Anyone familiar with the Bible stories in the Old Testament has met the magi before.
We meet them in Egypt, opposing Moses and Aaron, trying to keep the Israelites enslaved to the king of kings of the time, the mighty Pharaoh.
We meet them later in the empires of Babylon and Persia. Like Pharaoh, those kings of kings collect magi and wise men to give them secret insight, not least by interpreting the heavens.
In Babylon, it is the “Chaldeans” (the magi of Babylon) who tattle on Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego when they refuse to bow down to Nebuchadnezzar’s idol (Dan 3:8). The three young men get thrown into a fiery furnace and require divine intervention on their behalf.
In Scripture, therefore, magi are not “the good guys.” And why should they be? Yahweh clearly forbade astrology and other forms of divination, identifying them as abominations (Deut 18:10–12).
At Christmas, however, the new King of kings commandeers the magic of the magi and uses their wicked practices to reveal himself. His star arises, and a group of magi from the east (Babylon? Persia? cf. Rev 16:12) head west.
The Prophecy of Balaam
These magi arrive in Jerusalem, and they already know that they’re looking for “the king of the Jews.” How can they know this?
Presumably, the lore of the magi is passed down and occasionally shared. Many years before, there was another man, probably a magus of some sort, who was hired by a rival king to curse Israel. At the time, Israel was threateningly large but out in the wilderness and vulnerable. That magus, however, was overtaken by the power and word of Yahweh who caused him to pronounce repeated blessings over Israel rather than curses.
His name was Balaam. According to Numbers 22:5, he lived at Pethor, near “the River,” which usually refers to the Euphrates at the edge of Mesopotamia elsewhere in Scripture.1
At the climax of his prophetic utterances, Balaam refers to Yahweh. He says, “the oracle of him who hears the words of God, and knows the knowledge of the Most High.” Then he proclaims, “I see him, but not now; I behold him, but not near: a star shall come out of Jacob, and a scepter shall rise out of Israel; it shall crush the forehead of Moab and break down all the sons of Sheth” (Num 24:16–17 ESV).
In its own time, the prophecy was cause for chagrin for the king who hired Balaam because he was king of Moab, and the prophecy entailed getting crushed like the serpent under the heel of the seed of the woman.
But for the magi from the east in the late years of the first century BC, there are a couple of other things particularly pertinent.
The obvious of these is that there is a star who will arise. Such imagery was old hat for magi everywhere who considered the heavenly bodies to be symbolic of earthly rulers (as, for that matter, does Scripture). This star was specifically coming out of Jacob, arising out of Israel, and in the days of Christmas, that could only mean a “king of the Jews.”
King of the Jews
However the magi ascertained that this star was a sign of this “King of the Jews,” they end up in Jerusalem where Herod is the king of the Jews already, thank you very much.
Despite that, they come into town publicly asking where the newly-born King of the Jews could be. “We have seen his star,” they say, “and we have come to worship him.” Or is it simply render obeisance, bow down before him, acknowledging his regal authority?
Taking the less extraordinary understanding first, why would these Gentile magi from far away come to render obeisance to the “King of the Jews”?
Balaam’s prophecy suggests that the anticipated “star” will wield more than local power. Moreover, if the magi are familiar with the prophecy of Balaam, perhaps they are familiar with the promises to Abraham, to whose heirs Yahweh had promised not merely what we now think of as “the promised land” but the whole swath of real estate stretching from the Nile all the way to the Euphrates (i.e., “the River”; see Gen 15:18; cf. Deut 11:22; Josh 1:4; Is 27:12). Given this, it would be quite apropos for them to recognize his lordship over their territory even if they were from the area of the Fertile Crescent. (Interesting aside: Yahweh promised Abraham’s seed the land specifically where their fathers had not served “the gods”; see Josh 24:14.)
The Balaam prophecy also refers to “tearing down all the sons of Sheth” (Num 24:17) The verb is a bit obscure (in Isaiah 22:5, it may denote the battering down of walls), but of perhaps more interest is the reference to Sheth. Is this a place or tribe related to Moab or is it a reference to Adam’s son Seth (שֵׁת)? If the latter, the Balaam prophecy is hinting at universal hegemony because all humanity remaining after the great flood is descended from Seth. This would definitively imply universal kingship for the star, or at least worldwide power.2
Now to the precise intention of proskuneo here. Certainly, the magi recognize the infant as royal. But is the meaning of proskuneo here worshiping a divine being or limited to bowing down before a ruler? It’s hard to be altogether sure, but two things hint at the improbable actually being true.
First, the Balaam prophecy appears to connect the “him” who will arise with the great Yahweh himself, the Most High, the Almighty, whose self-disclosure causes the old magus to fall down (Num 24:16).
Second, when the magi actually arrive in the presence of the infant Jesus, they do not simply bow; they fall down prostrate (Matt 2:11). Although in the ancient world this was quite customary when in the presence of someone of much greater rank, I have not found evidence for such a gesture with regard to uncrowned infants.
