THE VISION OF THE CHARIOT

The word came expressly to Ezekiel the priest…in the land of the Chaldeans, by the river Chebar, and the Hand of the Lord was there upon him. (Ezekiel 1:3)...

The Celtic historian, Conor MacDari, informs us that the word Chaldea stems from the same Indo-European root as the word "caul," or "veil," behind which the entire mystery of God has been hidden. (see Habakkuk 1:5,6). The river Chebar, means a river of "time", or "of some great distance away." (see Ezekiel 12:27).

Behold, a whirlwind came out of the North…(v.4)...

The prophet beholds with his mind's eye the whole history of Western civilization, and especially as it culminates in the events of the 20th century, as it is written: For the Lord will come with Fire (War), and his chariots like a Whirlwind. (Isaiah 66:15). This is the same Whirlwind into which the spirit of the prophet Elijah (the spirit of John the Baptist) ascended (2 Kings 2:1). The author of the Book of Revelation, projecting his thoughts toward the end of this vision, toward the West, says: I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day, and heard behind me (in the East) a great voice, as of a trumpet. (Revelation 1:10).

A GREAT CLOUD, and a Fire infolding itself…(v.4)...

There is the disciplined and focused Fire of Divine Wisdom, which burns day and night upon the Holy Candlestick in the Temple of God, which, when ignited (when its Light is infolded in the hearts of men), can avert the judgments that are preparing to fall upon the Earth. (see Luke 12:49,50). It seems, however, that the Fire men prefer will prove to be the great cleansing Fire of human warfare itself. It is this Fire (the Fire which went behind the children of Israel to show them the way that they should go--away from it), that the American people seemed determined to ignite, and bring down upon themselves in the end...see Revelation 18:8.

And a Brightness was about it, and out of the midst thereof as the colour of Amber…(v.4)…

Amber flows from the center, or interior of the Tree, and symbolizes the mysteries that were hidden and ensouled in the dimensions of Tree of Life itself. The Brightness is the brightness of Varuna, the Clear Bright Sky. (see Exodus 24:10).

Also out of the midst thereof came the likeness of Four living creatures, and this was their appearance, they had the likeness of a Man...(v.5)…

This Man is the supernal, or heavenly macrocosm, the Celestial Man of Light, the Androgynous Adam Kadmon, the Angel of the Lord, in whose image every human being is created; and who in turn is the expressed reflection of the Presence of God as it makes itself known in the oracles of Nature. (see Acts 13:38-41).

The Four living creatures are reflected in the Four cardinal points of the Heavenly Circle, through which the Sun passes on its voyage from East to West every Day, and through which it passes on its Yearly curcuit through the Four seasons, from the West, through Winter, Spring, Summer, and back to the Harvest season in the West again.

O Wheel...Ezekiel 1:15,16; 10:13.

The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament his handiwork...(Psalm 19:1).

He telleth the number of the stars. He calleth them all by their names...(Psalm 147:4).

Thus saith the Lord, which giveth the light of the Sun for a light by Day, and the ordinances of the Moon and the Stars for a light by Night, which divideth the Sea when the waves thereof roar; the Lord of hosts is His name.

If those ordinances depart from me, saith the Lord, then the seed of Israel shall also cease from being a nation from before me...(Jeremiah 31:35,36).

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And everyone had Four faces, and every one had Four wings…(v.6)…

The Four faces do not only represent the faces of the Four living creatures, or the Four cardinal points of the Heavenly Circle (or the middle of each of the Four seasons of the year, and in the classic Christological sense of things the Four Evangelists), but four of the Seven Spirits that light up the Menorah in the temple of God, which include those of the Two Anointed ones who will apear in our time at the place named Majesty on the Oracle. (See Zechariah 3:9 and Zechariah, chapter 4). As we can see now, the Gospel narratives--through the hidden channels that exist between one Sefira and another--can be referring at one time to one corner of the Oracle and at another time to another, and sometimes to the collective Center. They are not always referring to the same individual, or to the same time in history:

"This is based on the premise that specific sefirot stand in particular relationships of radiation with other sefirot…The face of one turns toward another and consequently there develops between them a channel of influence…

Such channels are paths of reciprocal influence between the different sefirot. This process is not a one-way influx from cause to effect. It also operates from effect to cause, dialectically turning the effect into a cause." Kabbalah, by Gershom Scholem, p.116.

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"Paul was an ecstatic visionary who experienced…visions of a heavenly being he called 'Christ' and the 'Lord,' and the fact is that neither Paul nor any other first-century Christian felt a need to distinguish between the heavenly being and the 'historical Jesus.'

(Paul) reveals the words of Jesus in one such vision: 'my grace is sufficient for thee.' (2 Corinthians 12:1-4, 9). This is 'eyewitness' testimony of a saying of Jesus, one obviously not recorded in the Gospels…

We can do no better than to bring our literary judgment to bear on such accounts, using the concept of two different kinds of figures--the historical Jesus and the visionary Christ--in a way the first century did not. When we return to Luke's first chapter, we should perhaps recognize anew that there are both the 'historical Jesus' and the Jesus of Luke's tradition, who has the same status as the figure known to Paul and John the apocalypt…

And what was the source of the facts imparted to Paul?…Earlier he had written that the tradition which he had handed on came to him from the 'Lord himself.' (1 Corinthians 11:23). So we must understand that what Luke means by 'eyewitnesses' and what he means by doing historical research, comparing sources, and judging the accuracy of those sources, is not the same as what a modern historian would mean by the same terms. What one learns from the 'traditions handed down to us from the original eyewitnesses' must be seen as having the same status, for a first-century thinker like Luke or Paul, as information gained from visions and from reading the scriptures for predictions of Jesus.

The Gospels are about the figure composed from these….strands of information; they are not about the 'historical Jesus.' And that figure is a complex series of fictional creations; in the case of the canonical Gospels, THERE ARE AT LEAST FOUR FIGURES CALLED 'JESUS.' Randal Helms, Gospel Fictions.

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Howbeit we speak wisdom among them that are perfect; yet not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes of this world that come to nought.

But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the world to our glory.

Which none of the princes of this world knew, for had they known it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory…

Which things we teach, not in words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Spirit teacheth, comparing spiritual (the East) with spiritual (the West)...(1 Corinthians 2:6-8; 12,13./ 1 Timothy 3:16).

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"He who sees me (the Universal Self) present in all beings, and sees all beings existing in me, I am never out of sight of them, nor are they out of sight of me." Bhagavad Gita VI.

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But we see (Jesus...another manifestation of Vishnu, another manifestation of the Angel of Divine Presence) who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death (performing the great Non-violent Sacrifice), crowned with glory and honour, that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man (in every man).

For it became him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many children unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through suffering.

For both He that sanctifieth, and they who are sanctified are all of one; for which cause He is not ashamed to call them brethren...(Hebrews 2:9, 11-18).

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It is not possible for anyone to see anything that actually exists unless one become like them.

This is not the way with (the unspiritual) man in the world. He sees the Sun without becoming a Sun, and he sees heaven and earth and all those things, but he is not these things…

But you saw the Spirit and became spirit. You saw Christ and became Christ.

So in this place (the natural state of mind) you do see yourself. But in that place you do see yourself, and what you see you shall become...(The Gospel of Phillip/ 1 Corinthians 15:1-8).

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But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image, glory for glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord...(2 Corinthians 3:18).

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Of his fulness have we all received...(John 1:16)..

The wings in Ezekiel's vision symbolize the mind caught up to the knowledge of the mystery of God, as it is also written: Ye have seen what I have done to the Egyptians (the inhabitants of the whole world), and how I bare you on Eagle's wings and brought you unto myself. (Exodus 19:4; 1 Thessalonians 4:17). Isaiah makes use of six wings in his vision, and this because he is describing the mystery of the Chariot as it revealed itself from the time of Aaron and Moses to our own, and from the farthest East to the farthest West, and not simply as it was revealed from the time of Christ (the time of John the Baptist and Paul) to our own as Ezekiel did.

