CATCHING THE LIGHT

THE ENTWINED HISTORY OF LIGHT AND MIND

Arthur Zajonc 1993

Page 26

The Arab Connection

"Toward the end of the Roman empire the stage was set for further developments in the history of the mind. The closing of the Platonic Academy in A. D. 529 by Justinian was the final death knell of Greek philosophy in the West and the dawn of the Dark Ages. For many centuries, the Academy had been a sanctuary in which the ideas of Plato and his followers flourished. With the rise of Christianity, however, pagan thought was in danger of being eradicated. In A.D. 389, the great library in Alexandria with its half-million scrolls was destroyed by rioting Christians. Under a state that sanctioned the Roman Church, the Platon- ists, who still revered the pagan gods, were persecuted and hounded as dangerous heretics. When Justinian's soldiers swept into the Platonic Academy, the last disciples of Plato had to / Page 27 / flee Athens. The seven great sages of the Academy departed with their precious books bound for Persia where the emperor Khurso I received them graciously at his magnificent summer palace in Jundishapur (near what is today Dizful, Iran).20

In the court of Khurso I, and at the illustrious Academy of Jundishapur, literature, the arts, science, and philosophy flour-ished. The Athenian refugees found here a cosmopolitan at-mosphere of remarkable tolerance. The indigenous religions of Zoroastrianism and Manichaeism mingled with eastern religious thought, as well as pagan, Christian, and Jewish influences. Jundishapur was founded as a prisoners' camp following the de-feat of the Roman emperor Valerian in A. D. 260 by Shapur I. By the sixth century it had become the greatest center of learning in the world, boasting an outstanding astronomical observatory, medical school, and the world's first hospital. Jundishapur was known then, and for centuries thereafter, for its physicians and wise counselors. The rise of Islam blunted the impact of Jun-dishapur, but the leaders of Jundishapur's Academy were the nucleus around which the scholarship and learning of Islam formed.

With the rise of Islam in the seventh century, a cultural revolution of unprecedented scope took place on the Arabian peninsula. Following the establishment of the new religion by Mohammed and a system of governance for the vast empire won through holy wars, Islamic scholars became tremendously active in collecting and translating Greek manuscripts. Baghdad, dur- ing the ninth century under the guidance of the scholar and translator Hunayn ibn Ishaq, became a great center of learning, and Arab science and scientists rose quickly in importance. While thinkers in the West forsook the concerns of Hellenism for religious questions, especially the matter of salvation, phi- losophers and physicians of the Islamic Near East, under the influence of Jundishapur, were busy mastering, commenting on, and furthering the knowledge of antiquity"

 

 

IN THE NAME OF GOD THE COMPASSIONATE THE MERCIFUL

 

8
M
O
H
A
M
M
E
D

13
15
8
1
13
13
5
4
+
=
72
7+2
=
9
NINE
9

4
6
8
1
4
4
5
4
+
=
36
3+6
=
9
NINE
9

M
O
H
A
M
M
E
D

PEACE BE UPON HIM

 
M
O
H
A
M
M
E
D

15
8

+
=
23
2+3
=
5

8
M
O
H
A
M
M
E
D

13
15
8
1
13
13
5
4
+
=
72
7+2
=
9

1+3
1+5

1+3
1+3

4
6

4
4

8
1

5
4
+
=
18
1+8
=
9

4
6
8
1
4
4
5
4
+
=
36
3+6
=
9
NINE
9

M
O
H
A
M
M
E
D

 

5
I
S
L
A
M

9
19
12
1
13
+
=
54
5+4
=
9

9
1
3
1
4
+
=
18
1+8
=
9
NINE
9

I
S
L
A
M

 
I
S
L
A
M

9
19

+
=
28
2+8
=
10
1+0
=
1
5
I
S
L
A
M

9
19
12
1
13
+
=
54
5+4
=
9

1+9
1+2

1+3

10
3

4

1+0

1

9

1

+
=
10
1+0
=
1

9
1
3
1
4
+
=
18
1+8
=
9
NINE
9

I
S
L
A
M

 
G
A
B
R
I
E
L

9

+
=
9

7
G
A
B
R
I
E
L

7
1
2
18
9
5
12

+
=
54
5+4
=
9

1+8

1+2

9

3

7
1
2

9
5

+
=
24
2+4
=
6

7
1
2
9
9
5
3

+
=
36
3+6
=
9
NINE
9

 

7
G
A
B
R
I
E
L

7
1
2
18
9
5
12

+
=
54
5+4
=
9

7
1
2
9
9
5
3

+
=
36
3+6
=
9
NINE
9

 

THE UPSIDE DOWN OF THE DOWNSIDE UP

 

6
S
P
I
R
I
T

19
16
9
18
9
20

+
=
91
9+1
=
10
1+0
=
1

1
7
9
9
9
2

+
=
37
3+7
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

S
P
I
R
I
T

 
S
P
I
R
I
T

9

9

18
1+8
=
9

9
NINE
9

S
P
I
R
I
T

1

9

9

19
1+9
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

S
P
I
R
I
T

19

9

9

+
=
37
3+7
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1
6
S
P
I
R
I
T

19
16
9
18
9
20
+
=
91
9+1
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

1+9
1+6

1+8

2+0

10
7

9

2
+
=
28
2+8
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

1+0

1

1

1

1
ONE
1

9

9

+
=
18
1+8
=
9

1
7
9
9
9
2
+
=
37
3+7
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

S
P
I
R
I
T

6
S
P
I
R
I
T

1

1

1

1
ONE
1

2

2

2

2
TWO
2

7

7

7

7
SEVEN
7

9
9
9

27
2+7
=
9

9
NINE
9

S
P
I
R
I
T

9
9
9

S
P
I
R
I
T

6
S
P
I
R
I
T

19
16
9
18
9
20

+
=
91
9+1
=
10
1+0
=
1

1
7
9
9
9
2

+
=
37
3+7
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

S
P
I
R
I
T

 

 

 

CATCHING THE LIGHT

THE ENTWINED HISTORY OF LIGHT AND MIND

Arthur Zajonc 1993

THE GIFT OF LIGHT  

 

Page 28

"The famous philosopher, mathematician, astronomer, and op-tician Ibn al-Haytham figured prominently in these develop-ments.21 In his hands, the history of sight took another significant step away from earlier and more spiritual or psychological views and toward a mathematical and physical theory of vision.

Born in Basra (Iraq) in A.D. 965, Ibn al-Haytham, or Alhazen as he came to be known in the West, became the greatest optical scientist of his age. As a child and young man, Alhazen had attempted to attain knowledge of truth through the Islamic re- ligious sciences of his day. Dismayed by the elusiveness of this goal and the rancor he saw between competing religious sects, he resolved to concern himself with a "doctrine whose matter was sensible and whose form was rational. ,,22 Truth was one, he felt, and throughout the following decades he maintained his initial resolve to avoid the vagaries of the spiritual sciences. Instead, he produced dozens of treatises on mathematical and scientific subjects, the most influential of which was his Optics. One hundred and fifty years after his death in 1040, the Optics was translated into Latin and subsequently became the foun- dation for future optical research. Two aspects of his work will be of special concern to us: his replacement of the Platonic theory of vision with his own quite different theory, and his study of the camera obscura. Both reflect Alhazen's reimagin- ation of light.

-

THE PROMINENT GREEK accounts of vision had given full weight to the inner activity of the seer. As we have seen, this came to be embodied in their view that a pure fire, essential to sight, resided within the eye and rayed out, sunlike, to illuminate the world. This view was taught in various forms in the West until the twelfth century, for example by the great teacher William of Conches at the cathedral schools of Chartres and Paris. A profound student of Plato, Conches also drew from Galen the

 

 

 

 

 

 

Page 34

The illuminating interior ray or fire had vanished. Yet Des-cartes still holds a two-stage theory of vision. In the first, light (which he conceived of as material and mechanical) is conveyed through the physical organ of sight to a common sensorium in the body. The mechanical stimuli are then, in Descartes's view, "perceived" by a spiritual principle within man. For Descartes the world of extension, of substance-res extensa-reached all the way into the body but could not of itself complete the process of vision. A spiritual principle, the mind or soul-res cogitans- was still required. Like the philosopher in the illustration ob-serving the flickering retinal images from his dark vantage point, the immaterial mind observed the mechanical proddings of the world in the sensorium.

Although the light of the eye that reached out and granted meaning to raw sensation had retreated from the body, it re- mained in Descartes's dualist position as a disembodied spirit, a vestige of the past. Yet even this faint echo of a Greek heritage was destined for at least temporary extinction.

Modern Sense Physiology

We shall, sooner or later, arrive at a mechanical equivalent of consciousness.

Thomas Huxley

The final development in the evolutionary drama of sight (and I must leave much out) occurred in our century. By the mid-1900s, the neurophysiology and psychology of vision had ad-vanced to an extraordinary degree. The detailed knowledge we now possess of brain structure and function, of the neural anat- omy of the eye and visual pathways, is truly staggering. In the flush of excitement that naturally accompanies a century of dis- covery, many feel that they hold now in their hands "the me- Page 35 / chanical equivalent of consciousness," as Thomas Huxley called it.

The Harvard biologist and Nobel laureate David Hubel speaks for many scientists when he states that the brain is a machine "that does tasks in a way that is consonant with the laws of physics, an object that we can ultimately understand in the same way we understand a pnntlng press."30 oreover, contrary to Descartes, we have no need to appeal "to mystical life forces- or to the mind" to account for perception, thought, or emotion. They are purely and simply states of the physical brain.

Hubel rightly recognizes the profound implications of this view for everything we do. Our image of the mind sets the agenda for everything from education to love relationships. According to Hubel, once we understand that mind is an illusion, and that brain is the sole reality, then we can restructure our systems of education and social institutions to serve the brain, not an an-tiquated notion of "spiritual man."

In traditional language, the substitution of a purely material and sensual image for a spiritual reality is idolatry. In his in- sightfullittle book Saving the Appearances, Owen Barfield sug-gests a connection between the biblical injunction against idolatry and the veneration of models so common to modem scientific practice.31 Scientific models certainly have their right-ful place. But when does a model become an idol, that is, when is it taken for something other than a model, becoming "reality"? The model of an atom as a miniature planetary system is helpful only as long as it is not taken literally. Quantum physicists discovered long ago the dangers of idolatry. Neurophysiologists have yet to learn the lesson. For many of them, the brain has become an idol; it has become quintessential man.

