Genesis gives us the key to opening the door to everything. All we have to accept is that stories in Holy books almost certainly operate at many different levels beyond what is taught to children in Sunday School.
In the story of the original humans in the Garden of Eden, God ‘opens the eyes’ of Adam and Eve as punishment for Eve eating the forbidden fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. For in doing so their eyes are opened to the concept of ‘good and evil’, but we should not be side tracked by wondering what good and evil are. What is being revealed here, in my view, is that the Unity Consciousness of the blissful Garden, split into binary consciousness. If the reader overlooks the reference to newly realised binary opposites, then the message is repeated for reinforcement.
When Adam and Eve see each other naked, for the first time, their consciousness moves from being one, to two. This ‘same but different’ paradox between men and women is the same for all binary thoughts and words. Carl Jung suggested that the minds of men and women differ as metaphorically expressed by the nuanced differnces of their bodies.
The message in Genesis, is not about ‘good’ or ‘evil’ or ‘man’ or ‘woman’; it’s about binary thought; a fataly flawed characteristic.
But thinking in opposites creates an illusion of understanding. This is whispering serpent’…the one that slides down the ladders of thought.
In physics, nothing is black and white; there is just light and an absence of light and everything in between. But using opposites as a sort of ‘algebra’ for thought has enabled modern scientists to deconstruct nature and use it’s methods to make technology.
Batteries consist of negative and positive poles. The brain consists of left and right hemispheres. Breath goes in and out. Humans are born and die. Chromosomes are X and Y.
This is how have un-zipped the polarities that keeps atoms spinning, but there is a catch!
Our thoughts attach to the oversimplified opposites. Left and Right political views are a prime example of extremist views plunging the world into chaos. Edward de Bono introduced the non-binary word Po in his book Beyond Yes and No to express infinite possibility and a practical key to freedom of thought.
Opposite ideas should only ever be a mere framework for rational thought, otherwise the space in between disturbs ‘certainty’, leading to confusion and conflict. Consider a recent example;
In the United Kingdom, the Supreme Court has just ruled that a woman is a person who was born a ‘biological woman’. In other words, a ‘biological man’ cannot become a woman. This rule provides clarity for the lawyers; but is it true?
I would argue that the model does not fit neatly over reality. When it comes to the provision of public toilets, there will need to be a ‘third space’ for those with particular needs, for instance, those who feel different to their biological gender.
Is not an impossible problem for many ‘third spaces’ already exist as a ‘disabled toilet’. All that is needed now is a gender neutral sign on the door. Something that is not ‘men’ or ‘women’.
We see here that humans are not as simple as the rule of two ‘opposite’ biological genders. Consider the complexity of the body. We have a brain with left and right hemispheres. Each half has a nuanced contrast of functions; rational and creative respectively. Psychologically, each woman has an unconscious animus and each man has an unconscious anima. One in ten of us are left handed; the rest right. In some cultures, left is ‘evil’ and right ‘good’. There have been libraries written on the complexities of gender differences.
But we also experience a range of emotions, almost involuntarily, which can be categorised as ‘expansive’ or ‘passive’ in nature. Anger and valour are expansive and ‘male’, sadness and tenderness are ‘female’ emotions, for example. Of course, men and women have the whole range of emotions in varying degrees beneath the fig leaf.
Finally, the subtlest human characteristic that guides mind, heart and body is ‘intuition’. Albeit a peaceful, almost silent, internal voice, it has a function to guide us when we are lost. Another name for intuition is Soul, and yes, souls can be ‘good’ and ‘evil’ as illustrated in the Old Testament. There is a Bible story in which Joseph experienced wise, prophetic dreams. His soul’s ability to describe the future intuitively through the pathway of dreams is symbolised by his ‘coat of many colours’. Dream messages are not black and white, but as subtle as a colour from the subtle spectrum of light.
This level of subtlety is desperately needed today, in my view, if humankind is ever going to recreate the Garden of Eden on earth through deep compassion and understanding. If we do not, a Wasteland awaits.
Who is the third who walks always beside you? When I count there are only you and I together, but when I look ahead up the white road, there is always another one walking beside you, Gliding wrapped in a brown mantle, hooded. I do not know whether a man or a woman – but who is that on the other side of you?
What the Thunder Said (from line 359) from The Wasteland by T.S. Eliot
You may wonder why many great mystics have used poetry to express themselves. The masters who have written volumes of scholarly books might look across the writing table at the snoring companion who finished writing after just a few lines.
