Before the advent of the nuclear age, scientists pondered the origins of the Sun’s tremendous expenditure of heat and light. Many ideas were advanced; none were universally accepted. Most shrugged their intellectual shoulders, saying that the source of the Sun’s fire was yet a mystery.
With the advent of the atomic bomb, science felt they had their answer. Physicists and astronomers advanced the idea — and the public accepted it — that the Sun was fired by the same fuel as the weapon that won the war in the Pacific, the atom. The logic was rather compelling, too, when one considered the prodigious amount of energy released in an atomic bomb. Everyone saw the awesome size and power of a nuclear detonation thanks to another, new, post-war invention — television. We were regaled with seemingly endless news reports and documentaries regarding the unthinkable devastation that awaited us if the two superpowers of the Cold War ever had the temerity and foolhardiness to employ those weapons.
Thus, the theory became fact. Nuclear fission, and later fusion, was thought to be responsible for the vast amounts of energy that the Sun radiated. Only nuclear processes, it was reasoned, could release that much energy from matter in order to power the Sun for millions of years.
Then we entered the space age. Ever more sophisticated equipment was employed to probe the workings of the Sun. Unmanned space probes were launched toward the Sun in an ongoing effort to understand it. Ironically, the more they learned, the less the data fit with their nuclear model.
The temperature problem
The first problem was discovered when they took the Sun’s temperature, so to speak.
The nuclear model of the Sun predicted that the atomic fires at its center were the hottest, that the heat and pressure at the Sun’s core were ideal for supporting nuclear fusion and fission. Moving away from the active core, they hypothesized, the temperature would gradually drop until, at the surface, it would be relatively cool, certainly cooler than the center.
What they learned surprised everyone. The sun was much cooler, relatively speaking, at the center than at the surface. Indeed, the hottest spot was above the surface, in the corona. That is, the point of greatest heat and light was not within the Sun or even on the surface. It was located high above the surface in what can be characterized as the Sun’s atmosphere.
How could that be? What could cause a nuclear-fired star like our Sun to have such anomalous heat characteristics? It was like finding that a wood stove was hottest outside rather than inside where the fire burned. The newly acquired data did not fit the model of a nuclear-powered Sun. Something was clearly wrong.
No one really seemed interested in doubting the theory, however. Rather than question the nuclear nature of the Sun, scientists sought for another explanation that might reconcile the data with the nuclear engine theory of the Sun.
Several ad hoc explanations were ginned up to explain the anomalous temperature readings within the context of the nuclear Sun theory, most of them so convoluted that the individual of average intelligence and education was unable to dispute them, much less follow the logic.
Neutrinos, neutrinos everywhere
Then there is the neutrino problem.
Neutrinos are highly energetic subatomic particles emitted by nuclear reactions. They are hard to detect because they have no electrical charge or apparent mass, and they pass easily through matter. They are ubiquitous in space. Physicists theorize that neutrinos are ejected from stars because the stars, like our Sun, are fired by nuclear reactions. We are bombarded by neutrinos from those stars every day of our lives, but they go unnoticed because they pass through us as easily as light passes through a pane of glass. Indeed, most neutrinos are so energetic that they can pass easily through anything on the Earth’s surface — walls, cars, buildings, whatever.
Scientists believed that our star, the Sun, ought to emit a huge number of neutrinos since — according to the current theory of its workings — it generates its power by a nuclear fission reaction. Scientists knew from practical experience with the atomic bomb that neutrinos are the automatic byproducts of such reactions.
An experiment was devised in order to test the theory by counting the most energetic neutrinos — those emitted by the closest star, our Sun. Of course, if you wish to sample only those neutrinos from the Sun, then you must have a way to screen out the constant rain of cosmic rays from space that would interfere with any such detection. Physicists determined that the only way they could “see” neutrinos from our sun was to go deep into an existing mine where the less energetic particles from space would have been slowed or stopped after passing a considerable distance through Earth’s crust, while more energetic neutrinos from our neighboring star would still reach their detection equipment deep within the Earth. Using sophisticated devices, they would be able to detect the most energetic neutrinos of all, those that come from our Sun.
Nuclear physicists expected to find copious numbers of neutrinos in their experiment, thus confirming their nuclear engine theory for the Sun. They were stunned to discover that the opposite was true. Instead of detecting numerous neutrinos, as should have been the case according to their theories, they “saw” almost none. How could this be?
As with the temperature problem they refused to follow the Occam’s Razor principle: The simplest explanation is probably the correct one. They could not bring themselves to question their elegant thermonuclear theories. Once again, scientists conjured up numerous ad hoc theories to explain still more data that contradicted their model of a nuclear Sun, including new categories of neutrinos that came in various “flavors.”
These and other anomalies too esoteric to discuss here point away from the theory of the Sun as a nuclear engine. Instead, they point to the Sun as an electromagnetic engine.
The light goes on
Consider this possibility: We may live in an electric universe, the only other form of energy known to have enough power to light the Sun. The galaxies may be lit, ordered and shaped by electrical energy, the stars within them powered by electricity. The Earth we live on, indeed all the planets and moons in our solar system, may be immersed in, defined and regulated by electromagnetic fields.
Many scholars and maverick scientists have speculated recently that such may be the case. They point out that the Sun may operate like a negatively charge body accumulating additional charge from the environment it moves through, then divesting itself of that energy by discharging like a great cathode in space. (The cathode in your television set does just that to light up the screen.) This accumulated charge is released in a constant discharge, creating light and heat, in a process somewhat analogous to that in a fluorescent light bulb.
It fits the observed data
This would explain the lack of neutrinos from the Sun. They would be incidental to an electric Sun, not primary as in a nuclear Sun. It would also explain the temperature anomaly. The active, energetic area, the corona or photosphere, would be the hottest, with the surface of the Sun and the interior registering progressively cooler relative temperatures. Of course, this is exactly what astrophysicists observed when they took the Sun’s temperature.
Once again, Velikovsky was the first to speculate that in past catastrophic near collisions, the complex but powerful electromagnetic forces brought to bear by planets closing on one another generated colossal interplanetary effects such as interplanetary lightning, disturbed rotation, massive inductive heating and numerous other secondary, electrical phenomena. How could a passing planet slow and stop the Earth’s rotation, then restart it again, if planets are electrically neutral? Forces other than gravity must have been at work. (Remember that Mormon wrote in Helaman that the Earth stops and even reverses rotation for a short time.) These assertions suggest that the true nature of the universe, and the Sun specifically, is electrical.
Learning from our own experience
It is ironic that a half-century of nuclear experimentation has failed to yield the abundance of power for the use of mankind that science originally promised. Except as a devastating weapon of war, the nuclear genie has little magic. Nuclear power generation is a dismal failure due to its lethality, as we learned at Chernobyl. Nuclear fission provides only a miniscule about of energy worldwide for that very reason. Nuclear fusion, the counterpart of fission, that once seemed to hold such promise as an abundant energy source, is still a costly, ephemeral, theoretical dream.
Could it be that this eventuality has a lesson for us in our view of the Sun’s fires?
On the other hand, ever since Nikola Tesla invented the polyphase, alternating current electrical system we use today, the world has been powered and lit by electricity. Together with the internal combustion engine, electricity has revolutionized our world. It has become so much a part of our existence that it is hard to imagine life without electricity to do our bidding. Yet, we still understand little of its nature or its workings. Like our ancestors who learned to use fire without understanding its nature, we have partially harnessed the energy of the cosmos with almost no understanding of it. Like light and gravity, electricity remains largely a mystery to us.
Is it merely a coincidence that we have employed electrical power so readily and effectively while nuclear power has faltered? Might it be that this is an indication of the true relative importance of the two in the universe?
The implications in such an idea are both staggering and stimulating. If true, it may explain gravity as an electromagnetic effect rather than strictly one of mass. The study of superconductors promises remarkable discoveries in the near future about the nature of electricity and the relationship between gravity, magnetism and electrical currents.
It suggests that humans, living in an extremely low frequency (ELF) electrical environment such as that on the Earth, are primarily electrical creatures rather than chemical, as modern medicine teaches. Dr. Robert Becker tried to open our eyes to this possibility years ago in his book, The Body Electric.
Perhaps most interesting of all, some form of electromagnetic levitation could explain how the ancients all around the world succeeded in moving massive stones over great distances to construct their ancient sacred temples and monuments — a technology that we will likely employ ourselves one day when we unlock the secrets to our electrical universe.
© Anthony E. Larson, 1999
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
A Modern Myth
It is hard to conceive that in this age of enlightenment and scientific advancement that there could be any myths left in modern man’s paradigm. We believe ourselves to be smarter, more inventive and certainly more knowledgeable than our predecessors. After all, we ride where they walked, eat where they hungered, fly where they could only gaze and live a life of ease and comfort they could not envision in their wildest fantasies. It is almost preposterous to think that we might harbor notions as foolish as those embraced by our ancestors.
The ancients believed such foolishness as: the world was flat, the brain was useful only to cool the blood, life emerged spontaneously from swamps and ponds of stagnant water, idols answered prayers and the Earth was the center of the universe. Is it possible that we, the enlightened ones, still have similarly silly skeletal notions in our cultural closet?
A tale of oil and dinosaurs
A number of years ago, a large oil company advertised its gasoline product with an animated television commercial, explaining how ancient plants and animals gave their all so we could have gasoline for our cars today. The animators depicted a cartoon dinosaur poking its head out of a car’s filler pipe, making a somewhat comical growling sound as the car sped off.
This amusing commercial illustrated the modern view, held by geologists and paleontologists, that Earth’s petroleum deposits came from the remains of long dead plants and animals — a cleaver portrayal of orthodox science’s theories that Earth’s petroleum deposits and its many byproducts originated in the distillation of hydrocarbons from the decaying remnants of massive, ancient flora and fauna accumulations, buried by successive deposition in enormous subsidence zones. Over great expanses of time, they opine, these deposits were compressed in geological processes, squeezing out the hydrocarbons, which then collected in great pools beneath impermeable layers of rock. Hence the term “fossil fuel.”
Old ideas die hard
A century ago, this idea seemed logical. Probably since time began, man has mined coal for energy from great seams layered in the earth. Those same coal beds, and the strata adjoining them, hold the fossils of ancient plants and animals. Since the only things on this planet seen to contain appreciable amounts of hydrocarbons were the flora and fauna that proliferate on its surface, scientists naturally assumed that this was the source for buried hydrocarbons. Deep peat beds found in some locations seemed to support that idea. Those peat beds were thought to be simply an early step in a process that eventually would create coal and hydrocarbon deposits. Thus, it seemed reasonable to assume that coal and oil were the byproducts of some ancient biomass.
While such thinking may have been acceptable in the past, it is no longer viable. This is one of the great myths of modern science. What is more, it serves to demonstrate how intractable scientists are about their pet theories when faced with evidence that does not fit their paradigm.
A new age
This explanation for the existence of crude oil and natural gas — hydrocarbons — beneath Earth’s crust may have been useful up until the mid-twentieth century, but it has no meaning in light of the preponderance of evidence that has accumulated in the last 40 years — especially that gathered since mankind entered the space age.
For decades, we have launched unmanned probes to other planets and moons in our solar system. These have sent back pictures and data sufficient to teach us the true origin of Earth’s hydrocarbons. We have learned that hydrocarbons are present almost everywhere in the solar system, not just on Earth. Sophisticated spectrographic analysis has detected hydrocarbons in the atmosphere of many major planets and many large moons.
An oil world
Most notable for its concentration of hydrocarbons (scientists cautiously use the word “methane”) is great Titan, a moon nearly the size of Mars that circles Saturn. Data suggests that the atmosphere of this planet-sized moon is composed primarily of hydrocarbons in one form or another. Scientists say that so great is the concentration of hydrocarbons in its atmosphere that when it rains on Titan, condensed hydrocarbons fall in droplet from clouds of methane rather than water as on Earth. In fact, where Earth is a water planet with streams, lake, rivers and oceans of water, Titan is an oil planet with streams, lakes, rivers and oceans of flowing hydrocarbons in one form or another ranging from light, volatile oils to heavier forms.
Earth’s true history
What seems likely from the evidence collected to date is that Titan and Earth represent two distinct phases of similar planetary evolution. The oil deposits deep in Earth’s crust betray the unarticulated truth that this planet once passed through a phase like that which persists on Titan today. At some time in Earth’s long, ancient history, our atmosphere was so charged with hydrocarbons that they naturally accumulated in great concentrations on the surface. Some of the heavier oils — some almost tar-like — were deposited in layers and then buried in seismic events. Some of the lighter hydrocarbons, like naphtha, would have seeped deep into the ground to accumulate in vast pools, just as water concentrates in great, deep aquifers today. Those great pools of oil, gas or petroleum remained entombed in Earth’s crustal rock, insulated from the chemical and catastrophic processes that ultimately reduced our atmosphere to its present composition.
If not there, why here?
No one speculates that these newly discovered hydrocarbons found elsewhere in the solar system came from any kind of decayed biomass. The environment on most other planets — most notably the gaseous giants — is far too harsh to support any life, much less generate anything approaching the quantity needed to produce massive amounts of hydrocarbons. So, why assume that oil elsewhere — on Earth, for example — came exclusively from life?
This beg the question: Since there are massive amounts of hydrocarbons elsewhere in the solar system, might it be that Earth’s hydrocarbon deposits originated in the same way as those others? Of course, the only logical answer is yes! If it is impossible that hydrocarbons found elsewhere in the solar system are the byproducts of life, then it stands to reason that the same likelihood holds true for Earth.
Modern myths cling to life
Ironically, even though the newest evidence seems to suggest another source for Earth’s hydrocarbons, no one in the orthodox scientific or scholastic community speaks or writes of it. Indeed, the latest textbooks written and used by academia in classes on geology, paleontology and astronomy intended to “educate” the young, perpetuate this absurd fiction. Although the truth is as plain as the nose on our collective face, we persist in teaching a fabrication, a fraud. Once again, as in the days of Copernicus and Galileo, we see the establishment academia clinging like grim death to an absolute myth!
Immanual Velikovsky, the author of Worlds in Collision, speculated over 50 years ago that hydrocarbons were introduced into the Earth’s atmosphere anciently, but within historic times, when errant planets in our solar system passed devastatingly close to the Earth. Scientists mocked and criticized his theory on the strength of their conviction that hydrocarbons existed nowhere else in the solar system but on Earth. Such criticism was rather persuasive then since mankind knew so little about other worlds. Even the best telescopes did little to reveal the conditions that truly existed on other planets. However, now that the recently discovered evidence supports Velikovsky’s early assertion, there is still no re-evaluation of his theories forthcoming from establishment science.
Velikovsky’s theory was not just a lucky guess, as some charged. He asserted that hydrocarbons are plentiful in the atmospheres of other planets, based on ancient eyewitness accounts of fire falling from the sky and burning over the ground when one or more of those planets passed perilously close to the Earth, mixing their volatile atmospheres with our own. Given recent evidence, it appears that Velikovsky was actually more accurate than his detractors.
