Something
eclipsed the sun on the Dark Day prophesied of by Isaiah, Christ, and
John.
In
2017 four of my siblings, Darold, Dennis, Shirley, and Sue, drove
down from northern Virginia to Tennessee because a total solar
eclipse was going to pass there. Not that they are adventure seekers,
but they had never been able to be in a total solar eclipse before.
And this might be the opportunity of a lifetime. Recently, Darold
described it to me. He said, “It was the oddest thing. It gave a
360⸰ sunset on all
horizons. And straight above at the center of the sky was a dusky
twilight, the darkness gradually grew grey and then brighter toward
the circular horizons. On the ground at the eclipse’s darkest you
can see objects, but if you need to do some work with them, you would
need artificial light. The sky was almost like the darkness at the
verge of night. And because some light was coming in at the horizons the shadows were more defined than usual, not fuzzy as normal days.”
Why
does his description matter? Yes, and here is why.
Of
late there has come out a new explanation for the Dark Day of May 19,
1780 that normalizes it to just another day, that undermines the
miraculous phenomenon (and, I suspect, to destroy the influence of
Isaiah 13:10, Matthew 24:29, Mark 13:24, Luke 21:25, and Revelation
6:12). Articles are coming out saying that the darkness came from an
“advection inversion” over New England from some immense Ontario
forest fire.
[Webster’s Third New International Dictionary,
Unabridged inversion: A reversal of normal atmospheric temperature
gradient : increase of temperature of the air with increasing
altitude; advection: the horizontal movement of a mass of air which
causes changes in temperature or in other physical properties of
air—compare convection; convection: 1: the action or process of
conveying or transmitting; 2: a mechanically or thermally upward or
downward movement of a limited part of the atmosphere that is
essential to the formation of many clouds (as cumulus clouds) and is
used in certain heating systems 3a:
the circulatory motion that occurs in a fluid at a non-uniform
temperature owing to the variation of its density and the action of
gravity b: the transfer of heat by this automatic circulation
of a fluid.
Oxford Dictionary (shorter version) Advection inversion : A temperature inversion caused by advection as warm air passes over a cool surface.]
The people were afraid. But why, if they had had a dark day a couple years before? Or if another one a couple of years later, why the debate for another century or two? Why did no one tell them to remember that the same
happened on other occasions, as would have happened if the Dark Day
was an advection inversion on what was really a normal occasion, as
rationalizing it would certainly happen in our smarter, atheistic,
more mature modernity. Even in those days deism was explaining away
the biblical miracles, and deism was rife in America. As nowadays, their newspapers would have sought to quiet the people’s fears. Abraham Davenport, a member of the Connecticut State Senate, decided that if the Lord
was coming he would just as well be found doing his duty. The
Revolutionary War was underway and General Washington notated the darkness in his diary.
This
is how it was described by Ellen White in The Great Controversy,
p. 306-308:
“Twenty-five
years later [after the unprecedented Lisbon Earthquake] appeared the
next sign mentioned in the prophecy—the darkening of the sun and
moon. What rendered this more striking was the fact that the time of
its fulfillment had been definitely pointed out. In the Saviour’s
conversation with His disciples upon Olivet, after describing the
long period of trial for the church,—the 1260 years of papal
persecution, concerning which He had promised that the tribulation
should be shortened,—He thus mentioned certain events to precede
His coming, and fixed the time when the first of these should be
witnessed: ‘In those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be
darkened, and the moon shall not give her light.’ Mark 13:24. The
1260 days, or years, terminated in 1798.
“A
quarter of a century earlier, persecution had almost wholly ceased.
Following this persecution, according to the words of Christ, the sun
was to be darkened. On the 19th of May, 1780, this prophecy was
fulfilled.
“‘Almost,
if not altogether alone, as the most mysterious and as yet
unexplained phenomenon of its kind, ... stands the dark day of May
19, 1780,—a most unaccountable darkening of the whole
visible
heavens and atmosphere in New England.’—R. M. Devens, Our
First Century, page 89.
