Chapter V
The Divine Mother
This volume of letters and commentaries cannot complete itself, and for the reader it cannot really begin, without impressing upon the soul the realization that the Great Mother--the Divine Feminine Manifestation of the Godhead--is also impressing Herself once again upon the thought patterns of humanity. Just as the Sixth constellation Virgo precedes the events of the great Seventh month, wherein we observe the High Holy Days here in the West, and the epic completion of our present historical cycle...
Shekhina...Revelation 12.
...so the entire idea of the coming of the Messiah(s) is intricately connected to the reemergence of the Female and Mother aspects of Divinity. The children of Abraham (and our orthodox and fundamentalist brethren must be particularly attentive), will come to re-realize that God is Mother as well as Father. Please begin to perceive it in the sefira named Kether, or the Crown, on the Tree of Life, as it becomes one with the idea of the Universal Tao (this occurs when the Oracle-Tree is seen in its universal dimensions), thus the Fountainhead of every balanced principle in the created universe...
Kether (The Tao) The Supreme Crown
EAST
WEST
The Tao that can be told is not the Eternal Tao (Ain Sof). The Name that can be named is not the Eternal Name...
Yet Mystery and Manifestations arise from the same source. This source is called Darkness. Darkness within darkness. The gateway to all understanding...Tao Te Ching, First Precept.
...And they will come to realize that God (in their intricately balanced form as Mother and Father) is not only creating the conditions that are bringing about this present surge in human awareness, but the very conditions that are bringing an end to the old political, economic, and religious order itself...
The Tao doesn't take sides; it gives birth to both good and evil. The Master doesn't take sides; She welcomes both saints and sinners...
HOLD ON TO THE CENTER. Fifth Precept
THE TAO IS THE GREAT MOTHER: empty yet inexhaustible, it gives birth to infinite worlds.
It is always present with(in) you. You can use (and abuse) it any way you want. Sixth Precept
There was something formless and perfect before the universe was born. It is serene. Empty. Solitary. Unchanging. Infinite. Eternally Present. IT IS THE MOTHER OF THE UNIVERSE. For lack of a better name I call it the Tao.
It flows through all things, inside and outside, AND RETURNS TO THE ORIGINS OF ALL THINGS.
THE TAO IS GREAT. THE UNIVERSE IS GREAT. EARTH IS GREAT. MAN IS GREAT. THESE ARE THE FOUR GREAT POWERS...Twenty Fifth Precept, The Tao Te Ching, A New English Version, by Stephen Mitchell.
What continuity will there be between the Old and the New? It is likened in the oracles to the birth of a child--a Wondrous Child:
And there appeared a great wonder (in the heaven of human comprehension); a Woman clothed with the Sun, and the Moon under Her feet, and upon Her head a Crown of Twelve Stars. (She is crowned in the Majesty of the Universe itself, because She also is God. She and the Father are ONE).
And She, being with Child, travailed in birth, and pained to be delivered...(Revelation 12:1,2).
__________
Then answered he unto me and said, the more thou searchest, the more thou shalt marvel; for the world hurries to pass away, and cannot comprehend the things that are promised to the righteous in the time to come, for this world is full of unrighteousness and infirmities.
But as concerning the things whereof thou asketh, I will tell thee, for the evil is sown, but destruction thereof is not yet come.
If therefore that which is sown be not turned upside down, and if the place where the evil is sown pass not away, that cannot come which is sown with the good.
Then I answered and said, how and when shall these things come to pass?
And he answered and said, Do not thou hasten above the Most Highest, for thy haste is in vain...
Did not the souls of the righteous also ask questions of these things in their chambers, saying, How long shall I hope on this fashion? When cometh the fruit of the floor of our reward?
And he said unto me, The archangel gave them answer, saying, even when the number of seeds is fulfilled in you, for He hath weighed the world in a balance.
By measure hath He measured the times, and by number hath He numbered the times, and He doth not move nor stir them till the said number be fulfilled.
Then answered I, O Lord that bearest rule, is it that the floors of the righteous are not filled because of the sins of us who dwell upon the earth?
So he said unto me, Go thy way to a woman with child, and ask of her when she has fulfilled her months, if her womb may keep the birth any longer within her?
Then said I, No Lord she cannot. And he said unto me. In the grave (see Ezekiel 37) the chambers of souls are like the womb of a woman. For like as a woman that travaileth makes haste to escape the necessity of the travail; even so do these places haste to deliver those things that are committed unto them.
From the beginning, look, what thou desirest to see, it shall be shewed thee...(2 Esdras 4:26-43, KJV).
__________
Behold, the plagues draw nigh, and are not slack.
As when a woman with child in her ninth month bringeth forth, within two or three hours of her birth great pains compass her womb, which pains, when the child cometh forth, they slack not a moment.
Even so shall not the plagues be slack to come upon the earth, and the world shall mourn, and sorrow shall come upon it on every side.
Hear my words, make ye ready to the battle, and in those evils be as pilgrims upon the earth...(2 Esdras 16:35-40).
__________
We have been in pain with child. We have, as it were, brought forth wind. We have not wrought deliverance in the earth, neither have the inhabitants of the world fallen...(Isaiah 26:18).
A photo taken just recently one stormy day.
Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a Nation be born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed she brought forth her children.
Shall I bring to the birth, and not cause to bring forth? saith the Lord: shall I cause to bring forth, and shut the womb? saith the Lord...(Isaiah 66:8,9).
__________
But of the times and the seasons, ye have no need that I write unto you.
For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night (see John 10:1-10).
For when they shall say, Peace and Safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape.
But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief.
Ye are all the children of Light, and the children of the Day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness...(1 Thessalonians 5:1-9).
__________
Now why dost thou cry aloud? Is there no king in thee? Is thy counselor perished? For pangs have taken hold of thee as a woman in travail.
Be in pain, and labour to bring forth, O daughter of Zion, like a woman in travail:
For thou shall go forth out of the city, and thou shalt dwell in the field (see Matthew 13:38), and thou shalt go even to Babylon: there the Lord shall redeem thee from the hand of thine enemies...(Micah 5:9-12).
__________
Ye shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice, and ye shall be sorrowful. But your sorrow shall be turned into joy.
A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow because her hour is come. But as soon as she is delivered of the child she remember no more the pain, for joy that a child is born into the world...(John 16:20,21).
Just as every child is born out of the darkness of its own mother's womb, into the light of the world beyond, so this Child is being born out of the Darkness of this age into the Light of the age to come. This Child is the coming age. It is coming to birth with all of the ideas, interpretations, and revelations that went into hiding with the Mother herself, when She, along with the mysteries of the Feminine Principle, went into occultation at the time of Christ two thousand years ago. Where is this Child being born? Naturally, in the lower parts of the earth (below the Navel, in the West), but moreso, in the hearts and minds of every single individual, male and female alike, who is being reborn, or born-again, in the process.
"Once upon a time twins (an allusion to the two sides of the Tree of Life) were conceived in the same womb. Seconds, minutes, hours (centuries), passed as the two dormant lives developed. The spark of life glowed until it ignited in the formation of their tiny embryonic minds. With their simple minds came feeling, and with feeling perception, of their surroundings, of the other, of self.
When each perceived the life of the other, as well as their own, they also sensed that life was good, and they laughed and rejoiced, the one saying, How lucky we are to have been conceived, and to have this world. The other chiming, And blessed be the mother who gave us this life and each other. Each budded and grew arms and fingers, lean legs and stubby toes. They stretched their lungs, churned and turned in their new-found world. They explored their world, and in it found the life-cord which gave them life from the precious mother's blood. They said, How great is the mother that she shares all she has with us. And they were pleased and satisfied with their world.
As time passed they noticed a change in each other. We are changing, said the one. What can it mean? IT MEANS, said the other, THAT WE ARE DRAWING NEAR TO THE BIRTH.
An unsettling chill crept over the two, and they both feared, for they sensed that birth meant leaving their world behind. Were it up to me, said the one, I would live here forever.
But we must be born, said the other. It has happened to all others who were here before us. For, indeed, there was evidence of life there before, as the mother had born others.
But is there life after birth? How can there be life after birth, said the other. Do we not shed our life-cord? And have you ever talked to anyone who has been born? Has anyone ever reentered the womb after birth? No! And he fell into despair and lamented, If the purpose of conception and all our growth is that it be ended in birth, then life is truly absurd.
He stabbed the darkness with his unseeing eyes, and as he clutched his precious life-cord to his chest, said, If this is so, and life is absurd, then there really can be no mother. But there is a mother cried the other. Who else gave us this nourishment and our world? We get our own nourishment, and the world has always been here. And if there is a mother, where is she? Have you seen her? Does she ever talk to you? No, we invented the mother because it satisfied a need in us. It made us feel happy and secure.
Thus while one despaired the other resigned itself to the birth. Hours ached into days, and days fell into weeks. And it came time. Both knew that the birth was at hand. And both feared what they did not know. As the one was the first to be conceived, so it was the first to be born. The other followed soon after.
They cried as they were born into the light, and coughed out fluids, gasping for dry air. And when they were sure they had been born, they opened their eyes, seeing for the first time, and found themselves cradled in the warm arms of the Mother. They lay open-mouthed and awe-struck before that Beauty and Truth they could not otherwise have hoped to have known." The Midwives Alliance of Indiana, (April, 1987).
Who is this Mother? First of all She is not simply the result of metaphysical and theological word-play, but rather the natural extension of Divine Reality which constantly expresses itself in every study of the laws and principles of the Universe. Before creation (the Great Emanation) God was united with Him and Herself (or Her and Himself) in one singularly-conscious form, until the moment of Creation itself when God broke, or emanated, into positive and negative forces and the material order appeared. With it appeared all the conceptual forms into which the Mind of Creation descended, and with which it would clothe itself. With creation She came forth:
SHE IS A TREE OF LIFE to them that lay hold upon Her: and happy is everyone that retaineth Her...(Proverbs 3:18).
She is ever-present. She is the Feminine manifestation of the Presence of God. She (along with the Father), is both hidden and revealed everywhere in Nature, in myth, and in the pages of Holy Writ. As God is Creator, She is Creation. She descended with the process of Creation, from form to form--always keeping the concept of the Divine Father (the Higher invisible Principle) with Her--through the formation of the Solar System, to that of the planet Earth, to the creation of humanity on Earth, and finally to the ongoing creation of the mind of humanity in our very own day. She has given birth a billion times, and (just as She gave birth 2,000 years ago to the age that is now ending) She is travailing in birth again, and the whole world is experiencing Her fierce contractions...
In the scriptures She is our mother Sarah bringing forth Her child in the time of life. (Genesis 18, and 19). She hid the leaven in Three measures of meal until the whole was leavened. (Matthew 13:33):
The kingdom of heaven is like unto a woman who taketh of the incorruptable leaven and hideth it in three measures of meal...And till the whole is leavened, being baked by fire...becoming one loaf...(The Gospel of the Perfect Life XXXIX.5).
Before She was Sarah She was Sarasvati, the wife of Brahma (Abrahm), and the Mother of the Four Vedas:
ABRAM AND SARAI..."The early River Goddess, Sarasvati, becomes identified with speech (Vach). She appears as the wife of Brahma, and the Goddess of Wisdom and Eloquence. (See Proverbs 7:4; Genesis 20:2). In the great epic, the Mahabrata, She is called the Mother of the Four Vedas. (And thus, the Four Gospels)...
Further evidence of a common source is found in the doctrine common to Indian, Greek, and Babylonian systems that all originates from a watery abyss (the womb of the world), and again from a Cosmic egg. Indian lore combines the idea of creation through Water and the Word, in the double meaning of Saras, which can be taken as water and voice, hence Sarasvati...Her characteristics are found in the Babylonian goddess Sarpantium, who, as blended with Erua, the daughter of Ea, becomes 'the Lady of the Deep,' the 'Voice of the Deep,' and possessor of knowledge concealed from men." Pagan Christs, J.M. Robertson, pp.59,60.
__________
"Brahma (Creator) formed from His (and Her) own substance a female, who is celebrated under the names of Satarupa, Savitri, and Sarasvati...
Brahma's wife is Sarasvati, the goddess of Wisdom and Science, the Mother of the Vedas. She is represented (at times) with Four arms. With one of her right hands she is presenting a flower to her husband, by whose side She constantly stands." The Dictionary of Religion and Myths.
__________
The Lord possessed me in the beginning of His way, before His works of old.
I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was.
When there was no depths, I was brought forth; when there was no fountains abounding with water...
Then was I by Him, as one brought up with Him; and I was daily His delight, rejoicing always before Him.
Rejoicing in the habitable part of His earth; and my delights were with the sons of men.
Now therefore hearken unto me, O ye children: for blessed are they that keep my ways.
HEAR INSTRUCTION, AND BE WISE, REFUSE IT NOT.
Blessed is the man that heareth me, watching daily at my gates, waiting at the posts of my doors.
For whoso findeth me findeth LIFE, and shall obtain favor of the Lord.
But he that sinneth against me wrongeth his own soul (see Matthew 12:31,32): all they that hate me love death...(Proverbs 8:22-36).
__________
Wisdom (Sophia) crieth without; She uttereth Her voice in the streets: She crieth in the chief places of the concourse, in the openings of the gates: in the city She uttereth Her words, saying:
How long, ye simple ones, will ye love simplicity? and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge?
Turn ye at my reproof: behold, I WILL POUR OUT MY SPIRIT UNTO YOU, I will make my words (the meaning of all things) known unto you... (Proverbs 1:20-23).
In a song from the Vedas there are three verses at the close addressed to the river Sarasvati. In the first two she is a goddess (a force of Nature) who is the inspirer of noble thoughts, "the knower of good thoughts in men"...In the next verse there is mention of the great Flood of Waters that grants wisdom through its own wisdom. In another song there is a verse where the Sarasvati is described as a kind Mother giving milk to her baby from her breast. (See Genesis 21:1-8; Isaiah 28:9-11). In another verse Sarasvati is spoken of as associated with the Maruts (please see the previous chapter on the connection between the Maruts and the Essenes)..."She goes forward with a Chariot...She is invoked to go to the Place of Worship." The Quintessence of the RigVeda, pp.68,69.
TRANSLATION: "Sarasvati-speech which is inspirer of acquiring noble virtues and is the instructress of the Right Minded, refined by knowledge of the Vedas upholds the Yajna (the Great Nonviolent Sacrifice...please see previous chapter).
PURPORT: It is only the science and true speech of the learned who are pure in thought, word, and deed, which is full of all knowledge and devoid of all deceit that can give true knowledge to the people...
'According to Rishi Dayananda, the word Sarasvati also means a 'learned lady.' In this Mantra it means that a learned lady always uses and instructs others to use true and sweet words, tender good advice to all, and performs the Yajnas (sacrifices) well...'
TRANSLATION: The Vedic speech, which along with noble actions and intellect, enlightens the great ocean of the words like the great ocean of water, gives intellectual brightness." The Holy Rigveda, Mandala I, Hymn III, pp.46-48.
__________
"Now for some reason or another best known to themselves, the translators of the bible have carefully crowded out of existence and smothered up every reference to the fact that the Deity is both masculine and feminine. They have translated the feminine-plural by a masculine-singular in the case of the word ELOHIM. They have, however, left an inadvertent admission of their knowledge that it was plural in Genesis 1:26 and 5:1,2: 'And ELOHIM said: Let US make man.' Again (v.27), how could Adam be made in the image of Elohim, male and female, unless the Elohim were male and female also?
The word Elohim is a plural ending from a feminine-singular ALH (Eloh), by adding IM to the word. But inasmuch as IM is usually the termination of the masculine-plural, and is here added to a feminine noun, it gives the word Elohim the sense of a female potency united to a masculine idea, and thereby capable of producing an offspring.
Now we hear much of the Father and the Son, but we hear nothing of the Mother in the ordinary religions of the day. But in the Qabalah we find that the Ancient of Days conforms Himself simultaneously into the Father and Mother, and thus begets a Son. Now this Mother is Elohim. (Please see the following chapters on the Divine Name).
Again, we are usually told that the Holy Spirit is masculine. But the word RVCh, Ruach (Spirit), is feminine, as appears from the following passage of the Sepher Yetzirah: AChTh RVCh ALHIM ChIIM...Achath (feminine, not Achad, masculine) Ruach Elohim Chiim: 'One is She the Spirit of the Elohim of Life.'" The Kabbalah Unveiled, by S. L. Mac Gregor Mathers, pp.21,22.
It was the Spirit of the Mother (conjoined with the Father), and all Her mysteries, which descended from Kether (the Supreme Crown on the Tree of Life) into the Mystery of Christ in the time of John the Baptist: And, lo, a Voice from Heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. (Matthew 3:17). There cannot be a son without a father and a mother.
Malachi, chapter 4
It was also the Divine Mother (Wisdom Herself) who allowed (compelled) the Male (solar) principle to come to power with the Rising of the Sun in the time of Christ. For in the Mystery of Christ both good and evil (balance and imbalance) were to be brought to perfection and revealed, as it is also written: For the mystery of Iniquity doth already work. (2 Thessalonians 2:7). As we follow this pathway of the "male order" out of the East to this fulness of time in the West, we can look back and see the intended effects of Her work (of Their work). She wanted us to see what a world completely out of balance looks like, how it is filled with violence and aggression, with competitiveness, with oppression, and injustice. The world is reeling under the effects of male domination. It is filled with the spirit of little boys parading around in the guise of grown men, wearing uniforms and medals, playing soldiers and politicians, wearing crowns and miters on their heads, flying here and there, making hollow speeches, filling the earth with vanity, with destruction and with death...while with increasing insolence, impotence, and ignorance of things divine, they preside over the ongoing collapse of their own world order...
