{"id":194,"date":"2020-12-04T12:15:37","date_gmt":"2020-12-04T17:15:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=194"},"modified":"2020-12-04T12:15:37","modified_gmt":"2020-12-04T17:15:37","slug":"i-saw-three-ships","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2020\/12\/04\/i-saw-three-ships\/","title":{"rendered":"I Saw Three Ships"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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When you think about, I Saw Three Ships Come Sailing In<\/em> is a rather unusual Christmas carol. 

There are no boats in the accounts of Jesus\u2019 birth.  The Jews of Bible times, in fact, were generally terrified of open water.  Only fishermen routinely set sail, and that was on the comparatively placid lake called the Sea of Galilee.   

One of the carol\u2019s verses declares that the ships come sailing into Bethlehem.  That\u2019s an interesting picture, since the City of David sits high and dry in the Judean Mountains, 2,543 feet above sea level.

The number \u201cthree,\u201d however, provides some clues to the song\u2019s message.

It echoes the traditional number of Magi (or \u201cwise men\u201d in the King James Version).  Sometime during the 1100\u2019s, three sailing vessels were said to have transported the purported bones of the Magi to the cathedral in Cologne, Germany, where they became holy relics.  By the mid-1600\u2019s, wandering English minstrels had crafted the familiar folk song and lyrics we have today to commemorate that voyage.    

There\u2019s another possibility, however. 

Camels, which exhibit an extraordinary capacity to travel great distances between drinks of water, are known as \u201cships of the desert.\u201d  Some historians believe the \u201cthree ships sailing in\u201d represent the Magi\u2019s visit to the young Jesus, which is reported in Matthew 2:1-12. 

It\u2019s worth noting how many questions still swirl around this event.

For instance, how many actual visitors from the east were searching for Jesus?  Matthew doesn\u2019t say.  But because they brought three gifts, the number stuck.  Later tradition even assigned them names:  Melchior, Caspar, and Balthazar.  There\u2019s no evidence such individuals ever existed. 

Were they kings?  The Bible uses the term magioi<\/em>, from which we get Magi (as well as the word \u201cmagic\u201d).  They were almost certainly not royalty, but rather dedicated students of the night skies.

We can only be grateful that John Henry Hopkins, Jr., who wrote We Three Kings<\/em> in 1857, chose not to call his carol We Undetermined Number of Astronomers from Present-Day Iraq<\/em>. 

What was the star they saw, the one that guided them on their journey to Bethlehem? 

Some theorize it was a supernatural beacon.  Others suggest it was something sufficiently unusual to attract their attention.  Perhaps it was a conjunction of planets \u2013 the close alignment of two or more bodies in our solar system.  This year on the winter solstice (December 21) we\u2019ll be treated to what astronomers are calling \u201cthe great conjunction.\u201d  Jupiter and Saturn will appear so close together above the southwest horizon after sunset that they may seem, at first glance, to be just one body.  Of course, they\u2019re not literally close together.  Saturn (the dimmer of the two) is a whopping 401,592,178 miles farther away from us than Jupiter.  That\u2019s more than four times the distance from the earth to the sun.  But this \u201cgreat conjunction\u201d will be the closest visible alignment of Jupiter and Saturn since the Middle Ages.

What we know for sure is that those who came from the east to visit Jesus were searchers.  And they brought special gifts.

Gold, incense (or frankincense, as the older English versions have it), and myrrh are not the kinds of gifts one would generally order online from Babies R Us. 

Jesus, of course, was no ordinary child.  So what\u2019s the significance of the gifts?

Gold is a gift worthy of a king.  In truth it\u2019s prized by most everyone \u2013 from ancient times to today\u2019s Wall Street speculators. 

Incense is a gift associated with worship.  It was extravagantly expensive.  Worshippers would put a pinch of incense into a flame, and its sweet smell would connote the beauty of a relationship with God.

Myrrh is the most counterintuitive of the gifts.  It was a burial spice.  Why in the world would one give something like that to a child?  From day one, the death<\/em> of Jesus \u2013 and his subsequent resurrection \u2013 was part of his story.  The fuller meaning of Jesus\u2019 life is already embedded in the Bethlehem accounts.

The ultimate meaning of Jesus\u2019 life was well known to those who crafted these lyrics almost 400 years ago:

I saw three ships coming sailing in on Christmas Day, on Christmas Day<\/em>
I saw three ships coming sailing in on Christmas Day in the morning.<\/em>

And what was in those ships all three on Christmas Day, on Christmas Day?<\/em>
And what was in those ships all three on Christmas Day in the morning?<\/em>

Our Savior Christ and His lady on Christmas Day, on Christmas Day<\/em>
Our Savior Christ and His lady on Christmas Day in the morning

Pray, wither sailed those ships all three on Christmas Day, on Christmas Day
Pray, wither sailed those ships all three on Christmas Day in the morning

O, they sailed into Bethlehem on Christmas Day, on Christmas Day
O, they sailed into Bethlehem on Christmas Day in the morning<\/em>

And all the bells on Earth shall ring on Christmas Day, on Christmas Day<\/em>
And all the bells on Earth shall ring on Christmas Day in the morning<\/em>

The Irish singer Orla Fallon offers this lilting Celtic version<\/a> of the familiar carol. 

People sometimes sigh, \u201cOne day, when my ship comes in, everything will be OK.\u201d  On that day, they assume, they will finally experience love, joy, and peace.

Here\u2019s the good news:

Love, joy, and peace can be ours right now as we abandon ourselves to the One whose arrival at Bethlehem is the centerpiece of every carol. 
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When you think about, I Saw Three Ships Come Sailing In is a rather unusual Christmas carol.  There are no boats in the accounts of Jesus\u2019 birth.  The Jews of Bible times, in fact, were generally terrified of open water.  Only fishermen routinely set sail, and that was on the comparatively placid lake called the Sea of Galilee.    One… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":195,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[9,53],"class_list":["post-194","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-christmas-carols","tag-magi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=194"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":196,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194\/revisions\/196"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}