The Christmas Star

The Christmas Star Matthew 2:1-12 O the symbols and imageries of Christmas: Mary on a donkey with Joseph going to Bethlehem, the baby in the manger, the wise men visitation, the star in the east. Ah, the star. It is fitting that God used a celestial object to announce the birth of Christ since “the heavens declare the glory of God…” Psalm 19:1. But what is this star in the east? I have always wondered about this star since it is so prominent in frightening and threatening one king, while bringing other nations together through their emissaries. Coincidentally, appearing when a census of the whole world was ordered, this little baby would cause time to restart with a new calendar in the ensuing years. Because of a little baby in a manger with His own nightlight, He was to secure His peace and place in the world, where He would begin a new history. It would begin His-story. The Bethlehem star has its place in the biblical record, but does it have integrity in science, in astronomy, can it be explained with reason? Most of what you might find about it is an apologetic, a defense for its appearance, most likely outside the realms of science. But what if God could use the very nature and alignment of the stars and planets to make a celestial statement for all the earth to behold? The first question I have is the star appearing “in the east.” Where does that put the people looking at it? Well, in the west – looking east, so one would think. What is west of Israel - the biggest landmark of Europe and the Middle East, the Mediterranean Sea. Israel and Bethlehem are on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. If someone saw a star in the east they would have to be in Italy or northern Africa. However, we are led to believe that the wise men came from modern-day Jordan, Syria, Turkey and Iraq to the north and Iran, Yemen, Saudi Arabia from the west and south. If wise men from these countries saw a star in the east, they would have headed out to Russia and China across the mountains of Afghanistan. So what gives? Is the scripture in error, and if so, then its integrity is in question. So what are we to understand? Would you believe we will have a similar Christmas Star this very year? Well, according to Joanne Kimberlin, a 2007 Pulitzer Prize finalist, we can see a Christmas Star this year much like the wise men saw so many years ago. This year there will be an alignment of Jupiter and Saturn where they will be in their closest alignment in 800 years, creating a wonder that frankly is not all that unusual, but one that also happened around the time Jesus was born. These two planets actually align every 20 years or so. But it’s not always in December and it’s been nearly 800 years (we’re talking Middle Ages) since they got this close. Technically, the two largest planets in our solar system will still be hundreds of millions of miles apart. But this December 21, they will look like they’re nearly touching, creating a radiant point of light that’s being 2 dubbed the Christmas Star, or Star of Bethlehem, for obvious reasons. Making it even more special - December 21 also marks the winter solstice, the longest night of the year, the tipping point where the light once again starts gaining ground on darkness. You have to appreciate the symbolism, how even today, after all we have been through, we can see a page out of the Bible, telling of an unusual star, a star of hope, a light quite similar to the one that led the wise men to the baby Jesus. Astronomers have long theorized that the Nativity star might have really been another alignment, known as a conjunction of Jupiter, Venus and a bright star named Regulus which occurred around 2 BC. Regulus is the brightest star in the constellation Leo and among the brightest in Earth's night sky. Regulus, combined with Jupiter and Venus, would have indeed been the brightest singular light in the night sky at the time of Jesus’ birth. While the forces directing our universe remain full of mystery, planetary orbits are now predictable. Sometimes with the planets, they come together to make for a fascinating celestial appearing. In this year, 2020 will be wrapped up with a special bow. A miracle or merely astrophysics, you decide, but at least it tells us of a light at the end of a long, dark tunnel. How many of us put a star at the top of our Christmas tree? Actually, I put an angel that radiates with light, but I digress… None-the-less, bright stars top Christmas trees in Christian homes around much of the world. We sing, "Star of wonder, star of night, Star with royal beauty bright, Westward leading, still proceeding, Guide us to Thy perfect light." Now we have the guys going west – from the east, rather than east from the west. Where in heaven’s name is the star positioned? Inquiring minds want to know. The star that guided the wise men to a manger in the little town of Bethlehem where Jesus was born is either a pious fiction, or contains some astronomical truth? To understand the Star of Bethlehem, we need to think like the three wise men. Motivated by this "star in the east," they first traveled to Jerusalem and told King Herod the prophecy that a new ruler of the people of Israel would be born. We also need to think like King Herod, who asked the wise men when the star had appeared, because he and his court, apparently, were unaware of any such star in the sky. These events present our first astronomy puzzle of the first Christmas: How could King Herod's own advisers have been unaware of a star so bright and obvious that it could have led the wise men to Jerusalem? Next, in order to reach Bethlehem, the wise men had to travel directly south from Jerusalem; somehow that star in the east "went before them, 'til it came and stood over where the young child was." Now we have our second