Solar deity

“ Sun worship played an important part in nearly all the early pagan Mysteries. This indicates the probability of their Atlantean origin, for the people of Atlantis were sun worshipers. The Solar Deity was usually personified as a beautiful youth, with long golden hair to symbolize the rays of the sun. This golden Sun God was slain by wicked ruffians, who personified the evil principle of the universe. ”

“ Deity, all the universe is a symbol of creative power and wisdom which is boundless and enduring, and proclaims that our world, the sun and the universe are eternal and enduring.
The question of the continued existence of our solar system is a fascinating subject to most of our astronomers; they seem never to be weary of looking forward to a time when the light of the sun will expire with age, or it will be destroyed by some great catastrophe. ”

“ Many deities have been associated with the sun. The Greeks believed that Apollo, Bacchus, Dionysos, Sabazius, Hercules, Jason, Ulysses, Zeus, Uranus, and Vulcan partook of either the visible or invisible attributes of the sun. The Norwegians regarded Balder the Beautiful as a solar deity, and Odin is often connected with the celestial orb, especially because of his one eye. Among the Egyptians, Osiris, Ra, Anubis, Hermes, and even the mysterious Ammon himself had points of resemblance with the solar disc. ”

“ It appears to have been gotten up as a substitute for sun-worship, as this luminary was believed to be constituted of fire, though in reality there never was any such thing as sun or solar worship. Christian writers represent the ancient Persians as has having been addicted to solar worship. But Firdausi, Cudworth and other authors declare that neither they nor any other nation ever worshiped the sun, but merely an imaginary Deity supposed to reside in the sun. Heathen nations have been charged with many things of which they were not guilty ”

“ The solar orb, like the nature of man, was divided by the ancient sages into three separate bodies. According to the mystics, there are three suns in each solar system, analogous to the three centers of life in each individual constitution. These are called three lights: the spiritual sun, the intellectual or soular sun, and the material sun (now symbolized in Freemasonry by three candles) . The spiritual sun manifests the power of God the Father; the soular sun radiates the life of God the Son; and the material sun is the vehicle of manifestation for God the Holy Spirit. ”

“ The woman alluded to in this text is the Virgo of the Zodiac, as will be made apparent hereafter.
Of all the divinities of the ancient mythology God Sol was the only one distinguished by the exalted title of Lord or Lord God, for the reason that he was made the organizer of chaos and governor of heaven and earth. Hence, having constituted him the lord of light and darkness, as well as good and evil, the ancient astrologers in composing the solar fables made him say of himself, "I form the light and create darkness; I make peace and create evil, I the Lord do all these things," Isaiah xlv., 7. ”

“ One of the prettiest, oldest, and most universally favorite solar myths is the one which represents the Sun as a divine being, youthful and of surpassing beauty, beloved by or wedded to an equally powerful goddess, but meeting a premature death by accident and descending into the dark land of shades, from which, however, after a time he returns as glorious and beautiful as before. ”

“ Believing that God Sol was necessitated to remain at his post to direct the course of the sun, the ancient astrologers conceived the idea of teaching that, attended by a retinue of subordinate genii, he descended to earth through the medium of incarnations at the end of 600 year cycles, to perform the work of man's redemption and, having made Virgo of the Zodiac the mother of the Solar divinity, they taught in their allegorical Astronomy, or scriptures, that his incarnations were born of a Virgin. ”

“ In the same manner ends the tale of the long toil and sorrows of other Sun-gods. The last scene exhibits a manifest return to the spirit of the solar myth. He must not die the common death of all men, for no disease or corruption can touch the body of the brilliant Sun. After a long struggle against the dark clouds who are arrayed against him, he is finally overcome, and dies. Blacker and blacker grow the evening shades, and finally "there is darkness on the face of the earth," and the din of its thunder clashes through the air. ”

“ The sun, the most glorious object of the universe, became the central object of worship, and occupies a conspicuous position in their religious system. The various aspects of the sun as it pursued its course across the sky became so many solar deities. Horus was the youthful sun seen in the eastern horizon. ”

“ Moon worship preceded sun worship. Veneration of the moon was at its height during the hunting era, while sun worship became the chief religious ceremony of the subsequent agricultural ages. Solar worship first took extensive root in India, and there it persisted the longest. In Persia sun veneration gave rise to the later Mithraic cult. Among many peoples the sun was regarded as the ancestor of their kings. ”

“ A recent writer thus eloquently refers to the universality, in ancient times, of sun-worship: "Sabaism, the worship of light, prevailed amongst all the leading nations of the early world. By the rivers of India, on the mountains of Persia, in the plains of Assyria, early mankind thus adored, the higher spirits in each country rising in spiritual thought from the solar orb up to Him whose vicegerent it seems—to the Sun of all being, whose divine light irradiates and purifies the world of soul, as the solar radiance does the world of sense. ”

“ As the great cosmic Bard of solar biology expresses it in his sublime epic:
The radiant flux and reflux, the serene
Atomic ebb and flow of force divine,
This, this alone, is God, the Demiurgus;
By this alone we are, and still shall be.
O joy! the Phantom of the Uncondition’d
Fades into nothingness before the breath
Of that eternal ever-effluent Life
Whose centre is the shining solar Heart
Of countless throbbing pulses, each a world! ”

“ There is the golden harvest in its summer beams. Again, the contemplative spirit in all ages has formed an association between the sun and the Deity, whether as the fittest symbol of God, or as being His greatest gift to man. Here we have an association still more refined, and of a somewhat less frequent character, but one which will be found to enter, in a very subtle manner, into that impression we receive from the great luminary. ”

