tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21571340051170465282024-03-13T08:42:01.558-07:00Bell CurveLiberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.comBlogger48125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-50259067862630615852020-04-02T17:37:00.001-07:002020-04-02T17:38:52.768-07:00'My Corona' [Video]: Investigating Symbol Patterns<br />
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<br />Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-4968179198958372152015-11-30T14:14:00.002-08:002017-12-28T18:49:09.157-08:00Forty-Seven (47)<p>"I walked forty-seven miles of barbed wire..." ~ Bo Diddley ("Who Do You Love?" 1956.)</p>
<p>The essayist and “Discordian Saint,” Robert Anton Wilson, popularized the notion of the “23 Phenomenon.”<a href="#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" title="">[1]</a> Jim Brandon, Loren Coleman, James Shelby Downard, Michael Hoffman and others have called attention to the high-strangeness surrounding the number 33.<a href="#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2" title="">[2]</a> Anyone having a cursory familiarity with the mystical discipline of numerology will recognize instantly that esoteric significance is attached to many numbers.<a href="#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3" title="">[3]</a> But one that is less-acknowledged also seems to have a buzz about it lately. I’m thinking of 47.</p>
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<p>A guided sampling of current events might help the reader to get a flavor for my opinion on this matter. Take this, for instance. Several news sources over the last week have reported that “Nearly 47M Americans Will Travel for Thanksgiving.”<a href="#_ftn4" name="_ftnref4" title="">[4]</a> As synchronicity would have it, this is the same number of Americans – 47 million – reputed to be receiving food stamps.<a href="#_ftn5" name="_ftnref5" title="">[5]</a> If you can believe it, and diehard Obama-supporters probably do, that’s also the number of Americans (maybe the selfsame ones) who lack (or until recently lacked) health insurance coverage.<a href="#_ftn6" name="_ftnref6" title="">[6]</a> </p>
<p>In the face of the criticisms of Obama’s numbers issuing from the political “right,” it is worth remembering the fact that the number 47 was at the center of controversy just four odd years ago when Republican presidential hopeful “Mitt Romney told a group of donors in a secretly taped video that 47% of Americans will vote for President Obama because they are ‘dependent upon government’ and ‘believe that they are victims.’”<a href="#_ftn7" name="_ftnref7" title="">[7]</a> That didn’t go over so well for him.</p>
<p>Why should 47s figure so unusually – or so it seems to me – in political controversies? We probably should not even get started on the claim that the Silicon Valley company Ubiquiti Networks’s claim that it had been taken in by a “cyber scam” to the tune of… Well, I’ll leave you to guess the amount.<a href="#_ftn8" name="_ftnref8" title="">[8]</a> </p>
<p>In any case, to return for a moment to population statistics, it turns out that “47 million” is also alleged to be the approximate number of subscribers to Amazon’s “Prime” service.<a href="#_ftn9" name="_ftnref9" title="">[9]</a> </p>
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<p>Consider, also, the regrettable fact (if it is a fact) that “Nearly 47 Million People Now Have Dementia.”<a href="#_ftn10" name="_ftnref10" title="">[10]</a></p>
<p>One can only presume that the 47 million spoken of – if some or all of the figures are veridical – in these cases are <i>not</i> the same people. The notion that 47 million dementia sufferers without health insurance might have been traveling this weekend on food stamps seems a bit too much to put up with, even for someone with sympathies towards the peculiar world of synchro-mysticism.</p>
<p>In other news, in March, the “progressive” organization MoveOn expressed concern about “47 Republican senators [who] wrote directly to the ayatollah of Iran urging him to break off diplomatic negotiations with President Obama.”<a href="#_ftn11" name="_ftnref11" title="">[11]</a> </p>
<p>This past October, word reached the United States of an important anthropological find in China involving “Forty-seven smooth teeth dug out of a cave…”.<a href="#_ftn12" name="_ftnref12" title="">[12]</a> </p>
<p>On a lighter note, a recent flurry of YouTube commercials featuring one “Tai Lopez” has him report: “I remember sleeping on a couch with $47 in my bank account in a mobile home in North Carolina…”.<a href="#_ftn13" name="_ftnref13" title="">[13]</a> </p>
<p>In 2013, <i>Matrix</i>-actor Keanu Reeves was featured in Universal’s box-office failure <i><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1335975/">47 Ronin</a></i>. Aficionados of the genre can compare, and probably have already, the 1941, Japanese-made film <i>Genroku </i>Chūshingura (“<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0033654/">The 47 Ronin</a>”). </p>
<p>Or again, in 1998, the Copenhagen, Denmark-based software company Io-Interactive A/S released the video game <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00004RFBE/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B00004RFBE&linkId=3a137953e41f81070708a1471ba3e43a">Hitman: Codename 47</a></i>.<a href="#_ftn14" name="_ftnref14" title="">[14]</a> The storyline revolves around assassinations carried out by the character <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00004RFBE/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B00004RFBE&linkId=3a137953e41f81070708a1471ba3e43a">Agent 47</a>.</p>
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<p>And those are just a few scattered items that have crossed my desk (or computer screen) over the last couple of years. Are the 47s simply random? Maybe. If they are actual figures, then perhaps their appearances lately, especially on the high-profile political scene <i>à la</i> Obama and Romney before him, is just a curiosity.<a href="#_ftn15" name="_ftnref15" title="">[15]</a> </p>
<p>It is conceivable, however, that the 47s are orchestrated, by persons or “forces” unknown. But why should one think that the number 47 has any “force” in these and other reports? For that matter, why should <i>any</i> number?</p>
<p>One possible answer to this latter question apparently proceeds from the ancient Greek mathematician and philosopher <a href="http://www.storyofmathematics.com/greek_pythagoras.html">Pythagoras</a>. According to the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plato">Plato</a>’s illustrious student, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristotle">Aristotle</a>, “the Pythagoreans say that things exist by ‘imitation’ of numbers.”<a href="#_ftn16" name="_ftnref16" title="">[16]</a> This Pythagorean strand was subsequently woven into the abstruse metaphysical framework known as “<a href="http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plotinus/">Neoplatonism</a>.”<a href="#_ftn17" name="_ftnref17" title="">[17]</a></p>
<p>The 15<sup>th</sup>-century Italian Renaissance thinker <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giovanni_Pico_della_Mirandola">Giovanni Pico della Mirandola</a>, “in his Mathematical Conclusions[,] had stated that ‘By number a way may be had for the investigation and understanding of everything possible to be known.”<a href="#_ftn18" name="_ftnref18" title="">[18]</a> Erstwhile Lord Mayor of London<a href="#_ftn19" name="_ftnref19" title="">[19]</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Billingsley">Sir Henry Billingsley</a> actually included Pico’s statement in his seminal English translation of <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1888009195/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=1888009195&linkId=17bd95c77ab69759e38ce29d17d8475a">Euclid</a>’s <i>Elements</i>.<a href="#_ftn20" name="_ftnref20" title="">[20]</a> </p>
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<p>The 13<sup>th</sup>-century Spanish Kabbalist <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0887065538/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0887065538&linkId=7cc1acaa79ef677c40aafe550ddd3a0c">Abraham ben Samuel Abulafia</a> “translate[d] numbers into his meditations on the combinations of Hebrew letters.”<a href="#_ftn21" name="_ftnref21" title="">[21]</a> “For [15<sup>th</sup>-16<sup>th</sup>-century German humanist scholar] <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0803289464/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0803289464&linkId=e3cb1f86c4647bc6dcc52dd4582d7d02">Johannes Reuchlin</a> …Pythagoras’ philosophy, as he outlined in the dedication of his <i>De arte Cabalistica<a href="#_ftn22" name="_ftnref22" title=""><b>[22]</b></a></i> …to Pope Leo X, ‘derives in origin from the teachers of Kabbalah’.”<a href="#_ftn23" name="_ftnref23" title="">[23]</a></p>
<p>Considerations of this sort led 20<sup>th</sup>-century British scholar Frances Amelia Yates to conclude that Kabbalah “could transform into a kind of mystical mathematics.”<a href="#_ftn24" name="_ftnref24" title="">[24]</a> Of course, this Pythagorean/Kabbalistic legacy, this sort of “mystical mathematics,” has become something of a foundation stone in the various “brotherhoods” of Freemasonry.</p>
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<p>And now, at last, we’re better-positioned to answer the question: What about 47?</p>
<p>First of all, it must be recalled that the above-named Euclid’s “47th proposition” figures prominently in many Masonic emblems.<a href="#_ftn25" name="_ftnref25" title="">[25]</a> Masonic sources often link Euclid with Pythagoras.</p>
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<p>In one such book, under the heading “Forty-Seventh Problem of Euclid,” we read: “This was the invention of our ancient friend and brother Pythagoras, who, in his travels through Asia, Africa, and Europe, was initiated into several orders of priesthood and raised to the sublime degree of Master Mason. This wise philosopher enriched his mind abundantly in a general knowledge of things, and more especially in Geometry, or Masonry.”<a href="#_ftn26" name="_ftnref26" title="">[26]</a></p>
<p>47 is not simply peripherally connected to Freemasonry, then. It is arguably quite near to its symbolic heart.</p>
<p>Another anchor for 47 might be its link to other phenomena, such as that in the vicinity of Wilson’s 23s. Consider: “The Earth’s axis is tilted at an angle of 23.5° away from the plane of the ecliptic.”<a href="#_ftn27" name="_ftnref27" title="">[27]</a> Furthermore: “The Tropic of Cancer is the circle marking the latitude 23.5 degrees north, where the sun is directly overhead at noon on June 21, the beginning of summer in the northern hemisphere. The Tropic of Capricorn is the circle marking the latitude 23.5 degrees south where the sun is directly overhead at noon on December 21, the beginning of winter in the northern hemisphere.”<a href="#_ftn28" name="_ftnref28" title="">[28]</a></p>
<p>Not to put too fine a point on it, but: “This makes the whole tropical belt 47 degrees wide.”<a href="#_ftn29" name="_ftnref29" title="">[29]</a></p>
<p>Another possibly relevant consideration has to do with the calendar. Of course, since no month has more than 31 days, 47 will not show up in date calculations in precisely the same sorts of ways as some of the examples catalogued by Wilson. It can be present in years. Indeed, 47s figure just that way with respect to historically interesting, and even anomalous, events.</p>
<p>Consider an ancient example. Christianity owes a lot to Saint Paul. No fewer than 7 books of the New Testament are attributed to <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00IPXIISK/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B00IPXIISK&linkId=c869aa9e577dd6c61cd750d626abb205">him</a><a href="#_ftn30" name="_ftnref30" title="">[30]</a> and his efforts as “Apostle to the Gentiles”<a href="#_ftn31" name="_ftnref31" title="">[31]</a> were instrumental in assisting the spread of early Christianity. “[T]he earliest date at which the commencement of the first missionary journey<a href="#_ftn32" name="_ftnref32" title="">[32]</a> …can be placed is the spring of AD. 47.”<a href="#_ftn33" name="_ftnref33" title="">[33]</a></p>
<p>In my own notes, 1947 has many intriguing examples of bizarre events. For instance, the grisly “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0060582502/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0060582502&linkId=ef9e7245dfecc0dbc67ffc7fd819b5fc">Black Dahlia</a>” murder of Elizabeth Short (who had only attained the youthful and Kabbalistically-significant age of 22) occurred on or around January 15, 1947. </p>
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<p>Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry had a life-changing experience later that same year. “After …[World War Two], he [Roddenberry] was a pilot for Pan Am. On June 18, 1947, as the airline was inaugurating its ‘round the world’ service, the engines of the ‘Clipper Eclipse’ conked out, the aircraft caught fire and crashed in the Syrian desert.”<a href="#_ftn34" name="_ftnref34" title="">[34]</a></p>
<p>As far as more recent mysteries go, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Arnold_UFO_sighting">Kenneth Arnold</a>’s alleged sighting of a “flying saucer” must surely rank as one. It happened June 24, 1947. Ufologists and “UFO buffs” alike also know that the “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roswell_UFO_incident">Roswell Incident</a>” occurred on or around July 8, 1947. It was a busy year.<a href="#_ftn35" name="_ftnref35" title="">[35]</a> </p>
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<p>Whether related to the UFO business or not,<a href="#_ftn36" name="_ftnref36" title="">[36]</a> a key event from the standpoint of Anglo-American crypto-politics was the creation of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Its official birthday is given as September 18, 1947.</p>
<p>Another way of searching out the possible significance of 47 is to observe that February 16 is the 47<sup>th</sup> day of the year.<a href="#_ftn37" name="_ftnref37" title="">[37]</a> Fidel Castro become Prime Minister of Cuba on February 16, 1959. Castro has independent interest. 19<sup>th</sup>-20<sup>th</sup>-century British researcher Nesta Helen Webster wrote that “[i]n 1779 Spartacus [i.e., Adam Weishaupt] [wrote] to [others in the occult society] suggesting that instead of ‘Illuminati’ the Order should be called the ‘Order of Bees’ [<i>Bienenorden oder Bienengesellschaft</i>], and that all the statutes should be clothed in this allegory.”<a href="#_ftn38" name="_ftnref38" title="">[38]</a> With this in mind, I note that, in Jim Brandon’s <i>Sirius Rising</i> audio recordings (vol. 1), James Shelby Downard mentions Fidel Castro in connection to T. H. White’s <i>The Book of Beasts</i>.<a href="#_ftn39" name="_ftnref39" title="">[39]</a> It turns out that word “castro,” designates a sort of bee. “The Greeks call the ones [i.e., the bees] that are produced in the outer part of the honeycomb ‘<i>castros</i>,’ the drones (workers?) or castrated ones…”.<a href="#_ftn40" name="_ftnref40" title="">[40]</a></p>
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<p>Some other notable 47<sup>th</sup>-day occurrences include, in 1985, “the official launch” of Hezbollah by Sheik Ibrahim al-Amin<a href="#_ftn41" name="_ftnref41" title="">[41]</a> and, in 2005, the effective date of the Kyoto Protocol.<a href="#_ftn42" name="_ftnref42" title="">[42]</a></p>
<p>Before the confederate surrender on the highly-symbolic date of July 4, 1863, Union General and later U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant subjected Vicksburg to “forty-seven days of constant shelling… Thereafter, Grant became Abraham Lincoln’s favorite general.”<a href="#_ftn43" name="_ftnref43" title="">[43]</a></p>
<p>As an aside, I register the quick point that 47 also seems to be a popular numerical designator for various pieces of military technology. One thinks, for example, of the Soviet-designed machine gun <i>Avtomat Kalashnikova</i>, better known as the AK-47; the Colt Walker single-action revolver (first sold in 1847); the Bell Hellicopter 47;<a href="#_ftn44" name="_ftnref44" title="">[44]</a> Boeing Aircraft Company’s Boeing B-47 Stratojet;<a href="#_ftn45" name="_ftnref45" title="">[45]</a> Douglas Aircraft Company’s C-47 “Skytrain”; and the Republic Aviation P-47 “Thunderbolt.” Given the Obama/Romney 47s, the CIA-connection and some of the other tidbits cataloged above, one might get the impression that 47s are “keyed-in” on militaristic and political wavelengths of some sort.<a href="#_ftn46" name="_ftnref46" title="">[46]</a></p>
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<p>Maybe 47 is an emblem of the “shadow-government.” During the attacks of September 11, 2001 on the Pentagon and on the “Twin Towers” of the World Trade Center (WTC) complex, WTC “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/7_World_Trade_Center">Building 7</a>” also collapsed. Building 7 had been 47 stories high. Additionally, WTC’s buildings 1 and 2, the “North” and “South Towers,” each contained “47 massive core columns” near the central elevator machinery.<a href="#_ftn47" name="_ftnref47" title="">[47]</a></p>
<p>Possibly any number, when raised to salience in one’s consciousness, may take on symbolic proportions. Maybe I was pre-tuned to 47 in particular, owing to the fact – “coincidentally” – that my father was that very age when I was born. Or, just perhaps, “<a href="http://www.47.net/47society/">The 47 Society</a>” has been on to something big.</p>
<p>- Matthew J. Bell</p>
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<p>Notes:</p>
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<hr /><p><a href="#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1" title="">[1]</a> Robert Anton Wilson, <i>The Illuminatus! Trilogy</i>, New York: Dell, 1984; “The 23 Phenomenon,” <i>Fortean Times</i>, <<a href="http://www.forteantimes.com/features/commentary/396/the_23_phenomenon.html">http://www.forteantimes.com/features/commentary/396/the_23_phenomenon.html</a>>; etc.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref2" name="_ftn2" title="">[2]</a> For the merest sampling, see, e.g., Jim Brandon, <i>The Rebirth of Pan</i>, Dunlap, Ill.: Firebird Press, 1983; Loren Coleman, “33s: The Rebirth of Pan,” <i>Twilight Language</i>, Oct. 5, 2015, <<a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2015/10/33s-Pan.html">http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2015/10/33s-Pan.html</a>>; and James Shelby Downard and Michael A. Hoffman II, <i>King Kill 33</i>, Coeur d’Alene, Idaho: Downard Trust; Independent History and Research, 1998. The number 33 is of prime importance in the Scottish Rite of Freemasonry, where the ultimate and honorary degree is the thirty-third. Additionally, occult writers such as Helena Blavatsky and Manly Palmer Hall have periodically made mention of, or visually represented, thirty-threes in various works. I am too lazy to look up the references right now, but will try to get around to it later.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref3" name="_ftn3" title="">[3]</a> Besides the various meanings assigned to the numbers <a href="http://numerology-thenumbersandtheirmeanings.blogspot.com/p/attributes-of-numbers-0-to-10.html">0-9</a>, other numbers of interest – among the probable infinity that could be cited! – include (beside 13, which I ignore because of its complexity):</p>
<p>11 – see Recluse, “The Fall of 11?” <i>VisupView</i> [weblog], Sept. 13, 2012, <<a href="http://visupview.blogspot.com/2012/09/the-fall-of-11.html">http://visupview.blogspot.com/2012/09/the-fall-of-11.html</a>>.</p>
<p>24/42 – see Loren Coleman, “It Could Be Tomorrow! Black Sunday,” <i>Twilight Language</i> [weblog], Nov. 21, 2015, <<a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2015/11/Black-Sunday.html">http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2015/11/Black-Sunday.html</a>>.</p>
<p>36 – see Celtic Rebel, “Sing Our Own Song [VII],” <i>The Rebel Path</i> [weblog], January 7, 2009, <<a href="http://therebelpath.com/2009/01/07/hammer-and-anvil-vii/">http://therebelpath.com/2009/01/07/hammer-and-anvil-vii/</a>>.</p>
<p>72 – see Matthew J. Bell and Jim Brandon, “Star Trek In Tenebris,” <i>Bell Curve</i> [weblog], Jun. 5, 2013, <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/06/star-trek-in-tenebris_5.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/06/star-trek-in-tenebris_5.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref4" name="_ftn4" title="">[4]</a> See, e.g., Bart Jansen, “AAA: Nearly 47M Americans Will travel for Thanksgiving,” <i>USA Today</i>, Nov. 17, 2015, <<a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/11/17/aaa-thanksgiving-travel/75921872/">http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/11/17/aaa-thanksgiving-travel/75921872/</a>>. Jansen remarks that: “The projection for 46.9 million travelers from Nov. 25 through Nov. 29 is based on economic forecasting and research by IHS Global Insight,” <i>ibid</i>. The source apparently is Julie Hall, “46.9 Million Americans to Travel for Thanksgiving, According to AAA,” <i>AAA News Room</i>, <<a href="http://newsroom.aaa.com/2015/11/46-9-million-americans-to-travel-for-thanksgiving-according-to-aaa/">http://newsroom.aaa.com/2015/11/46-9-million-americans-to-travel-for-thanksgiving-according-to-aaa/</a>>. Loren Coleman will be gratified to know, however, that an alternate AAA release – dated the 23<sup>rd</sup>, no less – indicated: “Approximately 42 million Americans are expected to take a road trip this Thanksgiving,” Amanda Shapiro and Michael Green, “Drivers to Pay Lowest Thanksgiving Gas Prices Since 2008,” <i>AAA News Room</i>, Nov. 23, 2015, <<a href="http://newsroom.aaa.com/tag/thanksgiving-travel-forecast/">http://newsroom.aaa.com/tag/thanksgiving-travel-forecast/</a>>. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref5" name="_ftn5" title="">[5]</a> The food stamps recipient number is disputed, but see Brad Plumer, “Why are 47 Million Americans on Food Stamps? It’s the Recession – Mostly,” <i>Washington Post</i>, Sept. 23, 2013, <<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/09/23/why-are-47-million-americans-on-food-stamps-its-the-recession-mostly/">https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/09/23/why-are-47-million-americans-on-food-stamps-its-the-recession-mostly/</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref6" name="_ftn6" title="">[6]</a> See Munir Moon, “Do the Math: Obamacare Won't Change the Number of Uninsured,” <i>Huffington Post</i>, Feb. 5, 2014, updated Apr. 5, 2014, <<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/munir-moon/do-the-math-obamacare-won_b_4692510.html">http://www.huffingtonpost.com/munir-moon/do-the-math-obamacare-won_b_4692510.html</a>>. Or, more cautiously, it might have been the number before the roll-out of “Obamacare”; who knows what the story is, presently? And it should be noted that some Obama supporters might have instead believed Obama’s alternate count of 30 million. See Byron York, “Obama: I used to say 47 million Uninsured. Now, It's 30 Million,” Washington Examiner, Sept. 8, 2009, <<a href="http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/obama-i-used-to-say-47-million-uninsured.-now-its-30-million./article/132996">http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/obama-i-used-to-say-47-million-uninsured.-now-its-30-million./article/132996</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref7" name="_ftn7" title="">[7]</a> Gregory Korte, “Romney: Obama Voters ‘Believe They are Victims’,” <i>USA Today</i>, Sept. 17, 2012, <<a href="http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/politics/story/2012/09/17/romneys-47-remark/57797246/1">http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/politics/story/2012/09/17/romneys-47-remark/57797246/1</a>>. Actually, the hoopla surrounding Romney on that occasion marked my first awareness of this “47 phenomenon.” My early thoughts on the number were recorded under the ponderous title: “47 (Or How Romney Lords It over Inferior Fools with Euclidean I-Ching).” (Available at <i>Bell Curve</i> [weblog], Sept. 18, 2012, <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/47-or-how-romney-lords-it-over-inferior.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/47-or-how-romney-lords-it-over-inferior.html</a>>.)</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref8" name="_ftn8" title="">[8]</a> James Eng, “Ubiquiti Networks Says It Was Victim of $47 Million Cyber Scam,” NBC, Aug. 7 2015, <<a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/tech/security/ubiquiti-networks-says-it-was-victim-47-million-cyber-scam-n406201">http://www.nbcnews.com/tech/security/ubiquiti-networks-says-it-was-victim-47-million-cyber-scam-n406201</a>>. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref9" name="_ftn9" title="">[9]</a> Jennifer Booton, “Amazon Now Has Around 47 Million Paying Prime Members,” <i>Market Watch</i>, Oct. 20, 2015, <<a href="http://www.marketwatch.com/story/amazon-now-has-47-million-prime-members-report-shows-2015-10-20">http://www.marketwatch.com/story/amazon-now-has-47-million-prime-members-report-shows-2015-10-20</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref10" name="_ftn10" title="">[10]</a> According to a report from Alzheimer’s Disease International. “Nearly 47 Million People Now Have Dementia, Report Shows,” <i>Yahoo Health</i>, Aug. 25, 2015, <<a href="https://www.yahoo.com/health/nearly-47-million-people-now-have-dementia-report-127552673327.html">https://www.yahoo.com/health/nearly-47-million-people-now-have-dementia-report-127552673327.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref11" name="_ftn11" title="">[11]</a> Anna Galland, email, <i>MoveOn</i>, Jul. 14, 2015; citing Leslie Savan, “‘Daily News’ to GOP ‘Traitors’: Drop Dead,” <i>The Nation</i>, Mar. 11, 2015, <<a href="http://www.thenation.com/article/daily-news-gop-traitors-drop-dead/">http://www.thenation.com/article/daily-news-gop-traitors-drop-dead/</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref12" name="_ftn12" title="">[12]</a> These teeth, it was said, “…reveal that Homo sapiens may have arrived there [China] 80,000 years ago.” Amina Khan, “Find Alters Human Migration Theories: The Discovery of 47 Teeth in a Chinese Cave Suggests People Arrived There at Least 80,000 Years Ago,” <i>Los Angeles Times</i>, Oct. 17, 2015, p. B2.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref13" name="_ftn13" title="">[13]</a> The actual text, here, is from: Joel Brown, “3 Ways to Maximize Your Life & Riches – Tai Lopez,” <i>Addicted2Success</i>, <<a href="http://addicted2success.com/success-advice/3-ways-to-maximize-your-life-riches-tai-lopez/">http://addicted2success.com/success-advice/3-ways-to-maximize-your-life-riches-tai-lopez/</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref14" name="_ftn14" title="">[14]</a> Eidos Interactive, 2000.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref15" name="_ftn15" title="">[15]</a> Perhaps my perception of the 47s merely owes to my own idiosyncrasies. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref16" name="_ftn16" title="">[16]</a> Aristotle, <i>Metaphysics</i>, ca. 350 B.C., W. D. Ross, transl., online at <<a href="http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/metaphysics.1.i.html">http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/metaphysics.1.i.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref17" name="_ftn17" title="">[17]</a> In general, “Neoplatonism” was an “[a]ncient Greek philosophy, metaphysics, [and] philosophy of religion. [It was t]he philosophical tradition founded by Plotinus , developed through his disciple Porphyry , the Syrian School of Iamblichus, the school of Athens, represented by Plutarch, Proclus , and Simplicius, and the Alexandrian school until the fall of Alexandria in 642. Plotinus' <i>Enneads</i> (edited by Porphyry) was the source of this tradition, and Proclus' <i>Elements of Theology</i> was the systematic exposition of its doctrines. Neoplatonism, which was the last philosophical system of the classical world, explained the origin of the world in terms of Plotinus' three hypostases (the one, <i>nous</i>, and the soul) and the process of emanation. Neoplatonism attempted to reconcile the two supposedly incompatible systems of Plato and Aristotle, by considering Aristotle's philosophy as an introduction to Plato's higher wisdom. This attitude led many Neoplatonists to comment extensively on both Plato and Aristotle and thus contributed greatly to the history of philosophy. Neoplatonism advocated polytheism and mysticism and had a favorable attitude toward theology. Hence it became the main opposition of early Christianity, which it directly attacked.” “Neoplatonism,” in Nicholas Bunnin and Jiyuan Yu, <i>The Blackwell Dictionary of Western Philosophy</i>, Oxford: Blackwell, 2004.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref18" name="_ftn18" title="">[18]</a> Frances Yates, <i>The Occult Philosophy of the Elizabethan Age</i>, reprint ed., London and New York: Routledge, 2001, p. 30. Here is the apparent sense of Yate’s reference to Pico’s “Mathematical Conclusions”: “When Pico went to Rome in 1486 to publicly defend his 900 theses or intellectual propositions drawn from all philosophies, fourteen were conclusions ‘according to the mathematics of Pythagoras’ …Giovanni Pico della Mirandola regarded Pythagoras as a ‘wise man’, observing that according to Iamblichus ‘Pythagoras took the Orphic theology as a model’ after which he patterned and shaped his own philosophy. For that reason alone Pythagoras’ sayings were called ‘sacred’ because they derived from the ‘Orphic initiations’, from which flowed ‘the secret doctrine of numbers and whatever was great and sublime in Greek philosophy’.” Ariel Hessayon, <i>“Gold Tried in the Fire”: The Prophet TheaurauJohn Tany and the English Revolution</i>, Burlington, Vermont: Ashgate Publ., 2007, p. 339; archived online at <<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=_wMRdH1w1ZsC&pg=PA339">https://books.google.com/books?id=_wMRdH1w1ZsC&pg=PA339</a>>; citing Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, <i>On the Dignity of Man</i>, Charles Glenn Wallis, transl., Paul J. W. Miller, ed., Indianapolis and New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1965, pp. 15 and 33. (Note: “TheaurauJohn Tany” was the assumed name of the 17<sup>th</sup>-century English religious figure Thomas Totney.)</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref19" name="_ftn19" title="">[19]</a> For information about the Lord Mayor, see again Bell and Brandon, “Star Trek in Tenebris,” <i>op. cit</i>., <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/06/star-trek-in-tenebris_5.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/06/star-trek-in-tenebris_5.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref20" name="_ftn20" title="">[20]</a> “By Numbers, a way is had, to the searchyng out, and understandyng of euery thyng, hable to be knowen,” Giovanni Pico della Mirandola; quoted by Sir Henry Billingsley, transl., Euclid, <i>The Elements of Geometrie</i>, 1570; citing <i>Conclusiones sive Theses DCCCC</i>, Rome, 1486, 25, 35, no. 11. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref21" name="_ftn21" title="">[21]</a> Hessayon, <i>loc. cit.</i>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref22" name="_ftn22" title="">[22]</a> ‘On the Art of the Kabbalah,’ Hagenau, 1517.