Hidden History: Lost Civilizations, Secret Knowledge, and Ancient Mysteries (46 page)

Researchers insist that the possibility of finding a living example of

Homo floresiensis or Ebu Gogo should
not be dismissed out of hand, particularly as Southeast Asia is a relatively
rich area for finds of mammals unknown to science. Examples include an
antelope, Pseudoryx nghetinhensis (described from the Lao-Vietnamese border as recently as 1993) and the
kouprey, an ox-like creature (known
to Western science only since 1937).
Bert Roberts and Michael Morwood
are convinced that exploration of the
remaining rainforest on Flores and
caves associated with the Ebu Gogo
stories could provide them with vital
samples of hair or other material, perhaps even living specimens. They also
think it probable that the skeletal remains of other, equally divergent Homo
species, await discovery in other isolated corners of Southeast Asia. Indeed, the fact that a lost Homo species
such as floresiensis, which had lived
so recently, yet remained unknown
until 2003, strongly suggests there are
more significant gaps in our understanding of the history of humanity
than we could ever have imagined.

The Three Wise Men, named Balthasar, Melchior, and Gaspar, from a late 6th century
mosaic at the Basilica of San Apollinare Nuovo, Ravenna, Italy.

The Magi are familiar to most
people as the Wise Men from the East
in the Bible. The Gospel of Matthew
describes them following the Star of
Bethlehem to find the savior and offering him their gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. But did these
mysterious wise men bearing exotic
gifts really exist outside of this biblical story? And if so, what was the Star
of Bethlehem?

The word Magi (the plural of the
term Magus), comes from Latin via the
Greek word Magoi, itself borrowed
from Old Persian Magus. The Old English word is Mage, and it is from this

that we get our word magic. One of the
earliest mentions of the Magi is by the
Greek historian Herodotus (c. 484 B.C.-
c. 425 B.C.) who states that they were a
sacred class of priests living in Media
(roughly the northwestern part of Iran
and the area of Kurdistan), and one of
the six tribes that composed the original Medes. However, as the Persian
Empire expanded into their area in the
sixth century B.C., the priests of the old
Median religion, which was possibly
of Mesopotamian origin, found it necessary to adapt their practices to the
monotheistic Zoroastrian faith, though
this was a slow and painful process. It is recorded that when Darius the
Great, Persian Emperor from 521 B.C.
to 486 B.C., and one of the early kings
of the Achaemenid Dynasty (c. 560 B.C.-
330 B.C.), discovered that the Magi at
the Median court were skilled interpreters of dreams, he established them
in preference to the state religion of
Persia. Whatever the truth of this, by
the time Herodotus was writing, the
Magi had become priests in the Persian Zoroastrian religion, with a role
comparable to Shamans or medicine
men. Part of their duties was to serve
as astrological consultants to the Persian emperors, and they soon attained
a powerful religious influence and
earned respect as wise men throughout the Empire.

An important source for the
Magians under Darius are the
Persepolis Fortification Tablets, a substantial collection of ancient Persian
cuneiform administrative texts, dating
from between 506 and 497 B.C. It is in
these texts that the Magi are described
as operating in a dual capacity, wielding both religious and political influence. This combined function of
administrator and priest was a common practice in Near Eastern societies at the time. The Magi were given
important religious responsibilities,
as is illustrated in the description of
the tan-sacrifice at the Persian capital city of Persepolis. As the tablets
describe the Magi as fire kindlers, this
ritual seems to have been a type of fire
sacrifice to Ahuramazda (the wise
lord), the supreme god of the ancient
Persians. Together with the testimonies of ancient Greek authors, the Fortification Tablets indicate that the
Magi were present at the royal court

of the Persian emperors, and involved
at the very highest level in Persian
religious practice and administration.

With the invasion of Persia by
Alexander the Great in the winter of
331 B.C. the Achaemenid Dynasty came
to an abrupt end. Although ancient
sources mention Magi at Alexander's
court being involved in rituals of some
sort, it is also clear that Alexander
destroyed many Zoroastrian sanctuaries, probably because he saw their religion as a threat to his authority.

The Greek writer and geographer
Strabo (c. 63 B.c.-c. A.D. 21) describes a
sect of Magians in Cappadocia (central
Turkey). He called them fire kindlers,
who possessed fire temples containing
an altar on which a fire was kept continuously burning. The Magians visited the temple daily for around an
hour, where they would make incantations holding bundles of tamarisk or
other branches in front of the fire and
"wearing round their heads high turbans of felt, which reach down their
cheeks far enough to cover their lips."
It seems that some Magi also traveled
west, arriving and settling in Greece
and Italy. Traces of their beliefs and
practices can be found in Mithraism,
an ancient mystery religion based on
worship of the god Mithras, which became popular among the Roman Legions around the third to fourth
centuries A.D. At the time of the Roman Empire, the word Magi began to
be used as a more general term to describe any representatives of an eastern cult, and by the time of the birth
of Jesus, it had come to mean anyone
involved in magic, astrology, or dream
interpretation. The Magi seemed to
have been accepted as part of the courts of the Roman Empire, as a number of them are mentioned as accompanying high ranking officials and
governors.

