We have all heard of the Star of Bethlehem. Every year at Christmas, it is a prominent reminder that Christ was born and three wise men (the Magi) showed up to give him special gifts befitting a king.

In much of the story, the star takes a backseat in the story of Christ’s birth.

Should it?

Does it have a far more reaching purpose and mean much more than we realize?

Let’s examine both the historical and spiritual record.

Believe it or not, astrology isn’t a new thing. Why do I say that? Because the ancient Hebrews studied astrology. The Bible itself is full of it. I’ll share some passages later in the article. Yet, I won’t take the time to exhaustively discuss ancient Hebrew astrology, except for the purpose of the Star of Bethelem. So, you’ll want to read all of this article for context.

The point I want to stress is that the ancient Hebrews knew and understood that God spoke throughout all of His creation — Through heaven, the heavens (i.e., the stars), and nature on Earth.

Astrology means stars, and of course, we all know that Christmas famously involves a star, the Star of Bethlehem.

Throughout Israel, archeologists have uncovered the prevalent use of the zodiac in synagogues. In nearly any Galilean synagogue in the first century, quite prominently displayed in mosaic would have been an image of the twelve signs of the zodiac, representing the twelve tribes of Israel. Jesus would have seen these astrological symbols.

Now, let’s be clear. Jesus did not protest this in the synagogues. They weren’t what we think of when we see or hear about astrological things today such as horoscopes and readings, etc. In ancient Judaism, the stars pointed to God, not a misguided notion of manipulating the spiritual world for earthly gain through deceptions by Satan and demons.

In ancient Judaism, the icon of the zodiac represented the heavens. It had a natural place in Jewish worship and ritual. One scholar, Bernard Goldman, noted the zodiac in ancient synongues was a “symbol of the heavens and constellations under whose aegis the destinies of nations and of men were ordered.” In the first century, astrological symbols weren’t just iconographic symbols.

They represented God’s cosmic order of things.

Throughout the Old Testament, we see astrology on full display. It repeatedly speaks of the sun, moon, and stars (i.e., astrology). Philo of Alexandria, a prominent and respected first-century Jewish philosopher, referred to the sun, moon, and stars as gods. Not gods in the sense that people should worship them as independent powers in the heavens or that they were separate from Yahweh. Instead, they were a sort of lesser-ranking officials in God’s divine government over creation.

The language of the sun to rule the day and the moon and stars to rule the night is all over the place in the Old Testament. Philo’s point was that God rules and acts through sun, moon, and stars. They don’t act on their own, have any authority or control over anything, or function independently from Him.

In many instances, stars are explained as angels and demons. Isaiah refers to Satan as Helel ben Shakhar (translated as Lucifer), son of the Morning (Star), which, strictly speaking, is the planet Venus.

In the Book of Revelation, we see “seven stars” are the “angels of the seven churches (Rev. 1:20). In Revelation 9:1, it says “a star fell from heaven, representing Satan.” In Revelation 12, we see the twelve stars represent the 12 tribes of Israel.

As modernists, we we have separated heaven, the heavens, and earth from one another. We say that only what we see, feel, and hear through science and human logic is real. For the ancient people, all three of these things were real at the same time, and they saw all three as working together.

So, God works through angels in His creation — Both in governance and also as messengers. God did and still does communicate through them to us, if we’re paying attention.

Let’s look at some Scripture, in particular Psalm 19:1-6:

“The heavens are telling of the glory of God; And their expanse is declaring the work of His hands. Day to day pours forth speech, And night to night reveals knowledge. There is no speech, nor are there words; Their voice is not heard. Their line has gone out through all the earth, And their utterances to the end of the world. In them He has placed a tent for the sun, Which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber; It rejoices as a strong man to run his course. Its rising is from one end of the heavens, And its circuit to the other end of them; And there is nothing hidden from its heat.”

What we see is that the universe, i.e., the “heavens,” are pouring forth speech and revealing knowledge. The psalmist says there is something being communicated. Most modern commentaries ignore this passage because they don’t know what to do with it. They ignore Jewish astrology (or assume it didn’t exist) as irrelevant.

This is a significant mistake!

The word “line” in this passage is a Hebrew concept for “ecliptic.” It’s the lines that one could draw of the astronomical or astrological path the the sun follows over the course of a year as it rises in the east and sets in the west. As you know, the sun doesn’t rise and sets in the same spot every day and changes from month to month with the seasons. The sun’s movement was called the ecliptic (or lines).

What Psalm 19 is saying is that how the heavens communicate what they are saying from God has to do with the path of the sun and the specifics of its path. You can argue, legitimately, that the Psalm is just poetry, yet the Apostle Paul doesn’t reference this psalm in this way as you’ll see momentarily.

The psalmist uses the language of the bridegroom as a reference to Christ exiting heaven and coming to Earth, humbling Himself and taking on flesh. It notes that the heavens rejoice over this.

In Romans 10:18-19, the Apostle Paul uses Psalm 19 to ask, “Have they not heard?,” and making the point that the heavens declared Jesus and the Gospel… And that if they had paid attention they would have known because all things are observable in the sky. He’s literally saying the Gospel is being preached by the movements of the sun and the stars in they heavens.

Even Torah gets in on the action…

In Numbers 15:17, Moses wrote:

“I see him, but not now;
I behold him, but not near;
A star shall come forth from Jacob,
A scepter shall rise from Israel,
And shall crush through the forehead of Moab,
And tear down all the sons of Sheth.”