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref23" name="_ftn23" title="">[23]</a> Hessayon, <i>loc. cit</i>. According to Frances Yates: “The kind of Cabala which Pico expounds in his seventy-two Cabalist Conclusions is a simplified version of Spanish Cabala. This fact alone is sufficient to indicate that this powerful influence on the Italian thinkers came from Spanish Jews, and was brought about through the disturbances in Spain which uprooted Spanish Jewry and led to the Expulsion of 1492 [by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella]. Though Pico’s Cabalist Conclusions were formulated by 1486, some years before the actual date of the Expulsion, there seems little doubt that his instructors were Spanish Jews. Chief among them was the mysterious character known as Flavius Mithridates who provided Pico with Cabalist manuscripts. Pico certainly knew Hebrew fairly well, but would have been dependent on Jewish experts for interpreting these difficult sources. And it would seem that Flavius Mithridates encouraged Pico in the Christian interpretation of Cabala, even to the point of inserting into the texts interpolations of his own pointing in a Christian direction. What can have been Flavius’s motive in this encouraging and directing Pico towards his momentous adoption of Cabala into Christianity, as he understood it, remains a problem, and one which awaits further investigations by the Hebrew experts,” Yates, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 19. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref24" name="_ftn24" title="">[24]</a> <i>Ibid</i>. Michael Hoffman rehearsed much of this history on his “Magic and Paganism in the Reign of Elizabeth I,” audio CD, <<a href="http://revisionisthistorystore.blogspot.com/2010/03/hoffmans-revisionist-history-store.html">http://revisionisthistorystore.blogspot.com/2010/03/hoffmans-revisionist-history-store.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref25" name="_ftn25" title="">[25]</a> For information, see Thomas Greene “The 47<sup>th</sup> Proposition: The 47<sup>th</sup> Proposition of the 1<sup>st</sup> Book of Euclid as Part of the Jewel of a Past Master,” <i>Ars Quator Coronatorum</i> [transactions of the Quator Coronati Lodge, No. 2076], vol. xiv, 1901, London: United Grand Lodge of England, pp. 27-30; archived online at the Grand Lodge of British Columbia and Yukon, <<a href="http://www.freemasonry.bcy.ca/aqc/1901/euclid.html">http://www.freemasonry.bcy.ca/aqc/1901/euclid.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref26" name="_ftn26" title="">[26]</a> George Thornburgh, <i>Masonic Monitor of the Degrees of Entered Apprentice, Fellow Craft, and Master Mason: Together with the Ceremony of Receiving Visitors, Instituting and Constituting Lodges, Installation, Laying Corner</i> <i>Stones, Dedications, Masonic Burials, and Lodge of Sorrow</i>, Little Rock, Ark.: G. Thornburgh, 1909, p. 70; archived online at <<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=G09EAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA70">https://books.google.com/books?id=G09EAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA70</a>>. “What was there in the discovery of this [i.e., the 47<sup>th</sup> Problem] that should have given such joy to our ancient friend and brother Pythagoras? From time immemorial, buildings have been constructed as rectangles, which, to be true, must have a perfect angle of 90° in each corner. To erect these angles was the great problem of the Master Mason of ancient times. To the Master only was given the secret by means of which a perfect angle could always be formed. This secret was usually communicated by means of three rods, bearing the relation of 3, 4, and 5. When these three rods were joined together, their ends touching, a right angle was always formed,” “The Swastika in Masonry,” John. H. Brownell, Arthur Maurice Smith, Joseph E. Morcombe, Richard Pride and George T. Campbell, <i>The American Tyler-Keystone: Devoted to Freemasonry and Its Concordant Orders</i>, vol. 24, Ann Arbor, Mich.: Tyler Publ. Co.; J. H. Brownell, 1909-1910, p. 363; archived online at <<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=aSznAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA363">https://books.google.com/books?id=aSznAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA363</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref27" name="_ftn27" title="">[27]</a> “And it’s because of this tilt that we have seasons here on Earth,” Fraser Cain, “Earth’s Axis,” <i>Universe Today</i>, Dec. 8, 2009, <<a href="http://www.universetoday.com/47176/earths-axis/">http://www.universetoday.com/47176/earths-axis/</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref28" name="_ftn28" title="">[28]</a> “When the lines were named 2000 years ago, the Sun was in the constellation of Capricorn during the winter solstice and Cancer during the summer solstice (hence the names). Now due to the precession of the equinoxes the Sun is no longer in these constellations during these times, but the names remain.” Cathy Jordan, “What is the Significance of the Tropic of Cancer, Tropic of Capricorn, Arctic Circle and Antarctic Circle? (Beginner),” <i>Ask an</i> <i>Astronomer</i>, Cornell Univ., Jun. 27, 2015, <<a href="http://curious.astro.cornell.edu/physics/160-our-solar-system/the-earth/seasons/15-what-is-the-significance-of-the-tropic-of-cancer-tropic-of-capricorn-arctic-circle-and-antarctic-circle-beginner">http://curious.astro.cornell.edu/physics/160-our-solar-system/the-earth/seasons/15-what-is-the-significance-of-the-tropic-of-cancer-tropic-of-capricorn-arctic-circle-and-antarctic-circle-beginner</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref29" name="_ftn29" title="">[29]</a> Guy Stanton Ford, ed., <i>Compton’s Pictured Encyclopedia</i>, vol. 8, Chicago: F. E. Compton, 1922, p. 3,862; archived online at <<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=JlNHAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA3862">https://books.google.com/books?id=JlNHAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA3862</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref30" name="_ftn30" title="">[30]</a> This is the number accepted by scholars of all theological stripes. Academics more congenial to Christian church tradition typically credit 13 or 14 of the New Testament books to Paul.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref31" name="_ftn31" title="">[31]</a> See The Bible, The Epistle to the Romans, chapt. 11, verse 13.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref32" name="_ftn32" title="">[32]</a> See The Bible, The Book of the Acts of the Apostles, chapt. 13, verse 4 through chapt. 14, verse 28.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref33" name="_ftn33" title="">[33]</a> Cuthbert Hamilton Turner, “Bible,” Hugh Chrisholm, ed., <i>The Encyclopædia Britannica: A Dictionary of Arts, Sciences, Literature and General Information</i>, 11<sup>th</sup> ed., vol. 3, Cambridge [U.K.] and New York: Univ. Press, 1910, p. 892; archived online at <<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=3Jw3AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA892">https://books.google.com/books?id=3Jw3AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA892</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref34" name="_ftn34" title="">[34]</a> Jordan Hoffman, “One Trek Mind #46: Roddenberry... Beyond Star Trek,” <i>Star Trek</i> [dot] com, Oct. 24, 2012, <<a href="http://www.startrek.com/article/one-trek-mind-46-roddenberry-beyond-star-trek">http://www.startrek.com/article/one-trek-mind-46-roddenberry-beyond-star-trek</a>>. Too bad it wasn’t recorded under the title “One Trek Mind #47.” Dang it! Another factoid: Some accounts put the later Dead Sea Scroll discoveries in 1947.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref35" name="_ftn35" title="">[35]</a> As part of his “case” for the number 23, Robert Anton Wilson noted that Ordo Templi Orientis (“Order of the Eastern Temple”) “magician” Aleister Crowley “began the study of magick [<i>sic</i>] in 1898, at the age of 23,” Wilson, “The 23 Phenomenon,” <i>loc. cit</i>. Since Crowley’s persona has retained its occult “aura,” I cannot resist observing that the “Great Beast” died on December 1 in 1947. (He was 72 years old, which number is important in Kabbalism.)</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref36" name="_ftn36" title="">[36]</a> Note that Vice Admiral Roscoe Henry Hillenkoetter, an early director of central intelligence, has also been named as a suspected member of the so-called “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Majestic_12">Majestic 12</a>” group. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref37" name="_ftn37" title="">[37]</a> Another avenue of research could revolve around November 14. On that date there are 47 days left in the year. I observe that compulsory school-integration began on a November 14. “On November 14, 1960, the nation watched as six-year-old Ruby Nell Bridges walked into William Frantz Elementary School and into history. A federal court ordered the New Orleans school system to desegregate, making Bridges the first African-American to attend the elementary school,” “Ruby Bridges: A Class of One,” <i>News Hour</i>, PBS, Feb. 18, 1997, <<a href="http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/social_issues-jan-june97-bridges_2-18/">http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/social_issues-jan-june97-bridges_2-18/</a>>. The symbolism of the name “Ruby Bridges” should probably not be overlooked. In a previous post, I reviewed the Dorothy’s “ruby slippers” and the JFK assassination’s Jack Ruby, in the light of a particular presentation of Michelle Obama wearing a ruby-colored dress. See Matthew J. Bell, “Al-O,” <i>Bell Curve</i> [weblog], Jan. 23, 2013, <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/al-o.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/al-o.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref38" name="_ftn38" title="">[38]</a> Nesta H. Webster, <i>Secret Societies and Subversive Movements</i>, London: Boswell, 1924; archived online at <<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/files/19104/19104-0.txt">http://www.gutenberg.org/files/19104/19104-0.txt</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref39" name="_ftn39" title="">[39]</a> New York: G. P. Putnam, 1960.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref40" name="_ftn40" title="">[40]</a> <i>Ibid</i>., p. 153; archived online at <<a href="http://images.library.wisc.edu/HistSciTech/EFacs/Bestiary/M/WHITE157.jpg">http://images.library.wisc.edu/HistSciTech/EFacs/Bestiary/M/WHITE157.jpg</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref41" name="_ftn41" title="">[41]</a> According to information presented by Itamar Rabinovich and Jehuda Reinharz, eds., <i>Israel in the Middle East: Documents and Readings on Society, Politics, and Foreign Relations, Pre-1948 to the Present</i>, Waltham, Mass: Brandeis Univ. Press; Hanover, N.H. and London: Univ. Press of New England, 2008, p. 424; archived online at <<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=iVJR9UZnTVAC&pg=PA424">https://books.google.com/books?id=iVJR9UZnTVAC&pg=PA424</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref42" name="_ftn42" title="">[42]</a> “The <i>Protocol</i> entered into force on 16 February 2005 in accordance with Article 23…”, Status of Ratification of the Kyoto Protocol,” <i>Framework Convention on Climate Change</i>, United Nations, <<a href="http://unfccc.int/kyoto_protocol/status_of_ratification/items/2613.php">http://unfccc.int/kyoto_protocol/status_of_ratification/items/2613.php</a>>. The article number clearly deserved attention by those interested in the 23-phenomenon, which raises the possibility that one number might be a “gateway” to another. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref43" name="_ftn43" title="">[43]</a> William B. Hopkins, <i>The Pacific War: The Strategy, Politics, and Players that Won the War</i>, Minneapolis, Minn.: Zenith Press; MBI Publ. Co., 2010 [orig. 2008], p. 328; archived online at <<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=KixzKor30OMC&pg=PA328">https://books.google.com/books?id=KixzKor30OMC&pg=PA328</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref44" name="_ftn44" title="">[44]</a> This was militarized and designated H-13 Sioux.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref45" name="_ftn45" title="">[45]</a> One of these “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1956_B-47_disappearance">disappeared</a>” under mysterious circumstances, and carrying nuclear material.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref46" name="_ftn46" title="">[46]</a> Whereas, e.g., 23s are perhaps quintessentially “Fortean,” 33s are characteristically “Masonic,” 22s and 72s are “Kabbalistic” and so on. Do the numbers have well-defined “spheres of influence”? Perhaps not. I would guess that investigators, should any care to look into the issue, would find that the number-symbols blend into each other at the edges. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref47" name="_ftn47" title="">[47]</a> <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2014/08/through-griffin-door.html">David Ray Griffin</a>, <i>Cognitive Infiltration</i>, Northampton, Mass.: Olive Branch Press, 2011, p. 68. Cf. David Ray Griffin, 9/11 Ten Years Later: When State Crimes against Democracy Succeed, Northampton, Mass.: Oliver Branch Press; Interlink, 2011, p. 37; archived online at <<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=xcYwQoLmht0C&pg=PA37">https://books.google.com/books?id=xcYwQoLmht0C&pg=PA37</a>>. Another interesting tangent might be the genetic angle. Persons with 47 chromosomes are supposed to be anomalous and are variously considered inferior or superior. I explored this theme a bit in my earlier 47-related <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/47-or-how-romney-lords-it-over-inferior.html">post</a>.</p>
<p>Disclosure: "We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.”</p>Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com16tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-10732180887516347832015-11-15T09:30:00.000-08:002015-11-21T09:57:00.911-08:00Isis Unveiled in Paris?<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/Isis_RitesOf_MoinaMathers.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="359" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/Isis_RitesOf_MoinaMathers.jpg" width="214" /></a></div><br />
<p>(Image from Wikipedia.)</p>
<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Liddell_MacGregor_Mathers">Samuel Liddell "MacGregor" Mathers</a> and his wife <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moina_Mathers">Moina</a> (born Mina Bergson) introduced their "<a href="https://isiopolis.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/isis-a-montmartre_1900-art-fac_p470.jpg">Rite of Isis</a>" in Paris in the 1890s. Have we now, to borrow the title from Russian-born mystic <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helena_Blavatsky">Helena Petrovna Blavatsky</a>, seen "<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isis_Unveiled">Isis Unveiled</a>"?</p>
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<a href="https://blipparcom.s3.amazonaws.com/media/public/2015/08/25/final_-_as_aboveukoutdoor_ref140.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="750" src="https://blipparcom.s3.amazonaws.com/media/public/2015/08/25/final_-_as_aboveukoutdoor_ref140.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<p>Pictured: A promotional poster for <i>As Above, So Below</i>, Universal Pictures, 2014. Of course the phrase "as above, so below," traces back to alchemical texts such as the fabled <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/12/neil-armstrong-astronaut-or-alchemist.html">Emerald Tablet</a>. Among other things, it signifies the mystical correspondences that various occultists believe exist between <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/07/speculation-and-reflection-on-chess.html">the Macrocosm and the Microcosm</a>.</p>
<p>In his <i>Dans l’ombre des cathedrals</i>,<a href="#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" title="">[1]</a> Robert “Ambelain claims that Notre Dame [cathedral] was constructed on the site of an ancient temple to Isis, worshipped by the early settlers, known as the Parisi, and constructed on an alchemical formula for the control of natural forces.”<a href="#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2" title="">[2]</a></p>
<p>The 19th-20th c. Ezra Pound associate and modernist poet Hilda Doolittle, writing as “H.D.,” once wrote:</p>
<p>"Isis, Iris,
Fleur-de-lis,
Bar-Isis is son of Isis,"</p>
<p>"(bar ou ber ou ben, signifiant fils).
so Bar-Isis is Par-Isis?
Paris, anyway; …"</p>
<p>"why do they punish us?
come out, come out of the darkness;
will I be burnt to cinders in this heat? …"</p>
<p>"Bar-Isis, Paris;
I call Paris, Paris,
not to the Greek …"</p>
<p>"This is my new prayer;
I pray to you?
Paris, Bar-Isis?"</p>
<p>"to Osiris?
or to Isis-self, Egyptian flower …
out of the sea, over the sand,"</p>
<p>"a symbol, obelisk, no man,
Memnon, Bar-Isis, son of <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/07/aurora-copycat-effect.html">Dawn</a> ["Dawn" = <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/aurora-rising-aurora-consurgens-part-1.html">"Aurora"</a> - Ed.]."<a href="#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3" title="">[3]</a></p>
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<a href="http://exhibits.library.yale.edu/files/original/40c0ed5422d491c91ef383ec76f9f03d.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="621" src="http://exhibits.library.yale.edu/files/original/40c0ed5422d491c91ef383ec76f9f03d.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<p>“H.D. at Yale: photograph of Hilda Doolittle, Norman H. Pearson, and Bryher in front of Sterling Memorial Library, Yale University.”<a href="#_ftn4" name="_ftnref4" title="">[4]</a></p>
<p>In wartime London, “…the ‘Lowndes Group’ [after her residence at 49 Lowndes Sqaure, SW1] had begun to form around H.D. …Besides Hilda …, there was Norman Pearson…”.<a href="#_ftn5" name="_ftnref5" title="">[5]</a> Pearson, by the way, not only penned a foreword to H.D.’s above volume of poetry, but also is credited as the copyright holder.<a href="#_ftn6" name="_ftnref6" title="">[6]</a></p>
<p>“In 1942, erstwhile Yale student Donald Downes recruited English professor Norman Holmes Pearson into the OSS [i.e., William Donovan’s wartime spy-shop, the Office of Strategic Services]. …Pearson knew how to read materials ‘as intently as possible for hidden messages’ because the Yale Department of English taught him ‘how to read, really read, closely, without interruption, how to interrogate a manuscript. …’ (After the war, Pearson would resume his scholarly career, which included collaborating with his friend W.H. Auden in the editing of the five-volume anthology ‘Poets of the English Language.’)”<a href="#_ftn7" name="_ftnref7" title="">[7]</a></p>
<p>“During the Second World War, [later Central Intelligence Agency counterintelligence chief, James Jesus] Angleton worked at the Office of Special [<i>sic</i>] Services, the CIA’s forerunner. Angleton’s OSS boss Norman Holmes Pearson was another Yale alum. Angleton ran counterintelligence until [investigative journalist] Seymour Hersh laid him low in 1974 with a series of New York Times exposés about the CIA’s involvement in domestic spying.”<a href="#_ftn8" name="_ftnref8" title="">[8]</a></p>
<p>Now, a <i>New York Times</i> headline reads: “After Paris Attacks, C.I.A. Director Rekindles Debate Over Surveillance.”<a href="#_ftn9" name="_ftnref9" title="">[9]</a></p>
<p>In the 2006 movie The Good Shepherd,<a href="#_ftn10" name="_ftnref10" title="">[10]</a> British actor Michael Gambon plays the character Dr. Fredericks, who appears to have been modeled upon Norman Holmes Pearson.</p>
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<p>[Dr. Fredericks:] "Use your trade craft well. Particularly the use of black propaganda, and the ingredient known as playback - understanding how effectively your own disinformation is actually working on the enemy. It's vital to penetrate the enemy's intelligence services; push them into an unreal world, as it were. The very qualities that make a good intelligence officer - a suspicious mind, a love of complexity in detail - are the very qualities of someone you will be observing. A mental facility to detect conspiracies in betrayal are the same qualities most likely to corrode natural judgment. Everything that seems clear is bent. Everything that seems bent is clear. Trapped in reflections you must learn to recognize when a lie masquerades as a truth, and then deal with it efficiently, dispassionately."<a href="#_ftn11" name="_ftnref11" title="">[11]</a></p>
<p>###</p>
<p>For crypto-political analysis, see
<a href="http://bellofliberty.blogspot.com/2015/11/isis-us-cia-connection.html">"ISIS: The US/CIA Connection."</a></p>
<p>Notes:</p>
<br />
<hr /><p><a href="#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1" title="">[1]</a> Robert Ambelain, <i>Dans l’ombre des cathédrales: étude sur l’ésotérisme architectural et décoratif de Notre-Dame de Paris dans ses rapports avec le symbolisme hermétique, les doctrines secrètes, l’astrologie, la magie et l’alchimie</i> [“In the shadow of Cathedrals: Study on the Architectural and Decorative Esoteric Notre Dame de Paris in Its Relations With the Hermetic Symbolism, Secret Doctrines, Astrology, Magic and Alchemy”], Paris: Ed. Adyar, 1939.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref2" name="_ftn2" title="">[2]</a> Timothy Materer, <i>Modernist Alchemy: Poetry and the Occult</i>, Ithaca, N.Y. and London: Cornell Univ. Press, 1995, p. 91; archived online at <<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=RAT7RSNRUmQC&pg=PA91">https://books.google.com/books?id=RAT7RSNRUmQC&pg=PA91</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref3" name="_ftn3" title="">[3]</a> H.D., <i>Hermetic Definition</i>, sixth printing, New York: New Directions, 1972, pp. 5<i>ff</i>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref4" name="_ftn4" title="">[4]</a> “H.D. at Yale: photograph of Hilda Doolittle, Norman H. Pearson, and Bryher in front of Sterling Memorial Library, Yale University,” <i>Online Exhibits</i> [Yale Univ.], Sept., 1956, <<a href="http://exhibits.library.yale.edu/items/show/9090">http://exhibits.library.yale.edu/items/show/9090</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref5" name="_ftn5" title="">[5]</a> Bryher [Annie Winifred Ellerman], <i>The Days of Mars; A Memoir, 1940-1946</i>, New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1971; quoted by Michael Howard Holzman, <i>James Jesus Angleton, the CIA, and the Craft of Counterintelligence</i>, Amherst, Mass.: Univ. of Mass. Press, 2008, p. 42; archived online at <<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=H8q_zVR_5EYC&pg=PA42">https://books.google.com/books?id=H8q_zVR_5EYC&pg=PA42</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref6" name="_ftn6" title="">[6]</a> <i>Hermetic Definition</i>, <i>op. cit</i>., front matter.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref7" name="_ftn7" title="">[7]</a> Jeet Heer, “School for Spies: What the CIA Learned (and Mis-learned) in the Groves of Academe,” <i>Boston Globe</i> [online], Dec. 28, 2003, <<a href="http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2003/12/28/school_for_spies/">http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2003/12/28/school_for_spies/</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref8" name="_ftn8" title="">[8]</a> David Hillel Gelernter, <i>America-Lite: How Imperial Academia Dismantled our Culture (and Ushered in the Obamacrats)</i>, New York: Encounter Books, 2012, p. 47; archived online at <<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=BC8uAgAAQBAJ&pg=PT42">https://books.google.com/books?id=BC8uAgAAQBAJ&pg=PT42</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref9" name="_ftn9" title="">[9]</a> Scot Shaneov, “After Paris Attacks, C.I.A. Director Rekindles Debate Over Surveillance,” <i>New York Times</i>, Nov. 16, 2015, <<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/17/us/after-paris-attacks-cia-director-rekindles-debate-over-surveillance.html">http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/17/us/after-paris-attacks-cia-director-rekindles-debate-over-surveillance.html</a>>. On John Brennan’s lies, see Editorial Board, “Mass Surveillance Isn’t the Answer to Fighting Terrorism,” <i>New York Times</i>, Nov. 17, 2015, <<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/18/opinion/mass-surveillance-isnt-the-answer-to-fighting-terrorism.html">http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/18/opinion/mass-surveillance-isnt-the-answer-to-fighting-terrorism.html</a>>. H/t: Michael A. Hoffman, “Top US Security Officials Caught Lying,” <i>Revisionist Review </i>[weblog], Nov. 19, 2015, <<a href="http://revisionistreview.blogspot.com/2015/11/top-us-security-officials-caught-lying.html">http://revisionistreview.blogspot.com/2015/11/top-us-security-officials-caught-lying.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref10" name="_ftn10" title="">[10]</a> Universal Pictures. Directed by Robert De Niro, it featured an all-star cast, including Alec Baldwin, Matt Damon, William Hurt, Angelina Jolie, Joe Pesci and John Turturro.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref11" name="_ftn11" title="">[11]</a> Transcript at "The Good Shepherd," <i>Eye of the Mind</i> [weblog], Mar. 11, 2010, <a href="http://eye-of-enigma.livejournal.com/21466.html">http://eye-of-enigma.livejournal.com/21466.html</a>.<p/>
Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-17252851723866317142015-10-13T19:37:00.001-07:002015-10-16T18:25:34.169-07:00Name Game Notes: Sandman and Trump<p>Is there, above and beyond the patchwork of presidential hopefuls, a part to be played by what <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/">Loren Coleman</a> periodically presents as the "<a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=%22name+game%22+site%3Acopycateffect.blogspot.com&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8">name game</a>"?</p>
<p>Out of the <a href="http://www.politics1.com/p2016.htm">numerous contenders</a>, two names immediately stand out: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernie_Sanders">Bernard "Bernie" Sanders</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump">Donald John Trump</a>.</p>
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<a href="http://www.lookhuman.com/render/product/2456/2456848488060069/bb453wr-w800h800z1-91920-enter-sandman.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="500" src="http://www.lookhuman.com/render/product/2456/2456848488060069/bb453wr-w800h800z1-91920-enter-sandman.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<p>In some contexts, the Democratic-Socialist candidate, Bernie Sanders, is being called "Sandman." Take, for instance, the London <i>Guardian</i> article "<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CD-E-LDc384">Enter Sandman</a>: Why Have Democrats Fallen in Love With Bernie Sanders?"<a href="#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" title="">[1]</a></p>
<p>"The Sandman is a mythical character in central and northern European folklore who brings good dreams by sprinkling magical sand onto the eyes of people while they sleep at night."<a href="#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2" title="">[2]</a></p>
<p>Does Bernie Sanders's function to bring "good dreams" to left-of-center humanists, disenfranchised by "New Democrats" who (like the Clintons and Obama) are - in the words of Noam Chomsky - "in effect, moderate Republicans."<a href="#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3" title="">[3]</a></p>
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<p>Sandman lore goes back at least to the early nineteenth century. The character is depicted by German short story writer <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._T._A._Hoffmann">E. T. A. Hoffmann</a> in <i>Der Sandmann</i>,<a href="#_ftn4" name="_ftnref4" title="">[4]</a> and was further popularized by Danish writer <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Christian_Andersen">Hans Christian Andersen</a> in "<i>Ole Lukøje</i>."<a href="#_ftn5" name="_ftnref5" title="">[5]</a></p>
<p>Recently, it was reimagined by British graphic novelist <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_Gaiman">Neil Gaiman</a> in his <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sandman_%28Vertigo%29">Sandman series</a>, which extended from 1989 to 2013. </p>
<p>A "<a href="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v158/Sarah531/sandman-3trailer.jpg">Sandman</a>" also figures in director <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sam_Raimi">Sam Raimi</a>'s <i><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0413300/">Spider-Man 3</a></i>.<a href="#_ftn6" name="_ftnref6" title="">[6]</a></p>
<p>Readers can discover more about the several incarnations of the Sandman D.C. comic character <a href="http://dc.wikia.com/wiki/Sandman">here</a>.</p>
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<p>"<a href="https://ionenewsone.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/14346325639247-e1436542111556.jpg?w=640&h=747">Trump</a>" (definition) "'[S]urpass, beat,' 1580s... 'playing card of a suit ranking above others,' 1520s, alteration of 'triumph' ...which also was the name of a card game. ...'fabricate, devise,' 1690s, ...'deceive, cheat' (1510s), from Middle English <i>trumpen</i> (late 14c.), from Old French <i>tromper</i> "to deceive," of uncertain origin. Apparently from <i>se tromper de</i> 'to mock,' from Old French tromper 'to blow a trumpet.' Brachet explains this as 'to play the horn, alluding to quacks and mountebanks, who attracted the public by blowing a horn, and then cheated them into buying. ...' The Hindley Old French dictionary has <i>baillier la trompe</i> 'blow the trumpet' as 'act the fool,' and Donkin connects it rather to <i>trombe</i> 'waterspout,' on the notion of turning (someone) around. Connection with triumph also has been proposed. Related: Trumped; trumping. Trumped up 'false, concocted' first recorded 1728."<a href="#_ftn7" name="_ftnref7" title="">[7]</a></p>
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<p>Donald Trump's surname, on the other hand, conjures up the so-called <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_Arcana">Major Arcana</a> of the occult "<a href="https://arrowinflight.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/rider-waite-smith_deck.png">Tarot</a>" deck.</p>
<p>"The antiquity of the game of Tarot is unknown. In packs now ascribed to the 15th century, trump cards bear the images of Fame, Death, and other subjects taken from [the card game of] ...Trionfi. During the Renaissance age, Tarot was played by the wealthy, and card packs were <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVi0glcrbCvvHH0RxTXJn_FKXYaXEO3fZdgMxBEJFveJtaNqms7_lnxjpUsddYhzTG5gKo0WTqjkkLjwLKZuZq7ijZoiSZmtuGVZknL1oVgdtI9hs-Tzmr7MYq6CeF-4CsCIHFrMXFw6s/s1600/tarot_aleister_crowley_frieda_harris.jpg">painted by artists</a>..."<a href="#_ftn8" name="_ftnref8" title="">[8]</a></p>
<p>Some investigators think it "probable" that "...'<i>trionfi</i>' is the same game as 'trump'..." and is of Italian origin.<a href="#_ftn9" name="_ftnref9" title="">[9]</a></p>
<p>A similar theme is the "<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Face_card">face card</a>" - king, queen and jack - in <a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/02/Piatnikcards.jpg">the standard deck of 52</a> (<a href="http://www.sacred-texts.com/eso/nop/nop11.htm">four</a> suites of <a href="http://www.sacred-texts.com/eso/nop/nop20.htm">thirteen</a> cards each).</p>
<p>According to the Anglo-American esotericist and occultist <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A._E._Waite">A. E. Waite</a>: "As to the trump cards they may be explained by a final couplet: - 'King, Queen, Knight, Knave. The bridegroom, youth, and child, then all the human race - Thy path by these degrees back to the One retrace."<a href="#_ftn10" name="_ftnref10" title="">[10]</a> </p>
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<p>Of course, the "<a href="http://www.cryptomundo.com/wp-content/uploads/joker-card.jpg">Jokers</a>" both stand outside of this system and are related to it.<a href="#_ftn11" name="_ftnref11" title="">[11]</a></p>
<p>As "coincidence" would have it, as I sit typing these notes, <a href="http://www.infowars.com/">Infowars</a> commentators <a href="ttps://twitter.com/PrisonPlanet">Paul Joseph Watson</a> posted the following to his <a href="https://www.facebook.com/">Facebook</a> account:</p>
<p>"The delusion of 'happiness' is dependent on an ever growing detachment from reality."<a href="#_ftn12" name="_ftnref12" title="">[12]</a></p>