The dangers associated with this kind of adulation of the brain are innumerable. The image we have of ourselves is a powerful thing; it shapes our actions, and so also the world we fashion for us and for our children. It is important, therefore, patiently and carefully to distinguish between idol and fact.

Page 36

I am not suggesting a simplistic Romantic return to the past. There is no turning back. Yet are Hubel and the legions of scientists who think like him right to reduce our humanity to brain function? The answer is, quite simply, no. The brain as described by Hubel is a carefully crafted and dazzling image fashioned from the fruits of scientific research, one full of in- sights; but which is ultimately mistaken for something it is not. Is it possible to embrace the results of science without falling into such idolatry? Yes, but this, perhaps more than any other, is the challenge we confront in our times. Our success or failure in fashioning a nonidolatrous science will determine much for our future.

Rekindling the Fire of the Eye

The movements we have traced are like a contrapuntal harmony where one melody sounds against the other. As the light of the eye dims, that of the world brightens. As the beacon of the eye gradually retreats, the power of sunlight projects itself deeper and deeper into the human being until finally the ethereal em- anations of Plato, and even the Cartesian spectator, vanish from the Western scientific sense of self. Yet some data and scientific developments indicate the possibility of a "postmodern" view of self and vision that has room in it for the light of the eye. In them, the interior ray may once again find a place, even if under another guise.

We have learned that our consciousness is not immutable. Our habits of thought become perceptions, and while powerful and pervasive, these are not universal or "true." We should learn to take responsibility for them. Do they accord with our deepest intentions and the good of our society and planet? Or do we need to "reimagine" ourselves and our world? In this way Matthew's remarks make real sense: "If thine eye be evil, thy / Page 37 / whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!" Our light, a light of meaning, fashions a world, forms it from the light of day. If our light be darkness-be evil-then we bring darkness and evil into our whole body, personal and social. If it be light- be good-then health flows into us, and into the world.

Plato's light of the eye was a light of interpretation, of "in-tentionality," as modem phenomenologists would say; a light that grants meaning. Cognition entails two actions: the world presents itself, but we must "re-present" it. We bring ourseJves, with all our faculties and limitations, to the world's presentation in order to give form, fig1:1re, and meaning to that content. The beautiful and productive images we craft on the basis of expe- rience are images only-fruits of the imagination. They are no less true for being so. If in our enthusiasm we forget this, then images become idols demanding propitiation at their high altars. Nor should these reflections become grounds for abandoning the path of knowledge, because it is a philosophy of growth and development. The organs of insight we bring are neither fixed nor limited, but malleable and expansive. Thus the importance of integrating the insights into light gained by artistic and spir-itual disciplines as well as scientific ones.

"Plato's light of the eye was a light of interpretation,"

Plato's light of the I was a light of interpretation,

 Plato's light of the 9 was a light of interpretation,

 

CHAPTER 3

Light Divided: Divine Light and Optical Science

Page 38

"Our original question-what is the nature of light?-has been answered differently by different peoples. To the Egyptians it asked after man's relationship to the god Ra. They sought first a moral or spiritual answer, not a mechanistic one. By contrast, we search to explain the nature of light by tracing light rays through intricate optical systems. We seek light's mathematical and physical lawfulness. The sequence of words-what is light?-does not have a unique meaning. The Egyptian answer is utterly different from that of quantum optics, but are they necessarily at odds? Or does the Egyptian yearn to know a different part of light's expansive being?

We should be open to the possibility that the essential ques- tions posed about nature in past or future ages may be quite different from those posed by us today. As C. S. Lewis wrote in his lovely book The Discarded Image, it is not that our present- day understanding is unsubstantiated, but we should realize that "nature gives most of her evidence in answer to the questions we ask her.". The questions we ask, as well as the answers we are willing to accept, reflect our temper of mind. The images of one age may be discarded by another less because of new discoveries than because of new priorities and new questions, all of which reflect a changing psyche.

Page 39

By remaining open to conflicting proposals regarding the na- ture of light, we allow the wide-ranging drama of the past its place, and so read the full biography of light rather than only the fragment we have written ourselves. We can also wonder afresh at our present understandings of light and see the future as being still undeterl{lined. As we approach the ancients' un- derstanding of light, we should leave our own hard-won, con-temporary images at the threshold to see as others have seen.

 

The Lost Eye

I

am the one

who openeth his eyes, and there is light; When his eyes close, darkness falleth.

Ra

speaking; from the

Turin papyrus, 1300 B.C."

Two eyes looked down on the civilization of the Nile, the "two eyes of Horus," the sun and moon. No more significant symbol existed in ancient Egypt than the eye of the sun-god Ra. His eye-the sun-was creative, his vision was life itself. It was said that mankind arose from the tears of his eye. in Egyptian, the very words for tears and men sounded similar.

 

TEARS OF A CROWN

 
T
E
A
R
S

20
5
1
18
19
+
=
63
6+3
=
9
NINE
9

2
5
1
9
1
+
=
18

1+8
=
9
NINE
9

T
E
A
R
S

 
T
E
A
R
S

1

1
ONE
1

1+0

10

1+9

19

T
E
A
R
S

20
5
1
18
19
+
=
63
6+3
=
9
NINE
9

2+0

1+8
1+9

2

10

1+0

5
1

+
=

2
5
1
9
1
+
=
18

1+8
=
9
NINE
9

T
E
A
R
S

 

WHY WEEPEST THOU WHOM SEEKEST THOU

 

The nature of light was clear to the Egyptians. As the priest- scribe wrote in the above fragment 3,300 years ago, when Ra "openeth his eyes. . . there is light; When his eyes close, dark- ness falleth." The gaze of Ra was the light of day. For men and women of that civilization, to stand within daylight was to stand in the sight of their sun-god. The power of vision to illuminate the world was universalized, projected onto the grandest scale, becoming the brightness of day. The gaze of God was light. Light was God seeing."

 

TWO EYES YOU ARE TWO EYES YOU BE EYE SEE YOU ARE TWO EYES FOR ME

 

We are reminded of the Greeks, who felt the force of their vision, the "light" of their own eye, and developed a theory of / Page 40 / vision based, in part, on that experience. From the mythology of the Egyptian world with its multitude of stories about the eyes of Horus or Ra, we come to realize that prior to the individualized light of Greek visual theory, sunlight itself was felt to be an emanation of an eye, that of the sun-god Ra. In neither case was light a substance or thing, but rather was felt to be the power of seeing. To see was to illumine. For Empedocles, the human eye was like a lantern lit at the hearth of creation. When open, it rayed forth into the world and man saw. For the Egyptian priest, the sun itself was an eye, which, when open, brought the day and, when closed, the night. The kinship between the eye and the sun was felt deeply for many centuries, from ancient Egypt to the medieval mystics. In Persian and Greek mythology the identical image reappears-the sun and moon are the eyes of gods placed into the heavens.2

The earliest answer given to our question-what is the nature of light?-must be: it is the sight of God. Mankind, formed from the tears of Ra or by means of his sight alone, shares somewhat in his nature, like debased gods.3 By the time of the Greek philosophers, we, like the gods, illuminate the world with our sight. The sight of Ra lights up the cosmos; the sight of man lights up our personal world.

Page 41

The change from universal illumination and the eye of god to the human is beautifully told in the Egyptian story of the "lost eye" of Horus or Ra that appears in many variations within Egyptian mythology." It seems that the Eye of the supreme god of Egypt wandered away from its appointed course as the Sun, becoming lost in the watery depths of this world and living as a lioness in the eastern mountains of the sunrise. Ra sent Shu and Tefnut in search of it, but by the time the Eye was found and returned to the face of Ra, another eye had been fashioned to take its place. The original Eye was outraged, but the god Thoth pacified and healed it. Ra went still further and made a place for it within the enclosed serpent form of the uraeus, and placed it in the middle of his forehead "where it could rule the whole world." In the depiction of the pharaohs, this same' em-blem rested on their heads. The Eye of Ra, the Sun, was no longer free to rove unfettered, but was now forever encompassed by the asp-serpent. Delimited and individualized by the power of the serpent, it became the ruler of this world. The all-mighty pharaoh, therefore, is depicted as crowned with the uraeus. The eye of Ra becomes the eye of man; the light of god the light of man.

Light was, and has remained, an aspect of God. Imaged in countless ways as sight or angel or one of a thousand other things, it has been inseparable from man's groping to represent the spirit. From Egypt we move to ancient Persia, where light, darkness, and the divine unite to form a glorious religious uni-verse."

I AM THAT I AM

 
I

9

+
=
9

1
I

9

+
=
9
NINE
9

I

 

2
M
E

13
5

+
=
18
1+8
=
9

1+3

4

5

+
=
5

4
5

+
=
9

NI NE
9

 

2
M
E

13
5

+
=
18
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=
9

4
5

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=
9

NI NE
9

 
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G
O

15
+
=
15
1+5
=
6

3
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G
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5
7
15
+
=
27
2+7
=
9

1+5

6

5
7

+
=
12
1+2
=
3

5
7
6
+
=
18
1+8
=
9
NINE
9

 

3
E
G
O

5
7
15
+
=
27
2+7
=
9

5
7
6
+
=
18
1+8
=
9
NINE
9

 

1

I
9
9
9
2

ME
18
9
9
3

EGO
27
18
9

 

 

 

4
E
Y
E
S

5
25
5
19
+
=
54
5+4
=
9

5
7
5
1
+
=
18
1+8
=
9
NINE
9

PARADISE

PARADE EYES EYES PARADE

 
E
Y
E
S

19
+
=
19
1+9
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1
4
E
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E
S

5
25
5
19
+
=
54
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=
9

9
NINE
9

2+5

1+9

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10

1+0

1

5

5

+
=
10
1+0
=
1

1

5
7
5
1
+
=
18
1+8
=
9

9
NINE

E
Y
E
S

 

 
I
R
I
S

9

9

+
=
18

1+8
=
9

9
NINE
9

I
R
I
S

9

9
19
+
=
37
3+7
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1
4
I
R
I
S

9
18
9
19
+
=
55
5+5
=
10
1+0
=
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1

1+8

1+9

9

10

1+0

1

9

9

+
=
18
1+8
=
9

9
NINE
9

9
9
9
1
+
=
28
2+8
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

I
R
I
S

 

4
I
R
I
S

9
18
9
19
+
=
55
5+5
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

9
9
9
1
+
=
28
2+8
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

I
R
I
S

 

4
I
R
I
S

9
9
9
1
+
=
28
2+8
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

I
R
I
S

1

1

9
9
9

+
=
27
2+7
=
9

9
NINE
9

I
R
I
S

 