The rulers thought it was by their own power and will that they were doing what they did, but the Holy Spirit in secret was accomplishing everything through them as it wished. Truth, which existed from the beginning, is sown everywhere. And many see it being sown, but few are they who see it being reaped...(The Gospel of Philip II)
When the Male principle came to power, as it did in the most historical way two thousand years ago, we see that not only did the Mother herself go into hiding (concealing herself in such otherwise obscure literary figures as Mary--Mare, the Sea, or the Waters of Life--and Elizabeth, or ElSabat, the personification of the sacred number Seven), but the entire Feminine (Lunar) principle went into occultation with Her. And we follow this realization (making note of all the ways the Feminine principle has been ruthlessly ill-treated, tortured, set aside, disregarded, and callously tread under foot), into our own times, to the High Holy Days in the West, and to the words:
Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, In the Seventh Month, in the first day of the month (the day of the New--returning--Moon), shall ye have a sabbath, a memorial of blowing of trumpets, an holy convocation...(Leviticus 23:24).
__________
Blow the trumpet in the New Moon, in the time appointed on our solemn feast day...(Psalm 81:3).
__________
He hath appointed the Moon for seasons, and the Sun knoweth his (own) going down...(Psalm 104:19).
The meaning of the New Moon which accompanies the descent of the Divine Mother into our collective field of consciousness, will be realized in the return of the Feminine Principle to its own rightful (balanced) place in the cosmic order. This Anointed one shall appear as the Messiahs are revealed in our time at the place named Majesty on the Tree of Life. (Zechariah 4:10-14)...
THE SUN AND THE MOON, CHRISTIANITY AND JUDAISM
Moreover the light of the Moon shall be as the light of the Sun, and the light of the Sun shall be Sevenfold as the light of Seven days, in the day that the Lord bindeth up the breach of his people, and healeth the stroke of their wound...(Isaiah 30:26).
So why does it say of the Divine Mother that She has the moon under her feet? (Rev.12:1). First of all, we see that it is here at the Foot of the mystery where the Feminine principle shall reappear in perfect balance with the Male principle. And when it does, She will have under her own Foot any continued notion of the spiritual inferiority, or difference between the male and female principles--the one being potent, for instance, and the other "merely" receptive; one full of light and the other darkness; and one above and the other below...
Then why is the Child of Revelation called a "manchild," or a "Son?" Please! students of scripture, feminists, everyone, quit the childishness. God has only so many physical and literary forms to work with, and there are only so many principles to be expressed, so stop stumbling over them. Stop being offended by them. Come to maturity (Ephesians 4:13). Be spiritual. God hid these principles from the literal, unspiritual mind, so that the spiritual mind could be manifest in the last day, so that Divine Wisdom could be revealed in the last day. This child is called a "son" because a son (not in the literal, or physical sense, but in the world of thought-forms and ideas) has a penus. And a penus (not in the literal or physical sense but in the world of thought-forms and ideas) is capable of penetrating and impregnating another. Thus the penus, and by extension the notion of a "son," is a metaphor for the ability to penetrate another--not with a penus but with the seed of truth, with the meaning of the Word of God, with a right interpretation of reality. Is the female capable? Is she equal to the task? Of course! She has always known it. Has she been called to it? From the very beginning. Is her name not Adam (Genesis 5:1,2), thus, is she not also the Christ? So let us grow past the allegories and metaphors, the types and images. Let's cast off the yoke of literalism and get on with the higher realities of Life. (Please read the chapter entitled "Circumcision").
In the following Gnostic scene Peter, along with Andrew, plays the heavy as usual. He is typed as the rigid literalist who must be taught the secret meaning of the Scriptures and the lessons of the Spirit over and over again:
"But they were grieved. They wept greatly, saying, How shall we go to the Gentiles and preach the gospel of the Son of man? If they did not spare him, how will they spare us? Then Mary (Magdalene) stood up, greeted her brethren, and said: Do not be irresolute, for his grace will be entirely with you, and will protect you. But rather let us praise his greatness, for he has prepared us AND MADE US INTO MEN. When Mary said this, she turned their hearts to the good, and they began to discuss the words of the Savior.
Peter said to Mary, Sister, we know that the Savior loved you more than the rest of women. Tell us the words of the Savior which you remember--which you know and we do not, nor have we heard them. Mary answered and said, What is hidden from you I will proclaim to you. And she began to speak to them...
(When Mary was finished) she fell silent, since it was to this point that the Savior had spoken with her. But Andrew answered and said to the brethren, Say what you wish to say about what she has said. I at least do not believe that the Savior said these things. For certainly these teachings are strange ideas. Peter answered and spoke concerning the same things. He questioned them about the Savior: Did he really speak with a woman without our knowledge and not openly? Are we to turn about and listen to her? Did he prefer her to us?
Then Mary wept (for them) and said to Peter, My brother Peter, what do you think? Do you think that I thought this up by myself in my heart, or that I am lying about the Savior? Levi answered and said to Peter. Peter you have always been hot tempered. Now I see you contending against the women like the adversaries. But if the Savior made her worthy, who are you indeed to reject her? Surely the Savior knows her very well. That is why he loved her more than us. Rather let us be ashamed AND PUT ON THE PERFECT MAN and acquire him for ourselves as he commanded us, and preach the gospel, not laying down any other rule or other law beyond which the Savior said. (Rome?). (Saudi Arabia?)." The Gospel of Mary, The Nag Hammadi Library.
___________
Simon Peter said to them, Let Mary leave us, for women are not worthy of life.
Jesus said, I myself shall lead her in order to make her "male", so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every woman who will make herself male will enter the kingdom of heaven...(The Gospel of Thomas 114).
Did Peter really believe that Mary was spiritually inferior? Or that women, in the literal, physical sense of the term are not worthy of life? (As the twisted and tormented Augustine and other early Catholic fathers were to in the following centuries)? Of course not. Who would follow them if they did? These guys were not jerks. They were the radicals, the spiritual counter culture of their time. They are members of the Fellowship of the Mystery. And the females among them are all part of the same spiritual conspiracy. One cannot imagine, for instance, that Peter's wife (or any other of the Essene ladies) is some dotish, unintelligent figure cowering around the backdrop of the New Testament narratives, on her way to spiritual oblivion, whose only purpose is to wait on Peter, or that she would stand for such talk unless she herself understood the imagery. But rather imagine her strong and spiritually vibrant, and as perceptive in all of these matters as he. And be sure, if Peter is a prophet it is because she has given him the power to be one. And if he has come to understand the meaning of the higher mysteries for himself, experientially, which include the mysteries of the Feminine principle, it is because she has helped him learn them. And if the penus is a metaphor the vagina even more so:
The Vagina...A Cave of Treasures concealed in a garden of delight. It is the pathway to the Navel of the Earth; it is the portal of life itself. The uninitiated, the unchosen, the unspiritual, have never seen it. (Her secrets that is). They may have thought about it, lusted after it, even forced themselves upon it. They may have imagined themselves its guardians, set rules for it, and commanded it to stay in its place, but they have never experienced it. It is the Higher Mysteries, and the way to the hidden, inner meanings of Life itself that we speak of. It is Divine Wisdom that we speak of, sometimes Mother, sometimes Sister, sometimes Lover, that we speak of. She is true love, and she is heavy with spiritual birth...
As above, so below. The precept is illustrated here in Da Vinci's Last Supper. Forget what detractors have to say about it, there she is, Thunder, Perfect Mind, Magdaline, the Female Christ. She has always been one with Him, and He with Her, in the eyes of those who know.
How did She break loose from her guardians? She is Wisdom, Sophia, She cannot be contained. She listeth where She will. She is the Mistress of the Tantric Path. She descended to us, and with us, bringing all of her secrets with her. Among her many personalities is the Magdalene, the personification of spiritual perfection. All of her devils (her mental complexities) are gone out of her--all Seven of them. The uninitiated, however, the unchosen, the unspiritual, have never lain with her, or been impregnated by her. How is this accomplished?...
Some said, Mary conceived by the Holy Spirit. They are in error. They do not know what they are saying. When did a woman ever conceive by a woman?...(The Gospel of Philip, The Nag Hammadi Library).
...By becoming one with Wisdom Herself--balanced and in harmony with all of the principles of reality--by becoming receptive to Her. Everyone is male (man) to those below them in the spiritual order of things, and female (woman) to those above them. It is all metaphor. Not only must we make ourselves female (nazarites in the fullest sense) to the higher order of reality, in order to perceive (or conceive) that reality within ourselves, but we must learn to cherish that reality, as well as its mirror image here below. Thus each of us must learn that love (and therefore sexuality), is a sacrament of the very highest order. We must be taught the Tantric path (in ways that the lower order of things by itself is incapable of expressing), and learn not to partake of sexuality frivolously, without realizing, or coming to realize, that we are partaking of the very highest mysteries of Life at the same time. We must come to learn of course, that none can experience the (sheer) pleasure of love, who have not first overcome the (mere) love of pleasure...
Sexuality is a reflection in our own physical and individual lives below, of the erotic union, and the cosmic devotion the Divine Mother and Father have for each other in the worlds above. In the symbol of the Universal Tao the Two are found in an eternal state of intellectual, emotional, and sexual embrace. Life on Earth is the fruit of this relationship. Thus those who understand these things--that they are children, born of both Heaven and Earth--strive to bring themselves into conformity with the pattern of this relationship, to a whole and balanced state of mind; and certainly so if we wish to pass through the dimensions of this world into the pure dimensions of the world-beyond. To pass through the Door our individual minds must be aligned with the Mind of the Universe itself, with the Central Pillar of the Oracle of Nature where both that the Male and Female Principles of Life meet and face each other in the mysteries of Christ. Both purity of mind, and the liberation of the mind, are the keys, for it is the mind alone that can pass over--and only the mind of Light at that.
It is also time for those who consider themselves to be religious to complete the Hajj. When they do they will learn to stop enforcing their own interpretation of "purity" upon others, but to see to it that they become pure themselves. Only then--only through unconditional love, and only through a mature understanding of the often rigorous process of personal transformation that one must experience, how the pathway to spiritual perfection often carries the individual soul off in other directions before it returns them to the straight path again--may one person become a guide to another. Everyone must work out their own salvation, with trembling within, but free from the condemnation and the restrictions of others. The path of return is marked Freewill Offering. (Leviticus 1:1-3). This transformation process, of course, is an almost purely Western phenomenon as it is written: Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. The path is paved with grace.
Thus it is also time to take off the veils, and to replace them with "really good hejab." (Voluntarily of course). And let no one take refuge in the literal precepts of the Qur'an, or any other holy Book, for Allah (in Her own Feminine persona) has purposefully enacted such precepts into the text of the Holy Qur'an in order to cause those who cannot see into their higher meanings to stumble, so that they will reveal themselves in the last days...(Hebrews 4:12)...
Immature minds, hidden lust. These guys don't get it yet.
If one is full of lust, as most authoritive males are, God knows it. If it lies latent in the heart, God knows it. It makes absolutely no difference if the outward object of such lust is fully clothed or fully naked. The chief fault is not in the object of the lust (especially if such a one is pure in heart, or even unwitting), but in the one who lusts. This has been one of the great purposes of the Western experience, of the collective and unbridled descent into the lower, material world, and into the manifold ways of the flesh: so that the soul may learn to make a truly freewill offering of itself, as it learns to overcome (in the presence of every temptation) all of the lower attractions of the world and the ways of the flesh itself. For it is only in such an environment that the soul can break the power of every inordinate affection--in ways, that is, that are ultimately, and fully liberating to the soul itself. Is this not the fast that I have chosen? To loose the bands of wickedness, to let the oppressed go free; and that ye break EVERY yoke. (Isaiah 58:6).
And to say: What! shall we indeed give up our gods for the sake of a mad poet?
Nay, he has come with the truth and verified the apostles.
Most surely you will taste the painful punishment.
And you shall not be rewarded except (for) what you did.
Save the servants of Allah, the purified ones.
For them is a known substance,
Fruits, and they shall be highly honored.
In gardens of pleasure,
On thrones, FACING EACH OTHER...(Sura 37.36-44).
To bear the yoke of one's own lower thoughts and impulses are the heaviest oppressions of all. All social, political, and sexual oppression arises from those places in the soul (the heart and mind) that have not been opened up and liberated, that have not been exposed to the higher Light. If the Divine Mother is revealing Herself in our day, in ways that are perfectly conducive to the attainment of true holiness and purity of mind (as in Miriam No Longer Behind the Veil), and if the Anointed Ones shall be revealed in Her light, Her daughters and sons may do so as well: Her daughters may take off the veils. They may come out into the Light--but only if they want to, of course. (Please consider the Chapter on the Mysteries of Islam).
Wisdom is glorious, and never fadeth away: she is easily seen of them that love her, and found of such as seek her.
She (nurtures) them that desire her, in making herself first known unto them.
Whoso seeketh her early shall have no great travail; for he shall find her sitting at his doors.
To think therefore upon her is perfection of wisdom, and whoso watcheth for her shall quickly be without care.
For she goeth about seeking such as are worthy of her, shewing herself favourably unto them in the ways, and meeteth them in every thought.
For the very true beginning of her is the desire of discipline; and the care of discipline is love;
And love is the keeping of Her laws; and the giving heed unto Her laws is the assurance of incorruption;
And incorruption maketh us near to God:
Therefore the desire of wisdom bringeth to a kingdom...(Wisdom of Solomon 6:12-20).
Tender is the Tree of Life
Tender is the Tree of Life,
Her branches salaam to the wind.
In due time, she sheds leaves florid
As tears for the orphaned girl,
The impulsive bride,
Reluctant bridegroom,
Wanderer, wayfarer
All those pelted by the world.
The Tree of Life awaits the time
Of tender buds, flowers and fruits,
For this is when she tempts us all to eat
The penniless, prominent
Or piddling, infamous, godly,
Or gone from our minds, majestic
Or ministerial. She shelters
Birds of every color.She seeks out the child, shunning the
Hot-headed father, the
Fractious brother; she courts
The stranger whose home is
The world. She opens herself
To him and shields him with
Leaves light and warm as goose down,
For the wayfarer spreads
Aboard the seeds of her
Compassion.Orphan, stranger
Each has stood a moment before
The Tree in full flame as the sacred
Smoke wafts up toward
Madness or heaven beyond
The cloudbanks of memory
And desire to a reality
Beyond bearing—but that's
Another story.
Zara Rabb
For all men have one entrance into life, and the like going out.Wherefore I prayed, and understanding was given me: I called upon God, and the Spirit of wisdom came to me.
I preferred her before scepters and thrones, and esteemed riches nothing in comparison to her...
For She is a treasure unto men that never faileth: which they that use become the friends of God, being commended for the gifts that come from learning...
For She is the brightness of the Everlasting Light, the unspotted mirror of the power of God and the image of his goodness.
Being but One She can do all things: and remaining in herself, She maketh all things new, and in all ages entering into holy souls, She maketh them friends of God, and prophets.
For God loveth none but him that dwells with Wisdom.
For She is more beautiful than the sun, and above all the order of stars: being compared with the light, She is found before it...(Wisdom of Solomon 7:6-29).
__________
For at first she will walk with him by crooked ways, and bring fear and dread upon him, and torment him with her discipline, until She may trust his soul, and try him by her laws.
Then She will return the straight way unto him, and comfort him, and shew him her secrets...(Ecclesiasticus 4:17,18).
It is also time to break down the mehitzah (as many already have). The principles of reality are based upon the idea of "symmetry" (Yin-Yang), (Positive-Negative), (Male-Female). Those precepts are being discovered and reconstructed in the findings of 20th century physics, just as they were anciently constructed into the dimensions of the Oracle with its male side and its female side. The precepts of the Torah, which are based upon these very same principles of reality, have always contained and implied the principles of balance that operate and function between them, and which join them together as one. And initiates in the hidden science have always been free to interpret them in that light, and to guide their own lives in accordance with them. Which is why the truly spiritual seem at times to be irreligious in the eyes of the orthodox, because they always seem to be in violation of some (literal) precept of the law, or of some custom or another as they are observed by the rigidly orthodox. As far as Judaism is concerned, and the struggles that exist between Reformed and Conservative Jews, and their Orthodox co-religionists, there is a blessing and a curse on each of their houses. If either knew, for instance, where the Western wall of the temple was really located, if either possessed true Daat, then the one would not be insisting on the right to pray at it (at that wall over there), whether in mixed company or not, and the other would not be found storming its precincts in fitful attempts to drive females from it, or to divide the females from the males, as they do. Such behavior may indicate a zeal for the law, but also an historic ignorance of its meanings. The spectacle is tiring to God (if such a thing were possible).
