19:5 · We do not know when the first Olympic Games were held in ancient Greece, but we do know that they took place many years earlier than the year 776 B.C. when one started to record the names of the winners. The games were a sort of combined worshipping and competition festival, held in honor of Zeus at the foot of the mountain of the gods, Olympus. Men competed with each other, first only in running a short distance, then successively in more athletic sports, and even horse racing. Poetry and music also had their place. The event was repeated every fourth year.
    These games ceased to be held sometime during antiquity, but in 1893 this old tradition was partly (no poetry and music) reestablished by Baron Pierre de Coubertin, and the first Olympic Games in modern times were held in Athens in 1896.
    The five circles are said to symbolize the five inhabited continents of the world. The number five is also related to the planet Venus (in astrology a symbol for the instinct to seek the company of other humans) and thereby to the four-year period between the games, the olympiades. Four years was the time between the return of Venus to the same point in the zodiac. For more details about Venus and the four-year period, see in Group 29.
    Compare with , the sign for married, and with , the sign representing the highest form of togetherness, the community of the Holy Trinity.