Brevity in speech and writing is not accomplished easily. Winston Churchill remarked how much easier it is to write a half hour speech than a five minute one. This paradox is perhaps why men of few words are misunderstood, when they should be revered. In a world where technology encourages everyone to ‘have their say’, words are flying around the globe with a speed and volume never known before.
Yet ‘saying more with less’ is surely an art well worth remembering and putting to good use?
If poetry were an equation then let us suppose, it would look like this;
1 + 1 = 3
To explain:
There is a principle of the sum of the parts being greater than the whole.
The first ‘1’ is a simple fact or what we call ‘information’. It is like a railway timetable or menu. It is not generally revealing of anything except as an aid to the general running of things.
The second ‘1’ is knowledge. It is again fairly basic but more subtle to acquire as it comes with experience, understanding and manipulation of all that ‘information’.
Strangely their sum is not ‘2’. When a person acquires a significant amount of information and knowledge during their life, a moment is reached, or at least grasped out for, which conflates facts and knowledge into wisdom which is represented as ‘3’. Wisdom has the quality of the unexpected and often comes as a jolt or joke…as in the Japanese Koan or the royal court Jester’s flippant remark.
In the game of chess this is represented as the ‘knights move’. The knight decides to take what Robert Frost describes in his famouse poem as ‘The Road Not Taken’.
Wisdom has the same quality as; ‘that’s it!’
So why does poetry use brevity to such effect?
We might define a poem as;
…the realisation of ideas using few words…
This runs counter to most modern philosophy and thought where books are written on obscure subjects using specific terms. In other words, if you used these ideas in conversation with those not conversant with them; no one would understand you.
By drawing back from the minutely specific, a poet has the advantage of not only using fewer words, but unexpected ones that suddenly make sense. There becomes an understanding already in place between the writer and the reader through shared experience of life and perhaps, intution. This might be described as a resonance between a subtle sequence of words and the experience to which they refer. If the reader has not had that life experience, as in a child for instance, then the poem cannot be understood.
Tuning forks work as a metaphor for resonance in the physical world. Usually in the physics lab, they are of similar size but if we use ‘philosophical’ tuning forks, then an infinitely large tuning fork will animate a very small one and visa versa.
Resonance picture credit: Quanta Magazine
In this way, as we experience life, we become literally ‘attuned’ to the Universe. There is a Universal tuning fork and a human one. The human feels the energy of the Universe and the information/knowledge/wisdom that travels with the resonant waves. (Remarkable recordings of sounds have now been made from the planets in the solar system which should be heard to believe!) Beyond this level of vibration is the Perfect Word which we might call Mind or God.
The Ancient Egyptians may have understood this or something similar, as they built temples at several times a larger scale than the proportions of the human body. We know that much of the beauty of the body is a product of precise use of sacred proportions.
In his book ‘The Temple in Man’; Schwaller de Lubitz laid images of an upscaled human body over plans of Temples in Luxor. The proportions known as the Golden Mean and Fibonacci series (as evident in the natural processes of growth and fractal patterns in nature) were used to amplify the resonant frequencies focused in and emanating from the Holy of Holies. By this way whatever was contained and protected within the Holy of Holies – such as a statue of a god in Ancient Egypt or the Ark of the Covenant when in possession of the Hebrews – became energised by universal wisdom or one might say; alive.
Scaled down to the human body is our own ‘Holy of Holies’; the human heart. It is placed in the body at a point of focus, so that when metaphorically cleansed and open, the Universal resonances can tune into the own body’s resonance. What you become is whatever energy you focus on in this lifetime whether demonic or angelic, factual or wise, destructive or creative.
The choice as always, is ours. It will there reflect, your truths and generate into the world the messages which you will relay to other people; just as a mobile or cell phone relay station, receives and transmits microwaves.
As an aside, the manifestation of crop circles in certain parts of the world is, in my view, this same effect. Wisdom from inter-dimensional intelligences is being expressed as diagrams and projected onto the surface of the globe. These diagrams are in a way visual poems; very precise and full of meaning. By merely looking at the patterns, it is said, their message can be absorbed and understood; even unconsciously as in the mandala paintings of the East.
It is a curious fact that the experience of each human generation differs considerably from the world that their parents and grand parents experienced. Every twenty five years or so new science and technologies, new social norms, new artistic expression, new language, new opportunities…new everything, replace the old lamps with new.