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<p>It puts me in mind of the much-repeated, but less-analyzed phrase, the "American dream." The <i>Online Etymology Dictionary</i> reports:</p>
<p>"‘American dream’ ...coined 1931 by James Truslow Adams (1878-1949), U.S. writer and popular historian (unrelated to the Massachusetts Adamses), in 'Epic of America.' '[The American Dream is] that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement. It is a difficult dream for the European upper classes to interpret adequately, and too many of us ourselves have grown weary and mistrustful of it. It is not a dream of motor cars and high wages merely, but a dream of social order in which each man and each woman shall be able to attain to the fullest stature of which they are innately capable, and be recognized by others for what they are, regardless of the fortuitous circumstances of birth or position.' [Adams] Others have used the term as they will."<a href="#_ftn13" name="_ftnref13" title="">[13]</a></p>
<p>To many Americans, the "American dream" probably did (or maybe does) designate "...the dream of being a blue-collar manufacturer living, in a suburban house with a white picket fence, with your wife and two kids."<a href="#_ftn14" name="_ftnref14" title="">[14]</a></p>
<p>Maybe this "dream" has a shadow-side - to be distracted with "fast-food" and "professional sports," in an updated version of Juvenal's "bread and circuses.”<a href="#_ftn15" name="_ftnref15" title="">[15]</a> Or perhaps it's entirely shadow-play - a mockery of the sleeping "masses," sustained by illusion. They get their "news" from the same corporate-owned media that make Transformers look real and (in Noam Chomsky's words) "<a href="http://chomsky.info/2005012502/">sell us toothpaste</a>." In fantasy-land, the ephemeral lottery ticket symbolizes the chance that the "average Joe" will make it big. One recent count puts your odds at "one in 175 million" - give or take 220,000.<a href="#_ftn16" name="_ftnref16" title="">[16]</a></p>
<p><iframe width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/oNuX7bs2qAM" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
<p>"Mr. Sand-man ...<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNuX7bs2qAM">bring me a dream</a>."<a href="#_ftn17" name="_ftnref17" title="">[17]</a></p>
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<p><a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/laugh.html">It's Hil[l]ar[y]ous</a>.<a href="#_ftn18" name="_ftnref18" title="">[18]</a> </p>
<p>"Medieval English form of Hilarius or Hilaria. During the Middle Ages it was primarily a masculine name. It was revived in Britain at the beginning of the 20th century as a predominantly feminine name. In America, this name and the variant Hillary seemed to drop in popularity after <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillary_Clinton">Hillary Clinton</a> (1947-) became the first lady."<a href="#_ftn19" name="_ftnref19" title="">[19]</a></p>
<p>Notes:</p>
<br />
<hr /><p><a href="#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1" title="">[1]</a> Steve Winkler, Jul. 7, 2015, <<a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/07/why-do-so-many-democrats-support-bernie-sanders">http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/07/why-do-so-many-democrats-support-bernie-sanders</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref2" name="_ftn2" title="">[2]</a> "Sandman," <i>Wikipedia</i>, Sept. 27, 2015, <<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandman">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandman</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref3" name="_ftn3" title="">[3]</a> Noam Chomsky, "Rollback," <i>Z Magazine</i>, Jan.-May, 1995, <<a href="http://chomsky.info/199505__/">http://chomsky.info/199505__/</a>>; cf. Gabrielle Dunkley, "Noam Chomsky: Obama Would Have Been A 'Moderate Republican' Several Decades Ago," <i>Huffington Post</i>, Feb. 1, 2013, <<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/01/noam-chomsky-obama_n_2599622.html">http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/01/noam-chomsky-obama_n_2599622.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref4" name="_ftn4" title="">[4]</a> "The Sandman," in <i>Nachtstücke</i> ["Night Pieces"], Berlin: n.p., 1817.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref5" name="_ftn5" title="">[5]</a> <i>Eventyr, fortalte for Børn</i> ("Fairy Tales Told for Children)", 3rd ed., Copenhagen: C. A. Reitzel, 1842.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref6" name="_ftn6" title="">[6]</a> Columbia, 2007.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref7" name="_ftn7" title="">[7]</a> Douglas Harper, "Trump," <i>Online Etymology Dictionary</i>, <<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=trump">http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=trump</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref8" name="_ftn8" title="">[8]</a> Elizabeth Boyd, <i>Popular arts of Spanish New Mexico</i>, Santa Fe, N.M.: Museum of New Mexico Press, 1974, p. 463; archived online at <<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=U71aAAAAMAAJ">https://books.google.com/books?id=U71aAAAAMAAJ</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref9" name="_ftn9" title="">[9]</a> Cavendish [pseud. of Henry Jones], "Historical Notes on Our National Card Game," London Society, vol. 9, London: William Clowes and Sons, 1866, p. 66; archived online at <<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=pBpLAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA66">https://books.google.com/books?id=pBpLAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA66</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref10" name="_ftn10" title="">[10]</a> Arthur Edward Waite, The Mysteries of Magic, London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner and Co., 1897, p. 184; archived online at <<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=RLZQvfyrwtwC&pg=PA284">https://books.google.com/books?id=RLZQvfyrwtwC&pg=PA284</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref11" name="_ftn11" title="">[11]</a> See also "<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/03/veritas-vincit.html">Veritas Vincit</a>", "<a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2009/01/joker-copycats.html">Joker Copycats</a>", "<a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2013/02/Hugo-Joker.html">Victor Hugo, The Joker, Joker Copycats</a>," and "<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hue-of-lincoln.html">Hue of Lincoln</a>".</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref12" name="_ftn12" title="">[12]</a> Paul Joseph Watson, post, Facebook, Oct. 11, 2015, <<a href="https://www.facebook.com/paul.j.watson.71/posts/10153714911016171">https://www.facebook.com/paul.j.watson.71/posts/10153714911016171</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref13" name="_ftn13" title="">[13]</a> Douglas Harper, "American Dream," 2015, <<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=American+dream">http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=American+dream</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref14" name="_ftn14" title="">[14]</a> "American Dream," Urban Dictionary, Apr. 18, 2006, <<a href="http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=american+dream&defid=1705731">http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=american+dream&defid=1705731</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref15" name="_ftn15" title="">[15]</a> <i>Panem et circenses</i>, <i>Satires</i>, book 10.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref16" name="_ftn16" title="">[16]</a> Ronald L. Wasserstein, "A Statistician's View: What Are Your Chances of Winning the Powerball Lottery?" <i>Huffington Post</i>, May 16, 2013, updated, Jul. 16, 2013, <<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ronald-l-wasserstein/chances-of-winning-powerball-lottery_b_3288129.html">http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ronald-l-wasserstein/chances-of-winning-powerball-lottery_b_3288129.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref17" name="_ftn17" title="">[17]</a> Francis Drake "Pat" Ballard, "Mr. Sandman," recorded by The Chordettes, Cadence, 1954.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref18" name="_ftn18" title="">[18]</a> From Latin hilarius, (“cheerful”)…. "Hilarious," <i>Wiktionary</i>, <<a href="https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/hilarious">https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/hilarious</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref19" name="_ftn19" title="">[19]</a> "Hilary," Behind the Name, <<a href="http://www.behindthename.com/name/hilary">http://www.behindthename.com/name/hilary</a>>.</p>
Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-72283575321406718202015-09-12T17:53:00.001-07:002015-09-12T17:54:54.149-07:00You blockhead!<p>Charlie Brown in Minecraft.</p>
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Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-48299357292316904042015-06-29T16:43:00.000-07:002017-12-02T19:31:46.305-08:00Water of Fire: On Rainbows and Hexagrams<p><b>Water of Fire: On Rainbows & Hexagrams</b></p>
<p>As readers are doubtless aware, California is presently beset with epic drought conditions. Meanwhile, as I write this, the Midwest was racked with another round of severe thunderstorms, several of which spawned tornados, and many of which exacerbated flood conditions in any areas already experiencing their wettest June on record.</p>
<p>What might a person of synchromystic turn of mind make of the conjunction of such pressing news items as drought-plagued <i>Golden State<a href="#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" title=""><b>[1]</b></a></i> and rain-soaked “heartland”?<a href="#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2" title="">[2]</a> A rough starting place would be to explore the age-old juxtaposition of the primal elements <i>fire</i> and <i>water</i>. Amongst the many representations of the symbolical union of these two primal elements in the occult, two stand out.</p>
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<p>The first notable fire-water combination is the <i>rainbow</i>.</p>
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<p>(Still frame from Stanley Kubrick’s <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000HL09MG/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B000HL09MG&linkId=889812a37c2252e70324390f797ebab9">Eyes Wide Shut</a></i>, Warner Bros., 1999.)</p>
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<p>(“<a href="http://www.angelfire.com/il2/lalaboof/images/gsmile.gif">Rainbow Brite</a>.”)</p>
<p>Aleister Crowley associates the Zodiacal fire “triplicity” water of fire with the: “Rainbow – fading spiritualized reflection of the Image.”<a href="#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3" title="">[3]</a></p>
<p>In some forms of Buddhism: “The rainbow …is the pathway that separates the supernal and the sacred realms from the mundane and the profane. …[T]he rainbow is …the Pathway of the Gods…”.<a href="#_ftn4" name="_ftnref4" title="">[4]</a></p>
<p>“[T]he seven colours of the rainbow-staircase are assimilated to the seven directions of space. The ascent of the rainbow stairway is symbolically equivalent to the seven steps taken by the Buddha at his nativity.. It is a progress through the six directions back to the seventh ‘direction’, the dimensionless and spaceless point of Unity; it is a return to the hub of the six-spoked Wheel of the World; it is a transcendence of the spatial condition. The Buddha’s descent of the rainbow-staircase, coming down from the celestial spheres to the world of men, is yet another expression of the genesis of the spatio-temporal world from its Principle; it is a descent from the point-summit of the universe into the world of spatial and temporal differentiation.”<a href="#_ftn5" name="_ftnref5" title="">[5]</a></p>
<p>This Buddhist “pathway” has an analog in the so-called “rainbow bridge” of Norse mythology – and “blockbuster” Marvel movies.</p>
<p>Is there a multi-colored game afoot? Is Roy G. Biv a servant of God or of the Devil?<a href="#_ftn6" name="_ftnref6" title="">[6]</a></p>
<p>On the one hand, the Biblical book of Genesis relates that God said: “This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.” So God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and all life on the earth.”<a href="#_ftn7" name="_ftnref7" title="">[7]</a></p>
<p>“[T]he bow is the symbol of fate. As a rainbow, it displays the will of God himself in religious mysticism.”<a href="#_ftn8" name="_ftnref8" title="">[8]</a></p>
<p>On the other hand, according to the Jewish website Chabad.org: “[T]he rainbow is a sign that mankind is sinning… [A] generation that never sees a rainbow is on an especially high level of spirituality and righteous conduct.”<a href="#_ftn9" name="_ftnref9" title="">[9]</a> </p>
<p>As just outlined, the rainbow’s biblical history is bound up with a cataclysmic flood. “As a result of the moral decay of the generation, 1,656 years after the world was created, G‑d flooded the world and destroyed it. The only survivors of the Flood were Noah, his family and the animals that were on the ark with them.”<a href="#_ftn10" name="_ftnref10" title="">[10]</a></p>
<p>The New Testament book of Second Peter tells us that, in the future, things will end differently. “But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything done in it will be laid bare.”<a href="#_ftn11" name="_ftnref11" title="">[11]</a> </p>
<p>One subcurrent to the rainbow theme that is relevant to the question of sin is the sexual aspect of all of this. </p>
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<p>For example, “[t]he powerful Voodoo god, Dan …is generally depicted in Benin in the shape of a serpent biting its tail [i.e., as an alchemical ouroboros]. It is …assimilated to the rainbow and is regarded as a doubly bisexual being since it is its own twin, the two in one, ‘coiled in a spiral round the world which they preserve from disintegration.’”<a href="#_ftn12" name="_ftnref12" title="">[12]</a> </p>
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<p>(Rainbow serpent Dan.)</p>
<p>Maybe the Nordic “Bifröst” should be pronounced with an emphasis on the “bi.” </p>
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<p>This sexual dimension comes to the forefront in the “gay rights movement.”<a href="#_ftn13" name="_ftnref13" title="">[13]</a> (See below for a discussion of how the phrase the “gay science” was previously used as a synonym for <i>alchemy</i>.)</p>
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<p>One of the centerpiece symbols in alchemy is the "rebis." Literally, the word designates a "dual" or "double thing." Maybe we could say a "bi thing"? It is a representation of the androgyne ("man-woman"), called the "bisexual man" by James Shelby Downard. The presentation of alchemical rainbows follow, therefore, closely upon the elevation of the transsexual poster-androgyne, Bruce (alias "Caitlyn") Jenner.</p>
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<p>According to the relevant <i>Wikipedia</i> article the so-called “Rainbow Flag”: “…commonly the <i>gay pride flag</i> and <i>LGBT pride flag</i>, is a symbol of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) pride and LGBT social movements.”<a href="#_ftn14" name="_ftnref14" title="">[14]</a></p>
<p>The second fire-water symbol is the hexagram.</p>
<p>“The hexagram consists of two equilateral triangles with the same centre but pointing in opposite directions, usually upwards and downwards. …The downward-pointing and upward-pointing triangles …symbolize the sexual union of the female and male principles, of Śakti and Śiva, of water and fire.”<a href="#_ftn15" name="_ftnref15" title="">[15]</a> </p>
<p>As indicated in the above paragraph, the hexagram occurs in Eastern religions such as Buddhism and Hinduism. The primary significance of the hexagram is arguably Jewish-Kabbalistic.<a href="#_ftn16" name="_ftnref16" title="">[16]</a> (More on Judaism, below.) However, there is a related (and possibly derivative) line in alchemy.<a href="#_ftn17" name="_ftnref17" title="">[17]</a></p>
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<p>“In alchemy, the two triangles of the hexagram …represent the union of fire and water.”<a href="#_ftn18" name="_ftnref18" title="">[18]</a> </p>
<p>However, the rainbow also has its place in the alchemical tradition.<a href="#_ftn19" name="_ftnref19" title="">[19]</a> “The rainbow is …symbolical of …[a particular] stage in the alchemical process. At a certain period, as a result of putrefaction, there is observed a phenomenon of many-coloured lights…”.<a href="#_ftn20" name="_ftnref20" title="">[20]</a> “A rainbow of colors appeared in the alchemist’s flask.”<a href="#_ftn21" name="_ftnref21" title="">[21]</a></p>
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<p>(From Kenneth Anger's [born Kenneth Wilbur Anglemyer] <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01G4DWL3K/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B01G4DWL3K&linkId=ab8d40adce515a8bf57c45c164118f73">Lucifer Rising</a></i>, 1972.</p>
<p>Crowley associates the Alchemical rainbow with “[t]he ‘coat of many colours’ said to have been worn by Joseph and Jesus, in the ancient legends…”.<a href="#_ftn22" name="_ftnref22" title="">[22]</a> </p>
<p>As with the rainbow, the hexagram has sexual undertones. The upwards-pointing triangle is said to symbolize the active, male generative organ, the phallus; the downwards-pointing triangle supposedly represents the passive, female receptive organ, the womb. Anyone familiar with Dan Brown’s <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0307474275/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0307474275&linkId=6e25da7eec6ef5186bc8dd4bc36c3164">Da Vinci Code</a></i> novel, or its big screen adaptation, will recall the importance of the “blade” and “chalice” to the “Holy Grail”-themed plot. </p>
<p>For that matter, alchemy itself is thoroughly shot-through with the psychosexual if not the explicitly sex-magical. In <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0738709034/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0738709034&linkId=ff98f9e220f294c3ea90bd5f55780d68">The Path of Alchemy</a></i>, Mark Stavish writes that “The ‘gay science’ is an ancient name for alchemy.”<a href="#_ftn23" name="_ftnref23" title="">[23]</a> </p>
<p>Following the visionary thinker James Shelby Downard, revisionist historian and writer Michael Hoffman has pointed out that alchemy comes in two “types.” On the one hand, there is an ersatz, exoteric, lead-into-gold variety. On the other hand, there is a genuine, esoteric, man-into-“superman” variety.<br />
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“By way of illustrating [this latter form of] human alchemy let us recall that Friedrich Neitzsche popularized the nickname for alchemy, the ‘gay science.’<a href="#_ftn24" name="_ftnref24" title="">[24]</a> In 1996, according to Pew Research, 65% of the American public opposed homosexual ‘marriage.’ …Pew reports that [by] 2012 only 44% of the American people oppose[d] homosexual marriage. …[T]here is no question that in a mere 16 years homosexual marriage has gained acceptance among an increasing number of Americans. The ‘gay science’ marches on and manages to process Americans away from a bedrock of Christian civilization.”<a href="#_ftn25" name="_ftnref25" title="">[25]</a></p>
<p>It is worth pointing out that, “[i]n alchemy, the ‘first matter,’ the substance from which the Philosopher’s Stone is created, or even the stone itself …[is] the <i>Prima Materia</i>[,] …the material beginning and end of all things.” Wouldn’t you know it? According to Martino Rulando, in his Lexicon Alchemie Sive Dictionarivm Alchemisticvm (“Lexicon of Alchemy or Dictionary of Alchemy,” 1612) one of the fifty “alternate names for the Prima Materia” was “The Rainbow – on account of its colors.”<a href="#_ftn26" name="_ftnref26" title="">[26]</a></p>
<p>The rainbow theme also surfaces in Freemasonry.<a href="#_ftn27" name="_ftnref27" title="">[27]</a> Notables here would include an appendant body called the “Royal Ark Mariners.”</p>
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<p>Additionally, there is the Masonic youth group known as the International Order of Rainbow Girls.</p>
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<p>The rainbow shows up on several Masonic “tracing boards” and “aprons.” For example, one website selling the “George Washington Apron” notes that said smock represents the prominent arch as a stylized rainbow. “The <i>rainbow</i> is sometimes associated with the Royal Arch. It is also part of the architectural arch, being the 9th arch under Solomon’s Temple. It is supported by two Pillars.”<a href="#_ftn28" name="_ftnref28" title="">[28]</a> </p>
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<p>A further question is what, if anything, do rainbows have to do with hexagrams? Can these symbolic threads be woven together? Is there a nexus at which the two strands meet?<a href="#_ftn29" name="_ftnref29" title="">[29]</a></p>
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<p>One possible answer is that the symbolism of rainbows and hexagrams intersect in the religion of Judaism or in the persons of various Jews. On the idea of religious intersection, consider two points.</p>
<p>Firstly, rainbows have a significance in Judaism beyond the minimal “sin symbol” noted above. Blogger Maurice Pinay informs us that “[t]he rainbow is the symbol of the Noachide movement – the movement to bring humanity under a rabbinic system of double standards called ‘Noachide Law’ enforced by subsidiary courts of a Sanhedrin based in Jerusalem.</p>
<p>“From Chabad Lubavitch website, noahide.org: ‘The Seven Noachide laws are general commandments with many details. Transgressing any one of them is considered such a breach in the natural order that the offender incurs the death penalty. Apart from a few exceptions, the death sentence for a Ben Noach is Sayif, death by the sword / decapitation, the least painful of the four modes of execution of criminals.<a href="#_ftn30" name="_ftnref30" title="">[30]</a> (The four methods of capital punishment in Torah are: S’kilah - Stoning; S’rifah - Burning; Hereg - Decapitation; Henek - Strangulation.) The many formalities of procedure essential when the accused is an Israelite need not be observed in the case of the Noachite. The latter may be convicted on the testimony of one witness, even on that of relatives, but not on that of a woman. He need have had no warning from the witnesses; and a single judge may pass sentence on him.’”<a href="#_ftn31" name="_ftnref31" title="">[31]</a></p>
<p>Secondly, the rainbow and hexagram symbols actually dovetail. This is suggested pictographically. Consider that, under at least one representation, “[t]he rainbow relaes to …spatial symbolism by way of its seven colours, or, more precisely, its six colours and white.<a href="#_ftn32" name="_ftnref32" title="">[32]</a> …Placed on the circumference of a circle the three primaries will be found at the three points of an equilateral triangle; the three complementaries will be at the points of a second triangle which is the reverse of the first, in such a way that each primary colour is placed at a diametrically opposed position to its complementary… [T]he seven colours form a wheel with six spokes, which is the two-dimensional equivalent of a three-dimensional cross having six branches emanating from a centre. In this way the colours correspond to the seven directions of space.”<a href="#_ftn33" name="_ftnref33" title="">[33]</a> </p>
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<p>As to the notion that the rainbow and hexagram merge in a more personal way, we remind readers that the rainbows springing up like weeds nowadays are related to the decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to legalize “same sex marriage.” Interestingly, despite the fact that Jews, statistically, are supposed to comprise only 2.5 percent of the U.S. population,<a href="#_ftn34" name="_ftnref34" title="">[34]</a> Jewish justices make up 33% of the “Supremes.”<a href="#_ftn35" name="_ftnref35" title="">[35]</a> Leaving aside the very important discussion concerning the genetic differences between Ashkenazi (who are probably descended from a tribe of Asiatic Turks known as “Khazars”) and Sephardic Jews, the received view is that Justices Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Elena Kagan are all ethnically Jewish.</p>
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<p>Notes:</p>
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<hr /><p><a href="#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1" title="">[1]</a> Readers should keep in mind the preoccupation of alchemy with gold. To your appetites, see John Matson, “Fact or Fiction?: Lead Can Be Turned into Gold, Particle Accelerators Make Possible the Ancient Alchemist’s Dream – But at a Steep Cost,” Scientific American, Jan. 31, 2014, <<a href="http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/fact-or-fiction-lead-can-be-turned-into-gold/">http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/fact-or-fiction-lead-can-be-turned-into-gold/</a>>. For more on alchemy see Jim Brandon, “Neil Armstrong: Astronaut …or Alchemist?” Bell Curve [weblog], Dec. 11, 2012, <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/12/neil-armstrong-astronaut-or-alchemist.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/12/neil-armstrong-astronaut-or-alchemist.html</a>> and “Speculation and Reflection on Chess,” <i>Bell Curve</i> [weblog], Jul. 24, 2013, <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/07/speculation-and-reflection-on-chess.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/07/speculation-and-reflection-on-chess.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref2" name="_ftn2" title="">[2]</a> As an additional “sync,” I note that <i>USA Today</i> reported on a fire at a water park. Jane Onyanga-Omara, “More than 500 Injured in Fire at Taiwan Water Park,” <i>USA Today</i>, Jun. 28, 2015, <<a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2015/06/28/hundreds-injured-taiwan-party/29420041/">http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2015/06/28/hundreds-injured-taiwan-party/29420041/</a>>. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref3" name="_ftn3" title="">[3]</a> <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0877282684/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0877282684&linkId=db72e731ce296646eb5a6193244f4d3c">The Book of Thoth</a></i>, reprint ed., Stamford, Conn.: U.S. Games Sys., 1996, p. 286. Cf. <i>ibid</i>., p. 35. Elsewhere, by inference, Crowley associates the rainbow with the drunken ecstasy (which word derives from the Greek for “standing outside of oneself”) of the Fool. See <i>ibid</i>., p. 68.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref4" name="_ftn4" title="">[4]</a> Adrian Snodgrass, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0877277001/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0877277001&linkId=164116b5d990aefdff31cb2c90f6cdad">The Symbolism of the Stupa</a></i>, Ithaca, N.Y.: Southeast Asia Program Publications; Cornell Univ., 1985, p. 289. “To the Khmer, the nāga was ‘the symbol of the rainbow, regarded as the magic bridge giving entry to the abode of the gods.’” Jean Chevalier and Alain Gheerbrant, <i>The Penguin Dictionary of Symbols</i> [PDS], John Buchanan-Brown, transl., reprint ed., New York: Penguin, 1997, p. 691.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref5" name="_ftn5" title="">[5]</a> <i>Ibid</i>., pp. 275ff; citing René Guénon, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00GWOK850/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B00GWOK850&linkId=5d0c7ba7cc831f682e2ad4435f7faf6b">Symboles fondamentaux de la science sacrée</a></i>, Paris: 1962.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref6" name="_ftn6" title="">[6]</a> Except for the extraneous “V” – a symbol that represents, variously Venus and vaginas (or wombs) – the letters R-O-Y-G-B-I are an anagram for “Bi Orgy.” Doubtless this is a coinkydink. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref7" name="_ftn7" title="">[7]</a> The Holy Bible, Book of Genesis, chapt. 9, verses 12-17. “Guénon has drawn attention to the importance of the way in which the rainbow complements the Ark by appearing over it as a sign of the ‘covenant.’” PDS, p. 42.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref8" name="_ftn8" title="">[8]</a> PDS, p. 115.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref9" name="_ftn9" title="">[9]</a> Mendy Kaminker, “What is the Significance of a Rainbow in Judaism?” Chabad, <<a href="http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/2770455/jewish/What-Is-the-Significance-of-a-Rainbow-in-Judaism.htm">http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/2770455/jewish/What-Is-the-Significance-of-a-Rainbow-in-Judaism.htm</a>>; citing <i>Likutei Sichot</i> vol. 35, Noah III. Kaminker adds that “The Zohar [she refers to vol. 1, 72:2] says that before the Messiah comes, an especially bright and colorful rainbow will appear.” For more on several Jewish angles, see further on.</p>
<p>Of possible interest is the remark of the mysterious – although some would say the literally <i>in</i>credible – John Todd. Todd, who alleged that he had been raised in a family of occultists, once <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rP1pRaUDFc">remarked</a> that, amongst practitioners of various “black arts”: “…Lucifer is [known as] the god of the rainbow. …And if you’ll read Ezekiel 28, you’ll find out [that] he is. He does kind of radiate like a rainbow. He’s covered with different colored jewels and so on.” (Listen beginning between 5:19-28.) A quick review of the cited passage in the Old Testament book of the prophet Ezekiel reveals that the jewels at issue include carnelian [reddish-brown], chrysolite [yellow] and emerald [green], topaz [red, yellow, gray, reddish-orange, or blue-brown], onyx [black] and jasper [red, yellow, brown or green], lapis lazuli [dark blue], turquoise [greenish blue] and beryl [colorless]. (Bracketed information comes from the top hits of various Google searches on strings such as “what color is [stone type]?”)</p>
<p>Also accruing to the “shadow side” of rainbow lore must be the statements of “serial” (cereal) killers Herman Mudgett and Anders Breivik. For Mudget – alias H. H. Holmes – murder was like “the seeking of buried treasure at the rainbow’s end.” (<<a href="http://murderpedia.org/male.H/h/holmes.htm">http://murderpedia.org/male.H/h/holmes.htm</a>>. For Breivik’s part (and he is technically classified as a mass murderer rather than a “serial” one), one website relates that “The defendant [Breivik] is of the opinion that Norwegian culture has been destroyed by the Marxists through a Marxist cultural revolution. The curriculum of Norwegian schools supports this. Songs such as ‘Children of the Rainbow’.” (<<a href="http://murderpedia.org/male.B/b/breivik-anders-judgment.htm">http://murderpedia.org/male.B/b/breivik-anders-judgment.htm</a>>.)</p>
<p>Some esoteric "adepts" try, through several means - often having to do with sex-magic - to manifest an spirit or "rainbow body." "Tibetan systems run somewhere between the Chinese and Indian, in that they are concerned with liberation, but also with the creation of an etherial body made from their bodily essences. This Diamond Body, or Rainbow Body, is pure light and can materialize at the will of the adept. Like the Chinese and Indian systems, the Tibetan system uses rituals for the purification of the mind and emotions of the practitioners, as well as the visual images in both anthropomorphic deities and abstract geometric forms. The Rituals of the Pentagram and Hexagram fulfill this function when performing the Middle Pillar." Mark Stavish, "Secret Fire: The Relationship Between Kundalini, Kabbalah, and Alchemy," Hermetic [dot] com, Mar. 11, 1997, (<<a href="http://hermetic.com/stavish/essays/secret-fire.html">http://hermetic.com/stavish/essays/secret-fire.html</a>>.).
