Sunspots
One of the best known, yet most mysterious, solar phenomena is the periodic appearance of sunspots, which affect life on earth in numerous ways. Sunspots are the most easily observed solar feature and have been seen for centuries. The earliest known record of sunspots appears in the Chinese Book of Changes, written prior to 800 B.C.
Sunspots are magnetic disturbances, or storms, on the sun’s surface that are thought to be caused by magnetic effects in the sun’s interior. They form dark, cool depressions on the surface of the photosphere (the surface layer of the sun). They appear to be dark because they are several thousand degrees cooler than the photosphere. Nevertheless, they are still quite hot and bright. A typical sunspot would shine with ten times the brilliance of the full moon if it were to be placed in the night sky.
Sunspot cycles
Sunspots may last from a few hours to a few months. They appear in a well-documented cycle. The number of sunspots rises from a solar minimum, when there are few or no spots visible, to a solar maximum, when as many as 300 spots may be observed at one time. The length of the cycle varies between 7 and 17 years, but on the average the cycle lasts 11.1 years.
The rise of the sunspot cycle to a solar maximum is accompanied by an increase in solar flares, the most powerful form of solar activity. Solar flares increase the intensity of the solar wind. The solar wind, which reaches the earth in about four and one-half days, impacts the magnetosphere, a magnetic field surrounding the earth, causing such phenomena as the aurora borealis and geomagnetic storms. It can generate extremely low frequency (ELF) waves—radio waves with a very long wavelength—which can influence human biology and behavior.
Mental, emotional and physical effects
The radiation generated by sunspots and solar flares has a number of effects. The most easily detected is the disruption of radio communications. But some scientists also claim that everything from climatic changes to wars, earthquakes and flu epidemics are associated with increased solar activity.
Other scientists dispute these claims. And sunspots and solar flares are certainly not the only cause of such disturbances. But there is a correlation between solar activity and certain kinds of social, behavioral and geophysical effects.
Riots, battles, arson attacks, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions have been charted within days or weeks of intense solar activity. For example, in 1980, solar flares in May coincided with riots in Miami and South Korea and the eruption of Mount St. Helens in May and June. Solar flares also preceded the April 1982 conflict between Great Britain and Argentina over the Falkland Islands and the U.S. attack on Tripoli, Libya, on April 14, 1986.
By tracking solar flares, biologist Marsha Adams was able to assist the San Francisco fire department by predicting arson attacks 72 hours in advance. She believes that flares affect people within the first few days after they happen. She has also found that earthquakes tend to occur about four days after flares. Adams and other investigators reported a correlation between increased solar activity and freak weather conditions, crime waves and political instability.
Mental instability appears to be connected with solar activity as well. Psychiatrists have noticed that voluntary admissions to mental hospitals increase for two to three days after a solar-induced magnetic disturbance. Joe H. Allen, Chief of the Solar-Terrestrial Physics Division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, said scientists at the Kettering Magnetic Laboratory have found that geomagnetic disturbances may produce a temporary deficiency of calcium or lithium ions inside brain cells, which is a characteristic of bipolar disorder.[1]
Adams found that wars tend to break out two to three years after the sunspot maximum—although they occasionally break out before it. She believes that large earthquakes, around 7.0 on the Richter scale, tend to occur near the peak of the sunspot cycle. Very large earthquakes, however—8 and above—tend to occur two to three years after the sunspot peak. Peaks in the sunspot cycle have coincided with major flu epidemics going all the way back to 1761.
Economists have even found links between solar activity and the economy. For example, in “Solar and Economic Relationships,” which appeared in the Quarterly Journal of Economics in 1934, Carlos Garcia-Mata argued that there is a correlation between the appearance of sunspots near the solar equator (which happens just after the sunspot peak) and times of economic depression.
Spiritual effects
The ascended masters have given us a further understanding of solar activity. Sunspots, as signs in the heavens, are surely signs of the times that we must read. And their burst and their flare and their fire do deliver a message of warning: “Cease and desist from your anti-light and anti-Christ consciousness, else the sacred fire shall consume not alone your works and your words but yourselves.”
Sunspots, then, precede the descent of the judgment. They give warning to all that change is in order. On December 11, 1988, Lord Maitreya told us that “solar rings and sunspots play their role in inaugurating change.”[2]
In his dictation of October 7, 1989, beloved God Harmony said:
Even the solar flares and activities of the sun in the remainder of this year will be a means whereby the spiritual Sun behind the sun of this solar system may be translated to the earth in positive ways, even though there be some negative side effects from these manifestations.[3]
Beloved Helios, dictating through our beloved messenger Mark Prophet, said in his January 11, 1970, Pearl of Wisdom:
The current cycle of sunspots and solar flares affects the weather of the planet, the moods of its people, even business cycles and, of course, the release of spiritual light energy to the earth. One should note, therefore, not only the negative interference to the radio networks of the earth but also the vast positive extensions of cosmic possibilities and revelations that shatter darkness with the brilliance of new and fervent hope for the overcoming of age old problems.
Sickness, sin and death—all forms of discord, bigotry, tyranny, struggle and degradation—must yield before the great cosmic burst of light, else those who continue to be advocates of darkness and shame will find the spiral of karmic recompense becoming a lash of such chastening as to almost annihilate that portion of their consciousness which persists in identifying with unreality.[4]
Sources
Pearls of Wisdom, vol. 33, no. 9, March 4, 1990.