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9

NUMBER

9

THE SEARCH FOR THE SIGMA CODE

Cecil Balmond

1998

Page 214

"THE NINETYNINE NAMES OF GOD"

 

THE DAILY MAIL

Monday August 18,2003

Front page headline

999

STORM

 

THE STAR MIRROR

THE COSMIC SYMMETRY OF HEAVEN AND EARTH

Mark Vidler

1

999

Page

99

THE MEASURE OF OSIRIS
STARRY CONSTELLATIONS


"The earliest extant account of the night sky was written by the Greek Aratus, in a poem called Phaenomena c.250 BC. His work became renowned in Greece and later in Rome, and, as R. H. Allen explains,

'His poem is now apparently our sole source of knowledge as to the arrangement of the early constellations, and has been closely fol- lowed as an indispensable guide... His sphere, probably identical with that of Eudoxus of a century previous, accurately represents the heavens of about 2000-2200 BC.'9
Earlier, Eudoxus (c.350 BC) had written an astronomical work, now lost, called The Mirror. In the light of the mirror between stars and mountains, one has to wonder what Eudoxus had in mind when he chose that par- ticular title.
It is said both Aratus and Eudoxus studied astronomy in Egypt. It was around the time of Eudoxus that the 12 zodiac signs were rendered at Denderah (in the Nile river kink).
Aratus says to his students of star lore, 'Look for signs upon signs.' He describes the sky as a beautiful tableau of surreal giants, kings, queens, birds, bears, lions, horses, dogs, goats, fish, serpents, a hare, a scorpion, a crab, a bull, a-dragon, a sea monster, a boat, a stream - and just one isosceles triangle, the constellation Triangulum.
Aratus also advises, 'Look for concurrence of three,' a geometric term referring to the meeting of three lines.
Although Triangulum is the only geometric shape officially named in a sky full of figurative images, Aratus does describe another geometric shape in the constellation of Pegasus the winged horse: the Great Square. He also says that all the constellations he describes were created 'at once', 'in primordial time'. This suggests that Triangulum and the Great Square in Pegasus were also seen geometrically by our earliest ancestors."

 

MIRROR

4+9+9+9+6+9

 

8 DENDERAH 59 41 5
6 ZODIAC 58 31 4
14 117 72 9
1+4 1+1+7 7+2
5 9 9 9


LINE NILE

 

THE STAR MIRROR

THE COSMIC SYMMETRY OF HEAVEN AND EARTH

Mark Vidler

1

999

STARS IN THEIR EYES

Page 4

The pattern of the three stars in Orion's Belt is almost identical to the layout of the three main Giza Pyramids. They are the mirror image of each other.

"Nothing like this had ever been considered before, but Bauval demon-strated the three large Giza pyramids provide a direct reflection of the stars of Orion's Belt.4 This astonishing discovery suggests the three mon-umental pyramids at Giza are symbols representing three specific bril-liant stars. In other words, the Giza builders were so enraptured by the sky and their god Osiris they attempted to provide a map of the central stars in Orion by using pyramids as symbols of stars.
It was already well known that the ancient Egyptians built numerous temples and pyramids pointing to the stars, but these alignments were horizontal, i.e. along the ground, pointing to the horizon. This form of research had been pioneered by Sir Norman Lockyer, whose classic work The Dawn of Astronomy (Macmillan, 1894) clearly shows that ancient monument builders were working on points and lines defined first in the sky, then back on the Earth.
The method employed by the ancient architects was extremely simple. Lockyer only had to follow the baseline of an ancient building to the horizon and there he would find the sun rising at the summer solstice, or ' a brilliant star rising, or a similar notable celestial event. Although some errors have been found in this early work, Lockyer (and Professor Nissan in Germany) discovered that the ancient Egyptians had used the horizon as a celestial marker and oriented their buildings according to a stellar lore. Lockyer had found a code in the stones.
 In 1894, when he first published his findings, the academic world was almost entirely unprepared to accept that any co-ordination existed / Page5 / between the temples of ancient Egypt and the sky; it just seemed too fan- tastic. Yet Lockyer was doing no more than following a straight line described on the ground by the ancient surveyors and architects, and he repeatedly discovered 'by alignment' our own brilliant sun at the solstices or the equinoxes, or other celestial alignments, including several to the star Sirius. In many cases (including the Giza pyramids), when the line described by the building was extended to the horizon it located a point due north or due south, due east or due west. Nevertheless, academics at the time dismissed Lockyer's findings as 'coincidence' or 'chance' or 'serendipity'. In fact he was ridiculed.
But Lockyer had really uncovered a form of antique communication in which the structure of a building could be used to define something greater, beyond the structure itself. His study suggested the ancient Egyptian pyramids and temples are akin to symbols in a mute and mis-understood astronomical language.
Since Lockyer's day an immense amount of work has been conducted in this field. Now, all over the world, ancient structures are yielding their stellar secrets. There is little doubt that ancient monument builders from Egypt, England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, France, Germany, Iran, Iraq, the Lebanon, Israel, Turkey, Tibet, China, India, the USA, Mexico, Peru, Cambodia and many other locations were all primarily concerned with astronomical phenomena when they designed and built their monumen-tal structures.
In all cases it appears these diverse ancient cultures were preoccupied with the sky for a good reason. This book is written in pursuit of that reason."

11 SERENDIPITY 144 63 9
6 CHANCE 34 25 7
11 COINCIDENCE 84 57 3

Page 37

"Figure 27: Orion's Belt isosceles triangle diagram omitted

"Then the penny dropped.
The three stars in Orion's Belt also form an isosceles triangle.
It was a remarkable moment. Quite suddenly the complex nature of these star spotlights became apparent. This was coincidence, but it was a pre-planned coincidence. The pyramid was definitely locating bright stars grouped in isosceles triangles in 2450 BC.
Naturally I continued investigating each one of the brilliant stars spot- lighted from the Great Pyramid. I needed to ascertain whether any of the other 11 spotlights had also located a cluster of three bright stars in an isosceles triangle.
The process adopted for finding the brightest stars is very simply achieved using modern computer systems. By setting a magnitude limit on the computer, one effectively lifts the veil of background stars, thus revealing the pattern created by only the very brightest stars in one area of the sky. The arrangement of these stars can then be checked in the star atlas. Imagine a dark blanket has been thrown over the sky and only the very brightest lights can penetrate it.
Using this method, I followed the next spotlight to the star Gacrux, in the little constellation Crux:"

 

