A New Source for the Star of Bethlehem? The Ragnarok Connection

As I continue to pursue as many connections as I can with my work on science, history, religion, and Christmas, I keep coming across new little things on the Star of Bethlehem. Years ago, I was told by a Mormon that the book from Joseph Smith includes two allusions to the Christmas Star (i.e., 3 Nephi 1:19–20). That usually isn’t considered an independent source, since most folks believe the Book of Mormon is a 19th century creation, not an ancient document.

However, I happen to come across a truly amazing, cosmic source I had not expected. By Odin’s beard! It was nay expected. For what was shown to have been was revealed by the Eye of Odin, overpowered by the Mighty Thor!

According to the ever-seeing Eye, there was a tremendous event that shook Asgard to its complete destruction, the unspeakable Ragnarok. What was shown by the eye was reproduced by the visionary master of art, Jack Kirby, in The Mighty Thor, Vol 1, No. 293 and the following issue. For the fiery destruction of heavenly Asgard was seen in the night sky 2000 years ago, producing the Christmas Star.

But… of course that is how it happened!

After all, it was shown to the Thunderer twice.

How could there be any doubt now? One would have to be a skeptic to not believe based on this testimony. Then again, I know of a good book on the subject…

The Star and the Skeptical Christmas–The Star of Bethlehem

The holidays are approaching fast, and the first snows are coming over the United States. The ever-expanding day of Christmas will truly be here soon. And all around the world, both preachers and even some scientists will be talking about a perennial subject: the Star of Bethlehem and what it could have been. Since the 1930s, planetaria the globe over have had presentations of what planet or exploding star could have been the famed light that brought wise men from the East to a lowly crib in a tiny town in Judea.

But can science really explain this celebrated celestial event? Is it something actually miraculous or a literary artifice? How can someone tell? Moreover, why is this a subject that draws both astronomers and theologians to ask these sorts of questions?

All that and more is considered in The Star of Bethlehem: A Skeptical View. Not only covering all of the major and minor hypotheses to explain the meaning and motions of the Star, including the extraterrestrial, it investigates what was possibly on the mind of the ancient author of the Gospel story and what is in mind for many others that continue to pursue this subject. The Star of Bethlehem was also the subject of a major conference at the University of Groningen, and the major conclusions of SoB: ASV find support by experts in many fields.

So this holiday, learn about fascinating astronomical science, history, religion, cultures from the Romans to the Persians to the ancient Jews, and also understand a bit more about how science and religion interact through history and today.

Author: Dr. Aaron Adair is a professor of physics at Merrimack College, where he both teaches and conducts education research, along with continuing investigations of ancient religions and the heavens. He received his PhD from Ohio State University and worked as a planetarium show presenter at Michigan State University. He has previously published on the subject of the Star in Zygon and was an invited speaker to the University of Groningen’s conference on the Star.

Praise for SoB: ASV:
“Well researched, scientifically reasoned, elegantly concise, this book will long be required reading on the ‘Star of Bethlehem’. Full of fascinating historical facts, and better informed and more careful than any other book on the subject, this should be on the shelf of everyone interested in that legendary celestial event.” Richard Carrier, Ph.D., author of Proving History: Bayes’s Theorem and the Quest for the Historical Jesus.

“A fascinating and readable feat of hardcore historical legwork and keen scientific analysis.” David Fitzgerald, author of The Complete Heretic’s Guide to Western Religion: The Mormons.

“…tightly-argued, well-reasoned…. Adair masterfully demonstrates why every effort to rationalize the Star thus far has failed…. A concise and rigorous must-read for anyone interested in religion, history, and modern efforts to understand the past.” Jason Colavito, author of The Cult of Alien Gods.

 

Dr. Aaron Adair, Star of Bethlehem Press Kit

My Talk on Ancient Aliens and Modern UFOs is Now Up!