SERIOUSLY

ISIS

SIRIUS

IRIS

IS

 PARADISE

PARADE EYES EYES PARADE

PA . . . RA ... DE ... IS . . . E

20
S
I
R
I
U
S
O
S
I
R
I
S
I
S
I
S
I
R
I
S

19
9
9
9

19

19
9
9
9
19
9
19
9
19
9
9
9
19

 

6
S
I
R
I
U
S

19
9
9
9

19

6
S
I
R
I
U
S

9
9
9

+

=

27

2+7

=

9

6
O
S
I
R
I
S

9
9
9

+
=
27
2+7
=
9

4
I
S
I
S

`

9

9

+
=
18
1+8
=
9

4
I
R
I
S

9
9
9

+
=
27
2+7
=
9

 

 

1

I
9
9
9
2

ME
18
9
9
3

EGO
27
18
9
4

EYES
54
18
9
4

IRIS
55
28
1

IF THINE I OFFEND THEE

 

 

CATCHING THE LIGHT

THE ENTWINED HISTORY OF LIGHT AND MIND

Arthur Zajonc 1993

THE GIFT OF LIGHT

Light in a Dark World

Legend has it that at the age of thirty, Zoroaster, whose life had been spent in careful attention to the path of righteousness, stood in the river Daiti in order to draw water for ritual libations. / Page 42 /

 

 

Page 209

"As the sun sets, its light passes through more and more of the atmosphere en route to the eye. Thus, in its journey from sun to us, light passes through the darkening or "turbid" medium of air, as Goethe called it. In the process, all the warm colors arise. This is the archetypal relationship between light and dark- ness that yields red, orange, and yellow-light through dark- ness. The stronger the darkening, the redder the color.

The blue vault of the daytime sky offers us the archetypal instance of the other pole of color. Here light does not pass through darkness, but just the opposite-darkness passes / Page 210 / through light. Looking up, we gaze into the dark depths of space, but once again the atmosphere intervenes. Now, however, it plays a different role. In this case, the air catches the light. We look, therefore, through the light-filled medium of the atmo-sphere into the darkness. Or, if we follow Goethe and conceive of darkness as equally, if oppositely, active to light, darkness shines through the light-filled air, and the cool colors arise.

Once you learn to see the law of color in the colors of the heavens, you will see examples of it everywhere, from the blue haze over a smoky pool table, to the use of "atmospheric per-spective" by a painter (that which is distant appears blue be-cause of the intervening turbidity of air). Prismatic colors, as in the boundary colors discussed above, are more complex but can also be understood in this way. In all cases, light and darkness meet in a turbid medium to create color.

The account of color production given by the most recent theories of physics offers a similar, if far more exact and math- ematical account. In them, colors arise through the "scattering" of light. The turbid medium provides innumerable scattering centers, be they molecules in air or a glass prism. From them light is scattered according to strictly mathematical laws, and in the process colors are produced. Even the rainbow, set be- tween Alexander's dark band and a luminous interior region, can be understood in an analogous way. Where light meets darkness, colors flash into existence. Colors are, therefore, the offspring of the greatest polarity our universe can offer. In the mythic language of Zarathustra, colors are a reflection of the mighty battle relentlessly waged between the god of light, Ahura Mazda, and the dark hosts of Ahriman. In Goethe's lan-guage, "Colors are the deeds and sufferings of light," the deeds and suffe.rings of light with darkness.24

If we follow Goethe's pathway into color, we are not led to models of light in terms of waves or particles, but to a perception of those relationships between light and darkness that give rise / Page 211 / to color. Seen aright, the phenomena of the blue sky and sunset are the theory, and true to its Greek root, theoria, theory really is a "beholding." In Goethe's words, "The highest thing would be to comprehend that everything factual is already theory. The blue of the heavens reveals to us the fundamental law of chro- matics. One should only not see anything further behind the phenomena: they themselves are the theory.25

Like the geologist reading rocks, or Newton seeing the apple fall, or Archimedes crying "Eureka!" we can grow to perceive the laws of chromatics in the blue of the heavens and the first light of dawn. Through studying the action of light in darkness, and darkness in light, we come to sense the "deeds and suf- fering" that are color. Once we have kindled an Empedoclean light within, fashioned the requisite organs of insight, the ar- chetypal phenomena appear, and in them we see an idea.

PHILOSOPHY SINCE PLATO has divided knowing into two insular realms: ideas and experience. Naively, but tenaciously, Goethe ceaselessly sought a way to experience ideas, to bridge the chasm others thought unbridgeable. The union of idea and ex- perience may seem impossible, but as Goethe says, "nothing forbids us from seeking a loving approach to that which lies beyond our reach.26

Goethe's method gradually converts facts to theory, seen real-ity to ideal reality, and is Goethe's response to philosophical dualism. One cannot take truth by force, but perhaps indirectly, through phenomena, sign, and symbol we may approach her. "The True, which is identical with the divine, does not allow itself to be recognized by us directly. Rather we discern it only in reflection, in instance, symbol, in particular and kindred appearances. We become aware of it as incomprehensible life and yet cannot renounce the wish to comprehend it."

Goethe's method requires a reciprocal enhancement of both / Page 212 / natural phenomena and the observing mind. It all begins with wonder, as Plato rightly said, but then passes on to interest and so to active inquiry. In the process, new organs of perception are fashioned that are suited to seeing the essential aspects of the phenomena before us. As we enhance our cognitive capac- ities we simultaneously enhance the world we see until, ulti-mately, we behold the ideal within the real as archetypal phenomenon. To them one rises, as Goethe described the pro-cess, and from them one can descend in order to understand specific phenomena. They are the ultimate experience, and the limit beyond which one cannot legitimately go. Most of us, however, do not recognize this and so go on, putting, for ex-ample, a model or idol in place of the archetype. "The sight of an archetypal phenomenon is generally not enough for people; they think they must go still further; and are thus like children who after peeping into a mirror turn it round directly to see what is on the other side.Page 27"

 

6
E
U
R
E
K
A

5
21
18
5
11
1
+
=
61
6+1
=
7

5
3
9
5
2
1
+
=
25
2+5
=
7
SEVEN
7

 

6
E
U
R
E
K
A

ADD

5
21
18
5
11
1
+
=
61
6+1
=
7
TO

2+1
1+8

1+1

REDUCE

3
9

2

5

5

1
+
=
11
1+1
=
2

5
3
9
5
2
1
+
=
25
2+5
=
7
SEVEN
7

 

"GOETHE'S SENSE OF scientific understanding is grounded in in-sight, not model building, and so is true to the heart of both science and art.

Every scientific discovery from Galileo to Einstein can trace its origin to the eureka experience in which a phenomenon becomes transparent to the ideal, and an idea is seen. From this exhilarating moment, the scientist works to translate his or her insight into words and symbols. In the process, the eureka experience is often lost while its technical power is retained. Goethe was more interested in the former, seeking constantly for means that would permit everyone to have their own epiphany into nature's ways, to see ideas. -

GOETHE PERFORMED FOR philosophy a common piece of parlor magic. The magician stands with two disconnected solid metal / Page 213 / rings before the audience, one in his left hand, the other in his right. He taps them together to prove the impossibility of their union. Then, before their very eyes, he clangs the two and they are linked. Each ring passes through the middle of the other. In an instant the topology has changed utterly. Now all such distinctions as inside-outside simply lose their meaning. Like the two rings, Goethe considered the realms of thinking and perceiving as interpenetrating. Perceiving is at once outside and at the center of thinking, and thinking likewise passes through the heart of seeing, and surrounds it.

Two worlds, kept so long apart, are united in our perception of archetypal phenomena. To see them we must fashion new organs of cognition, for they cannot be gained by logic alone. Once known, they represent the highest we can hope to attain. To the artist, one final and all-significant aspect of this method is that in perceiving the archetypal phenomenon, one does not denude or degrade nature but exalt her. The sunset is still gloriously red, not reduced to differential absorption and scat- tering. The perception of a scientific idea does not require the death of the beautiful.

The last chapter of Goethe's Theory of Color undertakes a preliminary treatment of the "sensory-moral" effects of color. In these pages, Goethe describes his inner response to color, connecting it back to earlier sections of the book. The eye's tendency to complete the color circle is related to the principles of color harmony; the polarity of warm and cool colors takes on new me~ning in light of his prism experiments. The inner aspects are as much a part of the experience of color as the redness of red. The archetypal phenomena include the moral with the sen-sual.

Remember Goethe's motivating question framed on a hillside outside Rome regarding the use of color by artists. Remember, too, the therapeutic use of color at Sunfield Children's Home. Textbook physics cannot answer the real questions of Goethe or Wilson. Such answers come only by working with the phenomena / Page 214 / themselves, hecause then we fashion organs for a science in which the beautiful as well as the useful, the human as well as the physical, can be experienced. Thus, Goethe performed a second piece of conjuring. As Gaston Bachelard once wrote, and as Goethe amply demonstrated, "The phenomena of the world, as soon as they acquire a little consistency and unity, turn into the human truths."28

More Light!

Throughout his life Goethe was a lover of nature and especially of light. When he was young, that love was passionate; when he was old, it became quiet but intense. As a child, Goethe revered God through his works, his creation of minerals, plants, animals, and heavens. Above all these ranked the sun. To this god, the child Goethe once constructed an altar after the fashion of Old Testament prophets. On his father's ornate, red, four- sided music stand he arranged his most precious specimens: crystals, ores, shells, and plants. Yet something especially fine was needed for the summit-a flame with gently rising smoke, perhaps. In a small porcelain saucer the young priest placed a tablet of incense, completing the altar. Lighting the tablet was all that remained in order to consummate the ceremony.

The secret service occurred at dawn with only Goethe in attendance. As a brilliant sun rose above the apartments to the east, Goethe used a magnifying glass to focus the sunlight onto the incense. Like a Zoroastrian priest, the child connected the sacred fire atop his altar to the sun. The liturgy was complete. Through the power of the sun, and with a little technical assis-tance from the lens, the mystery was enacted. Johann was con-tent.

Goethe lived long enough to see his color science ignored or rejected by scientific contemporaries in whom mechanical con- / Page 215 / ceptions of light were unalterably rooted. They preferred a math-ematical language to that of color experience, physical models to archetypal phenomena. Yet this greatest of Germany's many geniuses never swerved from his own judgment concerning the high value of what he had accomplished.

