Late to the Party

Christmas is one of my favorite holidays, but I do have one small Christmas pet peeve: Nativity scenes. Nearly all of them depict three wise men present at Jesus’ birth, offering their gifts among the animals and shepherds. Yet when we read Scripture carefully, we find that the magi actually arrived later, and we do not know how many of them came.

When we read Matthew 2:1–2—“After Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of King Herod, wise men [magi] from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, ‘Where is he who has been born king of the Jews?’”—we learn two important details. First, the magi did not arrive until after Jesus was born. Second, Matthew does not specify the number of wise men but simply tells us multiple wise men came. The tradition of the three wise men likely arises from the three gifts presented to Jesus.

Later in the account, when King Herod realizes he has been deceived—because the magi did not return to him after they had been warned by God in a dream—he orders the killing of all boys two years old and under (Matt 2:16). The order he decreed shows that some significant amount of time had passed, reinforcing the conclusion that the magi’s journey took weeks, months, or even over a year from when they had first seen his star rising in the sky until they had reached Jerusalem. Matthew further describes Jesus as a paidion (“young child”), not a brephos (“infant”) when the magi see and worship him (Matt 2:9–11).

I hope my exploration of Jesus and the magi doesn’t discourage anyone’s love for celebrating the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ. My heart is simply to help us correctly distinguish between tradition and Scripture. My encouragement is that we would all continue to open God’s Word, delighting in the truth it reveals. And please don’t go home and get rid of your nativity scene if it includes the three wise men. Maybe just place them a little bit farther from the manger to help you remember they came late to the party.

Keanan Fischer