Sirius heliacal rise

We recently published a post detailing the mechanics of the heliacal rising of a star or constellation. The heliacal rising of Sirius is currently taking place (on days that vary slightly depending upon your latitude on the earth) -- an extremely important event in ancient civilization.

For observers at about 35° north latitude and an elevation at sea level, Sirius rises on August 7th at 5:32 am. It continues to rise about four minutes earlier each day, a phenomenon described in this previous post.

At the same latitude and elevation, the sun rises on August 7th at 6:16 am. It continues to rise about a minute later each day (in the northern hemisphere), as the earth proceeds along its orbital path from the summer solstice (which already took place back in June) towards fall equinox (in September) and ultimately to winter solstice.

Until its heliacal rise, the sun was rising earlier than Sirius. However, as Sirius rises earlier and earlier, it eventually begins to rise earlier than the sun (and as it keeps rising earlier and earlier its rise will continue "into the night" and further ahead of sunrise). When Sirius first begins to rise earlier than the sun, the sky is still too bright to observe Sirius. However, as Sirius continues to rise earlier, it is higher in the sky each day when the sun comes up. Another way of thinking about this is that the sun is lower and lower below the eastern horizon as Sirius comes up over the eastern horizon each morning (because Sirius is rising earlier and earlier). Eventually, Sirius will rise prior to the sun at such a point that the sky is not bright enough to drown it out, and Sirius will be visible in the early morning sky above the eastern horizon, which will be lit by the sun's rays but not enough to drown out this brightest of fixed stars. When Sirius rises above the horizon and the sun is still 7° below the horizon, Sirius will be bright enough to be seen.

Fainter stars than Sirius must continue rising earlier before they are seen on their dates of heliacal rise, meaning that the sun would have to be further below the horizon than 7° before they would be visible for the first time. However, Sirius can be seen when it rises far enough ahead of the sun to crest the horizon when the sun is still 7° below the horizon. These conditions are beginning to be met for Sirius this week (on August 7th in most of the latitudes of the continental United States).

In their seminal text Hamlet's Mill: An Essay on Myth and the Frame of Time, Giorgio de Santillana and Hertha von Dechend discuss the incredible importance of the star Sirius to ancient civilizations -- including the ancient advanced civilization that they believed must have predated Sumer, Babylon and dynastic Egypt, and bequeathed to them a highly sophisticated understanding of astronomy, mathematics and science.

They point out that Sirius was associated with a plethora of ancient mythological images and themes. In addition to being the star of Isis the consort of Osiris, Sirius was also identified (among other things) with a celestial bow and arrow (216). De Santillana and von Dechend show that ancient Babylonian star descriptions identified the stars that we associate with the lower legs and tail of the constellation Canis Major with a drawn bow pointing to Sirius, which became the "Arrow Star."

The constellation is shown below, with the positions of the stars that form the bow pointing to Sirius connected by bright green lines:


























That this bow pointing to Sirius was very ancient is confirmed by its depiction in ancient Egyptian imagery, such as the Round Zodiac at Dendera (see detail below):


















The great emperors of Ancient China were also depicted pointing the bow and arrow at a celestial dog or jackal, clearly indicative of the Dog Star Sirius, as shown in the image below (a similar image is reproduced in Hamlet's Mill between pages 216 and 217, as is the Dendera Zodiac shown above):
























The authors of Hamlet's Mill explain that Sirius was also associated in some way with the depths of the sea, citing for example an ancient Babylonian New Year's ritual addressed to the "Arrow Star, who measures the depths of the sea" and the sacred texts of Zoroastrianism, the Avesta, which names the arrow Tishtriya and addresses it as "Tishtriya, by whom the waters count" (358). They also cite also numerous myths in which a goddess or a maiden who shoot an arrow from a bow into the midst of the ocean -- or to "the navel of the ocean" -- including a myth from the Northwest Indians of British Columbia (318).

