Hello ATS,
First of all I want to emphasize that this is a theory that resonates with me. That is why I want to share it here and read your feedback.
This post has been posted on the Dutch forums by my friend Dodeca.
He is the source for your reference.
Saturn/Venus,
The "Enuma Anu Enlil" records have been used by the Saturnians as one of the sources for the concept that Saturn was known in antiquity as "the
Star of the Sun" and in fact was considered to be the Sun. Cardona and other Saturnians who used the essay "Sun and Saturn" (1910) by Morris
Jastrow have been faulted for ignoring Jastrow's comments, to quote Leon Ellenberger..
"According to Morris Jastrow, Jr., in his 'famous' and oft-cited article 'Sun and Saturn,' Saturn was not given a specific name until after Venus
and Jupiter were named, which is surely strange if Saturn was the primordial deity described by the 'Saturnists.'"
-- Ellenberger, "An Antidote to Velikovskian Delusions" in Skeptic (1995) or at
abob.libs.uga.edu...
This sequences of naming, and similar faults, are entirely resolved if consideration is given to the sequence of events as I have proposed in this
essay. The records in question all date to after 747 BC, although Jastrow suggest that some predate the period of Hammurabi (ca 1700 BC).
That Saturn is called "sun" (Shamas) is no surprise. Until 3114 BC Saturn indeed was the Sun, and certainly the "sun of the night." After 3114 BC,
and until 2250 BC, with some interruptions, Jupiter assumed the role of the "Sun of the night" and was called Shamas. Some 1500 years after Jupiter
disappeared from view -- became a star -- the Babylonian astronomers were suddenly pressed into service by the Assyrian kings. The names of the
planets to be watched were derived from a 3000 year old tradition. Duplicated names could be sorted out when seen in context. Additionally, some
tablets are annotated with indications of whether the daytime or nightime Sun was meant.
What none of the Saturnian commentators have done is to elucidate some of the truly strange wording of the tablets, like...
"Saturn stands in the halo of the moon"
"The moon has a halo around it and Saturn stands in it."
"When the sun stands in the place of the moon.."
"When a mock-sun stands over the moon (or) under the moon.."
"If Samas has a halo around it, there will be rain."
"When Jupiter [stands] in the sun.."
"If Venus approaches Samas, the King will perish." with a note explaining that here by Samas the Sun in meant.
A "sun-crown" above Venus...
"Dilbat [Venus] is decked with two crowns."
"A 'Samas' crown above the moon, is explained as 'Lu-Bat [Saturn] [standing] by the moon.'"
"If a mock-sun stands above the moon or below the moon.."
"If Mars reaches the road of the sun [the ecliptic] .. there will be a famine."
"The mock-sun and moon appear together," explained as "on this night Saturn approached (or 'was near') the moon."
On this last note, specifically, Jastrow starts to justify the texts of the tablets in uniformitarian terms, as..
"It would appear, therefore, that the association of sun with Saturn was carried to the extent of using even the term which stands for an image of
the sun due to atmospheric conditions to represent Saturn. Naturally a 'mock-sun' or parhelion cannot stand above or below the moon or be seen
anywhere near it."
"The term was intended to apply to a "mock-moon" and this phenomenon of a second moon was explained as due to the presence or reflection of Saturn
near or standing by the moon."
"I venture to think, that we have in this naive explanation of an atmospheric phenomenon which seems simple enough to the modern astronomer, a
suggestion as to the origin and meaning of this interesting association of the sun with Saturn, leading to the wide spread usage of the signs for
Samas (An-UT and Amna) to represent Saturn."
"Strange as it may seem to us, the planet Saturn appears to leave been regarded as 'the sun of the night' corresponding to Samas as 'the sun of
the daytime' and the cause of such light as the night furnishes. It was argued, that since there was a sun furnishing the light of day, so there must
be some corresponding power which causes the illuminations of the heavens at night."
Besides the fact that such reasoning degrades the intellectual abilities of the Babylonians, none of these suppositions are necessary. The "crescent
of the Moon," seen below, above, even on both the left and right, or seen in multiple units, are simply the diffraction of the light of a bright
planet on approaching the last remaining band of the equatorial rings. It would be placed some distance away, probably 1/4 or 1/2 degrees, and thus
make it appear as if the planet were placed within a Moon.
Mesopotamian "Star and Crescent" images show the star inevitable well within what would be the orb of the Moon, a situation which would not happen
if the crescent genuinely belonged to the Moon.
The left and right diffraction, when a bright object were centered on the band of the equatorial ring, would result in an image identified as the
'double axe' in antiquity, although I would assume that the 'double axe's was more likely seen in remote antiquity, before 2349 BC, when the
ecliptic dipped completely behind the still intact Absu. Jupiter, with its gigantic coma, would have been the candidate for this imagery. The handle
of the axe, which is frequently, but not at all times, shown, is probably the south polar plasma plume. The double bitted battle axe is a fantastical
invention of the current age. Even the tomahawk does not appear until the late Bronze Age.
Jastrow and others allowed that the situation of Saturn, or another planet, might be seen above or below the Moon because the Moon frequently runs off
the ecliptic by some 5 degrees. What has not been accounted for, of course, is to have the Moon's crescent appear on the top or bottom. That does not
happen in real life.
It is the same diffraction of the point light source of a planet when behind the last of the equatorial rings which causes the depiction of planets as
a four and eight pointed figures.
It should also be pointed out again that this last equatorial ring was red. It would cause Sirius to appear as red when the axis of the Earth shifted.