Today is the Feast of the Epiphany of the
Lord.I’ve had a number of posts on this
feast and the subject of the Magi.You
can access past posts on these subjects here.There are posts on the significance of the
Epiphany as well as to its details.There are posts on Fr. Dwight Longenecker’s wonderful book unlocking the
mystery of these wise men, The Mystery of the Magi:The Quest to
Identify the Three Wise Men.And there are analysis of poems by G.K.
Chesterton and T.S. Eliot on the subject of the Magi.All well worth exploring.
Today I would like
to emphasize the gifts the Magi present infant Jesus.It is commonly understood that the gift of
gold represents Jesus’ royalty, frankincense represents his priestly office,
and myrrh His sacrificial death.Pierre-Marie Dumont in this month’s Magnificat magazine (Jan
2026, Vol. 21, No. 11, pp 6-7) proposes we offer these gifts to Jesus today in
the form of spiritual gifts.The gold we
give is our love, “gold refined by the fire mentioned in the Book of Revelation
(3:18).”The frankincense we offer are
our prayers “that ascend to God as a sweet-smelling offering.”The myrrh we offer is “our communion in the
Passion and death of Jesus,” consisting of our sacrifices and offerings to the
Lord.I found that beautiful.
Here is today’s
Gospel reading.
When Jesus was born in Bethlehem of
Judea, in the days of King Herod, behold, magi from the east arrived in
Jerusalem, saying, “Where is the newborn king of the Jews?
We saw his star at its rising and
have come to do him homage.”
When King Herod heard this, he was
greatly troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.
Assembling all the chief priests and
the scribes of the people,
He inquired of them where the Christ
was to be born.
They said to him, “In Bethlehem of
Judea, for thus it has been written through the prophet:
And you, Bethlehem, land of Judah, are
by no means least among the rulers of Judah; since from you shall come a ruler,
who is to shepherd my people Israel.”
Then Herod called the magi secretly and
ascertained from them the time of the star’s appearance.
He sent them to Bethlehem and said,
“Go and search diligently for the
child.
When you have found him, bring me
word, that I too may go and do him homage.”
After their audience with the king
they set out.
And behold, the star that they had
seen at its rising preceded them, until it came and stopped over the place
where the child was.
They were overjoyed at seeing the
star, and on entering the house they saw the child with Mary his mother.
They prostrated themselves and did
him homage.
Then they opened their treasures and
offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.
And having been warned in a dream
not to return to Herod, they departed for their country by another way..
~Mt 2:1-12
Bishop Barron explains
the traditional understanding of the three gifts, but he also connects the expedition
of the Magi with a search for the ultimate fulfillment which is the quest to
discover God.
What is admirable in
the Magi is that they follow the sign so that the longing will be fulfilled if
we move in this direction.“We’re the
three kings longing for Christ.”That is
beautiful.
I have presented
pastoral homilies by different members of the Capuchin Franciscan Friars before
in their YouTube channel, “A Simple Word.”I have never presented Fr. Christopher Gama before, and here he provides
an insightful homily.
We can only find God
through the virtue of humility.“Creation
points out the way, and God finishes the path.Grace builds on nature!”It
changes us and sends us home in another way.
Sunday Meditation: “They opened their treasures and offered him gifts of
gold, frankincense, and myrrh.”
Let’s end with this
lovely Christmas carol perfect for the epiphany, performed by North Valley
Chamber Chorale:
On this second Sunday of Christmas, we
celebrate the Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord.Who were these strange men—the Gospel does
not say they were kings—who followed a star to baby Jesus?Well I had four blog posts on the reading of
Fr. Dwight Longenecker’s book, The
Mystery of the Magi.If you really want
to know who these mysterious men were—not the fable of Balthazar, Caspar, and
Melchior—but the real history, read my posts.Here is blog post #4 on Fr. Longenecker’s book, and from there are links to Posts one, two, and
three.The real history is more
astonishing than the legend.
However, Matthew’s spiritual significance is
just what epiphany means.Epiphany is a revelation of God, a theophany,
and here the Magi reveal to the world that baby Jesus is the Christ, King of
the Jews.
When Jesus was born in Bethlehem of
Judea,
in the days of King Herod,
behold, magi from the east arrived
in Jerusalem, saying,
“Where is the newborn king of the
Jews?
We saw his star at its rising
and have come to do him homage.”
When King Herod heard this,
he was greatly troubled,
and all Jerusalem with him.
