Vision of Ezekiel
Type: Hypothetical daylight disk and close encounters
Place: Middle East
Date: 14^th to 6^th Century Before The Common Era
Several passages in the Bible, particularly the Old Testament, have been seized on by some UFOlogists to support the theory that they are descriptions of sightings of or encounters with UFOs. Such interpretations, however, are a minority view.
Book of Exodus: Scholars date the Exodus at about the 14^th century BCE. In Exodus Ch 13, vs 21-22, as Moses leads the children of Israel out of Egypt toward Mount Sinai and the Promised Land "…the Lord went before them by day in a pillar of a cloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; to go by day and night". This, according to Brinsley le Poer Trench, is "a wonderful description of a modern flying saucer".
Second Book Of Kings: In Ch 2, the prophet Elijah - who lived around 900 BCE - crosses the River Jordan with his son Elisha; in verse 11, "it came to pass, as they still went on, and talked, that, behold, there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven." This is seen by some commentators as a description of the prophet being taken aboard a flying saucer.
Book of Ezekiel: This Hebrew prophet was a captive of Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, and was transported to Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) in 597BCE. On four occasions, he had visions that some writers think were of extraterrestrial spaceships. These are recounted in Chapters 1, 8, 10 and 43. The first description reads in part as follows: "A whirlwind came out of the north, a great cloud, and a fire infolding itself, and a brightness was about it, and out of the midst thereof as the colour of amber, out of the midst of the fire."
From this, Joseph F Blumrich, a senior executive at NASA's Marshall Spaceflight Center, reconstructed the "spacecraft" Ezekiel saw; according to Blumrich, it was an elaborate device like a quadruple helicopter.
Assessment: Of the pillars of cloud and fire in Exodus, Ronald Story notes that the Bible says that, when the Hebrews arrived at Mt Sinai, they found it "altogether in a smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire… and the whole mount quaked greatly" - which Story considers more likely to be a volcano than a UFO.
Elijah's translation to heaven by fiery chariot is, of course, purely symbolic. Many critics have pointed out that even before Ezekiel begins his account of the "UFO", he specifically states that "the heavens were opened, and I saw visions of God". In short, Ezekiel is describing mystical revelations, not material objects.

Source: UFO: The Complete Sightings Catalogue by Peter Brooksmith (Blitz Editions)

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