Threshing Floors and Solar Symbols

Alice C. Linsley

This ancient sun circle was used as a threshing floor.

In the ancient world, daily activities like cooking, sowing, harvesting, and threshing grain had religious significance. The threshing floor was at a high elevation where the wind could carry away the chaff. 

Threshing floors were associated with the sun and with solar cycles. They were used to determine times and seasons. A center post served to cast a shadow, on the same principle as a sundial. Some threshing floors, such as the one shown above, resemble solar images.

The threshing floor ("guran") was a sacred place at a high elevation. High places such as these were places of worship in the ancient world. The Jebusite ruler Araunah sold David a threshing floor upon which David constructed an altar.

In the Bible, divine encounters (theophanies) often occur at high places such as mountain tops or in the hill country. The Horite Hebrew of Edom were known to prefer the "hill country" (Gen. 14:6; Gen. 36). They grew their grain in the valleys below, but their threshing floors and granaries were at higher elevations.

There is some evidence that threshing floors were the sites of the hieros gamos or sacred marriage, during harvest times. Judah's intercourse with a shrine qadesh took place at Timna, which had a temple dedicated to Hathor. Timna was directly north of Abdullum in Jebusite territory. Judah went to Timna to visit with his friend from Abdullum and to help with the harvest. 

Among the Canaanite populations the hieros gamos may have represented a hope or expectation concerning the Divine Son. However, among the Hebrew devotees of God Father, God Son, and Hathor, the conception of the Divine Son did not involve sexual intercourse. Instead, a virgin of their ruler-priest caste was expected to conceive by solar overshadowing (Luke 1).

Hathor is shown on ancient monuments wearing the solar cradle: long cow horns in which the Sun rests as a sign of divine appointment. She was the patroness of the Horite Hebrew metal workers of Edom.

Hebrews 4:2 states that the message concerning the risen Lord was preached to the Apostles' ancestors. From this we may assume that Abraham and Moses shared the faith of their ancestors to whom God first revealed the "Proto-Gospel" concerning the Seed of God who would be born of the Horite ruler-priest lines. He was expected to pass through death to life and lead his people from the grave to eternal life. He is often called "the Bread of Life."

There is a connection between the sowing and harvesting of grain and the making of bread in solar circles. The most common solar symbol was the 6-prong symbol which is found to this day on Irish Maslin bread (shown here). 

Some Maslin loaves are decorated with an oak leaf on top. Maslin bread is the oldest known bread eaten by the Celts. It was the bread of common folks, containing a blend of wheat and rye flours. The rosette is a solar symbol, and it is found wherever the early Hebrew dispersed. 

On this traditional Serbia cake (shown right) the solar rosette is surrounded by oak leaves. Hesus (fulfilling the primitive Horus archetype) was crucified on an oak tree. The hope of his third-day resurrection was enacted by the sowing of grain in the fields. In antiquity, this annual ritual was overseen by Horite Hebrew priests who led the people in procession to the fields, much as Anglican priests officiate at Rogation Day ceremonies in late May.

Anglican priest blessing the fields in Hever, Kent

Among the Horite Hebrew, the seed that was sown spoke of the long-expected Righteous Ruler who would trample the serpent under his feet (Gen. 3:15). Jesus referred to himself as the "Seed" when he foretold his death in Jerusalem. He explained to his disciples, "Unless a seed fall into the ground and die, it cannot give life." (John 12:24)

The Apostle Paul makes a reference to the Seed also. Now to Abraham and his Seed were the promises made. He saith not, and to seeds, as of many; but as of one, and to thy Seed, which is Christ… And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise. (Galatians 3:16, 29)

The rosette on the Maslin bread and the Serbian cake is identical to the solar symbol found on the tombs and ossuaries of Hebrew. The symbol is associated with the hope of life after death or bodily resurrection.

Tomb at Banais, Israel

Ossuary of Miriam, daughter of the priest Yeshua

Related reading: Is It Possible to Speak of the Proto-Gospel?; Solar Imagery and the Proto-Gospel; Goran Pavlovic on Oaks; Horite and Sethite Mounds; Threshing Floors in Ancient Israel: Their Ritual and Symbolic Significance, by Jaime L. Waters, (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2015)