Hezekiah's Sundial Shadow

Hezekiah's Shadow 2 Kings 20:10
 “Interpreters agree that the events described in chapters 38 and 39 preceded the invasion of 701 B.C. . . Many date these events in 703 B.C., but the evidence more strongly suggests a date of about 712 B.C.” (Wolf, commentary on Isaiah) Solar Eclipse March 5, 701 BC
 “Hezekiah was granted an added fifteen years (2 Kg 20:6); since he died c. 686 B.C. 718?? this promise can be dated from about the time of the siege of Jerusalem. His recovery was also symbolic of the recovery of Jerusalem.” (Wiseman)

2Ki 20:8  And Hezekiah said unto Isaiah, What shall be the sign that the LORD will heal me, and that I shall go up into the house of the LORD the third day?
An arrogant demand for a sign from the Lord is sin (Matt 16:1-4), but God might choose to honor a humble request for a sign (Jdg 6:36-40).

2Ki 20:9  And Isaiah said, This sign shalt thou have of the LORD, that the LORD will do the thing that he hath spoken: shall the shadow go forward ten degrees, or go back ten degrees?
2Ki 20:10  And Hezekiah answered, It is a light thing for the shadow to go down ten degrees: nay, but let the shadow return backward ten degrees.
2Ki 20:11  And Isaiah the prophet cried unto the LORD: and he brought the shadow ten degrees backward, by which it had gone down in the dial (degree) of Ahaz.

God let Hezekiah choose the final nature of the sign. Again, the purpose of this exercise was to strengthen Hezekiah's faith for the future.
What is causing the shadow?   How did the shadow move back ten steps? Why was it easier to go backward than forward? Why did Hezekiah need a sign in the first place?

Sundial is called "dial of Ahaz" (2 Kg 20:11) .
Dial

For the measurement of time, only once mentioned in the Bible, erected by Ahaz (2Ki_20:11; Isa_38:8). The Hebrew word (ma'aloth) is rendered “steps” in Exo_20:26, 2Ki_10:19, and “degrees” in 2Ki_20:9, 2Ki_20:10, 2Ki_20:11. The ma'aloth was probably stairs on which the shadow of a column or obelisk placed on the top fell. The shadow would cover a greater or smaller number of steps, according as the sun was low or high. As Ahaz copied the altar at Damascus (2Ki_16:7; 2Ki_16:10) so he probably copied the sun dial 700 B.C. But the division into 12 hours is not implied in the Old Testament day. (See DAY.) The "degrees" were "steps" ascending to his palace (Josephus).

The dial was of such a size and so placed that Hezekiah, when convalescent, could witness the miracle from his chamber; probably "in the middle court," the point where Isaiah turned back to announce to Hezekiah God's answer to his prayer (2Ki_20:4; 2Ki_20:9; Isa_38:21-22). Ahaz' intimacy with Tiglath Pileser would naturally lead the "princes of Babylon to inquire of the wonder done in the land," which shows that the miracle of the recession of the shadow on the dial was local, perhaps produced by divinely ordered refraction, a cloud denser than the air being interposed between the gnomon and the "degrees" or "dial."

Dial. An instrument for showing the time of day from the shadow of a style or gnomon on a graduated arc or surface.
Probably the sun-dial was a Babylonian invention. Daniel at Babylon (Dan_3:6) is the first to make mention of the “hour.”

1. Hezekiah's Sickness and the Sign
One of the most striking instances recorded in Holy Scripture of the interruption, or rather reversal, of the working of a natural law is the going back of the shadow on the dial of Ahaz at the time of Hezekiah's recovery from his illness. The record of the incident is as follows. Isaiah was sent to Hezekiah in his sickness, to say:

“Thus saith Yahweh, the God of David thy father, I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy tears: behold, I will heal thee; on the third day thou shalt go up unto the house of Yahweh.... And Hezekiah said unto Isaiah, What shall be the sign that Yahweh will heal me, and that I shall go up unto the house of Yahweh the third day? And Isaiah said, This shall be the sign unto thee from Yahweh, that Yahweh will do the thing that he hath spoken: shall the shadow go forward ten steps, or go back ten steps? And Hezekiah answered, It is a light thing for the shadow to decline ten steps: nay, but let the shadow return backward ten steps. And Isaiah the prophet cried unto Yahweh; and he brought the shadow ten steps backward, by which it had gone down on the dial of Ahaz” (2Ki_20:5-11). And in Isa_38:8, it is said, “Behold, I will cause the shadow on the steps, which is gone down on the dial of Ahaz with the sun, to return backward ten steps. So the sun returned ten steps on the dial whereon it was gone down.”

