CHAPTER 1, PART 2

THE FIRST AND ESSENTIAL DIMENSIONS OF THE TREE OF LIFE

The First Principles of the Oracles of God: Hear O Israel, the Lord our God is ONE:

Out of One, Ten

In the beginning God created...

THE TEN SEFIROT

"(The study of the Tree of Life) focuses ultimately on the Ten sefirot. By penetrating the literal surface of the Torah, the mystical commentators transform the biblical narrative into a biography of God. The entire Torah is read as a divine name [The Four letters of the Divine Name, YHVH, 10 + 5 + 6 + 5 = 26 in the Hebrew numerical system, as do the Four Sefirot that appear along the Central Pillar of the Tree, 1 + 6 + 9 + 10]. Even a seemingly insignificant verse can reveal the inner dynamics of the sefirot--how God feels, responds, and acts, how She and He relate intimately with each other and with the world. The opening chapter of Genesis appears to describe the creation of the world, but it alludes to a more primal beginning--the emanation of the sefirot, their emergence from the Infinite, or Ein Sof (literally "Endless"). In contrast to the personal God of the sefirot, Ein Sof represents the radical transcedence of God. Not much more than its Name can be said..." The Essential Kabbalah, by Daniel C. Matt, p.7.

"From above to below, the Sefirot depict the drama of emanation, the transition from Ein Sof (that unfathomable Nature of God--the Nothingness that resides at the Center of all reality), to creation. In the words of Azriel of Gerona, 'They constitute the process by which all things come into being and pass away.' From below to above, the Sefirot constitute a ladder of ascent back to the One. The union of Tipheret and Shekinah gives birth to the human soul, and the mystical journey begins with the awareness of this spiritual fact. Shekinah (A manifestation of The Divine Feminine Principle), is the opening to this realization. One who enters must enter through this gate. Once inside, the Sefirot are no longer an abstract theological system; they become a map of consciousness. The mystic climbs and probes, discovering dimensions of being. Spiritual and psychological wholeness is achieved by meditating on the qualities of each sefirah, by imitating and integrating the attributes of God. 'When you cleave to the Sefirot, the Divine Holy Spirit enters into you, into every sensation, and every movement (and, into every insight to spiritual reality).'" The Essential Kabbalah, by Daniel C. Matt, p10.

The Name descends and expands.

"The sefiroth are emanations from the primal, simple unity; making known His [Their] good which is without end…These ten names are inextinguishable; Ten attributes of [Their] Divine Glory and greatness; Ten fingers of [Their] mighty hands; Ten garments of glory, in which [They] are clothed; Ten visions in which [They] are seen; Ten forms, in which [They] have formed everything; Ten sanctuaries, in which [They] are exalted; Ten degrees of prophecy, in which [They] manifest Themselves; Ten lecturns, from which [They] teach; Ten thrones, from which [They] judge the nations; Ten steps, on which [They] descend; And Ten on which one ascends to [Them]; Ten lights, which illuminate all intelligences; Ten kinds of fire, which consume all desires; Ten kinds of Glory, which rejoice all rational souls and intellects; Ten Words, by which the world was created; Ten spirits by which the world is moved; Ten commandments; Ten numbers; and Ten dimensions; and weights, by which all is counted, weighed, and measured." On the Mystical Shape of the Godhead, by Gershom Scholem, p.40.

BEFORE THE BIG BANG

A review of Perfect Symmetry, A Search For the Beginning of Time, by Heinz R. Pagels

By David M. Schramm

"LESS THAN A DECADE AGO, QUESTIONS ADDRESSED IN PHYSICS TODAY WOULD HAVE BEEN IN THE REALM OF PHILOSOPHY OR THEOLOGY."

"In the Beginning was nothing, and then there was symmetry. This led to inflation and broken symmetry, so that the universe as we know it could begin to exist. Not quite Genesis, but nevertheless a fine creation event. Our knowledge of the birth of the universe has increased enormously in the past decade, ever since the Big Bang theory became firmly established. We have observations of the background radiation left over from the time when the universe was hot and dense. In addition it has been shown that the nuclear reactions that occurred when the universe was hot enough to be a giant thermonuclear reactor, produced helium, deuterium and lithium in amounts that exactly agree with what extrapolations from astronomical observations tell us they should be. Thus, the precise thermonuclear conditions of the early universe--as early as one second after creation--are well established.