The scriptures are full of male terminology because they are full of the power of penetration and impregnation. The mind that is opened by them, and to them, becomes one with them. It has nothing, however, to do with the physical differences that exist between the male and the female, but rather with the literary differences that exist between the terms man and woman. Religious orthodoxy stumbles over these terms, and cannot, in its own rigid adherence to literal forms, assimilate the meanings or the effects. It is fixed in a literal interpretation of the word man. But so is Feminism. It is captured by the mystique associated with the word woman. Try as it does to unburden itself of all the connotations associated with the word, it will not let go of the word itself. (Not that it should. It is a very powerful word. Women should just come to terms with the meaning and the implications of the word itself). We have expressed it in other places and it must be expressed here again. The term "man" in the scriptures refers (in their not-so-hidden, and not so mysteriously complicated sense), to every soul--male and female alike--who have attained to the higher realities. It is as Paul begins to intimate when he says: For we know that the Torah is spiritual, and, that we (have also been) delivered from its literal restrictions on the mind, having died to them through (an understanding of) the mysteries of the Tree of Life...That we should serve in the newness of the Spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter. (Romans 7:4-14). But even the oldness of the letter has always made the male and female equal. The newness of the Spirit, in this case, simply illuminates the meanings that have been there from the beginning:
This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day that God created MAN, in the likeness of God made he him.
Male and Female created he them, and blessed them, AND CALLED THEIR NAME ADAM, in the day they were created...(Genesis 5:1,2).
God called his name Adam, and her name Adam. They are, when they both understand the meaning, and when they are joined together in one mind, both Adam. They are not Adam and Eve, or Adam and Lillith, but Adam. It is understood in the precepts of Christ, which--in every type and image--are the true expressions of the Torah:
For as in Adam (the natural man, the old letter), all die, even so in Christ (the spiritual man and the meaning of the old letter) shall all be made alive...(1 Corinthians 15:22).
__________
For he is our peace, who hath made both one, AND HATH BROKEN DOWN THE MIDDLE WALL (the mahitzah) OF PARTITION BETWEEN US;
Having abolished in "his" flesh the enmity, EVEN THE LAW OF COMMANDMENTS CONTAINED IN ORDINANCES; for to make in himself of the two, ONE NEW MAN, so making peace.
And that he might reconcile both unto God IN ONE BODY by the Cross, having slain the enmity thereby...(Ephesians 2:14,15).
The Roman church, of course, has not come close to the meanings either, wholly married to the affairs of the lower world, and stuck in the Augustinian view of reality as it is...
FIRM "NO" ON WOMEN'S ORDINATION
Vatican City__The Holy See Jan 24 presented its most comprehensive case yet on why it says the Catholic Church will never ordain women.
The Church's top doctrinal experts announced the release of of a book gathering together the major recent Church documents on the subject and a raft of scholarly essays bolstering their position.
The book is part of a series of books produced by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (remember the Inquisition). It was not clear why the latest volume was devoted to the contentious issue of women priests. But it follows a visit to the Vatican last month by the spiritual leader of the Anglican Church, which ordains women. Pope John Paul II has called the practice AN "OBSTACLE TO UNITY" within the Catholic Church...
In summing up the Church's arguments, Bishop Scola said, "The Church does not have the power to modify the practice, uninterrupted for 2,000 years, of calling ONLY MEN to the ministering of the priesthood, in that this was wanted directly by Jesus." He cited arguments that Jesus decided to choose only men for the 12 apostles and that the priesthood is "objectively linked to the male sex of Jesus."
So much for the Vatican's point of view. Uta Ranke-Heinemann treats the subject splendidly in her Eunuchs For the Kingdom of Heaven, Women, Sexuality, and the Catholic Church. (Of course this was the intended effect of the Spirit's literary devices to begin with. She deprived the Roman hierarchy, obsessed as it was, and is, with its own literal, male sense of things, from understanding Peter's Hidden Man of the Heart. 1 Peter 3:4. The entire mystery was sealed from the Roman church). And the rabbis--those who had access to such works as the Bahir (one of the earliest books of the Kabbalah to emerge out of the even earlier traditions of the Merkabah mystics), and who subsequently made a deep study of such works--should also have come to the meanings but did not. They read the words:
"In Hebrew, Solomon is Shlomoh, from the root Shalom, meaning 'peace.' (See 1 Chronicles 22:9). As discussed earlier, peace is the attribute of Daat, Knowledge, which is the concept of union and reconciliation, especially between male and female. THE WORD SHALOM--PEACE--COMES FROM THE SAME ROOT AS SHALEM, WHICH MEANS PERFECT AND COM PLETE. IN PARTICULAR, NEITHER THE MALE OR THE FEMALE IS COMPLETE WITHOUT THE OTHER.
Shalom (ShaLWM) is spelled WITH A VAW (or Waw), (The place where the Male and Female Principles meet on the Tree of Life), while Shlomoh is spelled with a Heh. As discussed earlier, the Vaw represents the male, while the Heh is female. (As in Yod Heh Vaw Heh...Yod-Father, Heh-Mother, VAW-SON). Shlomoh-Solomon is therefore the concept of 'Peace' in Malkhut-Kingship, the Female. Shlomoh-Solomon is therefore said to be 'the king to whom peace belongs.' (Shavout 35b, Rashi on Song of Songs 1:1). God therefore told Solomon that his name was like the name of 'My Glory' since glory always refers to the sefirah of Malkhut-Kingship.
Wisdom was then given to Solomon through 'the Daughter,' which is also the sefirah of Malkhut-Kingship. It is an important kabbalistic teaching that Malkhut-Kingship is the sefirah through which all others are revealed. Since Solomon made himself a counterpart of Malkhut-Kingship, he could draw through it." Bahir II.65.
...and then continue, despite the words, and in the very presence of their own female counterparts--their wives and daughters--to thank the Master of the Universe for not making them ignoramuses or woman. Even if all concerned suspect the allegorical or esoteric meaning in the phrase, it is time to dispense with it. Those who translated this work approached right-meaning at Bahir 198 when discussing Genesis 1:28, and then utterly confused it again when quoting Genesis 2:18, and 22, by reassociating the word female with the word woman again--substituting the former for the latter as did the entire orthodox world at that time. The Gnostics (those who "really knew" that is) made no such mistake, and searched for language capable of conveying the true and higher realities:
"And Thought performed a deed and she came forth, namely she who had appeared before him in the shine of his light. This is the First Power which was before all of them which came forth from his mind. She is the forethought of the All--HER LIGHT SHINES LIKE HIS LIGHT--the perfect power which is the image of the invisible, virginal Spirit who is perfect. The first power, the glory of Barbelo, the perfect glory in the aeons (the sefiroth), the glory of the revelation, she glorified the virginal spirit and it was she who praised him because thanks to him she came forth. This is the First-Thought, his image; SHE BECAME THE WOMB OF EVERYTHING. FOR IT IS SHE WHO IS PRIOR TO THEM ALL, THE MOTHER-FATHER, THE FIRST MAN, the Holy Spirit, the Thrice-male, the Thrice-powerful, the Thrice-named androgynous one, and the eternal aeon among the invisible ones, and the first to come forth." The Apocryphon of John, the Nag Hammadi Library.
Of course we are not to imagine that every Gnostic group was privy to Her innermost mysteries. What we do know is that almost all of the Gnostic groups (the heretics as they were called by the othodox church), the knowledgeable and the unknowledgable alike, were all driven out over time by the emerging and more powerful dictates of the World-church. They were driven almost out of the pages of history itself--in much the same way as the early rabbis excommunicated the likes of Rabbi Eliezar ben Hyarcanus (the Great), for fraternizing with the "other side" (the Essenes), and, of course, the likes of that other Pharisee, Paul (Elisha Ben Abuyah himself), for commanding them to be silent:
But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be silent.
For Adam (the spiritual male, and the spiritual female) was first formed, then Eve.
And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in transgression...(1 Timothy 2:9-15).
__________
Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak: but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law. (See Exodus 23:21,22; 1 Peter 1:2).
And if they will learn anything let them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for a woman to speak in the church...
(And then Paul says): If any man thinketh himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord...(1 Corinthians 14:34-37).
Please see that at no time does Paul command the female to be silent, but the woman. The difference between the two terms is as vast as is spiritual reality from the church's inability to interpret it. But neither does Paul divulge the difference in any outright way. He leaves it for the Holy Spirit to enlighten each individual soul as She will, according to Her own great purposes in history. (Continued)...
An interview with Leonard Nimoy in the February, 2004 edition of Moment Magazine:
MOMENT...Have you ever felt as if you have seen the Shekinah physically or spiritually?
NIMOY...You asked me a very interesting question. My Shekinah...is an artistic vision, my artistic interpretation. I'm not claiming to actually see or be in the physical presence of Shekinah. I have a spiritual sense of what a Shekinah is all about for me. And I have experienced that at times, at various times in my life.
MOMENT...What does it feel like to spiritually experience the Shekinah?
NIMOY...I think--I hope-- that most people at one time or another in their lives have a feeling of being in a state of grace for a moment or two, feeling that all has come together for them, that they have a sense of harmony, a sense of inner peace, a sense of successful combining of instinct and will. It's the coincidence of events that makes one feel that you're in the right place at the right time and doing the right thing.
MOMENT...Many Jews seem unaware of the Shekinah. Do you hope that your photographs will make them more aware?
NIMOY...I think it is true that a lot of Jews are not familiar with the idea, the concept. It was the Kabbalists in the 1600s who taught in what is now Safed in Israel who very energetic about their belief in mysticism and Shekinah. Not a lot of people read or study Kabbalah. It's a narrow field...It's a very interesting issue to me because it grew out of an Orthodox experience, and yet it is a feminist idea that is not particularly welcome to Orthodox people. I find it, right or wrong, a very interesting and strange mixture of spirituality, religion and contemporary culture.
MOMENT...Tell us why you photograph women wearing tefillin.
NIMOY...Tefillin are typically associated with men...Now, this is not the first time this thought has been presented. There is reason to believe that...Rashi's daughter wore tefillin to pray. MY SENSE IS THAT SHEKINAH CAN WEAR TEFILLIN IF SHE WANTS...I wonder if you're at all aware that in Israel there's a law that says that a woman standing at the Western Wall to pray in Jerusalem and wearing tefillin is subject to criminal prosecution and can be jailed UP TO SEVEN YEARS.
MOMENT...What about the veils the women in your photographs wear?
NIMOY...THE WORD VEIL TO ME MEANS MYSTERY. IT MEANS SOMETHING NOT QUITE VISIBLE. It means something between the viewer and the object that can be sometimes seen through, sometimes removed, sometimes obscured. IT HAS TO DO WITH THE MYSTERY OF SHEKINAH.
(continued)...Yet Paul says it plainly enough when alluding to Adam and Eve at Ephesians 5:31,32: This is a great mystery, he says, but I speak concerning Christ (the male and female joined together) and the Church. She (Eve), is not the figure of the female gender, but rather, she is a figure of all the males and females together, the priests, rabbis, ministers, reverends, and imams (and all others who cling to their lesser interpretations), who have not yet ascended to the higher realities, and who therefore keep their flocks entangled in the gross elements of the world and in the literal elements of the Word. "She" (Eve) is all those to whom the first Adam (the first spiritual couple) went in ancient times, in their first attempts to explain the meaning of the revelations and insights they were receiving from God (from the Mind of Nature Herself). "She" (Eve) was Adam's first church. Has "she" not given birth to two kinds of sons, Cain and Abel? Are they not still with us? Are not the sons of Darkness now grown powerful, violent, and wicked in the earth? All in their father's name? Are they not now occupying thrones and seats of power, and positions of great worldly authority in the earth, seats which their own professed Father (Christ, the second Adam), refused to sit in? (See Matthew 4:8-11; John 6:15). These are the disobedient ones, of whom the scriptures refer when they say: Their feet shall slide in due time. (Deuteronomy 32:35), and finally: They shall kill you thinking they are doing God service. (John 16:2). It is the point the original author of the Kerygma Patrou is driving at when he or she speaks of the woman, the present World-church (RELIGION) as it exists in all of its many forms and divisions here at the end of the 20th century:
"There are two kinds of prophecy, the one is 'male' (interpret correctly here), the other is found amongst those who are born of woman. (Not females). Proclaiming what pertains to the present world "female" prophecy (the terms are confused here again) desires to be considered male. On this account she steals the seed of the male (continue to interpret from the higher reasonings, we're dealing in metaphors here), envelops them with her own seed of the flesh and lets them--that is, her own words--come forth as her own creation.
She promises to give earthly riches gratuitously in the present world and wishes to exchange the slow for the swift, the small for the greater. She not only ventures to speak and hear of many gods (as if both good and evil did not flow from the same source, and as if all the nations and the affairs of the world were not under the direction of the same God), but also believes that she herself will be deified (or even raptured away); and because she hopes to become something that contradicts her nature, she destroys what she has. Pretending to make sacrifices, she stains herself with blood at the time of her menses (proving that she is barren of understanding) and thus pollutes those who touch her. When she conceives she gives birth to temporary kings and brings about wars in which much blood is shed. Those who desire to know the truth from her, are led by many and opposing statements and hints to seek it perpetually without finding it, even unto death. (Please understand Revelation, chapter 17, and Ezekiel 16 in this same light, and in the light of each other).
For from the beginning a cause of death is certain for blind men; for she prophecies errors, ambiguities, and obscurities, and thus deceives those who believe her. Therefore she has given an ambiguous name to her firstborn son, she named him Cain (compare Genesis 4:1 and Job 3:1-10), which word has a two-fold meaning; for it is interpreted both 'possession' and 'envy' and indicates that later he was to envy his brother Abel a woman, or a possession, or the love of his parents. But if it was none of these, then it was well ordered that he should be called 'Possession,' for he was her first possession that was profitable to her...For he was a murderer and a liar and did not wish to cease from sin once he had begun to do so. Moreover his descendants were the first adulterers. They made harps and lyres and forged instruments of war. Therefore also is the prophecy of his descendants full of adulterers and harps which secretly excite to war." The Apostolic Pseudepigrapha.
When Paul says:
But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God...(1 Corinthians 11:3).
(And) Wives, submit yourselves unto your husbands, as unto the Lord.
For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the Body...(Ephesians 5:22,23; Colossians 3:18).
...he knows that the spiritual mind coming to perfection will not mistake the hidden principles and allegories in these texts for literal commandments. He knows the Divine Spirit will reveal Her own meanings in the fulness of time, as She did in great part to the 9th century kabbalist, John Scotus Eriugena:
"St. John the Evangelist, too, heard the voice of the Word. Responding to its call, he appropriated and entered into it. Fully listened, and divested of all that was not the Word, he became one with the divine spiritual field of its nature. Thus in a state of pure reciprocity which contains the meaning-being of all things, St. John became the ear of the Word. Becoming its ear, he spoke, and speaking he became its mouth and voice, the Voice of the Eagle.
In this way and without warning we are plunged into the central mystery of Christianity: the meeting place of the human soul with Christ in the phenomenal world. How does this take place? Consider Eriugena's interpretation of the story of Christ and the woman of Samaria at Jacob's well:
It is the 'sixth hour,' the cosmic midday; Christ, tired by the rigors of incarnation, meets THE WOMAN--THE HUMAN SOUL--by the well of the world. Seated upon its rim, he asks water of her, a Samaritan. Surprised, she wonders why he, a Jew, would ask water of her. He replies that if she knew whom he really was, she would ask him in turn for 'living water.' The woman then notices that Jesus has no way of drawing any kind of water. But he repeats that the water he offers is living, a well continuously springing up unto eternal life. Finally the woman asks him for some, and he replies, 'Go, call thy husband.' That is, he says to her that she cannot drink his water unless she first calls her husband. Eriugena explains this as follows:
'THE WOMAN IS THE RATIONAL SOUL (anima) WHOSE HUSBAND (literally, 'vir'. or 'man'--with the connotation of active power, not 'maritus' or 'conjunx') IS UNDERSTOOD TO BE THE ANIMUS, which is variously named now intellect (intellectctus), now mind (mens), now animus and often even spiritus. This is the husband of whom the Apostle says 'The head of the woman is the man, the head of the man is Christ, the head of Christ is God.' IN OTHER WORDS, THE HEAD OF THE ANIMA IS THE INTELLECTUS, AND THE HEAD OF THE INTELLECTUS IS CHRIST. Such is the natural order of the human creature. THE SOUL MUST BE SUBMITTED TO THE RULE OF THE MIND, THE MIND TO CHRIST (the idea of harmony and balance between the Two principles), and thereby the whole being is submitted through Christ to God...Spirit revolves perpetually about God and is well named the husband and the guide of the other parts of the soul.'" The Voice of the Eagle, The Heart of Celtic Christianity, by Christopher Bamford.
Thus in the spiritual realm not only may both the male and the female be considered "man," but either one of them can be the "husband" of the other one as well. Only intractable and spiritually hardened minds refuse to break down the barriers that exist between themselves and their own imperfect, and unspiritual interpretations. But these shall, sadly, be left behind as the human mind goes on to perfection in Christ. Both males and females possess the same faculties of animus and anima. When they are in harmony, the one above the other, the "husband" is the head of the "wife." But when the female finds herself married to a male who does not understand these principles, when she does, then she is the spiritual husband in the relationship and is required to honor her mate as the "spiritually weaker vessel." (1 Peter 3:1-7). Everything must be accomplished in love (when it is possible). But when both understand these principles there is true harmony, and both are equally submissive to the other. The middle wall of partition is removed (as it will between all Christians and Jews on the Tree of Life), and there is peace.
