Timing is the sine qua non of human existence and meaning. From the beginning of human civilization, measuring time by reference to the movements of the heavenly bodies has been the preeminent occupation of mankind–time itself being the creature of the celestial bodies.¹ From time immemorial, the survival and prosperity of the empire, city-state or even a remote outpost or village depended upon appropriately timing the sowing and reaping of crops, knowing and following the movements and migrations of wild animals hunted for food and clothing, and adequately preparing for the changing seasons, in season. Thus, there arose in the most advanced civilizations a priestly caste of learned initiates responsible for tracking and recording the movements of the heavenly bodies (or gods) and deciphering what their movements portended for mortals and the welfare of their earthly habitations.

To preserve this vital knowledge accumulated by the priestly caste over the generations, elaborate stories became attached to the various gods that ruled the heavens. The development of these stories was intertwined with the establishment of various Holydays interspersed throughout the year, each serving to commemorate the various deities of the heavens and their respective deeds, thereby providing an explanatory or ex”planet”ary framework for the various phenomena affecting human life and serving to enculturate the appropriate activities in their season according to the festivities assigned to that season. Thus, was the prosperity of the polis secured. And in the process, the priestly caste acquired great knowledge, wealth and power, for the fate of empires and the longevity of the kingly dynasties ruling them depended largely upon the accuracy of their advice and upon their ability to convince the unlearned masses, whose labors built the empire, to follow it. An Earthly rulers’ legitimacy was established by their seeming mastery (with the help of their priests) over the heavens, even going so far as to wear headdresses fashioned to resemble the corona (or crown) of the sun to symbolize that even the chief god of the heavens was subject to their sovereignty. As a consequence, the priests became masters of public spectacles and ceremonies.

Imagine being present in the courtyard of Solomon’s Temple for the Passover festivities, taking in the grandeur of both the imposing stone edifice and the magnificent views of the surrounding countryside visible from the Temple Mount. It is just before sunrise, and you are standing amongst the throng of people who made the long pilgrimage to Jerusalem, all of whom are facing westward towards the Eastern Portico of the magnificent Temple, which is aligned perfectly so that as the Sun rises over the Mount of Olives where the Red Heifer was just sacrificed, its first rays shine through the Eastern Portico right into the Holy of Holies, illuminating the gold bedecked Mercy Seat of the Ark of the Covenant. Simultaneously, you witness the illumination of the spectacularly bejeweled breastplate of the High Priest standing in the Eastern Portico facing the crowd, the 12 illuminated gemstones of his garment representing the twelve tribes of Israel, which themselves represent the twelve Mansions of the Sun (i.e. the Zodiac). All are illuminated by the spectacular rays of the rising Sun, which the astronomer priests (the tribe of Levi), with the help of the astrological wisdom Solomon gathered by marrying the daughters of foreign kings the world over, had timed so that the chief festival of their high holy days coincided with the Sun’s alignment with the architecture of their Temple.

One cannot overestimate the effect of this experience on the assembled crowd, which has just witnessed the Glory of the Shekinah that led their ancestors out of Egypt, enter into the Temple. The experience would not be unlike that which would have been felt by the ancient Mayans assembled at the great pyramid of Chichen Itza during the vernal and autumnal equinoxes watching as the late afternoon Sun created the illusion of a snake creeping down the northern staircase of the massive pyramid dedicated to their feathered snake god, Kukulcán. At the time and place appointed by the priests, this ray of light reflecting the image of the feathered snake would slither down the stairway to heaven into the underworld, mysteriously uniting the heavens, earth and underworld in during a religious feast day that undoubtedly included much merrymaking and the offering of religious sacrifices.