<p>A final “satanic” aspect of the rainbow is its association with the chameleon. “Since the chameleon ‘has been given every color’,” certain tribes like the Dogon – important in the lore of the star Sirius – “associate it [i.e., the chameleon] with the rainbow, the path from Earth to Heaven.” PDS, p. 181. Interestingly, as Michael Hoffman has pointed out, the separation of heaven and earth was effected by means of Cronus-Saturn’s (i.e., Satan’s) “fateful sickle.” Michael A. Hoffman II, <i>Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare</i>, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho: Independent History and Research, 2001, p. 31</p>
<p>According to Crowley, however, the rainbow can be “pierced.” “[T]he occult significance of Sagittarius is the arrow piercing the rainbow; the last three paths of the Tree of Life make the word Qeseth, a rainbow, and Sagittarius bears the arrow which pierces the rainbow…”. <i>Op. cit</i>., p. 101.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref10" name="_ftn10" title="">[10]</a> <i>Ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref11" name="_ftn11" title="">[11]</a> 2 Peter 3:10, New Intl. Vers. For related information touching on “fire and ice,” see “Hercules (and his Twin),” <i>Bell Curve</i> [weblog]<i>,</i> Oct. 8, 2012, <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hercules-and-his-twin.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hercules-and-his-twin.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref12" name="_ftn12" title="">[12]</a> PDS, p. 909. There is another interesting voodoo tie in. “In his books <i>The Serpent and the Rainbow</i> ([New York: Simon and Schuster,] 1985) and [<i>Passage of Darkness:</i>] <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0807842109/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0807842109&linkId=6eb81d362d68c19dc6f5188e05273c80">The Ethnobiology of the Haitian Zombie</a></i> ([Chapel Hill, N.C.: Univ. of N.C. Press,] 1988), [Canadian anthropologist Wade] Davis not only gives his readers the components of zombification but also outlines his theories on why such a horrifying act exists: Making a zombie is a very effective method of capital punishment. …[T]he members of the secret Maroon societies used zombification – or the threat of it – to control first the slaves then the superstitious Haitian citizens. Davis’s conclusions have been clouded by allegations of farud and questions about his sensational, rather than scientific, approach. The Serpent and the Rainbow movie, starring Bill Pullman and directed by Wes Craven, opened in 1988.” Rosemary Guiley, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0816060487/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0816060487&linkId=b5e50b2b92eb23a90ac762e0c9eb022f">The Encyclopedia of Magic and Alchemy</a></i>, New York: Facts on File; Infobase Publ., 2006, p. 347. <br />
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Hence, the rainbow symbol arguably fits in with the so-called “Zombie culture.” “You probably know that zombies are popular right now. You might not know just how outrageously, staggeringly, mindblowingly popular they happen to be. Zombies are the undisputed king of all genres. Not only do they top bestseller lists and video games and the iPad, the undead dominate television, too. <i>The</i> <i>Walking Dead</i> attracts somewhere between three to four times the viewers of <i>Mad Men</i> on a typical night. And this week, <i>World War Z</i> arrives in theaters – the Brad Pitt adaptation of the bestselling novel. It will complete the zombie apocalypse. They are now, officially, everywhere.” (Stephen Marche, “Why Zombies Are Everywhere Now,” <i>Esquire</i>, Jun. 19, 2013, <<a href="http://www.esquire.com/entertainment/movies/a23139/why-zombies-are-everywhere/">http://www.esquire.com/entertainment/movies/a23139/why-zombies-are-everywhere/</a>>.)</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref13" name="_ftn13" title="">[13]</a> This is also mentioned in “The ‘Gospel of Judas’ and ‘Yezidism’ (‘Yazidism’),” <i>Bell Curve</i> [weblog], Aug. 20, 2012, <<a href="http://bellofchurch.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-gospel-of-judas-and-yezidism.html">http://bellofchurch.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-gospel-of-judas-and-yezidism.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref14" name="_ftn14" title="">[14]</a> “Rainbow flag (LGBT movement),” <i>Wikipedia</i>, Jun. 29, 2015, <<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbow_flag_%28LGBT_movement%29">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbow_flag_%28LGBT_movement%29</a>>. The flag, as designed by American artist Gilbert Baker, originally “had eight colors, each with a symbolic meaning: Hot Pink: sexuality[,] Red: life[,] Orange: healing[,] Yellow: sunlight[,] Green: nature[,] Turquoise: magic/art[,] Blue: serenity/harmony[,] Violet: spirit[.]” “Gilbert Baker (artist),” <i>Wikipedia</i>, May 21, 2015, <<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilbert_Baker_%28artist%29">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilbert_Baker_%28artist%29</a>>. A caption on the same page (<i>ibid</i>.) reads: “The six-colour version of the pride flag is the most commonly used version. The original version from 1978 had two additional stripes – hot pink and turquoise which were removed due to manufacturing needs.” If this information is accurate, it is noteworthy that the two omitted colors, considered jointly, exemplify <a href="http://www.cbc.ca/radio/q/schedule-for-friday-june-26-2015-1.3128742/pride-flag-creator-gilbert-baker-on-the-rainbow-s-real-meaning-1.3128763">sex-magic</a> – which is precisely the esoteric meaning of the alchemical <i>magnum opus</i> (“great work”).</p>
<p>As an aside, Gilbert Baker “designed the rainbow flag …in San Francisco in 1978.” So the rainbow flag first appeared in the now drought-affected Golden State. He was said to have been born in Kansas, however – in the water-drenched Midwest. See “82 Interesting Facts About …LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender),” <<a href="http://facts.randomhistory.com/facts-about-lgbt.html">http://facts.randomhistory.com/facts-about-lgbt.html</a>>.<br />
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For more analogs to the “rainbow flag,” see Bob Schlenker, “Part 11 – The Sodomite Gateway – FedEx – Our Most Important Package is Yours,” <i>Open Scroll Blog</i> [weblog], Feb. 15, 2012, <<a href="http://theopenscroll.blogspot.com/2012/02/part-11-sodomite-gateway-fedex-our-most.html">http://theopenscroll.blogspot.com/2012/02/part-11-sodomite-gateway-fedex-our-most.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref15" name="_ftn15" title="">[15]</a> Gudrun Bühnemann, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/8124603987/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=8124603987&linkId=1ec6c42cbaf94183bf936bb587a8ea1b">Maònòdalas and Yantras in the Hindu Traditions</a></i>, Leiden: Brill, 2003, pp. 43-44.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref16" name="_ftn16" title="">[16]</a> According to Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan, Judaism itself <i>is</i> an “Eastern religion.” “I think people often forget that Judaism is an Eastern religion. The prophets were really mystics.” Aryeh Kaplan, interviewed by Russell Barber, “Jewish Mysticism,” <i>First Estate</i>, WNBC-TV [New York Ciy], channel 4, 1979; archived online at <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAB19Jyp1BA>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref17" name="_ftn17" title="">[17]</a> As I disclosed three years ago in the “Knight of Aurora-Athena,” <i>Bell Curve</i> [weblog], Jul. 28, 2012, <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/07/knight-of-aurora-athena.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/07/knight-of-aurora-athena.html</a>>: “There are two traditional ways of preparing the Philosophers (sic.) Stone, the wet way and the dry way. The dry way takes only eight days using double philosophic mercury. ...Fragments from the writings of Heraclitus of Ephesus, a Greek philosopher who lived about 500BCE, suggest that the dry and wet methods have the same result: Pleasure of souls is to become wet | The dry soul is the best of all and the most wise | The way up and the way down are One and the same. The wet way, from Persia, is convenient because it only requires a simple flask, although it can take up to eighteen months to complete. …Preparing the Philosophers’ Stone by the wet method involves a number of stages. The first three of these stages are: 1. Prepare the Secret Fire, a nitrate catalyst. 2. Elicit and purify the white vapor of Mercury. 3. Dissolve the Sulphur and prepare the Philosophers’ Stone. …The ancient Egyptians reputedly used the dry method and called it the <i>Saturn Regime</i>. …The mineral of lead is certainly appropriate for the Saturn Regime or Dry Method. …Shakespeare concealed Portia, the Virgin of the Merchant of Venice, in lead.” Stuart Nettleton, <i>The Alchemy Key: Unraveling the Single Tangible Secret in All Mysteries</i>, Sydney, Australia: privately publ., [1997] 2002, pp. 201, 202-203 and 210; archived online at <<a href="http://www.hermetics.org/pdf/alchemy/Alchemy_Key.pdf">http://www.hermetics.org/pdf/alchemy/Alchemy_Key.pdf</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref18" name="_ftn18" title="">[18]</a> Bühnemann, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 44, n. 75.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref19" name="_ftn19" title="">[19]</a> It is apparent that the alchemical rainbow is itself a symbolic bridge. The rainbow symbol is a gateway to such other, now-prevalent symbols as the aurora, the peacock and winter.</p>
<p>“The rainbow of colors seen in the Peacock’s Tail gradually merged together into pure whiteness. …Symbolism of the Peacock’s Tail includes a rainbow appearing in the dark clouds of a thunderstorm, the bursting forth of the colors of spring after the darkness of winter, and the colors of the Aurora Borealis (Northern Lights) gleaming against the night sky.” Dennis William Hauck, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1592577350/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=1592577350&linkId=6f04827252637c3d04fb496a28fdca19">The Complete Idiot's Guide to Alchemy</a></i>, New York: Alpha Books, 2008, p. 151.)<br />
<br />
As I have sketched elsewhere, the peacock is also associated with Satan. See “The ‘Gospel of Judas’ and ‘Yezidism’ (‘Yazidism’),” Church Bell, Aug. 20, 2012, <<a href="http://bellofchurch.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-gospel-of-judas-and-yezidism.html">http://bellofchurch.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-gospel-of-judas-and-yezidism.html</a>>. NBC’s <a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3f/NBC_logo.svg/2000px-NBC_logo.svg.png">logo</a> is a rainbow peacock.</p>
<p>Although I have touched upon the winter symbol complex in such places as “47 (Or How Romney Lords It over Inferior Fools with Euclidean I-Ching),” <i>Bell Curve</i> [weblog]<i>,</i> Sept. 18, 2012, <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/47-or-how-romney-lords-it-over-inferior.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/47-or-how-romney-lords-it-over-inferior.html</a>> and, with Jim Brandon , “Re: ‘Alias St. Nick’,” <i>Bell Curve</i> [weblog], <http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/12/re-alias-st-nick.html>; it deserves a fuller treatment. For instance, in the popular “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0944947/">Game of Thrones</a>” cable television series, adapted from George R. R. Martin’s <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Song_of_Ice_and_Fire">A Song of Ice and Fire</a></i>, the phrase “<a href="http://gameofthrones.wikia.com/wiki/Winter_is_Coming_%28motto%29">Winter is Coming</a>” is the motto of the House of Stark. The “stark” name also occurs in the Marvel Avenger’s orbit, being the surname of “Iron Man” (Tony Stark). For a startling, side-by-side comparison of Tony’s father, Howard Stark, with the real life Jet Propulsion Lab-cofounder Jack Parsons, see “Shuttling Symbols,” <i>Bell Curve</i> [weblog], Oct. 14, 2012, <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/shuttling-symbols.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/shuttling-symbols.html</a>>. Of course, if one is cataloging recent items, one should not forget to list <i>Captain America: <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1843866/">The Winter Soldier</a></i>. Apparently there is a new tv show titled “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt4397640/">Winter</a>.” For something a bit more historical, one might note the Russian <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_Palace">Winter Palace</a>.</p>
<p>On Auroras, see for example “Aurora Rising (Aurora Consurgens), Part 1,” <i>Bell Curve</i> [weblog], Aug. 30, 2012, <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/aurora-rising-aurora-consurgens-part-1.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/aurora-rising-aurora-consurgens-part-1.html</a>> and Loren Coleman, “Aurora: Synchromystic Wonderland,” <i>Twilight Language</i> [weblog], Jul. 25, 2012, <<a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/07/aurora-synchro.html">http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/07/aurora-synchro.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref20" name="_ftn20" title="">[20]</a> Crowley, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 103. He further wrote: “In this card [i.e., Trump 14, ‘<a href="http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/crowley/tarot_images/arta.jpg">Art</a>’], therefore, is foreshadowed the final stage of the Great Work. Behind the figure, its edges tinged with the rainbow, which has now arisen from the twin rainbows forming the cape of the figure, is a glory bearing the inscription Visita Interiora Terrae Rectificando Invenies Occultum Lapidem. ‘Visit the interior parts of the earth: by rectification thou shalt find the hidden stone.’ Its initials make the word V.I.T.R.I.O.L., the Universal Solvent…”. <i>Ibid</i>., pp. 103-104.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref21" name="_ftn21" title="">[21]</a> Nettleton, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 13.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref22" name="_ftn22" title="">[22]</a> <i>Ibid</i>. Crowley refers the reader back to his discussion of “Au 0, the Motley of the Green Man, Dreamer-Redeemer.” <i>Ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref23" name="_ftn23" title="">[23]</a> Mark Stavish, <i>The Path of Alchemy: Energetic Healing and the World of Natural Magic</i>, Woodbury, Minn.: Llewellyn Publ., 2006, appendix c, p. 204, n. 12.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref24" name="_ftn24" title="">[24]</a> Nietzsche also popularized the idea of a “superman,” in the relevant sense.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref25" name="_ftn25" title="">[25]</a> Michael Hoffman, “Of Human Alchemy and the Gay Science,” <i>Revisionist Review</i> [weblog], Aug. 4, 2012, <<a href="http://revisionistreview.blogspot.com/2012/08/of-human-alchemy-and-gay-science.html">http://revisionistreview.blogspot.com/2012/08/of-human-alchemy-and-gay-science.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref26" name="_ftn26" title="">[26]</a> Guiley, <i>op. cit</i>., pp. 261 and 262.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref27" name="_ftn27" title="">[27]</a>For information on a possible link between Freemasonry and the "homosexual movement," see "Freemasonry's Connection To The Homosexual Movement," <<a href="http://www.home60515.com/23.html">http://www.home60515.com/23.html</a>>. <br />
<br />
There are numerous other associations. For example, in Ancient Greek mythology, “Iris was the goddess of the rainbow, the messenger of the Olympian gods. …Her name contains a double meaning, being connected both with <i>iris</i>, ‘the rainbow,’ and <i>eiris</i>, ‘messenger.’” “Iris,” <i>Theoi</i>, <<a href="http://www.theoi.com/Pontios/Iris.html">http://www.theoi.com/Pontios/Iris.html</a>>. See also “Tony Scott, Etc.,” <i>Bell Curve</i> [weblog], Aug. 21, 2012, <http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/tony-scott-etc.html>.<br />
<br />
Or again, there is a rainbow in the back of Albrecht Dürer’s celebrated 16th-century engraving, <a href="http://uploads1.wikiart.org/images/albrecht-durer/melancholia-1514.jpg">Melancholia I</a>. For more on this, see Frances Amelia Yates, <i>The Occult Philosophy in the Elizabethan Age</i>, reprint ed., London and New York: Routledge, 2001.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref28" name="_ftn28" title="">[28]</a> “The George Washington Apron,” Lodge Aprons [dot] com, <<a href="http://www.lodgeaprons.com/gw_apron/">http://www.lodgeaprons.com/gw_apron/</a>>. <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20100407112709/http:/www.lodgeaprons.com/gw_apron/">Cache</a>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref29" name="_ftn29" title="">[29]</a> For those who think that it is absurd to view symbols in this way, see Albert Mackey who, in his Encyclopedia of Freemasonry, likens the rainbow to a masonic handshake. “The Hebrew word <i>oth</i>, is frequently used in Scripture to signify a sign or memorial of something past, some covenant made or promise given. Thus God says to Noah, of the rainbow, ‘it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth’; and to Abraham he says of circumcision, ‘it shall be a token of the covenant betwixt me and you.’ In Freemasonry, the grip of recognition is called a <i>token</i>, because it is an outward sign of the covenant of friendship and fellowship entered into between the members of the Fraternity, and is to be considered as a memorial of that covenant which was made, when it was first received by the candidate, between him and the Order into which he was then initiated.” <br />
<br />
For more on how symbols are used to bamboozle non-initiates, see Michael A Hoffman, <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Societies-Psychological-Warfare-Michael-Hoffman/dp/0970378416">Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare</a></i>, Coeur d’Alene, Idaho: Independent History and Research, 2001 and “Are the Pyramid and All-Seeing Eye Symbols 'Masonic'?” <i>Bell Curve</i> [weblog] Jun. 6, 2015, <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2015/06/are-pyramid-and-all-seeing-eye-symbols.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2015/06/are-pyramid-and-all-seeing-eye-symbols.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref30" name="_ftn30" title="">[30]</a> Chabad’s website encourages the reader to “see the Rambam’s Hilchos Melachim 9:14.”</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref31" name="_ftn31" title="">[31]</a> Maurice Pinay, “The Real Dangers of the Rainbow,” <i>MauricePinay</i> [weblog], Jul. 30, 2007, <<a href="http://mauricepinay.blogspot.com/2007/07/real-hidden-dangers-of-rainbow.html">http://mauricepinay.blogspot.com/2007/07/real-hidden-dangers-of-rainbow.html</a>>; reproducing an excerpt from “The Seven Laws of the Descendents of Noah,” Noahide [dot] org, <<a href="http://www.noahide.org/article.asp?Level=173&Parent=166">http://www.noahide.org/article.asp?Level=173&Parent=166</a>>; citing Talmud tractate Sanhedrin, folios 57a and b and Maimonides, <i>Hilchos Melakim</i>, 9:14.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref32" name="_ftn32" title="">[32]</a> “The six colours of the rainbow are the three primaries – red, yellow and blue – and the three complementaries – orange, purple and green.” Snodgrass, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 287.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref33" name="_ftn33" title="">[33]</a> Snodgrass, <i>op. cit</i>., pp. 286-287.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref34" name="_ftn34" title="">[34]</a> Alan M. Dershowitz calls this a “high estimate”: “…take a high estimate of Jews as 2.5 percent of the general U.S. population…”. (Alan M. Dershowitz, <i>The Vanishing American Jew: In Search of Jewish Identity for the Next Century</i>, Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 2000, p. 346, n. 22.)</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref35" name="_ftn35" title="">[35]</a> Patrick J. Buchanan, “Are Liberals Anti-WASP? If Kagan is Confirmed, the Court Will consist of 3 Jews and 6 Catholics,” <i>WorldNetDaily</i>, May 13, 2010, <http://www.wnd.com/2010/05/153417/>.</p>
Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-27983826411934860332015-06-06T13:34:00.002-07:002015-06-13T17:20:04.256-07:00Are the Pyramid and All-Seeing Eye Symbols 'Masonic'?<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://watch.pair.com/eye.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="499" src="http://watch.pair.com/eye.jpg" width="478" /></a></div><br />
<p>Numerous self-assured bloggers and writers make the claim that the pyramid and “all-seeing eye” symbolism on the dollar bill is benign or, at least, non-“Masonic.”<a href="#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" title="">[1]</a></p>
<p>One prominent website that takes this line concentrates heavily on showing that the people who “contributed elements to the final design …were not Freemasons.” </p>
<p>Even if this is granted, this information, while certainly interesting and possibly useful, cannot be considered a decisive “refutation” of the claim that the great seal is “Masonic” (in some sense) any more than we can show (say) that a mural on a building is not a susceptible to being labeled “Christian” because the architect who placed it there and the decorators who created it have no locatable baptismal records. For all we know, non-Christian artists could have been commissioned or otherwise expressly tasked with producing a Christian-themed arrangement. Similarly, for all we know, non-Masons may have been charged with inventing a (broadly) “Masonic” composition. These possibilities are not foreclosed upon by noticing that the contract workers are not Christians or Masons, respectively.</p>
<p>Investigators are advised to probe matters a bit more deeply. One obvious starting point would be to ask the question: what scholarly work, if any, has been done in this area?</p>
<p>According to Freemasonic apologist, Dr. S. Brent Morris, the "expert on the Great Seal" is Dr. Robert R. Hieronimus.<a href="#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2" title="">[2]</a> <br />
<br />
Dr. Hieronimus summarizes placement of the eye-pyramid symbol on the dollar bill by Freemason Franklin Roosevelt, at the behest of Freemason Henry Wallace, possibly under the direction of the Theosophist Nicholas Roerich.<br />
<br />
"In 1934, secretary of agriculture and former vice president Henry A. Wallace submitted a proposal to the president to mint a coin depicting the [great] seal's obverse and reverse. Wallace's interest in the seal's reverse had been aroused when he discovered Hunt's 1909 volume [cited above] on the seal's history. The Latin phrase <i>Novus Ordo Seclorum</i> (New Order of the Ages) struck him as meaning 'the New Deal of the ages.' President Franklin D. Roosevelt was so impressed with this connection that he decided to place both sides of the Great Seal on the dollar bill rather than a coin. Roosevelt's action brought 153 years of obscurity to an end, and the seal's reverse was officially recognized.<br />
<br />
"Wallace was interested in esoteric topics and was a friend of the Russian mystic Nicholas Roerich. One theory holds that <b>Wallace undertook the promotion of the seal's reverse for kabbalistic reasons</b>,* with Roerich as his guru."<a href="#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3" title="">[3]</a> <br />
<br />
Around 1927, Henry Wallace, an admirer of Russian mystic Helena Blavatsky and an adherent of her brand of occultism (called "theosophy"), "...joined the Masons, ...[a] secret society rich with ritual... George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Theodore Roosevelt, and numerous other prominent men, including Wallace's own father, were active Masons. <b>Wallace participated in both the Blue Lodge</b> [that is, the first three degrees of Craft Freemasonry] <b>and the Scottish Rite</b> [that is, an 'appendant' Masonic body offering degrees from four through thirty-three] <b>branches of Masonry and received the Thirty-second Degree</b> in November 1928. He stopped there - one step short of the Scottish Rite's highest rank [In fact, the thirty-third degree is honorary, as opposed to "earned." - Ed.] - but <b>maintained his affiliation with the Masons until the late 1940s</b>,* when he 'demitted' from the Masonic lodges in both Des Moines and Washington, D.C."<a href="#_ftn4" name="_ftnref4" title="">[4]</a><br />
<br />
Franklin Roosevelt's Masonic affiliation is easily verifiable.<a href="#_ftn5" name="_ftnref5" title="">[5]</a><br />
<br />
Nicholas Roerich was, among other things, a Theosophist. (Here, one can consult any number of publicly available resources, such as <i>Wikipedia</i>.)<br />
<br />
Two features common to both Freemasonry and Theosophy are salient.<br />
<br />
First, both systems are Luciferian. <br />
<br />
Blavatsky's system of thought is overtly Luciferian. To put it a different way, Blavatsky plainly announced that, to her, Lucifer was the true god, while the Biblical God was, at best, a pretender (and at worst the genuine "adversary").<br />
<br />
"...<i>Demon est Deus inversus</i> ['the devil is god, inverted']. The devil is now called <i>Darkness</i> by the Church, whereas, in the Bible he is called the 'Son of God' (see Job), the bright star of the early morning, <b><i>Lucifer </i></b>(see Isaiah). There is a whole philosophy of dogmatic craft in the reason why the first Archangel, who sprang from the depths of Chaos, was called <i>Lux </i>(Lucifer), the 'Luminous Son of the Morning,' or manvantaric Dawn. He <b>was transformed by the Church into Lucifer or Satan, because he is higher and older than Jehovah, and had to be sacrificed to the new dogma</b>."<a href="#_ftn6" name="_ftnref6" title="">[6]</a><br />
<br />
On the other hand, Freemasonry is <i>covertly </i>Luciferian. Unknown to low-grade, so-called "porch Masons," at its highest levels, Freemasonry espouses the same teaching regarding Lucifer as does Theosophy.<br />
<br />
Masonic authority Albert Pike wrote the following in his monumental (as well as tedious and largely unoriginal) <i>Morals & Dogma</i>:<br />
<br />
"<b>LUCIFER</b>, the Light-bearer! Strange and mysterious name to give to the Spirit of Darkness! Lucifer, the Son of the Morning! <b>Is it he who bears the Light,</b> and with its splendors intolerable blinds feeble, sensual, or selfish Souls? <b>Doubt it not!</b>"<a href="#_ftn7" name="_ftnref7" title="">[7]</a><br />
<br />
Secondly, both Freemasonry and Theosophy revolve around symbols.</p>
<p>Every symbol has two categories of meaning: (1) outer, exoteric, false (misleading or incomplete) meaning; and (2) inner, esoteric, true meaning.</p>
<p>As Dr. Hieronimous has stated: "<b>Symbols conceal and they reveal</b>."<a href="#_ftn8" name="_ftnref8" title="">[8]</a> </p>
<p>To be exact, symbols "reveal" esoteric meaning to initiates who "have eyes to see" while obscuring the inner-meaning from non-initiates (disparagingly called by secret society adherents the "profane"). Non-initiates thus apprehend - and parrot - exoteric meaning only. <br />
<br />
Blavatsky expressed this dynamic in <i>The Secret Doctrine</i>. Note well her phrase "truth concealed by the symbol":<br />
<br />
"The ancients ...conceal[ed] ...[the] true nature [of occult powers] under various allegories, for the benefit (or to the detriment) of the <b>uneducated rabble</b>, they never departed from the multiple object in view, while <b>inverting them</b>. They <b>contrived to throw a thick veil over the nucleus of truth concealed by the symbol</b>, but they ever tried to preserve the latter as a record for future generations, <b>sufficiently transparent to allow their wise men to discern that truth behind the fabulous form of the glyph</b> or allegory."<a href="#_ftn9" name="_ftnref9" title="">[9]</a> <br />
<br />
Here, Freemasonry proclaims its symbolic obsession quite directly:<br />
<br />
"Of the various modes of communicating instruction to the uninformed, the masonic student is particularly interested in ...the instruction ...by symbols. ...No science is more ancient than that of symbolism. ...To study the symbolism of Masonry is the only way to investigate its philosophy. <b>This is the portal of its temple, through which alone we can gain access to the <i>sacellum </i>['shrines'] where its <i>aporrheta </i>['secret doctrines'] are concealed</b>."<a href="#_ftn10" name="_ftnref10" title="">[10]</a> <br />
<br />
As with Blavatsky, Masonic encyclopedist Albert Mackey in the above quotation stressed the relationship between symbols and "concealed" "truth." We may summarize Mackey by saying that, in Freemasonry, symbols are literally the keys to Temple.<br />
<br />
We call special attention to the mocking attitude, apparent in these few quoted lines, that "initiates" of these occult systems have for outsiders (<i>cowan</i>). The origin of the word "hoodwink" comes from this arrogant disposition.<br />
<br />
Mackey's <i>Encyclopedia </i>(cited above) defines "hoodwink" as follows:<br />
<br />
"A symbol of the secrecy, silence, and darkness in which <b>the mysteries of our art should be preserved from the unhallowed gaze of the profane</b>."<a href="#_ftn11" name="_ftnref11" title="">[11]</a></p>
<p>"Profane" here designates any person who has not been admitted into the Masonic "Temple" - <i>pro-fanus</i> means "before (that is, outside of) the temple."</p>
<p>However, the hoodwink must be understood as sort of hidden-in-plain-sight gambit, as opposed to outright concealment. That this is so is apparent from the upper echelon's mocking even of lower-level initiates - in a manner similar to what one finds in college fraternities.<br />
<br />
The Scottish Rite's erstwhile Sovereign Grand Commander Albert Pike goes further: "The Blue Degrees are but the outer court or portico of the Temple. Part of the symbols are displayed there to the Initiate, but <b>he is intentionally mislead by false interpretations</b>."<a href="#_ftn12" name="_ftnref12" title="">[12]</a><br />
<br />
(Incidentally, as the former head of the Scottish Rite, Albert Pike was instrumental in establishing his Order's headquarters [the House of the Temple] in Washington, D.C., right in the seat of Federal power.)<br />
<br />
Pike proceeds to expand upon the process of misleading people - even low-grade initiates - as to the true significance of various symbols.<br />
<br />
"It is not intended that he shall understand them [the symbols]; <b>but it is intended that he shall imagine he understands them</b>. Their true explication is reserved for the Adepts, the Princes of Masonry. ...It is well for the mass of those called Masons, to imagine that all is contained in the Blue Degrees; and <b>whoso attempts to undeceive them will labor in vain</b>... Masonry is the veritable Sphinx, buried to the head in the sands...".<a href="#_ftn13" name="_ftnref13" title="">[13]</a><br />
<br />
Following their Luciferian inversion-tactics, Masons "hoodwink" what they regard as the ignorant the "masses" by a cruel (mis-)application of John 1:5:<br />
<br />
<i>Lux lucet in tenebris, et tenebrae non comprehenderunt</i>.<br />
<br />
Translated, this says: "The light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not."<br />
<br />
In the Gospel of John, Jesus himself is the light, and the darkness is the sinful world. In the Freemasonic inversion, the "light" is that of Masonry's hidden (occult) teachings and the "darkness" is, well, the "unenlightened."<br />
<br />
This is the not-at-all-concealed meaning of "Illuminism" and "Illuminati." They fancy themselves the "Enlightened" ones - Plato's philosopher kings.<br />
<br />
Here, also, is another hoodwink. As Rabbi Marvin Antelman has written:<br />
<br />
"The Hebrew word for one who is 'poor' is <i>ani</i>, which is a letter rearrangement of the Hebrew word <i>ayin</i>, 'eye.' <b>The pyramid with the eye signifying enlightenment is the symbol of the king-priest Platonic caste and the Illuminati</b>."<a href="#_ftn14" name="_ftnref14" title="">[14]</a> <br />
<br />
In his book, <i>The Secret Teachings of All Ages</i>, Freemasonic philosopher and "mystic" Manly Palmer Hall wrote: <br />
<br />
"<b>If any one doubts the presence of Masonic and occult influences at the time the Great Seal was designed, he should give due consideration to the comments of Professor Charles Eliot Norton of Harvard</b>...".<a href="#_ftn15" name="_ftnref15" title="">[15]</a><br />
<br />
Remarking on the All-Seeing Eye poised conspicuously above the truncated pyramid, Professor Norton stated:<br />
<br />
"[I]t can hardly (however artistically treated by the designer) look otherwise than as <b>a dull emblem of a masonic fraternity.</b>"<a href="#_ftn16" name="_ftnref16" title="">[16]</a><br />
<br />
Norton was no slouch. Researcher Linda Dowling paints Professor Norton in the following terms:<br />
<br />
"...Charles Eliot Norton ...[was] an <b>eminent scholar</b> and professor of art history at Harvard, and a figure widely regarded as <b>the most cultured man in America</b>."<a href="#_ftn17" name="_ftnref17" title="">[17]</a><br />
<br />
The back matter for the book <i>The Liberal Education of Charles Eliot Norton</i>, by James Turner, states of Norton that he was a:<br />
<br />
"...<b>towering figure in American journalism, letters, and education</b>. Norton was editor of the <i>North American Review</i> and a founder of the <i>Nation</i> [periodical]. He was the leading American Dantist [Dante scholar] of his day, translating the <i>Vita Nuova</i> and the <i>Divine Comedy</i> in what became standard versions. He initiated art history in the college curriculum, organized the field of classical archaeology in the United States, and formulated what has come to be known in college courses as 'Western Civilization.'"<a href="#_ftn18" name="_ftnref18" title="">[18]</a></p>
<p>To summarize:</p>
<p>According to the person (Dr. Hieronimous) acknowledged by Freemasonic spokesman S. Brent Morris to be the authority on the Great Seal, two high-level Freemasons were responsible for the placement on the dollar bill of the unfinished pyramid with the all-seeing eye.<a href="#_ftn19" name="_ftnref19" title="">[19]</a></p>
<p>According to the same authority, one Theosophist may have orchestrated the entire thing.</p>
<p>Freemasons (and Theosohists) ostentatiously display symbols in order to mislead non-initiates and communicate <i>sub rosa</i> meaning to "Adepts."</p>
<p>The pyramid-eye symbol has been admitted to be Masonic by Freemasonic philosopher Manly Hall.</p>
