Matthew 2:23 Revisited
Table of Contents
In this post I will cite a few commentaries explaining what did Matthew exactly mean when he wrote that Jesus is supposed to be a Nazarene according to the prophets. All emphasis will be mine.
23. Matthew often says “he came and did—”; here Joseph came and settled, his new home being in Nazareth.66 Luke locates both Joseph and Mary in this town (Luke 1:26–27; 2:4), but Matthew has not said anything so far about where either lived; he has said only that Jesus was born in Bethlehem. We should not read too much into city; the Greek language does not have a word equivalent to our “town,” and it makes do with “city” or “village.” We should understand that Nazareth was more than a hamlet, but not that it was a bustling metropolis. It was apparently not an important place; it is not mentioned in the Old Testament, the Talmud, the Midrashim, or Josephus (so BAGD). Matthew finds another fulfilment of prophecy in this choice of domicile. They lived there so that prophecy might be fulfilled. On this occasion there are some small differences from the way Matthew usually cites prophecy; thus he uses the plural prophets, he omits “saying,” and he inserts the word I have translated that (and which is taken by many interpreters as the equivalent of quotation marks, by others as meaning “because”). All this may be connected with the fact that it is not easy to find the words he will be called a Nazarene in any of the prophetical books, or for that matter, anywhere in the Old Testament.69 No passage even resembles this. It appears that Matthew is drawing attention to the thrust of Old Testament prophecy about the Christ rather than to any one passage. Jesus went to Galilee so that what was written about him in the prophets would be fulfilled, and we see this in his being called a Nazarene, a citizen of an obscure and unimportant town. Had he been known as “Jesus of Bethlehem” he would have had the aura of one who came from the royal city; there would have been overtones of messianic majesty. But “Jesus the Nazarene” carried with it overtones of contempt.71 We are to understand the prophets as pointing to one who would be despised and rejected, and Jesus as fulfilling this by his connection with obscure Nazareth.
Cf. Knox, “No such prophecy has survived to us. But an obscure village is often regarded by its more important neighbours as typical of an unfashionable or provincial outlook; cf. Jn. 1.46. The prophecy (Is. 53.3) that our Lord would be despised by men was fulfilled when his contemporaries spoke of him scornfully as ‘a prophet from Nazareth’ (like our ‘wise men of Gotham’)” (The New Testament, p. 2, n. 4). Zahn has a somewhat similar view, but he takes ὅτι as causal, “because.” Lenski, Ridderbos, and Plummer also take it as causal. (Leon Morris, The Gospel according to Matthew, The Pillar New Testament Commentary [Grand Rapids, MI; Leicester, England: W.B. Eerdmans; Inter-Varsity Press, 1992], pp. 48–49)
23. Matthew, with his typical avoidance of unnecessary detail, does not mention that Nazareth had already been the family home before the birth of Jesus (Luke 1:26; 2:4). What interests him is the significance of the choice of Nazareth in the light of Scripture. The Messiah was expected to come from Bethlehem (2:4–6), and Jesus’ coming from Nazareth, an insignificant village with a partly Gentile population and outlook, could well be an embarrassment (cf. John 1:46; 7:41–42, 52); it must be scripturally defended. Now Nazareth is not mentioned in the Old Testament (or in any other contemporary Jewish literature), and the words He shall be called a Nazarene do not occur in the Old Testament. How then does Jesus’ upbringing in Nazareth fulfil what was spoken by the prophets? Matthew does not explain, and numerous suggestions have been made (see Gundry, UOT, pp. 97–104). The two most favoured Old Testament passages are Isaiah 11:1, where the Messiah is described as a ‘branch’ (nēṣer) from the root of Jesse (a similar image, though not the word nēṣer, is used in other Messianic passages, e.g. Isa. 4:2; 53:2; Jer. 23:5; 33:15; Zech. 3:8; 6:12), and Judges 13:5, where Samson