The description of the Big Bang, from one second through three minutes (when the helium was formed), was popularly described in 1977 in Steven Weinberg's well-known book, 'The First Three Minutes.' Since 1977 the field has driven closer and closer to the creation event itself. By current standards, three minutes is now relatively late in the history of the universe.

The ability to tackle questions about the earliest times comes from the symbiosis between astrophysics, which studies the very large, and elementary particle physics, which studies the very small. The relationship between the two disciplines is often called the inner-space and outer-space connection. (The earlier in the development of the universe the higher the temperature of the environment and thus the higher the energy of the physical processes that control the situation. High energy physics involves the study of elementary particles at the world's largest accelerators, like Fermilab in Illinois, CERN in Geneva, SLAC at Palo Alto, Calif., and, it is hoped, at the proposed Superconducting Super Collider (S.S.C.) in the United States.

In effect, these accelerators duplicate the conditions of the very early universe. CERN is now reaching conditions at 0.0000000001 seconds, and the S.S.C. should push this back by another factor of 100.000. From the studies at CERN, it is known that forces such as gravity, the nuclear strong interaction, the nuclear weak interaction, and the electromagnetic interaction, seem to become united at higher energies. In other words, the different forces we observe in our present low-energy world have their symmetry restored at high energy, even though this symmetry is 'broken' in today's world. The expected energy of the ultimate restoration of all symmetry is well beyond the capabilities of even the S.S.C.. In fact, a true total unification accelerator would stretch all the way to the center of our galaxy and is thus a bit outside current funding limits. However, the early universe probably went through just such energetic conditions as would be produced in such an accelerator. It may have been that this moment of total unification and perfect symmetry is what produced the cosmic inflation, the initial, very rapid expansion of the universe, which set the initial conditions for the Big Bang.

To reconstruct what occurred during the first moments takes both the ability to extrapolate particle accelerator results to higher and higher energies and the ability to look at the debris (galaxies, stars, people) left over from the Big Bang. New breakthroughs in either discipline now stimulate the other. Cosmology now makes predictions about what should be seen in accelerator experiments , and new accelerator results help answer longstanding cosmological questions.

Less than a decade ago, the kinds of questions that are addressed in physics today would have been considered in the realm of philosophy or theology. While we may not have the complete answers, we can at least ask scientifically meaningful questions and perhaps even expect answers within our lifetimes. Cosmology is no longer in the realm of the mystical; it has become a science that is approachable, at least in part, with the experimental method."

MEETING TRIES QUANTUM LEAP: QUANTUM PHYSICS TO THEOLOGY

By Gerald Renner

STAR ISLAND, N.H.__Some 235 scientists, engineers, philosophers, clergy, religious scholars and just plain folks spent a week recently on this small island in the Atlantic Ocean 10 miles off the coast of Portsmouth, N.H. They explored concepts of cosmology in physics and Oriental religion, between which some people claim to see a relationship.

Scientists have treaded more boldly in the past decades beyond the physical to the metaphysical, as they push to the edges of creation in an attempt to understand the universe. Some of the questions they ask sound remarkably like those philosophers and theologians have asked for millennia.

The question whether a commonality actually exists between religious and physical concepts was guaranteed to create a row--although one couched in the polite language of intellectual disputation. The conference theme was the idea of nuclear physicist Lawrence W. Fagg, a past vice-president of the sponsoring Institute of Religion in an Age of Science. The 35-year old group wants to end the ideological war between religion and science.

Dramatic advances in quantum mechanics have led to new concepts of how the universe began, said Fagg, research professor of Nuclear Physics at Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C.

He said he is struck by parallels between concepts physicists advance, often in poetical and metaphorical language, and religious descriptions of time, space, the beginning of the cosmos, and "ultimate reality." Fagg said, "Early religious mystics saw there was a beginning, often involving light emission, thousands of years before anyone heard of the big-bang theory."

Scientists have drawn a picture of the universe to within a trillionth of a second of the big-bang, the cosmic explosion they say brought into existence all that is, including time and space. But what was there before the big-bang? Some scientists say such a question cannot be asked or answered. But some speculate a "quantum foam" produced a bubble that expanded into a universe.