The light of the ferryman's lamp in Goethe's fairy tale The Lily and the Green Snake turned all it touched to gold. Similarly, colors are the precious ripples that sparkle in light's wake. For decades Goethe studied them, saying at his life's end, "I have known light in its purity and truth, and I consider it my duty to strive after It."29

In his final conflict with death, light was still Goethe's last request. A half hour before his passing, Goethe commanded that the window shutters be opened so that more light might stream into the room where he lay. His earthly striving at an end, how fitting that Goethe's last words are said to have been: "More light!"30 Ruskin was right, those who love color are pure. Surely to them, if to anyone, will be granted nature's open secret-light."

 

 

 
9
L
I
G
H
T
+
D
A
R
K

12
9
7
8
20

4
1
18
11
+
=
90
9+0
=
9

L
I
G
H
T

D
A
R
K

 
9
L
I
G
H
T
+
D
A
R
K

12
9
7
8
20

4
1
18
11
+
=
90
9+0
=
9

3
9
7
8
2

4
1
9
2
+
=
45
4+5
=

NINE
9

L
I
G
H
T

D
A
R
K

 

L
I
G
H
T

D
A
R
K

9

8

+
=
17

1+7
=
8

8
EIGHT
8
9
L
I
G
H
T
+
D
A
R
K

12
9
7
8
20

4
1
18
11

+
=
90
9+0
=
9

9
NINE

1+2

2+0

1+8
1+1

3

2

9
2

+
=
16

L
I
G
H
T

D
A
R
K

9
7
8

4
1

+
=
29
2+9
=
11
1+1
=
2
TWO
2

3
9
7
8
2

4
1
9
2

+
=
45
4+5
=
9

NINE
9

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Page 211

"One cannot take truth by force, but perhaps indirectly, through phenomena, sign, and symbol we may approach her. "The True, which is identical with the divine, does not allow itself to be recognized by us directly. Rather we discern it only in reflection, in instance, symbol, in particular and kindred appearances."

 

Page 321

Least Light: A Contemporary View

The Place of Light

 

"Hast thou perceived the breadth of the Earth? declare if thou knowest it all. Where is the way where light dwelleth? and as for darkness, where is the place thereof?"

Book of Job

 

In his story of world creation, before anything else could happen, Hesiod had first to bring forth a brooding space filled with possibility, called Chaos. In Greek, its root meaning was "gap." Here, in the place provided by Chaos, rose the "wide-bosomed Earth," as Hesiod called it, "a sure, eternal dwelling-place for all the deathless gods who rule Olympus's snowy peaks.,,18 The place of earth was created before the earth itself.

Everything must have location, a place where it is. Aristotle declared that "A natural scientist must inform himself not only on the infinite, but also on place. ,,19 What then is the place of light? One would suppose that with the photon concept of light, a straightforward response would be forthcoming; but quantum theory and experiment again conspire to make the place of light completely elusive.

-

IN AN IMPORTANT paper of 1949, Eugene Wigner and T. D. Newton, then at Princeton, looked for the place of elementary quantum particles: electrons, protons, mesons, and photons.20 They were interested in "localized states," that is to say, they sought a clear way to define position for particles within the formalism of quantum mechanics. Everything began well enough. Elementary particles that possess mass, like the elec- tron and neutron, presented no special problems. However, when they turned their attention to light, a sudden hitch ap- peared. They commented that light was different; they could find no mathe~atical object within quantum theory that properly

 

 

Page 327

 

" Least Light: A Contemporary View

could something so simple arise from such a complex analysis? Casimir was suspicious. Bohr agreed and pointed Casimir in a totally unexpected direction. Casimir's calculation had exam- ined the detailed mechanisms by which atomic motions in the metal plates might induce unexpected electromagnetic fields and

thus attract a nearby plate.25 He had used the still relatively'

new quantum theory of Schrodinger and the relativity of Einstein, but Bohr urged Casimir to turn his attention away from the plates and to the empty space around them. It would have been sense- less advice twenty-five years earlier, but in the intervening de- cades a full quantum theory of light (quantum electrodynamics) had been developed, and one of its features was a new under- standing of the vacuum, of emptiness.

Where before the vacuum had been understood as pure emp- tiness-no matter, no light, no heat-now there was a residual hidden energy. Take away everything, cool to absolute zero in temperature, and still the vacuum remains, and it is shimmering with a special kind of light. Called the "zero-point energy of the vacuum," it seems an essential part of quantum-field theory. Bohr suggested that Casimir look to it, to the vacuum, for the force between two metal plates. Casimir followed Bohr's pre- scient advice and in a two-page--derivation, he arrived by an elegant path at what had caused him so much trouble before.26 Since Casimir's calculation, experiments have shown the force to occur with exactly the form he predicted.

Without launching into the details of quantum electrody-namics (or QED), I can still draw attention to a few features of the calculation that are suggestive of a new way of understanding emptiness. According to QED, after one has removed all matter and all light from space, an infinite energy still remains. Since there is no way to extract this energy out of the vacuum, theorists dismissed it as a curious artifact of the theory, of little real significance, at least until Casimir made his calculation. By inserting two parallel conducting plates into the vacuum, Casi- / Page 328 /

 

Y RAM MARY MARY Y RAM

 

8

HARMONIC
81

45

9
9

HARMONIES
102

48

3
7

HARMONY
94

49

4
5

PRISM
75

30

3
6

MIRROR
91

46

1
5

LIGHT
56

29

2
3

RAY
44

17

8
4

RAYS
63

18

9
10

RAY OF LIGHT
121

58

4
8

LIGHT + RAY
100

46

1
11

ZARATHUSTRA
153

45

9
10

AHURA MAZDA
94

40

4
7

AHRIMAN
64

37

1
6

GOETHE
60

33

6
8

DARKNESS
91

28

1
9

LIGHT + DARK
90

45

9
5

RIGHT
62

35

8
5

WRONG
77

32

5
6

QUANTA
74

20

2
3

ADI
14

14

5
6

LOVING
79

34

7
11

LOVING LIGHT
135

63

9
10

LIVING HEAT
107

53

8
4

HEAT
34

16

7
5

HEART
52

25

7
10

LOVING HEAT
113

50

5
6

EVOLVE
81

27

9
8

EVOLVING
106

43

7
 

 LOVEEVOLVEEVOLVELOVE

 

 

 

 

4
A
T
U
M

1
20
21
13

+
=
55
5+5
=
10
1+0
=
1

2+0
2+1
1+3

2
3
4

1

+
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1

1
2
3
4

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10
1+0
=
1

ONE
1

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1

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1

2

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2

3

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=
3

4

+
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4

10

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1

4
A
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1
20
21
13

+
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55
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10
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1

1
2
3
4

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10
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=
1

ONE
1

 

6
R
A

A
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M

18
1

1
20
21
13

+
=
74
7+4
=
11
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2

1+8

2+0
2+1
1+3

9

2
3
4

1

1

+
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2

9
1

1
2
3
4

+
=
20
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2

TWO
2

6
R
A

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T
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18
1

1
20
21
13

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=
74
7+4
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11
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2

9
1

1
2
3
4

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20
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2

TWO
2

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1

1

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2

2

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2

3

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3

4

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4

9

+
=
9

 

6

OSIRIS

89

35

8

89

Minus
35

=
54

 

 

14

9

+
=
23
2+3
=
5

8
M
A
G
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T
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13
1
7
14
5
20
9
3

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72
7+2
=
9

1+3

1+4

2+0

4

5

2

1
7

5

9
3

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=
25
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=
7

4
1
7
5
5
2
9
3

+
=
36
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9
NINE
9

8
M
A
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T
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13
1
7
14
5
20
9
3

+
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72
7+2
=
9

4
1
7
5
5
2
9
3

+
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36
3+6
=
9
NINE
9

 

9
19

+
=
28
2+8
=
10
1+0
=
1
5
P
R
I
S
M

16
18
9
19
13

+
=
75
7+5
=
12
1+2
=
3

1+6
1+8

1+9
1+3

7
9

10
4

1+0

1

9

+
=
9

7
9
9
1
4

+
=
30
3+0
=
3

THREE
3

5
P
R
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S
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16
18
9
19
13

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=
75
7+5
=
12
1+2
=
3

7
9
9
1
4

+
=
30
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3

THREE
3

9

15

+
=
24
2+4
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6

6
M
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R
R
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13
9
18
18
15
18

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=
91
9+1
=
10
1+0
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1

1+3

1+8
1+8
1+5
1+8

4

9
9
6
9

9

+
=
9

4
9
9
9
6
9

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=
46
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10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

6
M
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R
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13
9
18
18
15
18

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=
91
9+1
=
10
1+0
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1

4
9
9
9
6
9

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=
46
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=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

6
M
I
R
R
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9
9
9

9

6
M
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R
R
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13
9
18
18
15
18

