The Wise Men (1)

Who were they ?

The authorised version speaks of wise men from the east in Matthew chapter 2. The revised standard version also speaks of wise men. The Greek is Magi; persons who were a learned class in ancient Persia. Youngs concordance says that wise in the passage means Magian (a Persian astronomer or priest). Magi is presumably simply the plural of Magian. Those translations such as J. N.Darby's that use the word Magi are simply leaving the Greek word untranslated, while those like the authorised version that say wise men are seeking to give the sense of the word in English. Both are in their own way right. The New English Bible calls them astrologers, presumably an assumption from the fact they had divined the birth of the king of the Jews from the appearance of a star. However, the authorised version is to be preferred as the thought of them as wise men is commendable, whereas Scripture does not speak well of astrologers (Isaiah 47:13 & 14).

Why did they come ?

Scripture gives the reason: "We have seen his star in the east" (Matthew 2:2). But why were they looking for his star: the star of the king of the Jews ? It appears the wise men came from Chaldaea; the place where Daniel had been master of the scribes, magicians, Chaldeans, [and] astrologers (Daniel 5:11 &12). Perhaps the wise men had read Daniel's prophecies and were therefore on the watch to see when the Messiah would be born (Daniel 9:25). Further, it was a Persian monarch who subsequently ruled that part of the world and that had given the decree that the temple should be rebuilt (Ezra 1:1-4). May not God have honoured this by giving the subjects of the king of Persia the opportunity of seeing at an early date the one born to reign over the Jews ?

Why did they bring gold, frankincense and myrrh ?

This is presumably because Old Testament scriptures speak prophetically of gifts being brought to God's King in Israel, so that we have:-

"And he shall live; and to him shall be given of the gold of Sheba; and prayer shall be made for him continually: all the day shall he be blessed" (Psalm 72:15).

"All they from Sheba shall come: they shall bring gold and incense" (Isaiah 60:6).

The first quotation it will be noted speaks only of gold, but the the reference to prayer contains the idea of incense as we get in Psalm 141:2 "Let my prayer be set forth before thee as incense" and also in Revelation 5:8 there is a similar idea. In neither of these quotations is myrrh mentioned; the reason for this will be shown below.

Why in popular usage are the wise men called kings ?

Further, in verses 10 &11 of Psalm 72 already quoted we have:-

"The kings of Tarshish and of the isles shall render presents; the kings of Sheba and Seba shall offer tribute: Yea,all kings shall bow down before him; all nations shall serve him."

These verses doubtless are the main ones that led to the thought that the wise men were kings, though there are others, notably Isaiah 49:7 and 60:3. However, this is almost certainly not true. Neither were there necessarily three wise men. The idea that there were probably arose because of the three gifts that were brought. There might have been as few as two; there could have been three or more. Probably some servants came with them. There must have been at least two as the scripture speaks of wise men (plural).

Why does not the story of the wise men agree with prophecy ?

The explanation as to why the story of the visit of the wise men does not agree with the prophetic scriptures is as follows:-

(1) The prophetic scriptures refer to the coming day when Christ will reign in glory.

(2) The wise men came to see a babe in a manger, not a king reigning in glory. Their diversionary trip to see Herod in Jerusalem did not help them find the child. When they left Jerusalem the star they had seen in the east went before them until it came and stood over the place where the little child was (Matthew 2:9).

(3) The gifts they gave were not only gold and frankincense but also myrrh. Myrrh is a pain killer and indicates that Christ had come to suffer, not to reign. It is to be noted in this connection that Christ was offered wine medicated with myrrh when he was crucified, though he would not drink it (Mark 15:23).