<p>The pyramid-eye symbol was recognized as obviously "Masonic" (broadly construed) by eminent scholar and Harvard University art expert Charles Eliot Norton.</p>
<p><b>For these reasons alone - and more beside - it is <i>reasonable</i> to hold that both:</b></p>
<p><b>(1.) The standard, "non-Masonic" interpretations of the Great Seal – articulated by such websites as <a href="http://greatseal.com/mythamerica/notmasonic.html">http://greatseal.com/mythamerica/notmasonic.html</a> – are merely echoes of an exoteric cover story that has been calculated to mislead percipients; and,</b></p>
<p><b>(2.) The Masonic interpretation <i>is</i> viable.</b></p>
<p>Notes:</p>
<br />
<hr /><p><a href="#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1" title="">[1]</a> For just one example, see ”Is the Pyramid & Eye on the Great Seal (and Dollar Bill) a Masonic symbol?” <a href="http://greatseal.com/mythamerica/notmasonic.html">http://greatseal.com/mythamerica/notmasonic.html</a>. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref2" name="_ftn2" title="">[2]</a> Morris's opinion in this matter is expressed in an interview with Christian J. Pinto, <i>Secret Mysteries of America's Beginnings Volume 3: Eye of the Phoenix, Secrets of the Dollar Bill</i>, DVD, Antiquities Research Films, 2009. As of this writing, the entire 170 min. presentation is on YouTube at <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88-YHGqf27k">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88-YHGqf27k</a>. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref3" name="_ftn3" title="">[3]</a> Robert Hieronimus, <i>Founding Fathers, Secret Societies: Freemasons, Illuminati, Rosicrucians, and the Decoding of the Great Seal</i>, Rochester, Vermont: Inner Traditions, 2006, p. 103. * Kabbalah refers to a tradition of Jewish mysticism and magic.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref4" name="_ftn4" title="">[4]</a> John C. Culver and John Hyde, <i>American Dreamer: A Life of Henry A. Wallace</i>, New York: W.W. Norton, 2001, p. 81. * Note: Culver and Hyde seem unaware that the 33rd degree is strictly honorary. * The dollar was decorated by Roosevelt in 1934-1935, well before "the late 1940s."</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref5" name="_ftn5" title="">[5]</a> See FDR's online tribute at the website for the Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania, <a href="http://www.pagrandlodge.org/mlam/presidents/froosevelt.html">http://www.pagrandlodge.org/mlam/presidents/froosevelt.html</a>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref6" name="_ftn6" title="">[6]</a> H. P. Blavatsky, <i>The Secret Doctrine: The Synthesis of Science, Religion, and Philosophy</i>, vol. 1, p. 70, Theosophical Univ. Press, online ed., <a href="http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-1-04.htm">http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-1-04.htm</a>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref7" name="_ftn7" title="">[7]</a> Albert Pike, <i>Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry</i>, reprint ed., Richmond, Va.: L.H. Jenkins, 1946, p. 321.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref8" name="_ftn8" title="">[8]</a> In Christian Pinto, <i>loc. cit</i>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref9" name="_ftn9" title="">[9]</a> Blavatsky, <i>The Secret Doctrine</i>, vol. 1, p. 466, <a href="http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-2-14.htm">http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-2-14.htm</a>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref10" name="_ftn10" title="">[10]</a> Albert G. Mackey, <i>Encyclopedia of Freemasonry</i>, Chicago: The Masonic History Co., 1956, vol. 2, p. 1033. See also Albert Gallatin Macke, <i>The Symbolism of Freemasonry: Illustrating and Explaining Its Science and Philosophy, Its Legends, Myths, and Symbols</i>, New York: Clay & Maynard, 1869.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref11" name="_ftn11" title="">[11]</a> Vol. 1, p. 464.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref12" name="_ftn12" title="">[12]</a> Pike, <i>Morals and Dogma</i>, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 819.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref13" name="_ftn13" title="">[13]</a> <i>Ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref14" name="_ftn14" title="">[14]</a> Marvin S. Antelman, <i>To Eliminate the Opiate</i>, vol. 2, Israel: Zionist Book Club, 2002, p. 99.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref15" name="_ftn15" title="">[15]</a> Manly P. Hall, <i>The Secret Teachings of All Ages: An Encyclopedic Outline of Masonic, Hermetic, Qabbalistic and Rosicrucian Symbolical Philosophy</i>, San Francisco: H.S. Crocker, 1928, p. 91; reproduced online at <a href="http://www.sacred-texts.com/eso/sta/sta21.htm">http://www.sacred-texts.com/eso/sta/sta21.htm</a>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref16" name="_ftn16" title="">[16]</a> Gaillard Hunt, ed., <i>The History of the Seal of the United States</i>, Washington D.C.: United States Department of state, Government Printing Office, 1909, p. 55; archived online at <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=jUZmAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA55">https://books.google.com/books?id=jUZmAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA55</a>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref17" name="_ftn17" title="">[17]</a> Linda Dowling, <i>Charles Eliot Norton: The Art of Reform in Nineteenth-Century America</i>, Lebanon, N.H.: Univ. of New Hampshire Press, 2007, p. ix.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref18" name="_ftn18" title="">[18]</a> James Turner, <i>The Liberal Education of Charles Eliot Norton</i>, Baltimore & London: The Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 1999, back matter.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref19" name="_ftn19" title="">[19]</a> Note well that S. Brent Morris is entirely hostile to the idea that there is any nefarious symbolical import to the symbol. Hence, his endorsement of Hieronimous is extremely valuable, evidentially speaking.</p>
<p>For more information, see Robert Keith Spenser's <i>The Cult of the All-Seeing Eye</i> (Hawthorne, Cal.: Christian Book Club of America, 1964) and Freemason David Ovason's <i>The Secret Symbols of the Dollar Bill</i> (New York: HarperCollins, 2003).</p>Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-81736079216000093922014-11-28T17:10:00.000-08:002014-11-28T17:11:17.080-08:00Keystone Kop?<div style="text-align: center;">
"<b>Do you mock me? Where is the keystone?</b>"<br />
~ Silas <span style="font-size: x-small;"> (The Da Vinci Code, Columbia, 2006) </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9hGFRoBSOB9yDiGnZ6t2E3MVecheqJBno2CXbjFPMifWOANnSjaZkbtWWN9nDwke4v8eFY3OHvBNeN5d44bpf_ESEXKydhueV8JJBIt_Hmpqro0GigN9Q57v6_UZauRC8htFqkGgYf9z1/s1600/1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9hGFRoBSOB9yDiGnZ6t2E3MVecheqJBno2CXbjFPMifWOANnSjaZkbtWWN9nDwke4v8eFY3OHvBNeN5d44bpf_ESEXKydhueV8JJBIt_Hmpqro0GigN9Q57v6_UZauRC8htFqkGgYf9z1/s1600/1.jpg" height="249" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://images.moviefanatic.com/iu/t_full/v1364990965/the-da-vinci-code-photo.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Synchromystic trailblazer Loren Coleman recently <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2014/11/arch-bomb.html">posted</a> about the supposed plot, by certain radicals operating in St. Louis, to bomb the <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/cover-story-2014-12-08">Gateway Arch</a>.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQBhntgefaXrM-TN3fL5PqsRedgoFuWMmv_paituMrhxKqaT9KIpabGKPDuGjrM9VS2vOkNqJa-kO83eFWf-cpYTsEoXyuPYKmaCX_JHBsEtl031_ygIlMutUAVUOtvZRCTvFS0btb5EVT/s1600/8.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQBhntgefaXrM-TN3fL5PqsRedgoFuWMmv_paituMrhxKqaT9KIpabGKPDuGjrM9VS2vOkNqJa-kO83eFWf-cpYTsEoXyuPYKmaCX_JHBsEtl031_ygIlMutUAVUOtvZRCTvFS0btb5EVT/s1600/8.jpg" height="320" width="234" /></a></div>
<span style="font-size: xx-small;"> </span><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://img.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-wemple/files/2014/11/nyercover.jpg">Source</a>)</span><br />
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As Coleman notes, this structure, known to St. Louisans as the "Arch," was represented on the latest cover of the cultural magazine, <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/cover-story-2014-12-08"><i>The New Yorker</i></a>. The image, which depicts the Arch in a sort of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taijitu">Taijitu</a>-esque (Yin-Yang) juxtaposition of white and black, strikingly visually summarizes the media's preoccupation with racial tensions in the St. Louis County municipality of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferguson,_Missouri">Ferguson</a>.<br />
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Importantly, <i>The New Yorker</i>'s Arch is missing its uppermost portion - including the crucial segment known in architecture as the "<a href="http://www.ldsces.org/content/images/manuals/dc-trm/dc-002.gif">keystone</a>."<br />
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The reference source, <i>Encyclopedia of Freemasonry</i>, has the following to say about the word "Keystone": "The stone placed in the center of an arch which preserves the others in their places, and secures firmness and stability to the arch. As it was formerly the custom of Operative Masons to place a peculiar mark on each stone of a building to designate the workman by whom it had been adjusted, so the Keystone was most likely to receive the most prominent mark, that of the Superintendent of the structure. Such is related to have occurred to that Keystone which plays so important a part in the legend of the <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2014/11/Ferguson.html">Royal Arch Degree</a>."<span style="font-size: xx-small;"> (Albert Mackey, vol. 1, Chicago: Masonic History, 1956, p. 517.)</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhP2YL6s-G5AEsLUUAw9gTjInmMpH5d6De2KlR5ZPwIe7bHPogVJ7SVEV56qr5Px-uuLDgt0wCm8BzCoLJ2D-jpX7C2iBdqQru_fYBj6a3iIM5z20rJAmEneiMrkkGK9BhbvwrMegOCBlf-/s1600/2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhP2YL6s-G5AEsLUUAw9gTjInmMpH5d6De2KlR5ZPwIe7bHPogVJ7SVEV56qr5Px-uuLDgt0wCm8BzCoLJ2D-jpX7C2iBdqQru_fYBj6a3iIM5z20rJAmEneiMrkkGK9BhbvwrMegOCBlf-/s1600/2.jpg" height="320" width="319" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.tampayorkrite.com/images/Royal.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDF9ImgYb9XAKKEophFuWGKZ9dmfDkSxwG-02ye2WF6z4CvqdwnPl6ms_YEI8_BMfkjPPogTXuNNyxKlESpBbcY0doeA2Vb-ooNNTgIvUIcDgTghzc4q_0jXnnSTRhgmPvzGsrXB3r5w7g/s1600/3.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDF9ImgYb9XAKKEophFuWGKZ9dmfDkSxwG-02ye2WF6z4CvqdwnPl6ms_YEI8_BMfkjPPogTXuNNyxKlESpBbcY0doeA2Vb-ooNNTgIvUIcDgTghzc4q_0jXnnSTRhgmPvzGsrXB3r5w7g/s1600/3.png" height="278" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(Symbol for the Deathly Hallows, <i>Harry Potter</i>; <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/51/Deathly_Hallows_Sign.svg/2000px-Deathly_Hallows_Sign.svg.png">source</a>)</span></div>
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Under the heading "Vault, Secret," one reads: "As a symbol, the Secret Vault does not present itself in the first Degrees of Freemasonry. It is found only in the advanced Degrees, Such as the Royal Arch of all the Rites, where it plays an important part. Doctor Oliver, in his Historical Landmarks <span style="font-size: xx-small;">(volume ii, page 434)</span>, gives, while referring to the building of the second Temple, the following general detail of the Masonic legend of this vault:<br />
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"'The foundations of the Temple were opened, and cleared from the accumulation of rubbish, that a level might be procured for the commencement of the building. While engaged in excavations for this purpose, three fortunate Sojourners are said to have discovered our ancient Stone of Foundation, which had been deposited in the secret crypt by Wisdom, Strength, and Beauty, to prevent the communication of ineffable secrets to profane or unworthy persons.<br />
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"'The discovery having been communicated to the Prince, Prophet, and Priest of the Jews, the stone was adopted as the chief corner-stone of the re-edified building, and thus became in a new and more expressive sense, the type of a more excellent Dispensation. An avenue was also accidentally discovered, supported by seven pairs of pillars, perfect and entire, which, from their situation, had escaped the fury of the flames that had consumed the Temple, and the desolation of war that had destroyed the city.<br />
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"'The Secret Vault, which had been built by Solomon as a secure depository for certain secrets that would inevitably have been lost without some such expedient for their preservation, communicated by a subterranean avenue with the king's palace; but at the destruction of Jerusalem the entrance having been closed by the rubbish of falling buildings, it had been discovered by the appearance of a <b>keystone </b>amongst the foundations of the <i>Sanctum Sanctorum</i>. A careful inspection was then made, and the invaluable secrets were placed in safe custody.'" <span style="font-size: xx-small;">(Mackey, vol. 2, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 1075.)</span><br />
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Of course, this out to get one's Fortean wheels turning as another recent news item has been about a controversial oil pipeline. What's the name, again? Oh, yes, that's right: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keystone_Pipeline">The</a> <a href="http://www.newsweek.com/2014/12/05/all-eyes-keystone-another-tar-sands-pipeline-just-crossed-border-286685.html">Keystone</a>.<br />
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Lexi-Links abound, it seems. An award-winning, Canadian-made, Internet-driven video series called "Guidestones" began in 2012. During that first season, episode 24 <span style="font-size: x-small;">(see <a href="http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/nov/24/rioting-breaks-out-in-ferguson-after-grand-jury-cl/">November 24 riots</a>)</span> was titled "<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2749960/">The Keystone</a>."<br />
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The series's symbol is reminiscent of the <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2014/08/Tridents-Sync.html">trident theme</a> that Coleman has, of late, posted on numerous times (<a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2014/11/Trident-Bell.html">1</a>, <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2014/07/venice-deaths.html">2</a>, <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2014/08/Aug-24.html">3</a>, etc.).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgihj1jQ2J3BchigO9yCH_gybeW5PDuajmf43_JU55bsiN74d3ZEzjdObYyhJRtnXjserirn0nAucaeQXUyTfnbP5xCOHf9W8QAtbAKqeePjX3kbpdELNtcNgrYQgf3SbY-L7Vh41YpknaY/s1600/4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgihj1jQ2J3BchigO9yCH_gybeW5PDuajmf43_JU55bsiN74d3ZEzjdObYyhJRtnXjserirn0nAucaeQXUyTfnbP5xCOHf9W8QAtbAKqeePjX3kbpdELNtcNgrYQgf3SbY-L7Vh41YpknaY/s1600/4.jpg" height="320" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/11/The_Guidestones_Symbol.jpg">Source</a>) </span></div>
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Perhaps most peculiarly, Guidestones was directed by one Jay <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0272472/bio?ref_=nm_ov_bio_sm"><b>Ferguson</b></a>.<br />
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The director's surname, obviously, draws the mind at once back to the beleaguered Missouri city/suburb of Ferguson. On August 9, 2014, for those who need the refresher, 18-year-old Michael Brown was shot and killed by police officer Darren Wilson. (Note: Former Ferguson, MO police officer Darren Wilson should not be confused with the Darren Wilson of the <a href="http://keystonenevada.com/board-of-directors/darren-wilson/">Keystone Corporation</a>.)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAH_iVlN9nJw7BTdH99Y6nisUl7HjMUhV93SsgsUQNSPeb-YNMNSYrr1BKhVDLgCtua6DIH074dz7JhSkxomXImVA5L4WgIAXHzxAH0JGOCWvNg5Cs9LX5n_z_Gq5NspD9OkoVR0m6PLWk/s1600/7.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAH_iVlN9nJw7BTdH99Y6nisUl7HjMUhV93SsgsUQNSPeb-YNMNSYrr1BKhVDLgCtua6DIH074dz7JhSkxomXImVA5L4WgIAXHzxAH0JGOCWvNg5Cs9LX5n_z_Gq5NspD9OkoVR0m6PLWk/s1600/7.JPG" height="303" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2014/08/19/1408461061325_Image_galleryImage_Officer_DARREN_WILSON_pic.JPG">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Does this perhaps make Wilson a Keystone Kop?<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJqWOP8PqXmiHsCoYLfLEBIrPzz0hUHLYqVNGW5YxQsgxOF2Qoo8JVZjo0SLCCVuSAT_Jp5ebfIeLDGJUaLjCUpL_Zf9vAuq7Hv9mGXxp0CGC2e8dCBlTURnvKNDj4rBcIMz5aDhGdToBq/s1600/5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJqWOP8PqXmiHsCoYLfLEBIrPzz0hUHLYqVNGW5YxQsgxOF2Qoo8JVZjo0SLCCVuSAT_Jp5ebfIeLDGJUaLjCUpL_Zf9vAuq7Hv9mGXxp0CGC2e8dCBlTURnvKNDj4rBcIMz5aDhGdToBq/s1600/5.jpg" height="248" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bd/KeystoneKops.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcP5Yw7z3Qq6bOpM2DynwFVOAIFqx9W-EHt2I3XZtS-1UIh1r8EiAmuIaeOh_KjDd9QEMhhuA9YlAjQMfQ0MyRPiK8XfLXTCFqGAmhhr0sjz-rN5j9BU-Jnk4eWENmSBcaMRBPLLVKH7KF/s1600/6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcP5Yw7z3Qq6bOpM2DynwFVOAIFqx9W-EHt2I3XZtS-1UIh1r8EiAmuIaeOh_KjDd9QEMhhuA9YlAjQMfQ0MyRPiK8XfLXTCFqGAmhhr0sjz-rN5j9BU-Jnk4eWENmSBcaMRBPLLVKH7KF/s1600/6.jpg" height="303" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.hollywoodoutbreak.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/keystone-kops-350x332.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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See also <a href="http://www.edkohout.com/mundane/arch-1.html">HERE</a>.Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-21581074799860167342014-08-27T14:57:00.002-07:002015-10-31T10:18:18.547-07:00Through the Griffin Door<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://jesslyn8706.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/gryffindor.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="600" src="http://jesslyn8706.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/gryffindor.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<p>(Harry Potter's Gryffindor)</p><br />
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<a href="http://cdn2.independent.ie/incoming/article30525329.ece/13ba8/ALTERNATES/h342/corey+griffin.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="342" src="http://cdn2.independent.ie/incoming/article30525329.ece/13ba8/ALTERNATES/h342/corey+griffin.PNG" width="405" /></a></div><br />
<p>(ALS "Ice Bucket Challenge" founder, Corey Griffin)</p><br />
<p>On August 20, the <a href="http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/ice-bucket-challenge-co-founder-corey-griffin-drowns-diving-%20%20tragedy-1461982" target="_blank" shape="rect">IBT</a> reported that "Ice Bucket Challenge Co-Founder <b>Corey Griffin</b> Drown[ed] in [a] Diving Tragedy".</p>
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<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/c2/Peter_Griffin.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="405" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/c2/Peter_Griffin.png" width="342" /></a></div><br />
<p>(Family Guy's Peter Griffin)</p><br />
<p>Prior to Robin Williams's suicide, it was <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2723457/BBC-shows-episode-Family-Guy-involving-Robin-Williams-failed-suicide-attempt-just-minutes-death-announced.html" target="_blank">reported</a> that "BBC shows episode of Family Guy involving Robin Williams and failed suicide attempt just minutes before his death is announced".</p>
<p>The main anti-hero of that animated situation comedy is none other than <b>Peter Griffin</b>.<br />
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<a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20110428134608/http://understandingdeeppolitics.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/drg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="247" src="https://web.archive.org/web/20110428134608/http://understandingdeeppolitics.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/drg.jpg" width="359" /></a></div><br />
<p>(Professor David Ray Griffin)</p><br />
<p>Or again, as we approach the anniversary of 9/11, we might revisit some of the independent, investigative work that has been summarized most ably - and most famously - by Professor <b>David Ray Griffin</b>.</p>
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<a href="http://previous.presstv.ir/photo/Site%20Video/09-29-2011/Webster_Tarpley.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://previous.presstv.ir/photo/Site%20Video/09-29-2011/Webster_Tarpley.jpg" width="450" /></a></div><br />
<p>(Webster Griffin Tarpley)</p>
<p>Another writer who has gotten into the 9/11 pageant was Webster Griffin Tarpley in his <i>9/11 Synthetic Terror: Made in USA</i> (Joshua Tree, Cal.: Progressive Press, 2005). His <i>George Bush: The Unauthorized Biography</i> (with Anton Chaitkin, Washington, D.C.: Executive Intelligence Review, 1992) and <i>Barack H. Obama: The Unauthorized Biography</i> (Joshua Tree, Calif. : Progressive, 2008) are also noteworthy.</p>
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<a href="http://www.alt-market.com/images/stories/g-edward-griffin.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="336" src="http://www.alt-market.com/images/stories/g-edward-griffin.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<p>(Writer G. Edward Griffin)</p><br />
<p>I would be remiss if I neglected the Federal Reserve critic and author of <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Creature-Jekyll-Island-Federal/dp/0912986212">The Creature From Jekyll Island</a></i>, G. Edward Griffin.</p>
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<a href="http://www.pgriff.info/about.jpg " imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="309" src="http://www.pgriff.info/about.jpg " width="300" /></a></div><br />
<p>("Professor Griff," Richard Griffin)</p><br />
<p>Another notable would be Richard Griffin, the rapper better known by the stage name, Professor Griff. Check him out being interviewed by radio host Alex Jones <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PV_wN-kqwaQ" target="_blank">HERE</a></p>
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<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fc/Walterburleygriffin.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="393" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fc/Walterburleygriffin.jpg" width="270" /></a></div><br />
<p>(Architect Walter Burley Griffin.)</p><br />
<p><a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/">Loren Coleman</a> also mentions <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Burley_Griffin">Walter Burley Griffin</a>, an early associate of esteemed architect Frank Lloyd (<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hue-of-lincoln.html">Lincoln</a>) <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Lloyd_Wright">Wright</a>.</p>
<p>Of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Griffin" target="_blank">course</a>: "The griffin, griffon, or gryphon ...is a legendary creature with the body, tail, and back legs of a lion; the head and wings of an eagle; and an eagle's talons as its front feet." </p>
<p>The Griffin "will ...tear to pieces any human beings which it happens to come across." (T.H. White, ed., <i>The Book of Beasts</i>, New York: G.P. Putnam, 1960, p. 24.)</p>
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<a href="http://www.grandmasgraphics.com/graphics/tenniel/aiw/aiw082.jpg " imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="346" src="http://www.grandmasgraphics.com/graphics/tenniel/aiw/aiw082.jpg " width="500" /></a></div><br />
<p>(Alice In Wonderland's Gryphon)</p><br />
<p>"It's all about as curious as it can be," said the Gryphon. (Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, 1866, chap. 10.)</p>
<p>Sources:</p>
<p><a href="http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/ice-bucket-challenge-co-founder-corey-griffin-drowns-diving-tragedy-1461982">http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/ice-bucket-challenge-co-founder-corey-griffin-drowns-diving-tragedy-1461982</a></p>
<p><a href="http://cdn2.independent.ie/incoming/article30525329.ece/13ba8/ALTERNATES/h342/corey+griffin.PNG">http://cdn2.independent.ie/incoming/article30525329.ece/13ba8/ALTERNATES/h342/corey+griffin.PNG</a> </p>
<p><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/c2/Peter_Griffin.png">http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/c2/Peter_Griffin.png</a> </p>
<p><a href="http://understandingdeeppolitics.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/drg.jpg">http://understandingdeeppolitics.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/drg.jpg</a> </p>
<p><a href="http://www.alt-market.com/images/stories/g-edward-griffin.jpg">http://www.alt-market.com/images/stories/g-edward-griffin.jpg</a> </p>
<p><a href="http://www.pgriff.info/about.jpg">http://www.pgriff.info/about.jpg</a> </p>
<p><a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2723457/BBC-shows-episode-Family-Guy-involving-Robin-Williams-failed-suicide-attempt-just-minutes-death-announced.html">http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2723457/BBC-shows-episode-Family-Guy-involving-Robin-Williams-failed-suicide-attempt-just-minutes-death-announced.html</a> </p>
<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Griffin">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Griffin</a> </p>
<p><a href="http://www.grandmasgraphics.com/graphics/tenniel/aiw/aiw082.jpg">http://www.grandmasgraphics.com/graphics/tenniel/aiw/aiw082.jpg</a> </p>
<p><a href="http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Alice%27s_Adventures_in_Wonderland_%281866%29/Chapter_10">http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Alice%27s_Adventures_in_Wonderland_%281866%29/Chapter_10</a> </p>
Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-3318128936786358722013-12-16T19:19:00.002-08:002017-12-28T18:48:27.900-08:00Re: 'Alias St. Nick'<div style="text-align: left;">by Matthew Bell</br>with Jim Brandon</br><span style="font-size:80%;">author of <i>Weird America</i></br>and <i>The Rebirth of Pan</i></div></p>
<p>As daylight dwindles and even the chill of autumn begins to seem to us a warm memory, we are beset from all sides by bad news. From relentless Centers for Disease Control flu alarmism to the repeated warnings of the imminent threat of economic catastrophe – on this, the 100<sup>th</sup> “birthday” year of the Federal Reserve – we are, it seems, infected with the dreaded “seasonal affective disorder.” To put it less clinically, our spirits flag and winter’s icy fingers extend from their polar stronghold to tighten their grip on our collective neck. Oh, “…[r]espite! Respite and nepenthe…”.<a href="#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" title="">[1]</a> Exasperation drives the question: “Lord, to whom shall we go?”<a href="#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2" title="">[2]</a></p>
<p>When, “what to our wondering eyes should appear” but that endangered species of architectural burlesque, the contemporary Cathedral of consumerism that is a <i>shopping mall</i>. </p>
<p>Hundreds of poor wretches scramble inside. On each heart is the hope of exchanging a wad of rapidly devaluing cash for just a little taste of Christmas cheer.</p>
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</iframe>
<p>But, Lo! Who is <i>this</i> in the midst of this hustle-bustle, serenely enthroned, on a garish chair, in an ostentatious bright ruby-red getup? </p>
<p>In “normal” circumstances, such an apparently dreadful fashion sensibility would alert the style-conscious mavens of 21<sup>st</sup>-century America to the presence of mental disorder. Forthwith would commence a predictable process of social ostracization – punctuated, perhaps, with 50,000 volts bursting forth from the taser of some excitable police rookie or rent-a-cop charging forward toward the red menace like an enraged bull after a <i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muleta">muleta</a></i>. </p>
<p>Here however, amongst the surrounds of this luxuriantly festooned galleria, the figure decked out in a brilliant scarlet and snow-white outfit has all the animal charm of a living lodestone. The crowd is scattered about him, transfixed – like bits of iron frozen under the invisible influence of a tremendous red magnet. </p>
<p><i>And the children</i> – how they throng the open space! Each tiny form draws slowly and inexorably in towards the jolly fat man, like a doomed little planet caught in the gravitational field of a red giant star. Most remarkably, on impact, they spill their little guts, some sobbing wildly, while others whisper secret desires into this stranger’s ear!</p>
<p>Is this the latest in the Nefarious Surveillance Agency’s bid to keep tabs on Americans? Is this some secret agent masquerading about, donning this absurd disguise and proffering an assumed name? Is it a modern retelling of the age-old tale of a wolf going hunting in sheep’s clothing?</p>
<p>No! It’s Santa Claus, of course. Alias Kris Kringle.<a href="#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3" title="">[3]</a> Alias Father Christmas.<a href="#_ftn4" name="_ftnref4" title="">[4]</a> <i>Alias…Saint Nick</i>! So check this out as “the jolly old elf” is cartoonized into a predatory cat licking his chops over delectable mice – or kiddies? – from Santa skeptics at MGM as early as 1935. (You may need to turn up the volume a bit on this one. Also, be sure to check the endnote to see what those movie folks were doing at their own studio Christmas parties. Adults only, please!)<a href="#_ftn5" name="_ftnref5" title="">[5]</a></p>
<p><iframe width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/rjGrkN4DMtw" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
<p>Who is Santa Claus, really?</p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="http://www.orbitbooks.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/santa-5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="367" src="http://www.orbitbooks.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/santa-5.jpg" width="285" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.orbitbooks.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/santa-5.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<p>Consulting the popular source <i>Wikipedia</i>, one learns about Santa’s proximate origins in a Dutch figure labeled <i>Sinter Klaas</i>. Supposedly a bastardization of Sint Nikolass (“Saint Nicholas”), Sinter Klaas is alleged to be a reference to a 3<sup>rd</sup>-4<sup>th</sup> century Lycian bishop named Nicholas of Myra.<a href="#_ftn6" name="_ftnref6" title="">[6]</a> </p>
<p>The well-known 19<sup>th</sup>-century short story writer, Washington Irving, included a surrealistic vignette in his <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0143105612/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0143105612&linkId=aac882443063efe367d4286a80824d0f">A History of New York</a></i> (1812 ed.), a fanciful pseudo-history of the Dutch settlers of New York first published on St. Nicholas Day in 1809, that depicted St. Nicholas taking flight.<a href="#_ftn7" name="_ftnref7" title="">[7]</a></p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c8/Lorenzo_Lotto_-_St_Nicholas_in_Glory_with_Sts_John_the_Baptist_and_Lucy_-_WGA13707.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="836" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c8/Lorenzo_Lotto_-_St_Nicholas_in_Glory_with_Sts_John_the_Baptist_and_Lucy_-_WGA13707.jpg" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c8/Lorenzo_Lotto_-_St_Nicholas_in_Glory_with_Sts_John_the_Baptist_and_Lucy_-_WGA13707.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">(“Saint Nicholas in Glory,” by Lorenzo Lotto (1529).<a href="#_ftn8" name="_ftnref8" title="">[8]</a>)</div>
<p>According to this version, our beloved Santa Claus is thus said to be a sixteen-hundred year throwback to a real-life Christian holy man with a penchant for outrageous magnanimity – a prominent example of which involved, as the story goes, sacks of gold making their merry ways down a chimney<a href="#_ftn9" name="_ftnref9" title="">[9]</a> (on which more below), traditionally the “devil’s corner” in European folklore, saving three penniless maidens from lives of humiliating whoredom. </p>
<p>It seems that enthroned in our malls is generosity personified: good ol’ Nick himself (or a reasonable facsimile thereof). </p>
<p>Or is it?</p>
<p>Some allege that there’s something sinister lurking under those classic Santa features.<a href="#_ftn10" name="_ftnref10" title="">[10]</a> You know the ones we mean. As envisioned by the theologian-<i>cum</i>-poet, Clement Clarke Moore (or could it have been Henry Livingston, Jr.?), and popularized, first by greeting card pioneer Louis Prang in <i>fin de siècle</i> America, and then by the Coca-Cola company in vast advertising campaigns during the 1930s, we’re referring to those twinkling eyes, rosy cheeks, cherry nose, droll mouth, snow-like beard, and plump belly. </p>
<p>Is this the face of evil?</p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrIyb3RyaYFbH2tpL1DvTrtokQcuIB5aukzTJkc8a1NOYIxuTcyZHKLTMSYUVev4_p08usGGuP0CuvZsNXovmlOspiqz0oSTxpwSaWubhwSGMVpxAUWJL6ABYXQcQ8rPKBMBeDghQslKKz/s1600/1933_Coca_Cola.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="634" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrIyb3RyaYFbH2tpL1DvTrtokQcuIB5aukzTJkc8a1NOYIxuTcyZHKLTMSYUVev4_p08usGGuP0CuvZsNXovmlOspiqz0oSTxpwSaWubhwSGMVpxAUWJL6ABYXQcQ8rPKBMBeDghQslKKz/s1600/1933_Coca_Cola.JPG" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrIyb3RyaYFbH2tpL1DvTrtokQcuIB5aukzTJkc8a1NOYIxuTcyZHKLTMSYUVev4_p08usGGuP0CuvZsNXovmlOspiqz0oSTxpwSaWubhwSGMVpxAUWJL6ABYXQcQ8rPKBMBeDghQslKKz/s1600/1933_Coca_Cola.JPG" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>Gadshill: “Sirrah, if they meet not with saint Nicholas’ clerks, I’ll give thee this neck.”</br> Chamberlain: “No, I'll none of it: I pray thee keep that for the hangman; for I know thou worshippest saint Nicholas as truly as a man of falsehood may.”</i><a href="#_ftn11" name="_ftnref11" title="">[11]</a></div>
