referring to the Magi’s great joy at seeing the Star standing over the house at the culmination of their long trek to worship the messianic baby. The Magi certainly felt a sense of wonder at seeing the Star as they journeyed from Jerusalem to Bethlehem—that is conveyed by “behold” in verse 9. But they were even more astonished and overjoyed when they realized that the Star was pinpointing an exact location, which they interpreted to be where the Messiah was. Evidently they perceived the celestial marvel to be a divine confirmation and vindication of their journey. The Star had, as it were, intervened to ensure that their pilgrimage came to a successful conclusion.
Astonishingly, that night the Star had appeared to be making the same journey as the Magi. It had led them from Jerusalem to Bethlehem and right to the house where the messianic baby was staying. Indeed the Star evidently looked like it was about to enter the house. In the wake of this spectacular phenomenon, there could be no doubt that the newborn baby in this house was the one whose birth had been proclaimed previously in the eastern sky (cf. v. 2).
The Magi Meet the Messiah
Matthew 2:11 recounts what happened in the aftermath of the Magi’s observation of the Star standing over the place where the infant Messiah was: “And going into the house they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him. Then, opening their treasures, they offered him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh.”
A House. Having been guided by the Star to the very place where the messianic child was lo
cated, the Magi made their way to the building and went inside. We discover in this verse that Jesus was in a “house.” Wherever Jesus was born, whether in a stable, a cave, or the part of a house normally used by animals, he was certainly in a house by the time the Magi arrived on the scene. Presumably, as soon as the census was over and the population of Bethlehem had returned to normal levels, Mary, Joseph, and Jesus moved into living quarters more suitable for human habitation and remained there until they eventually fled from Bethlehem to Egypt (v. 14).
The Child and His Mother. It is striking that the Magi see inside the house “the child with Mary his mother” (v. 11). The celestial phenomenon that the Magi had seen in the eastern sky back in their homeland had been divinely orchestrated to get them to see this very sight: the recently born holy child with his mother. Now, finally, the Magi could feel joy and relief at having fulfilled their divinely appointed mission to welcome the Messiah to the earth.
The absence of Joseph, Jesus’s legal father, from the description is notable. It reinforces the impression that the focus of the Magi was on the Virgin Mary and her holy child. As Luz points out, the description here recalls 1:18–25, where Matthew narrates that Jesus was born to a virgin in fulfillment of Isaiah 7:14.105 It is fitting that this quiet allusion to Jesus’s divine parentage is followed by the statement that the Magi fell down prostrate to worship him.