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Herod, as King of the Jews, was alarmed at the prospect of a usurper. Herod assembled the chief priests and scribes of the people and asked them where the "Anointed One" (the Messiah, Greek: Ὁ Χριστός, romanized: ho Christos) was to be born. They answered, in Bethlehem, citing Micah 5:2. Herod therefore sent the magi to Bethlehem ...
Two other references to Bethlehem being in Judea in Matthew 2:1 and 2:5 indicate that Matthew was keen to show that Jesus was born in Judea. In this verse he does not use the same spelling he did previously, thus also linking to the Old Testament figure Judah .
If the story of the Star of Bethlehem described an actual event, it might identify the year Jesus was born. The Gospel of Matthew describes the birth of Jesus as taking place when Herod was king. [96] [97] According to Josephus, Herod died after a lunar eclipse [98] and before a Passover Feast.
1 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, 2 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. 3 When Herod the king had heard these things, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.
By Rodolfo Galvan Estrada III, Adjunct Assistant Professor of the New Testament, Fuller Theological Seminary.Every Christmas, a relatively small town in the Palestinian West Bank comes center ...
Also notable about this verse is that King Herod, who has only heard that the King of the Jews had been born, asks about the Christ, or the messiah. That the magi, who first noted the star, do not know and are not even asked about where the messiah might be born is a sign that they are ignorant of Jewish scripture.
It is also one of the Twelve Great Feasts of Eastern Orthodoxy, a popular cycle in Byzantine art. The story continues with King Herod asking his advisers about ancient prophesies describing the birth of such a child. As a result of their advice, he sends soldiers to kill every boy child under the age of two in the city of Bethlehem.
That Herod picks this number is considered an important clue to when Jesus was born. [11] It is taken to indicate that close to a year had elapsed since the birth of Jesus. Herod is believed to have died in 4 BC so based on Matthew, Jesus' birth is guessed to have been in 5 or 6 BC.