The Great Christ Comet (50 page)

Until October 11/12 the comet's apparent brightness was dropping (the drop was in the order of about 2 or 3 magnitudes from September 30 to October 11/12). Thereafter the apparent magnitude began to build again as the comet neared Earth.
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As the cometary coma rose on October 11, it may have been backlighting part of the edge of the 27.5-day-old waning crescent Moon (magnitude -9.41).

The remarkable growth of the coma-baby in Virgo's womb is reminiscent of the dramatic growth of Comet Holmes as a result of its outburst late in 2007 (
fig. 10.25
).
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However, while a major outburst event cannot be ruled out in the case of the Christ Comet, there is probably no need to make recourse to such to explain the spectacular enlargement of the coma. The fact that the massive, productive comet had just made its closest pass by the Sun and was rapidly approaching Earth is probably sufficient to explain the stunning expansion.

The whole time the coma was growing, so also was the tail. And, of course, the longer it grew, the earlier it rose in the east each night. On October 2 the cometary scepter was something like 110 degrees long. On October 14 it was over 155 degrees in length. By that time the tail was starting to rise around sunset and so was visible for the whole night. When the coma rose toward the end of the night, the massive comet must have been an awesome sight to behold. To Near Eastern astrologers probably attuned to perceive significance in the direction to which the tail pointed, it must have seemed remarkable that this extraordinarily long and ever-lengthening tail was pointing right to the western horizon.

The Baby Drops

From October 7 to 14 the cometary baby dropped slightly within Virgo's womb, even as it grew. This downward movement was due to the fact that the comet's orbit was straightening out after its hairpin turn around the Sun at perihelion and the fact that the comet was increasingly heading toward Earth. The more the orbit straightened out, the faster the comet seemed to descend within Virgo. The momentum of the descent appeared to build with every passing day, but in the first few days there was relatively little movement. Indeed, while the coma was descending within the context of the rising fixed stars of Virgo, the nucleus itself was technically still rising in altitude (i.e., increasing in its apparent distance from the Sun) up to October 14, when it reached its highest point in the predawn eastern sky (it was about 23½ degrees above the horizon at sunrise). By October 14 the comet coma's sunward side had descended (relative to Virgo's stars) to the level at which it had been on September 29.

Any intensification of the apparent magnitude of the comet as it came within about 0.5 AU of Earth (not to mention the steadily increasing brightness boost due to the forward-scattering effect as the phase angle grew) would have been offset by the continued growth of the coma, which caused the brightness of the comet to be more broadly distributed and hence less stunning. By October 11 the coma was probably something like 4 degrees long and at least -10.8 in apparent magnitude.
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At this magnitude such a coma would have stood out in sharp contrast from the ancient night sky.
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The baby's face may have seemed especially bright.

Virgo's Labor Begins

While we cannot know for sure exactly where the nucleus was within the coma, it seems safe to conclude that about 10% of the coma was on the sunward side of the nucleus. This is important because it determines when the coma would have been perceived to be pushing down on Virgo's cervix/pelvic floor. Accordingly, October 15 emerges as the most likely date for the beginning of Virgo's “active labor.” At that point the coma's major axis (i.e., the length of the baby) was something like 6 degrees. Since there was general agreement throughout the Greco-Roman world and the Near East (Egypt and Bab­ylon) at the turn of the ages regarding the level of Virgo's groin relative to the stars of the constellation, the interpretation of the nativity scene transpiring in Virgo as described by Revelation 12:1–5 would have been widely shared.

At that time the comet's apparent magnitude was probably somewhere between -10.7 and -14.3 (
table 10.5
).
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A 6-degree-long elliptical (oval) coma of this apparent magnitude would have been a striking feature of the night sky in the ancient Near East.
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With such a large cometary baby at that location within Virgo, those watching the celestial drama in the eastern sky naturally assigned great pain to Virgo.
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The slow descent of the cometary baby over the next few days, coupled with its still-increasing size, would have reinforced the perception that the labor was painful.
October 17 and 18 were probably perceived to be the climax of Virgo's pain, since it was at that point that the widest part of the baby was passing through her vaginal opening.

