The Parthenon Frieze and the relevance today
of the wisdom of
the Greek Gods
Click here for new research about the Elgin Marbles demonstrating that the reasons for building the Parthenon were documented and known to Plato's parents' generation.
SUMMARY
I have tried to determine the interpretation of the Frieze, which is not adequately explained elsewhere. As an integral part of the building it has to be read not as mere decoration but as potent and sacred symbolism. I have tried to enter the mindset of the ancient Greeks and I beleive the result is capable of great educational value. Were I an ancient Greek in the Panatheic Procession, what would I be thinking as we visited first the temple of Hephaestus on our way to the temple on the Acropolis of Athena herself, passing through the eastern doorway surmounted by the East Frieze depicting the Gods sitting on stools except Zeus on a chair, and finding within the respendant Athena facing the rising sun atop a podium depicting the birth of Pandora?
When we read the Iliad, we find our heroes of the book really not in determination of their own lives but at the will and bidding of the Gods. It was against this background that Plato and Aristotle were revolutionary in rational thinking and the frieze may start to reflect thinking from which their ideas developed.
In summary, I deduce that the Parthenon was built in celebration of the creation of mankind through Pandora, into whom all the Gods had contrinuted a component. The frieze depicts the Assembly of Gods, with Zeus as it's Chair Man. A debate appears and their disposition indicates a contrast between those who promote mankind and those who provide temptations, as if to say to the Chairman that mankind can be shown to fall for temptations and is therefore worthless. It's a hung Council and so the Chairman carries the decision as to wehether mankind is good enough. In terms of the Homeric tradition, our thoughts and lives being directed at the whim of the Gods, we carry the components of the Gods in our heads through our common descent from Pandora and within us, we are responsible as the Chairman within us for the directions that we choose.
The frieze is therefore to the Greeks as the First Judgment, in the same way as is the Last Judgment to the Christian tradition. It teaches concepts of temptation, corrosive thoughts in terms of desire, deceipt and hate, morality compatible with the Mystery schools, Buddhism, Old Testament Judaism and its derivatives.
The frieze operates in the past, in the present and the future.
The reading of this frieze here accords with the translations of Homer's Iliad by Chapman (1598) and Pope in the 19th Century. Appreciation of the frieze has been obscured since the 1930s when the Duveen Bequest to the British Museum prevented copies of missing sections of the frieze being displayed in proper order adjacent the original marble panels.
It is only in copies of the frieze such as that at Hammerwood Park that in the section depicting the Gods one sees that one is seated clearly on a chair and the rest are on stools, temple servants in the middle also carrying stools on their heads. Seated so, the Zeus figure becomes a Chairman of a Council - of Gods.
Here is a complete analysis of the Frieze which ties its complete explanation to documentary sources
The concept of the Council of Gods fired the thoughts of the generations of Pope and Chapman to the extent that the turn-of-the-century edition of Pope's translation even included a wonderful line drawing illustration of the Council of Gods in their ethereal realm among the clouds in the sky . . .
Of all the most beautiful literary references is Chapter XX of the Iliad in the Pope translation
'What moves the god who heaven and earth commands,
And grasps thunder in his awful hands,
Thus to convene the whole ethereal state? . . .
" 'Tis true (the cloud-compelling power replies)
This day we call the council of the skies
In care of human race ; even Jove's own eye
Sees with regret unhappy mortals die.
Far on Olympus' top in secret state
Ourself will sit, and see the hand of fate
Work out our will . . .
On the frieze note how the Gods in the middle turn their back upon the temple servants in their midst, keeping the deliberations of the council secret, hidden from the temple staff . . . Here is an illustrated analisis
As with all religious parables or allegories, the Parthenon Frieze is capable of operating on at least two or three levels. Heavenly forces, influences upon earth and influences upon our minds - or past, present and future in accordance with the cyclical nature of time.
