The Adoration of the Magi

Jesus was visited and adored first by the poor and simple, the despised of this world, which loves grandeur and looked for a Messias who was to come in kingly state. Yet He was not to want the homage of the rich, the noble, and the great. After the shepherds were to come the Kings. The Epiphany, that is, the Manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles in the persons of the holy Magi, was always for us, the descendants of Gentiles, a very joyous and consoling mystery, reminding us of our vocation to the true faith. It has been called, indeed, the Christmas Day of the Gentiles. All the Fathers in their homilies to the people spoke of it with great eloquence, and with ardent love; and the memory of it has been held in singular reverence throughout the Christian world. At Rome especially its octave is celebrated with great pomp.

St. Matthew’s account of the coming of the Magi is contained in a few simple words: “When Jesus, therefore, was born in Bethlehem of Juda, in the days of King Herod, behold there came wise men from the East to Jerusalem, saying, Where is he that is born King of the Jews? For we have seen his star in the East, and are come to adore him.”¹

The question naturally arises as to who were these wise men, or Magi, what were their names, whence had they come, and what had been the motive of their journey? It has been the commonly received opinion that they were men skilled in astronomical science, who watched the movement of the stars; and, as St. Leo says, it was not possible in those days for any to dedicate themselves to that science save those who held the highest rank in society, men adorned with wisdom, and on that account rulers amongst their people. That such were the Magi there can be no doubt, and hence they are called indiscriminately wise men and kings. They were, in fact, so many little kings in the different regions from which they came. We have an example of this kind of sovereignty in the five kings whom Abraham, with his three hundred and eighteen followers, defeated, rescuing Lot from their hands.² The Magi are, accordingly, always styled kings by the ancient Fathers. St. Leo, St. Augustine, St. Jerome, St. Hilary, St. Caesarius, and others, all give them this title. Tradition is invariable as to their being three in number; so much so, that Calmet calls this opinion the common and universal opinion of the Church. We may see this truth expressed in sacred sculpture and pictures prior to the time of St. Leo, where the Magi represented as adoring the Divine Infant are always three; and, indeed, we see this indicated in Scripture itself by the three distinct gifts which they offered—gold, frankincense, and myrrh.³

We do not find their names mentioned in the early writers; but they must have been handed down traditionally, since the Venerable Bede says that they were called Gaspar, Baldassar, and Melchior. The Churches of Cologne and of Milan have constantly venerated them under these names; and it is under these names that they are to this day known to the faithful.

As to the motive cause of their journey, we must remember how, fifteen centuries before, the prophet Balaam was sent for by King Balak to curse Israel, and, having mounted a hill, whence he beheld the Hebrews encamped in the desert, seized by the Spirit of God, he began instead to bless them, exclaiming, “How beautiful are thy tabernacles, O Jacob, and thy tents, O Israel! . . . I shall see him, but not now: I shall behold him, but not near. A star shall rise out of Jacob, and a scepter shall spring up from Israel.”⁴ The holy Magi were well acquainted with this prediction, which had been preserved in their country; and since, as we have said, they were constant observers of the heavenly bodies, scarcely had they noted on the night of the Nativity the appearance of a new star of extraordinary splendor, when they believed that they beheld the fulfillment of Balaam’s prophecy, and that this luminary announced the birth of the great King. This observation, and the conviction resulting therefrom, came to the three kings separately at the same time; for they must necessarily have been apart from each other, residing in the several districts which they ruled. All three, however, beholding the star simultaneously, and simultaneously illuminated by divine grace, understood that it announced the birth of the promised Redeemer, and forthwith set out to follow its guidance. Thus, we may believe they met and prosecuted their road together, with their respective trains of dromedaries, and with their eyes fixed aloft upon this wondrous star, which was not, like the other luminaries, in the distant vault of heaven, but in mid-air above their heads.⁵ We cannot, indeed, conceive of it otherwise, if its movement was to act as a guide to the direction they were to take.