2. The Sign a Real Miracle
The first and essential point to be noted is that this was no ordinary astronomical phenomenon, nor was it the result of ordinary astronomical laws then unknown. It was peculiar to that particular place, and to that particular time; otherwise we should not read of “the ambassadors of the princes of Babylon, who sent ... to inquire of the wonder that was done in the land” (2Ch_32:31). It is impossible, therefore, to accept the suggestion that the dial of Ahaz may have been improperly constructed, so as to produce a reversal of the motion of the shadow at certain times. For such a maladjustment would have occasioned the repetition of the phenomenon every time the sun returned to the same position with respect to the dial. The narrative, in fact, informs us that the occurrence was not due to any natural law, known or unknown, since Hezekiah was given the choice and exercised it of his own free will, as to whether a shadow should move in a particular direction or in the opposite. But there are no alternative results in the working of a natural law. “If a state of things is repeated in every detail, it must lead to exactly the same consequences.” The same natural law cannot indifferently produce one result, or its opposite. The movement of the shadow on the dial of Ahaz was, therefore, a miracle in the strict sense of the term. It cannot be explained by the working of any astronomical law, known or unknown. We have no information as to the astronomical conditions at the time; we can only inquire into the setting of the miracle.
Note: There is the possibility that Nibiru in passing when the earth went into its path may have caused the event to occur.

3. The “Dial” a Staircase
It is unfortunate that one important word in the narrative has been rendered in both the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American) by a term which describes a recognized astronomical instrument. The word “dial” (ma‛ălōth) is usually translated “degrees,” “steps,” or “stairs,” and indeed is Thus rendered in the same verse. There is no evidence that the structure referred to had been designed to serve as a dial or was anything other than a staircase, “the staircase of Ahaz.” It was probably connected with that “covered way for the sabbath that they had built in the house, and the king's entry without,” which Ahaz turned “round the house of Yahweh, because of the king of Assyria” (2Ki_16:18 the Revised Version, margin). This staircase, called after Ahaz because the alteration was due to him, may have been substituted for David's “causeway that goeth up,” which was “westward, by the gate of Shallecheth” (1Ch_26:16), or more probably for Solomon's “ascent by which he went up unto the house of Yahweh” which so impressed the queen of Sheba (2Ch_9:4).

4. Time of Day of the Miracle
At certain times of the day the shadow of some object fell upon this staircase, and we learn from both 2 Ki and Isa that this shadow had already gone down ten steps, while from Isa we learn in addition that the sun also was going down. The miracle therefore took place in the afternoon, when the sun moves on its downward course, and when all shadows are thrown in an easterly direction. We are not told what was the object that cast the shadow, but it must have stood to the west of the staircase, and the top of the staircase must have passed into the shadow first, and the foot of the staircase have remained longest in the light. The royal palace is understood to have been placed southeast of the Temple, and it is therefore probable that it was some part of the Temple buildings that had cast its shadow down the stairway in full view of the dying king, as he lay in his chamber. If the afternoon were well advanced the sun would be moving rapidly in altitude, and but little in azimuth; or, in other words, the shadow would be advancing down the steps at its quickest rate, but be moving only slowly toward the left of those who were mounting them. It may well have been the case, therefore, that the time had come when the priests from Ophel, and the officials and courtiers from the palace, were going up the ascent into the house of the Lord to be present at the evening sacrifice; passing from the bright sunshine at the foot of the stairs into the shadow that had already fallen upon the upper steps. The sun would be going straight down behind the buildings and the steps already in shadow would sink into deeper shadow, not to emerge again into the light until a new day's sun had arisen upon the earth.

