THE MAGI AND THE PROPHET DANIEL
Getting back to our questions from the previous installment, Which was, ‘How
did the magi mentioned in Mat. 2; know anything about the birth of a Jewish
king who would rule the entire world?’ Maybe
we can find out where these men came from and how they knew about the coming
Messiah and his significance for them. A friend sent me a link from You Tube
that approaches the issue of the star from a historical/scientific perspective 1 and I
really enjoyed it and agreed with almost all of it but it seems to leave my
questions unanswered, which is, “How did these guys know that this strange star
was a sign that influenced them to travel to an unknown destination and bring
expensive gifts for a child?” I am convinced that the ‘wise men’ had access to
the book of Daniel and could determine from it and perhaps, from stories about
Daniel concerning future events, including the birth of Messiah who would rule
the whole earth.
Our first clue that connects these astrologers with Babylon is
found in the name, translated, ‘wise men’ in Matthew 2:2 (KJV). In Greek it is magos or magi (Pl), a
very old and interesting word. It refers to the Persian priestly cast, related
to the 6 tribes of the Medes. They were the priests of the Zoroastrian religion.
Their existence in Persia and Babylon goes back before the time that the
prophet Daniel, who was among the captives in the exile, lived and ministered.
These facts connect our magi with Babylon, which at the time of Daniel ruled a
huge amount of geography including Persia.
In Daniel 2:2 “Then the king gave the command to call the
magicians, the astrologers, the sorcerers, and the Chaldeans to tell the king
his dreams. So they came and stood before the king. 3 And the king said to them, ‘I have had a
dream, and my spirit is anxious to know the dream.’”
The Hebrew word here translated “magicians” in the Septuagint
(Greek translation of the Old Testament from approx. 200 BC) is Magi, the same
as Matthew.
Secondly, from chapter 2:4, until the end of Chap. 7, Daniel
switches from Hebrew to the Aramaic language.
2:4 Then the Chaldeans
spoke to the king in Aramaic, "O king, live forever! Tell your servants
the dream, and we will give the interpretation." Aramaic was the language
of Babylon and was undoubtedly spoken by Daniel since he arrived in Babylon as
a child and was trained in the language and literature of the Chaldeans
Do you think it an accident that Daniel shifted to the
language of the land where he lived for this portion of the book?
Third: Daniel prophesied three different governmental shifts
in Babylon, that the local astrologers and others witnessed, two of them in
dramatic fashion.
You know the
story. Nebuchadnezzar has a dream and calls his magi to interpret the dream but
this time he orders them to tell him what he dreamed as well as what it meant.
Perhaps he was suspicious that the magi were just making up the interpretations
that they had told him before. Nebuchadnezzar ordered the execution of all the magi
if they couldn’t tell him the content of the dream, as well as the
interpretation. Daniel hears about it and goes to the king with what God has
given him and thus saves the lives of all the magi. I’m sure the magi held on
to this story and later paid close attention to the ongoing fulfillment of that
prophesy and others.
The last
portion of the king’s dream ends with the coming messianic kingdom and Daniel’s
interpretation of it.
“While you were watching, a rock was
cut out, but not by human hands. It struck the statue on its feet of iron and
clay and smashed them. Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver and the
gold were broken to pieces at the same time and became like chaff on a
threshing floor in the summer. The wind swept them away without leaving a
trace. But the rock that struck the statue became a huge mountain and filled
the whole earth.”
(2:34, 35)
Then Daniel’s
interpretation of the dream:
v.44 "In the time of those kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that
will never be destroyed, nor will it
be left to another people. It will crush all those kingdoms and bring them to
an end, but it will itself endure forever. 45 This is the meaning of the vision of the rock
cut out of a mountain, but not by human hands -- a rock that broke the iron, the bronze, the
clay, the silver and the gold to pieces. The great God has shown the king what
will take place in the future. The dream is true and the interpretation is
trustworthy."
Undoubtedly,
the magi of Daniel’s day heard or later found out about this and other
prophetic words that Daniel gave. They watched the beginning of the fulfillment
of them in their day. I have no doubt that these stories were passed on by word
of mouth and in writing through generations of magi until the ones that saw the
star and followed it all the way to Bethlehem.
I would like
to invite you to take your own journey through Daniel and imagine yourself as
one of the magi. See what you might find in the writings of this great prophet
and see how it might have influenced your life if you were a magi!
Later we will
look at another prophetic word in Daniel that might have shed even greater
detail on the timing of the coming of the messianic king.
1 Here’s the link to a
scientific perspective on the star of Bethlehem <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzWi0tWKoxo>
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