Goddess Of The Sun

A solar deity or sun deity is a deity who represents the Sun, or an aspect of it. Such deities are usually associated with power and strength. Solar deities and Sun worship can be found throughout most of recorded history in various forms. The Sun is sometimes referred to by its Latin name ''Sol'' or by its Greek name ''Helios''. The English word ''sun'' derives from Proto-Germanic *''sunnǭ''.

Overview

Predynasty Egyptian beliefs attribute Atum as the Sun god and Horus as god of the sky and Sun. As the Old Kingdom theocracy gained influence, early beliefs were incorporated into the expanding popularity of Ra and the Osiris-Horus mythology. Atum became Ra-Atum, the rays of the setting Sun. Osiris became the divine heir to Atum's power on Earth and passed his divine authority to his son, Horus. Other early Egyptian myths imply that the Sun is incorporated with the lioness Sekhmet at night and is reflected in her eyes; or that the Sun is found within the cow Hathor during the night and reborn each morning as her son (''bull'').

Mesopotamian Shamash played an important role during the Bronze Age, and "my Sun" was eventually used to address royalty. Similarly, South American cultures have a tradition of Sun worship as with the Incan Inti.

In Germanic mythology, the solar deity is '' Sol;'' in Vedic, Surya; and in Greek, Helios (occasionally referred to as Titan) and (sometimes) as Apollo. In Proto-Indo-European mythology the sun appears to be a multilayered figure manifested as a goddess but also perceived as the eye of the sky father Dyeus.

Solar myth

Three theories exercised great influence on nineteenth and early twentieth century mythography. The theories were the "solar mythology" of Alvin Boyd Kuhn and Max Müller, the tree worship of Mannhardt, and the totemism of J. F. McLennan.

Müller's "solar mythology" was born from the study of Indo-European languages. Of them, Müller believed Archaic Sanskrit was the closest to the language spoken by the Aryans. Using the Sanskrit names for deities as a base, he applied Grimm's law to names for similar deities from different Indo-European groups to compare their etymological relationships to one another. In the comparison, Müller saw the similarities between the names and used these etymological similarities to explain the similarities between their roles as deities. Through the study, Müller concluded that the Sun having many different names led to the creation of multiple solar deities and their mythologies that were passed down from one group to another.

R. F. Littledale criticized the Sun myth theory, pointing out that by his own principles, Max Müller was himself only a solar myth. Alfred Lyall delivered another attack on the same theory's assumption that tribal gods and heroes, such as those of Homer, were only reflections of the Sun myth by proving that the gods of certain Rajput clans were actual warriors who founded the clans a few centuries ago, and were the ancestors of the present chieftains.

Solar vessels and Sun chariots

The Sun was sometimes envisioned as traveling through the sky in a boat. A prominent example is the solar barque used by Ra in ancient Egyptian mythology. The Neolithic concept of a "solar barge" (also "solar bark", "solar barque", "solar boat" and "sun boat", a mythological representation of the Sun riding in a boat) is found in the later myths of ancient Egypt, with Ra and Horus. Several Egyptian kings were buried with ships that may have been intended to symbolize the solar barque, including the Khufu ship that was buried at the foot of the Great Pyramid of Giza.

Examples of solar vessels include:
* Neolithic petroglyphs which are interpreted as depicting solar barges.
* The many early Egyptian goddesses that were seen as sun deities, and the later gods Ra and Horus were depicted as riding in a solar barge. In Egyptian myths of the afterlife, Ra rides in an underground channel from west to east every night so that he can rise in the east the next morning.
* The Nebra sky disk, which is thought to show a depiction of a solar barge.
* Nordic Bronze Age petroglyphs, including those found in Tanumshede, often contain barges and sun crosses in different constellations.

The concept of the 'solar chariot' is younger than that of the solar barge and is typically Indo-European, corresponding with the Indo-European expansion after the invention of the chariot in the 2nd millennium BC.
The reconstruction of the Proto-Indo-European religion features a 'solar chariot' or 'sun chariot' with which the Sun traverses the sky.