The entire language of the Scriptures is based upon this synthesis of principle and form. And that the Universe itself is based upon cosmic sexual principles is evident, not only in the sublime union that binds the male and female together in the highest (tantric) state of love--creating life, bringing forth life--but in the corresponding union that binds the upper and lower worlds to each other. What words do we use to express the relationship? Father (pure Thought) above, and Mother (the phenomenal World, out of which every one of us has been born), below. Some in the Feminist camp contend that the Father and Son overthrew the Mother with the advent of Christianity. It is an impossible reality. God is not divided, and cannot be overthrown. Just as Wisdom (Hokhmah) is the first extension of Kether, so Wisdom (Sophia) is the natural extension of the invisible Presence of God in the world. As She descended she took upon Herself all the physical forms of the Lower order, giving birth in time to the literary forms...but also to the very notion of God the Father itself. If She had not instructed us in the ways of His Presence, we would have known absolutely nothing of Him at all. Between them they brought forth the "Son." They entrusted all of their mysteries to the realm of the Son, but They, and especially She, did not leave them unattended:
"There can be no doubt that the goddess to whom the Hebrews clung with such tenacity down to the days of Josiah, and to whom they returned with such remorse following the destruction of the Jerusalem temple, was, whatever the prophets had to say about her, no foreign seductress, BUT A HEBREW GODDESS, THE BEST DIVINE MOTHER THE PEOPLE HAD HAD AT THAT TIME.
Following the death of the spirit of idolatry in the days of Nehemiah, the Hebrew goddess succeeded in surviving. She underwent, to be sure, an astounding metamorphosis, but then that too is the mark of a living Deity. In one of her manifestations she penetrated--in what period we can only conjecture--the rebuilt sanctuary as THE FEMALE CHERUB, POISED IN MARITAL EMBRACE WITH HER MALE PARTNER IN THE DARK CELL OF THE HOLY OF HOLIES. In another she became the manifestation of God's Presence, THE SHEKINAH--a feminine name just as God's is masculine--a loving, rejoicing, motherly, suffering, mourning, and in general emotion-charged aspect of deity...
The new mythology of Kabbalah, revealed in the writings of the Jewish mystics of the 13th century...knows evil goddesses, in addition to good ones. They are the she-demons of yore, Lilith, and Naamah...who managed to work themselves up to a much higher position, until their queen, Lilith, becomes God's consort. This happened following the destruction of the Jerusalem temple and the subsequent exile of Israel, which came to be regarded as a catastrophic event not only for the people but also for God. The Shekinah, or Matronit, as She now was called, in her motherly love for her children, went into exile with them. This brought about a separation between her and the King who thereupon allowed Lilith, queen of the demons, to attach herself to him and take the place of the Matronit as his spouse...
The Matronit, meanwhile, continued to be closely concerned with her children. Like a true goddess, she played the role of spouse as well as mother to her people. She also assumed the form of a Divine Queen and bride, who joined them every Friday at dusk, (at evening), to bring them joy and happiness on the Sacred Sabbath." The Hebrew Goddess, by Raphael Patai, p.26.
__________
I was sent forth from the Power, and I have come to those who reflect upon me, and I have been found among those who seek after me...
I am the first and the last.
I am the honored one and the scorned one.
I am the whore and the holy one.
I am the wife and the virgin.
I am the mother and the daughter...
Why, you who hate me, do you love me? And hate those who love me?
You who deny me, confess me, and you who confess me, deny me...
You who know me, are ignorant of me, and those who have not known me, let them know me...
I am she who cries out...(The Thunder: Perfect Mind, The Nag Hammadi Library).
The Divine Mother (Holy Wisdom) did not only clothe herself in the obscure and lowly literary figure of Mary (Miriam) in the time of Christ, as well as in the Virgin's alter image, the Magdaline; and She did not only enter into the congregation in the collective figure of the Church (a title which the Roman and Orthodox churches arrogated to themselves over time), but She has been dwelling in the literary figure of Eve from the very beginning in the story in Genesis. But more: in her darkest aspect, and from the very beginning, She had ensouled Herself in the character of Lilith as well. (Read the entire text of The Thunder: Perfect Mind). How else could humanity ever come to know the difference between good and evil, light and darkness, truth and error, if Wisdom Herself had not descended into the Darkness of the Human Soul to draw it down to those places where such things are realized? How could we have ever discovered our own propensity for the darkness; indeed, how could history ever have come to pass as it has, and how could it come to the conclusion it is about to, if Wisdom had not descended with us to the Lower side of the Tree, enticing us to partake of it--if She had not fed us, as it were, with such measured amounts of human awareness, as to awaken our minds to the nature of Darkness itself? (see Hebrews 5:12-14).
The Tree of Life is a cosmic metaphor for Life itself, and the Dark side of this Tree is a metaphor for human experience. We had to eat from it. In the (Solar) mystery of Christ the Divine Mother has been accompanying the people back to the Western ends of the Earth, back to the garden of Eden, to those events recorded in the first chapters of Genesis. All of this to complete the very process of Creation itself, for the mind of Adam is still being created. (Genesis 1:26). She has descended with us into the realm of Darkness, not only in the interest of bringing forth daughters and sons capable of uniting all of the dimensions of the Oracle to each other, but to demonstrate to all of us together the great and powerful, and subtle nature of Darkness itself, especially as it is revealing itself here in America at the end of the age. She is revealing this spirit not only to us but in us...as it is written: For Satan is more subtil than any beast of the field. (Genesis 3:1).
THE SERPENT MOUND , ADAMS COUNTY, OHIO
Behold, I go to prepare a place for you...John 14:1-4.
This ancient earthwork hidden in the primal woods since the time of Christ, along a ridge in the place we now call Ohio, is a living prophecy of those events that are about to unfold in our time, as the Great Serpent(s) rises up in our midst in their attempt to devour the Child of Revelation as soon as it is born. (Revelation, chapter 12). This cosmic Serpent has Seven turns in its frame between its spiral tail and its devouring mouth. These are the historical turns of human events that have carried the mind of Light into these times, and to the things that must come to pass at the time of the Seventh and Eighth sefirot on the Tree of Life named Endurance and Majesty. The egg represents the coming age, which is now in the process of hatching, as well as the heart and minds of all those who are being born into it.
Allegheny, The Place of the Foot
And the Lord said unto the Serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life:
And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel...(Genesis 3:14,15).
At a gathering of environmentalists some time ago (a Tree-huggers Ball), a song was sung in honor of the Mother Goddess--a rythmic litany of names humanity has known her by. A voice in the gathering said, "Return to paganism." Another said, "It is not paganism." Another said, "Pre-christian," and finally one said, "Full-circle." When the prophets inveighed against the Queen of Heaven in ancient times (Compare Jeremiah 7:18, and 44:17), they were not taking a stand against the idea of God as Mother, or against the fact that She was an object of worship for much of the ancient world, they worshipped Her themselves, but against the things that were, and which still are practiced in Her name. They inveighed against the basest rituals that were being performed in honor of Her mysteries, and against the fact that these rituals never brought their practitioners to a real and meaningful understanding of Her Presence in the world. The same is true today. Our worship of Her has devolved to idolatry. In the name of progress, for instance, the church acts hand in hand with those who are literally destroying and scarring the face of the Divine Mother. Is She not, in one of Her many manifestations, the Holy Mother Planet Earth Herself? And side by side with these destroyers the American church has also set aside and disregarded the plaintive cries of those who have been made stewards of this Sacred Mystery by God Themselves...
During a recent pilgrimage to the sacred mountain in South Dakota we met an indigenous man who told us not to fail to see her when we got there. "Who?" we asked. "Earth Mother giving birth to the World," he said. Look hard, you will see her." And there she was! We ascended to the Navel of this sacred mountain and payed homage to Creation--to Heaven Father and Earth Mother.
The cover of one of the latest editions of the Village Voice has a caricature of Bush's secretary of the Interior, appropriately entitled "Eco-Terrorist Gail Norton:"
WASHINGTON, D.C.__As she sailed through her Senate confirmation hearing last week, interior secretary nominee Gail Norton played the classic moderate, draping herself with the dual mantles of "conservative" and "conservationist." What bull (*!@?$$#!t). A libertarian from the West, Norton has spent the last two decades railing against federal control of public lands and doing all she could to subject their water and energy resources to the bracing reality of the market place. "I hate the government telling me what to do," she once said. "And I assume other people do." As Colorado's attorney general in the mid 90s, she chalked up a scandalous record: looking the other way in the face of damaging polution, dragging her feet on prosecuting big business, even challenging the Environmental Protection Agency's authority to override state law...In another spectacular case she testified against her own citizens, siding with a big corporation that fouled the air. After years of bouncing between libertarian think tanks (think Ayn Rand) and states' rights groups, Norton may finally get the authority to implement her freewheeling ideas on a large, large scale. James Ridgeway.
At a past-recent gathering of Indigenous Peoples, the theme was "The Cry of the Earth." Many came to speak. The following comments are from notes taken during the conference which was aired on Public Television. These comments--and may we add to them Al Gore's The Earth in the Balance, Ecology and the Human Spirit--are an indictment against the entire American Corporate State, including the so-called Environmental Protection Agency. The former because they represent the Voice of God spoken through the living victims of the great American atrocity, this nation's wholly violent and destructive 400-year march into the heart of this sacred continent. The latter because it reminds us plainly that as far as the American Corporate State is concerned it is still "business as usual," and nothing but "words" spoken over and over again with the same forked tongues. The Corporate State will do nothing that is not in its own financial interest, thus it will do nothing to redeem itself in the eyes of God, as it continues to provoke the Creator (the Great God of War Himself), and to draw the wrath of Nature Herself down upon the whole house...The Divine Mother and Her children will be saved from the ravages of man, and the earth will be healed. Is her name not also Kali?...
Virgil Killbear, of the Lakotas, spoke of the Sacred Number 7, given to the Sioux by the Seven Brothers and Seven Sisters. He spoke of the Seven Sacred Laws:
1. To carry about in one's heart the welfare of the people.
2. To have pity and great compassion.
3. To have respect for all things, and tolerance.
4. To cultivate great minds.
5. To seek humility.
6. To be brave and courageous.
7. To get Wisdom and Understanding.
THE PROPHECIES
1. When the Eighth Star appears, change will come.
2. You will see the events unfold.
3. As unnatural events meet the real, you will see. (Two men and two women cannot make life).
4. When things that are not supposed to happen, happen.
5. When the sacred circle spins in reverse. (Zionism in the East).
6. The Sacred Earth which moves will reveal itself in a different manner.
7. When womankind cries, saying it is too difficult.
8. When earth cries, the mothers cry.
9. When the Sacred Hoop of Life is broken.
10. The Seventh Generation will mend it.
Ollie Nepensi, Great Grandmother from the Rosebud reservation:
I have tears in my eyes, because the prophecies are coming true. My elders said these things to me.
In the future bad things will come, and you will live to see it.
The water is your life, take care of it.
Care for the wood, the trees. They are being cut.
Recall the old ways (one foot ahead, one foot behind).
Things are not the same; things do not grow as they used to.
The children are like strangers.
They have no respect for family, for elders, home, or environment.
We have lost our religion. It was stolen. (Practitioners have been arrested).
Some young people, however, are coming back.
The strangers are "wiring us up," destroying us.
The coming ruler, (unclear), but a time of great tribulation.
Arvol Lookinghorse spoke Lakota:
We are the caretakers of the heart of the continent called Turtle Island.
Less than five hundred years ago life was abundant. Where is that abundance?
We are at a critical stage in human, moral, and technological development.
All things are interrelated.
The mending of the Sacred Hoop has begun.
May we have the courage to heal Mother Earth...
A Great Flood came to this island before "the contact" to purify the earth.
After that the Sacred Pipe was brought to the people by the Spirit Woman (the White Buffalo Calf Woman).
The bowl, the Red stone represents the Mother.
The wooden stem represents the Tree of Life.
As the Tree grows so do our people.
The Red Pipe Stone is turning white, it must be restored.
It must not be used as a tourist attraction.
The dreams and visions will return.
The prophecies are coming true.
We are part of a cycle of life which has no beginning and no end.
"The story of these people has at its center and all around it the story of the Medicine Wheel. The Medicine Wheel is the very Way of Life of the people. It is an understanding of the Universe. It is the Way given to the Peace Chiefs, our Teachers, and by them to us. The Medicine Wheel is the everything of the people.
It is the Living Flame of the Lodges, the Great Shield of Truth written in the Sign of the Water. It is the Heart and Mind. It is the Song of the Earth. It is the Star Fire and the Painted Drum seen only in the eyes of children. It is the Red Pipe of the Buffalo Gift smoked in the Sacred Mountains, and it is the Four Arrows (Directions) of the Peoples' Lodge. It is Our Sun Dance.
The Medicine Wheel begins with the touching of our Brothers and Sisters. Next it speaks to us of the touching of the world around us, the animals, the trees, grasses, and all other living things. Finally it teaches us to sing the Song of the Whole World, and in this way to become a Whole People.
Medicine Wheel, Wyoming
Each tiny stone within the Medicine Wheel represents one of the many things in the universe. One of them represents you, and another represents me. (Please see 1 Peter 2:5). Others hold within them our mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, and our friends. Still others symbolize hawks, buffalo, elks, and wolves. There are also stones which represent religions, governments, philosophies, and even nations. All things are contained within the Medicine Wheel, and all things are equal within it. The Medicine Wheel is the Total Universe.
Our teachers tell us that all things within the Universe know of their harmony with every other thing, and know how to give away to one another, except man. Of all the Universe's creatures it is we alone who do not begin our lives with knowledge of this great harmony.
All things in the Universe Wheel have spirit and life, including the rivers, rocks, earth, sky, plants, and animals. But it is only man,of all the beings on the Wheel, who is a determiner. Our determining spirit can be made whole only through learning of our harmony with all other spirits in the Universe. To do this we must learn to seek and to perceive. We must do this to find our place within the Medicine Wheel. To determine this place we must learn to Give Away.
The Vision Quest, or perceiving quest, is the way we must begin this search. We must follow our Vision Quest to discover ourselves, to learn how we perceive of ourselves, and to find our relationship to the world around us. Among the people, a child's first teaching is of the Four Great Powers of the Medicine Wheel." Seven Arrows, by Hyemeyohsts Storm, pp.1-6.
Audrey and Leon Shenendoah, the Iriqouis Delegation:
This people planted the Sacred Tree of Peace in Rome and New York City.
As we are gathered it is our responsibility to bring a message about caring for our Sacred Mother Earth.
Our Creator has given us our Mother the earth, and it contains everything we need for life.
Our Mother provides the medicine we need for daily life.
They are there for health as well as sickness.
They bring a healthy mind when used right.
We have our Grandfathers, the Thundering voices, they bring the rain.
Our brother, the Sun, brings light and warmth.
Our Grandmother, the Moon, she is directly related to the Female Principle of life.
She determines when life will be born.
Oren Lyons:
The Creator gave all peoples stories and creation myths. They are all true.
The leaders were supposed to carry out the instructions...
By keeping our thanksgivings and offerings we support life.
When we stop life will stop.
Make sure it is not your generation.
Hopi Delegation:
Since 1948 we have been believing that we would come together like this. We have been knocking on doors...FOUR DOORS, FOUR KNOCKS, NO MORE
.
Martin Gashesesheoma, spiritual leader:
When you hear the prophecies they will bring everyone to the right state of mind to work together.
We promise to live a simple life. Spider Woman instructed us.
Jacob Swamp:
The Peacemaker made them stand around the Sacred Tree, and told them about those who would come with sharp objects.
The Tree will begin to fall.
Do not lose faith, or peace will not come again.
Our leaders are tired, all things have come to pass, but many new ones are being born.
I give thanks today for the people who came, and who stayed to hear the messages.
All the children of the world must come together and work for global peace.
In September of 1994, the White Buffalo Calf was born in the state of Wisconsin.
And the nations were angry, and thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead, that they should be judged, and that Thou shouldst give reward to thy servants the prophets, and to the saints, and them that fear thy Name, small and great, and shouldst destroy them that destroy the earth...(Revelation 11:18).
Seemeth a small thing unto you to have eaten up the good pasture, but ye must tread down with your Feet the residue of your pastures? And to have drunk of the deep waters, but ye must foul the residue with your Feet.
And as for my flock, they eat that which ye have trodden down with your Feet; and they drink that which ye have fouled with your Feet. (See Deuteronomy 32).
Therefore, thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I, even I, will judge between the fat cattle and the lean cattle...(Ezekiel 34:18-20).
__________
Ye shall not pollute the land wherein ye are, for blood it defileth a land; and the land cannot be cleansed of the blood that is shed upon it, but by the blood of him that shed it...(Numbers 35:33).
__________
"Tell me now Oldest Mother, why did the Old Man, the Lord of the Lightning, let the white man take our lands?
Sit and be still (said Old Eyes of Fire), for I shall tell you what you need to find your vision.
Eyes of Fire made circles in the dust with her stick and then drew a big Circle that surrounded all the little circles.
These little circles, she said, are all the little nations and all the little religions of the world, but the Big Circle is the One Big Nation and the One Big Religion that encloses them all, and means them all, and knows them all just as a mother quail draws her chicks under her spread wings and loves them all as a mother should.
