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Though it wasn’t the Gospel writers’ concern, world politics made a radical shift in preparation for the birth of the Messiah. The East had dominated the previous great sweep of history. Civilization had been centered in Egypt, Babylon, and Persia. Alexander the Great moved the world’s political and cultural center to the West by conquering these ancient empires. After Alexander the Great, it was—and still is—a Greek world. Eventually that Greek world was absorbed by the Romans, who merely put a veneer of power politics over the Greek worldview and continued its development. 

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Through the centuries, local politics had brought its share of misery to the Jewish people. Early in Greek rule, the aristocracy—primarily the hereditary priesthood and the rich—adapted themselves to Greek culture and rule. For them, surrender of Biblical mandates was a small price for entry into the realm of wealth and power. They became known as the Sadducean party. Others reacted against their “betrayal” of God and the Jewish culture, forming the Pharisees and the more extreme Essenes. 

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One small glimpse of independence had come and gone a century and a half before Jesus was born. In 167 B.C., a Jewish man by the name of Mattathias, in a fit of rage over the required idolatry imposed by the Greco-Syrian ruler, revolted. Miraculously, he and his five sons cleared the land of its idolatry and Syrian rule. 

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The son who led the revolt was Judas the Hammer, or Judas Maccabean. Never quite free of the greater powers of their day, Simon, the last of the brothers to rule, sought Rome’s protection from Egypt and Syria. From that time forward, Roman interference in Jewish life increased until Rome totally ruled Israel. Roman intrigue in local politics eventually put Herod the Great in power. Thus, the insult of a non-Jew being appointed King over the Jews was added to the injury of Roman subjugation. It was into this world that God the Son came.