The Portent

by Michael S. Heiser

  “Thank you,” Kamran responded. “Let’s talk about the twelve stars.”

  He resumed his presentation: “The twelve stars around the head of the woman are easily traced to Old Testament and other Jewish religious writings. In Joseph’s dream in Genesis 37, the sun, the moon, and eleven stars represent Jacob, his wife, and the eleven tribes of Israel. Joseph, the twelfth tribe, would be the twelfth star in the vision of Revelation 12.

  “Jewish writers like Josephus and Philo thought the stars were also a description of the garments of the Israelite high priest, since he represented the twelve tribes before Yahweh in the temple. Those writers believed the twelve stars of the tribes of Israel corresponded to the twelve signs of the zodiac. This is known from several zodiac mosaics found in ancient Jewish synagogues.”

  Kamran cut in to type more, “The point I am making is that the vision of Revelation 12 has a long history of being understood by Jews in terms of both the Old Testament and astronomy. Now for the dragon.”

  The pre-recorded mechanized voice continued: “The dragon is a well-known Old Testament symbol. Many scholars have identified the dragon as the chaos sea-monster symbol of Israelite religion. Revelation 12, 13, and 15 describe this dragon as coming from the sea. This links the dragon to the fourth beast of Daniel 7, who also came from the sea. The four beasts of Daniel 7 were four kingdoms, aligned to the great image made of four different metals in the vision of Daniel 2.”

  “Dr. Scott,” Kamran typed, “what was the identity of the fourth kingdom?”

  “Most scholars take it as Rome, though there are some exceptions. Rome makes the most sense to me. The key is Daniel 2. In that passage, the kingdom of God appears in the fourth kingdom, the stone made without human hands in Nebuchadnezzar’s dream. The New Testament is crystal clear that the kingdom of God began during the first coming of Jesus, which was during the rule of Rome, so it’s sensible to have Rome as the fourth kingdom.”

  “I agree,” Kamran typed. “These comments are good enough for understanding the astronomy, as we will see. I want to focus on the birth and not the interpretation of events after the birth.”

  He resumed the presentation: “Once more, it is important to note that the images of Revelation 12 are easily known from the Old Testament. Less obvious is how people who were not Jewish, but who lived at the same time and needed the same message from God, would have receive the message. The Apostle John was a Jew, but he also lived in a Greek and Roman culture.”

  Kamran paused to type, “Still in agreement, Dr. Scott? If so, we can move on.”

  Brian nodded.

  “Paul tells us in Romans 10:18 that all people could have known about the arrival of the Savior because the voice of the stars went out to all the earth. Paul is quoting Psalm 19:4, which describes the heavens as communicating the glory of God. The voice of the stars, according to Paul, means that all nations heard the news of the coming king.”

  Brian’s mind suddenly drifted back to his confrontation with the Colonel, to Isaiah 40:5, The glory of the Lord shall be revealed …

  “Some Hebrew manuscripts of Psalm 19:4 say that the ‘line’ of the stars declares their message, not their ‘voice,’ ” Kamran’s recording continued. “The line of the stars describes the ecliptic—the path of the zodiac constellations. The wording is different, but the idea is the same no matter the manuscript difference.”

  Kamran hit the keyboard again. “We are now ready to read the vision of the night sky. Please watch the video on the screen as I narrate what you see. My comments will reflect the point of view from Israel, since the Apostle John is giving us the description. The magi in Babylon would have seen the same events and more as they journeyed to Israel, but the exact timing of the birth of Jesus requires viewing the sky from the ground in Israel, the place of the birth.

  “The key figure is the woman. Revelation 12:1 gives us clear details: the woman is ‘clothed’ with the sun, there are twelve stars around her head, and the moon is at her feet. The ‘birth’ of the Messiah is associated with this heavenly scene. The word John uses to describe this vision is ‘sign’—semeion in Greek. Scholars say this is the same word used many places by Greek writers to describe constellations.