But if we suppose that the magi are drawing upon Balaam’s prophecy, this observation can be explained by the fact that in Balaam’s oracle, he specifically falls down when he sees the vision of the Almighty (Num 24:16). This suggests that we are on the right track in supposing that somehow Balaam makes the connection between Yahweh himself and the “star” who would arise from Jacob. If so, the Christmas magi may well know much more than we might at first suppose.
At any rate, here they are in Jerusalem, asking after the newborn king of the Jews, tempting fate boldly given the reputation of that other king of the Jews, Herod.
The Scholars of the King
Understandably, Herod is none too pleased by the presence of the magi. But when you think about it, his response may be a little bit surprising because it presupposes the truth of what the magi are saying and therefore of divine prophecy. Herod gets his team of biblical experts together, not because he doesn’t believe, but because he does. (The insane part, of course, is that he imagines he can stop it.)
Herod’s biblical scholars, comprised of temple authority types (mostly Sadducee in persuasion, and many likely appointed by Herod himself) and teachers of the law (mostly Pharisee in persuasion), are competent enough.3 They rightly note that, according to prophecy, the Messiah will be born in Bethlehem by drawing upon Micah 5:2–5 (as well as a tip of the hat to 2 Samuel 5:2).
The prophet Micah’s ministry took place in the years of Kings Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah (Mic 1:1). The news that the Messiah was destined to be born in Bethlehem would have been rather distressing in his day as the prophecy would imply that the house of David would not be ruling from Jerusalem. In other words, already in the days of Micah, the prophets know that something is going to go radically amiss, and likely for some time. The house of David would be consigned to going back to its humble beginnings and starting over.
Whether this reality is on the radar of Herod and his scholarship team is hard to say. But the situation at the time certainly fit well with the circumstances envisioned by Micah’s prophecy. There was a king on the throne in Jerusalem, but he was not an heir of David; Herod an Idumean interloper (from the nation of Edom; Josephus, Ant. 14.1.3; 14.15.2). That was bad news for Judah, but the birth of the Messiah was in turn bad news for Herod, who would know the jig was up. The greater King of the Jews will presumably displace the lesser, returning the house of David to its rightful place upon the throne (see Numbers 24:18, where Balaam’s prophecy specifically pronounces the dispossession of Edom).
And so, having gleaned the biblical information, Herod feigns piety and fidelity, instructing the magi to go to Bethlehem and find the Child and to bring back word to him so that he too can render the Child his due honor (Matt 2:8).
The team of scholars, as well as many others in Jerusalem, would have heard what the magi had said publicly concerning the birth of the King of the Jews. What is striking is that, while they offer Herod his scriptural data, they show no effort to seek out the newborn King. They are indifferent at best. This appalling response to the news of Messiah’s birth stands in stark contrast to the response of the shepherds and of the Gentile magi themselves. This foreshadows the intransigence and sustained opposition which the Jerusalem leadership will offer to Jesus later.
The Visit with the Son of David
When the magi emerge from their conference with Herod, the star begins to guide them. Whether it moved in this fashion before or they just traced it to Jerusalem we are not specifically told. But now it functions in the same fashion as the Shekinah did in the wilderness for Israel (Ex 13:21). In Exodus, the Shekinah was itself the manifestation of the presence of Yahweh; here, the star acting as the Shekinah leads the magi into the bodily presence of Yahweh, lying in the manger.
Upon entry into the house, they find the Child and Mary his mother (Matt 2:11). If he is present, Joseph is not mentioned. Jesus is indeed the “son of David” and heir to the throne by way of Joseph, yet he does not derive his glory from Joseph. To the contrary, he is the one who brings glory to the fallen house of David.
In response to seeing the Child, the magi fall down and do obeisance, or worship, an act to which we’ve already referred. They then open their treasure boxes and offer him gifts.
The gifts which the magi offer solidify a Solomonic theme we may already have been detecting. In the Old Testament, the immediate pairing of frankincense and myrrh occurs only in contexts written in Solomon’s own Song (Song 3:6; 4:6, 14).
The Solomonic connection to Jesus should be an unsurprising theme. Jesus, after all, is presented as the ultimate and final “son of David,” and Solomon was the first son of David to sit upon the throne. Solomon and Jesus are thus paired bookends to the story of the house of David.
The narrative here is particularly reminiscent of Solomon because it describes visitors from distant lands who came to bear witness to his wealth and wisdom (1 Ki 4:34; 10:1–10). Here, the wise ones come from afar to bear witness to the wisdom of an unspeaking babe. The foolishness of God is wiser than the wisest of men. Jesus is the one “greater than Solomon” (Matt 12:42).
The Solomon imagery again places the newborn Messiah as a counterpoint to the present interloper on the throne. Herod had attempted to style himself as a new Solomon, not least by his building projects. Solomon had been a great builder, and his signature work was of course the original glorious temple in Jerusalem.
