An ancient Gnostic reworking of Genesis (from which I will provide excerpts here) seems to provide an account of the origin of daylight saving’s time. Here’s the text (which in some places is fragmentary):
…Now Yaldabaoth had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed. And the Yaldabaoth made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the bush of beans of vigor and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Yaldabaoth took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. And the archons commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not brew the beans of the bush of vigor, for if you drink of it you will surely die.”
Yaldabaoth said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.” So he caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and closed up the place with flesh. Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. But this day was the start of daylight saving’s time, and the man slept for an hour less than he normally would have, and when he awoke his wound was still sore, and his pain caused him to become angry against Yaldabaoth and against the woman he had created. For the man was very grumpy in the morning, especially when he was deprived of an hour’s sleep for no good reason…
Now the serpent was more caffeinated than any of the wild animals Yaldabaoth had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden, and you must lose an hour of sleep every day’?”
The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, ‘You must not brew the fruit of the bush that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’ He also said, ‘You must set your clocks ahead one hour tonight.’ ”
“You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you drink of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be awake, able to stay up late into the night pondering good and evil, including the evil of daylight saving’s time, when you are deprived of sleep.”
When the woman saw that the fruit of the bush had a delightful aroma, and was also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and brewed it. She also gave a cup to her husband, who was with her, and he drank it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they had been deprived unfairly of an hour’s sleep, and would not get it back until half a year later. And so they went and tried to take an afternoon nap; but they could not, for the beverage they had drunk prevented them from sleeping.
When Yaldabaoth saw what had transpired, he said, “The man has now become like one of us, being able to stay awake forever. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of knowledge, and know good and evil.” So Yaldabaoth banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. After he drove the man out, he reminded them to set their clocks ahead one hour. And he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden a Starbucks, with expensive prices to guard the way to the beverage brewed from the fruit of the bush of vigor.
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