  “Since the sun and moon have positions relative to the woman, the language is astronomical. The ecliptic line, the sun, and the moon are in color in the image you see. In the night sky the woman would be a constellation located within the normal path of the ecliptic line. This line will speak to us now—as Psalm 19 said.

  “The only zodiac sign of a woman that exists along the ecliptic is Virgo—the Virgin. Modern astronomers list twelve stars around what is considered the head of the woman of this constellation.

  “In the period of Jesus’ birth, the sun on its annual course through the heavens entered into the constellation of the woman on about August 13, and exited from her feet on about October 2. But the Apostle John saw the scene when the sun was ‘clothing’ the woman. This indicates that the sun in the vision was located in the woman’s body.

  “There is a twenty-day period in the year when the sun is inside Virgo. But that occurs every year. We need to know a specific year. That year is determined by the other elements in the vision as well as astronomical events that explain the movement of the star in Matthew and that align with Luke’s chronology for the priestly service of Zechariah, John the Baptist’s father and Jesus’ cousin. Recall that both the pregnancies of Mary and Elizabeth, John the Baptist’s mother, were divinely announced.

  “The year that accounts for all the elements is 3 BC. I will show you all the signs that need to be accounted for as we proceed so you will all see that 3 BC is the precise year. For now, we will focus on the sun clothing the Virgin in 3 BC.

  “In 3 BC, the sun would have clothed the Virgin from about August 27 through September 15. Jesus would have to be born within that period. This timeframe correlates precisely with the chronology of Luke concerning the timing of the birth of John the Baptist and his father Zechariah’s scheduled time of service at the temple, where the angel met him to announce John’s birth.

  “From the religious perspective of the magi, just these signs would have denoted a divine birth. We know the magi were familiar with the virgin-birth prophecy of Isaiah 7:14 since they journeyed to Judah and asked for the whereabouts of the king of the Jews. They knew the Scriptures since the prophet Daniel, a magi himself, had brought the Scriptures with him to Babylon.

  “We must now account for the moon at the Virgin’s feet. The position of the moon pinpoints the birth to one day within the twenty days the Virgin is clothed with the sun and really to within ninety minutes on that day. According to John’s description, the moon must be under the woman’s feet at the same time the sun is clothing the woman.

  “In the year 3 BC, these two events occurred from 6:15 p.m. until around 7:45 p.m. on September 11. This is the only day and time window in the whole year that the astronomical phenomenon described in Revelation 12 could take place. This means that Jesus was born just after sunset on September 11, 3 BC.”

  “That’s awesome,” Malcolm marveled.

  “I’d say it’s creepy,” Melissa added. “September 11? Are you kidding?”

  “I’m with Melissa,” Clarise spoke up. “It’s a really weird coincidence—and we don’t like that word here. Do you think this gives our modern September 11 some sort of added meaning, Kamran?”

  Kamran took to the keyboard quickly. “I can think of messages that the unseen world of evil ones could communicate by the date and the symbol of the two towers in New York, but I am cautious. I don’t want to let my imagination go too far. I think it must mean something, but I’m not sure what. But for our discussion, September 11 is not the important date formula—the Jewish dating will be our focus. This focus will become more important as we proceed with the things we can know. They are much more strange.”

  “More strange?” Ward asked. “It feels like we just shot the bull’s-eye out of str
ange.”

  Kamran shook his head. He wasn’t smiling.

  “What else is there?” Neff asked, intrigued by Kamran’s assertion.

  “Much more.”

  He resumed the presentation: “You can see the Virgin and the elements of Revelation 12. There are more signs for the birth date that would have been very important to the magi. Notice in this slide that above the head of the Virgin there are two celestial objects: Jupiter and Regulus. You only see one object, but there are two names. That is because Jupiter and Regulus are aligned.

  “Jupiter and Regulus are called the ‘king planet’ and the ‘king star’ in ancient Graeco-Roman astrology. This is because Jupiter is the largest planet. Regulus is very bright, so it is prominent. For that reason and the constellation of which it is a part, it was considered the star of kings.”