“ Nature-worship was the foundation of all polytheistic religions; and that the principal heathen deities were originally personifications of the great luminary that gives light and heat to the earth, or of certain influences thereof, admits of little doubt. The solar character of numerous deities is clearly discernible. Jupiter had power over the phenomena of the skies. ”

“ The authors of the original solar fables, having lived in that remote age in which physical prowess was recognized as the highest attribute of humanity, conceived the idea that God Sol, while passing through his apparent orbit, had to fight his way with the animals of the Zodiac, and with others in conjunction with them. ”

“ Put one of the cold thin moons of Saturn into the centre of the solar system,—would the universe revolve about that little dot? Loyal matter with irresistible fealty gravitates towards the sun, and wheels around the balance-point of the world's weight, be it where it may, called by whatever name. ”

“ And thus will it be, until the Sun, in its mighty solar heavens of purified spiritual life, will form the last, the final battle ground of matter, receiving ITS NEW LIFE FROM A GREATER CENTER THAN ITSELF. A glorious solar world, well typified in the last Battle of the Gods, and the new Earth—a World whereon the Angels tread in superlatively beautiful forms, clothed with the ideals and emanations of their own divine purity—Souls clothed in Air, treading the ethereal Realms of Light, as the children of God, and the inheritors of the Kingdom of Heaven. ”

“ Of what they are the symbols the Mason in that Rite is not told. Nor does the Moon in any sense rule the night with regularity.
The Sun is the ancient symbol of the life-giving and generative power of the Deity. To the ancients, light was the cause of life; and God was the source from which all light flowed; the essence of Light, the Invisible Fire, developed as Flame manifested as light and splendor. The Sun was His manifestation and visible image; and the Sabæans worshipping the Light-God, seemed to worship the Sun, in whom they saw the manifestation of the Deity. ”

“ And yet wise people wonder and say, How curious that the ancient Aryans should have had so many solar myths. Why, every time we say "Good-morning," we commit a solar myth. Every poet who sings about "the May driving the Winter from the field again" commits a solar myth. ”

“ The most picturesque sight of all the Solar System is seen as you stand on Saturn, and watch the rings and the eight moons chasing one another in the heavens above you.
The inhabitants of this beautiful world believe that the soul of each God-adorer at death passes out into the spirit life on the rings where it will continue in a blissful existence until the final judgment. ”

“ But if we reflect deeply we will perceive that the great bestower and giver of life is God; the sun is the intermediary of His will and plan. Without the bounty of the sun therefore the world would be in darkness. All illumination of our planetary system proceeds or emanates from the solar center. ”

“ It is the sign of the Man. The truths of the past are becoming etherealized. Our solar parent has scarcely crossed the threshold of the sign Aquarius, and already we observe in many directions the activities of the peculiar influx. True, it is but the first flush of the dawn of a new era, the harbinger of a glorious day to our race. In the light of this truth, ponder well on the nature of the influx radiating from the solar center, each orb of his shining family absorbing a different ray, or attribute, of solar energy, corresponding to its own peculiar nature. ”

“ It is itself a result of the awakening of such powers by men, for the teachings which it puts before us are founded upon direct observations made in the past, and rendered possible only by such development.
As a philosophy, it explains to us that the solar system is a carefully-ordered mechanism, a manifestation of a magnificent life, of which man is but a small part. ”

“ The serpent, which brings ruin to mankind, seems to be the constellation of that name which ushers winter into the world, and over which the sun finally prevails. In fact, almost every detail of the Saviour-legend which is the life and soul of Christian doctrine points to the solar origin of the myth: the nature of his functions, the time and manner of his birth and death, the very terminology of the story in older literature, is transparently astronomical. Looking back on the myths which we have summarized above, we see that they only find an adequate explanation in the solar theory. ”

“ He was, at this time, unknown to me; his arresting book on ‘A Modern Reconstruction of Sun-worship in Ancient Egypt’ being my only link with his unusual mind. Apparently he regarded the sun as the deity of the scientific religion of the future which would replace the various anthropomorphic gods of childish creeds. He discussed the possibility of the zodiacal signs being some kind of Celestial Intelligences. Belief blazed on every page. Men’s life is heat, derived solely from the sun, and men were, therefore, part of the sun in the sense that a Christian is part of his personal deity. ”

“ Here we can clearly watch the gradual transition from the visible sun to the invisible agent of the sun which may have taken centuries to evolve, and if we consider how almost everything on earth is dependent on the sun for its very life, we can understand how a perfectly natural road led from the sun as seen in heaven, to the sun as the highest, the supreme, nay, in the end, as the only deity. This religious and philosophical development of the concept of the sun did not, however, prevent its simultaneous mythological growth. ”

“ Then, as light is analogous to the Divine Nature, and favorable to souls struggling to return to their First Principle, and as that light so increases at the Vernal Equinox, that the days prevail in duration over the nights, and as the Sun has an attractive force, besides the visible energy of his rays, it follows that souls are attracted toward the solar light. ”

“ The heathen idea is that the orbs of heaven are divine, or at least that each expresses a divinity. This does not in itself seem an unnatural idea when we consider the great benefits that come to us through the instrumentality of the sun and moon. It is the sun that morning by morning rolls back the darkness, and brings light and warmth and returning life to men; it is the sun that rouses the earth after her winter sleep and quickens vegetation. It is the moon that has power over the great world of waters, whose pulse beats in some kind of mysterious obedience to her will. ”

“ But as all the parts of the earth are not immediately illuminated, but come into the solar light successively, not only in consequence of the earth's diurnal revolution round its own axis, but in consequence of its annual revolution round its whole orbit; so this Sun of righteousness, who has shined out, is bringing every part of the habitable globe into his Divine light; that light is shining more and more to the perfect day; so that gradually and successively he is enlightening every nation, and every man ”