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For those of you interested in the intersection of science and religion: http://www.johnpratt.com/items/docs/lds/meridian/2010/venus.html ” class=”bbcode_url”> http://www.johnpratt.com/items/docs/lds/meridian/2010/venus.html John Pratt is an astronomer who has spent some time studying religious chronology. He’s identified seven sacred calendars, and then used astronomical observations to pinpoint some of the dates of religious events. One of my favorite articles is this one:
http://www.johnpratt.com/items/docs/lds/meridian/2010/venus.html ” class=”bbcode_url”> http://www.johnpratt.com/items/docs/lds/meridian/2010/venus.html There’s a lot to read, but you can kind of pick and choose. One other really interesting article is about Adam’s birthday and the timing of the Fall.
http://www.johnpratt.com/items/docs/lds/meridian/2003/mortal.html#4.1 ” class=”bbcode_url”> http://www.johnpratt.com/items/docs/lds/meridian/2003/mortal.html#4.1 I know there are a lot of people who don’t interpret the Bible literally (and I vaccilate… I mean, a guy got swallowed by a fish and then spit out after 3 days?!?), but Pratt does a good job of showing that, at the very least, the chronology of the book is amazingly consistent.
It sounds interesting, how I wish for an extra 8 hours in the day… I’m skeptical. Maybe I’ll come back to this. I think a lot of these end up being the result of looking for the answer you want, rather than using the scientific method to derive the actual correct answer to an ubiased question. Brown wrote:I think a lot of these end up being the result of looking for the answer you want, rather than using the scientific method to derive the actual correct answer to an ubiased question.
Well, I’m no scientist, but Pratt definitely is – he has degrees in physics and astronomy. If you’re a scientist, I’d be interested to know what you think about his methods, since I’m not qualified to critique them.
As for Thoreau and Orson, I sympathize with both of your sentiments. One of the rules that I’ve made for myself is that when I’m going through these periods of doubt, I try to spend as much time looking for evidence that things really happened the way the church says as I do researching the inconsistencies and troubling aspects of our religion. In other words, I try not to spend all my time looking at the warts, and spend some time trying to find the beauty of our belief system.
Here’s one last example of what I consider to be an amazing finding by Pratt that uses the sciences of physics and astronomy to confirm a truth that our church teaches – namely that Christ was born on the 6th of April 1 BC.
http://johnpratt.com/items/docs/lds/meridian/2010/venus.html#2 ” class=”bbcode_url”> http://johnpratt.com/items/docs/lds/meridian/2010/venus.html#2 “2.1 Birth of Jesus: A Unique Time
Let us consider each of four sacred calendars separately. First, consider the Hebrew calendar, which is based on the motions of both the sun and moon. Of the seven symbolic holy days revealed to Moses, Passover apparently represents the day of the birth of Jesus Christ, even as the nation of Israel was “born” on the day of the exodus from Egypt.[5] If that were the only clue we had to his birth, then it could be at Passover in any year at all, for it is an annual spring feast.
The second clue is that the Native American tradition is that the birth of Quetzalcoatl, which appears to have been their name for Jesus Christ, occurred on the day 1 Reed.[6] That day occurs once every 260 days, implying that Passover can only occur on 1 Reed about once in 260 years. In the period from 84 BC through AD 130, the only time on which Passover coincided with 1 Reed was during the night preceding Thu 6 Apr 1 BC. It is pinpointed to the night time because the Hebrew day begins after sunset, whereas the Native American day begins at dawn. The scriptures even tell us that Jesus was born at night (Luke 2:
, and the Passover feast is timed to be at night. Thus, this coincidence alone might be enough to convince us that the L.D.S. position that April 6 is the day to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ is not without historical foundation.[7]But there are two more calendars which point to the day as a unique sacred day in history. There are also Mercury and Venus calendars, which are based on the phases of those planets symbolizing the four sacred events in the life of Quetzalcoatl of Creation, Birth, Prime, and Resurrection. Those calendars most likely begin at midnight, when those evening and morning stars can never be seen. It turns out that the day Wed 5 Apr (midnight to midnight) coincided with “1 Creation” of both of those cycles, being the first day of each cycle. How often do Passover, 1 Reed, and 1 Creation on both Mercury and Venus calendars occur at the same time?
Only for one 6 hour period in 7,000 years, from sunset to midnight on Wed 5 Apr 1 BC.End quote.
(Note that the time from sunset to midnight on the Hebrew calendar would be April 6th, 1 BC since the Hebrew day begins just after sunset. Also note that, to my knowledge, the church is the only one who believes that Christ was born on this date. Most other historians and religious leaders say His birth was sometime between 7-4 BC.)
So here we have the calendars of two planets, one Middle Eastern society and one Mesoamerican society that align during a six hour period that only happens once in 7,000 years, which just happens to be when Mormon scripture (D&C 20:1) and several latter-day prophets proclaim that Christ was born. Coincidence? I don’t know… I’m truly not qualified to critique the argument. To my layman’s brain, though, that seems like pretty compelling evidence.
There are arguments against this position… just google “Jesus birthday April 6” and you’ll get a taste of what other people are saying.
Let me just emphasize that I’m not trying to convince anybody here… I just find it interesting, and think that when we’re going through a crisis of faith, it’s sometimes good to look for evidence that supports the church’s claims. That way we can weigh all the evidence we gather in our own mind, decide what the probability that the church’s claims are true, and make our own decision about what direction we should head.
As a side note, this is one of the things that has kept me in the church despite my doubts. No matter how much evidence I think I’ve accrued that the church isn’t what it claims to be, if I’m being honest, I have to admit that I don’t have all the evidence in front of me, and that if I did, I might feel very different than I do at that moment. Of course, all of us have to decide what the tipping point is – when will the evidence against the truthfulness of the church outweigh our willingness to continue to search for more evidence of it’s claims? That’s a personal decision, and is probably different for each of us…
Quote:“I sometimes think that the universe is a machine designed for the perpetual astonishment of astronomers.”
– Arthur C. Clarke (agnostic)
SamBee wrote:Quote:“I sometimes think that the universe is a machine designed for the perpetual astonishment of astronomers.”
– Arthur C. Clarke (agnostic)
lol. nice.
:clap: LOVE that quote. :thumbup: Wasn’t the church distancing themselves from 6th April as the birth date? DBmormon, did I imagine this?
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