1) It expresses the intentions of those of the past "Genetic Engineering Council" Gods who allowed us to have been made, acccording to Plato by Hephaestus, in "the care of the human race". It describes the politics among the Gods, noted in the last century by Grote in his treatise on Ancient Greece and the myths of the Gods, as well as the same politics that we will, in our turn in the future, face in the course of descovering the products of our own genetic engineering activities.
and
2) because the Council commissioned Pandora, the first woman, to be made with each of the members of the Council throwing in a component consistent with their function on the Council, understanding of the frieze allows us to understand the way in which we are programmed to think - the voices and forces within us - in the present. So in this way the debate of the Gods on the frieze relates to our own psyche: the legend is that each of them provided a component of Pandora, the first woman as Eve in the Christian tradition, from whom we are all descended. All of us, men and women are derived from Pandora so these component influences apply to all of us. (This makes much more satisfying meaning of every aspect of the Adam and Eve story).
The result is that we see a multi-faceted view of our creation, our environment and our own selves. This has a curious similarity with Dannion Brinkley's meeting with 13 "beings of light" and contemplations upon the contributions of each of the Gods of the Parthenon Frieze into Pandora as our ancestor may bear examination.
The Council was unsure whether we were worthy to grow up like them so they gave us free will with positive and negative aspects, the negative of which could be turned to positive use for benefit. (Example: Hermes - communication, good vs. deceipt and gossip bad)
The message of the Elgin Marbles:
It's the Chairman's vote that counts.
The present - the forces within us
We have the chairman, the ego, the id, within us and we have free will to take our bodies, ourselves wherever the chairman directs. Without understanding this frieze we can be led out of balance and all too easily into ways of destruction. All criminal and anti-social behaviour is visible from an imbalance on the frieze's Council and madness arises either when Dionysus is given the vote (through alcohol or worse) or when the Council has lost its Chairman! Rejection of the behaviour temptations proffered to us by some members of the Council gives us a Nirvana, a heaven on Earth. Understanding of the frieze in this way is capable of bringing enormous benefits.
Of the negative forces, they correspond with concepts excluded from Buddhist Nirvana and are encompassed within the concept of evil in Christianity. But in their identification on the frieze they begin to be altogether more visible and easier to resist. If people become more aware of the frieze they become able to guard more easily against ways which, by no means being prohibited by the Gods, actually lead them into danger.
Those Gods/forces who always vote pessimistically about us are:
Hermes - communication, deceiptful communication and theiving + - -
Ares - war, hate, murder - - -
Artemis - hunting (feeding of self and family), greed, money greed, power + - - -
Aphrodite - love, lustful greed/desire + -
Poseidon - environment storms earthquakes - we have no power to defend ourselves against him but our actions colour how he behaves towards us.
Allowing the Aphrodite, Artemis or Hermes voices to vote in one's head
1. permits Ares to take over - leading to hate, untruths told about us, violence and even murder and
2. can colour the Poseidon environment in which we live.
If people can be more aware of the pessimist voters plotting against us, they might have been more careful in entering situations in which Ares (Satan) has power.
Divine intent from above? Or seeing how we are programmed and how others are programmed to see us?
The Future - we become creators
The physicists view:
A story of the future - or the past?
Is history about to repeat itself?
David Pinnegar BSc ARCS
- In his preface to his novel Jurassic Park, Crichton points out the dangers of unregulated commercialised genetic research and engineering. We know that such research will bring mankind the greatest of benefits and we have seen how the book of Revelation says so. But in view of Revelation's plagues and Crichton's warning story, is it not unsafe to do so? Eventually the chances are that an experiment with the Tree of Life will go wrong. An accident will happen. Wouldn't it be better therefore, then or before, to wait until we have greater capability to conduct such experiments elsewhere in space? Perhaps initially in a station on the moon or thereafter, if we could, on another planet? If space travel was a real option, wouldn't we like to explore the tools of creation - to the full - on another planet? If we were to ultimately understand that mechanism of DNA would we, just for the sake of science like to try to create a DNA from a silicon rather than a carbon base? If another planet were found to have an atmosphere and adequate conditions of "sunlight" wouldn't we try to create designer life from the dust (the chemistry) of that planet? Would not some curious engineer, however much he was prohibited from doing so, have a go at creating life in our image, not only for the sake of it but perhaps as an insurance policy in case our own life on earth were to be wiped out in an accident? Would not we then pass on the story of Father Christmas and teach our created beings in our wisdom as our children? Are we not ourselves Father Christmas? As Chaplin pointed out Luke: "the kingdom of God is within man".