<p>Considered as an anagram, the letters of his name S – A – N – T – A, can be rearranged to generate the proper noun <i>Satan</i>.<a href="#_ftn12" name="_ftnref12" title="">[12]</a> This point was made especially memorably by the Saturday Night Live character, the Church Lady (<a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0014C49PA/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B0014C49PA&linkId=a6edbc0b1fc8a33bc92e3545c80f052c">Dana Carvey</a>).</p>
<p><iframe width="500" height="281" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/62Qfbrc1jdo" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
<p>“Church Lady: Hello, I’m the Church Lady, and this is ‘Church Chat.’ Well, you know, the holiday season has arrived. And, with it, a little letter from Toledo, Ohio. Let’s read that, shall we?</p>
<p>“[ reading ] ‘Dear Church Lady: I am shocked at the number of people who bring their children to total strangers in Santa suits, and allow them to hold their young ones firmly on their pelvic regions, offer them candy and whisper, <i>Don’t be afraid to tell me what you really want!</i> What causes this mass hysteria?’ Signed, Elaine.</p>
<p>“Well, Elaine, let’s examine the word ‘Santa,’ shall we? [ holds up board with ‘SANTA’ spelled across it in removable letters ] Santa. Let’s see, what have we got here? We’ve got an S and an A, an N, a T, and another A. Hmm.. [ rearranges the letters ] Who could be causing all those laps to bounce up and down curiously? Who would help grown men peel the focus from the baby Jesus on his birthday? Who could it be, I just don't know. Could it be.. [ echo ] Satan?!?! [ the letters now spell ‘SATAN’ ]”<a href="#_ftn13" name="_ftnref13" title="">[13]</a></p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="http://www.brewpalace.com/Images/Beer/Youngs-OldNick.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="375" src="http://www.brewpalace.com/Images/Beer/Youngs-OldNick.jpg" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.brewpalace.com/Images/Beer/Youngs-OldNick.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<p>There is much more. The “good ol’ Saint Nick” moniker is an echo of a popular sobriquet for the Devil himself: <i>Old Nick</i>. The Online Etymology Dictionary relates that this usage of “Nick” was in place “…by the 1640s” adding that “…the reason for it is obscure.”<a href="#_ftn14" name="_ftnref14" title="">[14]</a></p>
<p>Terry Gilliam incorporates this designator into his odd 2009 flick, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003DPKCNY/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B003DPKCNY&linkId=95aabcb7adc86d8bcfc920b2562c5268">The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus</a></i>. Otherwise known as the ill-fated “Joker”-actor Heath Ledger’s final film (he died midway through filming), Gilliam’s devil-character is called “Mr. Nick.” </p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="https://vgy.me/2hJjgV.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="335" src="https://vgy.me/2hJjgV.jpg" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/anderson.cooper.360/blog/2006/08/did-santa-claus-kill-jonbenet.html" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<p>This sinister current in the Santa tradition has some disturbing <a href="http://thesynchromystic.com/">synchronicities</a>. Consider, for instance, the infamous – and still unsolved – murder of the six-year-old girl, JonBenét Ramsey. </p>
<p>The basic contours of the incident are fairly widely reported as follows. On December 26, 1996, the lifeless body of the “beauty pageant princess” was discovered in the basement of her family’s house in Boulder, Colorado. Her date of death is now given as Christmas.</p>
<p>Besides the child’s parents, John and Patsy Ramsey, numerous suspects have been suggested. One such candidate was: “William 'Bill' McReynolds, a retired University of Colorado journalism professor who gained unwanted notoriety as the man who played St. Nick<a href="#_ftn15" name="_ftnref15" title="">[15]</a> for the family of JonBenet Ramsey…”.<a href="#_ftn16" name="_ftnref16" title="">[16]</a></p>
<p>“McReynolds and his wife, Janet, both came under some scrutiny as potential suspects…, not only because he’d been in the house shortly before JonBenet’s slaying, but also because police discovered two eerie parallels between the McReynold’s lives and details from the Ramsey case.</p>
<p>“For one, it was discovered that a daughter of McReynolds, plus another young girl, had once been abducted in Longmont[, Colorado, northeast of Boulder] by an unknown assailment. The second girl was molested. The McReynolds girl, 9 at the time, was not. Both were released within hours. The date of the incident was Dec. 26, 1974 – 22 years<a href="#_ftn17" name="_ftnref17" title="">[17]</a> to the day before JonBenet’s murder was discovered.</p>
<p>“Additionally, police learned that Janet McReynolds had written a play in 1977, <i>Hey Rube</i>,<a href="#_ftn18" name="_ftnref18" title="">[18]</a> based on the 1965 torture-murder in Indiana or a teen-age girl who – like JonBenet – was found dead in a basement.”<a href="#_ftn19" name="_ftnref19" title="">[19]</a></p>
<p>Regarding the real-life apparent abduction of her own daughter, Janet McReynolds reported that the captor “…had a change of heart. He wept and said, ‘The Devil made me do it.’ He drove the girls back to the edge of town and released them.”<a href="#_ftn20" name="_ftnref20" title="">[20]</a></p>
<p>Although Sinter Klaas himself is <i>usually</i> cast as “…a protector of children”,<a href="#_ftn21" name="_ftnref21" title="">[21]</a> aggression against children is a component in the lore of Sinter Klaas’s “assistant.”<a href="#_ftn22" name="_ftnref22" title="">[22]</a> In this vein, we should examine the Dutch tradition, periodically denounced from predictable quarters as being “racist,” of depicting Sinter Klaas with a “dark helper.” Named <i>Zwarte Piet</i>, that is “Black Pete,” the curious figure, who now executes inoffensive tasks such as tossing sweets (<i><a href="http://us.123rf.com/400wm/400/400/ivonnewierink/ivonnewierink1010/ivonnewierink101000209/7975053-zwarte-piet-met-handen-vol-van-traditionele-snoep.jpg">snoepgoed</a></i>) to the kiddies, once performed the more antagonistic rôle of punishing ne’er do wells.<a href="#_ftn23" name="_ftnref23" title="">[23]</a> </p>
<p>“‘Sinterklaas’ travels from Spain by boat, accompanied with his white horse and an agile Moorish slave called ‘Black Peter.’ …For the naughty, there’s nothing. And for the really bad, an awful fate awaits as Black Peter searches them out in the night, even if they try hiding under their beds. When he finds them, he stuffs them into a canvas sack and drags them back to Spain, where they are drowned in an inkwell or ground up into pepper.”<a href="#_ftn24" name="_ftnref24" title="">[24]</a></p>
<p>According to some accounts, Black Pete owes his dark color to the fact that he, and not particularly Sinter Klaas, gains entrance to various houses by way of their soot-lined chimneys. There are chimney-connexions with Thor (see the above link<a href="#_ftn25" name="_ftnref25" title="">[25]</a>) and Harry Potter, both recently depicted in multiple blockbusters, as well as with the arch-Freemason, John Theophilus Desaguliers, who, besides being a grand master of the Grand Lodge of England and an early-day scientist, also busied himself with the study of chimneys.<a href="#_ftn26" name="_ftnref26" title="">[26]</a></p>
<p><iframe width="500" height="281" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/gWPiq4dixBc" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
<p>Perhaps, as Clayton L. Wright playfully imagined in his satirical “Masonic Christmas Card”:</p>
<p>“… ‘Why Santa!’ he shouted and lowered his blade, | ‘I see you’re a Mason!’ the Tyler relayed | …Adorned like the Master’s, complete with a sign | Of ‘Lodge Number One, the North Pole’ on one line! …”.<a href="#_ftn27" name="_ftnref27" title="">[27]</a> </p>
<p>“Soot,” in turn, is etymologically connected to the mythical Egyptian lord of chaos, <i>Set</i>. Even about Saint Nick himself, we read in the aforementioned poem, “A Visit From Saint Nicholas,” (now better known under the title, taken from its opening line, “’Twas the Night Before Christmas”):</p>
<p>“…He was dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot | And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot…”.<a href="#_ftn28" name="_ftnref28" title="">[28]</a></p>
<p>This description is apparently operative in the Santa artwork of caricaturist Thomas Nast, whose early depictions of the Christmas icon looked more like the swarthy chimney spelunker, Pete, than the immaculate red-suited fellow we think of today. Some Santa researchers have thus been led to speculate that Santa may be of a piece with Big Foot or the Scandinavian Wild Men.<a href="#_ftn29" name="_ftnref29" title="">[29]</a></p>
<p><i>Ordo Templi Orientis</i> occultist Kenneth Grant makes the tantalizing comment, concerning the word “soot” (meaning <i>black</i>) that “[o]ur word ‘soot’ derives from this incalculably ancient name [Set]. Set was the primordial god of the Egyptians; no earlier exists in the recorded history of the present human race.”<a href="#_ftn30" name="_ftnref30" title="">[30]</a></p>
<p>“In medieval iconography, Saint Nicholas is sometimes presented as taming a chained devil, who may or may not be <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zwarte_Piet">black</a>.”</p>
<p>What is this ancient Egyptian magical name, or rather its derivative, doing in a poem about Christmas? Is Black Pete a tamed devil? Does St. Nick enjoy dominion over the demonic realm as apparently did other characters such as St. Dunstan and St. Elegius?<a href="#_ftn31" name="_ftnref31" title="">[31]</a></p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="http://images.bridgemanart.com/api/1.0/image/600wm.UIG.3468350.7055475/535464.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="363" src="http://images.bridgemanart.com/api/1.0/image/600wm.UIG.3468350.7055475/535464.jpg" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://images.bridgemanart.com/api/1.0/image/600wm.UIG.3468350.7055475/535464.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20100117063501/http://anvilfire.com/21centbs/stories/images/StEligius_03.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="345" src="http://web.archive.org/web/20100117063501/http://anvilfire.com/21centbs/stories/images/StEligius_03.jpg" width="264" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.anvilfire.com/21centbs/stories/images/StEligius_03.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<p>Or worse, can a case be made that Santa Claus <i>is</i> none other than Black Pete, the devil himself? These, and many other, questions press themselves on attentive cultural observers.</p>
<p>Apart from typographical errors and a potentially off-putting tenor of evangelical “preachiness,” an impressive summary of the dastardly evidence against Santa can be read on Terry Watkins’s webpage, “<a href="http://www.av1611.org/othpubls/santa.html">Santa Claus: The Great Imposter</a>.”<a href="#_ftn32" name="_ftnref32" title="">[32]</a></p>
<p>Furthermore, Santa’s northern abode has sinister symbolic connotations. “Then the LORD said unto me, Out of the north an evil shall break forth upon all the inhabitants of the land.”<a href="#_ftn33" name="_ftnref33" title="">[33]</a></p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="http://www.crystalinks.com/saturncronus.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="350" src="http://www.crystalinks.com/saturncronus.jpg" width="469" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.crystalinks.com/saturncronus.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<p>The insightful cosmological writer, David Talbott, saw things in Saturnian terms:</p>
<p>“In ancient ritual Saturn appears as the stationary sun or central fire at the north celestial pole. When Saturn ruled the world, his home was the summit of the world axis: with this point all major traditions of the great father [Saturn,<a href="#_ftn34" name="_ftnref34" title="">[34]</a> in his view] agree. Even today, in our celebration of Christmas, we live under the influence of the polar Saturn. For as Manly P. Hall observes, ‘Saturn, <i>the old man who lives at the north pole</i>, and brings with him to the children of men a sprig of evergreen (the Christmas tree), is familiar to the little folks under the name of Santa Claus.’”<a href="#_ftn35" name="_ftnref35" title="">[35]</a></p>
<p>Freemasonic authority Albert Mackey, writing in his important <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00MJ59FY6/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B00MJ59FY6&linkId=6e8a321ed9e48158a7654990c8487f0b">Encyclopedia of Freemasonry</a></i>, explains that: “The north is Masonically called a <i>Place of Darkness</i>. … The east was the place of the sun's daily birth, and hence highly revered; the north the place of his annual death, to which he approached only to lose his terrific heat, and to clothe the earth in darkness of long nights and dreariness of winter.”<a href="#_ftn36" name="_ftnref36" title="">[36]</a></p>
<p>This judgment is arguably corroborated by both Jewish and Christian traditional symbology, according to chroniclers. In the former, “[a]ccording to the [early Kabbalistic] book <i>Bahir</i>, north is the abode of evil; and Satan, the principle of temptation and evil comes from the north.”<a href="#_ftn37" name="_ftnref37" title="">[37]</a> In the latter, the north stand for “…the region of Lucifer and powers of evil…”.<a href="#_ftn38" name="_ftnref38" title="">[38]</a></p>
<p>St. Augustine reportedly has stated outright: “The Devil has his abode in the North.”<a href="#_ftn39" name="_ftnref39" title="">[39]</a></p>
<p>If not the Devil, then who is he?<a href="#_ftn40" name="_ftnref40" title="">[40]</a> Did we pass too quickly over the possibility that St. Nick is a spook or a government operative of some sort? It seems that Santa’s mandate does include surveillance. </p>
<p>“…He sees you when you’re sleeping | He knows when you’re awake | He knows if you’ve been bad or good | So be good for goodness sake! | So! You better watch out…”<a href="#_ftn41" name="_ftnref41" title="">[41]</a> </p>
<p>How, pray tell, does Santa “know” things of this nature? Has he the ability to remotely activate our webcams and cellular microphones? Well, that was the thrust of pop music satirist Ray Stevens in his hilarious ‘70s spoof, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00A2TKN4W/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B00A2TKN4W&linkId=156d7fe62d343bd3c22d8d9d1cad0812">Santa Claus Is Watchin’ You</a></i> [still available as an MP3 from Amazon] in which the ol’ dude is really the head of the CIA, and a snooping pain in the butt toward practically everyone.</p>
<p>“Absurd! How dare you?” you say? </p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="http://i.imgur.com/O8Bq8Ka.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="281" src="http://i.imgur.com/O8Bq8Ka.jpg" width="500" /></a></div> <br /><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://i.imgur.com/O8Bq8Ka.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<p>One must consider, here, the fact that in 2013 Santa’s “flight” from the North Pole<a href="#_ftn42" name="_ftnref42" title="">[42]</a> will – from takeoff to final landing – be overseen (from an operational standpoint), by the North American Aerospace Defense Command, otherwise known as NORAD.</p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="https://953wiki.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/NORAD-Santa-tracker.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://953wiki.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/NORAD-Santa-tracker.jpg" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="https://953wiki.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/NORAD-Santa-tracker.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<p>Once the proud residents of thirteen subterranean suites deep in the heart of that primo synchromystic landmark, <i>Cheyenne Mountain</i> (Colorado), made famous in the 1983 movie <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0015NORDW/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B0015NORDW&linkId=f7a0fa66d10ccc24221483be2b5d01de">WarGames</a></i>, these days NORAD occupies humbler quarters, inside <i>Peter</i>son Air Force Base out east of Colorado Springs. As for Cheyenne Mountain, much more later but for now, think <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002KPINY8/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B002KPINY8&linkId=e946cea378edac7192fc5f28abf2ae99">Stargate</a></i>…</p>
<p>In any case, the military got into the Santa protection racket back when NORAD was known as the Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD). One fateful Christmas back in 1955, the same year that Dr. Emmett Brown “first” tested his now-famous “flux capacitor,” successfully sending young <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00498XR9U/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B00498XR9U&linkId=003645f5296386629eaed94533c9ab8f">Marty McFly</a> “back” to 1985, a well-meaning but sloppy copy editor made an historic error.<a href="#_ftn43" name="_ftnref43" title="">[43]</a> Persons unknown placed a Sears (perhaps the marketing underling was a <i>seer</i>) advertisement encouraging children to phone Santee and listing, instead of what one supposes would have been the phone number for some <i>ad hoc</i> Christmas call center, the number “…to the CONAD Commander-in-Chief’s operations ‘hotline’.” Mistakes happen. (What are the odds, huh?)</p>
<p>Nowadays one might fear that unsolicited phone calls “for Santa,” at a top-secret government installation, from slap-happy children (of any age), might well be construed by the Feds as an invitation to break down some homeowner’s front doors for a little quality extraordinary rendition time. But the 1950s was a calmer era. (Ahem.)</p>
<p><iframe width="500" height="281" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/YOQswEHV5hE" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
<p>“The Director of Operations at the time,” a good-natured colonel by the name of Harry Shoup, merely shrugged off what we imagine might have been an interminable succession of childish inquiries, and redirected CONAD’s sophisticated (for the time) radar equipment and highly trained (we’ll suppose) staff toward the task of “check[ing] …for indications of Santa…”. Folks, that story’s not just sweet, it’s saccharine sweet, I’d say.</p>
<p>They didn’t have anything else extremely important going on that night. </p>
<p>But whatever it <i>was</i>, the Santa tracking event has grown into an extravaganza. In an operation that seems to grow increasingly extensive every year, NORAD has rolled out an elaborate – and newly trademarked – website in order to accommodate (what they claim is) worldwide attention. “Even as the Pentagon works to cut $1 trillion from its coffers, the Santa mission continues.”<a href="#_ftn44" name="_ftnref44" title="">[44]</a></p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href=" http://static1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20101220030340/noradsanta/images/8/8c/2008_-_Santa_NORAD_Pre-Breif.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="332" src=" http://static1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20101220030340/noradsanta/images/8/8c/2008_-_Santa_NORAD_Pre-Breif.jpg " width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href=" http://static1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20101220030340/noradsanta/images/8/8c/2008_-_Santa_NORAD_Pre-Breif.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<p><a href="http://www.noradsanta.org/">http://www.noradsanta.org/</a></p>
<p>One might wonder: <i>why</i>?</p>
<p>Is it just a cheap way to plug U.S. military superiority?<a href="#_ftn45" name="_ftnref45" title="">[45]</a> Or is there something <i>more</i> to it?</p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fe/Phra_Maha_Chedi_Chai_Mongkol_Naga_emerging_from_mouth_of_Makara.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="375" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fe/Phra_Maha_Chedi_Chai_Mongkol_Naga_emerging_from_mouth_of_Makara.jpg" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fe/Phra_Maha_Chedi_Chai_Mongkol_Naga_emerging_from_mouth_of_Makara.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">The serpent-like Nagas (above).<a href="#_ftn46" name="_ftnref46" title="">[46]</a></div>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/90/National_emblem_of_Indonesia_Garuda_Pancasila.svg/2000px-National_emblem_of_Indonesia_Garuda_Pancasila.svg.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="500" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/90/National_emblem_of_Indonesia_Garuda_Pancasila.svg/2000px-National_emblem_of_Indonesia_Garuda_Pancasila.svg.png" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/90/National_emblem_of_Indonesia_Garuda_Pancasila.svg/2000px-National_emblem_of_Indonesia_Garuda_Pancasila.svg.png" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">The eagle-like Garuda, which likes to eat Nagas, as it appears on Indonesia's national emblem, the <i>Garuda Pancasila</i> (above).<a href="#_ftn47" name="_ftnref47" title="">[47]</a></div>
<p>While you’re sipping your eggnog – and you might want to spike it with gin for the rest of this – here are some musings for your examination.</p>
<p>Question: Is NORAD now enacting a ritual cryptically honoring a “polar god,” variously identified as Draco (as represented in the constellation by that name and popularized as a character in the harry Potter franchise) or, among Kabbalistic Jews, as <i>Te’li</i>?<a href="#_ftn48" name="_ftnref48" title="">[48]</a></p>
<p>Santa, of course, is domiciled at the North Pole.<a href="#_ftn49" name="_ftnref49" title="">[49]</a> Although the present north star is Polaris, in ancient times, the identity of the pole star was different. The drift from star to star over time is due to the fact that the earth is slightly tilted (around 23.5°), and revolves with a slight “wobble.”<a href="#_ftn50" name="_ftnref50" title="">[50]</a> These things create an effect termed “<a href="http://courses.physics.northwestern.edu/Phyx125/Precession%20of%20the%20Earth.pdf">axial precession</a>.” </p>
<p>In any case, previously, the pole star was α-Draconis, also known as Thuban (which star is, incidentally, a “white giant”). Draco, the dragon or the great serpent, is a circumpolar constellation, which means that it never sets from view –it’s always above Santa while he and his mythical elves (an evil variety of which are the chief antagonists in the latest Thor movie) make toys in the old workshop. There is some reason to think that ancient Egyptian iconography might relate to this ancient polar node.<a href="#_ftn51" name="_ftnref51" title="">[51]</a> </p>
<p>Moreover, seemingly tongue-in-cheek word has it that some of the most powerful cryptocrats in the world might really be part of a “shape-shifting group of reptilian descendants from the constellation Draco”.<a href="#_ftn52" name="_ftnref52" title="">[52]</a></p>
<p>Another curious wrinkle comes by way of the former U.S. Air Force intelligence officer, George A. Filer III, who once reported the following. “I think that Walter Schirra aboard Mercury 8 was the first of the astronauts to use the code name ‘Santa Claus’ to indicate the presence of flying saucers next to space capsules.”<a href="#_ftn53" name="_ftnref53" title="">[53]</a></p>
<p><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0987422480/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0987422480&linkId=e724be125950cdd56f6051489ab320a5">Jacques Vallée</a>, the mathematician, computer scientist, astronomer, and ufologist who “…served as the real-life model for the character portrayed by François Truffaut in Steven Spielberg’s film <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00170ERC4/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B00170ERC4&linkId=0baed3e1476e14fbf1e275c22f476151">Close Encounters of the Third Kind</a></i>”,<a href="#_ftn54" name="_ftnref54" title="">[54]</a> has written that on September 28, 1954 at <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint-Nicolas-de-Redon">Saint-Nicolas-de-Redon</a> in France, “[a]t ‘La Butte Rouge’ two railroad engineers, Bernard and Potraux, who were bringing a locomotive from nantes to Auray, saw a dark object take off with a purple glow and follow them for 15 sec before veering off. Potraux had to see a doctor.”<a href="#_ftn55" name="_ftnref55" title="">[55]</a></p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/Herakles/Hpix/1990.14.0209.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="344" src="http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/Herakles/Hpix/1990.14.0209.jpeg" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/Herakles/Hpix/1990.14.0209.jpeg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<p>Additional possible connexions are legion. Consider, for instance, the symbol of the tree, so prominent during this season. Mythical trees are sometimes linked to dragons. The dragon Ladon guarded another tree in the garden of the Hesperides, from which hung the legendary golden apples.<a href="#_ftn56" name="_ftnref56" title="">[56]</a></p>
<p>Magical trees occasionally crop up in Hollywood productions as well. I am thinking, for example, of the reference to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yggdrasil">Yggdrasil</a>, the world-tree, in <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005PW3OS8/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B005PW3OS8&linkId=a1b71a37ff43f2eb1ef5eed9db443568">Captain America: The First Avenger</a></i> (2011).<a href="#_ftn57" name="_ftnref57" title="">[57]</a> </p>
<p>Jewish mysticism also – quite famously – has the Kabbalistic “Tree of Life.”<a href="#_ftn58" name="_ftnref58" title="">[58]</a> The Christmas tree, the story has it, traces its origins back to the “Paradise Tree” in medieval “passion plays.” The Paradise Tree was supposed, by at least one Lutheran scholar, to have been a representation of the tree from which Adam and Eve partook, facilitating their downfall.<a href="#_ftn59" name="_ftnref59" title="">[59]</a></p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="https://vgy.me/cnDKsQ.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="608" src="https://vgy.me/cnDKsQ.jpg" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<p>As previously mentioned, there is another Jewish-association with Draco.<a href="#_ftn60" name="_ftnref60" title="">[60]</a> </p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="https://vgy.me/TjxOk7.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="569" src="https://vgy.me/TjxOk7.jpg" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<p>According to rabbi and researcher Aryeh Kaplan, the <i>Te’li</i> – the Kabbalistic representation of the great polar dragon, Draco – is very important in esoteric cosmology.<a href="#_ftn61" name="_ftnref61" title="">[61]</a> </p>
<p>As an added lexical wrinkle, the name for a Kabbalah center is, in German, <i>Klaus</i>,<a href="#_ftn62" name="_ftnref62" title="">[62]</a> which word bears an obvious similarity to Santa’s quasi-surname, <i>Claus</i>. These centers, more broadly known as Houses of Study (<i>Beth ha’Midrash</i>) – apparently for Talmud or Kabbalah – “…aside from being used for studying, are also used to monitor matters of public concern…, to make calculations for religious purposes…, and to deliver a public memorial eulogy… A House of Study possesses sanctity and the presence of God is to be found there…”<a href="#_ftn63" name="_ftnref63" title="">[63]</a> A <i>Beth ha’Midrash</i> is, therefore, a sort of Holy Klaus – a “Santa Claus.”</p>
<p>What “matters of public concern” or religious “calculations” or “eulogizing” might be going on in NORAD’s Holy Klaus rite is anyone’s guess.</p>
<p>The learned Kabbalah expert and professor <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0805210512/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0805210512&linkId=8c90bc71b67ca4211eabb94ee2ce77da">Gershom Scholem</a> explains that in “practical Kabbalah”: “[t]he sorcerer draws forth the spirit of impurity from the <i>kelippot</i> and mixes the clean and the unclean together.”<a href="#_ftn64" name="_ftnref64" title="">[64]</a> </p>
<p>What in the world are “kelippot”? We’re thrilled that you asked!</p>
<p>In the complex Kabbalistic system of the 16<sup>th</sup>-century rabbi, Isaac Luria, the “…<i>klipah</i>, <i>kelipot</i>” are “the shells …of the demonic side” of creation that “…[obscure] …the divine light.”<a href="#_ftn65" name="_ftnref65" title="">[65]</a> That clears things right up, doesn’t it? An important thing to note is that, in this Lurianic framework, “Gentiles come from that dark side…”.<a href="#_ftn66" name="_ftnref66" title="">[66]</a></p>
<p>Furthermore, “…the power of the <i>kelippah</i>…”, “…represent[ed]…” by “…a dragon or a demonic reptile,”<a href="#_ftn67" name="_ftnref67" title="">[67]</a> must “…be subdued via observance of the Torah and mitzvoth…”.<a href="#_ftn68" name="_ftnref68" title="">[68]</a> </p>
<p>Is the Santa ceremony supposed to draw down celestial or super-celestial powers? Is all the pageantry calculated – by someone or something – for psychological effect?<a href="#_ftn69" name="_ftnref69" title="">[69]</a></p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a1/Humorism.svg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="500" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a1/Humorism.svg" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a1/Humorism.svg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<p>Or is the effect more elemental?</p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8f/Fotothek_df_tg_0007129_Theosophie_%5E_Alchemie.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="494" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8f/Fotothek_df_tg_0007129_Theosophie_%5E_Alchemie.jpg" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8f/Fotothek_df_tg_0007129_Theosophie_%5E_Alchemie.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<p>One might argue that the Santa mythos contains all of the raw materials necessary for some sort of alchemical working. Considering the classical schema of Hippocrates and Galen, when combined in the correct manner and at the correct time, the four elements – earth, water, air, and fire – yield the <i>prima materia</i> (“first matter”).</p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="http://fineartamerica.com/images-medium/prima-materia-fertilized-by-the-avis-science-source.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="261" src="http://fineartamerica.com/images-medium/prima-materia-fertilized-by-the-avis-science-source.jpg" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://fineartamerica.com/images-medium/prima-materia-fertilized-by-the-avis-science-source.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
<p>Santa’s wintery polar clime falls under the purview of water.<a href="#_ftn70" name="_ftnref70" title="">[70]</a> His capable reindeer unarguably have command over the air, which element also involves elves, since elves “are spirits of air,” though “they spring from earth and water”.<a href="#_ftn71" name="_ftnref71" title="">[71]</a> Finally, the well-known references to chimneys and soot in the lore clearly associate Santa with fire.</p>
<p>What is one to make of all of this Santa-mania?</p>
<p>We’re not sure, but we recommend that you give it a little thought – we heard tell that Santa Claus is coming to a town near you… <i>soon</i>!</p>
<p><iframe width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/b_UTRlzg-f8" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
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<hr /><p><a href="#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1" title="">[1]</a> Edgar Allan Poe, “The Raven,” 1845, reproduced at <<a href="http://www.houseofusher.net/raven.html">http://www.houseofusher.net/raven.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref2" name="_ftn2" title="">[2]</a> John 6:68.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref3" name="_ftn3" title="">[3]</a> “After nearly a century and a half this synonym for Santa Claus is still heard, even though the words have nothing to with Santa. The term originated in America in about 1830 and was spelled <i>Krisskring’l</i> before taking its present form. <i>Krisskring’l</i> stemmed from a misunderstanding of the word <i>Christkindlein</i> used by German immigrants, its meaning not ‘Santa Claus’ but ‘the Child in the Manger,’ or ‘the little Christ child’,” Robert Hendrickson, “Kris Kringle,” <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0965478602/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0965478602&linkId=7aed17ec48f784374980c586d3c79f2b">Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins</a></i>, New York: QPB, 2004, p.418. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref4" name="_ftn4" title="">[4]</a> In contemporary American culture, the name “Father Christmas” (although seldom used) is taken to be synonymous with “Santa Claus.” For instance, Robert Hendrickson, writing in his <i>Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins</i>, designates <i>Father Christmas</i> “[t]he preferred British name for the American name <i>Santa Claus</i>”, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 254.</p>
<p>However, it seems that this facile equation is resisted by some Europeans. A recent article published in the <i>Telegraph</i> [U.K.] newspaper contains the subheading “Germany museum director believes the Father Christmas spawned in Germany is under threat from the more modern Santa Claus associated with Coca-Cola.” Explaining that the Father Christmas character ultimately “derives from” Saint Nicholas of Myra, Bavarian Christmas Museum director, Felicitas Höptner, says that “…the German <i>Father Christmas</i>, or ‘<i>Weihnachtsmann</i>,’ was invented as a secular figure after the Reformation when Protestants spurned saint worship and sought an alternative gift-giver to the sacred Nicholas with his bishop’s mitre and crook”, David Crossland, “Germany moves to claim ‘under threat’ Father Christmas,” Dec. 15, 2013, <<a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/10518864/Germany-moves-to-claim-under-threat-Father-Christmas.html">http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/10518864/Germany-moves-to-claim-under-threat-Father-Christmas.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref5" name="_ftn5" title="">[5]</a> Hugh Harmon and Rudolf Ising, “Alias St. Nick,” <i>Happy Harmonies</i>, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer [MGM], 1935. MGM, of course, are the initials of Metro Pictures, controlled by Marcus Loew, followed by the initials of the surnames of Samuel Goldwin (<i>né</i> Szmuel Gelbfisz) and Louis B. Mayer (<i>né</i> Lazar Meir). </p>