+
=
91
9+1
=
10
1+0
=
1

18
18

18

+
=
54
5+4
=
9

15

+
=
15
1+5
=
6

13

+
=
13
1+3
=
4

9

+
=

9

9

8

+
=
17
1+7
=
8

5
L
I
G
H
T

12
9
7
8
20

+
=
56
5+6
=
11
1+1
=
2

1+2

2+0

3

2

9
7
8

+
=
24
2+4
=
6

3
9
7
8
2

+
=
29
2+9
=
11
1+1
=
2
TWO
2

5
L
I
G
H
T

12
9
7
8
20

+
=
56
5+6
=
11
1+1
=
2

3
9
7
8
2

+
=
29
2+9
=
11
1+1
=
2
TWO
2

3
R
A
Y

18
1
25

+
=
44
4+4
=
8

1+8

2+5

9

7

1

+
=
1

9
1
7

+
=
17
1+7
=
8
EIGHT
8

3
R
A
Y

18
1
25

+
=
44
4+4
=
8

9
1
7

+
=
17
1+7
=
8
EIGHT
8

19

+
=
19
1+9
=
10
1+0
=
1
4
R
A
Y
S

18
1
25
19

+
=
63
6+3
=
9

1+8

2+5
1+9

9

7
10

1+0

1

1

+
=
1

9
1
7
1

+
=
18
1+8
=
9

NINE
9

4
R
A
Y
S

18
1
25
19

+
=
63
6+3
=
9

9
1
7
1

+
=
18
1+8
=
9

NINE
9

15

9

8

+
=
32
3+2
=
5

10
R
A
Y

O
F

L
I
G
H
T

18
1
25

15
6

12
9
7
8
20

+
=
121
1+2+1
=
4

1+8

2+5

1+5

1+2

2+0

9

7

6

3

2

1

6

9
7
8

+
=
31
3+1
=
4

9
1
7

6
6

3
9
7
8
2

+
=
58
5+8
=
13
1+3
=
4
FOUR
4

10
R
A
Y

O
F

L
I
G
H
T

18
1
25

15
6

12
9
7
8
20

+
=
121
1+2+1
=
4

9
1
7

6
6

3
9
7
8
2

+
=
58
5+8
=
13
1+3
=
4
FOUR
4

9

8

+
=
17
1+7
=
8

8
L
I
G
H
T
+
R
A
Y

12
9
7
8
20

18
1
25

+
=
100
1+0+0
=
1

1+2

2+0

1+8

2+5

3

2

9

7

9
7
8

1

+
=
25
2+5
=
7

3
9
7
8
2

9
1
7

+
=
46
4+6
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

8
L
I
G
H
T
+
R
A
Y

12
9
7
8
20

18
1
25

+
=
100
1+0+0
=
1

3
9
7
8
2

9
1
7

+
=
46
4+6
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

26

8

19

+
=
53
5+3
=
8

11
Z
A
R
A
T
H
U
S
T
R
A

26
1
18
1
20
8
21
19
20
18
1

+
=
153
1+5+3
=
9

2+6

1+8

2+0

2+1
1+9
2+0
1+8

8

9

2

3
10
2
9

1+0

1

1

1

8

1

+
=
11
1+1
=
2

8
1
9
1
2
8
3
1
2
9
1

+
=
45
4+5
=
9
NINE
9

11
Z
A
R
A
T
H
U
S
T
R
A

26
1
18
1
20
8
21
19
20
18
1

+
=
153
1+5+3
=
9

8
1
9
1
2
8
3
1
2
9
1

+
=
45
4+5
=
9
NINE
9

8

26

+
=
34
3+4
=
7

10
A
H
U
R
A

M
A
Z
D
A

1
8
21
18
1

13
1
26
4
1

+
=
94
9+4
=
13
1+3
=
4

2+1
1+8

1+3

2+6

3
9

4

8

1
8

1

1

4
1

+
=
16
1+6
=
7

1
8
3
9
1

4
1
8
4
1

+
=
40
4+0
=
4

FOUR
4

10
A
H
U
R
A

M
A
Z
D
A

1
8
21
18
1

13
1
26
4
1

+
=
94
9+4
=
13
1+3
=
4

1
8
3
9
1

4
1
8
4
1

+
=
40
4+0
=
4

FOUR
4

8

9

14

+
=
31
3+1
=
4

7
A
H
R
I
M
A
N

1
8
18
9
13
1
14

+
=
64
6+4
=
10
1+0
=
1

1+8

1+3

1+4

9

4

5

1
8

9

1

+
=
19
1+9
=
10
1+0
=
1

1
8
9
9
4
1
5

+
=
37
3+7
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

7
A
H
R
I
M
A
N

1
8
18
9
13
1
14

+
=
64
6+4
=
10
1+0
=
1

1
8
9
9
4
1
5

+
=
37
3+7
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

 

14

19
19

+
=
52
5+2
=
7

8
D
A
R
K
N
E
S
S

4
1
18
11
14
5
19
19

+
=
91
9+1
=
10
1+0
=
1

1+8
1+1
1+4

1+9
1+9

9
2
5

10
10

1+0
1+0

1
1

4
1

5

+
=
10
1+0
=
1

4
1
9
2
5
5
1
1

+
=
28
2+8
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

8
D
A
R
K
N
E
S
S

4
1
18
11
14
5
19
19

+
=
91
9+1
=
10
1+0
=
1

4
1
9
2
5
5
1
1

+
=
28
2+8
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

9
L
I
G
H
T
+
D
A
R
K

12
9
7
8
20

4
1
18
11

+
=
90
9+0
=
9

1+2

2+0

1+8
1+1

3

2

9
2

9
7
8

4
1

+
=
29
2+9
=
11
1+1
=
2

3
9
7
8
2

4
1
9
2

+
=
45
4+5
=

NINE
9

9
L
I
G
H
T
+
D
A
R
K

12
9
7
8
20

4
1
18
11

+
=
90
9+0
=
9

3
9
7
8
2

4
1
9
2

+
=
45
4+5
=

NINE
9

9
L

I

G

H

T

+
D

A

R

K

3
x
9
x
7
x
8
x
2
=
3024

4
x
1
x
9
x
2
=
72

3024
+
72
=
3096

3024
-

72

=

2952

15

8

+
=
23
2+3
=
5

6
G
O
E
T
H
E

7
15
5
20
8
5

+
=
60
6+0
=
6

1+5

2+0

6

2

7

5

8
5

+
=
25
2+5
=
7

7
6
5
2
8
5

+
=
33
3+3
=
6
SIX
6

6
G
O
E
T
H
E

7
15
5
20
8
5

+
=
60
6+0
=
6

7
6
5
2
8
5

+
=
33
3+3
=
6
SIX
6
 

THE SOLAR SYSTEM

199

55

1

THE COSMOS

117

36

9

GEOCENTRIC

99

54

9

HELIOCENTRIC

121

67

4

SUN

54

9

9

VACUUM

81

18

9

OXYGEN

90

36

9

PHYSICS

99

36

9

PROTON

98

35

8

PROTONS

117

36

9

ELECTRON

92

38

2

ELECTRONS

111

39

3

CARBON DIOXIDE

123

69

6

ATOM

49

13

4

ATOMS

68

14

5

QUANTUM CHROMO-DYNAMICS

267

96

6

QUARK

68

23

5

QUARKS

87

24

6

HARMONIC

81

45

9

HADRON

60

33

6

HADRONS

79

34

7

HALO

36

18

9

SCIENCE

58

31

4

QUANTA

74

20

2

PHOTON

88

34

7

PHOTONS

107

35

8

LIGHT

56

29

2

LEPTON

82

28

1

LEPTONS

101

29

2

CARBON

53

26

8

HYDROGEN

96

51

6

NEUTRON

107

35

8

NEUTRONS

126

36

9

RADIO WAVES

117

45

9

RAY

44

17

8

RAYS

63

18

9

RELATIVITY

141

51

6

RADAR

42

24

6

RADIATION

91

46

1

ATOMIC NUMBER

134

53

8

ATOMIC NUMBERS

153

54

9

ATOMIC WEIGHT

133

61

7

TACHYON

86

32

5

TACHYONS

105

33

6

TACHYONICS

117

45

9

PARTICLE

84

39

3

PARTICLES

103

40

4

WAVE MECHANICS

126

54

9

WAVE PARTICLE

135

54

9

WAVE PARTICLE DUALITY

227

83

2

MECHANICS

75

39

3

MAGNETIC

72

36

9

REST

62

17

8

MOTION

86

32

5

INERTIA

76

40

4

FORCE

47

29

2

FORCES

66

30

3

GRAVITY

102

39

3

QUANTUM

107

26

8

OPTICS

82

28

1

 

QUANTA

74

20

2

PHOTON

88

34

7

 

5

LIGHT

56

29

2

6

PHOTON

88

34

7

11

144

63

9

1+1

1+4+4

6+3

2

9

9

9

 

WAVE MECHANICS

126

54

9

WAVE PARTICLE

135

54

9

 

MOTION

86

32

5

INERTIA

76

40

4

 

QUANTUM

107

26

8

OPTICS

82

28

1

 

WHO ARE YOU

?

 

I

AM

SUPREME BRAHMAN

BEFORE ABRAHAM

WAS

I

AM

I

THE

GREAT

SUSTAINER  

 

 

THE COSMOS

117

36

9

GEOCENTRIC

99

54

9

SUN

54

9

9

VACUUM

81

18

9

OXYGEN

90

36

9

PHYSICS

99

36

9

PROTONS

117

36

9

HARMONIC

81

45

9

HALO

36

18

9

NEUTRONS

126

36

9

RADIO WAVES

117

45

9

RAYS

63

18

9

ATOMIC NUMBERS

153

54

9

TACHYONICS

117

45

9

WAVE MECHANICS

126

54

9

WAVE PARTICLE

135

54

9

MAGNETIC

72

36

9

 

PROTON

98

35

8

PHOTONS

107

35

8

CARBON

53

26

8

NEUTRON

107

35

8

RAY

44

17

8

ATOMIC NUMBER

134

53

8

REST

62

17

8

QUANTUM

107

26

8

 

HADRONS

79

34

7

PHOTON

88

34

7

ATOMIC WEIGHT

133

61

7

 

CARBON DIOXIDE

123

69

6

QUANTUM CHROMO-DYNAMICS

267

96

6

QUARKS

87

24

6

HADRON

60

33

6

HYDROGEN

96

51

6

RELATIVITY

141

51

6

RADAR

42

24

6

TACHYONS

105

33

6

 

ATOMS

68

14

5

QUARK

68

23

5

TACHYON

86

32

5

MOTION

86

32

5

 

HELIOCENTRIC

121

67

4

ATOM

49

13

4

SCIENCE

58

31

4

PARTICLES

103

40

4

INERTIA

76

40

4

 

ELECTRONS

111

39

3

PARTICLE

84

39

3

MECHANICS

75

39

3

FORCES

66

30

3

GRAVITY

102

39

3

 

ELECTRON

92

38

2

QUANTA

74

20

2

LIGHT

56

29

2

LEPTONS

101

29

2

WAVE PARTICLE DUALITY

227

83

2

FORCE

47

29

2

 

THE SOLAR SYSTEM

199

55

1

LEPTON

82

28

1

RADIATION

91

46

1

OPTICS

82

28

1

 

3

THE

33

15

6

4

NINE

42

24

6

7

PLANETS

87

24

6

14

162

63

18

1+4

1+6+2

6+3

1+8

4

9

9

9

 

4

MASS

52

7

7

12

ACCELERATION

97

38

2

 

6

ENERGY

74

38

2

12

ACCELERATION

97

38

2

JOHANNES KEPLER

153

63

9

ALBERT EINSTEIN

153

63

9

 

 

 

8

+
=
8

4
G
A
T
H

7
1
20
8

+
=
36
3+6
=
9

2+0

2

7
1

8

+
=
16
1+6
=
7

7
1
2
8

+
=
18
1+8
=
9
NINE
9

4
G
A
T
H

7
1
20
8

+
=
36
3+6
=
9

7
1
2
8

+
=
18
1+8
=
9
NINE
9

 

