Колоб: Небесное тело в теологии СПД

Celestial body that is "nearest unto the throne of God" in LDS theology

Kolob is a star
or planet described in the Book of Abraham, a sacred text of the Latter Day Saint movement. Several Latter Day Saint denominations hold the Book of Abraham to have been translated from an Egyptian papyrus scroll (which was actually a copy of the Egyptian funerary texts) by Joseph Smith, the founder of the movement. According to this work, Kolob is the heavenly body nearest to the throne of God. While the Book of Abraham calls Kolob a "star", and therefore some Latter Day Saint commentators consider Kolob a planet. The body also appears in Latter Day Saint culture, including a reference to Kolob in an LDS hymn.

According to the traditional, literal Mormon interpretation of the Book of Abraham, Kolob is an actual star in this universe that is, or is near, the physical throne of God. According to Smith, this star was discovered by Methuselah and Abraham by looking through Urim and Thummim, a set of seer stones bound into a pair of spectacles. LDS Church leader and historian B. H. Roberts (1857–1933) interpreted Smith's statements to mean that the Solar System and its governing "planet" (the Sun) revolved around a star known as Kae e vanrash, which itself revolved with its own solar system around a star called Kli flos is es or Hah ko kau beam, which themselves revolve around Kolob, which he characterized as "the great centre of that part of the universe to which our planetary system belongs". Roberts was confident that astronomers would confirm this hierarchy of stars orbiting other stars. The literal interpretation of Kolob as a star or planet had significant formative impact on Mormon belief and criticism, leading to conceptions such as that the Biblical creation is a creation of the local Earth, Solar System, or galaxy, rather than the entire known physical universe.

The Book of Abraham is unclear as to whether Kolob is a star or a planet, This would appear to include planets as among the "stars", and the Book of Abraham calls Earth a star. In addition, it appears to classify Kolob among a hierarchy of "planets". On the other hand, in the Egyptian Alphabet and Grammar paper, Kolob is classified as one of 12 "fixed stars", as distinct from 15 "moving planets". The term "fixed stars" generally refers to the background of celestial objects that do not appear to move relative to each other in the night sky, including all stars other than the Sun, nebulae and other starlike objects. Though "fixed", such objects were proven to have proper motion by Edmund Halley in 1718. Apparently referring to proper motion, Smith said that Kolob moves "swifter than the rest of the twelve fixed stars". Also, the Book of Abraham refers to "fixed planets", thereby including planets in the set of celestial objects that may be "fixed". It also calls the Sun a "governing planet", further complicating the terminology. So it is unclear whether Smith understood Kolob to be a planet or a star. Writers in the Latter Day Saint movement have taken both positions on the issue. Brigham Young, second president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints (LDS Church), spoke of Kolob as a planet, as did LDS Church apostles John Taylor, Orson Pratt (a mathematician with an interest in astronomy), Orson F. Whitney, and Alvin R. Dyer. Other Mormon theologians have also viewed Kolob as a planet, but several Mormon writers have called Kolob a star, including B. H. Roberts and LDS Church president David O. McKay.

According to several Mormon writers (such as W. Cleon Skousen in his book The First 2000 Years), the Earth was created near Kolob over a period of 6,000 years, then moved to its present position in the Solar System. This hypothesis is based on oral comments attributed to Smith. According to the hypothesis, the reason that Earth time was measured in Kolob time was that the Earth was near Kolob. As a corollary, some Mormon writers argue that at the end times, the Earth will be plucked from the Solar System and returned to its original orbit near Kolob. LDS Church apostle Bruce R. McConkie came to a different conclusion, arguing that during the first "day" of creation (not necessarily a 1,000 year "day" in Kolob time, a "day" meaning a phase of creation), Earth was formed and placed in orbit around the Sun. The idea that the Earth was formed elsewhere and then migrated to orbit around the Sun does not accord with the scientific understanding of Earth's formation, which is that the Earth formed in orbit around the Sun about 4.5 billion years ago by accretion from a protoplanetary disk, and has remained near its original orbit until the present.

Several Mormon authors have attempted to situate Kolob within modern astronomy. Skousen speculated that Kolob is a star at the Galactic Center, Sagittarius A*, of our own galaxy. This view also had the support of several former general authorities of the LDS Church, including J. Reuben Clark and George Reynolds (with Janne M. Sjödahl). In the mid 19th century, early efforts to find a single "central sun" in the galaxy failed. Another Mormon author has hypothesized that Kolob exists outside the Milky Way at a place called the "metagalactic center", and that this galaxy and other galaxies rotate around it. Within mainstream astronomy, the idea of a metagalactic center was once assumed, but has been abandoned because on large scales, the expanding universe has no gravitational center. Another Mormon author has speculated that Kolob is Polaris.

In addition to the literal interpretation of Kolob as an actual heavenly body, the LDS Church has proposed that Kolob is also "a symbol of Jesus Christ", in that like Kolob, Jesus "governs" all the stars and planets similar to the Earth. A metaphorical interpretation suggests that Kolob may be construed as a metaphor for Jesus.

Some Mormon scholars have sought to link the Kolob doctrine to ancient astronomy. have sought to show that this astronomy is more consistent with ancient geocentrism than with 19th century Copernican and Newtonian astronomy, and thus carries with it the misconceptions of ancient astronomy. For example, in their interpretation, Kolob is the highest and slowest moving of a series of concentric heavenly spheres, which are centered on Earth. According to Fawn Brodie, Smith's idea of Kolob may have been derived from the "throne of God" idea found in Thomas Dick's The Philosophy of a Future State, which Brodie said Smith "had recently been reading" before dictating the Book of Abraham, and which "made a lasting impression" on him.

"If You Could Hie to Kolob" (hie, hurry) is a Latter day Saint hymn by early Mormon W. W. Phelps. The music is taken from a well known folk tune known as "Dives and Lazarus". It was originally published in 1842 in Times and Seasons and is hymn number 284 in the LDS Church's current hymnal.