Epiphany's enduring question What will we do with new wisdom? A scientist seeking knowledge in the laboratory ... a pastor discerning truth in the Scriptures ... an adult son of aging parents searching for the wisdom to lighten their burden of failing health: I am all of these things. Growing up I was nurtured in Christian faith, yet also encouraged to pursue my curiosity about the natural universe.  A good-natured father helping me set up my telescope on the roof ... a mother nervously wondering what she might find dissected on the kitchen table, relieved when bedtime devotions arrived without injury or explosion: these memories come flooding back to me now in that same house in Oklahoma, where I’ve come on leave from pastoral call to help them face the shadow of lung cancer, fading senses and ailing limbs.I need the season of Epiphany, a celebration even more ancient than Christmas, for its reminder of the many ways in which Christ, the light of the world, shines in our darkness. The story of Jesus’ birth begins with ancient sages seeking a star and, for me, continues in the saga of modern sages seeking a different star, becoming my own story .... Those ancient sages are known to us only through their appearance in Matthew 2:1-12, the Gospel for the Epiphany of the Lord, Jan. 6. We know little about these wise men. “We Three Kings of Orient Are” were likely not kings, nor three in number. Most likely these Magi, the biblical term, were learned observers of the skies from the Middle East, possibly clergy in the Zoroastrian religion dominant in ancient Persia. In the ancient world celestial events were associated with earthly happenings, including the birth of important people. These Magi came to Jerusalem alerted to the birth of the king of the Jews because they had “observed his star at its rising.” Notice that the rising star itself hadn’t guided them to the child’s location, only that it had signaled the time of his birth. They came to find out where he was so they could pay him homage. Jesus was born into a tense political climate, the Pax Romana, or peace of Rome, imposed on Judea by the Roman Empire occupying it. The arrival of foreigners inquiring about a newly born king of the Jews rapidly made its way to Herod, Rome’s appointed king. Jewish prophecy had long predicted the arrival of a messiah who would rule through peace rather than the sword. At rumors of this alternative king, Herod “was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him” (Matthew 2:3). Herod used common political tools—secret meetings and deception—to exploit these questing Magi for his own purposes. After consulting Jewish religious leaders to learn what the Scriptures say about the messiah’s birthplace, he summoned the foreigners for their information: When exactly was this king born? In return, he answered their question about the king’s expected location, sending them to Bethlehem in search of the child. As they set out, the star appeared again and guided them to the child and the joyful conclusion to their journey, where they worshiped Jesus and offered their gifts. The famed star of Bethlehem has proven endlessly fascinating: Can it be explained as a natural occurrence like a comet or a planetary conjunction, or should it be seen as a miraculous manifestation? These questions remain unresolved, but they’re not the point of this story. What catches my attention is that these ancient sages employed respected tools of their time for seeking knowledge. Star’s rising Today we would call it astrology, the assumption that earthly events can be read from celestial ones, and most of us, myself included, would reject it. We may regard this particular star’s rising as a miraculous sign from God, but these Magi made such predictions from the stars as routinely as scientists today consult them for knowledge of the universe. What I find significant in this story is the fact that God is able to use any means available for revealing truth to those who truly seek it. Yet the story of Jesus’ birth isn’t so much about how we gain knowledge, but what we do with it. Both Herod and the Magi combined different kinds of knowledge—the inspired scriptural account of where this long-awaited king would be born and the sky-based observation of when it had taken place—for their own purposes. For the nervous political king, the goal was to preserve his power by killing his perceived competitor, asking the Magi to return with the child’s identity and feigning a desire to pay his respects. When the Magi were warned in a dream (another widely recognized channel for divine communication in the biblical world) to avoid Herod as they returned home, Jesus’ life was spared, though Herod’s murderous paranoia cost many others (Matthew 2:12-23). The Magi’s goal, by contrast, was to find this child and revere him as the God-sent king he was. These Gentile outsiders became the first people recorded in Matthew’s Gospel to discover the Son of God, a discovery that would change the world. In this we indeed see them as “wise men.” Nineteen centuries later, a different group of “wise