<p>Regarding Mayer’s notorious Christmas parties, which he allegedly only briefly attended, we read the following. “Mostly the studio was all business, except during the annual Christmas parties. Early on Christmas Eve, the first few hours were spent delivering gifts – agents to department heads, producers, and other important types. …By 11:00 A.M., each department had a bar going. Around this time, Mayer would make an appearance, mount a rostrum, and promise another great year like the one just passed. And then he would leave the studio. Like the parent leaving the house, it was the signal for the kids’ party to kick into high gear. The projection room in the sound department began running stag films, and by the early afternoon, remembered Wallace Worlsey Jr., the proceedings had evolved into ‘an orgy that would have made Caligula feel at home’,” Scott Eyman, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0743204816/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0743204816&linkId=2704d472f1ba7fae5281d4d8405a768e"><i>Lion of Hollywood: The Life and Legend of Louis B. Mayer</i></a>, New York: Simon & Schuster, 2008, p. 218.</p>
<p>In a similar seasonal sexual spirit, although a bit more tame than Hollywood's "XXXmas" antics, one might note the popular “torch song,” “Santa Baby,” in which an oh-so-seductive female 1940s-style crooner details her “want list” to the (presumably unattainable) head elf. See renditions by <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFMyF9fDKzE">Eartha Kitt</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ycWObpi73Y">Madonna</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txflW45Awsk">Taylor Swift</a>, and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Baby">others</a>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref6" name="_ftn6" title="">[6]</a> The feast day of St. Nicholas is, however, on December 6, not December 25. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref7" name="_ftn7" title="">[7]</a> “When <i>A History of New York</i> was released to the public on December 6, 1809, St. Nicholas Day, Irving’s authorship could only be guessed at. St. Nicholas Day was a day on which some Dutch New Yorkers honored the patron saint sometimes referred to as ‘Sancte Claus.’ Irving had orchestrated everything perfectly. The two-volume work was advertised as that ‘found in the chamber of Mr. Diedrich Knickerbocker,’ and ‘published in order to discharge certain debts he has left behind’,” Andrew Burstein, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0465008534/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0465008534&linkId=a69e6f39b94fb04173cf4247aa13d050"><i>The Original Knickerbocker: The Life of Washington Irving</i></a>, New York: Basic Books, 2008, p. 72.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref8" name="_ftn8" title="">[8]</a> “Santa Claus became Manhattan’s saint and the genius of Western commercial Christmas. Saint Nicholas, his avatar, was one of medieval Europe’s favorite saints. In France, the cathedral of Chartres narrates the story of his adventures and miracles on the south portal and in four stained-glass windows. In England, 385 churches were dedicated to him before the end of the fifteenth century, compared with 202 to the country’s patron saint, Saint George”, Marina Warner, “The Original Santa: An Introduction to the Benevolent Saint Nicholas of Myra, Bari, and the North Pole,” <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000KGJD4I/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B000KGJD4I&linkId=6164aed5fe4d4f77b780786bf493a3c1">Connoisseur</a></i>, Dec., 1985, p. 94..</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref9" name="_ftn9" title="">[9]</a> Other versions say “window.”</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref10" name="_ftn10" title="">[10]</a> Supposedly, there is a skull said to be that of Saint Nicholas in the Church of the Holy Protector on Mount Athos is Greece. This is according to the unverified (and well-nigh unverifiable) testimony of Yuri Vorobyevsky, “The Omega Point,” <i>Path to the Apocalypse</i>, vol. 3, ch. 17.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref11" name="_ftn11" title="">[11]</a> William Shakespeare, “The First part of King Henry the Fourth,” act 2, scene 1. “St. Nicholas was the patron saint of scholars; and Nicholas, or old Nick, is a cant name for the devil. Hence he equivocally calls robbers, <i>St. Nicholas’ clerks</i>”, <i>The Plays and Poems of William Shakespeare</i>, vol. 16, London: F. C. and J. Rivington, 1821, p. 237, <<a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=hKrTAAAAMAAJ">http://books.google.com/books?id=hKrTAAAAMAAJ</a>>, cf. <<a href="http://shakespeare.mit.edu/1henryiv/full.html">http://shakespeare.mit.edu/1henryiv/full.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref12" name="_ftn12" title="">[12]</a> Writer Lucy W. Waterbury provides an interesting anecdote regarding the attempt, on one occasion, presumably by Christian missionaries, to introduce the character of Santa Claus to an assembly of Africans. “The attempt to introduce Santa Claus was not a success. He was greeted with shrieks and groans and cries of ‘let me out,’ ‘it is the evil one,’ ‘it is the day of judgment.’ The small fry caught the infection and fled to the bedroom [of the hosting house], while the black children crept under chairs and tables to hide themselves. Santa Claus was obliged to remove his disguise very hastily, and they were soon reassured and bean to laugh and chatter and nibble their cakes and fruits. One said that he thought that Elijah had returned, another that it was John the Baptist, and another that it was Satan, and all hi evil deeds rose up before him.” “Christmas in Heathen Lands,” <i>Biblical World</i>, vol. 10, no. 6, Dec., 1897, p. 470.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref13" name="_ftn13" title="">[13]</a> “Church Lady,” transcript, <i>Saturday Night Live</i>, season 13, episode 6, Dec. 5, 1987, <<a href="http://snltranscripts.jt.org/87/87fchurchchat.phtml">http://snltranscripts.jt.org/87/87fchurchchat.phtml</a>>. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref14" name="_ftn14" title="">[14]</a> Douglas Harper, “Nick,” <i>Online Etymology Dictionary</i>, <<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?%20term=Nick">http://www.etymonline.com/index.php? term=Nick</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref15" name="_ftn15" title="">[15]</a> Another Santa-tie-in with this case is the fact that there was a mysterious “note” apparently associated with a “toy bear.” “A prophetic note was in a small pouch attached to a toy bear that authorities are seeking information about in the JonBenet Ramsey homicide investigation, according to the victim’s aunt. …Boulder District Attorney Alex Hunter sought help from the public in tracking down information about the foot-long stuffed toy bear dressed in a Santa suit. …[Pam] Paugh [the sister of JonBenet’s mother Patsy Ramsey] speculated that the bear may have been used to lure JonBenet out of her room”, “Ramsey Relative Says Note was in Toy Bear Pouch,” Associated Press via <i>Las Vegas Review Journal</i>, Jan. 3, 1999, p. 6B.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref16" name="_ftn16" title="">[16]</a> Charlies Brennan, “‘Santa’ Bill McReynolds Dies at 72,” <i>Rocky Mountain News</i>, Sept. 6, 2002, p. 4A. The Kabbalistic significance of the number 72 has been discussed elsewhere. See Matthew Bell with Jim Brandon, “Star Trek in Tenebris,” Bell Curve, Jun. 5, 2013, <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/06/star-trek-in-tenebris_5.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/06/star-trek-in-tenebris_5.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref17" name="_ftn17" title="">[17]</a> “Twenty-two[:] This number …symbolizes the manifestation of being in all its diversity and during its allotted span, that is, in both space and time. In fact, it is the sum total of the twenty-two [Hebrew] letters which, according to the Kabbalah, give expression to the universe. …[The Zoroastrian] <i>Avesta</i> was written in books each of twenty-two chapters and their collection of prayers contains twenty-two. The Revelation attributed to St. John comprises twenty-two chapters, too, while there are twenty-two major arcana in the Tarot”, Jean Chevalier and Alain Gheerbrant, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0140512543/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0140512543&linkId=5a1c8ccf7fa421d50128aa013efed66a">Dictionary of Symbols</a></i>, John Buchanan-Brown, trans., London: Penguin, 1996, p. 1046.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref18" name="_ftn18" title="">[18]</a> “In carnival parlance, … ‘Hey, Rube,’ is a call for help”, Janet McReynolds, “Abduction, Play Recalled After JonBenét’s Murder,” <i>Denver Post</i>, Mar. 26, 1997, p. 5F.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref19" name="_ftn19" title="">[19]</a> Brennan, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 10A.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref20" name="_ftn20" title="">[20]</a> McReynolds, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 1F.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref21" name="_ftn21" title="">[21]</a> Warner, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 96.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref22" name="_ftn22" title="">[22]</a> This is not to say that anti-child violence doesn’t crop up in the St. Nick lore. For example, consider <i>Saint Nicolas</i> cantata by the 20<sup>th</sup>-century British composer, Benjamin Britten (with libretto written by <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Crozier">Eric</a> <a href="http://themichigancatholic.com/2012/11/from-crozier-to-candy-cane-the-real-st-nicholas/">Crozier</a>). (Cf. William Henry Fry’s “Santa Claus Christmas Symphony,” 1853, <<a href="http://www.naxos.com/catalogue/item.asp?item_code=8.559057">http://www.naxos.com/catalogue/item.asp?item_code=8.559057</a>>)</p>
<p><i>Wikipedia’s</i> helpful summary of part seven reads: “The seventh movement of Saint Nicolas depicts the legend of the Pickled Boys. Nicolas finds himself in an inn where a group of travellers have paused for the night. They invite the bishop to dine with them, but Nicolas stops them from eating, realising that the meat that they eat is in fact the flesh of three boys murdered and pickled by the butcher. Nicolas calls to the boys, ‘Timothy, Mark, and John, put your fleshly garments on!’ and the boys come back to life, singing ‘Alleluia!’,” “Saint Nicolas (Britten),” Oct. 20, 2013, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Nicolas_%28Britten%29%23VII._Nicolas_and_the_Pickled_Boys">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Nicolas_%28Britten%29#VII._Nicolas_and_the_Pickled_Boys</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref23" name="_ftn23" title="">[23]</a> In other accounts, Santa is accompanied by Knecht Ruprecht (“slave Rupert”). “To the Pennsylvania Dutch, he is known as Belsnickel. Other names for the same character are Pelznickle, ‘<a href="http://books.google.com/books/about/Santa_Claus_Last_of_the_Wild_Men.html?id=hkw2bPlfTUQC">Furry Nicholas</a>,’ and Ru-Klas, ‘Rough Nicholas.’” </p>
<p>See <<a href="http://www.av1611.org/othpubls/santa.html">http://www.av1611.org/othpubls/santa.html</a>>. Cf. “Knecht Ruprecht,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knecht_Ruprecht">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knecht_Ruprecht</a>>. On the “Bell” name, see Loren Coleman, “The Bell Name and Belltown Leprechauns,” Twilight Language,” Jun. 22, 2012, <<a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/06/belltown-leprechauns.html">http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/06/belltown-leprechauns.html</a>>, Matthew Bell with Jim Brandon, “NASA's 33-Degree Kline-Konnektion,” <i>Bell Curve</i>, Sept., 8, 2012, <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/nasas-33-degree-kline-konnektion.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/nasas-33-degree-kline-konnektion.html</a>>, and Matthew Bell, “Belling the (Hurricane) Gilbert,” <i>Bell Curve</i>, Nov. 14, 2012, <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/11/belling-hurricane-gilbert.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/11/belling-hurricane-gilbert.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref24" name="_ftn24" title="">[24]</a> Lance Gay, “In Europe, Children Can’t Escape Watchful Eye of Santa: If You’re Not Good, Bad Things Might Happen,” Scripps Howard via <i>Gazette Telegraph</i>, Dec. 14, 1992, p. D2. Gay further reports:</p>
<p>“In Germany, ‘Sankt Nikolaus’ brings with him the horrible dark servant called ‘Knecht Ruprecht,’ who carries a birch with which he beats bad children who don’t say their prayers. Like Black Peter, Ruprecht also stuffs the very bad into his sack and carries them away, but no one in Germany knows where because no children have ever returned to say. In Austria, the bad actor is Krampus, who brings chains with him to lock up children. In Eastern Europe, Santa’s enforcers are the Fool, the Witch, and Barteln, who gore bad boys to death and blacken the breasts of bad little girls. In Iceland, its Gryla, mother of the terrible Christmas monsters, whose diet consists only of bad children”, <i>ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref25" name="_ftn25" title="">[25]</a> There are also supposed to be Santa-Odin associations as well, such as the latter’s eight-legged horse, <i>Sleipnir</i>, fathered by Loki, which might be comparable, numerologically, to Santa’s original eight reindeer (if we don’t let poor Rudolph join in any reindeer games). According to the <i>Wikipedia</i> article titled “Sleipnir,” the word reportedly means “slippy” or “the slipper” <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleipnir">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleipnir</a>>. We have no word on whether this accounts for why St. Nicholas is sometimes said to <i>slip</i> goodies into stockings, shoes, and other footwear (e.g., one might imagine, <i>slippers</i>). </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref26" name="_ftn26" title="">[26]</a> See, e.g., <<a href="http://books.google.com/books/about/Fires_Improved_Or_A_New_Method_of_Buildi.html%20?id=7ihRQAAACAAJ">http://books.google.com/books/about/Fires_Improved_Or_A_New_Method_of_Buildi.html ?id=7ihRQAAACAAJ</a>>. Reportedly, “[s]potting a chimneysweep at Christmas time and touching his coat always brings good luck”, Gay, <i>loc. cit</i>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref27" name="_ftn27" title="">[27]</a> <<a href="http://phoenixmasonry.org/masonic_christmas_card.htm">http://phoenixmasonry.org/masonic_christmas_card.htm</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref28" name="_ftn28" title="">[28]</a> <<a href=" http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/171924"> http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/171924</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref29" name="_ftn29" title="">[29]</a> See Loren Coleman’s overview article “Santa = Wildman 2013,” <i>CryptoZooNews</i>, Nov. 30, 2013, <<a href="http://www.cryptozoonews.com/santa-wildman2013/">http://www.cryptozoonews.com/santa-wildman2013/</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref30" name="_ftn30" title="">[30]</a> “Set,” glossary entry, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1906073031/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=1906073031&linkId=33efb1399e9b5aca7b086f275d53af37">The Magical Revival</a></i>, p. 226. Cf. Michael A. Hoffman II, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0970378416/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0970378416&linkId=76833034fcdfb3e8157691b5e26e6252">Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare</a></i>, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho: Independent History & Research, 2001, p. 31.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref31" name="_ftn31" title="">[31]</a> See “Jock Dempsey, Legends of St. Eligius and St. Dunstan,” <i>Anvilfire</i>, 2001, <http://www.anvilfire.com/article.php?bodyName=/21centbs/stories/StEligius_StDunstan.htm>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref32" name="_ftn32" title="">[32]</a> Cf. <<a href="http://www.biblebelievers.com/watkins_santa/santa.html">http://www.biblebelievers.com/watkins_santa/santa.html</a>>. As an interesting coda to the St. Nick/Black Pete discussion, we note an episode in the life of the great 13<sup>th</sup>-century philosopher and theologian, St. Thomas Aquinas. </p>
<p>“[T]he devil appeared [to St. Thomas] under the guise of a negro: ‘How dare you come here to tempt me!’ he shouted as he advanced with clenched fist; whereupon the fiend vanished. The year 1273 was drawing to a close when the pen dropped from his hand, before reaching his fiftieth year. It was on St. Nicholas Day, the 6<sup>th</sup> day of December, and in that saint’s [St. Nicholas’s] chapel, that he [St. Thomas] has a long ecstasy while saying Mass; what was then communicated he never revealed, but from that hour ‘he suspended his writing instruments,’ as William de Tocco puts it.” John Placid Conway, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0069VK1MQ/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B0069VK1MQ&linkId=785cfbbe492ef34192dcb4b3364c476f">Saint Thomas Aquinas, of the Order of Preachers (1225-1274): A Biographical Study of the Angelic Doctor</a></i>, London: Longmans, Green, 1911, p. 95. Cf. Guillaume de Tocco, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0888441274/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0888441274&linkId=c5a7552360251a3236ba5fa203700208">Ystoria sancti Thome de Aquino</a></i>, 1323, reprint ed., Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediæval Studies, 1996, p. 162.</p>
<p>After Aquinas’s vision, in St. Nicholas chapel, on St. Nicholas day, this great doctor of the faith, to whom the Catholic Church is largely indebted for its Catechism, “…laid aside his pen and would write no more.” Daniel Kennedy, “St. Thomas Aquinas,” <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0787640042/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0787640042&linkId=a3f572c4381134e33f55621e49c8b55b">Catholic Encyclopedia</a></i>, vol. 14, New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1912, <<a href="http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14663b.htm">http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14663b.htm</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref33" name="_ftn33" title="">[33]</a> Jeremiah 1:14, <i>King James Version</i>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref34" name="_ftn34" title="">[34]</a> On some of the similarities between the representation of Saturn and another “Father” – Father Time – see, e.g., Matthew Bell, “Now is the Time,” <i>Bell Curve</i>, Jan. 17, 2013, <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/now-is-time.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/now-is-time.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref35" name="_ftn35" title="">[35]</a> David N. Talbott, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0385113765/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0385113765&linkId=e33419ea94cea76d47003a912484a0ae">The Saturn Myth</a></i>, Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1980, p. 42. Emphasis in original. See also: <a href="http://bellofchurch.blogspot.com/2015/10/lord-of-time.html">"The Lord of Time"</a>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref36" name="_ftn36" title="">[36]</a> “North,” vol. 2, Chicago: Masonic History Co., 1956, p. 717.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref37" name="_ftn37" title="">[37]</a> Jean Chevalier and Alain Gheerbrant, “North,” <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0140512543/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0140512543&linkId=5a1c8ccf7fa421d50128aa013efed66a">Dictionary of Symbols</a></i>, trans., John Buchanan-Brown, London: Penguin, 1996, p. 705.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref38" name="_ftn38" title="">[38]</a> J.C. Cooper, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0500271259/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0500271259&linkId=98d2698bb3450b076839d273a01aa2c0">An Illustrated Encyclopædia of Traditional Symbols</a></i>, London: Thames & Hudson, 1987, p. 112.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref39" name="_ftn39" title="">[39]</a> Cited by Dennis Stillings, “Demon of Megaparsec Dimensions Discovered in the Northen Sky,” <i>Artifex</i>, vol. 6, no. 2, Apr., 1987, p. 17, n. 1.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref40" name="_ftn40" title="">[40]</a> What about Santa’s apparent beneficence? Would Satanic a figure be associated with gift-giving and merry-making? One internet commentator is worth quoting in this regard. Asking the question: “Can the Devil be a bringer of good luck?” The author answers: “Yes, indeed, according to old European traditions.” See “The Devil,” <http://www.luckymojo.com/devil.html>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref41" name="_ftn41" title="">[41]</a> <<a href="http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/jump5/santaclausiscomingtotown.html">http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/jump5/santaclausiscomingtotown.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref42" name="_ftn42" title="">[42]</a> “Another symbol related to an aspect of the Grail legend and deserving special attention is Montsalvat (literally, ‘mount of salvation’), represented as rising out of the midst of the sea in an inaccessible region behind which the sun rises, its peak situated ‘on distant shores no mortal can approach.’ It is at one and the same time the ‘sacred isle’ and the ‘polar mountain,’ two equivalent symbols…; and it is the ‘land of immortality,’ which is naturally identified with the Terrestrial Paradise”, René Guénon, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0900588543/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0900588543&linkId=6ccc41c3a37d73ac81aad3d2356684d2
">The King of the World</a></i>, Hillsdale, N.Y.: Sophia Perennis, 2004, pp. 31-32.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref43" name="_ftn43" title="">[43]</a> 1955 was, incidentally, also the year in which heartthrob actor James Dean died at the age of 24, in a car accident involving his Porsche 550 Spyder. This would be entirely irrelevant, in the present context, were it not that, as of this writing, the news media is abuzz with talk of the death of heartthrob actor Paul Walker in a car accident involving a Porsche Carrera GT. Although there are notable differences (Walker was 40 and not driving the Porsche), “Walker is being compared to actor James Dean…” Shamika Sanders, “Paul Walker Autposy Reveals He Was Alive After Crash & Touching Tribute Goes Viral,” <i>Hello Beautiful</i>, Dec. 6, 2013, <<a href="http://hellobeautiful.com/2013/12/06/paul-walker-tribute/">http://hellobeautiful.com/2013/12/06/paul-walker-tribute/</a>>. See Rex Reed, “A Career Cut Short: Fast and Furious Star Paul Walker Died in a Tragic Car Crash Last Weekend: In ‘Hours,’ he gives the performance of his life,” <i>New York Observer</i>, Dec. 6. 2013, <<a href="http://observer.com/2013/12/a-career-cut-short-fast-and-furious-star-paul-walker-died-in-a-tragic-car-crash-last-weekend/">http://observer.com/2013/12/a-career-cut-short-fast-and-furious-star-paul-walker-died-in-a-tragic-car-crash-last-weekend/</a>>. </p>
<p>Curiously, Peterson AFB, the new home of NORAD, was so-named in the wake of a tragic accident. “[A] tragedy occurred that would indelibly affect the base. On 8 August 1942, 1st Lt. Edward J. Peterson, Operations Officer for the 14th Photo Reconnaissance Squadron and a native of Colorado, crashed while attempting to take off from the airfield when the left engine of his twin engine F4 (a reconnaissance variant of the P-38 Lightning) failed. A base fire department crew rescued Lt. Peterson from the burning wreckage. Unfortunately, Lt. Peterson sustained significant burns and died at a local hospital that afternoon, thereby becoming the first Coloradan killed in a flying accident at the airfield. Consequently, on 13 December 1942, officials changed the name of the Colorado Springs Army Air Base to Peterson Army Air Base in honor of the fallen airman.” “Peterson Air Force Base History,” fact sheet, Mar. 12, 2007, <<a href="http://www.peterson.af.mil/library/factsheets/factsheet.asp?id=4507">http://www.peterson.af.mil/library/factsheets/factsheet.asp?id=4507</a>>. </p>
<p>We note the reconnexion, in light of the NORAD Santa-tracking charade at this particular air base, of the “Pete” name with “St. Nicholas.”</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref44" name="_ftn44" title="">[44]</a> Tom Roeder, “Santa Claus Will be on NORAD’s Radar Once Again,” <i>Gazette</i> [Colorado Springs, Colorado], Dec. 1, 2013, p. F1. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref45" name="_ftn45" title="">[45]</a> “One goal this year, [Stacy] Knott[, a spokeswoman for the binational command,] said, is to show the world that NORAD has more missions than its best-known work Dec. 24. ‘We’re trying to make sure we have a balance between showing the operational side of NORAD and how we track Santa,’ she said”, Roeder, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. F4.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref46" name="_ftn46" title="">[46]</a> The serpent <href="#Nagini">Nagini</a>, in the Harry Potter series popularized a cognate of “<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N%C4%81ga">Naga</a>.” Since we earlier enumerated several <i>nick-</i>names for the Devil, we might as well add to our list “<a href="http://www.sacred-texts.com/etc/ddl/ddl14.htm">Old Serpent</a>” and “<a href="http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Old+Harry">Old Harry</a>.” See Hendrickson, “Scratch, Old Scratch,” <i>op. cit</i>., p. 642.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref47" name="_ftn47" title="">[47]</a> “…Santa’s escorts over North America are pilots flying other missions with <b><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Noble_Eagle">Operation Noble Eagle</a></b>, designed to prevent another 9/11-style attack”, Roeder, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. F4. Operation Noble Eagle is abbreviated <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neo_%28The_Matrix%29">ONE</a>, which adds another layer of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monad_%28Gnosticism%29">gnostic</a>-<href="#The_One">neoplatonic</a> <a href="http://www.jesuotaku.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/keanu-whoa-2012.jpg">symbolism</a>. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref48" name="_ftn48" title="">[48]</a> See Aryeh Kaplan, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0877288550/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0877288550&linkId=51b49d90ab3bcee46d028f5aefd2394a">Sepher Yetzirah: The Book of Creation</a></i>, Northvale, N.J.: Jason Aronson, 1995. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref49" name="_ftn49" title="">[49]</a> One of several North Pole mock-ups is located a few miles northwest of Colorado Springs, in the township of Cascade, at the foot of Pike’s Peak. We’re sure that it was only coincidentally installed at this location, near NORAD’s Santa-thon headquarters, in 1956 – a year after the Santa tracking began.</p>
<p>In any case, called “Santa’s Workshop in North Pole, Colorado,” the attraction was the brainchild of the curious personality, “…former Hollywood set designer, Arto Monaco”, Philip G. Terrie, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0815609043/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0815609043&linkId=6ba8fc74096a117ae4775384e379b6a0">Contested Terrain: A New History of Nature and People in the Adirondacks</a></i>, Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse Univ. Press, 2008, p. 161. Cf. Sarah Colwell, “North Pole Theme Park Makes Magic Happen,” <i>Gazette</i> [Colorado Springs], Dec. 24, 2004, “Metro” section, p. 1.</p>
<p>Monaco also designed a similar “<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa%27s_Workshop_%28amusement_park%29">Santa’s Workshop</a>” set up in Wilmington, New York. At the time of this writing, the Wikipedia stub titled “Santa’s Workshop (amusement park)” indicates that this day-attraction “was one of the first theme parks in the United States”, <i>Wikipedia</i>, Oct. 7, 2013, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa%27s_Workshop_%28amusement_park%29">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa%27s_Workshop_%28amusement_park%29</a>>. “But half a decade before <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disneyland_Park_%28Anaheim%29">Disneyland</a>, there was Santa’s Workshop in Wilmington,” Brian Mann, “Arto Monaco: The King of Make Believe,” Dec. 20, 2002, <<a href="http://www.northcountrypublicradio.org/news/story/2204/20021220/arto-monaco-the-king-of-make-believe">http://www.northcountrypublicradio.org/news/story/2204/20021220/arto-monaco-the-king-of-make-believe</a>>. </p>
<p>Before building Santa (and other fairy tale-themed) escapes, Monaco designed a replica German village for the U.S. army, purportedly to prepare soldiers for an invasion of Germany. Here, however, the Wikipedia article erroneously – but synchromystically – records the location of the little Deutschland – actually named “Annadorf” – as “…<b>San Claus</b>, California …west of Santa Clarita Mountains”, “Arto Monaco,” Apr. 21, 2012, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arto_Monaco">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arto_Monaco</a>>. </p>
<p>Annadorf was located on the “…Big John Flats in the Angeles Forest, just twelve miles northwest of Wrightwood”, <<a href="http://www.wrightwoodcalif.com/forum/index.php?topic=13911.0">http://www.wrightwoodcalif.com/forum/index.php?topic=13911.0</a>>. We verified this by phone (Dec. 11, 2013) with John Lenau, the president of the Wrightwood Historical Society. The area is about 25 miles from the Vasquez Rock formation. (On the Vasquez, Devil’s Punchbowl, and Mormon Rock formations, see Jim Brandon, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0912019018/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0912019018&linkId=25639309534ebe3a2cfff03fdd4d5b84">The Rebirth of Pan: Hidden Faces of the American Earth Spirit</a></i>, Dunlap, Ill.: Firebird, 1983, p. 109.)</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref50" name="_ftn50" title="">[50]</a> According to the physicist-alchemist Isaac Newton, precession works out to about one degree every 72 years. A quick and dirty summary on Wikipedia reads: “Isaac Newton determined the cause of precession and established the rate of precession at 1 degree per 72 years, very close to the true value, thus demonstrating the magnitude of the error in the value of 1 degree per century”, “Great Year,” Sept. 7, 2013, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Year">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Year</a>>, citing Voltaire: “A degree is equivalent to seventy-two years…”, “On Infinites In Geometry, And Sir Isaac Newton's Chronology,” letter 17, <<a href="http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1778voltaire-lettres.asp%23Letter%20XVII">http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1778voltaire-lettres.asp#Letter%20XVII</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref51" name="_ftn51" title="">[51]</a> For a flavor of this quirky opinion, see “Terry,” “The Pyramid Builders & Draco Alpha,” <<a href="http://www.aloha.net/~hawmtn/pt_man.htm">http://www.aloha.net/~hawmtn/pt_man.htm</a>>; reproduced by David Icke, <<a href="http://www.davidicke.net/mysteries/pyramid/draco-alpha.html">http://www.davidicke.net/mysteries/pyramid/draco-alpha.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref52" name="_ftn52" title="">[52]</a> James Cusick, “Watch out Watford: Here comes the secretive Bilderberg Group,” <i>Independent</i> [U.K.], May, 21, 2013, <<a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/watch-out-watford-here-comes-the-secretive-bilderberg-group-8626134.html">http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/watch-out-watford-here-comes-the-secretive-bilderberg-group-8626134.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref53" name="_ftn53" title="">[53]</a> George A. Filer, “NASA Flights Have Seen UFOs,” <i>Filer’s Files</i>, no. 10, Mar. 3, 2000, reproduced as “It's A Great, Big, Wonderful World We Live On,” <i>Rense</i>, <http://www.rense.com/ufo6/big.htm>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref54" name="_ftn54" title="">[54]</a> “Jacques Vallée,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, Oct. 6, 2013, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Vall%C3%A9e">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Vall%C3%A9e</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref55" name="_ftn55" title="">[55]</a> Jacques Vallée, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0987422480/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0987422480&linkId=3a052d0a836aabb244f9f61cd8e64f95">Passport to Magonia: From Folklore to Flying Saucers</a></i>, Chicago: Henry Regnery Co., 1969, pp. 212-213. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref56" name="_ftn56" title="">[56]</a> “Drakon Hesperios,” Theoi, <<a href="http://www.theoi.com/Ther/DrakonHesperios.html">http://www.theoi.com/Ther/DrakonHesperios.html</a>>. </p>
<p>The age-old dispute between alchemy, which “consider[s] gold to be the symbol of perfection,” and Kabbalists, who give pride of place to silver, is resolved, so Johnny <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnny_Marks">Marks</a> might have imagined in the “silver and gold decorations” that one finds “on every Christmas tree.” </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref57" name="_ftn57" title="">[57]</a> But such symbolism also crops up in <i><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0800369/">Thor</a></i> (2011), <i><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0414993/">The Fountain</a></i> (2006), and other movies.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref58" name="_ftn58" title="">[58]</a> Pages 625 to 626 in the 1972 edition of the <i>Encyclopædia Judaica</i>, in Gershom Scholem’s article on “Kabbalah,” shows a representation of a stylized menorah, resembling a tree. This was the creation of the Christian Kabbalist, Guilame Postel, about whom see: Matthew Bell, “Going ‘Postel’: The Making of a ‘Judeo-Christian’,” Church Bell, Sept. 25, 2012, <<a href="http://bellofchurch.blogspot.com/2012/09/going-postel-makings-of-judeo-christian.html">http://bellofchurch.blogspot.com/2012/09/going-postel-makings-of-judeo-christian.html</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref59" name="_ftn59" title="">[59]</a> Richard P. Bucher, “O Christmas Tree: The Origin and Meaning of the Christmas Tree,” Our Redeemer Lutheran Church, Nov., 2000, <<a href="http://www.orlutheran.com/html/chrtree.html">http://www.orlutheran.com/html/chrtree.html</a>>. </p>
