winter solstice It is one of the most beautiful phenomena that occur on Earth. Is about the longest night of the yearwhen the sun reaches its greatest height, but paradoxically it is the moment in which we can celebrate that the light of the sun is beginning to gain ground, every day that passes. Although in theory the winter solstice only lasts an instant, it usually refers to a specific whole day.
This year, the winter solstice will be special. In the northern hemisphere it will occur at 4:28 p.m. (universal time), that is, at 10:28 a.m. in Mexico, on December 21, and it will almost coincide with the entry of Saturn into Capricorn.which will occur on December 19.
Sun
The apparent coming and going of the sun determines each particle of the Earth, because it is on this star that every form of life on our planet depends. But more than a simple star, it is from the cosmic dance that the Earth does around it, of rotations and translations, where the balance of life comes from. It is at the solstices and equinoxes that time and space are defined.: the rhythm of our life, which compared to the cosmos seems so meager.
But the sun has remained that dazzling figure around which these terrestrial movements take place across the firmament. Perhaps that is why it has been anthropomorphized and deified at the same time. He has been given the body of a king, and also of a warrior – that’s what the emperors of Constantine’s time called him. But he has also been associated with Christ, Mithras, Horus, Cronus, Dionysus or Huitzilopochtli. For this reason, says Manly P. Hall, a scholar of ancient philosophy, that:
There has not been a people who has not gone through some kind of phase of solar symbolism in their philosophy, science, and theology. The sun has thus mastered all the arts.
But this great star has always kept the essence that has made us adore it over the centuries. A devotion beyond all syncretism or anthropocentrism, and that has lasted until today. The fact that it is the sun that dominates each cell of the Earth, and its natural cycles, has made it culturally and religiously omnipresent (and terrestrially essential).
These are some facts about the winter solstice that will make you understand the importance of the sun providing us with the magical winter season.:
The solstice is ruled by Saturn because the sun enters the sign of Capricorn. Saturn is the god of agriculture, and that is why the Roman Saturnalias were held on the solstice, great festivals of reinvestment and worship of the star.
The birth of Jesus Christ on December 25 could represent the replacement of the cult of Helium, the solar representation of the Roman Empire.
The solstice is actually a binomial moment that divides culture into two moments, since in one hemisphere of the globe it is winter and in the other it is summer. But in all of them there are similar rituals around these cosmic moments.
There are also festivities around the winter solstice outside of Europe. In Japan, for example, there is the revival of Amaterasu, the sun goddess of Japanese mythology.
The solstice is symbolically the death and resurrection of the sun. During this time, the star reaches its maximum declination on the equator, sinking into the cosmic trench to gradually reemerge from the bowels of Capricorn in a new life cycle.
Capricorn represents the door of the gods, while Cancer, located at 180 degrees, is the door of men. Thus, the winter solstice is associated with divinity in ancient Western astronomy.
It is the longest night of the year, when dawn begins later and sunset begins earlier.
The inclination of the Earth’s axis makes us see the sun with each time a smaller angle. This moment of immobility is what gives its name to the solstices, a word that derives from Latin and means «sun that remains still.»
In theory, the winter solstice only lasts for a moment, the one in which the sun is “still”. But this term is also used to refer to the 24 hours of the day in which it takes place.
Annually, in the Gregorian calendar, the solstice fluctuates slightly, but in the long term and only about one day every 3,000 years.
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