The Parthenon Frieze depicts a Council of the Gods. It is a hung Council considering just this question which we will too in our turn: "Was it a good idea to create a new mankind in our image?" It's the Chairman's vote that counts.
The past - we learn of
and understand the actions of the Gods who guide us
Plato: Critias (extract)
. . . There were many special laws affecting the several kings inscribed about the temples, but the most important was the following: They were not to take up arms against one another, and they were all to come to the rescue if any one in any of their cities attempted to overthrow the royal house; like their ancestors, they were to deliberate in common about war and other matters, giving the supremacy to the descendants of Atlas. And the king was not to have the power of life and death over any of his kinsmen unless he had the assent of the majority of the ten.
Such was the vast power which the god settled in the lost island of Atlantis; and this he afterwards directed against our land for the following reasons, as tradition tells: For many generations, as long as the divine nature lasted in them, they were obedient to the laws, and well-affectioned towards the god, whose seed they were; for they possessed true and in every way great spirits, uniting gentleness with wisdom in the various chances of life, and in their intercourse with one another. They despised everything but virtue, caring little for their present state of life, and thinking lightly of the possession of gold and other property, which seemed only a burden to them; neither were they intoxicated by luxury; nor did wealth deprive them of their self-control; but they were sober, and saw clearly that all these goods are increased by virtue and friendship with one another, whereas by too great regard and respect for them, they are lost and friendship with them. By such reflections and by the continuance in them of a divine nature, the qualities which we have described grew and increased among them; but when the divine portion began to fade away, and became diluted too often and too much with the mortal admixture, and the human nature got the upper hand, they then, being unable to bear their fortune, behaved unseemly, and to him who had an eye to see grew visibly debased, for they were losing the fairest of their precious gifts; but to those who had no eye to see the true happiness, they appeared glorious and blessed at the very time when they were full of avarice and unrighteous power.
Zeus, the god of gods, who rules according to law, and is able to see into such things, perceiving that an honourable race was in a woeful plight, and wanting to inflict punishment on them, that they might be chastened and improve, collected all the gods into their most holy habitation, which, being placed in the centre of the world, beholds all created things.
And when he had called them together, he spake as follows-** The rest of the Dialogue of Critias is missing.
- The story was preserved by Plato, having been heared whilst a child, at the time of the carving of the Elgin Marbles. It was handed down via his great-grandfather from Solon, the ancient ruler of Athens who himself had heared it from the Egyptian priests, ascribing the event it to around 9600 BC. Recent dating of the pyramids ascribes them to the same epoch. Upon learning the story were not the Athenians therefore likely to build their edition of a splendid monument to speak to mankind of such monumental events, the Panathenaic procession itself referring to a ceremony concerning the Greek version of the Flood legend? Might not therefore the sculpture of the Parthenon itself take up the Critias story where Plato's text enigmatically ends?
Copy of the Parthenon, Tennessee
Click here to find musical events going on there
- but don't leave Hammerwood yet!
The Debate of the Gods
The deities depicted are as reflection of human personality made in God's image. The frieze depicts the supremacy of just the one - Zeus supreme on his throne, mythologically the father of the others. Civilisation and the procreators of mankind are depicted by Hera, Zeus, Athena, and Hephaestus with only Apollo looking towards them. Is the frieze a reflection of the Council of our Creators? What might they be asking? Their proceedings are secret: even the temple servants in their midst are unaware - the deities sit quite aloof from the earthly ceremony around them. The question must be very fundamental.
We see the Gods depicted in our image. At risk of irreverence in the simile, at the zoo's chimpanzees' tea party, who is looking at who? Could the Gods be asking "Was it a good thing to create man in our image?"
The family unit is depicted by Zeus and Hera, goddess of marriage together with either their daughter Nike or Iris, the messenger of the Gods. The pair represent conventional biological creation. Also central to the frieze is Athena and Hephaestus who created Pandora, the first woman, from the clay of the earth. Athena was the goddess of science, wisdom and knowledge and, if so, would have had knowledge of DNA, especially as she came into life not by conventional means but by springing out of Zeus' forehead! Hephaestus was able to construct things - Athena & Hephaestus are how people work outside marriage to advance mankind. According to Plato, Hephaestus made the first man. He was banished to earth: he bumped his foot upon falling out of heaven and is depicted on the frieze with a club foot as a result. Of the other deities, Apollo looks towards them: the God of the arts, music and poetry who is elsewhere accompanied by his nine muses, and who is also associated with archery in myths including the slaying of a serpent. All of these clearly consider man to be good and capable of the highest achievements.
