The "King Star"

In one of my Chinese classes my teacher, who formerly lived in China, told a very interesting story regarding one of the wise men. As it's getting close to Christmas time, I figured that this was a good time to post this.


While he (my teacher) was walking down the street one day with a friend. As they were walking the friend began to tell the story of how a very long time ago, one of the very important astrologers of the Chinese emperor saw a star in the sky and realized that this was the star of a king. The astrologer, wanting to pay a visit to the newborn king began the long journey to visit the king. My teacher's friend then said that the astrologer also brought a very nice gift with him, but could not remember the English word, though he did remember it started with an "f". My teacher asked if it could perhaps be frankincense. The friend, then very excited, said that this was exactly the word he had been looking for, and he was very curious as to how this American had known the name of the gift that the astrologer had brought.


After hearing this story I was very curious and wanted to know more. Here is what I've found.


According to many Chinese Christians, one of the wise men that visited Jesus when He was young was from China. Chinese Christians believe that this was an astrologer by the name of Liu Shang. The arguments that they have are sound pretty good too, if you ask me.


 Liu Shang was the chief astrologer for the Han rulers at the exact same time that Jesus was born. As an astrologer, he soon noticed that a new star in the west had appeared in the sky, a star known to the Chinese as the "king star". Supposedly, whenever the "king star" appeared in the sky a new king had been born. Shortly after seeing this star, Liu Shang disappeared for two years.


The Chinese were very advanced in their astronomy at the time and the Silk Road, one of the main roads of commerce that connected China to the West, was already in existence at this time. Shang could have easily taken this route west. A journey along this route at the time would have easily taken around one to two years to reach Jerusalem. It is interesting to note Matthew 2:16 at this point which says that King Herod, "gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi."


After finding all this out, I think that I've come to the conclusion that one of the wise men was Chinese.