“…we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him” (King James Bible, Matthew 2:2)

The Wise Men’s journey to Bethlehem was no holiday excursion.  It was an expedition into the unknown, fraught with hardship and peril.  They did not know how long they would be away; how far they had to go; indeed, not even where they were going.

They had to take with them clothing to meet the extremes of heat and cold which the open desert held for them during the long summer days and long winter nights.  Then there were the hours and weeks and months of jolting and swaying on their camels, and all the time the danger of being robbed and perhaps murdered by marauding bandits.  And even when they reached their journey’s end, it would not be the end of their journey, because they had to go through it all over again before they could get back home.

So their first sight of the roofs and towers of Jerusalem must have been a tremendous thrill.  This was the last capital city, for beyond it lay the shore of the Mediterranean.  Here surely was their goal, here was the Monarch, his court and his throne, whom they had come so far to honour.