5. Hezekiah's Choice of the Sign
We can therefore understand the nature of the choice of the sign that was offered by the prophet to the dying king. Would he choose that ten more steps should be straight-way engulfed in the shadow, or that ten steps already shadowed should be brought back into the light? Either might serve as a sign that he should arise on the third day and go up in renewed life to the house of the Lord; but the one sign would be in accordance with the natural progress of events, and the other would be directly opposed to it. It would be a light thing, as Hezekiah said, for the shadow to go forward ten steps; a bank of cloud rising behind the Temple would effect that change. But no disposition of cloud could bring the shadow back from that part of the staircase which had already passed into it, and restore it to the sunshine. The first change was, in human estimation, easily possible, “a light thing”; the second change seemed impossible. Hezekiah chose the seemingly impossible, and the Lord gave the sign and answered his prayer. We need not ask Whether the king showed more or less faith in choosing the “impossible” rather than the “possible” sign. His father Ahaz had shown his want of faith by refusing to put the Lord to the test, by refusing to ask a sign, whether in the heaven above or in the earth beneath. The faith of Hezekiah was shown in asking a sign, which was at once in the heaven above and in the earth beneath, in accepting the choice offered to him, and so putting the Lord to the test. And the sign chosen was most fitting, Hezekiah lay dying, whether of plague or of cancer we do not know, but his disease was mortal and beyond cure; he was already entering into the shadow of death. The word of the Lord was sure to him; on “the third day” he would rise and go up in new life to the house of God.

6. Meaning of the Sign
But what of the sign? Should the shadow of death swallow him up; should his life be swiftly cut off in darkness, and be hidden until a new day should dawn, and the light of a new life, a life of resurrection, arise? (Compare Joh_11:24.) Or should the shadow be drawn back swiftly, and new years be added to his life before death could come upon him? Swift death was in the natural progress of events; restoration to health was of the impossible. He chose the restoration to health, and the Lord answered his faith and his prayer.
      The sign was to strengthen his faith for the future.
     We are not able to go further into particulars. The first temple, the royal palace, and the staircase of Ahaz were all destroyed in the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, and we have no means of ascertaining the exact position of the staircase with respect to Temple or palace, or the number of the steps that it contained, or the time of the day, or the season of the year when the sign was given. It is possible that if we knew any or all of these, a yet greater significance, both spiritual and astronomical, might attach to the narrative.

7. The Fifteen “Songs of Degrees”
Fifteen years were added to the life of Hezekiah. In the restoration of the second temple by Herod fifteen steps led from the Court of the Women to the Court of Israel, and on these steps the Levites during the Feast of Tabernacles were accustomed to stand in order to sing the fifteen “songs of degrees” (Pss 120 through 134). At the head of these same steps in the gateway, lepers who had been cleansed from their disease presented themselves to the priests. It has been suggested that Hezekiah himself was the compiler of these fifteen “songs of the steps,” in thankfulness for his fifteen years of added life. Five of them are ascribed to David or as written for Solomon, but the remaining ten bear no author's name. Their subjects are, however, most appropriate to the great crises and desires of Hezekiah's life. His great Passover, to which all the tribes were invited, and so many Israelites came; the blasphemy of Rabshakeh and of Sennacherib's threatening letter; the danger of the Assyrian invasion and the deliverance from it; Hezekiah's sickness unto death and his miraculous restoration to health; and the fact that at that time he would seem to have had no son to follow him on the throne - all these subjects seem to find fitting expression in the fifteen Psalms of the Steps.
e-sword

Using NASA's framework:
The building that the stairs led to is the most probable source of the shadow, but a nearby statue would fare just as well.

Speculation involves, that the earth rotated backwards, or pivoted on a different axis. Why we would look for a naturalistic mechanism when the text says God did it is beyond me. Both of these speculations carry massive geological upheavals if they occurred naturalistically. God would have had to miraculously cover these effects since there is no record of these massive upheavals. A better speculation is that time is not continuous, but quantized. Existence can change between one quantum state and another without having to pass through supposed intermediate states. If every moment is a newly created quantized state in the mind of God, then in the blink of a thought He can do as He wills.

Isaiah 24 insert on the effects of Nibiru.
20) a radical tilting of the earth’s axis.
    21) a tottering/wobbling of the earth in its path of revolution around the sun (Isa 24:18; Isa 13:13; Psalm 46:2-3; Josh 10:11-13)

It was easier to go forward than backward. It happens every day when I fall asleep for a moment. He moved it backward.

God was speaking to him through Isaiah. Isaiah offered the sign to prove that God was speaking through him. When someone comes claiming to speak for God, it would be fair to ask, "How do I know what you say is from Him?"

This was also recorded by the Chinese on the same date. They said the sun set and later rose back up.They had two sunsets in one day. Other seismic events were recorded on this date globally. Answer: The sun or the planets did not move, the earth didn't stop spinning. It was a polar shift of the earth's crust maybe ten or more degrees. Recently, around the time of the Japan earth quake the earth shifted around 4 degrees at the poles.

