Matthew 2:16 facts for kids

Matthew 2:16 is the sixteenth verse of the second chapter of the Gospel of Matthew in the New Testament.

Joseph and Mary had been visited by an angel and told that Herod would attempt to kill Jesus, their son. Doing as told, they took their infant son and fled by night into Egypt, where they stayed until Herod had died. The three Magi were separately warned in a dream of the threat that King Herod posed and went home by a different route than they came.

Herod had planned to make the Magi tell him of the whereabouts of the Christ child. When he heard of the Magi's change in course, he grew angry and tried to kill the infant messiah by killing all the young children in the area, an event known as the Massacre of the Innocents.

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In the King James Version of the Bible the text reads:

Then Herod, when he saw that he was mocked of the wise men,

was exceeding wroth, and sent forth, and slew all the children

that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, from

two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently

inquired of the wise men.

The World English Bible translates the passage as:

Then Herod, when he saw that he was mocked by the wise men,

was exceedingly angry, and sent out, and killed all the male children

who were in Bethlehem and in all the surrounding countryside, from

two years old and under, according to the exact time which he had

learned from the wise men.

The Novum Testamentum Graece text is:

Τότε Ἡρῴδης ἰδὼν ὅτι ἐνεπαίχθη ὑπὸ τῶν μάγων

ἐθυμώθη λίαν, καὶ ἀποστείλας ἀνεῖλεν πάντας τοὺς παῖδας

τοὺς ἐν Βηθλεὲμ καὶ ἐν πᾶσι

τοῖς ὁρίοις αὐτῆς ἀπὸ διετοῦς καὶ κατωτέρω,

κατὰ τὸν χρόνον ὃν ἠκρίβωσεν παρὰ τῶν μάγων.

For a collection of other versions see BibleHub Matthew 2:16