In the course of its almost five thousand-year history within the framework of European cultures, astrology developed just gradually into a comprehensive world view with divinatory intentions. It has its roots in the first known cultic reverence of the heavenly bodies. One preliminary stage of astrology is thus the astral cult. Some scholars of religion see in this reverence the very beginning of all subsequent religions on earth [7]. This generalization may be somewhat exaggerated, but if we look at the first and oldest records of religious reverence of the stars, something seems to speak for this speculation after all: around 3000 BC, the Sumerian cuneiform, which was initially a pictographic script, was developed in the Mesopotamian region—around the area of present-day Iraq. Later, the pictographs were transformed into the so-called line-form. Here the symbol for God is a star-shaped arrangement of lines [8]. One could conclude from this that God and star have the same linguistic root in the Sumerian cuneiform. Later Babylonian and Assyrian inscriptions reveal a connection between God and star or constellation as well [9]. The oldest reliable record in which stars are provided with names is known to us, however, from around 1800 BC [10].
Posted on: Tue, 30 Dec 2014 17:32:56 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015