In this manner, the entire history of human existence has been mapped to correspond to the cycles of the celestial bodies in relation to each other and Earth. Hence, the feast days, Holydays, creation stories and national myths of all cultures from all eras are strikingly similar to each other, explaining why each empire is so easily able to assimilate the religion and customs of the defeated peoples of the civilizations that preceded it. Accordingly, the ancient Romans and Greeks would recognize their mythologies, Holyday feasts and calendars in those of the Christians who succeeded them, and in like manner, the even more ancient Persians, Babylonians and Egyptians would recognize theirs in the religion of the Jews and each other, for all are referable to the movements of the same heavenly bodies in relation to their effect on terrestrial life within the context of time, and all were birthed within the language and culture of those civil religions that preceded them.

It should come as no surprise then that the most famous passage of literature attributed to that talismanic king, whose wisdom is widely reputed to exceed that of any other human in history, concerns time. King Solomon writes:

3:1 For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: ² a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; ³ a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; ⁴ a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; ⁵ a time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; ⁶ a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to throw away; ⁷ a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; ⁸ a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace.

⁹ What gain have the workers from their toil? ¹⁰ I have seen the business that God has given to everyone to be busy with. ¹¹ He has made everything suitable for its time; moreover, he has put a sense of past and future into their minds, yet they cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. ¹² I know that there is nothing better for them than to be happy and enjoy themselves as long as they live; ¹³ moreover, it is God’s gift that all should eat and drink and take pleasure in all their toil. ¹⁴ I know that whatever God does endures for ever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it; God has done this, so that all should stand in awe before him. ¹⁵ That which is, already has been; that which is to be, already is; and God seeks out what has gone by.

¹⁶ Moreover, I saw under the sun that in the place of justice, wickedness was there, and in the place of righteousness, wickedness was there as well. ¹⁷ I said in my heart, God will judge the righteous and the wicked, for he has appointed a time for every matter, and for every work. ¹⁸ I said in my heart with regard to human beings that God is testing them to show that they are but animals. ¹⁹ For the fate of humans and the fate of animals is the same; as one dies, so dies the other. They all have the same breath, and humans have no advantage over the animals; for all is vanity. ²⁰ All go to one place; all are from the dust, and all turn to dust again. ²¹ Who knows whether the human spirit goes upwards and the spirit of animals goes downwards to the earth? ²² So I saw that there is nothing better than that all should enjoy their work, for that is their lot; who can bring them to see what will be after them?

Ecclesiastes 3

And so, King Solomon, who personifies the pinnacle of human wisdom, bestows his most famous ode upon Father Time, known to the Greeks as Chronos/Cronus and to the Romans as Saturn. In a fitting tribute to this god, the Roman feast day of Saturnalia, which Christians now celebrate as Christmas, was a Holyday celebrated with public feasts in a spirit of revelry, drunkenness and licentiousness in which the entire social order was purposefully turned upside down with the slaves and servants being served by their masters. Tellingly, the Christians who followed them claimed that their Saviour, whose birthday they chose to celebrate on Saturnalia, would do the same thing–viz, that the last shall be first and the first shall be last in the kingdom that he promised to bring down from the heavens to Earth.² Thus, this feast day to Father Time, who was later conflated by Christians with Father Christmas or Santa Clause (Saturn), is still celebrated by acting out that philosophy dating back to Solomon, who, after observing the ravages of time on human life and the monotony of human labor governed by that wretched sundial, essentially concluded: Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die.³

Accordingly, all religious systems operate on the basis of astrological timing, and the people who orchestrate them and operate within them are, at their core, astrologers, sorcerers and diviners, seeking to utilize the movements of the celestial bodies within the constricts of time to the advantage of themselves, their families, tribes and nations. All religions evolved for the purpose of securing the prosperity of the city or nation so that it would ascend in power and could dominate that of its neighbors and thereby accumulate more wealth and resources. And all religions are spread by virtue of their adherents’ unshakeable belief that their gods are greater and more powerful than that of their rivals and that their homegrown sacrifices and ceremonies are more efficacious in securing the favor of such gods. And in one sense, they are correct. The more closely one’s religious beliefs attune one’s actions to the revolutions of the spheres that govern life on Earth, the more prosperity and success one secures. And so it is with nations. Thus, all religious systems are transactional. They exist for the purpose of obtaining a benefit or advantage in this world–i.e. to secure the blessings of food, shelter, health, wealth, national prosperity and victory over one’s enemies. Fundamentally, therefore, all religions seek to gain the favor and blessing of Cronos/Saturn (later Father Time), whom Paul of Tarsus referred to as the Prince of the Power of the Air.⁴