The Evangelist tells us that these three wise men came from the East, but does not specify their country. Opinions have consequently varied on this subject; but the most probable, and the most generally received, is that they came from Idumea and from Arabia Felix, near to which are Saba, Madian, and Epha. There are several reasons in its favor, and it has the authority of many ancient Fathers—St. Justin, Tertullian, St. Cyprian, St. Epiphanius, and others. Idumea and Arabia are truly eastward as regards Bethlehem; in Arabia was uttered the prophecy of Balaam, called hither by the King of Moab; and Moab, as St. Jerome observes, is a province of Arabia; it would retain, therefore, a vivid remembrance of the prediction. Arabia also abounds in gold, frankincense, and myrrh, the gifts offered by the Magi as the products of their country. Here, then, would have been the beginning of the fulfillment of prophecies which await a much fuller accomplishment: “The kings of the Arabians and of Saba shall bring gifts; to him shall be given of the gold of Arabia”.⁶ “The dromedaries of Madian and Epha, all they from Saba shall come, bringing gold and frankincense.”⁷

That the kings set out as soon as they saw the star, and that the star appeared at the moment of Christ’s birth, may be gathered from the words of the Evangelist: “When Jesus was born in Bethlehem, there came wise men from the East”. He does not say, “in those days,” allowing a certain interval, but gives us to understand that these holy men suffered no delay to intervene; they made straight for Jerusalem, the capital of Judea, where they might assuredly expect to find the new-born King of the Jews whom they had come to adore. But, as they approached Jerusalem, the star suddenly disappeared. The miraculous light was withdrawn; but God had not left them deprived of guidance. They entered the city, inquiring, “Where is he that is born King of the Jews, for we have seen His star in the East, and are come to adore Him”; but they could get no reply. Instead of joy, Jerusalem was filled with perturbation and dismay. The one absorbing idea, doubtless, was the fear of the jealousy of the tyrant Herod, when this report of a competitor for his throne should reach his ears, which it presently did: “and King Herod, hearing this, was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him”.⁸ Miserable blindness of God’s own people! These Magi came from afar to seek in Judea the King, the Messias, whom the Jews themselves neither sought nor recognized in their own land. Yet they had at hand the means of recognizing Him had they desired it, and could even point the way which none of them cared to follow.

Herod, concealing his fears, assembled the chief priests and scribes, and asked of them where Christ should be born. They gave him the true reply, quoting the prophecy of Micheas.⁹ Herod then called the Magi privately, and made minute inquiries of them as to the time when the star appeared, and bade them, when they had found the Infant, to return and tell him, that he, too, might go and adore Him. When the kings issued from Jerusalem, and were taking the road to Bethlehem, the star, which had disappeared when they entered the city, again shone forth; at which, the Evangelist says, “they rejoiced with exceeding great joy”. The spot where they again beheld it was at a well about half-way between Jerusalem and Bethlehem, which is still called the Well of the Star, or the Well of the Three Kings. They no longer needed a guide, for the star, as the Evangelist says, “went before them, until it came and stood over where the child was”.¹⁰ Maria d’Agreda saw it in vision enter the grotto, and not disappear until it had rested over the head of Jesus, and had dissolved into a luminous aureole of light encompassing Him. It had done its work, and had brought the holy pilgrims to the feet of the Infant God, enthroned on His Mother’s knee, as we may believe, for the Evangelist says: “They found the Child with Mary His mother,” not meaning thereby to exclude the presence of Joseph, but simply to indicate that He was in His Mother’s arms when the Magi, who were divinely illuminated with the knowledge of the mystery, found Him and fell down before Him, adoring Him and presenting their gifts.

