Matthew 2:1-12
Epiphany 2010
Patrick Preheim
January 03, 2010
Wise Men, Magi, and Magicians
In this season of darkness I will begin today with the story of light. The
story of R. Wallenberg.
Among the list of Righteous Gentiles—Christians who undertook the rescue of Jews
from Nazi extermination—the name of Raoul Wallenberg is the most highly
honoured. Born to a life of privilege, a member of one of Sweden’s most
distinguished families, he volunteered in the midst of the war for a hazardous
diplomatic mission in Budapest for the purpose of rescuing Hungarian Jews.
By the time he arrived in Budapest in July 1944 half a million Jews had already
been deported to death camps in Poland. Additional transports were leaving every
few days. Under the cover of his diplomatic status, Wallenberg immediately went
to work distributing Swedish passports to Hungarian Jews. Despite the brazen
audacity of his operation, he managed to browbeat the Hungarian authorities,
working under the thumb of the Nazis, to respect the protected status of these
“subjects” of a neutral state...He had become the Jew’s last and only hope. He
would typically appear at the train station, alerted that a shipment of Jews was
heading out, bluster his way past the Nazi guards with an imperious shout, “I am
Wallenberg! I insist that all Swedish citizens be removed from this transport
immediately!” Before the astonished guards could react he would hustle the
children and anyone able to wave a piece of paper—a driver’s license, a library
card—onto his waiting trucks.
He could not save them all. But there was always the hope that by trying harder,
with a bit more finagling, with a little less sleep, with a few more bribes or
brash threats, he might save just one more. As the end of the war came steadily
closer, the race against death became more heated....The Russians siege of
Budapest began on December 8, 1944...But in spite of the dangers, Wallenberg
insisted on remaining to protect “his Jews” and to oversee relief work after the
armistice. He was now a man marked by the remaining Nazis; his diplomatic cover
would no longer protect him. Yet he managed to survive, and with him nearly a
hundred thousand Jews. For them the nightmare was over. For Wallenberg was only
beginning.
On January 16 Wallenberg surrendered to Red Army troops and insisted on being
taken to headquarters. From there he disappeared into the silence of the Soviet
Gulag, one of the first casualties of the new Cold War. Apparently the Soviets
suspected that the rich Swedish capitalist...somehow able to manage an enormous
underground operation under the noses of the Nazis, must be some kind of foreign
spy. Within days Wallenberg had been conveyed to
Moscow, where he was held in the infamous Lubianka Prison of the secret
police...
Aside from the mystery of his fate there remains a deeper enigma. Unlike many
other rescuers, Wallenberg left no record of soul-searching, conversion, or even
profound reflection on the meaning of his efforts. He did not come from a
particularly religious family, and his privileged upbringing had fairly
insulated him from much contact with suffering. He simply rose to the ethical
demands of the situation as though it were the self-evident duty of a human
being. He did what needed to be done. (Robert Ellsberg, All Saints: Daily
Reflections on Saints, Prophets, and Witnesses for Our Time, p. 555-556)
I began with the story of Wallenberg because it is the story of the magi.
Wallenberg was a marginal believer, unconnected to any religious community, and
yet he followed a star worthy of the Christ child. Wallenberg, the religious
outsider, followed the star while the chief priests and scribes within the
tradition failed to acknowledge the obvious or act upon it. Genocide is wrong;
so why does it take a secular Swede to save thousands of Jews in Hungry? We who
are in the tradition must be cognizant that God provides a guiding light to
those not of the faith. The magi, who are not only far from being Jewish, also
come from a profession particularly odious to God fearing Jews. The travelers
from the east bear the title magi in addition to their gifts. The word Magi does
not appear too many other places in the biblical text, but outside of Matthew 2
the usages and parallel words for magi are categorically bad. In Acts 13 we
encounter a “magos” (the singular of magi) who opposes the ministry of Paul and
Silas and earns the harsh title of “son of the devil” (13:10). The term “mag”,
from which the word magi comes, appears a couple of times in Jeremiah.
Nergal-shar-ezer was a chief soothsayer, a chief mag, who oversaw operations
against Jewish King Zedekiah during the siege of Jerusalem (R. C. Thomson,
appearing in the Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament, edited by Harris/
Archer /Waltke, vol. 1, entry 1143). Mag is an Akkadian word, from the East, and
it does not appear in earlier Hebrew writings. The Hebrew words which describe
magi like activity (soothsaying, divination, prediction) are equally unrelenting
to those practicing prognostication. Here is a small section from commentaries
on the Torah pertinent to the story of the magi from Matthew’s gospel:
“Sorcery...was a form of soothsaying, where omens were read from clouds...the
forms, movements, and positions of other heavenly bodies, were believed to give
information and omens about the future. But God’s people have been given a
revelation, so they have no need to consult the occult world. In fact, they are
warned not to do so” (Walter C. Kaiser, Jr., “Book of Leviticus” in The New
Interpreter’s Bible, vol. 1, p. 1135). The Torah makes all spiritual powers
“subject to the overriding sense of the unique, personal, and gracious nature of
the Lord as God...Personal prayer, not magical formulas, is the basis for
humans’ communication with God and with the divine world” (Ronald E. Clements,
“Book of Deuteronomy” in The New Interpreter’s Bible, vol. 2, p. 428-429).
