Time-does it move forward or in Circles?

I know; it sounds like a trick question. But in the ancient world time was circular. The earth continually renewed itself through the regular recurring cycles of nature: Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter. Such a cycle is basically “startime” (the sun is a star) produced by the rotation of the earth around the sun in our solar system giving us also, in addition to the recurring seasons of the year, the time of day: dawn, noon, sunset, night. These cycles are described as the theory of the eternal return. “The universe and all existence and energy [have] been recurring, and will continue to recur in a self-similar form an infinite number of times across infinite time or space. The theory is found in Indian [India] philosophy and ancient Egypt and was subsequently taken up by the Pythagoreans and Stoics” in the Greek tradition.¹ In many ways, without modern precision, cyclical time replicates our own system of sidereal time—time as tracked by clocks, watches, and chronometers. In short, except for daylight savings time, your watch is keyed to the circle of the earth around the sun.

The Judeo-Christian view of time, on the other hand, is linear. Everything originated in God’s act of creation (Genesis 1:1-2:4a; 2:4b-3:24) and moves forward toward the inevitable Day of the Lord at which moment “the heavens will pass away with a loud noise and the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the works that are upon it will be burned up” (2 Pet 3:10 RSV)—and time will be no more. All events in world history, from creation to end, are believed included in this forward movement, which gives an illusion of progress in history.

Today we experience time from both of these perspectives. Reckoning time from a linear perspective and a cyclical perspective both prove useful for us in order to situate ourselves in time—e.g., hour of the day, season of the year, century provided by our linear calendar. We also experience time in other ways—as passing fast or slow, depending on how occupied we are in a given situation; as either individual and private or epochal and public—for example, one’s personal birthday celebration as opposed to the end of WWII. Life is believed to be a progressive series of such milestones or epochs—at least as we calculate time today.

The idea that time is linear is aided by a decision to distinguish the passage of time between BC (before Christ) and AD (Anno Domini—in the year of the Lord). This theological plot on time, which shifts time from circular to linear is credited to Dionysius Exiguus of Scythia Minor in 525 AD; his system was not widely accepted until after 800AD, however. The BC/AD system of Exiguus was used to number the years in the Gregorian and Julian calendars. Our modern calendar derives from the Gregorian Calendar, which is the most widely used calendar in the world today.² Modern critical scholars change BC/AD designations to BCE (Before the Common Era) and CE (Common Era) in order to secularize the divisions. The segments remain essentially the same, however.

One comes to realize the core problem of time by addressing the following question: how are all personal and public epochs since the beginning of time linked so as to give us a single linear sequence of time with all events taking their place in a relentless progression toward a particular goal?³

Historians also think of the movement of history as a linear movement. History is defined as “a branch of knowledge that records and explains past events as steps in the sequence of human activities.”⁴ Historical narrative is an attempt to reconstruct the past, not in its aggregate totality, but in what the historian considers its more significant aspects. In my view, however, history itself is something other than a historical narrative.⁵ Nevertheless modern historians still see time and human history moving forward in a linear line. Yet here we are making circles around the sun locked into a solar system going no place in particular. How do you see it?

Charles W. Hedrick

Professor Emeritus

Missouri State University

¹https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_return

²https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anno_Domini

³This argument is adapted from, and with apologies to, John Dominic Crossan, Raid on the Articulate. Comic Eschatology in Jesus and Borges (New York: Harper & Row, 1976), 133-136.

⁴Webster’s Third New International Dictionary (2002), s. v. “history.”

⁵Hedrick, “History, Historical Narrative, and Mark’s Gospel,” Wry Thoughts about Religion Blog, Dec 22, 2013.

WILL THE EARTH ABIDE?

