Many passages in the Old Testament expressed the idea of a Messianic king, a ruler from David’s family line, whose reign would be righteous, perpetual, universal (Isaiah 7:13 through 9:7; Isaiah 32:1, Isaiah 32:2; Jeremiah 33:15, Jeremiah 33:16; Psalm 2:1-10, etc.); about a Righteous Sufferer (Ps 22, etc.), whose sufferings in Isaiah 53:1-12 are described to have expiatory and redeeming characteristics and about a Messianic kingdom, which would unite all nations, extend through the whole earth, and embrace all peoples (Isa 60; Psalm 87:1-7; Daniel 2:44; Daniel 7:27). This kingdom currently exists as a spiritual kingdom in which one can find forgiveness and righteousness. [See page: The Kingdom of God]
The Cultural Shift for Messiah’s coming
After the Israelites returned from the exile, they witnessed many preparations for Christ’s arrival. During this time there was a decentralization of the Jewish religious ideals through the rise of synagogue worship and the widespread dispersion of the people. Contact with Hellenic culture (as in Philo) especially increased people’s Messianic expectations. Some of these were of a crude apocalyptic character (See page: APOCALYPTIC LITERATURE; ESCHATOLOGY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT many were political and revolutionary but some were of a purer and more spiritual focus (Luke 2: 25, Luke 2:38). Jesus attached Himself to those spiritual ideas in His preaching about the kingdom and Himself as its Lord. The idea of the coming Messiah also extended to the Gentile world. The wise men in Matthew 2 were likely Zoroastrian magi from Persia who were expecting the Messiah to come as part of their own Zoroastrian religious writings as told in Yast 13.129 and Yasna 30.8-10. It is also told that there was an expectation of a great One who around this time would come from Judea (Tacitus, History v. 13; Suet . Vespas 4).