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Researchers have pinpointed the date of what could be the oldest solar eclipse yet recorded. The event, which occurred on 30 October 1207 BC, is mentioned in the Bible, and could have consequences for the chronology of the ancient world.
Using a combination of the biblical text and an ancient Egyptian text, the researchers were then able to refine the dates of the Egyptian pharaohs, in particular the dates of the reign of Ramesses the Great. The results are published in the Royal Astronomical Society journal Astronomy & Geophysics.
The biblical text in question comes from the Old Testament book of Joshua and has puzzled biblical scholars for centuries. It records that after Joshua led the people of Israel into Canaan -- a region of the ancient Near East that covered modern-day Israel and Palestine -- he prayed: "Sun, stand still at Gibeon, and Moon, in the Valley of Aijalon. And the Sun stood still, and the Moon stopped, until the nation took vengeance on their enemies."
"If these words are describing a real observation, then a major astronomical event was taking place -- the question for us to figure out is what the text actually means," said paper co-author Professor Sir Colin Humphreys from the University of Cambridge's Department of Materials Science & Metallurgy, who is also interested in relating scientific knowledge to the Bible.
Colin Humphreys and Graeme Waddington. 'Solar eclipse of 1207 BC helps to date pharaohs.' Astronomy & Geophysics (2017). DOI: 10.1093/astrogeo/atx178.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 30 2017, @09:49PM (3 children)
Still better than the eclipse though since it is at least consistent with the description.
1) Nothing appears to be "standing still" during a eclipse.
2) It says the sun was "at Gibeon" and the moon was "in the Valley of Aijalon".
I checked, these are not the same place: http://bibleatlas.org/valley_of_aijalon.htm [bibleatlas.org]
The most basic and noticeable thing about a solar eclipse is that the sun and moon appear to be in the same place.
(Score: 2) by Mykl on Tuesday October 31 2017, @01:48AM (1 child)
I'm probably not helping, but it occurred to me that Gibeon is close to gibbous. Perhaps a translation/language issue over the years? The sun might be considered gibbous if the moon partially eclipsed it (e.g. by 10-20%). Not enough to make it look like a crescent.
I don't have an answer to the "Valley of Aijalon", however that may have been the direction of the moon at the time, or some sort of metaphor?
TL:DR - I wouldn't take the wording in that passage literally.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Tuesday October 31 2017, @02:27AM
I checked the Wikipedia entry on Joshua, and this bit stood out to me:
So, not terribly accurate there then, also this from the Old Testament entry:
So, if Joshua is the oldest book of the old testament, it is still at least 800 years removed from its subject.
Lets just stop trying to tie the bible to historical events shall we? There are so many better ways to do history.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Spamalope on Tuesday October 31 2017, @02:14AM
The English is a translated translation, possibly of oral tradition.
From the article “But going back to the original Hebrew text, we determined that an alternative meaning could be that the sun and moon just stopped doing what they normally do: they stopped shining. In this context, the Hebrew words could be referring to a solar eclipse, when the moon passes between the earth and the sun, and the sun appears to stop shining. This interpretation is supported by the fact that the Hebrew word translated ‘stand still’ has the same root as a Babylonian word used in ancient astronomical texts to describe eclipses.”
From that map Aijalon appears to be in a valley, Gibeon to the east in a mountainous/hilly area. The hill/peak the sun rose over may be used as a rough calendar marker, so the city (or peak it may be named for) are used as a direction name.
So, in the valley of Aijalon the sun and moon stopped over Gibeon - and the nation attacked/revolted based on that portents. (and lived to tell about it)
Ancient histories are full of portents/auguries being used to determine the timing of actions, so that's reasonable too.
You can see an example of sleuthing to untangle translation errors in a New Testament gospel to get some idea how this could happen.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmAY-vJGPhc [youtube.com]
I'm not religious, but do find it interesting that at least some of the stupid things are misunderstandings.