“An
eyewitness living in Massachusetts describes the event as follows:
‘In the morning the sun rose clear, but was soon overcast. The
clouds became lowery, and from them, black and ominous, as
they
soon appeared, lightning flashed, thunder rolled, and a little rain
fell. Toward nine o’clock, the clouds became thinner, and assumed a
brassy or coppery appearance, and earth, rocks, trees, buildings,
water,
and persons were changed by this strange, unearthly light. A few
minutes later, a heavy black cloud spread over the entire sky except
a narrow rim at the horizon, and it was as dark as it usually is
at
nine o’clock on a summer evening....
“‘Fear,
anxiety, and awe gradually filled the minds of the people. Women
stood at the door, looking out upon the dark landscape; men returned
from their labor in the fields; the carpenter left his tools,
the
blacksmith his forge, the tradesman his counter. Schools were
dismissed, and tremblingly the children fled homeward. Travelers put
up at the nearest farmhouse. ‘What is coming?’ queried every
lip
and heart. It seemed as if a hurricane was about to dash across the
land, or as if it was the day of the consummation of all things.
“‘Candles
were used; and hearth fires shone as brightly as on a moonless
evening in autumn.... Fowls retired to their roosts and went to
sleep, cattle gathered at the pasture bars and lowed, frogs peeped,
birds sang their evening songs, and bats flew about. But the human
knew that night had not come.…
“‘Dr.
Nathanael Whittaker, pastor of the Tabernacle church in Salem, held
religious services in the meeting-house, and preached a sermon in
which he maintained that the darkness was supernatural.
Congregations
came together in many other places. The texts for the extemporaneous
sermons were invariably those that seemed to indicate that the
darkness was consonant with Scriptural prophecy....
The
darkness was most dense shortly after eleven o’clock.’—The
Essex Antiquarian, April, 1899, vol. 3, No. 4, pp. 53, 54. ‘In
most parts of the country it was so great in the daytime, that the
people
could
not tell the hour by either watch or clock, nor dine, nor manage
their domestic business, without the light of candles.…
“‘The
extent of this darkness was extraordinary. It was observed as far
east as Falmouth. To the westward it reached to the farthest part of
Connecticut, and to Albany. To the southward, it was observed along
the seacoasts; and to the north as far as the American settlements
extend.’—William Gordon, History of the Rise, Progress, and
Establishment of the Independence of the U.S.A., vol. 3, p. 57.
“The
intense darkness of the day was succeeded, an hour or two before
evening, by a partially clear sky, and the sun appeared, though it
was still obscured by the black, heavy mist. ‘After sundown, the
clouds came again overhead, and it grew dark very fast.’ ‘Nor was
the darkness of the night less uncommon and terrifying than that of
the day; notwithstanding there was almost a full moon, no object was
discernible but by the help of some artificial light, which, when
seen from the neighboring houses and other places at a distance,
appeared through a kind of Egyptian darkness which seemed almost
impervious
to the rays.’—Isaiah Thomas, Massachusetts Spy; or,
American Oracle of Liberty, vol. 10, No. 472 (May 25, 1780).
Said an eyewitness of the scene: ‘I could not help conceiving at
the time,
that
if every luminous body in the universe had been shrouded in
impenetrable shades, or struck out of existence, the darkness could
not have been more complete.’—Letter by Dr. Samuel Tenney, of
Exeter,
New Hampshire, December, 1785 (in Massachusetts Historical Society
Collections, 1792, 1st series, vol. 1, p. 97). Though at nine
o’clock that night the moon rose to the full, ‘it had not the
least
effect
to dispel the deathlike shadows.’ After midnight the darkness
disappeared, and the moon, when first visible, had the appearance of
blood.”
No
one mentioned fog or the smell of smoke. And the light was not
darkened from the sky only, but also from the candles and lanterns.
