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  • From: "Harold R. Holmyard III" <hholmyard AT ont.com>
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Genesis 8:22
  • Date: Thu, 27 Apr 2006 11:33:13 -0500

Dear Yitzhak,

> HH: The word MW(D ("time") clearly can refer to the seasons of
nature. In Jer 8:7 it refers to the migration season for birds. In Ps
> 104:19 it refers to nature's seasons:

I think you are mistranslating Psalm 104. The word mw(d very often
refers to the full moon holiday.


HH: A full moon holiday is foreign to the context of the natural world of Psalm 104:

Psa. 104:18 The high mountains belong to the wild goats; the crags are a refuge for the coneys.
Psa. 104:19 The moon marks off the seasons, and the sun knows when to go down.
Psa. 104:20 You bring darkness, it becomes night, and all the beasts of the forest prowl.
Psa. 104:21 The lions roar for their prey and seek their food from God.
Psa. 104:22 The sun rises, and they steal away; they return and lie down in their dens.
Psa. 104:23 Then man goes out to his work, to his labor until evening.

HH: What do wild goats care about a full moon holiday? What do beasts of the forest care about it? What do lions care about it?

HH: Here is a small piece of writing about this part of Psalm 104:
http://www.asa3.org/ASA/PSCF/1995/PSCF6-95Schafran.html

The second section which mentions mankind, verses 19-23, demonstrates Yahweh's sovereignty over creation by appointing heavenly bodies to regulate the seasons and days. The key word here is "for the seasons" The rest of the section is a series of specific illustrations on how the sun and moon regulate the animal world and man. Key terms are used to express the regulation of the natural world by the moon and sun. The sun knows "its setting or going down" darkness becomes "night" all forest life roams under the cover of "night" the sun "rises" to mark the end of the day; man goes out to his work "until evening"

The specific illustration demonstrating the regulation of the moon and sun is the interplay between mankind and the lion. The lion hunts at night and rests in the day; mankind rests at night and "tills" the land in the day. Here man and animal are placed on an egalitarian level as workers from the natural world who illustrate how wonderfully the sun and moon regulate the cycle of time.


This appears clearly from its use to
denote the special holidays such as Passover and Sukkoth.


HH: I know, but that's not the context here.


Even
Shavuoth is included because the date given in the Bible falls on the
15th of the month when assuming a 12x30 or 4x91 calendar, and this
can be considered a further development from an original date in the
15th of a lunisolar calendar.


HH: Fine, but the context does not mention the sabbath.


Moed also appears in conjuction with
the term Hodesh (new moon) and also Hag and Shabbat, the later
also probably a term for the full moon in certain cases.


HH: FIne.


In the case
of Psalm 104, this kind of interpretation is also very plausible. In
fact, the moon is not usually associated with the seasonal calendar
(this is the role of the sun), so this interpretation of Psalm 104 is
probably more likely, and yours seems rather unlikely.


HH: The moon is related to the cycle of day and night, to the cycle of months, to the tides. It seems to do other things. Here are a few quotes from people writing on this topic (note especially the second quote):
http://uplink.space.com/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=askastronomer&Number=114701&page=10&view=collapsed&sb=6&o=0&fpart=

Neil F. Comins's What if the Moon Didn't Exist addresses this very possibility [the existence of the earth without the moon] in an article. His consensus--he's a physicist, by the way--is that the Earth would rotate much more rapidly, and hence probably be a windier and stormier place.

"According to three French scientists, the moon's gravity is now believed to be what keeps the earth's axis inclined 23 degrees, thus ensuring a regular change of seasons. (Nature, February 18, 1993)." -"Awake!," 7/8/94, p. 4.

To the already striking list of factors that make planet Earth uniquely suitable for life, astronomers may have to add another item: the Moon. Our satellite does far more than provide an ornamental night light for the skies and create tides. According to computer studies by French astronomers, it also helps to regulate earth's obliquity, that is, the degree of tilt of its spin axis. Mars, which does not have such a large satellite, has apparently shifted in its degree of tilt between 10 and 50 degrees over the ages. This instability has probably caused catastrophic climate changes, with the polar caps melting and then refreezing. The computer studies revealed that without the moon, which exerts a restraining influence, the earth's obliquity may well have shifted by some 85 degrees. Thus, the French astronomers conclude: "One might consider the Moon to act as a potential climate regulator for the Earth."- Ibid., 9/22/93, pp. 28,29.

