Wisemen Revisited

In the beginning was the Word; shortly thereafter there were committees and bagpipes.

If you happen to be a good Presbyterian (yes, there are bad Presbyterians), this makes perfect sense.  If you are not, please allow me to explain.

“In the beginning was the Word,” refers to John 1:1, which says the Jesus was the Word. Good enough, we are going to be talking about the baby Jesus.

Committees: Presbyterians are big on committees.  In fact, virtually every office in the church is to some degree elected, and we have a great propensity for committees, sub-committees, ad nauseam. In fact, the American form of government was heavily based on the Presbyterian form of church government, which is why in both everything gets bogged down in committees and everything happens at a glacial speed. And Presbyterians do everything “decently and in order;” decently and in order is a very big deal. Nobody ever accused us of having too much fun.

Finally bagpipes:  after the Reformation, Lutheranism came out of Germany; Dutch Reformed came out of (surprise) Holland, and Presbyterianism came out of Scotland, hence the bagpipes.  Growing up in Presbyterian churches in Southern California, every time a church started a new building project or ordained a new minister, they brought in a couple of bagpipers to celebrate the event. If you are a true Presbyterian, whether you love or hate the bagpipes, you are at least familiar with them.

All of this will become relevant in just a bit.

Tonight I was driving home from a medical appointment in a new location.  Google maps took me on a most circuitous route, I’m assuming because it was rush hour.  I was hell-and-gone from anywhere I recognized, and over hill and dale.  It was all good though, because I was listening to Queen and rocking away.  But there were two things of note on the way home:

1. Driving down a dark two-lane road with houses on both sides (which is what counts for suburbs in CT but are nothing like tract homes in So Cal), I encountered a guy walking his dog.  He was dressed all in black, the dog was black (I think a lab) and the night and road were black. There were no street lights. The only hint that he was there was reflective tape on the dog leash. And he was walking down the road, IN THE DRIVING LANE (no sidewalks) into on-coming traffic. I was going slow enough that I was able to swing around him without any danger. However, I do question his safety choices.  I’m just glad he is not now dead and I’m not being held on some form of vehicular manslaughter.

   
   

2. I also drove past a church which still had its Christmas decorations out.  There was a lovely display of Mary, Joe and Jesus, as well as a couple of shepherds and sheep.  No wisemen, which is fine, because Biblically they come later, at Epiphany which is celebrated January 6. On second thought, this is not okay; I was driving by on January 14, so the wisemen should have been there by then. But anyway, we know that when Herod found out about the New King through the visiting wiseman asking for directions, he had all the baby boys under two years old killed, to eliminate any kingly competition.  Plus it was a long journey, etc. The wiseman could have come anywhere from two weeks to two years after Jesus’ birth. So I'm actually okay with them not having any wiseman as part of their display.  However, they did have several of those brown stick reindeer covered in white Christmas lights: a very odd choice. I’m not at all convinced that there were reindeer in Bethlehem. . . . UNLESS, perhaps this was a Presbyterian church and were trying to make a link with Scotland and the whole bagpipe thing. Because apparently Scotland is home to Britain's only free-ranging herd of reindeer, which can be found in the Cairngorm Mountains. I recognize that the string connecting reindeer to the nativity, to Presbyterians because of the northen-ness of Scotland, and then bagpipes, is thin and tenuous at best, but I'm doing my best here. Thus I’ll give this church the benefit of the doubt regarding the light-up reindeer.

However, all of this led me to further ponderings on the wisemen.  Nativity scenes are always depicted with three wiseman, because they brought three gifts:  gold, frankincense and myrrh. Presumably each of three wisemen brought one gift; however, there is no evidence of that.  Certainly they were referred to as wisemen, plural, so we know there were at least two.  However, I would like to posit that there could have been many permutations on that:

• Perhaps there were only two wiseman, and one was more generous than the other, and hence brought two gifts, or maybe even all three;
  

• Perhaps there were five or six wisemen.  They could have either pooled their funds and bought three gifts, or three could have been generous and the others could have been cheapskates, apprentices, whatever;
  

• Finally, I like to think there could have been a whole caravan of twenty or more.  We know that in Daniel 2:2, King Nebuchadnezzar “commanded to call the magicians, the enchanters or soothsayers, the sorcerers, and the Chaldeans [diviners], to tell the king his dreams.” That sounds like a lot of wisemen, and those are just those serving the king.  Truly there could have been a lot of various wisemen who had seen or heard of the star. Different time, different king, but still lots of wisemen.

