Christmas is about two parallel worlds coming together.  One consists of concrete and steel, books and computers, cars and planes.  The other consists of angels and demons, eternal and supernatural words, and places called heaven and hell. 

For the first time in many years, Christmas and Hanukkah occur on the same day—25 December 2005.  Hanukkah, sometimes called the Feast of Dedication or the Feast of Lights, is a Jewish festival, not based upon the ancient Mosaic tradition established in the Old Testament, but on Jewish history.

In the Christmas carols we sing, we sing of two aspects of the Christmas celebration, the star (in many carols) and of “Good King Wenceslaus.”  In this Perspective, I would like to address both.

• First, who was Good King Wenceslaus (907-929)?  Wenceslaus ruled over the kingdom of Bohemia.  The young king lived and ruled during a period of intense conflict.  Both his mother and grandmother were murdered, victims of court intrigue and anti-Christian conspirators.  Also, he was the object of various plots, coups and revolts.  He described himself as “the mere vice-regent of Christ’s reign and rule in this realm.”  He was the first-generation ruler of a pagan people, who chose to “reflect, however dimly, the offices of Christ in this world as a visible token of His happy appearance.”  He therefore embarked on reforming the penal system of Bohemia, criminalized abuse of children and outcasts.  He personally modeled virtue and humility before his people.  He served as a guard, protecting both his family and the church from attacks.  As George Grant has observed, “He straightway announced the initiation of Scriptural standards of justice, mercy, and forgiveness—without prejudice—to all within the kingdom.”  The king also saw that his kingdom served the poor and helped meet their needs.  He argued that since the nation of ancient Israel was commanded by God to ensure justice for the homeless, the alien and the sojourner, so should Bohemia.  Wenceslaus’s exiled brother, Boleslaus, joined a party of influential pagan nobles who sought to overthrow Wenceslaus.  One morning as Wensceslaus made his way to church, he met Boleslaus.  In the midst of a struggle that ensued, a group of pagan lords joined the struggle and murdered Wenceslaus.  As he fell at the chapel door, he muttered, “Brother, may God forgive you.”  The people of Bohemia declared him a martyr, and his brother, Boleslaus, later repented of his horrific deed and was gloriously converted.  Wensceslaus’s death ensured that his kingdom, Bohemia, would become a strong Christian nation, characterized by the Christian virtues of justice and mercy.  Before his death, he decreed:  “The happy appearance of our Christ in the world has made for a new dispensation of civic virtue.  Because the Lord abides forever, He has established His Throne for judgment, and He will judge the world in righteousness.  He will surely execute judgment for the peoples with equity.  The Lord also will be a Stronghold for the oppressed, a Stronghold in times of trouble.  As a consequence, His earthly Vice-Regent must needs be a bastion of justice, mercy and humility.”  We sing one of our traditional Christmas carols to honor this arguably “good king.”  Written by John Mason Neale and published in 1853, the music originated in Finland 300 years earlier.  The carol is about the King’s service to the poor on St. Stephen’s day, 26 December.  That is why we traditionally sing the carol as a part of Christmas.  See George Grant’s beautiful tribute to this king in Tabletalk (December 2003), pp. 59-60.

• Second is a word about the star that guided the magi.  Ancient Persia had a priestly caste called Magi, mentioned in Daniel (2:2, 4-5 and 10).  Astrology was very popular in the ancient Near East, and the magi were both astrologers and astronomers.  Early Jews were also interested in astrology.  One of the messianic prophecies said, “A star will rise from Jacob” (Numbers 24:17).  To them Jupiter was “the king’s planet” and Saturn was Israel’s “defender.”  An old Jewish proverb said, “God created Saturn to shield Israel.”  Early astrologers observed that planets move in a belt in the heavens they called the zodiac.  They thereby divided the zodiac into twelve equal blocks, or signs.  According to Chaldean astrology, each sign represented a different nation.  Pisces, the sign of the fish, represented Amurru, which included Syria and Palestine.  To Jewish astrologers Pisces represented Judea.  They predicted that the Messiah would appear when Saturn, their “defender,” met Jupiter, “the king’s planet” in Pisces.  Since many of the Jews did not return from the Babylonian captivity and continued to live in Persia, the magi would have been familiar with Jewish astrological beliefs.  In 7 B.C., Jupiter and Saturn came together in Pisces for the first time in 853 years.  Shortly before the sunrise on 12 April, 7 B.C., Jupiter and Saturn emerged together out of the dawn in Pisces.  They began moving together until on 29 May 7 B.C., they were in conjunction, passing within less than one degree of each other.  Then they began moving apart.  The magi no doubt watched this with great interest, knowing of the Jewish expectation.  In late September-early October there was a second conjunction and a third on 4 December 7 B.C.  The magi would have tried to understand the significance of this tri-partite conjunction.  Then on 6 February something else occurred.  Mars, which had been far away in the sky months earlier, now joined Jupiter and Saturn in Pisces.  One year later, in February or early March 5 B.C., blazing across the sky from the east came a nova, a star that suddenly explodes, becoming ten thousand to one hundred thousand times brighter than it was before.  The nova was heading toward Judea and the magi decided to follow it.  The nova was visible for more than ten weeks.  If the magi left Persia after it first appeared, they would have been able to reach Bethlehem while it was still visible.  While in Jerusalem, the magi lost sight of the nova, for once a month the moon would hide the light of the nova.  When the nova reappeared, it would have been fifty degrees high due south of Jerusalem at dawn—directly over Bethlehem.  See One Year Book of Christian History (29 May), pp. 300-301, (on which this Perspective is heavily dependent) and Mark Kidger, The Star of Bethlehem (Princeton University Press, 1999).

This account of the magi and the star may not be the only explanation, but the evidence, chronicled in the sources I have studied, seems plausible.  These astronomical events, 7-4 B.C., give a notable and defensible explanation for the magi and for the star.  In the powerful story of these Gentile worshipers of the newborn King (Matthew 2), God is not affirming nor commanding a belief in astrology; rather, He is giving us a framework for understanding how the magi came to Bethlehem to worship and to lavish their gifts upon the one “born King of the Jews.”