What is the story of the three kings?

Answer 1

There is no story of three kings in The Bible. However, Matthew's Gospel does talk of magi who came to see the baby Jesus. The magi were actually priests of the Persian religion, Zoroastrianism. Matthew was familiar with the Zoroastrian religion, and his story of the virgin birth is suggestive of the virgin birth of the Zoroastrian Saoyshant. By having the magi, priests of the Zoroastrian religion, wish to visit Jesus and bring expensive gifts, he was drawing a parallel with Zoroastrian beliefs and showing that even the priests of this great religion would have wanted to worship Jesus.

In more recent times, the Zoroastrian connection became less important, and the priests began to be called wise men, the translation used in most English versions of the Bible. Because of the gifts that Matthew described, they are sometimes now referred to as kings, but the original intention of the biblical author was to write of Zoroastrian priests. They first went to King Herod to enquire about the baby born to be king of the Jews. Herod's advisers said that the baby must be in Bethlehem, and now the star changed direction and led them to Bethlehem, where it showed them the exact house in which Jesus lay.

John Shelby Spong (A Bishop Rethinks the Birth of Jesus) says that among people he knows in New Testament circles, the universal assumption is that Matthew's magi were not actual people, a view that Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury and leader of the world's Anglicans, agrees with.

Answer 2

The story of the three kings, also known as the three wise men or magi, comes from the Christian Bible. They are said to have followed a star to Bethlehem to visit and bring gifts to the newborn baby Jesus, symbolizing the revelation of Jesus as the savior of the world to both Jews and Gentiles. The story is commemorated in the Christian festival of Epiphany on January 6th.