Remarkably, the throne of Virgo had suddenly been transformed into a birthing chair! (See
fig. 10.26
.)

This extraordinary size of the coma was due to the largeness of the comet nucleus, the productive nature of the comet, its intrinsic brightness, the small perihelion distance, and the fact that the nucleus on October 15–17 was only about 0.4–0.3 AU from Earth (roughly the distance of Mercury from the Sun). All of these factors had to come together perfectly for the extraordinary phenomenon in Virgo to occur as it did.

The Meteor Storm

From October 15 to 19 Virgo was in active labor, giving birth to the child. Relative to the stars of Virgo, the coma was clearly descending. From the 16th to the 19th, more and more of the cometary baby was rising above the horizon after 80 Virginis each morning. However, until the whole baby was completely below the level of her vaginal opening, the baby had not been born. The birth occurred on October 20. During these days the baby was growing dramatically; each morning it was 12–17% larger than the previous morning. The morning of October 15, when labor began, corresponded with Tishratu 1 in Bab­ylon (the month had begun the previous evening). The first day of the Hebrew month of Heshvan probably also coincided with October 15 (although it is possible that it was delayed until the 16th).

On October 19 there was a dramatic new development in the grand heavenly play: radiating from the upper section of the tail of the serpentine constellation figure Hydra (the longest constellation in the sky), next to Virgo's left leg, was a fantastic meteor storm.
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A full one-third of the stars of the sky seemed to be ejected from their places (Rev. 12:4). Because the radiant of the meteor storm was relatively low on the eastern horizon, the stars looked like they were being thrown toward the earth. Then the star in the tip of Hydra's tail (
π
Hydrae) rose to the point that it was level with the horizon. It was an unforgettable moment—there was the serpentine dragon, having just displayed his rage and power, looking like he was standing up on the earth.

The fact that this great 6 BC Hydrid meteor storm occurred when Virgo's cometary baby had almost fully emerged from her womb seemed to endow the events in that part of the sky with special significance. The association between the two was hard to avoid because much of Hydra (in particular the lower part of its tail) was located next
to Virgo, to her south. The apparent throwing of stars from one-third of the sky to the earth by Hydra's tail seemed to add a new dimension to the grand narrative centered around the cometary coma. In this context, what Hydra was doing seemed ominous—the Chaos Monster was evidently furious and extremely dangerous. He was about to pounce on the unsuspecting baby and try to seize and eat it as soon as it had fully emerged from its mother's womb. It was a disturbing scene on the eve of the messianic child's birth.

The comet's apparent magnitude at the time was at least -9.2 (if n=3), -11.0 (if n=4), or -13.0 (if n=5) (see
table 10.6
).
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At this stage the comet was very close to the Earth-Sun line (the phase angle of the nucleus was 155 degrees) and this would have boosted the brightness of the sunward side of the coma by 3 magnitudes beyond what our figures suggest.
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Unquestionably, the cometary coma would have been clearly visible in the sky of ancient Bab­ylon. Nevertheless, the massive size of the coma (perhaps approaching 10 degrees in length) meant that the brightness was not quite as striking as the resultant apparent magnitude and forward-scattering brightness boost calculations might suggest. If the radiant of the meteor storm on the eve of the birth of the cometary baby was lower on Hydra's tail—that is, closer to
γ
(Gamma) Hydrae than Corvus/the Raven—that would suggest that the cometary light at that stage was not sufficiently bright to bleach out the glory of the meteors in that third of the sky. Of course, if the radiant was high on Hydra's tail, that is, close to Corvus/the Raven, for example, at HIP59373, then the cometary coma might have been below the horizon when the radiant was above it.