The success of Velikovsky’s predictions regarding the existence of extraterrestrial hydrocarbons should have caused the scientific and scholarly institutions to reassess their scathing criticisms of the good doctor’s other theories, but they did not. Likewise, once mankind entered the space age, the orthodox myth of crude oil’s origin in ancient biomass should have been dispelled immediately. But it was not. Instead, today’s science textbooks parrot the same tired myth of yesteryear.
The answer to why this old tradition was not summarily dismissed and why science refuses to reconsider Velikovsky’s theory reveals much about our culture and our intransigence — something Book of Mormon prophets would have called “stiffneckedness.”
As it is with science, so it is with religion. Whenever people who have embraced a myth are confronted by truth, they seldom relinquish the myth — ‘impartial’ scientists and ‘truth-seeking’ religionists included. Indeed, they continue to embrace the myth in the face of all evidence to the contrary, either completely ignoring the evidence for the truth or viciously attacking it with spurious logic and an utter absence of common sense. Not only do we see evidence of this time and again in the biblical record, as in the book of Mormon, we see it all around us today.
© Anthony E. Larson, 1999
The ancients believed such foolishness as: the world was flat, the brain was useful only to cool the blood, life emerged spontaneously from swamps and ponds of stagnant water, idols answered prayers and the Earth was the center of the universe. Is it possible that we, the enlightened ones, still have similarly silly skeletal notions in our cultural closet?
A tale of oil and dinosaurs
A number of years ago, a large oil company advertised its gasoline product with an animated television commercial, explaining how ancient plants and animals gave their all so we could have gasoline for our cars today. The animators depicted a cartoon dinosaur poking its head out of a car’s filler pipe, making a somewhat comical growling sound as the car sped off.
This amusing commercial illustrated the modern view, held by geologists and paleontologists, that Earth’s petroleum deposits came from the remains of long dead plants and animals — a cleaver portrayal of orthodox science’s theories that Earth’s petroleum deposits and its many byproducts originated in the distillation of hydrocarbons from the decaying remnants of massive, ancient flora and fauna accumulations, buried by successive deposition in enormous subsidence zones. Over great expanses of time, they opine, these deposits were compressed in geological processes, squeezing out the hydrocarbons, which then collected in great pools beneath impermeable layers of rock. Hence the term “fossil fuel.”
Old ideas die hard
A century ago, this idea seemed logical. Probably since time began, man has mined coal for energy from great seams layered in the earth. Those same coal beds, and the strata adjoining them, hold the fossils of ancient plants and animals. Since the only things on this planet seen to contain appreciable amounts of hydrocarbons were the flora and fauna that proliferate on its surface, scientists naturally assumed that this was the source for buried hydrocarbons. Deep peat beds found in some locations seemed to support that idea. Those peat beds were thought to be simply an early step in a process that eventually would create coal and hydrocarbon deposits. Thus, it seemed reasonable to assume that coal and oil were the byproducts of some ancient biomass.
While such thinking may have been acceptable in the past, it is no longer viable. This is one of the great myths of modern science. What is more, it serves to demonstrate how intractable scientists are about their pet theories when faced with evidence that does not fit their paradigm.
A new age
This explanation for the existence of crude oil and natural gas — hydrocarbons — beneath Earth’s crust may have been useful up until the mid-twentieth century, but it has no meaning in light of the preponderance of evidence that has accumulated in the last 40 years — especially that gathered since mankind entered the space age.
For decades, we have launched unmanned probes to other planets and moons in our solar system. These have sent back pictures and data sufficient to teach us the true origin of Earth’s hydrocarbons. We have learned that hydrocarbons are present almost everywhere in the solar system, not just on Earth. Sophisticated spectrographic analysis has detected hydrocarbons in the atmosphere of many major planets and many large moons.
An oil world
Most notable for its concentration of hydrocarbons (scientists cautiously use the word “methane”) is great Titan, a moon nearly the size of Mars that circles Saturn. Data suggests that the atmosphere of this planet-sized moon is composed primarily of hydrocarbons in one form or another. Scientists say that so great is the concentration of hydrocarbons in its atmosphere that when it rains on Titan, condensed hydrocarbons fall in droplet from clouds of methane rather than water as on Earth. In fact, where Earth is a water planet with streams, lake, rivers and oceans of water, Titan is an oil planet with streams, lakes, rivers and oceans of flowing hydrocarbons in one form or another ranging from light, volatile oils to heavier forms.
Earth’s true history
What seems likely from the evidence collected to date is that Titan and Earth represent two distinct phases of similar planetary evolution. The oil deposits deep in Earth’s crust betray the unarticulated truth that this planet once passed through a phase like that which persists on Titan today. At some time in Earth’s long, ancient history, our atmosphere was so charged with hydrocarbons that they naturally accumulated in great concentrations on the surface. Some of the heavier oils — some almost tar-like — were deposited in layers and then buried in seismic events. Some of the lighter hydrocarbons, like naphtha, would have seeped deep into the ground to accumulate in vast pools, just as water concentrates in great, deep aquifers today. Those great pools of oil, gas or petroleum remained entombed in Earth’s crustal rock, insulated from the chemical and catastrophic processes that ultimately reduced our atmosphere to its present composition.
If not there, why here?
No one speculates that these newly discovered hydrocarbons found elsewhere in the solar system came from any kind of decayed biomass. The environment on most other planets — most notably the gaseous giants — is far too harsh to support any life, much less generate anything approaching the quantity needed to produce massive amounts of hydrocarbons. So, why assume that oil elsewhere — on Earth, for example — came exclusively from life?
This beg the question: Since there are massive amounts of hydrocarbons elsewhere in the solar system, might it be that Earth’s hydrocarbon deposits originated in the same way as those others? Of course, the only logical answer is yes! If it is impossible that hydrocarbons found elsewhere in the solar system are the byproducts of life, then it stands to reason that the same likelihood holds true for Earth.
Modern myths cling to life
Ironically, even though the newest evidence seems to suggest another source for Earth’s hydrocarbons, no one in the orthodox scientific or scholastic community speaks or writes of it. Indeed, the latest textbooks written and used by academia in classes on geology, paleontology and astronomy intended to “educate” the young, perpetuate this absurd fiction. Although the truth is as plain as the nose on our collective face, we persist in teaching a fabrication, a fraud. Once again, as in the days of Copernicus and Galileo, we see the establishment academia clinging like grim death to an absolute myth!
Immanual Velikovsky, the author of Worlds in Collision, speculated over 50 years ago that hydrocarbons were introduced into the Earth’s atmosphere anciently, but within historic times, when errant planets in our solar system passed devastatingly close to the Earth. Scientists mocked and criticized his theory on the strength of their conviction that hydrocarbons existed nowhere else in the solar system but on Earth. Such criticism was rather persuasive then since mankind knew so little about other worlds. Even the best telescopes did little to reveal the conditions that truly existed on other planets. However, now that the recently discovered evidence supports Velikovsky’s early assertion, there is still no re-evaluation of his theories forthcoming from establishment science.
Velikovsky’s theory was not just a lucky guess, as some charged. He asserted that hydrocarbons are plentiful in the atmospheres of other planets, based on ancient eyewitness accounts of fire falling from the sky and burning over the ground when one or more of those planets passed perilously close to the Earth, mixing their volatile atmospheres with our own. Given recent evidence, it appears that Velikovsky was actually more accurate than his detractors.
The success of Velikovsky’s predictions regarding the existence of extraterrestrial hydrocarbons should have caused the scientific and scholarly institutions to reassess their scathing criticisms of the good doctor’s other theories, but they did not. Likewise, once mankind entered the space age, the orthodox myth of crude oil’s origin in ancient biomass should have been dispelled immediately. But it was not. Instead, today’s science textbooks parrot the same tired myth of yesteryear.
The answer to why this old tradition was not summarily dismissed and why science refuses to reconsider Velikovsky’s theory reveals much about our culture and our intransigence — something Book of Mormon prophets would have called “stiffneckedness.”
As it is with science, so it is with religion. Whenever people who have embraced a myth are confronted by truth, they seldom relinquish the myth — ‘impartial’ scientists and ‘truth-seeking’ religionists included. Indeed, they continue to embrace the myth in the face of all evidence to the contrary, either completely ignoring the evidence for the truth or viciously attacking it with spurious logic and an utter absence of common sense. Not only do we see evidence of this time and again in the biblical record, as in the book of Mormon, we see it all around us today.
© Anthony E. Larson, 1999
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
Understanding Section 133
The acquisition of vital information from catastrophists and comparative mythologists about the traditional, cultural archetypes that dominate our scriptures and the information contained in an anecdotal story related by Patriarch Homer M. Brown of his grandparents’ encounter with Joseph Smith one evening in Nauvoo now allow us to turn our attention to one of the more symbol laden, latter-day revelations about future events given to the prophet.
In Doctrine and Covenants, Section 133, the Lord reveals much about the changes in the heavens and the earth that will be seen one day. But in order to fully understand what is recorded there, we must combine our understanding of the Saturn traditions and the concepts Joseph Smith communicated to Benjamin Brown.
A new reading
We turn our attention to the verses in Section 133 that focus on a series of events seen to occur prior to the second coming. “For behold, the Lord God hath sent forth the angel crying through the midst of heaven, saying: Prepare ye the way of the Lord, and make his paths straight, for the hour of his coming is nigh—.” (Doctrine & Covenants 133:17.)
This verse sets the scene. We are about to be told of events that will transpire immediately prior to the second coming. Thus, we now have at hand a method of understanding more clearly the nature and impact of those things that will be seen in the very last days.
In the next verse, we are immediately immersed in traditional, astral imagery. “When the Lamb shall stand upon Mount Zion, and with him a hundred and forty-four thousand, having his Father’s name written on their foreheads.” (Ibid., v. 18.)
For a full interpretation of these allusions used in the prophetic language in verse 18, we must turn to the Saturn traditions.
The lamb of god
Just as the crescent in its inferior position on the limb of Saturn ...
... became the symbol for the sacred cow or bull, ...
... so the same crescent when located in the superior position ...
... was characterized as a ram due to the similarity in appearance of the planet’s inverted crescent with the horns of a male sheep.
The “lamb” in the polar configuration was the small, red planet, Mars, the son of the “sire,” the “ram,” Saturn. The use of this imagery became highly anthropomorphisized in Egyptian art and was rendered accordingly, as seen above.
Given that imagery, it is iconographically correct to refer to the son of the ram god as a “lamb,” an often-used allusion in ancient symbolism.
Naturally, the prophets would immediately see the symbolic value of referring to the Savior, the Son of God, as a lamb. It was an association that anyone steeped in ancient symbolism would easily understand. So, the phrase “Son of God” became the “Lamb of God.” Once made in antiquity, the connection would persist to become part of the language of the prophets and the scriptures, right down into New Testament times.
The fact that revelations produced by Joseph Smith display the proper use of such ancient iconography speaks eloquently for their authenticity. False prophets in this day and age have no grasp of such idiographic relationships and thus fail to use them properly, if at all.
Mount Zion
Looking further, we see that Mount Zion mentioned in verse 18 is, of course, the axis mundi, world or cosmic mountain upon which the polar configuration, the temple or city of god, appeared to stand, answering to the this archetypical image.
This “mountain” is the basis for temple imagery the world over—Olympus in the Greek culture, Jerusalem’s Mt. Moriah in the Israelite culture—where temples are often either designed to resemble a mountain, mound or pyramid, or set on top of one or next to one. It is also the basis for a similar allusion in the scriptures where the temple is described as “the mountain of the Lord’s house.”
The 144,000
So, too, is the “hundred and forty-four thousand” named in verse 18. That symbolically derived number (12 x 12 x 1000) is simply a metaphoric means of saying “more than you can count.” It was never meant to express a fixed number, as it is so often misinterpreted in modern prophetic schemes.
These ‘individuals’ are also prominently mentioned in Revelation where they stand with a “Lamb” and are part of mount “Sion.” Joseph Smith and the scriptures depict them in symbolic terms, as though they were individuals, servants of God or priesthood holders. Originally, they were based in the thousands of illuminated prominences that radiated outward from the edge of the celestial planet/god/city, as seen in this exploded view.
They were characterized in tradition and mythology as the inhabitants of the celestial city, and as such are iconographically useful in depicting those saved or exalted souls who will stand with Christ at the final judgment, as John and Joseph Smith explained.
The returning hero weds
The next verses introduce a new dimension to our investigation, allowing us to see the origins of Christian symbolism in the more ancient cultural and religious usages.
“Wherefore, prepare ye for the coming of the Bridegroom; go ye, go ye out to meet him. (Ibid., v. 19.)
While the reference to the “Bridegroom,” as every Christian knows, is clearly an allusion to Christ’s role as husband to the church, this reference goes back to a more ancient, cosmological tradition.
During the evolution of the polar configuration, Mars was seen to move away from the center. In doing so, it seemed to the ancients to “wander” about heaven and grow much larger as it engaged in a variety of metamorphoses in a planetary ‘dance’ that engaged both Venus and the Earth.
These phases of the planetary epic spawned a multitude of myths and traditions about cultural heroes who wandered away from home, orphaned or dispossessed, who then engaged in a series of misadventures, challenges or contests in which they performed miraculously and then finally returned home to discover their heritage, roots or exalted station in life. These mythical archetypes are recognizable to modern eyes, for example, in recent incarnations such as the story of Aladdin, the Prince and the Pauper, the story of King Arthur or the tales of Hercules.
Eventually, Mars returned to the center place after several eventful excursions. This return was seen as a marriage ceremony wherein the two planets, the warrior/hero Mars and the goddess/queen Venus, were ‘joined’ or ‘wed’ after the wanderer’s long absence from the center place or home.
So the early Christian church adopted this cultural tradition to describe the returning Christ, coming to initiate the Millennium after his long absence from the Earth. Hence, the Christian imagery of the bridegroom and the bride, as used by the Lord and Joseph Smith in Doctrine and Covenants, find their roots in ancient planetary imagery.
Bigger than life
The next verse leaves the impression that the Lord’s return will see him as a giant standing on the Earth, with one foot on the Asian continent and the other on the American continent. “For behold, he shall stand upon the mount of Olivet, and great deep, and upon the islands of the sea, and upon the land of Zion.” (Ibid., v.20.)
Once again, such imagery is based on ancient symbolism spawned in the Saturn configuration of planets when it assumed the prototypical image of the “heaven man” with its ‘arms’ stretched heavenward and its ‘feet’ planted on the limb of the Earth, as seen in this illustration.
This Egyptian glyph, below, is perhaps the best example of the heaven man archetype and a reminder that the primary symbols were occasionally portrayed most precisely in ancient art. More than most, this example approaches an accurate portrayal of the archetypical symbol derived from the polar configuration and serves as strong evidence that this symbol was the origin of much biblical imagery.
In this instance, the planet Venus, seen to sit in the center of Saturn, was considered the head, Saturn’s crescent formed the outstretched arms, Mars at the top of the column became the chest or torso and the pillar the legs of the heaven man or angel archetype.