is presented as a Nazirite (Heb. nĕzîr, lxx naziraios). The disadvantage of the former is that the word-play is not obvious in Hebrew, and would be completely lost in Greek; and of the latter that Matthew uses Nazōraios not naziraios, and that Jesus was never a Nazirite anyway. Neither passage provides Matthew’s actual wording. (The ‘shall be’ of Judg. 13:5 would have fitted well here; that Matthew instead wrote ‘shall be called’ suggests that that was not his source.) It should be noted, however, that the formula introducing the quotation differs from the regular pattern (see pp. 42–43) in two ways: it refers not to a single prophet but to the prophets, and it concludes not with ‘saying’ (legontos) but with ‘that’ (hoti). This suggests that it is not meant to be a quotation of a specific passage, but a summary of a theme of prophetic expectation. Thus it has been suggested that Matthew saw in the obscurity of Nazareth the fulfilment of Old Testament indications of a humble and rejected Messiah; for Jesus to be known by the derogatory epithet Nazōraios (cf. John 1:46) was not compatible with the expected royal dignity of the Messiah, and thus fulfilled such passages as Psalm 22; Isaiah 53; Zechariah 11:4–14. (Gundry, UOT, pp. 103–104, points out that a play on the word nēṣer in Isa. 11:1 would also convey this same message, as the shoot from the cut-down stump is a symbol of lowly origin [and cf. the despised plant image in Isa. 53:2], and was so understood in contemporary Judaism.) (R. T. France, Matthew: An Introduction, vol. 1, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1985), pp. 93–94)
The last of the five fulfillment quotations in Matt 1–2 poses a unique problem. No such citation appears in the Old Testament. Matthew may be acknowledging this fact by using, for the first time here, the plural “prophets.” In other words, he may be indicating that he is not quoting one specific text but summarizing a broader scriptural theme. What might this theme be? A common suggestion links Nazareth with the Hebrew nezer, which means branch and signifies a king from David’s line (cf. e.g., Isa 11:1). Matthew would then be making a typical Hebrew play on words because “Nazareth” itself does not derive from nezer.
The second possibility, proposed at least as long ago as the days of Jerome (fourth century), is that “Nazarene” was a slang or idiomatic term for an individual from a very remote or obscure place (much like our contemporary words hick or backwoodsman). This interpretation would fit well with the attitude toward Nazareth reflected in John 1:46 and is perhaps to be preferred in light of the context of Matt 2. Matthew has pointed out the originally insignificant town in which Jesus was born, the ignominy of his flight to Egypt, and the grief of death surrounding his infancy. It would be appropriate if a reference to the obscure and despised city of his childhood appeared here. Old Testament precedent for the Messiah’s obscurity culminates in Isa 52–53. A third explanation links “Nazarene” and “Nazirite.” But Jesus was not a Nazirite, and the orthographical evidence for this linkage is lacking. (Craig Blomberg, Matthew, vol. 22, The New American Commentary [Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1992], p. 70)
By God’s Plan, They Settle in an Obscure Place (2:23)* Jewish leaders who opposed Matthew’s community undoubtedly reviled Jesus by wondering how a great Messiah could come from politically insignificant Nazareth (compare Jn 1:46). Nazareth was, like many Galilean towns, “a tiny agricultural village.” Earlier estimates suggested that it contained as many as sixteen hundred to two thousand inhabitants (Meyers and Strange 1981:27, 56), but more recent estimates have suggested five hundred (Stanton 1993:112). It was the sort of community where everyone would know everyone else’s business, but it was a religiously orthodox town (see Meyers and Strange 1981:27; Finegan 1969:29). Though Nazareth existed in the shadow of the large, Hellenized Jewish city of Sepphoris, Galilean villages and towns were not very dependent economically on the two Hellenized cities (Goodman 1983:27, 60).
