A TIME OF GIFTS

     I have long liked to think of Epiphany as the feast of faith for scholars. We have no idea who the three chaps from the East were, or even where they came from. They are variously known as “wise men”, “three kings”, and in the French version “mages” or “les rois mages”. Some people have thought of them as coming from Persia. In the 7^th century they were given names: Balthazar, Melchior, and Caspar. In the 16^th century they were given ethnic origins: Balthazar was European, Melchior was African, and Caspar was from the Far East. Their gifts betoken grandeur and sanctity: myrrh, I had read, prefigured Jesus’ death and entombment, but it was also an ingredient in the chrism of sanctity. And myrrh, apparently, grows naturally in Yemen.

     Two things are certain: they were not Jewish – they were Gentiles – and they appear to have been scholars, royal or no, magi or no. The Church has decided that Epiphany shall be the feast of the Gentiles, and quite rightly reads Paul on the subject. But I like to think of it as the feast of scholars. There have been times and places when to be a scholar seemed a natural opposite of having faith in God. Ditchkins notwithstanding, this is less true now. (For those not in the know: “Ditchkins” is a portmanteau name for the late Christopher Hitchens and the all-too-current Richard Dawkins, and all who sail in them.)

     It is currently fashionable to adore Pope Francis (I concur, on the whole) and retroactively to deplore Pope Benedict XVI. But scholars, of all people, should not fall into that trap, whether we are Roman Catholic or not. Benedict was one of the supreme scholars of our time on the topic of faith’s relation to reason, which is the topic of topics for scholars and their relation to God.

     Meanwhile, let us bring our own presents to the Child – not, probably, as grand as gold, incense and myrrh, but the fruits also of a journey across a desert.