7 ORIONIS 99 45 9
6

OSIRIS

 89 35 8
5 ORION 71 35 8
6 ORIGIN 72 45 9

Page 51

ON TOP OF THE WORLD

MEASURE FOR MEASURE


"Very gradually I began to realize that the pyramids are actually vehicles carrying information. In many respects the Great Pyramid is like a book. The ancient designers have written a message in it, yet we can only read it once we are released from late twentieth-century historical dogma. In other words, we need to forget the common image of Cheops, a dumb, despotic Pharaoh,6 commissioning such a structure for his own glorifica-tion. Once the pyramid is understood as a complex astronomical device, such an idea appears unlikely. Cheops, who 'was not religious' according to his grandson, and who 'closed the temple',7 is hardly likely to have created the largest astronomical monument on Earth, far less have the inclination to align it 11 times with isosceles triangles of neighbouring stars precisely when Capella passes over Egypt's highest mountain.
After two years of research I had accumulated sufficient information to convince myself that the Pharaoh Cheops described by Egyptologists played but a small part in the design of the Great Pyramid (if he played any part at all). The sophisticated series of astronomical alignments show that the Egyptians were defining the sky on the meridian with far greater accuracy than the Greeks at the time of Ptolomy, nearly 3,000 years later.
The reason why I have attempted to illustrate the highly sophisticated nature of the astronomical design of the Great Pyramid very early in this , book is because the 11 astronomical 'spotlights' from the Great Pyramid ultimately reveal an. extremely profound relationship between Earth and sky. However, if we, remain irretrievably attached to the belief that no sci-entific sophistication could possibly have existed on Earth over 5,000 years ago, then the information that follows will make little sense.
There is now ample evidence indicating the presence of a sophisti-cated global understanding in prehistory. The pyramid shape, for exa-mple, is repeatedly found In ancient architecture around the world - In Africa, South America, North America and Asia, as well as the Middle East. The Sumerians, Egyptians and Olmecs built pyramid shapes. So / Page 52 / did the Incas, the Aztecs and the Mayans. Silbury Hill in England is a' stone pyramid covered with earth. Antique pyramid shapes are found at
Cahokia in Illinois, USA (see plate 8 omitted), and a truly massive rash of pyra-mids lies across the Pyramid Fields near Xi'an in China (see plate 9 omitted). Isn't the pyramid an unusual shape - almost useless as a functional building, highly laborious to create and requiring stringent standards of engineer-ing? Yet the common view of ancient history is that these disparate cul-tures, despite their isolation and their ignorance of each other, all became dedicated to the construction of similarly shaped, near useless; gigantic buildings. Is it rational to suggest the buildings have the same unlikely shape by chance?
Without exception these global pyramids were laboriously con- structed from earth, clay bricks or solid stone and their interiors are entirely inhospitable. They were built as immutable mountains; they were built to function in the long term, to survive millennia, to provide a record. The pyramids of the world are parts of a whole, but to read their collective record requires a paradigm shift.
Until Robert Bauval made his discovery, the equation 'stars are moun-tains' had been sitting unrecognized on the Giza plateau for millennia. The scientific knowledge achieved in the past is manifest in dramatically clear geometry and in astronomy, but current dogma so often prevents the correct interpretation being made."

Legominisms
'A certain possibility is introduced from a realm where the impossi-ble doesn't exist. It is something new which doesn't belong to the cause and effect of this world, and therefore changes the entire situ-ation. The doing of this and how it is done is unseen; but, in gen- eral, it is then necessary that something should be seen, manifested, so that the particular new thing should be able to operate in the visible world among people with ordinary perceptions.'9"

 

11

 LEGOMINISMS 135 54 9
LEGO 39 21 3
MIN 36 18 9
ISMS 60 15 6

Page 53
And it's a relief to know this near fantastic form of communication can be described more succinctly as follows:

'...legominism; i.e. a symbol that somehow encapsulates the mean-ing of what it is that is to be conveyed to the future.'10
But is there really anything here to be 'conveyed to the future'? Are the pyramids really symbols in an immutable language? Why should we believe such a thing?

Love and the Stars

There is almost boundless evidence in the written words, in the murals  and in the architecture of ancient Egypt showing how the ancient  Egyptians loved the sky with great passion. In my opinion this was a very real love, a very religious love and a profoundly moving love. It literally .. created the power to move mountains in a manner never witnessed before or since.
The love of a god is perhaps the greatest love of all. Those who feel this love build great churches and cathedrals, great mosques and temples, often with huge domes or spires. This is exactly what happened in early Egypt. The pure love of the star gods was very potent in those days.
Each large ancient Egyptian pyramid has a temple at the base; a pyra-mid is a religious and stellar monument at one and the same time. At Giza the god Osiris in Heaven is immortalized in the pattern of the three pyramids on Earth. This symbolism demonstrates the love of Earth and sky united. Nut and Geb are together. forever. Osiris is immutably recre-ated on the Earth. Osiris is wanted forever, for eternity.
But this love was not based on whimsy. The ancients were aware of something. Their monuments have purpose, they communicate an ancient faith and they use geometry as a means of expression.
In order to define the precise time in history when a single star passes exactly over a mountain summit a very detailed understanding of both / Page 54 / the celestial and terrestrial spheres is required. So, in allowing myself to believe that the alignment of Capella over Mt Katherine was a known event synchronized with the arrival of Melkalanin over Giza, I had to attribute the Giza designers with knowledge akin to our own. This para-digm shift is the essential ingredient in our study, but it is so difficult to procure from present day culture. Perhaps I have dwelt too long on this single issue, but I am trying to emphasize that some vital aspect of our ancient history is missing. There is empirical scientific evidence that our ancestors understood the globe of stars and the globe of the Earth in uncanny detail. But the evidence is not written down... it is older than writing. The communication is geometric and it is highly sophisticated. It requires our own levels of sophistication to understand it - and this is at the heart of the challenge."

 

9 GEOMANCER 81

45

 9
8 GEOMETRY 108 45 9
10 GEOCENTRIC 99 54 9
7 SPHERES 90 36 9

 

LOOKING FOR CLUES

Page 54
"The first place to investigate the formal use of ancient geometry on Earth is perhaps the Giza plateau itself. Here at Giza there are three vast pyra-mids that together (in plan view) form an isosceles triangle. But a single natural high point overlooks the pyramids. The relationship between the nat-ural high point and the pyramids is strictly geometric, forming an equlateral tri-angle (see Figure 36). So the three man-made high points are integrated by geometry into the local topography. '
The use of high points appears to be significant:

a. The stars are high points.

b. The local peak is a high point.

 c. The pyramids are high points.

The isosceles and equilateral geometry linking all these high points cre-ates a literal pun realized in physical form. Many historians attest to the fact that this form of punning was well used by the ancients in literature.

Page55

"But Giza is located at the apex of a vast river delta (the Greek Triangle), so once again the isosceles symbolism spreads naturally from the equilateral triangle on the Giza plateau over the surrounding land.
Looking at the Nile Delta, I began to wonder if the 'high point' was t symbolized by more than just a mountain or pyramid peak. The posi-tioning of the Great Pyramid at the apex of the Nile Delta suggested the terrestrial geometry employed by the Giza designers extended to other forms of point. I became drawn into a closer study of the topography of Egypt in general."

 

THE STAR MIRROR

THE COSMIC SYMMETRY OF HEAVEN AND EARTH

Mark Vidler

1

999

Page 95

MYTH, SYMBOLS AND REALITY

"Imagine you are living several thousand years in the future. You are an archaeologist, and you visit a long deserted and eroded part of the world called the Isle of Wight, just off the southern coast of Britain.
On the island you are fortunate enough to discover the remains of an old stone building created in the shape of a cross and from within the ruins you recover a .tong-lost relic called the Bible, which tells the story of a man from God who was killed on a cross. Searching around the site, beneath some rubble you discover the worm-eaten remains of a large wooden cross!
With this discovery is it now wise for you to return home and declare to your colleagues that you have recovered the cross upon which Jesus Christ was crucified? Or should you consider the cross as a symbol of something, rather than a functional object?
Is it not time to consider that some of the pyramids' vacant coffers had no part in death but were in fact symbols designed to signify the eternal life of Osiris? After all, the ancient Egyptians were obsessed with / Page 96 / eternal life and the Hollywood image of an empty coffin symbolizes the 'undead' state of Count Dracula even today.
Symbols of immortality were traditionally placed within or beneath a temple spire and the empty coffer, the deserted tomb, appears in every single one of the large Old Kingdom pyramids penetrated by Dr Edwards.
Nobody is dead. Osiris has defeated death. That was the faith of ancient Egypt.