And their Feet were straight feet…(v.7)…

The mystery of Christ (like a Great Wheel), has been heading in one direction, forward and Westward (Hebrews 12:13-15), toward those places at the Feet of the Tree of Life named Endurance and Majesty as it is also written: In that day we shall raise against him (against the spirit of Antichrist), Seven shepherds and Eight principle men. (Micah 5:5). Having arrived, at the place of the Left Foot, we have also come to the words that say:

How then shall they (the Jews) call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they (the Christians and all others) believe in him (DaViD) of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher?

And how shall they preach, except they be Sent? (See Ezekiel 2:1-3), as it is written, How beautiful are the Feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things. (See Isaiah 52:1-8)...(Romans 10:14,15).

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And the soles of their Feet was like the soles of a calf's foot, and they sparkled like the colour of burnished brass…(v.7)…

The mystery of Christ being just as much a child of the Vedas as it is the Torah, and because the Divine Mother was symbolized in the East (as well as in Egypt) in the form of a Cow, so Her offspring moving Westward are symbolized in the form of a calf, as it is written: And ye shall go forth as calves in the stall. (Malachi 4:2). The burnished brass (or bronze), symbolizes the human alloy that is being forged together out of the various families and religious traditions of the earth, in the great furnace of spiritual affliction which is America in the twentieth century. (Daniel 3:10; 1 Peter 1:7). (Please make the requisite distinctions between the doctrines of the Mormon Church--the American religion--and the universal truth of matters that is unfolding in the world in our time. The Church of Latter Day Saints will have to give back everything they have appropriated, as will the entire American Body-politic, in the Day of Jubilee).

And they had the hands of a man under their wings on their four sides; and they four had their faces and their wings…(v.8)…And their wings were joined one to another…(v.9)…

We can see how all of the historical elements of the Mystery of Christ are connected to itself, For these things were (written) that the scriptures should be fulfilled, A bone of him shall not be broken. (John 19:31-36; Exodus 12:46; Psalm 34:20). The wings symbolize the spiritual flight the Mystery of Christ has been on for the last two thousand years, rising as it did in the East, to descend again at the end of the age here at the Western ends of the earth. We might also see with our own child's eyes, how every playful cartwheel is an image of this great pageant of Nature.

As for the likeness of their faces, they four had the face of a Man, and the face of a Lion ON THE RIGHT SIDE…(v.10)…

Open up the drawstrings, and let down the veil. Take the line that leads from Leo to Aquarius in the great Circle of the heavens, and lay it back down on the Right side of the Oracle; and then the line that leads from Taurus to the Eagle (or Scorpio), laying it down again on the Left side (Ezekiel 2:1-7; 1 Corinthians 15:). Now the Veil is opened and we can see the Mystery hidden within...the Mystery of the Universal Christ and him (them) crucified.

The Man and the Lion are the constellations Aquarius and Leo, which lay on a line directly opposite each other on the Celestial Circle. We will take this line, according to the words in Ezekiel, and lay it down on the Right hand side of the Oracle, on top of that line which leads from the person of Paul to the Messiahs in our time. And we will see that just as we in our time are moving from the age of Pisces (which is understood in the symbol of the Two Fishes with which Jesus fed the multitude…Matthew 14:15-20, and which is further symbolized in astrological circles by the Two Feet of the universal Man), into the age of Aquarius, so the symbol of Aquarius is placed at the Eighth sefira on the Oracle. All of which is understood in the words: When ye are entered into the city (into the gates of the Higher Jerusalem) there shall a man meet you, bearing a pitcher of water; follow him into the house where he entereth in…(Luke 22:10-12). As we faithfully follow the spirit of the unfolding aquarian age, not looking back, nor getting entangled in the affairs of the age that is ending, we will be led by the Spirit to an upper room--that is to say, into a higher state of consciousness, where the mysteries of the coming age will be revealed and the waters of Life will be poured out anew.

And then we place the constellation Leo, the Lion, at the Fifth sefira on the Right side of the Tree of Life named Power. This place also corresponds to the location on the Oracle of the Strong Right Hand, and Mighty Arm of the Lord, as it is written, Who shall rouse Him up? (Genesis 49:9). When we place the center of the Oracle, Tifereth, or Beauty, in the center of Europe, we see how the length of the Strong Right Arm extends up into Eurasia, and into the lands of the "former" Soviet Union. (Please understand Isaiah 63). (The other Arm of the Lord extends into the regions of Islam, as it is written: And mine ARMS shall judge the people...Isaiah 51:5. But this is another chapter)...

We do not want to get too far ahead of ourselves, or confuse ourselves with too much imagry, but seeing how we have found ourselves here in this part of the world, up in Eurasia, let us study those words in the Revelation which say:

And he had in his Right Hand Seven Stars; and out of his mouth went a sharp Two-edged Sword; and his countenance was as the Sun shineth in his strength.

The Mystery of the Seven Stars which thou sawest in my Right Hand, and the Seven Golden Candlesticks. The Seven Stars are the angels of the Seven Churches; and the Seven Candlesticks which thou sawest are the Seven Churches...(Revelation 1:16, 20).

If one of the symbols of the Lord's Great Power is a lion (which the spirit of Antichrist here in America, in its own ferociousness, seeks to emulate...1 Peter 5:8; Revelation 13:2), it is also discovered in the symbol of the Bear. And it is this very symbol of the Seven Stars of the Great Bear Constellation, Ursa Major, that the Lord is holding in his Powerful Right Hand, as it is also written: Arise devour much flesh. (Daniel 7:5)...

The number FIVE..POWER. (Geburah JUDGMENT)

The Seven Stars, or the Angels of the Seven Churches, have been traditionally interpreted as the Seven heads, or the figurative Seven bishops of the figurative Seven churches--the cosmic overseers of the Mystery of Christ. The interpretation is not far from exact. But it fails when it attempts to limit the interpretation with purely Christian (or rather Catholic) imagry, when it typically fails to account for the original seers, the original true shepherds of the people, the Rishis of old--who still dwell among us. These are those who (out of every religious tradition) are One with the mysteries of the higher worlds, who are able to connect the symbols, and who are still able to interpret them for us in our time:

"In India the Seven Rishis were linked with Mount Meru (the moveable Mount Zion). To demythologize that statement (partly at least), URSA MAJOR, circling the celestial pole, was linked with a world center. This (center) was the hub and the heart of the universe...god-inhabited, paradisal. Around Meru (Zion) in one guise or another the whole panoply of heaven and earth was built. Meru as a developed myth is absent from the Rig Veda, which does not go beyond the ill-defined skambha, or world axis. But it could have been known to the western Indo-Aryan branch. The Iranian's reduced version of the mountain...shows not only that the motif reached the Middle East but that it was probably Indo-European. Meru could have passed from there to the Hindus at a later stage...

This is Jerusalem, guarded by Draco the Dragon

If the western Indo-Aryans brought the Seven Rishis to Sumer, did they also bring the linked motif of Mount Meru? Or, again, to demythologize somewhat, if they transmitted the Seven mystique, did they also transmit the linked motif of cosmic centrality?" Dawn Behind the Dawn, by Geoffrey Ashe, pp.107-131.

This comprehensive study by Geoffrey Ashe will pinpoint the center of this entire Mystery, not by actually locating it, but by circumambulating it. It will also, as does the Book of Revelation, reach into the past, and into the East, and link the Seven Rishis to the cosmic center, and both to the Seven stars of the Great Bear Constellation, Ursa Major (of which we will have more to say in the chapter on Russia and the holy angels).

