Messiah's Birth
By Daniel Gregg
In the 15th year of Tiberius Caesar Messiah Yeshua is almost 30 years old (Luke 3:23). "Almost" or "nearly" is the correct translation of the Greek here. It is not "about 30" as if Luke was not sure, or as if Luke was being imprecise. "Almost thirty" is more precise than just saying he was 29. It means he was 29 and pressing on to the end of the 29th year.
In Luke 2, the story of the Shepherds tells us that they were pasturing their sheep and keeping watch by night in the fields of the Bethlehem town district. The presence of the Shepherds is a seasonal indicator, because they were only allowed in the local fields after the harvest, and they would only keep them there until plowing and planting resumed. The window for the Shepherds opened about Shoshanim or Av to late Tishri or Cheshvan, when the rains began. After Sukkot, the farmers would be waiting for the fall rains so that they could plow and sow their fields. They hoped these rains would start after Sukkot in the 7th month, and become heavy in the 8th month. When the ground softened from the rain, they could plow, and this means that the shepherds had to leave. The Shepherds would return to the wilderness where they would graze on new grass that came up during the winter. But during the night, in the wilderness, they keep their flocks in "folds," that is rock enclosures they had built or caves in the wilderness. But usually it was structures of stacked rock to keep the wind and weather off of the flocks while they huddled together at night. They would then let them out to graze in the middle of the day when the temperature warmed up.
This pattern was a symbiotic relationship between the flocks of the Shepherds and the fields of the farmers. The farmers left the stubble high in the fields and let the weeds grow. The flocks ate this down and dunged the fields. It was beneficial for the shepherds, because the season they were allowed in was just that season when the grass in the wilderness was drying up. And Bethlehem, since it stood on the ridge at 2500 feet was considerably wetter than the Judean wilderness. During this season, they did not need a sheep fold because the farmers fields were bordered by rock walls, and they kept watch at night because the protection was not as perfect as a fold. There were still predators to be guarded against.
This late summer to early autumn time is the season of the shepherds to watch their flocks by night in the town district, and sometime during this season, Messiah was born. Can we narrow this down further?
Yes, we can. Luke tells us that John's father Zechariah was serving during the time of his division in the Temple, in the division of Aviyah (Abijah). Now there were 24 priestly divisions, and Aviyah was the 8th of these. The duty calendar for the Temple would go through each of the 24 divisions in 24 weeks, each division changing out at noon on the Sabbath, and then when the 24 divisions had used up 24 weeks, the divisions would start over again with division one and go another 24 weeks until all the divisions had served. And they would keep starting over like this every time the 24 divisions were used up.
This method of divisional rotations is called a continuous rotational system because like the seven day week it never resets once it starts. It is also like Solomons 12 month rotation for governors of districts of Israel to provide food for the kings table. The 12 months rotated around the calendar with no 13th month. This meant that in about 38 years the months of service would rotate around the year. The same thing happened with the priestly division it rotated around the year.
The reason for continuous rotations is equity. Every priest, by law, had to be granted equal access to his portion of the offerings that Israel brought to the altar. No one was to be allowed more time in service than someone else. And no priest was to be discriminated against by giving them less time. For the same reaons, Solomon's 12 month provisional schedule for the king's table rotated without a leap month. This was to keep the tax burden equally distributed for the 12 districts of Israel.
One may ask what happens at the three pilgrim festivals. The answer is that all the priests served under the direction of the regular division on duty, whosever week it was. The regular division would get it the regular duty, and then all the priests, including the regular division for that week would divide up all the extra demands among themselves. The division priests for the week would end up pulling double shifts so to speak. But this burden was also equitable because the each division would end up serving on a festival, and over time, it would average out to the same number times for each division.
It has been widely assumed that the divisions had an annual reset on Nisan 1 or Tishri 1. This is not the case, and it would result in an inequitable distribution of the proceeds of the altar. Since there are more than 48 weeks in a year, some divisions would end up with three weeks of service. That means they would be paid 33.3% more than divisions that could serve only two weeks.
