A heavenly spectacle happening every 6585.32 days, lasting up to 7.5 seconds, can be seen along a track 300 kms wide but cannot be observed with the naked eye

A solar eclipse is a celestial event that takes place when the moon gets in between the earth and the sun. This event has always caught the attention of mankind since the beginning of time and has always been a matter to ponder upon. For example, why can a lunar eclipse be observed everywhere on earth under the night sky yet seeing a solar eclipse is only limited to a corridor 300 km in diameter? A solar eclipse is dependent upon two conditions: First there needs to be an intersection of a lunar orbit with the earth’s orbital plane; second the phase of the moon at the time needs to be a new moon. Because there are 12 months in a year, one would expect 12 solar eclipses, but a 5 degree difference between orbital planes makes this intersection a less frequent event. The diameter of a lunar shadow on earth during a solar eclipse is only 300 km while the shadow of the earth falls on the moon as wide as 12,000 km in diameter.

The sun and the moon, the brightest objects that are most visible to our eyes, are not hanging up there without any purpose. In addition to their many significant effects on our biological, psychological and social conditions, the sun and the moon offer us incredible reasons to be amazed not least during the eclipse when we observe from the earth their complete overlap: a star as big as almost 1.5 million km and a satellite as small as 3,500 km in diameter. The sun and the moon need to be positioned in their orbits with such a precise calculation that this enormous size difference does not get noticed during a solar eclipse by an observer on the ground. This is only possible when both the sun’s and the moon’s distances to the earth are reversely proportioned to their sizes. This fine balance is called “angular diameter” or “visual angle” by scientists. Therefore, in order for a complete solar eclipse to take place, the sun’s and the moon’s angular diameter need to be equal to each other.

If we have to explain this with mathematical expressions:

Lunar diameter / Moon-Earth distance = Solar diameter / Sun-Earth Distance

If we take numbers as below:

Lunar diameter 3,474 km, Moon-Earth distance 376,000 km, solar diameter 1,400,000 km, Sun-Earth Distance 149,000,000 km

Then we get two similar ratios:

3,474 / 376,000 = 0.009239361

1,400,000 / 149,000,000 = 0.009395973

As seen above, the ratio of the two independent and unrelated numbers turns out to be very similar to each other indicating the management of the universe through fine care, calculated fashion and wisdom. The significance of the angular diameter in this solar phenomenon is oftentimes ignored or covered not sufficiently enough in documentaries, books, and journals, whereas it offers a lot for us to ponder deeply over how the entire universe relates to our lives through many apparently irrelevant events. The sun and the moon and their eclipses are substantial reasons for awareness, appreciation and prayer, as highlighted in a Qur’anic verse:

“And the night and the day, and the sun and the moon (all the phenomena and objects you see in the universe) are among His signs (guiding to His absolute Oneness). Do not prostrate in adoration of the sun or the moon, but prostrate in adoration of God, Who has created them, if indeed it is Him that you worship.” (Fussilat 41:37)

A solar eclipse, as do all other things in our material universe, takes place in a world of causations. Yet, it takes place in such mysterious finely tuned measurements that may become a reason for divine testing, and it has been more so in the past for that matter. The Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, gave a warning on this issue for us not to fail this test: “The sun and the moon are two signs of God; they are not eclipsed on account of anyone’s death or on account of anyone’s birth. So when you see them, glorify and supplicate God, observe prayer, give alms.” Thus, it is important to observe the universe and use our intelligence to discover the laws operative in nature and the divine wisdom behind those seemingly supernatural events.

Alexander Graham Bell, the famous inventor and scientist, mentioned three rules designed to keep people mentally young, alert, and strong. These are: observe, remember, and compare. Following these easy rules shows us how to build our perceptions, sharpen our intellect, and discover new ways of thinking. The first step is to observe concrete facts that can be found all around us, the second step is to remember the observed facts, and the third step is to compare them and formulate conclusions. As Bell said: “These conclusions are real knowledge, and they are your own.”