But while Nazareth was humanly insignificant, Matthew emphasizes that it was divinely significant. Jewish leaders may have been inclined to question, “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?” (Jn 1:46 NASB), but Matthew turns their objection around by showing divine significance in the choice of Nazareth as Jesus’ hometown. Matthew accomplishes this exercise by a wordplay, a standard and accepted form of argumentation in both Jewish and Greco-Roman rhetoric (Keener 1992b:54 n. 101). Although we would not use an argument based on wordplay today (in English wordplays usually constitute bad puns rather than arguments), Matthew’s argument demonstrates that we, like Matthew, should be prepared to answer our culture’s objections and questions regarding our Lord Jesus in culturally relevant ways. His case for Nazareth also reminds us that God often uses the despised things of the world to accomplish his purposes (1 Cor 1:27).
That Matthew is making a play on the name Nazareth is easier to recognize than the specific word with which he is playing, and scholars divide in their opinions here. Two views are most common. Those who believe that Matthew would not use a wordplay that worked only in Hebrew usually hold that Matthew intended “Nazirite” (Patte 1987:39–40; Meier 1980:16). Scholars who argue this position typically assume that Matthew drew a typological application from Samson in Judges 13:5 (part of the former prophets), which he attributed for some reason to the Messiah.
But whereas Matthew’s less skillful readers would have to have satisfied themselves that the text was in their Bible somewhere, those skillful enough to recognize that no single text said this would also recognize Matthew’s method; many might also know Hebrew. Thus other scholars appeal to the prophets’ messianic title “the branch” (Is 4:2; Jer 23:5; 33:15; Zech 3:8; 6:12); Isaiah 11:1 uses the same term, which is more clearly messianic than “Nazirite.”
(Craig S. Keener, Matthew, vol. 1, The IVP New Testament Commentary Series [Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1997], Mt 2:23)
The threat to the young king did not end with his return to Israel after Herod’s death. The Lord confirmed Joseph’s fears of Herod’s cruel son (2:22), and so Joseph took his family farther north to his and Mary’s hometown, Nazareth in Galilee (see Luke 1:26–27; 2:39). At this time Galilee was an out-of-the way province, far from the centers of religious and political power in Jerusalem. The Father wanted the king’s beginnings to be quiet and unnoticed, where he would grow to maturity among the common people whom he had come to save.
Nazareth was a neighborhood with a dubious reputation (see John 1:46). It was a Roman military post with all the attendant and “disreputable” trappings. While Jesus grew up with strong convictions, keeping himself from giving in to the temptations that surrounded him, he learned in this setting to understand and have compassion on the sick and sinful people around him (see Luke 2:40). His ability to dine with the outcasts (Matt. 9:10–13) did not develop overnight. Although the turn of events in Joseph’s return with his family to Israel may seem haphazard, God had a purpose in every detail.
Matthew uses the formula “in order to fulfill” thirteen times in his Gospel. Among them, Matthew 2:23 is unique. It refers to the prophets. This plural usage is helpful in explaining that this statement is not found verbatim in any one prophet in the Old Testament. Rather, it seems to be an indirect quotation summarizing the tenor of more than one prophet. What Matthew intended to communicate was not a word-for-word quote found in a specific location, but a theme supported in multiple locations in the Old Testament.
Why did Matthew highlight this negative anticipation of Messiah’s ministry? A couple of reasons are likely. First, by the time Matthew wrote his account, the word Nazarene had become a household adjective describing anything despised and scorned. When Christ’s followers were called members of “the Nazarene sect” by their enemies (Acts 24:5), the term was intended as an insult.
(Stuart K. Weber, Matthew, vol. 1, Holman New Testament Commentary [Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 2000], pp. 22–23)
“He Will Be Called a Nazarene”: Fulfillment of the Prophets.
The difficulty involved here is very simple—there are no Old Testament texts that refer to Jesus as a Nazarene, let alone explicitly say “he shall be called a Nazarene.” Gundry (1975:97–104) has a very thorough discussion of this matter. There are two major approaches to solving the difficulty. The one posits a pun or paronomasia where Matthew is associating the place name “Nazareth” and the word for a resident of Nazareth, “Nazarene,” with either the Hebrew word for “branch” (netser [5342, 5342]; Isa 11:1; cf. synonyms in Isa 4:2; 53:2) or the Old Testament “Nazirite” [5139B, 5687], one especially dedicated to God (Num 6; Judg 13:5, 7; 16:17; 1 Sam 1:11; Lam 4:7; Amos 2:11–12; cf. Luke 1:15; Acts 18:18; 21:23–24). In light of Matthew’s emphasis on Jesus’ Davidic roots, the “branch” pun is plausible. But the Nazirite pun seems unlikely, given the insistence of Matthew 11:18–19 that Jesus did not live an ascetic lifestyle.
