2024-01-06 03:37:00
The three Wise Men following the star of Bethlehem (Photo: Pixabay)
Today is January 6: “Three Kings’ Day” or, rather, “the feast of the epiphany of the Lord”, Epiphany means “manifestation”. Jesus makes himself known. Although this happened at different times and to different people, the Church celebrates three events as epiphanies: Epiphany before the Three Wise Men (Matthew 2:1-12), Epiphany to Saint John the Baptist at the Jordan (Matthew 3:13-17), and Epiphany to his disciples and the beginning of His public life with the miracle in Cana (John 2:1-12).
The evangelist Matthew says: “When Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of King Herod, wise men came from the east to Jerusalem and said: Where is the one who has been born King of the Jews? for we saw his star in the east and came to worship him.” That is to say that the Magi of the East were not just anyone, they were received by the king and he offered them help with whatever they needed.
During the captivity of the Jews in Babylon, religious thinkers from the East first discovered the Tanakh and learned of the ancient prophecy regarding the star of Bethlehem from the seer and soothsayer Balaam, who predicted the coming of the Messiah: “A star rises from Jacob. and a rod is lifted up out of Israel” (Numbers 24:17). Then, during the Babylonian captivity, the prophet Daniel predicted the exact date of the Messiah’s birth (Dan. 9:25). They knew regarding her in all Jewish homes. King Herod also knew her.
That is why the questions of the Three Wise Men regarding the Royal Child scared Herod so much. After consulting with the chief priests and scribes, Herod discovered that Bethlehem was the place where the Messiah would be born according to the prediction of the prophet Micah (Micah 5:2). Then, “in secret,” as the Gospel tells us, he called the Magi to his palace and learned from them that the star had become visible in the sky even before the birth of the one they were looking for, and that it was she who was looking for them. guided him on his journey. Herod ordered them to find the Child in this small town, so that he might worship him. When the Magi left Jerusalem, the star once more illuminated their path and led them to the house, where at that moment the Mother of God with the Son and the righteous Joseph the Bridegroom were: “And, entering the house, they saw the Child with Mary, his Mother, and they fell down and worshiped Him” (Matthew 2:11).
Hieronymus Hieronymus Triptych (1485-1500): “Adoration of the Three Wise Men”
Who were the Three Wise Men who came to worship the Child God? This event becomes an object of reflection for many interpreters already in the first monuments of Christian literature. Following the tradition of the Old Testament, Christianity negatively evaluates magic and astrology as activities incompatible with the idea of free will and God’s Providence for man. However, the evangelist Matthew speaks of the Magi in a positive sense, as people who perform a pious act, unlike the Jews who did not accept the Savior. For Matthew, the pagan world recognized the Savior, but God’s chosen people did not recognize their Lord and Creator. Speaking of the Magi, the evangelist uses the term μάγοι (magicians, sorcerers). In ancient literature, this term has two meanings: people belonging to the Persian Zoroastrian priests and Babylonian astrologer priests. It is impossible to say with certainty from which country these wise astrologers came: most likely Persia or Babylon. In these countries the messianic expectations of the Jews were known thanks to the prophet Daniel. As early as the 2nd century, in early Christian literature, the Arabian Peninsula was often called the homeland of the Magi, thus relating it to the Old Testament prophecies regarding the worship of foreigners to the Messianic King of Israel: “The kings of Arabia and Saba will bring gifts; and all kings will worship him; all nations will serve him, for he will deliver the poor, the mourning, and the oppressed…and he will save the souls of the needy” (Ps. 71:10-13).
It is so common to say that they come from Persia that when the Persian king Khosrau II Parviz destroyed almost all the Christian churches during the conquest of Palestine in the 7th century, he saved the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem thanks to the frescoes in which they represent the Magi in Persian tunics.
The Gospel does not say exactly how many wise men came to Bethlehem, but it is generally accepted that there were three, according to the number of gifts. Their names, Gaspar, Melchior and Baltasar), are found for the first time in the Venerable Bede (†735). In some narratives there is information regarding his appearance: Gaspar turns out to be a “beardless young man,” Baltasar is a “bearded old man,” and Melchior is “swarthy” or “black,” originally from Ethiopia.
Then, having entered, the wise men “fell down and worshiped him; and opening his treasures, they brought him gifts: gold, frankincense, and myrrh” (Matthew 2:11). Each of these gifts had a symbolic meaning. They brought gold to Jesus as King of the Jews, incense, as to God. Myrrh (myrrh) is an expensive aromatic substance used to embalm bodies during burial, such as the Savior who became the Son of Man, to whom “many sufferings and burial” were predicted.