While the return of the Savior will undoubtedly be a magnificent manifestation, just as it was when he descended from heaven after his resurrection to appear before the Nephites, his stature will not assume epic proportions as this verse implies.
A celestial metaphor
Indeed, it is the thesis of this presentation that these verses are not at all meant to be descriptive of the Savior’s coming, as it is commonly supposed. While it is symbolically correct to apply these metaphors to his advent, the imagery tells us more. It betrays a celestial scene based in cosmological origins.
If we return to the first verse quoted in this monograph, we find that we were introduced to an angel “crying through the midst of heaven.” Ironically, it is the very “heaven man” image from which the ancients derived the “angel” icon. Thus, this icon is likely the origin of the “angel” image of prophecy, used by so many prophets.
This opens the door to a more meaningful or amplified reading of these verses. It is the concept that what is described here is not Christ’s advent at all, but a planetary encounter between the Earth and another planetary body — the harbinger of the second coming or last “grand sign” of the Savior’s advent. And, in fact, when we consult Joseph Smith’s pronouncements as recorded in the Brown account regarding these very verses, we find that, indeed, he spoke plainly of a planetary encounter.
What better way to impress on the reader the planetary nature of the events described in these verses than to couch them in symbolic terms reminiscent of ancient times when Earth was a satellite of a gas giant and a companion to other planets? If what will be seen in Earth’s heavens just prior to the Savior’s advent—Joseph’s “planet, comet”—is a planetary display akin to that seen anciently, why not use all the traditional metaphors to memorialize that fact? To do otherwise would be inconsistent with prophetic convention. Anyonewell versed in the ancient traditions, such as a prophet, would be inclined to use the ‘proper’ and ‘correct’ symbolism and metaphor. And, indeed, that is what we see done in these once enigmatic verses.
Moreover, approaching these verses with this in mind, we find immediate clarification of the imagery. All that is needed is knowledge of how these icons were employed anciently and we have the proper interpretation. Or as Peter put it, “No prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.” Prophecy is meant to be interpreted systematically, using the imagery known in the times of the ancient prophets who spoke these words, imagery common to all ancient cultures. It is we moderns, who esteem this imagery as ‘myth,’ that have stripped it from our culture and our traditions, leaving us unable to grasp its meaning when we encounter it.
Returning planet imagery
Looking back at the verses examined thus far from Section 133, we find that, indeed, all the imagery has its basis in ancient planetary imagery, just as the following verses. “And he shall utter his voice out of Zion, and he shall speak from Jerusalem, and his voice shall be heard among all people; And it shall be a voice as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of a great thunder, which shall break down the mountains, and the valleys shall not be found.” (op. cit., vs. 21, 22.)
Sound was an integral part of the ancient events. Electrically energetic planets in close proximity were easily capable of generating a multitude of electromagnetic oscillations that became audible in Earth’s atmosphere, from the most subtle to excruciatingly loud. It is proper to refer to the sounds as coming from a geographical location — “he shall utter his voice out of Zion, and he shall speak from Jerusalem” — because the sound or voice would seen to emanate from there since the entire Earth would become a planet-sized transducer or speaker, oscillating in response to electromagnetic waves propagated by nearby planets.
Thunder and crashing water are probably only somewhat reminiscent of those sounds since they were heard to accompany the tremendous shaking of the ground, as alluded to in these verses. Furthermore, it is appropriate to connect these colossal sounds with the transformation of Earth’s topography — “which shall break down the mountains, and the valleys shall not be found” — because they likely went hand in hand.
The next verse further confirms our thesis. “He shall command the great deep, and it shall be driven back into the north countries, and the islands shall become one land. (op. cit., v. 23.) Let’s learn what this means in Joseph’s own words from the Patriarch Brown account.
Here we see yet another anticipated effect of the Earth joining in a polar orbit with another, larger body. Joseph was exactly right in assessing that our planet’s rotation might slow when electromagnetically joined with a new neighbor, thus significantly diminishing the centrifugal forces that maintain an equatorial bulge at the equator. This would have the effect of raising the ocean levels at the poles and diminishing or depressing those around the equator.
But there would be another, even greater reason for this oceanic migration that may not have occurred to Joseph: tremendous tidal action due to gravity, which would also serve to draw Earth’s oceans into gigantic tides, the primary one centered on the North Pole and the secondary or reflexive tide on the South Pole.
A consequence of such permanent polar tides would be the appearance of heretofore submerged land bridges between many of the continents — especially at the equatorial latitudes where the effect would be the most dramatic. Water levels in some places might subside hundreds of feet in great, worldwide tsunamis as the oceans raced to the poles, thus “receding from the Earth.” Imagine a ring of dry ground girding the equator, joining all the continents.
Thus, we would see the literal fulfillment of verse 23. “… the great deep … shall be driven back into the north countries, and the islands shall become one land.”
A planetary “docking maneuver”
Having introduced the concept of intersecting planets, “the coming together of the two planets,” Joseph next refers to a circumstance that has no meaning except in a universe governed by electromagnetic forces.
In fact, the perception by science of such an event has not changed since Joseph’s day. Scientists still speak, hypothetically, of such events as collisions, insisting that they would be, as Joseph said, “disastrous.”
The Roche limit is the orbital distance at which the gravity of the larger planet will begin to tidally tear apart the smaller planet as they approach one another. Even if, as Joseph proposed, the planets were traveling in the same direction or sharing a similar orbit as one gradually overtook the other, their approach would eventually bring them within the Roche limit, which would be utterly disastrous to the smaller orb. It would be summarily sundered into so many chunks.
Yet, Joseph’s scenario sees no such outcome. Saying emphatically that “it would not be disastrous,” he seems to understand what orthodox science denies to this day: There are greater forces at work in such a scenario than gravity. These electromotive forces would serve to both prevent an outright collision or dismemberment and, at the same time, lock the two planets together in a tandem orbit.
In fact, proponents of the electric universe theory insist that electromagnetic plasma layers — once called VanAllen belts but now called Langmuir sheaths — surrounding both approaching planets would pull the planets together at a distance, yet also prevent them from colliding by holding them apart as the distance between them diminished. In effect, the two planets’ approach would first be cushioned, then the two would electromagnetically couple, held in stasis at a distance from one another, neither drifting apart nor colliding. And while the tidal effects would be tremendous, pulling the oceans to the poles, they would be insufficient to destroy either planet.
Joseph’s prophetic insight
Joseph Smith’s scenario, as we have read, suggests just such a circumstance. Yet, how could he know of this? Even today science denies such a possibility. Indeed, electricity was only a novelty in that day. Thus, its role in creating electromagnetic effects was virtually unknown. In fact it still has no acknowledged role in planetary science even today.
Clearly, Joseph had learned through revelation that Earth was once held in juxtaposition with another planet anciently before being separated, even if he did not completely understand the mechanics of such a coupling. For this reason he speaks of it “returning” in conjunction with the events described in Section 133.
Indeed, this is the only context in which these statements have any meaning.
And this is the point: In the context of modern “scientific” notions, Joseph’s statements in the Brown account sound like the fanciful inventions of a fertile imagination. However, when seen in the context of the Saturn traditions and the electric universe, it is a stunningly accurate depiction and a testament to the prophetic prowess of Joseph Smith. Moreover, the Brown account allows a much more meaningful interpretation of Section 133.
Seen in the light of our new perspective on ancient history, we can see that the next verse from the 133rd Section has been grossly misconstrued by Latter-day Saints. “And the land of Jerusalem and the land of Zion shall be turned back into their own place, and the earth shall be like as it was in the days before it was divided.” (op. cit., v. 24.)
Continents do not drift
This verse does not describe the popular geologic notion of continental drift. As we have seen, Joseph does not speak of shifting landmasses in his interpretation of Section 133. However, he does speak of shifting oceans that will permanently reveal great tracts of land, thus reversing the “division” of the Earth in Peleg’s day.
More significant still is the reference to Jerusalem and Zion being “turned back into their own place.” While such a statement might be construed to be an indication of continents in motion to our ears, seen through the lenses of ancient tradition, it tells a very different story.
Latter-day Saints tend to think of Zion as a people, for so it is used in modern parlance. We also think of Jerusalem as an earthly city in the Middle East. However, anciently this was not so. The archetype of the holy city, Jerusalem was the Saturn configuration, and Zion (Sion) was the name of the heaven-spanning mountain that both held up the celestial city and connected it to the Earth. Thus, if the heavenly city and its sacred mountain are “turned back in their own place,” the phrase refers to the return of that grouping of planets that gave rise to that imagery anciently.
This verse, then, is not about earthly cities. It is, as is consistently done in these verses, an allegory based in celestial constructs. And, in fact, the return of a planet is what Joseph’s instruction to the Browns was all about, lending further credibility to this idea.
The proposed explanation of these verses extends to yet another verse in the 133rd Section. “And they who are in the north countries shall come in remembrance before the Lord; and their prophets shall hear his voice, and shall no longer stay themselves; and they shall smite the rocks, and the ice shall flow down at their presence.”
Joseph’s explanation of the melting ice is as follows:
Once again, we see an explanation that not only supports the contention that Joseph viewed these prophesied events as planetary catastrophes, we also a reiteration of the joining planets theme.
Also, in this same passage, we come to one of the most misunderstood prophecies in all scripture in that many claim the “they” in this verse means the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel.
Not about the Lost Tribes of Israel
Because ancient tradition connected to the disappearance of the Lost Tribes tells of them disappearing into “the north countries,” modern Saints have interpreted this verse to refer to those Ten Lost Tribes because of the identical reference.
Once again, however, when we look at Joseph’s statement, we get the picture of a returning planet.
That is, their planet will once again take up its historic, traditional position in “the north.” This, of course is indicative of the unique polar orbit posited by Talbott and illustrated in the Dibble facsimile, as drawn by Joseph Smith.
Note that nowhere in the Brown account does the Prophet suggest that the Ten Tribes would come from that planet, only that it was thought to be “their” planet or the one that was connected to them by tradition.
Since Joseph attributes all the other phenomena in this account to effects generated by the return of the old celestial or heavenly order, it seems likely that he meant to convey that same point in this instance rather than referring to the return of any group of people. In fact, placing the Ten Tribes interpretation on this solitary verse in an entire sequence dedicated to planetary symbolism seems completely out of place. A more sensible approach would seem to be to allow the verse to be seen as complementary to the rest of the passage rather than interpreting it as a parenthetical comment.
It bears mention at this point that many early Saints attribute to Joseph Smith the belief that the Lost Tribes inhabited another planet. This, of course, is impossible to verify since there is no direct statement to that effect recorded by the Prophet.
From the standpoint of the polar configuration of planets illustrated above, such a circumstance would seem to be patently impossible. First of all, no known mechanism would allow people to relocate from Earth to Mars or Venus, the two planets most proximate to Earth in the Polar Configuration. The natural forces unleashed in those events would have been too traumatic to humans to see the Lost Tribes survive the transit—even if a transport mechanism could be identified. Secondly, the distances were similar to those that separate the Earth and its moon today. Bridging such a hostile gap would appear to be even more of an impossibility.
Since the traditions tell of no other, habitable planets parking in a polar orbit above the Earth anciently that might have served as a refuge for migrating Israelites, the Lost Tribes interpretation of this verse fails.
Furthermore, space probes to those two planets have returned no evidence that they are inhabited. Indeed, the environments on Mars and Venus today could not support human beings, except one imagines some supernatural intervention to miraculously preserve them alive. Even if these two planets were to return to their former location near the Earth, there could be no people living there to return. Therefore, the interpretation of these verses as the return of an inhabited planet also fails.
The most likely explanation for the belief of many early Saints that Joseph taught such an idea can only be considered a uniform misinterpretation based on the way the prophet explained the concept. Indeed, since the return of the Lost Tribes will coincide with these latter-day catastrophes, the two are closely connected in prophecy and easily mistaken one for the other.
A celestial highway
Moving on, we see another, traditional aspect of the polar configuration reused in the description of the coming event as recorded in Section 133. “And an highway shall be cast up in the midst of the great deep.” (op. cit., vs. 27.)
Once again, Joseph clarifies the revelation.
This “highway” was also Mt. Sion supporting the holy city at its apex where it appears to split into twin peaks.
In this phase of the configuration’s career, the pillar or mountain could easily be construed as a road or path. It is the origin of the symbolic notion that the streets of heaven are paved with gold. It is the reason many ancient temples were accessible only via a lengthy causeway or avenue leading up to the gates.
The final verses we will consider here from the 133rd Section follow the returning planet imagery.
Lest the reader lapse into interpreting these verses as applying to the Lost Tribes, consider the third verse. The “everlasting hills” do not tremble at the “presence” of any people, but they do tremble at the return of a planet to Earth’s northern skies, re-establishing the ancient heavenly order.
If one reads “them” to mean the returning 144,000 or “servants” that stood about the polar configuration, a more consistent interpretation with internal themes, then these verses simply continue the same planetary metaphor.
So it is that the powerful imagery of these verses from Section 133 are easily interpreted, thanks to the Brown account of Joseph’s teachings about the last days and the pivotal research of modern catastrophists and comparative mythologists.
© Anthony E. Larson, 2004
In Doctrine and Covenants, Section 133, the Lord reveals much about the changes in the heavens and the earth that will be seen one day. But in order to fully understand what is recorded there, we must combine our understanding of the Saturn traditions and the concepts Joseph Smith communicated to Benjamin Brown.
A new reading
We turn our attention to the verses in Section 133 that focus on a series of events seen to occur prior to the second coming. “For behold, the Lord God hath sent forth the angel crying through the midst of heaven, saying: Prepare ye the way of the Lord, and make his paths straight, for the hour of his coming is nigh—.” (Doctrine & Covenants 133:17.)
This verse sets the scene. We are about to be told of events that will transpire immediately prior to the second coming. Thus, we now have at hand a method of understanding more clearly the nature and impact of those things that will be seen in the very last days.
In the next verse, we are immediately immersed in traditional, astral imagery. “When the Lamb shall stand upon Mount Zion, and with him a hundred and forty-four thousand, having his Father’s name written on their foreheads.” (Ibid., v. 18.)
For a full interpretation of these allusions used in the prophetic language in verse 18, we must turn to the Saturn traditions.
The lamb of god
Just as the crescent in its inferior position on the limb of Saturn ...
... became the symbol for the sacred cow or bull, ...
... so the same crescent when located in the superior position ...
... was characterized as a ram due to the similarity in appearance of the planet’s inverted crescent with the horns of a male sheep.
The “lamb” in the polar configuration was the small, red planet, Mars, the son of the “sire,” the “ram,” Saturn. The use of this imagery became highly anthropomorphisized in Egyptian art and was rendered accordingly, as seen above.
Given that imagery, it is iconographically correct to refer to the son of the ram god as a “lamb,” an often-used allusion in ancient symbolism.
Naturally, the prophets would immediately see the symbolic value of referring to the Savior, the Son of God, as a lamb. It was an association that anyone steeped in ancient symbolism would easily understand. So, the phrase “Son of God” became the “Lamb of God.” Once made in antiquity, the connection would persist to become part of the language of the prophets and the scriptures, right down into New Testament times.