Some have seen in St. Luke’s employment of the phrase “entering into the house” a proof that the Holy Family had removed from the cave of the Nativity into a house in the city, but no such inference can be drawn from the use of a word which in Scripture we find indiscriminately applied to all the habitations of living beings, including even those of birds and beasts. Hence in the Psalms we find the “highest of the trees of the field” spoken of as the “house of the heron”.¹¹ But the authority of St. Jerome, who lived in the holy places, and is the surest witness of the sacred traditions which had been there preserved, ought to be alone sufficient to remove all doubt on the question. Writing to Marcella, a Roman matron, and speaking of the grotto of Bethlehem, he says: “Behold, in this little hole in the earth was born the Creator of the Heavens; here He was wrapped in swaddling clothes, here visited by the shepherds, here pointed out by the star, here adored by the Magi”.¹² St. Augustine, St. John Chrysostom, not to speak of other Fathers and Doctors, are of the same opinion, which the learned Suarez also maintains as the commonest. Indeed, the Church herself sings on the feast of the Epiphany, and through the whole octave, “Today the star brought the Magi to the crib”. The devout feelings of the faithful certainly echo the Church’s tradition, and they cannot reckon for nothing. Even had they less solid warrant than they can lay claim to in this instance, they are, as we may say, the passive voice of the Church. For the God-Man, the King of the Universe, to be born in what St. Jerome forcibly describes as “a hole in the earth” is, we know, the setting forth of a great mystery—the mystery of His humiliation and abasement, as also of the lesson of poverty and self-denial which He came to teach, and by which He was to rebuke and condemn the pride of the world. Mary and Joseph knew this well. Nor can we suppose that for mere accommodation’s sake they would remove from their lowly and symbolic “hole in the rock” as soon as the diminished concourse of strangers at Bethlehem rendered it possible to find shelter in an ordinary house. This, at least, is not an idea which recommends itself to Christmas devotion. It clings to the stable and the crib. Here our Lord received the adoration of the shepherds, figures of His chosen people: this is certain; and here, also, we may well feel sure, He received the homage of the Kings of the East, representatives of the Gentiles, and not in a hired lodging. St. John Chrysostom speaks of their not being scandalized in that they found nothing of this world’s greatness, but only this narrow cabin, mean crib, and a poor mother, in order that we may learn that they came, not to honor a mere man, but to adore a God Incarnate, the Author of all good.¹³

Many even believe that the Virgin did not leave the grotto of the Nativity until the forty days of her prescribed retirement after childbirth were accomplished, when she went to Jerusalem to present her Son in the Temple, and submit herself to the rite of purification. Be this as it may, the adoration of the Magi preceded the Presentation by many days, and we may therefore confidently rest on the Church’s tradition that on the sixth of January, that is, twelve days after the birth of the Divine Infant, the Magi adored Him in the stable of Bethlehem where He was born. This period of twelve days allows ample time for the journey of the Kings from Arabia, including their brief pause at Jerusalem. It is true that some who have held that the Kings came from very distant regions of the East, which would have rendered it impossible for them to have arrived twelve days after the Nativity, have referred their visit to a later period, and have supposed it to take place a year and twelve days after the birth of Jesus. But this opinion seems to involve several insurmountable difficulties, to overcome which as many gratuitous suppositions must be accepted, always a strong objection when it is question of proving an alleged fact; and it must be confessed that it seems to jar not a little with all our devotional ideas, and to break up, so to say, the cluster of beautiful mysteries which gather round the Birth of the world’s Redeemer and adorn our Christmas festivity, when we love to gaze upon Him reigning from the Crib, as hereafter He was to reign from the Cross. To the two only reasons which might appear to militate plausibly in its favor, we shall briefly allude anon.