In his book Sirius Matters, astronomer Dr. Noah Brosch notes that in the past, "the heliacal rising of Sirius was an outstandingly favorable time for the gathering of medicinal herbs" (26). He also records that in the time of the ancient Greeks, the men of the island of Kea (Ceos) in the Aegean each year "would dress up in armor and ascend a hill to witness the heliacal rising of Sirius" (25).

If possible, be sure to rise early this week and look for the brilliant star Sirius before the sunrise, low in sky by the eastern horizon. Look for Orion and use the belt, drawing a line through the belt stars towards the horizon. The image at the top of this post shows Orion and Sirius to the left of the belt stars -- in the morning, when Orion is just rising, the constellation will be oriented more horizontally than pictured above (to orient the picture above the way you will see it in the sky before dawn, just mentally rotate the image above counterclockwise almost a quarter turn, for viewers in the northern hemisphere).

Liquid water on Mars

Yesterday, the journal Science published a paper by planetary scientist Alfred S. McEwen, along with colleagues Lujendra Ojha, Colin M. Dundas, Sarah S. Mattson, Shane Byrne, James J. Wray, Selby C. Cull, Scott L. Murchie, Nicholas Thomas, and Virginia C. Gulick entitled "Seasonal Flows on Warm Martian Slopes."

In it, they analyze new high-resolution images from a special camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and argue that ongoing seasonal temperature changes appear to be causing what may be salty water near the surface of Mars to flow in liquid form even today, which is the first time anyone has determined that this is happening. The article's lead author, Dr. McEwen of the University of Arizona, is the principle investigator on that camera, which is called the HiRise camera (for High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment).

Planetary scientist Oded Aharonson says, "This is the best evidence yet of liquid water emerging on the surface of Mars" in an accompanying story in Science Now entitled "Is Mars Weeping Salty Tears?" That story argues that the salty content of the water lowers the freezing point, and that the surface may get close to freezing, warm enough to allow meager flows (which have been designated "recurring slope lineae," or RSL) to melt and make their way down steep crater slopes prior to drying up or evaporating.

A NASA article published Thursday on the same subject says that sunlight sometimes warms temperatures to 80° F in parts of the Martian surface. In this interview which aired on NPR yesterday, Dr. McEwen confirms that the surface can get up to "a balmy eighty degrees Fahrenheit or so, maybe even warmer" but that at night it gets much colder and thus the temperatures just a few inches below the surface stay extremely cold. He notes that "some of this activity occurs when the surface temperatures are too cold for pure water to melt," which indicates that the water (if it is water) must be salty, and explains the temperatures described in the Science Now article referenced above. He also notes that the atmospheric pressure is so low on Mars that pure water would actually boil at temperatures near freezing, but that salty water which has a higher boiling point would not.

The abstract for Professor McEwen's paper notes that "the exact mechanism and source of the water are not understood." However, it is impossible (for me) not to point out that these findings are very much consistent with the predictions of the hydroplate theory, as discussed in this previous post entitled "Let's go to Mars," published before these new findings became known to the general public (or at least to me).

In that post, we saw that hydroplate theory creator Dr. Walt Brown believes that salty water remains frozen at the surface of Mars and that it came from above in the form of comets and icy asteroids which bombarded the Martian surface (creating the craters where this activity is being noted). According to his theory, this water originated on earth and was blasted into space during the violent eruption of underground water which initiated the flood event. We have seen that there are hundreds of data points on earth which appear to support such an event (some of those are described in the posts linked in this previous post).

We should all congratulate the scientists who have discovered this ongoing dynamic activity on the surface of Mars and wish them the best with their continuing investigation of this phenomenon. Additionally, it would not be a bad idea for them to become acquainted with the hydroplate theory, no matter how different it is from the reigning conventional theories, because it provides an explanation which appears to shed light on these recent findings, as well as an explanation which accords well with phenomena here on earth which can be studied in person.

Did early earth have two moons?