Good news, everyone! My talk for the Illini Secular Student Alliance at UIUC back in April is now up for everyone to see. In my presentation, I talk about the 20th century origins of the ancient astronaut hypothesis (now in its modern TV form, Ancient Aliens), the sorts of claims about the past and why they don’t hold up, and into the sorts of claims related to modern UFOs and alien visitations–that is, close encounters. I also get to bring up my research and book on the Star of Bethlehem.

You can watch the talk here (kindly recorded and edited by Illini SSA group members):

At the end I provided a bunch of links to useful websites, which I reproduce here:

• Jason Colavito (books, blog)–http://www.jasoncolavito.com/

• Robert Sheaffer (books, Skeptical Inquirer)–http://badufos.blogspot.com/

• Michael Heiser (websites, blog)–http://drmsh.com/

• Exposing Pseudo-Astronomy (Stuart Robbins)–http://pseudoastro.wordpress.com/

If I made any significant mistakes, feel free to let me know. And of course, I don’t mind if you let others know about the presentation. 🙂

#Godzilla2014 — The New Cthulhu

Friday night I was able to see the new American kaiju film, Godzilla. It was a great film and I hope lots of people see it, otherwise there won’t be enough sequels. After the movie, I participated in a panel discussion with other scientists, comic experts, film critics, and Godzilla fans, in particular to talk about science, society, and film. The topic of the night was, in part, going to be about the sorts of monsters that science can and has produced. In particular, the foil would be the Frankenstein monster and the original monster. However, watching the film I realized that the proper hypotext for the scientific message behind the beast wasn’t that of Mary Shelly’s novel or the 1954 film where the monster is a product of atomic bomb testing. Rather, this is a creature more in common with Cthulhu.

Will this be the sequel? Fingers crossed!

Let me explain, but please note that there will be spoilers. 

Death Star Physics — I Have a Bad Feeling about This

You may remember that last year there was a tongue-in-cheek petition to the White House to have the US build a Death Star in order to boost the economy. That petition was responded to in the most wonderful way. But besides the absurd cost and the stupidity of actually having a planet-destroying space station, there is the wonder of the limits on feasibility. Not just engineering, but what does the physics suggest. I am hardly the first person to look at the question, but the ones I have found online seem incomplete or have some small errors. So, using some basic physics and modeling, let’s see what we can say about the power of the Death Star. And given Darth Vader claims that it is nothing compared to the power of the Force, then we can put some lower limits on what the Force can do.

That’s no moon…

Now, the key thing your Death Star needs to do is deposit enough energy into a planet to cause it to explode.

The Star of Bethlehem & Arthur C. Clarke

One of the masters of science fiction is the late, prolific author, Sir Arthur C. Clarke. His most famous work is probably the novel and screenplay to 2001: A Space Odyssey, and he promoted the idea of satellites in geostationary orbit, which make modern telecommunications possible.

Clarke also wrote many short stories, and one in particular won him the Hugo Award back in the 1950s. This was a story about the discovery of the real cause of the Star of Bethlehem at around the time of Jesus’s birth. “The Star” managed to combine hard science, space travel, and theological and philosophical conundrums.

You can read the story here, or you can listen to Clarke reading that story here:

It was also adapted into an episode of the 1980s reboot of The Twilight Zone. From the special effects, set designs, and music, the 80s really comes through. You can watch that episode here:

The TV version made some changes, notably trying to end on a more positive note, ignoring the tragedy that the plot involved. It was a Christmas episode and thus trying to get into the spirit of the holidays, but forcing an inspirational message on top of a story about the genocide of a peaceful civilization isn’t going to make for a holiday classic.

Besides these points of fiction, Clarke may also be responsible for the attraction of the nova or supernova hypothesis of what really was the Star of Bethlehem. It would be over two decades after he published his short story until it was printed in a scientific journal, but over and over again it appears as an option for a scientific explanation of the Star. Of course, I have something to say about that.

