The pagan seer Balaam, summoned by the king of Moab to curse Israel, was overmastered by the Spirit of God and uttered instead a fourth oracle: 'I shall see him, but not now: I shall behold him, but not near. A STAR SHALL RISE out of Jacob and a sceptre shall spring up from Israel' (Numbers 24:17).
The prophecy was understood messianically across the ancient Jewish world — the Dead Sea Scrolls cite it of the coming anointed one, and a century after Christ the last great Jewish revolt named its leader Bar Kokhba, 'son of the star,' after this verse. The Church reads its true fulfillment in the star of the Nativity: 'We have seen his star in the east, and are come to adore him' (Matthew 2:2).
The Fathers loved the symmetry — a Gentile seer gave Israel the prophecy, and Gentile seers, the Magi, were the first to read its fulfillment in the sky. The star 'went before them, until it came and stood over where the child was' (Matthew 2:9), and the wise men opened their treasures: gold, frankincense, and myrrh.