Of the others we have one who is the only figure with his feet off the floor - Ares. He can't wait to spring up and cause trouble - like Satan wants to get mankind to argue among themselves to stop them procreating further - see Job chapter 1 - has done enough in Bosnia. Hermes is the god of communication who stole cattle the minute he was born and deceived Apollo. In the biblical legend of Babel when mankinds languages became confused, the vote of Hermes' hand was certainly against us and he too faces away from those on the frieze who sponsored us. On the other side - again looking away - is Poseidon, who moves seas and mountains and did enough damage in Holland in the winter of 1995, South Africa in 1996 and America and Athens in 1997! At the end there is Artemis - who still glories in the power and gore of the hunt today - Maxwell, BCCI, Nick Leeson, genetic manufacturing companies exploiting DNA mutations for profit - together with Aphrodite - who is the goddess of purely carnal love. All of these five think that no good can come of the creation of man and look away from the others: Hermes, Ares, Poseidon, Artemis , and Aphrodite. I believe them to be saying, "no good can come of creating mankind and letting them achieve what we have done - let's go down and confound them all". This appears to be the story in the Book of Job.
Dionysus is not meant to be at this ceremony and, perhaps, has no vote - the Olympian attending should be Hestia, the goddess of the hearth but she always stays at home and never comes out. Dionysus is associated with the vine and the fruits of the earth and seems to be saying "Come and enjoy the ceremony". As an honorary Olympian he has no vote, turning his face into the frieze. However, when drugs or alcohol get hold of an individual or society, he is given the right to vote.
Lastly there is Demeter, the goddess of the food-bearing earth who holds her chin on her arm and looks despairingly sad. Clearly she would like humans to treat her better: in the creation of winter she was the ultimate victim of Prometheus' theft of fire from the Gods - her daughter is banished to the underworld for six months every year as a result. With any luck, if we treat her right, Demeter might declare an interest and abstain. Making nuclear explosions, dumping toxic waste in the sea and meddling with her genetic stock might cause her to cast her vote.
Provided therefore we treat Demeter with respect the voting is:
5 for mankind, 5 against and one abstention:
- it's the chairman's vote that counts!
But if we upset Demeter, according to Plato our Earthly Mother who gave birth to mankind from the seed of the fallen angel Hephaestus, might we not fear that she might whisper in the ear of Poseidon to move some mountains or cause some floods (Holland, America, Athens), or worse to Zeus pater, Jupiter, Yahweh - our heavenly father - to come and do something about it?
St John, like Lord Jesus, was of the Essenes and his texts recently translated from the Dead Sea Scrolls (Szekely: The Gospel of the Essenes) show that the concept of us having to pay reverence both to our Earthly Mother and our Heavenly Father was taught by Christ. The concept was central to being "born again" but has been edited out of our bibles in the split between St Paul's following with St James and the Essenes.
The Renaissance and the relevance of the Frieze today
In the similarities between the Greek myths and Christianity, we have rediscovered the pre-Darwinian inspiration which was the powder keg behind the Renaissance from which so many great men emerged.
The Moravian Count Zinzendorf , with whom the Latrobe family were directly connected, was the originator of the word "ecumenical". Sir Walter Raleigh in his "History of the World" had epitomised the spirit of the age drawing an absolute parallel between the Greek myths and Genesis.
It is within this context therefore that we are correctly to read the King James translations of Job in
respect of the "Sons of God" coming down with Satan (Ares) among them to see if Job can be confounded
and in Genesis to giants (depicted in battle with the gods both on the Parthenon metopes and upon the
Peplos at the focus of the Elgin Marbles), "sons of god" and men of renown (Achilles, etc.)