Another approach views the pun theories as overly subtle and posits instead that Matthew was drawing together the obscure geographical origins of the Messiah and the theological thrust of the Old Testament that the Messiah would be humble and despised. This view notes the obscurity and humility of the Messiah in Matthew and connects this with the general tenor of the Old Testament that the Messiah would be despised and rejected (Ps 22:6–8, 13; 69:8, 20–21; Isa 49:7; 53:2–3, 7–8; Dan 9:26). Matthew’s mention of the transformation of obscure Bethlehem by Jesus’ birth (2:6), along with his stress on Jesus’ humility (11:29; 12:19; 21:5) and rejection (8:20; 11:16–19; 15:7–8), are cited by advocates of this position (Carson 1984:97; Gundry 1975:103–104; Morris 1992:49; Tasker 1961:45; Toussaint 1980: 56–57). Other references to Nazareth in Matthew also imply its unsavory Gentile connections and obscurity—that is, from the perspective of urban Jerusalem (4:13; 21:11; 26:71). Additional support is found in the evidence elsewhere in the New Testament that Nazareth was a despised place (John 1:46–47; 7:41–42; 52) and that “Nazarene” was a term of derision for the early disciples of Jesus(Acts 24:5).
Though it is difficult to rule out the first approach as a possible secondary allusion, the second approach is preferable. Matthew’s introductory formula cites the prophets in general, so it seems that he was alluding to the general teaching of the prophets, not to a word play on a specific word in a single passage. The general tenor of the prophets that the Messiah would be lowly and despised is echoed repeatedly in Matthew, though it evidently cut against the grain of first-century messianic speculation.
(David Turner and Darrell L. Bock, Cornerstone Biblical Commentary, Vol 11: Matthew and Mark [Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 2005], pp. 54–55)
The third reference, ‘So was fulfilled what was said through the prophets: “He will be called a Nazarene” ’ (23), is the most remarkable of them all. Nowhere is it to be found in the Old Testament, nor is Nazareth even mentioned there. We need to look a little deeper, if we are to hazard a guess at Matthew’s purpose in including it. The fact that Matthew speaks vaguely of ‘the prophets’ in the plural may give us the key to this complex allusion. A man from Nazareth was despised in Jesus’ day: it was an obscure town from which no good was thought to come, situated in ‘Galilee of the Gentiles’,19 and there was plenty of indication among the prophets that the Messiah would be despised. The word ‘Nazarene’ may also have sprung to Matthew’s mind as a word-play on the Hebrew for ‘Branch’ (nēṣer) in Isaiah 11:1, a notable messianic text denoting a king from David’s line. Another possibility is that Matthew might also have been thinking of Isaiah 49:6, part of one of the Servant Songs applied to Jesus in early Christian times. There the term ‘those … have kept’ could be interpreted, with a slight change of Hebrew pointing, as ‘Nazarene’, yielding the sense: ‘It is too small a thing for you to be my servant to restore the tribes of Jacob and a Nazarene to restore Israel …’ If this is so, then early in the Gospel we have the idea of Jesus, God’s suffering Servant and child, preserved by him but rejected by the people. This is certainly a theme that will occupy us as the Gospel unfolds, but it is impossible to be sure which Old Testament allusions were uppermost in Matthew’s mind. The very obscurity of the allusion shows that the infancy narratives are not fanciful, based on Old Testament prophecies. The history was primary, and the Old Testament, the acknowledged source of God’s revelation, is ransacked by the evangelist in order to point it up. (Michael Green, The Message of Matthew: The Kingdom of Heaven, The Bible Speaks Today [Leicester, England; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2001], p. 73)
Further Reading
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