Chronological timeline of texts tagged with Wayward Stars
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In the ancient world, the stars and planets were thought to be living beings, rational and divine, set in the heavens and moving in fixed paths. The notion of a "wandering star" came from watching the sky, observing how a few objects in the night sky drifted and at times appear to reverse course, a backward path known today as retrograde motion. Greek observers named these few the wanderers, which is the root of the word planet. Because the steady stars modeled obedience, the "wandering stars" were interpreted as rebellious divine beings that strayed from their path and were destined to be judged for their disobedience.
Note: Dates shown in this timeline are approximate and based on scholarly estimates.
Back to Tag200-50 B.C.E.
1 Enoch 2:1
Pseudepigrapha
1 Observe everything that occurs in the heaven, how the celestial bodies do not alter their paths, and the luminaries in the sky, how they all rise and set orderly, each in its own season, without deviating from their assigned courses. 2 Look at the earth, and pay attention to the things that unfold from beginning to end, how consistent they are, how nothing on earth changes, how all of God’s works appear to you. 3 Observe the summer and winter, how the entire earth is filled with water, and how clouds, dew, and rain cover it.
200-50 B.C.E.
1 Enoch 18:15
Pseudepigrapha
11 And beyond that abyss I saw a place which had no firmament of heaven above, and no firmly founded earth beneath it; there was no water upon it, and no birds, but it was a waste and horrible place. 12 I saw there seven stars like great burning mountains, and to me, when I inquired about them, 13 The angel said: 'This place is the end of heaven and earth; this has become a prison for the stars and the host of heaven. 14 And the stars which roll over the fire are those which have transgressed the command of the Lord at the beginning of their rising, because they did not come forth at their appointed times. 15 And He was angry with them, and bound them until the time when their guilt should be consummated, even for ten thousand years.'
200-50 B.C.E.
1 Enoch 21:5
Pseudepigrapha
1 And I proceeded to where things were chaotic. 2 And I saw there something horrible: I saw neither a heaven above nor a firmly founded earth, but a place chaotic and horrible. 3 And there I saw seven stars of heaven bound together in it, like great mountains and burning with fire. 4 Then I said: 'For what sin are they bound, and on what account have they been cast in here?' 5 Then said Uriel, one of the holy angels who was with me and was chief over them, and said: 'Enoch, why do you ask, and why are you eager for the truth? 6 These are of the number of the stars of heaven, which have transgressed the commandment of the Lord, and are bound here until ten thousand years, the time entailed by their sins, are consummated.'
200-50 B.C.E.
1 Enoch 80:6
Pseudepigrapha
5 In those days, the sun will be seen, and it will travel in the evening on the extremity of the great chariot in the west and will shine more brightly than is typical for the order of light. 6 Many leaders of the stars will deviate from their established order. They will change their orbits and duties and not appear at their designated seasons. 7 The entire order of the stars will be hidden from the sinners, and the thoughts of those on the earth will be mistaken about them, leading them to go astray and even regard them as gods. 8 Evil will be multiplied upon them, and punishment will come upon them to destroy all.'
100 B.C.E. - 100 C.E.
Testament of Naphtali 3:2
Pseudepigrapha
Be ye, therefore, not eager to corrupt your doings through covetousness or with vain words to beguile your souls; because if ye keep silence in purity of heart, ye shall understand how to hold fast the will of God, and to cast away the will of Beliar. Sun and moon and stars change not their order; so do ye also change not the law of God in the disorderliness of your doings. The Gentiles went astray, and forsook the Lord, and changed their order, and obeyed stocks and stones, spirits of deceit. But ye shall not be so, my children, recognizing in the firmament, in the earth, and in the sea, and in all created things, the Lord who made all things, that ye become not as Sodom, which changed the order of nature. In like manner the Watchers also changed the order of their nature, whom the Lord cursed at the flood, on whose account He made the earth without inhabitants and fruitless.
80-30 B.C.E.
Psalms of Solomon 18:10
Pseudepigrapha
8 to direct people to righteous actions, in the fear of God, to confirm them all in the presence of the Lord. 9 This will be a good generation living in the fear of God, in the days of mercy. 10 Our God is great and glorious living in the highest heavens, who arranged the sun and moon into orbits to mark the times of the hours from day to day. And they have not deviated from their course that he appointed for them. 11 Their course each day is in the fear of God, from the day God created them and until forever. 12 And they have not wandered from the day he created them, from ancient generations. They have not veered off their course except when God directed them by the command of his servants.
360 B.C.E.
Plato Timaeus 40
Classical
And each member of this class He endowed with two motions, whereof the one is uniform motion in the same spot, whereby it conceives always identical thoughts about the same objects, and the other is a forward motion due to its being dominated by the revolution of the Same and Similar; but in respect of the other five motions they are at rest and move not, so that each of them may attain the greatest possible perfection. From this cause, then, came into existence all those unwandering stars which are living creatures divine and eternal and abide for ever revolving uniformly in the same spot; and those which keep swerving and wandering have been generated in the fashion previously described. And Earth, our nurse, which is globed around the pole that stretches through all, He framed to be the wardress and fashioner of night and day, she being the first and eldest of all the gods which have come into existence within the Heaven. But the choric dances of these same stars and their crossings one of another, and the relative reversals and progressions of their orbits, and which of the gods meet in their conjunctions, and how many are in opposition, and behind which and at what times they severally pass before one another and are hidden from our view, and again re-appearing send upon men unable to calculate alarming portents of the things which shall come to pass hereafter — to describe all this without an inspection of models of these movements would be labor in vain.
