Adityas: Solar deities, the greatest of which is Vishnu.

(See also: Adityas, Hinduism, Hinduism Dictionary, Sanskrit Dictionary, Body Mind and Soul)

Samson is said to have lived during the period when the Israelites were oppressed by the power of the Philistines. At this time an angel from God appeared to Manoah, an Israelite from the tribe of Dan, in the city of Zorah, and to his wife, who was barren. This angel predicted that they would have a son. In accordance with Nazaritic requirements, she was to abstain from wine and other strong drink, and her promised child was not to have a razor used upon his head. In due time the son was born; he ...

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Samson, Samson - Biblical story, Samson - In rabbinic literature, Samson - In other literature, Samson - Samson as myth, Samson - Samson's name and birthplace, Samson - Dusk, Samson - The day, Samson - The yearly sun

Read more here: » Samson: Encyclopedia II - Samson - Biblical story

Samson is said to have lived during the period when the Israelites were oppressed by the power of the Philistines. At this time an angel from God appeared to Manoah, an Israelite from the tribe of Dan, in the city of Zorah, and to his wife, who was barren. This angel predicted that they would have a son. In accordance with Nazaritic requirements, she was to abstain from wine and other strong drink, and her promised child was not to have a razor used upon his head. In due time the son was born; he ...

See also:

Samson, Samson - Biblical story, Samson - In rabbinic literature, Samson - In other literature, Samson - Samson's Life, Samson - Samson's name and birthplace, Samson - Dusk, Samson - The day, Samson - The yearly sun

Read more here: » Samson: Encyclopedia II - Samson - Biblical story

Samson - Samson's name and birthplace. In the Hebrew text that English translations of the book of Judges are based on, Samson is named Shimshon (Samson is an English rendering). Standard translations of the meaning of this name are usually ...who serves... or of the sun, but it can also be translated as Little Shamash (essentially as Shamash-ino). Shamash itself translates as sun or ...who serves.., but it is als ...

See also:

Samson, Samson - Biblical story, Samson - In rabbinic literature, Samson - In other literature, Samson - Samson as myth, Samson - Samson's name and birthplace, Samson - Dusk, Samson - The day, Samson - The yearly sun

Read more here: » Samson: Encyclopedia II - Samson - Samson as myth

Samson - Samson's name and birthplace. In the Hebrew text which English translations of the book of Judges are based on, Samson is named Shimshon (Samson is an English rendering). Standard translations of the meaning of this name are usually ...who serves... or of the sun, but it can also be translated as Little Shamash (essentially as Shamash-ino). Shamash itself translates as sun or ...who serves.., but it is also ...

See also:

Samson, Samson - Biblical story, Samson - In rabbinic literature, Samson - In other literature, Samson - Samson's Life, Samson - Samson's name and birthplace, Samson - Dusk, Samson - The day, Samson - The yearly sun

Read more here: » Samson: Encyclopedia II - Samson - Samson's Life

By the Victorian era, the solar-phallic ideas of Payne Knight along with the less risqué work of scholars like Max Müller had taken strange turns as they made their way into popular discourse. Groups like the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn were using scholarly parallels between Christ, Osiris and other putative solar dying-and-rising gods to build up elaborate systems of mysticism and theosophy. By the twentieth century, this spiritualized turn to the universal-dying-god hypothesis had made its way into the sunlit uplands of acad ...

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Life-death-rebirth deity, Life-death-rebirth deity - The naturalist approach, Life-death-rebirth deity - The internal approach, Life-death-rebirth deity - Criticisms of the category, Life-death-rebirth deity - Christianity, Life-death-rebirth deity - Proposed life-death-rebirth deities, Life-death-rebirth deity - External link

Read more here: » Life-death-rebirth deity: Encyclopedia II - Life-death-rebirth deity - The internal approach

Sun Worship All ancient pantheons contain a deity associated with the sun, so that the reverence and worship paid to the sun was ritually universal even where lunar worship may have predominated. With the Zoroastrians, sun worship was the dominant religious theme although a pantheon of other deities was not excluded.

It was not the visible orb which was worshiped as the solar divinity, but the spiritual power or being within or above the physical sun, which was but its reflection. The lord of the solar system sends its septenary forces and substances to all parts of the solar kingdom, thus binding it into a single organic individual.