The darkness affected light vertically and laterally. Now please
notice the statement, “a heavy black cloud spread over the entire
sky except a narrow rim at the horizon.” This is very much like my
brother’s description the perfect solar eclipse that he and my other siblings were in. “…straight above at the center of the sky was a
dusky twilight, the darkness gradually grew grey and then brighter
toward the circular horizons (which was in regular daylight).”
The
difference between my brother’s solar eclipse and the Dark Day is
that the Dark Day moon was gibbous, meaning almost a full moon. Being
a gibbous moon and not a new moon dismisses the possibility of a
solar eclipse. And not being a full moon dismisses a lunar eclipse
from causing the Dark Day’s moon appearing like blood, as the above
statement recalls, “...notwithstanding there was almost a full
moon, no object was discernible but by the help of some artificial
light….” Natural solar eclipses are caused by our moon moving in
between us and the sun, and they don’t last but a few minutes. The
shadow cast by perfect solar eclipses travels about 2000 miles per
hour across mid-America, and the shadow is only 100 miles in
diameter, depending on the distance of the moon (which varies). So,
the event is short-lived.
Putting
this all together, the darkness was not a somewhat normal occurrence,
as in a meteorological formation caused by a huge fire. This Herschel
the astronomer alluded to, “The dark day in North America was one
of those wonderful phenomena of nature which philosophy [science] is
at a loss to explain.” The darkened sun and red moon were not the
results of natural eclipses, solar or lunar.
So,
the darkness and the blood moon might have been caused by some other
cosmic object situated between Earth and the Sun. A rogue planet
inside our moon’s orbit, maybe? Close enough to eclipse both Earth to make
its sky black rather than grey, darken the whole of New England, and
give the moon the color of a lunar eclipse? A gigantic hand? Or…
...simply
God’s powerful word through Christ.
“By
the word of the LORD were the heavens made; and all the host of them
by the breath of His mouth…. For He spake, and it was done; He
commanded, and it stood fast.” (Psa.
33:6,9).
“Mine
hand also hath laid the foundation of the earth, and My right hand
hath spanned the heavens: when I call unto them, they stand up
together.” (Isa. 48:13).
“...His
Son, whom He hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also He made
the worlds; who
being the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His
person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He
had by Himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the
Majesty on high.” (Heb. 1:3).
“For
the stars of heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give
their light: the sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the
moon shall not cause her light to shine.
And
I will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their
iniquity; and I will cause the arrogancy of the proud to cease, and
will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible.
I
will make a man more precious than fine gold; even a man than the
golden wedge of Ophir.
Therefore
I will shake the heavens, and the earth shall remove out of her
place, in the wrath of the LORD of hosts, and in the day of his
fierce anger.” (Isa. 13:10-13).
“But
in those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and
the moon shall not give her light, and the stars of heaven shall
fall, and the powers that are in heaven shall be shaken.”
(Mark 13:24,25).
“And
there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars;
and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and
the waves roaring; men's hearts failing them for fear, and for
looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the
powers of heaven shall be shaken.” (Luke
21:25,26).
“And
I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a
great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and
the moon became as blood;
And
the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth
her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind.
And
the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every
mountain and island were moved out of their places.
And
the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the
chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free
man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains;
And
said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the
face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the
Lamb:
For
the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand? ”
(Rev. 6:12-17).
“And
the seventh angel poured out his vial into the air; and there came a
great voice out of the temple of heaven, from the throne, saying, It
is done.
And
there were voices, and thunders, and lightnings; and there was a
great earthquake, such as was not since men were upon the earth, so
mighty an earthquake, and so great.
And
the great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the
nations fell: and great Babylon came in remembrance before God, to
give unto her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath.
And
every island fled away, and the mountains were not found.
And
there fell upon men a great hail out of heaven, every stone about the
weight of a talent: and men blasphemed God because of the plague of
the hail; for the plague thereof was exceeding great.” (Rev.
16:17-21).
“Immediately
after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and
the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from
heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken:
And
then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then
shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son
of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.
And He shall send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they
shall gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of
heaven to the other.” (Matt. 24:29-31).
