As a Christian and an astronomer, it’s only natural I should have a keen interest in the mystery of the Star of Bethlehem. While I’ve never done any original research on the topic, I’ve followed new developments from a distance over the years. And each time it appears all plausible explanations have been exhausted, someone comes up with a fresh idea.

Now we have a lengthy treatise written by an academic. Will we be surprised again?

Skeptic Turned Believer 

I have to admit I started Colin Nicholl’s The Great Christ Comet: Revealing the True Star of Bethlehem with considerable skepticism. Quickly perusing the book before I began reading in detail, I noticed Nicholl adopts 4 B.C. as the date of Herod’s death. While this has been the consensus view among historians, recent scholarship throws this dating into doubt (more on this below). Nicholl is obviously aware of this debate, but seems overly dismissive of challenges to the consensus. I feared if he lacked careful attention to this important point, his scholarship on other points would be similarly weak.

I’m happy to report, however, that I was wrong in my initial assessment of The Great Christ Comet. Unquestionably, Nicholl is a deeply knowledgeable and meticulous biblical scholar. Nearly every page contains multiple footnotes, often to obscure books and scholarly journals. But he is also humble. He acknowledges early on that the study of the mystery of the Star of Bethlehem requires expertise in multiple disciplines including biblical studies, Ancient Near Eastern (ANE) history, and astronomy. I’m impressed he dialogued with multiple astronomers while working on this book. Gary W. Kronk, a leading expert on comets, wrote the foreword.

Read the article “The Great Christ Comet: Revealing the True Star of Bethlehem” on thegospelcoalition.org.