The Astronomy Of The Bible An Elementary Commentary On The Astr

Modern Astronomy--Astronomy in the Classical Age--The Canon of Holy Scripture closed before the Classical Age--Character of the Scriptural References to the Heavenly Bodies--Tra...

Indian Eclipse of 1898--Contrast between the Heathen and Scientific Attitudes--The Law of Causality--Inconsistent with Polytheism--Faith in One God the Source to the Hebrews of...

Babylonian Creation Myth--Tiamat, the Dragon of Chaos--Overcome by Merodach--Similarity to the Scandinavian Myth--No Resemblance to the Narrative in Genesis--Meanings of the Heb...

Twofold Application of the Hebrew Word _raqia`_--Its Etymological Meaning--The Idea of Solidity introduced by the "Seventy"--Not the Hebrew Idea--The "Foundations" of Heaven and...

The Order of the Heavenly Movements--Daily Movement of the Sun--Nightly Movements of the Stars--The "Host of Heaven"-- Symbolic of the Angelic Host--Morning Stars--The Scripture...

The Double Purpose of the Two Great Heavenly Bodies--Symbolic Use of the Sun as Light-giver--No Deification of the Sun or of Light--Solar Idolatry in Israel--_Shemesh_ and _[H.]...

Importance of the Moon in Olden Times--Especially to the Shepherd--Jewish Feasts at the Full Moon--The Harvest Moon--The Hebrew Month a Natural one--Different Hebrew Words for M...

Vivid Impression produced by a Total Solar Eclipse--Eclipses not Omens to the Hebrews--Eclipses visible in Ancient Palestine-- Explanation of Eclipses--The Saros--Scripture Refe...

The "Seven Planets"--Possible Scripture References to Venus and Jupiter--"Your God Remphan" probably Saturn--The Sabbath and Saturn's Day--R. A. Proctor on the Names of the Days...

The "Greek Sphere"--Aratus--St Paul's Sermon at Athens--The Constellations of Ptolemy's Catalogue--References to the Constellations in Hesiod and Homer--The Constellation Figure...

Resemblance between the Babylonian and Genesis Deluge Stories--The Deluge Stories in Genesis--Their Special Features--The Babylonian Deluge Story--Question as to its Date--Its C...

Joseph's Dream--Alleged Association of the Zodiacal Figures with the Tribes of Israel--The Standards of the Four Camps of Israel--The Blessings of Jacob and Moses--The Prophecie...

The Four Serpent-like Forms in the Constellations--Their Significant Positions--The Dragon's Head and Tail--The Symbols for the Nodes--The Dragon of Eclipse--Hindu Myth of Eclip...

Difficulty of Identification--The most Attractive Constellations--_Kimah_--Not a Babylonian Star Name--A Pre-exilic Hebrew Term--The Pleiades traditionally Seven--Mädler's Sugge...

_Kesil_--Probably Orion--Appearance of the Constellation-- Identified in Jewish Tradition with Nimrod, who was probably Merodach--Altitude of Orion in the Sky--_Kesilim_--The "B...

Probably the "Signs of the Zodiac"--Babylonian Creation Story--Significance of its Astronomical References--Difference between the "Signs" and the "Constellations" of the Zodiac...

Rotation Period of Venus--Difficulty of the Time Problem on Venus--The Sun and Stars as Time Measurers--The apparent Solar Day the First in Use--It began at Sunset--Subdivisions...

The Week not an Astronomical Period--Different Weeks employed by the Ancients--Four Origins assigned for the Week--The Quarter-month--The Babylonian System--The Babylonian Sabba...

The New Moon a Holy Day with the Hebrews--The Full Moons at the Two Equinoxes also Holy Days--The Beginnings of the Months determined from actual Observation--Rule for finding E...

The Jewish Year a Luni-solar one--Need for an Intercalary Month--The Metonic Cycle--The Sidereal and Tropical Years--The Hebrew a Tropical Year--Beginning near the Spring Equino...

Law of the Sabbatic Year--A Year of Rest and Release--The Jubilee--Difficulties connected with the Sabbatic Year and the Jubilee--The Sabbatic Year, an Agricultural one--Interva...

The Jubilee Cycle possessed only by the Hebrews--High Estimation of Daniel and his Companions entertained by Nebuchadnezzar--Due possibly to Daniel's Knowledge of Luni-solar Cyc...

METHOD OF STUDYING THE RECORD--To be discussed as it stands--An early Astronomical Observation. BEFORE THE BATTLE--Movements of the Israelites--Reasons for the Gibeonites' Actio...

The Narrative--No Astronomical Details given--Purpose of the Scripture Narrative--Kepler's suggested Identification of the Star--The New Star of 1572--Legend of the Well of Beth...

