Where Did We Get Our Division of Time?Our present division of time into 60 seconds, 60 minutes and 6 days +0 (which would be 7 for us) is based on the observations of early African astronomers. Their knowledge spread with the dispersion of the early Hebrew ruler-priests into Mesopotamia.
Early Nilotic astronomers observed and recorded the movement of the stars to understand their seasonal effect on the Nile Valley. These astronomers were mainly
temple priests who had been keeping records of astronomical cycles and events for many millennia.
Plato wrote that Nilotic scribes had been keeping astronomical records for 10,000 years. He should know since
he studied with a priest in Memphis for 13 years and knew about Earth's Great Year (also called the "Platonic Year"). This is the duration of time between 25,000 and 28,000 years that it takes for Earth to complete the cycle of
axial precession. This precession was known to Plato who defined the "perfect year" as the return of the celestial bodies (planets) and the
diurnal rotation of the fixed stars to their original positions. The ancients understood much more about the natural world than is generally recongized.
By 4245 BC, the priests of the Upper Nile had established a calendar based on the appearance of the star Sirius. Apparently, they had been tracking this star and connecting it to seasonal changes and agriculture for thousands of years. The priest Manetho reported in his history (c.241 BC) that Nilotic Africans had been “star-gazing” as early as 40,000 years ago.
The ancient Nilotic astronomers observed that 36 groups of stars (small constellations) rise in a consecutive order on the eastern horizon every 24 hours. Each decan rises for 10 days. This gave them the formula of 36 X 10 = 360 days, with the calendar broken into 12 months of 30 days each.
The Sumerian civilization (c.7000 - 2000 B.C.) represents a sexagesimal system based on a calendar with 360 (60x6) days in a year (with a few days added when the priests realized that the calendar needed adjusting according to the discrepancy between the lunar phases and the solar cycle). The duplication of 6 is 12, so the number 12 is a feature of this system, with 12 hours assigned to "day" and 12 hours assigned to "night", and roughly 12 months.
The
oldest known time counting device (shown above) ever found dates to about 45,000 years ago and was found in a cave in the Lebombo Mountains of southern Africa. This lunar phase counting device of 29 distinct notches that were deliberately cut into a baboon’s fibula.
The months of a lunar calendar alternate between 29 and 30 days. Since the period of 12 such lunations, a lunar year, is 354 days, 8 hours, 48 minutes, 34 seconds (354.36707 days), purely lunar calendars are 11 to 12 days shorter than the solar year.
What is Time?
Time can be defined in different ways, depending on the discipline from which one is approaching the subject. In Physics, time is often spoken of as a fourth dimension, yet the existence of time depends on electromagnetic radiation, an aspect of the three-dimensional world in which we live.
Regardless of how time is defined, it is something that humans cannot escape. It is an inescapable feature of the universe that God created. St. Augustine wrote, “God moves the spiritual through time." As we are spiritual as well as fleshly creatures, God moves us through time toward His eternal Being. At some point, as St. Paul reminds us, we must put off this perishable body for the imperishable body.
Solar time or the solar year is the measurement of time according to the earth’s rotation around the sun.
Sidereal time is the orbital period of the earth around the sun, taking the stars as a reference frame. It is 20 minutes longer than the solar or tropical year because of
precession. The
sidereal year is the measurement of time relative to a distant star. It is used in astronomy to predict when a star will be overhead. Due to the somewhat wobbly rotation of the earth around the sun, a sidereal day is slightly less than a solar day. This means that time is relative to where we are in the universe.
What is Eternity?
Many think that eternity is endless time, but eternity is timelessness. This means that eternity cannot be an aspect of the creation in which we live. However, it is an aspect of God’s nature. Theologically, it is possible to speak of the eternal God as timeless.
While eternity pertains to God and not to the creation, eternity is not beyond the grasp of humans. Intellectually, we are able to recognize the difference between time and eternity. The Christian Faith teaches that we were made to enjoy God in eternity, and that Jesus came so that everyone who believes in Him and receives His life-giving Spirit has eternal life.
In the Athanasian Creed we express the belief that "The Father is eternal, the Son is eternal, the Holy Ghost is eternal." Paul tells us that, “as many of you who have been baptized into Christ, have put on Christ.” In our baptism, we come naked before God and we are given the undergarments of eternity, but the fine outer garments will be given to us on the Last Day at the general resurrection.
As Steven Hawking... boasted many years thereafter, we proved that time was created. We proved that time has a beginning. But through his contacts with certain Christians like his wife Jane, who's an Anglican, as a friend of mine from Cal Tech, Don Page, who had daily Bible studies with Steven and Jane Hawking while he was doing research pointed out, if you prove that time has a beginning, that it was created, it eliminates all theological possibilities but Jesus Christ.
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