Caesar's comet

[ghost]

Is this the star of Bethlehem?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caesar%27s_Comet

[DCHindley]

Is this the star of Bethlehem?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caesar%27s_Comet

I don't think so, as the date of it is way off and it was a one time manifestation (it probably burned up in the earth's atmosphere).

Some years back, I used the orbital elements of Halley's comet that were in a library book and got a planetarium program to plot what it might look like from Jerusalem around 12 BCE (it was at perihelion 10th October, but visible several months before IIRC) and it was at one point directly overhead, similar to what the gospel account says it did.

However, that is still well before the period between 4 BCE and 1 BCE when most later Christian chronographers place it. It does resonate with the scholars who date Jesus' crucifixion in 36 CE. "You are not yet 50 and you have seen Abraham?" (Jn 8:57). Because of this, Irenaeus thought Jesus must have been between 40 & 50 years of age (Against Heresies, 2:22:4-6).

So, late (October) 12 BCE to the traditional date of crucifixion, 30 CE, would make him 41, and even 36 CE would make him 47. If one wants to stick to the start of his career at "about 30" that takes us to 18 CE, plus 3 years max for the length of his preaching career, and we are now at 21 CE, which is the date that Caesar Maximinus Daia's Acts of Pilate says he suffered his punishment. The next occurrence, coincidently, was 25 January 66 CE, just before the beginning of the Jewish revolt. In short, despite some obvious dating conflicts, there is something for everyone to love about comet Halley.

DCH

[Peter Kirby]

The next occurrence, coincidently, was 25 January 66 CE, just before the beginning of the Jewish revolt. In short, despite some obvious dating conflicts, there is something for everyone to love about comet Halley.

Interesting. Thanks for this.

[wiki]Caesar's Comet[/wiki]
[wiki]Halley's Comet[/wiki]

[ghost]

I don't think so, as the date of it is way off and it was a one time manifestation (it probably burned up in the earth's atmosphere).

It doesn't have to be from the same time period.

[DCHindley]

I don't think so, as the date of it is way off and it was a one time manifestation (it probably burned up in the earth's atmosphere).

It doesn't have to be from the same time period.

I thought that having a connection with a historical figure is what naming a comet after him was all about. "Oh, oh, yeah! We need something catchy to connect with our mythical Jesus. Remember that comet that preceded, or was it followed (not that it matters), the death of Caesar? Lets associate it with the birth of Jesus!"

Comets as announcements of, or warnings about, historical figures is not that uncommon, but generally they are actual comets or supernovae or meteor showers, not memories of some other event transferred to a new figure. Extra bright stars (supernovae, etc), meteors, comets, it doesn't matter. The terms for any one of these was easily used for any of the others. Were they thinking of giant gaseous balls of hydrogen and helium collapsing upon themselves and undergoing atomic fusion? Or conglomerations of space stones and ice evaporating from the solar wind as they flew in an eccentric orbit around the sun? Or rocks entering our atmosphere at tens of thousands of stadia per hour and burning up before they reach the ground? Of course not. It was just sky signs sent by the gods. Any other explanation was just preposterous.

DCH

[ghost]

I thought that having a connection with a historical figure is what naming a comet after him was all about. "Oh, oh, yeah! We need something catchy to connect with our mythical Jesus. Remember that comet that preceded, or was it followed (not that it matters), the death of Caesar? Lets associate it with the birth of Jesus!"

More like this…

http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/R ... *.html#7.1

When, however, a certain star during all those days appeared in the north toward evening, which some called a comet, claiming that it foretold the usual occurrences, while the majority, instead of believing it, ascribed it to Caesar, interpreting it to mean that he had become immortal and had been received into the number of the stars, Octavius then took courage and set up in the temple of Venus a bronze statue of him with a star above his head.

http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/R ... .html#88.1

He died in the fifty-sixth year of his age, and was numbered among the gods, not only by a formal decree, but also in the conviction of the common people. For at the first of the games which his heir Augustus gave in honour of his apotheosis, a comet shone for seven successive days, rising about the eleventh hour, 79 and was believed to be the soul of Caesar, who had been taken to heaven; and this is why a star is set upon the crown of his head in his statue.

It was voted that the hall in which he was slain be walled up, that the Ides of March be called the Day of Parricide, and that a meeting of the senate should never be called on that day.

[ghost]

Here is the six-pointed star on the helmet,…

http://www.carotta.de/subseite/echo/tumult/20.jpg

…and here is the chi-rho.

http://www.carotta.de/subseite/echo/21_4cm.jpg

http://www.carotta.de/subseite/echo/tumult-e.html

[ghost]

This is a larger image of the chi-rho coin.

http://www.carotta.de/subseite/echo/tumult/21.jpg

[DCHindley]

ghost,

I have it on good authority that Caesar's Comet is exactly the same as the Comet™ we can buy in our grocery stores today, basically a mixture of powered calcium carbonate (limestone) and powdered silica (quartz), although without the sodium dichloro-s-triazinetrione dehydrate (cyanuric acid) as bleaching agent. In antiquity, the substitute for modern bleach would have been anhydrous ammonia created from decomposed human urine. Mmmmm.

And since Comet™ is mentioned in the bible, it is OK to use, unlike Coca Cola, which is NOT mentioned in the Bible.

Of course, Comet™ works much better on stained countertops and porcelain than Coca Cola, although the latter can sometimes be used to remove certain food stains from fabrics.

Mr Scowling Waggyfinger

[ghost]

What do you mean?