Dealing with the Undead


So Osiris never really died as far as the ancient Egyptians were con-cerned, he lives to this day and beyond. He had a mortal form, but he became immortal. Yet how did he meet his mortal end?
Ancient myths tell us how the lord Osiris was tricked and murdered by his brother Set in a very unusual fashion. Set was jealous of Osiris, so he 'took the measure of Osiris' and built a special coffer to precisely agree with his brother's dimensions, then he tricked Osiris into lying down inside the carefully made coffer. Set and his cronies immediately slammed down the lid, sealed it up, took the coffer down to the Nile and threw it in..
It was a terrible way for Osiris to die. But all was not lost. The love, faith and divine powers of his wife Isis finally led to the recovery  of the coffer, whereupon:
Osiris was released from the coffer that killed him. He left the coffer empty and became immortal.
Isn't it appropriate that the pyramids of Osiris should contain the symbol of his resurrection?"

Figure 54: (omitted) Osiris in judgement
Moreover, the Great Pyramid itself reflects part of the image of Osiris in Heaven, as well as containing an empty coffer symbolizing the god's immortality. Has this pyramid therefore been waiting for 'the Eternal Return of Osiris' at:Orion's high point?
In his immortalized form the god Osiris became the judge of the dead, but it is still far from clear when the judgement is supposed to take place.

Judging the Dead


An illustration from a New Kingdom papyrus shows Osiris watching a human heart being weighed against a feather (see Figure 54). Osiris as judge of the dead uses the traditional balance to make his judgement and he always sits on a square throne in these scenes.
Osiris is in fact a very geometric god. His stars are ordered in right angles and isosceles triangles (see Figure 55 on page 98 for the right angle in Orion) (figure omitted), while on the ground his temples are built from squares rising to the central apex of four isosceles walls.

Page 98
I hope the edges of this argument are now pulling together. There are good reasons for recognizing the pyramids as symbols of eternal life and eternal light. They are stars and they are mountains, and they conform to the geometry of Osiris, and these stars appear to live forever."

  

4 HARE 32 23 5
5 KRSNA 63 18 9
4 HARE 32 23 5
5 KRSNA 63 18 9
5 KRSNA 63 18 9
5 KRSNA 63 18 9
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 RAMA 33 15 6
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 RAMA 33 15 6
4 RAMA 33 15 6
4 RAMA 33 15 6
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 MAHA 23 14 5
6 MANTRA 67 22 4
10 90 36 9

 

4 HARE 32 23 5
5 KRSNA 63 18 9
4 HARE 32 23 5
5 KRSNA 63 18 9
5 KRSNA 63 18 9
5 KRSNA 63 18 9
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 RAMA 33 15 6
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 RAMA 33 15 6
4 RAMA 33 15 6
4 RAMA 33 15 6
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 HARE 32 23 5
640 316 100
6+4+0 3+1+6 1+0+0
10 10
1+0 1+0
1 1 1

 

5 KRSNA 63 18 9
5 KRSNA 63 18 9
5 KRSNA 63 18 9
5 KRSNA 63 18 9

 

4 RAMA 33 15 6
4 RAMA 33 15 6
4 RAMA 33 15 6
4 RAMA 33 15 6

 

4 HARE 32 23 5
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 HARE 32 23 5
4 HARE 32 23 5

 

HARE occurs x 8
KRSNA occurs x 4
RAMA occurs x 4
16

 

H = 8
K = 11
R = 18
37

 

13 H A R E K R S N A R A M A
8 1 18 5 11 18 19 14 1 18 1 13 1 + = 128 1+2+8 = 11 1+1 = 2
8 1 9 5 2 9 1 5 1 9 1 4 1 + = 56 5+6 = 11 1+1 = 2 TWO 2
1 1 1 1 1 + = 5 5
2 + = 2 2
4 + = 4 4
5 5 + = 10 1+0 = 1
8 + = 8 8
9 9 9 + = 27 2+7 = 9
H A R E K R S N A R A M A

 

6 NUMBER 73 28 1
7 NUMBERS 92 29 2
5 COUNT 73 19 1
9 COUNTLESS 128 29 2

 

5 COUNT 73 19 1
6 NUMBER 73 28 1

 

SRI KRISHNA 126 54 9
SRI 46 19 1
SHRI 54 27 9
SHREE 55 28 1

 

KRSNA 63 18 9
KRISHNA 80 35 8
GAURANGA 70 34 7

 

SIVA 57 15 6
SHIVA 59 23 5

 

7 PROTONS 117 36 9
7 PHOTONS 107 35 8

 

5 SOUND 73 19 1
9 VIBRATION 110 47 2
5 NOISE 62 26 8

 

5 SOUND 73 19 1
5 NOISE 62 26 8
135 45 9
1+3+5 4+5
9 9 9

 

PHOTELECTRIC 134 62 8
EFFECT 45 27 9

 

KINETICS 90 36 9
KINETIC 71 35 8
ENERGIES 82 46 1
153 81 9
1+5+3 8+1
9 9 9

 

X RAYS 87 24 6
RAYS 63 18 9

 

7 NEUTRAL 91 28 1
8 NEUTRONS 126 36 9
8 NEUTRINOS 135 36 9
9 CHRYSALIS 114 42 6
7 CRYSTAL 98 26 8
8 CRYSTALS 117 27 9

 

7 HARMONY 94 40 4
3 HOW 46 19 1
4 MANY 53 17 8

 

11 ABRACADABRA 52 34 7

 

11 CATASTROPHE 126 45 9
5 CHAOS 46 19 1
4 CHAO 27 18 9
7 CHAOTIC 59 32 5

 

9 ABORIGINE 80 53 9
10 ABORIGINES 99 54 9
10 ABORIGINAL 88 52 7

 

ABYSS 66 12 3
CHASM 44 17 8

 

ABRAHAM MAN 72 36 9

 

ABBOT 40 13 4
ABBEY 35 17 8

 

ALMA MATER 84 30 3
ALMA 27 9 9
MATER 57 21 3

 

APOSTASY 116 26 8

 

APOTHEOSIS 127 46 1

 

APOTROPAIC 114 51 6

 

DIE 18 18 9
DIETY 63 27 9
DEIFICATION 95 59 5
DEIFY 49 31 4
DEISM 50 23 5

 

DEJA VU 63 18 9

 

HUMAN BEING 94 49 4
HUMAN 57 21 3
BE 7 7 7
IN 23 14 5
GOD 26 17 8

 

7 CYCLOPS 93 30 3

 

CYCLOPS
1 C 3 3 3
1 Y 25 7 7
1 C 3 3 3
4 LOPS 62 17 8

 

7 MERCURY 103 40 4
5 QUICK 61 34 7
6 SILVER 85 31 4

 

10 PRIMORDIAL 115 61 7
5 POINT 74 29 2
15 189 90 9
1+5 1+8+9 9+0
18
1+8
6 9 9 9

 

5 VOICE 54 27 9
2 OF 21 6 6
3 THE 33 15 6
5 LOGOS 68 23 5

 

SPHERES 90 36 9
CRYSTALS 117 27 9

 

