What Is The Significance of The Wise Men?
Response to comment [from a Christian]: "What Is The Significance of The Wise Men?"
[Who Were the Wise Men? By John MacArthur] "He's the king. And if Israel isn't going to acknowledge it then God is going to drag a bunch of people from Persia to acknowledge it. He's king. God has master-planned history. And the sad part of it is that the people who should have known, the people who should have known missed it and the people from way off who should have never guessed showed up and worshipped. That's history..." Full text: Who Were the Wise Men?
"So why are the Wise Men so depicted in almost every Nativity Scene?"
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 [Matt.
2:1].
"This is the historical record of the coming of the wise men. Notice that they
came in the days of Herod the king. One thing that Herod did not want was
competition. In fact, the one thing that Herod would not tolerate was
competition. So the wise men coming to Jerusalem really alerted him.
“Behold there came three wise men from the east to Jerusalem.” Is that what your
Bible says? You say, “No, you’ve inserted the number three.” Well, isn’t that
what you’ve been taught by your Christmas cards? I think a great many people
know more about the Christmas story from Christmas cards than from the Bible,
and therefore they have many inaccurate impressions. I’ll attempt to correct
several of them in this chapter.
First, you will notice that the record doesn’t tell us there were three wise
men. I don’t know how many there were, but I doubt whether three wise men would
have disturbed Herod or have excited Jerusalem. I do believe that three hundred
men would have done so. These wise men who came from the East evidently came
from different areas. They had been studying the stars, and when this new star
appeared, they joined forces and came to Jerusalem. I don’t know how many there
were, but I’m almost sure it wasn’t three, and I believe three hundred would be
more nearly true. But, please, don’t say that I said there were three hundred!"
McGee, J. V. (1991). Vol. 34: Thru the Bible commentary: The Gospels (Matthew
1-13) (electronic ed.) (37). Nashville: Thomas Nelson.