Today, the taxpayer-funded American radio station NPR featured an interesting new theory attempting to explain the longstanding dilemma of what could have caused such a difference in terrain and geology on one side of earth's moon versus the other side.

The new theory, introduced by University of California at Santa Cruz professor Erik Asphaug, posits that the distinct difference between the two sides of the moon, long debated by scientists, could have been caused by a low-speed collision between the current moon and a former sister moon about 1/30th the size of the current moon, with the former sister moon "squishing" on impact and then being flattened by gravity along the far side of the current moon, accounting for the different geology.

The NPR story can be heard by following this link, and a transcript of the story can be found at this location. Slightly more detailed descriptions of Professor Asphaug's theory can be found elsewhere on the web, such as this story describing the appearance of the theory which was published in the journal Nature yesterday.

Professor Asphaug's new theory proposes that both moons -- the current moon and the erstwhile sister moon -- were formed when a "Mars-sized protoplanet smacked into Earth late in its formation period" (Naturenews article linked above). This event scattered debris into space, some of which "coalesced to form the moon" but some of which was left over, enough to form a sister satellite only 1,000 km or so in diameter.

This second moon, according to the theory, may have coalesced and remained at one of the Lagrange points ahead of or behind the earth on its orbit. We have discussed the importance of Lagrange points in this previous post describing the first actual (rather than speculative) space rocks definitively proven to be orbiting the sun along earth's same path in one of these Lagrange points.

According to the theory as described in the Naturenotes article, "Such a moon could have survived in a Lagrangian point long enough for its upper crust and that of the Moon to solidify [. . .]." However, as Professor Asphaug explains, tidal forces from earth and the gravity from the sun tend to disrupt bodies in these Lagrange points over time. "The Lagrange points become unstable and anything trapped there is adrift," he says.

The smaller moon collided with our remaining moon, but because they shared an orbit, the collision was relatively slow, and resulted in more of an event "like a mud clod thrown at a wall," as Dr. Asphaug says in the NPR interview. "You end up with a pancacke," he says.

We commend Dr. Asphaug for looking at the conventional explanations for the differences between the two sides of the moon and wanting to come up with something better, perceiving the current theories to be lacking. We also agree that the current theories are lacking, and noted that the very different features on the two sides of the moon cause a real problem for conventional theories in this previous post on the subject.

However, as with any other theory purporting to explain the existing evidence (including, of course, the hydroplate theory), we believe that due diligence is required rather than unquestioning acceptance (NPR may not be the forum for airing critical examinations of new scientific theories; in any event, NPR's story contained none). In the case of this new proposed explanation for the origin of the moon and its current surface appearances, there appear to be several thorny questions which may mitigate against its ultimate acceptance.

First, the idea that our moon originated from an ancient collision from a "Mars-sized protoplanet" has some problems. As Walt Brown, author of the hydroplate theory, points out in his book (which can be read in its entirety online here), many principles of physics appear to rule out an earthly origin for the moon. In the section of his book on the Origin of the Moon, he argues that:

The Moon could not have spun off from Earth, because its orbital plane is too highly inclined. Nor could it have formed from the same material as Earth, because the relative abundances of its elements are too dissimilar from those of Earth. The Moon’s nearly circular orbit is also strong evidence that it was never torn from nor captured by Earth. If the Moon formed from particles orbiting Earth, other particles should be easily visible inside the Moon’s orbit; none are.

Some claim that the Moon formed from debris splashed from Earth by a Mars-size impactor. If so, many small moons should have formed. The impactor’s glancing blow would either be too slight to form our large Moon, or so violent that Earth would end up spinning too fast. Also, small particles splashed from Earth would have completely melted, allowing any water inside them to escape into the vacuum of space. However, Apollo astronauts found on the Moon tiny glass beads that had erupted as molten material from inside the Moon but had dissolved water inside! The total amount of water that was once inside the moon probably equaled that in the Caribbean Sea.

These are powerful arguments and not well-understood by the public (if they were, then presumably NPR and Naturenotes would spend more time explaining how the speculative ancient impact was able to create a moon with the properties we see today, let alone how it was able to create two moons).

