The wise men were likely accomplished astronomers, watching the stars for signs of a King's birth technical terms used in the Bible's description point to a real astronomical event that could explore the origin of the star of Bethlehem.
Bright stars top Christmas trees in Christian homes all over the world, The faithful sign about the star of wonder that guided the wise men to a manger in the little town of Bethlehem described by the evangelist Matthew in the New Testament. Is the star's biblical description a pious fiction or does it contain some astronomical truth.
To understand the star of Bethlehem we have to think like the three wise men motivated in the "star of the east" who first traveled to Jerusalem and told King Herod the prophesies that a new ruler of the people of Israel would be born, we also need to think like King Herod who asked when the star had appeared because he and his court were unaware of any such star in the sky.
These events present us with the first astronomy puzzle of the first Chritmas. How could King Herod's own advisors have been unaware of a star so bright and obvious that it could have led the wise men to Jerusalem?
To reach Bethlehem the wise men had to travel south from Jerusalem somehow that the star in the sky went before them, "where the young child was." Now we have a second first Christmas astromomy.puzzel how can a star in the east guide the wise men to the south?
The north star guides lost hickers to the north, so shouldn't a south star lead them to the south?
And we yet have a third first Chrismas astronomy puzzel how does Matthew's star more than "before like a showplough you might follow during a blizzard and then xtop and stand over the manger in Bethlehem in which lies the infant Jesus Christ.
Any astronomer knows that no star can do these things nor comet or Jupiter or a supernova or a conjuction of planets or any other bright object in the nighttime sky one can claim that Matthew describes a miracle.
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