The Evil Magician’s Deal in the story of Aladdin
Perhaps you know this from your own life experience? Then consider how extraordinary the changes must have been if you multiply a generation by a hundred. You will then be in 500BCE. We know roughly what people around the world were doing at this time but can we hope to understand how they experienced the world? When we think about this and contemplate the art, literature and stories, architecture and engineering, religious expression, military campaigns, and famous leaders, we realise that we really have no idea of what was in their minds. Why should we even expect to understand them?
When we consider the Ancient Egyptians of this time for instance, we know something about the everyday lives of the ordinary people and the aristocratic priests and pharaohs, but their religious and spiritual expressions baffle us.
We can imagine that consciousness of the time was intimately connected with the religious rituals intended to thank and gain the co-operation of the Pantheon of gods. The process produced visible and tangible effects that today we would describe as magical. The really big magic is described as a miracle; performed by saints and prophets.
What miraculous power was contained in the Arc of the Covenant did, for instance; a power that made Moses steal it from the Egyptians? Did he need the Arc to perform miracles such as winning battles against all odds?
The Magic of Heka
For this reason we might describe the Egyptian religion as being a ‘magical science’, in the same way perhaps that owners of mobile phones today interface with magic, for they do not understand how their devices work, only how to use them.
Various religions have always spun into and out of existence all over the world expressing experiences and ideas about the physical and energetic universes that we cannot even imagine today. They shared certain ethics, at least approximately, about treating others as you would like to be treated…but there were darker powers at work. The floors in many Cathedrals andMasonic Halls are black and white squares, in case we need reminding.
At some point in the last few millennium, spiritual disciplines were taken over by the ‘dark side’. The mystery schools of Rome and Greece selected initiates to keep the hidden abilities and powers out of the experience of the general populous, but inevitably this knowledge has leaked to those whose intentions are not honourable.
The Catholic religion persecuted the Jews and Muslims in Spain who said they had converted to Christianity. The Spanish Inquisitions used interrogation and torture to find out if their conversions were sincere. The reader can reflect on other examples of religions who have used evil means to satisfy perverted desires, such as religious wars and the treatment of indigenous peoples by missionaries.
One might ask; what has replaced the desire to worship a benign supreme being?
I would argue that science and scientific method has become the new world religion. The scientist who perhaps started this transition was the great mathematician and physicist, Sir Isaac Newton.
Issac Newton as an Alchemist
He modestly described himself as having the advantage of ‘standing on the shoulders of giants’ while others call him ‘the last of the magicians’. Certainly his best scientific work was done before he reached the age of thirty and in his later years he devoted himself to the pseudo-science of Alchemy and interpreting ancient Biblical texts. He never attempted to replace religious truth with scientific truth as they were the same.
But despite this, Newton became the tipping point that has propelled later generations ( including ourselves ) into a more mechanical interpretation of the universe. This we might reflect, is also why we cannot understand our ancestors who lived in a more ‘energetic’ world. Materialism became the new religion and it’s high priests today are scientists and inventors such as Bill Gates, Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg. All the miraculous journeys of the mystics to the planets and stars in ancient times are being re-enacted with hydrogen powered rockets and space craft.
Space X Rocket picture credit; Actual News Magazine
But over the centuries this new religion has performed the same split as previous religions. There is ‘good science’ and ‘bad science’; in other words, science has also a branch whose effects are malign. For example, when Albert Einstein realised how his theories contributed to the production of the first Atomic bomb, he is reported to have exclaimed, ‘I wish I had been a plumber.’ Scientists and politicians could have confined the knowledge of the power of the atom to secrecy; just as they did the ideas of ‘free electricity’ described in Nicola Tesla’s technologies, the electric car, the hydrogen engine and the tyre that does not wear out.
Instead the genii was out of the bottle and it will never be able to put back into it. This decision was attempted to be justified as ‘saving thousands of lives by ending the second world war more quickly’. How taking the lives of non-combatant civilians in their tens of thousands and not considering it a war crime is something for history to decide.
If those politicians had considered how the Atom bomb would mould the following centuries and the lives of their children and grand children, they might have anticipated loose canons like Kim Jun Ill in North Korea and the Iranians, gaining the geopolitical power that such weapons bestow.
picture credit; Independent.ie
Just as in Star Wars, the main players have been tempted to use their spiritual powers in malign ways. Right wing politicians of today use the promise of being ‘scientific’ to deceive voters. The use of ‘scientists’ to advise governments in the recent pandemic is an example of this. Most fields of science have a spectrum of members with differing opinions. It is too simple for governments to choose scientists whose ideas support the politician’s agendas.
