On April 8, a total solar eclipse will transverse the continental US, passing from the southwest California border with Mexico and crossing to the northwestern United States. While skeptics claim this astronomical phenomenon has no spiritual significance, others note that the last eclipse that transversed the United States ushered in a catastrophic hurricane season, the global COVID epidemic, the war in Ukraine, and the horrific Hamas attack on Israel. Such a series of events has led many to take note of the upcoming eclipse which takes place on the first day of Nisan, the first month of the Biblical calendar that also marks the beginning of the redemption from Egypt.

The total eclipse will pass over Mexico from the Pacific Ocean at around 11:07 AM PDT and continue over the United States, starting in the Southwest and moving northeast until it passes over the shore of the northeast U.S. in northern Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. The eclipse will exit continental North America on the Atlantic coast of Newfoundland, Canada, at 5:16 p.m. NDT.

A solar eclipse occurs when the moon passes between earth and the sun, thereby obscuring the image of the sun for a viewer on earth. A total solar eclipse occurs when the moon’s apparent diameter (as seen from earth) is larger than the sun’s, blocking all direct sunlight and turning day into darkness. As it happens, the moon will make the month’s closest approach to earth (just 223,000 miles) one day before the total solar eclipse, thereby appearing its largest on the day it crosses between the earth and the sun.Total eclipse occurs only in a narrow path across the earth’s surface, with the partial solar eclipse visible over a surrounding region thousands of miles wide.

It will be the first solar eclipse visible in the continental U.S. since Aug. 21, 2017, and the only total solar eclipse in the 21st century where the totality will be visible in Mexico, the United States and Canada. It will also be the last total solar eclipse visible in the contiguous United States for the next two decades – until Aug. 23, 2044.

Whereas the path of the 2017 eclipse crossed from the Pacific northwest to southern Florida, the upcoming solar eclipse will begin traversing the continent from the southwest of the US and end in the Northeast. The paths of the two eclipses form a transcontinental ‘X.’ In a strange coincidence, the only spot in the path of both eclipses, receiving a double-dose of this modern plague of darkness, and the point of the longest duration for both eclipses, is a particular part of southern Illinois, known appropriately enough as Little Egypt. The Egyptian connection is so strong that there are several cities in the area named for ancient Egyptian places like Karnak, Cairo, and Thebes.

The 2017 eclipse was also known as “the Seven Salem Eclipse” because the path of that eclipse crossed over seven U.S. locations named “Salem”:

-Salem, Oregon

-Salem, Idaho

-Salem, Wyoming

-Salem, Nebraska

-Salem, Missouri

-Salem, Kentucky

-Salem, South Carolina

Salem was the Biblical name for Jerusalem before King David made it his capital. Abraham visited Malkitzedek, the King of Salem (Genesis 14:18–20). The name Malkitzedek (My King Is Righteousness) hints at a belief in the God of Israel.

The path of the upcoming solar eclipse will cross over seven U.S. locations named “Nineveh”…

-Nineveh, Texas

-Nineveh, Missouri

-Nineveh, Indiana

-Nineveh, Ohio

-Nineveh, Pennsylvania

-Nineveh, Virginia

-Nineveh, New York

The eclipse will also cross over a location named “Nineveh” in the province of Nova Scotia in Canada.

It is interesting to note that a solar eclipse known as the Bur-Sagale eclipse took place on 15 June 763 BCE, passing over the Assyrian capital city of Nineveh in the middle of the reign of Jeroboam II, who ruled Israel from 786 to 746.  According to 2 Kings 14:25, the prophet Jonah lived and prophesied in Jeroboam’s reign. The biblical scholar Donald Wiseman has speculated that the eclipse took place around when Jonah arrived in Nineveh and urged the people to repent

As the son of the scion of the Mishkoltz Hasidic dynasty and a descendant of King David, Rabbi Yosef Berger circulates among many hidden righteous men and is privy to their thoughts. He emphasized that the eclipse will take place on the first day of the Hebrew month of Nisan, the month in which the Jews left Egypt.

“It is undeniable that we are on the verge of the Final Redemption,” Rabbi Berger said. “But most people either don’t understand what that means or deny the obvious. Nisan is the first month of the Biblical year. All of the kabbalists and hidden righteous men know that after the beginning of the Hebrew month of Nisan, the entire order of Creation will change in preparation for the final redemption. Seven years ago, people scoffed when they said this, but the world has gone through so much, changed so much in that time.”