Even to consider the question seriously starts the tectonic plates shifting beneath one's feet. If the earth passes away, it takes along with it human consciousness, history, and civilization. As unthinkable as it may be, the impermanence of the earth has been considered even by the biblical writers, although God pronounced his creative act "very good" (Genesis 1:31).  The biblical myth, however, is that God once destroyed every living thing on the earth (Genesis 7:4, 21-23), so something went very wrong.  The flood event was not understood by the writers as a destruction of the earth, but (as we would say) a global destruction of life, which God promised never to do again by floods (Genesis 9:11-17).  God promised that the earth and earthly life cycles would continue "while the earth remains" (Genesis 8:20-22), which is not quite a promise that the earth is permanent.  Hence, in this expression the biblical writer raises the specter of the earth's impermanence.

 

            The threats of destruction involving the earth in Hebrew Bible are usually like the flood incident—threats against a particular people for a particular reason (e.g., Zephaniah 1:14-18; 3:1-8).  The earth abides, but certain peoples are destroyed.  Even the "Little Apocalypse" of Isaiah 24-27 (First Isaiah) predicts only a devastation of the earth and not its destruction. Isaiah 65:17-20 (Third Isaiah), however, foresees a "new heavens and a new earth" and asserts that "the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind."

 

            Paul's letters seem inconsistent.  In one letter he suggests that even the (old) earth is anticipating redemption, because of its being in bondage to decay (Romans 8:19-23), which suggests that the present earth will continue after its redemption.  Yet in another letter he writes that "the form of this world is passing away" (1 Corinthians 7:26, 31).  The writer in Second Peter unambiguously announces the destruction of earth:

 

The Day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a loud noise, and the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the earth and the works that are upon it will be burned up. (2nd Peter 3:10).

 

The prophetic writer, John, echoes Third Isaiah in foreseeing the advent of a "new heaven and a new earth," and echoes Paul in announcing the "passing away" of the first heaven and first earth (Revelation 21:1-4).

 

            Do you suppose that God's mind for some reason was changed about the creation being "very good," and as a result what began "good" in God's judgment will end up in a fiery cataclysm?  If so, why would God decide to destroy a "very good" and perfectly innocent creation?  Animals, plants, and the "material stuff" of earth are not unrighteous, evil, or unethical, and scarcely deserve punishment.  Such insentient things and creatures would scarcely even be able to appreciate that they were being punished.  Perhaps the biblical writers are wrong in foreseeing the end of the world, for they cannot actually read God's mind. When it comes to God, all of us human beings are limited and see things only "in a mirror dimly" (1 Corinthians 13:9, 12)—even prophets, preachers, and TV evangelists.

 

            Nevertheless, that said, the transience of our habitable blue and white planet earth has always been threatened by natural causes.  A large enough wandering comet striking earth would cause catastrophic devastation.  In 1908 a comet about the size of a football field, among other things leveled 2000 square kilometers of forest in central Siberia. Perhaps some other cosmic catastrophe might occur, such as a "super nova within ten or twenty light years of the solar system," an event that some conjecture was the cause of the passing away of the dinosaurs "some sixty-five million years ago." Super novae are huge exploding stars.

 

            Our Sun is a star, or put another way, the stars you see in the night sky are suns.  They have a limited life span. "Billions of years from now, there will be a last perfect day on earth. Thereafter the Sun will slowly become red and distended," on its way to becoming a red star, then degenerating to a white dwarf; ultimately it becomes a dark and dead black dwarf.  Our earth would have then long since become uninhabitable to life as we know it. Sagan's description of the death of the earth echoes Second Peter: Earth will "swelter even at the poles" and then,

 

The Arctic and Antarctic icecaps will melt…Eventually the oceans will boil, the atmosphere melt away to space and a catastrophe of the most immense proportions will overtake our planet.

 

Will we earth people be able to survive without our mother, the earth?  We were spawned millions of years ago in an earthy primordial soup of dust from the stars and nourished at mother earth's breast on our way to becoming human beings. Perhaps, we will, but what might we become without her?

 

How does it seem to you?

 

Charles W. Hedrick

Professor Emeritus

Missouri State University

 

Carl Sagan, Cosmos (1980): comets, 73-76; death of the sun, 230-32; death of the dinosaurs, 283; origins of life, 30-31; super nova, 238-39.