The fact that revelations produced by Joseph Smith display the proper use of such ancient iconography speaks eloquently for their authenticity. False prophets in this day and age have no grasp of such idiographic relationships and thus fail to use them properly, if at all.
Mount Zion
Looking further, we see that Mount Zion mentioned in verse 18 is, of course, the axis mundi, world or cosmic mountain upon which the polar configuration, the temple or city of god, appeared to stand, answering to the this archetypical image.
This “mountain” is the basis for temple imagery the world over—Olympus in the Greek culture, Jerusalem’s Mt. Moriah in the Israelite culture—where temples are often either designed to resemble a mountain, mound or pyramid, or set on top of one or next to one. It is also the basis for a similar allusion in the scriptures where the temple is described as “the mountain of the Lord’s house.”
The 144,000
So, too, is the “hundred and forty-four thousand” named in verse 18. That symbolically derived number (12 x 12 x 1000) is simply a metaphoric means of saying “more than you can count.” It was never meant to express a fixed number, as it is so often misinterpreted in modern prophetic schemes.
These ‘individuals’ are also prominently mentioned in Revelation where they stand with a “Lamb” and are part of mount “Sion.” Joseph Smith and the scriptures depict them in symbolic terms, as though they were individuals, servants of God or priesthood holders. Originally, they were based in the thousands of illuminated prominences that radiated outward from the edge of the celestial planet/god/city, as seen in this exploded view.
They were characterized in tradition and mythology as the inhabitants of the celestial city, and as such are iconographically useful in depicting those saved or exalted souls who will stand with Christ at the final judgment, as John and Joseph Smith explained.
The returning hero weds
The next verses introduce a new dimension to our investigation, allowing us to see the origins of Christian symbolism in the more ancient cultural and religious usages.
“Wherefore, prepare ye for the coming of the Bridegroom; go ye, go ye out to meet him. (Ibid., v. 19.)
While the reference to the “Bridegroom,” as every Christian knows, is clearly an allusion to Christ’s role as husband to the church, this reference goes back to a more ancient, cosmological tradition.
During the evolution of the polar configuration, Mars was seen to move away from the center. In doing so, it seemed to the ancients to “wander” about heaven and grow much larger as it engaged in a variety of metamorphoses in a planetary ‘dance’ that engaged both Venus and the Earth.
These phases of the planetary epic spawned a multitude of myths and traditions about cultural heroes who wandered away from home, orphaned or dispossessed, who then engaged in a series of misadventures, challenges or contests in which they performed miraculously and then finally returned home to discover their heritage, roots or exalted station in life. These mythical archetypes are recognizable to modern eyes, for example, in recent incarnations such as the story of Aladdin, the Prince and the Pauper, the story of King Arthur or the tales of Hercules.
Eventually, Mars returned to the center place after several eventful excursions. This return was seen as a marriage ceremony wherein the two planets, the warrior/hero Mars and the goddess/queen Venus, were ‘joined’ or ‘wed’ after the wanderer’s long absence from the center place or home.
So the early Christian church adopted this cultural tradition to describe the returning Christ, coming to initiate the Millennium after his long absence from the Earth. Hence, the Christian imagery of the bridegroom and the bride, as used by the Lord and Joseph Smith in Doctrine and Covenants, find their roots in ancient planetary imagery.
Bigger than life
The next verse leaves the impression that the Lord’s return will see him as a giant standing on the Earth, with one foot on the Asian continent and the other on the American continent. “For behold, he shall stand upon the mount of Olivet, and great deep, and upon the islands of the sea, and upon the land of Zion.” (Ibid., v.20.)
Once again, such imagery is based on ancient symbolism spawned in the Saturn configuration of planets when it assumed the prototypical image of the “heaven man” with its ‘arms’ stretched heavenward and its ‘feet’ planted on the limb of the Earth, as seen in this illustration.
This Egyptian glyph, below, is perhaps the best example of the heaven man archetype and a reminder that the primary symbols were occasionally portrayed most precisely in ancient art. More than most, this example approaches an accurate portrayal of the archetypical symbol derived from the polar configuration and serves as strong evidence that this symbol was the origin of much biblical imagery.
In this instance, the planet Venus, seen to sit in the center of Saturn, was considered the head, Saturn’s crescent formed the outstretched arms, Mars at the top of the column became the chest or torso and the pillar the legs of the heaven man or angel archetype.
While the return of the Savior will undoubtedly be a magnificent manifestation, just as it was when he descended from heaven after his resurrection to appear before the Nephites, his stature will not assume epic proportions as this verse implies.
A celestial metaphor
Indeed, it is the thesis of this presentation that these verses are not at all meant to be descriptive of the Savior’s coming, as it is commonly supposed. While it is symbolically correct to apply these metaphors to his advent, the imagery tells us more. It betrays a celestial scene based in cosmological origins.
If we return to the first verse quoted in this monograph, we find that we were introduced to an angel “crying through the midst of heaven.” Ironically, it is the very “heaven man” image from which the ancients derived the “angel” icon. Thus, this icon is likely the origin of the “angel” image of prophecy, used by so many prophets.
This opens the door to a more meaningful or amplified reading of these verses. It is the concept that what is described here is not Christ’s advent at all, but a planetary encounter between the Earth and another planetary body — the harbinger of the second coming or last “grand sign” of the Savior’s advent. And, in fact, when we consult Joseph Smith’s pronouncements as recorded in the Brown account regarding these very verses, we find that, indeed, he spoke plainly of a planetary encounter.
After re-entering the house, the Prophet said, “Brother Brown, I noticed when I came in that you were reading the Doctrine and Covenants. Will you kindly get it?”
He did so. The Prophet turned to Section 133 and read, commencing at the 26th verse and throughout to the 34th verse. He said, after reading the 31st verse, “Now, let me ask you what would cause the everlasting hills to tremble with more violence than the coming together of the two planets? (Scriptural and Secular Prophecies Pertaining to The Last Days, pp. 89, 90.)
What better way to impress on the reader the planetary nature of the events described in these verses than to couch them in symbolic terms reminiscent of ancient times when Earth was a satellite of a gas giant and a companion to other planets? If what will be seen in Earth’s heavens just prior to the Savior’s advent—Joseph’s “planet, comet”—is a planetary display akin to that seen anciently, why not use all the traditional metaphors to memorialize that fact? To do otherwise would be inconsistent with prophetic convention. Anyonewell versed in the ancient traditions, such as a prophet, would be inclined to use the ‘proper’ and ‘correct’ symbolism and metaphor. And, indeed, that is what we see done in these once enigmatic verses.
Moreover, approaching these verses with this in mind, we find immediate clarification of the imagery. All that is needed is knowledge of how these icons were employed anciently and we have the proper interpretation. Or as Peter put it, “No prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.” Prophecy is meant to be interpreted systematically, using the imagery known in the times of the ancient prophets who spoke these words, imagery common to all ancient cultures. It is we moderns, who esteem this imagery as ‘myth,’ that have stripped it from our culture and our traditions, leaving us unable to grasp its meaning when we encounter it.
Returning planet imagery
Looking back at the verses examined thus far from Section 133, we find that, indeed, all the imagery has its basis in ancient planetary imagery, just as the following verses. “And he shall utter his voice out of Zion, and he shall speak from Jerusalem, and his voice shall be heard among all people; And it shall be a voice as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of a great thunder, which shall break down the mountains, and the valleys shall not be found.” (op. cit., vs. 21, 22.)
Sound was an integral part of the ancient events. Electrically energetic planets in close proximity were easily capable of generating a multitude of electromagnetic oscillations that became audible in Earth’s atmosphere, from the most subtle to excruciatingly loud. It is proper to refer to the sounds as coming from a geographical location — “he shall utter his voice out of Zion, and he shall speak from Jerusalem” — because the sound or voice would seen to emanate from there since the entire Earth would become a planet-sized transducer or speaker, oscillating in response to electromagnetic waves propagated by nearby planets.
Thunder and crashing water are probably only somewhat reminiscent of those sounds since they were heard to accompany the tremendous shaking of the ground, as alluded to in these verses. Furthermore, it is appropriate to connect these colossal sounds with the transformation of Earth’s topography — “which shall break down the mountains, and the valleys shall not be found” — because they likely went hand in hand.
The next verse further confirms our thesis. “He shall command the great deep, and it shall be driven back into the north countries, and the islands shall become one land. (op. cit., v. 23.) Let’s learn what this means in Joseph’s own words from the Patriarch Brown account.
“Relative to the waters rolling back to the north, if you take a vessel of water and swing it rapidly around your head, you won’t spill any. But if you stop the motion gradually, it will begin to pour out.
“Now,” he said, “Brother Brown, at the present time this earth is rotating very rapidly. When this planet returns it will make the Earth that much heavier, and it will then revolve slower. That will account for the waters receding from the Earth for a great while, but it has now turned and is proceeding rapidly eastward.” (op. cit., p. 91.)
Here we see yet another anticipated effect of the Earth joining in a polar orbit with another, larger body. Joseph was exactly right in assessing that our planet’s rotation might slow when electromagnetically joined with a new neighbor, thus significantly diminishing the centrifugal forces that maintain an equatorial bulge at the equator. This would have the effect of raising the ocean levels at the poles and diminishing or depressing those around the equator.
But there would be another, even greater reason for this oceanic migration that may not have occurred to Joseph: tremendous tidal action due to gravity, which would also serve to draw Earth’s oceans into gigantic tides, the primary one centered on the North Pole and the secondary or reflexive tide on the South Pole.
A consequence of such permanent polar tides would be the appearance of heretofore submerged land bridges between many of the continents — especially at the equatorial latitudes where the effect would be the most dramatic. Water levels in some places might subside hundreds of feet in great, worldwide tsunamis as the oceans raced to the poles, thus “receding from the Earth.” Imagine a ring of dry ground girding the equator, joining all the continents.
Thus, we would see the literal fulfillment of verse 23. “… the great deep … shall be driven back into the north countries, and the islands shall become one land.”
A planetary “docking maneuver”
Having introduced the concept of intersecting planets, “the coming together of the two planets,” Joseph next refers to a circumstance that has no meaning except in a universe governed by electromagnetic forces.
“Now,” he said, “scientists will tell you that it is not scientific, that two planets coming together would be disastrous to both. But, when two planets or other objects are traveling in the same direction and one of them with a little greater velocity than the other, it would not be disastrous because the one traveling faster would overtake the other.”
In fact, the perception by science of such an event has not changed since Joseph’s day. Scientists still speak, hypothetically, of such events as collisions, insisting that they would be, as Joseph said, “disastrous.”
The Roche limit is the orbital distance at which the gravity of the larger planet will begin to tidally tear apart the smaller planet as they approach one another. Even if, as Joseph proposed, the planets were traveling in the same direction or sharing a similar orbit as one gradually overtook the other, their approach would eventually bring them within the Roche limit, which would be utterly disastrous to the smaller orb. It would be summarily sundered into so many chunks.
Yet, Joseph’s scenario sees no such outcome. Saying emphatically that “it would not be disastrous,” he seems to understand what orthodox science denies to this day: There are greater forces at work in such a scenario than gravity. These electromotive forces would serve to both prevent an outright collision or dismemberment and, at the same time, lock the two planets together in a tandem orbit.
In fact, proponents of the electric universe theory insist that electromagnetic plasma layers — once called VanAllen belts but now called Langmuir sheaths — surrounding both approaching planets would pull the planets together at a distance, yet also prevent them from colliding by holding them apart as the distance between them diminished. In effect, the two planets’ approach would first be cushioned, then the two would electromagnetically couple, held in stasis at a distance from one another, neither drifting apart nor colliding. And while the tidal effects would be tremendous, pulling the oceans to the poles, they would be insufficient to destroy either planet.
Joseph’s prophetic insight
Joseph Smith’s scenario, as we have read, suggests just such a circumstance. Yet, how could he know of this? Even today science denies such a possibility. Indeed, electricity was only a novelty in that day. Thus, its role in creating electromagnetic effects was virtually unknown. In fact it still has no acknowledged role in planetary science even today.
Clearly, Joseph had learned through revelation that Earth was once held in juxtaposition with another planet anciently before being separated, even if he did not completely understand the mechanics of such a coupling. For this reason he speaks of it “returning” in conjunction with the events described in Section 133.
Indeed, this is the only context in which these statements have any meaning.
And this is the point: In the context of modern “scientific” notions, Joseph’s statements in the Brown account sound like the fanciful inventions of a fertile imagination. However, when seen in the context of the Saturn traditions and the electric universe, it is a stunningly accurate depiction and a testament to the prophetic prowess of Joseph Smith. Moreover, the Brown account allows a much more meaningful interpretation of Section 133.
Seen in the light of our new perspective on ancient history, we can see that the next verse from the 133rd Section has been grossly misconstrued by Latter-day Saints. “And the land of Jerusalem and the land of Zion shall be turned back into their own place, and the earth shall be like as it was in the days before it was divided.” (op. cit., v. 24.)
Continents do not drift
This verse does not describe the popular geologic notion of continental drift. As we have seen, Joseph does not speak of shifting landmasses in his interpretation of Section 133. However, he does speak of shifting oceans that will permanently reveal great tracts of land, thus reversing the “division” of the Earth in Peleg’s day.
More significant still is the reference to Jerusalem and Zion being “turned back into their own place.” While such a statement might be construed to be an indication of continents in motion to our ears, seen through the lenses of ancient tradition, it tells a very different story.
Latter-day Saints tend to think of Zion as a people, for so it is used in modern parlance. We also think of Jerusalem as an earthly city in the Middle East. However, anciently this was not so. The archetype of the holy city, Jerusalem was the Saturn configuration, and Zion (Sion) was the name of the heaven-spanning mountain that both held up the celestial city and connected it to the Earth. Thus, if the heavenly city and its sacred mountain are “turned back in their own place,” the phrase refers to the return of that grouping of planets that gave rise to that imagery anciently.
This verse, then, is not about earthly cities. It is, as is consistently done in these verses, an allegory based in celestial constructs. And, in fact, the return of a planet is what Joseph’s instruction to the Browns was all about, lending further credibility to this idea.
The proposed explanation of these verses extends to yet another verse in the 133rd Section. “And they who are in the north countries shall come in remembrance before the Lord; and their prophets shall hear his voice, and shall no longer stay themselves; and they shall smite the rocks, and the ice shall flow down at their presence.”
Joseph’s explanation of the melting ice is as follows:
“Now, what would cause the mountains of ice to melt quicker than the heat caused by the friction of the two planets coming together?”
And then he asked the question, “Did you ever see a meteor falling that was not red hot? So, that would cause the mountains of ice to melt.” (op. cit., p. 91.)
Once again, we see an explanation that not only supports the contention that Joseph viewed these prophesied events as planetary catastrophes, we also a reiteration of the joining planets theme.
Also, in this same passage, we come to one of the most misunderstood prophecies in all scripture in that many claim the “they” in this verse means the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel.
