The Great Christ Comet (35 page)

All of this coheres perfectly with the data about the comet that we extrapolated from Matthew's account, for in both Matthew and Revelation we discover a very large, intrinsically bright comet with a long tail, a retrograde, narrowly inclined orbit, and a small perihelion distance. Both Matthew and Revelation reveal that the comet heliacally rose (this is explicitly stated in Matt. 2:2, and implied in Rev. 12:1–2
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) and that it was in connection with this event that it spoke most powerfully. Moreover, both accounts suggest that the comet moved from the western evening sky to the eastern morning sky and then returned to the western evening sky.
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When we recognize that Revelation 12:1–5 records the celestial wonders that so impressed the Magi, suddenly their behavior—traveling hundreds of miles to worship the Messiah and securing gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh—appears eminently more reasonable.

It should also be noted that the massive size of the Christ Comet is curiously supported by the apocryphal and pseudonymous
Protevangelium of James
(
Gospel of James
) 21:2–3, which dates to around AD 150. According to that source, in response to Herod's question regarding what celestial sign the Magi saw that related to the newborn King, the Magi answered, “We saw an immense star [
astera
pammegeth
ē
] shining among these stars and causing them to become dim, so that they no longer shone; and we knew that a king had been born in Israel.”
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“We Saw His Star at Its Rising”:
Matthew's Account of the Cometary Star

In light of what we have discovered in Revelation 12:1–5, it is helpful to reread Matthew 1–2. Is Matthew's account of the comet consistent with the testimony of Revelation 12 concerning the celestial sign that attended the Messiah's birth?

Matthew 1:18–25 discloses what happened in Judea at the very time when the Magi in the east were gazing in astonishment at the spectacle unfolding in the eastern sky. Then
2:1–12 relates the story of the Magi's pilgrimage to worship the newborn King of the Jews.

Matthew 1:18–25

With respect to the question of what happened in Judea at the point when the celestial sign took place in the eastern sky, Matthew 1:18–25 emphasizes that the terrestrial event was the birth of the Davidic Messiah to a virgin girl who had conceived by the miraculous intervention of the Holy Spirit, in fulfillment of Isaiah 7:14.

Matthew 1:18a highlights the subject of the paragraph: “Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way.” We discover that Mary, betrothed to Joseph, a descendant of Abraham and David (vv. 1–17), had not had sexual intercourse with him but nevertheless “was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit.”

According to Matthew, Joseph, not realizing that a remarkable miracle had transpired as God was putting into effect the glorious salvation promised through the Prophets, concluded that Mary had been immoral with another man and that he had no choice but to divorce her. However, Joseph was gracious and kind and was fond of Mary, and so he resolved to carry out the divorce in as quiet a manner as possible, so that he might not add to her disgrace (v. 19).

Matthew then tells of how God let Joseph in on his secret plan, because it was to be through Joseph that the Messiah would have, as his legal father, a descendant of King David. An angel commanded Joseph not to be afraid to take Mary as his wife, explaining that the child “conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit” (v. 20b). It was, in other words, a virginal conception. The angel went on to say that “She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins” (v. 21). Mary would be a virgin mother and would bear for the line of David a son. Joseph would then name the son Jesus.

After waking up from his revelatory dream, Joseph “did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him”: he married Mary but avoided having sexual intercourse with her until she had given birth to her son, and he named the son Jesus (vv. 24–25).

In the middle of the narrative, Matthew inserts a parenthetical comment to explain the Scriptural background to what was taking place (vv. 22–23): “All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: ‘Behold, the virgin shall be with child and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel' (which means, God with us).” Matthew's claim is that Mary's virginal conception and birth of Jesus occurred in fulfillment of Isaiah 7:14.

The focus of Matthew 1:18–25 therefore is on the fact that Jesus was conceived in and born to a virgin but with a descendant of David as his legal father. Isaiah 7:14 was fulfilled when Joseph's betrothed, Mary, a virgin, became pregnant by the Holy Spirit and gave birth to Jesus.

