Look to the skies, for there you shall see me.

That, according to Christianity, reveals the prophesy of the second coming, when Christ will arrive on a cloud.

The sky has always held a fascination for man; not only its complexity, enormity and its uniformity but also its mystique.

The sky, which reveals the seasons and the cycles, is used to chart the lives of all people born on earth through, their horoscopes. But that ‘heaven’ above us holds more mysteries than we can imagine and sponsors a host of beliefs or superstitions which dictate our lives on earth.

For example, the moon; the moon lunar gives rise to the word lunatic because of the effects that it is supposed to have on certain people. To some this may appear to be an unexplainable occurrence, yet we know and believe that the moon affects the tides; a human body comprises mostly of water.

During a lunar eclipse the seas are always at high tide!

The Solar eclipse has been just as enlightening to the human race; Chinese and Babylonian records go back 4000 years, and Egyptian Solar eclipse records reach as much as 4500 years ago.

In ancient China, both the solar and lunar eclipses were regarded to be signs from heaven which foretold the future of the Chinese Emperor; predicting eclipses were important to the state, and several Chinese astrologers of this time were murdered because they failed to predict a solar eclipse. These ancient people believed that a solar eclipse occurred when a legendary celestial dragon devoured the Sun; the same dragon which attacked the Moon during lunar eclipse. During this time it became a tradition to bang a drum or to make loud noises in order to frighten the dragon away.

Other communities relate a similar story; Vikings mythology tells the story of two wolves who want to eat the Sun and Moon. The wolf Skoll goes for the Sun, while the other wolf Hati, goes after the Moon. When either is caught, there is an eclipse. When this happens, the people make as much noise as they can to scare off the wolves. When an eclipse occurred in America, the ancient Serrano Indians of California believed that it was the spirits of the dead trying to eat the Sun or Moon. When this occurred the shamans and assistants sang and danced to appease the dead spirits, while everyone else made noises to frighten the spirits away.

Throughout history eclipses of the Sun have been regarded as phenomena, which to some, represented the end of the world; the Greek word eclipse means abandonment.

The sun as always held a prominent place in the hearts of mankind, because it was always associated to life. And in many civilisations the sun came not only to represent a great power but also a God. In these different regions the sun has been represented as a God or Goddess, an entity which represented power and strength, and the worship of the sun can be found throughout recorded history around the world. In the different world religions that arose the solar deity was known by various and different names, although the attributes given to the sun were almost identical.

Much superstition was also associated to comets; the word ‘comet’ arises from the Greek word ‘hair,’ and originally, comets were regarded as stars with flowing hair. To some people comets represented a curse while to others it was a sign of good luck.

We ca see from this short essay how much the superstitions regarding eclipses and heavenly bodies was to affect man and his world. Today we know what a comet is; we know that the sun is not a God; we know what an eclipse is. We also know that the moon revolves around the earth, and that somehow it affects our tides.

But what we do not know is the effect the universe may have over us; after all who knows the power of the universe and the things which keep man in subjection to it.