Another problem not addressed in that particular section of Dr. Brown's book but apparent from his examination of the origin of asteroids is the density of earth's current moon. This web page from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory lists the densities of many objects in the solar system, including earth's moon, which turns out to be among the densest bodies in the solar system, at 3.344 grams per cubic centimeter (on average). No other moon in the solar system, except for Jupiter's Io, is as dense, and in fact most planets are less dense as well.

This is important because, as we discussed in the blog post about the origins of asteroids in the solar system, many of the asteroids (especially those that are large but not very dense) are probably examples of bodies that actually did coalesce from matter ejected from the earth -- not ejected by the collision of a Mars-sized protoplanet, but ejected during the rupture event that initiated a worldwide flood. Those with high densities similar to the density of earth's crust are probably single rocks, but those with lower densities (such as Ceres, with a mean density of only 2.077 grams per cubic centimeter) are probably loosely-packed clusters of smaller rocks, held together by their own weak gravity as well as by the presence of frozen water which was also ejected from earth during the same event.

Dr. Brown argues that the irregularly-shaped moons of Mars, Deimos and Phobos, are probably similar low-density composite asteroids held together in the same way. Indeed, the mean densities of Deimos and Phobos (as can be seen in the previously-linked NASA Jet Propulsion Lab data tables) are only 1.471 and 1.872 grams per cubic centimeter, respectively. These facts would appear to argue that the earth's moon is not a coalescence of smaller rocks that were ejected from earth by a collision from a Mars-sized protoplanet.

Further, Dr. Asphaug's new theory does not appear to give a satisfactory explanation for the fact that almost all of the largest craters on the moon are on the side which faces the earth. As we already discussed in the blog post which shows that the hydroplate theory gives a good explanation for the distinct features of the moon's surface, it is very difficult to argue that large traveling space rocks avoided the dark side and swooped around to a position between the earth and the moon before turning back towards the moon and hitting its surface. It is much more likely that these large craters facing the earth are the result of large chunks of debris striking the moon after the violent eruption of the rupture that led to the flood.

On the other hand, a slow-motion impact resembling "a mud clod thrown at a wall" in which the smaller moon "kind of splats" (in the words of Professor Asphaug) would not appear to be a likely candidate for throwing up large pieces of debris which then came back to impact on the other side of the moon from the "splat." And yet the fact remains that many large objects appear to have hit the near side of the moon and not the far side, unless we were to argue that the larger craters on the far side were later covered up by the "splat" of the second moon (this explanation leaves the problem of the few large craters that are found on the far side, presumably occurring after the splat).

In short, the new theory of a second moon may have some data which argues against it. However, it is important to reiterate that putting forward bold new theories is commendable, and Professor Asphaug and his colleagues should receive recognition for examining the evidence and coming up with a creative explanation that may tie the data together more coherently than theories which came before.

Personally, I believe that the evidence on the surface of the moon -- which does pose an ongoing problem for scientists -- is much more coherently explained by the events described in the hydroplate theory. Additionally, while the new "second moon theory" relies upon some speculative events for which there is little or no evidence and against which the principles of physics appear to argue, such as the assumption of a Mars-sized ancient impactor to get the entire timeline started, the hydroplate theory is corroborated by literally hundreds of other pieces of evidence around the world and indeed throughout the rest of the solar system.

Additionally, the hydroplate theory provides compelling new insight into the extensive evidence found in the human timeline, evidence that has mystified mankind for centuries and which contradicts other conventional theories of the past, as well as provoking alternative theories galore. The examination of the way that the hydroplate theory appears to be supported by evidence from ancient mythology and archaeology is discussed in the Mathisen Corollary book, the first book to apply the hydroplate theory to extensive "human evidence" of this sort.