ARAMAIC 46 28 1

 

A 1 1 1
RAMA 33 15 6
I 9 9 9
C 3 3 3

 

3 SIN 42 15 6
4 SINS 61 16 7
6 SINNER 79 34 7
6 SORROW
3 SEE 29 11 2
5 INNER 60 33 6

 

DEAREST 72 27 9

 

SINNER 79 34 7
SEES 48 12 3
INNER 60 33 6
108 45 9
1+0+8 4+5
9 9 9

 

3 THE 33 15 6
5 MINDS 59 23 5
3 EYE 35 17 8

 

3 THE 33 15 6
4 MIND 40 22 4
7 73 37 10
7+3 3+7 1+0
10 10
1+0 1+0
7 1 1 1

 

I 9 9 9
EYE 35 17 8
EYES 54 18 9

 

ISLAM 54 18 9
ISLAMIC 66 30 3

 

2 IS 28 10 1
6 LAMECH 42 24 6
1 I 9 9 9
1 C 3 3 3

 

5 SEDNA 43 16 7
5 ANDES 43 16 7
9 VIRACOCHA 80 44 8
8 KUKULKAN 102 21 3
12 QUETZALCOATL 153 45 9

 

KALKI 44 17 8
VISHNU 93 30 3

 

THING 58 31 4
NIGHT 58 31 4

 

NIGHT 58 31 4
NO LIGHT 85 40 4

 

SIVA 57 15 6
SHIVA 59 23 5
KRISHNA 80 35 8
KALKI 44 17 8
BRAHMA 43 25 7

 

SRI KRISHNA 126 54 9
SRI 46 19 1
KRISHNA 80 35 8
KRSNA 63 18 9

 

9 PATANJALI 84 30 3

 

THE STAR MIRROR

THE COSMIC SYMMETRY OF HEAVEN AND EARTH

Mark Vidler

1

999

 

THE STAR MIRROR
THE LAST WORD

"Page 276
'True without deceit, certain and most true.
What is below is like what is above and what is above is like what is below, for the performing of the marvels of the one thing.'18

"In this book I have been discussing something I have failed to under-stand myself. I cannot see how the position of any particular star over the Earth can have any bearing on the Earth. There is no apparent physi-cal connection between mountains and starlight other than light itself. Despite this there is clearly a numerical connection between the bright-est stars and the highest mountains, and these numbers (defining the par- allels on the spheres) do illustrate a straightforward equation where the parallel defined by the brilliant star persistently equates with the parallel of a predominant mountain. The highest mountains therefore 'mirror' the brightest stars in a manner certainly not to be expected from a truly random process, but this has proved hard to illustrate in a book because of the scales involved.
The reader may imagine that by following any chosen parallel on Earth they will encounter a world-dominating summit, but this is cer- tainly not the case when the Earth parallel you are following is but a frac-tion of a degree in width. It is possible to prove this by choosing at random a series of ten parallel bands each with a width of 0.2ç. If you arbitrarily define these ten Earth parallels at intervals on a map of Asia,
the odds of chance are set against one of your chosen parallels locating, Mt Everest. Thus, to define a world-order summit with each one of your randomly selected parallels would be passing strange.
Yet, as we have seen, when the brilliant Duat stars are employed to define the narrow parallels, each one matches the location of a world- order summit. An emphatic link therefore exists between the brightest Duat stars and the highest points on half the Earth; a series of numerical equations that cannot readily be attributed to serendipity. None the less I am at a loss to describe this union between Heaven and Earth without / Page 277 / a symbol for divinity appearing in the equation itself, and no such symbol exists in modem science.
So perhaps the most successful way to communicate this enduring faith intellectually is, after all, to build a great mountain under a brilliant star."

 

4 ATUM 1 2 3 4 + = 10 = 1
4 ATOM 1 2 6 4 + = 13 = 4
8 2 4 9 8 23 5

 

 

WHY SMASH ATOMS

A. K. Salomon 1940

"ONCE THE FAIRY TALE HERO HAS PENETRATED THE RING OF FIRE ROUND THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN HE IS FREE TO WOO THE HEROINE IN HER CASTLE ON THE MOUNTAIN TOP"

 

PARADISE PARADE EYES PARADE I's

 

M INE N INE

M+N=27 2+7 = 9

SAINT = 63 6+3 = 9 LUKE = 49 9+4 = 13 1+3 = 4

THIRTEEN = 99

SAINT = 63 6+3 = 9 MATTHEW = 90

 

THE HOLY BIBLE

Scofield Reference

SAINT LUKE

C 23 V 33

AND WHEN THEY WERE COME TO THE PLACE WHICH IS CALLED CALVARY THERE THEY CRUCIFIED HIM AND THE MALEFACTORS ONE ON THE RIGHT HAND AND THE OTHER ON THE LEFT

44

AND IT WAS ABOUT THE SIXTH HOUR AND THERE WAS A DARKNESS OVER ALL THE EARTH UNTIL THE NINTH HOUR

45

AND THE SUN WAS DARKENED AND THE VEIL OF THE TEMPLE WAS RENT IN THE MIDST

 

C 24 V 8

AND THEY REMEMBERED HIS WORDS

9

AND RETURNED FROM THE SEPULCHRE AND TOLD ALL THESE THINGS UNTO THE ELEVEN AND ALL THE REST


SAINT MATTHEW

C 27 V 45

NOW FROM THE SIXTH HOUR THERE WAS DARKNESS OVER ALL THE LAND UNTO THE NINTH HOURAND ABOUT THE NINTH HOUR JESUS CRIED WITH A LOUD VOICE SAYING ELI ELI LAMA SABACHTHANI THAT IS TO SAY MY GOD MY GOD WHY HAST THOU FORSAKEN ME

Page 465/6

 THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN

"They talked of "humanity," of nobility - but it was / the spirit alone that distinguished man, as a creature largely divorced from nature, largely opposed to her in feeling, from all other forms of organic life. In man's spirit, then, resided his true nobility and his merit - in his state of disease, as it were; in a word, the more ailing he was, by so much was he the more man. The genius of disease was more human than the genius of health. How, then, could one who posed as the friend of man shut his eyes to these fundamental truths concerning man's hiumanity? Herr Set- tembrini had progress ever on his lips: was he aware that all prog-ress, in so far as there was such a thing, was due to illness, and to illness alone? In other words, to genius, which was the same thing? Had not the normal, since time was, lived on the achievements of the abnormal? Men consciously and voluntarily descended into disease and madness, in search of knowledge which, acquired by fanaticism, would lead back to health; after the possession and use of it had ceased to be conditioned by that heroic and abnormal act of sacrifice. That was the true death on the cross, the true Atone-ment.