One can prove that these Nisan 1 and Tishri 1 reset systems are unbiblical, and were never practiced. Besides being inequitable, which violates the Torah, the beginning of the divisions in Solomon's Temple in his 12th year was on the 2nd week of Tishri. The texts says that all the divisions were sanctified during the first week of that Tishri. And then starting in the 2nd week of the month, the first division began, and the rotations ran continuously right down to the destruction of the Temple on Av 10, 587 BC.
During the first Temple the divisions began rotating on October 13th, 1012 BC at noon. This was the Sabbath at the end of the first week of Tishri that year, because the new moon day had fallen on the first day of the week. Tishri 7 (noon on Sabbath, Oct. 13) to Tishri 14 (noon on Sabbath, Oct. 20) the first division served. This continued in strict rotation until 587 BC.
In 587 BC, on the 9th day of Av (a Sabbath), division 14, Jeshebeab, would have entered their week, but they did not get to do it, because the temple was burned on the 9th and the 10th.
In the 2nd Temple, the structure was completed on the 3rd day of Adar in the 6th year of Darius, which was Feb, 10, 515 BC. Between this time and the Passover, the rotations picked up where they had left off. Division 14 could have completed its week in the 4th week of Adar II (II Adar 17 to 24; March 26 to April 2, 515 BC). Technically it was not necessary to pick up where they left off after a hiatus because the divisions had to be reconsituted, only four divisions having returned. But it is how it works out when we back calculate by two different methods. The 14th division could have finished its abandoned week from 587. But this is merely symbolic. They were starving to death or under great duress for quite some time before this.
Clearly, the Temple suffered some interruptions after 515 BC. Antiochus IV certainly interrupted things. It appears however that a theoretical rotation was kept even if it could not actually be served. What we really need is a key date in the second Temple period when a known division was serving. Is there such a date?
Yes, there is, and we will see in the end that there are two synchronization points, one in Luke and one at the destruction of the second Temple. I will work off of the second Temple destruction, and when all the pieces fall into place, it will be seen that Luke 1-2 is a second witness to the actual divisional rotations.
The Second Temple was burned on Av 9-10 (Aug. 5-6), AD 70 when the division of Jehoiarib was on duty. This division had just come on duty on Av 8, which landed on Sabbath August 4. Av 9 that year was on the first day of the week (motse Shabbat—the going out of the Sabbath). We have two sources on the date, Seder Olam and Josephus, "The Second Temple was destroyed on Av 9 according to Rabbi Chalaphta, on a Sunday, when the course of Jehoiarib was on duty. It was On Av 10 according to Jos. Ant. 6:250, the difference being Solomon's Colonnade was fired on the 9th, and the Inner Temple on the 10th. The astronomically calculated Julian date is Sun, August 5 and Mon, Aug 6 respectively, AD 70."
So the destuction date is double witnessed. Seder Olam says that week was the week of the first division. Taking this as a witess, we can back calculate and see if Luke can confirm it.
Going backwards from AD 70, we find that Sabbath July 6 to Sabbath July 13 (Month IV, day 23 to day 30) was the service week for the division of Abijah, the 8th. Zechariah went off duty on July 14, 3 BC, which was the new moon day for the month of Av, the 5th month. Luke then reports the passage of 5 moons, July 14, Aug 13, Sept 12, Oct 12, Nov 11. On the 6th moon was the Anunciation to Miryam.
Now I should point out that Luke 1:26 reads, "Ἐν δὲ τῷ μηνὶ τῷ ἕκτῳ" and Exodus 19:1 reads, "τοῦ δὲ μηνὸς τοῦ τρίτου"; notice the same word for "month" is use here. However the Hebrew says "בַּחֹדֶשׁ הַשְּׁלִישִׁי", "In the third new moon" or "renewing." The rule is this. If the word hodesh is used without a numeral it means the new moon or the new moon day. If it is used with a numeral then it has the meaning of month. The difference is that without the numeral it is the renewing point of the cycle, whereas with a numeral it is a day within the renewing cycle. So after the Hebrew custom, Luke is telling us that it was the New Moon Day of the 6th month.