Modern astronomy began a little more than three centuries ago with the invention of the telescope and Galileo's application of it to the study of the heavenly bodies. This new i...

A few years ago a great eclipse of the sun, seen as total along a broad belt of country right across India, drew thither astronomers from the very ends of the earth. Not only di...

The second verse of Genesis states, "And the earth was without form and void [_i. e._ waste and empty] and darkness was upon the face of the deep." The word _teh[=o]m_, here tra...

"And God said, Let there be a _r[=a]qi[=a]`_ in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. And God made the _r[=a]qi[=a]`_, and divided the waters wh...

As has been already pointed out, the astronomical references in Scripture are not numerous, and probably give but an inadequate idea of the actual degree of progress attained by...

"And God said Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons and for days, and years: and let th...

It is hard for modern dwellers in towns to realize the immense importance of the moon to the people of old. "The night cometh when no man can work" fitly describes their conditi...

"Moreover the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold, as the light of seven days, in the day that the Lord bindeth up th...

The stars and the heaven, whose host they are, were used by the Hebrew writers to express the superlatives of number, of height, and of expanse. To an observer, watching the hea...

Great comets are almost always unexpected visitors. There is only one great comet that we know has been seen more than once, and expect with reasonable certainty to see again. T...

Great meteorites--"aerolites" as they are called--are like great comets, chance visitors to our world. Now and then they come, but we cannot foretell their coming. Such an aerol...

We do not know what great comets, or aerolites, or "star-showers" were seen in Palestine during the centuries in which the books of the Bible were composed. But we do know that...

The planets, as such, are nowhere mentioned in the Bible. In the one instance in which the word appears in our versions, it is given as a translation of _Mazzaloth_, better rend...

The age of Classical astronomy began with the labours of Eudoxus and others, about four centuries before the Christian Era, but there was an Earlier astronomy whose chief featur...

As we have just shown, the constellations evidently were designed long before the earliest books of the Old Testament received their present form. But the first nine chapters of...

Beside the narrative of the Flood given to us in Genesis, and the pictorial representation of it preserved in the star figures, we have Deluge stories from many parts of the wor...

The earliest reference in Scripture to the constellations of the zodiac occurs in the course of the history of Joseph. In relating his second dream to his brethren he said--

There are amongst the constellations four great draconic or serpent-like forms. Chief of these is the great dragon coiled round the pole of the ecliptic and the pole of the equa...

The translators of the Bible, from time to time, find themselves in a difficulty as to the correct rendering of certain words in the original. This is especially the case with t...

_K[)e]s[=i]l_, the word rendered by our translators "Orion," occurs in an astronomical sense four times in the Scriptures; twice in the Book of Job, once in the prophecy of Amos...

We have no assistance from any cuneiform inscriptions as to the astronomical significance of _`Ayish_, _K[=i]mah_, and _K[)e]s[=i]l_, but the case is different when we come to _...

The foregoing extract from the fifth tablet of Creation has no small astronomical interest. Merodach is represented as setting in order the heavenly bodies. First of all he allo...

In two passages of the Book of Job a word, _`Ash_ or _`Ayish_, is used, by context evidently one of the constellations of the sky, but the identification of which is doubtful. I...

There is a difference of opinion at the present day amongst astronomers as to the time in which the planet Venus rotates upon her axis. This difference arises through the diffic...

The present chapter has little, if anything, to do with astronomy, for the week, as such, is not an astronomical period. But the sabbath and the week of seven days are so intima...

As was pointed out in the chapter on the Moon, the Hebrews used two expressions for month--_Chodesh_, from a root meaning "to be new"; and _Yerach_, from the root meaning "to be...

As the Rabbi Aben Ezra pointed out, _shanah_, the ordinary Hebrew word used for year, expresses the idea of _annus_ or _annulus_, a closed ring, and therefore implies that the y...

Syria came up"; but in this case it probably means early spring, for it is only of late centuries that war has been waged in the winter months. Down to the Middle Ages, the armi...

The principle of the week with its sabbath of rest was carried partially into the month, and completely into the year. The seventh month of the year was marked out pre-eminently...

The cycle of 49 years, marked out by the return of the Jubilee, was a useful and practical one. It supplied, in fact, all that the Hebrews, in that age, required for the purpose...

There are three incidents recorded in Holy Scripture which may fairly, if with no great exactness, be termed astronomical miracles;--the "long day" on the occasion of Joshua's v...

The second astronomical marvel recorded in the Scripture narrative is the going back of the shadow on the dial of Ahaz, at the time of Hezekiah's recovery, from his dangerous il...

No narrative of Holy Scripture is more familiar to us than that of the visit of the wise men from the East to see Him that was born King of the Jews. It was towards the end of t...