Having bowed before the Child and worshiped Him, the Magi, “having received a revelation in a dream not to return to Herod,” returned to their lands without passing through Jerusalem. They do not tell us how long they were in Bethlehem, nor how long their trip took.
Reliquary with the remains of the Three Wise Men in the Cologne Cathedral, Germany
According to the golden legend, all of them later became Christians and preachers of the Gospel. They were baptized by the holy apostle Thomas, who preached the gospel in Parthia and India. Western traditions even speak of his episcopal ordination by the apostle Thomas. The relics of the Magi were found by the holy queen Helen Equal to the Apostles in Persia and placed in Constantinople, and in the 5th century they were transferred to Milan. Currently the gold reliquary with his relics is in the Cologne Cathedral.
And according to another pious legend, the Virgin Mary carefully preserved the gifts of the Magi throughout her life. Shortly before Her Dormition, She gave them to the Church of Jerusalem, where they remained together with the belt and mantle of the Mother of God until the year 400. The gifts were later transferred by the Byzantine emperor Arcadius to Constantinople, where they were placed in the church of Hagia Sophia.
What then are the gifts of the Three Wise Men that, according to tradition, have reached our days?
The gold brought by the Three Wise Men is made up of 28 small gold pendant plates in the shape of trapezoids, quadrilaterals and polygons, decorated with elegant filigree motifs. The pattern is not repeated on any of the plates. Frankincense and myrrh, brought separately, were once combined in small, dark-colored balls the size of an olive. About seventy of them have survived. This union is very symbolic: frankincense and myrrh, offered to God and man, are united as inextricably as two natures were united in Christ: the divine and the human.
In 1453, Sultan Muhammad (Mehmed) II besieged and took Constantinople and the Byzantine Empire fell. The young sultan’s mother was the Serbian princess Maria (Mara) Brankovic, who was the daughter of the Serbian ruler Georgiy Brankovich. Mary ended up married to the sultan, but very strangely she was not required to convert to Islam and remained faithful to the Orthodox Christian faith until the end of her days. And it was thanks to her that many Orthodox shrines were saved and preserved. Mehmed II, who loved his mother very much and respected his religious feelings, did not interfere in this. In addition to respecting the shrines, the sultan allowed his mother to take under her personal protection the Holy Mount Athos, a monastic country, which all the previous rulers of Constantinople considered it an honor to help. The tradition started by Maria Brankovich so pleased the sultanas of later centuries that, even being Muslims, they fervently guarded this bastion of Orthodoxy.
In 1470, Maria Brankovich decided to visit Mount Athos, which she loved so much since she was little and whose land she dreamed of visiting, despite the ancient monastic tradition that forbade women from going to the Holy Mountain. What she wanted most was to see the monastery of Saint Paul of Xiropotamia, where many Serbs worked at that time. Her father, Georgiy Brankovich, loved this monastery very much. Here he built a temple in the name of his patron saint, George the Victorious.
The chest with the relics of the Three Wise Men: gold, frankincense and myrrh that were preserved for believers and are in the Monastery of Saint Paul on Mount Athos, in Greece
Mary’s ship washed ashore near St. Paul’s Monastery. Mary carried with her ten trunks with rescued relics, among which were the supposed gifts of the Magi to Jesus in Bethlehem. At the head of the solemn procession, Mary began to climb the mountain. Halfway to the monastery she stopped in amazement when she heard a voice: “Don’t come closer! From here begins the kingdom of the Other Lady, the Queen of Heaven, the Lady of the Mother of God, the Representative and Guardian of the Holy Mountain.” Mary fell to her knees and began to pray, asking the Queen of Heaven to forgive her for her obstinacy. The abbot and his brothers left the monastery to meet Mary, to whom she gave the trunks with her relics and returned to the ship. In the place where Mary once knelt, a cross called Tsaritsyn was erected. The nearby chapel represents the monks’ meeting with all the relics.
According to ancient tradition, the precious gifts of the Magi are reverently preserved in St. Paul’s Monastery to this day. The monks are very aware of the great spiritual and historical value of these pieces, which is why, following the night service, they take the gifts from the sacristy in a small silver chest for the worship of the pilgrims. The gifts exude a strong fragrance and when they are opened, the entire church is filled with the fragrance. The monks of Svyatogorsk noticed that the gifts cured the mentally ill and those possessed by demons.
And so it is that the gifts that the Magi offered to Jesus are today in the custody of the monks on Mount Athos. These are covered in legends and ancient traditions and every January 6 we remember and venerate the Three Wise Men by repeating in our homes what they did in Bethlehem, and we take them to the littlest ones in our families, no longer gold, incense and myrrh , but hopes, joy and love in the form of some toy.
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