Another simple example might be when a president of the United States is voted out, he challenges the counting of the votes. Hardly a clever argument since counting is taught in primary school, but such is the force of the personality of Donald Trump, that even after being proven wrong by the various courts and organisations with expertises in the presidential voting process, he still maintains the election was ‘rigged’.
Scientific method has always included the presentation of evidence to support and prove a hypothesis. Those in power today (or who advise the powerful) who have gone over to the dark side, reveal themselves by not presenting proof of what they say.
During the pandemic, advice from ‘experts’ was presented which has since been disproved. Even You Tube now no longer bans references to the high risk group being solely the over 60’s and that vaccinated individuals are as likely to transmit the virus as the non-vaccinated. This would have made a huge difference to how societies reacted to the pandemic as this was known using published scientific statistics from Israel in April 2020.
False science can be summed up as ‘irrational’. Politicians who make irrational statements have a unique advantage over the rational minded; they are very hard to predict and even harder to debate with. They will confuse people so much that reasonable conversation is impossible.
In conjunction with ‘bad ideas’ is the use of dominating personalities to challenge benign ideas and processes. Force does not mean physical violence necessarily, but in the infamous storming of the Capitol Building in Washington, we see that it is a weapon that the high priests of dark science and their followers are willing to use.
picture credit; CBC
This fateful combination of the irrational and force, was fatefully used by many historical figures such as Adolf Hitler and present day leaders such as Vladimir Putin.
It is naïve of opponents to dismiss their irrationality as mental illness, deceit or stupidity. A leader might have all of these characteristics which combined with aggression can overcome the most assertive opponents. Hitler’s own generals were exasperated by his unsound strategic decisions and overpowering personality.
So what are we to do? Should we look on and do nothing?
John Stuart Mill in 1867 in an address to St Andrew’s College said;
“Let not any one pacify his conscience by the delusion that he can do no harm if he takes no part, and forms no opinion. Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing. He is not a good man who, without a protest, allows wrong to be committed in his name, and with the means which he helps to supply, because he will not trouble himself to use his mind on the subject.”
In my view inaction is not an option against present day threats. An example of inaction might be the attitude of the Europeans to Russia’s invasion of Georgia and now Ukraine. If we doubt this then there are warnings from the past that we might heed.
The Georgian Five Day War picture credit; fpri
In 1961 Dwight Eisenhower made the following warning to democracies in his farewell speech from the Whitehouse;
“In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists, and will persist.”
Perhaps today we could add ‘media’ and ‘pharmaceutical companies’ to the list of those seeking to acquire ‘unwarranted influence’.
The president who succeeded him was John F. Kennedy who warned of the dangers posed to world peace;
“Our goal is not the victory of might but the vindication of right…not peace at the expense of freedom, but both peace and freedom, here in this hemisphere, and, we hope, around the world. God willing, that goal will be achieved.” –“Radio and Television Report to the American People on the Soviet Arms Build-up in Cuba (485),” October 22, 1962, Public Papers of the Presidents: John F. Kennedy, 1962.
Kennedy was a Catholic and appealed to the Pope to intervene in the Cuban Missile crisis; what you might call a ‘spritual intervention’.
As already explained, from the mystery schools of ancient Greece and Rome to the various secret societies of the present day, techniques in spiritual growth and personal power were taught. The original purpose was, of course, to be one with the Divinity which included a type of magic.
These techniques were based on the use of mind and energy and are the product of strict spiritual discipline. This should not be confused with religion, which is a pale copy for people who do not have the interest, time, stamina, spiritual calling, perseverance, courage or many other special qualities unique to the holy and saintlike beings of our past and present. The spiritual path is followed by a tiny fraction of one percent of the world’s population because it is uniquely demanding. It is the equivalent of the special forces in military organisations and The Knights Templar exemplified how these two areas of human experience have much in common.
Today one might believe the modern Freemason’s are the inheritors of this most secret and powerful knowledge. The face they turn to society is as solely as givers of charity to the needy but one does not have to research too deeply to find that there are other directions that they extend their power.
As in Star Wars, the ‘dark side’ usurps even the most holy, benign and righteous so that power moves from helping the poor and weak to helping the rich and strong. The right wing governments of today reflect this perversion. The predictions of past American presidents are confirmed as we see industry, pharmaceuticals, media, military, governments and oligarchs; support the elites at the expense of truth and freedom for the general population.