first-Christmas astronomy puzzle: how can a star "in the east" guide our wise men to the south? The North Star 3 guides lost hikers to the north, so shouldn't a star in the east have led the wise men to the east? And we have yet a third first-Christmas astronomy puzzle: how does Matthew's star move "before them," like the taillights on the snowplow you might follow during a blizzard, and then stop and stand over the manger in Bethlehem, inside of which supposedly lies the infant Jesus? What could the 'Star in the East' be? The astronomer knows that no star can do these things, nor can a comet, or Jupiter, or a supernova, or a conjunction of planets or any other actual bright object in the nighttime sky. So we might think that Matthew's account describes a miracle, something beyond the laws of physics. But Matthew chose his words carefully and wrote "star in the east" twice, which suggests that these words hold a specific importance for his readers. Can we find any other explanation, consistent with Matthew's words, that don’t require that the laws of physics to be violated and that has something to do with astronomy? The answer, amazingly, is yes. Astronomer Michael Molnar points out that "in the east" is a literal translation of a Greek technical term, used in Greek astrology 2,000 years ago. It described, very specifically, a planet that would rise above the eastern horizon just before the sun would appear. Then, just moments after the planet rises, it disappears in the bright glare of the sun in the morning sky. For a brief moment, one can see this "star in the east." Now for a little Astronomy 101, we know that virtually all the stars remain fixed in their places in the night sky; the stars rise and set every night, but they do not move relative to each other. The stars in the Big Dipper appear year after year always in the same place. But the planets, the sun and the moon wander through these fixed stars; in fact, the word "planet" comes from the Greek word for wandering star. Though the planets, sun and moon move along approximately the same path through the background stars, they travel at different speeds, so they often lap each other. When the sun catches up with a planet, we can't see the planet, but when the sun passes far enough beyond it, the planet reappears. That may take months to occur. When the planet reappears again and rises in the morning sky just moments before the sun, that special first reappearance of a planet is what "in the east" referred to in ancient Greek astrology. In particular, the reappearance of a planet like Jupiter was thought by Greek astrologers to be symbolically significant for anyone born on that day. So for the people of Jesus’ day, the "star in the east" refers to a celestial event with special significance, such as a king was to be born. Put a couple stars together at the same time in the night sky and you have a light show as never before both in the morning and in the night. What about the star parked directly above the manger? The word usually translated as "stood over" refers to a particular moment when a planet stops moving and changes apparent direction from westward to 4 eastward motion. This occurs when the Earth, which orbits the sun more quickly than Mars or Jupiter or Saturn, catches up with, or laps, the other planet. Together, these rare combinations of astrological events would have suggested to ancient Greek astrologers a regal horoscope and a royal birth. The wise men were, in fact, very wise and mathematically skilled astrologers. They also knew about the Old Testament prophecy that a new king would be born of the family of David. They had been watching the heavens for years, waiting for alignments that would foretell the birth of this king. When they identified a powerful set of heavenly signs, they decided the time was right to set out to find the prophesied leader. If Matthew's wise men actually undertook a journey to search for a newborn king, the bright star didn't guide them; it only told them when to set out, and they wouldn't have found an infant swaddled in a manger. Science knows that the stars and planets did their thing, which caught the wise men’s attention. Another phenomenon began on April 17 of 6 BC (with the rising of Jupiter that morning) and lasted until December 19 of 6 BC (when Jupiter stopped moving to the west, stood still briefly, and began moving to the east, as compared with the fixed background stars). Whether in 2 BC or 6 BC, there were celestial events that could very well have foretold a royal birth. Take your pick. At any event, by the time the men could have arrived in Bethlehem, the baby Jesus would likely have been at least a toddler, triggering Herod’s slaughter of the infants. So, what does this tell us, what is the bottom line? Matthew wrote to convince his readers that Jesus was indeed the prophesied Messiah. Given the signs of the times embedded in his gospel, he must have believed the story of the Star of Bethlehem would be convincing evidence for many in his audience. The Star of Bethlehem is only one of many signs that support our believing in Jesus as the Son of God. From the angel’s visits to Elizabeth and Zachariah, to Mary and Joseph, to the census, to the road trip to Bethlehem, to the virgin birth, to the star, to the wise men and on and on, there is a library full of tangible evidence of Jesus’ birth being by the hand of God. But even when you add it all up, one must still make a leap of faith to say, “Yes, Lord, I believe.” May this Christmas season be a time to reexamine why we believe, based both on the stories from the Bible, upon our reason and traditions, but most of all upon our own experience of the Spirit bearing witness to our spirit that Jesus is the Son of God, come into the world to be our Lord and Savior. Thank you, Jesus.