15

9

8

+
=
32
3+2
=
5

7
G
O
L
I
A
T
H

7
15
12
9
1
20
8

+
=
72
7+2
=
9

1+5
1+2

2+0

6
3

2

7

9

8

+
=
24
2+4
=
6

7
6
3
9
1
2
8

+
=
36
3+6
=
9
NINE
9

7
G
O
L
I
A
T
H

7
15
12
9
1
20
8

+
=
72
7+2
=
9

7
6
3
9
1
2
8

+
=
36
3+6
=
9
NINE
9

 

7

GOLIATH

72

36

9

4

GATH

36

18

9

 

IN THE NAME OF GOD THE COMPASSIONATE THE MERCIFUL

 

8
M
O
H
A
M
M
E
D

13
15
8
1
13
13
5
4
+
=
72
7+2
=
9
NINE
9

4
6
8
1
4
4
5
4
+
=
36
3+6
=
9
NINE
9

M
O
H
A
M
M
E
D

PEACE BE UPON HIM

 
M
O
H
A
M
M
E
D

15
8

+
=
23
2+3
=
5

8
M
O
H
A
M
M
E
D

13
15
8
1
13
13
5
4
+
=
72
7+2
=
9

1+3
1+5

1+3
1+3

4
6

4
4

8
1

5
4
+
=
18
1+8
=
9

4
6
8
1
4
4
5
4
+
=
36
3+6
=
9
NINE
9

M
O
H
A
M
M
E
D

 

5
I
S
L
A
M

9
19
12
1
13
+
=
54
5+4
=
9

9
1
3
1
4
+
=
18
1+8
=
9
NINE
9

I
S
L
A
M

 
I
S
L
A
M

9
19

+
=
28
2+8
=
10
1+0
=
1
5
I
S
L
A
M

9
19
12
1
13
+
=
54
5+4
=
9

1+9
1+2

1+3

10
3

4

1+0

1

9

1

+
=
10
1+0
=
1

9
1
3
1
4
+
=
18
1+8
=
9
NINE
9

I
S
L
A
M

 
G
A
B
R
I
E
L

9

+
=
9

7
G
A
B
R
I
E
L

7
1
2
18
9
5
12

+
=
54
5+4
=
9

1+8

1+2

9

3

7
1
2

9
5

+
=
24
2+4
=
6

7
1
2
9
9
5
3

+
=
36
3+6
=
9
NINE
9

 

7
G
A
B
R
I
E
L

7
1
2
18
9
5
12

+
=
54
5+4
=
9

7
1
2
9
9
5
3

+
=
36
3+6
=
9
NINE
9

 

THE UPSIDE DOWN OF THE DOWNSIDE UP

 

6
S
P
I
R
I
T

19
16
9
18
9
20

+
=
91
9+1
=
10
1+0
=
1

1
7
9
9
9
2

+
=
37
3+7
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

S
P
I
R
I
T

 

9

9

S
P
I
R
I
T

1

9

9

S
P
I
R
I
T

19

9

9

+
=
37
3+7
=
10
1+0
=
1

6
S
P
I
R
I
T

19
16
9
18
9
20

+
=
91
9+1
=
10
1+0
=
1

1+9
1+6

1+8

2+0

10
7

9

2

1+0

1

9

9

+
=
18
1+8
=
9

1
7
9
9
9
2

+
=
37
3+7
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

1

2

7

9
9
9

S
P
I
R
I
T

6
S
P
I
R
I
T

19
16
9
18
9
20

+
=
91
9+1
=
10
1+0
=
1

1
7
9
9
9
2

+
=
37
3+7
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

S
P
I
R
I
T

 

 

9
14

9

+
=
32
3+2
=
5

5
S
I
N
A
I

19
9
14
1
9

+
=
52
5+2
=
7

1+9

1+4

10

5

1+0

1

9

1
9

+
=
19
1+9
=
10
1+0
=
1

1
9
5
1
9

+
=
25
2+5
=
7

SEVEN
7

5
S
I
N
A
I

19
9
14
1
9

+
=
52
5+2
=
7

1
9
5
1
9

+
=
25
2+5
=
7

SEVEN
7

 

8

+
=
8

5
A
L
L
A
H

1
12
12
1
8

+
=
34
3+4
=
7

1+2
1+2

3
3

1

1
8

+
=
10
1+0
=
1

1
3
3
1
8

+
=
16
1+6
=
7
SEVEN
7

5
A
L
L
A
H

1
12
12
1
8

+
=
34
3+4
=
7

1
3
3
1
8

+
=
16
1+6
=
7
SEVEN
7

5
A
L
L
A
H

1
3
3
1
8

1
x
3
=
3

3
x
3
=
9

9
x
1
=
9

9
x
8
=
72

 

ALLAH
34

16

7

GABRIEL
54

36

9

SPIRIT
91

37

1

MOHAMMED
72

36

9

ISLAM
54

18

9

IMAM
36

18

9

 

ALLAH
34

16

SPIRIT
91

37
1

 

ALLAH
34

16

7

AKHENATEN
79

34

7

 

AKHENATEN
79

34

7

MOHAMMED
72

36

9

 

GABRIEL
54

36

9

ISLAM
54

18

9

 

JUDAISM
77

23

5

CHRIST
77

32

5

 

5

ISLAM
54

18

9
6

ISRAEL
64

28

1

 

 

 

 

7
A
L
G
E
B
R
A

1
12
7
5
2
18
1
+
=
46
4+6
=
10
1+0
=
1

1+2

1+8

3

9

1

7
5
2

1
+
=
16
1+6

=
7

1
3
7
5
2
9
1
+
=
28
2+8
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

 

7
A
L
G
E
B
R
A

1
12
7
5
2
18
1
+
=
46
4+6
=
10
1+0
=
1

1
3
7
5
2
9
1
+
=
28
2+8
=
10
1+0
=
1
ONE
1

 

6
A
L
-
J
A
B
R

1
12

10
1
2
18
+
=
44
4+4
=
8

1+2

1+0

1+8

3

1

9

1

1
2

+
=
4

1
3

1
1
2
9
+
=
17
1+7
=
8
EIGHT
8

 

6
A
L
-
J
A
B
R

1
12

10
1
2
18

+
=
44
4+4
=
8

1
3

1
1
2
9

+
=
17
1+7
=
8
EIGHT
8

 

 

 

15

+
=
15
1+5
=
6

9
B
L
A
C
K

B
O
D
Y

2
12
1
3
11

2
15
4
25

+
=
75
7+5
=
12
1+2
=
3

1+2

1+1

1+5

2+5

3

2

6

7

2

1
3

2

4

+
=
12
1+2
=
3

2
3
1
3
2

2
6
4
7

+
=
30
3+0
=
3

THREE
3

 

9
B
L
A
C
K

B
O
D
Y

2
12
1
3
11

2
15
4
25
+
=
75
7+5
=
12
1+2
=
3

2
3
1
3
2

2
6
4
7
+
=
30
3+0
=
3

THREE
3

   

5

BLACK
29

11

2
4

BODY
46

19

1
9

75

30

3

7+5

3+0

12

1+2

9

3

3

3
 

FINGERPRINTS OF THE GODS

Graham Hancock

1995

Page 273

"The precessional numbers highlighted by Sellers in the Osiris myth are 360, 72, 30 and 12."

"These he joined to the 360 days of which the year then consisted (emphasis added)."

"Elsewhere the myth informs us that the 360 - day year consists of "12 months of 30 days each".

And in general,as Sellers observes , "phrases are used which prompt simple mental calculations and an attention to numbers ".

"Elsewhere the myth informs us that the 360-day year consists of '12 months of 30 days each'.

Thus far we have been provided with three of Seller's precessional: 360, 12 and 30. The fourth number,which occurs later in the text, is by far the most important. As we saw in Chapter Nine, the evil deity known as Set led a group of conspirators in a plot to kill Osiris. The number of these conspirators was 72."

 

CONNECTIONS

James Burke

Introduction

" Man has lived in close contact with change since he first appeared on Earth. During everyone of the

thirty-six

million minutes of his life,"

 

 

 

   

THE TIMES OF JESUS CHRIST

Michael D. Bennett

1995

A key to the pattern of history

Page 4

"And while he yet spake, behold a multitude, and he that was called

Judas, one of the twelve, went before them '" Then Jesus said unto the

chief priests, and captains of the temple, and the elders, which were come to him, Be ye come out, as against a thief, with swords and staves? When I was daily with you in the temple, ye stretched forth no hands against me: but this is your hour, and the power of darkness."

Luke ch. 22 w. 47 & 52-53

4. THE DISPENSA nON OF mE FULNESS OF TIMES

Each individual major event in the life of Jesus occurred at a perfect particular moment in time. However, taken together these different moments, spread over more than thirty-three years of the lifetime of Jesus, together represent the only "acceptable" period, forming the one window of opportunity in time (a dispensation) when the Father's purpose for man could be fulfilled by the Son. So the Bible speaks not of "a due time" but of "the fulness of the time" - it is one time, and only one time. Similarly, the prophet speaks not of "an acceptable day" but of "the acceptable year of the Lord" - it is one year, and one year in particular when this preaching must begin - "This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears"!

The lifetime of Jesus must therefore be viewed as a special period, marked out in time, as a remarkable dispensation or day of opportunity. This was how Jesus presented it:

"Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was giad."

JotVt ch. 8 v. 56

"I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work. As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world."

John ch. 9 w. 4-5

It is important to understand the magnitude both of the moment and of the period, and the utter importance of Jesus Christ's combining perfect timing and obedience. Everything in heaven and on earth depended on Him:

"Now before the feast of the passover, when Jesus knew that his hour was come that he should depart out of this world unto the Father ... Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands John ch. 13 w. 1 & 3

Page 5

"That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him:"

Ephesians ch. 1 v. 10

5. A "TIME" IS A PERIOD OF ~ DAYS (OR YEARS!)

It has been well established by students of Bible Prophecy that a time is a definite period lasting 360 days or years. Briefly, the following verse, which lists time periods in order of increasing duration, shows that a time is longer than a month but shorter than a year:

"Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years."

Galatians ch. 4 Y. 10

Moreover, a comparison of scriptures shows that "a thousand two hundred and threescore days" (1260 days - Revelation ch.12 v.6) is equivalent to "a time, and times, and half a time" (3.5 times - Revelation ch.12 v.14). As 1260 days = 3.5 times, then a time = 1260/3.5 = 360 days (which is longer than a month, but slightly shorter than a solar tropical year (almost 365.25 days).