If this point is ambiguous in vs. 26, it is made clear in vs. 36. "καὶ οὗτος μὴν ἕκτος ἐστὶν αὐτῇ,"And this moon a sixth is to her." Compare Exodus 12:2, LXX, "ὁ μὴν οὗτος ὑμῖν ἀρχὴ μηνῶν," "The moon this to ye first of the moons"; and in Hebrew "הַחֹדֶשׁ הַזֶּה לָכֶם רֹאשׁ חֳדָשִׁים", "This new moon to ye [is] head of the new moons." Rashi, on Exodus 12:2 writes, "החדש הזה — He showed him the moon in the first stage of its renewal, and He said to him, “The time when the moon renews itself thus, shall be unto you the beginning of the month”. (The translation therefore is: “This stage of renewal (חדש) shall be the moment of beginning the months”; cf. Mekhilta). " Umberto Cassuto, a famous modern Orthdox Jewish scholar writes, "הַחֹדֶשׁ הַזֶּה", means "חִדּוּשׁ זֶה שֶׁל הַיָּרֵחַ". "This Hodesh" means "the making-being-renewed of the moon" ("חידוש זה של הירח"; on Exodus 12:2).
Finally, in New Testament Koine Greek, Thayer supplies us with, "μην 1. a month 2. the time of new moon, new moon, (barbarous Lat. novilunium; after the use of the Hebr. חֹדֶשׁ, which denotes both a month and a new moon). For a Hellenistic Jew familiar with the LXX and the classics, the word μην meant a new moon if it was unadorned with a numeral greater than 1. So when reading passages like Exodus 19:1, the Greek Jews understood μην to mean the third new moon. In later Greek the word μην shifted to the exclusive sense of "month" and νεομηνίας was used to refer to the new moon. This shift was because this is how the administrative state used the word.
LLM Synthesis: The semantic rule of the Hebrew calendar is this: if the word chodesh is used without an attached numeral, it specifically denotes the physical new moon or the literal New Moon Day. If it is used with a numeral, it denotes the broader span of the month. The critical difference is that without the numeral, it marks the exact renewing point of the cosmic cycle, whereas with a numeral, it marks a specific sequence within the shifting cycles. Following this strict Hebrew custom, Luke is telling his audience that Gabriel arrived on the New Moon Day of the sixth month.
If this point is at all ambiguous in verse 26, it is made completely clear by the time the reader reaches verse 36: "καὶ οὗτος μὴν ἕκτος ἐστὶν αὐτῇ" (And this moon, a sixth, is to her). This phrasing directly echoes the Greek Septuagint translation of Exodus 12:2: "ὁ μὴν οὗτος ὑμῖν ἀρχὴ μηνῶν" (The moon, this one, to you is the head of the moons). In the original Hebrew, this foundational text reads: "הַחֹדֶשׁ הַזֶּה לָכֶם רֹאשׁ חֳדָשִׁים" (This new moon to you is the head of the new moons).
For a Hellenistic Jew deeply familiar with the Septuagint and the classical masters, the word mēn natively meant a literal new moon whenever it stood alone, unadorned with a numeral greater than 1. Consequently, when reading passages like Exodus 19:1, Greek-speaking Jews understood mēn to mean the arrival of the third new moon. While later vernacular Greek shifted mēn to the exclusive, abstract sense of a civil "month" and required the newer term νεομηνία (neomēnia) to isolate the new moon day, this shift occurred precisely because that was how the administrative, bureaucratic state forced the use of the word. In the sacred, historical text of Luke, the ancient, visual lunar clock remains fully intact.