Nonetheless, one can still appreciate the beauty of what Clarke had done, taking a story that was (I argue) originally fiction, and bringing in science to explain things, and instead of creating harmony between faith and reason a new rending of sacred clothing.

The Star of Bethlehem: A Skeptical View — My Upcoming Book

Nearly two millennia ago, a story was told of a wondrous star in the heavens, beaming forth to proclaim the birth of an infant, destined to rule. Coaxing priests from an eastern kingdom to travel in search of this infant, the object led them to their destination and allow for the worship of the savior of the world.

Or so the story goes. But did it really happen, and if so, what was this magnificent star? A comet? An exploding star? An astrological portent? Something more bizarre? These theories and more have been put forward to explain the legend of the Star of Bethlehem, perhaps the most famous celestial light in all of religious literature. Inspiring scientists and theologians to search and fiction authors to write, including the great Sir Arthur C. Clarke, the Star of Bethlehem has been the perennial science story of the holidays. It is a project that finds its roots in the work of the influential astrophysicist Johannes Kepler, and numerous other astronomers have written about the Star over decades and up to today, such as David Hughes, Michael Molnar, Mark Kidger, and the late Sir Patrick Moore. Every year or so a supposedly new explanation is released to the press. Was it Jupiter and Venus or Jupiter and Saturn this time? Or how about the discovery of Uranus? Perhaps a variable star? The zodiacal lights? What other speculation will come about to show that there was a light guiding magi from the East to the birthplace of Jesus?

These speculation should begin to find its end in the newest book on the subject: The Star of Bethlehem: A Skeptical View (Amazon: US, UK, FR, DE; B&N; PDF). Based on nearly a decade of contemplation and research, this volume seeks to prove that no natural phenomenon, no astrological alignment, no physical interpretation of the Star of Bethlehem is plausible and comports to the story as told in the Gospel of Matthew. In fact, the story likely isn’t historical at all.

Published by Onus Books and including a foreword by astronomer and columnist at Astronomy magazine, Bob Berman, The Star of Bethlehem goes through all of the major theories for the Star as something in nature, including the astronomical, the astrological, and even the alien. The volume also explores the history of these sorts of interpretations and the motivations behind them. Lastly, it is demonstrated that the legend is a literary artifice, one that shows the author of the Gospel to be gifted as a story-teller but not someone interested in science and history as modern researchers are. To continue to look for the Star in the skies is to misunderstand the story.

Exploring the science of supernovae, the mechanical computers of the ancient Greeks, the astrological beliefs and practices of the Persians, and the nature of ancient religious texts, The Star of Bethlehem presents science and history without the need to fit to an apologetic goal.

Praise for The Star of Bethlehem: A Skeptical View:

A fascinating and readable feat of hardcore historical legwork and keen scientific analysis.
—David Fitzgerald, author of The Complete Heretic’s Guide to Western Religion: The Mormons.

Well researched, scientifically reasoned, elegantly concise, this book will long be required reading on the ‘Star of Bethlehem’. Full of fascinating historical facts, and better informed and more careful than any other book on the subject, this should be on the shelf of everyone interested in that legendary celestial event.
—Richard Carrier, Ph.D., author of Proving History: Bayes’s Theorem and the Quest for the Historical Jesus.

The Star of Bethlehem is a concise and rigorous must-read for anyone interested in religion, history, and modern efforts to understand the past.
—Jason Colavito, author of The Cult of Alien Gods.

While the argument that the ‘Star of Bethlehem’ story is a myth isn’t a new one, Aaron Adair—an astronomer and physicist at The Ohio State University—offers a look into the past through the eyes of a scientist, while not once ignoring the value of New Testament scholarship. This is a must-read, and perhaps the definitive, book on this subject.
—Thomas Verenna, co-editor of ‘Is This Not the Carpenter?’ The Question of the Historicity of the Figure of Jesus and undergraduate student at Rutgers University

If you enjoy The Star of Bethlehem, you may also enjoy another skeptical look at the Nativity story of Jesus: The Nativity: A Critical Examination by Jonathan Pearce.

