几个世纪以来，落日标志着斋月和赎罪日等节日的禁食仪式结束，这是在一整天的剥夺之后享用美味佳肴的暗示。但是，如果太阳的发条突然发生变化，就像乘坐国际空间站的宇航员一样，国际空间站以每小时
17,000 英里的速度绕地球旋转，每天为乘客提供 16 次日出和日落，该怎么办？
如果亿万富翁太空企业家（如埃隆·马斯克）提出的在太空生活和工作的数百万人的拟议未来能够实现，那将不仅仅是几个 NASA 宇航员在努力解决如何观察他们以太阳为中心的宗教习俗。
企业主贾里德·艾萨克曼 (Jared Isaacman) 于 9 月 15 日登上 SpaceX Crew Dragon 并成为第一个从美国本土飞往轨道的太空游客，他说，虽然他是犹太人，但他并不打算观察赎罪日。在他发射那天的日落时分开始。
“老实说，我实际上不是一个宗教人士，”他说，并承认他一直是新泽西州当地犹太教堂的捐助者。
但如果未来的太空游客选择在太空中观察赎罪日——一个禁食、忏悔和敬拜的日子——他们可能不得不解决深刻的神学问题。
在高超音速宇宙飞船的范围内观察宗教习俗的历史——无论多么笨拙——实际上已有数十年之久，并且充满了丰富的轶事。
太空中的宗教：一段历史
从太空飞行的早期开始，宇航员和宗教领袖就试图为外星追求注入精神意义。
在 1968 年美国宇航局的阿波罗 8 号任务期间，宇航员在绕月飞行的途中阅读了圣经的第一本书《创世纪》。在 1969 年第一次登月期间与尼尔·阿姆斯特朗在一起的巴兹·奥尔德林也悄悄地从鹰号登月器上接受了圣餐——喝了一口酒，咬了一口由他在休斯顿的长老会牧师祝福的面包——就在这些人开始之前人类踏上月球的第一步。
2007年，马来西亚宇航员Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor成为第一个留在国际空间站的穆斯林修行者，马来西亚伊斯兰国家法特瓦委员会甚至发布了特别指导方针，专门指导他和其他未来穆斯林宇航员的实践。虽然他的飞行恰逢斋月，但理事会表示，他的禁食可以推迟到他返回地球后，否则他可以根据他发射地点的时区进行禁食。他还免除了在祈祷时试图跪下的义务——这是零重力下的一项艰巨壮举。根据法特瓦委员会的指导方针，试图面对沙特阿拉伯的圣地麦加，正如穆斯林在萨拉赫或每日祈祷期间必须做到的那样，他只能尽最大努力。
犹太学者也提出了类似的想法。并非所有的犹太宇航员都试图遵守犹太人的安息日，即星期六的休息日，在此期间犹太人应该避免所有工作活动。但以色列宇航员伊兰·拉蒙在 2003 年确实尝试过，当时他乘坐航天飞机飞行任务，并按照“主要拉比专家”的建议，按照佛罗里达州卡纳维拉尔角的时间观察安息日，他是从那里出发的。推出。
在 20 岁的国际空间站上发生的其他宗教仪式包括一年一度的圣诞节庆祝活动和犹太节日逾越节和光明节——包括 1993 年令人难忘的一集，其中美国宇航局宇航员杰弗里霍夫曼广播自己在微重力下旋转陀螺国家电视台。
“这是一个小游戏——一个陀螺——它是你旋转的东西，然后你就会看到哪一方出现了。据此，你要么赢要么输，我只是想看看你如何重新解释太空飞行的规则因为没有上升或下降，”他对着镜头解释道。
至于犹太宇航员应该如何在太空中观察赎罪日的神学说法，还没有任何正式的指示——事实上——这引发了一些拉比和宗教学者之间的分歧。
几个世纪以来，当太阳和月亮不遵守大多数人熟悉的规范时，拉比们一直在努力解决如何庆祝适时假期的困境。耶路撒冷谢克特犹太研究所所长拉比大卫·戈林金 (David Golinkin) 于 2002 年写的一份答复或拉比对有关犹太法律问题的书面答复，其中包含了一些不同的论点。来自 18 世纪的拉比雅各布·埃姆登 (Jacob Emden) 自然不熟悉太空旅行，但他熟悉这样一个概念：距离地球的北极或南极如此之近，以至于旅行者可能几个月都看不到日落。他的决心是简单地计算“天”，就像人们在低纬度地区通常所做的那样，标记 24 小时的过去。来自 19 世纪的另一位拉比 Israel Lifshitz 表示，如果旅行者有一块显示其原点时间的手表，他们应该按照那个时间来庆祝假期。
但面对现代太空旅行的问题，戈林金写道，美国宇航局宇航员应该将手表设置在德克萨斯州休斯顿的美国中部时区，因为大多数美国宇航局宇航员都驻扎在那里。
（Inspiration4 船员将从佛罗里达州出发，据推测，如果定时宗教仪式对他们中的任何一个人来说是个问题，那么他们将坚持美国东部时区。）
另一方面，2007 年为犹太认证组织 Star-K 撰稿的 Rabbi Dovid Heber 只是说“理想情况下，人们不应前往外太空。”但是，“如果必须去”，有许多不同的选择可以满足宗教要求。然而，Heber 确实指出，理论上可以将应该是一天的假期延长到三天，这取决于航天器轨道的确切位置。
新泽西州亨特登的 Eli Kornfeld 表示，艾萨克曼支持的犹太教堂的拉比告诉美国有线电视新闻网，他同意戈林金的评估。如果有一天他生活在太空中，他仍然会根据地球时钟观察赎罪日的斋戒。不过，他补充说，在如此重要的犹太人纪念日期间，他可能会尽其所能避免进入太空。在赎罪日，犹太人不应该工作，通常避免使用电力、开车或乘坐飞机。
尽管如此，科恩菲尔德说，他承认，如果有一天，数百万人在太空中生活和工作，犹太信仰将随着环境而发展和适应。