Assembling all the chief priests and
the scribes of the people,
he inquired of them where the Christ
was to be born.
They said to him, “In Bethlehem of
Judea,
for thus it has been written through
the prophet:
And you, Bethlehem, land of Judah,
are by no means least among the
rulers of Judah;
since from you shall come a ruler,
who is to shepherd my people
Israel.”
Then Herod called the magi secretly
and ascertained from them the time
of the star’s appearance.
He sent them to Bethlehem and said,
“Go and search diligently for the
child.
When you have found him, bring me
word,
that I too may go and do him
homage.”
After their audience with the king
they set out.
And behold, the star that they had
seen at its rising preceded them,
until it came and stopped over the
place where the child was.
They were overjoyed at seeing the
star,
and on entering the house
they saw the child with Mary his
mother.
They prostrated themselves and did
him homage.
Then they opened their treasures
and offered him gifts of gold,
frankincense, and myrrh.
And having been warned in a dream
not to return to Herod,
they departed for their country by
another way.
~Mt 2:1-12
Fr. Geoffrey Plant as
usual does a thorough of explaining the historical and biblical significance of
the Epiphany.
Fr. Geoffrey gives a
handful of theories of where the Magi came from but none of them agree with Fr.
Longenecker’s research.I would go with
Fr. Longenecker.
Now for a sermon on the spiritual significance
of the epiphany, let’s turn to Jeff Cavins.
It occurs to me that the light given off by
Christ shines through the Magi.Let the
light of Christ shine through you.Let
your person be a manifestation of Christ, an epiphany to the world.
We don’t see much of how the Magi are
transformed by their visit, but the poet T.S. Eliot speculates on how one
particular Magus (singular for Magi) is transformed in his great poem “The
Journey of the Magi.”I provided a detailedanalysis of the poem here if you wish to read and understand this great work of
poetry.
Solemnity Meditation: “Where is the
newborn king of the Jews?We saw his
star at its rising and have come to do him homage.”
Instead of a hymn this week, I am going to
provide a reading by someone named Arthur L. Wood of T.S. Eliot’s he Journey of the Magi.”
I selected this clip since it provided the
words, but that is also an excellent reading.
The Feast of the Epiphany is a manifestation
of Jesus’s divinity.It is a making
known that God is among us, a revelation.The three kings come to find the King of the World.
When Jesus was born in Bethlehem
of Judea, in the days of King Herod, behold, magi from the east arrived in
Jerusalem, saying,
“Where
is the newborn king of the Jews?
We
saw his star at its rising
and
have come to do him homage.”
When King Herod heard this, he was
greatly troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.
Assembling
all the chief priests and the scribes of the people,
He
inquired of them where the Christ was to be born.
They
said to him, “In Bethlehem of Judea,
for
thus it has been written through the prophet:
And
you, Bethlehem, land of Judah,
are
by no means least among the rulers of Judah;
since
from you shall come a ruler,
who
is to shepherd my people Israel.”
Then
Herod called the magi secretly
and
ascertained from them the time of the star’s appearance.
He
sent them to Bethlehem and said,
“Go
and search diligently for the child.
When
you have found him, bring me word,
that
I too may go and do him homage.”
After
their audience with the king they set out.
And behold, the star that they had
seen at its rising preceded them, until it came and stopped over the place
where the child was.
They
were overjoyed at seeing the star,
and
on entering the house
they
saw the child with Mary his mother.
They
prostrated themselves and did him homage.
Then
they opened their treasures
and
offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.
And
having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod,
they
departed for their country by another way.
~Mt 2:1-12
Over the years I have written often on the
Feast of the Epiphany and the visit of the three magi.You can access all those posts here.Be sure to look through my explanation of T.S.
Eliot’s great poem, “Journey of the Magi,” and my review’s of Fr. Dwight
Longenecker’s book on the Magi, The
Mystery of the Magi.
For a reflection on the Gospel passage this
week I found Bishop Barron’s homily very profound.
I’ll also add this nice little picture summary
from Aleteia of the Three Kings story
with some lovely Middle Eastern music to compliment it.
Meditation: “They were
overjoyed at seeing the star, and on entering the house they saw the child with
Mary his mother.”
That is what the Feast of the Epiphany was
once called, as you will hear explained.The Feast of the Epiphany celebrates the first manifestation of Christ,
the Son of God, to the gentiles.
Last year I posted a Sunday Meditation of today’s
Gospel reading.Please refer back to
that.So today I will focus on the first reading, a reading from the Book of the
Prophet Isaiah.