In his 1882 book concerning "Atlantis - The Antediluvian world", Augustus Donnelly summarises:
"In the number given by the Bible for the Antediluvian patriarchs we have the first instance of a
striking agreement with the traditions of various nations. Ten are mentioned in the Book of
Genesis. Other nations, to whatever epoch they carry back their ancestors, whether before or after
the Deluge, whether the mythical or historical character prevail, they are constant to this sacred
number ten, which some have vainly attempted to connect with the speculations of later religious
philosophers on the mystical value of numbers. In Chaldea, Berosus enumerates ten Antediluvian
kings whose fabulous reign extended to thousands of years. The legends of the Iranian race
commence with the reign of ten Peisdadien (Poseidon?) kings, 'men of the ancient law, who lived
on pure Homa (water of life)' (nectar?), ' and who preserved their sanctity.' In India we meet with
the nine Brahmadikas, who, with Bramah, their founder, make ten, and who are called the Ten
Petris, or Fathers. The Chinese count ten emperors, partakers of the divine nature, before the dawn
of historical times. The Germas believed in the ten ancestors of Odin, and the Arabs in the ten
mythical kings of the Adites." (Lenormant and Chevallier, "Anc. Hist. of the East," vol. i., p.13.)"
The Tennessee Parthenon: interior
The Frieze and Buddhism:
Myth, religion, heaven and Babel
As Christians we believe that "the Chairman" is responsible for our final judgment and sentence to heaven
or hell.
The Buddhist Gospel in Buddha's sermon on the annihilation of suffering confirms the concepts of the
identities of our destroyers embodied in the Parthenon Frieze:
"And what, my friends, is the root of evil?
Desire is the root of evil; hatred is the root of evil; illusion is the root of evil; these things are
the root of evil."
"And what is the root of unwholesome karma?
Greed is a root of unwholesome karma; Anger is a root of unwholesome karma; Delusion is a
root of unwholesome karma."
"Enraptured with lust, enraged with anger, blinded by delusion, overwhelmed, with
mind ensnared, man aims at his own ruin, at others' ruin, at the ruin of both parties, and he
experiences mental pain and grief. "
"But, if lust, anger, and delusion are given up, man aims neither at his own ruin, nor at
others' ruin, nor at the ruin of both parties, and he experiences no mental pain and grief. Thus is
Nirvana immediate, visible in this life, inviting, attractive, and comprehensible to the wise.
The extinction of greed, the extinction of anger, the extinction of delusion: this, indeed,
is called Nirvana."
The Parthenon frieze identifies those who prevent us from attaining heaven or Nirvana in the desirous
deities of hunting Artemis and lustful Aphrodite, warring Ares and deceiving, deluding, Hermes. The
concept of Nirvana is, of course, a garden of Eden independent of the earthly realities of Poseidon and
Demeter.
Suddenly we find alignment between Greek mythology, Buddhism and Christianity.
As religious beings we all look out of our pigeon-holes with our blinkers on: we are all told "this is the
only way: do not stray". Suddenly we find we are all living in the same pigeon-loft. As in the Indian Vedic
texts:
Truth is one, but men give her a thousand different names.
The story of the tower of Babel left us not only with differing languages of speech but also of thought. We
came away from Babel with different perceptions and traditions of exactly the same knowledge and prior
events.
If we are to confound those who wish to destroy us, instead of them confounding us, we have to ignore our
differences and concentrate on our areas of agreement. In doing so, not only will differences become
irrelevant but they will be wholly overcome.
For our survival we need to achieve a universal understanding and fraternity between peoples and nations.
We need remember only two things: the necessity of persuading Demeter to abstain and thereafter that it's
only the Chairman's vote that counts!
1 Corinthians 14:33
For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints.
Musical intervals are derived from a series of harmonic frequencies - e.g. fundamental 100 cycles per
second; octave 200; fifth 300; fourth 400; major third 500; minor third 600; narrow minor third 700; tone
800; tone 900; tone 1000; semi tone 1100; etc quarter tones.
In the Alpen horn, the most primitive wind instrument ever played, the music of east and west unite. The
west uses intervals up to the 8th harmonic finding harmony in the lowest, the east all harmonics are used
but finding melody from the fifth upwards.