“我认为犹太教最美丽的事情之一是它如何能够相关，并适应各种不断变化的技术、行业和发现，”他说。
How to practice religion could be a big question for some space tourists
For centuries, a setting sun has signaled the end of fasting rituals on holidays such as Ramadan and Yom Kippur, a cue to tuck into a delicious meal after a full day of deprivation. But what if the sun's clockwork were to suddenly change, as it does for astronauts riding aboard the International Space Station, which whips around the Earth at 17,000 miles per hour, giving passengers 16 sunrises and sunsets each day?
If the proposed future of millions of people living and working in space — as it has been proposed by the billionaire space entrepreneurs such as Elon Musk — comes to fruition, it'll be far more than just a few NASA astronauts grappling with how to observe their sun-centric religious practices.
Jared Isaacman, the business owner who on Sept. 15 climbed aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon and became the first space tourist to fly to orbit from US soil, said that, although he is Jewish, he didn't plan to observe Yom Kippur, which began at sundown the day of his launch.
"To be very honest, I'm actually not a religious person," he said, acknowledging that he has been a contributor to a local synagogue in New Jersey.
But if space tourists of the future choose to observe Yom Kippur — a day of fasting, repentance and worship — in space, they might have to grapple with deep theological questions.
The history of observing religious practices — however awkwardly — from the confines of a hypersonic spaceship is actually decades long and full of rich anecdotes.
Religion in space: A history
Astronauts and religious leaders attempted to imbue extraterrestrial pursuits with spiritual significance from the earliest days of spaceflight.
During NASA's Apollo 8 mission in 1968, the astronauts conducted a reading of Genesis, the first book of the Bible, on their way to orbit the moon. Buzz Aldrin, who was with Neil Armstrong during the first moon landing in 1969, also quietly took communion from the Eagle lunar lander — taking a sip of wine and a bite of bread blessed by his Presbyterian minister back in Houston — just before the men took humanity's first steps on the moon.
