The Sun god

' Turn your face to the sun and the shadows fall behind you'
Maori proverb

The Sun is seen as a masculine symbol, a powerful life-enhancing energy.
Our ancestors saw the all-powerful Sun as standing for the masculine principle - the power of rational thinking.

The Greeks worshipped the Sun as the god Helios. They believed that every morning at dawn, crowned with the shining aureole of the sun, Helios rose from the sea in the east. Clothed in purple robes this handsome, beardless god rode in his golden sun-chariot, pulled by his four fire-breathing, winged steeds through the sky and descended every night in the west. Helios was the subject of the 'Colossus of Rhodes', completed in 292 BC.

The Romans worshipped Mithras - originally a Persian god of the sun. In the beginning of time Mithras had sacrificed the mythical great bull, and the blood which was spilt gave life to earth. Sun worship in the Roman Empire was officially recognised during the time of Emperor Aurelian, when he instituted the cult of
'Sol invictus' - the Invincible Sun. The Romans made Sunday -'the venerable day of the sun', and an official day of rest.

Ra was the Egyptian Sun god, depicted crowned with a sun disc encircled with a cobra on his hawk-like head. The ancient Egyptians believed the Sun was his eye and that he journeyed daily across the sky in a boat. The rising sun was to them the symbol of creation.

The Hindu Solar god, Surya, is worshipped as a symbol of health and immortal life, and is depicted as a red man with three eyes and four arms driving his chariot with seven horses. Many come to the eastern banks of the Ganges in Varanasi at sunrise to bathe and pray to Ganga - the goddess who is the Ganges river - and Surya, the husband of dawn.