Herod knew how to get things done.
After the Roman Senate elects him King of Judea, he banishes his wife and son so he can marry into Jerusalem royalty, though it takes him another three years to become the actual ruler.
Once in charge though, he was Hell on Wheels bringing running water to the city, the first functional sewage system, oversees a peaceful reign but most of all, gives the people what they want ... the rebuilt Temple of King Solomon!
Herod's bothered and perplexed.
Three men claiming to be Kings themselves, wise men and Magi, have shown up asking where is the new King? The one to replace them all? They're prepared to accept his reign and even brought gifts.
Priding himself on never being caught by surprise, Herod's shocked beyond belief.
"I'm the best damn thing that's ever happened to these people," he mutters continuing to gaze at his Temple's western wall.
The people of the city rush inside to worship, scrubbed and clean in the public baths built upon the water Herod makes run.
"You can't trust the people to know what's right," he snaps, pouring himself a glass of wine.
Damn religion has been the bane of his existence since getting into politics!
It's why he got rid of a wife and kid. He needed religious legitimacy to rule the Holy City so he marries into the Jews though he doesn't care for her, hates her family and thinks the religion has way too many rules.
Herod knows the secret to political success is giving the people what they want, don't establish too many rules and give all of the glory to God.
Religion, it seems to him, is the opposite ... demand people do things they don't want, heap Commandment upon Commandment upon them and proclaim the Clergy the best damn thing since sliced bread ... or flushing toilets.
He giggles at the thought.
"And who do these Orientals think they are presuming to know things I don't? What do they know? this is my Country! ... my land ... my people ... and I know what my people want and I know what my people need ... and they sure as Hell don't need another King because I'm the best damn thing they've ever known!"
"If anything happens to me it'll scare the living daylights out of them! They love me."
He'd checked out their story with his own legal team and there was piece of religious thought claiming a messiah would be born in the middle of nowhere smack dab in the middle of Herod's Kingdom.
"No way in Hell's that true," he mutters. "And even if there was, he can't touch me."
Having collected himself, Herod is smug returning to the great hall where he's kept the three wise guys waiting.
"I greatly admire your commitments and beliefs," he told the three not-so-Wise fellows, "and respect that you believe a great King has been born under my nose. It's not true! Were it so, I'd know. And I don't ... so it's not true."
The three looked questionably at each other.
"But if you find the child, come back and let me know ... so that ... and Herod snickers ... I can be wise like you."
The Magi left and never returned.
And it wasn't anything spectacular that drove the point to Herod. There were no choirs of Angels, trumpets blaring from the Heavens and he never did see that damn star.
It was the sudden realization one sunny day that they'd never returned.
"Those son-of ..." he thinks, jumping from his throne to dispatch hastily thought out military orders.
"What if they had found him?"
Great politicians know to plan for the worse and hope for the best.
"I'm not taking any chances," he thinks giving the orders.
"There's an infection in newborns ... to protect my beloved people from public health threats ... they must be euthanized so my Kingdom continues on earth as it is ..."
No one ever heard anything else from the Three Kings of Orient.
The only thing reminding us Herod was here at all are four walls of a building he had constructed for the glory of God where ... to this day ... people pray before the western wall.
But go anywhere ... anywhere at all ... and ask, "You ever heard the story of a baby in a stable?"
Odds are ... they've have.
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