The Gospel writer Matthew twice feels the need to ascribe honor to Jesus related to his birth. Matthew first ascribes honor by assigning a royal blood line to Jesus. Matthew traces Jesus back to the warrior King David. Oddly enough, he traces that blood line through Joseph, a man Matthew himself believed was not Jesus’ father. In today’s Gospel, Matthew is attempting to bestow honor to Jesus’ rather unceremonious birth by assigning dignitaries to it. Matthew alone tells the story of three Wise Ones coming to visit Jesus; the Magi.
Matthew accords honor to Jesus via three peaceful wisdom figures, Magi, from the East. Matthew juxtaposed that honor bestowed with the dishonor evident in a warrior politician who is home grown, King Herod. The dual character story showcases the necessary paradigm shift honor must undergo. Herod and all warlords seek their own transient honor. The word derives from the honor accorded military commanders after their battlefield victories. Seeking to maintain their honored position, warlords are willing to kill new and/or disobedient people and ideas. The Magi are wayfarers who seek the Presence of Divinity and are wise enough to respect it in the lowly and peaceful ones among us. In Christ we reconsider honor. We can dispense with it entirely given its violent origins and meaning. In the Magi, we can reconsider it as not a bowing to the exalted warriors who stand armed before us and instead is a gift of peace given to the children who come after us. Making the paradigm shift can help recreate our world as a life-giving one. The Haudenosaunee people, also known as the Iroquois, tell the story of the Great Peacemaker who gave to the people a tradition referred to as The Great Law of Peace. Included among its principles: “Now we put our minds together to see what kind of world we can create for the seventh generation yet unborn.”
What is the world we want, for ourselves and for the children who come after us? If it is a world built on paying honor to warriors then rest secure, for it is the blood soaked world we inhabit. If it is instead a peaceful world in which creation itself and every child born into it is respected, then let us start bringing our gifts to it.
Prayer: Spirit of Magi, let there always be a star in the sky to guide us to the Mystery of Presence here on earth.
Question: Will the children of the next generation know I have respected them?
January 4, 2015 Gospel Matthew 2:1-12 Epiphany of the Christ Child