Examples of solar chariots include:
* In Norse mythology, the chariot of the goddess Sól, drawn by Arvak and Alsvid. The Trundholm sun chariot dates to the Nordic Bronze Age, more than 2,500 years earlier than the Norse myth, but is often associated with it.
* Greek Helios (or Apollo) riding in a chariot. (See also Phaëton)
* Sol Invictus depicted riding a quadriga on the reverse of a Roman coin.
* Hindu Surya riding in a chariot drawn by seven horses.

In Chinese culture, the sun chariot is associated with the passage of time. For instance, in the poem ''Suffering from the Shortness of Days'', Li He of the Tang dynasty is hostile towards the legendary dragons that drew the sun chariot as a vehicle for the continuous progress of time. The following is an excerpt from the poem:

The Sun was also compared to a wheel, for example, in Greek ', Sanskrit ', and Anglo-Saxon ', all theorized to be reflexes of PIE . Scholarship also points to a possible reflex in poetic expressions in Ukrainian folk songs.

Gender

Solar deities are often thought of as male (and lunar deities as being female) but the opposite has often been the case. In Germanic mythology, the Sun is female, and the Moon is male. Other European cultures that have sun goddesses include the Lithuanians (Saulė) and Latvians (Saule), the Finns ( Päivätär, Beiwe) and the related Hungarians. Sun goddesses are found around the world in Australia ( Bila, Wala); in Indian tribal religions (Bisal- Mariamma, Bomong, 'Ka Sgni) and Sri Lanka (Pattini); among the Hittites (Wurusemu), Egyptians (Hathor, Sekhmet), and Canaanites (Shapash); in the Canary Islands (Chaxiraxi, Magec); in Native America, among the Cherokee ( Unelanuhi), Natchez (Oüa Chill/Uwahci∙ł), Inuit ( Malina), and Miwok ( He'-koo-lās); and in Asia among the Japanese (Amaterasu).

The cobra (of Pharaoh, son of Ra), the lioness (daughter of Ra), and the cow (daughter of Ra), are the dominant symbols of the most ancient Egyptian deities. They were female and carried their relationship to the sun atop their heads, and their cults remained active throughout the history of the culture. Later another sun god (Aten) was established in the eighteenth dynasty on top of the other solar deities, before the "aberration" was stamped out and the old pantheon re-established. When male deities became associated with the sun in that culture, they began as the offspring of a mother (except Ra, King of the Gods who gave birth to himself).

World religions

Solar deities are revered in some of the major world religions.

Christianity

Church Fathers

The comparison of Christ with the astronomical Sun is common in ancient Christian writings. By "the sun of righteousness" in Malachi 4 () "the fathers, from Justin downward, and nearly all the earlier commentators understand ''Christ'', who is supposed to be described as the rising sun". The New Testament itself contains a hymn fragment in Ephesians 5: "Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you." Clement of Alexandria wrote of "the Sun of the Resurrection, he who was born before the dawn, whose beams give light".

Purported Christianization of Sol Invictus

= Christianization of ''Natalis Invicti''

=

According to one hypothesis about Christmas, the date was set to 25 December because it was the date of the festival of Sol Invictus. The idea became popular especially in the 18th and 19th centuries.

The Philocalian calendar of AD 354 marks a festival of '' Natalis Invicti'' on 25 December. There is limited evidence that the festival was celebrated at around the time before the mid-4th century.

The earliest-known example of the idea that Christians chose to celebrate the birth of Jesus on 25 December because it was the date of an already existing festival of the Sol Invictus was expressed in an annotation to a manuscript of a work by 12th-century Syrian bishop Jacob Bar-Salibi. The scribe who added it wrote: "It was a custom of the Pagans to celebrate on the same 25 December the birthday of the Sun, at which they kindled lights in token of festivity. In these solemnities and revelries the Christians also took part. Accordingly when the doctors of the Church perceived that the Christians had a leaning to this festival, they took counsel and resolved that the true Nativity should be solemnized on that day."

