This is the
Classical Astronomy Update, an email newsletter especially
for Christian homeschool families (though everyone is welcome!) Please feel free to share this with any interested
friends.
The mighty God, even the Lord, hath spoken, and called the earth from the rising of the sun unto the going down thereof. -- Psalm 50:1 IN THIS UPDATE This Week! Classical Astronomy on TOS Podcast Classical Astronomy Easter Articles USA Total Solar Eclipse Pre-Anniversary Hello Friends, After many years of waiting, I'm very excited that the next TOTAL ECLIPSE OF THE SUN over the USA is only a year away! Details follow below. The most exciting part is this
will pass over more heavily populated areas in the eastern USA than the 2017 eclipse, and so a lot more people will have a chance to witness God's glory in the heavens! The date is Monday, April 8, 2024 (that's next YEAR, not next WEEK!) Circle that date and start making your plans to be prepared for ECLIPSE DAY 2024! This Week! Classical Astronomy on TOS Podcast I'm pleased to announce that I will be appearing this week on the podcast of The Old
Schoolhouse magazine! On Wednesday, April 5, at 1:00 PM EDT I will join our host Heather and Paul and Gena, the magazine publishers, to discuss Natural Timekeeping–Reviving the Lost Art. This the essence of Classical Astronomy -- the ancient methods of finding the time of day, the day of the month, and the month of the year from the Sun, Moon, stars and planets. This is one of the Scriptural reasons for which the Sun and Moon were created (Genesis 1:14). These natural methods of celestial timekeeping were practiced by all pre-industrial cultures around all the world throughout all history, but have been "kicked to the curb" in the last 150 years, replaced by mechanical clocks and other artificial methods. Many people today like homesteaders seek to revive lost arts, and would do well to add natural timekeeping to their list. And modern
timekeeping infrastructure is very fragile and could be taken down by a solar storm or an enemy attack. In an increasingly precarious world, preppers would do well to learn about natural timekeeping in the event of a grid failure or other devasting event. Here are the details: Natural Timekeeping–Reviving the Lost Art Wednesday, April 5, at 1:00 PM EDT
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If you can't watch live, I'm told the stream will be posted afterwards at the same links. Hope you'll all tune in! And please share with your friends! Classical Astronomy Easter
Articles Longtime readers of this newsletter might recall 15-20 years ago when I wrote a series of articles explaining the Scriptural and astronomical foundations of our calendar, as particularly applied to finding the time of the Hebrew feast of Passover and the Christian feast of Easter. These articles appeared
first in this newsletter (starting circa 2003) and were then reprinted at Crosswalk.com. They were later incorporated into our Signs & Seasons homeschool astronomy curriculum. Long story short, according to Scripture, Passover is reckoned as the Full Moon closest to the first day of spring. And Easter (or more properly Pascha) is directly based on Passover, and is the oldest and most important Christian feast, going back to the
Apostles. There is an unfortunate "urban legend" that Easter is instead a "pagan holiday." Some Christians become very contentious on this point. But the facts refute that notion and are presented in these articles, and also in Signs & Seasons. According to the ecclesiastical rules established in A.D. 325, Easter (Pascha) occurs on the
first Sunday following the first Full Moon following the first day of spring (the vernal equinox). This is especially notable in 2023 since Passover and Easter both occur in the coming week, which is not always the case every year. The Full Moon is Wednesday, April 5, which is the first night of Passover. Easter is next Sunday, April 9, according to the Gregorian calendar, which is followed by the western churches, Catholic and Protestant. Eastern Orthodox churches celebrate Easter the next Sunday, April 16, following the old Julian calendar, which is 13 days behind the Gregorian, and does not line up precisely with the celestial times of the vernal equinox or
Full Moon. Here are those Easter articles and a couple other articles of interest. Please feel free to email me with your thoughts. For more information about topics from Classical Astronomy discussed in this newsletter,
please check out a homeschool astronomy curriculum (but popular with adult readers too!) Visit our archive of previous editions of the Classical Astronomy Update newsletters, going back to 2007. *****
USA Total Solar Eclipse Pre-Anniversary Saturday, April 8, 2023 will be the "pre-anniversary" of the next total solar eclipse over the USA! This rare and precious event will occur next year on Monday, April
8, 2024. You're probably not hearing much about it right now in the mainstream media, though you might here something over the next week. But you can believe that this will be a BIG STORY a year from now. That's all well and good, except everyone will need to BE PREPARED in advance if they wish to witness this event. And by the time this story hits the news cycle, it will be too late. A TOTAL ECLIPSE OF THE SUN is the rarest natural sight that can be seen from Planet Earth. Under very special circumstances, the Sun and Moon align so that the body of the Moon passes in front of the disc of the Sun and blocks the sunshine for several
minutes. Full daylight quickly falls into a deep twilight over a short span of seconds and a black Sun is visible in the sky, surrounded by the elusive solar corona, the wispy halo of the Sun's outer atmosphere, which is only visible during totality. Very often, when I tell people about a total solar eclipse, they say, "Oh yeah, I've already seen one of those." So my response is, "Ummm...