(See also: Sun Worship, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Body mind and Soul)

Viewing the Aten as Akhenaten's god is actually a simplification. Aten was the focus of Akhenaten's religion. Aten is the name given to represent the solar disc. The term Aten was used to designate a disc, and since the sun was a disc, gradually became associated with solar deities. Consequently, Aten expresses indirectly the life-giving force of light. The full title of Akhenaten's god was Ra-Horus, who rejoices in the horizon in his name of the light which is in the sun disc. (This is the title of the god ...

See also:

Aten, Aten - Overview, Aten - Royal Titulary, Aten - Early form, Aten - Later form

Read more here: » Aten: Encyclopedia II - Aten - Overview

Supporters The cosmocratores, rectores mundi, Pillars of the World, exemplifying the Scandinavian ases and the planetary spirits of certain Christian mystics. In Hinduism they are the guardian deities of the eight cardinal points, and are called loka-palas.

In theosophy, so far as our own solar universe is concerned, the supporting spiritual powers involved in the carpentry of the universe, referring to the rectors of the planets. Just as a human community is formed by individuals, just so is a solar system formed by the solar chief and the planetary individuals which not only by their life and energies and substances make such solar system, but continuously support it and keep it going as a cosmic individual throughout its entire life term.

(See also: Supporters, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Body mind and Soul)

Sun The central focus of radiating energy, physical and spiritual, of any solar system. In our solar system the sun is one of several suns subordinate to the more central sun of the universal solar system. In the solar cosmos as a whole it is the Logos, the head of the septenary hierarchy of creative forces, corresponding to the Christos, Abraxas, Mithras, Dionysos, etc., in man. Its names among the many peoples of the earth are countless: Osiris, Ormazd, Apollo, Phoebus, Ammon-Ra, Helios, Surya, etc. Symbolized by the circle with a central point, it is for its own system the All-Father. Sun worship, in the occult sense, was once the universal foundation of religion, but it has mostly given place to what is really lunar worship. The sun is often found contrasted with the moon as spiritual is with material; and solar magic means white magic as contrasted with the dark lunar magic. Thus we find deities classed as solar and lunar, or particular deities have both a solar and a lunar aspect. As Father and Son he is seen in Osiris and Horus, atman and buddhi-manas, God and Christos.

Our visible sun, though the center of its system, is not the father of the planets but their "co-uterine brother," one of the "eight sons of Aditi." It is not the creator of the fohatic forces, but their radiating focus. Nor is it an incandescent and cooling body; it is nature's great laboratory of intelligently vital and electromagnetic forces for our system. "The Sun is the heart of the Solar World (System) and its brain is hidden behind the (visible) Sun. From thence, sensation is radiated into every nerve-centre of the great body, and the waves of the life-essence flow into each artery and vein. . . . The planets are its limbs and pulses" (SD 1:541). Physiologically, the sun pulsates life through the solar system, in connection with the 11 and 22 year sunspot phenomena -- the solar spots being due to the contraction of the solar heart.

The sun is a vitally electric glowing sphere; what our eyes see is a reflection, the shell of the real sun, which is hidden behind this reflection. Further, the sun is the storehouse of the vital force of the solar system, which is the "Noumenon of Electricity"; it issues forth from the sun as life currents not only for the earth and every organism upon it, but for all the planets of the solar system (SD 1:531). The production of this vital energy will not cease until the end of the solar manvantara when the sun will instantaneously disappear, after certain long-standing premonitory symptoms.

The sun, like each of the planets, is a chain of globes, of which we see only the globe on the fourth cosmic plane -- a highly ethereal body composed of the fifth, sixth, and seventh, states of matter (counting upwards) of the fourth cosmic plane.

Regarding the elements which scientists state are present in the sun, because such elements are present in spectroscopic observations, theosophy holds that no element on the earth is missing in the sun, and there are other elements there which are unknown to science, yet which are present in the sun.

In the enumeration of the seven sacred planets the sun is used as a substitute for an esoteric planet.

The enormous importance which the sun assumes in nature is based on its being the spiritual and intellectual head of solar system, as well as the general physical and psychological life-giver.

