The Star of Bethlehem : The Legacy of the Magi [Hardcover]

Michael R. Molnar (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Christian scholars have expended considerable ingenuity in providing scientific glosses for the scriptural account of the Star that shone above Bethlehem at the time of Jesus' birth. Astronomer Molnar disputes such explanations precisely because they derive from a modern perspective far removed from the outlook of ancient stargazers, who eagerly scanned the heavens for signs of the Messiah's birth. Ancient texts show conclusively that no portent would have excited greater expectations of a divine birth in Judea than a lunar occultation of Jupiter in the constellation Aries. And because sophisticated computer calculations reveal that such an eclipse did occur on April seventeenth in the year 6 B.C., Molnar fixes this as the celestial event that signaled the Christ child's birth. This assertion does require pushing Christ's birth back two years earlier than the commonly accepted 4 B.C. But evidence gleaned from early Roman and Jewish sources makes an earlier Nativity plausible. The uncanny fit of all the ancient and modern pieces of this puzzle makes for a highly persuasive argument. Bryce Christensen

Review

"In support of an original interpretation of the Star, Molnar has assembled an impressive range of astrological and numismatic data, much of which will be new even to expert readers." -- Virginia Trimble, author of Visit to a Small Universe

"Molnar's The Star of Bethlehem is a fascinating contribution to the immense literature that attempts to come to terms with the Christmas Star represented in Matthew's Gospel. In my opinion, this book is the most original and important contribution of the entire twentieth century on the thorny question of how events recorded there, should be interpreted." -- Owen Gingerich, Harward-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics

"This book has stunning new insight and approach, which finally gives a confident answer to a question that has fascinated all Christians through the ages." -- Bradley E. Schaefer, Yale University

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 208 pages
• Publisher: Rutgers University Press (September 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0813527015
• ISBN-13: 978-0813527017
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.9 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (26 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #620,865 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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33 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A novel approach to a perennial enigma., May 18, 2000

By 

Mark E. Miller (Kalamazoo, MI USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Star of Bethlehem : The Legacy of the Magi (Hardcover)

The Star of Bethlehem is a perennially favorite topic for planetarium shows, articles, musings, sermons, and books. What could be left at this late date to say about it? Quite a lot, actually. Enough so that two new books, both titled "The Star of Bethlehem" (How original!) and both copyright 1999 are on my desk as I write.

The story about the Star is found only in the Gospel of Matthew. There are three possibilities: 1) The star was a myth - invented by the writer of Matthew or earlier Christians whom he followed, in order to give Jesus appropriately royal auspices for his birth. 2) The star was a miracle provided by God to guide the Magi, even perhaps visible only to them. 3) The star was a natural astronomical event or events. These three are obviously mutually exclusive and exhaustive. If either of the first two possibilities are correct, there is little more to be said; therefore both of our authors give them short shrift.

Both books cover some of the same material in about the same way. Jesus was *not* born on December 25 of 1 BC as worked out by the Scythian monastic scholar Dionysius Exiguus (Denny the Dwarf) in 525 AD. King Herod, of whom the Magi inquired about the birth, died in 4 BC. For other reasons, the birth is fairly firmly dated to between 6 and 4 BC. If the shepherds were `abiding with their flocks by night', the birth did not take place in December. For various reasons, these authors agree that Spring is more likely.

"The Star of Bethlehem - An Astronomer's View", by Mark Kidger, gives a review of all the various suggestions that have been made over the years, finally settling on a combination of events being the sign: a triple conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in Pisces (the sign Kidger says is associated with the Jews - more on this later) between May and December of 7 BC, with Mars approaching this pair in February of 6 BC, followed by a near-occultation of Jupiter by the Moon in Pisces in February of 5 BC, and then, possibly a nova in March/April 5 BC, as suggested by some Korean and Chinese records.

I would have found this scenario plausible were it not for the second, and to my mind more interesting, book: "The Star of Bethlehem - The Legacy of the Magi" by Michael R. Molnar. There are two problems, as pointed out by Molnar, with the kinds of solutions reviewed, and those eventually suggested, by Kidger. Firstly, they tend to focus on what we as moderns would find to be visually compelling sights in the heavens. But this neglects the fact that the Magi were certainly *astrologers*, most likely Hellenistic rather than Babylonian in their astrological theories. Most of the events put forward would not have been significant to contemporary astrology. Kidger himself makes this point but does not seem to follow through with a close study of Hellenistic astrology as Molnar has made. Secondly, we have the advantage over the Magi of *knowing*, at least approximately, what the correct time frame is, then sifting through a small number a years to find the most significant events during those years. We have to imagine an ongoing community of astrologers, scanning the skies for generations perhaps, and imagine what would have been absolutely unique over many years, and compelling enough to make them undertake an arduous journey. In this light, Kidger's series of events are not so special.

Molnar made a key discovery, beginning with a study of ancient coins, which often incorporated astrological symbols, that Aries was the constellation contemporary astrologers believed controlled the Levant, of which Judea was a part. The identification of Pisces with the Jews is Medieval and hence anachronistic in this context.

When the Magi say "...we have seen his star in the east...", they would have been referring to the helical rising of a star or planet - that is, when it is newly visible in the morning sky rising ahead of the sun. Jupiter had its heliacal rising on April 17 of 6 BC in Aries. On that same day, the moon occulted Jupiter for the second time in a row (previously on March 20). This would have greatly increased the astrological significance of kingly Jupiter. Molnar covers about half a dozen other astrological portents for this day, involving rulers of the trines, exaltations, attendance, and beneficent planets, that space does not permit me to explain in detail. In terms of astrological import, this day is absolutely unique for hundreds of years, and Molnar makes a strong case, to my mind, that he has indeed found the origin of the curious story in Matthew.

