I Wonder... [Feast of the Epiphany]

The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson

Matthew 2:1-12

I Wonder…

It’s all very mysterious really, this story of these visitors from the east.  Mystery: mystery writes its story in the inspired imaginations of wondering readers who, across the centuries, have found their hearts captured by this tale.  We have inherited these inspired imaginations, these wonderings.  Because, you see, there is actually, if you read the story carefully, very little detail included in the Gospel telling according to Matthew – the only one of the four Gospels to include this story at all. 

Over the years this story has grown and changed. 

Over the years names have been bestowed upon these visitors; but the Gospel writer mentions nothing of names.

Over the years the number of visitors has been fixed at three in the Western world – no doubt because three gifts are listed; but the Gospel writer gives us no count or census.  The gifts were expensive; perhaps there were many visitors and one guy suggested, “Instead of a lot small gifts, why don’t we pool our money and buy three really nice gifts?”  Everybody has a person like that in their lives.  That they somehow settled on gold, frankincense, and myrrh for a baby, I think reinforces that this might have been a committee decision.  And also how we know they were probably all men.  Women would not have brought such impractical gifts to a new mother who wrapped her first born child in bands of cloth.  

Over the years these mysterious visitors acquired and mounted camels for their transportation needs; but the Gospel writer never mentions any camels.  For all we know they could have perched themselves on the backs of elephants, or arrived on horseback, or been high and lifted up by teams of strapping eunuchs, or they could have walked.

Over the years the visitors were crowned as kings – and perhaps they were; the Gospel writer neither confirms, nor denies, royal lineage.  In the Greek they are simple called “Magi”.  And commentators cannot even agree on what is meant by that.  Are they sages from Sheba or magicians from Mongolia or astrologers from Africa or Zoroastrian priests from Persia?  Maybe.  Probably not all four at once.

The utter lack of substantive detail has spawned a cottage industry of speculation.  Everyone – from biblical scholars to visual artists to toy makers – filling in the gaps of this fascinating story.

All that the Gospel writer tells us is that after Jesus’ birth magi from the East came to Jerusalem in search of the king of the Jews.  They followed some mysterious, wandering star that inexplicably stopped over and highlighted the place where Jesus was.  Upon their arrival, they knelt down before Jesus and paid him homage.  They then opened their treasure chests, which they apparently carried with them from wherever they came, and offered him the contents: gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.  And then being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.  And that’s it.  They depart from the story as suddenly as they arrived on the scene.

And we are left with many more questions than answers.  We are left alone to wonder.

I wonder why they even bothered.  Because frankly in the sparse details of the story it seems clear that these visitors were doing OK.  They owned treasure chests after all.  Why leave it all behind on a whim, to chase a star?  They had no idea when they left their homes, perhaps their families, perhaps their jobs, that they would find a child who was the son of God.  They simply saw a light in the sky; and whatever urge that light awakened in them caused them to leave everything to follow it.  No matter from where they journeyed, the journey was dangerous – no street lights to light their way, no police officers to protect and serve them, and, by carrying gold down the same paths that bandits walked, they journeyed as moving targets.  The hostile king they encountered was also dangerous – desperately afraid of losing his throne, suspicious of these foreigners and their treasonous inquiries, ready to murder even children if he felt it was necessary – and he did; that is the very next story in Matthew’s Gospel.  And then the journey back home: just as dangerous as the first.  All to bow before a child.  

I wonder how they felt when the realized the journey ended where it did.  They tried the palace first, which makes sense: they were trying to find a newborn king.  They likely expected their journey to end at a celebratory feast in some palace, where a proud king doted on the bouncing baby heir to his throne.  But the journey ended at a simple house, in a small, rugged village.  And inside, there were no royal thrones – no queen, no prince, just a young mother with her child.  Is this it?  No pomp.  No fanfare.  The local king knew nothing of the birth.  It was pretty far off of the radar.  I wonder if they felt let down.  After the long journey, after hauling those precious gifts all that way west, it’s just a house, and just a child.

I wonder if doubt ever crept in.  On the journey, with its struggles and setbacks.  Or in the palace, surrounded by the puzzled looks of puzzled people.  Or at the house.  Or on the way the back home.  I wonder if they ever regretted the costs they paid to bow down before a child.

I wonder what they told the people back home.  Did they tell the same story as Matthew’s Gospel – about the star, and the jealous king, and the simple house, and the little child?  Or did they add flourishes that made the trip sound worth it?  Or in their embarrassment and disappointment did they deflect the inquiries and just try to move on with their old lives – like the disciples after the crucifixion?

I wonder.  But this Gospel will no more answer my questions than it has answered the many wonderers who have been captivated and perplexed and inspired and frustrated by this story in ages past.

We call today the Feast of the Epiphany.  And this story from Matthew’s Gospel gives us a sense of the nature of this feast: it is the story of a most unexpected divine revelation.  But though there is revelation, and the magi do find the place to which the star leads them, the revelation is still shrouded in mystery; the revelation is not complete.  It does not provide us with all the answers we seek.  Revelation, as we receive it, is always in part.  Epiphany does not relinquish our questions; but perhaps it teaches us to ask better questions.  Epiphany does not extinguish our deep hunger, actually quite the opposite: the little taste only makes the hunger grow, makes us much, much hungrier.  Each glimpse of God, each new revelation, only increases our wonder.  And so then we are destined to lives of wondering: wrestling with a mystery we will never solve, saddled with questions that have no answers, walking a journey in which we will find glimpses but never a final destination.      

The details of this story are sparse.  There are no names.  There are no places.  In a round world anywhere can be east.  And I think that is purposeful.  I think what makes this story so compelling is that it does not belong to those visitors from the East; it is our story.

Epiphany is about that holy spark that inspires a person to take a chance on a journey – a journey into the mysterious heart of a mysterious God.  There is no final destination.  The hunger that sends us out on our search for cessation only grows.  The venture will inspire many more questions than answers. 

I wonder why you would take that journey.  But even more I wonder why you would not.