As it especially regards the honor of our saint, we must not pass over in complete silence the opinion of some that Joseph was not present at the adoration of the Magi, because he is not mentioned as being so. But surely this omission cannot be thus regarded. How much have the Evangelists omitted as regards Mary, the Mother of Jesus; how much as regards Jesus Himself! St. Matthew does not say that Joseph was not present, and it seemed scarcely necessary to state that he was present. Where should he be? and why should he be absent? There was no need to conceal or put him out of sight from fear of misapprehension on the part of the Magi. Their very gifts prove that they knew the mystery of the Incarnation, and that it was a God-Man to whom they had come to do honor. Gold they offered as to their king, incense to their God, and myrrh to His Sacred Humanity, which He had assumed to Himself that He might by His Passion and Death redeem a fallen world. The Fathers and the Doctors of the Church are all agreed that, while outwardly guided by the light of the star, they were inwardly illuminated by the Holy Spirit. If anything is to be concluded from the silence of the Evangelist concerning St. Joseph, it can only be a tribute to his humility. We may, indeed, imagine that when the kings entered he withdrew into the background, for Joseph ever sought to hide himself, that the divinity of Jesus and the glory of his immaculate Virgin Spouse should alone be manifested. And does it not seem as if his humble desire had been seconded by the Evangelists? He is mentioned by them all; it could not be otherwise; but it is worthy of notice that not a syllable of his is recorded by them. Mysterious silence, symbol and token of his profound humility! But tradition has recorded what the Evangelist failed to mention; namely, his presence at the visit of the Magi. St. John Chrysostom, speaking of the sorrows and the joys of St. Joseph, says that the grief he had felt upon learning that the ferocious Herod had been troubled, and all Jerusalem with him, on hearing of the birth of this new king was succeeded by great joy on beholding the star coming to rest on the head of the Divine Infant, and the adoration of the Magi. In all the sculptures and pictures of the early times of the Church representing this mystery we see the figure of our saint, a little behind Mary, leaning on his flowering staff, in rapt contemplation of the glory of the Divine Child; and one of the most learned and diligent historians of all that appertains to the life and worship of St. Joseph boldly asserts that it must be regarded as an undoubted truth that he was present when the Magi came to visit the Infant Jesus and offer Him their mystical gifts.¹⁴ After adoring their God and King, and paying their homage to His august Mother, they turned, no doubt, with loving reverence to Joseph, honoring in him the head of the Holy Family, appointed by the Eternal Father to represent His paternity; and to his care they would consign the precious treasures they had brought.

We are unwilling to believe that these holy pilgrims, who had come so far, and for so high an object, would have returned immediately; and, though Scripture only records their arrival, adoration, and departure, it seems probable, as with the shepherds, that their visit to the cave was not a solitary one, their attendants, with the dromedaries, finding accommodation in Bethlehem, where the influx of strangers had now ceased. If Holy Church celebrates her greater feasts with octaves, and, in the case of the greatest, continues her Alleluias much longer, may we not well conceive that the devotion of the Magi, who were not commemorating a feast, but keeping it in very deed at its glorious origin, was extended over several days? If so, their delay may have been a Providential dispensation by which the execution of Herod’s murderous purpose was suspended. The hypocritical tyrant had enjoined them to return to him; he would wait, therefore, until he had received from them certain and accurate information as to where to find his intended victim, and would probably take no step until he had dismissed them to their own country, ignorant of his design. Time may thus have been afforded for our Lady’s accomplishment at Jerusalem of the rite of purification. Whether any misgivings as to compliance with Herod’s injunction arose in the minds of the Magi we do not know. It would seem that they could hardly be long in Judea without hearing of some of his deeds of violence and blood; and if, as St. John Chrysostom says, it was one of St. Joseph’s sorrows to learn how Herod and all Jerusalem with him were troubled at hearing of the birth of the King, he can hardly have been silent on the subject when it became question of the Magi’s return. Be this as it may, we may well feel assured that these holy men, so remarkable for their faithful correspondence with divine light, did not fail to seek by fervent prayer to learn the will of God; and that will, the Gospel tells us, was made known to them in a dream. “Having received an answer in sleep that they should not return to Herod, they went back another way into their own country.”¹⁵

We hear no more in Scripture of the Magi. Whether they subsequently heard of the preaching of Jesus and the wonders He wrought we are ignorant; but of this we may be certain, that, if God had called them again, they would have revisited Judea as promptly as before, to confess and adore Him. Certain it is that their faith did not remain idle in them. They performed the Apostolic work of preparing their people for embracing the truth; and, after the Ascension of our Lord, the Apostle Thomas, we are told, ordained them bishops in their own country, where they cooperated admirably in the extension of the Church, making a holy end, full of years and of merits. The Bollandists say that Melchior died at the age of a hundred and sixteen, Gaspar at the age of a hundred and nine, and Baldassar at that of a hundred and twelve, about the middle of the first century. From Arabia, where they died, St. Helen, mother of Constantine, transported their relics to Constantinople; from thence they were transferred, Constantine still reigning, to Milan, where they were deposited in the church of St. Eustorgius. Finally, in the year 1162, Frederic Barbarossa, having taken and spoiled Milan, gave them to Raynold, Archbishop of Cologne, who placed them in the church of St. Peter, where to this day they still repose, and receive, as for centuries they have done, the veneration of the faithful.