DCHindley

With all the talk about Jesus' birth going on this time of year, I have always been fascinated by the links between Cyrus the Great (who was called a "Christ" in the Lxx translation of Isaiah 45:1) and Jesus Christ.

Per Wikipedia, which is here correct (although the article needs rewriting for clarity):

According to Herodotus, [Cyrus] was the grandson of the Median king Astyages ... After the birth of Cyrus, Astyages had a dream that his Magi interpreted as a sign that his grandson would eventually overthrow him. He then ordered his steward Harpagus to kill the infant. [Think Herod ordering the killing of the babies in Bethlehem]

Harpagus, morally unable to kill a newborn, summoned the Mardian Mitradates ..., a ... bandit herdsman from the mountainous region bordering the Saspires, and ordered him to leave the baby to die in the mountains. Luckily, the herdsman and his wife ... took pity and raised the child as their own, passing off their recently stillbirth infant as the murdered Cyrus [Think of Joseph & Mary with the shepherds]. ...

Herodotus claims that when Cyrus was ten years old, it was obvious that Cyrus was not a herdsman's son, stating that his behavior was too noble [Think of Jesus the 12 year old prodigy in the temple].

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyrus_the_Great

Then there is the dancing fish story in Matt 11:17 = Luke 7:32:

We piped to you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn

Herodotus tells a tale in which this kind of thing is relayed. King Cyrus of Persia chides the representatives of the Ionian and Aeolian Greeks for refusing his original terms (to become his vassals and pay tribute) when they thought they were in a position of strength, but come hat-in-hand seeking the same terms when their strongest ally, king Croesus of Lydia, was defeated by Cyrus.

He is said to have replied:

Cease your dancing now, as you did not choose to come and dance when I piped to you.

This is probably an allusion to one of Aesop's fables, who is thought to date to the same period.

Aesop's fables have come down in a variety of forms so the original forms are hard to reconstruct, but the story of the fish and a piping fisherman is one of them. The following web source is not scholarly, but may illuminate:

O you most perverse creatures, when I piped you would not dance,
but now that I have ceased you do so merrily.

http://www.aesopfables.com/cgi/aesop...ishermanPiping

Ah, you dance now when I play," said he. "Yes," said an old Fish: "When you are in a man's power you must do as he bids you.

http://www.aesopfables.com/cgi/aesop...fabl/TheFisher

DCH