Connected to the collective conscious, we are all but harmonics of the whole. Derived from Adam and the
genetic code of God Himself - or according to Plato from the ancient Egyptian from Hephaestus who was
suffered to be thrown out of heaven for so doing, bumping his foot - we are all genetic harmonics of the
whole.
Before Galileo it was inconceivable that Earth is not the centre of the solar system and our solar system is
not the centre of the Universe.
None of us can know everything - we are all but a small part containing the full image of the whole, just
as a fragment of a hologram plate, we are all but harmonics.
The religions are all the same - differing only in what is absent, removed by God for the purpose of
removing argument about whatever was irrelevant or cause for argument at the time. The religions are all
harmonics of the fundamental.
1 Corinthians 14:10
There are, it may be, so many kinds of voices in the world, and none of them is without
signification.
So easy it is to say I, my religion, my belief is the fundamental. In doing so we set up harmonics which
grate and discord with the fundamental, the whole, the one.
How do we hear the one?
On an electric or pipe organ, play the C and E an octave above middle C. If loud enough, sometimes
enhanced by standing waves, you will hear a note impure (because in the West we stretch our scale to
force (temper) the ability to play all keys, achieving equal inharmony / harmony in all) sharp C two
octaves below. Then play the E and G above. You will hear the same fundamental note, more in tune. You
may not hear it unless you listen carefully. In peace. In silence.
You may still not hear it but I can prove it is there. Play C E. It is still. Play E G. It is still. Play C G. It
wobbles (beats) and you may hear C an octave below. Insert the E. The wobble changes speed. Play C E.
Play E G. Play them together. The wobble is the difference, the beat between the two different tempered
fundamentals.
So the difference between one and the other is the fundamental. In life we are tempted to reject on account
of differences in part rather than using the difference to shift our perspective on the whole to thereby find
fundamental accord and agree.
The Dead Sea Scrolls - the Seals of Revelation
and the Speech of the Seventh Angel:
A voice from 2000 years ago for our time and the Industrial Age
The text of the book of Revelation differs markedly from St John's original manuscript "The Essene
Gospel of Peace" found with the Dead Sea Scrolls.
The text was translated by Edmond Szekely in 1974 and is poetry of outstanding beauty. It includes a
different text concerning the seven seals which refers most recognisably to the progressive stages of the
industrial revolution and the onward march of technology, from pollution to the misuse of the tools of
Creation (atomic physics, computer programmes, mechanical and biological robotics and nano-
technology) together with the discovery of the portion of DNA (realised this autumn) responsible for
controlling lifespan or alternatively giving eternal life.
Perhaps this text was deliberately withheld from us because otherwise we would never have embarked
upon the industrial revolution which was to be our destiny?
And I opened the first seal.
And I saw, and beheld the Angel of Air.
And between her lips flowed the breath of life
And she knelt over the earth
And gave to man the winds of Wisdom.
And man breathed in.
And when he breathed out, the sky darkened,
And the sweet air became foul and fetid,
And clouds of evil smoke hung low over all the earth
And I turned my face away in shame.
And I opened the second seal.
And I saw, and beheld the Angel of Water.
And between her lips flowed the water of life
And she knelt over the earth
And gave to man an ocean of Love.
And man entered the clear and shining waters.
And when he touched the water, the clear streams darkened
And the crystal waters became thick with slime,
And the fish lay gasping in the foul blackness,
And all creatures died of thirst
And I turned my face away in shame.
And I opened the third seal.
And I saw, and beheld the Angel of Sun.
And between her lips flowed the light of life,
And she knelt over the earth
And gave to man the fires o f Power.
And the strength of the sun entered the heart of man,
And he took the power, and made with it a false sun,
And, lo, he spread the fires of destruction,
Burning the forests, laying waste the green valleys,
Leaving only charred bones of his brothers.
And I turned my face away in shame.
And I opened the fourth seal,
And I saw, and beheld the Angel of Joy.
And between her lips flowed the music of life,
And she knelt over the earth
And gave to man the song of Peace.
And peace and joy like music
Flowed through the soul of man.
But he heard only the harsh discord of sadness and discontent,
And he lifted up his sword
And cut off the hands of the peacemakers,
And lifted it up once again
And cut off the heads of the singers.