So, you can see, ancient Judaism and the Bible is full of astrology. It’s also prevalent in Daniel and throughout the prophets.

So, what does this have to do with the Star of Bethlehem, the magi, and Christ’s birth?

For those of us who enjoy the early church fathers, St. Ignatius (a first-century Bishop personally discipled by the Apostle John), wrote in a letter to the church in Ephesus:

“And hidden from the ruler of this age was the virginity of Mary and the one born from her, and likewise the death of the Lord. Three famed mysteries which God worked in silence. How then was he made manifest to the ages? A star in heaven shining beyond all of the stars and its light was ineffable. And its great newness brought about wonderment. The remaining stars with the sun and moon became a chorus for that star. And it exceeded, with its light, them all. And there was confusion: from whence did this great newness and strangeness come to them? By this, all magistry was destroyed and every evil chain disappeared. Ignorance was taken away. The ancient kingdom is destroyed utterly. God appeared humanized in order to bring about the great newness of unending life. And that which had been planned by God was given a beginning. Therefore they all were troubled because the destruction of death was being prepared.”

There are a lot of interesting things in St. Ignatius’ letter. Of importance to me is the reference to “a star in heaven” and the ancient kingdom. Why? Because he says the virgin conception and birth of Christ was hidden from the ruler of this age, i.e., Satan.

By the star, St. Ignatius declares the star isn’t just the announcement of the virgin birth and Christ’s incarnation to the world. The stars, i.e., the angels and demons, did not know ahead of time what was happening. He talks about the reaction of the stars to this sign appearing in the heavens. The star is how Christ is revealed as proclaimed by Numbers 15:17, among many other passages.

I can’t stress this enough, the Star of Bethlehem is the revelation in the heavenly places to demons (and angels). The secret is out, so to speak. By the word “kingdom,” St. Ignatius is not talking about earthly kingdoms. He’s talking about demonic forces — Satan’s kingdom.

In Luke 2, the Angels appear to shepherds and announce the Messiah’s birth. In verses 13-14, it says…

“And suddenly there appeared with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying,

“Glory to God in the highest,
And on earth peace among men with whom He is pleased.””

What the shepherds experienced was the angels finding out what had just happened. It was a secret to them as well. The Star is an expression of the angel’s massive applause. The point is, it was just as much news to the angels and demons as was to the Magi and those waiting for the Messiah.

The Star of Bethlehem wasn’t just a sign, it was the stars singing. It was the heaven’s rejoicing. It was a mystery revealed in Christ’s birth to them and to us.

This is vital to understand… Christ’s birth was the revelation of a new covenant fulfilled in His resurrection, yet it was also a declaration to Satan and his demons that their end was closer than the beginning.

This is the good news! It’s the beginning of newness of unending life, eternal life because that was God’s plan from the beginning. For us, it’s the beginning. For the demons, it’s the beginning of the end. They are under assault, we are being rescued.

In Matthew 2:2, the Magi see this star. They were paying close attention to the heavens. In fact, their trade was identified as astrologers who’s job it was to interpret the stars. They lived in Persia and likely knew of Daniel’s prophecy of a coming King. Remember, Daniel was a head of a group of Babylonian wise men and was respected by those who followed him in Persia for four centuries.

The Magi were convinced that Daniel’s prophecies were coming true. They knew of Numbers 24:17. Some Persians believed the appearance of this special star in the sky would reveal something unique occurring that had never occurred before.

This astronomical event signaled something of epic importance to the pagan Magi. So, they journeyed for two years to Israel. Shockingly, they were not at the scene of the manger despite the many representations of them offering gifts to the newborn Christ.

So, the Star of Bethlehem served several purposes:

• To declare the birth of the Anointed One, the Redeemer, as a some to come declaration that all who believed in Him would never perish but have eternal life.
• To reveal to the heavens, i.e. angels and demons, the timing and mystery of Christ’s entrance into the world.
• To proclaim to the world the Gospel and declare to all people they have heard the Good News (Romans 10:18-19) and are without excuse.

Just like no spiritual entity or human knew the time of Christ’s birth, it’s also true of His second coming. You can’t know the hour, day, month, or year. Period. No one even has a ballpark idea. It’s a mystery that God will reveal at such a time of His choosing. It will surprise us and the angels, and shock Satan and the demons.

What the Star of Bethlehem did was remind us that God created the earth, the heavens, and Heaven. We have lost sight of this truth in modern society. It’s barely even discussed in most churches. We don’t relate anymore to the heavens. We are completely disconnected by our own doing.

Secularism and materialism deny that God speaks and acts, and often even that He exists; it denies the whole spiritual world exists and this vain philosophy has separated us from the rest of creation.

What Christ did through our salvation is re-unite us with His creation, our departed loved ones, angelic beings, the heavens, the earth, and the nature that surrounds us. Through Christ, we see how all of His creation works and connects us with His love for us — Including the stars, the sun, and the moon.

I hope this article reinvigorates your understanding of how the spiritual world impacts your life, and that God’s creation is expansive. I hope it inspires you to study Scripture more deeply. There are still many mysteries and God isn’t done talking to us yet, if we’re paying attention.

God bless you,
Rev. Fr. Don Purdum