And they four had the face of an Ox on the Left side, they four also had the face of an Eagle…(v.10)…

TAURUS, THE ZODIACAL SIGN: "A symbol of the second period of the cycle of life. It signifies the Divine out-going activity in the creation of forms. THE BULL OF THE WEST represents the Matrix of forms on the buddhic plane; or the productive energy of buddhi. It pertains to the period of involution when spirit is descending into matter and giving it the potencies of forms and qualities afterwards to be evolved in natural phenomena, and in the souls of humanity.

The title given to Merodach (Jeremiah 50:2) the sun-god, when he passed through the twelve zodiacal signs, was Gudi-bir, 'the bull of light.' Hence it was that the eliptic was termed 'the yoke of heaven' bound as it were upon the neck of the Solar Bull. Thus the first of the zodiacal signs, the opener of the primitive Accadian year, was called 'the bull who guides the year.'" The Dictionary of World Religions.

The Ox as a Hebrew symbol also represents the true, spiritual priesthood, called of God and not of men (1 Corinthians 9:8-12/Deut.25:4; Hebrews 5:1-4), of which the ancient Levitical order was a type and image. This spiritual order has been pulling the plow, turning up the soil of the human heart, and sowing into it the seed of divine Thought all these centuries, as it is written: Now hear the parable of the sower...(Matthew 13:12-18; Amos 9:13-15). Place the sign of Taurus on the Left side of the Oracle, on the Solar side, at the place where John the Baptist appeared in the time of Love. See the Mystery of Christ sowing its way across the times, arriving at last in the West at the sign of the constellation...Scorpio. Ezekiel places the sign of the Eagle here. This Eagle is a symbol of the Higher mind, the Scorpion of the lower. This Eagle, however, also has its own higher and lower aspects. It symbolizes both the mind of Christ, and the mind of Antichrist which seeks to be like Christ. (Habakkuk 1:5-9). Thus it is written: Where the eagles are gathered together there shall the Body be. (Luke 17:30-37)...

But we know that the prophet is also implying the constellation Scorpio, because he says right afterwards--referring to the days wherein we are called to Stand upon our Feet here in the West: And thou son of man, be not afraid of them, neither be afraid of their words, though briars and thorns (the cares of the world) be with thee, AND THOU DOST DWELL AMONG SCORPIONS. (Ezekiel 2:6). And Paul, also looking into these days, says:

So when this corruption shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written,

Death is swallowed up in Victory. O DEATH, WHERE IS THY STING? O grave, where is thy victory? (see Ezekiel 37)...(1 Corinthians 15:54,55).

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As for the likeness of the (Four) living creatures, their appearance was like burning coals of fire (see Isaiah 6:6), and like the appearance of lamps: it went up and down among the living creatures; and the fire was bright, and out of the fire went forth lightning…(v.13)…

The children of the Everlasting Covenant (the true Universal Israel--which is comprised of every soul on earth who is keeping the true intent of the Law, and a holy devotion to the things of God intact in their hearts...see Romans 2:9-16), provide the burning coals of fire placed upon the altar of the holy Temple, upon which they make the daily sacrifice of themselves to the Eternal One. These fires of personal transformation provide the brightness and the warmth of God's wisdom and love in the midst of the troubled human condition. Great numbers of souls, from every race and religious tradition on earth, have passed into eternity through the Doorway that exists at the center of human consciousness. many more passed through as the coals surrounding them erupted into the massive holocausts and judgment wars of the twentieth century. (Genesis 15:5-16). Every soul of them burns as the eternal Seven-branched Candlestick in the temple of God

As lightning strikes out of the heavens to the earth, splitting the Tree, so the Divine Lightning strikes out of the Mind of God (Kether), quickening all who it touches in its historic pathway to ground:

Behold, I have told you before. Wherefore if they say unto you, Behold, he is in the desert; go not forth: behold, he is in the secret chambers; believe it not. FOR AS LIGHTNING COMETH OUT OF THE EAST, AND SHINETH EVEN UNTO THE WEST; so shall the coming of the son of man be. (Matthew 24:25-27).

And from the days of John the Baptist until NOW the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent (try to) take it by force…He that hath ears to hear let him hear...(Matthew 11:12-15).

Ezekiel goes on in the first chapter to describe in epic, symbolic terms the things that have come to pass over the course of the history of the world. But notice again, he is only describing the Western half of the mystery, from the time of Christ to our own. This is the realm of the Son--the Lamb. (Exodus 4:22; Psalm 2; John 1:29). Why is he called a Lamb? Because in the West, where the mind of Christ is being brought to perfection, those who are coming to perfection are continually being called upon to offer the great Non-violent Yajna, a Sacrifice of themselves. In so doing they are laying a righteous, as well as a wholly spiritual foundation upon which to build the age to come. (Compare Romans 11:15 and 1 Corinthians 15:12-30; and then learn how to connect these things to the words in Ezekiel, chapter 37).

And then this aspect of the Mystery of Christ (the son) is likened to a Lamb because the realm of the Father, whose sign is Aries, the Ram, lying on the Eastern horizon, is the very same out of which the Divine Father is now rising to deliver the Lamb. Look into Russia and China as it is also written: In the mount of the Lord it shall be seen. (Genesis 22:13,14). This is also what Ezekiel is describing when he says A wheel within, or in the midst of a wheel. (Ezekiel 1:25; 10:1-7). It is the history of the spiritual race being brought to perfection in the midst of the greater circle of all the other spiritual events surrounding it--one Holy Nation in the midst of all other nations, as it is also written: For I, saith the Lord, will be unto her a wall of fire round about, and will be the glory in the midst of her. (Zechariah 2:5). When the seraphims, which symbolize all the other principalities and powers of the earth (which ever existed since the beginning of the world until now), let down their wings the Mystery of God is revealed. (Ezekiel 1:25; Revelation 10:1-7).

And when they went, I heard the noise of their wings, like the noise of great waters (many peoples) as the Voice of the Almighty, the voice of speech, as the noise of an host: when they stood they let down their wings…(v.24)…

And he saith unto me, The waters which thou sawest, where the whore (worldly religion) sitteth, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues...(Revelation 17:15).

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And above the firmament (above the point of normal human comprehension) that was above their heads was the likeness of A THRONE, as the appearance of A SAPPHIRE STONE (One Single Radiant Sefira in the Middle of the Tree), and upon the likeness of the Throne was the likeness as the appearance of a Man above upon it…(v.26)…

Just as one must mine through tons of rock and clay to find one vein of precious stones, so the use of gemstones in the books of Ezekiel and Revelation symbolize the concentration of spiritual thought-forms in the mind that is otherwise occupied in earthly matters. The green beryl (v.16) and the blue sapphire (v.26) symbolize the green earth below and the blue sky above. The terrible crystal (v.22) also symbolizes the radiance of God's Presence stretched forth over the whole of human events. The remainder of Ezekiel's vision concerning the "rings," or the "spheres that were high" are discussed in the chapter devoted to the Angelic Powers. As for the other chapters in the Book of Ezekiel, they will reveal their own meanings in the light of the oracles, in the light of history, and in light of the unfolding events of our time. (Since writing this, September 11th has come to pass, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have come to pass, and much more yet is about to come to pass--all of it leading to the realization of God's kingdom on earth).

