Welcome to a problem-identifying node of the Pandeism index!!
Our recent lunar eclipse puts me in mind of a well-worn historical tale of
theological manipulation, recounted from February of
1504. It begins with
Christopher Columbus and his
crew languishing off the shores of
Jamaica, having lost much of his
fleet to
storms and errors of
seamanship and, of equal consequence, having long since lost the
awe initially instilled in the natives. This, now, was the fourth
voyage of
discovery undertaken by Columbus, and the sheer
magnitude of the Europeans' first
arrival, over a
decade before, had given way to the disappointing reality: for all their
technological capacity, these pale people from faraway lands were but men,
fault-filled as any.
European rapaciousness for material gain had alienated the locals, depriving Columbus and his crew of an important source of
sustenance which they had come to rely upon as their own stores of supplies had waned. The weary and beleaguered "Admiral of the Seas" retired to his
flagship -- one of only two ships remaining out of an original fleet of thirty vessels, and began
consulting his
maps and
charts for some
hint of an
advantage to be
pressed.
But then, Columbus hit upon a
snippet of information more valuable to him then and there than all the
gold of the
New World: a prediction by a
German mathematician/
astronomer (and, naturally,
astrologer) born with the name of Johannes Müller von Königsberg, but better known by an adopted
Latin sobriquet,
Regiomontanus (a Latin translation of "Koenigsberg"). For Columbus was in
possession of Regiomontanus' book on astronomy, titled
Ephemerides. Turning through those
aged pages, Columbus observed Regiomontanus'
calculation that a total
eclipse of the
moon would soon happen, on February 29,
1504.
The Science of the Total Lunar Eclipse
Now, this is the sort of eclipse wherein the moon passes through the
shadow of the Earth cast by the light of the
Sun. This might be imagined to be a common thing, to those whose impression of
astronomy is derived from two dimensional
picture-
book illustrations of astronomy. Too often these relate a moon making neat
circles on a
flat plane around an
Earth itself then depicted as making equally neat circles on the same flat plane as it rounds the Sun, with all other planets politely occupying variously nested circles on that same plane. Were that the whole
story, both solar and lunar eclipses would be a humdrum daily occurrence, and the
phases of the moon and variations in the
tides would be completely different, the latter becoming more focused on Earth's
equator.
But the
truth is far more dynamic. Even as the moon orbits the Earth (in a slight
ellipse, not a perfect circle), so does its plane of orbit spin, as though that plane were a solid disk on an axis which someone had accidentally tapped, so that the entire disk slowly flipped around the gravitational well at its center. The object traveling the periphery of the disk thus moves across both directions at once. Recall, the Earth is only about 8,000 miles in
diameter, and the moon a mere 3,000, while the diameter of the disk representing the constant travels of the moon exceeds 400,000 miles!! Only occasionally does the flipping of this disk cause it to line up with the plane of the Earth's orbit of the Sun, so that for a few hours, the moon would be eaten by Earth's shadow. And Regiomontanus did not simply set down a date for this eclipse in his
book; he diagrammed the projected progression of the eclipse across multiple lines of longitude, inadvertently instructing Columbus as to the precise time to employ this information -- it, that is, the calculations were correct.
Gambling With Superstition
Columbus well knew how the
appearance of the eclipse would manifest; first, a disk of
blackness would seem to spread across the face of the moon, devouring it from sight; and then, when all of the direct light of the Sun was extinguished from its reflection, a barely-visible ghost of the moon would seem to reappear, like an object becoming visible as eyes adjust when passing from the bright of day into a darkened room, taking on an unsettling reddish hue (a product of its continued
reflection of
sunlight scattered around the Earth by its
atmosphere, and some
starlight for good measure). Obtaining an
audience with native leaders, he informed them that their uncooperativeness had angered
God, whose displeasure would be displayed the following night by the moon becoming "inflamed with wrath". The natives laughed off this
warning, and Columbus returned to his ship to wait. But the calculations were correct. The following night, even as the moon broke the horizon the first signs of the eclipse of its face could be seen. By the time the
satellite had become fully obscured and had donned its
bloody hue for the night, the natives were running to Columbus to beg his god's forgiveness; Columbus responded that he would pray for such, and that his god would consider the matter; and some time later, Columbus reported that God accepted this
submission and had indeed deigned to lift this
curse, an announcement shortly followed by the reappearance of the moon in its regular form, as if whatever had swallowed it were just as slowly now spitting it out.