men” set out in search of a different star and a discovery that would also change our view of the universe. This discovery, too, was born into a war-torn world, predicted by a Jew, and confirmed by scholars of a different land and faith. Einstein’s astonishing claim In 1915, at the height of World War I, a Swiss-German patent clerk named Albert Einstein published his theory of general relativity. He made the astonishing claim that the Newtonian picture of the universe, revered for centuries as complete, was in fact flawed and needed to be replaced by his theory. Einstein predicted certain phenomena would differ from the expected Newtonian picture, but these were only observable under certain extreme conditions. One such prediction was that since photons actually have mass (the famous energy equivalence principle of E = mc2), light from a distant star would be deflected as it passed a massive object like our sun. Einstein’s work, unknown in wartime England, came to the attention of a leading British astronomer, Sir Arthur Eddington, a pacifist Quaker who opposed the war and its associated anti-German furor. He lived on the verge of imprisonment for his views but was allowed to continue his research through the influence of a powerful colleague. He quickly realized that a total solar eclipse, approaching in May 1919, would be the ideal opportunity to test Einstein’s outrageous prediction. Stars photographed near the darkened sun’s edge, only possible during an eclipse, would be slightly shifted compared to photographs of the same stars taken in the night sky. Following the war’s end in late 1918, two expeditions (one led by Eddington) observed the 1919 eclipse. The results were announced in November of that year: Newton’s long-held picture of the universe indeed had been overturned. Overnight the very shape of the universe changed, and Einstein was propelled onto front pages worldwide becoming the media sensation he would remain throughout his life. Like the story of Jesus’ birth, what is significant about this narrative isn’t the exact nature of the observed star that signaled a world-changing discovery. Rather, it’s how that discovery was made. Einstein’s confirmed prediction was a dramatic demonstration of the power of human thought coupled with observation as a way of knowing ourselves and our world. Coming a year after the end of the Great War, this discovery was a hopeful sign that human science and technology could be put to more peaceful applications than the devastations of chemical weaponry and trench warfare that had just claimed millions of lives and challenged the optimistic spirit of the age. Like the more ancient star story, what is even more significant about this modern tale is the question it raises for us now. Within two generations, Einstein’s new understanding of matter and energy led to the development of atomic and nuclear technologies for good or ill—human destruction on an unprecedented scale or vast amounts of energy for human betterment. In the century since Einstein’s ideas were first put forth, we have gained an increasingly detailed picture of our biological nature and history. The developing biotechnologies of our day offer breathtaking possibilities for healing but also for frightening genetic discrimination against the unborn. What will we do with our newfound scientific wisdom? Will we, like Herod, use it to protect our power and prosperity at the expense of others? Or will we, like the Magi, use all information available to us, whether written in the Scriptures or the stars, to seek and follow a humble king who rejected the scepter of military might? Will we use technology to impose the Pax Romana, controlling others for our advantage, or will we seek the peace of Christ and offer our gifts to others for Jesus’ sake? It may have been the light of a star that signaled to those sages, ancient and modern alike, an extraordinary discovery. But it was the light of faith that guided them through political tensions and war in search of the truth. I, too, have turned to the Bible and to nature for knowledge and inspiration. The Magi offer a model for our present-day faith and science dialogue: Faith isn’t to be found in the knowledge of God as we think of it in modern scientific terms. Rather, faith is in the way we orient (literally) our lives toward our guiding star, the Son of God. As for this pastor, scientist and son, I will follow the Magi in our ongoing quest. I turn to the revealed word of Scripture and to natural signs from the telescope, microscope and fossil record to understand our lives as children of God. I watch as my mother turns to the sages of modern medicine for healing from a lung tumor. And I also journey with her as she turns to God in prayer for healing for her whole person. Because we are following a star that guides us still .... |
Join the discussion
Type your comments in the form below and click [add comments]
Please keep your comments brief and on-topic. We reserve the right to edit or remove inappropriate entries. E-mail lutheran@thelutheran.org with any problems or questions.