But almost uniquely among gods, the god of the Hebrews, known as Yahweh, the Hebrew word for “being” itself, namely, I AM, WAS and WILL BE, is frequently portrayed in his Holy Writ as rejecting his own purported worshippers who are seeking to manipulate the movements of the heavenly realms for earthly power and treasure. Mind you, the religious and legal institutions of his followers clearly operate under and are subservient to the same precepts of all the others in that it makes use of astrological knowledge and the cosmic law of karma (reducible to an eye for an eye…) to secure advantage and prosperity for the Hebrew nation in the Earth. And Moses, who was educated in the astrological mysteries of Pharaoh’s Court, purposefully set it up that way with the blessing and at the instruction of Yahweh, as his purpose was to establish an Earthly nation in fulfillment of Yahweh’s promise to his ancestor Abraham, and thus, the chosen nation was still subject to the system ruled by the Prince of this World. But yet, their Holy Scriptures bizarrely portray Yahweh as frequently rejecting their offerings and sacrifices to Him. For example, Yahweh would not accept the offerings of Cain, causing him to become so angry and jealous that he murdered his own brother, Abel, whose offering was accepted by Yahweh.⁵ Similarly, Yahweh declared, through his prophet Amos, the destruction of his own nation who worshipped him as their God, stating:

²¹I hate, I despise your festivals, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies. ²² Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them and the offerings of well-being of your fatted animals I will not look upon. ²³ Take away from me the noise of your songs; I will not listen to the melody of your harps. ²⁴ But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.

Amos 5:21-23

But why does Yahweh reject his worshippers’ adoration and offerings to him? A clue is offered in the words attributed to Yahweh’s prophet Zechariah:

In the fourth year of King Darius, the word of the Lord came to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, which is Chislev. ² Now the people of Bethel had sent Sharezer and Regem-melech and their men, to entreat the favor of the Lord, ³ and to ask the priests of the house of the Lord of hosts and the prophets, “Should I mourn and practice abstinence in the fifth month, as I have done for so many years?” ⁴ Then the word of the Lord of hosts came to me: ⁵ Say to all the people of the land and the priests: When you fasted and lamented in the fifth month and in the seventh, for these seventy years, was it for me that you fasted? ⁶ And when you eat and when you drink, do you not eat and drink only for yourselves? ⁷ Were not these the words that the Lord proclaimed by the former prophets, when Jerusalem was inhabited and in prosperity, along with the towns around it, and when the Negeb and the Shephelah were inhabited?⁸ The word of the Lord came to Zechariah, saying: ⁹ Thus says the Lord of hosts: Render true judgments, show kindness and mercy to one another; ¹⁰ do not oppress the widow, the orphan, the alien, or the poor; and do not devise evil in your hearts against one another. ¹¹ But they refused to listen, and turned a stubborn shoulder, and stopped their ears in order not to hear. ¹² They made their hearts adamant in order not to hear the law and the words that the Lord of hosts had sent by his spirit through the former prophets. Therefore great wrath came from the Lord of hosts. ¹³ Just as, when I called, they would not hear, so, when they called, I would not hear, says the Lord of hosts, ¹⁴ and I scattered them with a whirlwind among all the nations that they had not known. Thus the land they left was desolate, so that no one went to and fro, and a pleasant land was made desolate. (emphasis added)

Zechariah 1:1-14

A similar clue is offered in the letter attributed to Jude:

¹¹ Woe to them! For they go the way of Cain, and abandon themselves to Balaam’s error for the sake of gain, and perish in Korah’s rebellion. ¹² These are blemishes on your love-feasts, while they feast with you without fear, feeding themselves. They are waterless clouds carried along by the winds; autumn trees without fruit, twice dead, uprooted; ¹³ wild waves of the sea, casting up the foam of their own shame; wandering stars [planets, which were widely regarded as gods or fallen angels], for whom the deepest darkness has been reserved forever. (emphasis added)

Jude 1:11-13

It is the transactional approach to religious worship that is being rejected here, and it is being rejected in the most forceful terms possible. Yahweh unequivocally does not desire to be worshipped in this manner. It is perhaps human nature to approach the worship of divinity as the dispenser of blessings, prosperity and safety, in both this world and in the next. It is in fact quite common to approach religion as a business transaction, much as a child approaches Santa Claus at Christmas time. But that is the manner in which those whose portion is in this world worship Lucifer (Saturn) and his fallen hosts, who dispense worldly goods and make illusory promises of immortality in exchange for religious rituals, incantations and blood sacrifices.

But, Yahweh desires to be worshipped in Spirit and in truth–worship that is made manifest in the manner in which one treats “the widow, the orphan, the alien, or the poor;” namely, with justice, mercy and compassion. This manner of religious worship has no part with the type of worship engaged in for the purpose of obtaining advantage in the building of one’s own household, business, city or empire, whether political or ecclesiastical. Yahweh called Abram to leave Ur and the gods of his fathers behind and to step out into faith in search of the Promised Land–a land that he did not yet see, and which he never got the opportunity to start building with human hands or stones. Likewise, Jesus, who claims to be the firstborn heir to Yahweh’s kingdom, requires that his disciples, who were promised status as his joint heirs in this Kingdom, leave behind their Earthly homes along with their slavery to the god of time, whose worship was transactional in nature and whose kingdoms were built of wood and stone with the blood and sweat of slave labor.

Thus, those who, like Abraham, “lose their lives” by abandoning their homes and kinfolk, who continue to labor in their toilsome slavery to the god of time in exchange for a measly 30 pieces of silver,⁶ will find that in their “foolish” act of losing their “life,” they have “gained” their life, having obtained through faith in the unseen promises of Yahweh the Key of David that unlocks the Gates to the Celestial City where streams of Living Water flow freely and the Tree of Life bears its fruit, not by the light of the Sun, but by the Shekinah of the Divine Face of the Eternal I Am. For faith is the Key of David. And the Key of David is greater than the Key of Solomon. Hence, Jesus’ words to his disciples: “Follow me, and let the dead bury their own dead.”⁷ For as Jesus taught, he was and is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Those who desire to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven must follow his teachings and become like little children; they should follow the example of the birds of the air, who do not worry what they shall next eat or drink. For those who chase such things will hunger and thirst again. They are never satisfied; their bellies never filled. They should be like the flowers of the field, who do not fret over what they will wear, yet they are clothed in raiment more beautiful than the silk robes of Solomon.

Jesus was serious when he said that He was no threat to Cesare or even to the Pharisees. For Jesus’ kingdom was not terrestrial, having refused to bow down and worship Saturn while fasting in the wilderness, which would have conferred upon him access to the Key of Solomon and the great wealth and power accessible to those who hold them. Therefore, Jesus had no need to ride into his capitol on a stead or a chariot to take his throne, but instead could saunter into his kingdom to the praise and adulation of the poor while riding upon on a poor man’s donkey, which he had his disciples swipe for the occasion.

Rome and Jerusalem both fancy themselves the Eternal City. Hence their eternal enmity could be set aside on one occasion to conspire to murder this man who laid claim to the Throne of David, which they both covet. For they both failed to conceive that Jesus’ kingdom and David’s Throne is not terrestrial. Rome and Jerusalem both lay claim to their status by appealing to Holy Writ, the prophecies of the celestial bodies and to signs and wonders. But they are no more Eternal or Holy than Sodom or Gomorrah. They assumed that because Jesus, too, appealed to Scripture and astrology for his teachings and was conversant in them to such extent that his magic outperformed that of their most experienced sorcerers and wizards, that he had come to lay claim to their terrestrial sovereignty. Hence they set aside their eternal enmity in order to conspire in his death. For no king can countenance a rival king or kingdom within its borders.

