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Despite being first published 40 years ago, Stoner by the American writer John Williams was the surprise publishing hit of 2013. In the novel Williams recounts how an agricultural student, forced to take an English class, discovers the beauty of literature for the first time through studying a Shakespearean sonnet. On Radio 4’s Front Row the other evening, Ruth Rendell said this revelation was a moment of epiphany, and commented on how the once obscure book has struck a chord today with many people who, like Stoner, suddenly discover books after no habit of reading for pleasure. An experience of epiphany is frequently used by novelists for dramatic effect and to move on the plot. Dickens often used it in his novels such as David Copperfield, when David suddenly realises that Agnes whom he has known since childhood and taken for granted is the woman he should marry. The word epiphany itself comes from the Greek epiphaneia, meaning a manifestation or a striking appearance. But the Christian theological meaning of epiphany is more than a sudden, eureka moment. It goes beyond mere emotion and includes rational thought and discerning what one’s conscience requires. And above all, it means attempting to understand what God is asking. The most well-known example of this is the visit of the wise men to Bethlehem to discover the Christ child, guided there by a star. The story, celebrated by the Feast of the Epiphany on January 6th, confirms that being enlightened can take you on an unexpected path, and sometimes the most unlikely people can experience a revelation of God. It took the poet T S Eliot to draw out most effectively the religious meaning of epiphany in The Journey of the Magi. It is an arduous, unsettling experience, Eliot says, with people telling the Magi “this was all folly”. Their world was turned upside down. They went to find the new-born child but, say the Magi, “this birth was death, our death.” Yesterday the Liberal Democrat MP Sarah Teather revealed in an interview that she decided not to stand again as an MP after spending a month on a Catholic retreat – in other words, a time of silence and prayer. She came to understand what she needed to do but there was no sense of instant happiness or satisfaction. In many ways she chose a very difficult path. But she discerned what was right for her. Not all of us have a month to spare to understand which road to take in life. But January is a time of new beginnings, when at least an hour or two might be put aside to understand more deeply life’s purpose and life’s meaning.