= Calculation hypothesis

=

In the judgment of the Church of England Liturgical Commission, this view has been seriously challenged"Although this view is still very common, it has been seriously challenged" – Church of England Liturgical Commission, ''The Promise of His Glory: Services and Prayers for the Season from All Saints to Candlemas'' (Church House Publishing 1991 ) quoted i
The Date of Christmas and Epiphany
/ref> by a view based on an old tradition, according to which the date of Christmas was fixed at nine months after 25 March, the date of the vernal equinox, on which the Annunciation was celebrated.''Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church'' (Oxford University Press 2005 ), article "Christmas" The Jewish calendar date of 14 Nisan was believed to be that of creation, as well as of the Exodus and so of Passover, and Christians held that the new creation, both the death of Jesus and the beginning of his human life, occurred on the same date, which some put at 25 March in the Julian calendar.Frank C. Seen, ''The People's Work''
(Fortress Press 2010 ), p.72Frank C. Senn, ''Introduction to Christian Liturgy'' (Fortress Press 2012 ), p. 114]

It was a traditional Judaism, Jewish belief that great men lived a whole number of years, without fractions, so that Jesus was considered to have been conceived on 25 March, as he died on 25 March, which was calculated to have coincided with 14 Nisan. Sextus Julius Africanus (c.160 – c.240) gave 25 March as the day of creation and of the conception of Jesus. The tractate ''De solstitia et aequinoctia conceptionis et nativitatis Domini nostri Iesu Christi et Iohannis Baptistae'' falsely attributed to John Chrysostom also argued that Jesus was conceived and crucified on the same day of the year and calculated this as 25 March. A passage of the ''Commentary on the prophet Daniel'' by Hippolytus of Rome, written in about 204, has also been appealed to.

Among those who have put forward this view are Louis Duchesne, Thomas J. Talley, David J. Rothenberg, J. Neil Alexander, and Hugh Wybrew.

The ''Oxford Companion to Christian Thought'' also remarks on the uncertainty about the order of precedence between the celebrations of the Birthday of the Unconquered Sun and the birthday of Jesus: "This 'calculations' hypothesis potentially establishes 25 December as a Christian festival before Aurelian's decree, which, when promulgated, might have provided for the Christian feast both opportunity and challenge." Susan K. Roll calls "most extreme" the unproven hypothesis that "would call Christmas point-blank a 'christianization' of Natalis Solis Invicti, a direct conscious appropriation of the pre-Christian feast, arbitrarily placed on the same calendar date, assimilating and adapting some of its cosmic symbolism and abruptly usurping any lingering habitual loyalty that newly-converted Christians might feel to the feasts of the state gods".

= Winter solstice hypothesis

=

Among scholars who view the celebration of the birth of Jesus on 25 December as motivated by choice of the winter solstice, rather than that he was conceived and died on 25 March, some reject the idea that this choice constituted a deliberate Christianization of a festival of the Birthday of the Unconquered Sun. For example, Michael Alan Anderson writes:

The same point is made by Hijmans:

He also states that:

A study of Augustine of Hippo remarks that his exhortation in a Christmas sermon, "let us celebrate this day as a feast not for the sake of this sun, which is beheld by believers as much as by ourselves, but for the sake of him who created the sun", shows that he was aware of the coincidence of the celebration of Christmas and the Birthday of the Unconquered Sun, although this pagan festival was celebrated at only a few places and was originally a peculiarity of the Roman city calendar. It adds: "He also believes, however, that there is a reliable tradition which gives 25 December as the actual date of the birth of our Lord."

In the 5th century, Pope Leo I (the Great) spoke in several sermons on the Feast of the Nativity of how the celebration of Christ's birth coincided with the increase of the Sun's position in the sky. An example is: "But this Nativity which is to be adored in heaven and on earth is suggested to us by no day more than this when, with the early light still shedding its rays on nature, there is borne in upon our senses the brightness of this wondrous mystery.