But the kingdom that Jesus came to usher in is not of this world. Hence, the stone the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone of the Holy City in the only Eternal Kingdom. The builders of terrestrial empires wanted no part in that kingdom, for they only cared about amassing and preserving treasures subject to rot and decay. The same was true of the Hebrew children who left Egypt to worship Yahweh, and the same is true today of the people who call themselves Christian and build churches and parachurch ministries the world over to “spread the Gospel,” while making a pretty penny in so doing. Like Esau before them, they trade their inheritance for what will be soon reduced to a pile of scat before the Sun completes even a single trip around the Earth. Because these folks were too busy building ministries to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, Jesus opened his Eternal City up to beggars, the poor, prostitutes, transgender and homosexual folks, drug addicts, and all manner of the unclean who have been given no part in the kingdoms of this world and its churches other than that as slave labor for the building of their cities of dust. But these cities will prove no more Eternal than the Pyramids of Giza, which to this day continue to crumble into the dirt from which they were made.

ENDNOTES

¹ Genesis 1: 14 And God said, ‘Let there be lights in the dome of the sky to separate the day from the night; and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years, 15 and let them be lights in the dome of the sky to give light upon the earth.’ And it was so. 16 God made the two great lights—the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars. 17 God set them in the dome of the sky to give light upon the earth, 18 to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. 19 And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day.

² Matthew 20: 1“For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. ² …. And when they received it, they grumbled against the landowner, ¹² saying, ‘These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.’ ¹³ But he replied to one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong; did you not agree with me for the usual daily wage?^[d] 14 Take what belongs to you and go; I choose to give to this last the same as I give to you. ¹⁵ Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or are you envious because I am generous?’^[e] 16 So the last will be first, and the first will be last (emphasis added). See also Matthew 19:30; Mark 10:31; and Luke 13:28-30 (“There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrown out.  Then people will come from east and west, from north and south, and will eat in the kingdom of God. Indeed, some are last who will be first, and some are first who will be last.”).

³ Ecclesiastes 8: 15 “So I commend enjoyment, for there is nothing better for people under the sun than to eat, and drink, and enjoy themselves, for this will go with them in their toil through the days of life that God gives them under the sun.” It is noteworthy that this ancient wisdom of Solomon was later criticized in the Holy Writ of his descendants, as the prophets of Yahweh sought to point the Hebrew children to a higher wisdom given by the God who reigned outside of and over the god of time (Satan). See Isaiah 22: 12 “In that day the Lord God of hosts called to weeping and mourning, to baldness and putting on sackcloth; ¹³ but instead there was joy and festivity, killing oxen and slaughtering sheep, eating meat and drinking wine. ‘Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.’ ¹⁴ The Lord of hosts has revealed himself in my ears: Surely this iniquity will not be forgiven you until you die, says the Lord God of hosts.”

See also Luke 12: 13 “Someone in the crowd said to him, ‘Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me.’ ¹⁴ But he said to him, ‘Friend, who set me to be a judge or arbitrator over you?’ ¹⁵ And he said to them, ‘Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.’ ¹⁶ Then he told them a parable: ‘The land of a rich man produced abundantly. ¹⁷ And he thought to himself, ‘What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?’ ¹⁸ Then he said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. ¹⁹ And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.’ ²⁰ But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ ²¹ So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God.'”

⁴ Ephesians 2:1 “You were dead through the trespasses and sins ² in which you once lived, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work among those who are disobedient.” i.e. the spirit of the times or the zeitgeist or Father Time and his heavenly minions.

⁵ Genesis 4

⁶ Zechariah 11:4-17

⁷ Matthew 8:22; and Luke 9:60