jmamos

On the brightest "star" in history:

Touche. Looking back at the site, all that the site claims is that "No one alive had ever seen such a conjunction." I thought he said something about the brightest star in history in a speech he gave a year and a half ago. My erroneous claim came from either me remembering wrong, or an error in his speech that is not on his website.

On Jupiter:

Jupiter "stopped" very few times in the appropriate time period. Two of the times were right next to Regulus, and a third time was on Christmas. That's three coincidences in about four or five chances. This is not alone enough to base a religion on, but (again partially depending on the date of Herod's death) I do think it is reasonable to call it impressive but inconclusive evidence.

jmamos

Matt. 27:46 gives the time of Jesus' death as 3pm. The Beth. site claims that at 3pm "the moon was going to blood." The claim that we can say it was in the correct hour is my own; at this point the Beth. site is being narrative rather than quantitative. The site the lists the eclipses gives the time, but I have not actually checked the time zones to substantiate the claim (I'm not sure how to interpret the listed times in terms of Israeli time zones.) Which leaves my claim undefended and unrefuted.

Peter gave the argument behind his quotation of Joel in verse 22: "... Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know." His argument is based on signs that "you yourselves know." The eclipse occurring on the day of Christ's death was the most recent lunar eclipse, and is the event with which his audience was most familiar.

yummyfur

The "Bethlehem Star" in Matthew(Luke does not have the star) is fairly easy to explain. The editor of Matthew wanted something dramatic about Jesus' birth and he also wanted something both Kingly and something that would intimate his connection to his great prophecy and message, that of the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple.

Halley's comet made a dramatic appearance in 65/66 AD looking something like a sword. This was at the start of the Jewish revolt, and many looked at it as prophetic, initially some Jews as a sign of God's support, and later as a sign of Jerusalem's and the Temple's destruction, this is Josephus's and possibly Rabbi Yehoshua ben Hananiah's take(he is made to possibly mention the comet in the Talmud, in a snarky negative sense), after the fact.

What better than to link Jesus' birth to the same comet that appears at the onset of the Jewish revolt. The problem is the editor might have read, or heard, or had the same source of information as Rabbi Yehoshua ben Hananiah or the Talmud editor, about the comet, who said:

"There is a star which appears once in seventy years that makes the captains of the ships err"

The actual periodicity of Halley's is 75-76 years, not 70, so really the comet appeared in 11 or 10 BC (Roughly the year Herod's new Temple was dedicated). But the editor of Matthew does the math based on the 70, and decides that 5/4 BC is a good date to put Jesus' birth.

Now Roman's considered comets to be inauspicious prodigy's, and Parthian's might consider them signs of impending invasion, and new Kings, as Tigranes of Armenia conquered deep into Parthian territory during the 87 BC Halley's comet, and proclaimed himself King of Kings, a title that goes with the territory of Babylon, of course in the end, Tigranes great empire will be for naught, as he submitted to Pompey in 66 BC. This is why I think the editor of Mathew adds the whole Magi portion to his theme about the star.

yummyfur

The "Bethlehem Star" in Matthew(Luke does not have the star) is fairly easy to explain. The editor of Matthew wanted something dramatic about Jesus' birth and he also wanted something both Kingly and something that would intimate his connection to his great prophecy and message, that of the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple.

Halley's comet made a dramatic appearance in 65/66 AD looking something like a sword. This was at the start of the Jewish revolt, and many looked at it as prophetic, initially some Jews as a sign of God's support, and later as a sign of Jerusalem's and the Temple's destruction, this is Josephus's and possibly Rabbi Yehoshua ben Hananiah's take(he is made to possibly mention the comet in the Talmud, in a snarky negative sense), after the fact.

What better than to link Jesus' birth to the same comet that appears at the onset of the Jewish revolt. The problem is the editor might have read, or heard, or had the same source of information as Rabbi Yehoshua ben Hananiah or the Talmud editor, about the comet, who said:

"There is a star which appears once in seventy years that makes the captains of the ships err"

The actual periodicity of Halley's is 75-76 years, not 70, so really the comet appeared in 11 or 10 BC (Roughly the year Herod's new Temple was dedicated). But the editor of Matthew does the math based on the 70, and decides that 5/4 BC is a good date to put Jesus' birth.

Now Roman's considered comets to be inauspicious prodigy's, and Parthian's might consider them signs of impending invasion, and new Kings, as Tigranes of Armenia conquered deep into Parthian territory during the 87 BC Halley's comet, and proclaimed himself King of Kings, a title that goes with the territory of Babylon, of course in the end, Tigranes great empire will be for naught, as he submitted to Pompey in 66 BC and the Artaxiad dynasty of Armenia would be completely overthrown by the Romans in 12 BC(near the time of the next Halley's comets real apperance). Also coincidently in 66 AD Nero would crown Tiridates I as king of Armenia. This is why I think the editor of Mathew adds the whole Magi portion to his theme about the star.

