Three wise men visited baby Jesus

Matthew 2 names three gifts (gold, frankincense, and myrrh), and "three wise men" is a straightforward, very old inference from that count, not a number the text states. Some early Eastern Christian traditions run the other direction entirely and name twelve magi. Matthew doesn't even place them at the manger: by the time they arrive, the family is in a house (Matthew 2:11), and Herod's later order to kill boys "two years old and under" (2:16) implies real time has passed since the birth.

Kenneth Bailey's Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes pushes on a question most retellings skip past entirely: where is "the East"? Read from Rome, the phrase suggests Persia or Parthia, and "Magi" in Greek literature often does mean a Persian priestly caste. But Bailey argues that for a writer and audience actually living in the Holy Land, "the East" more naturally meant the territory on the other side of the Jordan, placing the magi's origin much closer to home than the popular Persian-caravan image suggests, and tying the story back to Isaiah 60's vision of nations streaming toward Jerusalem's light, which Matthew appears to be deliberately echoing.