Astronomers tend to be instantly dismissive of anything having to do with astrology, even to the extent of neglecting its proper application to a historical problem such as this one. Astrology, like it or not, is an important part of the history of human thought, and of the history of astronomy itself, which grew out of it. Michael Molnar is to be congratulated for shedding light on this ancient way of thinking.

28 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Surprising and worthwhile!, July 26, 2000

By 

John Rummel (Madison, WI) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Star of Bethlehem : The Legacy of the Magi (Hardcover)

This book surprised the heck out of me. I expected another typical rundown of the usual astronomical suspects (comets, supernova, planetary massings and conjunctions, etc.) but was pleasantly surprised to find instead a very serious and scholarly treatment of first century astrology. As a certified skeptic, I've always given fairly short-shrift to astrology in general, but until reading Molnar's book, I don't think I ever understood how truly complex and technical it is. Certainly the "science" of the ancient world, Molnar argues that without such an understanding of astrology, the biblical clues as to the identity are simply missed by virtually all researchers of the star of Bethlehem. For good reason, most astronomers and biblical scholars have largely avoided the role of astrology other than casual mentions. Instead, they have focused on astronomical phenomena that are visually striking, and which they believe would have been meaningful to the visitors from the east.

Molnar takes the astrological bull by the horns, and, combined with the very novel angle of first century coinage, provides a compelling and persuasive new theory of the true nature of the Matthean "star." Briefly, Molnar points to the language of the original Greek text of Matthew 2, and identifies unmistakable allusions to a star's helical rising, and to features of a planet's "retrograde" motion (he argues that the Greek for "went before" and "stood over" are clearly references to a retrograde loop and stationary point).

In a very well documented and easily readable account, Molnar traces the evidence to a helical rising and subsequent lunar occultation of Jupiter in April of 6 BC. After this event, which took place in the constellation of Aries, Jupiter proceeded to travel east, go retrograde, and resume its eastward journey over the next several months. Though the occultation would not have been observable (it happened after noon on April 17th), Molnar argues that this is inconsequential since all astrology was done via charts based on Ptolemy's tables of planetary positions anyway. Astrologers were much more interested in the significance of their charts and rarely made any effort to observe the events they portrayed. Furthermore, many significant astrological events are visually unimpressive even if they are observable.

I don't know if Molnar is right. Others take the approach that the star must have been a series of conjunctions or nova phenomenon (Kidger and Hughes). Some say the whole event is a myth (Gardner). Molnar's contribution is certainly worth reading and has gained the approval of some fine authorities (Gingerich and Trimble both wrote jacket reviews).

25 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars WOW! First new research result on Star in 400 years!, December 21, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: The Star of Bethlehem : The Legacy of the Magi (Hardcover)

Molnar's book has given me one of the few 'conversion' episodes in my life. He has shown that all the previous claims about the Star of Bethlehem are provably wrong. The simple reason is that they are all *astronomical* spectaculars (that would impress modern astronomers) while the only people who need to be impressed are the *Magi* (i.e., Persian astrologers) who only pay attention to *astrological* spectaculars. That is, there is no place for a comet on a horoscope, the Magi would never have looked up to spot a supernova, and triple conjunctions are astrologically meaningless. Wow, Molnar is right! The application of modern ideals to ancient situations is an easy and deadly trap, and now Molnar is showing that all previous research of the Star is totally wrong. I feel embarrassed for myself and for the historical/astronomical community at not realizing that the Emperor really had no clothing.

Constructively, Molnar next shows what the Star must have been - based on what the *Magi* would have considered as important. As astrologers, they would take the Star to be a horoscope indicating the birth of a very great king in Judea. For the last decade, Molnar's scholarly articles have worked on many points of ancient astrology, where many surviving books tell us exactly what is needed for a regal horoscope and what would point to Judea. Molnar searches over a long range of time to find the one time when all the portents point to a very great king to be born in Judea. And the date fits well with all historical evidence. So I strongly conclude that Molnar has indeed correctly identified the Star of Bethlehem.

The implications of Molnar's discovery are less clear. For example, it does not decide on the divinity of Christ. Nor does it decide on the details of what actually happened. Possibilities range from the traditional Christian story all the way to a Greek convert around AD 70 discovering the omen of Jesus only by back calculation.

Molnar's Star of Bethlehem is a set of around ten items that the horoscope should show. Only one of these items is that the Moon and Jupiter should be in conjunction. This conjunction happens once a month as the Moon goes around the zodiac. Molnar's thesis does not require in any way the existence of a lunar occultation of Jupiter, although the astrological significance would increase with zero separation. It is fully adequate that the Moon pass by Jupiter at any distance, which it certainly did. It is also adequate that the Magi could have gotten the Moon's position accurate to within a few degrees, and this was easily done in ancient times. In *modern* times, there indeed is a roughly one hour uncertainty in the time of the occultation (as was well known to Molnar), but this is totally irrelevant to Molnar's thesis. However, the *existence* of the occultation is certain, as can be confirmed from Tuckerman's tables, Voyager calculations, or the Chapronte-Touze & Chapront integrations.

I have published many scholarly articles in the refereed literature on ancient astronomy in the Middle East (including ephemeris research and biblical chronology) and I have been in touch (at conferences and with HASTRO-L) with many other top level scholars. Most of us have been totally converted to Molnar's thesis. We are kicking ourselves for not having thought of it first. A typical reaction is the world's greatest archaeoastronomer saying "Blindingly obvious, in retrospect".