Long ago, all our people were united in love and knowledge. The Wise Old Chiefs and the Wise Old Women taught the children how to grow up and be good and to love one another. All the land belonged to all the people and all the children felt that every man or woman was a father and a mother...
But tell me Oldest Mother, why did the Spirit of the Earth let the white man take our people's land?
All these things have I told you so that you will understand, she replied. The Wise Old Ones told me long ago why the white man was sent. The Heart of All Being sent them because the white man comes from a land where only white men lived and it was necessary for them to come to this place where they would learn about other races and learn to live with them, and that one day, when the Indians got the old Spirit back again, and would teach the white man how to really love one another and how to love all mankind. Now because the Indians were humbled and made poor by the white man's conquest, they have been cleansed of all selfish pride. They are ready for a Great Awakening, and they will awaken others." Warriors of the Rainbow, Strange and Prophetic Dreams of the Indian People, by William Willoya and Vinson Brown.
__________
Therefore if you will obey my Voice, and keep my covenant, then shall ye be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people, FOR THE EARTH IS MINE...(Exodus 19:5).
__________
The land shall not be sold forever; for the land is mine: for ye are strangers and sojourners with me.
And in all the land of your possession ye shall grant a redemption for the land...(Leviticus 25:23).
Statement from Chief Arvol Looking Horse:
"I, Chief Arvol Looking Horse of the Lakota, Dakota and Nakota Nation would like to offer a statement concerning the violation against the Sacred Sundance Ceremony at Big Mountain, Arizona. The Sacred White Buffalo Calf Bundle that I care for consists of the Seven Sacred Rights and one of them is the Sundance. Because of this responsibility, my work is toward World Peace and Global Healing, as our ceremonies are connected to the Sacred Mother, including her well being preserved for generations to come. The Sacred Tree represents all life upon Mother Earth. A very important protocol in putting up the Sacred Tree with it’s offerings of prayers for all life including health for our relatives, is that the ceremony and energy must not be broken or stopped. This ceremony has been with Sacred Bundle for nineteen generations. We have shared this ceremony for health and well being with other Indigenous Nations to bring spiritual awareness and strength back to Nations.
When I heard of the Hopi Nation’s attitude and violations to a spiritual ceremony, I had to realize that it was not the Hopi Nation, but rather a group of people who have been affected by the disease of the mind. This disease that has spread throughout Turtle Island to many Honorable Nations that have made decisions affecting relationships toward their own brothers and sisters of Indigenous Nations, including the violation toward our Mother Earth.
In my Peace works I was honored to sit with many Hopi Traditional Elders, including the late Thomas Banyanca, who had the most deepest respect for all ceremonies, as we shared the Sacred C’anupa together. We understood that our work and message was the same. His concern for his people violating their own culture and traditions was the same as mine. There are many other Traditional Hopi who understand the proper protocol to ceremonies and would not think and do anything toward violating one another in interrupting a Sacred Right. So this brings my thoughts to those who do not understand who they are as a Hopi, a person that holds a bloodline to their Ancestors that walked in honor and in harmony. Many Nations, have these kinds of people that are not aware of the blood that carry in their veins and responsibility to bring honor to their people by making wise decisions based on compassion, understanding and respect. This makes me realize that the people making these decisions have another motive based on the material world, which brings unbalance to our Mother the Earth. They only need to understand that these prayers made at all ceremonies are for their children’s health as well. Prayers need to be offered for our people that have become lost in their spirit and identity as an Indigenous Nation of this Turtle Island. Our prayers are strong and to react the same as them will not resolve anything, but bring more division and confusion.
My prayer is for this issue to be resolved in a most Peaceful way and honor to all Nations represented will heal and communicate for Peace and Harmony. In a Sacred Hoop of Life, where there is no ending and beginning! Mitakuye Oyasin (all my relations),
From: Black Hills Woman PAULA H
Subject: response of a question of why?
Someone just asked Arvol why all this is happening and whether it was because our Elders are few...from his book "White Buffalo Teachings":
We must understand the two ways we are free to follow, as we choose the positive way or the negative way the spiritual way or the material way. It’s our own choice--each of ours and all of ours. You yourself are the one who must decide. You alone and only you--can make this crucial choice. Whatever you decide is what you’ll be, to walk in honor or to dishonor your relatives. You can’t escape the consequences of your own decision. On your decision yes, on your own personal decision depends the fate of the entire World. We are the only species destroying Mother Earth! You must decide. You can’t avoid it. Each of us is put here in this time and this place to personally decide the future of humankind. Did you think the Creator would create unnecessary people in a time of such terrible danger?
My Grandmother once told me to understand that every person can have a good heart, a heart big enough to change the world! She said the Great Spirit wouldn’t give us something we couldn’t handle! Know that you yourself are essential to this World. Believe that! Understand both the blessing and the burden of that. You yourself are desperately needed to save the soul of this World. Did you think you were put here for something less?
We carry a Message that has been handed down to us from Elder to Elder through the generations, a sacred Message of a Way of Life that Wakan Tankan the Great Spirit, the Great enveloping Mystery, has blessed us with. Each generation has an obligation to pass this Message down to the next.
Because our Word like the breath of Life that carries it--is sacred, it must always passed down in truth. We do this in our ceremonies, our prayers, our prophecies and our sacred teachings.
In our way, a leader has to be humble and think about the Seventh Generation. Every generation must consider the welfare of the Seventh Generation yet to come. As we turn to the four cardinal directions, we hear our Ancestors in the winds, encouraging us to make decisions based on generations to come. Remember, seven generations ago our Grandfathers and Grandmothers prayed for our welfare, even though we weren’t yet born. If they had forgotten those who were not yet born, if they had forgotten us, we wouldn’t be here today.
One of our prophecies warns that, if there comes a time when people would wake up to each new day with continuous negative energy, it would adversely affect the path of a Wakan Ye-j’a (a sacred spirit child) coming into this world, and the new life would return back to the spirit world. We witness this many times today when children die before they are born. Yes, we ourselves are the Seventh Generation, and we too, must remember those who aren’t yet born, the Seventh Generation yet to come.
The Seventh Generation is now upon us. Every generation is the Seventh Generation, and each generation has its special task, its Instructions.
Ours is global healing through World Peace and Prayer. That is this generation’s task. That is my task and that, my friend, is your task, too. Our Instructions from Wakan Tankan tell us to promote global healing, to teach peace and harmony to the many Nations of Mother Earth and to begin both a Great Healing and a Great Forgiving. We must teach all Peoples that Mother Earth is not a resource, but the very Source of Life itself. Unless we do this, the powers of destruction will overwhelm us.
So our generation has been put here to save all future generations. That’s why we hold this World Peace & Prayer Day each year since 1996, because two years before that the White Buffalo Calf was born among us as a Sign both of Warning and of Deliverance. In a Prophecy, we were told we would be the key people to re-educate our relatives, teaching the medicines of balance and harmony that our Mother Earth needs to survive. That’s why I say that we are at a Crossroads, each of us and all of us a Crossroads predicted in our Prophecies.
We ourselves stand at the very Crossroads of understanding the positive and negative influences that affect all Life yet to come. We ourselves--you and me and all of us must make the right decision on behalf of the Seventh Generation. But we have little time.
These days time moves too fast for us to catch up. Babies are having babies. Today we have seven generations in a single century instead of over two or even three. We become grandfathers and grandmothers when we're not yet out of our thirties. When so many of our People die young, those who remain must become Elders. We go from being children to being Elders. There's no in-between, no teaching ground.
Long ago, we lived to be over one hundred years old, and now our lives have been cut short. There was once an understanding that we would each go through four stages in life after we are born upon this Mother Earth as a Wakan ye-j’a (a sacred child). We would have the life span needed to complete the four balanced cycles of life, which is also represented in our Medicine Wheel. We had time to learn the full meaning of becoming a young man or becoming a young woman. We had time to earn our true spirit-name, time to perform the good deeds that brought us a well-deserved Eagle Feather. Above all, learning the meaning of patience, being humble, respectful and understanding the teachings that would bring us to full maturity, so that one might finally become an Elder, a Keeper of Wisdom. This span once took a hundred years or more. Now time is fore-shortened, and we must learn in days or weeks what once took us months or years."
The roots of Indigenous spirituality reach deep into the bosom of Mother Earth, and reach high into the Sky of the Mind of the Creator, connecting all things in the natural and supernatural worlds. It is a branch (or rather the root) of Hebrew thought that the remainder of us have been sent here again to explore, and to be instructed in. But the impulse to tread lightly, and to learn, was quickly overwhelmed by the onrushing force of Darkness, by the more natural urge to exploit, to kill, and to steal. (Read Genocide Against The Indians, Its Role in the Rise of U.S. Capitalism, by George Novack). In the great School of Life, however, no other form of instruction would have sufficed. For only now can we fully understand why Nature is risen up everywhere around us and against us. The great Transgression began with Columbus and the other Spanish Conquistadors, and the Latin church that supported them; and moved right up the Atlantic coast with the English, the Dutch and the French; and then inwards along rivers and forests, mountains and plains, until it reached the Pacific. It is still underway in the continuing saga of modern venture-capitalism, with its now more-rapid, more-mindless, and more-obscene surge of development--highways to everywhere, travel plazas, malls, condos, sports complexes, business and entertainment complexes, entertainment, ENTERTAINMENT!, A-musements, Neon lights, business, fast-food chains, entertainment, cartoons everywhere, MINDLESS CARTOONS, A-musements, awards, sitcoms, sports, more sports, more awards, business logos, sports logos, advertisements everywhere, more and more advertisements, consumption, production, destruction, bulldozers on every hillside, clearcutting, strip-mining, mountain-top removing, paving, concreting, cutting, fertilizing, chemicals draining off into the waterways, poisoning everything, cancer, cutting, building, hamburgers, french fries, consuming, investing, more consuming, more investing, more destroying, traffic, cars everywhere, more traffic, more malls, more buying, more and more traffic...We are not of sound mind. We are politically, economically, technologically and spiritually INSANE.
No wonder so many Indigenous peoples do not take others serious. The people show up at pow wows, drum circles, and vision-quest "weekends" with ATM and Visa cards in their back pockets, without even realizing the discrepancy. We want to live in both worlds, in the spirit-world of our own longing imagination, and the corporate world of the American imagination, with its demonic delusions of unbridled economic growth. It is well that Nature has the solution to these things at hand--great economic Collapse, and then revival. (Matthew 7:27).
Not realizing how the Mother Principle went into occultation with the rise of the Solar principle in the time of Christ (taking her mysteries with her), the orthodox structures that came to power afterwards nearly relegated her to nonexistence, allowing her little more status than that of a handmaiden. She is allowed to light the Sabbath candles, and even in our time to serve as an altar girl (a practice which the Vatican has recently tried to discourage). But in other places She is breaking down the barriers altogether. "To do justice to the mystery of God," says Elizabeth Johnson, in her She Who Is, "we need a whole treasury of metaphors:"
"Metaphor is an important word in all of this. No one in this debate is claiming that God is a man or a woman, God transcends such definitions. The debate is over how God is viewed.
First off 'its political,' she said. 'God is the highest symbol in any religious system. Viewing God always as male hashes out politically as viewing the male in a higher position. If you start rethinking--that female can also be highest--it transfers very quickly to human relationships.'
Wisdom is seen as Mother to all things. 'She reaches mightily from one end of the earth to the other, and orders all things well.' The Bible says, as a Spirit she passes into holy souls and makes them friends of God.
Johnson takes this to give a new model of the Trinity. She likens this spirit to the Holy Spirit. Jesus acquires a feminine dimension by being viewed as a human incarnation of divine Wisdom. And God the Father becomes, in Johnson's terminology, Holy Wisdom, Mother of the Universe...
Johnson said she's not opposed to viewing God in masculine terms, but she'd like to give that tradition a long rest. She encourages a view of God who is near, closely related to the people who suffer.
Asked how she would rewrite the old Baltimore Catechism definition of God: 'God is the Supreme Being who made all things.' She said it remains a good answer. But the offer proved too good to turn down, and continued: 'I think I would add, and who is neither male nor female, but created both in the divine image.' She paused, and added with a smile that one could also say: 'God is the Supreme Mother who made all things, who gave birth to the world.'" A Review by Paul Moses.
Caitlin Matthews, in her Sophia, Goddess of Wisdom, the Divine Feminine from Black Goddess to World Soul, brings Her from beyond the veil of Ezekiel 16 and Revelation 17 to Her descending glory at Revelation 21. As the symbolisms transform themselves in our minds we must in turn be transformed by them:
"Our's is the knowing ignorance of the child in its mother's womb. We have to be born and we are frightened by the extra-womb dimension. Out of the womb we begin to be terrified by our origins, but one of the prophecies of Sophia is 'I will give thee the treasures of darkness, and the divine riches of secret places.' Those treasures of the Divine Feminine lie deep within us, waiting to be discovered. (p.17).
Mystical Christianity has always kept the doors open for Sophia to go in and out. Where Sophia has been there I have followed...Gnosis speaks of Sophia as the Woman with three measures of meal. I BELIEVE SHE KNOWS JUST WHEN THE DOUGH IS RISEN, AND WHEN THE TIME COMES EVERY FORM OF SPIRITUALITY WILL KNOW ABOUT HER IN WAYS UNDREAMED OF. (p.2).
If the emphasis is loaded for the West it is because Sophia is most needed and least appreciated here. My purpose is to give Wisdom a voice, for she calls aloud in the city looking for her beloved, and few listen. (p.2).
We in the West are haunted by the loss of our Mother. Our Mother country is a place we have never (consciously) visited, though it is endlessly projected as a paradise. But if the Goddess has been displaced from her territorial home all this long while, where has She been residing in the interim? (p.5).
We didn't invent the Goddess, She has always been there from the beginning...Somehow humanity left home and forgot its Mother. Perhaps our ancestors took her for granted so much that they lost touch? Well our generation wants to come home now and be part of the family in a more loving way. Because the West still has a lot of growing up to do, and the Goddess has a lot to teach us. (p.15).
For women the tide is turning. Throughout the history of Western spirituality, images of the Divine Mother of Life recur, showing that the loss of paradise is more than balanced by the quest for knowledge, the Wisdom which inhabits Life.
Sophia also appears in the surprising guise of a harlot...The image is perfectly reasonable in the context of gnosis for she is a woman of knowledge...'It is I who am the harlot, and the holy,' says the Thunder Perfect voice of Sophia. The image of the whore and the holy one are as interblent within Gnosis as they are throughout Biblical tradition. Rahab the harlot helped Joshua's men escape from Jericho and became an ancestor of Mary. She placed her red cord in the window as a sign...
Mary Magdalene is familiar to us from the Gospels as the archetypal harlot...she has been conflated with the Woman taken in Adultery, the Anointing Woman, and others. All that Luke 8:2 tells us is that the Magdalene was one 'from whom Seven devils had gone out.' Jesus frequently exorcised the sick of such possession, but it is not without significance that Mary should possess Seven devils...This statement establishes Mary as someone who has already reached perfection according to the Gnostic ideal...Like Sophia, this has left Mary with two personas: as the Bride of Christ in mysticism and the fallen maiden of social reality. (pp.165-69).
As more women and men meditate upon Sophia they discover their own lost wisdom. It is a long process of stripping off the veils one by one. It is a journey of descent, a valorous fall in order to remember." (p.33).
In her On Being a Jewish Feminist, a collection of essays on Jewish women, Susannah Heschel writes:
"The challenge emerging today demands a Copernican revolution; a new theology of Judaism, requiring a new understanding of God, revelation, halakah, and the Jewish people, in order to support and encourage change. (p.xxiii).
The essays in this volume examine images of women in various facets of contemporary Jewish life. Taken together they reveal that older, biblical, rabbinical, and medieval images continue to thrive...These images reveal not who women are, but how women are made to appear and function from a male-dominated perspective.
When opponents describe the sexual danger of ordaining women as rabbis, for example...they unconsciously draw on ancient Jewish legends, such as those describing the mysterious, threatening power of Lilith, the mythical female demon. In their struggle with contemporary discrimination, feminists are actually wrestling with these unspoken hidden images which often keep the community from making changes even though no rules forbid them. (p.xxxi)
Clearly there is a need for reinterpretation in Judaism if women are to be transformed from subject to object...Theology must apply feminine concerns in examining the meaning of religious symbols, traditions, and beliefs, and strive to give answers to ultimate questions.
Religious beliefs and observances have life cycles of their own. They may take different shapes, flourish or wane. Some die because of their incredibility or irrelevance, others receive new life through reinterpretation...by creating a framework for understanding larger questions of revelation, tradition, authority, and change. (p.xxxii).
The treatment in Judaism of women derives not from the Torah...but from its misinterpretation by rabbis throughout the centuries. (p.115).
Conservatism claims to employ a perennial historical consciousness of the Jewish people as a guide to religious observances and belief. Jewish law, while held to be divinely inspired, may be interpreted according with that consciousness...Problematic is the fact that this historic consciousness has yet to be defined. Does it refer to the experience of the Jewish people or to the Jewish leaders?...
