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Christmas Star

Entry 918, on 2009-01-03 at 22:05:36 (Rating 5, Religion)

I know its a bit late to comment on this because its no longer topical, but I recently come across some discussions of the Christmas Star, also known as the Star of Bethlehem. This star, of course, is the one mentioned in the Bible which allegedly signalled the birth of Jesus. Its a subject I was often asked about when I taught astronomy, along with other fringe subjects such as UFOs.

I say allegedly in relation to Jesus' birth because, as you will know if you read my blog, I doubt whether Jesus even existed, so any discussion of events around his birth are meaningless. However let's assume the Jesus story is basically true and look at what the star might possibly have been.

I would classify the possibilities into three broad categories: one, there really was a star, or something that looked like a star, which behaved in a similar way to what was described in the Bible; two, there was an astrological event of some sort which was described as a "star"; three, there was no star and it was just invented to suit a fictitious story.

So was there a real star? No, obviously not. If there had been a previously unknown star, or a nova, or a supernova, or any other significant new object it would have been observed by many cultures. It wasn't. In fact, only one of the three gospels even mentions it! Yes, that's right, Matthew is the only one of the four gospels which mentions either the Star of Bethlehem or the magi! How many people know that? Not many, judging by the surprise many people show when I tell them. So there was no real star, supernova, or any other object we would actually call a star.

And its generally accepted that Mark is older than Matthew and is based on it, so why is the star not mentioned there? It seems like the writer of Matthew (whoever that was) just made it up many years after the alleged events occurred. Its actually worse than that too. The Gospel of John not only doesn't mention the star but it doesn't even mention Bethlehem. I mean, this is absurd. Why would anyone take any notice of this junk? Beats me!

So what about an astrological event? Conjunctions (events where several planets appear close together in the sky) happen quite often and there were several candidates from about the time that Jesus was allegedly born, but none of these were extraordinary in any way. So again we come up with nothing.

What about the last possibility? Well that seems a lot more likely to me. The gospels are so inconsistent, contradictory, and full of events which are almost certainly fictitious, that its OK to ignore them. So there is one gospel in the Bible (a book full of fake stories, contradictions, and propaganda) which mentions the star, the other three don't, and there is no mention of it anywhere else. Really the only reasonable conclusion is that its a pile of nonsense just like so much other Christian mythology.

So those are my thoughts on the subject. How much time has been spent trying to explain something which is obviously a myth? Just like the time spent on explaining the other nonsense in the Bible, away too much, I think.

Comment 1 (1868) by Anonymous on 2009-01-13 at 22:12:56:

One thing you haven't thought of is the theory about the star being a visiting UFO. Think about it. Jesus might have been an alien. That might explain the miracles!

Comment 2 (1869) by OJB on 2009-01-15 at 04:40:44:

Well that's really covered by option 2: that is, something that looked like a star. One advantage of this theory is that a UFO might have been visible locally only, which explains why it wasn't seen more widely, but it doesn't explain why its only in one gospel. So, like most Bible stories, the best explanation is that they just made it up!

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