Fagg wonders whether the foam is related to the Hindu's timeless Brahman, the Chinese Tao or to St. John's Gospel: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."

There are other possible connections: What about the Buddhist idea that everything is in constant flux and part of an interconnected but ineffable whole, a network of relations that extend beyond space and time? And what about the Hindu notion of cyclical time--that the universe dissolves and renews itself in another form? Can any insight be applied from that to the scientific puzzle over whether the physical universe is bound to collapse into itself--the big crunch--or expand to infinity and die with a wimper?

After seven days, the seemingly simple question of whether the scientists and religionists could even talk to each other constructively remained open. Hartford Courant.

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"We couldn't get over the idea of Ten dimensions."

"The other Six remained curled up, like rose buds that never bloomed."

"It's Beautiful, Wonderful, Majestic, and Strange."

"A single Supreme Force somehow seems...sensible."

"The various forces and particles we know of could have branched off the Family Tree, so to speak."

"The focus of the work...is to bring superstring theory down from its Ten-dimensional ivory tower to a new Four-dimensional form that can be used to make predictions that might be confirmed or refuted by earthly experiments."

"They wrote: 'A naive comparison suggests that to calculate the electron mass from superstrings would be a trillion times more difficult than to explain human behavior in terms of atomic physics."

"...the faith in superstrings based solely on its mathematical Beauty to faith in a Supreme Being...comes with an equal lack of experimental evidence."

"Is there some deep geometrical reason why in Ten dimensions this theory is special?"

"We have the equations...but we don't yet have the principle on which the theory must be based."

"Well, String, if you're Everything does that make you God?" The Theory of Everything, by Gary Taubes, Discover, Nov. 1986.

What are these "strings" (these one-dimensional-every-dimensional vibrations that fills up the space of our universe), but a manifestation in the intelligent world, of the first motion of the Mind of God toward creation. From the purely spiritual realm, beyond matter, through that point located at the Sefira (or emanation on the Tree of Life) called Tipheret, or Beauty, God's thoughts emanated (exploded) outwards (downwards) into the phenomenal universe, unfolding and revealing themselves in all of the structural patterns and mathematical equations that are even still forming themselves in our minds. The Father (Pure Thought as we say) remained above, the Mother (bringing with Her all of the principles of the Unity of all things) descended. They who are ONE became TWO. The gravitational field appeared, the Principles of Duality appeared, the pulsating illusions of matter came into existence.

"So when He willed to create this visible world He first fully formed the intelligible world, in order that He might have use of a pattern wholly God-like and incorporeal in producing the material world, as a later creation--the very image of the earlier, to embrace in itself objects of perception of as many kinds as the other contained objects of intelligence." Philo Judaeus, On The Creation.

Ten Dimensions, Four expanding, Six (Tifereth) concealed.

"'There is a certain eternal law, to wit, Reason, existing in the Mind of God and governing the whole universe.' This notion of an Eternal, Divine Law of Nature greatly influenced Western philosophy and science. Descartes wrote about the laws; and Newton believed the highest aim of his scientific work was to give evidence of the laws impressed upon nature by God. To discover the fundamental laws of Nature remained the aim of natural scientists for three centuries following Newton.

In modern physics, a very different attitude has now developed. Physicists have now come to see that all theories of natural phenomena, including the laws they describe, are creations of the human mind; properties of our conceptual map of reality, rather than of reality itself." Fritjof Capra, The Tao of Physics, p.286.

"Science, the interpreter of the laws of nature and of the principles underlying them, cannot help us in our search to find the mystery of time and space. The proper domain of science is the physical universe.

The modern archangel has no wings. An invincible giant, when her feet touch the earth. Her marvellous power (however), her initiative, wisdom, and penetrating intelligence are all gone the moment she rises above the soil; and though it be only a few inches, upon this battlefield she is overcome at once--faint and almost inanimate in an unequal battle because she could not readjust her energies to new conditions. At present (the author is writing in the early 20th century) science is a child of earth and waits for her redeemer, through whom she will be born-again a child from heaven." The Hidden Treasures of the Ancient Qabalah, by Elias Gewurz, p.74.