About the author:

Aaron Adair is a soon-to-be PhD in physics education from the Ohio State University and holds three degrees in science and mathematics from Michigan State University. He has previously worked as a planetarium show presenter, a SETI researcher, and a part of the ATLAS detector collaboration at CERN. He has written on the Star of Bethlehem previously in Sky & Telescope and Zygon: Journal of Science & Religion, and has been invited to participate in a conference about the Star at the University of Groningen. This is his first book. Adair may be contacted through his book’s Facebook page and through email.

And the New Doctor is… William Hartnell?

HT James McGrath:

So, as the news came out over the weekend, a new actor has been chosen to play The Doctor on the now almost 50 year show Doctor Who. That actor, Peter Capaldi, has previously had roles in the show and its spin-off Torchwood. But one thing that makes him remarkable is that he breaks a trend in new Doctors. Since the role was played by William Hartnell, the actors have progressively been progressively younger. The current Doctor, Matt Smith, got the role at the age of 27. This couldn’t go on forever, unless we have an episode of baby Doctor Who. Adorable, but not exactly great for story-telling and ratings. Besides, you can’t have a baby running away from Daleks.

But Capaldi breaks that trend, and he is 55, the same age that Hartnell was when he had the rule in 1963. And he seems to be aware of this. Apparently he is already mimicking some of the gestures of the original Doctor.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I don’t think this is coincidence. A preview of how Capaldi will play the new Doctor? Perhaps. After all, the most recent materials have been returning to classic enemies, especially from the time of the Second Doctor with Patrick Troughton. And in some ways I see some of Troughton’s Doctor in Smith’s performances. So if Capaldi also brings with him some of the First Doctor into his character, that will be rather interesting. Also, if the canon of Doctor Who is going to stick to what has been established (there being only 12 regenerations), then the writers could be forcing a sort of chaistic structure to the story of the Doctor, with the end paralleling the beginning.

But that is speculative to the highest degree. After all, we know that the number of regenerations is not limited by canon, but by ratings. The ultimate wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey.

Of course, with the new Doctor not being played by a woman or a non-white actor, that doesn’t do much for diversity. But there is still one place that it has happened.

In the mean time then, here’s to the upcoming 50th anniversary and then the Christmas special with its newest Doctor. Hope to see the series continue on strong. And with more stories by Neil Gaiman!

Focus on the Family Supports Super-Abortion? Man of Steel Review by FotF

The newest film incarnation of Superman has been making tons of money, and I was part of that, having gone to see Man of Steel on its first midnight showing that was possible. Though I didn’t find the movie to be that great, it looks set to make the film franchise with Supes pay off again (no thanks to Superman IV).

But I was a bit surprised by the review of the movie by Focus on the Family (FotF), a well-known evangelical/fundamentalist Christian organization that is a major component of the Religious Right in the US. They found the movie to be 3.5 out of 5 on the family-friendly metric they have, which means that a lot of that violence is effectively OK for everyone to watch (and there is lots of destruction, though strangely little blood).

[Spoiler Alert] When it came to the violence, there are two things that I found odd in that review. One was that they were only minorly phased by Kal-El (aka Superman) snapping General Zod’s neck. Sure, Kal feels bad about it, but it was hardly something that I think of as a minor thing for kids to see. Now, the audience I saw it with applauded when that happened, and that took me aback. The situation Supes found himself in did seem to require drastic action, but but such focused homicide doesn’t seem heroic or worth applauding. Just compare to how Superman defeats Zod and his helpers in Superman II: he uses his mind and tricks them into losing their powers, and their defeat is easy (even Lois takes on of them out). That lack of thoughtfulness by the Man of Steel only made him seem brutish and not the hero we have come to know.