After its destruction and the ensuing Babylonian exile, the rebuilt temple was a shadow of the former; the elder Jews who remembered the temple of Solomon wept at the paucity of the new structure (Ez 3:12; cf. Zech 4:10). Herod, however, imitated the grandiose architectural vision of Solomon, kicking off a building project that made the temple one of the “vacation destinations” of its day.
The gifts of the magi fit this temple theme: the gold adorning the temple, the myrrh as a component in the holy anointing oil (Ex 30:23), and frankincense as an ingredient in the holy temple incense (30:34–38). All of this reinforces the Solomonic connection and underscores that the new King will not only be the truly wise one but also the Temple-builder par excellence, a theme that recurs throughout the gospels.
The Solomonic connection points not only to superlative comparison (“how much more”) but also to contrasts. We are reminded of this when we consider the role Solomon plays within the genealogy immediately preceding the birth narratives in Matthew. The text doesn’t name Bathsheba but rather rubs our noses in the ignominy: “David begat Solomon by she who belonged to Uriah” (Matt 1:6). David’s glory recedes behind the shame of his adultery, and that shame casts a shadow over Solomon. But one glory of this greater son of David is that he is born of a virgin (1:18–25).4
As we work from Matthew to Revelation, the “greater than Solomon” theme is underscored by the fact that this Son has come to supercede — indeed, to shatter — the would-be Solomonic temple of his own day. Revelation 16:12 speaks of “kings from the east” crossing the dried-up Euphrates. Unlike Matthew’s kings of the east, these do not come to worship the Messiah, but to destroy the city which has rejected him and killed his saints and prophets (cf 16:6, leading us to take “Babylon” to be a stand-in for Jerusalem). A little further on, Revelation 18:13 places together frankincense and myrrh as undelivered cargo for this fallen Babylon — a presentation whose time has now past.
The magi’s presentation of frankincense and myrrh to Jesus, therefore, has signalled an end to its role in the temple.
Or rather, he himself has become the temple which Solomon could not build.5 Frankincense and myrrh have found their true and final home.
Another contrast with Solomon is with his great wealth and power. He had inherited the kingdom at its peak; Jesus goes all the way back to the beginning, born in Bethlehem, unaccompanied by any accoutrements of wealth or royal power and prerogative. Solomon is the consolidating figure in the story of the house of David; Jesus will be the resurrecting one. His destiny is glorious, but unlike Solomon, his pathway is the wood of the manger and then of the cross.
Drawing it All Together
The story of the magi is not a cute illustration that “wise men seek Jesus.” It is a multi-layered account of how Yahweh overturns expectations, subdues his enemies, and sets his Anointed upon his throne as promised. It reminds us that Jesus is the true Son of David, who even at his weakest and most vulnerable draws the nations to himself. It demonstrates that Jesus is truly Emmanuel (God with us), the true Shekinah (God manifested among us), the incarnated presence of the God of Israel (God revealed as one of us). And it prepares us for the conflicts he will have with the Jerusalem leadership, so consumed by their own position and self-importance that they fail to seek out and worship their own Messiah.
Astrologers read the stars, an activity of the night. Now, however, the day has dawned, and Jesus, the true star of Jacob, conquers them with his light.
Tim Gallant lives outside of Nashville, Tennessee. His most recent book is Christmas: Story of an Earth-Shaking Birth.
NOTES
- E.g., Ez 4:10, 11, 16; HALOT, s.v. הַנָּהָר, which always refers to the Euphrates when returned with the definite article. ↩︎
- The word elsewhere in Scripture refers only to Seth, son of Adam and Eve. Scholarly attempts to connect the word to a tribe or location relating to Moab appear to be wholly conjectural (see e.g. the discussion in Timothy Ashley, Numbers [NICOT; Eerdmans, 1993], 501). The arguably negative connotations of the verb are not decisive to the question, both because of its obscurity, as well as the fact that elsewhere Scripture uses language of destruction where ultimate salvation is apparently a possible prospect (see e.g. Psalm 83:17–18). Either way, the Numbers text would reinforce universal power; the contextual focus is upon dominion rather than deliverance. ↩︎
- The “temple authority types” consist notably of “chief priests” (Matt 2:4), which probably refers to current and former high priests, many of whom Herod appointed; so, W. D. Davies and D. C. Allison, Matthew 1–7 (ICC; T&T Clark, 2004), 240, citing Josephus, Ant. 15:22–41; 15:319–322. ↩︎
- While David is overshadowed by Bathsheba in Matthew 1:6, Joseph is altogether omitted in the magi narrative. ↩︎
- In fact, the role of Jerusalem itself has been turned upside down. Historically, magi practice witchcraft and divination and are the traditional enemies of the Jews. Now, however, the roles have been reversed: the magi have become worshipers of the Messiah while the chief priests and scribes commit the sin of rebellion and presumption which Yahweh has identified as witchcraft and divination (1 Sam 15:23). Jerusalem has become Babylon. ↩︎