“They found him in the Temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors,
both hearing them, and asking them questions.”
Epiphany is, par excellence, the season of teaching. It begins with the Magi-Kings bearing gifts to the Child Christ, gifts that primarily teach; “sacred gifts of mystic meaning,” as one of the hymns puts it. And then, there is this Gospel story, the only Gospel story about the boyhood of Jesus. He is found in the Temple in Jerusalem by his parents. He is with the doctors, the teachers of the Law. He is both listening and asking questions and providing answers. He is at once both student, humanly speaking, and teacher, divinely speaking. Epiphany is about what God makes known to us through the humanity of Jesus Christ.
This Gospel story challenges us about education. It does so from within the meaning of the story of the Epiphany itself which is primarily about adoration, a concept which we have, perhaps, lost or forgotten in our contemporary culture and which then affects how we think about education, about teaching. Education, too, is often described as a kind of journey, an adventure in learning, and so forth. But what kind of journey?
There is a journey to be sure, the journey to and from Bethlehem by the Magi-Kings. And there is a journey to Jerusalem and, ultimately, back to Nazareth in the Gospel story of Christ teaching in the Temple.
We seem to like our journeys, our trips and travels. But what are they about? Are they a flight from reality? A kind of escape from the pressures of the day-to-day? A desire to get away from it all? This contrasts completely with the biblical journeys of the Epiphany. You see, the Magi are the original truth-seekers. They come with purpose. They come prepared with gifts, gifts that honour and respect the truth they seek and before which they bow in the presence of the Holy Child of Bethlehem. The gifts they bring are hardly useful gifts; they are, instead, gifts that teach us who the Child Christ is. They are offered and opened in worship. The greater journey is about teaching and adoration. God opens out to us the truth of himself and calls forth in us an attitude of devotion and worship. The Truth is both taught and adored.
The gifts signal their deep commitment to the Truth, namely, their adoration of God. And this marks a special feature of the biblical journeys. They are not about a flight from reality, from Truth, but a journey to the Truth which is always to be adored. In a way, the Gospel story of the boy Christ in the Temple complements that fundamental Epiphany theme. The story emphasizes Christ engaged with the doctors, the teachers of the Law, in the Temple. The Law is about the truth of God revealed in the witness of the Hebrew Scriptures and, ultimately, fulfilled in the witness to the truth of Jesus Christ in the New Testament. Mary and Joseph “found him in the Temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors, both hearing them and asking them questions. And all that heard him were astonished at his understanding and answers.”
In this Gospel, Jesus says to Joseph and Mary, who have found him and questioned him, “did ye not know that I must be about my Father’s business?” It is a challenging question and one which opens out to the greater mystery of God. What is his father’s business?
It is about creation and redemption, about the dignity of our humanity as enveloped in the cloak of God’ glory, a glory that cannot be cheapened. But it requires our commitment to the Truth in all our journeyings. It is about the recovery of that capacity to adore. Epiphany teaches us how to “come and worship;” in short, to adore and to learn to love what we are being taught.
“They found him in the Temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors,
both hearing them, and asking them questions.”
Fr. David Curry
January 23rd, 2012
AMD Service of the Deaf