Seeing the Heavens Through the Eyes of the Ancients

Drawing 1

The key to Mithraic symbolism lies in understanding how the people of the ancient world imagined the cosmos. First and foremost, they believed the earth to be at the center of the universe, with the stars embedded on the inside of a great sphere that surrounded the earth. Near this great sphere of stars—but somewhat closer to the earth—were the sun and the planets.

The ancients were conscious of one feature of the cosmic sphere that is little known today—the celestial equator (see drawing 1, at top). Just as the earth has an equator encircling it halfway between its north and south poles, so too does an equator encircle the great sphere of the cosmos halfway between the celestial north and south poles. Because the earth was believed to be at the very center of the cosmos, the earth’s equator and the celestial equator were seen as parallel.