In 2007, Malaysian astronaut Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor became the first practicing Muslim to stay on the International Space Station, and the Islamic National Fatwa Council of Malaysia even issued special guidelines specifically to guide his and other future Muslim astronauts' practices. Though his flight coincided with Ramadan, the council said his fasting could be postponed until he returned to Earth or else he could fast in accordance with the time zone of the place he was launched. He was also relieved of the obligation to attempt to kneel while praying — a difficult feat in zero gravity. And attempting to face toward Mecca, the holy land in Saudi Arabia, as Muslims must during Salah, or daily prayer, was left up to his best abilities, per the Fatwa Council guidelines.
Jewish scholars have proposed similar ideas. Not all Jewish astronauts have attempted to observe Shabbat, the Jewish day of rest, which falls on Saturday, during which Jews are supposed to refrain from all work activity. But Israeli astronaut Ilan Ramon did attempt it in 2003, when he flew aboard a Space Shuttle mission and, in keeping with advice from "leading rabbinical experts," he observed Shabbat in accordance with Cape Canaveral, Florida time, the place from which he had launched.
Among the other religious observances that have taken place on board the 20-year-old ISS are annual Christmas celebrations and the Jewish holidays of Passover and Hanukkah — including a memorable 1993 episode in which NASA astronaut Jeffrey Hoffman broadcast himself spinning a dreidel in microgravity on national television.
"It's a little game — a dreidel — and it's something that you spin, and then you see which side comes up. And according to that, you either win or lose and I was just trying to see how you might reinterpret the rules for spaceflight since there's no up or down," he explained to the camera.
As far as what theology says about how Jewish astronauts should observe Yom Kippur in space, there have not been any formal directives and — in fact — it's sparked disagreements among some rabbis and religious scholars.
For centuries, rabbis have grappled with the dilemma of how to celebrate timely holidays when the sun and the moon aren't adhering to the norms that most humans are familiar with. A responsum, or a rabbi's written response to a question about Jewish law, from Rabbi David Golinkin, president of the Schechter Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem, written in 2002 goes through some of the various arguments. A rabbi from the 18th century, Jacob Emden, was naturally not familiar with space travel, however he was familiar with the concept of traveling so close to the Earth's North or South Pole that a traveler might not see a sunset for months. His resolution was to simply count "days" as one normally would at lower latitudes, by marking the passage of 24 hours. Another Rabbi from the 19th century, Israel Lifshitz, stated that if a traveler has a watch that shows the time at their point of origin, they should observe holidays according to that time.
But faced with the modern-day issue of space travel, Golinkin wrote that NASA astronauts should set their watches to the U.S. Central time zone of Houston, Texas, since that is where most NASA astronauts are based.
(The Inspiration4 crew is launching out of Florida, and presumably, if timed religious observance was an issue for any of them, they would then stick to the U.S. Eastern time zone.)
On the other hand, Rabbi Dovid Heber, writing for kosher certification organization Star-K in 2007, simply says that "ideally, one should not travel to outer space." But, "if one must go," there are a number of different options that would satisfy the religious requirements. Heber does note, however, that it is theoretically possible to stretch what should be a one-day holiday into three days, depending on exactly where the spacecraft's orbit lies.
The rabbi of the synagogue Isaacman has supported, Eli Kornfeld of Hunterdon, New Jersey, told CNN Business that he agrees with Golinkin's assessment. If he were one day living in space, he would still observe Yom Kippur fasts in accordance with Earth-based clocks. Though, he added, he would probably do everything in his power to avoid being in space during such an important Jewish observance. On Yom Kippur, Jews are not supposed work and typically avoid using electricity, driving cars or riding in airplanes.
Still, Kornfeld said, he acknowledged that if, one day, millions of people are living and working in space, the Jewish faith would evolve and adapt with the circumstances.
"I think one of the most beautiful things about Judaism — how it's able to be relevant, and to adapt to all sorts of changing technologies and industry and discoveries," he said.
