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28.2%ANMag Issue 21 Global Awareness
The Planets and the Tropics of Capricorn and Cancer
By Ali Sadeeq, Staff Writer
Kano, Nigeria − After the big bang and the formation of stars among colonies of stars, there are individual stars that formed planetary systems, like the case in our own solar system. What did God tell us about the planets? In Surah Rahman he told us:
Q55:17: "He is the lord of the two easts and the two wests".
What does God mean with two easts and two wests? The majority of people do not know that the point at which sun rises every year are two points, and the point at which it sets are also two. The ingenuity of this system was to distribute sunlight fairly to all regions of the earth. The planet earth being spherical is flattened at the poles (North and South). Therefore, if the point of sunrise and sunset on the earth is only one, then the poles will lose a significant amount of sunlight. To avoid this, God orders that for every six months, the position of sunrise and sunset will shift to allow each hemisphere to get equal amount of sunlight, and this is responsible for the seasons. This is achieved by the angle of tilt of the earth. On June 22 of every year, the sun follows through the line that is called the Tropic of Cancer, an imaginary line that is exactly 23 27’ North of the equator. This line begins in the northern Pacific and passes through central Taiwan, southern China, and India, through the Arabian Sea into Saudi Arabia, the Red sea, Egypt, Libya, Algeria, Mali and Mauritania. It crosses the Atlantic Ocean through the Bahamas, Cuba and the Gulf of Mexico, passing through Mexico, Hawaii, and finally to the north Pacific. And on December 22, as the earth tilts, the sun will follow the course of the Tropic of Capricorn which is 23 27' South of the equator, and it starts in the northern Pacific and passes through the Coral Sea, the Indian Ocean, Madagascar, passing through Mozambique, South Africa, Botswana, Namibia and the Atlantic Ocean, reaching Brazil, Argentina and finally to the northern Pacific Ocean.
These two routes enable the North and South Poles to get ample sunlight though the countries that these two tropics pass through and are usually hotter. All the known deserts on this planet are either directly under these lines or close to them. Therefore, the eastern point of Tropic of Cancer and Capricorn are the two easts, and the western points of the Tropic of Cancer and Capricorn are the two wests.
The satellites were formed by condensation from the contracting planets, while the comets and meteors were formed from materials left over between the planets. In our own solar system, we have the sun, the nine planets, thirty-two satellites attending six of the planets (more are being discovered), 1600 known asteroids, about 1000 comets, hoards of meteorites and a thin cloud of interplanetary dust. All the celestial bodies swim in space in their own orbits. Each follows its fixed path without interference. The planets go round the sun, the satellites go round their planets and the sun itself rotates on its own axis. Even galaxies rotate. And all those heavenly bodies were in rounded course (spherical, oval, and circular etc). Hitherto, the celestial motions took place in circles, the circle being the perfect geometrical figure.
Q36:40: "It is not permitted for the sun to catch the moon, nor can the night outstrip the day, each just swims along in its own orbit according to law".
All the celestial bodies swim in space in their own orbit, each following a fixed path as ordained by God and controlled by his creation, gravity.
The sun, which most people, assume to be stationary, has its own orbital path, the zodiac belt, which is the apparent path the sun follows among the stars. It is divided into twelve sections of 300, each totaling 360. The sun is located in the outer part of our galaxy (the milky way), and it takes 250 million years to complete one trip around the center of the galaxy, i.e. one solar year at a speed of 220 km/s. It is estimated that the sun has made this trip 18 times since its birth (roughly 4.6 billion years ago). The sun is a circular object, as the above verse told us, and it has a radius of 695,508 km (109 times larger than the planet earth). Its rotation is like that of the earth from west to east though it has differential rotation i.e. parts of the sun rotate at different rates, as it is mainly gas. It was only recently, in the last 30 years, that it was discovered that it is not only the planet earth that has a moon. Moons are common occurrence in our solar system as Mars has one, Jupiter has sixteen moons, Saturn at least eighteen, Uranus also eighteen, Neptune eight. The possibility of discovering more moons is there, for astronomers now get a better view of the planets. The moons also, wherever found, are circular and orbiting their parent planets in circles.
There are also 1600 known asteroids, several hundred comets and countless meteors. The general rule is all celestial bodies are circular, the circle being the perfect geometrical figure. In the Qura'n God uses adjurations. An adjuration is a solemn appeal for persons to do some act or to believe some important statement by the evidence of something great or sublime or remarkable or out of the ordinary. In one of those verses God said in Chapter:
Q81:15 "So verily I call to witness the planets that recedes".
So which are the planets that recede? Looking into our solar system we can see that the planets Mercury and Venus lie within the orbit of the Earth; thus, they are closer to the sun than the Earth. When any of them is on the far side of the sun, each will appear like a small full moon. As the angle Earth-planet-sun increases, a proportionally diminishing fraction of the illuminated surface will be presented to view. And when the angle reaches 90 degrees, the planets will appear half-illuminated. Following this, a crescent form of steadily diminishing breadth will be repeated in the reverse order until the planets (Mercury and Venus) become fully illuminated. Thus, they are continuously appearing and receding from our vision. The adjuration continues in Q81:15: "[and the planet that] go straight"
The phase of the planets revolving outside the orbit of the Earth differs from those within the Earth’s orbit in as much as the angle planet-earth-sun can never reach 90 degrees. As such, Mars is always more than half-illuminated (constant), and in Jupiter, the illumination is always there, though very small.
Qura’n Q81:15: "[and the planets that] hide".