ZODIAC
Concerning King Josiah of Judah, 2 Kings 23:5 says: “And he put out of business the foreign-god priests, whom the kings of Judah had put in that they might make sacrificial smoke on the high places in the cities of Judah and the surroundings of Jerusalem, and also those making sacrificial smoke to Baal, to the sun and to the moon and to the constellations of the zodiac and to all the army of the heavens.” The expression here rendered “constellations of the zodiac” comes from the Hebrew word maz·za·lohthʹ, which occurs but once in the Bible, although the word Maz·za·rohthʹ found at Job 38:32 may be related. It is the context that helps make clear its meaning.
The discovery of what may be called the zodiacal zone is generally credited to the early Babylonians. They doubtless observed the apparent yearly path of the sun among the stars, which path is now known as the ecliptic. Within a zone 16 degrees wide, extending 8 degrees on each side of the ecliptic, is the area called the zodiac. The early astronomers could note that within this zone or belt lie the apparent paths of the sun, moon and major planets, as viewed from the earth. It was not until the second century B.C.E., however, that a Greek astronomer divided the zodiac into twelve equal parts of thirty degrees each, and these parts came to be called the “signs of the zodiac” and were named after the related constellations. The word “zodiac” is from the Greek and means “circle of animals,” since the zodiac’s twelve constellations originally were all designated by the names of animal or marine life.
These signs today do not resemble the constellations after which they were originally named. This is due to what is known as the precession of the equinoxes, which results in a gradual westward shift by the constellations of one degree every seventy years in a cycle that is said to take 25,800 years to complete. Thus, the sign of Aries has, in the past 2,000 years, moved backward 30 degrees, into the sign Pisces, the constellation W of Aries.
CONNECTION WITH ASTROLOGY
The zodiacal constellations were made objects of false worship from early Mesopotamian times onward. Certain qualities were attributed to each of the different constellations and these were then used in astrological predictions based on the particular position or relationship of the celestial bodies to the signs of the zodiac at any given time. As shown by the text at 2 Kings 23:5, such use of astrology was introduced into Judah by foreign-god priests whom certain kings had brought into the country. Jehovah God long before had prohibited such star worship on penalty of death. (Deut. 17:2-7) While the constellations mentioned at Job 9:9; 38:31, 32 and Amos 5:8 doubtless figure among those of the zodiacal zone, yet these texts make plain that such celestial bodies are but the creation of Jehovah God and all subject to his divine laws and statutes.
Astrology was a predominant facet of Babylonian worship. The predictions based on the zodiac by her astrologers, however, did not save Babylon from destruction, even as the prophet Isaiah had accurately forewarned.—Isa. 47:12-15; see ASTROLOGERS.
In modem times the zodiacal signs continue to play an important part in the worship of many peoples. Interestingly, the signs of the zodiac found their way into some of the religious cathedrals of Christendom and can today be seen in such places as the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris, as well as on the cathedrals of Amiens and Chartres, France.