= Christian iconography

=

The charioteer in the mosaic of Mausoleum M has been interpreted by some as Christ by those who argue that Christians adopted the image of the Sun (Helios or Sol Invictus) to represent Christ. In this portrayal, he is a beardless figure with a flowing cloak in a chariot drawn by four white horses, as in the mosaic in Mausoleum M discovered under Saint Peter's Basilica and in an early-4th-century catacomb fresco. The nimbus of the figure under Saint Peter's Basilica is rayed, as in traditional pre-Christian representations. Clement of Alexandria had spoken of Christ driving his chariot across the sky. This interpretation is doubted by others: "Only the ''cross-shaped'' nimbus makes the Christian significance apparent". and the figure is seen by some simply as a representation of the sun with no explicit religious reference whatever, pagan or Christian.

Life of Christ and astrological comparisons

Another speculation connects the biblical elements of Christ's life to those of a sun god. The Christian gospels report that Jesus had 12 followers (Apostles), which are claimed to be akin to the twelve zodiac constellations. When the Sun was in the house of Scorpio, Judas plotted with the chief priests and elders to arrest Jesus by kissing him. As the Sun exited Libra, it entered into the waiting arms of Scorpio to be kissed by Scorpio's bite.Nicholas Campion, ''The Book of World Horoscopes'', ''The Wessex Astrologer'', 1999, p. 489 clearly refers to both conventions adopted by many astrologers basing the Ages on either the zodiacal constellations or the sidereal signs.

Many of the world's sacrificed godmen, such as Osiris and Mithra, have their traditional birthday on 25 December. During this time, people believed that the "sun god" had "died" for three days and was "born again" on 25 December. After 25 December, the Sun supposedly moves 1 degree north, foreshadowing longer days. Note: This is a reprint; Kuhn died in 1963. The three days following 21 December remain the darkest days of the year where Jesus (the Sun) dies and remains unseen for three days.

At the beginning of the first century, the Sun on the vernal equinox passed from Aries to Pisces (1 A.D. to 2150 A.D). That harmonizes with the mentioned lamb and fish in the gospels. The man carrying a pitcher of water (Luke 22:10) is Aquarius, the water bearer, who is always seen as a man pouring out a pitcher of water. He represents the Age of Aquarius, the age after Pisces, and when the Sun leaves the Age of Pisces (Jesus), it will go into the House of Aquarius.

Hinduism

Worship of Surya

The ritual of ''Surya Namaskār'', performed by Hindus, is an elaborate set of hand gestures and body movements, designed to greet and revere the Sun.

In India, at Konark in the state of Odisha, a temple is dedicated to Surya. The Konark Sun Temple World Heritage Site. Surya is the most prominent of the ''navagrahas,'' or the nine celestial objects of the Hindus. ''Navagrahas'' can be found in almost all Hindu temples. There are further temples dedicated to Surya–one in Arasavalli, Srikakulam District in Andhra Pradesh, one in Gujarat at Modhera, and another in Rajasthan. The temple at Arasavalli was constructed in such a way that on the day of Radhasaptami, the Sun's rays directly fall on the feet of the Sri Suryanarayana Swami, the deity at the temple.

Chhath ( hi, छठ, also called ''Dala Chhath'') is an ancient Hindu festival dedicated to Surya, unique to Bihar, Jharkhand and the Terai. The major festival is also celebrated in the northeast region of India, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, and parts of Chhattisgarh. Hymns to the Sun can be found in the Vedas, the oldest sacred texts of Hinduism. Practiced in different parts of India, the worship of the Sun has been described in the Rigveda. In the state of Odisha, there is another festival called Samba Dashami which celebrates ''Surya''.

The sun is prayed to by South Indians during the harvest festival.

In Tamil Nadu, the Tamil people worship the sun god during the Tamil month of Thai, after a year of crop farming. The month is known as the harvesting month and people pay respects to the sun on the first day of the Thai month known as Thai pongal, or Pongal, which is a four-day celebration. It is one of the few indigenous worships by the Tamil people, irrespective of religion.

In other parts of India, the festival is celebrated as Makar Sankranti and is mostly worshiped by Hindu diaspora

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