Saturday, February 4, 2017

Could Star Collision Herald the Messiah?

So will the Messiah appear in 2022? That's the claim made by Rabbi Yosef Berger, citing passages from the Zohar, a principle text in traditional Jewish Kabbalah. According to the Zohar, the Messiah will come when several stars appear in the sky. Berger believes that this may be referring to two stars in the KIC 9832227 system that are predicted to collide in 2022.

It should be noted that the linked article's headline refers to Jesus returning, but Berger is Jewish and none of his quoted statements are related to Jesus. Most Jews do not believe that the Messiah has come in the past, but rather will appear at some future time.

In 2022, two stars in the Northern Cross – in star system KIC 9832227 will collide in 2022, in a blast which will be visible to the naked eye from Earth, Calvin College experts predict.

Rabbi Yosef Berger of King David’s Tomb in Mount Zion, Jerusalem, cited the 12th century Rabbi Moses ben Maimon – known as Rambam, or Maimonides.

Berger told Breaking Israel News, ‘The Rambam brings this verse about a star appearing as proof that the Messiah will come one day.

Berger refers to the Zohar – a collection of commentaries on the Jewish Torah, saying, ‘The Zohar states explicitly that the Messianic process will be accompanied by several stars appearing.’

As the collision will be visible to the naked eye, it will appear as of a new very bright star in the sky. But like all predictions based on prophecy, it is hard to ascertain how much of it is really in the text and how much lies in the interpretation. This has been the bane of fundamentalists trying to predict the date of the apocalypse since the nineteenth century.

The fact is that even if the text is correct, any number of astronomical events could produce what look like several new stars appearing in the sky. It could allude to a conjunction of bright planets, a comet, or a supernova. The predicted planetary collision is rare and interesting, but whether or not that makes it spiritually significant remains to be seen.

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