The Epiphany of the Lord

On the Feast of The Epiphany there is a lot of baggage that needs to be cleared away in order to get to the heart of the matter. Much of the clutter surrounding the day does no harm, but it can obscure our view of the central concern of our observance.

For instance, our creches and our hymnody insist on three wise men.  Matthew chapter two, where the single biblical account of the visit of the wise men occurs, does nothing to enumerate these Eastern travelers.  Tradition has calculated that total because of the number of gifts that the gospel records.  Matthew says in verse 11 that they offered the child gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.  There is nothing, however that indicates that there was “one wise man, one gift.” The number of visitors could have been two, and the gifts may have been presented collectively.  It is interesting to note that some Eastern Christianity practitioners give twelve as the number of wise men. Some Christian traditions name the wise men, designating them as Melchior, Gaspar and Balthasar.  The Cologne Cathedral in Germany houses a great shrine of the Magi, even purporting to house relics from “The Three Holy Kings.”

The designation Magi is the plural of Magus.  (This is the from which we receive the word “magic.”)  The Magi were priests or other adherents of Zoroastrianism in Persia.  The existence of the sect is verified from a variety of non-biblical sources.

In many modern-day manger scenes, the Wise Men play a significant symbolic role.  In some depictions, one of the three figures is quite young.  A second is middle-aged.  The third appears as a very elderly man.  The meaning is clearly that people of all ages respond to the coming of Christ into the world.  In like manner there are creches that have one wise man of fair skin, blond hair and blue eyes.  A second member of the group has olive skin and straight, dark hair.  The final traveler has very dark skin and thicker features.  These diverse characters indicate that the Savior comes not to one group, but to every nation.

That these visitors receive the title “kings” comes from scriptural references such as Isaiah 60:3 “Nations shall come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn,” or Psalm 72:10 “May the kings of Tarshish and of the isles render him tribute, may the kings of Sheba and Seba bring gifts.”  Again, while the association is certainly present, the actual designation of the Eastern travelers as kings is nowhere explicitly present in Matthew.

Henry van Dyke’s The Other Wise Man is a delightful story, but it, too, serves to muddy the water a bit.  There are scores of other fictional works and seemingly countless fragments of Christian lore and legend that also take a kernel of truth and expand on it beyond the boundaries of literary precision.

So, if we set all of these things aside, what do we know?  I am not engaging in any literary-critical questions here.  I do want to take a look at what is before us in the received text.

What we have is a declaration that God is at work in order to bring about the final realization of God’s divine plan.  This will occur in spite of the most wicked expressions of opposition, such as those exhibited by King Herod.  Jesus is the long-awaited Messiah of the Jews; he is the fulfillment of Old Testament scripture; and he is the savior of the entirety of creation, in spite of any artificially-erected boundaries. 

In the early days of the church, it was Epiphany rather than Christmas that was the pre-eminent winter feast.  The revelation of worldwide salvation took precedence over the birth of the king of the Jews.

Sadly, the church now treats this great day as an ending of something, rather than a beginning.  The Epiphany comes at the conclusion of the Twelve Days of Christmas.  It has its moment as a flash in the pan and then the calendar moves on.  Even though the following eight weeks (in 2019) receive their designation as “The Season After Epiphany,” observances such as The Baptism of the Lord and The Transfiguration move to the forefront during these days.

But, today is the great Feast Day.  Let’s not let it slip away too quickly.