Rise up in splendor, Jerusalem!Your light has come,
the
glory of the Lord shines upon you.
See,
darkness covers the earth,
and
thick clouds cover the peoples;
but
upon you the LORD shines,
and
over you appears his glory.
Nations
shall walk by your light,
and
kings by your shining radiance.
Raise
your eyes and look about;
they
all gather and come to you:
your
sons come from afar,
and
your daughters in the arms of their nurses.
Then
you shall be radiant at what you see,
your
heart shall throb and overflow,
for
the riches of the sea shall be emptied out before you,
the
wealth of nations shall be brought to you.
Caravans
of camels shall fill you,
dromedaries
from Midian and Ephah;
all
from Sheba shall come
bearing
gold and frankincense,
and
proclaiming the praises of the LORD.
~Is 60:1-6
Jeff Cavins provides a thoughtful reflection.
I also found a Jewish reading of this passage
that I thought would complement this well.An explanation from Lise Rosenthal from Temple Beth Israel.
Now that’s a little different, isn’t it?The caravans are going back to Jerusalem from
a diaspora.So now think to the Gospel
reading.The Magi will also be coming
back to Jerusalem to pay homage to the splendor of the light.
Today
was the Feast of the Epiphany, and I have posted often on it.But I was listening some John Michael Talbert
songs this evening and I wanted to create a post of two songs, one certainly on
the epiphany and the other more loosely.First, his rendition of “We Three Kings.”
He
plays it a shade slower than most.I
think it gives the song more reverence.
Then
I came across this song which I had never heard before, “I Found My Beloved,”
which is not a Christmas song, nor a song of the Magi.Actually it’s an imagine excursion from the
point of view of St. John of the Cross.But it struck me that these are the emotions any one of the Magi might
have experienced.
That
is a magnificent song.
I
hadn’t posted much Christmas music this year.Between work, which took me a way for a couple of weeks, illnesses in
the family, and then my cold.I just
haven’t had that much time.Merry
Christmas, Happy New Year, and Happy Feast of the Epiphany.
In
addition to Eliot’s “The Journey of the Magi,” which I posted here,
we also read and discussed G.K. Chesterton’s poem, “The Wise Men” as part of
our discussion of Fr. Dwight Longenecker’s book, The Mystery of the Magi: The Quest to Identify the Three Wise Men.You can read the four part blog posts on
Longenecker’s book: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4.
The Wise Men
By G.K. Chesterton (1913)
Step softly, under snow
or rain,
To find the place where men can pray;
The way is all so very
plain
That
we may lose the way.
Oh, we have learnt to
peer and pore,
On tortured puzzles from our youth,
We know all labyrinthine
lore,
We are the three Wise Men
of yore,
And we know all things but the truth.
We have gone round and
round the hill,
And lost the wood among the trees,
And learnt long names for
every ill,
And served the made gods,
naming still
The Furies the Eumenides.
The gods of violence took
the veil
Of vision and philosophy,
The Serpent that brought
all men bale,
He bites his own accursed
tail,
And calls himself Eternity.
Go humbly . . . it has
hailed and snowed . . .
With voices low and lanterns lit;
So very simple is the
road,
That we may stray from it.
The world grows terrible
and white,
And blinding white the breaking day;
We walk bewildered in the
light,
For something is too
large for sight,
And something much too plain to say.
The Child that was ere
worlds begun ─
(. . . We need but walk a
little way . . .
We need but see a latch
undone . . .)
The Child that played
with moon and sun
Is playing with a little hay.
The house from which the
heavens are fed,
The old strange house that is our own,
Where tricks of words are
never said,
And Mercy is as plain as
bread,
And Honour is as hard as stone.
Go humbly; humble are the
skies,
And low and large and fierce the Star,
So very near the Manger
lies
That we may travel far.
Hark! Laughter like a
lion wakes
To roar to the resounding plain,
And the whole heaven
shouts and shakes
For God Himself is born again
And we are little
children walking
Through the snow and rain.
You
can hear “The Wise Men” read on YouTube, here:
I
can’t say I understand every line, but I think I got the gist, though it took
quite a few readings and listening’s.This is a poem you have to hear.
So
I have to say I was a little confused by the different forms of the
stanzas.There are three forms, a
quatrain (four lines), a cinquain (five lines), and a sestet (six lines).The stanzas are all in iambic meter
(unstressed/stressed syllable pattern) and are of eight syllables (referred to
as four feet) long.The quatrains and
the sestet end with a shortened line of six syllables.I should also mention that the quatrain and
the sestet also have an alternating ABAB (and a concluding AB for the sestet)
rhyme scheme while the cinquain has an ABAAB rhyme scheme.
