The Astronomy of the Bible / An Elementary Commentary on the Astronomical References of Holy Scripture

by E. Walter Maunder

We thus know, roughly speaking, what was the declination of the sun—that is to say, its distance from the equator of the heavens—at the time of the battle; it was not less than 18° north of the equator, it could not have been more than 24°.

But, if we adopt the idea most generally formed of the meaning of Joshua's command, namely, that he saw the sun low down over Gibeon in one direction, and the moon low down over the valley of Ajalon in another, we can judge of the apparent bearing of those two heavenly bodies from an examination of the map. And since, if we may judge from the map of the Palestine Exploration Fund, the valley of Ajalon lies about 17° north of west from Gibeon, and runs nearly in that direction from it, the moon must, to Joshua, have seemed about 17° north of west, and the sun 17° south of east.

But for any date within the three summer months, the sun in the latitude of Gibeon, when it bears 17° south of east, must be at least 56° high. At this height it would seem overhead, and would not give the slightest idea of association with any distant terrestrial object. Not until some weeks after the autumnal equinox could the sun be seen low down on the horizon in the direction 17° south of east, and at the same time the moon be as much as 17° north of the west point. And, as this would mean that the different combatants had remained so close to each other, some four or five months without moving, it is clearly inadmissible. We are forced therefore to the unexpected conclusion that it is practically impossible that Joshua could have been in any place from whence he could have seen, at one and the name moment; the sun low down in the sky over Gibeon, and the moon over the valley of Ajalon.

Is the narrative in error, then? Or have we been reading into it our own erroneous impression? Is there any other sense in which a man would naturally speak of a celestial body as being "over" some locality on the earth, except when both were together on his horizon?

Most certainly. There is another position which the sun can hold in which it may naturally be said to be "over," or "upon" a given place; far more naturally and accurately than when it chances to lie in the same direction as some object on the horizon. We have no experience of that position in these northern latitudes, and hence perhaps our commentators have, as a rule, not taken it into account. But those who, in tropical or sub-tropical countries, have been in the open at high noon, when a man's foot can almost cover his shadow, will recognize how definite, how significant such a position is. In southern Palestine, during the three summer months, the sun is always so near the zenith at noon that it could never occur to any one to speak of it as anything but "overhead."

And the prose narrative expressly tells us that this was the case. It is intimated that when Joshua spoke it was noon, by the expression that the sun "hasted not to go down about a whole day," implying that the change in the rate in its apparent motion occurred only in the afternoon, and that it had reached its culmination. Further, as not a few commentators have pointed out, the expression,—"the sun stood still in the midst of heaven,"—is literally "in the bisection of heaven"; a phrase applicable indeed to any position on the meridian, but especially appropriate to the meridian close to the zenith.

This, then, is what Joshua meant by his command to the sun. Its glowing orb blazed almost in the centre of the whole celestial vault—"in the midst of heaven"—and poured down its vertical rays straight on his head. It stood over him—it stood over the place where he was—Gibeon.

We have, therefore, been able to find that the narrative gives us, by implication, two very important particulars, the place where Joshua was, and the time of the day. He was at Gibeon, and it was high noon.

The expression, "Thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon," has now a very definite signification. As we have already seen, the valley of Ajalon bears 17° north of west from Gibeon, according to the map of the Palestine Exploration Fund, so that this is the azimuth which the moon had at the given moment. In other words, it was almost exactly midway between the two "points of the compass," W.b.N. and W.N.W. It was also in its "last quarter" or nearly so; that is, it was half-full, and waning. With the sun on the meridian it could not have been much more than half-full, for in that case it would have already set; nor much less than half-full, or it would have been too faint to be seen in full daylight. It was therefore almost exactly half-full, and the day was probably the 21st day of the month in the Jewish reckoning.