Bible Myths and their Parallels in other Religions by T. W. Doane

_Sun-worshipers_, and at early dawn on the 25th of December, the astrologers of the Arabs, Chaldeans, and other Oriental nations, greeted the infant Saviour with gold, frankincense and myrrh. They started to salute their God long before the rising of the Sun, and having ascended a high mountain, they waited anxiously for his birth, facing the East, and there hailed his first rays with incense and prayer.[480:2] The shepherds also, who remained in the open air watching their flocks by night, were in the habit of prostrating themselves, and paying homage to their god, the Sun. And, like the poet of the Veda, they said: "Will the powers of darkness be conquered by the _god of light_?" And when the Sun rose, they wondered how, just born, he was so mighty. They greeted him: "Hail, Orient Conqueror of Gloomy Night." And the human eye felt that it could not bear the brilliant majesty of him whom they called, "The Life, the Breath, the Brilliant Lord and Father." And they said: "Let us worship again the _Child of Heaven_, the Son of Strength, Arusha, the Bright Light of the Sacrifice." "He rises as a mighty flame, he stretches out his wide arms, he is even like the wind." "His light is powerful, and his (virgin) mother, the Dawn, gives him the best share, the first worship among men."[480:3]