What was the Star that Guided the Magi? (original) (raw)

Near the time of Jesus' birth, "wise men from the east" appeared in Jerusalem inquiring, "Where is he who has been king of the Jews? For we have seen his star in the east, and have come to worship him" (Matthew 2:1-2). What exactly was this star? Matthew tells us that it "went before" the magi, and that "it came to rest over the place where the child was" (Matthew 2:9). This is surely strange behavior for a star. Over the centuries commentators have suggested that this star was a planetary conjunction, a comet or a supernova, a so-called new star. Grave di culties beset each of these proposals, however. True, comets do traverse the sky, and supernovas and planetary conjunctions, because of the earth's motion, at least appear to move. But that a lighted object high in the sky above could guide someone on the earth below to a precise location simply makes no sense. St. John Chrysostom, the famous Antiochean preacher of the fourth century, long ago recognized the di culty and proposed a solution: "Bethlehem's star did not remaining on high point out the place, it not being possible for them [the magi] so to ascertain it; instead it came down and performed this o ce. For you know that a spot of such small dimensions, being only as much as a shed would occupy, or rather as much as the body of a little infant would take up, could not possibly be marked out by a star. For by reasons of its immense height, it could not su ciently distinguish so con ned a spot." (1)