Rabbi Berger noted the connection to Nineveh.

“Just as God sent Jonah to warn Nineveh, He is sending this eclipse as a warning to the nations,” Rabbi Berger said. “Just as the people of Nineveh had to repent in a set amount of time, the nations have a limited amount of time to perform acts of repentance.”

Towards this end, Rabbi Berger established a charity to give Pidyon Nefesh, a donation, that “redeems” the nefesh, or soul. The money becomes an exchange for the life of the person, since money and the nefesh are one aspect. 

“Just like the eclipse in 2017 ushered in the COVID epidemic, the war in Ukraine, and the horrific attack on Israel and the war on Hamas, this eclipse will mark the beginning of greater changes that will overturn the order of the world. But by the time people realize that the geula (redemption) is beginning, it will be too late.”

It should be remembered that the complete solar eclipse that transversed the continental United States in August 2017 ushered in the most devastating hurricane season in U.S. history. Four days after the eclipse, Hurricane Harvey made landfall on the Gulf Coast of Texas, the first major hurricane to do so in over a decade. The hurricane resulted in unprecedented flooding that prompted more than 13,000 rescues, displaced more than 30,000 people, and inundated hundreds of thousands of homes. At least 38 confirmed deaths were attributed to the hurricane and damages were estimated at up to $160 billion.

In the Bible, solar events are recorded as having a remarkable and sometimes supernatural significance. Control over the sun was demonstrated by God in the three-day Plague of Darkness, and is prophesied to be an essential part of the End Times. The Prophet Joel (2:31) predicted, “The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord.” The Prophet Amos makes a similar prediction: “And on that day – declares my God – I will make the sun set at noon, I will darken the earth on a sunny day.”

In giving rebuke to Hezekiah to inform him that he would die from his illness, the prophet Isaiah (13:9) wrote, “The stars and constellations of heaven shall not give off their light; The sun shall be dark when it rises, And the moon shall diffuse no glow.” As Isaiah predicted – and as much later calculated by NASA – on March 5 in 702 BC, the 16th year before Hezekiah’s death, a prominent solar eclipse appeared over the Middle East. Its path crossed the Arabian Peninsula and the obscuration of the sun over Israel was more than 60 percent.

In its discussion of eclipses, the Talmud (Sukkot 29a) specifically described solar eclipses as being a bad omen for the nations that base their calendars on the solar cycle. At the end of this section describing the omens contained within eclipses, the Talmud states a disclaimer: “When Israel does the will of the place (God), they have nothing to fear from all of this,” citing the Prophet Jeremiah as a source.

Thus said Hashem: Do not learn to go the way of the nations, And do not be dismayed by portents in the sky; Let the nations be dismayed by them! Jeremiah 10:2

The same source in the Talmud specifies that lunar eclipses are a bad omen for Israel since Israel is spiritually represented by the moon. If the lunar eclipse takes place in the east side of the heavens, then it is a bad omen for all the nations in the east, and similarly, if it occurs in the western hemisphere of the sky, it is a bad sign for all the nations in the west.

A solar eclipse can only occur because the sun and the moon appear to be the same in diameter as seen from the earth. This is due to a coincidence that is unique and has not been found anywhere else in the galaxy. Though the sun is about 400 times farther away than the moon, the sun is also about 400 times bigger. If the distances or sizes were different than they actually are, eclipses would not take place. 

The Talmud relates to this, explaining why the sun and the moon appear to be the same size. The Talmud (Hulin 60b) discusses the seeming contradiction in the verse describing the creation of the sun and the moon.

Hashem made the two great lights, the greater light to dominate the day and the lesser light to dominate the night, and the stars. Genesis 1:16

Though initially described in equal terms, the verse then noted the sun and the moon were not equal, with the sun being called the “greater light” and the moon the “lesser light”. The Talmud explains that when God created the sun and the moon they were equal in every manner, including size and intensity. The moon complained, saying, “Two kings cannot share one crown.” God agreed and made the moon shine less intensely, compensating the moon by commanding Israel to set the calendar by its cycles.

Jewish mysticism explains that this slight to the moon will be rectified at the end of days when the sun and the moon will be equal in both size and intensity.