THE ORDINANCES OF THE HEAVENS
As has been already pointed out, the astronomical references in
Scripture are not numerous, and probably give but an inadequate idea of
the actual degree of progress attained by the Hebrews in astronomical
science. Yet it is clear, even from the record which we have, that there
was one great astronomical fact which they had observed, and that it had
made a deep impression upon them.
That fact was the sublime Order of the heavenly movements. First amongst
these was the order of the daily progress of the sun; rising in the east
and moving slowly, majestically, and resistlessly upward to the
meridian,--the "midst" or "bisection" of heaven, of Josh. x. 13,--and
then passing downwards as smoothly and unfalteringly to his setting in
the west.
This motion of the sun inspires the simile employed by the Psalmist in
the astronomical psalm, the nineteenth. He sings--
"The heavens declare the glory of God.
* * * * *
In them hath He set a tabernacle for the sun,
Which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber,
And rejoiceth as a strong man to run his course.
His going forth is from the end of the heaven,
And his circuit unto the ends of it:
And there is nothing hid from the heat thereof."
The night revealed another Order, in its way more majestic still. As the
twilight faded away the bright and silent watchers of the heavens
mustered each in his place. And each, like the sun during the day, was
moving, slowly, majestically, resistlessly, "without haste, without
rest." Each had its appointed place, its appointed path. Some moved in
small circles in the north; some rose in the east, and swept in long
curves over towards their setting in the west, some scarcely lifted
themselves above the southern horizon. But each one kept its own place.
None jostled another, or hurried in advance, or lagged behind. It is no
wonder that as the multitude of the stars was observed, and the unbroken
order of their going, that the simile suggested itself of an army on the
march--"the host of heaven." And the sight of the unbroken order of
these bright celestial orbs suggested a comparison with the unseen army
of exalted beings, the angels; the army or host of heaven in another
sense, marshalled, like the stars, in perfect obedience to the Divine
will. So in the vision of Micaiah, the son of Imlah, the "host of
heaven" are the thousands of attendant spirits waiting around the throne
of God to fulfil His bidding.
"I saw the Lord sitting on His throne, and all the host of
heaven standing by him on His right hand and on His left."
But more frequently it is the starry, not the angelic, army to which
reference is made.
So Jeremiah prophesies--
"As the host of heaven cannot be numbered,
Neither the sand of the sea measured:
So will I multiply the seed of David My servant,
And the Levites that minister unto Me."
The prophets of Israel recognized clearly, that the starry host of
heaven and the angelic host were distinct; that the first, in their
brightness, order, and obedience formed fitting comparison for the
second; but that both were created beings; neither were divinities.
The heathen nations around recognized also the hosts both of the stars
and of spiritual beings, but the first they took as the manifestations
of the second, whom they counted as divinities. There was often a great
confusion between the two, and the observance or worship of the first
could not be kept distinguished from the recognition or worship of the
other; the very ideogram for a god was an 8-rayed star.
The Hebrews were warned again and again lest, confusing in their minds
these two great hosts of stars and angels, they should deem the one the
divine manifestation of the other, the divinity, not accounting them
both fellow-servants, the handiwork of God.
Thus, in the wilderness, the Lord commands them through Moses--
"Take ye therefore good heed unto yourselves, . . . lest thou
lift up thine eyes unto heaven, and when thou seest the sun,
and the moon, and the stars, even all the host of heaven,
shouldest be driven to worship them, and serve them, which the
Lord thy God hath divided [distributed] unto all nations under
the whole heaven."
But the one celestial army continually suggests the other, and the two
are placed in the closest parallelism when reference is made to the time
when the foundations of the earth were fastened, and the corner stone
thereof was laid,
"When the morning stars sang together,
And all the sons of God shouted for joy."
So when Deborah sings of the deliverance which the Lord gave to Israel
at the battle of the Kishon, she puts the stars for the angelic legions
that she feels assured were engaged in warring in their support.
"They fought from heaven;
The stars in their courses fought against Sisera."
The "courses" of the stars are the paths which they appear to follow as
they move round the pole of the heavens as the night proceeds, whilst
the stars themselves stand for the heavenly helpers who, unseen, had
mingled in the battle and discomforted the squadrons of Sisera's
war-chariots. It almost reads as if to Deborah had been vouchsafed such
a vision as Elisha prayed might be given to his servant:--
"Therefore sent the King of Syria thither horses, and
chariots, and a great host: and they came by night, and
compassed the city about.
"And when the servant of the man of God was risen early, and
gone forth, behold, an host compassed the city both with
horses and chariots. And his servant said unto him, Alas, my
master! how shall we do?
"And he answered, Fear not: for they that be with us are more
than they that be with them.