A time is 360 days precisely. Interestingly it is also the closest number of whole days to the average (359.80464 days) of the present durations of the two years still widely used. These are: (i) the lunar year (comprising 12 lunar months each of 29.53059 days) lasting 354.36708 days, still used by the Moslem world~ and, (ii) the solar tropical year, lasting 365.24219 days, used by most of the world. It should be made clear that all historical dates and intervals given below refer to the solar tropical years, to which our present Gregorian calendar closely approximates, with a discrepancy amounting to only about two days in 7,000 years. [Various authors have suggested that once, perhaps before Noah's flood, the durations of the lunar and solar years were identical at 360 days, so that the time is the original duration of the year of this creation. As this interesting idea is unproven, it must be treated with caution.] What is clear is that: (I) God is dealing in periods of "time(s)" lasting 360 days~ and, (2) often these periods are very protracted owing to use of the day for a year scale, so that "a time" of 360 days translates into a great "time" of360 years (i.e. 360 solar tropical years)!

Page 9

7. ONE "TIME" - ~us CHRISf AND ALEXANDER 'DIE GREAT Alexander the Great was a colossus of history. He is still

remembered today in song and conversation, where his name and memory are still synonymous with human military power and empire building.

The Greek empire which sprang into prominence is mentioned in prophecy as the third (brass) empire after Babylon (Daniel ch. 2 v. 39. More importantly here, Alexander the Great was himself mentioned so clearly that modernists use this to argue that Daniel's prophecy was written after, rather than before these events.

"The ram which thou sawest having two horns are the kings of Media and Persia. And the rough goat is the king of Grecia: and the great horn that is between his eyes is the first king [Alexander the Gteat J."

Daniel ch. 8 w. 20-21

Daniel's prophecy predicted that Alexander would utterly defeat the Persians and that his empire would rapidly replace theirs and achieve world domination. Daniel also foretold that Alexander would be broken at the pinnacle of his power, and his empire split into four parts. All of this carne to pass.

Alexander was born in 356 B.C. and inherited the throne of Macedonia from his father Philip who was murdered in 336 B.C. From the start Alexander's intention was to conquer Medo-Persia. In two years he trained an army, and in 334 B.C. he led it across the Hellespont into Asia Minor (modern Turkey) towards Persia routing the Persian army as he advanced. In the following year 333 B.C., Darius III, king of Persia, counter-attacked with a great army, but he was routed at the battle of Issus (near the north east angle of the Mediterranean). In 332 B.C. Alexander turned south, but was held up for seven months besieging Tyre before pushing on further south through Palestine, and entering Egypt unopposed. According to the Jewish historian Josephus, Alexander spared Jerusalem from attack after he had seen a vision of the Jewish High Priest outside the city. He accepted a surrender of Jerusalem by the High Priest and was shown the prophecies of Daniel concerning the king of Grecia (i.e. himself).

In 331 B.C. Alexander returned through Palestine and Syria and marched east against Persia, defeating Darius at the great

Page 10

battle of Gaugamela near Nineveh on the Tigris in September of that year. Darius fled to Media, and Alexander marched on to Persia taking the treasures from the royal palaces at Susa and Persepolis. In 330 B.C. he turned north to Ecbatana capital of Media catching and killing Darius south of the Caspian Sea. Alexander continued his victorious campaign, finally emerging into India in 326 B.C. where he marched down the Indus to the sea, and returned to Persia by way of the coast. Quite suddenly, in 323 B.C. (June 10th) he was taken ill and died in Babylon aged either thirty-two or thirty three.

The comparisons between Alexander and Jesus are striking:

(1) Alexander is a personified example of the greatest power that this world can produce, while Jesus is both the personified example of the greatest power which comes from heaven, and the greatest man ("He shall be great "Luke ch. 1 v. 32).

(2) Alexander led a great army in a great conquest which overthrew one world empire while founding a new one which survives, in modified form, to the present day. Jesus too leads a great army, but he single-handedly overthrew Satan's empire and founded a new body, the Church, which survive~ and grows ever stronger to the present day.

(3) Alexander died and was defeated by death in Babylon aged 32 or 33. Jesus lay down his life and defeated death and rose again in Jerusalem, aged 33.

(4) Perhaps the greatest comparison here is that Alexander the Greek conquered Palestine and spared Jerusalem accepting its surrender by the High Priest in the year 332/31 B.C. (Nisan-Nisan). Jesus came to Jerusalem and was rejected by the High Priest, and crucified by the Romans at Passover of A.D. 30. The scripture says that "... in due time Christ died for the ungodly" (Romans ch. 5 v. 6). It seems highly significant that it was 360 years (one time) which had elapsed between Alexander the Great's memorable conquest of Jerusalem in 332/31 B.C., and Jesus Christ's greater victory at Jerusalem, over death, in A.D. 30 (Figure 2)!

Greeks are mentioned specifically only once in the gospels, and it seems highly significant that Greeks who had come to

Page 11

Jerusalem are specifically mentioned as wishing to see Jesus immediately prior to the time of His victorious death.

" And there were certain Greeks among them that came up to worship at the feast: The same came therefore to Philip [Alexander's father's name) ... saying. Sir, we would see Jesus. ... And Jesus answered them, saying, The bour is come, that the Son of man should be glorified... Now is tbe judgment of tbis world: now sball tbe prince of tbis world be cast out. "

John ch. 12 vv. 20-23 & 31

Alexander the Great conquers Jesus Christ is crucified

Palestine and accepts the and conquers death at His surrender of Jerusalem Resurrection at Jerusalem

L one "time" ~I r 360 years 1

332/31 B.C. A.D. 30

Alexander the Greek son Greeks visiting Jerusalem

of Philip of Macedon ask Philip "Sir, we would "visits Jerusalem" see Jesus"

Figure 2. Christ's great victory over death at Jerusalem was one

"time" (360 years - to the nearest whole year) after

Alexander the Great's conquest of Palestine and acceptance of the surrender of Jerusalem ("... in due time Christ died for the ungodly").

8. lWO "TIMFS" mE D~UCflON OF mE KINGDOM OF ISRAEL

The united kingdom of Judah and Israel governed by David and Solomon, split in 930 B.C. Rehoboam ruled the small southern kingdom of Judah, comprising the tribal lands of Judah and Benjamin, with Jerusalem as its capital city. To the north the larger kingdom of Israel, comprising the tribal lands of ten Israelite tribes, was ruled by Jeroboam who chose Samaria as his capital city.

The history of the northern kingdom of Israel was mainly a sad tale of idolatry and rebellion under successive kings "who did evil in the sight of the LORD". Consequently this part of God's kingdom came under the ultimate "seven times" punishment

 

 

Page13

The end of the northern kingdom of Israel could not have been more complete. Moreover, it was brought about by the direct activity of the king of the most dominant world power of the time

- Assyria.

These most significant events in the history of God's kingdom occurred an exact number of "times" before two major events early in the life of the Lord Jesus Christ (Figure 3). Thus, the start of the siege of Israel's capital in 724/23 B.C. was two complete "times" of years before the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ (Israel's rightful king) in 4/3 B.C. (Figure 3). Moreover, the fall of Samaria, and the ending of the northern kingdom, and the deportation of Israel to foreign captivity in Assyria in 722/21 B.C. was two complete "times" before the holy family fled from Israel to Egypt to avoid Herod's lethal persecution in 2/1 B.C. (Figure 3). " when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law" (Galatians ch.4 v.4).

9. THREE "TIMES" - REJECI1ON OF GOD AS KING OF ISRAEL It is clear that God always intended that He Himself would be

Israel's king, so that the nation would be a theocracy.

"... The LORD came from Sinai ... and he came with ten thousands of saints

... Yea, he loved the people; ... And he was king in Jeshurun, when

the heads of the people and the tribes of Israel were gathered together." Deuteronomy ch. 33 w. 2,3 & 5

" And Gideon said unto them, I will not rule over you, neither shall my

son rule over you: the LORD shall rule over you"

Judges ch. 8 v. 23

"I am the LORD, your Holy One, the creator of Israel, your King" "

Isaiah ch. 43 v. 15

Thus, when the people later asked for an earthly king, God told Samuel that they were not rejecting him, but rejecting God Himself as their ruler.

"And the LORD said unto Samuel, Hearken unto the voice of the people in all that they say unto thee: for they have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me, that I should not reign over them. "

I Samuel ch. 8 v. 7

Page 14

Saul was the first earthly king of Israel, as King of

ite monarchy was founded in his first

r I. c. Saul was the finest specimen of a

d shoulders above other men in Israel. .

'as flawed, and he was soon rejected by

,1051/50 rant di~obedience of God's i.nstructi°n.s Foundation 0

:. Saul s dynasty was short-lived, but It first shortlive(

.one of David" an everlasting dynasty monarchy unl nteed by God's oath and covenant.

Figure 4. Th lcingdom shall be established for ever before of ablished for ever." nul

II Samuel ch. 7 Y. 16 an< , holiness that I will not lie unto David. His uru md his throne as the sun before me."

Psalm 89w. 35-36

David shall never want a man to sit upon the However 1.tI , . , Jeremiah ch. 33 Y. 17 rejection of t

:ar of theocracy represented by Samuel "

Btth thi.

thaII.du eyCl ~. It was at s time t srae rejecte saith unto tl ~quently, Samuel anointed Saul as king We have no

'. at the start of his forty year reign.

le last time that Israelites would reject Sigru f the rejection

would ask for a human king, and so ~n

I (~051 B.C.) \J

both to allow a human monarchy m kIng of Israe. n Himself a man, as the rightful heir to it was a com :el Gabriel, speaking to Mary, said of first unendu

1051/50 B.C.

~l be called the Son of the Highest: and the guaranteed t mm the throne of his father David: And he indeed endu of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there These two f(

Luke ch. 1 w. 32-33. God were se dispensation one all thing~

Page

FINGERPRINTS OF THE GODS

Graham Hancock

1995

Page 273

"The precessional numbers highlighted by Sellers in the Osiris myth are 360, 72, 30 and 12."

"These he joined to the 360 days of which the year then consisted (emphasis added)."

"Elsewhere the myth informs us that the 360 - day year consists of "12 months of 30 days each".

And in general,as Sellers observes , "phrases are used which prompt simple mental calculations and an attention to numbers ".

"Elsewhere the myth informs us that the 360-day year consists of '12 months of 30 days each'.

Thus far we have been provided with three of Seller's precessional: 360, 12 and 30. The fourth number,which occurs later in the text, is by far the most important. As we saw in Chapter Nine, the evil deity known as Set led a group of conspirators in a plot to kill Osiris. The number of these conspirators was 72."

