Bright stars flaunt the tops of Christmas trees around the world. Almost everyone knows about the star that led the Magi to the manger in the small town of Bethlehem, where Jesus was born. The star of Bethlehem is described in the Gospel of Matthew in the New Testament. Is this star biblical fiction or did it really exist? Let's take a look at it from the point of view of the astronomers described on Phys.org.
Astronomical question
To understand the star of Bethlehem, we need to think as the three wise men thought. Focusing on this “star in the east,” they first arrived in Jerusalem and told prophethood to King Herod: a new ruler of the Israeli people was born. We also need to think like King Herod, who asked the three wise men when the star appeared, because he himself and his court apparently did not see this star in the sky.
These events give us the first astronomical riddle of the first Christmas: how could the court sages of King Herod not know about the appearance of such a bright star, and how did she bring the Magi to Jerusalem?
Then, in order to reach Bethlehem, the Magi had to go straight south from Jerusalem; The "star in the east" "moved in front of them until it stopped over the place where the baby was." And now we have the second astronomical mystery of the first Christmas: how could a star "in the east" lead the Magi to the south? The North Star led the wandering wanderers to the north, so why did the star in the east not lead the Magi to the east?
There is the third part of the riddle of the first Christmas: how did the star described by Matthew move “before them” and then stop and hang over the manger in Bethlehem, in which baby Jesus supposedly lay?
What could be a "star in the east"?
Any astronomer knows that no star is capable of that. Neither a comet, nor Jupiter, nor a supernova, nor a parade of planets, nor can it behave like that in the night sky. One could assume that the words of Matthew describe a miracle that lies beyond the laws of physics. But Matthew carefully chose the words and wrote twice the "star in the east", which suggests that these words had a special meaning for the readers of his Gospel.
Can we find another explanation which will correspond to the words of Matthew and which does not require a violation of the laws of physics? Which will fit into the modern way of astronomy? Oddly enough, the answer will be yes.
Astronomer Michael Molnar points out that “in the east” is a literal translation of the Greek phrase en te anatole, which was a technical term used in Greek mathematical astrology 2,000 years ago. He describes, and very specifically, a planet that rises above the eastern horizon shortly before sunrise. A few moments after the appearance of the planet, it disappears in the bright light of the sun in the morning sky. It turns out that no one sees this “star in the east” if it does not look at it at a certain moment.
Now we introduce some astronomy. In the course of human life, almost all the stars remain in their places. The stars light up and go out every night, but do not move relative to each other. Stars of the Big Dipper appear from year to year in the same place. But the planets, the sun and the moon are different from the fixed stars; in fact, the word "planet" is derived from the Greek name for a "stray star." Although the planets, the Sun and the Moon move approximately along the same path against the background of stars, they move at different speeds, therefore they sometimes close each other. When the Sun covers the planet, we cannot see it, but when the Sun overtakes the planet, it appears again.
Now turn again to astrology. When the planet appears again in the morning sky shortly before sunrise, for the first time in many months, during which it hid itself in the glow of the sun, this moment is known to astrologers as a heliacal sunrise. Heliacal sunrise - this is a special first appearance of the planet, and there is what the Greek astrologers called en te anatole. In particular, the heliacal rise of Jupiter was considered by Greek astrologers to be an important event for all those born on that day.
Thus, the “star in the east” refers to an astronomical event that was astrologically important in the context of ancient Greek astrology.
What about the unexpected star parking over those same creches? The biblical analogue of the "hanging star" comes from the Greek word epano, which was also important for ancient astrologers. It means a certain moment when the planet stops its movement and begins to move not in the west, but in the east direction. This happens when the Earth, which revolves around the Sun faster than Mars, Jupiter or Saturn, catches up with another planet.
Thus, a rare combination of astrological events (the desired planet appeared before the Sun; the Sun was in the right zodiac constellation; a number of planets important for astrologers) allowed ancient Greek astrologers to assume that on that very day the king of kings was born.
Magi looking into the sky
Molnar believes that those same magicians, in fact, were very wise and mathematically savvy astrologers. They also knew about the Old Testament prophecy that the new king would be born in the family of David. Most likely, they watched the heavens for many years, waiting for the objects to align, which would foretell the birth of a new king. When a powerful set of astrological omens was collected, the Magi decided that it was time to find the baby.
If the Magi Matthew actually took a trip to find the newborn king, the bright star could not direct them; she only told them when to go. And they could not find the baby in the manger. In the end, the child was already 8 months old by the time they had unraveled the astrological message, which, in their opinion, foreshadowed the birth of the future king. The sign appeared on April 17, 6 BC. er (from the heliacal rising of Jupiter that morning, after which the Moon covered it in the constellation Aries for dinner) and lasted until December 19, 6 BC. er (when Jupiter stopped moving westward, for a moment, it froze and began to move eastward with relatively frozen stars in the background). In the shortest time it took for the Magi to reach Bethlehem, baby Jesus has grown a little.
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