"And Elisha prayed, and said, Lord, I pray Thee, open his
eyes that he may see. And the Lord opened the eyes of the
young man; and he saw: and, behold, the mountain was full of
horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha."
The solemn procession of the starry host through the long night--the
rising in the east, the southing, and the setting in the west--is not
the only ordered movement of the stars of heaven that may be recognized.
As night by night brightens to its dawn, if we watch the eastern horizon
and note what stars are the last to rise above it before the growing
daylight overpowers the feeble stellar rays, then we see that some
bright star, invisible on the preceding mornings, shines out for a few
moments low down in the glimmer of the dawn. As morning succeeds morning
it rises earlier, until at last it mounts when it is yet dark, and some
other star takes its place as the herald of the rising sun. We recognize
to-day this "heliacal rising" of the stars. Though we do not make use of
it in our system of time-measuring, it played an important part in the
calendar-making of the ancients. Such heralds of the rising sun were
called "morning stars" by the Hebrews, and they used them "for seasons"
and "for years." One star or constellation of stars would herald by its
"heliacal rising" the beginning of spring, another the coming of winter;
the time to plough, the time to sow, the time of the rains, would all be
indicated by the successive "morning stars" as they appeared. And after
an interval of three hundred and sixty-five or three hundred and
sixty-six days the same star would again show itself as a morning star
for a second time, marking out the year, whilst the other morning stars
would follow, each in its due season. So we read in Job, that God led
"forth the Mazzaroth in their season."
This wonderful procession of the midnight sky is not known and admired
by those who live in walled cities and ceiled houses, as it is by those
who live in the open, in the wilderness. It is not therefore to be
wondered at, that we find praise of these "works of the Lord . . .
sought out of all them that have pleasure therein," mostly amongst the
shepherds, the herdsmen, the wanderers in the open--in the words and
prophecies of Job, of Jacob, Moses, David and Amos.
The thought that each new day, beginning with a new outburst of light,
was, in its degree, a kind of new creation, an emblem of the original
act by which the world was brought into being, renders appropriate and
beautiful the ascription of the term "morning stars" to those "sons of
God," the angels. As the stars in the eastern sky are poetically thought
of as "singing together" to herald the creation of each new day, so in
the verses already quoted from the Book of Job, the angels of God are
represented as shouting for joy when the foundations of the earth were
laid.
The "morning star" again stands as the type and earnest of that new
creation which God has promised to His servants. The epistle to Thyatira
concludes with the promise--"He that overcometh, and keepeth my works
unto the end, . . . I will give him the morning star."
The brightest of these heralds of the sun is the planet Venus, and such
a "morning star" for power, glory, and magnificence, the king of
Babylon had once been; like one of the angels of God. But as addressed
in Isaiah's prophecy, he has been brought down to Sheol:--
"How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the
morning!. . . For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend
into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God
. . . I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be
like the most High."
But the "morning star" is taken as a higher type, even of our Lord
Himself, and of His future coming in glory. St. Peter bids the
disciples, to whom he writes, take heed unto the word of prophecy as
unto a lamp shining in a dark place "until the day dawn, and the Day
star arise in your hearts." In almost the last words of the Bible, the
Lord uses the same image Himself:--
"I, Jesus, have sent Mine angel to testify unto you these
things in the Churches. I am the root and the offspring of
David, the bright and morning star."
In the sublime and ordered movements of the various heavenly bodies, the
Hebrews recognized the ordinances of God. The point of view always taken
in Scripture is the theo-centric one; the relation sought to be brought
out is not the relation of thing to thing--which is the objective of
physical science--but the relation of creature to Creator. We have no
means of knowing whether they made attempt to find any mechanical
explanation of the movements; such inquiry would lie entirely outside
the scope of the books of Holy Scripture, and other ancient Hebrew
literature has not been transmitted to us.
The lesson which the Psalmists and the Prophets desired to teach was
not the daily rotation of the earth upon its axis, nor its yearly
revolution round the sun, but that--
"If those ordinances depart from before Me, saith the Lord,
then the seed of Israel also shall cease from being a nation
before Me for ever."
In the Bible all intermediate steps are omitted, and the result is
linked immediately to the first Cause. God Himself is the theme, and
trust in Him the lesson.
"Lift up your eyes on high, and see Who hath created these,
That bringeth out their host by number: He calleth them all by
name; by the greatness of His might, and for that He is strong
in power, not one is lacking.
"Why sayest thou, O Jacob, and speakest, O Israel, My way is
hid from the Lord, and my judgment is passed away from my God.
Hast thou not known? hast thou not heard? the everlasting God,
the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not,
neither is weary; there is no searching of His understanding.
He giveth power to the faint; and to him that hath no might He
increaseth strength. Even the youths shall faint and be weary,
and the young men shall utterly fall: but they that wait upon
the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with
wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; they shall
walk, and not faint."