Luke steers us toward this conclusion further with the words, "And she was completely concealing herself five new moons," (vs. 24) which run up to the sixth new moon, "And with the sixth new moon the Messenger Gavriel was sent from the Almighty (vs. 26). She said, "So thus Yahweh has been doing with me during the days in which he looks upon me to take away my disgrace among men" (vs. 25).
A few points here are due. Elizabeth could well have guessed her conception was on the new moon day, right after Zechariah's priestly division ended. But her concealment does not require us to assume that. Zechariah came home, and not being able to speak, wrote down for her what had happened. He was highly motivated to cooperate with Elizabeth at this point because he was cursed with an inability to speak. Elizabeth would have considered then the point in time when Yahweh began to actively look upon her with favor as commencing with the new moon day when Zechariah arrived back in the Levitical city that was their hometown. She would not know from any physical sign for quite some weeks. So the calculation is from the end of the division. Her words give the timing as Yahweh looking upon her, which is a Hebrew idiom for looking with favor. See Genesis 4. So the text bypasses the conception date, while implying it might be on the new moon day. It does not, however, require it. She is counting from when Zechariah communicated to her.
The wording in Luke 1:36 confirms the timeline "καὶ οὗτος μὴν ἕκτος ἐστὶν αὐτῇ" (And this new moon, the sixth is for her). By leading with "this new moon" without a day number, and the Messenger speaking to Miryam on a particular day, the text is indicating that the five months concluded with a new moon.
Luke says she completely hid herself, περιέκρυβεν. This is an intensive Greek word meaning total concealment. This is a highly unusual statement, and does not have anything to do with a custum of hiding. Normally women were not visible in their pregnancy for up to five months, and certainly they could conceal it with a loose dress. There was no need to seclude or hide for the first five months of pregnancy. I mean there was no need to hide from the public. In fact, if she did not go about her ordinary duties, she would have drawn unwanted attention to herself, i.e. they would say "What is wrong with Elisheva?" What it means is that she did not tell anyone, and did not reveal it to the public. Because if she did, they would ridicule her.
The five new moons are backended by the sixth new moon. The phrase, "And this new moon, the sixth is..." (vs. 36) fronts the text with "this new moon"; this appears to be a deliberate recall of Exodus 12:2. But when the annunciation came to Miryam, Elisheva was still completely concealing the pregnancy, and no doubt continued to do so for those days of the sixth month that it took Miryam to travel to her. This makes Luke's statement a chronologicon—a statement meant to indicate how long the progress of total concealment had gone on just before arriving at the sixth month. Luke is responsible for the duration of the five months. Elisheva did not say to herself, I will conceal myself for five months. Since Luke is saying this, he means five months, and not a day more, bang the sixth new moon. If it had been some way into the sixth month, then he could not have said five months. He would have to say five months and some days to be totally honest, or even six new moons. The five months is a literary temporal way point, i.e. how long up to a particular day .
I should give another example. It is written that Saul was the son of a year, and yea two years he has reigned (1 Sam. 13:1). This statement has caused translators a conniption fit. They have called it a scribal error, changed it to thirty years, or deleted it. But the text is a chronologicon to indicate how much progress his reign has made. It is not his total 40 years. The idiom "son of a year" means the first year is complete, and the second year is current. The reason for Samuel's careful statement is that Saul was about to blow the Jubilee trumpet to make war on the Philistines and to recover the lost inheritance of Israel that they had seized.
So Luke has brought us forward to the sixth new moon. He brings the chronology to term in 2:6-7, "Then it happened that while they were there, the days were fulfilled for her to give birth. Then she gave birth to her first-born son." This statement is not just a poeticly vauge statement. Nor is it a statement that her days were just finished, whatever number they might be. But "the days" here is definite. A period of time is being measured out. The word "for her to give birth" means "in order for her to give birth"; In Greek this is an articular infinitive, αἱ ἡμέραι τοῦ τεκεῖν αὐτήν, i.e. "the days for THE giving birth for her." This is reinforced by the word "completed", meaning the number of days had run its course. Luke, being a medical doctor, who had no doubt counseled and assisted many women, knew how to calculate and predict the expected term for a child to be born.
