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question about twelfth night
The oddest questions come into my mind sometimes. Today's came while reading an article about festivities of the day. I suspect I have both readers with the same question and readers with the answer, so I'll ask here. (Tried Wikipedia, tried Google.)
The feast of epiphany is on the 12th day of Christmas. The magi weren't there from the start; the star showed up on the day of Jesus's birth and, after seeing it, the magi spent some time getting there. (I don't know if that's in Christian scripture or tradition or what, but I understand it to be consensus.) Epiphany is the celebration of the magis' arrival.
The Christian bible tells us that Mary had to give birth in a stable because there was no room at the inn.
Every nativity scene I have ever seen shows the magi and everyone else crowded around the child -- in the stable.
Are we to understand that the family is held to have camped out there for 12 days? Or did artistic license get way out of hand and it wasn't worth the trouble to rein it in?
From what I've seen, these sorts of questions are less a part of Christian tradition than of Jewish tradition. So just to be clear lest I offend: this is sincere curiosity.
The feast of epiphany is on the 12th day of Christmas. The magi weren't there from the start; the star showed up on the day of Jesus's birth and, after seeing it, the magi spent some time getting there. (I don't know if that's in Christian scripture or tradition or what, but I understand it to be consensus.) Epiphany is the celebration of the magis' arrival.
The Christian bible tells us that Mary had to give birth in a stable because there was no room at the inn.
Every nativity scene I have ever seen shows the magi and everyone else crowded around the child -- in the stable.
Are we to understand that the family is held to have camped out there for 12 days? Or did artistic license get way out of hand and it wasn't worth the trouble to rein it in?
From what I've seen, these sorts of questions are less a part of Christian tradition than of Jewish tradition. So just to be clear lest I offend: this is sincere curiosity.
no subject
speculation aided by running a planetarium backward
[*] One popular hypothesis recgarding the star in question was that it was a conjunction of three planets making an extra-bright spot in the sky; even if the magi noticed it was a conjunction and not a mysterious new star, it would've been an astrologically significant event. IIRC, that hypothesis is also one of the data that point to Jesus having been born in 4BCE, but it's been a while and I may have misremembered.
Re: speculation aided by running a planetarium backward
My personal thought is that the most plausable thing is that it was an astrological not astronomical event that sent them. but thats a WAG at best.