Sunday, January 18, 2009

 

40

PRAYER OF CONFESSION THIS MORNING AT CHURCH:

"Lord of Life, forty years after the death of Martin Luther King, Jr., a part of his dream is about to come true. As the nation and the world turn their attention to the inauguration of the first black president in American history, we hear the singing of a new song, and we rejoice at the capacity of human beings to hope. Make us all mindful that the task he faces is enormous, the challenges are immense, and the change will not happen overnight. In the meantime, give to each of us the capacity to sacrifice for the Common Good. In the name of Jesus of Nazareth, our Teacher and Lord, we pray, Amen."

(Our extremely rational preacherman had a little fun with the "forty" business this morning. But who's to say? The Lord does move in myterious ways ...)

--ER

Comments:
I hadn't thought about the whole "40" thing. Interesting . . .
 
40? Check out your Sun of God book for "40"'s meanings. 40 is represented in Hebrew by the letter Mem which also means water and sometimes flood. Check out the Hebrew Letters=Numbers chart in the book.(Greek does the same kind of thing) Many significant names sum to 40 in the Bible.
The "science of magic numbers", later known as gematria, dates back to Babylon and India. The Wise Men story is full of secret forties.
So...why?
Let me dig into this a while.
 
Ah yes, Pecher would like this one.
Babylonian God:
Ea (Enki, Nudimmud)
- god of the waters. He is in charge of the bolt which bars the sea. He knows everything. He is the "Lord of Wisdom" and "Lord of Incantations". When he speaks, of a thing, it will be made.....
Symbol: Ram's head; goat-fish (a goat's head on a fish's body)
Sacred number: 40

Hum, that's the image of Capricorn the constellation isn't it.

I'll dig a bit more.
 
Counting time in units of 40 days.
Summary:

A fixed count of 3205 days in association with the passage of 9 solar circles requires that the intercalation each 40th day be continued in perpetuity. (The cited count of 40 days must never be preempted or be broken).

Essentially, the respective cycle of 40 days must here be interpreted to be primary and independent from the confines of the annual circle.

Of additional significance concerning the track of 40 days is that some early cultures appear to have attributed religious significance to this respective time span. To the princes of Egypt, adherence to this respective cycle was probably believed to mirror a lifestyle that was lived by the gods. Among ancient Hebrews and early Christians, a cycle of 40 days was probably not held in the same religious regard. Even so, the passage of this respective time cycle was given a certain amount of very serious consideration. Primal or original Christians did probably routinely fast on the 40th days. By the 4th century, a 40-day fast was widely practiced. This custom of fasting for 40 days (Lent) continues to be practiced by a segment of modern Christians.

According to Biblical and related sources, YHVH commanded the Israelites to track and celebrate a jubilee calendar as a condition of living in the promised land. Even though early adherence to a jubilee calendar appears to be indicated, the Israelites were seemingly also aware of the cited calendar system of counting 40 days. The Genesis record--in dating the epoch of the flood--is just short of being explicit in showing that a calendar predicated upon a track of 40 days did originate with the epoch of creation.

Returning to more of the astronomical significance of time tracking a 40-day cycle, each passing solar year can effectively (almost perfectly) be measured and metered out by simply counting solar days--as cited. In this modern era, the epoch of each passing solar year can inherently be determined to within the limits of 2.2 second (on average). Because Earth's spin appears to be slowing down by a tiny amount with each passing century, it can be recognized that the track of a 40-day cycle could have been used to exactly (perfectly!) measure and meter the solar-year rate in some era of the past.

A PERFECT 9-YEAR CALENDAR *
_____________________________________

Renewal = 1 day
Year 1 = 356 days
Year 2 = 356 days
Year 3 = 356 days
Year 4 = 356 days
Year 5 = 356 days
Year 6 = 356 days
Year 7 = 356 days
Year 8 = 356 days
Year 9 = 356 days

* - Each 40th day (a perpetual rate)
must be leaped or intercalated
apart from days comprising the
the cited calendar count.

____________________________________

Calendar count = 3205.00000 days
40th (uncounted rate) = 82.17949 days
Average 9-year rate = 3287.17949 days

Annual calendar rate = 365.24217 days
Actual solar-year rate = 365.24219 days
Average difference = 2 seconds (!!!)

{Anyone want to explain these calculations to me?}

Source: http://www.creation-answers.com/forty.htm

By further digging you can find this 40 day based time cycle in Zoroastrian, Mayan, and North African tribal calender systems.
This would suggest that it would have origins deeper in time back past the invasion of the Male Aryan Gods (6,000 years ago) to the Mother God era of agriculture.
 
OK, so carried away with 40 I got, but it does make the point left over from the 25 books thread. Jesus in the wilderness for 40 days has meaning now lost and gone for us. No matter how much we explain it to and among ourselves we won't catch the significance that an ordinary person would have in A.D. 99 or so.

'The margins reveal the core.' A useful Geographic and Medical aphorism, that should be applied to theology.
 
And that is a critical point to trying to grasp Scripture.
 
So why did you bring up 40?

The dog has a bone.

There are 354.37 days in a lunar year (of 12 moons/months), and 365.24 days in a solar year; together they average 360 days.

A 40 day cycle x 9 anomolistic months in the 360 day year.

The Babylonian/Sumerian/Chaldean numerical system is in a mixed base 6 and 10 and 60.

They divided a circle into 360 parts or degrees.

They divided the day into 4 parts. Each part had 6 hours, each hour had 60 minutes, each minute had 60 seconds.

They used a lunar count of 12 months plus 6 days within their 360day year.

They also had 40 day cycles which created 9 anamolistic months within the 360 day year.

Every six '360 day' years they had a leap month of 30 days.

After six of these 6 year "360" day years they then had a four year period that had the 30 day leap month.

The 36 year cycle:
(360+360+360+360+360+360+30)x 6 =
13140 days
plus the four year cycle of:
360+360+360+360+30 = 1470 days

13140 days plus 1470 days sum to:
14,610 days in the 40 year cycle.

Using our modern solar year of 365.25 days times 40 years you get 14,610 days.

So the Chaldean or Babylonian or Sumerian 40 days cycle and 40 year cycle correspond exactly with the modern calender concept.

This is how there were 4 diunal sections(mornign-afternoon-evening-night), 40 day, and 40 year cycles within the use of the 360 day average year.

But 40....why?
 
???
 
You are no doubt familiar with Deep Thought the computer that was created by the pan-dimensional, hyper-intelligent race of beings (whose three dimensional protrusions into our universe are ordinary white mice)came up with the ultimate answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything. After seven and a half million years of calculation, the answer finally turned out to be 42. Deep Thought admonished the receivers of the Ultimate Answer that he checked it very thoroughly, and that quite definitely 42 was the answer.

It is possible that Deep Thought was simply off by 5.0% and that 40 is actually the meaning of life.

Maybe that is why.
 
Deep Thought perpetuated a rounding error!
 
It is more like Deep Thought was engaged in perturbation. A perturbation comprises a method of mathematical massaging that is used to find an approximate solution to a problem which cannot be solved directly. Thus an error of that degree would be acceptable in that "40" itself my be a result of perturbating.
 
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