Lloyd M. Graham, in a courageous attempt to overturn the notion of the need for God in the universe--in his Deception and Myths of the Bible--nevertheless challenges us in a very forthright way to arrive (or re-arrive) at some meaningful conclusions concerning the Scriptures, which he says reflect not reality but a perversion of it, one foisted upon us by a priestly caste hell-bent on maintaining its power and privileges in the earth. We fall in line with his righteous indignation concerning the worldly-religious institutions of this age, and the unholy arrangements they have made between themselves and the political powers of the earth, but we contend that the problem is not necessarily with the Scriptures but with the way they have been translated and interpreted since the time of Christ. The problem lies between those priests (male and female alike) who were (and are) ordained by God (for whom the Scriptures are an oracle), and those who are ordained by men. Those who are of the world cannot interpret the writings of those who are, or were of the Spirit. It is part of the mystery of the Word itself, as it is written: There must be heresies among you, that they which are approved might be manifest. (1 Corinthians 11:19). While Graham himself stumbles right over the root of the Tree of Life and the countenance of the Great Dragon in his narratives, he comes closer than many "theologians" in describing the real nature of what he says "we mistake for God," and what he says we mistake for our "so-called" mystery of Christ--which he further says, and rightly so (in many ways) is but a rearrangement of the pagan mysteries to suit the Christian view of the world. We are unskilled in the Word of God if we cannot take him seriously in these matters, answering him not with zealous and frenzied denial, but with the simple realization that the pagan mysteries grew out of the Hebrew state of mind to begin with, and that the Universal Mystery of Christ is the fulfillment of them all. He says, however:

"In spite of our so-called enlightenment millions still believe that God controls the weather, when it is actually the Sun." (Well? That sounds right to me). "Where the Babylonian poet saw only the action of the deified forces of nature the Hebrew writer saw the working of God." (Exactly)!...

...for this is exactly what separates the Hebrew mind from all others. He goes on to say, expressing the sentiments of every fervent Humanist:

"There is no intelligent or moral force in creation--save that which man is becoming--and no guiding principles save those that exist in the depths of nature itself, violence and indifference…again, save those that man attains and impresses upon himself:"

The 'original sin' was the sin of creation--what could be more original? However the word is wrong; it should be crime. But as sin is the biggest thing priests can think about, they called it sin, and made it human to incriminate man and absolve the Creator. Yet if this world, with all its pain and suffering, is the work of a self-conscious Being, then creation is a crime and its Creator a criminal. From this there is only one escape-unconscious Causation…" (p.64).

Graham catches every believer here and makes us give thought. We feel the weight of his indictment, and have agonized with God over it ourselves. In fact, years ago, when this work was just beginning, as I was reading the sacred texts through for the first time, and encountering the reality of it all in my own mind, also realizing that I was being asked to rationalize and explain God's (Nature's) tremendously violent behavior, I went through fits of refusal. (It was a stark realization. Either Graham was right or the God I worshipped as a child--was indeed, responsible for it all). Slowly, however, I came to understand it at another level, in terms of the illusion, or the transitory state of our present reality itself (and yes, the tremendous pain and the suffering). Nevertheless, we must understand something very profound about our present spiritual reality, we are still in the process of being created. We are only now approaching the full impact of the words: Let us make man in our image. God is transferring the full content of Their thoughts and emotions into ours'--revealing every aspect of Themselves so that there can be no doubts or serious spiritual or mental conflicts afterwards, concerning who our Parents really are, what they are like, and what we can talk to them about--everything. They understand everything. It is Glasnost in its highest form, unfolding as it is on the world-wide plain of human events. The violence of it all cannot be understood outside of the realization of what it ultimately means to be created in God's image: for one part of God is indeed fierce and terrible (which image we shall have learned never to conjure up again in the future, through our own unrighteous deeds, of which we also had to be made capable if we were to ultimately stand upon our own feet as truly free Christlike beings). It is a Christ-conscious spirit that God is creating in us. But in the whole economy of relationship between God and the emerging Christ-spirit in the world, the latter could not have been created in any other way outside of the manifestation of the first. If we had been made to act just instinctively (thus with nothing in us but good), as opposed to consciously (with the potential for evil always with us), we could become neither "manlike" or divine. That is, we could never proceed from the natural state of mind, and this natural existence--as true sons and daughters of God--to the next. And besides, we would always have this lingering suspicion of God, that They held something back from us--the dark side of Their own thoughts--and we would remain in a constant pursuit of it. (Genesis 3:1-13). Being wise Parents, the Creators have taken this time in history to reveal the Darkness in all of its splendour--not only to us but in us...as well as in Themselves.

Lloyd Graham goes on unwittingly, but correctly to say:

"FAIR EDEN IS ONE WITH ALL THE HAPPY LANDS ALWAYS IN THE WEST--the Hesperides, Elysian Fields, Fortunate Isles, Isles of the Blest, the brave Valhalla (and may we add Gerizim…Deut.11:29-32), WHOSE PASSING IS GOTTERDAMMERUNG, THE TWILIGHT OF THE GODS…

This was the Paradise mythological man lost. We need not mourn for it, however, for it is not only well lost but meant to be lost, the process must go on. SO EASTWARD IN THIS WAS PLANTED A GARDEN. NOW ALL MEMBERS OF THE SECRET ORDERS KNOW WHAT 'EASTWARD' MEANS--FORWARD, TOWARD THE SPIRITUAL LIGHT, spiritual attainment, and so on. This is all right in Evolution, for Evolution is always toward the light, BUT IN INVOLUTION IT MEANS THE VERY OPPOSITE--TOWARD DARKNESS, EVIL, MATTER. THUS THE WEST TO US, THE PLACE WHERE THE SUN WENT DOWN TO DENSE MATTER. (Eastward in Eden). THIS IS PARADISE LOST, AND PARADISE REGAINED IS BUT ITS EVOLUTIONARY OPPOSITE--THE LIFE PRINCIPLE'S FREEDOM FROM BONDAGE IN MATTER. This is why we place it in Evolution also, and why another creator, soon to be released from matter, said, 'This day thou shalt be with me in Paradise. (pp.44,45).

Since there is no physical 'tree of life' nor yet of 'good and evil,' this story must be symbolic. Why then can't we see that the whole story, nay the whole book, is symbolic. THE 'TREE OF LIFE' IS LIFE ITSELF, MORE SPECIFICALLY THE LIFE PRINCIPLE, GROWING IN THE MIDST…Calling it a tree is by no means peculiar to the Hebrews; every ancient race had its 'tree of life.' With the Greeks it was Gogard, with Ladon the serpent; with the Norse it was Yggdrasil, the ash, at the foot of which was Nidhogg, their serpent. According to Hesiod, Zeus created three races of men, the last out of ash trees. The Hindus pictured Creation as a tree, Ashvatta, with its roots in the Absolute (Kether) and its branches (seven planes) hanging downward…(p.48).

THE PRIMAL SERPENT, THE GREAT DRAGON OF REVELATION, CHAPTER 12

Throughout the ancient world THE SERPENT WAS THE SYMBOL OF THE CREATIVE PRINCIPLE…IN THIS MYTH IT HAS NOT YET REACHED THE (BIOLOGICAL) STAGE YET; IT IS STILL WITHIN THE EARTH. IT IS 'THAT OLD SERPENT, WHICH IS THE DEVIL, AND SATAN' OF REVELATION. (Please see Chapter 3). And so the serpent, Satan, the devil, the Creator, are all one. As the creative process is both downward and upward, the Greeks had a symbol for both. This is the Caduceus of Hermes, the messenger (active agent) of the gods (the higher thought forms). The serpent on the Left is Involution; that on the Right is Evolution, as the Creative force returning to its source...The garden is the earth itself; THE MIDST OF THE GARDEN IS THE MIDDLE POINT (Jerusalem) BETWEEN ITS INVOLUTIONARY CREATION AND ITS EVOLUTIONARY EXPRESSION. It is at this point that Evolution starts, and THE 'TREE OF KNOWLEDGE' IS EVOLUTIONARY EXPERIENCE. While the Life Principle was on the Involutionary side (of the tree) it was spiritual (invisible, hidden) in the sense of substance. When in Evolution it emerged as biological life (at first that is...Ezekiel 29:1-3)…and Hell and Death followed after it, as per Revelation. At this point we have a complete about face, an evolutionary power taking over the work of the involutionary Creator…It is this that Satan, the evolutionary process, or impulse, that must from here on urge and push, and with which we must struggle with throughout all Evolution. Today its followers, the pious and the reactionary, have gone too far, and so seeing no other way, Satan has called on his good friend Mars for help. IN THIS WAR-FILLED CENTURY THESE TWO SYMBIONTS ARE TRYING TO DESTROY THE SPIRITUAL INERTIA OF PISCEAN MAN. But not even these can do it unless they first destroy the spiritual error he has lived by"…(p.57-63).