AT ONE MENT

 

THE TIBETAN BOOK OF THE GREAT LIBERATION

OR THE METHOD OF KNOWING NIRVANA THROUGH KNOWING THE MIND

Edited by W. Y. Evans-Wentz commentary by C. G. Young 1954

Page 222

THE SEEING OF REALITY

THE YOGA OF KNOWING THE MIND,
[THE DOCTRINE OF THE THREE TIMES]


"The essence of the doctrine concerning the Three Times in at-one-ment will now be expounded.
The yoga concerning past and future not being practised, memory of the past remains latent.1
The future, not being welcomed, is completely severed by the mind from the present.
The present, not being fixable, remains in the state of the Voidness.2

[THE YOGA OF THE NIRVANIC PATH]


There being no thing upon which to meditate, no medita- tion is there -whatsoever.
There being no thing to go astray, no going astray is there, if one be guided by memory.3
Without meditating, without going astray, look into the True State, wherein self-cognition, self-knowledge, self-illu-mination shine resplendently. These, so shining, are called 'The Bodhisattvic Mind '.4

 / Page 223

In the Realm of Wisdom, transcendent over all meditation, naturally illuminative, where there is no going astray, the vacuous concepts,1 the self-liberation, and the primordial Voidness are of the Dharma-Kaya.
Without realization of this, the Goal of the Nirva':£ic Path is unattainable.
Simultaneously with its realization the Vajra-Sattva state is realized,
These teachings are exhaustive of all knowl.edge,3 exceed- ingly deep, and immeasurable...."

Page 222

"1. Or, literally, 'is relinquished'.
2. As has been set forth above, on pp. 7-9, 2103, mind, in its true nature, takes no cognizance of sangsaric time, and is, therefore, as timeless as it is conditionless. By not practising the yoga of introspection whereby, as in modern psycho-analysis, all memories of past experiences are recoverable when brought under the purview of the present, latent memories remain latent, the past remains separated from the present. By not welcoming the future, or by ignorantly regarding it as not being realizable in the present, it is hidden, or cut off, from the present. And the present, being sangsarically unstable, is perceived by man as a constant flux of instability, or as an ever-moving point separating past from future.:. The present, and its two companion sangsaric concepts, the past and the future, are, in the primor-dial, unmodified, non-created state of the Voidness, realized by the master of this yoga to be homogeneous, or undifferentiated timelessness. To realize time per se is to realize the unpredicable at-one-ment of the Three Times.
3.For countless aeons the microcosmic mind has been wandering in the' Sangsara and experiencing existence. Therefore, if the memories of the past be recovered by successful application of the yoga of introspection, they will be found to constitute invaluable stores of Wisdom, born of experiences during other ages and lifetimes when one had entered upon and trodden the Path, and adequate to guide and prevent one from going astray now.
4 'The Bodhisattvic Mind' is a symbolic term signifying the supernormally enlightened mind of one who, being a candidate for the complete enlighten- ment of Buddhahood, had taken the vow of a Bodhisattva (' Enlightened

Page 223
"Although they are to be contemplated in a variety of ways, to this Mind of self-cognition and self-originated Wisdom;
Being'), not to relinquish sangsaric existence, by entering into Nirvana, until all Ignorance has been transmuted into Divine Wisdom. In language which is astonishingly similar, Plotinus teaches of this same Divine Illu-mination, which he himself realized and of which he thus has right to speak: 'When one shall see the divine resplendence of virtue within onself; when one shall dwell within oneself wholly; when one shall cease to meet within oneself any obstacle to unity; when nothing foreign any longer altereth, by its admixture, the simplicity of thine inner essence; when within thy whole being thou shall be a veritable light, immeasurable, uncircumscribed, unin- creasable, infinite, and entirely incommensurable because transcendent over all measure and quantity; when thou shalt have become such, then, having become sight itself, thou mayst have confidence in thyself, for thou wilt no longer have need of a guide. Thereupon, thou must discern with great care. for only by means of the eye that will then open itself within thee shalt thou be able to perceive the Supreme Beauty. To obtain this vision of the beauti- ful and of the divineness within, one must begin by rendering oneself beautiful and divine' (I. vi. 9).
I All concepts, as our text later teaches, are in their essentiality vacuous. In the True State, as'in the Platonic realm of ideas, concepts per se are devoid of form or sangsaric content. Being of the Voidness, they are, as the unshaped, unformed, non-created, the supra-sang-saric unpredictable seed of thought of the Supra-sangsaric Mind, whence they are sown through-out space to produce shaped, formed, sangsaric universes of illusory appearances.
Vajra-Sattva (' Immutable Being'), the Sainbhoga-Kaya reftex of Akshlob- hya, the Dhyani Buddha presiding over the Eastern Realm of Pre-eminent Happiness, is a personification of vast esoteric significance in the Mahayana. (See The Tibetan Book of the Dead, pp. 9n 108 10,}Vajra-Sattva is sometimes conceived as being equivalent to the Adi (or Primordial)-Buddha, and he then symbolizes the Dharma-Kaya. Accordingly; realization of this state. when He is in this aspect, is equivalent to the realization of Perfect Buddha- hood, or Nirvana.
3 Text: mthah-drug (pron. tha-trug) , literally, 'six directions', namely, the four cardinal points; the zenith and nadir; here taken in a figurative sense as implying completeness, or exhaustion, of all knowledge.

AT ONE MENTALLY

Bondage and Liberation

I: BONDAGE

Upon Ignorance dependeth karma;

Upon karma dependeth consciousness;

Upon consciousness depend name and form;

Upon name arid form depend the six organs of sense;

Upon the six organs of sense dependeth contact;

Upon contact dependeth sensation;

Upon sensation dependeth desire; ":

Upon desire dependeth attachnient;

Upon attachment dependeth existence;

Upon existence dependeth birth;

Upon birth depend old age and death, sorrow, lamenta-tion, misery, grief, and despair.

Thus doth this entire aggregation of misery arise.


II: LIBERATION


But upon the complete fading out and cessation of Ignorance ceaseth karma;

Upon the cessation of karma ceaseth consciousness;

Upon the cessation of consciousness cease name and 'form;

Upon the cessation of name and form cease the six organs of sense;

Upon the cessation of the six organs of sense ceaseth contact;

Upon the cessation ofcc;>ntact ceaseth sensation;

Upon the cessation of sensation ceaseth desire;

Upon the cessation of desire ceaseth attachment;

Upon the cessation of attachment. ceaseth existence;

Upon the cessation of existencecease'th birth;

Upon the cessation of birth cease old age and death, sorrow, lamentation, misery, grief, and despair.

Thus doth this entire aggregation of misery cease.

The Buddha, Samyutta Nikaya, xxii. 9016
(based upon H. C. Warren's Translation).

 

MIN DOTH DREAM WHAT DOTH MIN MEAN

 

WAY OF THE PEACEFUL WARRIOR

A BOOK THAT CHANGES LIVES

Dan Millman 1980
Page 45

"Don't be afraid," he repeated. "Comfort yourself with a say- ing of Confucius," he smiled. " 'Only the supremely wise and the ignorant do not alter.' " Saying that, he reached out and placed his hands gently but firmly on my temples.
Nothing happened for a moment-then suddenly, I felt a grow- ing pressure in the middle of my head. There was a loud buzzing, then a sound like waves rushing up on the beach. I heard bells ring-ing, and my head felt as if it was going to burst. That's when I saw the light, and my mind exploded with its brightness. Something in me was dying-knew this for a certainty-and something else was being born! Then the light engulfed everything.
I found myself lying back on the couch. Socrates was offering me a cup of tea, shaking me gently.
"What happened to me?"
"Let's just say I manipulated your energies and opened a few new circuits. The fireworks were just your brain's delight in the energy bath. The result is that you are relieved of your lifelong illusion of knowledge. From now on, ordinary knowledge is no longer going to satisfy you, I'm afraid."
"I don't get it."
"You will," he said, without smiling.
I was very tired. We sipped our tea in silence. Then, excusing myself, I rose, put on my sweater, and walked home as if in a dream."