And I turned my face in shame.
And I opened the fifth seal.
And I saw, and beheld the Angel of Life,
And between her lips
Flowed the holy alliance between God and Man,
And she knelt over the earth
And gave to man the gift of Creation.
And man created a sickle of iron in the shape of a serpent
And the harvest he reaped was hunger and death.
And I turned my face away in shame.
And I opened the sixth seal.
And I saw, and beheld the Angel of Earth.
And between her lips flowed the river of Eternal Life,
And she knelt over the earth
And gave to man the secret of eternity,
And told him to open his eyes
And behold the mysterious Tree of Life in the Endless Sea
But man lifted his hand and put out his own eyes,
And said there was no eternity.
And I turned my face away in shame.
And I opened the seventh seal.
And I saw, and beheld the Angel of the Earthly Mother.
And she brought with her a message of blazing light
From the throne of the Heavenly Father.
And this message was for the ears of man alone,
He who walks between earth and heaven.
And into the ear of man was whispered the message.
And he did not hear.
But I did not turn away my face in shame.
Lo, I reached forth my hand to the wings of the angel,
And I turned my voice to heaven, saying,
"Tell me the message. For I would eat of the fruit
Of the Tree of Life that grows in the Sea of Eternity."
And the angel looked upon me with great sadness,
And there was silence in heaven
And then I heard a voice, which was like unto the voice
Which sounded like a trumpet saying
"O Man, wouldst thou look upon the evil thou hast wrought
When thou didst turn thy face away from the throne of God,
When thou didst not make use of the gifts
Of the seven Angels of the Earthly Mother
And the seven Angels of the Heavenly Father?
And a terrible pain seized me as I felt within me
The souls of all those who had blinded themselves,
So as to see only their own desires of the flesh.
The text omits the speech of the third angel contained in Revelation 8.10 concerning the fall of the star
from heaven but includes the speech of the seventh angel, apparently prohibited from inclusion from the
usual text:
"O man, wouldst thou have this vision come to pass?"
And I answered, "Thou knowest, O Holy One,
that I would do anything
that these terrible things might not come to pass."
And he spoke: "Man has created these powers of destruction.
He has wrought them from his own mind.
He has turned his face away
from the Angels of the Heavenly Father and the Earthly Mother,
and he has fashioned his own destruction."
And I spoke: "Then there is no hope, bright angel?"
And a blazing light streamed like a river from his hands
As he answered,
"There is always hope,
O thou for whom heaven and earth were created"
The hope remaining in the mythical Pandora's box together with the hope for the vote of the Chairman of
the Council depicted on the Parthenon Frieze now comes alive anew - but we need to earn it!
Nativity
As we look for missing pieces of our jig-saw we find a picture more gloriously wonderful, more
mysteriously miraculous than any of which we may have dreamed before.
St John's manuscripts lead us back to appreciation of both our Earthly Mother as well as our Heavenly Father. As we come to terms with the tools of our creation which so easily threaten our destruction, we will be born - or stillborn. It is the responsibility of all who lead, just as midwives and doctors, to arrange our safe passage.
In the womb we make our mother feel sick and kick her a lot - yet she loves us most dearly even when we do not know how to love. We hear her heartbeat and digestion and we feel her movements. We know a lot about her, we sometimes hear her voice but we do not know her. Even less can we hear, let alone know, our Heavenly Father - and yet in love for others and for our Earthly Mother we can both reflect His love for us and come to terms with meeting Him - and the means of our own creation.
We may, even yet, earn the Chairman's vote!
(The translation of St John's original manuscripts and other Essene texts is available in three volumes from The Cayce Centre, 13 Prospect Terrace, New Kyo, Stanley, Co. Durham, DH9 7TR, Telephone +441207 237696 Fax +441207236398.)
e-mail for The Cayce Centre
Whether in ancient Egypt, India, Greece, the shores of the Dead Sea or in modern times, although times change - in the words of the Led Zeppelin film made at Hammerwood Park - "The song remains the same".
This page was inspired by Latrobe's work at Hammerwood Park. Click here to visit or stay.
Click to return to Hammerwood Resources page and here for a tour of the house and more classical resources.The Tree of Knowledge
The Tree of Life
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