Not about the Lost Tribes of Israel
Because ancient tradition connected to the disappearance of the Lost Tribes tells of them disappearing into “the north countries,” modern Saints have interpreted this verse to refer to those Ten Lost Tribes because of the identical reference.
Once again, however, when we look at Joseph’s statement, we get the picture of a returning planet.
He continued, “Now, as to their coming back from the northern waters, they will return from the north because their planet will return to the place from whence it was taken. (op. cit., p. 91.)
That is, their planet will once again take up its historic, traditional position in “the north.” This, of course is indicative of the unique polar orbit posited by Talbott and illustrated in the Dibble facsimile, as drawn by Joseph Smith.
Note that nowhere in the Brown account does the Prophet suggest that the Ten Tribes would come from that planet, only that it was thought to be “their” planet or the one that was connected to them by tradition.
Since Joseph attributes all the other phenomena in this account to effects generated by the return of the old celestial or heavenly order, it seems likely that he meant to convey that same point in this instance rather than referring to the return of any group of people. In fact, placing the Ten Tribes interpretation on this solitary verse in an entire sequence dedicated to planetary symbolism seems completely out of place. A more sensible approach would seem to be to allow the verse to be seen as complementary to the rest of the passage rather than interpreting it as a parenthetical comment.
It bears mention at this point that many early Saints attribute to Joseph Smith the belief that the Lost Tribes inhabited another planet. This, of course, is impossible to verify since there is no direct statement to that effect recorded by the Prophet.
From the standpoint of the polar configuration of planets illustrated above, such a circumstance would seem to be patently impossible. First of all, no known mechanism would allow people to relocate from Earth to Mars or Venus, the two planets most proximate to Earth in the Polar Configuration. The natural forces unleashed in those events would have been too traumatic to humans to see the Lost Tribes survive the transit—even if a transport mechanism could be identified. Secondly, the distances were similar to those that separate the Earth and its moon today. Bridging such a hostile gap would appear to be even more of an impossibility.
Since the traditions tell of no other, habitable planets parking in a polar orbit above the Earth anciently that might have served as a refuge for migrating Israelites, the Lost Tribes interpretation of this verse fails.
Furthermore, space probes to those two planets have returned no evidence that they are inhabited. Indeed, the environments on Mars and Venus today could not support human beings, except one imagines some supernatural intervention to miraculously preserve them alive. Even if these two planets were to return to their former location near the Earth, there could be no people living there to return. Therefore, the interpretation of these verses as the return of an inhabited planet also fails.
The most likely explanation for the belief of many early Saints that Joseph taught such an idea can only be considered a uniform misinterpretation based on the way the prophet explained the concept. Indeed, since the return of the Lost Tribes will coincide with these latter-day catastrophes, the two are closely connected in prophecy and easily mistaken one for the other.
A celestial highway
Moving on, we see another, traditional aspect of the polar configuration reused in the description of the coming event as recorded in Section 133. “And an highway shall be cast up in the midst of the great deep.” (op. cit., vs. 27.)
Once again, Joseph clarifies the revelation.
“And relative to the great highway which should be cast up when the planet returns to its place in the great northern waters, it will form a highway and waters will recede and roll back.”
This “highway” was also Mt. Sion supporting the holy city at its apex where it appears to split into twin peaks.
In this phase of the configuration’s career, the pillar or mountain could easily be construed as a road or path. It is the origin of the symbolic notion that the streets of heaven are paved with gold. It is the reason many ancient temples were accessible only via a lengthy causeway or avenue leading up to the gates.
The final verses we will consider here from the 133rd Section follow the returning planet imagery.
Their enemies shall become a prey unto them. And in the barren deserts there shall come forth pools of living water; and the parched ground shall no longer be a thirsty land. And they shall bring forth their rich treasures unto the children of Ephriam, my servants. And the boundaries of the everlasting hills shall tremble at their presence. (op. cit., vs. 28-31.)
Lest the reader lapse into interpreting these verses as applying to the Lost Tribes, consider the third verse. The “everlasting hills” do not tremble at the “presence” of any people, but they do tremble at the return of a planet to Earth’s northern skies, re-establishing the ancient heavenly order.
If one reads “them” to mean the returning 144,000 or “servants” that stood about the polar configuration, a more consistent interpretation with internal themes, then these verses simply continue the same planetary metaphor.
So it is that the powerful imagery of these verses from Section 133 are easily interpreted, thanks to the Brown account of Joseph’s teachings about the last days and the pivotal research of modern catastrophists and comparative mythologists.
© Anthony E. Larson, 2004
A Personal History
(Note: Many readers have inquired into the circumstances that led this author to write about history and prophecy. Rather than answer each inquiry at length, it seemed appropriate to address the topic in print, where one telling would suffice for all. The following, then, is an autobiographical sketch.)
Hamilton School stood on the corner of 8th South and 3rd East in Salt Lake; the First Ward chapel stood right next door. It was called the First Ward because it was the first ward constituted by the pioneers after they settled in the valley in 1847. By the time I was born, there were hundreds of wards in Salt Lake, but this had been the first.
In those days, Primary was held on a weekday, immediately after school, not during Sunday services as it is now. When school was dismissed, Primary would be convened next door, in the chapel. The first child to arrive at the ward house would be given a shiny, large hand bell to ring, calling all the children to Primary. The child so appointed, would stand at the top of the stairs outside the chapel entrance to ring the bell vigorously.
After brief opening exercises, the congregation of squirming, noisy children was dismissed to several classes, based on age.
It was in a Primary class, on just such a day, that my first inkling of the value of the scriptures in general and prophecy in particular came from a dear sister teaching a classroom full of inattentive, disruptive children. I do not recall who that diligent teach was, but I owe her a profound debt of gratitude. She set me on a course that led me to where I am today.
That particular day, I was probably one of the least attentive to the subject of the scriptures until she ventured into the idea that one could learn the future by reading them. She emphasized that some of the books in the Bible had been written by men who had seen the future in vision. She went on to explain that by reading what those prophets had written, we, too, could know what was going to happen in the future.
I was hooked. I went home and opened up the Bible — probably for the first time in my life — to read about the future. It was disappointing to learn that there was really very little prophecy. And what there was of it was not easy reading, nor was it understandable. It was all much too cryptic for a young mind.
I needed a key.
That was a setback, but not a barrier. From that day forward, I occasionally found myself searching the scriptures to find those parts that contained prophecy. The desire to search out and understand prophecy proved an excellent motivation to read all the scriptures. After all, if I didn’t read and understand it all, how would I know which was prophecy and which was not?
Later, in my teenage years, whenever anyone spoke in church on prophecy, they had my full, undivided attention. In those days, General Authorities often spoke in local sacrament meetings. Sometimes they even arrive unannounced to speak. On many occasions I listened intently to those men who would deliver profound and sobering commentaries on the last days. The depth of their knowledge, the power of their conviction and the generous influence of the Spirit made an indelible impression upon my young mind and heart.
In those days, Sacrament meetings ran a full hour and a half on Sunday evenings — often much longer when a general authority spoke. In addition, far more meeting time was dedicated to topics of the second coming and the last days than in today’s meetings. Those were topics that sparked my interest and imagination.
On Sunday nights, I would go to my upstairs room at bedtime, but not to sleep. There, lying in bed, I would listen on my crystal radio set to Herbert W. Armstrong’s radio program, “The World Tomorrow.” It was all about the fulfillment of biblical prophecy in the wake of the Second World War. I was only about 14 years old, but the topic riveted me.
Armstrong was a flamboyant evangelist. Today, we would call him a Millennialist. He preached prophecy, primarily from the book Revelation, and its fulfillment in post-war events. Like all such preachers of that era, he taught of the second coming in the wake of political and social upheaval. Armstrong believed that a union of the European political states would soon come about, as predicted by the prophecy of the many-headed beast in Revelation. Central to his interpretation was the atomic bomb as fulfillment of the “hellfire and brimstone” of scripture. I eventually lost interest in Armstrong because none of the short term predictions he made seemed to occur. More to the point, his views left me hanging. There seemed to be little basis for his interpretation other than mere coincidence.
I was impressed by anyone who displayed some depth of knowledge regarding the scriptures in general and prophecy in particular. Few outside the church seemed to have any real sense of the scriptures. They all seemed to repeat the same views, with only minor variations. Most of it was trite. They depended more upon shrill oratory than upon true substance. Within the church, I found a few whose knowledge of the gospel seemed encyclopedic — far greater than most Saints. I wondered to myself how they had come to know so much and if it would ever be possible that I could achieve such a level of understanding.
I was a senior I high school when I set myself a life’s goal. Sitting in a Sunday school classroom, listening to an engaging and informative speaker, I decided that if it were possible, I would like to become such a gospel scholar. That meant not only reading the scriptures, but also reading everything others had written about the gospel. It was an imposing task that amounted to a lifetime of work, but it was one that I hoped to achieve.
During my stay in the mission field, someone loaned me a copy of Crowther’s Prophecy: Key to the Future. I was impressed by his exhaustive research, which included many obscure prophecies by Joseph Smith. Sadly, however, Crowther’s conclusions differed little from those of millennialists like Armstrong. To my way of thinking, Crowther had done a marvelous job of compiling ancient and modern prophetic utterances but had not provided the key as the title promised.
By that time I had already read most of Skousen’s books on prophecy. Like Crowther, he had many invaluable insights, but could not provide a key. Later, when Elder McConkie published his observations on prophecy, it seemed like more of the same — an interesting compendium of prophetic utterances, yet no truly insightful interpretation. In my mind, they all said just about the same things. However, that wasn’t good enough for me. After reading all I could find that had been written on prophecy by exegetes in and out of the church, I still felt unfulfilled, that something was missing. Most prophecy was still a mystery to me. The imagery was too foreign, too exotic. No one seemed to see it clearly — least of all me.
After my mission and throughout my early years as a husband and father, my interest in prophecy waned but my appetite for gospel knowledge did not. Having found little new insight or interpretation to prophecy, I turned my full attention to the gospel as a whole. I was determined to become as knowledgeable on gospel subjects as anyone else.
My hunger for knowledge impelled me to read almost all Mormon scholars and general authorities. I came to appreciate Nibley’s insightful gospel dissertations. He had an inquiring, encyclopedic mind. His work also made it clear that there was much to be learned. To understand the scriptures, one must be well versed in a multitude of disciplines. The more one knew about ancient history, the more one understood the scriptures. Nibley helped me see how vast an enterprise I had undertaken.
Increasingly, I found that I was called to teach, most often as the Gospel Doctrine instructor. This served to confirm for me that I was making good progress in my quest to become thoroughly gospel literate. Still, I had not found the key, nor was I sure that such existed.
Then, in the mid-1970s, my whole view of the gospel, ancient history and prophecy began to change when Reader’s Digest published a condensed version of Velikovsky’s Worlds in Collision in its book section. After reading it, I commented to my wife that Velikovsky’s views were certainly unorthodox and novel, but they also fit nicely with the scriptural record of events. It seemed remarkable that one agent was made to be the cause of so many diverse natural events, yet the interpretation did not seem forced or exaggerated to me. It was one of the most reasonable, logical analyses of biblical history that I had ever read.
I was interested to know more of Velikovsky, and so commented to my wife. A few days later, she produced paperback copies of both Worlds in Collision and Earth in Upheaval that she had located on the bookrack in a local store. After reading both books, I was convinced that Velikovsky had stumbled upon a central truth: planetary catastrophes had played a vital role in shaping ancient history. Years later, Nibley’s response to my inquiry as to the correctness of Velikovsky’s thesis was that Velikovsky was “essentially correct, but he could have cited better sources” — a comment only Nibley could make.
Velikovsky’s was an intellectually invigorating thesis. Having studied Geology, Archeology, Anthropology and the world’s religions in college, as well as having gained firsthand knowledge of the ancient Meso-American cultures on my mission in Mexico, Velikovsky’s views were especially meaningful for me. They opened sweeping new historical vistas that bore directly upon the scriptures. His thesis of ancient planetary catastrophes brought everything into sharper focus. It was as if a bright light had suddenly illuminated almost everything I had ever learned. The arcane imagery of the scriptures suddenly became more intelligible. The disjointed analyses of history made by scholars became far clearer.
I had found the long sought key.
Almost immediately I began to share my newfound wisdom with other saints. Equally immediately, I began to encounter the indifference and hostility that remain a constant in my work today. Close friends who shard my enthusiasm for knowledge and love of the gospel were only lukewarm about the idea I quickly embraced. A few showed genuine interest, but the majority were indifferent to the ideas. This apathy puzzled me, but it did not dampen my desire to know more.
It occurred to me that if Velikovsky was right about the nature of the Exodus miracles, then some general authority in the church — from Joseph Smith to the present leaders — must have said or written something that would substantiate or verify Dr. Velikovsky’s thesis. I began my search with the History of the Church, a five-volume record prepared under Joseph Smith’s direction and supervision — almost all of it in his own words. Surely, I reasoned, Joseph would have had something to say along these lines if Exodus actually recounted a planetary catastrophe, as Velikovsky maintained.
After reading 4 of the 5 volumes, I began to despair. It seemed that Joseph had said nothing to validate Velikovsky. However, I persevered in my task, and the answer came in the last volume. When it came, it also brought new, invaluable insight that opened up an even greater vista. It was as if a door that had only opened up a crack were suddenly thrown wide open.
Recorded in volume 5, page 337, Joseph Smith was speaking to a congregation of Saints on the Nauvoo Temple grounds. On that occasion, he swerved into a discussion of the signs of the second coming. Remarkably, I immediately recognized the signs he listed as identical to the natural phenomena that Velikovsky associated with the Exodus event. Still more remarkable, Joseph identified the agent of those events as “a comet, a planet.” Astoundingly, those were the same two words that Velikovsky used to describe the agent of the Exodus miracles. In a flash of insight, I realized that what I had been studying had as much to do with prophecy as with ancient history.
This was what they meant by epiphany! It was as if a brilliant light had suddenly illuminated every corner of my mind! This entire study was as much about prophecy as ancient history! The ideas began to rush through my mind, tumbling and falling over one another like boulders in an avalanche: History will end as it began; the symbolism of prophecy is rooted in ancient catastrophes; gospel symbolism stems from past catastrophes; clearly, Joseph Smith believed and taught this. Nothing I had ever read or heard approached this significance. Everything I had ever learned was a prelude to this discovery.
At long last I had the key!
More remarkable still, I had never heard a Mormon scholar expound on these ideas. I marveled that this could be so, given the power of these new ideas to unlock the most cryptic ideas, symbolism and teaching of the scriptures. Of course, in time I realized that one Mormon scholar — Joseph Smith himself — had, indeed, written and said much in this regard. This was part of the reason for his intense interest in things Egyptian: The Egyptian religion was the purest example of Saturn traditions know to the world in the mid-nineteenth century.