HH: Here's a comment about moon and time marking, showing that the moon could mark not only days and months but seasons (I capitalized the key word "seasonal" below) and cycles of years:
http://www.stonesofwonder.com/watching.htm

Just as much as the sun, the moon has always been an object of wonder and veneration. It is a spectacular night sky object, and has the advantage over the sun that it can always be looked at directly. Its cycle of phases during each month is obvious and those phases, and the months themselves, are a convenient way of dividing time and describing different periods of time in a pre-literate society.

Anyone observing the moon even casually over the period of a year would inevitably notice several interesting facts.

The most important is probably that the twelve or thirteen full moons over the course of the year do not rise and set in the same positions on the horizon. The full moons in summer rise and set much further to the south compared with those in winter. This means that the full moons of summer are in the sky for a shorter period than those of winter, and reach a lower altitude in the sky. From the perspective of a pre-technological society, it would seem very lucky that the winter full moons rose earlier and set later, providing light through the long winter nights just when it was needed most. In fact, it probably seemed miraculous. The full moon nearest to midwinter is always the highest and longest shining full moon of the year, and everyone has experienced bright moonlit frosty nights around the winter holiday.

Once this SEASONAL difference in the full moons had been noticed, a further fact would probably have been observed as well, as the years passed. This is that from year to year the rising and setting positions of these winter and summer solstice moons themselves change. The change from one winter solstice or summer solstice to its equivalent a year later is about 3°. (This is the same as the width of six moon diameters, and the change would be plain to any careful observer.) This is the most obvious way in which the other cycle of the moon's movement reveals itself. The moon goes through a cycle of horizon positions which repeats itself every 18.6 years. Fundamentally, the cycle is of a widening and narrowing band of rising and setting positions which the moon at any phase can attain. At one extreme point of the cycle, called the 'major standstill' (following Alexander Thom), the moon will rise and set far to the north, well beyond the position of the sun at the summer solstice. Two weeks later, the moon will be rising and setting far to the south, only appearing in the sky for a very short period.

Figure 9 illustrates the very different paths of the full moon across the horizon at the winter solstice and the summer solstice, during the lunar major standstill period. The contrast in rising positions and the time that the moon is in the sky at those two times of year is very marked, and would not have been missed by people who spent most of their lives out of doors. During the period of the major standstill the moon at phases other than full will swing between the two limits shown; in other words a waxing or waning moon could appear in the extreme positions to north or to south. But the only full moons which will attain the extreme positions shown in the diagram are those closest to the summer and winter solstices.

Just over nine years later, during the 'minor standstill', the limits of the moon's path have contracted, and the positions of the solstice full moons will be as shown in Figure 10. It will be seen that now there is less of a contrast between the summer and winter full moon positions, though the winter full moon is still in the sky for a much longer period than the summer full moon. Again it must be remembered that at other times of year during the minor standstill the moon's phases will move between those limits, with a waxing or waning moon capable of reaching the limiting positions.

Such are the fundamentally simple movements of the sun and the moon across our skies. The key positions for the sun are the two solstices and the two equinoxes, and for the moon the positions of the full moon closest to the two solstices at the times of the standstills. The easiest way of defining and recording such events for a society with no writing or instruments is by erecting permanent markers which cause a viewer to look towards the positions on the horizon where the sun or the moon will rise or set at the times in question. It is now accepted that this is part of the purpose of many of the standing stones, stone circles and chambered cairns erected in the late stone age or Neolithic period, and in the early Bronze age.


As for Jeremiah, I had considered the possibility that the terms in
Jer 8:7 refer to constellations. The main argument is the joint
terms sws and (gwr, which appear jointly in places I consider to
be astrological contexts. This example is a rebuke of astrology.


HH: The obvious meaning of the passage stands:

Jer. 8:7 Even the stork in the sky knows her appointed seasons, and the dove, the swift and the thrush observe the time of their migration. But my people do not know the requirements of the LORD.

HH: This text is unmistakably taking about the migration patterns of birds, which are seasonal.


In Isaiah 38:14 it appears as part of a prayer following an
astrological sign (Isaiah 38:8). I would also argue there are
reasons to read the Balaam inscription, where this term also
seems to appear, as an astrological document. While these
considerations are not conclusive, the word "seasons" as the
translation of Jer 8:7 is not necessary, and the usual translation
"appointed times" is more reasonable in this case as well.


HH: But they are times that come seasonally.

Yours,
Harold Holmyard





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