The Astronomy of the Bible, E. Walter Maunder [the reading strategies book TXT] 📗

THE MIDNIGHT CONSTELLATIONS OF WINTER, B.C. 2700.ToList

One or two other constellations appear, less distinctly, to refer to the first of these two promises. The Virgin, the woman of the zodiac, carries in her hand a bright star, the ear of corn, the seed; whilst, immediately under her, the great Water-snake, Hydra, is drawn out at enormous length, "going on its belly;" not writhing upwards like the Serpent, nor twined round the crown of the sky like the Dragon.

Yet again, the narrative in Genesis tells us that God "drove out the man" (i. e. Adam), "and He placed at the east of the garden of Eden the cherubim, and the flame of a sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life." No description is given of the form of the cherubim in that passage, but they are fully described by Ezekiel, who saw them in vision when he was by the river Chebar, as "the likeness of four living creatures." The same beings were also seen in vision by St. John, and are described by him in the Apocalypse as "four living creatures" (Zōa). "The first creature was like a lion, and the second creature like a calf, and the third creature had a face as of a man, and the fourth creature was like a flying eagle." Ezekiel gives a fuller and more complex description, but agreeing in its essential elements with that given by the Apostle, and, at the close of one of these descriptions, he adds, "This is the living creature that I saw under the God of Israel by the river of Chebar; and I knew that they were cherubim"—no doubt because as a priest he had been familiar with the cherubic forms as they were embroidered upon the curtains of the Temple, and carved upon its walls and doors.

The same four forms were seen amongst the constellation figures; not placed at random amongst them, but as far as possible in the four most important positions in the sky. For the constellations were originally so designed that the sun at the time of the summer solstice was in the middle of the constellation Leo, the Lion; at the time of the spring equinox in the middle of Taurus, the Bull; and at the time of the winter solstice, in the middle of Aquarius, the Man bearing the waterpot. The fourth point, that held by the sun at the autumnal equinox, would appear to have been already assigned to the foot of the Serpent-holder as he crushes down the Scorpion's head; but a flying eagle, Aquila, is placed as near the equinoctial point as seems to have been consistent with the ample space that it was desired to give to the emblems of the great conflict between the Deliverer and the Serpent. Thus, as in the vision of Ezekiel, so in the constellation figures, the Lion, the Ox, the Man, and the Eagle, stood as the upholders of the firmament, as "the pillars of heaven." They looked down like watchers upon all creation; they seemed to guard the four quarters of the sky.

If we accept an old Jewish tradition, the constellations may likewise give us some hint of an event recorded in the tenth chapter of Genesis. For it has been supposed that the great stellar giant Orion is none other than "Nimrod, the mighty hunter before the Lord," and the founder of the Babylonian kingdom; identified by some Assyriologists with Merodach, the tutelary deity of Babylon: and by others with Gilgamesh, the tyrant of Erech, whose exploits have been preserved to us in the great epic now known by his name. Possibly both identifications may prove to be correct.

More than one third of the constellation figures thus appear to have a close connection with some of the chief incidents recorded in the first ten chapters of Genesis as having taken place in the earliest ages of the world's history. If we include the Hare and the two Dogs as adjuncts of Orion, and the Cup as well as the Raven with Hydra, then no fewer than twenty-two out of the forty-eight are directly or indirectly so connected. But the constellation figures only deal with a very few isolated incidents, and these are necessarily such as lend themselves to graphic representation. The points in common with the Genesis narrative are indeed striking, but the points of independence are no less striking. The majority of the constellation figures do not appear to refer to any incidents in Genesis; the majority of the incidents in the Genesis narrative find no record in the sky. Even in the treatment of incidents common to both there are differences, which make it impossible to suppose that either was directly derived from the other.

But it is clear that when the constellations were devised,—that is to say, roughly speaking, about 2,700 b.c.,—the promise of the Deliverer, the "Seed of the woman" who should bruise the serpent's head, was well known and highly valued; so highly valued that a large part of the sky was devoted to its commemoration and to that of the curse on the serpent. The story of the Flood was also known, and especially the covenant made with those who were saved in the ark, that the world should not again be destroyed by water, the token of which covenant was the "Bow set in the cloud." The fourfold cherubic forms were known, the keepers of the way of the tree of life, the symbols of the presence of God; and they were set in the four parts of the heaven, marking it out as the tabernacle which He spreadeth abroad, for He dwelleth between the cherubim.

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 world. But in particular we have a very striking one from Babylonia. In the Epic of Gilgamesh, already alluded to, the eleventh tablet is devoted to an interview between the hero and Pir-napistim, the Babylonian Noah, who recounts to him how he and his family were saved at the time of the great flood.

This Babylonian story of the Deluge stands in quite a different relation from the Babylonian story of Creation in its bearing on the account given in Genesis. As we have already seen, the stories of Creation have practically nothing in common; the stories of the Deluge have many most striking points of resemblance, and may reasonably be supposed to have had a common origin.

Prof. Friedrich Delitzsch, in his celebrated lectures Babel and Bible, refers to this Babylonian Deluge story in the following terms:—