Again, we have the greatest respect for Professor Asphaug and his thirst for the truth. This is the kind of spirit that needs to permeate the search for answers, in astronomy, geology, biology, and anthropology. All such theories, including those that I offer in my own book and in this blog, should be critically examined in the very same way by many others, who will necessarily have different talents, backgrounds, and areas of specialization. The entire attitude we should all maintain might best be summed up by the current spokesman for Dos Equis beer, who advises his listeners, "Stay thirsty, my friends."

Lake Vostok and the deep liquid lakes on Antarctica

Lying underneath 4,200 meters of Antarctic ice, beneath a point where the coldest temperature ever recorded on earth was taken (−128° F in 1983), are the cold, dark waters of Lake Vostok, the largest of the unfrozen lakes of Antarctica. The ice above it is over 2.6 miles thick, but below that icy cap, the waters continue another 3,000 feet down (almost twice as deep as Lake Tahoe, and that's not counting the ice on top). It makes me cold just thinking about it.

Lake Vostok is a "subglacial lake," and it may amaze some readers to learn that there are over 150 such unfrozen lakes beneath the ice and snow of Antarctica. In fact, the existence of these lakes was not confirmed until the 1990s, although their presence had been postulated as early as the late 1800s. Data evidence for these lakes did not become available until the 1970s.

A scientific paper describing some of the features of Lake Vostok, as well as two more-recently discovered subglacial lakes nearby (known as "Lake 90° East" and "Lake Sovetskaya"), can be downloaded for free in pdf form here. That paper, entitled "Tectonically controlled subglacial lakes on the flanks of the Gamburtsev Subglacial Mountains, East Antarctica" and written by scientists Robin E. Bell, Michael Studinger, Mark A. Fahnestock, and Christopher A. Shuman, was published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters in January, 2006.

The paper's authors admit that the "size, depth and origin" of these two newer lakes "have not been investigated," but they are certain that lakes of these elongate shape and great depth must have a tectonic origin, rather than resulting from glacial scouring or meteorite impacts (page 1). In fact, the scientists assert that "These deep elongate basins probably pre-date Antarctic glaciation and likely contained surface lakes prior to becoming encased in ice" (page 3). They estimate that they have been encased in ice for somewhere between ten and thirty-five million years.

No real evidence is put forward for this estimated age, or even for the assertion that they were probably lakes that somehow became trapped in ice, although it is only to be expected that scientists who accept the tectonic theory would believe that tectonics somehow formed the deep basins in which these mysterious lakes now rest. The details of how liquid lakes could form in Antarctica, which is so cold that no month averages above freezing, and which receives so little precipitation (only two inches per year in the interior), are left unexplained. Some scientists have postulated that the pressure of so much ice might melt water at the bottom, but this begs the question of why huge subglacial lakes are not then found all over Antarctica, as well as in warmer climates that also contain glaciers.

In fact, the problem of so much ice and snow on Antarctica poses a king-sized problem for conventional tectonic theorists, let alone the massive system of lakes entombed beneath that ice. These enormous lakes (Lake Vostok is estimated in the above referenced paper to contain 5,400 cubic kilometers, which is larger than Lake Michigan) form yet another data point which should cause scientists to question the foundations of the tectonic theory (many others are listed in this previous blog post, and since the publication of that post, several others have been discussed, including the origin of water-carved features on Mars, the origin of comets, and the origin of asteroids).

Just as is the case with the rest of those data points, it appears that the hydroplate theory of Walt Brown offers a more satisfactory answer than the conventional tectonic theory for the origin of Antarctica's subglacial lakes. In the 8th edition of his book, Dr. Brown discusses the Antarctic lakes in some detail, on page 347 and following. He argues that the events surrounding a cataclysmic global flood would account for all of the evidence we find on Antarctica and the lakes that have been discovered there:

• How could a lake form on Antarctica?
• After all these years, why would even one Antarctic lake still be unfrozen?
  