 

THE NINE FREEDOMS

George King, D. D.1963

Enlightenment

Page 69

"ENLIGHTENMENT is a result of the controlled application of specific energies and procedures towards a predetermined end"

 There are three main ways in which man takes usable energy into his body. In order of importance these are breathing, drinking and eating. But, man should not only breathe, drink and eat; the animals do that. He is above the animals inasmuch as, unlike the more basic lifeforms, he possesses self-consciousness. This self-consciousness brings with it a greater reponsibility than the basic consciousness of the ani-mal. Because of this, man is completely responsible for the controlled use of all the Universal Life Force upon every breath he breathes. It is his duty, according to the Divine Law, to use the Pranic energies con- tained in the liquid he drinks and the food he eats, in a way which will most benefit his brothers. It is the duty of man to Spiritualize all mass. When he does so, then there is no doubt that such a controlled use of energy towards a predetermined end will bring that end into being.- If that end has been predetermined as-Enlightenment, then he can log-ically enjoy this elevated state (Note 1).
"Physical man can predetermine the end of his physical energy and cause this to be used in its best sense according to the Law
We can all use our bodies in such a way as to be either creative or destructive machines. If we destroy, then we will be destroyed. If we use our physical strength to build up, we will, as a direct reaction from this, be given even a greater strength to enable us to become even more creative so that all of our undertakings may become essentially useful to all men."

"Mental man can so control his picturization that he can direct his mental energies towards a goal which is in all-wise constructive, a goal of Service, of Spiritual  cooperation."

Page173

CHAPTER

9

"THE NINTH FREEDOM WILL BE SOLAR EXISTENCE"

 

THE MORNING OF THE MAGICIANS
Lois Pauwels and Jacques Bergier
1963
 
Page 226
"...dreams can foretell even distant future events,* and two German research workers, Moufang and Stevens, in a work entitled The Mystery of Dreams have cited a number of cases, which have been carefully checked, in which dreams revealed future events and led to important scientific discoveries.
The celebrated atomic scientist, Niels Bohr, when he was a student, had a strange dream. He saw himself on a Sun consisting of burning gas. Planets whizzed by, whistling as they passed. They were attached to the Sun by thin filaments, and revolved round it. Suddenly the gas solidified and the Sun and planets crumbled away. Niels Bohr then woke up and realized that he had just dis- covered the model of the atom, so long sought after. The 'Sun' was the fixed centre round which the electrons revolve. The whole of modem atomic physics and its applications have come out of this dream."
 
 
THE EGYPTIAN BOOK OF THE DEAD
E. A. Wallace Budge
1899
OF LIVING NIGH UNTO RA
Page
397
 
Or,
"The Chapter of making the way into heaven nigh unto Ra "
 Chap. cxxxi. 5]
[From the Papyrus of Nu (Brit. Mus. No. 10,477, sheets 17 and 18).)
Vignette: This Chapter is without vignette, both in the Papyrus of Nu and in the Saite Recension (see Lepsius, OF. cit., Bl. 54).
Text: (1)
THE CHAPTER OF HAVING EXISTENCE NIGH UNTO RA.
 
1 The overseer of the house of the overseer of the seal, Nu, triumphant, saith :-

"I am that god Ra who shineth in the night. Every "(2) being who followeth in his train shall have life in " the following of the god Thoth, and he shall give "unto him the risings of Horus in the darkness. The " heart of Osiris Nu, the overseer of the house of the overseer of the seal, triumphant, is glad (3) because "he is one of those beings, and his enemies have been "destroyed by the divine princes. I am a follower of "Ra, and [I have] received his iron weapon. (4) I "have- come unto thee, O my father Ra, and I have " advanced to the god Shu. I have cried unto the "mighty goddess, I have equipped the god Hu (5) and "I alone have removed the Nebt god from the path of "' Ra. I am a Khu, and I have come to the divine "' prince at the bounds of the horizon. I have met / Page 398 / [Chap. cxxxi. 6 " (6) and I have received the mighty goddess. I have "raised up thy soul in the following of thy strength, "and my soul [liveth] through thy victory and thy "mighty power; it is I who give commands (7) in "speech to Ra in heaven. Homage to thee, O great " god in the east of heaven, let me embark in thy boat, " O Ra, let me open myself out in the form of a divine "hawk, (8) let me give my commands in words, let me " do battle in my Sekhem (?), let me be master under "my vine. Let me embark in thy boat O Ra, in "peace, (9) and let me sail in peace to the beautiful " Amentet. Let the god Tem speak unto me, [saying], " 'Wouldst [thou] enter therein?' The lady, the "goddess Mehen, is a million of years, yea, two million "years in (10) duration, and dwelleth in the house of "Urt and Nif-urt [and in} the Lake of a million years; "the whole company. of the gods move about among "those who are at the side of him who is the lord of "divisions of places (?). And I say, 'On every road " and among (11) these millions of years is Ra the lord, "and his path is in the fire; and they go round about "behind him, and they go round about behind him.' "
 
THE MORNING OF THE MAGICIANS
Lois Pauwels and Jacques Bergier
1963
Page 226
"The celebrated atomic scientist, Niels Bohr, when he was a student, had a strange dream. He saw himself on a Sun consisting of burning gas. Planets whizzed by, whistling as they passed. They were attached to the Sun by thin filaments, and revolved round it. Suddenly the gas solidified and the Sun and planets crumbled away. Niels Bohr then woke up and realized that he had just dis- covered the model of the atom, so long sought after. The 'Sun' was the fixed centre round which the electrons revolve. The whole of modem atomic physics and its applications have come out of this dream."
 
"Niels Bohr then woke up and realized that he had just dis-overed the model of the atom, so long sought after. The 'Sun' was the fixed centre round which the electrons revolve"
"The 'Sun' was the fixed centre round which the electrons revolve"

 "Niels Bohr then woke up and realized that he had just dis-overed the model of the atom, so long sought after. The 'Sun' was the fixed centre round which the electrons revolve"
"The 'Sun' was the fixed centre round which the electrons revolve"
 
 
THE EGYPTIAN BOOK OF THE DEAD
E. A. Wallace Budge
1899
OF LIVING NIGH UNTO RA
Page
397
"And I say, 'On every road " and among (11) these millions of years is Ra the lord, "and his path is in the fire; and they go round about "behind him, and they go round about behind him.' "
 
"and his path is in the fire; and they go round about "behind him, and they go round about behind him.' "
 
"In 1913 Bohr perfected the Rutherford theory of the atom by an early use of quantum theory. An electron moving in a circle around the nucleus can be held in orbit by a balance between the electrostatic force of attraction to the nuclei and the centrifugal force due to its motion."
 
 
THE MORNING OF THE MAGICIANS
Lois Pauwels and Jacques Bergier
1963
Page 226
The 'Sun' was the fixed centre round which the electrons revolve"
 
 
THE EGYPTIAN BOOK OF THE DEAD
E. A. Wallace Budge
1899
Page 397
"and his path is in the fire; and they go round about "behind him, and they go round about behind him.' " 
 
 
 
A
HISTORY OF GOD
Karen Armstrong1993
 
UNITY THE GOD OF ISLAM

Page182

"As they converge on the Kaba, clad in the traditional pilgrim dress that obliterates all distinctions of race or class, they feel that they have been liberated / Page 183 / from the egotistic preoccupations of their daily lives and been caught up into a community that has one focus and orientation. They cry in unison; 'Here I am at your service, O al-Lah' before they begin the circumambulations around the shrine. The essential meaning of this rite is brought out well by the late Iranian philosopher All Shariati:

As you circumambulate and move closer to the Kabah, you feel like a small stream merging with a big river. Carried by a wave you lose touch with the ground. Suddenly, you are floating, carried on by the flood. As you approach the centre, the pressure of the crowd squeezes you so hard that you are given a new life. You are now part of the People; you are now a Man, alive and eternal. . .

