Matthew, Josephus, and the massacre of the innocents

Jason Engwer recently left an informative comment at Michael Brown’s site on why Josephus fails to mention the massacre of the innocents (Mt 2:16-18). I’d like to add a few observations of my own:

i) Children are a common casualty of war, and the ancient world was no exception. The death of a few boys in a small town by Herod’s henchmen would not be historically noteworthy.

ii) Josephus was born c. 37-38 AD. The Antiquities was published c. 93-94. So the event took place about 40 years before he was born–or about two generations before he was born. And his magnum opus was published about a century after the event.

iii) In the age of local and national newspapers, not to mention photojournalism, CNN, and so forth, it’s easy to have an unrealistic expectation of the kinds of events that would be newsworthy in the ancient world. But I think it’s safe to say that ancient people were remarkably ignorant of general history. They would have known about famous kings and conquerors, as well as having some knowledge of local lore (where they happened to live), but their knowledge of the past would be the exception rather than the rule.

iv) Matthew doesn’t record the massacre of the innocents because that’s a famous event; rather, that’s a famous event because Matthew recorded it. He made it famous.

To ask why Josephus failed to record this famous event presumes a frame of reference that Josephus never had. This is only famous in Christian circles. Known to readers of Matthew’s Gospel. From there it become more widely disseminated over the centuries by the church and Christmas celebrations.