THOTH'S CALENDAR

Interesting thing, calendars. It is one of the ingenious inventions of mankind, that we use without regard to its origin or makeup. The hieroglyphics discovered in caves, tombs, pyramids, and stone monuments around the world, reveals its origin to be tens of thousands of years old.

One such calendar of interest is the Ancient Egyptian Thoth Calendar, established in the reign of Pharaoh Shepseskaf (2494–2345 BC.) It was Thoth who created the 365-day calendar. Twelve months of 30 days each, 360 regular days with five extra days added on to the end of the year, and a single day added every fourth year as a leap year, making the calendar reliable to this day. The New Year's Day fell on the first day of the month of Thoth, around August 29 in our calendar.

It is believed that Thoth was the author of the Egyptian Book of the Dead and the Book of Breathing. Thoth loved sharing his knowledge with others. Today, Internet makes it possible for us to listen and share our knowledge with people around the world. Let's think of Thoth and share our stories. I think that would make Thoth sit up in his tomb and smile. The Feast of Thoth is celebrated as a day of writing and sharing stories in Egypt today.

So it is that calendars represent man's unique way of registering his accounts, and immortalizing people important to history. Like Mother Teresa, born August 26, 1910, who gave a new meaning to serving selflessly. Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the Soviet Union, who died last Tuesday, August 30, proved that differences can be resolved peacefully and amicably between big rivals, even ones like the United States and USSR.

And the philosopher Georg Hegel, born on August 27, 1770. He devised the concept of Dialectic, the idea that all human progress is driven by the conflict between opposites, that each political movement is imperfect and so gives rise to a counter movement which takes control - and is also imperfect - and thus gives rise to yet another counter movement, and so on to infinity.
Hegel wrote, "Genuine tragedies in the world are not conflicts between right and wrong. They are conflicts between two rights."

Just think how many of today's world conflicts we can resolve by just following some of the teachings of these three people mentioned in our calendars.

Reza Ghadimi
September 1, 2022