What kind of star did the magi see?

[tonychanyt]

Mt 2:

1 Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, 2 saying, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.”

The wise men (magi) saw the star when it first appeared. They had been following its general direction for a while. How long?

7 Then Herod summoned the wise men secretly and ascertained from them what time the star had appeared.

Matthew did not record the exact time but Herod knew.

8 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.”

By now, Jesus was a child. If the star first appeared when Jesus was born, they had been traveling for a long while, many months.

9 After listening to the king, they went on their way. And behold, the star that they had seen when it rose went before them until it came to rest over the place where the child was.

Now, the star identified the precise location, not just the general direction. This was not a natural movement of a star. The star was a sign, a supernatural phenomenon.

10 When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy. 11 And going into the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him.

After this, the wise men didn't report back to Herod.

16 Then Herod, when he saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, became furious, and he sent and killed all the male children in Bethlehem and in all that region who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had ascertained from the wise men.

This suggests that their journey took months to possibly up to two years.

What kind of star did the magi see?

It wasn't a natural phenomenon. It was a supernatural sign that God placed in heaven to guide the wise men's journey to find Jesus.

 

[Erik Nelson]

6-5 BC fits the visit of the Magi:

In 6-5 BC, tensions between Herod the Great and the Pharisees escalated sharply. According to Josephus and other sources, Herod executed several leading Pharisees who had publicly declared that the birth of the Messiah would signal the end of Herod’s rule. This messianic expectation was seen as a direct threat to Herod’s legitimacy and security on the throne, fueling his well-documented paranoia toward any perceived rivals.

Herod’s broader relationship with the Pharisees was already strained due to their resistance to Hellenization, their influence among the people, and their hope for a Davidic Messiah. In 6 BC, Herod forced the Pharisees to swear an oath of loyalty to him, an act that many refused, further deepening the conflict. Those who resisted faced severe consequences, including execution or imprisonment.

This crackdown on the Pharisees in 6 BC was part of a pattern of increasing brutality and suspicion in Herod’s final years, as he sought to eliminate any threats—real or imagined—to his authority. The episode highlights the volatile intersection of politics, religion, and messianic expectation in late Second Temple Judea.

The Pharisees’ messianic prophecy against Herod, as recorded by Josephus, was a direct and dangerous challenge to his rule. Around 6-5 BC, certain Pharisees prophesied to the wife of Pheroras (Herod’s brother) that God would soon take the throne from Herod and his descendants and give royal power to her, Pheroras, and their children. This prophecy implied the imminent rise of a new, divinely appointed king—interpreted as a messianic figure—who would end Herod’s dynasty.

The prophecy was not just a vague hope but a specific prediction that Herod’s rule was about to end and be replaced by a new royal line, possibly tied to the Davidic lineage through Pheroras’s wife. The expectation was so strong that even members of Herod’s household, like the eunuch Bagoas, were convinced they would benefit under the new king.

Herod responded with swift brutality: he executed the Pharisees responsible for the prophecy, along with Bagoas, a certain Karos, and anyone in his household who supported or believed the prediction. This crackdown highlights how seriously Herod took any messianic expectation as a political threat.

Summary:
The Pharisees’ prophecy in 6-5 BC foretold the end of Herod’s reign and the rise of a new, divinely chosen king, fueling messianic hopes among the people and provoking Herod’s lethal response. This episode reflects the intense intersection of religious expectation and political power in late Second Temple Judea. It supplies a plausible context for the Magi and Massacre of the Innocents.

 

[Erik Nelson]

Possible Historical Sequence:

• Augustus’s census decree (late 8 BC) would take months to reach distant provinces.
• Herod’s dynastic crises in 7 BC (traveling to Rome and Beirut) likely delayed any census or loyalty oath.
• In 6 BC, the loyalty oath Herod demanded (Josephus) plausibly parallels Luke’s census as a local Herodian registration.
• The Pharisees’ resistance and subsequent persecution likely fueled messianic expectations and unrest.
• The Magi’s arrival in 5 BC, with their dramatic inquiry and the appearance of the star, reignited and focused these hopes, inspiring the Pharisees to concoct their own prophecy that Pheroras (wife of Herod's brother) and her children would overthrow Herod, which plot Herod foiled and punished with the same the same ferocity as the massacre of the innocents.

Moreover, the involvement of Pheroras' wife hints at a maternal theme, consistent with some indignation at Herod's execution of dozens of young children in the massacre, and resonates with the indignation and grief associated with Herod’s execution of children in the Massacre of the Innocents.

The prophecy given to Pheroras’ wife by certain Pharisees specifically promised that the kingdom would come to her and her children after Herod’s downfall. This focus on her as a mother and her children as heirs places maternal hope and future generations at the center of the political-religious drama.

Herod’s actions—executing not only rivals but also their families, and ultimately ordering the massacre of Bethlehem’s infants—stand in stark contrast to the maternal hopes embodied by Pheroras’ wife. The massacre narrative in Matthew is deeply shaped by the image of mothers mourning their lost children, echoing Jeremiah’s “Rachel weeping for her children”.

The prominence of women and children in both the Pharisaic prophecy and the biblical massacre narrative underscores how Herod’s paranoia and violence targeted not just political opponents, but also the most vulnerable—mothers and their children.

Summary:
The maternal aspirations of Pheroras’ wife, as highlighted by the prophecy, provide a poignant counterpoint to Herod’s violence against children. This parallel deepens the emotional and symbolic resonance of the Massacre of the Innocents, connecting political intrigue and prophecy with the suffering and indignation of mothers in Herod’s Judea. This hints that Josephus was obliquely referencing the massacre of the innocents in 5 BC with all his references to Herod's violence against children and motherly outrage from 7-5 BC.