The term for fulfilled here, ἐπλήσθησαν, is not the ordinary word "to fulfilled" but the verb ἐπλήσθησαν (eplēsthēsan / were fulfilled) is an administrative and mathematical term. You cannot "fulfill" a number unless that number has a strict, predetermined limit. The verb is used in Luke 1:23 to denote the completion of Zechariah's service in the division of Abijah, a term spanning exactly 8 days, from noon on the Sabbath beginning his rotation to noon on the next Sabbath, when the next rotation came in. It is likewise used in Luke 2:21 in regards to the 8th day being filled up for circumcision. In Luke 2:22 the same word is used for the 40 days of postpartum purification required by the Torah. These are fixed terms of days and not vague statements with an oblique sense amounting to whenever it happened.
So what is the term date for a child. We need to look at the term from conception and not the term from the LMP. The latter is 280 days or 40 weeks. But the time from conception is 266 days, which is exactly 9 lunar months and one day. In antiquity this term could be calculated out by finding the average cycle of 28 days, then halving it at 14 for the day known to be the max fertility date, and then compling an average of actual terms.
In 3 BC, following the division of Abijah, the five months are Av, Elul, Tishri, Chesvan, and Kisleu. The sixth new moon was for Tebeth. The new moon day was on December 10, 3 BC. This was Julian day number: 1720671. Exactly 9 months and 1 day later, brings us to Sept. 1, 2 BC, which is Julian day 1720936. On an inclusive count (counting both December 10 and September 1) the number of days is 266. The inclusive math is 1720936—1720671+1= 266. So the term date from conception is September 1, 2 BC. And this day, September 1, 2 BC was the new moon day.
The spring equinox in 2 BC was on March 22 (Julian) using the visual horizon method of determing the first day of the year. This day also was the 15th day of the month, so that the Passover was in the new year. This criterion qualified this month to be the first month of the year. Accordingly, the seventh month of that year, Tishri 1, will fall on September 1, 2 BC. And this links up with the the legal time frame that the Shepherds were allowed to run their flocks in the fields of the Bethlehem district.
We see that Luke has given us a pristine chronology that leads straight to the new moon day of September 1, 2 BC. Now I have been giving you the proleptic Julian date for the new moon day, i.e. the day part of the day. In the proleptic Julian calendar (the standard, retroactively calculated solar model used by modern astronomers), the Tishri 1 holy day spanned August 31 at Erev to Sept 1 at Erev. Converting this to the actual Roman civic calendar reveals a stunning alignment. Due to this historical drift, the holy day of Tishri 1 on the civic Roman calendar would have straddled September 1 at evening to September 2 at evening. (To the modern reader, it must be noted that the Roman civic calendar on the ground differed from the astronomical calendar because the early Roman priests miscalculated Julius Caesar's leap year rules, inserting a leap day every three years instead of every four. To fix this accumulating error, Emperor Augustus completely froze all leap years starting in 8 B.C., a freeze that lasted through 2 B.C. Consequently, the actual physical calendar plaques—the Fasti—hanging in Rome were running exactly one day ahead of the true solar cycle). Remarkably, this means the visual biblical reset hit exactly on the first and second days of the Roman seventh month. That is the first day of the Roman 7th month to the second day of the Roman 7th month. If we consider that the first and second days after the new moon were observed in ancient Israel, this alignment is incredible, as well as the comedy of errors the Roman Priests made to arrive at it! It is like there was a divine hand behind the Roman calendar screw up guiding it toward the Almighty Son rather than the later to be divinized Augustus.
