Quote:There are several reasons for this ordinance. The first is, that the Sun is the supreme symbol and representative of spiritual power in our worldX just as the physical rays of the Sun are in fact the source of light, warmth, health and energy. Giving a few moments of time at the two critical moments in the day, sunrise and sunset, to aligning oneself physically and mentally with this source, is thereby to stand in harmony with the currents of life and of well-being on every level. Furthermore, since the visible Sun is but the “created manifestation” of the Power to which in reality adoration is addressed, the habitual use of “solar adoration” builds up a real perception of the spiritual underlying the physical, the “Sun behind the Sun,” and thus establishes the student in a rapport with the spiritual world.

The significance of the “moments” of dawn and of sunset must not be underestimated. The Sun-sphere essentially signifies the Eternal made manifest in the transient moment. Those who honor Dawn and sunset, day after day, winter and summer, grow in awareness that though these phenomena are in a sense “always the same,” yet in another sense they are never twice alike: each new day each new evening produces a wonder ever new.

The following form of adoration, based upon the solar invocation of the Isha Upanishad, is currently employed by members of the A.S. At dawn and sunset, and is recommended to the student:

Salutation and praise unto thee, O life-enkindling Sun, child of Creation’s Lord! O thou lone all-seeing Eye of the vault celestial!—extend thy light that I may see, but dim thy glory that I be not blinded.
Unmask thy countenance, O God of Light: for I am a lover of Truth and I would behold the spiritual essence concealed by thy golden disk!
So reveal unto my perception thy shining and inmost nature, even that high spirit which infuses thee and is one with the primal flame of mine own being.
O life-enkindling Sun, child of Creation’s Lord: salutation and praise unto thee!