  “What constellation is Regulus part of?” Sabi asked, moving his wheelchair a bit closer to the screen.

  “Leo.” The answer appeared on the screen, as Kamran had anticipated Sabi’s question. “Leo is the lion, and the Messiah is—”

  “The lion of Judah,” Nili finished the sentence, wide-eyed at the correlation.

  “Yes. Revelation 5:5 calls the lamb that was slain the ‘lion of Judah’ and the ‘root of David.’ The night sky on September 11, 3 BC would have looked like this, with Leo present.”

  The image popped up on the screen.

  Kamran continued, typing as quickly as he could. “For the magi, the conjunction of Jupiter and Regulus in the same sky as the Virgin clothed mid-body with the sun would have announced a royal birth—a divine royal birth, since they were thinking in terms of the Jewish Scriptures. Other wise men who perhaps had no knowledge of the Jewish prophecy would nevertheless have expected the same thing, given their belief in astrology—that the stars gave messages from the gods about what they were doing and going to do on earth. And all these celestial events occur together only on this date in this year.”

  “Good grief,” Malone said, shaking his head. “This is mind blowing. I’ll never accuse you again of just playing Halo on your time off.”

  The quip produced laughter all around the room, but Kamran offered no expression. He began to type feverishly again. “No—this is not the strangeness I spoke of. There is more.”

  “What about some of the obvious problems with a 3 BC date?” Brian interrupted. “Things like the date of Herod’s death. The New Testament has Jesus born before Herod died—and that was in 4 BC.”

  Kamran shook his head and waved Brian off and then started in on the keyboard again. “That date is based on a solar eclipse that Josephus says occurred shortly before Herod died. There was more than one eclipse between 5 BC and 1 BC. The details of Herod’s death can be aligned to the 1 BC eclipse.”

  “Really?” Brian asked. “Josephus has other chronological indicators besides an eclipse. Scholars have spent a lot of time correlating his work with Roman records.”

  “Have they considered that Josephus and the biblical writers might be using different calendars at different times—one political, the other religious?” Kamran asked.

  “Well …”

  “Herod’s death by the political calendar is 4 BC. By the Jewish religious calendar, it’s early 1 BC. A Jew could be looking at a date for Herod in one calendar and talk about it in relation to the other. Scholars who study ancient Herodian coins have shown that to be true. Therefore, the 4 BC date and the 1 BC date are not actually contradictory.”

  Brian glanced at Malcolm, who had a look on his face that said, “I told you so.” To Kamran he replied, “I’ll have to check on that.”

  Kamran nodded and held up a flash drive to draw Brian’s attention.

  “It’s all on the flash?”

  Kamran nodded again and tossed it lightly to Brian.

  “I suppose,” Brian continued as he slid the object into his shirt pocket, “that I’ll find an answer to the problem of how the 3 BC date can work with the governorship and census of Quintillus Varus as well?”

  Another nod.

  “Alright then.”

  “Looks like you found a graduate student,” Melissa leaned in and whispered to him.

  “Or maybe Kamran found one,” he replied under his breath.

  Kamran pointed to the screen and resumed the presentation. “One month before September 11, on August 12, 3 BC, Jupiter was in conjunction with a different object than Regulus—Venus, the ‘morning star.’ In Gentile astrology, Venus was Ishtar, the Mother, the goddess of fertility. Jupiter was the great Father. Therefore, a Jupiter-Venus conjunction would have signified to the Gentile that a divine royal birth was at hand.”

  “Isn’t Jesus called the ‘morning star’ in the Bible somewhere?” Fern asked, leaning forward, visibly captivated by what she was seeing.

  Kamran nodded and pointed to the screen, continuing the presentation. “The New Testament refers three times to Jesus as the ‘morning star.’ It was the brightest morning star; it ‘ruled’ the others, so to speak. That makes perfect sense given the astronomical signs. Second Peter 1:19 and Revelation 22:16 are the two clearest uses pointing to Jesus. The third is in Revelation 2:28, where Jesus tells the Apostle John that all those who overcome will be set over the nations—believers will displace the ruling, fallen sons of God who now have dominion.

