When revisiting the Christmas story, folks living almost two thousand years ago asked many of the same questions we do. Such as — don’t we all want to know more about the Magi? Traditions have grown up adding to the details in the Gospels: there were three of them (the Gospels don’t say how many, only that they brought three different gifts) and have given them names (Gaspar, Melchior, and Balthasar).
Folks in ancient times had their own stories about the Magi, quite different from ours. One can be found in a text called “The Revelation of the Magi”, purportedly written by the Magi themselves. (Nobody believes this, but it’s still a fun read!) Scholars think it was written in the 3rd century, and our lone surviving copy of it is in Syriac, housed in the archives of the Vatican.
According to this text, the Magi were an ancient order of mystics residing in a land called “Shir,” located at the extreme eastern edge of the inhabited world. They are descendants of Adam’s son Seth, who received a prophecy from his father Adam about the coming of a star that would signify the birth of God in human form. This prophecy is written down by Seth in the world’s first book, and is transmitted through the generations by his offspring, the Magi. In expectation of the star’s coming, every month the Magi immerse themselves in a sacred spring, ascend their country’s most sacred mountain (the “Mountain of Victories”), pray to God in silence, and enter a cave (the “Cave of Treasures of Hidden Mysteries”) atop the mountain to read Seth’s prophecies. Generations of Magi have done this for millennia, waiting for the prophecy to be fulfilled.
Then, one day, their wait is over. Tune in next week for what happens next!