Matthew 2 introduces us to a group of people who are a staple of nativity scenes and Christmas decor: the Magi (also known as the "Wise men" or "Kings"). Matthew is the only gospel writer to include these memorable characters, and the his account gives little background information on them. So what should we make of them?
Old Testament Background:
1. Numbers 22-24: The story of Balak and Balaam
The book of Numbers tells an interesting story about a time that Israel was journeying in the wilderness, and a local king (Balak) paid a Gentile prophet (Balaam) to curse Israel through the power of God. When Balaam the prophet went out to prophesy he wound up blessing Israel and saying one thing in particular in Numbers 24:17 that became a key prophecy in Israel:
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 borderlands of Moab,
and the territory of all the Shethites.
This was taken to be a prophecy of how King David would be anointed by God to lead Israel and to defeat their Gentile enemies. Note the similarities between the stories: a hostile king (Balak and Herod), Gentile's with spiritual insight (Balaam and the Magi), a star as symbol, and a coming king (David and Jesus). Matthew's original audience would not have missed these allusions and their central point: Jesus now stands in David's place as Israel's rightful king.
2. Daniel
In the Book of Daniel Daniel frequently himself at odds with a group of the King of Babylon's servants who are referred to as: magicians, enchanters, sorcerers and Chaldeans. All of these labels relate to the Magi. The Magi in Babylon were essentially astrologers, medicine men and men who practiced magic. The key here is to recognize that they were bad guys, whose livelihood depended on breaking the Torah and who opposed the faithful Israelites like Daniel. By understanding this we then see that Matthew is raising some hard questions:
1. Why can Gentile magicians recognize the star and read the signs and the King of Israel and the leaders of Israel can't?
2. What does it mean that God will use Gentile enemies to point to the Messiah? What does that tell us about God and His plans? What does that mean for Israel?
Here are a few other things to consider:
1. Does Matthew say how many Magi there were? Why do we always show three?
2. Note that the Magi would not have arrived on Jesus' birth night. If Herod is going to kill all the children under two, we would guess that Herod believed Jesus had been born some time before.
3. The gifts of the Magi are gifts fit for a king (the Queen of Sheba brings gold and spices to Solomon in 1 Kings 10) . . . not gifts fit for a poor child without power and status. This story is an early indication that Jesus is turning things upside-down.
I will close this blog with a great poem about the Magi by TS Eliot entitled "Journey of the Magi". The poem is told from the Magi's point of view and is about the "side-effects" of faith, namely, finding oneself an outside in the world because we've seen something greater and not being able to return to the comfortable life we had before God broke in . . . enjoy!
A cold coming we had of it,
Just the worst time of the year
For a journey, and such a long journey:
The ways deep and the weather sharp,
The very dead of winter.'
And the camels galled, sorefooted, refractory,
Lying down in the melting snow.
There were times we regretted
The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces,
And the silken girls bringing sherbet.
Then the camel men cursing and grumbling
and running away, and wanting their liquor and women,
And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters,
And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly
And the villages dirty and charging high prices:
A hard time we had of it.
At the end we preferred to travel all night,
Sleeping in snatches,
With the voices singing in our ears, saying
That this was all folly.
Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley,
Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;
With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness,
And three trees on the low sky,
And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow.
Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.
But there was no information, and so we continued
And arriving at evening, not a moment too soon
Finding the place; it was (you might say) satisfactory.
All this was a long time ago, I remember,
And I would do it again, but set down
This set down
This: were we led all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly
We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death.
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