So literally, the Roman seventh month, and the first day of it landed EXACTLY when the new moon of the Seventh Month occurred, that is the Kalends of September. And in the pre-imperial Roman calendar, this was the day the new moon appeared. If a divine point is being made here it is to connect the entering of Messiah into the world with a mission to the nations.
Now after the daily offering on Tishri 1, which was offered with the daybreak, the Musaf Sacrifice mandated for Yom Teruah was offered (cf. Numbers 29:1-6). After this, as soon as it was confirmed that the witnesses had seen the new moon, having traveled in some cases all night, Psalm 81 was sung in the service.
"Blow on the new moon the Shofar, in the concealment of the day of our feast. Because a statute for Israel it is, a custom for the Almighty of Jacob—a witness in Yah of Joseph he has set it—in his going out over the land of Egypt. A language I had not known, I hear." On the same day at dawn, Messiah was born, and the Messenger announced to the Shepherds, "For today in the city of David, there will have been born for you, a Rescuer, who is the Anointed One, Adonai...And suddenly there was with the Messenger a multitude of the heavenly host praising the Almighty and saying, 'Glory to the Almighty in the Highest, and on earth peace among men of good intention."
Now we have to decode "Egypt." Egypt is used here to stand as a figure for the house of bondage, for exile. The house of Joseph had been exiled into the nations. And so this puzzling verse in Psalm 81 is the notification of divine outreach to the nations. And for this reason the messengers message was pitched to all men "men of good intention." It was likely that this was delivered by the messengers in Greek, representing the languages of the exile of the house of Israel. So when Psalm 81 was sung in the Temple, it was the messengers from heaven who sung the interpretation of the puzzling line in the Psalm.
For it is written, "And he says, '[Too] Easy from being thou for Me servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and the Notsari of Israel to restore, but I will have given thee as a light to the nations to should be my salvation to the end of the earth" (Isa. 49:6). So if you understand, Ephraim of Israel became melo-ha-goyyim, the fullness of the nations. And the rescue of Israel includes the rescue of the nations.
So the Mission of Messiah is to go out over all the lands of exile, and all the lands where he hears a foreign language, to rescue Israel living in concealment, "in the concealment of the day of our feast." The utterance of the heavenly host was echoed by the other host of heaven, the levitical priests.
If we recall when the Philistines captured the Ark of the Covenant. They took it into the Temple of Dagon. And the Philistine god fell down before the Ark. Likewise on September 1, the Roman Calendar finally fell down in front of the Biblical Seventh Month.
Our date is confirmed by another witness. The Magi stated, "We have seen his star in the rising" (Matthew 2:2). The Magi were assiduous observers of the planet Jupiter, which in Hebrew was called "Tzedeq," meaning "Righteous." It was also known as the king star. Back in Parthia they had no doubt noted the helical rising of Jupiter in the constellation of Leo on August 1, 3 BC. The second helical rising was on September 1, 2 BC at dawn according to ideal calculation. Now for interpretive purposes, a helical rising did not have to be seen. It would otherwise be calculated according to ideal criteria for the first rising date. And interpreters would still use it for omens even a day later. The requirement for first seeing Jupiter in the dawning sky was right about 12 degrees Elongation from the sun, and 9 degrees arc of vision (the altitude distance between the sun and the star). On September 1, 2 BC the elongation was 11 degrees 50 arc minutes. And the Arc of vision was just about 11.5 degrees. This arc of vision more than compensates for the slightly below 12 degree value of the elongation. September 1, 2 BC at dawn is clearly the ideal calculated time for the rising of the star. The steep alignment of the arc of vision and the elongation were nearly vertical at the horizon. This is the ideal situation for excluding the morning of August 31st as a helical rising date.