These three simple rules always keep our brains busy and alert, lead us to think and become aware of the facts around us, and help us make connections between these facts that will take us to real knowledge. Human beings are the only creatures who can think and who are always trying to acquire more knowledge. Dr. Kopil states that only man makes his own history by using his free will in conjunction with his knowledge. In humanity’s attempt to deal with the difficulties of the surrounding world, many men and women have used their minds and their search for more knowledge to make many inventions and discoveries. Today, men and women still struggle to give shape to the world by pursuing knowledge. In the words of Dr. Bell, who changed the faith of the world with his works and inventions: “The great advantage in pursuing knowledge is that we may capture something that will contribute to the welfare of the world.” The essential point is to use the power of the mind to bring safety and happiness to this world. Dr. Mahmud states that this is possible only by mental and spiritual purification. When the power of knowledge is used for other purposes, it often leads to dangerous and embarrassing results.

Dr. Bell gives us detective stories as an example, and asks us: “What is a detective story, if it is not a record of observing, remembering, and comparing facts and of then drawing conclusions?” Let’s put ourselves in place of detectives. Our first and most important goal is to be aware of the facts around us, to pursue that knowledge which will lead us to the best solution. We need to remember each clue we collect, and to make sure that we do not miss a single detail. At the end, we will find ourselves trying to draw the correct conclusion by comparing all of the knowledge that we have gathered. It is easy to reach conclusions from established facts. But what is important for us is to reach our own conclusions by thinking, asking, evaluating, and keeping our minds busy and alert-just like detectives. I think this gives us more satisfaction and pleasure than having answers just given to us free-of-charge.

It is also necessary to emphasize the mental education of very young children. Dr. Caprio states that knowledge is not objective and does not have an absolute structure. What we know and understand is only our perceptions of reality. The essential thing is not to tell children things directly, for this might kill the child’s imagination, creativeness, and, most important of all, the mind’s power to think. Instead, encourage them to discover things for themselves. Asking them questions is alright, but also encourage them to find the answers themselves. Dr. Wood claimed that knowledge is the product of active construction, which we make and share with others. According to Dr. Bell, if children arrive at the wrong answer, do not give them the right answer and do not tell them that they are mistaken or wrong; rather, ask other questions to help them realize their own mistake and push their inquiry further.

Dr. Bell gives us several examples: “Suppose you wanted to teach a child about moisture and condensation. You should state to him that there are minute particles of water vapor in the air exhaled from the lungs, and that this water vapor will be condensed under certain conditions.”

In the first example, you did not allow your child to discover the fact and to reach his or her own conclusion, whether it is right or wrong. However, you gave the general conclusion or an established fact and asked the child to memorize it. You did not encourage your child to think, understand the facts, and reach his or her own conclusions. You gave the child the answer without requiring any effort on his or her part.

“Now suppose you tell him nothing, but simply ask him to breathe into a glass tumbler. He sees the moisture on the glass. Ask him where it came from. Have him breathe against the outside of the tumbler. Have him try the experiment with a glass that is hot and with one that is ice-cold. Have him try it with other surfaces. Do not do his thinking for him. Make him observe what takes place, stimulating him to remember the different results he observes and, by comparing them, to arrive at conclusions.”

The second example shows us that parents should be guides for their children. Be patient and let them make the observation. Let them do their own thinking, which will enable them to reach their own conclusion.

It is a well-known fact that we use only a fraction of our brain’s potential power. Moreover, we are not sure how far our minds can go. However, what we know for sure is that we can stretch our mind’s capacity and increase our brain’s potential power. I will end my article with Dr. Bell’s words: “Self education is a lifelong affair. It comes, naturally and inevitably, through using the mind and following this Rule of Three: Observe, Remember, Compare.”

REFERENCES

1. Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf, “Alexander Graham Bell,” Association review (Washington, DC: 1899).
2. Caprio, In Steffe, L. P., and Gale, J., Constructivisni in Education ( Lawrance Erlbaum: 1995)
3. Kopil, Alexa., ” Is the Brain the Origin of Man’s Mind?” The Fountain vol. 2., no.21 (Jan-Mar.1998).
4. Mahmud M. Sadat., “Thinking Straight and the Ways to Achieve It” The Fountain vol. 2., no.24 (Oct-Dec.1998).
5. Wood, T. “From Alternative Epistemologies to Practice in Education: Rethinking What It Means to Teach and Learn.” In Steffe, L. P., and Gale, J., Constructivism in Education (Lawrence Erlbaum: 1995).

This ‘book’ or exhibition was once much more dazzling; like a magnificent vessel sailing in the ocean of love and ecstasy or a chandelier with one thousand and one lights, it was beautiful beyond imagination. With its emerald hills and slopes and exhilarating valleys and plains, with its forests inhabited by thousands of kinds of cheerful animals and paradise-like gardens, fields and orchards, and with its singing birds and merry-making insects, this ‘book’ was the realm neighboring the other world. Divine mercy poured onto it in the form of rain to make the earth more fertile and, in return, hands were held open towards it in profound gratitude.

