It is said that three Arabian princes (not kings at all) followed a star to find the baby who was said to be the New King that the Jews were waiting for. Three gifts were given: gold, frankincense, and myrrh and people assumed, then that there were three of them. We do not know what other gifts were given, nor how much was given to Mary and Joseph.
Another thing, the Wiseman are shown riding camels and the richest people (especially princes) of that time did not ride camels. They would have ridden horses.
At no point in the writings does it say they followed a star. They saw a bright star in the night sky and assumed it was guiding them. Could it have been the phenomena that many were able to see the other night? Was it the Northern Star?
And, ad for the stable and the manger; it was most likely a cave or an building where the animals were kept beneath the main living areas, to keep them warm and the heat of the animals keep the upstairs warm from their bodies. As well, it kept them safe from predators and from being stolen. Archeologists, through digging and excavating have found that this was common there and at the time that the story took place. I watched a documentary on the Mongolian nomads and they still do such.
The artists commanded the story, or commandeered the story by their interpretations of the story. They are the ones who perpetrated the misinformation and it was accepted as reality. The Americas chose to make them white skinned and, as we see, even today, it hints at white supremacy to have them light skinned. The family was Middle eastern and this would have dark hair, eyes, skin not light skinned and blue-eyed. Again, misinformation warped into “white like us”. The story became folklore and myth.
I did not get to see the star because of the heavy snowfall we were having, but I would have been awed. In my story of the birth of a great teacher, it does not rest on the paintings of old masters or the cryptic story in the bible. I, as I have stated before, am more concerned about the welfare of a young teenager having a baby on her own, if she was on her own. Women are not mentioned that much in important parts of stories. Surely there was a midwife, surely there were women who attended to her and the baby. There are many blank spots in the story and the wisemen did not make it in one night from afar… it would have taken them months, so the star must have shone for months, maybe even years as they searched for that one manger and that one baby.
The wisemen were sent there with a purpose…to find out if it was true there was a baby born that could take over Herod’s reign. It has hidden undertones, indeed. It is the blank spots in the stories that bother me. I realize that Christianity is Patriarchal and written by men, and, at that time, for men. So much is left out, especially anything to do with women. It is a sweet story though, that we have all grown up learning as if it were truth.
Carol Desjarlais 22.12.30
Further Reading and Resource:
https://www.ucg.org/the-good-news/the-real-nativity-story-surprising-truths-you-may-not-know
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