My answer is the same that parted the Red Sea. In 1514bc a comet of ammonia approached Earth and split in two. Half impacted causing the the explosion of Atlantis splitting the island into Thera & Santorini, as well as volcanic upheaval of the whole region causing tsunami flood of Ogygos to all Greek coasts. The other took up stationary orbit over the equator for 40 years. First appearing in Egypt, then parting the sea, the ammonia chilling the water as air flow held back the walled sea drawing fresh air into the channel as direct wind. This pillar of cloud by day and light by night appeared only in Gregorian March and September (April & Oct). Now onto Hezekiah if you do your math, the promise of life was right after killing 185,000 the same day because that comet was cyanide. Close enough to kill them and yet stay in orbit, it was brighter than the sun and so the sun appeared to back up with the shadows it cast. In China, where is this date because the year is 732bc. Never claim its a same date, when you dont have the Chinese date. However, the sun in China set and it was the comet that then rose and set again.
http://hermeneutics.stackexchange.com/questions/1774/how-did-the-shadow-move-back-ten-steps-in-2-kings-208-11

The Sundial Of Ahaz
The story of a Divine sign
“Behold, I will bring again the shadow of the degrees, which is gone down in the sundial of Ahaz, ten degrees backward. So the sun returned ten degrees, by which degrees it was gone down.” (Isa.38.8).
This is another of those Old Testament incidents which seem to set at defiance the known laws of Nature and hence receive more than the usual attention from sceptics and “modern” Bible scholars. In reaction to this, many studious Christians of the traditional school have sought to explain the account along lines of scientific explanations of the miracle, always on the basis of the Authorised Version translation.

It was in the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah’s reign that the apparently fatal illness gripped him, and the word of the prophet Isaiah came to him “Set thine house in order; for thou shalt die, and not live” (Isa.39.1). And Hezekiah prayed to the Lord, for he was a devout man, and he had worked hard for the good of his people of Judah, and his work was not yet finished. There was more in Hezekiah’s grief than appears on the surface, too, for as yet he had no son, and the promised seed, Christ, could come only through his line. It seemed as though God intended to abandon His own purpose and the glory of Israel never come at all. So Hezekiah prayed that he might live.

His prayer was answered. He heard that fifteen years were to be added to his life. Isaiah was commissioned to give him a sign that the Lord would both heal his sickness and deliver the city from the army of Sennacherib, which was at the time threatening Judah, for this was before the celebrated destruction of Sennacherib’s army outside Jerusalem (Isa.38,6-7 and 36.1 and 36,37). According to the parallel account in 2 Kings 20.8-11, Hezekiah was given the choice of two signs. Either the shadow of the “sundial of Ahaz” was to go down ten degrees, or it was to return back ten degrees. Hezekiah chose the latter. It was a light thing, said he, for it to go down ten degrees; it did that every day anyway; “nay, let the shadow return back ten degrees.” And the shadow went back!
This sounds like a most amazing happening. It would seem to the ordinary man that the only way in which the shadow on a sundial could return would be for the sun to reverse its course and appear to traverse the sky from west to east, which, since it is the earth that moves, and not the sun, would imply that the earth had changed its direction of rotation and was turning backwards. On this basis the commentators of the nineteenth century endeavoured to demonstrate that such a thing did actually happen in the days of Hezekiah. A distinguished astronomer, E. W. Maunder, in the early years of the 20th century produced elaborate calculations to support this view.

Before discussing the nature of the miracle, however, let us examine the story itself, and particularly the language used, and let us try to reconstruct for ourselves the scene of which Hezekiah’s sick-bed formed the centre-piece on that memorable day.

Hezekiah lay sick in his palace. There is still much that is not known about the Jerusalem of his day, but the position of the palace of the Kings of Judah is definitely established. It lay a little to the south of the Temple, facing the Mount of Olives, which rises from the opposite side of the deep valley of the Kedron. From where Hezekiah reclined he could see the Mount directly before him and the Temple towards his left. Somewhere nearby, near enough for him to witness the ‘sign’, was the ‘sundial of Ahaz.’

Nowhere else in the Bible is there any mention of an instrument for measuring time. Until the days of Daniel, over a century later, there are no indications that the children of Israel divided the day into hours. One is justified therefore in looking a little more carefully at this expression ‘the sundial of Ahaz.’