(See also: Sun, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Body mind and Soul)

Gayatri: the most sacred verse in the Vedas (Rg III, 62:10) that invokes the Solar Deity, Savitri, for wisdom in daily living. It has been used in daily worship and in initiation ceremonies throughout the ages in Bharat.

(See also: Gayatri, Hinduism, Yoga, Body Mind and Soul)

Karneios (Greek) Carneus (Latin) Title of Apollo; like Krishna, who is also mystically an imbodiment of a solar spiritual force, this deity refers to mystical matters connected with the sun and its spiritual effluvia radiating throughout the solar system. Apollo Karneios was celebrated at Sparta in the great festival of the Karneia, held during nine days of the Attic month Metageitnion (August).

(See also: Karneios, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Sokaris (Egypt, Egyptian). A fire-god; a solar deity of many forms. He is Ptah Sokaris, when the symbol is purely cosmic, and "Ptah-Sokaris-Osiris" when it is phallic. This deity is hermaphrodite, the sacred bull Apis being its son, conceived in it by a solar ray.

According to Smith’s History of the East, Ptah is a "second Demiurgus, an emanation from the first creative Principle" (the first Logos). The upright Ptah, with cross and staff, is the "creator of the eggs of the sun and moon ". Pierret thinks that he represents the primordial Force that preceded the gods and "created the stars, and the eggs of the sun and moon ". Mariette Bey sees in him "Divine Wisdom scattering the stars in immensity ", and he is corroborated by the Targum of Jerusalem, which states that the "Egyptians called the Wisdom of the First Intellect Ptah".

(See also: Sokaris, Theosophy, Spirituality, Body mind and Soul, Spiritual Dictionary, )

The area of modern town of Boryslav has been inhabitated at least since the Bronze Age. There are remnants of a pagan shrine from 1st millennium BC located in the area, with ca. 270 petroglyphs found, most often solar signs - symbols of pre-Christian Solar deity. Between 9th century and 13th century the site of the modern town housed a fortress named Tustan, which was a part of a belt of similar strongholds defending the Kievan Rus' from the west and south. After the dissolution of Kievan Rus', the town became a part of the Halych-Vol ...

See also:

Boryslav, Boryslav - History, Boryslav - External link

Read more here: » Boryslav: Encyclopedia II - Boryslav - History

Thanesar derives its name from the words "Sthaneshwar" which means the abode of God. The Sthaneshwar Mahadev Temple, whose presiding deity is Lord Shiva, is believed to be the oldest temple in the vicinity. Other religious sites include the Brahma Sarovar, the Sannihit Sarovar, Gurdwara 6th Patashahi and the Devi Bhadrakali temple, which is counted among the 51 Shakti Peethas. The bathing-fair held here on the occurrence of a solar eclipse is said to be attended by half a million pilgrims. Thanesar was ...

See also:

Thanesar, Thanesar - Introduction, Thanesar - Mythological Importance, Thanesar - Religious & Historical Importance, Thanesar - Modern Thanesar

Read more here: » Thanesar: Encyclopedia II - Thanesar - Religious & Historical Importance

Assur (Chaldean or Assyrian) (from a-shir leader)

Also Asur, Ashur. Originally the titular deity of an ancient Assyrian city of learning on the Tigris, but with the rise of the Assyrian Empire his prominence was extended so that he became one of the foremost gods of the Assyrian pantheon. The title Asir was also given to other important deities such as Marduk and Nebo.

Like Marduk, Assur was first recognized as a solar deity and represented in symbol with the adjunct of the winged disk; but later he became a god of war, so that the winged disk took a minor place under the figure of a man with a bow. Assur remained the chief deity even when the Assyrian capital was moved to Nineveh about the 8th century BC, although he was obliged to share this honor with Ishtar, then regarded as his consort, until the fall of the Assyrian Empire (606 BC).

(See also: Assur, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Apep formed part of the more complex cosmic system resulting from the identification of Ra as Atum, i.e. the creation of Atum-Ra, and the subsequent merging of the Ogdoad and Ennead systems. Consequently, since Atum-Ra, who was later referred to simply as Ra, was the solar deity, bringer of light, and thus the upholder of Ma'at, Apep was viewed as the greatest enemy of Ra, and thus was given the title Enemy of Ra. As the personification of all that was evil, Apep was seen as a giant snake, crocodile, serpent, or in later ...

