Holy Innocents vs. First born of Egypt

[Cathy]

How do I answer a cynical, formerly-Christian relative who argued with me tonight that the Holy Innocents are equivalent to the firstborn children of Egypt just before the Exodus? In essence, he compared Herod to …well, you get the picture. Is there a charitable way to answer this? Or should I remain silent (as I have so far)? Along with your responses, I also ask for your prayers.

 

[amontoya]

The death of the firstborn in Egypt was a sign from God demonstrating His absolute power and authority, as well as a defense of His people, Isreal. The slaughter of the Holy Innocents was a jealous outburst of a power hungry king desperate to wipe out his “competition.” IMHO

 

[epostle]

The first-born in Eygpt died as a consequence of Pharoah’s hard-heartedness. The other first-born were SPARED whose doorways bore the vertical and horizontal marks of blood from the lamb. If the Holy Innocents of the Gospel are an equivalent, which ones were spared?

The answer is the Holy Innocents have absolutely NOTHING to do with the first-born in Egypt. It was prophecied in Wisdom 11:7
in rebuke for the decree to slay the infants,
thou gavest them abundant water unexpectedly,

 

[BlestOne]

Good points everyone… I thought about it from this angle:
Each of the plagues leading up to and including the final first born deaths was about God showing he was the GOD… All the plagues were involving things that Egyptians worshiped as Gods…including first born sons…

What was there to correlate with what Herod did? He was threatened by the fact that even foreigners recognized Jesus as King of the Jews. He was King… and now some Jewish infant, not of “noble” birth was seen as King by the Magi???

More likely a correlation could be drawn between Herod and the King of the Egyptians here:
Exodus 1:
15 The king of Egypt told the Hebrew midwives, one of whom was called Shiphrah and the other Puah, 16 7 When you act as midwives for the Hebrew women and see them giving birth, if it is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, she may live." 17 The midwives, however, feared God; they did not do as the king of Egypt had ordered them, but let the boys live. 18 So the king summoned the midwives and asked them, “Why have you acted thus, allowing the boys to live?” 19 The midwives answered Pharaoh, “The Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women. They are robust and give birth before the midwife arrives.” 20 Therefore God dealt well with the midwives. The people, too, increased and grew strong.

 

[patg]

How do I answer a cynical, formerly-Christian relative who argued with me tonight that the Holy Innocents are equivalent to the firstborn children of Egypt just before the Exodus? In essence, he compared Herod to …well, you get the picture. Is there a charitable way to answer this? Or should I remain silent (as I have so far)? Along with your responses, I also ask for your prayers.

The issue is whether a simplistic literalist reading is sufficient for understanding. I think not - Matthew is teaching theological truth rather than historical truth. Matthew’s Infancy Narrative weaves images from scripture around the accounts of events in order to teach the significance of those events in the lives of the audience.

When a person who knows the Old Testament reads the infancy narratives, they realize that many of the details unique to each story have a familiar ring to them. In fact, they are Old Testament allusions added to the stories to teach the significance of the events being recounted. When one is able to bring these Old Testament allusions to bear on one’s understanding of the story, a whole new level of meaning opens up. Only by doing this can we understand the theological richness that Matthew and Luke have added to their accounts by their of midrash.

What is Matthew telling his audience when he includes in his infancy narrative the accounts of the star, the magi, Herod’s plot, the massacre of the babies, and the flight into Egypt? Each of these images recalls to the mind of Matthew’s largely Jewish audience something significant in their past. He organizes his gospel into five sections that reflect the Pentateuch, the five books of the old law. He pictures Jesus giving the new law on a mountain, just as Moses did. Everywhere in Matthews’s gospel we read of Jesus against the backdrop of the history of the Jewish people, for it is only against this backdrop that Jesus’ true identity can be understood by Matthew’s largely Jewish audience.

 

[utunumsint]

How do I answer a cynical, formerly-Christian relative who argued with me tonight that the Holy Innocents are equivalent to the firstborn children of Egypt just before the Exodus? In essence, he compared Herod to …well, you get the picture. Is there a charitable way to answer this? Or should I remain silent (as I have so far)? Along with your responses, I also ask for your prayers.

If you read the accounts of Herod provided by Josephus, you will see that the massacre of the Holy Innocents is certainly not out of character for him. He murdered the last Hasmonean King and usurped the throne, killed three of his own sons, murdered his brothers, had his first wife killed, all out of paranoia, or to protect his own power base. He would have seen the announcement of the true king of Isreal as a direct threat to his power.

If there is a parallel between Pharaoh and Herod, it was probably done intentionally by the Gospel writer, but this does not mean the original story has no basis in historical fact.

God bless,
Ut

 

[Claire_from_DE]

How do I answer a cynical, formerly-Christian relative who argued with me tonight that the Holy Innocents are equivalent to the firstborn children of Egypt just before the Exodus? In essence, he compared Herod to …well, you get the picture. Is there a charitable way to answer this? Or should I remain silent (as I have so far)? Along with your responses, I also ask for your prayers.

So your relative is saying that God is no better that Herod because both caused the death of the innocent? You could point out the issue of motive. Herod wanted to do away with a rival king before he came to power. He killed many children just for the chance of killing one child who may have come to power in future years. God, on the other hand, sent his angel to kill the firstborn of Egypt to deliver Israel from many years of slavery. He had given the Egyptians several warnings of His intentions (the other plagues) so that they could escape this one.

In addition, the lives of all are in the hand of God. Each person who died in Egypt was known to God and loved by Him and was judged mercifully according to whatever standards He used in judging the righteous gentiles. Herod, on the other hand, was motivated only by hatred.

 

[Leopard]

How do I answer a cynical, formerly-Christian relative who argued with me tonight that the Holy Innocents are equivalent to the firstborn children of Egypt just before the Exodus? In essence, he compared Herod to …well, you get the picture. Is there a charitable way to answer this? Or should I remain silent (as I have so far)? Along with your responses, I also ask for your prayers.

The parallel is not between the Holy Innocents and the firsborn of the Egyptians, but between the Holy Innocents, ordered killed by Herod, the King of Judea and the sons of the Hebrew slaves ordered killed by Pharoah, the King of Egypt:
Exodus 1:15-16:

The king of Egypt told the Hebrew midwives, one of whom was called Shiphrah and the other Puah, “When you act as midwives for the Hebrew women and see them giving birth, if it is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, she may live.”… Pharaoh then commanded all his subjects, “Throw into the river every boy that is born to the Hebrews, but you may let all the girls live.”

 

[Ora_et_Labora_1]

The parallel is not between the Holy Innocents and the firsborn of the Egyptians, but between the Holy Innocents, ordered killed by Herod, the King of Judea and the sons of the Hebrew slaves ordered killed by Pharoah, the King of Egypt:

I was thinking about this today and would have to agree with the parallel of the killing of the sons of the Hebrew slaves in Egypt rather than the firstborn of the Egyptians (didn’t the death of the firstborn extend also to livestock?). If Jesus is The Profet, the “new” Moses, then it would “make sense” given the greater picture (Jesus’ flight to and from Egypt, etc.).