How old was herod when he died?

Answer 1

A:

Matthew 2:16 says that Herod sought to kill the children in and around Bethlehem under two years old, so Jesus must have been under two. In fact, Herod would have been very cautious if he really felt that there was a threat to his reign, meaning that Jesus could scarcely be more than a year old. So, on this evidence, Jesus was somewhere between a few weeks and two years old, but probably under one year old.

Note that in Luke's Gospel, whose author had never heard of Herod's Slaughter of the Innocents, Joseph and Mary took Jesus back from Bethlehem to Nazareth just a few weeks after his birth.

Answer 2

A:

King Herod died in April 4 BCE.

Matthew's Gospel says that Jesus was born during the reign of Herod and implies that he was born several years earlier. He would probably have been a growing boy by the time word of Herod's death reached Joseph in Egypt and they began the return trip to their home in Bethlehem, turning aside because of further danger and travelling to Galilee to settle in a city called Nazareth. Exactly how old the boy Jesus was, we could not say.

Luke's Gospel also says that Jesus was born during the reign of Herod but then contradicts itself by saying that he was born during the census of Quirinius, taken ten years after Herod's death. Raymond E. Brown (An Introduction to the New Testament) says the best explanation is that, although Luke likes to set his Christian drama in the context of well known events from antiquity, sometimes he does so inaccurately. This account provides no meaningful information about how old Jesus was.

Answer 3

Jesus was probably born in 6 BC. King Herod died in 4 BC. Jesus was probably 2 years old.

Answer 4

There is no indication in The Bible how old Herod was when he died.

Answer 5

He was about 33 1/2 years old when he was crucified.