See also:

Apep, Apep - Development, Apep - Battles with Ra, Apep - Worship

Read more here: » Apep: Encyclopedia II - Apep - Development

Shu (Egyptian) [from shu dry, parched]

The Egyptian god of light, popularly associated with heat and dryness, and the ethereal spaces existing between the earth and the vault of the sky; often depicted as holding up the sky with his two hands, one at the place of sunrise, the other of sunset.

The phonetic value of shu is the feather, which is the symbol of this deity, and appears above his headdress. Shu is manifest during the day in the beams of the sun, and at night in the beams of the moon; the solar disk is his home. He is likewise one of the chief deities of the underworld, the gate of the pillars of Shu (tchesert) marking the entrance to this region, the pillars representing the four cardinal points said to hold up the sky.

Although the twin brother of Tefnut -- often alluded to as the twin lion-deities -- Shu is more often represented with Seb and Nut (deities of cosmic space and of its garment of ethereal substance) in his position of holding up the sky, because in theosophical terminology cosmic light as well as cosmic intelligence (the Logos) is born from Brahman and pradhana, or parabrahman and mulaprakriti.

Shu on the smaller scale is solar energy (SD 1:360).

(See also: Shu, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Abraxas: A popular magical deity in the ancient world, Abraxas (also called Abrasax) was depicted on classical amulet gems as a humanlike figure with a rooster’s head and serpents for feet, wielding a charioteer’s whip. The letters of his name in Greek add up to 365, the number of days in a year, which marked him as a solar deity and a lord of time.

In modern times, Abraxas has achieved a new popularity by way of the writings of psychologist Carl Jung, who gave him a central place in his Gnostic work. The Seven Sermons to the Dead and elsewhere in his writings.

Also See: Abrasax

(See also: Abraxas, Magic, Shamanism, Paganism, Wicca)

Mankind's most fundamental understanding of the Sun is as the luminous disk in the heavens whose presence above the horizon creates day, and whose absence causes night. In many prehistoric and ancient cultures, the Sun was thought to be a deity or other supernatural phenomenon. One of the first people in the Western world to offer a scientific explanation for the sun was the Greek philosopher Anaxagoras, who reasoned that it was a giant flaming ball of metal even larger than the Peleponessus, and not the chariot of Helios. For teaching this heresy he was imprisoned b ...

See also:

Sun, Sun - General information, Sun - Structure, Sun - Core, Sun - Radiation zone, Sun - Convection zone, Sun - Photosphere, Sun - Temperature minimum, Sun - Chromosphere, Sun - Corona, Sun - Theoretical problems, Sun - Solar neutrino problem, Sun - Coronal heating problem, Sun - Faint young sun problem, Sun - Magnetic field, Sun - Position of the Sun through the year, Sun - Solar space missions, Sun - History and future of the Sun, Sun - Human understanding of the Sun, Sun - The Sun as a power source, Sun - Sun and eye damage

Read more here: » Sun: Encyclopedia II - Sun - Human understanding of the Sun

Bela-Shemesh (Chald. Heb.). "The Lord of the Sun", the name of the Moon during that period when the Jews became in turn solar and lunar worshippers, and when the Moon was a male, and the Sun a female deity. This period embraced the time between the allegorical expulsion of Adam and Eve from Eden down to the no less allegorical Noachian flood. (See Secret Doctrine, I. 397.)

(See also: Bela-Shemesh, Theosophy, Spirituality, Body mind and Soul, Spiritual Dictionary, )

Phoebus (Greek) Pure, bright, radiant, beaming; the solar regent, and in Latin mystic mythology the sun god, offspring of Zeus and Latona: also known by the Greeks as Apollo or Phoebus-Apollo.

This deity represented both physical and spiritual purity and radiance to the Greeks; and to the Greek mind the solar divinity bore intimate relationships with mankind through his Oracle at Delphi, situated on the slopes of Mount Parnassus in Phocis, where a temple and oracular sanctuary were erected in his honor, to which consultants and suppliants thronged from all parts of the ancient world. Inscribed on the temple was the phrase associated with Socrates and Plato -- gnothi seauton (know yourself).

See also APOLLO; ORACLE

(See also: Phoebus, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)