The flood provides an obvious answer to the first question. When the flood waters drained into the newly formed ocean basins, every continental basin, including those on Antarctica, were left full of water -- some with warm and salty water. Therefore, Antarctica had lakes immediately after the flood. [. . .] The second question is answered when one realizes that for centuries after the flood, snowfall rates would be orders of magnitude greater than today, and many postflood lakes would be salty and deep. The more a lake freezes, the greater the salt's concentration becomes in the remaining liquid, so its freezing temperature drops.

The mechanism that caused the ice age -- warmer oceans after the flood and higher, colder continents than we have today -- is explained in Dr. Brown's book, and I discussed it briefly in this interview on Red Ice Radio, as well as some of the problems conventional theories have with explaining how an Ice Age would ever start and how one would ever stop.

Dr. Brown explains that when this Ice Age began and the water left on the Antarctic continent developed even a thin layer of ice and began to be exposed to the heavy precipitation in the form of snowfall that initiated the Ice Age, a "race" would develop between the growth of ice downward into these lakes, and the insulating property of the snow building upward on top of the ice:

The winner [of this race] will determine if the lake becomes a solid block of ice or a deeply buried liquid lake. Each year, the ice will grow downward and thicken, at a steady but diminishing rate. Simultaneously, snow will build up above the lake. If the snow's thickness reaches about 2,000 feet before the downward growing ice touches the lake bottom, the lake will be insulated enough to retain its heat and not completely freeze; the slight amount of geothermal heat coming up through the floor of the lake will then prevent it from freezing solid.

Those who hold to the tectonic theory would have to explain how that race would not be won by ice instead, as it would be today in Antarctica's extremely cold climate with extremely low precipitation. The Wikipedia entry for Lake Vostok (hardly a scholarly source, admittedly) confidently asserts that "Africa separated from Antarctica around 160 million years ago, followed by the Indian subcontinent, in the early Cretaceous (about 125 million years ago). About 65 million years ago, Antarctica (then connected to Australia) still had a tropical to subtropical climate, complete with marsupial fauna and an extensive temperate rainforest."

Details for how Antarctica moved south are nonexistent in this description, as is any explanation of how these tropical or subtropical lakes would have gathered successive insulating blankets of snow after they moved down to the latitudes of present-day Antarctica where such little precipitation ever falls. Even more troublesome is the question of how, if Antarctica drifted to its present location at very slow, tectonic rates, the remnants of the "marsupial fauna and tropical rainforest" became frozen and preserved to this day, instead of rotting away over the centuries or millennia that such an Antarctic drift south must have taken.

We have already examined these problems of fossil evidence on Antarctica, where skeletons of turtles and other warm-climate animals are found, and where the wood from large trees that could never grow in the latitudes of the Antarctic is still frozen and not fossilized but can actually be thawed out and burned to this day. In that previous post and the follow-up post discussing similar fossils near the Arctic Circle on the other end of the earth we saw why such evidence is a huge problem for the conventional tectonic theory but perfectly understandable by the hydroplate theory. Rather than supporting a tectonic explanation for the Antarctic lakes, as the Wikipedia entry authors want you to believe, this evidence only points more clearly to the hydroplate explanation.

The mysterious lakes of Antarctica, deep beneath thousands of feet of glacial ice, join the long line of evidence which is extremely troublesome for the proponents of the conventional tectonic theories but which accord perfectly with the events postulated by the hydroplate theory.

Video "Sugar: The Bitter Truth" with Robert Lustig MD

Worth watching is the (fairly long) video above, in which Robert Lustig, MD, discusses the evidence that the decades-long campaign against eating fat and cholesterol was based upon shoddy analysis, primarily that of Ancel Keys (1904 - 2004). Dr. Lustig believes that much of the danger attributed to the consumption of fat should actually be attributed to the consumption of sugar (particularly in the forms of sucrose and fructose as opposed to glucose alone), and that studies that were interpreted as showing the dangers of high fat in the diet were actually measuring the dangers of excessive sugar in the diet (the consumption of the two often go together).

