epi phanos

If you Google the Greek words "epi phanos" you get (at least on my browser) several entries with different definitions. Literally the words are something like "by light". But the sense is there in most of the uses - the appearance of light, the coming of light, the revealing of Christ. And this in the context of a visit from the wise men, the kings - those folks who had travelled great distances, following a star to see Jesus.

In his poem, the Journey of the Magi, T S Eliot puts the words of today's story into one of the travellers - a hard journey, he recalls and one which has changed him until he is ready for change, for a completed journey. "A cold coming we had of it," he notes and remembers where he could have been, with his money and his dancing girls.

This reality of letting go to journey is a harsh one - for following a star is not a guarantee of anything - I wonder what those travellers thought they would encounter or whether they thought that this journey would continue beyond its geographical limits.

Yesterday NPR was reporting the death of Mary Daly - the radical feminist theologian - Eliot's words - a cold coming - echo for her too. She had a cold coming and those who might have travelled with her often did not. I read some of her work at university and some at seminary - I didn't grasp it well, it didn't sit easy with me - but at the same time by pushing the pendulum out so far Mary Daly changed where it swings today.

Those who ask difficult questions, who take on seemingly impossible journeys, are those who often lead to the light shining in new and previously dark places. We are used to these travellers from the East and so we tuck them into our Christmas story - but the truth is that their journey to a baby in a foreign and hostile territory was not what most people would choose - it was in many senses radical.

We don't have to agree with everything which is said or done around us - but we do have to seek the light in it and look for a bigger purpose. Whether wise men or wise women, and even if we question that wisdom, the light shines in many faces and the conversation and journey has to continue.