So
the eight syllabic line quatrain, including the shortened fourth line, is a
classic ballad form.There are
variations on this, but what Chesterton chose might be most common.They are typically narrative and the form harkens
back to the Middle Ages, though they returned to popularity in the 19th
century.
The
cinquain was not as typical but also made a comeback in the 19th
century.The 19th century
poets strove for musicality, and Chesterton really comes from that
tradition.The great heyday of the
cinquain I would say was in the 17th century.“Hymn to God, My God, in My Sickness” by John
Donne is a really fine example.That
fifth line gives a cinquain more of a contemplative feel.
Finally
a sestet echoes the last six lines of an Italian sonnet, which among other
things gives a closure to a thought.
In
all there are ten stanzas, arranged in what I would consider a pattern:
4-5-5-5-4-5-5-5-4-6, where four stands for a quatrain, five for a cinquain, and
six for the sestet. There’s no such
established form that I could find, so I would say it’s Chesterton’s
creation.And like the Victorian poets
whose lineage he comes from (think Tennyson, Poe, Rossetti, even Yeats and
others) the musical/sound experience is paramount to his construction.And as I look at each of the stanzas, I would
say they function in their classical sense.Though not perfectly, the quatrains are narrative, the cinquains are
contemplative, and the sestet brings it to a conclusion.That’s pretty innovative and yet traditional
at the same time!
Now
what’s the narrative about?Yes, the
Magi traveling to Jesus, but what I can’t distinguish is whether it’s an actual
Magi speaking or someone in Chesterton’s present time (the narrator?) taking on
the persona of a Magi.It seems to
blur.What do people think on that?Is it one or the other or both?I just can’t make up my mind.
Now
what I would do at this point is identify the central idea of each stanza.Here’s my best guess.
Stanza
1: Journey to a place to pray, which I take is the Magi kneeling before the
manger as in a crèche scene.I’m also
struck by the paradox that way is plain but easy to lose one’s way.
Stanza
2: Describes the studious nature of the Magi with another paradox that despite
their learning they don’t know the truth.
Stanza
3: Further describes the Magi learning, but this time characterized as caught
in a circular trap serving merciless pagan gods.
Stanza
4: He describes these gods as hiding the truth, bringing evil by linking them
to the serpent.What’s fascinating here
is he has another reference to circular, the serpent biting his tail is a
circle, and he identifies it as a false eternity.
Now
take a break here.I would say that
stanzas one through four are the first chunk of thought.Let’s call this Part 1.It concerns the Magi’s fruitless existence
prior to encountering Christ.
Stanza
5: The journey continues.Again
Chesterton brings up the paradox about getting lost on a simple road.
Stanza
6: A description of the whirlwind of snow about them, being blinded by a light,
and paradoxically (again!) not being able to see something that is “too large
for sight.”
Stanza
7: A walking into the stable to find the Christ child. Best lines in the poem: “The Child that played
with moon and sun/Is playing with a little hay.”
Stanza
8: I have to admit, I am baffled by this stanza.Which house?The Magi’s home?The stable?The house of the narrator?This feels like the philosophic center of the
poem but I can’t get it.
OK,
those last four stanzas can be called Part 2.The reach the Christ child and are overwhelmed.
Stanza
9: I think they walk up to the manger here, and again another paradox: they are
near but yet so far still to go.I take
that as they still have a journey to comprehend the significance.
Stanza
10: So this concludes with a roaring laughter.Why?And another paradox, “God
Himself is born again.”“Again”?When was He born the first time?But the concluding couplet is very striking:
they have suddenly, I assume metaphorically, become children “walking through
snow and rain.”
So
what I take from that last stanza is that the joy of meeting the Christ child
transforms the narrators (he refers to a “we”) into children playing in
snow.The once drudgery of the journey
is a sort of child’s play now.This, and
the plain too that the lion roars on, brings the poem back to the first stanza
of snow and rain.It gives the poem a
circular feel.
This
leaves me with some unanswered questions.So why the circular form and how does that relate to the serpent’s evil
circular image in Part 1?What is stanza
8 all about?Why the laughter as a
concluding image—it seems to come from nowhere?And what about the narrator?Is
it the wise men of yore or present day speaker?
Still
I became very fond of the poem as I understood it!That was enjoyable.