As we continue to see how all the elements of the Cosmic Myth have blended themselves into the historical realities of our time, we may also then follow the Gospel narratives to their fullest artistic conclusion by realizing what they are: cryptic versions of a Divine Drama, a mystery play whose script was inspired from heaven, whose epic scenes are being played out on the stage of world events, and whose final act is about to unfold.

"The idea of a periodically expanding and contracting universe, which involves a scale of time and space of vast proportions has not only risen in modern cosmology, but also in ancient Hindu mythology.

Experiencing the universe as an organic and rythmically moving cosmos, the Hindus were able to develop evolutionary cosmologies which came very close to our modern scientific models. One of these cosmologies is based on the Hindu myth of 'Lila,' the Divine Play (the Western Pageant)--in which Brahma transforms himself into the world. Lila is a rythmic play which goes in in endless cycles, THE ONE BECOMING THE MANY, AND THE MANY RETURNING TO THE ONE. In the Bhagavad Gita, the God Krishna explains the rythmic play of Creation in the following words:

'At the end of the night of time all things return to my nature: and when the new day of time begins I bring them again into the light. Thus through my nature I bring forth all creation and this rolls around in the circle of time. But I am not bound by this vast work of Creation. I am, and I watch drama of works.'" (see Colossians 1:12-19). The Tao of Physics, pp.188,89.

In his The Book of Job as a Greek Tragedy, Horace M. Kallen pursues the belief that this ancient book is just that: a drama written in Hebrew form, with Hebrew archetypes rather than Greek, but nevertheless in the Greek spirit of the theatre. He says, "It is now more than half a century since I restored the Book of Job to what I believe was its original form--that of a Greek tragedy in the manner of Euripides:"

"The ancient Jews appear to have known nothing, of themselves, about the theatre or its implications in art and society: all that they did know seems to have derived from the Greeks…

Mr Moulten suggests that this is due to the lack of theatre, and attributes to this lack, the spread of the obvious dramatic impulse among the Jews through other literary forms, until epic, lyric, discourse, are all drawn together…For him, hence, the Book of Job, the bulk of which is in dialogue form, is a complete and integrated composition, 'a dramatic poem framed in an epic life,' but not a drama. For Ganung, Job is an 'epic of the inner life,' but not a drama; for Nathaniel Schmidt it is at most a dialogue after the fashion of Plato, or more generously, of 'Aeschylus in Prometheus Bound,' but not a drama. Most writers, in fact, who assign Job any dramatic character at all, attribute this character to Greek influence, and deny the nativity of dramatic form to Jewish soil"…(pp.3,4).(Please consider the chapter entitled The Book of Job).

Kallen's remedy comes in knowing which way to point in this instance to "Jewish soil"--not southwards to Palestine, but Northwards toward the center of Europe--and in knowing how the dramatic arts fell out of this higher state of mind into the Greek way of life to begin with (as did the whole oral tradition), all in humanity's attempt to emulate in their own natural lives the meanings of the mysteries of life itself. Except that the Greeks wound up, not with the reality but with images of it: with stage plays and stage actors, and finally (with marvelous and important exceptions, of course), with an industry full of movie and television stars who, in keeping with the decadence of these times (2 Timothy 3:-5), and chasing the bright lights of personal fame and fortune, have become blatantly shallow-minded, frivalous, deceptive, cliched, dirty-mouthed, self-important, violent, unaware, insincere, and for sale, whose chief occupation is more to tend their own sense of themselves in the eyes of the public, than the higher minds of those who feed upon those images. For there are really only two kinds of performing artists, those who want us to go away thinking about them and their careers, and those who want us to go away thinking of other things, of higher things, of things other than themselves and ourselves. (Compare Daniel 12:3)...

"Various writers, actors, musicians, artists, and politicians, for instance,are almost without exception sick people: and what are they suffering from? First of all from an extraordinary opinion of themselves...and then from being prepared to take offense at our lack of understanding and appreciation." P.D. Ouspensky, In Search of the Miracuulous, p.152.

And in our own frenzy to be entertained and a-mused by these kinds of celebrities who want their own names and images enshrined in our brainstems--(We are mad upon our idols...Jeremiah 50:38)--the Dark consortium is now complete. Government and industry, the sports world, the financial world, advertising and the mass media, show business, education, the military and the church, are all now hand in hand. The social policies and agendas of each of these institutions are those of the others. We fail to see that the children of Darkness have finally been bound in a bundle. (Matthew 13:37-43; Revelation 18:2; Prov.11:21).

If that form of Judaism that was being practiced in Central Europe (as we shall come to see in the following chapters) knew nothing of "the theatre" it was because the world itself was its theatre; its stage the past, the present, and the future:

THEATRE…"One way of telling a story is to act it out. An acted story is called a play. The actors in the play usually speak as they act out their parts. Plays as a rule are given in theatres. The first theatres that we know of were built by the ancient Greeks. Their theatres were not much like ours. They were all outdoors. The seats on a sloping hillside. The stage was a circle of grass. At first the Greek theatres were not used for plays. They were used for songs and dances in honour of the Greek gods." From a Children's Encyclopedia.

"The development of Greek drama stems from the Dithyrambos (8th and 7th centuries B.C.) which was a dance performed around an altar and accompanied by songs honouring the god Dionysus (the god of the Vine...John 15) whose life and deeds were thus glorified.

The next step was the introduction of an individual engaged in dialogue with the chorus, a development which probably originated in Attica, Greece, in the 6th century B.C. The content of this 'play' gradually became enlarged, Demeter and other Greek (notions of the) deities also being honoured…At first the performances took place in the open air (as did every Druid service) within a circle near a temple of the deities being honoured…

It is a miraculous fact that the work of the first dramatist, Aeschylus, shows elements of genuine dramatic plot and of dramatic psychology. Thought and poetic presentation are equally present in near perfection, as if Aeschylus marked not the beginning…BUT THE END OF A LONG LITERARY DEVELOPMENT." From a Big People's Encyclopedia.

J. M. Roberts, in his Pagan Christs, describing the elements of the Divine Mystery Play as it is presented in the Gospels, says: "As the story stands Jesus partakes with his disciples of the Passover, an evening meal. After a brief dialogue they sing a hymn and proceed in darkness (the long night of the Mystery) to the Mount of Olives (to the Foot of the Mystery…see Zecharaiah 14:4). Nothing is said of what happened or was spoken on the way." (p.49).

"It is not very likely that anyone who went to the grave on the first Easter Sunday met an angel who announced that Jesus had been raised from the dead. Modern exegetes are unanimous in interpreting the angel as a legendary figure, drawn from apocalyptic literature and used as a mouthpiece for the faith of the early church…

But mythical though he is, the angel is the centerpiece of the story, and if we interpret his role properly we will have answered many of the questions that cluster around Jesus' tomb. In contrast to the stone at the tomb, which functions in the Easter drama like a silent Greek choragus who warns us how not to interpret the scene, the angel has a speaking part and he directs us positively to what the Jerusalem church thought was the significance of Jesus' grave. The angel was invented to act as a role model for the listener, and he speaks forth what the community thought was the proper response to the empty tomb, namely the affirmation 'Jesus has been raised.'