The God invoked by Columbus had, seemingly, prevailed. But, naturally, the eclipse was not caused by Columbus' invocation of any deity; it was simply a natural phenomenon, which he had knowledge of which happened to be superior to that of this primitive tribal civilisation whom he dealt with -- though the science available to Columbus was itself primitive by leaps and bounds to what we now enjoy, over five centuries later. And, verily, Columbus had not even made his own discovery of this bit of information, but relied on charts and compilations of the same assembled by others decades before, most prized amongst these being Abraham Zacuto's
Perpetual Almanac compiling over 300 astronomical tables, as well as Müller's
Ephemerides. Columbus had heretofore chiefly relied upon these works for purely navigatory purposes, but in his dealings with the indigenous Caribbeans was able to glean one vital piece of information with which to sway less informed minds. The ability of Columbus to wrench religious significance from this mundane occurrence speaks volumes as to the
power of religious sentiment, and the power of men having a little bit of scientific knowledge to establish theologically grounded
fear and
control.
To be sure, Columbus did take some moment of risk in promising the eclipse to come; the charts might have contained an error, even a minor miscalculation of a few days would have undone this ploy. And, equally, Columbus must have wagered that the native response would be supplicant, and not simply a deepening of a sentiment already pregnant with hostility. And yet, at the same time, there is remarkable fortuity in the very fact that the scheduled occurrence of the eclipse in the coincided with this period in which Columbus needed to be able to call upon the spectre of supernatural assistance; for eclipses are, after all, uncommon events, and Columbus might have occupied a point where months or years separated an appropriate astronomical event from his time of need for one to be predictable. But both wagers paid off; the one being on the correctness of calculation of the mechanistic motions of spheres; the other as to the almost-as-mechanistic inclination toward human superstition, to believe that events celestial and terrestrial are dictated by the whims of a deity powerful enough to devour worlds.... and yet pliant enough to be persuaded to such feats by the
words and
deeds of the naked
ape.
The Faith of Columbus
This personal experience ought to have been instructive as to the ease with which any
hoaxster might ignite
any religious tradition in the minds of a sufficiently unsophisticated peoples. And yet, Columbus himself is recorded as a sincerely religious man, referring on occasion in his letters and journals to Biblical
prophecies of which he may have believed himself an
agent -- prophecies, unsurprisingly, of voyage and discovery. An odd twist of religiosity arises even in Columbus' refusal to allow the
Baptism of the native New World peoples encountered on his voyage; for to Baptise them would make them
Christians, and ecclesiastical law would then forbid them from being
enslaved. And Columbus viewed these
superstitious natives as fit for enslavement, and not
assimilation into European
culture (which was the only other alternative he could conceive for them). A considerable body of literature suggests Columbus to have been crypto-Sephardim, one of the
secret Jews who maintained the practice of their
faith even in the face of their people experiencing
torture and
execution across
Europe, and especially in
Inquisitorial Spain, in whose name Columbus had sailed. In the light of this theory, it is claimed by some that Columbus' endeavors take on new meaning, for he may have sailed not simply for glory, but to secretly secure a haven for the Jewish people. If that was his endeavor, then in retrospect perhaps he met with greater success than he could have imagined.
As for Columbus himself, his provisions replenished and ships repaired, he was able to sail for Spain, arriving there by November 7 of that year. His dreams of a royal governorship of the islands having been dashed by royal politics, Columbus would never again cross the ocean; the following year he published a
Book of Prophecies advancing his claims of being the fulfillment, through his explorations, of certain Christian prophecies. And the year after that, Columbus himself
died, aged 55, and living in such
comfort as plundered
East Indies gold would allow. And, for all of his religiosity, one article of
faith remained strongest within him until the day he died: his belief that in all of his voyages, he had been exploring the contours of
Asia.