Why were boys “two years old and under” (Matthew
2:16) slaughtered?
The
wise men may have told
King Herod that the
star had first appeared in the east two years
prior,
which he and/or they interpreted as the time of Jesus’ conception or
birth.
How many innocent boys did Herod slaughter?
The population of Bethlehem is estimated to have been a few hundred, perhaps
as high as a thousand, during this era. If the latter, 500 would have
been male. Assuming an average life expectancy
of 60 years and even age distribution, there would have been 16.7 boys 2
year and under. But both birth and mortality rates were high back
then, so there were more boys than old men. If the number 16.7 is
increased by 100%, Herod slaughtered as many as 33 innocent boys.
Who was “Rachel” (Matthew 2:18)?
Even though Jacob, whose descendants became the nation of Israel, had
four wives, Rachel was the only one he loved and chose as his wife.
Leah, the older sister of Rachel, had been forced upon him by her father, who was
determined to marry off his oldest daughter first, while Zilpah and
Bilhah, the maids of Leah and Rachel, respectively, had been pushed upon
him by their mistresses, who were competing to produce sons either
directly or through their maids. Rachel
died while giving birth to Benjamin, her second son, and was buried near
Bethlehem: “And as for me, when I came from Padan,
Rachel died by me in the land of Canaan on the way, when there was but a
little distance to go to Ephrath; and I buried her there on the way to
Ephrath - that is, Bethlehem” (Genesis 48:7). Even though Rachel
bore only two of Jacob’s twelve sons, she was Jacob’s wife of choice and
represents the mothers of the nation in Jeremiah 31:15, from which
Matthew 2:18 quotes as above.
Where is “Ramah” (Matthew 2:18)?
Located about 10 kilometers (6 miles) northwest of Jerusalem and about
14 kilometers (9 miles) from
Bethlehem of Judea, Ramah, which is also mentioned in Judges 19:13, was
a small town in the land given to the tribe of Benjamin, which descended
from Rachel’s second son with Jacob. When Israel split into northern and
southern kingdoms after King Solomon's reign in the 10th century BC, the
tribes of Benjamin and Judah became the southern kingdom, called Judah,
so Ramah was also a town in the kingdom of Judah.
What did “Jeremiah the prophet” (Matthew 2:18)
record in Jeremiah 31:15?
The anguish of the mothers in the kingdom of Judah after the Babylonians conquered
it in the 6th century BC and had killed or
carried off their children into exile in Babylon, as well as the anguish
of the mothers in Bethlehem when Herod
slaughtered their sons six centuries later. God’s word often has more
than one application (see
Psalm 22 and
Isaiah 53).
How did Joseph, Mary and Jesus manage in Egypt?
Egypt at the time had a large Jewish population, into which they would
have blended in easily. In fact, the world’s largest urban Jewish
population at that time was in Alexandria, the large Egyptian city on
the Mediterranean Sea, not in Jerusalem. And the
gold, frankincense
and myrrh brought by the wise men would have been used to meet their
financial needs.
In what year did Joseph, Mary and Jesus return to
Israel?
See When
was Jesus born?