WHO, THEN, IS THIS ANGEL? I PROPOSE THAT WE TAKE HIM FOR WHAT HE REALLY IS: NOT A SUPERNATURAL BEING WHO ACTUALLY APPEARED IN A TOMB ONE SUNDAY MORNING, BUT A DRAMATIC PERSONA WHO WAS INVENTED TO PLAY A ROLE IN THE CHRISTIAN LEGEND. Later readers of the legend who mistake him for a real angel…misunderstood the literary form, and therefore the point of Mark's Gospel. The Easter narrative, both in its pre-Marcan oral form and in the gospel version, is a legend, not a historical account. IT IS STRUCTURED IN THE FORM OF A DRAMA, A RELIGIOUS PLAY, AND THEREFORE COULD BE MISTAKEN FOR A PIECE OF HISTORY. However, in order to grasp the story according to its proper literary form--and therefore the way in which it was originally meant to be understood--I propose to treat the text at Mark 16:1-8 explicitly as a drama, which I call Easter at the Tomb. If we look at the Easter legend as a religious play, the 'angel' who appears at the tomb is, in fact, an actor who recites dramatic lines that were created for him, first by the early Jerusalem community…and then by the evangelist Mark.This approach may be strained at points, but it does help clarify how the Easter legend developed from the early oral version to Mark's written account and beyond." The First Coming, by Thomas Sheehan, pp.156,57.

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As for Mark, then, during Peter's stay in Rome he wrote an account of the Lord's doings, not, however, declaring all of them, nor yet hinting at the secret ones, but selecting what he thought most useful for increasing the faith of those who were being instructed. But when Peter died a martyr, Mark came over to Alexandria bringing both his own notes and those of Peter, from which he transferred to his former book the things suitable for whatever makes for progress toward knowledge. Thus he composed a more spiritual Gospel for the use of those who were being perfected. Nevertheless, he yet did not divulge the things not to be uttered (2 Corinthians 12:4), nor did he write down the hierophantic teaching of the Lord, but to the stories already written he added yet others and, moreover, brought in certain sayings of which he knew the interpretation would, as a mystagogue, lead the hearers INTO THE INNERMOST SANCTUARYY OF THE TRUTH HIDDEN BY SEVEN VAILS. Thus, in sum, he prepared matters, neither grudgingly nor incautiously, in my opinion, and, dying, he left his composition to the church in 1, verso Alexandria, where it is even yet most carefully guarded, being read only to those who are being initiated into the great mysteries. Saint Clement on the Secret Gospel of Mark.

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"What are we make of this? The feeding of the Five Thousand and the story of the 153 fishes clearly show that certain New Testament stories were composed as initiatory spiritual allegories. We may call them 'initiatory' for the simple reason that THEY PRESUPPOSE A MOVEMENT FROM THE OUTER WORLD OF MANIFEST FORM TO THE INNER PERSPECTIVE OF GENUINE INSIGHT. They were intended both to entertain and to edify at an outer level, designed to bring enjoyment even to children, yet they were also designed to possess within A DEEPER, HIDDEN DIMENSION, REFLECTING THE HARMONIC NATURE OF THE COSMIC PATTERN. However, since the unknown scholars who composed these tales, based upon the ancient models, were intentionally crafting vehicles for the transmission of spiritual insight, it is unlikely that they desired their teaching stories ultimately to be read in literal or historical terms. This was recognized by the initiated church father Origen (who was also branded a heretic by the emerging orthodoxy) who complains that 'very many mistakes have been made, because the right method of examining the holy texts has not been discovered by the greater number of readers.'...

'IT IS IMPORTANT TO REALIZE,' Origen wrote, 'THAT WHEREVER THE WORD FOUND HISTORICAL EVENTS CAPABLE OF ADAPTATION TO THESE MYSTIC TRUTHES, HE MADE USE OF THEM, BUT CONCEALED THE DEEPER SENSE FROM THE MANY; but where in setting forth the sequences of things spiritual there was no actual event related for the sake of the more mystic meaning. SCRIPTURE INTERWEAVES THE IMAGINATIVE WITH THE HISTORICAL, SOMETIMES INTRODUCING WHAT IS UTTERLY IMPOSSIBLE, SOMETIMES WHAT IS POSSIBLE BUT NEVER OCCURRED (yet) …

And not only did the Spirit thus deal with the scriptures before the coming of Christ, but, inasmuch as He is the same Spirit, and proceedeth from the One God, He (She that is) has done the same with the Gospels and the writings of the Apostles; for not even they are purely historical, incidents which never occurred being interwoven in the corporeal sense (with those events that had occurred)...'" Allegory, Initiation, and the Movement Toward Insight, A Study in the New Testament

David E. Aune, in a work entitled Prophecy in Early Christianity, and the Ancient Mediterranean World, explores the use of oracles, not only in the maintenance of the religious life of the Greco-Roman world at that time but in the very formation of Christianity itself. Of those "unknown authors" of the Gospels he says:

"One issue is the problem of the relationship between the prophetic utterances of Christian prophets and the transmission of the sayings of Jesus. Another is concerned with the Christian prophet as a charismatic exegete of the OT scriptures. If it can be demonstrated that Christian prophets, speaking in the name of the risen Jesus, made substantial contributions to the collection of sayings of the earthly Jesus, our knowledge of the transmission of gospel tradition will be immensely enriched. (p.22)...

Divination may be defined as the art or science of interpreting symbolic messages from the gods. Often these symbols are unpredictable or even trivial. Oracles, on the other hand, are messages from the gods in human language, received as statements from a god, usually in response to inquiries. The term 'oracle' is also used for the place where such messages are requested and received.(p.23)...

Many modern NT scholars…theorized that early Christian prophets played a major role in the transmission, formulation, and even the creation of the sayings of Jesus. This process is thought to have occurred primarily during the period (30-70 AD) when the gospel tradition had not yet been written down in the form of the Gospels. According to this view the oracles of Christian prophets, proclaimed in the first person as utterances of the risen Lord, gradually became intermingled with sayings of the historical Jesus…

One of the central assumptions of advocates of the theory that many of the sayings of Jesus in the synoptic gospels originated in early Christian prophetic activity is that Christians made no essential or lasting distinction between sayings of the historical Jesus and post-Easter oracles from the risen Lord. Consequently oracles in the 'I' style, uttered by the risen Lord through prophetic spokesmen gradually became assimilated to collections of sayings stemming from the historical Jesus. Proponents of this view point to the oracles in the Apocalypse of John that are in the form of sayings of the risen Jesus: (Revelation 1:17-20; esp. 3:20; 16:15; 22:12). Revelation 3:20 and 16:15 will serve as examples of these oracles in the 'I' style: 'Behold, I stand at the door and knock; If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.' 'Lo, I am coming like a thief! Blessed is he who is awake, keeping his garments That he may not go naked and be seen exposed.' A similar oracle is found in the Odes of Solomon 42:6. 'And I have risen and am among them, And I speak through their mouth.'

These oracle are cited for three reasons: (1) they are clear indications that early Christian prophets did in fact prophecy in the first person of the risen Lord. (2) the form of those sayings is such that could possibly have entered the traditions of the sayings of Jesus, and (3) the authority of such prophetic utterances would ensure their acceptance by Christian communities as sayings of Jesus"…David Aune, (pp.233,34).

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"But it is impossible to explore the historical sayings of Jesus without first considering Pauline theology. As Wilson points out, THE AUTHOR'S OF THE GOSPELS WERE (PERSONS) WHO HAD GAZED AT JESUS' LIFE THROUGH PAUL'S LOOKING GLASS…WITHOUT THE PAULINE TRANSFORMATION--the resurrection, the ascension into heaven, the command to 'go ye therefore, and teach all nations,'--Jesus' message could have survived only as the equivalent of his contemporary Rabbi Hillel's very similar ethical precepts." Susan Jacoby on A. N. Wilson's Life of Jesus.