This mandala is a symbol of the expanding, four-dimensional universe, with the first, primordial, singular act of creation at it's very center. It is the fundamental or underlying structure behind every other mandala and sacred shield in use by the family of humankind to express the range and the depth of their religious beliefs. Over the eons of time, and with each fiery cosmic event, the universe descended, from the very lightest elements to the heaviest to form the solar system which humanity inhabits.

 

 

This is the symbol of the Tree of Life, intact with the symbol of the universal mandala at its center. It is now a symbol of the solar system (our own) to which Creation has descended. It represents the Sun with its nine attending major planets, with our own planet Earth at its center. Life on Earth is the result of this relationship, and has been the focus of Creation since the moment of creation itself.

"For all the peoples of the Earth, the Creator has planted a Sacred Tree under which they may gather, and there find healing, power, wisdom, and security. The roots of this tree spread deep into the body of Mother Earth. Its branches reach upwards like hands praying to Father Sky. The fruits of this tree are the good things the Creator has given to the people: teachings that show the path to love, compassion, generosity, patience, wisdom, justice, courage, respect, humility, and many other wonderful gifts." Black Elk, The Story of the Sacred Tree,

Please do not imagine that knowledge of such scientific principles has always been necessary to the attainment of spiritual perfection, or of eternal life. Love has always been the key to these things. The Heaven of heavens is already populated by a great host of the very humblest, and the most simplest of souls, from every caste, family and religious tradition of humankind, who, having overcome the lower, darkened tendencies of this world in their own lifetimes, and having attained to the treasures of spiritual love, have passed mind-intact out of these dimensions into the world beyond. This multitude has passed, without any footnotes in history, through the quantum field that separates this finite universe from the one beyond, while others of great renown, and of enormous drive and earthly intellect, have missed the mark, or the point. The point, of course, is love; self-sacrificing, ego-destroying love. It leads to a state of Christ-consciousness, to an awakened state of mind, and to Nirvana, heaven…Nevertheless, at this moment in time an understanding of these principles is necessary, for they affect the people collectively, as a Nation. This understanding is essential to an interpretation of the oracles, which is absolutely essential if the people are to deliver themselves as a Nation from the culminating judgments that will be unfolding everywhere around us, as this age draws to its conclusion, and the new is born.

"Finally, Kali-yuga, the dark age, miserably subsists on twenty-five percent of the strength of dharma. Egotistic, devouring, blind, and reckless elements are now triumphant, and rule the day. Kali means the worst of anything; also 'strife, quarrel, dissension, war, battle,'…During the Kali-yuga man and his world are at their very worst. The moral and social degradation is characterized in a passage of the Vishnu Purana:

'When society reaches a stage where property confers rank, wealth becomes the only source of virtue, passion the sole bond of union between one and another, falsehood the source of success in life, [mere] sex the only means of enjoyment, and when outer trappings are confused with inner religion…' Then we are in the Kali-yuga, the world of today."

God (who has expressed Themselves in a multitude of names throughout history, and in a multitude of forms--but finally revealed in the Divine Name, thus in the totality of all that exists and in all that is coming to pass), has both descended and risen up over the course of time to fill up the entire space of human thought. There is nothing that is not God, or that is not some manifestation of the singular Presence of God:

"The basic Oneness of the Universe is not only the central characteristic of the mystical experience, but it is one of the most important revelations of modern physics. It becomes apparent at the atomic level and manifests itself more and more as one penetrates deeper into matter, down into the realm of sub-atomic particles. The unity of all things and events is the recurring theme throughout our comparison of modern physics and Eastern thought." The Tao of Physics, by Fritjof Capra, p.132.

We are, as one will see, not jealous for the Western world, nor poised against Eastern religion in some misguided struggle for the soul of twentieth-century man; for not only must religion and science be reconciled, but East and West as well. All things must be reconciled to God who is All and fills All. Everything true--East and West, North and South--converges at the Center.

Yet...Capra's preference for Eastern philosophy prompts in us two needs: First, to agree with him. For, despite the West's professed belief in the principle of the Unity of God, the effects of such belief are as seemingly absent from the Western religious tradition and Western history, as...well as antimatter from the universe. The West has always been at war with God, as is being witnessed in its fullest and most sublime sense in the world at this very moment in time. But then, secondly, to emphasize the uniqueness of the Hebrew experience--not its superiority as men measure such things, but its singular ability to ultimately perceive God where the world only perceives nature. (And, of course, the question will follow: Just who is a true Hebrew? And even a true Jew? The answer is that the day shall declare it).