According to Matthew, then, the terrestrial event that accompanied the celestial wonder in the eastern sky was the birth of the Davidic messianic King to a virgin who had conceived him by a miraculous work of God through the Holy Spirit. Whatever the celestial phenomenon was, it was highlighting that this was happening at that very time in the land of Judea, in fulfillment of Isaiah 7:14.

Matthew 2:1–12

Occasion of the Wonder

The opening two verses of Matthew 2:1–12 link the terrestrial event detailed in 1:18–25 to the Magi's journey from the east to Judea—and therefore to the natal sign the Magi saw when back in their homeland: “After Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, magi from the east came to Jerusalem” (2:1). The Magi's visit to Jerusalem therefore is chronologically located in the aftermath of the birth of the Davidic Messiah Jesus to the Virgin Mary.

Despite being hundreds of miles away
from Judea, the Magi knew that the divine Messiah had been born, and so they set out to worship him (v. 2). What the comet had done in the heavens in connection with its heliacal rising had revealed to them that the Messiah's nativity had taken place.

Meaning and Nature of the Wonder

According to verse 2, the Magi asked the people of Jerusalem, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews, for we saw his star at its rising and have come to worship him?” The logic of the Magi is striking: at or around the time of its recent heliacal rising, the Star, identified with the baby Messiah, had by its behavior in the heavens communicated to them that he had been born and could now be found in Judea. What the Magi saw therefore was a celestial nativity scene, an equivalent to the actual terrestrial nativity transpiring in Bethlehem. At the same time, in view of the probability that the Magi were alluding to Balaam's oracle (Num. 24:17) when they reported to the people of Jerusalem that they had seen “the star at its rising,” it seems very likely that during this phase of its apparition the comet as a whole looked like a scepter.

Terrestrial House of Grain

The emphasis on the birth of the Messiah is continued in verses 3–4. King Herod, convinced by the Magi's deeds and words that the Messiah had indeed been born, inquired of the chief priests and scribes as to where the birth was to have taken place according to the Hebrew Scriptures (v. 4). The Jewish teachers informed him, based on Micah 5:2, that the Messiah was to be born in Bethlehem, which means “House of Grain”
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(Matt.
2:5–6
).

First Appearance of the Star

When Herod was told that the Prophets had predicted that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem, he summoned the Magi and discovered from them the precise time when the Star had first appeared (v. 7). This information, Herod evidently assumed, disclosed the maximum possible age of the Messiah. We are informed in verse 16 that, at the point when Herod sent his troops to massacre the babies of Bethlehem and environs, he commanded them to kill all children in their first or second year. That means that the Star was first visible to the Magi at least 12 lunar months (if 7–6 BC) before the slaughter in Bethlehem and that the comet was a historically great one, visible to the naked eye for over a year in total.

When Herod issued his order to massacre the infants of Bethlehem, he was allowing that the Magi might have been wrong in their contention that the Messiah's birth coincided with the celestial wonder relating to the Star's heliacal rising. The Judean king evidently felt that it was only prudent to take seriously the possibility that the Messianic child might have been born at a stage of the Star's apparition prior to the sign in the eastern sky. In particular, Herod may have wondered if the Messiah's birth might have occurred at the point when the Star had first appeared. The first appearance, or “birth,” of a “star” in the celestial realm could naturally have been regarded as the equivalent of the appearance on the terrestrial stage, or birth, of the one whom the “star” represented. It is conceivable that what the Magi reported to Herod concerning their first observation of the Star encouraged the king to consider this moment in particular a candidate for the Messiah's birthday.

Armed with the maximum age and geographical location of the Messiah, the tyrannical king of Judea felt confident that he could succeed in an audacious bid to kill the newborn Davidic King (vv. 7–8, 16).