Every student of these affairs will begin to see how Paul's gospel itself is a chief source of the later Gospel narratives (Romans 2:16), thus how subtily those Gospel narratives are interwoven with the doctrines and the affairs of the "historic" Paul, or rather this mysterious Paul--whose real name was not Paul, or Saul, at all. (But this is the subject of another chapter). The lesson is that the Jesus (or the Hesus) of the Gospels is not an historical person, but is rather another of the many manifestations of the Lord, but here in the personification of the Suffering Servant, the Sacrificial Victim, the true Pacifist--which of necessity appears in conjunction with the Hebrew warrior archetype, Jehoshua. Which is why it took the early church fifty years or more to work out their spiritual frame of reference. The writers had to bring together into one Corporate state of mind (according to the structure and the dimensions of the Oracle) the truthes of all the other religious traditions that surrounded them; merge them with fitting historical events, as well as with events that they could see--by studying the oracles--would come to pass at the end of the age. All of this had to be assimilated, not only to the revelations of Paul but to the words of the Prophets, which the Gospels would accompany to the end of the age. The Baptist was Jesus, even as he was initiating others into the mystery of Jesus. Paul was Jesus in a most particular way, as we shall see, as were all of the other followers of Christ at that time. When the Romans put Jesus on the Cross it was thousands who were hung there, not just one. Jesus (Hesus) is the central figure in the great cosmic drama of human transformation, one that unites heaven and earth, and reconciles all things on earth to each other; and especially those things that are said to have happened then with the things that shall happen now.

To make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been his in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ…(Ephesians 3:9).

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The prophets inquired and searched out these things according to the Spirit of Christ THAT WAS IN THEM…(1 Peter 1:12).

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Which things we speak, not in words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Spirit teacheth, comparing spiritual with spiritual (East with West)…(1 Corinthians 2:12,13).

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It is not ye that speak but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you... (Matthew 10:20).

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And the Highest gave understanding to the Five men, and they wrote the books...(2 Esdras 14:42-47).

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They that were of understanding in sayings became also wise themselves and poured forth exquisite parables...(Ecclesiasticus 18:28,29).

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The Spirit of the Lord spake by me...(2 Samuel 23:2).

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But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into that same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord...(2 Corinthians 3:18).

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Of his Fullness we have all received…(John 1:16).

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He appeared to them all. He appeared to the great as great, and to the small as small…

To the angels as an angel, and to men as a man…

Some indeed saw him thinking they were seeing themselves. But when he appeared to his disciples in glory on the Mount (see Matthew 17:1-7) he was not small.

He became great but he made his disciples great that they might be able to see him...(The Gospel of Phillip).

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As for the parts in which he exists in his own manner and form and greatness, it is possible for them to see him and speak about that which they know of him, since they wear him while he wears them…

He, however, is as he is, incomparable. In order that the Father might receive honour from each one and reveal Himself, even in His ineffability, hidden and invisible, they marvel at Him mentally.

Therefore the greatness of His loftiness consists in the fact that they speak about Him and see Him. He becomes manifest so that He may be hymned because of the abundance of His sweetness and grace.

And just as the admirations of the silence…are mental offspring, so too the dispositions of the Word are spiritual emanations (or Sefiirot on the Tree of Life)...(The Tripartate Tractate, Nag Hammadi Library, p.66).

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"The elaborate and rather obscure descriptions of the details of the Merkabah was subsequently taken up by visionaries in the pre-Christian era, who sought to repeat the experience of the vision of the Merkabah (the vision of the Chariot and the Throne), and particularly in the first two centuries of the Christian era. Retaining Ezekiels's terminology (like the term, the son of man), while reinterpreting its meanings, his description was transformed by them into a depiction of the royal court of the Divine Majesty. This vision was revealed to the visionary upon ascent to the highest heaven: originally perhaps, the Third Heaven. (See 2 Corinthians 12:2)...

Isaiah had already seen 'the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up,' while Ezekiel describes the light surrounding the figure seated on the throne 'as the appearance of the Bow that is in the Cloud in the day of Rain.' (Ezek.1:28)...Needless to say, this vision of the Shape of God on the throne…became an object of contemplation and speculation. The ascent of the Merkabah mystics to heaven or, in a different version, to the heavenly Paradise, was considered successful if it not only led the mystic to the divine throne but also brought them a revelation of the image of the Godhead, the 'Creator of the Universe' seated on the throne.…

For in him dwelleth all the Fulness of the Godhead Bodily...(Colossians 2:9...KJV)

This form was that of the divine Kavod; rendering this word as 'glory,' 'splendour,' and the like fails to transmit the true substance of the numinous conception. Kavod refers to that aspect of God that is revealed and manifest; the more invisible God becomes for the Jewish consciousness, the more problematical the meaning of this vision of the divine Kavod. We have thus reached the first major topic in our discussion: namely THE MANNER IN WHICH THE JEWISH GNOSTICS AND MERKABAH MYSTICS CONCEIVED OF THE MYSTICAL FORM OF THE GODHEAD: THE 'SHI'UR KOMAH.' This Hebrew term is often translated as 'MEASURE OF HEIGHT,' the noun komah being construed in its biblical sense as 'height' or 'stature.' Such a rendering is valid, particularly given the appearance of this word in the Song of Songs. Nevertheless, 'komah' most likely has the precise signification here that it has in Aramaic, where it means quite simply 'body.' Indeed the body of the Creator or Demiurge is also called THE 'BODY OF THE GODHEAD.'… Thus it is rhapsodically promised that 'Whoever knows the measure of the Creator and the glory of the Holy One, blessed be He, is promised that he is a son of the world to come.'… The Mystical Shape of the Godhead, by Gershom Scholem, pp.20,21.

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That Christ may dwell in your heart 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.

And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye may be filled with the knowledge of God...(Ephesians 3:17-19).

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"But let us return to our point of departure: GOD'S POTENCIES GROW INTO CREATION LIKE A TREE, NOURISHED BY THE WATERS OF DIVINE WISDOM. The Sefirotic tree, of which the Kabbalists spoke in 'Sefer ha-Bahir,' preserves the image of the organic shape in which each thing is in its proper place, and where it partakes of the flow directed toward it from the union of the totality. THE SEFIROTIC TREE IN WHICH GOD HAS IMPLANTED HIS STRENGTH...IS ALSO THE TREE OF THE WORLD. Its root is located in the highest Sefiroth; its trunk embraces the central and thereby conciliating forces; while its branches or limbs which grow out of it at various points encompass the contradictory forces of divine activity…

The Sefiroth are thus not a series of ten emanations of aeons emerging from one another; on the contrary they constitute a well-structured form, in which every part or limb operates upon every other, and not just the higher ones on the lower. The Sefiroth are connected with one another by means of 'secret channels,' whereby each radiates into the other and in which the other is in turn reflected. The specific nature of each potency is deeply rooted in itself, but every potency likewise contains some aspect of all the others…It is through this process of infinite reflection that the whole is reflected in every member and thus…becomes a whole. Scholem, pp.42,43.

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There is one Body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling;

One Lord, one faith, one baptism (see 1 Cor.10),

One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all…

For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the Body of Christ. (The Mystical Shape of the Godhead):

Till we all come in the Unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God (Exodus 4:22; Psalm 2; Zechariah 12:10), unto a Perfect Man (Genesis 5:1,2), unto the Measure of the Stature of the Fulness of Christ…

From whom the Whole Body fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint (every channel between the Sefiroth) supplieth, according to the effectual working in the Measure of every part, maketh increase of the Body unto the edifying of itself in LOVE...(Ephesians 4:4-16).