For a year or two, I presented my ideas to everyone who would stand still long enough to listen. I was enthused, amazed and in awe of the power these ideas had to explain some of the most enigmatic parts of the gospel. I could not keep it to myself. I felt compelled to share what I had learned, thinking that other saints would certainly share my eagerness for these novel ideas. Once again, I found that most simply tolerated my little lectures out of simple courtesy; some were openly hostile. It was clear that most did not share my enthusiasm for these views.
Still, I felt certain that many others would find these ideas a truly remarkable and fulfilling as I did. I felt compelled to reach out to those who might share my enthusiasm for what I had learned. I wondered how that might be done. I began thinking about writing a book — a prospect that filled me with dread because I felt terribly inadequate as a writer. As a result, I procrastinated the task for over two years.
One day, after enduring yet another of my diatribes, a good friend, Kaye Jansen, suggested I stop talking about it and start writing about it. He offered the use of his newfangled typewriter, called a word processor. The rest, as they say, is history.
Every LDS publisher turned down my initial manuscript. Not only was it poorly written, but they were concerned about how much appeal it might actually have. After all, publishers depend upon a book’s sales to justify the expense of bringing it to the marketplace. One publisher, thankfully, thought my book had merit. Keith Terry, the owner of Crown Summit Books, called to say he wanted to publish.
With the help of a very patient and capable editor named Allen Young, the entire manuscript was revised and a full-fledged book was written. In the course of doing so, I had a crash course in writing that eventually led me to the career I’ve pursued for the last 30 years.
At first it seemed that one book, And The Moon Shall Turn To Blood, (the title was suggested to me by Mike Jensen, Kaye’s son) would be enough to cover the subject. But my more immediate concern was the business failure of my initial publisher. The time came when I had to walk away from publishing or become a desk drawer publisher. I opted for self publishing and borrowed funds from my parents in order to do so.
In time, it became clear that a second and third book might be necessary, due to the voluminous research by others following Velikovsky’s lead. The idea for a trilogy evolved and was adopted in place of issuing revised, enlarged editions of the original book, and The Prophecy Trilogy was born.
In time, I learned of David Talbott’s work on the Saturn myths, which became the basis for the third volume in The Prophecy Trilogy. Equally as important as Velikovsky’s seminal work, Talbott’s insights proved to be the key that unlocked the entire package: gospel symbolism, cultural and religious tradition of all ancient cultures, temple architecture and iconography, the language of the prophets, as well as the interpretation of ancient myth and tradition.
Only the light and knowledge that came through the Prophet Joseph Smith eclipses the invaluable research and dissertation of Velikovsky and Talbott. In fact, it is my considered opinion that without the work of Velikovsky and Talbott we cannot fully comprehend what Joseph sought to convey.
© Anthony E. Larson, 2000
Sunday, November 2, 2008
Kolob, the God Star
Every Latter-day Saint has read about Kolob in Abraham from the Pearl of Great Price. Many have speculated about it; most have given it little thought. Kolob’s possible location and identity in our universe seems to be the primary focus of such speculation. A careful review of this bit of revealed knowledge in light of the Saturn traditions may prove informative.
In chapter 3 of Abraham, it appears that God reveals to Abraham information about a star named Kolob that is physically located nearest to where he, the Lord, actually resides in the universe. An amplified explanation of Kolob can be found on page 37, opposite facsimile no. 2, the Egyptian hypocephalus Joseph Smith found among the papyri that came into his hands.
A new reading
The first thing we see upon reading Joseph’s explanation is that some of these terms are authentic Egyptian. This should not be surprising since he gleaned this information from an Egyptian document. The question is: Where did he learn these ancient Egyptian terms? For example, Joseph names one figure Hah-ko-kau-beam (Pearl of Great Price, Fig. 5, p. 37.)
It is reasonable to assume, given his lack of formal training in the Egyptian language, that he first heard the word spoken during a revelation. His rendering of the name is clearly an attempt to write it phonetically (something any of us might be forced to do when attempting to write a word from a foreign language we had only heard spoken), since the hyphenation does not conform to the way the Semitic word is actually written. A more proper hyphenation of the word would have been: Ha-kokab-im. The Egyptian kakab is the word for ‘star.’ Typically written in consonants, without vowels, it is rendered: KKB. Modern scholars choose the vowel sounds that are implied by their use in equivalent words in related modern languages. In effect, they make an educated guess as to the vowel sounds. Thus, Joseph’s kokab (or kokob as it is in Abraham) may be more accurate than the scholarly version, kakab. The preceding ha is a determinative, meaning ‘the,’ and im is a plural ending, the equivalent of the letter ‘s’ in English. Thus, Joseph Smith correctly wrote, albeit phonetically, the Egyptian words ‘ha kokab im,’ meaning ‘the stars.’
As with Kakab, so with Kolob
Kolob continues this pattern. Written KLB, it is clearly closely related in meaning to KKB, kokab. So, Kolob has ‘star’ as part of its meaning, but Nibley and others assert that it is closer in meaning to the Arabic word qalb, meaning ‘heart.’ Additionally, the Arabic-speaking peoples routinely use qalb as part of star names: qalb al-asad for Regulus, for example. The verb form of the word also means to turn upside down, to turn over and over. (This will become more meaningful in a moment.) The Egyptians thought of Canopus as the premier heart-star. Indeed, Egyptians conceived of their creator/king or sun god as having two hearts — the hat-heart was female, Tefnut, and the ab-heart was male, Shu — one within the other, although translators rarely concern themselves with the distinction. Also, Horus was said to be ab en hat, heart of the heart. It is likely that the use of ab in those words is the reason why scholars also point to ‘heart’ as one meaning of kolob and kakab.
Ironically, Shu is also the one “who sits in the midst of the Eye which is the seat of his Father.” Thus, the eye and the heart of the sun god, Re, are virtually synonymous in Egyptian lore, an unexpected and curious association from a modern perspective.
Looking through the Saturn myths
When all this is considered in light of Talbott’s Saturn thesis, we see that Kolob may be simply another Egyptian name for the Saturn/Venus/Mars assemblage of planets during Earth’s earliest epoch.
Re/Atum is Saturn. He is the father-god, the fixed, immovable sun god. His hat-heart is Venus, the female goddess who is everywhere in ancient mythology identified as the “eye goddess.” The ab-heart is Mars, the male warrior/hero/child who resides in his father’s eye, the ‘apple’ of his father’s eye.
The entire polar configuration was seen to rotate once every 24 hours. Hence, the verb form of qalb, meaning “to turn over and over” is most appropriate. Additionally, the Latin Venus was called Verticordia, the turning or whirling heart.
In fine, Joseph’s declaration that Hah-ko-kau-beam (ha-kokab-im) are stars was accurate. The etymological connection between kokab and Kolob indicates that both have the meaning ‘star.’ Kolob also has the additional meaning of ‘heart,’ as in the Arabic qalb, an otherwise odd association with the word ‘star,’ except in the context of the Saturn myth and the Polar Configuration.
Kolob is found
Turning now to Joseph Smith, we can see that what he described and explained in the Pearl of Great Price matches the Egyptian traditions and the Saturn myth.
Joseph’s explanation of Kolob as “First in government, the last pertaining to the measurement of time,” fits Saturn’s ancient role. It was perceived as the primary governing power in the heavens. Everything else appeared to move or revolve around it. While it appeared to fully rotate once daily, it also remained in a fixed heavenly station. Additionally, it was the timepiece par excellence. In the role of Kronos (Cronus), Saturn’s appearance was commensurate with the beginning of time. That is, the ancients had no way of telling time or differentiating night from day until they could see Saturn and its rotating crescent.
What is more exciting is that a reading of Abraham, chapter 3, from the standpoint of Talbott’s polar configuration of planets reveals what was, undoubtedly, the fundamental meaning of the Lord’s explanation. He used Semitic words because that is the language Abraham spoke. He described the original planetary configuration that existed before the Flood because it served to teach Abraham the core truth behind traditional beliefs and practices, as well as provide a teaching tool for spiritual truths, which he expounds later in this same chapter.
Abraham sees the Polar Configuration
In verse 2, we learn that Abraham saw “very great” stars near the throne of God. Ancient Saturn was perceived as the throne of god, if not god himself, in the eyes of the ancients. The other planets, Venus, Mars and the 7 small moons that were seen to orbit Saturn, were called stars. They were the “governing ones” that dominated Earth’s ancient heavens. The name Kolob may well apply, in this account, to Saturn itself because it is referred to as the “one to govern all those which belong to the same order as that upon which thou standest.” Saturn was the apparent ‘anchor’ or ‘governor’ of all the heavenly host in antiquity, including the Earth.
The issue of night and day was very different under those ancient skies. The light that ruled the day was the same light that ruled the night: Saturn. In the period of time we would call day, Saturn was very subdued in appearance, washed out, if you will, by the brightness of sunlight. However, when the sun set, it grew brighter until, at the time of day we would call midnight, it was at its brightest. So when the Lord relates to Abraham that “the planet which is the lesser light, lesser than that which is to rule the day, even the night, is above or greater than that upon which thou standest in point of reckoning,” he is only reiterating what he already declared in verse 3, except that this time he calls this orb a “planet” instead of “star.” He was simply being more accurate in his description.
Indeed, the Lord’s description to Abraham of one planet standing above another until one comes to Kolob answers to the illustration drawn by Joseph Smith, and published by Philo Dibble, of the Earth’s antediluvian state, much better than it answers to the present arrangement of planets moving in distant orbits. (See Volume III of The Prophecy Trilogy, page 119, for this illustration.) Furthermore, it accurately answers to the Polar Configuration of Planets as envisioned by Talbott. (Watch the video here.)
A new, clearer perspective
So we see that what was revealed to Abraham was quite different from what most Latter-day Saints believe, yet it serves to further substantiate this author’s thesis that the Polar Configuration, as Talbott explains it, was the actual state of the heavens in antiquity, and that understanding that fact illuminates the scriptures as nothing else.
The word Kolob is a construct of the Egyptian religion, based on the ancient heavens and not a present physical reality. What God revealed to Abraham was actually the order of the planets during the earliest epoch in our solar system, the Patriarchal Age, the time before the Flood known to Egyptians as Tep Zepi, or Golden Age, when our world and the heavens above it were vastly different than they are today. Both Abraham and Joseph Smith used Egyptian terms to describe the images they saw — Abraham saw it in vision, Joseph saw it on the papyri.
It should be gratifying to Latter-day Saints that modern research into Egyptian traditions, myth and legend has given credibility to the teachings and writings of this dispensation’s founding prophet and aided us tremendously in our efforts to comprehend scripture.
© Anthony E. Larson, 2001
In chapter 3 of Abraham, it appears that God reveals to Abraham information about a star named Kolob that is physically located nearest to where he, the Lord, actually resides in the universe. An amplified explanation of Kolob can be found on page 37, opposite facsimile no. 2, the Egyptian hypocephalus Joseph Smith found among the papyri that came into his hands.
A new reading
The first thing we see upon reading Joseph’s explanation is that some of these terms are authentic Egyptian. This should not be surprising since he gleaned this information from an Egyptian document. The question is: Where did he learn these ancient Egyptian terms? For example, Joseph names one figure Hah-ko-kau-beam (Pearl of Great Price, Fig. 5, p. 37.)
It is reasonable to assume, given his lack of formal training in the Egyptian language, that he first heard the word spoken during a revelation. His rendering of the name is clearly an attempt to write it phonetically (something any of us might be forced to do when attempting to write a word from a foreign language we had only heard spoken), since the hyphenation does not conform to the way the Semitic word is actually written. A more proper hyphenation of the word would have been: Ha-kokab-im. The Egyptian kakab is the word for ‘star.’ Typically written in consonants, without vowels, it is rendered: KKB. Modern scholars choose the vowel sounds that are implied by their use in equivalent words in related modern languages. In effect, they make an educated guess as to the vowel sounds. Thus, Joseph’s kokab (or kokob as it is in Abraham) may be more accurate than the scholarly version, kakab. The preceding ha is a determinative, meaning ‘the,’ and im is a plural ending, the equivalent of the letter ‘s’ in English. Thus, Joseph Smith correctly wrote, albeit phonetically, the Egyptian words ‘ha kokab im,’ meaning ‘the stars.’
As with Kakab, so with Kolob
Kolob continues this pattern. Written KLB, it is clearly closely related in meaning to KKB, kokab. So, Kolob has ‘star’ as part of its meaning, but Nibley and others assert that it is closer in meaning to the Arabic word qalb, meaning ‘heart.’ Additionally, the Arabic-speaking peoples routinely use qalb as part of star names: qalb al-asad for Regulus, for example. The verb form of the word also means to turn upside down, to turn over and over. (This will become more meaningful in a moment.) The Egyptians thought of Canopus as the premier heart-star. Indeed, Egyptians conceived of their creator/king or sun god as having two hearts — the hat-heart was female, Tefnut, and the ab-heart was male, Shu — one within the other, although translators rarely concern themselves with the distinction. Also, Horus was said to be ab en hat, heart of the heart. It is likely that the use of ab in those words is the reason why scholars also point to ‘heart’ as one meaning of kolob and kakab.
Ironically, Shu is also the one “who sits in the midst of the Eye which is the seat of his Father.” Thus, the eye and the heart of the sun god, Re, are virtually synonymous in Egyptian lore, an unexpected and curious association from a modern perspective.
Looking through the Saturn myths
When all this is considered in light of Talbott’s Saturn thesis, we see that Kolob may be simply another Egyptian name for the Saturn/Venus/Mars assemblage of planets during Earth’s earliest epoch.
Re/Atum is Saturn. He is the father-god, the fixed, immovable sun god. His hat-heart is Venus, the female goddess who is everywhere in ancient mythology identified as the “eye goddess.” The ab-heart is Mars, the male warrior/hero/child who resides in his father’s eye, the ‘apple’ of his father’s eye.
The entire polar configuration was seen to rotate once every 24 hours. Hence, the verb form of qalb, meaning “to turn over and over” is most appropriate. Additionally, the Latin Venus was called Verticordia, the turning or whirling heart.
In fine, Joseph’s declaration that Hah-ko-kau-beam (ha-kokab-im) are stars was accurate. The etymological connection between kokab and Kolob indicates that both have the meaning ‘star.’ Kolob also has the additional meaning of ‘heart,’ as in the Arabic qalb, an otherwise odd association with the word ‘star,’ except in the context of the Saturn myth and the Polar Configuration.
Kolob is found
Turning now to Joseph Smith, we can see that what he described and explained in the Pearl of Great Price matches the Egyptian traditions and the Saturn myth.
Joseph’s explanation of Kolob as “First in government, the last pertaining to the measurement of time,” fits Saturn’s ancient role. It was perceived as the primary governing power in the heavens. Everything else appeared to move or revolve around it. While it appeared to fully rotate once daily, it also remained in a fixed heavenly station. Additionally, it was the timepiece par excellence. In the role of Kronos (Cronus), Saturn’s appearance was commensurate with the beginning of time. That is, the ancients had no way of telling time or differentiating night from day until they could see Saturn and its rotating crescent.