But what I was really surprised about what how FotF didn’t wasn’t phased by the scene in which a ship being piloted by Zod was taken down by Kal. This was a ship Kal had earlier found, and it was an only exploration/colonization ship used by the Kryptonians. In a major chamber of that ship was a water-filled room full of Kryptonian fetuses. In the last centuries of the Kryptonians, their resources dwindled and had to use population control, so all births were done in a mechanical way, preparing babies for certain roles in life (Zod was born to be a warrior). So when Superman took down the ship with all the Krytonian fetuses in it, in effect that was abortion at a massive level. And that phased no one at FotF? Is it OK now to kill alien babies? And considering how much they want to compare Kal-El to Jesus, is now super-abortion Christlike?

Now, I’m not going to do a full review of the movie, just to say that I found Kal to be more a brute rather than a hero; when you watch Superman (1978) or even hear the John Williams soundtrack, you want to put on a cape and fly, but for this film I did not feel that at all. This figure didn’t show any great empathy or romance, and one scene with his human mother showed him completely unable to understand her tears. And now that FotF thinks this sort of thing is alright for the family (with parental supervision), I don’t know what to feel.

And don’t get me started on the scientific inaccuracies…

Star Trek and Nibiru–What was the Point?

It’s been a bit more than a week since the newest Star Trek movie came out, making a lot of money and should to make millions more. I’ve seen the movie, and I’ll probably talk about it more as a review, especially comparing it to the original show and run of movies, but for now I’ll do something that is pretty much spoiler-free. Except for the first scene in the movie.

At the start of the film, we seen goings-on at a planet where Kirk and McCoy are running from the natives. That planet, with an Avatar-like feel except for having mostly red plant life and white aliens, is called Nibiru. The name of the planet is well-known to the conspiracy-minded as it was predicted by doom-sayers to be on a collision course with Earth. Of course, that prediction was first for 2003. Then it was switched to 2012. What next?

Now, why Nibiru? Skeptics like Phil Plait moan at seeing the name, and other nerds don’t seem to understand why. However, I think there is a simple explanation, and it can help explain the entire movie in a literary way. Again, I won’t spoil anything beyond the opening, but this may help enjoy the movie in a more total fashion. The full action of the scene is that the Enterprise crew, when researching the planet, discovered it had an intelligent civilization but soon to be wiped out by a volcano. Spock devises a “cold fusion bomb” to kill the volcano’s wrath (yeah, instead of that, they should have said something like endothermic warhead–it’s SciFi and not cringe-worthy), but the setting of it goes wrong. So Kirk has to reveal the Enterprise to the natives to save Spock, rising out of the water (yes, the ship was acting as submarine), and then getting into beaming position to save Spock at the last minute. After leaving, the natives are seen drawing the ship and worshiping it. Kirk, in saving Spock, has broken the Prime Directive.

Now, what this scene has going on in its superstructure is something I see through the rest of the film: reversals. In the myth promoted by people such as Zecharia Sitchin, aliens from Nibiru came to Earth, landed, and used humans for their own purposes, namely for getting gold. In the process, they make human civilization and the myths of peoples, such as the Sumerians, who hold on to these tales. In Star Trek: Into Darkness, this is completely reversed: humans go to Nibiru, they save the aliens (rather than use them), and humans inspire their myths. Also the Enterprise comes from the water rather than from above, both acting as a reversal as well as recreating the helicarrier scene from Avengers–so it’s awesome and a reversal. This makes the scene intelligible and not just a name thrown on there to seem cool. I’m just surprised I haven’t seen anyone else make the same observation.

Throughout the rest of the movie you have these sorts of reversals, especially when you have this film playing with the material from the original series and movies. But again, no spoilers here, just the point that there are a lot of reversals, which seems to be the primary story-telling method being used by Abrams and his writers, which can be compared to perhaps the best Trek film of all, Wrath of Khan. But about that next time.