The Eye Of God

I’ve been going through some of the stuff I wrote for Sunshine. It’s been a while since I visited the site and was surprised and delighted by what I read. I wrote that?

Here’s a short one which was pretty cool.

The Eye Of God


Eclipse photos: Wendy Carlos

I look up. Incredible! It is the eye of God. A perfectly black disk, ringed with bright spiky streamers that stretch out in all directions.
Jack B. Zirker Astronomer Emeritus Sacramento Peak – National Solar Observatory

Since the beginning of human civilisation, people have connected the Sun with the eye of God.

Animation credit: Robin Edgar.

The right eye of the ancient Egyptian sky god, Horus, was the Sun. In Hindu mythology Surya , the Sun god, is called the eye of Varuna the god of the heavens. The Persian Sun god Mithras was believed to be the eye of Ahura Mazda, the creator god. The Greek god Helios was the god of the Sun as well as the god of Sight, and was portrayed as an eye with rays surrounding it. The Japanese Sun goddess Amaterasu was born from the left eye of Izanagi, the sky-father creator. The chief Norse god, Odin, gave his eye to Mirmir in order to acquire knowledge. His remaining eye was the Sun and is all-seeing and all-knowing. On the back of the American dollar bill there is an eye surrounded by rays of light floating in the sky above an unfinished pyramid. This is the Eye of Providence. As I’ve written before, light itself has been equated with knowledge.

When you see an image of an eclipse it’s not too difficult to see why people believed the Sun was the eye of God.

When you look into the Sun, what do you see?

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