Which magi gave frankincense to jesus

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In either view, the kingly connotations remain, and the message of the Magi is clear: this little baby was to be honored as royalty, no matter what the circumstances suggested! Only an ancient incense that is still beneficial today. Frankincense was used in the temple routines, burned ceremonially by the priests. It was not native to that region, however, so obtaining frankincense from the east was costly. This gift was precious in both meaning and value.

Because we now can analyze the properties and modes of action that substances like frankincense resin and its essential oil maintain, we can see further benefit beyond fragrance and ceremony. Traditional healing suggests frankincense for anti-inflammatory, anti-arthritic abilities.

We now see that this could be connected to immune modulating effects that might explain uses for both inflammatory illness and antimicrobial purposes. The most bittersweet of the gifts, myrrh had been imported to Egypt in droves for embalming rituals, and the practice filtered out through the surrounding areas. Even without the mummification process, myrrh was connected with death and burial.

A disheartening gift for a new mother to hold, yet beautiful in light of her understanding of his purpose. But was that all the myrrh was for? While the Middle Eastern regions used myrrh ceremonially, the Far East was using it for healing purposes.

China used myrrh for similar purposes — wound healing and to slow bleeding. Prophetic words often had both immediate and long term connotations, so these gifts could have followed a similar dual pattern.

Then Herod secretly called the wise men, and learned from them exactly what time the star appeared. And they, having heard the king, went their way; and look, the star which they saw in the east went before them, until it came and stood over where the young child was. And when they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceedingly great joy. And they came into the house and saw the young child with Mary, his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him. Then, opening their treasures, they offered gifts to him: gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

Being warned in a dream that they should not return to Herod, they went back to their own country another way. Although they are often called the 'Three Kings', the Bible does not say how many there were, or that they were kings. One theory is that they might have been Kings of the Yemen, as during this time the Kings of Yemen were Jews. Three is only a guess because they brought with them three gifts: but however many there were of them, they probably would have had many more servants with them.

They were certainly men of great learning. The word Magi comes from the greek word 'magos' where the english word 'magic' comes from. Magos itself comes from the old persian word 'Magupati'. This was the title given to priests in a sect of the ancient Persian religions such as Zoroastrianism. Today we'd called them astrologers. Back then astronomy and astrology were part of the same overall studies and 'science' and went hand in hand with each other.