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Bishop Richard's Weekly video Message - Transcript 09.01.2025

Video for January 9th, 2025

Hello everyone and welcome to this week’s video.  You find me seated on a camel today, which being Epiphany as I record this seems only sensible. The camels are visiting the Cathedral here in Hereford as part of our Epiphany celebrations and launch of the year of engagement.  We will be familiar with the imagery as the Christmas season draws to a close this evening.  Three kings, bearing three gifts visiting the baby Jesus in a manger.  The tableau in the crib scene at the cathedral brings all the events of the Christmas story together, although they are most likely separated by weeks of not months. Unfortunately, our common images are largely extrapolations from the Gospel texts.  They bring a certain comfort and contribute to the romantic Christmas atmosphere, but the texts themselves are much more challenging and grittier.  Please don’t hear this as a loss of confidence in biblical authority – quite the reverse.  God speaks more powerfully through the Gospels as they are rather than through later accretions.  I’m grateful to Dr Ian Paul for these insights.

At the time of Jesus’ birth there were two great blocs vying for power.  The Romans we are familiar with, but to the east was an empire almost as powerful; that of the Parthians or Persians. Their empire stretched nearly as far as India.  It is most likely that the three ‘kings’ were in fact Magi, members of the Parthian empire’s religious civil service.  Like Rome, the multiple ethnic groups that comprised this bloc had their own religious traditions. Those in government needed to be familiar with all of them.  In a deeply religious society influenced by Zoroastrianism, significance was seen in all sorts of things, especially an unusual conjunction of celestial bodies.  There are many theories as to what the star was. The most convincing seems to be a rare conjunction of the planets Jupiter and Saturn observed in the constellation of Pisces. For ancient sky watchers Jupiter signified Kingship; Saturn the West Lands (Palestine) and Pisces the end of days.  The interpretation was thus an end time king was to be born in Palestine.  Given the geopolitics, it would have been sensible for a delegation to be sent to establish diplomatic relations at the earliest possible stage. A group of diplomats (Magi) would be dispatched forthwith with a large entourage – the equivalent of a car with diplomatic plates and immunity. Sadly, it’s most unlikely that these Magi were on camels.  Camels were pack animals in those days.  People of their rank and significance would almost certainly have been riding horses, as some medieval art does portray them. Unfortunately for our Christmas card pictures, Magi riding camels is about as likely as my local Harley Davidson owners group deciding not to ride out on our motorcycles but to take a van instead!

It was Irenaeus, the second century Church Father, who first saw the significance of the gifts from a Christian perspective. Gold signified kingship; frankincense signified priesthood, and myrrh – often used to anoint dead bodies, as an indication of the sacrifice to come. He went further, seeing the giving of the gifts as the final humiliation of paganism; the kneeling in worship as act of submission and capitulation to a greater power.

The traditional sub-title of Epiphany as the revelation of Christ to the Gentiles is brought out very clearly in this reconstruction of events. Mathew takes an extraordinary risk by recording this.  In his own culture astrology and the like were punishable by stoning.  And yet God is so present throughout the universe that he can use distorted and even dangerous spiritual practices to point people to himself. God’s fingerprints are over everything. We shouldn’t be surprised that everyone has some sort of spiritual sensitivity that can be plugged into to communicate the good news of Jesus. All our proclamation in this year of engagement must start with a listening to where people are on their spiritual journey and take it from there.

+Richard

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