Despite its singular propensity for apostasy, and its attraction to the Darkness (but only because it has been sent in this direction, and because it has been set quite paradoxically free to commit such great transgressions), the Hebrew soul is one who is also "passing over:" from its old nature to a new; from Darwin's world to the realm of Love; from this age to the next; and from the material realm to the spiritual. A Hebrew is one who, while considering the nature of all things, makes the quantum leap across the expanse that divides the logic of the lower world from the logic of the higher world. Moses called this narrow expanse--this point, or moments in time and space--the Firmament. (Genesis 1:6-8). The Qur'an calls it The Place Where the Two Seas Meet. (Sura 55:17-21). In the East it is understood in the concept of Nirvana. Paul calls it the place where things are spiritually discerned. (1 Corinthians 2:1-16).

The Great Mandala of the Tree of Life.....

(Four Dimensions expanding...Six concealed)

In fact, long before Einstein conceptualized the hidden, fourth dimension of reality in the twentieth century, Paul had already asked us to consider it. He discovered it while considering the nature of God's invisible Presence in the elements of nature itself, in the very fabric of Time and Space. And then confirmed it to himself by studying the dimensions of the Mystery of Christ as they revealed themselves on the limbs of the sacred Oracle, the Tree of Life:

That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith, that ye, being Rooted and Grounded in love,

May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, AND HEIGHT... (Ephesians 3:17,18).

Just as Einstein's Fourth dimension, the space-time continuum (Paul's "Height"), cannot be perceived normally with the physical senses, but only with the mind (with the help of stories and graphs, and mathematical equations), likewise, Paul is saying that if we are to comprehend and interpret the meaning of the Universal Mystery of Christ, as they in the first-century were able to (and as it appeared later in literary form in the Gospels), we must learn to elevate our thoughts. We must learn to cease thinking in purely literal and physical terms. (And yes, to quit fighting and arguing with each other over literal meanings--as if anyone actually knew what they were talking about…Isaiah 29:10-12). We must transcend both apparent reality and literal meanings. This is the lesson of twentieth-century physics. It teaches us how to read the scriptures, and is what Paul meant when he wrote: For the invisible things of God from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead; so that they (the religious, scientific and political rulers of this world) are without excuse...(Romans 1:20). To fully comprehend the Christ Mystery one must be able to think in at least Fourth dimensional terms. One must be able to perceive the Presence of God risen up now in the sum of every unfolding human event.

(Without getting too far ahead of ourselves, this seems to be the place to offer an interpretation of the verse at John 1:14: And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. It is a paraphrase in the collective sense, according to the dictates of the oracles, of those words which were also written by Paul, forty years or more beforehand, which say: Therefore what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For ye are the temple of the living God; As God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them. And I will be their God and they will be my people...(2 Corinthians 6:16; Leviticus 26:11,12). In other words, what Paul in this case expresses clearly (that God dwells in every being) the author of the Book of John, using Paul's doctrine of Christ as a source of his own theological reasonings, says cryptically. They are both, however, saying the same thing: that the Word of God did not become flesh in one individual alone, but rather in the entire Body of Humanity together, and more particularly in the entire Body of every individual who has ever entered into this great Circle of the Mystery of Christ, from the time of Christ to this time. (See 1 Corinthians 12:12-14). And then, even more specifically in these times, in every one who is coming to perfection in this same Mystery here at this Western end of the earth, as it is written: From the rising of the Sun (in the East), to the going down of the same (in the West)...(Malachi 1:11). We speak to the meaning of it all in the following chapters).

The center of the mandala is the moment of Creation. Science has come to call it the Big Bang. We shall call it the First, or Great, Emanation. The infinitesimal point at its center, the Navel of Reality itself, is the point at which the singular Consciousness of God touches and reaches out into the phenomenal universe. It is from where the forces and dimensions that convey the Presence of the Mind of God emanated into the material realm. It is the point at which Pure Thought transformed itself into what we call matter (E=mc2). It happened at the moment of Creation. It happens in the conception of every human child.