It should be noted that by the rules of ancient astrological interpretation for birth horoscopes that this calculated date was good enough. And in fact, they preferred calculated dates because of the variations in observed ones. However, the Magi stated that they saw it, and that they followed the star afterwards, which means they set out on a journey. They saw his star in the east, or in the rising. This is likely a double entendre. They were in the east, in Parthia, when they saw it, and they saw it in the helical rising. Since it takes 4 months to get from that location to Bethlehem, they set out on their journey shortly after Sept. 1, 2 BC. The coincidence of the new moon day and the rising probably also made an impression on them, as well as the massive merger conjunction of Jupiter and Venus a bit earlier in the summer.
Another confirmation of the star is in Revelation 2:28 and 22:16. It says, "I will give him the morning star," that is Messiah will give it to those who have not known the deep things of Satan, who are getting the victory, and who are keeping the deeds of Messiah. It should be fairly obvious from this essay that the deeds of Messiah are expressed in faithfulness to his Torah. And the deep things of Satan are the counterfiet times and season that he has introduced into the tradition to alter the Scriptural times and seasons (Daniel 7:25). Along with the counterfiet times comes a counterfiet theology, a theology based on Hellenistic Philosophy, and expressed in its modern form as Augustinianism or Calvinism.
So he says he will give the morning star. If one follows the Torah, the conclusions lead to the morning star. Now Yeshua also said, "I am the root and the kindred of David, the bright dawn star" (Rev. 2:16; Zech. 6:12; Mat. 2:2). It should be noted that the Greek word that translated TZEMECH (Branch) was anatole, which means "riser," and can refer to the rising of a star as well as to the rising of a plant. As we have seen, he literally owns the rising of the bright planet called Tzedeq on the day of his birth. It took a group of Magi, astrologers and astronomical observers in Mesopotamia to notice. They did notice that for once, the Most High moved heaven and earth to signal and crown the birth of his only kindred Son.
Now, let us ask the question why authors of books about the Star of Bethlehem have not noticed how everything lines up? They have noticed quite a lot. But generally they have overlooked the September 1 date. Why is this? The reason they have not considered it, at least from the point of view of a scientific secondary cause, is that they are using a modern method of calculating the spring equinox that is based on geometry and not on the ground observational methods. The ancient method of finding the equinox by the Jewish priests was not Babylonian mathematics and Greek science. Rather they watched rising and setting sun travel to and fro on the eastern and western horizon, and they were looking for the sun to align east and west to fix the day of the circuit of the year. Because the sky has an atmosphere, refraction raises the sun above its geometric position as calculated by theory, and as a result it has a few more minutes to move down the angled path with which it approaches the horizen. The result is that it often reaches due west a day before a calculated geometical method would indicate! This is the exact method that stone age observatories lined up the beams of the sun on the equinox day. Refraction was baked in the cake.
We can, of course, calculate for refraction, even 2000 years ago, so find out when their observational method would have matched the first day of the year on the calendar. For 2 BC this date is March 22. And for 3 BC this date is March 22. Also the expected number of days was 365. And the 4 BC spring equinox had fallen on March 22 again after a period of 366 days from the 5 BC equinox, on March 21. It should be noted that the equinox date drops back to March 21st when the year before was 366 days. And that it jumps ahead to March 22 right after. The priest, of course were not using the proleptic Julian calendar. They were simply counting days from the last equinox.
In 2 BC, the new moon was seen on March 7 in the evening. This was an "A" case sighting on the Yallop scale. This rating for the moon is easily visible, and using it for the first month places the 15th of Nisan (Aviv) directly on the first day of the solar year. This alignment meets the criteria for the first month. However, if a geometic method of equinox calculation be used, then the equinox will come up on March 23rd, and the Passover will fall in the old year by that calculation. So this is why authors have missed the target.