The video presents compelling evidence that the entire modern approach to weight loss (based upon counting "calories in" and "calories out," without much examination of the different types of "calories in") is flawed, and that it ignores the different ways that the body processes and stores the calories that come in, some of which are stored in ways that are not harmful, and some of which are stored in ways that can be very harmful over time.

These arguments are consistent with the arguments presented in books we have mentioned on this blog before, such as Nourishing Traditions (discussed in this post) and Fat and Cholesterol are Good for You! (discussed in this post). Interested readers might also want to check out this previous post, entitled "Faulty theories can hurt you."

While Dr. Lustig's discussion is primarily centered around the prevention of obesity and specifically the rise of childhood obesity, the chemistry he is talking about impacts everyone, and is very important to consider carefully. It is likely that the factors he is discussing are a large part of a bigger problem which also includes a shift to different types of fats for cooking (discussed at greater length in the books and blog posts mentioned above) and other major changes to the food supply, especially in the years following the Second World War.

This subject illustrates the importance of good analysis and the dangers of uncritical acceptance of "conventional wisdom" around subjects that the general public believes have "been proven" and require no further examination.

Hat tip to my good friend Mr. D. Y. for bringing the above video to my attention (all the way from Japan)!

The critical concept of heliacal rising

Above is a simple sketch illustrating the important concept of heliacal rise.

We've discussed in a previous post the fact that stars along the ecliptic rise about four minutes earlier each night. The reason for this can be seen in the diagram, which shows the earth going around the sun in the direction indicated by the arrow along the orbital path (to the right of the diagram, from the position earth is depicted). The progress of the earth each day along this orbital path is what causes the stars to rise four minutes earlier each passing day.

We've also discussed the fact that some stars, by virtue of being located "on the ceiling" of the hypothetical "room" in which the earth orbits the sun, will be visible from the northern hemisphere each night (stars "on the floor" would be visible each night for observers in the southern hemisphere). Stars "on the walls," however will spend some part of the year obscured by the sun as earth orbits to a position in which the sun is between earth and "their wall."

For example, in the diagram above, if the earth were further back on its orbit (back where it was at the beginning of July, for example), you can see that observers on earth would be facing the position of the stars in Orion during the daytime. However, as earth continues along its orbit, there will be a point at which the rotation of the earth will reveal the stars of Orion in the sky before the continued rotation reveals the rising sun.

The earth has now reached that location, such that Orion in all his majesty can be seen in the eastern sky prior to the sunrise. At a location in the northern hemisphere of about 35^o north latitude, morning twilight currently begins around 5:45 and the sun rises at about twelve minutes after 6 am (getting a minute or so later each day, as we move further away from summer solstice and closer to equinox).

At the same latitude, the stars of Orion begin to come into view during the half hour prior to 4am, as the earth turns as indicated by the curved arrow above, bringing the stars up over the rim of the eastern horizon (actually, the eastern horizon is plunging "downwards" as earth spins, allowing an observer to see those stars). The eastern side of the sky is noticeably lighter and bluer than the western half as sunrise approaches, creating the impressive sight of the stars of Orion rising in the beautiful light-blue east.

The first return of a star on the eastern horizon just prior to sunrise, after its annual period of absence due to the interference of the sun, is known as the heliacal rising. The heliacal rising of the zodiac constellations, as well as of the stars of Orion and especially Sirius trailing Orion, were extremely important to ancient civilizations and their descendents around the world (including those who retained strong influence of those ancient civilizations into recent times, such as the Polynesians and the Indians of the Americas).

The earth has not yet reached the point on its orbit when the heliacal rising of Sirius, the brightest star in the sky (other than the sun), will take place, but earth is on its way to that spot, reaching it on August 7. Right now, because Sirius is to the "left" of Orion (in the orientation of the sketch above), it is still obscured by the sun when the earth turns in its direction, but as earth progresses around its track, you can visualize why Sirius will soon become visible in the light-blue east and will then begin "moving" towards the darker and darker part of the sky before sunrise on consecutive mornings as we go around.