Ahaz, the father of Hezekiah, was a great admirer of foreign innovations, as is evidenced by the account in 2 Kings 16, and he might very well have acquired a sundial for his palace grounds were such things in existence in his day. The earliest known sundials are of Greek manufacture and date back only so far as the sixth century B.C., two hundred years later than the time of Ahaz. The Roman engineer Marcus Vitruvius, the author of a celebrated work on architecture and mechanical inventions, written in the time of Augustus Caesar, a few years before Jesus was born, says that the sundial was invented by Berosus, the Chaldean priest (Arch. 9. 9); and Berosus lived only about 250 BC. Herodotus, the Greek historian (440 BC), states that the sundial was invented by the Babylonians (Hist.2,109), whilst in Homer’s “Odyssey” (900 BC) there is an obscure reference to a means of observing the revolutions of the sun in use in Syria (Odyss. 15,402). It is just possible therefore that Ahaz could have possessed a sundial.

It is when the word ‘sundial’ is examined that a totally different complexion is put upon the account. The Hebrew is maalah, which denotes an ascent by means of steps or stages, and is used for “steps” or “stairs” in the Old Testament. The steps of the altar in Exod. 20. 26, and of Solomon’s throne in 1 Kings 10,19,20. and the stairs of 2 Kings 9.13 and Ezek.40.6 are ‘maalah’. So, likewise, are the majestic words in Amos 9.6. “It is he that buildeth his stories in the heavens” where “stories” refer to the stages or terraces of the Babylonian ziggurats or temple towers, reared up into the heavens. And this word ‘maalah’ is also translated degrees in the accounts of the miracle. The AV translators are guilty of an inconsistency here for both “degrees” and “sundial” are from the same Hebrew word. Rotherham translates 2 Kings 20.11, “And he caused the shadow on the steps, by which it had gone down the steps of Ahaz, to go back ten steps” and Isa 38.8,  “Behold me! causing the shadow on the steps, which hath come down on the steps of Ahaz with the sun, to return backwards ten steps.”
Nehemiah (3.15 and 12.37) speaks of “stairs that go down from the city of David.” Jerusalem was built on several hills with two deep valleys – to those of the Kedron and Gay-Hinnom (Gehenna), intersecting them and there were various flights of stone steps built up the sides of these valleys. It is known that one such staircase descended the slope from the King’s Palace eastward down to the Horse Gate in the city wall (Neh.3.28; 2 Chron.23.15; Jer.31.40) and another ascended from the Horse Gate up to the south side of the Temple. By means of these two stairways the King possessed what amounted to a private way to the Temple, and there is one rather obscure passage in 2 Kings 16.18 which indicates that Ahaz made some alteration to one of these stairways. It seems then that the stairs leading down from the Palace to the Horse Gate are those to which reference is made in Isaiah.
Now these steps running roughly eastward down the slope, with the lofty buildings of the Palace at the top between them and the afternoon sun, were shrouded in shadow every afternoon. As soon as the sun had passed the zenith at midday, the shadow of the Palace roof would fall upon the topmost step, and thereafter as the sun sank towards the west, so the shadow would grow longer and creep down the stairs to the end. That is the shadow that had gone down ten of the steps (‘degrees’ in the AV) at the time of the sign. It must have been about the middle of the afternoon. Hezekiah had lain there many afternoons watching the shadow of his father’s house creep down those stairs until at length, as it reached the Horse Gate at the bottom, the sun sank below the horizon behind his palace, the daylight rapidly faded and the short Palestinian twilight gave way to black night. So is the fate of my father’s house, he must have thought bitterly: I am to die childless; there will be none of my line to reign after me on the throne of the Lord in Judah; all the promises made to the fathers will fail; there can never be a son of David to become David’s Lord. God had forgotten to be gracious.
And then he saw the sign! Josephus makes it plain in his account of the circumstances (Ant.10,2,1) that the shadow had gone down ten steps of the staircase and then returned. What had happened? What was it in this inexplicable phenomenon that convinced Hezekiah that God was with him and would heal him?