It should also be noted that the central Jewish authorities consistently prioritized the mathematical calculation of the spring equinox over raw physical observation when determining leap years. However, they were deeply conscious of competing factions that adamantly demanded the use of literal agricultural observations, such as the ripening of the barley crop. To manage this tension, the Sanhedrin devised a highly sophisticated method of accommodating these groups without surrendering their own mathematical control. They established a formal legal framework to inspect three distinct agricultural regions of the Land of Israel: Judea, Galilee, and Transjordan. By focusing their physical inspections on the unique microclimates within these zones—such as the deep, low-elevation greenhouse environments of Jericho and the lower Jordan Valley—the authorities could rely on areas that naturally witnessed the accelerated, early ripening of grain and fruits. Consequently, if just one or two of these strategically selected regions produced the necessary agricultural results in structural alignment with the mathematical equinox, it was legally sufficient to validate the calendar change, successfully pacifying the factions while keeping the calculated equinox firmly on top at all times.
The Talmud explicitly codifies this political and calendar management: "Our Rabbis taught: A year may be intercalated on account of three regions: Judea, Transjordan, and Galilee. On account of two of them together, the year is intercalated, but on account of only one of them, it is not intercalated. But when one of them is Judea, they may intercalate it on account of Judea alone..." (Sanhedrin 11b). Because each of these three broad geographic zones contained highly accelerated microclimates, the central authorities could almost always guarantee that the necessary agricultural criteria were met in a sufficient number of locations to declare the arrival of Nisan as early as required—that is, as early as the calculated astronomical spring equinox indicated! For it was a hard and fast rule of Rabbinic law that no matter how ripe the agricultural crops appeared on the ground, the festival of Passover could never be legally celebrated before the solar spring equinox had occurred. Therefore, the Sanhedrin's field inspection rules were meticulously constructed to serve as a legal warrant, ensuring that the visual calendar could never be artificially intercalated past a month that already satisfied the structural parameters of the equinox.
In fact, the Rabbis round about way at arriving at the correct calculation is codified directly in Torah. Only the sun and moon are for setting appointed times (Gen. 1:14). And in Exodus 13:10, Passover is to be observed "from days unto days," that is from one batch of 365 or 366 days to the next. And on account of laws of compassion and mercy for the poor, the year could not be delayed, because there was a ban on eating the firstfruits until they were offered in the Temple on the 16th day of the first month! To delay the year past these criteria was literally to take food from the poor.
Sanhedrin 12a says, "תָּנוּ רַבָּנַן: אֵין מְעַבְּרִין אֶת הַשָּׁנָה לֹא בִּשְׁבִיעִית וְלֹא בְּמוֹצָאֵי שְׁבִיעִית. אֵימָתַי רְגִילִין לְעַבֵּר? עֶרֶב שְׁבִיעִית. שֶׁל בֵּית רַבָּן גַּמְלִיאֵל הָיוּ מְעַבְּרִין בְּמוֹצָאֵי שְׁבִיעִית. ": "The Sages taught in a baraita (Tosefta 2:5): The court may not intercalate the year in the Sabbatical Year, so as not to prolong the prohibitions of the Sabbatical Year, nor in the year after the Sabbatical Year, when there is not much produce available, and delaying the consumption of the new crop would also cause hardship."
However valid one thinks this ruling may be, the authorities would certainly be hesitant to add an Adar II in the spring of 2 BC. Why? Because a sabbatical year had just ended on Tishri 1, 3 BC. And the crops ripening in the spring of 2 BC were the first new crops since the harvest of 4 BC. So you see, there is no way to avoid Tishri 1 on September 1, 2 BC. If the weather had been cloudy on March 7, 2 BC and the new moon had not been seen, but calculation predicted it would be seen, the authorities would certainly have cited the preceding Sabbath year as a reason not to intercalate. That is, they might have cited that reason even if it wasn't the way they ran the calendar.
The final clue: Revelation 12:1-5. The birth of Messiah is accompanied by a sign in heaven: a sun clothed women with the moon under her feet. This arrangement agrees perfectly with the sun in the constellation of Virgo and the moon under the feet is the new moon. It lines up with Tishri 1, 2 BC. It does not line up a month earlier or a month later.