The description of the Magi in the
Gospel of Matthew (written between
A.D. 60 and 80) visiting Jesus in
Bethlehem is the only source we have
for the event. The text says "there came
wise men from the east to Jerusalem"
and subsequently refers to the Magi's
interest in stars, so it is probable the
wise men he is speaking of were astrologers. This concern with the stars
has suggested to some that the wise
men came from Babylon, a well-known
center of astrology at the time. However, to judge purely by the nature of
the gifts they brought-gold, frankincense, and myrrh-Arabia would seem
more appropriate, though it did not
possess a Magian priesthood. Matthew
never mentions how many Magi there
were, but the number of gifts would
indicate three. The nature of these
gifts has potent symbolic power for
Christians: frankincense signifying
Christ's divinity; gold representing his
royalty; and myrrh, which was used in
anointing corpses, a symbol of the
forthcoming Passion and death.

According to the Gospel of Matthew, before arriving in Bethlehem,
the Magi first visited Herod, the Roman puppet king of Judea. After sighting the star in the east, they made
inquiries with Herod regarding the
new king. Herod, with his knowledge
of Old Testament prophecy, was able
to direct them to Bethlehem. He requested that the Magi return to see
him when they found any news, so that
he too could pay homage to the newborn savior. As they approached

Bethlehem, the star again appeared in
the sky so the Magi followed it until
they found the King of the Jews and
presented him with their gifts. The
astrologers were subsequently warned
in a dream to avoid going back to Herod
and traveled back to Persia by an alternative route. As a result of this
trick, Herod was furious and ordered
the massacre of the Holy Innocents, all
the children under two years old in
Bethlehem and the surrounding area.
But by then Joseph had taken Mary
and Jesus to safety in Egypt.

There has been a huge amount of
discussion about what kind of star it
could have been that brought the Magi
out of the east on their long trek to
Judaea. Explanations put forward for
this astronomical wonder include meteors, the planet Venus, planetary conjunctions, stella novae, comets, and
even UFOs. Nowadays, the two most
widely accepted suggestions are that
the star in the east was either the
planet Jupiter, or Halley's Comet.

The Greek word aster, used by
Matthew in his gospel to describe the
Star of Bethlehem, can be interpreted
to mean a comet. But is there any
record of a comet at this time? In the
Roman world there was a belief that
the appearance of a comet often heralded catastrophic political events,
even the death of an emperor, which
would suggest that it could not be associated with the birth of a new messiah. But among the Magi of the Black
Sea coast of Turkey, comets appear to
have been good omens. The successful
rule of one particular king in the area,
Mithridates VI, was so much associated with comets as positive celestial
portents that he even had coins minted depicting them. The appearance of
Halley's Comet in 12 B.C. caused consternation throughout the Mediterranean world, especially in the skies
above Rome. Because Herod is now
believed to have died in 4 B.C. most
scholars now place the birth of Jesus
somewhere between 12 and 4 B.C.,
which would make Halley's Comet a
possibility for the Star of Bethlehem.
A problem with the comet theory however, is that Matthew mentions that
Herod and the people of Jerusalem did
not notice the star of Bethlehem in the
night sky, which they surely would
have done if it was something as obvious as Halley's Comet.

Jupiter, known as the star of Zeus,
was traditionally the planet associated
with kings, and astronomer Michael R.
Molnar of Rutgers University in New
Jersey has interpreted statements in
Matthew's Gospel that the star "went
before" and "stood over" as referring
to to the reversal of motion and stationing of the planet Jupiter. Molnar
has discovered a Roman coin issued in
Antioch, the capital of Roman Syria,
which dates to the time of Jesus' birth
and which depicts the astrological sign
of Aries the Ram turning its head to

look back at a star. Molnar believes
that this coin was issued to commemorate the takeover of Judaea by Roman
Antioch in A.D. 6. Subsequent research
revealed that in an important astrological work by Claudius Ptolemy, the
Tetrabiblos, Aries the Ram is explained
as controlling the people of "Judea,
Idumea, Samaria, Palestine, and Coele
Syria"-all territories ruled by King
Herod. So it is possible that the star
on the coin represents Judaea's destiny in the hands of Roman Antioch.
This may indicate that astrologers
were waiting for the birth of a great
king of the Jews portended by the appearance of the Star of Bethlehem in
the constellation of Aries the Ram.
Molnar's research shows that the celestial events on April 17, 6 B.C., when
Jupiter was in Aries and there was
also a lunar eclipse of the planet, were
exactly those which would indicate the
birth of a divine person. Though a lot
more research needs to be done on this
theory, it provides the best evidence
yet that the Magi from Persia were
actually following a real star, in this
case Jupiter, which would ultimately
lead them to Bethlehem and the future
King of the Jews.