 

 

 

 

 

Page 16

10. FOUR "TIMES" - THE TABERNACLE (THE TEMPLE), AND IMMANUEL

There was no Tabernacle before the Exodus, nor indeed could there be. The Tabernacle was a symbol of God's presence at the centre of His people's national life. Israel did not become a nation until the year of the Exodus when God gave them the legal constitution for the kingdom of God on earth at Sinai. As there could be no established "church" without a free self-governing nation, so there could be no Tabernacle before the Exodus and the giving of the law.

The Tabernacle was a movable tent, unlike the Temple which was built of great stones. There was no Temple before the reign of Solomon, nor indeed could there be. First, in order to be a true symbol, no "permanent" Temple could be raised up until three great millennial days (3,000 years) from a destructive fall. Second, no Temple could be erected before there was a "son of David", who was also a "prince of peace". The Temple symbolized Jesus Christ and his royal priesthood. As there was no enduring monarchy in Israel before David's, no reigning son of David [and no reign of peace] until Solomon, then clearly the essential preconditions needed for the Temple symbol to fit Jesus were not met until the eleventh year of king Solomon's reign when the newly completed Temple was dedicated by the king and nation exactly 3,000 years (3 "days") after the start of the generations of Adam.

The Tabernacle, the Temple, and Jesus Christ are closely linked. They symbolized Him, and He was their perfect fulfilment. It follows then, that if His life is measured out in "times", so will theirs be.

i) The Temple of a "time"

It needs to be more widely noticed that Solomon's Temple was indeed recognised by God for exactly one great time. Construction began in the fourth year of Solomon and ended after seven years in his eleventh year.

Page 17

Figure 5. The foundation and dedication of the first Temple preceded landmarks in its destruction by exactly 360 years (a "time" of years) of ordained activity before Nebuchadnezzar's first and final removals of the original vessels made by Solomon.

"In the fourth year was the foundation of the house of the LORD laid,

in the month Zif: And in the eleventh year, in the month BuI. which is the eighth month, was the house finished throughout all the parts thereof, and according to all the fashion of it. So was he seven years in building it."

I Ki1gsm. 6w. 37-38

Solomon succeeded his father in 970 B.C., but all of that year was counted as the 40th year of David, under the system then in use to number the years of reigns. The year counted as Solomon's first year began in 969 B.C. Consequently, his fourth year began in 966 B.C., while his eleventh year began in 959 B.C. The years of our present calendar are not coincident with those referred to in I Kings which began with the first month at our March-April time. Thus, Solomon's fourth year was in 966-65 B.C., while his eleventh year was in 959-58 B.C.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Page 24

12. JESUS CHRIST'S "TIMES" ARE COMPLETE 360's

"The question was posed above as to whether the major events in the earthly life of Jesus (His Incarnation the start of His public ministry, His crucifixion and death and so His whole life) was marked by occurring at one or more complete "times" (i.e. periods of 360 years) after other significant events particularly highlighted by God in scripture? This article has shown, as summarized in Figure 8, that the major events in the life of Jesus occurred one, two, three, four or five complete "times" after the most highly significant events in the Old Testament ages.

It can therefore be safely concluded that when the following texts regarding major events in the life of Jesus speak of "due time", "the fulness of the time", or "the fulness of times", then the "time(s)" referred to is one or more great times of 360 years.

"But when the fulness of the time was come.. God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law," Galatians ch. 4 v. 4

"For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. Romans ch. 5 v. 6

"That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him:" Ephesians ch. 1 v. 10

 

Death of Abraham Five "times" 1800 years A.D. 26 The acceptable year of the Lord

Isaac Inherits1775 B.C.

The Exodus1445/44 B.C. Four "times" 1440 years The Incarnation 5/4 B.C. Christ's birth 4/3 B.C.

The Tabernacle 1444/43 B.C.

God rejected; Saul's monarchy 1051/50 B.C. Three "times" 1080 years Jesus rejected as King A.D. 30/31

Samaria attacked 724 B.C. Israel deported Two "times 720 years Christ's birth " 4/3 B.C Flight to Egypt 2/1 B.C.

Alexander the Great conquers Palestine 332/31 B.C years One "time" 360 years Jesus Crucified conquers death A.D. 30

Figure 8, Summary of the significant events in Old Testament scripture which precede major events in the in the life of Jesus by one to five complete "times".

 

Page 28

14. IUS ,,~" (KAIROS)

God created time, and He controls times. Moreover, God has stamped His hall-mark on history, demonstrating His absolute power, by determining that many major events in the history of His kingdom, are numbered and measured in great "times".

"... keep this commandment ... until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ: Which in his times (kairos) he shall shew, who is the blessed and only Potentate "

I Timothy ch. 6 w. 14-15

Only Almighty God could work on such a majestic scale, seeing the end from the beginning, and weaving an intricate pattern of fulfilled prophecy despite Satan's rebellion and man's disobedience. The pattern of the ages will be perfected in a unity planned before this world began. The threads are already being pulled together in a web of interwoven 360's, whose architect, centre and completion is the Lord Jesus Christ (Ephesians ch.l w. 3-4 & 9-11):

"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ ... According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world... Having made known unto us the mystery of his will which he hath purposed in himself: That in the dispensation of the fulness of times (kairos) he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him:"

 

 

SO EVEN C ROLL

 

THE SEVENTH SCROLL

Wilber Smith  

 Page 3

"The seventh scroll,' she whispered, and steeled herself to touch it. It was nearly four thousand years old, written by a genius out of time with history, a man who had been dust for all these millennia, but whom she had come to know and respect as she did her own husband. His words were eternal, and they spoke to her clearly from beyond the grave, from the fields of paradise, from the presence of f the great trinity, Osiris and Isis and Horus, in whom he had believed so devoutly. As devoutly as she believed in another more recent Trinity.

 

THE DAILY MIRROR

Thursday July 24th

Jonathan Cainer

"todays feature by

John Michell"

 

"Last week we looked at the circle of the universe. Its area is 12! (known as '12 fac-torial'), which means the numbers 1 to 12 multiplied together.

By two geometric processes, involving the square and the triangle, a smaller circle was devel-oped from this. Its radius is 5,040 or 7, the first seven numbers multiplied together.

This smaller circle rep-resents the earth with its satellite, the moon. 5,040 miles is the sum of the earth's mean radius (3,960 miles) plus the radius of the moon (1,080 miles).

It is a striking fact of nature that the circles of moon and earth illustrate a primary symbol of cre-ative geometry, the 'squared circle'. It isa marriage of opposites. The circle is the symbol of eternity and heavens;the square is the material world of earth. If you can draw them together so that each has the same measure round its perimeter, you have created a squared circle.

The diameters of the earth and moon are as 11 to 3. Using these simple num-bers, draw their two circles so that they touch each other. Enclose the earth circle in a square, and from its centre draw a cir-cle through the centre of the moon. Taking 22/7 as the value or pi, you can calculate that the circumference of this circle is 44. The square containing the earth circle has a side of 11, so its perimeter is also 44. Its actual measure is 31,680 miles. To complete the diagram, draw four 'moons' at the four quarters of the earth, and add two on each side of them - making 12 in all. The eight added circles pass through the eight points where the square and the cir-cle meet.

This basic diagram, the circle squared by the earth and moon, is the key to ancient science and wisdom. It is said to be revealed from time to time. There are many refer-ences to it in ancient writings and the archi-tecture of temples. One example is in the last two chapters of the Bible, where St John describes the Heavenly City. It is the ideal geometric pattern of the universe, beauti-ful, colourful and complete in all its parts. He gave its dimensions, based on the same numbers as in our squared-circle diagram.

In the geometer's creation story that we are following, certain numbers are specially prominent. The first is 5,040 - the measure in miles of the combined radii of the earth and moon. It is the pivot of the basic numbers 1 to 10, for 1 x 2 x 3x 4x5x6x 7 = 5040, and 7 x 8 x 9 x 10 = 5040. Plato gave 5,040 as the key to the esoteric diagram behind his ideal state constitution. 5,040 symbolises the female spirit of the world that was there from the beginning.

Next week's subject is the numbers 7 and 5 and their place in the geometry of creation."

 

KEYS TO HEAVEN:

Squaring the circle

(Illustrations omitted)

 

THE CITY OF REVELATION

John Michell

1972

Page

77

chapter

7

3168

The Perimeter of the Temple

Page 78

The perimeter of the temple is 3168, Lord Jesus Christ, when the temple is measured by the foot, the most sacred unit of ancient metrology. In terms of th~ megalithic yard (2'72 feet), however, the perimeter measures 1164, because 3168 feet = 1164 MY. Yet this makes no difference to the symbolic interpretation by gematria, for 1164 is the number of another name of Christ, "Greek script omitted) Son of God.

As a geodetic or earth-measuring number, 3168 also demonstrates the antiquity and sacred origin of British metrology, for

31,680 inches = half a mile.

31,680 ft. = 6 miles.

31,680 furlongs = 3960 miles = radius of the earth.

31,680 miles = perimeter of square containing the terrestrial sphere. , 31,680 miles = circumference of circle drawn on the combined diameters of the earth and moon (10,080 miles). M

Other cosmological correspondences of 3168 are given on page 109.

The Stonehenge sarsen circle with circumference of 316,8 feet' contains a~ area of 888 square yards, 888 being the number of Jesus, which is equal to 1080 square MY. The circle contained within a square of perimeter 316,8 feet, corresponding to the bluestone circle at Stonehenge, has an area of 666 square MY. Thus the two stone circles at Stonehenge have areas of 1080 and 666 square MY, these two numbers representing the opposite poles of lunar and solar or negative and positive energy.

The number 144 or 121 is. characteristic of the New Jerusalem scheme, and 3168 demonstrates the value of..."Pi " "as 22/7in terms of this number, for 144 x 7 = 1008 and 144 x 22 = 3168

3168 in Plato's city

"A remarkable use of the number 3168 occurs in Plato's account in Book V of.Laws of the mystical dimensions of the perfect city. Throughout his work Plato makes guarded reference to a secret canon of numbers that applies universally to every aspect of human life and activity, including government, astronomy, acoustics, kinetics, plane and solid geometry and divination. Linear measure- ments, areas and volumes are obviously incommensurable, but Plato declares that there are certain numbers that link these with each other and with all phenomena capable of being measured. As an example of these numbers, the study of which Plato recommends as the most sanctifying of all pursuits, he gives 5040."