probably not." You might have seen a total lunar eclipse during the nighttime when the Full Moon passes through the shadow of the Earth, when the bright lunar body becomes dark and reddish and kind of spooky-looking. If you ever saw a solar eclipse in the daytime on a sunny day, it was probably a partial solar eclipse, when you observe the Sun with a solar filter to see the Moon "taking a bite" out of the solar disc. During a partial solar eclipse, you can hardly even tell that anything special is going on with the Sun. It's still daylight, you're still
standing in the sunshine, and you still have a shadow cast behind you, pointing away from the Sun. If the partial solar eclipse is very deep, you can tell that something is "hinky" with the sky -- daylight is abnormal, not quite right. The light is kind of pale and weak, but it's still a sunny day, even when the Sun is 99% obscured. The Sun is SO BRIGHT that a 99% dip in brightness is barely noticable to the human eye, a mere factor of 100 over the span of an hour. The pupils in your eyes open up a bit larger to admit more light so that it still appears to be mostly normal daytime. But when the eclipse progesses that last bit -- from 99% to 100% -- the sky brightness drops by a factor
of 10,000, over only the span of a few seconds! It's like the Sun is turned down with a dimmer switch. A bright sunshiney day quickly descends into a deep stage of twilight at the onset of totality. The planets and the brightest stars become visible, sharing the sky with the black Sun, enshrouded by the corona. Your shadow disappears from behind you since you and your neighborhood and your entire city is under the full shadow of the Moon. A total solar eclipse is widely regarded by many as a spiritual experience. Some people scream and shout and freak out hysterically, just like stone age people might have done in times past. People have been known to give their
hearts to Jesus after seeing a total eclipse of the Sun. But then some are like me who keep a cool head, though it is still a fascinating natural phenomenon, about the coolest thing I've ever seen. In any event, it is a truly memorable, unforgettable experience. So anyway, unless you've witnessed something like that, NO, you have NOT seen a total solar eclipse! The last total solar eclipse over the USA was in 2017.
The one before that was in 1979. And in any total solar eclipse, totality is only visible along a narrow path of totality. The Moon's full shadow is relatively small spot on the Earth of about 100 miles in diameter. That shadow spot moves across the globe at speeds over 1000 miles per hour, following the motion of the Moon in its orbit. At locations away from the path of totality, most of the facing hemisphere of the Earth observes a partial solar
eclipse. During the 2017 eclipse, the path of totality extended across the USA from Oregon, through Idaho, Wyoming, Nebraska, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky,
Tennessee and South Carolina, nicking the corners of a couple other nearby states. But except for Nashville and Columbia, SC, the 2017 eclipse managed to thread the needle around large American cities, and mostly crossed over more rural areas. The path of the 2024 USA eclipse will be very different as it will cross over from Mexico into Texas and into more densely populated northern states east of the Mississippi. The path will fall over several large American cities, including Dallas, Little Rock, Indianapolis, Cleveland, Buffalo and Rochester. There are many more even larger cities within a few hours drive of this path. So MILLIONS of Americans will have a chance to witness totality!
The 2024 eclipse has the potential to be the most-viewed total eclipse of the Sun ever seen in all human history. Here's a link to a webpage with an interactive map showing times and other circumstances for the 2024 eclipse. Is your hometown
along the path? If so, drop me a line. You should plan to invite some out-of-town family and friends to join you for Eclipse Day 2024! Or else invite some other homeschool families to join yours and have an Eclipse Party! And if you don't live along the path, NOW is the time to find a place to stay. Hotel rooms will be booked well in advance. It might already be too late. Your planning should also include having ample eclipse glasses on hand for your immediate family, extended family, friends, neighbors and anyone else near or far. One the biggest problems with eclipse planning is, EVERYONE wants a pair of eclipse glasses, but supplies always grow short as the time
approaches. Entrepeneurs can make a lot of money under these circumstances since people will pay big bucks for a pair. We've ordered a supply of Eclipse Shades and will announce that in a future newsletter. Additionally, there will also be an annular solar eclipse over the USA this year on October 14, 2023. The good part about this is, it'll be "sneak preview" and an oppountunity to grab some Eclipse Shades ahead of the main event next April. But the bad part is, it will NOT be a jaw-dropping, awe-inspiring sight. This is a "ring" eclipse, a type of partial eclipse, and will not result in totality. It will be "cool" and "interesting" but will
likely not be emotionally moving. (More on this event in a future newsletter.) There is a concern that some people will not appreciate the difference and will blow off totality the next April. The 2024 event will be
the last total solar eclipse over the USA for 20 years, until 2044. But then there will be two in a row -- a little one that year, and another the next year, in 2045. But the 2045 eclipse will have the longest duration of any eclipse over the USA over a 5000 year span from 2000 B.C. to A.D. 3000! So anyone young today can look forward to that! If you live in Cleveland (or even if you don't) please follow our special Eclipse Over Cleveland Twitter page! Though it will be mainly focused on seeing this rare and special event from my hometown of Cleveland, Ohio, it will also include much general information and tutorials about this eclipse. Til next time, God bless and clear
skies, - jay The Ryan Family Cleveland, Ohio, USA When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained, what is man that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him? - Psalm 8:3-4, a Psalm of David
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