The point at the center is immediately an emerging or expanding circle, or sphere (and eventually some immense universal form that science can only speculate about at the moment), representing not merely the most fundamental structure of the universe, but the singular Nature of God from which all other forms in the universe emerged, of which the gravitational force is an agent, or a representative in time. The primal, fiery circle immediately broke, like cells dividing, into the emerging, and descending atomic structure (from the lightest elements over time to the heaviest), carrying the Image of the Presence of God into all the quarters of the (still) expanding universe, and finally into the formation of this Solar system and the planet Earth.

"The circle (sphere) has certain properties which set it apart from all other forms: it has no beginning and no end. Every point in its circumference is equidistant from its center, and its circumference considered as linear distance encloses a maximum area. It, like the point, represents unified perfection, and therefore infinity (like the number for pi), and eternity, and Deity. The circle emblematizes the conceptual world. In contrast to the circle, the square is the number four, which in turn represents the physical universe, because a minimum of four points is required for three-dimensional extension. Any attempt to change a circle to a square therefore involves reducing the infinite to the finite, and involves transmuting the Divine to the physical." Touches of Sweet Harmony, A Pythagorean Cosmology, pp.107-111.

__________

"A mighty King sits on His Throne, situated in the center of a huge palace with many halls, all of them filled with gold and silver, and precious stones. Those servants of the King who are far more interested in acquiring wealth than in gazing at the King's splendor spend all their time when they are admitted, in the outer halls gathering the treasures that they find there. So engrossed are they that they never see the Countenance of the King. But the wise servants, refusing to be distracted by the treasures in the hall, press on until they come to the King on His Throne in the center of the palace. To their astonishment, once they reach the King's presence they discover that the palace, its halls, and the treasures are really only an illusion, created by the King's magical powers. In this same way God hides Him [and Herself] in the garments and "barriers" of the cosmos and the upper worlds. When man recognizes that this is so, when he acknowledges that all is created out of God's essence, and that, in reality, there is no barrier between man and God, 'all the workers of iniquity Are disbursed.'" Israel ben Eliezer, the Bal Shem Tov.

Herman Minkowski, a contemporary of Einstein's, made use of the two two-dimensional diagrams (presented above) in order to express the relationship between the phenomenon of light and Einstein's four-dimensional space-time continuum. He outlined two vectors from the moment of creation expressing the dimensions of both time and space, which are as intricately connected to each other as the electro-magnetic force (light) is to itself. The world had discovered by then that light travels through space at 186,000 miles a second. By connecting these two points on the diagram to each other, and then by projecting a mathematical ray of light across the field of this equation, we see that the light ray must immediately assume a 45 degree (or 90 degree) relationship to the two-dimensional idea of time and space. (Please see that in this equation we also have the geometry of the world-pyramid when viewed from above, and, as we are discovering, the form of the Mystery of Christ as it presented itself to the adepts of the hidden sciences on the limbs of the Cosmic Tree. (John 1:1-8).

At the same time Science was also discovering that, just as a small image of the moment of creation was carried away by every single atom in the expanding universe, so light itself is continually born and re-born (as it were) as the energy of the universe transforms itself, as it is emitted from the atomic center of great fiery stars--our own Sun in particular--and then as it is absorbed and re-emitted by every other atom that it touches on earth. (Please begin to see how the mechanics of the universe are a macrocosmic reflection of the process of human spiritual development...2 Corinthians 4:6; Matthew 5:14-16; John 3:3, 19-21).

Likewise, the world was also discovering that time itself was not a continuous entity. It does not flow as it appears to, without interruption, as a stream running down to the sea. But it is rather like the pebbles that line the stream bed. Time, and therefore reality itself, is quantum in nature. It exists for an infinitesimally small fraction of a fraction of a second, and then it ceases to exist for approximately the same fraction of a second (according to certain principles of expansion and contraction). The universe is flashing on and off, creating and uncreating itself millions of times a second. We cannot see it because it is happening too fast.