It is not necessary to suppose that God interfered so much with the normal course of Nature as to halt and reverse the onward progression of the sun through the sky. Less spectacular and unlikely causes would have produced the effect. Under certain climatic conditions clouds of minute ice crystals can form at a great height in the upper reaches of the air; the apparent result as seen from the earth is the appearance of a band of light passing through the sun, and two additional suns, one on either side of the true sun. This effect, which is known as parhelia, or “mock sun” is due to the refraction of the sun’s light as it passes through the prismatic ice crystals on its way to the earth. If now a cloud, at a much lower altitude, should obscure real sun and the western “mock sun” over a certain district, the only light reaching that district is from the eastern “mock sun,” and the effect is as if the sun had receded eastwards by a certain fixed amount (always equal to one and a half hours of our time). Two occasions when this actually happened are on record; one was on 27th March 1703 at Metz in France, when the shadow on the sundial of the Prior of Metz was displaced by one and a half hours. The other occasion was on the 28th March, 1848 over parts of Hampshire when the same effect was observed.
Now this is a perfectly logical scientific explanation and the miracle could very well have been due to this cause, except for one consideration. Hezekiah had been at great pains to put down Baal worship, the constant curse of Israel, and to restore the worship of Jehovah. The sun was the visible symbol of Baal. Such a phenomenon as is described above would be probably interpreted by those who witnessed it as a manifestation of the power and interest of Baal. The credit for the sign, and consequently for the cure of Hezekiah’s sickness, would have been given, not to the God of Israel, but to Baal. Much of Hezekiah’s own good work would have been undone. For this reason it is unlikely that God would use the sun as an instrument for effecting the ‘sign’.

Is there then another possible means by which the miracle could have been performed, more in keeping with the majesty and power of God and more indisputably attributable to Him? The fact that as Hezekiah looked down his staircase, the Temple of the Lord was in full view upon his left, at the summit of Mount Moriah, suggests that there is.

The shadow of the palace lay ten steps down the staircase. Only the return of the sunlight could remove it – or a light brighter than sunlight. Every Israelite knew that there was such a light; the holy ‘Shekinah’, that supernatural light that shone from between the cherubim in the Most Holy, that had been the guide of Israel in the wilderness in those long ago Exodus days, a “fire by night,” one that had been seen on rare occasions when God had cause to manifest His majesty and power in visible form. That fierce light, brighter than the sun at noonday, had flashed out from the Tabernacle to slay Nadab and Abihu when they offered “strange fire” before the Lord (Lev.10.2); it had flooded the camp at the time of Korah’s rebellion (Num.16. 42-45); it had filled Solomon’s Temple at its dedication. Isaiah saw it once in vision when he received his commission of service (Isa.6.1). Is it possible that as Hezekiah gazed still upon the staircase, waiting for the sign that the Lord had promised him, the wondrous glory of the Shekinah did indeed blaze out from that sanctuary on the hill, blotting out the brightness of the sun itself, lighting all Jerusalem with its radiance? The shadow on the steps would have vanished in an instant. The whole scene, the Palace Gardens, the stairs themselves, the city wall and the Horse Gate far below, and the Mount of Olives on the opposite side of the valley, stand out in sharp relief vividly delineated in that blinding white light. If this is indeed what happened on that memorable day, what possible doubt could remain in Hezekiah’s mind? More convincing by far than any natural celestial phenomenon, this message from the sanctuary was as the appearance of God Himself.

All Jerusalem must have seen it. All Jerusalem must have interpreted it aright. The Shekinah came forth only for destruction or blessing. Hezekiah was a good king, a God-fearing man. It could only mean that he would recover, that he would live to play his part in the fulfilment of Divine promise, that there would yet be a son to sit upon the throne of the Lord after him, that the destiny of Israel would yet be achieved. The news would travel quickly, and before long all Judea would know what had happened, and that the king’s life had been prolonged for fifteen years.

So the wonderful story concludes with Hezekiah going up to the Temple to sing his songs of praise to the stringed instruments, all the days of his life, for his deliverance and for the marvelous happenings (Isa. 38.20). Fifteen songs did he compose and named them “songs of the steps”. They appear today in the Book of Psalms as Psalms 120 to 134, and they are headed “songs of degrees” by the AV translators. (The ascription of some of them to David is incorrect). For ever afterwards they were used in the Temple ceremonies, and today we use them still, a memorial of that day when the Lord turned back the shadow that was over the house of Israel, and His glory was seen in Jerusalem.

Resources
www.biblefellowshipunion.co.uk/2008/May_Jun/Sundial.htm
E. W. Maunder    www.biblestudytools.com/encyclopedias/isbe/dial-of-ahaz.html; www.keithhunt.com/Joshua3.html; www.bibleandscience.com/bible/books/genesis/genesis1_sunshadow.htm

687 BCE or CE Pole Shift Isa 31:8 or 38:1; Jam 5:17; 2 Kings 8:1; 8:5  Fiery Red Dragon Earth tilted again

John Ashcraft Jardalkal@aol.com Jesus in 2015-2017