By Courtney Roberts
RINF Alternative News
The year having come full circle, Christmas is upon us, once again. Each Christmas, we are faced with the familiar, yet mysterious images of the star and the Magi, the three wise men bearing gifts, crossing both the desert and the sky in search of the baby Jesus. The Magi of Matthew’s Gospel are such a fixture that Christmas wouldn’t be complete without them, and yet, even after 2,000 years, they still seem shockingly out of context in the Christian gospels; and all our attempts at explaining them-or explaining them away-have only deepened the mystery.
The inclusion of the Star of Bethlehem, with all its pagan astrological implications, in the overture to the First Gospel, has raised so many awkward questions for orthodox Christianity that one has to wonder how it ever made it into the Bible in the first place. So why would the authors (and editors) of the Christian gospels choose Zoroastrian Magi and astrology to herald the coming of Jesus Christ? Did the Magi have some special significance then that we have since lost? After all, the New Testament narrative opens with them. Why? Who were they, and why would Matthew imply that their astrology lead them to Jesus?
In pursuing answers to questions like these, I’ve come to believe that Matthew’s Magi have much more to offer than the traditional gifts for Jesus ascribed to them. In fact, once we begin to understand who the Magi were, how their astrology informed their beliefs, and how much those beliefs influenced their Jewish neighbors, some strikingly obvious conclusions emerge about their appearance. The priority of this story’s position within the Christian Bible, in the opening chapters of the very first book, is actually a testament to the widespread influence of the Persian Magi and their astrology in the rise of monotheism and Messianic expectations throughout the ancient world. Ultimately, Matthew’s Magi challenge our traditional understanding of how the three great monotheisms-Judaism, Christianity, and Islam-evolved, and might even be telling us something new about our future prospects together.
Who were the Magi?
The Magi were a hereditary order of priests and sages; wise men, if you will, who originated among the tribes of Media. The region the Magi knew as Media is now north-western Iran, bordering the southern shores of the Caspian Sea, approximately halfway between Baghdad and Tehran. The roots of their tribe extend back into the dim mists of prehistory, but from the 6th century BCE on, the Magi served as the official priesthood of the Persian religion, and of the Persian royal house.
In the West, where we traditionally revere the Greeks and Romans, we too often fail to acknowledge the far-reaching cultural and religious contributions of the Persians, their longstanding foes; and ours, by default. Meanwhile, Judeans living at the time of Christ were very much aware of the contributions of their Persian neighbors. Greece and Rome had not been kind to the Jews, whereas the nearby Parthian Persians and their Magi had long been their allies against these brutal foreign invaders.
Matthew and his contemporaries knew that the Jews were forever indebted to the Persians, who liberated them from the Babylonian captivity (ca. 538 BCE), and saved their nation from certain extinction. In repatriating the Jews, and authorizing the rebuilding of the burnt-out sites of Jerusalem and its temple, the Persians and their Magi leveraged a lot of input into the beliefs and practices of the Jewish religion.
The arrival of Alexander in 331 BCE, and the Hellenist Empire that survived his fateful demise, marked the beginning of hard times for both the Jews and the Persians. By the time of Christ, both nations shared a common messianic dream: the advent of a saviour king who would destroy the Greeks, and the Romans after them, and restore the rightful reign of God. The Magi were the main propagandists behind this popular messianism, and their reputation as master astrologers was put to good use in this cause.
The Magi’s Astrology
There’s no doubt that the Persian Magi were great astrologers, and Matthew and his contemporaries would have recognized them as such. Unlike the Greeks and the Romans, the Persians had their own distinct brand of religious astrology. For them, God’s time was organized into astrological millenniums; 1,000 year periods ruled by the signs of the zodiac, wherein timely conjunctions of Jupiter and Saturn signaled the rise of new empires and dynasties, great prophets and new religions, and more rarely still, heralded the dawn of a new world age, or aeon. Their astrology was rooted in the idea of the apocalypse; the uniquely Persian belief that the universe was created with an intrinsic astrological order to serve as a staging ground for the ongoing, and ultimate battle between good and evil; the outcome of which had already been decided long before time began. Their astrology thoroughly permeated their religion, and vice versa.