The power they use are on the surface is from ‘scientists’ and ‘economists’ but their real power is derived from what one might term ‘super nature’. The Nazi regime in the 1930’s in Germany were greedy to attain supernatural powers. Herman Goering was determined to find the ‘Holy Grail’ as described by Otto Wern and devoted much time and resources to acquiring knowledge on how to make a ‘superhuman’ race, the Aryans. Himmler included witch dances into SS ceremonies seen here in Poland in 1939.
Nazis Secretly Used Witcraft Intending to Extend the Reich
picture credit; Historynet
What we observe today in various governments around the world, is predicated and dictated by a group of leaders who influence and dictate under the general and historical term ‘illuminati’.
To finish on a lighter note, or perhaps more spine tingling, watch very carefully the magicians of today who demonstrate magic for entertainment. They maintain that they are mere illusionists and certainly most of them are. But ask yourself the question, when you see a magician put their hand through glass or lift impossible weights; how much of this is illusion and how much perverted spiritual powers? Then project these thoughts into every part of human society in the twentieth century.
Dynamo the Modern Magus
picture credit; poppytv.sg
Are we watching science or magic? Are we walking in the light or the dark?
As an appendix to this essay a poem by the author…
There is a city plan used by the Romans which is a circle divided vertically and horizontally into four sections. The divisions form streets aligned to the four points of the compass.
The circular form aligned to the cardinal directions had been used by many other cultures before, most notable being the great Henge’s found around the world. Research into these has revealed their astronomical alignments predicted precisely the solar, lunar and stellar cycles. The motivation for understanding these cycles was to appease the instinctive and intuitive desire to be in harmony with nature. Ancient civilisations depended on the cycles of nature for their next meal and their most holy festivals.
There are four principle solar annual events; the equinoxes and solstices. Using the solar calendar the winter solstice occurs in December, the summer solstice in June, the spring equinox in March and the autumn equinox in September; on around 21st and 22nd days of these months.
These correspond with four sacred festivals that originate in ancient times and are celebrated to this day, even if they have morphed from their origins.
In the most simple way we can divide the six months from September to March as being ‘winter’ and the subsequent months as ‘summer’. There are six months of ‘darkness’ and six months of ‘light’ in the broadest of terms.
In the myths of ancient Greece and Rome, the goddess Aphrodite or Venus lived in the light or ‘Heaven’ and Persephone in darkness or ‘Hades’. Both were in love with Adonis and appealed to Zeus to decide how they could share him. His decree was that they should have him for six months of each year.
Aphrodite – picture Smithsonian Magazine
The figure of Adonis is in this way critical to understanding the importance of the movement of the seasons in ancient times. Nature lived and died quite literally, as did their harvests, from these forces. If the harvests failed, famine turned nature and cities into wastelands.
April is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
memory and desire, stirring
dull roots with spring rain
The Wasteland – The Burial of the Dead – (opening lines) by T.S. Eliot
This uncertainty placed enormous importance for people to give proper respect to the ‘gods’ and nature through ritual worship.
Within the solar year are overlaid the twelve ‘moons’ or months within each solar cycle. The phases of the moon and sun combined were known then and to this day, to govern the process from seed to harvest. This is naturally between spring and autumn, the exact length of this season being determined by latitude. Nevertheless, the spring equinox is a date used today to fix the date of the festival of Easter. This is the Sunday after the first full moon after the 21st or 22nd March, proving the importance of the moon combined with the sun in their influence for humans and everything on earth.
We know this because of the plethora of ancient gods and goddess whose lifespans fitted into these celestial cycles. Because spring is the ‘rebirth’ of nature there are corresponding stories incorporating the ‘death and resurrection’ cycle. In the Christian calendar this is known as ‘Easter’ but it is known that that the goddess Astarte preceded this in the ancient Near East. Much later Ostara ( medieval Germanic) gave rise to the traditional Easter symbols of the moon gazing hare and eggs.
Ostara by Johannes Gehrts
What is less well known in our current times is the antithesis of this ‘spirit of new life’. There is a tradition of the deaths of various ancient gods and goddesses at this time; the goring of Adonis by a boar, Dionysus with the first leaves from grape vines, the rape of Persephone and the death of Hyacinthus. Each of these however is given a heavenly reprieve by a resurrection. Adonis was turned into a Myrtle tree, Persephone released from Hades for six months of the year and Hyacinthus turned into a spring flower, the Hyacinth by Apollo – the Solar deity.