The halakhic scholar who advises these improvements considers them to be advancements under the sheltering bough of the 'Torah's spirit and truth,' and these suggestions, he points out--segregated study, segregated minyanim, segregated celebration--do not violate halakhah, because they flow from the halakhic premise of separation, which in turn flows from the notion--in his words--'different rights and responsibilities do not necessarily imply inferior value.'...If it is not inferior value, why is it to be kept apart? (pp.138,39).
Thena Kendell writes of the 'drudgery of the holy days and the darkness of the Sabbath,' as the 'men' in the synagogues are thanking God 'for not making them born a woman.' (p.96).
The question of language...the language of questioning...One must ask pertinent questions of the Oracle. (p.120).
'Progressive elements' vs. the true and universal measure of justice: Cynthia Ozick speaks of the failure of the Torah in the instance of women, and demands that: 'Change must be based, not on new contingencies but upon the immutable law of God. It must be based upon (sound Scriptural) precepts.' (pp.148,49).
Each reference to the 'body' (Gashimuit vs. Ruhinuit) when referring to the realm of women) erases an attribute of the Spirit. To countermand the effects...the Weave of Women conducts an exorcism to rid itself of the 'demons' of false image, and observes a Holy Body Day to counter men's degradation of women's 'impure' bodies. On that day the women pray that they will be restored to their own temple, that they will no longer be captive...for there is no God of women, there has been no reaping of the sheaves in the land of women. (p.202).
In her call for a new midrash (Cynthia Ozick) proclaims that in our age this takes on the urgent form of imaginative literature. She compares the task to that of Johannan Ben Zakkai, who plunged into the elaboration of aggadah, and preserved Torah by augmenting it (with Kabbalah). (p.203).
If Jews in their full, not amputated collectivity, are drawn in awe to the 'Torah's spirit and truth,' then why do the sincerest scholars of the Torah keep women amputated?...Jewish life is in a state of internal self-afflicted injury, and justice is not being done...This wall between Jews and true justice separates Jews from the covenant." (pp.142,43).
THAT WHICH IS ALTOGETHER JUST SHALT THOU FOLLOW, THAT THOU MAYEST LIVE, AND INHERIT THE LAND (THE WHOLE STATE OF MIND) WHICH THE LORD THY GOD GIVETH THEE. (Deuteronomy 16:20).
Half of Judeao-Christianity's dilemma (and by extension a greater part of Islam's dilemma) can be attributed to its orthodoxy, its inflexibility, its literalism, thus to its inability to come to terms with the allegorical, and the epic dimensions of the Torah (and by extension the Qur'an); or with the epic, and spiritual expanse of the City of Jerusalem; thus with the completely spiritual dimensions of history itself. (But it couldn't act in any other way. It was bound by invisible forces larger than itself, all of which have been acting together in the very interest of Creation--for the human mind is, at this moment, still being created. It is being "fired" as it were, for a final time in what has been this great furnace of 20th century events...Genesis 15:5-16). (The solutions to all things is about to appear in the great design).
Talmudic Judaism has taught itself that Christianity is an aberration in the spiritual scheme of things, as if God had nothing better to do with the last two thousand years of human history than to waste it away, or worse yet, than to let all that time get away from Them, beyond Their control, as if They had no power over such things. And Christians, by imagining that Christianity, as it has organized and revealed itself since the time of Christ, is an expression of the spirit of Christ in the world rather than Antichrist. It is the spirit of Antichrist through and through, from head to foot--from the time of Constantine and Catholicism in all of its historic and schismatic forms; across all of the events of the Reformation, to the greatest practitioners of Ba'al of all time the American Church and all the worldlings who have risen to the top of it. The Scriptures are clear where they say that God would reduce each side (both Jews and Christians) to a remnant in our time, and that no one should act with authority over others in spiritual matters, or to even imagine that they themselves knew anything specific about the ultimate meanings of things, beyond a certain realization that each had been apportioned--for both good and evil--a part of the mystery to safeguard until the last days. By faith, not by sight, Paul said. Thus those who had authority should always have acted as good shepherds keeping their flocks from harm's way--especially from the ways of warriors and other surreptitiously violent men--and always as the learned who, when the book was brought to them to read, said I cannot for it is sealed. (Isaiah 29:10-12)...
Thus the truly learned have always said: "Until such a time as God will reveal the whole of it we will maintain what little we do know, it is enough. We will keep searching deeper for the meaning of things as we have been instructed, we will be attentive to the signs of the times, but most of all we will keep our hands from violence and bloodshed, from oppression, and from evil in all of its forms as best as we understand it." (The Sayings of the Fathers; 1 Peter 1:1-5; 2 Peter 3:14-18). In this proper attitude of obedience and humility before the Written Word the curtains are expanded, and everyone, and every insight and idea founded in the Word, is--for the time being--correct, and we may live by them. Faith would, indeed, have become the guiding and sustaining principle. The problems arose when one or another group felt compelled to monopolize the interpretation of the Word and define its meanings for everyone else, and when others in turn felt bound, or imprisoned by such a particular interpretation or another, being forced now as they were to answer to men rather than God for their beliefs and their actions--especially when they could plainly see that those who gained the ascendancy were apostate, or shortsighted and narrow-minded, and most certainly in our time the friends of violent and destructive men.
In terms of the question "Why is it to be kept apart?" we must actually come in partial defense of the rabbis here, but only by recalling for them (and for the rest of us as well), what they would not, or could not comprehend. It has to do with the hidden structure of the Tree of Life, and with the realization that our thought-patterns, and therefore our rituals and liturgy, were being formalized in the image of that Reality, thus with things that could not be reconciled in the orthodox mind until the fulness of time. The Oracle, is divided into two symmetrical halves. One side of the Tree is male, the other side is female. The Sun and Moon are ancient reflections of this essential spiritual reality. The two were placed, not only in the material heavens above but in the corresponding heavens of human comprehension, to draw our minds upwards to the higher meaning of things. Thus in our pursuit of such meanings we have discovered that the two are not only universal reflections of the Male and Female principles, but in our very own day they reflect the division that also exists between Christianity on the one hand, and Judaism on the other...
Blessed of Joseph, he said, Blessed of the Lord be his Land, for the precious things of heaven, for the dew, and for the deep that coucheth beneath.
And for the precious fruits brought forth by the Sun, and for the precious things put forth by the Moon...(Deuteronomy 33:13,14).
__________
And Isaac said run, and lay hold on them, and each according to his strength, and to him that seizeth them will the Sun and Moon belong. And Levi (Christianity) laid hold of the Sun, and Judah (Judaism) seized the Moon...(The Testament of Naphtali 2:1-4).s
__________
And now my children, obey Levi and Judah, and be not lifted up against these two tribes, for from them shall arise unto you the salvation of God.
For the Lord shall raise up from Levi as it were, a high priest, and from Judah as it were, a king, God and man, and He shall save all the Gentiles and the race of Israel...(Testament of Simeon 3:10,11).
__________
And there shall be upon every high mountain (every great nation), and upon every high hill (smaller nations), rivers and streams of water in the day of the great slaughter, when the towers fall.
Moreover the light of the Moon shall be as the light of the Sun, and the light of the Sun shall be Sevenfold, as the light of Seven days, in the day that the Lord bindeth up the breach of His people, and healeth the stroke of their wound...(Isaiah 30:25,26).
__________
Then shall the righteous shine forth as the Sun in the kingdom of their Father...(Matthew 13:43).
__________
Blow the trumpet in the New Moon, in the days appointed...(Psalm 81:3).
__________
He appointed the Moon for seasons; the Sun knoweth his (own) going down...(Psalm 104:19).
__________
Once have I sworn by my holiness that I will not lie unto DVD.
His seed shall endure for ever, and his throne as THE SUN before me.
It shall be established for ever as THE MOON , and as a faithful witness in heaven...(Psalm 89:35-37).
According to rabbinic tradition Rabbi Eliezer ben Hyarcanus was a disciple of Yochannan ben Zakkai, who was said to be a disciple of Hillel, the great expositor of the Torah in the time of Christ. We shall see that Yochannan ben Zakkai and the Essene, John (Yochannan) the Baptist (the "son of Zachariah"), were one and the same, or rather that the Yochannan of rabbinic fame acquired the name after the Kabbalistic doctrines of the early Church passed into Judaism via the original Schimon bar Yonah (Simon Peter) and others, and that this Rabbi Eliezer was one of chief agents of these transmissions. His association with the Essenes, the first Christians, and possibly with Paul (Elisha Ben Abuyah), was the eventual cause of his censure and excommunication from the rabbinic circle. Nevertheless, in a work ascribed to him many centuries later entitled The Chapters of Rabbi Eliezer the Great, there are two chapters dedicated to the course of the Sun and the Moon, and another concerned with the intercalation periods between them both...
These chapters seem primarily concerned with assuring that these two luminous bodies appear in the heavens together when they are supposed to, marking the times and the seasons in their proper order, so that Passover is always observed in the spring of the year, and the High Holy Days of the Seventh month are always observed when the Sun is falling in the West at the time of the Autumn equinox. But a closer examination reveals these chapters to be actually concerned with the conjunction of the Male and Female principles in their appointed times. In these chapters we are told that the Sun's path through the planetary spheres is a cycle of 28 years, bringing it back to its place of origin again--a cycle that has continued since the time these two great lights were created together in the Genesis account. (Genesis 1:16). And that the cycle of the Moon is 21 years, before it returns to its place of origin in respect to the other planets again. Starting out together, according to this purely apocryphal account, it means that the two must come together every (28 X 21) 588 years. Ten times 588 years is 5,880 years...
Likewise, when we calculate the times according to their Jubilees (periods of 49 years each, as we are commanded to at Leviticus 25:8), we see that the whole time of the Adamic epic (from Genesis to Revelation) is also (120 X 49), or 5,880 years. And in this circle we discover three periods of 40 Jubilees each: a period of 40 Jubilees between the time of Adam to the time of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, 40 Jubilees more to the time of Christ, and 40 Jubilees, or 1,960 years, from the time of Christ to our own, and to another of the many cosmic events that are falling in place together at this time in history--all of which have everything to do with the joining together in our time of the two sides of the Tree of Life--Male and Female, Christian and Jew...not to fail to mention, Things Above with Things Below.
And neither may our strictly literalist brethren go to calculating in order to prove such things incorrect--jot, tittle, seconds, minutes, hours, days--for all the times and events of God have their own complexities, and their own catching up with each other to do. Be sure that all things are locking in place together, but also that Divine Grace still presides over the wheels of Time, and over the whole process of revelation:
"'For the vision is yet for the appointed time. At the end it shall speak, and not lie. Though it lags toward the moment; it will not be belied.' (Habakkuk 2:1-3)...
This refers to the fact that the final moment (as in the birth-process itself) may be protracted beyond anything the prophets have foretold, for God moves in a mysterious way his wonders to perform...This is addressed to the men of truth, those who carry out the law (Torah), who do not relax from serving the truth even though the final moment be long drawn out. Assuredly, all the times appointed by God will come in due course, even as He has determined in His inscrutable wisdom." The Habakkuk Commentary, the Dead Sea Scriptures, pp.321,322.
Had God's Anointed One(s) (the Messiah/Moshiac, who will be manifest together in the composite name of D.V.D.) appeared two thousand years ago as many Jews at that time expected, history could not have unfolded as it has; the Terrible Presence of God could not have been revealed to world as it has in the 20th century; and the Gentiles (everyone is a Gentile until they enter the mystery of the Covenant...on their own) could not have come to the doorway of perfection, as they have in Christ. Thus in preparation for the manifestation of the true Messiahs in our time, the doctrines of Paul (who was the most rigid of his own Pharasaic sect) ascended to fulfill the words:
For from the Rising of the Sun even unto the going down of the same, my Name shall be great among the Gentiles...(Malachi 1:1).
And again, he saith, Rejoice ye Gentiles with his people...(Romans 15:10; Deuteronomy 32:50).
And, again, Praise the Lord all ye Gentiles. (Psalm 117:1); and again, Isaiah saith, There shall be a root of Jesse, and he shall rise over the Gentiles, and in him shall the Gentiles trust...(Romans 15:10; Isaiah 11:10).
As it is written: To whom he was not spoken of; they shall see. And they that have not heard shall understand...(Isaiah 52:15).
__________
Arise, shine, for thy Light has come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee.
For, behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people. But the Lord shall arise upon thee, and his glory shall be seen upon thee.
And the Gentiles shall come to thy Light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising...(Isaiah 60:1-3).
At no time over the course of this age could these scriptures have been fulfilled in Judaism, only in Christianity. Knowing this, the other side of the early Church--the Judaic side of the Church, initially presided over by Jacob (James the Just) and Simeon (Simon Peter)--left Paul to his work and went into occultation with Judaism itself, taking their merkabah mysteries and kabbalistic doctrines with them (purposfully sealed as they were from the world at large--even from Judaism at large). These doctrines emerged here and there, mixing with those of the various Gnostic schools and fellowships of Merkabah mystics, but finally in the spirit of the seventeenth-century Hasidic movement in Central and Eastern Europe, whose adherents are now primarily situated here in America. (Jeremiah 24). Thus the words: This child is set for the fall and the rising again of many in Israel (Luke 2:34). "Rising again" because it will be seen that the Messiahs of D.V.D. are children of this very same Hasidic tradition, as Paul, again, says: Boast not against the natural branches...For God is able to graff them back in again. (Romans 11:15-23). Luke also wrote of those who rejected the doctrine of Christ in those times, choosing instead to walk in the more literal ways of the Torah: No man also having drunk old wine STRAIGHTAWAY desireth new, for he saith the old is better. (Luke 5:39). And Clement, also initiated into these things, says:
"Neither are the Hebrews (the Jews) condemned on account of their ignorance of (YHShWH) by reason of Him who concealed him, if doing the things commanded by Moses, they do not hate him who they know not. Neither are those from among the Gentiles condemned who know not Moses on account of Him who concealed him, provided that these also, doing the things spoken by YHShWH, do not hate whom they do not know." Clementine Homily VIII.
The doctrines of the Kabbalah, upon which both Christianity and modern Judaism hang, can be traced historically from the early first century, across the pages of history, to our own present time in the West, to the Feet of the Oracle, and to the words: And the books were opened. (Daniel 7:10; Revelation 20:12). They can also be traced to the words: And I will give power unto my two witnesses. (Revelation 11:3)...
Who are these witnesses? One must see it in the Oracle. (Deuteronomy 17:6; 19:15; Isaiah 43:10,12; Matthew 18:16; 1 Corinthians 13:1). They are every soul, male and female alike (Jew, Christian, and all others from every religious tradition alike) who have ever entered into the Mysteries of the Tree of Life, and into this Great Circle of historical events, and specifically from the time of Aaron and Moses to our own time (and who, as a result, have ever testified to the things that have been coming to pass in the earth--many at the expense of their own well-being, and in peril of their own mortal lives). This Circle was one of which the number Seven provided the natural cosmic as well as geometric base, and also the far-off moment in time in which the Circle would be complete. Thus Moses wrote:
Seven Circles with Tipheret (the number Six) at the Center.
And Seven priests shall bear before the ark Seven trumpets of ram's horns, and on the Seventh day ye shall compass the city Seven times, and the priests shall blow the trumpets. (Begin to open the pages of the Book of Revelation, chapter 8, during the great World Wars of this century)...
And it shall come to pass, that when they make a long blast with the ram's horns, and when ye hear the sound of the trumpet, all the people shall shout; and the wall of the city shall fall down flat...(Joshua 6:4,5; compare Jeremiah 50:15).
Figurative Time
The entire epic has led full-circle back to Eden, back to the Western ends of the earth, and to the Seventh emanation on the Tree of Life named Endurance. The circle(s) used in this prophetic narrative is one of 360 degrees, or 360 units of time. This symbolic measurement is used consistently in the books of Daniel and Revelation and is in keeping with the mysteries of ancient Babylon. It divides the Circle of the Year into four even quadrants of three months each. (There are also 840 segments of the number seven in the great 5,580 year circle...It is the number Seven that is common to both of these circles). When we multiply 360 by the Seven times around the city, we have 2,520 units of time. The 2,520 units of time can also be divided into 84 figurative months of 30 days each. (2,520 ÷ 30 = 84) Half of these 84 months is 42 months, or 1,260 days. With these figures in mind--along with the realization that the time from John the Baptist to our time on the Tree of Life is figuratively half of the time, or half the distance that exists on the Tree of Life from the time of Aaron and Moses to our own--we can begin to interpret the meanings of the words...
7 times around the 360 degree Circle = 2,520 figurative units of time.
2,520 figurative units of time divided by 30 = 84 figurative months
84 figurative months divided into 2 periods = 42 figurative months + 42 figurative months.
42 figurative months X 30 figurative days = 1,260 figurative days.
And the Holy City shall they tread under foot Forty and Two months (figuratively, from the time of John the Baptist to our own time).
And I will give power unto my Two witnesses, and they shall prophecy a Thousand, Two Hundred, and Sixty days...(Revelation 11:2,3).
This is the same figurative period of time the Book of James refers to when it speaks, first of those times, and then of our own:
Elias (John the Baptist) was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain; and it rained not on the earth by the space of Three years and Six months. (42 months).
And he (the spirit of Elijah) prayed again, and the heavens gave rain (see Joel 2:23; Zechariah 10:1; Matthew 7:25-27), and the earth brought forth its fruit...(James 5:17,18).
