IN HIS Christmas short story in this edition of The Tablet, Jonathan Tulloch explores the fate of the gifts given to the Christ Child by the three wise men.Gold, frankincense and myrrh would have been valuable items to Jesus’ family, so what happened to them? This is a question that Scripture scholars appear not to be able to answer. Instead, they argue that the gifts should be seen as a symbolic telling of Jesus’ life – gold for a king, frankincense for a priest and myrrh for a dead body.Fr Nicholas King SJ told us: “Such items would indeed have been very valuable, but that is not the point that Matthew is making; what he is talking about is their symbolism.” Another biblical scholar, Fr Henry Wansbrough OSB, said: “I don’t like the idea of the H