Eric Vanden Eykel: Our Ongoing Fascination with the Magi

The Magi get 12 verses in the Gospel of Matthew, but that was all we needed to remain fascinated with them across history. In his new book The Magi, Dr. Eric Vanden Eykel starts with the Biblical story and follows the Magi all the way to Biff (if you know, you know).

Eric Vanden Eykel is Associate Professor of Religious Studies and the Forrest S. Williams Teaching Chair in the Humanities at Ferrum College in Virginia. He received his Ph.D. in Judaism and Christianity from Antiquity from Marquette University in Milwaukee, and he also holds masters degrees from Marquette and the Candler School of Theology at Emory University in Atlanta. Dr. Vanden Eykel’s primary area of research is early Christian apocryphal literature, with a special focus on texts and traditions about the infancies and childhoods of Jesus and Mary, his mother. He is the author of “But Their Faces Were All Looking Up: Author and Reader in the Protevangelium of James,” published by T&T; Clark, co-editor of Sex, Violence, and Early Christian Texts, published by Lexington Books, and author of The Magi: Who They Were, How They’ve Been Remembered, and Why They Still Fascinate, published by Fortress Press.

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