Seeing both time and light emanating from the central point of the mandala (which now also represents every mathematical point in the material universe, and every conceptual point in the human mind) we can, with Minkowski, divide the diagram into three metaphysical areas that accurately reflect the nature of time-space and light, and the relationship between them: the Future (which most assuredly exists in the construct of our own human understanding), the Past, and the Ever-present-moment. Humanity's future is defined by every place in the universe (both here on earth and in the material heavens above) upon which the light shines, or from which light emanates. If man can see it he can travel there--provided he has enough Time. If he cannot see it he cannot travel there, at least not in his own physical form. One cannot see with their own physical senses into the darkened, other-dimensional area on the diagram, because in order to do so we would have to get light to travel faster than itself, to cover more distance or to reveal more of space in less time. (Some physicists have recently claimed that they were able to induce matter to move at speeds faster than light. There is evidence for it elsewhere as well. If they could capture the moment in which it happens in a wide-enough array of images, then perhaps they could also see into the other world. Nature is teasing them though...And yet, some future communication system between the two worlds, or two universes, comes immediately to mind)...

Thus the material light not only defines humanity's future in the material realm, but because of the impossibility of attaining to it in the physical form, the speed of light confines man to the natural, material realm. He cannot, in his natural form (or in his natural state of mind), get across.

But reality is, as it is said, stranger than fiction. Where is the Future? It does not exist in the material realm at all. Nothing exists but the Ever-present-moment. And the Ever-present-moment is only as expansive as the smallest flick, or particle of time. The reality is that we all exist at the center of a vast Four-dimensional--actually Ten-dimensional--hologram of sorts, a Masterful Illusion created and sustained by the Mind of God itself. To see it with the mind's eye one must stop time for that fraction of a second…STOP! Now where is the Future? It does not exist yet. Where is it? It is still in the Mind of God. It is the next fraction of a second away. It is about to appear, but it is not here yet. Where is the Past? It is gone. It disappeared the last fraction of a second ago. Where did it go? It is in the mind of man. It is stored in Divine Images in the recesses of the human psyche. And in the process we see immediately that the Past is not the cause of the Future, but that the Future is the cause of the Past, and that everything that is unfolding in the earth before our eyes is emanating directly from the Mind of God.

Thus the upper triangle in Minkowski's equation represents just that: the Mind of God, as well as the heavens above, while the lower represents the mind of humanity, and the world below. Where these two symbols come together in the Mystery of the Universal Christ (at the Navel of the Great Mandala), and when they merge and are joined together, they represent not only a true state of prophetic vision, but the true, holy, and universal Nation--the very Nation that has preserved, and carried this Universal Vision back to this Western end of the earth and this fullness of time. Of course, upon arriving here, we must not imagine that the gift of sight was, or is the exclusive property of any one particular people alone. Universal Israel is a much more inclusive and greater reality than either Jews or Christians have understood:

"You know, sometimes...sometimes I see beyond this world. I see a Great reality. It's the Great Reality of God...People like you may not know it's there, but it's there. If you look, you can see it. It's right over there somewhere...right where you never thought to look before."

He (Matthew King, Lakota Wisdomkeeper) pointed a finger to the sky. (See Exodus 24:10).

"Yeah, just keep looking and you'll see it someday. Maybe not clear, but you'll see it. The Great Reality of God, that's what it is...This world we're living in comes right out of that world, just like a drop of dew comes out of the night sky and then goes back with morning. It's where our prayers go to when we pray." Travels in a Stone Canoe and The Return to the Wisdomkeepers, by Harvey Arden and Steve Wall. p.105.

Seek ye the Lord while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near.

Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him; and to our God for He will abundantly pardon.

For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.

For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts... (Isaiah 55:6-9).

These words become increasingly meaningful as we continue to interpret the Scriptures in light of the events of the 20th century, and when it is seen exactly where on earth we are going to place this point that separates human comprehension from the Mind of God. For the moment we will leave it at the center of the Oracle, at the place named Tipheret, or Beauty--keeping in mind the words, however:

Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised in the City of our God, in the mountain of His holiness.

BEAUTIFUL FOR SITUATION, the joy of the whole earth, is Mount Zion, ON THE SIDES OF THE NORTH, the city of the Great King... (Psalm 48:1,2).