Following Yonder Star . . . from Jerusalem to Bethlehem

When the Magi learned from Herod that the Scriptures had prophesied that the Messiah was to be born in Bethlehem, they assumed that the messianic baby would still be there and so made their way under the guidance of the Star to the town of David (v. 9). Perhaps the Magi assumed that the Messiah's family resided there permanently. If so, of course, they were wrong. The Messiah was to be found at Bethlehem even though Mary and Joseph ordinarily resided in Nazareth, because they had come down to Bethlehem for the census and found it more practical to remain there until after they had been purified (and performed the presentation of the child) at the Jerusalem temple on the fortieth day after the childbirth, in accordance with the Torah.
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As the Magi set out from Jerusalem to Bethlehem, the Sun set and, along with the stars and constellations, the comet reappeared in the southern sky in front of them (v. 9b). They recognized it as the celestial entity that they had been tracking for at least a year and that had revealed the Messiah's birth to them by what it did in connection with its rising—what they had referred to as the Messiah's Star when speaking to the people of Jerusalem.

Following Yonder Star . . . from Bab­ylon to Judea

We have already seen that the fact that the Magi, on the road from Jerusalem to Bethlehem, recognized the Star as the one they had previously seen back in their homeland suggests that they had been following its course in the heavens through the intervening period. The comet was now in a completely different part of the sky than it had been in when it had risen. At its rising it had been low on the eastern pre-dawn horizon, but now, within the space of about a couple of months, it was appearing in the southern evening sky.

The comet's presence in the evening and night sky presumably encouraged and urged on the Magi as they traveled across the wilderness toward Judea. The comet, as it set over the western horizon each night, may well have seemed to the Magi to be traveling toward Judea ahead of them, urging them onward. Indeed the comet's behavior as it set may have urged the Magi to depart quickly and may have influenced their choice of route. However, it was not their main reason for electing to journey to Judea. Their primary reason for undertaking this long trip was because of what they had seen the Star do in the eastern sky in connection with its heliacal rising (v. 2).

When the comet appears as the Magi are making their way from Jerusalem to Bethlehem, Matthew refers to it as “the star that they had seen at its rising” (v. 9). This retrospective reference is akin to the kind of thing we see in the Bab­ylo­nian astronomical diaries and monthly summaries, where each new report of a comet is introduced with a summary recollection of an earlier point in its apparition (these retrospective references in the Bab­ylo­nian records do
not
imply that the comet was not also seen during the time subsequent to the referenced event). For example, Bab­ylo­nian entries relating to the 138 BC and 120 BC comets retrospectively referenced earlier heliacal settings, while one entry concerning the 110 BC comet recalled its first appearance.
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In Matthew, the reference back to the Star's rising functions to remind the reader of the most important stage of the 1+-year cometary apparition, namely, what it did in the eastern sky to reveal the Messiah's birth
and prompt the Magi to travel to Judea in search of the baby Messiah. This reminder highlights that the very same astronomical entity that launched them on their pilgrimage to Judea was now present at its culmination, to help them complete their journey.

Following Yonder Star . . . to the House Where the Virgin and Child Were Staying

The comet would have given the impression of forward movement in front of the Magi on a basically horizontal plane as they traveled southward from Jerusalem to Bethlehem. Then, having reoriented itself as it descended toward the western horizon, the comet pinpointed the particular house where the messianic child was. The comet did this by seeming to stand over the house as it was about to set (v. 9). Matthew's description mandates that the comet at that point had a long tail which, from the Magi's perspective at the time, projected upwards into the sky from a coma that was stationed over the visible horizon behind the house where Jesus was. The description suggests that the comet that night was probably at least 30 degrees long but no more than about 45 degrees long. According to Matthew, the Star was clearly of such brightness and size that it seemed from the Magi's perspective to be standing right over the house. For the comet to be regarded as doing so, it must have been angled at between approximately 70 and 110 degrees from the horizon.