Those who sensed nature in that manner could not help but establish a deep heartfelt relation with the sound, melody, taste, smell and beauties which issued from it by the Hand of Power. For they were so intimate and familiar with it that whenever they gazed on it, they felt different things pertaining to the worlds beyond.

Like the elegance and grace in the architecture of a palace inspiring in us different things beyond the palace itself, nature, this exhibition of the miracles of Divine art, inspires in our hearts an intuition of the existence of One who, being the real source of all harmony and beauty, has brought it into existence and designed it, One who, although He makes us feel Himself through every work of His, is beyond the capacity of direct human perception.

The natural world and the heavens are as if in each other’s arms. It is as if in response to the strong desire of mountains to meet with heavens which they show by making their peaks lean on their skirts, heavens hang their skirts down over them. Like bees flying from one flower to the other, human imagination travels through the reflections of the Creator’s beauty and goes as fas as the horizon. When it reaches the horizon, thinking that the road goes on far into eternity beyond heavens, it sets out for a new journey and man begins to hear the melodies belonging to the worlds beyond. Those who, through their imaginations, can stay in those worlds for a long time, succeed in meeting the true beloved, with the love of whom they are consumed and for the union with whom they long.

For those who have resolved to make a journey through this realm of nature which provides knowledge of God for the traveller and where the heart, spirit and conscience overflow with innumerable kinds of pleasures, with its exhilarating spectacles, multi-coloured hills and slopes, impressive mountains that lead one into day-dreams, amorous gardens, awe-inspiring forests, streams and rivers murmuring in their way to union with seas-it is especially in spring and summer, a realm of joy, pleasure, peace and imagination. 

There is a magnificence, a charm, and a poetical harmony in every corner of this ‘book’ or exhibition. It is as if-with all its variety of beauty diversified in colours and forms, and the sheer charm of its general appearance, such that one would say, It is impossible for it to be more beautiful than this!-nature were in a sort of beauty competition. Those who have awakened to those beauties observe it differently and hear from it melodies of unimaginable beauty. Those ‘intoxicated’ spirits see trees dancing mentioning His Name and flowers announcing Him in the languages particular to themselves, and they hear everything in nature whispering peculiar messages from that symphony of beauty.

There are parts of nature which know of neither winter nor autumn. They are so dazzling and charming that you feel near the pont of touching the ultimate reach of beauty where this and other worlds are as if concentric with each other. The slopes of those places give you the impression that you are in gardens of Paradise, the rivers flowing through them bring to your mind the rivers of Paradise, and the swaying of their trees bring you a gust of breezes in gardens of Paradise. In short, in the beauties exhibited in those places you feel and observe the eternal beauties and, thinking that the worldly life is too short to experience all those beauties perfectly, you feel an earnest desire for eternity and turn to the Infinitely Powerful One so that that vital desire of yours may be realized.

What a pity it is that this magnificent book, this charming exhibition, which the Infinitely Merciful One has created and presented to man to observe and study and to be exhilarated by, is no longer given any more care than is given to a heap of junk or rubbish. Worse than that, it is more and more becoming a wasteland and like a dunghill.

Today, air, that magnificent conductor of Divine commands, is a suffocating smoke and a perilous ‘whirlpool’. Water, that source of life and other Divine bounties, is either a hazardous flood or forms desolate expanses of pitch. And earth, that treasure of Divine grace and munificence, is a wilderness no longer productive and a ruin without any ecological balance.

Like everything else entrusted to us, we have deplorably treated this ‘book’, this magnificent exhibition, which is an embodiment of Divine grace and mercy. How deplorably and awkwardly we have treated plains and residential places, which we have changed into deserts and heaps of ruin. How deplorably and gracelessly we have treated seas and rivers, which we have polluted. Again, how deplorably and awkwardly we have treated air and water, and fields, forests, and gardens, which we have made unfavorable to any life. Truly, by changing this Paradise-like world to a hell, how deplorably and awkwardly we have treated ourselves!

Unless we improve this world, whose order we have destroyed and which we have polluted, and restore it to its essential beauty and magnificence, it will inevitably collapse on us in heaps of wreckage.