Matt 2:16-23

Here the writer offers a well placed scripture but he leaves out the more juicy part, I think. After the part mentioned (Jer 31:15) it continues on talking about the fact that the children will return, they “shall come back to their own country” (31:17). I like this part, it smacks of resurrection and all that. Not sure why he left it out.

The wise men are something I neglected to mention before this. They are a very strange part of this story, especially if this is a Jewish tale. These guys are stargazers and all that; they believe the stars have something to do with the destiny of the region. This, though, is way outside of what Judaism was all about. It gives credence to the idea that Jesus was really haling the next sign of the Zodiac, Pisces, the fish. Why else would the story need a non-Jew to tell them that the messiah was there? Isn’t that information something the local rabbi should have? It’s a bit fishy. ---See zeitgeistmovie.com

Joseph is an interesting fellow. He has to be warned in a dream about everything. He makes no real conclusions for himself. He has a dream telling him that Herod is dead, as if that wouldn’t be big news. He then has another dream telling him to not go to a specific region; once again it is as if he just doesn’t talk to the people around him. Perhaps the author wanted to emphasize the connection to the OT Joe who had dreams all the time.

The interesting thing about the last quote is that it is not found anywhere in the OT. Perhaps there was another source that we don’t have. Or, this is just an idea, there may have been a prophet that said these things about the Messiah being a Nazorean (not to be mistaken for a Nazerite) and they were just getting around verbally. Not really sure. I think we forget that there was more that the Jews believed in than just the Torah and the rest of the OT. Already we’ve seen that the Jews had some regard for magi, who were astrologers, who we now call, in our puritanical way “wise men”. There were authorities out side of the written word. Not going to go further than that with this idea.

Matthew 1-2:15

The properness of this gospel is evident right from the start. The nativity changes from Mary to Joseph’s perspective quickly, it is more proper to have it from the man’s point of view. Through this passage scripture is fulfilled by Jesus very neatly to the point where it seems like the writer is just splicing passages together just to make them fit the story. You’re under the nice clean impression that Jesus was conceived and born in Bethlehem in a nice clean “house” (2:11). This is a very different impression than say in Luke, the only other telling of the nativity story. Which brings up the important question of why is this important at all? It wasn’t to the other two gospel writers. I’m not sure what the point is but I could get on just fine without it. It emphasizes the sonship of Christ I guess. I know that I probably prefer the messier version we find in Luke. But we’ll see when I get to it.