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MATTHEW 2:21 — KING JAMES VERSION 0
Matt 2:20Matt 2:22
“And he arose, and took the young child and his mother, and came into the land of Israel.”
And he rose and took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel. Joseph's third act of immediate obedience — he rose and went. The land of Israel is the promised land, the covenant space where the story has always been heading. The return from Egypt to Israel completes the Hosea 11:1 pattern: the son has been called out of Egypt, and now he enters the land that is his inheritance as son of David, son of Abraham, and son of God. The journey that began with a genealogy (chapter 1) and passed through a manger, a star, a massacre, and an exile now arrives at the beginning of the land where the rest of the story will unfold.

Church Fathers on Matthew 2:21

Joseph was not disobedient to the angelic warning, but 'he arose, and took the young Child and his mother, and came into the land of Israel.'

Gloss (Glossa Ordinaria) · medieval compilation

patra of Jerusalem, Herod, who was afterwards tetrarch, and Philip. The three first were put to death by Herod; and after his death, Archelaus seized the throne by occasion of his father’s will, and the question of the succession was carried before Aug ustus Caesar. After some delay, he made a distribution of the whole of Herod’s dominions in accordance with the Senate’s advice. To Archelaus he assigned one half, consisting of Idumaea and Judaea, with the title of tetrarch,…

Leo the Great · 5th century

Here is may be asked, How then could his parents go up every year of Christ’s childhood to Jerusalem, as Luke relates, if fear of Archelaus now prevented them from approaching it? This difficulty is easily solved. At the festival they might escape notice in the crowd, and by returning soon, where in ordinary times they might be afraid to live. So they neither became irreligious by neglecting the festival, nor notorious by dwelling continually in Jerusalem.

Augustine · 4th century · De Con. Evan. ii. 10
Read all 12 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain
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