Apollo and Hyacinth – picture Wikiart
It was natural therefore when the Roman Church fixed the date for the death and resurrection of the Christ Jesus, to choose the beginning of spring in the celestial manner described above. The church fathers did not need to know about the strong and balanced influence of the sun and full moon at this time of year, but relied upon the old method of supplanting old ways with a new religion using the previous festivals.
Adonis is an interesting mythological character as for many scholars his festival occurred in spring. In the city of Byblos (in modern Lebanon) where he was born and worshipped, the river ran red each year with the spring rains mixed with red earth. This fertility symbol and literal fertility for the fields, remind us of the menstrual cycle in women, bearer of eggs; nature’s cycle is the same as the human cycle.
And yet, according to Rudolph Steiner in his lecture on Easter*, the ‘Festival of Adonis’ was celebrated at the time of the autumn equinox rather than spring.
(*available on You Tube)
Numerous ancient temples (the Great Temple of Abu Simbel, Egypt) and dolmens (New Grange, Ireland), are aligned to allow the solstice rays of sun to penetrate an entrance passage into a womb like chamber and fill it with life giving light.
Abu Simbel solar solstice – picture La Vanguardia
Steiner describes the ‘Feast of Adonis’ as being conducted by women in pagan societies. They would sow seeds like cress, on a thin layer of soil in a broken pot shard. After tending them during the spring, the summer drought would kill the plants. After two days of ceremonial mourning, these were ceremonially processed on the third day to the sea or a nearby lake to be immersed as an ‘image’ of Adonis. Adonis is therefore a tragic god who is ‘born to die’ as much later was written into the story of the Christ Jesus. Further evidence is contained in Sir James Fraser’s prodigious work The Golden Bough (an anthropological study of Mediterranean religions) claiming the Jesus is a fertility god in the lineage of Adonis.
The Entrance Stone to the Garden Tomb – picture Inspiration Cruises and Tours
The references to dying processes taking three days, is described by Steiner as being a reference to an ancient understanding of the human dying process which also takes three days. The first day completes the death of the physical body, the second the ‘ether’ body and the third the ‘astral’ body. This is an theosophical categorisation similar to the ‘body, soul and spirit’ of the Hermeticists or ‘animal, vegetable and mineral’ of the Idealists. Either way, man and nature take three days for the process of dying or ‘transitioning’.
It is a fact that the dying sun the during winter solstice, stops moving on the horizon for three days, before the days lengthen again. The circular stone rolled over the tomb in which the body of Christ Jesus was moved after a similar number of days, referencing him to be a solar deity; a ‘sun of God’.
The true dates of the life of Christ are not stated in the Bible, although there are a few clues. If we are persuaded to imagine the nativity to take place in the winter, then there are suggestions that state otherwise. The first is that shepherds were out in the fields at night, indicating that they were ‘lambing’ – a season that all farmers know. A ‘census’ of people is unlikely to be held in the dark and cold winter months for practical reasons; the Romans were practical administrators. The ‘star in the east’ is likely to be Venus which is well known by agricultural communities, to rise in the early morning in the East in the spring.
Nastrium Egg – picture The Ornament Emporium
Finally, it is curious how men travelling east were following a star appearing in the east. It is probably, in my view, that this information is coded and the direction east indicates a time of year rather than direction of travel; after all, their direction of travel is not important information to progress the story and a good story teller would omit this. It is only included to complete the sub-narrative.
The east road of the city is of course corresponding to spring on the solar calendar and the time of year you would expect a ‘sun god’ to be born. So, whether the ‘Christ Mass’ is held in the winter, spring, summer or autumn is open to interpretation and would not be contradicted by the Bible.
What modern observers would do well to recognise is not the dogma but the symbolism of the Christian churches. The ‘mass’ is confidentially encouraging congregations to drink blood and eat human flesh on the solar day of the week whilst facing the rising sun.
For me, the symbols are only partly transcendent, as we feel in the energy of spring, while carrying more than a hint of the macabre death and the dying sun/son.
That corpse you planted last year in your garden,
Has it begun to sprout? Will it bloom this year?
Or has the sudden frost disturbed its bed?
poem: The Wasteland 1922 – The Burial of the Dead – T.S. Elliot
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