TOUGH In the New Testament, the book of Acts records four instances where the Christian missionaries confronted a magos outside of Palestine.
• Philip encounters Simon in one of the Samaritan villages who practiced magic (Acts 8:9).
• Paul confronts Bar Jesus, a Jewish sorcerer (Acts 13:6).
• Paul exorcises a female slave with a spirit of divination for which he and Silas were imprisoned (Acts 16:16).
• In Ephesus, many who had practiced sorcery burned their magic scrolls (Acts 19:18-19). The foremost reason why the Bible strictly forbids astrology, and every other related practice, is its monotheistic principle that there is only one God, Yahweh, who alone possesses the ultimate authority both to censure and censor all such practices.g Yahweh established a covenant with His people. For instance, God told them that He would take them as His own that they might know Him as their God who had brought them out from under the yoke of the Egyptians (Exodus 6:7). He would walk among them and be their God and that they would be His people (Leviticus 26:12; cf. Jeremiah 30:22; Hosea 2:23).
The gods of the ancient Near East were notoriously capricious, believed to bestow blessing and inflict curses as their mood dictates. However, Yahweh is not capricious; He remains faithful and does not waver in His covenant and promises. As the Creator, He controls the rain and gives His people fruitful seasons and bountiful harvests (Cf. Acts 14:17). The stars, as created by God (Genesis 1:16; Job 9:9; Psalm 148:5; Amos 5:8) are His handiwork (Psalm 8:4). Only Yahweh, as the Creator, has the power to use cosmic forces to control the succession of the seasons, time and weather, and human life on earth (Job 38:33). His throne is above the stars (Job 22:12).
QUESTIONS ANSWERED
The Gospel of Jesus, the Messiah, is the heritage of all humanity.”
MATTHEW’S UNIVERSALISM AS THE PURPOSE OF HIS GOSPEL We now return to Matthew’s Gospel. Matthew was a man who lived with two conflicting thought-worlds: that of the ancient Near East (i.e., the Mediterranean/Mesopotamian region); and the one dictated in the Hebrew Scriptures. While the former accepts astrology, the latter prohibits it. Moreover, based on the brief overview above, it is established that Christians cannot commend astrology in any form. Matthew would certainly have felt the tension between these thought-worlds
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