Looking directly into the sun, even for a few seconds, will destroy your retina. You would not immediately notice that damage. Your retina has no pain receptors. But the damage occurs. And it is permanent.
Sadly, many people discover this truth after trying to watch a solar eclipse through inadequate filters; sun glasses, photographic film, smoked glass, etc. In fact, the safest way to watch a solar eclipse is through reflection; not look directly at it, at all. The irony here is that it is perfectly safe to view a TOTAL ECLIPSE with the naked eye. It is the minutes before totality and those immediately after that hold the greatest threat to vision. In those minutes, many of us feel safe to look directly at the sun presuming enough of the harmful rays are blocked because the moon "covers" much of the sun.
One filter that DOES provide adequate protection for direct viewing of the eclipse before and after totality is "shade number 14 welder's glass." Have you ever looked at the glass in a Welder's helmet? At SN 14, the glass only transmits about 3 millionths of the visible light striking its surface. It is designed to protect the eyes of the wearer by keeping out all but the very brightest of lights, and it only allows a small amount of that through.
So, what do you see when you look at a Welder's helmet fitted with SN 14 glass? You see yourself. Yes, under certain circumstances you can see THROUGH it, but mostly you just see a very dark reflection of yourself and whatever is around you.
It makes me think of 1st Corinthians 13:12. I have always liked the rendering in the King James Version "For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known." (1 Corinthians 13:12 KJV)
Still, whether it is THROUGH a dark glass or into a dim mirror that we see, the effect is the same: an imperfect vision of reality.
The point of the 13th chapter of 1st Corinthians is this: we are to love, and we are not to allow ourselves to be distracted from that charge by ANYTHING. We all are curious to one degree or other about the great mysteries. What does the future hold? What follows death? Is there another age to come, and if so, what will it be like (and will I be there)? But we are not to know those answers just yet. And until that time, we are to be very actively engaged in faith, hope, and love.
As for me, I am happy to "see through a glass, darkly" as I sojourn here. Because, what's on the other side of that glass is very, very, very bright.
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http://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu
READINGS FOR THE COMING WEEK
Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany (February 3, 2013)
Jeremiah 1:4-10
Psalm 71:1-6
1st Corinthians 13:1-13
Luke 4:21-30
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