It is partly owing to this vagueness in the meaning of the word that so little certainty can be arrived at in regard to the most important allusion to the Magi in the Bible—that in Mt 2. We are told that certain μάγοι came from the east to pay their homage to the king of the Jews, whose star they had seen at its rising (ἐν ἀνατολῇ, AV and RV ‘in the east,’ which would probably require the plural). They consulted
erod, who procured them the required informa- tion by help of the scribes, and, after seeing the star again, they were successful in their search, otfered their gifts of gold, frankincense (cf. Holtz- mann, im doc.), and myrrh, and, in consequence of a divine warning conveyed in a dream, returned home by a different route, without revisiting Herod. The king, who had inquired of them secretly at what time the star first appeared, with a view to ascertaining the age of te child, put to death all the male children in Bethlehem ‘from two years old and under,’ the Holy Child escaping through the flight of his parents into Egypt.
(1) The Magi came Pom the east (ἀπὸ ἀνα- τολῶν should probably be taken with μάγοι in spite of the absence of the article, see Alford, in loc.; but this makes no difference to the general sense), but no conjectures as to the particular part of the east can pretend to any certainty. Prob- ably most is to be said for Arabia (Just. Martyr, Tertul., Epiphan., to whom it was suggested by Ps 7210. 16. Is 60°; the view has also modern defenders, e.g. Grotius, Wieseler, Holtzmann, Edersheim); but others have favoured Persia, Parthia, Babylon, and even Egypt (see the names in Meyer’s and Holtzmann’s Comm.). The ex- presion is quite vague (cf. Mt 811 247, Lk 13%,
ey 2118), and Plumptre has pointed out that ‘the language of OT, and therefore probably that of S . Matthew, included under this name countries that lay considerably to the N. as well as to the
Ε΄ of Palestine’ (see e.g. Nu 237, Is 41%); while th nature of the gifts presented is not decisive
(V eiss, Life of Christ, Eng tr. i. 266). It may, nowever, safely be assumed that they are not Jews (as v. ἃ. Hardt, Miinter, Paulus, ete.); the words ἀπὸ ἀνατολῶν and the exact terms of their question seem inconsistent with this supposition,
MAGI
while the evidence of Christian tradition is also weighty.
(2) The controversy whether μάγοι is here to be understood in a good or bad sense is really unim- portant. It is, no doubt, true that the bad sense
redominates in classical writers of the time (e.g.
80. Ann. ii. 27, xii. 22, 59; Plin. ΗΝ xxv. 59, xxvi. 9, xxx. 1, 6; ef. Kleuker, Anhang zum Zend-Avesta, ii. 3), that the Magus is frequently denounced in Rabbinical works (Hamburger, 2. s.v. ‘Zauberei’; Edersheim, Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, i. 210), and that the other NT allusions bear an unequivocally bad sense (Ac 89 Simon Magus, 135 Elymas). However, the evangelist lays no stress, either on the value of the religion of the Magi in general or on its falsity, so that the attempt of many ancient commentators (Just., Chrys., Theophyl.; cf. J. Lightfoot, Hor. Hebr. ii. 36) to press the bad sense here, is as irrelevant to the story in the Gospel as the ironical fears of Strauss for the dogmatic consequences of a favourable construction. The newly-born king of the Jews receives homage from Eastern sages; their views (beyond the reference to the star, which does not imply any opinion on astrology in general) are not touched upon, and therefore neither praised nor blamed—a point in which Mt 2 contrasts with Sen. Ep. 58, where some critics have endeavoured to find a parallel.
(3) The exact cause of the Magi’s coming can apparently only be guessed at. The passages in the Avesta on the three sons of Zoroaster and the triumph of Soshyos would appear, even if their bearing on the present story were more clear, to be too late in date to afford any assist- ance (Sacred Books of the East, iv. p. xxxvii). We must suppose that the Magi, to whatever nation- ality they themselves belonged, derived their in- ference that a king of the Jews was born, from Jewish sources. he coming of Messiah seems certainly to have been expected among the Jews at this time (Lk 2%; Ellicott, Hulsean Lectures ὃ, 75); and though the widespread feeling in the East, that a Jewish Messiah would conquer the world, is only attested for a later period (Eders- heim, op. cit. i. 203), Jewish authorities, if con- sulted on the appearance of an exceptional astro- nomical phenomenon, might well have explained it of Messiah. Unfortunately, it is difficult to ascertain either (a) what the precise Jewish view in regard to the star of Messiah was, or (Ὁ) what the actual astronomical fact was in which they regarded the expectation as now fulfilled.
(a) As regards the former point, in Nu 2417 (referred to by Just. Tryph. 106; Iren. Il. ix. 2; Orig. Cels. 1. 59, ete.), the star would most natur- ally apply to the prince himself, not to a sidereal phenomenon heralding his arene (cf. Weiss, op. cit. i. 266 ; G. Baur, Altt. Weissag. i. 346); the yassage in Aggadoth Mashiach (quoted by Eders- faint op. cit. i. 211), however important in other ways, is quite vague as to the nature of the star; while Abarbanel (1437-1508, a Portuguese Rabbi commenting on Daniel), who attaches special im- portance to the conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in Pisces, is a very late writer, the value of whose evidence for the earlier period is a difficult matter to decide.