What made king Herod think that a little baby would be a threat to his throne?
1) What made king Herod think that a little baby would be a threat to his throne? The obvious one: not that the child was a threat to him, personally (though that was certainly a possibility), but the idea that a child not his would succeed to the throne meant at the least that his dynasty would be overthrown – and that could not occur without a coup of some sort. The “magi” told him it was “written in the stars”, and his Jewish scholar corroborated at least some of the details. He was hardly the first ruler to act rashly in response to prophecy. 2) what sort of a king who had so much power Not that much. He ruled only with the favor of Rome – and (as he well knew) that could be withdrawn at any time, and a mob uprising could equally unseat him. More: Judea was at that time pretty near the edge of the Roman empire. The powerful Parthian empire nearby to the East had several wars with Rome and could decide to invade Judea in order to literally split the Roman empire. 3) And the funny pa