The Kabah is the world's sun whose face attracts you into its orbit. You have become part of this universal system. Circumambulating around Al-lah, you will soon forget yourself. . . You have been transformed into a particle that is gradually melting and disappearing. This is absolute love at its peak.".

 

 

 HOW GREAT THOU ART HOW GREAT THOU ART

THEN SINGS MY SOUL MY SAVIOR GOD TO THEE

HOW GREAT THOU ART

HOW GREAT THOU ART

Page 53

"Yahweh asked: 'Whom shall I send? Who will be our messenger?' / Page 54 /   and, like Moses before him, Isaiah immediately replied: 'Here I am! (hineni!) send me!' The point of this vision was not to enlighten the prophet but to give him a practical job to do. Primarily the prophet is one who stands in God's presence but this experience of transcen-dence results not in the imparting of knowledge - as in Buddhism- but in action. The prophet will not be characterised by mystical illumination but by obedience. As one might expect, the message is never easy. With typical Semitic paradox, Yahweh told Isaiah that the people would not accept it: he must not be dismayed when they reject God's words: 'Go and say to this people: "Hear and hear again, but do not understand; see and see again, but do not perceive.",6 Seven hundred years later, Jesus would quote these words when people refused to hear his equally tough message.7 Humankind cannot bear very much reality. The Israelites of Isaiah's day were on the brink of war and extinction and Yahweh had no cheerful message for them: their cities would be devastated, the countryside ravaged and the houses emptied of their inhabitants. Isaiah would live to see the destruction of the northern kingdom in 722 and the deportation of the ten tribes. In 701 Sennacherib would invade Judah with a vast Assyrian army, lay siege to forty-six of its cities and fortresses, impale the defending officers on poles, deport about 2000 people and imprison the Jewish king in Jerusalem 'like a bird in a cage'.8 Isaiah had the thankless task of warning his people of these impending catastrophes:

There will be great emptiness in the country
and, though a tenth of the people remain,
it will be stripped like a terebinth
of which, once felled, only the stock remains.9

It would not have been difficult for an astute political observer to foresee these catastrophes. What was chillingly original in Isaiah's message was his analysis of the situation. The old partisan God of Moses would have cast Assyria into the role of the enemy; the God of Isaiah saw Assyria as his instrument. It was not Sargon II and Sennacherib who would drive the Israelites into exile and devastate the country. It is 'Yahweh who drives the people out'.IO '"
        This was a constant theme in the message of the prophets of / Page 55 / Axial Age. The God of Israel had originally distinguished himself from the pagan deities by revealing himself in concrete current events not simply in mythology and liturgy. Now, the new prophets insisted, political catastrophe as well as victory revealed the God who was becoming the lord and master of history. He had all the nations in his pocket. Assyria would come to grief in its turn simply because its kings had not realised that they were only tools in the hand of a being greater
than themselves.11 Since Yahweh had foretold the ultimate destruc-tion of Assyria, there was a distant hope for the future. But no Israelite would have wanted to hear that his own people had brought political destruction upon its own head by its short-sighted policies and exploitative behaviour. Nobody would have been happy to hear that Yahweh had masterminded the successful Assyrian campaigns of 722 and 701, just as he had captained the armies of Joshua, Gideon and King David. What did he think he was doing with the nation that was supposed to be his Chosen People? There was no wish-fulfilment in Isaiah's depiction of Yahweh. Instead of offering the people a panacea, Yahweh was being used to make people confront un-welcome reality. Instead of taking refuge in the old cultic observances which projected people back into mythical time, prophets like Isaiah were trying to make their fellow-countrynen look the actual events of history in the face and accept them as a terrifying dialogue with their God.
While the God of Moses had been triumphalist, the God of Isaiah was full of sorrow. The prophecy, as it has come down to us, begins with a lament that is highly unflattering to the people of the covenant: the ox and the ass know their owners, but 'Israel knows nothing, my people understand nothing'.12 Yahweh was utterly revolted by the anima1 sacrifices in the Temple, sickened by the fat of calves, blood of bulls and goats and the reeking blood that smoked from the holocausts. He could not bear their festivals, New Year ceremonies and pilgrimages. 13 This would have shocked Isaiah's audience: in the Middle East these cultic celebrations were of the essence of religion. The pagan gods depended upon the ceremonies to renew their depleted energies; their prestige depended in part on the magnificence of their temples. Now Yahweh was actually saying that these things / Page 56 / were utterly meaningless. Like other sages and philosophers in the '1 Oikumene, Isaiah felt that exterior observance was not enough.
Israelites must discover the inner meaning of their religion. Yahweh wanted compassion rather than sacrifice:

You may multiply your prayers,
I shall not listen.
Your hands are covered with blood,
 wash, make yourselves clean.
Take your wrong-doing out of my sight.
Cease to do evil.
Learn to do good,
 search for justice,
help the oppressed,
be just to the orphan,
plead for the widow.'.

The prophets had discovered for themselves the overriding duty of compassion, which would become the hallmark of all the major religions formed in the Axial Age. The new ideologies that were developing in the Oikumene during this period all insisted that the test of authenticity was that religious experience be integrated successfuly with daily life. It was no longer sufficient to combine the observance to the Temple and to the extra-temporal world of myth. After enlighten-ment, a man or woman must return to the market place and practise compassion for all living beings.
The social ideal of the prophets had been implicit in the cult of Yahweh since Sinai: the story of the Exodus had stressed that God was on the side of the weak and oppressed. The difference was that now Israelites themselves were castigated as oppressors. At the time of Isaiah's prophetic vision, two prophets were already preaching a similar message in the chaotic northern kingdom. The first was Amos who was no aristrocrat like Isaiah but a shepherd who had originally lived in Tekoa in the southern kingdom. In about 752, Amos had also been overwhelmed by a sudden imperative that had swept him to the kingdom of Israel in the north. There he had burst into the ancient shrine of Beth-EI and shattered the ceremonial there with a prophecy of doom. Amaziah, the priest of Beth-El, had tried to send / Page 57 / ihim away. We can hear the superior voice of the establishment in his pompous rebuke to the uncouth herdsman. He naturally imagined that Amos belonged to one of the guilds of soothsayers, who wandered round in groups telling fortunes for a living. 'Go away, seer!' he said disdainfully. 'Get back to the land of Judah; earn your bread there, do your prophesying there. We want no more prophesying in Beth-El; this is the royal sanctuary, the national temple.' Unabashed, Amos drew himself to his full height and replied scornfully that he was no guild prophet but had a direct mandate from Yahweh: 'I was no prophet, neither did I belong to any of the brotherhoods of prophets. I was a shepherd and looking after sycamores: but it was Yahweh who took me from herding the flock and Yahweh who said: "Go, prophesy to my people Israel." 'IS SO the people ofBeth-EI did not want to hear Yahweh's message? Very well, he had another oracle for them: their wives would be forced on to the streets, their children slaughtered and they themselves would die in exile, far from the land of Israel.
It was of the essence of the prophet to be solitary. Like Amos he was on his own; he had broken with the rhythms and duties of his pasL This was not something he had chosen but something that had happened to him. It seemed as though he had been jerked out of the nonnal patterns of consciousness and could no longer operate the usual controls. He was forced to prophesy, whether he wanted to or nOL As Amos put it:

The lion roars; who can help feeling afraid?
The Lord Yahweh speaks: who can refuse to prophesy?16

Amos had not been absorbed like the Buddha into the selfless annihilation of nirvana but Yahweh had taken the place of his ego and snatched him into another world. Amos was the first of the prophets to emphasise the importance of social justice and compassion. Like the Buddha, he was acutely aware of the agony of suffering humanity. In Amos's oracles, Yahweh is speaking on behalf of the oppressed, giving voice to the voiceless, impotent suffering of the poor. In the very first line of his prophecy as it has come down to us, Yahweh is roaring with horror from his Temple in Jerusalem as he contemplated the misery in / Page 58 / all the countries of the Near East, including Judah and Israel. The people of Israel are just as bad as the goyim, the Gentiles: they might be able to ignore the cruelty and oppression of the poor but Yahweh could not. He noted every instance of swindling, exploitation and breathtak- ing lack of compassion: 'Yahweh swears it by the pride of Jacob: "Never will I forget a single thing that you have done." "7 Did they really have the temerity to look forward to the Day of the Lord, when Yahweh would exalt Israel and humiliate the goyim? They had a shock coming: 'What will this Day of Yahweh mean to you? It will mean darkness not light!"8 They thought they were God's Chosen People? They had entirely misunderstood the nature of the covenant, which meant responsibility not privilege: 'Listen sons of Israel, to this oracle Yahweh speaks against you!' Amos cried, 'against the whole family I brought out of the land of Egypt:
You alone, of all the families of the earth, have I acknowledged, therefore it is for your sins that I mean to punish you."9
The covenant meant that all the people of Israel were God's elect and had, therefore, to be treated decently. God did not simply intervene in history to glorify Israel but to secure social justice. This was his stake in history and, if need be, he would use the Assyrian army to enforce justice in his own land.
  Not surprisingly, most Israelites declined the prophet's invitation to enter into a dialogue with Yahweh. They preferred a less demanding religion of Cultic observance either in the Jerusalem Temple or in the old fertility cults of Canaan. This continues to be the case: the religion of compassion is only followed by a minority; most religious people are content with decorous worship in synagogue, church, temple and mosque..."

Page 99

"This is my Son, the Beloved; he enjoys my favour Listen to him.'9"

Page 101

"During the first century CE, a new kind of Buddhist hero emerged: the bodhisattva, who followed the Buddha's example and put off his own nirvana, sacrificing himself for the sake of the people. He was ready to endure rebirth in order to rescue people in pain. As the Prajna-paramita Sutras (Sermons on the Perfection of Wisdom), which were compiled at the end of the first century BCE, explain, the bodhisattvas

do not wish to attain their own private nirvana. On the contrary, they have surveyed the highly painful world of being, and yet desirous of winning supreme enlightenment, they do not tremble at birth-and-death. They have set out for the benefit of the world, for the ease of the world, out of pity for the world. They have resolved: 'We will become a shelter for the world, the world's place of rest, the final relief of the world, islands of the world, lights of the world, the guides of the world's means of salvation.'11

Further, the bodhisattva had acquired an infinite source of merit, which could help the less spiritually gifted. A person who prayed to a bodhisattva could be reborn into one of the paradises in the Buddhist cosmology, where conditions made the attainment of enlightenment easier.
The texts emphasise that these ideas were not to be interpreted literally. They had nothing to do with ordinary logic or events in this world but were merely symbols of a more elusive truth. In the early second century CE, Nagarjuna, the philosopher who founded the Void School, used paradox and a dialectical method to demonstrate the inadequacy of normal conceptual language. The ultimate truths, he insisted, could only be grasped intuitively through the mental disciplines of meditation. Even the Buddha's teachings were conven-tional, man-made ideas that did no justice to the reality he had tried to convey. Buddhists who adopted this philosophy developed a belief that everything we experience is an illusion: in the West, we would call them idealists. The Absolute, which is the inner essence of all things, is a void, a nothing, which has no existence in the normal sense. It was natural to identify the void with nirvana. Since a Buddha such as / Page 102 / Gautama had attained nirvana, it followed that in some ineffable way he had become nirvana and was identical with the Absolute. Thus everybody who sought nirvana was also seeking identity with the Buddhas.
It is not difficult to see that this bhakti (devotion) to the Buddhas and the bodhisattvas was similar to the Christian devotion to Jesus. It also made the faith accessible to more people, rather as Paul had wished to make Judaism available to the goyim. There had been a silnilar welling up of bhakti in Hinduism at the same time, which centred on the figures of Shiva and Vishnu, two of the most important Vedic deities. Yet again, popular devotion proved stronger than the philosophical austerity of the Upanishads. In effect, Hindus developed a Trinity: Brahman, Shiva and Vishnu were three symbols or aspects of a single, ineffable reality.
Sometimes it would be more helpful to contemplate the mystery of God under the aspect of Shiva, the paradoxical deity of good and evil, fertility and asceticism, who was both creator and destroyer. In popular legend, Shiva was also a great Yogi, so he also inspired his devotees to transcend personal concepts of divinity by means of meditation. Vishnu was usually kinder and more playful. He liked to show himself to mankind in various incarnations or avatars. One of his more famous personae was the character of Krishna, who had been born into a noble family but was brought up as a cowherd. Popular legend loved the stories of his dalliance with the cowgirls, which depicted God as the Lover of the Soul. Yet when Vishnu appeared to Prince Arjuna as Krishna in the Bhagavad-Gita, it is a terrifying experience:

I see the gods
in your body, O God,
and hordes of varied creatures:
Brahman, the cosmic creator,
on his lotos throne,
all the seers and celestial serpents.12

Everything is somehow present in the body of Krishna: he has no beginning or end, he fills space, and includes all possible deity: 'Howling storm gods, sun gods, bright gods and gods of ritual. "3 He is / Page 103 / also 'man's tireless spirit', the essence of humanity.'4 All things rush towards Krishna, as rivers roil towards the sea or as moths fly into a blazing flame. All Arjuna can do as he gazes at this awe-ful sight is quake and tremble, having entirely lost his bearings.
The development of bhakti answered a deep-rooted popular need for some kind of personal relationship with the ultimate. Having established Brahman as utterly transcendent, there is a danger that it could become too rarified and, like the ancient Sky God, fade from human consciousness. The evolution of the bodhisattva ideal in Buddhism and the avatars of Vishnu seem to represent another stage in religious development when people insist that the Absolute cannot be less than human. These symbolic doctrines and myths deny that the Absolute can be expressed in only one epiphany, however: there were numerous Buddhas and bodhisattvas and Vishnu had a variety of avatars. These myths also express an ideal for humanity: they show mankind enlightened or deified, as he was meant to be."
      

THEN SINGS MY SOUL MY SAVIOUR GOD TO THEE

HOW GREAT THOU ART HOW GREAT THOU ART

THEN SINGS MY SOUL MY SAVIOUR GOD TO THEE

HOW GREAT THOU ART

HOW GREAT THOU ART

 

 
 
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