  “And then Jesus describes us, His children, as ruling with a rod of iron—which is what Psalm 2 says about Him! And after all that, Jesus promises to give the believer the morning star. This means that we will rule as the Messiah rules—we’ll rule and reign with Him. We are morning stars as He is the morning star. See Dr. Scott’s dissertation if you want to know more.”

  Brian smiled to himself. “You make the theology sound so much cooler than I could.”

  Kamran beamed at the compliment before continuing. “Venus was therefore a special ‘bearer of light’ before the major conjunction of Regulus and Jupiter, the signs that the king was born. God, of course, is called the ‘Father of Lights’ in James 1:17. Jesus is the ‘radiance’ of the Father in Hebrews 1:2.”

  “And the light of the world!” Madison added enthusiastically.

  Kamran clapped his approval, enjoying her response. He pointed again up to the screen and resumed the recording. “All of this was foreshadowed in Isaiah 60:3, which prophesies the future return of the Glory—the presence of God—to Israel. The prophecy is filled with astronomical language: rising, brightness, a light.”

  The words of that passage appeared on the screen:

  Arise, shine, for your light has come,

  and the glory of the LORD has risen upon you.

  For behold, darkness shall cover the earth,

  and thick darkness the peoples;

  but the LORD will arise upon you,

  and his glory will be seen upon you.

  And nations shall come to your light,

  and kings to the brightness of your rising.

  Isaiah 40 again beckoned to Brian’s consciousness. The glory of the Lord shall be revealed … He closed his eyes in thought. But the glory was revealed earlier. Luke quoted the passage.

  Kamran paused the presentation. His expression turned somber. “I won’t take time to show you how the Jupiter-Regulus conjunction explains the apparent movement of the star of Bethlehem. All astronomers know about that—how Jupiter’s retrograde motion solves that part of the birth story. I want to move to the very startling material I learned from Father Mantello, my friend, the evening he died.”

  Kamran sighed and closed his eyes, collecting himself and his thoughts. He blinked and began typing. “I believe these signs in the sky are what Paul was talking about in Romans 10:18, where he insisted that all people had received the good news about the coming of the Messiah. Dr. Scott?”

  Brian focused his attention on the young man. “Yes?”

  “Look at Isaiah 40:5. I have the verse on the screen.”

  Brian looked up at the familiar words:

  And the glory of t
he LORD shall be revealed,

  and all flesh shall see it together,

  for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.

  Kamran continued. “Isaiah spoke of the birth of Jesus. We know this is true because this passage is quoted in Luke 3. Here is what Luke says about the message of John the Baptist.” He gestured to the screen.

  As it is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet,

  “The voice of one crying in the wilderness:

  ‘Prepare the way of the Lord,

  make his paths straight.

  Every valley shall be filled,

  and every mountain and hill shall be made low,

  and the crooked shall become straight,

  and the rough places shall become level ways,

  and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’ ”

  Kamran typed out his next question: “How did all flesh see the coming of the king—the salvation of God—together? The Colonel asked you what ‘together’ meant. Do you see now?”

  Brian sat in stunned silence as the answer broke through, invading his thoughts. “The heavens,” he said, looking at Kamran. “The other passage that has the heavens revealing the glory of God is Psalm 19—the one Paul was quoting in Romans 10:18. The heavens declare the glory of God … and the glory that was revealed was Jesus. All people saw together because all people can see the sky.”

  “Exactly. But do you see the how Isaiah 60 fits all this? We saw that part of Isaiah a few minutes ago.” Kamran began clicking back through his presentation. “It is the reason for my worry. Consider the slide.”

  But the LORD will arise upon you, and his glory will be seen upon you. And nations shall come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising.

  “It’s projected into the future,” Brian spoke his thoughts loud enough for the others to hear. “It’s about the kingdom come to earth in the future, when all nations will be drawn to God, so it’s not about the first coming of Jesus. The language of light … and brightness rising … the glory will be seen again.”