What is more exciting is that a reading of Abraham, chapter 3, from the standpoint of Talbott’s polar configuration of planets reveals what was, undoubtedly, the fundamental meaning of the Lord’s explanation. He used Semitic words because that is the language Abraham spoke. He described the original planetary configuration that existed before the Flood because it served to teach Abraham the core truth behind traditional beliefs and practices, as well as provide a teaching tool for spiritual truths, which he expounds later in this same chapter.
Abraham sees the Polar Configuration
In verse 2, we learn that Abraham saw “very great” stars near the throne of God. Ancient Saturn was perceived as the throne of god, if not god himself, in the eyes of the ancients. The other planets, Venus, Mars and the 7 small moons that were seen to orbit Saturn, were called stars. They were the “governing ones” that dominated Earth’s ancient heavens. The name Kolob may well apply, in this account, to Saturn itself because it is referred to as the “one to govern all those which belong to the same order as that upon which thou standest.” Saturn was the apparent ‘anchor’ or ‘governor’ of all the heavenly host in antiquity, including the Earth.
The issue of night and day was very different under those ancient skies. The light that ruled the day was the same light that ruled the night: Saturn. In the period of time we would call day, Saturn was very subdued in appearance, washed out, if you will, by the brightness of sunlight. However, when the sun set, it grew brighter until, at the time of day we would call midnight, it was at its brightest. So when the Lord relates to Abraham that “the planet which is the lesser light, lesser than that which is to rule the day, even the night, is above or greater than that upon which thou standest in point of reckoning,” he is only reiterating what he already declared in verse 3, except that this time he calls this orb a “planet” instead of “star.” He was simply being more accurate in his description.
Indeed, the Lord’s description to Abraham of one planet standing above another until one comes to Kolob answers to the illustration drawn by Joseph Smith, and published by Philo Dibble, of the Earth’s antediluvian state, much better than it answers to the present arrangement of planets moving in distant orbits. (See Volume III of The Prophecy Trilogy, page 119, for this illustration.) Furthermore, it accurately answers to the Polar Configuration of Planets as envisioned by Talbott. (Watch the video here.)
A new, clearer perspective
So we see that what was revealed to Abraham was quite different from what most Latter-day Saints believe, yet it serves to further substantiate this author’s thesis that the Polar Configuration, as Talbott explains it, was the actual state of the heavens in antiquity, and that understanding that fact illuminates the scriptures as nothing else.
The word Kolob is a construct of the Egyptian religion, based on the ancient heavens and not a present physical reality. What God revealed to Abraham was actually the order of the planets during the earliest epoch in our solar system, the Patriarchal Age, the time before the Flood known to Egyptians as Tep Zepi, or Golden Age, when our world and the heavens above it were vastly different than they are today. Both Abraham and Joseph Smith used Egyptian terms to describe the images they saw — Abraham saw it in vision, Joseph saw it on the papyri.
It should be gratifying to Latter-day Saints that modern research into Egyptian traditions, myth and legend has given credibility to the teachings and writings of this dispensation’s founding prophet and aided us tremendously in our efforts to comprehend scripture.
© Anthony E. Larson, 2001
Saturday, November 1, 2008
Before the Beginning
In an earlier monograph, the events of the creation, as written in the Old Testament, were explained in light of the Saturn thesis of David Talbott. Latter-day Saints typically believe what most of Christendom believes about the creation: that man had not yet been placed on the Earth when the first events transpired, that the creation account was subsequently revealed to prophets long after the first events themselves.
However, other evidence suggests that the creation story may actually be an eyewitness account, handed down from generation to generation. That is, even though the scriptures speak of man’s creation at the end of the story, Adam and his early descendants may have seen events that they came to call the ‘creation’ because it brought into existence a radically different world from the one they had previously known. Indeed, the ancient traditions and records of other cultures clearly portray the creation as an event witnessed by all mankind.
To fully understand how this might be, we must consider the work of Wal Thornhill, plasma physicist and electric universe proponent, who has given us a practical view of the conditions that may have existed in our solar system during the time when Adam was placed on the Earth, before Saturn became dominant in Earth’s heavens. Thornhill’s proposition not only fits with the sketchy details of the creation recorded in the Old Testament and the many traditions of other cultures, but it gives us a more complete view of the world our forefathers experienced before the epoch Latter-day Saints know as the Patriarchal Age, the Golden Age or the Age of Saturn. It was the world as it existed before the event that came to be known as the creation and the age of abundance that followed it when Saturn came to dominate Earth’s ancient skies. It is also an amazing view of what may be the most common condition of planets in our universe today — radically different than our own — and what the Earth and the heavens looked like in our world’s earliest epoch before the celestial collision that made it the harsh place it is today.
In his monograph entitled, “Other Stars, Other Worlds, Other Life?” Thornhill begins by pointing out that the most common stars in our galaxy, by far, are called Brown Dwarfs — ‘brown’ because they emit far less light than bright stars like our Sun, and ‘dwarfs’ because they are much smaller than the Red Giants that dominate the starry skyscape by their sheer size. In fact, Brown Dwarfs are remarkably small, approaching in size the gas giant planets in our solar system, Jupiter and Saturn.
Brown Dwarfs are far too small and cool to be powered by internal thermonuclear processes. (A serious problem for orthodox science, the very existence of such small, cool stars argues strongly for Thornhill’s electric universe theory.) The plasma envelope surrounding a Brown Dwarf is so tenuous that its planets could orbit within the star’s atmosphere. Rather than being vaporized by the intense heat of a thermonuclear star, such planets would encounter a salubrious, electrical environment. Such small, cool stars may be excellent incubators for life-bearing planets that might orbit them, as we shall see momentarily.
Spectrographic analysis of the light emitted from Brown Dwarfs confirms that their ‘atmospheres’ are rich in water (the atmosphere being the area within the photosphere) and other molecules of elements important to life. They emit light predominantly in the blue (ultraviolet) and red (infrared) ends of the visual spectrum.
The photosphere, together with the corona, is the source of light and heat in an electric star. The plasma envelope of the largest stars can extend many millions of miles above the surface. For example, were our Sun such a giant star, its atmosphere might extend beyond the present orbit of Jupiter! All the inner planets would orbit within its plasma envelope. Thornhill speculates that planets orbiting a parent sun within the envelope of the sun’s atmosphere are likely the most common arrangement in the universe since the recent discoveries of planets orbiting distant stars are all uncommonly close-orbiting planets. This is crucial because such an arrangement would put those planets in an environment radically different from the one in which we find ourselves today.
Consider what such a state of affairs would mean to the inhabitants of such a planet. Light would seem to come from all around rather than from a single, point source as it does now. There would be neither glaring sunlight nor shadows. There would be no day or night. There would be no stars or sun seen crossing the sky, and therefore no way of marking time. Even the parent sun would be virtually indistinguishable in a uniformly lighted sky.
Radiant energy would be evenly distributed over the entire planet, making every part of the planet pleasantly habitable, from the equator to the poles. There would be no seasons, no tropics and no ice caps. The weather systems we know would simply not exist. Such a mild, friendly climate would have none of the harsh extremes we endure now.
Lit by mostly ultraviolet and infrared light, the world would have been a bit gloomier than what we know, with a pale purple sky. On the other hand, because plants thrive on red light, such an arrangement would be very friendly to plant life — especially true because of an abundance of water and other life-giving molecules accumulated by the planet from the ‘atmosphere’ of its sun. Indeed, the environment within the parent sun’s atmosphere would be very conducive to life: consistent temperature, ample light for growth and abundant water. Under those conditions, one would expect such a planet to be teeming with life, a veritable planetary greenhouse.
The law of entropy that governs our existence would be suspended or largely negated in the altered electromagnetic environment near such a star. The energy received from the parent sun would operate to create more complexity and life, not dissolution and death as on our world. Oxidation or decay, as we know it, would be greatly mitigated. Aging would be slowed for the same reason because organs within the body would not be crippled by degeneration, as they are now. In fact, the electromagnetic environment would probably energize our cells and cause the body to renew and repair itself more rapidly and easily than at present. The lifespan of a human living on such a planet might be several times longer than in the harsh environment we presently endure.
All this should sound familiar to the student of the scriptures. What Thornhill describes sounds remarkably like the world described in the early verses of Genesis and in the fabulous traditions of all ancient cultures. Clearly, as established by Talbott’s research, Earth, Mars and Venus were once satellites of one or perhaps two Brown Dwarf parents, Jupiter and Saturn. All the remarkable conditions listed above pertained to our planet at one time. Our earliest ancestors lived in that exceptional environment.
Then, one tragic day, our pacific, primordial home experienced a “galactic traffic accident,” as Thornhill puts it. A pernicious intruder began to capture our Brown Dwarf parent, along with its planetary entourage. That interloper was Sol, our present-day sun. The trespassing sun usurped our parent sun’s power in the process and this extinguished its light and power until it became a faint shadow of its former self. Ultimately, after a long period of instability as the original system struggled to maintain its unique configuration in a new electrical environment, the original polar planetary configuration was dismantled in the aftermath of the capture, but not before creating a spectacular and astonishing celestial pageant for Earth’s newest inhabitants, Homo Sapiens, which became the basis for their cultural and religious traditions. Eventually, the ‘fall’ of Earth from its position near its parent and sister planets to its present, isolated orbit around the interloper sun gave us the world we know today: brilliant day with a glaring sun, black of night with a star-strewn sky, heat and cold, storm fronts, wind, rain, snow, ice ages, a largely uninhabitable planet and an existence fraught with pain and danger. Indeed, a “lone and dreary world.”
Perhaps more importantly, if we are to believe these prophecies, our parent planet will be returned one day to its “paradisiacal glory.” (Tenth Article of Faith, History of the Church, Vol. 4, pp. 535-541.)
Now we know what that change will bring.
© Anthony E. Larson, 2000
However, other evidence suggests that the creation story may actually be an eyewitness account, handed down from generation to generation. That is, even though the scriptures speak of man’s creation at the end of the story, Adam and his early descendants may have seen events that they came to call the ‘creation’ because it brought into existence a radically different world from the one they had previously known. Indeed, the ancient traditions and records of other cultures clearly portray the creation as an event witnessed by all mankind.
To fully understand how this might be, we must consider the work of Wal Thornhill, plasma physicist and electric universe proponent, who has given us a practical view of the conditions that may have existed in our solar system during the time when Adam was placed on the Earth, before Saturn became dominant in Earth’s heavens. Thornhill’s proposition not only fits with the sketchy details of the creation recorded in the Old Testament and the many traditions of other cultures, but it gives us a more complete view of the world our forefathers experienced before the epoch Latter-day Saints know as the Patriarchal Age, the Golden Age or the Age of Saturn. It was the world as it existed before the event that came to be known as the creation and the age of abundance that followed it when Saturn came to dominate Earth’s ancient skies. It is also an amazing view of what may be the most common condition of planets in our universe today — radically different than our own — and what the Earth and the heavens looked like in our world’s earliest epoch before the celestial collision that made it the harsh place it is today.
In his monograph entitled, “Other Stars, Other Worlds, Other Life?” Thornhill begins by pointing out that the most common stars in our galaxy, by far, are called Brown Dwarfs — ‘brown’ because they emit far less light than bright stars like our Sun, and ‘dwarfs’ because they are much smaller than the Red Giants that dominate the starry skyscape by their sheer size. In fact, Brown Dwarfs are remarkably small, approaching in size the gas giant planets in our solar system, Jupiter and Saturn.
Brown Dwarfs are far too small and cool to be powered by internal thermonuclear processes. (A serious problem for orthodox science, the very existence of such small, cool stars argues strongly for Thornhill’s electric universe theory.) The plasma envelope surrounding a Brown Dwarf is so tenuous that its planets could orbit within the star’s atmosphere. Rather than being vaporized by the intense heat of a thermonuclear star, such planets would encounter a salubrious, electrical environment. Such small, cool stars may be excellent incubators for life-bearing planets that might orbit them, as we shall see momentarily.
Spectrographic analysis of the light emitted from Brown Dwarfs confirms that their ‘atmospheres’ are rich in water (the atmosphere being the area within the photosphere) and other molecules of elements important to life. They emit light predominantly in the blue (ultraviolet) and red (infrared) ends of the visual spectrum.
The photosphere, together with the corona, is the source of light and heat in an electric star. The plasma envelope of the largest stars can extend many millions of miles above the surface. For example, were our Sun such a giant star, its atmosphere might extend beyond the present orbit of Jupiter! All the inner planets would orbit within its plasma envelope. Thornhill speculates that planets orbiting a parent sun within the envelope of the sun’s atmosphere are likely the most common arrangement in the universe since the recent discoveries of planets orbiting distant stars are all uncommonly close-orbiting planets. This is crucial because such an arrangement would put those planets in an environment radically different from the one in which we find ourselves today.
Consider what such a state of affairs would mean to the inhabitants of such a planet. Light would seem to come from all around rather than from a single, point source as it does now. There would be neither glaring sunlight nor shadows. There would be no day or night. There would be no stars or sun seen crossing the sky, and therefore no way of marking time. Even the parent sun would be virtually indistinguishable in a uniformly lighted sky.
Radiant energy would be evenly distributed over the entire planet, making every part of the planet pleasantly habitable, from the equator to the poles. There would be no seasons, no tropics and no ice caps. The weather systems we know would simply not exist. Such a mild, friendly climate would have none of the harsh extremes we endure now.
Lit by mostly ultraviolet and infrared light, the world would have been a bit gloomier than what we know, with a pale purple sky. On the other hand, because plants thrive on red light, such an arrangement would be very friendly to plant life — especially true because of an abundance of water and other life-giving molecules accumulated by the planet from the ‘atmosphere’ of its sun. Indeed, the environment within the parent sun’s atmosphere would be very conducive to life: consistent temperature, ample light for growth and abundant water. Under those conditions, one would expect such a planet to be teeming with life, a veritable planetary greenhouse.
The law of entropy that governs our existence would be suspended or largely negated in the altered electromagnetic environment near such a star. The energy received from the parent sun would operate to create more complexity and life, not dissolution and death as on our world. Oxidation or decay, as we know it, would be greatly mitigated. Aging would be slowed for the same reason because organs within the body would not be crippled by degeneration, as they are now. In fact, the electromagnetic environment would probably energize our cells and cause the body to renew and repair itself more rapidly and easily than at present. The lifespan of a human living on such a planet might be several times longer than in the harsh environment we presently endure.
All this should sound familiar to the student of the scriptures. What Thornhill describes sounds remarkably like the world described in the early verses of Genesis and in the fabulous traditions of all ancient cultures. Clearly, as established by Talbott’s research, Earth, Mars and Venus were once satellites of one or perhaps two Brown Dwarf parents, Jupiter and Saturn. All the remarkable conditions listed above pertained to our planet at one time. Our earliest ancestors lived in that exceptional environment.
