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The Story of "We Three Kings"Of the many Christmas carols written by the American Rev. John Henry Hopkins Jr., "We Three Kings" is his most well-known one. Although it was written in the 19th century, its style has led some experts to believe that that the song is of medieval origin and consider Hopkins as merely and "arranger". The Bible tells of "wise men from the East" who came from the East to worship Jesus Christ (see Matthew 2:1,7,16), but it never says that these men were kings, so some people were rather hesitant to accept "We Three Kings" as a genuine Christmas carol. This controversial point never prevented Hopkins from writing his carol about the visit of the wise men. The Gospel of Matthew makes no reference to the names, the number, or even the royalty of the wise-men, the details have come down to us through legend and tradition. The names traditionally given to the men are Caspar, Melchior and Balthasar, who were men who read and knew the movements of the stars (see Matthew 2:2) were chosen somewhere along the way, we don't know by whom or where. And why three wise men? This number was probably selected because of the three gifts for the baby Jesus: gold, frankincense and myrrh.
We three
kings of Orient are
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