But first, without going into a long discussion here on the relationship, or the analogy, that exists between such exotic phenomena as black holes in outerspace (which are required as a mathematical function of Einstein's discussion on the nature and behavior of time in a gravitational field), and the pathway the perfected human mind takes across the dimensions of inner space (its own inner space), which leads from this world to the next upon the death of the body, please consider again Minkowski's inclusion of that other dimension, that other world which he labeled Elsewhere. This Elsewhere is the Parallel Universe. It is right here, traveling along, living and breathing, and pulsating in quantum rhythm in the very same space as the world we inhabit. It exists in the same space, but in a different dimension of time. When it is flashing on, ours is flashing off. When it is off we are on. (-) (+) (-) (+) (-) (+) (-). The mind that can see it (even though the eyes cannot), and who knows the Way, can get there. (John 14:4-6). And we know this universe exists because of the words: Male and Female created He them...(Genesis 1:27).

Please consider The Holographic Universe, by Michael Talbot, but certainly the sub-chapter entitled Matter and Consciousness in the Addendum to this work before returning here to take another step toward understanding the relationship that exists between the Oracle--The Universal Tree of Life--and a perhaps even deeper set of quantum realities: the idea of metempsychosis, or the transmigration of certain souls from one place in time to another. In the meantime please continue to see that the Four-dimensional Mandala on the Tree of Life is set in a framework, not only of Ten dimensions but of our already-familiar Ten Sefiroth, or Ten Aeons, or Ten Manifestations of Divine Reality).

Thus it was no surprise, given the realization that as the universe was found to be expanding in all directions (toward some ultimate cosmic form), and, of course, human consciousness along with it, that Einstein's four dimensions were soon found to be insufficient to explain what is really going on in the mind of nature (the Mind of God that is). The mathematics of four dimensions did not coincide, or equate, with the continuing discoveries in the field of quantum physics (with those things discovered to be going on deep inside the recesses of the atomic structure). Other dimensions were needed to satisfy the equation between the very large and the very small, and also to satisfy the intellectual desire for simplicity and symmetry in the created order. A total of Ten dimensions has satisfied the equation. (Some reason eleven. But that coincides with the presence of that other illusive sefira named Da'at, of which we shall speak in a while).

In the meantime we will leave you to Michio Kaku's work entitled, Hyperspace, A Scientific Odyssey Through Parallel Universes, Time Warps, and the Tenth Dimension. It rises above many of the other popular works on this subject in that its language, as well as its logic, coincides with that of the Oracle. On the cover we find the picture of a Cube descending from heaven (or suspended in mid-air). The image has everything to do with the cubic form that is descending out of the Mind of God into human consciousness at Revelation 21:16. Without fully realizing (I presume) the further relationship that exists between this Six-sided geometrical form and the place named Beauty (and numbered Six on the Tree of Life), in a chapter entitled "Signals From the Tenth Dimension", he wonders: "Is Beauty a physical principle?" And when describing the theory of Ten dimensions, explaining how six of these ten never appeared in an expanded or expanding form as the other four, but remained concealed (not only within the almost purely spiritual domain of the atomic structure, but, as we shall see, at the center of the Oracle itself), he does so under the heading: "Compactification and Beauty." Something, or perhaps more appropriately, someone, is considered beautiful because all their parts fit together, in proportion, complimenting each other in the most eye-pleasing way (to the beholder of course). Thus the center of the Oracle is named Beauty for the same reason, because all of the parts of the world-puzzle will begin to fit together there, and compliment each other, without forcing or disfiguring them. They will fit there because they emanated from there, and because all things must return to their original source.

The Ten dimensions of reality (as they reveal themselves in the field of theoretical physics, and in the corresponding dimensions of the Cosmic World Tree, and as they work together with, and exert their influences on the virtually invisible space-time continuum in which all of us reside) allow us to reason the existence of the other worlds spoken of in the Kabbalah. These are the descending worlds of Emanation, Creation (one dimension), Formation (two dimensions), and Action (three dimensions). The last world, the world of Action, is the one that is apparent to our physical senses. Not only do these higher worlds, as well as the Fifth descending world (the world of pure abstract, Christ-Conscious thought), yield themselves to our intellectual and spiritual senses, they allow us to reason both the supernal and infernal aspects of the world in which we live--the higher, supernal realm of the East, and the lower, infernal realm of the West. They also allow us to find our way through the Doorway of this Universe into the Pure Land of the world beyond.

Please see:

Matter and Consciousness

Dark Energy

The Divine Name

(Chapter One continued)

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