Herod And Jesus
I picked up a copy of “Jesus Of Suburbia: Have We Tamed The Son Of God To Fit Our Lifestyle” by Mike Erre, for our flight to Portland this weekend, but started it at the airport before our flight took off. The author starts the book by talking about the Christmas story, and though I had heard most of what he talked about, there was one section that stuck out to me.
A king is mentioned in Matthew, Herod the Great, called “King of the Jews”, was half Jewish and came from the region of Idumaea. The Jews hated him not only because he was aligned with Rome, but also because they viewed him as an illegitimate Jewish king. He was cruel and paranoid, always thinking that someone was out to take his throne, even to the point of killing one of his ten wives because he was jealous of her. He murdered three of his sons, and drowned one of his brother-in-laws. He caused the Jewish people to remain in poverty so he could build monuments to himself. When he was dying he ordered many elite Jews be held captive in Jericho, and murdered upon his death so there would be mourning in Israel that day, even if it wasn’t for him.
All of this is going on in Matthew, but the interesting part to me is that in Genesis 25, Rachel (Isaac’s wife) was told that the two sons in her womb will turn into two nations, that those nations will conflict with each other and the older will serve the younger. Esau was born first and was given his name because he was hairy. Elsewhere in the Bible he is called “Edom” which means red, for his thick red hair. Jacob, was the youngest and later was renamed Israel. Esau became the father of the Edomites and Jacob, the father of the Israelites.
When the word “Edom” is translated into Greek, it becomes the word “Idumaea”, so the Idumaeans were descendants of Esau. This is the important part… Herod was “half Jewish and came from the region of Idumaea”. That’s a big deal when we look at the Christmas story. The book says that some even think that Herod (the Edomite) would have been aware of the scriptures prophesies of a king coming out of Israel who will conquer the descendants of Esau, which proves his paranoia. That to me, is an interesting little piece of trivia. Nothing life-changing, just cool.
I will finish it this weekend and let you know how the rest of the book is. Right now I am at a Chili’s in the Phoenix airport waiting for our flight to Portland.
This is really cool. The whole Jacob/Esau story is mind blowing, because you’ve got this prophesy about them, which would tell us that God chose before hand who would carry on the line of Israelites. But then, at the same time, you’ve got Jacob and Rachel conspiring to get the birthright and Isaac’s blessing. When it seems that Isaac will give the blessing to Esau, Rachel and Jacob intervene…so that tells us that man, his actions, had a part in that whole thing. Of course you could say that had they not done anything, God could have worked it out later, but…Augustine calls it a great mystery. Along the lines of Jesus being Redeemer of all mankind because the Jews rejected him….God predestined the redemption of mankind, but the Jews actions and self will played a part in carrying out God’s will.
Anyway, you didn’t ask for all that, but it made me think about it. Cool post!
That is interesting. If you look close enough, you can see that these are not just names and dates but people with real connections and real motivations.
One thing I noticed in reading through the O.T. histories a few years ago was that King David’s advisor Ahithophel, who aided Absalom in rebellion, was apparently the grandfather of Bathsheba. Perhaps this puts a new face on why one of David’s trusted advisors and a very wise man would turn traitor, having seen the way David treated his granddaughter and her husband.