Work with me here, but I like to think that there were a good 15-20 wisemen of various sorts who came along.  Maybe some were serious astrologers who truly believed, maybe some were just along for the ride and adventure, but it’s technically possible that there could have been way more than two or three wisemen.

Thus, let’s figure twenty wisemen but only three gifts.  Hmmm, how does that work out?  I think probably either one of two ways:  first, it could be that there were three generous wisemen who brought gifts, and the rest where just cheap groupies along for the ride.  Or, it could be that they were all sincerely devoted and pooled their funds to come up with these three marvelous gifts.

I like to think that they all pooled their funds and decided on these gifts. Of course, if they were at all Presbyterian in nature (unlikely, but work with me here), then they would have formed a committee to decide which gifts to get.  Gold would have been a no-brainer, as it’s valuable, easy to carry (although heavy), and useful, and represents kingship.  Frankincense and myrrh would have been important too; frankincense symbolized his priestly role and myrrh prefigured his death and embalming. But I can imagine a fairly complicated scenario with these last two.

Both frankincense and myrrh are perfumes which comes from the resin of a tree, and thus are liquid or at least a paste, something which would have melted in the heat of the desert sun.  Now, assuming they have a committee to discuss the bringing of frankincense and myrrh, wouldn’t there be concern about such valuable gifts spilling on the long camel journey across the desert?  Surely they didn’t have jars with threaded lids back then.  I’m fairly certain they had cork wine stoppers, but it seems to me they would want something a little more secure.  I can imagine that someone on the gift committee made a recommendation that they elect a Sub-Committee to Investigate Secure Transport of the frankincense and myrrh.

Again, relying on my imagination here, I think that the sub-committee might have come up with the idea of making rubber gussets to secure the lids. Rubber is not a desert plant, but in fact comes from India as it requires a tropical climate.  Thus, I can imagine that they sent a couple of wisemen and/or apprentices off on a journey to India to secure some rubber, before beginning on their real journey to Jerusalem. 

Wisemen Decision Chart

This, in fact, would explain why it took the wiseman so long to get there:  first a committee, then a sub-committee, then a separate journey to India to secure supplies, then a return to the East where they then had to fit the containers with the rubber gussets, pack, and get everyone, perhaps as many as twenty wisemen, ready to move. If the U.S. government were trying to do such a thing, it would take a minimum of five years, probably more like ten.  Again, giving the wisemen the benefit of the doubt, I really think they could have pulled it off in two years.

Finally, they cross the desert and arrive in Jerusalem, looking for the newborn king.  Encountering Herod (who is rather pissy but pretends to be nice), they go on their way, deposit the gifts with Mary, Joe and Jesus (who is now a toddler), and head off on a circuitous route to avoid Herod. Now Herod might have been a great builder, but he was a very.bad.dude and we do not like him. Herod killed all the boys under two; so, per the angel in the dream, Mary, Joe and Jesus fled to Egypt using the gold, frankincense and myrrh as their travel money and funds to setup themselves up down by the River Nile (or thereabouts) for several years. Meanwhile the wisemen trot on back across the desert and continue their lives as before, probably showing-off to family and friends their souvenirs from the trip.

So clearly, I AM NOT saying this is how it happened.  This is NOT the Gospel According to Sharie.  But I do like to think that it COULD HAVE happened this way.  What we know in scripture does not necessarily preclude this from being the way things went, and I recognize that it’s highly unlikely. However, it would help explain why the church that I passed on the way home had no wiseman: they were still in committee or off in India.  You never know.  I may be on to something!