The Sons of Zoroaster
By the time Matthew composed his Gospel (ca. 75 CE?), the Persian religion of the Magi harbored long-standing astrological traditions about a coming world savior, or messiah, who was to be born of a virgin. Ultimately, the Magi were expecting three world saviors, or ‘sons of Zoroaster,’ over the course of consecutive millenniums, and they were all to be born of virgins at the appropriate astrological intervals. The first two sons would help defeat evil, and spread the good religion throughout the world. The coming of the third savior would trigger the apocalypse, the ultimate battle between the forces of good and evil at the end of the world.
These ancient Persian traditions had tremendous bearing on the development of Jewish Messianic expectations, both politically and religiously. Matthew’s Judeans were inspired in their endless uprisings against their Greek and Roman overlords by the Persian religion and its astrology. Matthew’s inclusion of the Magi in his gospel reminds us that many Judeans still expected God to work through the Persians, and in concert with their astrology, to bring about their long-awaited redeemer king.
These same Persian traditions formed a vibrant part of early Islam, and shine through the work of the 8th and 9th century astrologers of the Golden Age of Baghdad. There, scholars like Masha’allah and ‘Umar Tiberiades preserved the unique religious chronologies of the Magi; only now, their astrological millenniums, and the cycle of Jupiter and Saturn conjunctions, heralded the birth of Christ and Christianity, as well as the birth of Muhammad and Islam. For these astrologers, the first two sons of Zoroaster had come. The good religion had been spread.
This is the astrology of the Magi. This is what the author of Matthew has been trying to tell us for two thousand years.
Inclusive Monotheism
In their astrology, the Magi focused on the big picture and the overarching God’s-eye view. They operated within an ‘inclusive monotheism,’ in which all who worship the one God are one and always have been. The coming of Jesus Christ and Muhammad; even the rebirth of Second Temple Judaism from the ashes of the Babylonian captivity, meant the fulfillment of their ancient Persian prophecies; prophecies which predicted the triumph and spread of the worship of the one God, the Good God, throughout the world. We lost that thread long ago, and instead, stubbornly cling to the medieval, man-made myths of ‘exclusive monotheism’- orthodox traditions that each claim their own separate origin in a special revelation, and then fight over the details. These claims are rooted in our very human failings rather than in history, for Judaism, Christianity and Islam are all branches of an old, old tree. With each passing day, and each new loss in the war on terror, the inclusive monotheism of the Magi; their most precious gift, looks more relevant than ever.
Even if the Magi never ventured across the desert as he says, Matthew would have done well to invent them. His case for Jesus, as both the King of the Jews and as a world savior, was boosted immeasurably by their appearance, and by the implied coincidence of his birth with their astrological indicators. So it is that over 2,000 years on, Matthew’s Magi cross our horizon again, bearing new gifts this time, in the truths they reveal to us about ourselves, and in their lasting testament to the common religious heritage we all share; or at least that we could share, and better late than never.
For more on this fascinating topic, read Courtney Roberts’ The Star of the Magi: The Mystery That Heralded the Coming of Christ (published in October 2007 by New Page Books).
Courtney Roberts, M.A. is a writer, teacher, and consultant, originally from Miami, FL. Her work reflects a unique perspective: a real passion for the ‘big picture’ that combines cosmology, religious studies and history. She developed her specialization in the role of astrology in religion, particularly Persian Zoroastrianism and western monotheism, while completing a Masters degree in Cultural Astronomy at Bath Spa University in England. Courtney maintains a busy schedule, writing, teaching, and lecturing to audiences of every persuasion all around the world, and can be contacted at www.thestarofthemagi.com.