For this week's spiritual thought, I've decide to touch on the Christmas Star, which has gotten a lot of hype this past month because of the conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter.
As a big astronomy buff, I've been eating up this whole conjunction thing. A few days ago, December 21, Jupiter and Saturn got so close in the sky that they looked like one star. Here is one picture I took ...
And the same picture close up, so you can see Saturn as a tiny bulge on the right side of Jupiter.
And this picture is through my telescope, where you can also see three of Jupiter's moons and maybe one of Saturn's moons as well to its upper left (also note that the telescope has flipped the image -- silly mirrors) ...
Okay -- with all that out of the way, let's get back to the spiritual thought. It was on that same day that I tuned in to a live Slooh event on YouTube. This is a group of telescopes that are set up to provide live events. And some astronomers were talking up a storm right before the sun started setting (in England -- I think). This main guy give this big long spiel about the Christmas Star. What was it really?
If you go to a planetary show this time of year (other than 2020), you'll most likely catch a Christmas Star presentation that provides several different scenarios: a supernova, a conjunction of planets, a comet are the three main ones I hear.
My favorite one is the supernova theory, as it is consistent with both the Biblical and the Book of Mormon account. The Bible describes a new star that led wise men to find Jesus (a journey that could have taken a couple of years). The Book of Mormon describes a night "as if day" and then a new star would appear. This seems to be consistent with the idea of a supernova exploding as it brightened the sky over the American continent (The Book of Mormon), and then lost most of its brilliance by the time it hit the Eastern skies (The Bible -- which doesn't mention a night "as if day"). However, there seems to be no other independent record of such a phenomenon around 1 AD. The first Chinese-recorded supernova is 185 AD. This doesn't mean it didn't happen -- just no way to corroborate the account.
The conjunction of planets theory is interesting, but I actually don't like it, because the ones that happened around 1 AD aren't particularly interesting to me. One popular conjunction is Jupiter with Venus and Regulus in June 2 BC. But, planets get that close to each other all the time. The one that just happened a few days ago is by far the most interesting conjunction I've seen, and much more interesting than anything that happened around 1 AD. There would have been a Jupiter/Saturn conjunction in 1 BC, but not as close as what we just saw.
The comet theory is also interesting, but again, records are sparse -- though one was recorded in 5 BC by the Chinese.
As the Slooh guy kept on talking, he made this interesting comment: these planetary presenters give these presentations because it sells around Christmas time. Sure enough, I've been to a couple of them. However, all of these astronomers and presenters seem to believe that the Christmas Star was "none of the above" because a star can in no way direct a person to Bethlehem. There's only one stationary star in the sky, "Polaris," which can only lead one toward the North Pole, but all other stars spin in the sky and have no power to lead. Well -- a star could help lock down the latitude, but not the longitude.
Perhaps the stars/comet/novas simply triggered a sign to let the wise men know to start looking, and then they used other means to find the exact geography. As a matter of fact, if the star were leading to the exact place, why did the wise men have to go to Herod? I actually like this idea ... because a star doesn't have to show geography to "show the way."
The Slooh guy also presented a new theory I had never heard before: maybe the Christmas Star was made up by Matthew, who wrote his account decades after it happened. Evidently there was a prominent work of fiction at the time in which a star led the protagonists, and perhaps Matthew mixed up the two stories. Luke doesn't mention a star in his account.
And also, the thought came to mind -- what if it were something completely different? What if it were a supernatural event? It couldn't have been a geostationary event -- something that can only happen at the equator. But what if God created a "local" star above the earth in orbit and held it in place right above Bethlehem (defying laws of physics), to help show the way?
But then again, does it matter what the Star really was? It's fun speculating, and as a side-chair astronomer, I would love to know the answer. If it all possible, I would enjoy going back in time to witness the Star for myself.
Coming back to spirituality -- I believe that we can have our own Christmas Star to lead the way. We can receive our own signs and revelations to help us in our own lives. If we are wise and keep an eye out for these, they can lead us all in the right direction. This very recent Christmas Star in our sky has been a perfect reminder of this very concept.
Finally, I'll close with this recording of my favorite song about the Star of Bethlehem ... this is the choral version I've sung in church several times in the past ...
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