The diagram and discussion above should help you gain a clear understanding of the critical concept of heliacal rising.

A brief examination of the importance of chakras and singing praises

In the 1950s, Frank Waters (1902 - 1995) and Oswald White Bear Fredericks (1905 - 1990s) spent three years tape recording the sacred traditions of the Hopi people as told to them by twenty-seven Hopi elders, who had consented to preserving their wisdom in a form other than oral tradition for the very first time.

From the recordings, Mr. Waters and Mr. Fredericks created a manuscript, which the elders reviewed and approved (an important point, as there are some who allege that Mr. Waters treated the Hopi tradition in a freewheeling fashion and changed what he was told into what he wanted it to be, which is a baseless allegation). This text became the Book of the Hopi, published in 1963.

One of the most striking features of the Hopi creation story, as related to Mr. Waters, is the belief that we are currently living in the Fourth World, the previous three having been destroyed by fire, ice, and water, respectively. As is now widely known, the Maya also believed that we are living in the fourth age of the world, which they called the Fourth Sun, the previous Suns having been destroyed, as this one will inevitably be as well. It is quite fascinating to examine the reason given by the Hopi elders for the destruction of the previous three worlds.

In the Book of the Hopi, we learn that the Creator gave the people two clear commands at the beginning of each new age: "First, respect me and one another. And second, sing in harmony from the tops of the hills. When I do not hear you singing praises to your Creator I will know you have gone back to evil again" (16).

Clearly, singing to the Hopi was a matter of very great importance. Further, the elders revealed their understanding that when men and women were first created, they began to multiply and spread throughout the earth, but that "This did not matter, for they were so close together in spirit they could see and talk to each other from the center on top of the head. Because this door was still open, they felt close to Sóktunang and they sang joyful praises to the Creator, Taiowa" (15).

This "center" or "door" on top of the head is very significant. As related by the Hopi elders, it was the uppermost of the vibratory centers inside every human, which corresponded to the vibratory centers in the earth itself:

The living body of man and the living body of the earth were constructed in the same way. Through each ran an axis, man's axis being the backbone, the vertebral column, which controlled the equilibrium of his movements and his functions. Along this axis were several vibratory centers which echoed the primordial sound of life throughout the universe or sounded a warning if anything went wrong.

The first of these in man lay at the top of the head. Here, when he was born, was the soft spot, kópavi, the "open door" through which he received his life and communicated with his Creator. For with every breath the soft spot moved up and down with a gentle vibration that was communicated to the Creator. 9 - 10.

Other vibratory centers included those at the brain, the throat, the heart, and the navel. The Hopi tradition makes clear that the successive destruction of the first three worlds took place after the majority of men began to cease their singing of praise to the Creator and stopped communicating with him through their first center.

What is most remarkable is that these vibratory centers described by the Hopi elders correspond quite closely to the chakras described in ancient Hindu texts and persisting in Tibetan, Hindu and Buddhist beliefs to this day, a similarity which Frank Waters points out in a footnote to his manuscript (pages 10 and 11). While most eastern traditions hold that the chakras are seven in number (and ten in number in some Tibetan traditions), the corresponding location of the crown of the head, the forehead (or brain), the throat, the heart, and the navel in both the eastern and the Hopi traditions is quite fascinating.

























It is also fascinating that the Hopi described these important "doors" as vibratory, in light of the subjects touched upon in this previous discussion of the importance of wavelengths and energy as they relate to human beings through music and (as John Anthony West has described in his books on ancient Egypt) the proportions of architecture and art. We discussed the importance of this concept further in another more recent blog post here.

Finally, it is quite interesting that the Christian faith also places great importance on singing (as well as chanting, in some traditions, and singing without accompanying instruments in some traditions as well).

Even more intriguing is the command found in 1 Corinthians 11:4 which says:
"Every man praying or prophesying, having his head covered, dishonoureth his head."

The reasons for this strict admonition are worthwhile to contemplate.