This means that this same spirit of Elijah is alive in the Remnant of our time. We will see, as we have already mentioned, how the prophetic account of these Seven times also carry our thoughts (in a more literal way), from the time of the people's first captivity in Babylon--the time of the prophets Ezekiel and Daniel in the 6th century B.C.--right into our own time, to the Feet of the Mystery of Christ on the Tree of Life. (Understand Ezekiel 2:1 and Daniel 4:10-17, 22-25).
And if any man will hurt them a fire proceedeth out of their mouth..(Revelation 11:5-7).
The words, of course, are symbolic, and are an allusion to the text in Jeremiah which says: Is not my word like Fire? (Jeremiah 5:14). It is the Word of God that proceeds out of their mouths. And if any man will hurt them it is by the Word of God that they must perish. (See 2 Thessalonians 1:6-9; Isaiah 66:15,16).
And their dead bodies shall lie in the streets of the Great City, which is (also) called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified...(Revelation 11:8).
This verse is obviously also symbolic, and to interpret it one must do so in the same epic and prophetic sense as before. One must be already learning something of the Egyptian Mysteries, and how these, interwoven as they are with the Mystery of Christ, and intertwined as they are with the very mysteries of Time and Space, span the earth from one side of the Tree of Life to the other, and how they carry the mind back again to the origins of it all in the initial revelation to Adam in the garden of Eden. Not only are the rivers of Eden the spiritual source of the ancient Nile, thus not only is America the original land of Egypt, but it is the present land of Egypt as well (Genesis 15:12-16). And if one can comprehend all this they will also understand that the mysteries of the crucifixion are not complete yet.
THE LAND OF EGYPT...Revelation 11:8; 17:8-18; Genesis 15:1-16.
The Remnant that is found at the Left side of the Tree of Life, at the place named Endurance, are those whose own lives will be required of them for the mystery of Christ's sake, in the great repressions that are soon to unfold in America. They will offer the Evening Sacrifice. They will fill up the number of the First Resurrection, a number that includes those throughout every generation since the time of Christ (from both sides of the Tree of Life, male and female alike, Christian and Jew alike...in addition to all others) who have ever layed down their lives for the sake of the higher mysteries (Revelation 20:6-8). Thus of the completion of this epic mystery it says:
And after Three days and a Half the Spirit of life from God entered into them, and they Stood Upon Their Feet (see it in the Oracle), and a great fear fell upon them which saw them.
And they heard a Great Voice (see Revelation 18) from heaven saying unto them, Come up hither, and they ascended up to heaven in a Cloud (see Exodus 19:3,4; 1 Thessalonians 4:17) and their enemies beheld them.
And in the same hour there was a great earthquake, and a Tenth part of the city fell, and in the earthquake were slain of men Seven thousand, and the remnant (those who were alive and remained) were afrighted and gave glory to the God of heaven...(Revelation 11:11-13).
__________
Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day, or shall a nation be born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children...(Isaiah 66:6-13).
__________
For ask now of the days that are past, which were before thee, since the day that God created man upon the earth, and ask from one side of heaven unto the other, whether there hath been any such thing as this great thing is, or hath been heard like it?
Did ever people hear the Voice of God speaking out of the midst of the (consuming) fire, as thou hast heard, and live?
Or hath God assayed to go and take him a nation from the midst of another nation, by temptations, by signs, and by wonders, and by war, and by a Mighty Hand, and by a Stretched Out Arm, and by great terrors, according to all that the Lord your God did for you in Egypt before your eyes... (Deuteronomy 4:32-34)
The "tenth part" of the city is the tithe that Abraham is paying to Melchizedek (Genesis 14:18-20). It is that symbolic 10th part of the children of Israel who are offering 100% of themselves in the cause of righteousness. They are the same as the Seven thousand who shall appear in, or with the spirit of Elijah (see 1 Kings 19:13-18), as the age comes to a close and the new is born. The remnant who were affrighted are all those who will be alive and remain after the persecutions are complete. (1 Thessalonians 4:16,17):
Else what shall they do which are baptised for the dead if the dead rise not at all? Why then are we baptised for the dead? and why stand we in jeapordy every hour?...(1 Corinthians 15:29,30).
__________
For if the casting away of the Jews (in order to advance the mystery among the Gentiles without actually revealing it) be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiving of them be but life from the dead?...(Romans 11:15).
Whoso keepeth the Fig Tree shall eat the fruit thereof; so they that waiteth on their master shall be honoured...(Proverbs 27:18).
Blessed art thou, O land, when thy king is the son of nobles, and thy princes eat in due season, for strength and not for drunkenness...(Ecclesiastes 1:17).
Therefore my people, I will open up your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the (higher) land of Israel.
And ye shall know that I am the Lord, when I have opened your graves, O my people, and brought you up out of your graves...(Ezekiel 37:12,13).
___________
Thy dead men shall live, together with My Dead Body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in the dust, for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out of her dead...(Isaiah 26:18-21).
In what way shall they be "caught up", and to where shall they ascend? Not off the earth and literally into the air as some childishly believe, but in the way that Paul was caught up at 2 Corinthians 12:4. It was his mind that was caught up, not only into the transcendent realm of the Tree of Life, but into the mystery of his own reincarnation in the last day. Thus he says: We which are alive and remain. As those on the Left side of the Oracle ascend inwards, through the dimensions of time and space to the parallel universe that lays just on the other side of this one (after having given their lives), so those who are alive and remain on this side of the Oracle shall follow the Messiahs after the judgments of this age to that corresponding place on Earth, the Jerusalem Above--which shall then become the New Jerusalem below, as it is written: And there shall be a new heaven and a new earth. (Revelation 21:1).
Paul, contrary to every adverse opinion concerning his relationship to the Torah, was (and is) a faithful student of it. He walked continually in the pathways of its (hidden) precepts. And, seeing deep into its structure, realizing that it was also handed down as it was in order to manifest and separate the spirit of Light in the last days from the spirit of Darkness, he saw that there are commandments in the Law which, when followed literally, allow men to do what is already in their sinful hearts to do--to exact vengeance, to oppress others, and to kill. Oh that we were wise Moses exclaimed. Thus Paul wrote:
Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions (and debates) rather than godly edifying which is in faith: so do.
Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned:
From which some having swerved have turned aside unto vain jangling;
Desiring to be teachers of the law; understanding neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm.
BUT WE KNOW THAT THE LAW IS GOOD, IF A MAN USE IT LAWFULLY;
KNOWING THIS, that the law (in its literal form) is not made for a righteous man (which is why rabbinic Judaism had to acquire for itself the added precepts of the Talmud, to keep the people in the ways of righteousness), but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers.
For whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for menstealers, for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine...(1 Timothy 1:4-10).
Paul was looking from his exalted place on the Tree of Life into these last times. It is the underlying, and implied meanings of the law that bring the soul to a state of Christlikeness, to the Pure Land of Bodhi-consciousness, to the state of True Love. The underlying meanings in the books of Samuel and the Kings also bring us to this dividing point. For if we read these texts literally, then the Messiah (David) whom God has appointed to us, to focus our thoughts and to deliver us from the gross darkness of this present age...
Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it: it is even the time of Jacob's trouble, but he shall be saved out of it.
For it shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord of hosts, that I will break his (the spirit of Antichrist's) yoke from off thy neck, and will burst thy bonds, and strangers shall no more serve themselves of him:
But they shall serve the Lord their God, AND DAVID THEIR KING, WHOM I WILL RAISE UP TO THEM...(Jeremiah 30:7-9).
...is no different than any of the other politicians, great and small, thugs and warlords, who are risen up in the earth in the name of religion in our time. Any one of them could qualify. (In fact most of them, in their own twisted ways, actually believe that they are messiahs). In this sense the literal David of the Scriptures--the purely male David--though he might be considered an heroic statesman by today's standards, is also a marauding despoiler, he is boastful, he is violent, vindictive, vengeful, and double-minded. He is an executioner, a concubinizer, and an adulterer. These are hardly the qualities we imagine that God would require of one who is about to inherit the throne of "his father David," and who is about to be raised up as the Messiah in our time.
But when we see this David in epic, as well as in purely allegorical and kabbalistic terms--in light of the Mystery of Christ of which he plays so great a part, thus as a didactic literary figure, one also created to instruct us in every negative as well as positive way--we understand. We understand why the Psalms of David--and the 118th Psalm in particular--are placed directly in the Center of the King James Version of the Scriptures. David is crucified there--right there in the City of David itself. (Psalm 118 is situated between the shortest and longest chapters in the Scriptures). When we see this literal DaViD crucified on the limbs of the Cosmic Tree we see that the qualities intentionally attributed to him, belonging as they do to the lower, unregenerated spirit of all men, are those of which every soul must in turn repent and overcome if it is to be crowned king--if it is to rule over the empire of its own individual existence--and how much more so if it is to be crowned king over the people themselves...
The Stone which the builders refused is become the head stone of the corner. This is the Lord's doing: it is marvellous in our eyes...(Psalm 118:22,23).
The David of the Old Testament (like the Jesus of the New Testament) is not a single individual, but a whole complex of spiritual principles and ideas embodied in the literary figure of one individual. These principles (primarily the principle of balance and symmetry, as the name David implies) have been struggling to overcome all the other thought-forms, ideas and lower archetypes that have entered into and captured the mind of Israel. The strife between David and Saul for instance, must be seen in the broad allegorical setting in which it is framed. The figure of David is an embodiment of the Higher Mysteries, of the emerging higher state of human undestanding, which are in the continuous process of appearing to the mind of the children of Light. Thus the words: David went out and came in before them. (1 Samuel 18:14-16). The Mysteries "come out" of the narratives to the children of Light, and return inwards when they are approached by the children of Darkness. That the mysteries of D.V.D., and the city of D.V.D., were hidden from history was further expressed in the words: And David built round about from Mil'lo and INWARD. (2 Samuel 5:9). Mil'lo represents the literal text itself, filled with external narrative and literary embellishment, all of which was intended to conceal the core of the secret narrative within...
Saul represents the lower, worldly spirit in Israel--the purely intellectual, the purely ethical. He represents organized religion and political power, as opposed to mystic insight and true spirituality--true Power. Saul (the Flesh) is ever envious of DaViD (the emerging Spirit in man), and ever seeks to kill him. Saul is that form of reasoning which always seeks to keep D.V.D. from becoming king in Israel. (1 Samuel 19:1; Galatians 5). The mysteries, then, must abide in a secret place and hide themselves as they have in the narratives of the Hebrew scriptures. (1 Samuel 19:2). Make all the necessary connections now. Study the oracles and put the story together:
And David said to Jonathan, Behold tomorrow is the NEW MOON, and I should not fail to sit with the king (with Saul, the lower reasoning in Israel) at meat. But let me go that I may hide myself in the field UNTO THE THIRD DAY AT EVENING...(1 Samuel 20:5)
And Jonathan said to David, Tomorrow is the NEW MOON, and thou shalt be missed, because thy seat will be empty...(1 Samuel 20:18, 24).
The Mystery of D.V.D. is hidden until the resurrection of the spiritual mind in Israel in the last day, in the time of the truly New Moon. (Genesis 40:12; Hosea 6:1,2; Ezekiel 37). A cave in scripture is not merely a place where mysteries are hidden (Deuteronomy 32:34), but it is also the place to which the people must repair (in their own minds) if they are to discover those mysteries again:
David therefore departed hence, and escaped to the cave Adul'lam: and when his brethren and all his father's house heard it, they went down thither to him.
And everyone that was in distress, and everyone that was in debt, and everyone that was discontented, gathered themselves unto him; and he became a captain over them: and there was with him about Four Hundred men...(1 Samuel 22:1,2).
We shall see that the
symbol of the Great Mandala of the Mystery of Christ 
is also the hieroglyph for the letter Taw, which is also equivalent to the number
400 in the ancient Paleo-Hebrew script. (Please see the subchapter entitled
From Proto-Hebrew to English). Thus the text in Samuel, and its reference to
the number Four Hundred, is intended to carry the mind of the spiritual aspirant
across the breadth of the entire Mystery, from the East to the West, and from
the past to the present. We can also see it in the story of David's pursuit
of the Amalakites:
Behold, THEY WERE SPREAD ABROAD UPON ALL THE EARTH, eating and drinking, and dancing, because of all the great spoil that they had taken out of the land of the Philistines, and out of the land of Judah.
And David smote them from the twilight even unto the Evening of the Next Day: and there escaped not a man of them, save Four Hundred young men, which rode upon camels, and fled...(1 Samuel 30:16,17).
Of course David did not smite them with the literal sword, because the Amalekites are not a literal people...
"AMALEQ (Ayin-Mem-Lamed-Kof) from AMAL (Ayin-Mem-Lamed) meaning 'toil, i.e., wearing effort (hence worry, of mind and body), greviousness, iniquity, labor, mischief, misery, pain, perverseness, sorrow, toil, travail, trouble, weariness, wickedness.'"
Then came Amalek and fought with Israel in Rephedim...(Exodus 17:8-16).
Amalek was the first of the nations, and his latter end shall be that he perish for ever...(Numbers 24:20)
Remember what Amalek did unto thee by the way when ye were come forth out of Egypt...(Deuteronomy 25:17-19).
The Amalekites represent the cares of the world that always attack the minds and the spirit of the people, demoralizing and weighing them down, and especially the weakest and the weariest of the people who are coming up behind. In times like our own these wearing attributes can begin to seem like virtues, and can transform themselves into a kind of (work) ethic that the people accept as normal, and which must for some patriotic or religious reasons be upheld, or endured. (Which in one sense is true...James, chapter 5). In 1 Samuel 15:7-9, Agag, the chief of the Amalekites, represents the highest form of ethics and civility, the very same that have come to characterize Israel's subservient relationship to the other nations--especially here in the capitalist West, in America. And Saul represents that worldly spirit in Israel (the mainline Protestant ethic if you will), and those who take pride in this relationship, in their civic responsibility, and for conservatives in their constant dwelling on the common sins of the common people, imposing upon them an ever-awareness of their responsibility to always uphold the mores and values of the national status-quo. But to attack the sins of the rich and powerful, and of the religious institutions that support them, to speak to the overwhelming spirit of wickedness in high places, Saul never would dare:
Thus saith the Lord of hosts, I remember that which Amalek did to Israel, how he laid wait for him in the way, when he came up from Egypt.
Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass...
And Saul smote the Amalekites from Havilah until thou comest to Shur, that is over against Egypt. (Please see that the narrative has carried us back to the garden of Eden in America).
And he (Saul) took Agag the king of the Amalekites alive, and utterly destroyed all of the people with the edge of the sword.
But Saul and the people spared Agag, and the best of the sheep, and of the oxen, and of the fatlings, and of the lambs, and all that was good, and would not utterly destroy them: but everything that was vile and refuse, that they destroyed utterly...(1 Samuel 15:1-9).
__________
And Samuel said, Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams.
For (this) rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou hast rejected the word of the Lord, he hath rejected thee from being king...(1 Samuel 15:22,23).
First of all, what child of Light would serve a God who literally commanded them to "slay utterly every man and woman, every infant and child, and all the livestock as well?" If they were truly children of Light they would not literally follow this command. (So God's word is like Fire). It is not that such terrors as these have not been visited upon humanity, it is just that God has never commanded the children of Light to perform them...for it is Light that God is creating. (God alone--and only in His most Terrible forms--may take the life of another person, for the Mind of Creation alone knows the true nature of each soul, and the pathway each must take from one life to the next, and the work that every soul performs in the interest of Creation). The account in Samuel, as in the Torah itself, is allegorical. The man we are commanded to slay is that propensity, or inclination, each of us have within ourselves to sow the seed of wrong thought into the heart and mind of another. This we must slay. The woman is that natural inclination each of us have within us to open ourselves up to wrong thought, and to allow it in. We are commanded us to slay these inclinations from within ourselves. The infants and children are "new errors" that are born out of the merger of old errors. Some of them grow up to become giants like the Roman church, or multinational corporations, or the American empire. Sucklings are strange ideas that cling to the philosophies of Israel, thus finding a life of their own inside of the minds and the doctrines of the congregation. Some of these grow up to become our guiding principles and leading lights as well. And the mixed livestock represent the confusion, the philosophies, the sacrifices, as well as the lesser desires and emotions that motivate the other (unspiritual) nations of the earth, which we have been commanded not to partake of...thus to slay.
The Scripture says that David fights the battles of the Lord. (1 Samuel 25:28). The words must not be taken literally, because it also says: The Lord is the same, yesterday, today, and forever. (Hebrews 13:8). This means that the Angel of the Lord's Presence--the very same who appeared to the mind of Israel in ancient times, hundreds of years before the time of David (Exodus 19; 23:20-23; 24:9,10; Joshua 5:13-15), the very same who does indeed exact judgments and wage literal battles in the earth (Matthew 24), indeed, the very same who flew into the World Trade Center on September 11th (Deuteronomy 32:22-29, 39-42; 2 Samuel 22; Psalm 18:1-10; Isaiah 66:15-18; Hebrews 12:25-29)--would not have the sons and daughters of Light engaged in literal, mortal combat at one time in history--in literal warfare in one age--and then in figurative, or spiritual warfare in another (as some contest). One can look back across the 20th century, and into the East at this present time, and see the effects of such reasoning--into the end of those who desire the ways of human warfare in the name of God, not realizing that they are ignorantly engaged in an (un)holy war against the Spirit of God at the same time. These are all the children of Darkness in the earth. It is this spirit of Darkness (in this case the spirit of Saul)--that God is preparing to judge in the world because of its historic refusal to adhere to the Word of the Lord and to walk in the ways of Christ.
