"The Star" by Arthur C. Clarke as published in The Ascent of Wonder: The Evolution of Hard SF
Quotes:
It is three thousand light years to the Vatican.
And sinking into the sea, still warm and friendly and life-giving, is the sun that will soon turn traitor and obliterate all this innocent happiness.
Synopsis:
Somewhere in the mid-26th century an unnamed Jesuit astrophysicist is having a crisis of faith. He is the chief astrophysicist of a mission to study the remnants of a supernova. When the ship arrives in the former star system they find that one planet did survive the solar holocaust. It was this systems equivalent of Pluto, circling far from it's parent star. On it they find something they dub the Vault.
The Vault is a monument left behind by a race that knew it's own extinction was coming and wanted to leave some record of their existence for others to find. This includes many things, art, texts and videos. Some of which the crew of the mission watch. This is a great tragedy, and leaves the crew depressed, but it is not the cause of the Jesuits crisis.
He has done some calculations and is able to determine that the light from this supernova is the same light that heralded the birth of Jesus Christ.
Thoughts:
A number of years ago I read a
blog post (now on a substack) by the Dark Herald about Stargate. The movie, not the tv show that came later. One of the criticisms he had of it was of the handling of the archeology scenes and the lack care that was shown in the handling of ancient artifacts. I thought about that when reading this story. The crew are all serious professional scientists, but none of them are archeologists. So what is their reaction when finding what has to be one of the greatest xeno-archeological finds in human history? Where the slightest mishandling could destroy countless literally irreplaceable archeological treasures?
"Hey, lets crack it open! What's the worst that could happen?"
Some might think this is an unfair criticism, but if you're gonna write "serious" science fiction, which this most definitely is, then that's the kind of thing you have to think of. And a single line could have fixed it. Something like, "Stephens the xeno-archeologist hadn't expected much work this trip, but it turned out to be the biggest dig of his career."
Outside of that, the story is very well written. And I remember thinking that the first time I read it when I was a teenager, but on this re-read something did bother me. The big idea of this story, falls a little flat for me. It feels a little bit like the "theological" discussions elementary school kids have where they ask, "Could God make a rock so heavy he couldn't life it?" Only less intellectually honest and more mean spirited.
It makes me think think of someone asking a believer how they can still believe after, insert any one of the many tragedies in human history, happened. The difference being that this "tragedy" never happened. Now I'm agnostic so hardly the best person to hypothesize on how a religious person would react, but I imagine the discussion going something like this:
Author: "Can you still believe in your so-called loving god after he has done this?!"
Mildly confused religious person: "But, but it didn't happen. It's literally just a story you made up in your head."
Author: "But it could've! You don't know where that light came from. God could have slaughtered billions to send that sign! An since he could have you have to answer me how you can still have faith just as if it had really happened."
Mildly confused religious person: "But that's absurd! It's like asking if you still love your grandmother if she was a serial killer? She wasn't and there's no reason to think she was, but she could've been so you have to treat it as if she was."
Author: "Just like a religious bigot to call my grandmother a serial killer. Have you no shame? Jesus would be ashamed of you."
Moving from mildly confused to completely fed up religious person: "No I didn't! And you don't even believe in Jesus!"
And so on. The story feels very much like a precursor to Internet atheism. Classier and more intelligent, but very much in the same vein. But the story did make me think, even if in ways that the author probably didn't intend, but that's still to it's credit.