Moses adds, “for these nations, which you are about to dispossess, give heed to
soothsayers and to diviners [to magi I would say]; but as for you the Lord your
God has not allowed you so to do. The Lord your God will raise up for you a
prophet like me from among you” (Dt 18:14-15).
What shall God do, however, when the best and brightest of our Christian young
people are not training themselves to look for religious signs? Or what shall
God do when a prophet does arise, but the people of God refuse to heed his or
her words? Or what shall God do when the chief priests and scribes of the age
are blind to stars, scripture and dreams as is the case in the Matthew 2
passage? What happens when genocide rages through Hungry and all the church
going Christians are silent? I suspect God chose the magi, a class of people
reviled by the Torah and prophets, to make a very specific point. In the pursuit
of justice, righteousness, and honour God has been and is operating beyond the
bounds of any single religious community.
Yes, God has given a light to the gentiles and uses them to work divine purposes
in the world. Richard Gardner, Believer’s Church Bible commentator, writes that
in a modern day pageant the magi “might consist of persons today who come from
the “outside” and who are looking for a new order—perhaps an ardent feminist, a
human rights advocate, maybe even a new age mystic. In such a pageant, the
cutting edge of Matthew’s story would again become evident.” (Richard Gardener,
Matthew: Believers Church Bible Commentary, p. 51). These kinds of people
certainly have something to teach us. And I truly believe our Christian
understanding of discipleship, spirituality, and community has something to
offer. Biblical scholar Eugene Boring applies the Matthew 2 scene this way: “The
task of the church is often to discern the ultimate quest that is expressed in
non-biblical and non-theistic ways in contemporary life, and continue Matthew’s
witness that the yearnings even of those who do not know fully what they seek
are met in the act of God at Bethlehem” (Eugene Boring, “Gospel of Matthew” in
The New Interpreter’s Bible, vol. 8, p. 144).
In my two years at NPMC I have been led to believe that many to most of the
congregation would agree with the religious inclusivity apparent in Matthew’s
second chapter. On the other hand, there might be room for growth on
understanding the unique importance of the Christ child to which Matthew also
clings. After years of questing, after all, the magi do pay homage to the
Christ. And Matthew does conclude his gospel with the great commission. Clearly,
Matthew’s story demonstrates that spiritualists of other traditions (even the
scourge known as magi) have access to Divine truth. Also clear in the story,
however, is the unique role Christ plays among the world religions. Matthew’s
gospel would say that we cannot exclude from the kingdom of God spiritual
seekers of the East simply because they are magi who practice religion
differently than we. Some of them have seen the star; they bring gifts; their
worship is authentic. Matthew’s gospel would further suggest that we cannot sit
idly by while they offer their gifts and praise-- that there is something for us
to learn from these magi and a unique perspective to share with them.
How does this story play itself out in real life. Well, I don’t know about real
life, but I can share an illustration from my life. I have a friend who has
taken up Buddhist meditation as his primary spiritual connection. He extols the
virtue of his new found discipline. In a non-judgemental way he pays attention
to his feelings: the joy, the anger, the anxiety. He is learning mindfulness. He
is learning to not let frustrations of the past or anxieties about the future
dictate the way he lives in this very moment. He knows I am a Christian and a
pastor to boot. I confess to mixed feelings that he was unable to apply himself
to the spiritual traditions of the Christian church in which he was raised. It
seems he found it easier to scrap Christianity and start anew in Buddhism rather
than look to his own tradition. This frustrates me because I have found a
spiritual grounding within the tradition similar to how he describes his
Buddhist meditation. In general, though, I am supportive of him-- some spiritual
insight is better than none. And I am actually trying to allow his spiritual
journey to deepen mine. So we talk and share some of our spiritual learnings. I
only limit the conversation when he becomes belligerent or antagonistic toward
my tradition. I think he does this to goad me, but that is another matter. I,
too, meditate—using various disciplines of the Christian tradition-- and I share
the good fruit of my devotions with him. I give witness to Jesus the teacher,
the way of the cross and resurrection moments I experience. I suspect that at
times this goads him, but that is another matter. The Christ may one day play an
important part in his life, so I don’t want to write or drive him off. It may
take him a number of years to find Bethlehem as he follows the star that is
guiding him. The star he is following has produced a calmer and more generous
person, and that is a good thing. I must simply trust that God will continue to
guide him and pay attention myself knowing that sometimes those closest to
Bethlehem miss the obvious.
It would have been good to sit down with Wallenberg. It would have been good to
labour side by side with him in the ghettos of Budapest. Wallenberg is dead, but
there are other magi around if we are interested. Epiphany is the season when we
celebrate the different ways in which God comes to be seen. Let us receive the
light that the faithful strangers bring. Let us go among all the nations to
share our own gifts our light with the various magi of God’s world. Amen.