In the Dead Sea scrolls there is mention of the House of Absalom. It refers allegorically to all of those in our time who oppose the teachings of righteousness, and who rise up against the mysteries of D.V.D. A close study of the scriptural account reveals the same, in the words of the wicked Hu'shai who counsels Absalom:
Therefore I counsel that all Israel be generally gathered unto thee, from DAN EVEN TO BE'ER-SHEBA, AS THE SAND THAT IS BY THE SEA FOR MULTITUDE; and that thou go to battle in thine own person.
So shall we come upon him (David) IN SOME PLACE WHERE HE SHALL BE FOUND, and we will all light upon him AS THE DEW FALLETH TO THE GROUND (see Deuteronomy 32), and of him and all the men that are with him there shall not be so much as one...(2 Samuel 17:11,12).
From Dan to Be'er-sheba is a word symbol which means "From the beginning of the epic," when Israel ascended into the Mystery under the eponymous name of Dan, "until it comes to the well--the Seventh Well--(to the meaning of the Torah) at the fulness of time.." And the term As the sand that is by the sea for multitude, hearkens to the promise God made to Abraham, a promise fulfilled in our time in the Mystery of Christ:
And the Angel of the Lord called Abraham a second time, and said, By myself have I sworn, saith the Lord, for because thou hast done this thing, and hast not withheld thy son, thine only son:
That in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed AS THE STARS IN HEAVEN, AND AS THE SAND WHICH IS UPON THE SEA SHORE; and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies.
And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice...(Genesis 22:15-18; Revelation 22...KJV).
The same spirit of rebellion is found in She'ba, the son of Belial, who blew a trumpet and said: We have no part in David, neither have we inheritance in the son of Jesse. Every man to his tents O Israel. (2 Samuel 20:1). The people threw his head over the wall. This means that they stopped paying attention to him, and assigned his contentions and his limited world-view a place outside the City. And there is the wicked Athalia, who, upon hearing that one of the seed-royal was spared, and was being anointed, shouted Treason Treason! (2 Kings 11:11-14).
The David we would serve is the one who played upon an instrument of Ten Strings (Psalm 92:3), and who inspired the hymns of Orpheus. We would not serve the "he" of the literal text (which was meant to repulse, and to drive the mind inwards), but the D.V.D. of the Psalms who was able to look into the hidden dimensions of time and space, and into the events of our very own times. When the instrument of Ten Strings is played to perfection one comes to the end of the scale on the Seventh note. When the Eighth note is played we discover that we have returned to the beginning again, but now at a higher octave--at a higher state of consciousness that is. Events surrounding the Seventh sefira named Endurance, or Victory, signal the end of this age, and those around the Eighth, named Majesty, signal the beginning of the age to come, as it is written:
Again, Jesse made Seven of his sons to pass before Samuel. And Samuel said unto Jesse, the Lord hath not chosen these.
And Samuel said unto Jesse, Are here all thy children? And he said, There remaineth yet the youngest (the eighth), and, behold, he keepeth the Sheep. And Samuel said unto Jesse, Send and fetch him: for we will not sit down till he come hither...(1 Samuel 16:10,11).
__________
And he shall stand and feed in the strength of the Lord, in the MAJESTY of the name of the Lord his God; and they shall abide: for now shall he be great unto the ends of the earth.
And this MAN shall be the peace, when the Assyrian shall come into our land; and when he shall tread in our palaces, then shall we raise against him Seven shepherds and Eight principal men...(Micah 5:3-5).
Isaiah said: And they shall take hold of ONE MAN. (Isaiah 4:1). And Paul said:
Till we come in the Unity of the faith (Christian and Jew, male and female), and of the knowledge of the Son of God, UNTO A PERFECT MAN, unto the Measure of the Stature of the Fulness of Christ...(Ephesians 4:13).
What is a Perfect Man? It is not a male person, but a male and female joined together in perfect understanding, as it is written:
Male and female created he them; and blessed them, AND CALLED THEIR NAME ADAM, in the day when they were created...(Genesis 5:2).
The Scriptures are a commentary on the Tree of Life. The Tree of Life is an expression of the Universal Tao:
I am the Tao, I am the Dharma, I am the Ch'i...No man cometh to the Father; but by me...(John 14:6).
"In the Taoist world view the world is an expression of the Tao--i.e., the One in which Yin and Yang intermingle with the primordial Ch'i (the Life Force). Heaven and Earth came into being through the separation of Yin and Yang (see Genesis 1:1), and their renewed intermingling caused the Ten thousand things--all things and creatures--to appear.
A Taoist text, The Experience of the Golden Flower, contains the following passage: 'Before heaven and earth were separate, there was only the indefinable One (Ain-sof, above Kether, the Crown). This One was divided and Yin and Yang came into existence. That which received Yang-ch'i rose up bright and clear and became Heaven; that which received Yin-ch'i sank down heavy and obscure and became Earth. AND THAT WHICH RECEIVED BOTH YIN-CH'I AND YANG-CH'I IN RIGHT PROPORTIONS BECAME MAN.'" The Shambhala Dictionary of Taoism, pp.17,18.
We cannot add to the many studies that have already connected Moses and Paul to the mysteries of "Hermes, Mercurius, the Thrice Majestic," from whom we derive the term "hermaphrodite," as well as the idea of things (or mysteries) being "hermetically" sealed. Therefore in Paul's Mystery of Christ There is neither male nor female (but both), for we are all One in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3:28).
"How am I to speak to you about him? His aeon is indestructible, at rest, and existing in silence, reposing and being prior to everything. For he is the head of all the aeons (the Sefiroth)...This is the First Thought, His image; She became the womb of everything, for it is She who is prior to the All, the Mother-Father, the first Man, the Holy Spirit, the Thrice-Male, the Thrice-Powerful, THE THRICE-NAMED ANDROGYNOUS ONE"...The Apocryphon of John, the Nag Hammadi Library.
__________
"Matthew said to him: Lord, Savior, how was man revealed? The perfect savior said: I want you to know that He who appeared before the universe in infinity, Self-grown, Self-constructed Father, being full of Shining Light (the Great Emanation) and ineffable; in the beginning, when He decided to have his likeness become a great power, immediately the principle (or beginning) of that Light appeared AS IMMORTAL ANDROGYNOUS MAN, that through that immortal man they might attain their salvation and awake from forgetfulness through the interpreter that was Sent, who is with you until the end of the poverty of the robbers." Eugnostos the Blessed and the Sophia of Jesus Christ, Nag Hammadi Library.
Overshadowing the mercy seat is not only the two Cherubim, revealing in their mutual form the balance that exists between the masculine and feminine principles of Life, but intersecting it from above are the dimensions of the Great Mandala of the Mystery of Christ, which pass right through the center of the Holy of holies. As ADaM (Adam-David-Messiah) is both male and female, so is D.V.D. our Messiah(s):
In that day shall the Lord defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem (not that city in the Middle East, but the Higher Jerusalem which spans the earth from the rising of the Sun to the going down thereof), and he that is feeble among them at that day shall be as David; and the House of D V D shall be as God, as the Angel of the Lord before them...(Zechariah 12:8).
And concealed within the structure of this Mandala is the name of DaViD itself. We see it when we explore the hieroglyphic and numerical dimensions of the original Hebrew-Phoenician script, the same with which the Torah and the books of the Prophets were first written. It is formed when the two Dalets in the name D V D are placed side by side and made to face each other in a state of cosmic realization, as the Cherubim over the mercy seat. (Exodus 25:20). Immediately they conform to the measure of the stature of the Fulness of Christ.(Ephesians 4:13...KJV)
That they must be brought together and reconciled in this way is indicated by the letter Vaw (the number Six) that joins them. Each Dalet is equivalent to the number Four. When joined together they equal 8, or the number on the Tree of Life named Majesty, where our Messiahs are to be found in our time. The Vaw, which is equivalent to the number Six, and which joins the two, is situated at the center of the Mystery. This is the place called Beauty, the Navel of the Earth, the City Above the Mother of us all. It is the City of D V D hidden in the Oracle and revealed in Christ. It is the place in the center of the Dragon's Head, to which the throne of David will be restored after the judgments of this age are settled. (See Isaiah 27 to 29). It is the focus of Creation. It is the Doorway into this world, and out of it again. It is the way into that other world that exists just as readily in the Heaven of heavens as these things were hidden in the heaven of our own earthly reality. To perceive one reality is to perceive the other. To gather together in these things on earth is to gather together with those on the other side. To go up to Jerusalem in this world is to come to the threshold of Eternity.
In that day Seven Women (the entire Church) shall take hold of ONE MAN (understand 2 Corinthians 11...KJV), saying, We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel: only let us be called by thy name to take away our reproach.
In that day shall the Branch of the Lord be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the earth shall be excellent and comely for them that are escaped of Israel.
And it shall come to pass, that he that is left in Zion, and he that remaineth in Jerusalem, shall be called holy, even every one that is written among the living in Jerusalem...(Isaiah 4:1-3).
"Rabbi Abba is appointed as scribe, and Simeon is the sole speaker. The discourse still concerns (things above and below), with the correspondences between them, but it sketches only the subject of Concealed Deity and deals at length with the manifestation of the Lower Countenance...And at a later stage a very considerable extension of symbolism regarding THE FIRST MANIFESTATION OF THE ANCIENT ONE UNDER THE FORM OF MALE AND FEMALE, which is, in fact, the emanation or 'forming forth' of the supernal sefiroth--Chokmah, or Wisdom, and Binah, or Understanding...
(It speaks of) His androgyne nature and His Union with the Bride, who cleaveth to the side of the Male until she is separated...Face to Face (as the Cherubim above the Ark of the covenant). Out of this comes the kabbalistic doctrine of the sexes, so much in advance of its time, in whatever Christian century we may elect to place the literature, NAMELY THAT THE MALE AND FEMALE SEPARATED ARE BUT AN INCOMPLETE HUMANITY, or, as the text expresses the idea, but half the body; that no blessing can rest on what is (metaphorically) mutilated and defective; that no divided being can subsist forever, or receive an eternal dowry, 'FOR THE BEAUTY OF THE FEMALE IS COMPLETED BY THE BEAUTY OF THE MALE.' THE CONJUNCTION OF THE SUPERNAL MALE AND FEMALE IS SAID TO BE IN THE PLACE CALLED ZION AND JERUSALEM...
'WHEN THE BRIDE IS UNITED TO THE KING(as king herself, or Queen) IN THE EXCELLENCE OF THE SABBATH, THEN ARE ALL THINGS MADE ONE BODY.' And then the Most Holy God sitteth on (Their) Throne, and all things enter and are integrated in the One, Undivided, Perfect, and Holy Name. 'When the Mother is united to the King, the worlds receive a blessing and are found in the Joy of the Universe.'" The Holy Kabbalah, by A. E. Waite, pp.146,147.
__________
"...It may be remembered in this connection that the most cryptic of all texts in the Zohar--containing the mysteries of Divine Personalities--is called The Book of Concealment of Modesty. These things being so, we may consider in the next place what is said on the subject of espousals, as these are known in the earth. (See Joel, chapter 2). There is one definition which is in the keeping with the Tradition at large, and this is that marriage is the Union of the Sacred Name here below--that is, its completion in each person. The thesis appertaining hereto is that circumcision is the symbol of all purity in sexual intercourse; that Israel is placed on this account in purity as a starting point and enters under the wings of Shekinah....
Now the Sacred Name is never (completely) attached to an incomplete man, being one who is unmarried or one who dies without issue. Such a person does not penetrate after death into the vestibule of Paradise on account of his incompleteness. (There is, of course, much room for discussion and greater understanding in these matters). He is like a tree that is rooted up, and he must be planted anew--that is to say, he must suffer rebirth, as we have seen, in order that the Sacred Name may be completed in all directions. (A holy Soul, truly celibate in this life, can experience this rebirth on the other side, and there discover, and find solace and completion in their own true soul mate)...The last statement refers ofcourse to the making of man, male and female, in the likeness of Elohim...God blessed Adam because they were made together Male and Female, and blessings (revelation) are found only where Male and Female are united for the fulfillment of the purpose of creation, which--according to the counsel of the Elohim--was to increase, multiply and replenish the earth...It may be even that the Zoharic legend concerning male and female being originally side by side is only a veiled way of indicating that they were not yet in the marital estate. AFTERWARDS THEY WERE FACE TO FACE, SIGNIFYING THE FULFILLMENT OF THE PRECEPT." The Holy Kabbalah, A. E. Waite, pp.377-79.
And there will I meet with thee, and I will commune with thee from above the Mercy Seat, FROM BETWEEN THE TWO CHERUBIMS WHICH ARE UPON THE ARK OF THE TESTIMONY...(Exodus 25:10-22).
We will leave the subject of the Divine Feminine Principle here, until God reveals it in the Messiahs themselves. In closing, however, we must say something of the mikvah (the ritual cleansing that orthodox Jewish females are made subject to after menses, and after the birth of children), and then something of the rites of the Red Heifer.
Concerning the mikvah, the Messiahs will dispense with it as a required ritual, as an instrument of assuring "feminine cleanliness", thus spiritual holiness. Neither menstruation or the bearing of children is unclean...but holy, holy, holy. The mikvah, again, results from an inability to interpret the Torah in epic and historic terms. First of all the issue of a "woman's" menses in the Torah has nothing to do with the Female gender, save that females bear in their bodies the physical manifestations of the metaphor, but rather with the soul--male and female alike--(and primarily with the religious institutions they belong to) who is either pregnant with spiritual understanding or barren of it. The World-church of Revelation, chapter 17, ruled almost entirely by males, is barren of it, and stains the world with "her" continual flow of blood...With the continual flow of the blood of her sons and daughters that is. (Revelation 17; Ezekiel 16; Leviticus 15:18-33).
What this woman, who imagines herself to be the keeper of the oracles of God, did not know is that when Israel went up into the Tree of Life--up into the State of Mind that was promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob--the first time under Joshua and Caleb, it was entering into the great Mother period of the Nation's history. Miriam (Mary--the Mysteries of the Sea) led them forth with singing and dancing. And then Deborah (whose name flows from the Six-sided honeycomb, thus Tipheret on the Tree of Life) became a "Mother in Israel." She represents the Feminine mythology of that whole ancient period. (Judges 5). The Mother, of course, gave birth to the Son--the next period in the Nation's history, which began in the time of Christ and is now coming to a close.
Let them that love God be as the Sun when he goeth forth in his might...(Judges 5:31)
If a woman have conceived seed, and born a man child: then she shall be unclean Seven days...and in the Eighth day the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised.
And then she shall continue in the blood of her purifying Three and Thirty days (for a total of Forty).
But if she bears a maid child, then she shall be unclean Two weeks...and she shall continue in the blood of her purifying Threescore and Six days (for a total of Eighty days, or for Two periods of Time commonly known as the Old and New Testaments)...(Leviticus 12:1-5).
FORTY DAYS + FORTY DAYS = EIGHTY DAYS
THE RED HEIFER...Without spot or blemish, having never been yoked...Indeed, not so much as having ever been seen since the time of Christ. (Numbers, chapter 19). This Heifer represents all of the mysteries (all of the natural symbolism) in which the Divine Mother who is descending again into our collective field of consciousness is clothed. She is descending to Her own children (the Calves in the stall...Malachi 4). How, if She is the Divine Mother (open the second chapter of the Holy Qur'an), is She now a heifer? Because She herself is Her own daughter. And because this daughter, being a virgin in every metaphorical sense of the word, having never been penetrated (or defiled as the outer mysteries have), is alone capable of purifying Israel. Why is she Red? Like her Mother Kali in the East (who is ablaze with judgment--blood and water, fire and earth), this one, knowing the Face of her Mother, has preserved herself for the Fire and her ordinances for the restoration of the children of Light.
She will be burned in the Fires of the Great Suttee...with the cedar wood (of Lebanon...see Ezekiel 31); with hyssop (that "springs out of the wall"...1 Kings 4:33. This is the planting of the Mystery that continually breaks forth from its own hiding place within the walls of the Holy City); and with scarlet (for the sins of the people...Isaiah 1:18). Her ashes, as the atoning blood of Christ itself (as the Evening Sacrifice), is sprinkled Seven times.
Those who have attempted to penetrate her mysteries, or to sacrifice her (in any literal way) are unclean till the Evening (till the going down of the Sun at the end of the age--till the revelation of every hidden thing). He that touches the Dead Body of any Man (and every single soul is guilty) shall be unclean these same Seven days. They shall purify themselves on the 3rd day and on the 7th. (These are both the same day). One who is clean (of the great transgression) shall gather up her ashes (all of her meanings), and her (meanings) shall be used in the waters of separation. (2 Corinthians 6:14-18; Revelation 18).
Those who will not purify themselves shall remain unclean, defiling the Sanctuary (the Temple of Heaven and Earth), and shall cut themselves off in these judgments from the Great Congregatation.