JoeWallack

JW:
Hullo. You seem to be unaware that Christianity is usually on the Defensive regarding the dating of Jesus' supposed birth. The majority opinion of Mainstream Christian Bible scholarship is that "Matthew" dates the birth of Jesus to c. 4 BCE while "Luke" dates the birth of Jesus to c. 6 CE which would be a difference of about 10 years (I guess you could try to harmonize that this eclipse lasted 10 years so that no one saw anything, which potentially would explain a lot). See:

Luke vs. Matthew on the Year of Christ's Birth by Richard Carrier (2006)

What you should find especially problematic here is that "Luke" assures her audience that she has carefully investigated all things Jesus yet makes no mention of any star in her Jesus' Infancy Narrative.

Additionally, regarding anything "Matthew" supposedly wrote being taken as swell evidence concerning an Impossible/Maybe Impossible/Near Impossible/ReMarkable event I'm reminded of what my wise old Jewish Boss used to say when I gave him the explanation that "I saw it written down". "Joe, that's just graphite on cellulite, isn't it." (he used to say that a lot).

No, I think you should warm up first by explaining to us how Jesus could be born before Jesus was born (BC). And please don't answer with "John's" Jesus saying that you have to be born again.



Joseph

BIRTH, n.
The first and direst of all disasters. As to the nature of it there appears to be no uniformity. Castor and Pollux were born from the egg. Pallas came out of a skull. Galatea was once a block of stone. Peresilis, who wrote in the tenth century, avers that he grew up out of the ground where a priest had spilled holy water. It is known that Arimaxus was derived from a hole in the earth, made by a stroke of lightning. Leucomedon was the son of a cavern in Mount Aetna, and I have myself seen a man come out of a wine cellar.

http://www.errancywiki.com/index.php/Main_Page

Cege

I'm answering as a Christian: there is no indication in the NT that anyone other than the "wise men" saw such a "star". If it were based on a real astronomical object, there should be evidence in other historical record and not just the gospel Matthew. The date (year, month, day) of Jesus' birth (mentioned only in Matthew & Luke) is unknown, and the selection of December 25th as a celebration date was arbitrary (January 6 was celebrated as the birth date long before Dec 25 was selected).

Mageth

If the moon was visible in the sky over Jerusalem at 3 pm on 4/3/33, it could NOT have been in eclipse!

And, since there was a (partial) eclipse on that date, the moon could NOT have been in the sky at 3 pm!

Amedeo

You asked, What was the star that the Magi followed to find Jesus?
What I find strange in you question is the uncertainty that the STAR stated, e.g., in Matthew may have been something other than a star.

To beging with, according to the story (Matt.:2), the Magi did not know precisely where the new-born KING was. When in Jerusalem, the inquired as to where he was. But apparently nobody knew and apparently nobody had seen some ominous star. So, Herod asked the chief priests and rabbis where THE MESSIAH (the Christ, not the King of the Judaeans) was supposed to be born. And they answered (what is stated also elsewhere, that -- according to the Scriptures -- he is supposed to be born in Bethlehem. [I am sure you have read my dissertains that the Gospels are two interwoven biographies: that of the expected Messiah and that of the King of the Judaeans (as per genealogies and per labeled crucifixion).]

Various people have tried to calculated eclipses around the zero year, which might have been called "stars." At any rate, some sideral phenomenon is suppose to have occurred when Jesus was born.

Aside from the fact that apparently this special sidererial phenomenon was not observed by the people in Jerudalem or judea, how could the Magi figure out that a star or something like that hovered above the environs of Jerusalem? Granted
that the magi were Chaldean or other atronomers and that the knew some Middle Eastern geography, they did not possees the art of trigonometry whereby to determine the vertical line from the star to a location on the flat land. If the followed the direction of the star (relatively to their home-basis), the newborn king could have been anywhere from their environment to Egypt and beyond).

So, while the star was whatever it was, the story of the Magi seems to be pure fiction. This is practically confirmed by the fact that if the Magi went to Jerusalem from south-eastern mesopotamia, the trip would have taken quite a few days. But now, according to Matthew, an agel warned Joseph and Mary to run away, whereas, according to Luke, the holy family was in no danger and, the 8th day, Jesus was brought to the temple for circumcision. (Jesus the King was safe in Egypt, whereas Jesus the Messiah was safe in Jerusalem... and every year the holy family wert to Jerusalem for the Passover.)

The two biographies of Jesus are not reducible to one.