“When Herod the king had heard these things, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.”
When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. Herod's disturbance and Jerusalem's collective anxiety at the news of a messianic birth sets a pattern that will repeat at Jesus' entry into Jerusalem in chapter 21: the city that should be most ready for its king is most alarmed by his arrival. The Magi's innocent question has created a political crisis at the highest level of power. Luke 1:51–52 anticipates this dynamic: the mighty are brought low and the lowly exalted. The one who threatens no one threatens everyone in power. Herod's fear is not merely political but tells us something about how the powers of this age receive the kingdom of God — with disturbance, with secret plotting, with calculated violence.
Church Fathers on Matthew 2:3
As the Magi seek a Redeemer, so Herod fears a successor.
'The King,' he is called, though in comparison with him whom they are seeking he is an alien and a foreigner.
Herod 'was troubled' when he heard that a King was born of Jewish lineage, lest, himself being an Idumaean, the kingdom should return again to native princes, and himself be expelled, and his seed after him.
Read all 24 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain
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