300-250 B.C.E.
Aratus Phaenomena 454
Classical
But of quite a different class are those five other orbs, that intermingle with them and wheel wandering on every side of the twelve figures of the Zodiac. No longer with the others as they guide couldst thou mark where lies the path of those, since all pursue a shifty course, and long are the periods of their revolution and far distant lies the goal of their conjunction. When I come to them my daring fails, but mine be the power to tell of the orbits of the Fixed Stars and Signs in heaven.
20-50 C.E.
Philo On the Creation 1:50
Classical
But since every city in which laws are properly established, has a regular constitution, it became necessary for this citizen of the world to adopt the same constitution as that which prevailed in the universal world. And this constitution is the right reason of nature, which in more appropriate language is denominated law, being a divine arrangement in accordance with which everything suitable and appropriate is assigned to every individual. But of this city and constitution there must have been some citizens before man, who might be justly called citizens of a mighty city, having received the greatest imaginable circumference to dwell in; and having been enrolled in the largest and most perfect commonwealth. And who could these have been but rational divine natures, some of them incorporeal and perceptible only by intellect, and others not destitute of bodily substance, such in fact as the stars? And he who associated with and lived among them was naturally living in a state of unmixed happiness. And being akin and nearly related to the ruler of all, inasmuch as a great deal of the divine spirit had flowed into him, he was eager both to say and to do everything which might please his father and his king, following him step by step in the paths which the virtues prepare and make plain, as those in which those souls alone are permitted to proceed who consider the attaining a likeness to God who made them as the proper end of their existence.
20-50 C.E.
Philo On the Giants 1:2
Classical
"And when the angels of God saw the daughters of men that they were beautiful, they took unto themselves wives of all of them whom they Chose." Those beings, whom other philosophers call demons, Moses usually calls angels; and they are souls hovering in the air. And let no one suppose, that what is here stated is a fable, for it is necessarily true that the universe must be filled with living things in all its parts, since every one of its primary and elementary portions contains its appropriate animals and such as are consistent with its nature; --the earth containing terrestrial animals, the sea and the rivers containing aquatic animals, and the fire such as are born in the fire (but it is said, that such as these last are found chiefly in Macedonia), and the heaven containing the stars: for these also are entire souls pervading the universe, being unadulterated and divine, inasmuch as they move in a circle, which is the kind of motion most akin to the mind, for every one of them is the parent mind. It is therefore necessary that the air also should be full of living beings. And these beings are invisible to us, inasmuch as the air itself is not visible to mortal sight. But it does not follow, because our sight is incapable of perceiving the forms of souls, that for that reason there are no souls in the air; but it follows of necessity that they must be comprehended by the mind, in order that like may be contemplated by like. Since what shall we say? Must we not say that these animals which are terrestrial or aquatic live in air and spirit? What? Are not pestilential afflictions accustomed to exist when the air is tainted or corrupted, as if that were the cause of all such assuming vitality? Again, when the air is free from all taint and innocent, such as it is especially wont to be when the north wind prevails, does not the imbibing of a purer air tend to a more vigorous and more lasting duration of life? It is then natural that that medium by which all other animals, whether aquatic of terrestrial, are vivified should itself be empty and destitute of souls? On the contrary, even if all other animals were barren, the air by itself would be bound to be productive of life, having received from the great Creator the seeds of vitality by his especial favour.
90-100 C.E.
Jude 1:12
New Testament
10 But these men do not understand the things they slander, and they are being destroyed by the very things that, like irrational animals, they instinctively comprehend. 11 Woe to them! For they have traveled down Cain’s path, and because of greed have abandoned themselves to Balaam’s error; hence, they will certainly perish in Korah’s rebellion. 12 These men are dangerous reefs at your love feasts, feasting without reverence, feeding only themselves. They are waterless clouds, carried along by the winds; autumn trees without fruit—twice dead, uprooted; 13 wild sea waves, spewing out the foam of their shame; wayward stars for whom the utter depths of eternal darkness have been reserved.
90-100 C.E.
Jude 1:13
New Testament
11 Woe to them! For they have traveled down Cain’s path, and because of greed have abandoned themselves to Balaam’s error; hence, they will certainly perish in Korah’s rebellion. 12 These men are dangerous reefs at your love feasts, feasting without reverence, feeding only themselves. They are waterless clouds, carried along by the winds; autumn trees without fruit—twice dead, uprooted; 13 wild sea waves, spewing out the foam of their shame; wayward stars for whom the utter depths of eternal darkness have been reserved.