Then, one tragic day, our pacific, primordial home experienced a “galactic traffic accident,” as Thornhill puts it. A pernicious intruder began to capture our Brown Dwarf parent, along with its planetary entourage. That interloper was Sol, our present-day sun. The trespassing sun usurped our parent sun’s power in the process and this extinguished its light and power until it became a faint shadow of its former self. Ultimately, after a long period of instability as the original system struggled to maintain its unique configuration in a new electrical environment, the original polar planetary configuration was dismantled in the aftermath of the capture, but not before creating a spectacular and astonishing celestial pageant for Earth’s newest inhabitants, Homo Sapiens, which became the basis for their cultural and religious traditions. Eventually, the ‘fall’ of Earth from its position near its parent and sister planets to its present, isolated orbit around the interloper sun gave us the world we know today: brilliant day with a glaring sun, black of night with a star-strewn sky, heat and cold, storm fronts, wind, rain, snow, ice ages, a largely uninhabitable planet and an existence fraught with pain and danger. Indeed, a “lone and dreary world.”
Perhaps more importantly, if we are to believe these prophecies, our parent planet will be returned one day to its “paradisiacal glory.” (Tenth Article of Faith, History of the Church, Vol. 4, pp. 535-541.)
Now we know what that change will bring.
© Anthony E. Larson, 2000
A Summary
There is one important question that should be addressed: What, if anything, should any Latter-day Saint make of all this new information?
Years ago, Chauncey Riddle, a religion instructor at Brigham Young University, dismissed this author’s view of prophecy based in ancient catastrophes, as set forth The Prophecy Trilogy, describing the endeavor as “an intellectual exercise, having little to do with one’s salvation.”
Relevant to salvation?
This raises the question of relevance. However correct this information may be, does it really have any bearing upon the outcome of this mortal trial? What value does it have in the greater scheme of things? Does any of this truly apply to one’s salvation and exaltation?
For most Saints, the answer to the question of relevance would be an unqualified “No.” Like Riddle, most Mormons feel that prophecy and gospel imagery have little to do with the primary aims of a righteous life that conforms to gospel teachings. This attitude is reflected in church literature in general and fosters the dismissive approach most Saints have toward a study of this kind. The emphasis is placed entirely on the spiritual aspects rather than the temporal, material or intellectual elements.
The Saints’ stumbling block
In this they err greatly. It’s the reason that prophecy is an enigma, the reason modern temple symbolism and ritual seem foreign, scriptural symbolism is puzzling and elusive, the imagery of prophetic visions is baffling and there are “mysteries” in the gospel that should not be so much as entertained, much less investigated.
While revelation through prophets and seers in our time might provide much of the information we need for our salvation and exaltation, it does not answer all questions. Much of what we need to know is contained in texts written hundreds or thousands of years ago. Hence, we have the constant exhortation to read the scriptures from our general authorities.
Different cultures, different times
The scriptures, ancient and modern, largely deal with events and experiences of individuals who lived in cultures and conditions far removed from our own in time and far different than our own. Even events recorded in the Doctrine and Covenants contain those same elements of obscurity for those of us who didn’t live two centuries ago when the church was being established, say nothing of texts penned over one, two or more millennia ago.
So, how can we expect to gain all we need to know for our salvation and exaltation by reading the scriptures when the worldview of those who wrote them was so very much different than our own?
Searching outside the scriptures
As a practical matter, reading the scriptures and the talks of general authorities, however valuable for gathering information, cannot answer all questions. The analysis of textual content, however helpful and useful, cannot explain all we read. We must go outside the scriptures in order to fully understand all we read there. We must view the wider picture, the context.
Hence, the Lord revealed to Joseph Smith that the Saints were to “… seek ye diligently …, seek ye out of the best books words of wisdom; seek learning, even by study and also by faith.” (Doctrine & Covenants 88:118.)
This counsel directs us to seek out extra-scriptural information. Paradoxically, it seems that we must look outside the scriptures in order to fully understand them. What T.S. Eliot wrote applies very well here. “And the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.” That is, until we look outside the scriptures for historical background, contemporary accounts, settings, conditions and cultural information, our knowledge of them will be incomplete. Only when we “explore” enough to see them with new eyes will the scriptures become fully meaningful.
Revelation alone can do the same thing. In fact, it can overcome ignorance far better than study and much more quickly. But since we “all have not faith” sufficient to obtain revelation for all our questions, the Lord told us, through Joseph Smith, to do the research.
Moreover, Joseph Smith also explained that God never gave a revelation without also providing the keys to understand that revelation. This implies that there is no mystery in the scriptures, nothing that we cannot understand, given the proper information.
Knowledge is key
Of course, getting that information, gaining knowledge is one of our primary directives. “And if a person gains more knowledge and intelligence in this life through his diligence and obedience than another, he will have so much the advantage in the world to come.” (Doctrine & Covenants 130:19.)
So, the answer to the questions posed at the outset of this article is simply this: If any part of the gospel message is omitted or not incorporated in our study, then our understanding is incomplete. If we do not understand prophecy, then our knowledge is incomplete. We cannot, then, also understand the language of the prophets, the symbolism of our temples, the meaning of things seen in visions recorded by the prophets, the Pearl of Great Price facsimiles, the Lord’s explanation of the heavens given to Abraham or the many statements of Joseph Smith on these subjects.
Prophecy: a key to salvation
Thus, this knowledge has everything to do with our salvation and exaltation. Understanding the nature of our world and the history that brought it to its present condition is vital to our comprehension of the gospel. Without it, we’re only getting half the message of the scriptures, the temple ceremonies or the words of the prophets.
Faith: the first principle
Take faith, for example. Since it is the first principle of the gospel, it follows that we must understand it best in order to practice our religion as it should be practiced. Understanding faith, therefore, is vital to our salvation. Of course, it also goes without saying that understanding priesthood power is vital since it is the one thing that sets the restored church apart from all the rest.
To the Saint who studies Exodus and the works of Moses with a view to the planetary catastrophe that unfolds in that saga, it becomes apparent exactly how faith and priesthood power function in our relationship with God. We see Moses as a man armed with no special powers — his priesthood not withstanding — save the foreknowledge that God gave him of impending events. His faith was not in what he wished or hoped to be true, as we typically define faith, but in what he knew to be true. The record shows that God revealed to Moses beforehand all that was to occur and what Moses was to do in each circumstance. His faith is manifest in his willingness to do as God commanded, to proclaim to everyone, even Pharaoh, what was going to happen, no matter how outrageous the claim or difficult his duty. In fact the one time Moses got in trouble was when he acted without God’s direction, making a decision on his own to strike the rock to bring forth water for the Israelites.
What’s more, we learn that Moses had no power to perform the ‘miracles’ of the Exodus; they were natural, albeit catastrophic, events — completely out of his control, one way or the other. He could not cause them any more than he could stop them. He did not part the Red Sea nor cause manna to appear. That was God’s doing; it was all God’s doing. Moses’ only role was to warn and guide the Israelites as God had directed him in order that they might avoid the worst of the devastation. In that role, he provided salvation, but he was not its author. He was only a messenger, a mouthpiece.
Correct perspective is vital
Without that perspective, we might be tempted to believe that a prophet has extraordinary latitude and power to control the elements. We might be tempted to think that holding the priesthood somehow entitles us to similarly extraordinary powers. Thus, this knowledge helps us preserve a correct perspective of our function as priesthood holders.
Without that perspective, we might believe that if we simply conjure up enough faith to believe strongly enough, then what we want to happen will come true. We consistently talk about faith in flawed terms, saying things like, “If we had enough faith, we could move mountains.” Once again, the information that comes to us via a more complete understanding of ancient events provides us with a clearer vision of faith, what it is and how it works.
Studying the gospel without the perspective that this reading offers gives us only half the message. It’s the equivalent of driving a car with one eye closed or trying to walk with only one leg instead of two.
Vital to our salvation, exaltation
Therefore, the inescapable conclusion is that the study of this alternative view ancient history, prophecy and the scriptures is vital to our salvation and exaltation. Without it, we stand a good chance of falling short of our goal. Understanding the subjects associated with past catastrophes and the symbolism they engendered can vastly improve the likelihood that we will leave this life, as God revealed to Joseph, with “so much the advantage in the world to come.”
Sounds like salvation and exaltation to my ears.
Chauncey Riddle couldn’t have been more wrong, and Latter-day Saints shouldn’t make the same mistake.
© Anthony E. Larson, 2005
Years ago, Chauncey Riddle, a religion instructor at Brigham Young University, dismissed this author’s view of prophecy based in ancient catastrophes, as set forth The Prophecy Trilogy, describing the endeavor as “an intellectual exercise, having little to do with one’s salvation.”
Relevant to salvation?
This raises the question of relevance. However correct this information may be, does it really have any bearing upon the outcome of this mortal trial? What value does it have in the greater scheme of things? Does any of this truly apply to one’s salvation and exaltation?
For most Saints, the answer to the question of relevance would be an unqualified “No.” Like Riddle, most Mormons feel that prophecy and gospel imagery have little to do with the primary aims of a righteous life that conforms to gospel teachings. This attitude is reflected in church literature in general and fosters the dismissive approach most Saints have toward a study of this kind. The emphasis is placed entirely on the spiritual aspects rather than the temporal, material or intellectual elements.
The Saints’ stumbling block
In this they err greatly. It’s the reason that prophecy is an enigma, the reason modern temple symbolism and ritual seem foreign, scriptural symbolism is puzzling and elusive, the imagery of prophetic visions is baffling and there are “mysteries” in the gospel that should not be so much as entertained, much less investigated.
While revelation through prophets and seers in our time might provide much of the information we need for our salvation and exaltation, it does not answer all questions. Much of what we need to know is contained in texts written hundreds or thousands of years ago. Hence, we have the constant exhortation to read the scriptures from our general authorities.
Different cultures, different times
The scriptures, ancient and modern, largely deal with events and experiences of individuals who lived in cultures and conditions far removed from our own in time and far different than our own. Even events recorded in the Doctrine and Covenants contain those same elements of obscurity for those of us who didn’t live two centuries ago when the church was being established, say nothing of texts penned over one, two or more millennia ago.
So, how can we expect to gain all we need to know for our salvation and exaltation by reading the scriptures when the worldview of those who wrote them was so very much different than our own?
Searching outside the scriptures
As a practical matter, reading the scriptures and the talks of general authorities, however valuable for gathering information, cannot answer all questions. The analysis of textual content, however helpful and useful, cannot explain all we read. We must go outside the scriptures in order to fully understand all we read there. We must view the wider picture, the context.
Hence, the Lord revealed to Joseph Smith that the Saints were to “… seek ye diligently …, seek ye out of the best books words of wisdom; seek learning, even by study and also by faith.” (Doctrine & Covenants 88:118.)
This counsel directs us to seek out extra-scriptural information. Paradoxically, it seems that we must look outside the scriptures in order to fully understand them. What T.S. Eliot wrote applies very well here. “And the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.” That is, until we look outside the scriptures for historical background, contemporary accounts, settings, conditions and cultural information, our knowledge of them will be incomplete. Only when we “explore” enough to see them with new eyes will the scriptures become fully meaningful.
Revelation alone can do the same thing. In fact, it can overcome ignorance far better than study and much more quickly. But since we “all have not faith” sufficient to obtain revelation for all our questions, the Lord told us, through Joseph Smith, to do the research.
Moreover, Joseph Smith also explained that God never gave a revelation without also providing the keys to understand that revelation. This implies that there is no mystery in the scriptures, nothing that we cannot understand, given the proper information.
Knowledge is key
Of course, getting that information, gaining knowledge is one of our primary directives. “And if a person gains more knowledge and intelligence in this life through his diligence and obedience than another, he will have so much the advantage in the world to come.” (Doctrine & Covenants 130:19.)
So, the answer to the questions posed at the outset of this article is simply this: If any part of the gospel message is omitted or not incorporated in our study, then our understanding is incomplete. If we do not understand prophecy, then our knowledge is incomplete. We cannot, then, also understand the language of the prophets, the symbolism of our temples, the meaning of things seen in visions recorded by the prophets, the Pearl of Great Price facsimiles, the Lord’s explanation of the heavens given to Abraham or the many statements of Joseph Smith on these subjects.
Prophecy: a key to salvation
Thus, this knowledge has everything to do with our salvation and exaltation. Understanding the nature of our world and the history that brought it to its present condition is vital to our comprehension of the gospel. Without it, we’re only getting half the message of the scriptures, the temple ceremonies or the words of the prophets.
Faith: the first principle
Take faith, for example. Since it is the first principle of the gospel, it follows that we must understand it best in order to practice our religion as it should be practiced. Understanding faith, therefore, is vital to our salvation. Of course, it also goes without saying that understanding priesthood power is vital since it is the one thing that sets the restored church apart from all the rest.
To the Saint who studies Exodus and the works of Moses with a view to the planetary catastrophe that unfolds in that saga, it becomes apparent exactly how faith and priesthood power function in our relationship with God. We see Moses as a man armed with no special powers — his priesthood not withstanding — save the foreknowledge that God gave him of impending events. His faith was not in what he wished or hoped to be true, as we typically define faith, but in what he knew to be true. The record shows that God revealed to Moses beforehand all that was to occur and what Moses was to do in each circumstance. His faith is manifest in his willingness to do as God commanded, to proclaim to everyone, even Pharaoh, what was going to happen, no matter how outrageous the claim or difficult his duty. In fact the one time Moses got in trouble was when he acted without God’s direction, making a decision on his own to strike the rock to bring forth water for the Israelites.
What’s more, we learn that Moses had no power to perform the ‘miracles’ of the Exodus; they were natural, albeit catastrophic, events — completely out of his control, one way or the other. He could not cause them any more than he could stop them. He did not part the Red Sea nor cause manna to appear. That was God’s doing; it was all God’s doing. Moses’ only role was to warn and guide the Israelites as God had directed him in order that they might avoid the worst of the devastation. In that role, he provided salvation, but he was not its author. He was only a messenger, a mouthpiece.
Correct perspective is vital
Without that perspective, we might be tempted to believe that a prophet has extraordinary latitude and power to control the elements. We might be tempted to think that holding the priesthood somehow entitles us to similarly extraordinary powers. Thus, this knowledge helps us preserve a correct perspective of our function as priesthood holders.
Without that perspective, we might believe that if we simply conjure up enough faith to believe strongly enough, then what we want to happen will come true. We consistently talk about faith in flawed terms, saying things like, “If we had enough faith, we could move mountains.” Once again, the information that comes to us via a more complete understanding of ancient events provides us with a clearer vision of faith, what it is and how it works.
Studying the gospel without the perspective that this reading offers gives us only half the message. It’s the equivalent of driving a car with one eye closed or trying to walk with only one leg instead of two.
Vital to our salvation, exaltation
Therefore, the inescapable conclusion is that the study of this alternative view ancient history, prophecy and the scriptures is vital to our salvation and exaltation. Without it, we stand a good chance of falling short of our goal. Understanding the subjects associated with past catastrophes and the symbolism they engendered can vastly improve the likelihood that we will leave this life, as God revealed to Joseph, with “so much the advantage in the world to come.”
Sounds like salvation and exaltation to my ears.
Chauncey Riddle couldn’t have been more wrong, and Latter-day Saints shouldn’t make the same mistake.
© Anthony E. Larson, 2005
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