The ‘Three Wise Men’ are a much-loved part of the Christmas story. (Photo: Getty/iStock)
The carol assures us that “We three kings of Orient are…” and tells us they were “following yonder star”. Can we be sure there were three of them? Were they kings? Where in the Orient were they from? What was the star they followed? In fact, there is a lot that we just do not know. This is the story …
What was the Star?
Many Christmas cards show kings in splendid oriental costumes riding on camels and then kneeling alongside shepherds, guided by a single bright star. We do not know what the “star” was that was seen. In ancient times what we call a planet was called a wandering star, and in fact that is where we get the word planet from because it is from the Greek word for wander. A moving star perhaps implies a planet or a comet. There are astronomical theories but we do not know for sure. If we knew the exact date of the birth that would help because we could use astronomical theories to work out the positions of the night sky that day, but we don’t.
How many Wise Men were there?
Our term “wise men” was coined by Tyndale to translate “Magi”. It is just in the plural, but we do not know exactly how many of them there were, or even if they were all men. We infer three only from the three gifts. There may have been many more. Early paintings of them from the Early Church sometimes have twelve.
Who were the Wise Men?
These visitors were not kings, but who they were we cannot be sure. Royal courts had Magi, and in the Bible we read about the wise men of Pharaoh in Genesis 41:8, the wise men of King Ahasuerus in Esther 1:13, and the wise men of King Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel 4:18, so they were likely coming on behalf of a king, without being kings themselves. Tradition ascribes them names, but we do not know what they were called, or which language they spoke.
Where did the Wise Men come from?
The text only tells us that they came from the east (Matthew 2:1), which in context meant east of the River Jordan, but which land we cannot be sure. In English we speak of east as the Near East, Middle East and Far East. Which of these easts they came from is not known. This has enabled different traditions to claim them as their own. Tradition sometimes has them coming from different lands, although most likely they came together from the same place. There are theories about where they came from, as far as Persia or as close as Petra, but no-one knows for sure. We do not know if they came by camel, horse, or by foot or even partially by ship. We do not know how long the journey took, nor when they set off.
How old was Jesus when the Wise Men arrived?
We do not know when the wise men arrived. We can be fairly sure that they did not arrive at the same time as the shepherds. There is a big clue in the presentation at the Temple, where Joseph and Mary sacrifice two birds (Luke 2:24) which is according to the law in Leviticus 12:8 that allowed two birds to be sacrificed instead of a lamb if the people were poor and could not afford a lamb.
This tells us that the wise men had not arrived yet, because if they had had gold then presumably they could have afforded a lamb. Another clue is that Herod determined the time when the boy was born (Matthew 2:7) and then killed all the boys under the age of two (Matthew 2:16), which suggests that Jesus was about a year old, because Herod built in a margin of error to hedge his bets. We do not know when the wise men arrived but it was no less than eight days after the birth, and no more than two years, probably somewhere in the middle between these two points.
Summary
As is often the case the gaps in our knowledge are filled in by tradition, created by the imagination of Christians over the centuries. When we scrape back the layers of tradition to the original story we have to admit that we do not know a lot, and perhaps that is wise. Matthew meant the focus of the story to be Jesus not his house guests.
