Eclipses still wield spiritual significance
Watch parties organized by faith groups in the US
On April 8 in Gatesville, Texas, members of Coryell Community Church will celebrate the “Eclipse of the Crosses” with live music, games and worship at the center of the solar phenomenon’s path of totality.
Organizers at the Jewish Community Center of Greater Buffalo have bought a thousand eclipse glasses for a viewing event complete with black-and-white deli cookies.
Ancient cultures viewed the temporary death of the sun’s light as a sign of the gods’ anger or even their impending departure. This month, the faithful convene in gatherings that reflect how celestial events continue to wield spiritual significance today.
“An eclipse is yet another opportunity to witness the handiwork of God,” said Eric Moffett, Coryell’s lead pastor. “We aren’t looking for any omens in the cosmos, but we are using this as an opportunity to, for a little over four minutes, be reminded that we live in a world made by God.”
Eclipses have inspired fear and awe from the Aztecs to the ancient Hindus. They’re also associated with some major religious events, including Jesus’ crucifixion and the passing of the Prophet Muhammad’s son.
Among the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, the sun was considered to bring life and fortune, the newspaper Biskinik reported. In some communities, when solar eclipses occurred, it was as if great black squirrels were devouring the sun. In response, all were called upon to make noise to frighten them away.
Bradley Schaefer, a professor of astronomy at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, said in most premodern cultures, the sun god was among the most powerful deities in the pantheon. An eclipse represented the destruction of that god – or at least a dire sign.
“Where better to put signs from the gods but in the heavens?” Schaefer said. “They’re telling us something, and what was universal from culture to culture is that it was always bad.”
Today, perspectives on eclipses vary widely within religious communities as well as between them.
The Talmud, a central Jewish text, says, “When the luminaries are stricken, it is an ill omen for the world.” More conservative members of the Jewish community still consider eclipses warnings, “a time for prayer and introspection,” said Mark Horowitz, chief operating officer for the Jewish Community Center of Greater Buffalo.
Some have claimed eclipses bear political significance. Anne Graham Lotz, daughter of famed evangelist Billy Graham and founder of AnGel Ministries, has seen speculation that the combined paths over the U.S. of this year’s eclipse and the previous two solar eclipses mimic the shapes of the first and last letters of the Hebrew alphabet – in other words, the beginning and the end.
“Maybe people are reading too much into it,” she said. “But when you look at the world, you don’t need an eclipse to know that things are getting really dangerous. Maybe it’s telling us it’s time to get right with God and the people in our lives, so that we have no regrets.”
Fourteen centuries ago, Muhammad watched his toddler breathe his last as the skies darkened above them – the beginning, it is believed, of a total eclipse. His followers speculated that even the sun and moon were grieving. Muhammad dispelled the notion but added that such events, as signs of God’s power, should nonetheless inspire prayer.
Omid Safi, a professor of Islamic studies at Duke University, said tradition holds that eclipses are divine, while honoring the prophet’s “steadfast refusal to use the fortuitous occasion of a solar eclipse at the passing of his son as a way of bolstering his own standing.”
Islam’s eclipse prayer is not mandatory, but many still take time to recite it. Nadia Abuisnaineh, who volunteers as a NASA solar system ambassador, organized an event in metro Minneapolis for last fall’s annular eclipse hoping to pique not only her community’s scientific curiosity but their sense of identity as Muslims.
She had no idea the gathering would come as Palestinians scrambled to evacuate northern Gaza, a week after the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israel. The timing made the gathering all the more powerful, she said. Attendees were overcome by the eclipse, some moved to tears.
“My community was very hurt, and for them it was a time to reflect and ask God to alleviate the pain and suffering,” Abuisnaineh said. “I never imagined that five months later, with the second eclipse coming, that we would still have to think about this and be advocating for our brothers and sisters in Palestine.”
With the April 8 event coming at the height of Ramadan, Abuisnaineh isn’t planning to arrange another gathering. Instead, she plans to remind community members to use the time to reflect. For herself, the avid stargazer is not about to miss a solar eclipse.
“If it’s sunny, I’ll take out all my eclipse glasses and knock on every door in my neighborhood,” she said. “It’s just a bummer to live your life and not know these things happen.”
Schaefer, of Louisiana State University, said as the science behind eclipses began to be understood, some used such knowledge to their advantage.
In 1504, Christopher Columbus was shipwrecked with his crew in Jamaica and for months relied on local natives to provide food. When the natives refused to continue, Columbus seized on the idea of using an upcoming lunar eclipse to convince the locals he could commune with the gods and make the moon disappear.
“Columbus knew it was just a shadow. But the Jamaicans saw it as a death of a god,” Schaefer said. “Once you understand what an eclipse is, it’s no longer the realm of the gods.”
Still, witnessing a solar eclipse can be a spiritual experience, even for those who aren’t necessarily religious.
Former NASA engineers Jeff and Susan Stone will watch the eclipse from their hilltop home in Kerrville, Texas, hosting a dozen-plus visitors from as far away as Sweden.
When they worked as flight controllers for the space shuttle program, the couple traveled to Mexico in 1991 to experience nearly seven minutes of totality. They’ve been eclipse-chasers ever since.
“It’s such an emotional event,” Jeff Stone said. “It touches your soul, it really does. Any time you realize there’s something bigger than you, it gives you perspective. Surely that power has a purpose.”
In Buffalo, Horowitz said the eclipse, while an obvious reminder of nature’s beauty, offers a chance to reflect on nature’s fragility and find hope amid worldly chaos and personal challenges.
“You can sometimes be clouded by all that darkness,” he said. “The natural world is trying to tell us that beyond the darkness, there is light.”