We can see into the structure of this Mystery in the fact that the Scriptures have the Christ-child being born six months after John the Baptist. (Luke 1:26...See it in then oracles). This text carries the birth story out of those times to our own, and to the words at Revelation 12:1,2. It has everything to do with the realization that the Christ-child is not only born in every generation but in every human birth. It tells us that what was born in those days is being born again in our days. This Child of Revelation, this emerging state of Higher Consciousness--Christ-Consciousness/ Buddha Consciousness--leads all who are being born (again) with it into the Coming Age. (Please consider the following chapter).

Some New Testament apocryphal books tell of the Christ child's early years, of his mischieviousness, his magic stunts, and youthful power trips over his playmates. Christianity, of course (or certain parts of it), was given to literary flights of fancy in those times, but these particular stories seem to be some author's insightful, and fittingly satirical account of the formative years of this whole religious movement itself. But we have come to a full age. We look around and see that it is not some one individual alone that is full of magic, but the whole world, and the Universe itself, in which we live and breath and have our being.

Nor must we fail to see the (apocryphal as well as historical) connection that exists between the figure of John the Baptist, the "son of Zacharias" (Luke 1:5), and the Book of Zechariah, whose pages are also opening up and having their effect in our time. And what of Elizabeth, the mother of John? She appears in the story, and then she is gone. Her name reveals exactly who She is. She is another, literary manifestation of the Divine Mother. Her name derives from a combination of the word El (one of God's many names), and the term "Sabet,"or "Sebat." Thus "El-Sabet." This name embodies the concept of the number Seven. Elizabeth is literally, or rather an allegorical embodiment of those mysteries that proceed from the Divine Mother, and which must also have their fulfillment here at the Western ends of the earth, as it is written: Behold, I send you Elijah...(Malachi, chapter 4).

Who then is Mary, whose name means "the Sea," or "the Waters of Life?" Her namesake, Miriam, led the children of Israel in song at Exodus 15:20,21, one that presaged the song of Hannah at 1 Samuel 2:1-10, and Mary's at Luke 1:46-55. One publication asked: "But who was the Virgin Mary? Where was she born? How did she live? Where did she come from? Where did she go? Why was she a virgin? Why was this virgin espoused to a man named Joseph? Why was he of the house of DVD? Why did she say that all generations shall call her blessed? Why is it that no historical record whatever--in all the world--not one recognizes the existence of this most wonderful personage which the world ever had in it?"

And mention Miriam in the Book when she drew aside from her family to an eastern place.

So she took A Veil (to hide herself) from them; then We sent to her Our Spirit, and there appeared to her a well made man. (Gabriel).

She said, Surely I fly for refuge from you to the Beneficent God, if you are one guarding (against evil).

He said: I am only a messenger of your Lord: That I will give you a pure boy.

She said: When shall I have a boy and no mortal has yet touched me, nor have I been unchaste?

He said: Even so; your Lord says: It is easy to Me; and that We make him a sign to men and a mercy from Us; and it is a matter which has been decreed.

So she conceive him; then withdrew herself with him to a remote place. And the throes (of childbirth) compelled her to betake herself TO THE TRUNK OF A TREE (in the West).

She said: Oh would that I had died before this, and had been a thing quite forgotten.

Then her child called out from beneath her: Grieve not, surely your Lord has made a stream to flow beneath you…

And she came to her people with him, carrying him.

They said, O Mirium! Surely you have done a strange thing. O sister of Aaron! Your father was not a bad man, nor was your mother an unchaste woman. But she pointed to him.

They said: How should we speak to one who was a child in a cradle?

He (the child in the cradle) said: Surely I am a servant of Allah; He has given me (Revelation) and made me a prophet.

And He made me blessed wherever I may be, and He has enjoined on me prayer and poor-rate so long as I live.

And dutiful to my Mother, and He has not made me insolent, unblessed.

And peace on me on the day I was born, and on the day I die, and on the day I am raised to life.

Such is Isa (Jesus), son of Marium; (this is) the saying of truth about which they dispute...(Sura 19:16-34).

The account in the Quran is, of course, purely apocryphal. The Quran knows the mystery even if Islam (and even if Christianity) does not. The virgin in this story has withdrawn herself to the Sacred Tree, and has safeguarded the mystery within her until the appointed time. The last we hear of her in the Gospels she is also beneath the Sacred Tree. She is one of Three Marys. (Perceive how the mysteries are constructing themselves here). The Son looks down upon her and the Apostle John, and he says to the Apostle: Behold thy Mother. And from that hour the disciple took her into his home. (John 19:25-27). Mary is, of course, a Christian representation of the otherwise "pagan" concept of the Heavenly Mother, the Goddess of Fertility, with corn or wheat as a symbol of her fertility. Her name is the same as Miriam, and none other than Myrrha, the mother of the beautiful Adonis in pagan mythology, and Maia, the mother of Mercury (Acts 14:12) and Buddha. She is Isis, wed to the mysteries of Egypt (Joseph-Osiris-the Word), whose child, Horus the Hawkeyed, soared up into heaven to behold the entire kingdom of Egypt, from its upper regions in the East to its lower regions in the West, and everything in between. (See it in the oracles). Mary is the Divine Mother in another of Her many literary manifestations. She is the Holy Shekinah of God who committed Herself at that time, not only to the dimensions of the Solar Mystery of Christ, but--as the fullest representation of the Divine Feminine Principle, the Moon--to a state of complete occultation until the fulness of these times. She appears again in the words: And there appeared a Great Wonder in heaven, a Woman Clothed With the Sun. (Revelation 12:1,2).

She was reported to be the daughter of Anna, a figure who hearkens back not only to Hannah but to those ancient Druid beliefs that gave rise to the myth of the virgin goddess Di-anna, the Moon, the balanced half of Appolo, the Sun. (Isaiah 30:26).

Look further into the oracles and see how the constellation Virgo is descending into the affairs of our times, not only to the words in Revelation, chapter 12, but to the full meaning of those which say: Behold, a Virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a "son," and they Shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is "God with us." (Matthew 1:23)...

Mary is the Sea (the embryonic fluids of the world), out of which these mysteries are being born. She is the Waters that covered the Navel Stone of the Mystery hidden within Her. She is the Three Marys, the Past, the Present, and the Future:

There were three who always walked with the Lord: `Mary his mother and her Sister and Magdalene, the one who was called his companion. His sister and his Mother and his companion were each a Mary...(The Gospel of Phillip).

She is the Mother, Sister, and Lover. In her fallen state she is Gwenifere of the Authurian cycles (a symbol of the modern Church). In her perfected state She is the Magdalene, whose devils are all vanished. She is also Brigid who became Mary. She is the Goddess Sophia, Divine Wisdom. She is both Lillith and Eve, the mother of all human experience. She is the Three Jerusalems. (Ezekiel 16:46)...

She is that city in the East named Samaria. She is that City which is completing its pilgrimage here in the West. And She is that City Above in the center, the Mother of Us All. (Galatians 4:26). She is the Lady of the Lake; She is the Matronit; She is the Holy Spirit--She is ONE with God. She is the Sabbath. She is every Mother.

As the Sun rises in the East every morning, and sets in the West every evening, so this present age began with the rising of the Spiritual Sun in the East almost two-thousand, or 40 Jubilees of years ago, and is coming to its conclusion as the Sun sets here in the West in this fulness of time. With this understanding, and with a growing ability to read the oracles, we can fully understand the words which say:

1 Samuel 2:1-10; Luke 1:41-55...(KJV).

Take heed brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God.

But exhort each other daily WHILE IT IS CALLED TODAY, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin (self-willfulness, apostasy and religious pride);

For we are made partakers with Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence STEADFAST UNTIL THE END...(Hebrews 3:12-14).

__________

And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, TO DAY shalt thou be with me in PARADISE…(Luke 23:43).

 

The Divine Chariot, Merkabah Texts

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