<p>Bucher’s capable summary is somewhat marred, however, by the disconnexion between his stated (and commendable) emphasis upon citation, and his failure to document a key passage. To be more specific, he begins his piece by lamenting the lack of sound scholarship on the history of the Christmas tree. He states:</p>
<p>“Many answers to these questions [about the origins of the Christmas Tree] have been offered on the Internet. Some are completely erroneous. Some make no distinction between history and legend. Unfortunately, none of them give sources for their assertions about the Christmas tree (a problem with most web articles!). Given that dependable scholarly sources about the history of the Christmas tree are hard to come by, citation-less Christmas tree web pages are understandable.”</p>
<p>Bucher then proceeds to document his points, systematically and nearly line by line, for several solid paragraphs. He loses a bit of steam when he gets to the alleged links between the Paradise Tree (which he had just claimed was banned by “the Church” in the 15<sup>th</sup>-century) and the Christmas Tree, merely asserting – with no citations whatever – that: “The people had grown so accustomed to the Paradise tree, however, that they began putting their own Paradise tree up in their homes on Dec. 24.” </p>
<p>The oversight is unfortunate, since the above-quoted sentence is arguably the linchpin for his thesis. Hence, however plausible his speculations may be, without the requisite documentation (especially for the crucial point about “the people’s” supposed psychological attachment to the Paradise Tree), from the standpoint of his text, they remain unsubstantiated conjectures. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref60" name="_ftn60" title="">[60]</a> In passing, we also note that Saint Nicholas “…became the adopted saint of bankers, pawnbrokers, merchants, and shopkeepers. …The three bags of gold [in the case, discussed above, of the girls destined for prostitution] eventually migrated from piety to commerce and became the emblem of moneylenders, the familiar sign of the pawnbroker’s shop”, Warner, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 97. </p>
<p>Apart from curiosities such as the banking forays of the Knights Templar and the interest-free Franciscan <i>monte di pieta</i>, it is simply an historical facts that, for many hundreds of years in Europe, “...none but Jews were permitted by the law to practise usury”, Michael Adler, "The Jews of Bristol in pre-Expulsion Days," Nov. 12, 1928, transactions, <i>Jewish Historical Society of England</i>, vol. 12, 1928-1931, p. 133, <<a href="http://www.jhse.org/book/export/article/14482">http://www.jhse.org/book/export/article/14482</a>>.</p>
<p>(Despite the prohibition on usury – lending money at interest – expressed in the Old Testament, e.g., Exodus 22:25-27, rabbis allowed usurious moneylending by Jews to non-Jews. Actually, the authoritative Maimonides, the 12<sup>th</sup>-century rabbi, physician, and philosopher, opined “...that for Jews to charge Gentiles interest is a positive command of the written law”, “Usury,” <i>Jewish Encyclopedia</i>, 1906, vol. 14, p. 615, <<a href="http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/14615-usury">http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/14615-usury</a>>. The <i>Shulchan Aruch</i>, the Judaic “digest” version of enforceable Talmudic laws, softens this somewhat, stating that “...it is permitted to lend money to a non-Jew at interest”, ch. <i>Yoreh De’ah</i>, section 159, lines 1-3, <<a href="http://www.torah.org/advanced/shulchan-aruch/classes/chapter13a.html">http://www.torah.org/advanced/shulchan-aruch/classes/chapter13a.html</a>>.)</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref61" name="_ftn61" title="">[61]</a> Illustrations are from Kaplan, <i>op. cit.</i>, pp. 232 and 235. This business is repeated by Jay Weidner and Vincent Bridges on pages 93<i>ff</i> of their 1999 book, <i>The Mysteries of the Great Cross of Hendaye: Alchemy and the End of Time</i> (Rochester, Vermont: Destiny, 2003 ed.). In this context, we must also bear Revelation 12:9 in mind: “The great dragon was hurled down – that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him”, <i>New International Version</i>, <<a href="http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=%20Revelation+12%3A9">http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search= Revelation+12%3A9</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref62" name="_ftn62" title="">[62]</a> Scholem, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 554. In Polish it is known as a <i>Kloiyz</i>. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref63" name="_ftn63" title="">[63]</a> Shelomoh Yosef Zevin, “Beyth haMidrash, House of Study,” <i>Encyclopedia Talmudica</i>, vol. 4, Spring valley, N.Y.: Feldheim, 1991, p. 111 and 108. The Beth ha’Midrash is a sacred space – possibly even outranking the synagogue in terms of holiness. At least, this was arguably the view of Rabbi Pappi – whose opinion, by the way, “[t]he law follows…” <i>ibid</i>., p. 109. Although, “The Ḥasidim call their synagogue ‘klaus’; and each of their miracle-workers maintains a klaus of his own, as do also his followers in other cities”, “KLAUS (German, ‘Klause,’ from the medieval Latin ‘clusa’= cloister),” <i>Jewish Encyclopedia</i>, 1906, <<a href="http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/9365-klaus">http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/9365-klaus</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref64" name="_ftn64" title="">[64]</a> Scholem, <i>op. cit</i>., pp. 633-634. Based upon his reading of the Asclepius by “Hermes Trismegistus,” the neoplatonist, Marsilio Ficino, “…was convinced that humans were able to ‘draw down the life of heaven’ through the spiritus mundi which is infused throughout the universe and to place it into statues and idols.” Stefan Rossbach, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0748610243/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0748610243&linkId=385631575f75eeba342eee1068dbce7e">Gnostic Wars: The Cold War in the Context of a History of Western Spirituality</a></i>, Edinburgh: Edinburgh Univ. Press, 1999, p. 123.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref65" name="_ftn65" title="">[65]</a> Alan Brill, “The Exclusivist Tradition,” <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0230340253/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0230340253&linkId=8c8d7ac177118ad113a0da14860e8033">Judaism and Other Religions</a></i>, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010, p. 165. Cf. Craig Heimbichner, "The Double-Mind in Occult Philosophy," lecture, audio recording, Independent History & Research.</p>
<p>In his Oration on the Dignity of Man, the 15<sup>th</sup>-century Christian-kabbalistic magus, Pico della Mirandola, wrote that “Man was to be worshipped because ‘he changes his nature into a god’s, as if he were a god; he knows the demonic kind inasmuch as he recognizes that he originated among them.’” Rossbach, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 122.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref66" name="_ftn66" title="">[66]</a> <i>Ibid</i>. </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref67" name="_ftn67" title="">[67]</a> Gershom Scholem, “Demons, Demonology,” <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0028659287/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0028659287&linkId=202b6cd6e17a89bfeab29ba002e9ec67">Encyclopædia Judaica</a></i>, vol. 5, Jerusalem: Keter, 1972, pp. 1532-1533.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref68" name="_ftn68" title="">[68]</a> <i>Ibid</i>., p. 1532.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref69" name="_ftn69" title="">[69]</a> “Practical Kabbalah is one way of dealing with evil. It is a form of magic, the dangerous art of gaining power over the psychological (<i>Yeziratic</i>) world through the use of symbols; …[c]ertain exercises can bring about deep changes in consciousness…” Z’ev ben Shimon Halevi, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0500810230/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0500810230&linkId=c3128e642775d1e03078e0fa1965693e">Kabbalah: Tradition of Hidden Knowledge</a></i>, New York: Thames & Hudson, 2002, p. 47.</p>
<p>Still not convinced? Consider then, please, the 1964 blockbuster (<--sarcasm) movie, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00A6HHKLY/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=B00A6HHKLY&linkId=20c3066cabd645d704f2754c1ac26bce">Santa Claus Conquers the Martians</a></i>. Actually, in <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0688031838/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0688031838&linkId=06da56291668e71bf687f0977755ce01">The Book of Lists</a></i> (New York: Bantam, 1980), authors David Wallechinsky, Irving Wallace, and Amy Wallace have the temerity to report (on p. 209) that this gem of a film is number seven on “The Ten Worst Films of All Time” list. (The list is attributed to Harry Medved and Randy Dreyfuss, p. 207.) I mean, although I’ve never seen the picture, I can scarcely believe it. But I digress.</p>
<p>In any event, the <i>Wikipedia</i> plot <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Claus_Conquers_the_Martians">summary</a> practically makes our case for us.</p>
<p>“The story involves …[an] ancient 800-year-old Martian sage [named] <i>Chochem</i> (a Yiddish word meaning ‘genius’), …[who] advise[s] that the children of Mars are growing distracted due to the society’s overly rigid structure; from infancy, all their education is fed into their brains through machines and they are not allowed individuality or freedom of thought. Chochem notes that he had seen this coming ‘for centuries’, and says the only way to help the children is to allow them their freedom and be allowed to have fun. To do this, they need a Santa Claus figure, like on Earth. Leaving the Chochem’s cave, the Martian leaders decide to abduct Santa Claus from Earth and bring him to Mars.” Chaos ensues. Starting to get it, <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1f/Santa_Claus_Conquers_the_Martians_1.jpg">yet</a>? </p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref70" name="_ftn70" title="">[70]</a> Furthermore, “Nixie” also known as <i>Niks</i>, an obvious etymology cousin to “Nick,” are “[l]esser water divinities” the “male water [spirit]” counterparts to the more famous female undines – which latter have middle eastern variants called “Drac.” See Patricia Turner and Charles Russell Coulter, <i>Dictionary of Ancient Deities</i>, Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 2000, pp. 350 and 156. H.P. Blavatsky writes: "Under the general designation of fairies, and fays, these spirits of the elements appear in the myth, fable, tradition, or poetry of all nations, ancient and modern. Their names are legion — peris, devs, djins, sylvans, satyrs, fauns, elves, dwarfs, trolls, norns, nisses, kobolds, brownies, necks, stromkarls, undines, nixies, salamanders, goblins, ponkes, banshees, kelpies, pixies, moss people, good people, good neighbors, wild women, men of peace, white ladies — and many more", <i>Isis Unveiled</i>, vol. 1, <<a href="http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/isis/iu1-00in.htm">http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/isis/iu1-00in.htm</a>>.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref71" name="_ftn71" title="">[71]</a> Chevalier and Gheerbrant, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 350. </p>
<p>Although the usual enumerations correlate gnomes with <i>Earth</i>, an unreliable source claims that elves are closely related elementals. “Elementals/Nature Spirits,” <<a href="http://natureelementals.com/NE1.html">http://natureelementals.com/NE1.html</a>>. </p>
<p>Another unverifiable source claims that: “In Norwegian legend, …Vindicans (little people) …were craftsmen [who] lived in …toadstools and mushroom[s]. Pixies and Elves[,] along with Gnomes[,] are a direct relative [of] the Vindican”, “Santa’s Village History,” <<a href="http://www.santasvillage.net/santas.village.history.html">http://www.santasvillage.net/santas.village.history.html</a>>.</p>
<p>More credible, perhaps, is the account published in a Colorado newspaper: “In pagan Scandinavia, people believed that house gnomes guarded them against evil. Mostly benevolent, gnomes could turn nasty is not properly treated. When Christmas became popular as a festive season during the mid-1800s, Scandinavian writers recast gnomes as the mischievous but true friends of Father Christmas. Santa’s elves are the children of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gr%C3%BDla">Gryla</a> and <a href="http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=is&u=http://is.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leppal%25C3%25BA%25C3%25B0i&prev=/search%3Fq%3DLeppaludi%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26hs%3DZfQ%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-US:official">Leppaludi</a>. Some say that there are 13 elves, some nine, some six”, “World of Wonder,” <i>Gazette</i>, Dec. 6, 2004, “metro” section, p. 8.</p>
<p>However, we note that even the absence of an obvious candidate “Earth elemental” does not necessarily do violence to the alchemical account. In the Kabbalistic schema, earth and water are virtually equated, and the three main elements – water, air, and fire – are represented by the three “mother” letters: Aleph, Mem, and Shin. See Charles Poncé, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0835605108/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=ellactor-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0835605108&linkId=42cfa1904b26a0f21dea635adc2c1ef5">Kabbalah</a></i>, Wheaton, Ill.: Quest, 1997, p. 41. You may breathe a sigh of relief.</p>
<p>Disclosure: "We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.”</p>
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Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-76622157136633259372013-07-25T14:36:00.002-07:002013-08-02T16:48:53.677-07:00Greenwich: In the Mean Time<p><font size=2>Matthew J. Bell</br>with Jim Brandon</font></br>author of <i>Weird America</i> and <i>The Rebirth of Pan</i></p>
<p>“[T]he blowing up of the first meridian </br>is bound to raise a howl of execration.”</br>- Joseph Conrad, <i>The Secret Agent</i><a name="_ednref1" title="" href="#_edn1">[1]</a></p>
<p>In the previous post, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/06/star-trek-in-tenebris_5.html" target="_blank"><i>In Tenebris</i></a>, we took on the topic of the layers of symbolism enveloping the City of London world financial center. Our treatment was occasioned by a fictional terrorist bombing there – perhaps near the intensely occultic Knights Templar church – as depicted in the new blockbuster movie, <i>Star Trek Into Darkness</i> (“<i>Into Darkness</i>”).</p>
<p>We now propose to explore further into – and in a moment, farther southeast of – this lurid Londoniana. Our primary setting will shift to Greenwich <a name="_ednref2" title="" href="#_edn2">[2]</a> (from the “...Old English <i>Grenewic</i> ...literally ‘Green Harbor’.”),<a name="_ednref3" title="" href="#_edn3">[3]</a> where so-called “Universal Time” is officially based. “Time and space are measured from [Greenwich]” in the astute words of the unusual group called the London psychogeographers.<a name="_ednref4" title="" href="#_edn4">[4]</a></p>
<p>This modern function is nevertheless in keeping with an ancient tradition, it seems. For “Greenwich was once an area of great sacred importance...” in the view of the insightful <i>Aquarian Guide to Legandary London</i>.<a name="_ednref5" title="" href="#_edn5">[5]</a> So, if science and its handmaiden technology have become the de-facto religion of the day, this area must be a veritable Vatican or Mecca. How the Greenwich conversion from the mythic or folkloric to the highly technical was made, at a critical turning point of European culture, will soon be told.</p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/WhiteTower.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="375" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/WhiteTower.jpg" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://worldalldetails.com/Slide/London_Architecture_United_Kingdom_Tower_of_London-918.html" target="_blank">Image source</a>) ; Tower of London. </span></div></br>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/Bran.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/Bran.jpg" width="441" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://api.ning.com/files/hSMjUnplmC1uTHMWtkpXWTZ8HHw*Zdp33Xy1fMmT*CXrk*clTu35Hi1nyWqSBlja3iXRqILLfsZPiWGyRl9mCQrdQEB7uOl-/TheEmperor.jpg" target="_blank"> Image source</a>) ; Legendary king Brân. </span></div></br>
<p>As we noted in part one, the Prime Meridian of longitude was established at Greenwich “by high adepts of alchemy and occult orders.” Their starting point? The ominously portentous Tower of London, reputed site of the ancient British <i>palladium</i> of power, the buried head of the Celtic king, Bran. From the Tower precincts the adepts measured in English miles, to four decimal places, a number that is generated by every school child studying simple geometry and the ratio of the circumferance of a circle to its diameter. In short, <i>pi</i>: or 3.1416 miles due east to the new meridian at Greenwich.</p>
<p>That at least was the claim of a little-known Scottish geometry savant, Hamish MacHuisdean, whose unusual work coauthor Jim Brandon discovered by chance years ago. In a moment, we will be taking a close look at the chief MacH. contentions that the <i>pi</i> constant is discrete at 3.1416 and <i>not</i> an irrational or infinitely recurring decimal – and that the 31416 “series” is the secret derivation of 33, the master Mason degree.</p>
<p>All this and the Kabbalah, too. We will consider the tantalizing indications of a cryptic rôle played by the formidable Jewish esoteric complex in these undertakings of the British maguses.</p>
<p><b>Traditional Aspects of Time</b></p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/Shiva.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/Shiva.jpg" width="280" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://www.fritjofcapra.net/shiva_statue.jpg" target="_blank">Image source</a>) </span></div></br>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/MasonicLodgeMarked.jpg " imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="352" src=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/MasonicLodgeMarked.jpg " width="500" /></a></div> <br />
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<a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/CollegiumFraternitatis_Edit.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="361" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/CollegiumFraternitatis_Edit.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href=" http://www.sacred-texts.com/mas/dun/img/00800.jpg " target="_blank">Image source</a>) One manifestation of the Creator-Destroyer duality is the Hindu deity, Shiva,<a name="_ednref6" title="" href="#_edn6">[6]</a> whose statue stands outside of the particle accelerator at CERN <a name="_ednref7" title="" href="#_edn7">[7]</a> (top). Kali, Hindu goddess of death and time, <a name="_ednref8" title="" href="#_edn8">[8]</a> is one of Shiva’s consorts. <a name="_ednref9" title="" href="#_edn9">[9]</a> Another manifestation of the same idea, as represented in a Masonic Lodge (middle).<a name="_ednref10" title="" href="#_edn10">[10]</a> Duncan’s legend reads: “1. Candidate prays. 2. First stop. 3. Second stop. 4. Third stop. 5. Room where candidates are prepared. 6. Ante-room where members enter the lodge. 7. Hall. 8. Doors. 9. Door through which candidates are admitted into the lodge. 10. Door through which members enter. 11. Altar. 12. Treasurer. 13. Secretary. 14. Senior Deacon. 15. Worshipful Master. 16. Junior Warden. 17 and 18. Stewards. 19. Senior Warden. 20. Junior Deacon. 21. Tyler.”<a name="_ednref11" title="" href="#_edn11">[11]</a> The same east (<i>oriens</i>), west (<i>occidens</i>), noon (<i>meridies</i>) layout appears on the Rosicrucian <i>Speculum Sophicum Rhodostauroticum</i> (1618, bottom).</span></div></br>
<p>For now, since “Time is of the essence” at Greenwich, we need to lay groundwork. Time, considered as a deity, is both “[t]he Creator and Devourer. ...it is... the revealer of Truth.”<a name="_ednref12" title="" href="#_edn12">[12]</a> Midway between the poles of creation and destruction is the vast middle ground over which operates a maintaining or sustaining force that keeps the present order. Hence, “In all the ancient mythologies there were triads...a creator, a preserver, and a destroyer. ...[In the heathen system of] the Indian, Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva... This system of triads... has become... in Freemasonry... the triad of three governing officers... [t]he Master and the two Wardens... We must...look for the origin of the triads... to the three positions and functions of the sun. The rising sun or creator of light, the meridian sun or its preserver, and the setting sun or its destroyer...”.<a name="_ednref13" title="" href="#_edn13">[13]</a> </p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/13thdegree1.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="105" src=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/13thdegree1.gif" width="180" /></a></div> <br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href=" http://www.scottishritecalifornia.org/images/13thdegree1.gif " target="_blank">Image source</a>) “In the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, the <b>Thirteenth Degree</b> or Knights of the Ninth Arch is properly an <i>écossais</i> [i.e., Scottish] Degree.”<a name="_ednref14" title="" href="#_edn14">[14]</a> “While there is no longer a working astronomical observatory at Greenwich, a ball still drops daily to mark the exact moment of 1 p.m....”.<a name="_ednref15" title="" href="#_edn15">[15]</a> 1 p.m. Is the <b>13th hour</b>.</span></div></br>
<p>To the Freemason, “Time ...is ...the symbol of well-directed perseverance in the performance of duty.”<a name="_ednref16" title="" href="#_edn16">[16]</a> And the “great object of a Freemason’s labor” is to “at last obtain the true Word which is the symbol of Divine Truth.”<a name="_ednref17" title="" href="#_edn17">[17]</a> The “true Word” was, according to Freemasonic legend, rediscovered “...at the hour of meridian...”.<a name="_ednref18" title="" href="#_edn18">[18]</a> Importantly, “[t]he cessation of time is the break-through to enlightenment; eternity.”<a name="_ednref19" title="" href="#_edn19">[19]</a> </p>
<p>This complex tissue of subtle symbolism was not lost on famed novelist, Joseph Conrad. His story, <i>The Secret Agent</i>, depicts an attempted bombing “...attack on the Greenwich meridian...”, which target represents “...a displaced attack on the empire...”.<a name="_ednref20" title="" href="#_edn20">[20]</a> Conrad explicitly describes the plot to detonate a bomb at the prime meridian in terms of “...rendering of cosmic chaos...”.<a name="_ednref21" title="" href="#_edn21">[21]</a> However, it is not simply the return to chaos – as the Joker-character seemingly wants, as an “agent of chaos” <a name="_ednref22" title="" href="#_edn22">[22]</a> in <i>The Dark Knight</i> Batman movie (2008). <a name="_ednref23" title="" href="#_edn23">[23]</a> Rather, what is in view is a combination of “chaos and eternity,” <a name="_ednref24" title="" href="#_edn24">[24]</a> exactly along the symbolical lines one would expect from a plot, not simply to blow up a landmark, but to control or harness the occult power of Time (Cronos/Saturn <a name="_ednref25" title="" href="#_edn25">[25]</a>) itself. <a name="_ednref26" title="" href="#_edn26">[26]</a> Although not about Greenwich, specifically, the reader may find it useful to ponder the comment of award winning English author (and psycho-geographer), Peter Ackroyd: “There are parts of London where time has actually hardened and come to an end.” <a name="_ednref27" title="" href="#_edn27">[27]</a> </p>
<p><b>Actual Terrorism Near Greenwich</b></p>
<p>Our present study is not merely concerned with thriller novels or science fiction movies, however. Within the last few weeks, the United Kingdom experienced its first terrorist attack since the 7/7 Bombing of 2005, when a British soldier (with duties in the Tower of London) was hacked to death at 2:20pm, Greenwich-time, on a street in the district of Woolwich. Woolwich is now “located in the Royal Borough of Greenwich.”<a name="_ednref28" title="" href="#_edn28">[28]</a></p>
<p>About the selection of the attack location, journalist Andrew Gilligan writes the following.</p>
<p>“<b>The site</b> of Wednesday’s attack <b>was not random</b>, nor in all probability was it chosen simply because there was a barracks nearby. Woolwich, as not many people seem to have realised, is one of the cradles of <i>al-Muhajiroun</i>. ...Woolwich is at the join of yet another <b>extremist-related ley line</b>. It is not just a major military garrison; it is not just one of the spawning-grounds of <i>al-Muhajiroun</i>; it is also, of course, home to the main Category-A prison where accused terrorists are held, and the main court, attached to it for security reasons, where terrorist trials take place.”<a name="_ednref29" title="" href="#_edn29">[29]</a></p>
<p>Despite the fact that Gilligan’s use of the phrase “ley line” arguably is merely artistic, it nevertheless brings the idea of mystical alignments into the public arena. </p>
<p>Also worthy of mention is a so-called “...French plot to change the way we tell the time...”.<a name="_ednref30" title="" href="#_edn30">[30]</a> This might be thought nothing more than a foofaraw, were it not for the the potent symbols swirling around Greenwich as well as the fact that this dispute over time-keeping must be set against the historic dispute over longitude-determination. “The French clung to the Paris meridian as a rival to Greenwich until 1911 for timekeeping purposes and 1914 for navigation. To this day, French cartographers continue to indicate the Paris meridian on some maps.” <a name="_ednref31" title="" href="#_edn31">[31]</a> And it may be recalled that a representation of this line, inlaid in the floor of an important Paris church, was shown in the recent film, <i>The DaVinci Code</i>. </p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/JohnHarrison_StarTrek.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="756" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/JohnHarrison_StarTrek.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://i2.cdnds.net/13/17/618x934/harrison.jpg " target="_blank">Image source</a>) </span></div><br />
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/JohnHarrison_Longitude.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="447" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/JohnHarrison_Longitude.jpg" width="355" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/12/John_Harrison_Uhrmacher.jpg " target="_blank">Image source</a>) John Harrison, from Into Darkness (top); John Harrison, solver of the “longitude problem” and inventor of the “marine chronometer” (bottom). </span></div><br />
<p>But we are getting ahead of ourselves. Let us back up and consider <i>Into Darkness</i>. As previously noted, the main villain in this latest Star Trek is Khan. But Khan is introduced under the alias <i>John Harrison</i>. “John Harrison” also names a historical personage, in this case, the man remembered for having solved the “longitude problem.” (Incidentally, this study was also a part-time occupation of Emmanuel Swedenborg. See <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=Np9U36-cJgoC&pg=PA56&lpg=PA56&dq=emanuel+swedenborg+%22longitude+problem%22&source=bl&ots=vNlnmbNDv1&sig=anCqaL9iRbLzF46onSbTlQNt1K4&hl=en&sa=X&ei=iOXxUZj3GYXXrQHSioA4&ved=0CDAQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=emanuel%20swedenborg%20%22longitude%20problem%22&f=false" target="_blank">HERE</a>.)</p>
<p>The “longitude problem” is simply a label for the difficulty, in an era predating satellites and fancy techno-gadgetry, of determining one’s longitude on the open sea. It turns out that every 15 degree movement – due east or west – has the effect of adding or subtracting one hour from one’s local time. Hence, if one can compare one’s local time, which local time can be gleaned from the position of the sun, to a reference time at a location with a known longitude, one can calculate the longitude of one’s current position. <a name="_ednref32" title="" href="#_edn32">[32]</a> </p>
<p><b>Siting the Meridian Line</b></p>
<p>Greenwich, England was selected for the longitude reference position. Towards this end, a project was begun – involving alchemist and physicist, Isaac Newton – to establish a line of 0 degrees longitude, running through Greenwich. <a name="_ednref33" title="" href="#_edn33">[33]</a></p>
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<a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/MacHPi_Marked.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="190" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/MacHPi_Marked.jpg" width="500" /></a></div>
<p style="font-size: 12px;">(Image source: MacHuisdean, <i>The Great Law</i>, p. 86, figure 15.)</p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/MacH_PiMilesTGreenwich-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="453" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/MacH_PiMilesTGreenwich-1.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<p style="font-size: 12px;">(Image source: MacHuisdean, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 47.)</p>
<p>How was this done? We wouldn’t have had a clue, except that, as we noted at the outset, a Scottish geometer and arithmetician named MacHuisdean (MacH for short) had published in the 1920s and ‘30s a curious and offbeat book that he called <i>The Great Law</i>. <a name="_ednref34" title="" href="#_edn34">[34]</a> When Jim Brandon, by sheer chance, found a copy of this in the amazing old Atlantis Bookstore on Hollywood Boulevard in Los Angeles years ago, he immediately saw its value in relation to the Prime Meridian. This imaginary but world-historically-important symbol construct had piqued his curiosity since reading Joseph Conrad’s <i>The Secret Agent</i> as a kid.</p>
<p>Quite discursive in nature, MacH’s book will quickly be found to have a fascination if not a monomania for the <i>pi</i> factor, citing a vast number of instances in which 3.1416 or variants up to 31416 recur in sites of geodetic interest to the author. These are primarily around the British Isles and by far the most important is the one shown above, asserting the pi-miles distance from the Tower of London’s adjunct Salt Tower to zero Greenwich. MacH tosses off this highly significant finding tersely, only citing “the Ordnance Survey Office in Southhampton” as his source and offering no insights on why or by whom the mileage was selected. <a name="_ednref35" title="" href="#_edn35">[35]</a></p>
<p>Verifying these claims has turned out to be a major work in progress, since what MacH seems to be talking about must be maps published three-quarters of a century ago by the British agency in question but locating them now in this country has not been fruitful. Also, the distance given by the Google mapping service from Salt Tower to Greenwich varies slightly depending upon where one places the ruler points. However, from the (“eye-balled”) center of the Salt Tower to roughly the center of “Prime Meridian Walk,” is 3.16019 miles, by our quick-and-dirty Google calculation. </p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/GoogleMapsDistance.jpg " imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="130" src=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/GoogleMapsDistance.jpg " width="500" /></a></div>
<p style="font-size: 12px;">(Image source: Google Maps.)</p>
One can obtain MacH’s <i>pi</i>-distance by placing the first ruler point on the easternmost edge of the Salt Tower. However, one ends up slightly to the west of “Prime Meridian Walk.” Perhaps the street name is a misnomer.<br>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/GoogleMapsDistance2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="128" src=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/GoogleMapsDistance2.jpg" width="500" /></a></div>
<p style="font-size: 12px;">(Image source: Google Maps.)</p>
<p>In resolving this discrepancy there are several possibilities. <b>1</b> – MacH correctly read his Ordnance map which was itself correct, but the current Google distance is wrong. <b>2</b> – MacH was correct reading the map but the map itself was wrong, and Google is right. <b>3</b> – Google is right and MacH, by error or (heaven forbid!) design, misrepresented the map which had no pi distance and substituted his favorite number. <b>4</b> – MacH correctly read his Ordnance map, which was itself correct, but the Google distance calculations are at variance with MacH because the relevant measurements are sensitive to the exact exact trajectory line MacH used, and this line is unknown to us. However, to round out our last possibility, we may suppose that <i>were</i> MacH’s trajectory lines known, Google would confirm MacH’s distance computations.</p>
<p>So, considering all of that and on the offchance that there really was a “<i>pi</i> distance” plotted out by God knows whom for this key geodetic link-up of the Tower palladium to the Greenwich node for time and space – and just imagine what psycho-geo novelist Peter Ackroyd could do with that image of the King Bran head still ritually venerated in a crypt under the Tower – we will examine 3.1416 a bit further. Surprisingly, this will involve a major Kabbalah connection, bringing in that high-voltage Jewish mystical aspect, which was certainly in the air at the time of Isaac Newton and the Royal Society clique and nascent Freemasonry in the late 1600s. </p>
<p>The Kabbalah will be found to embody the <i>pi</i> factor as a coordinate regulating the spatial aspects of creation. As this will be a considerable side trip from our present topic, however, we must consign that account – plus some further aspects of the seat-of-the-pants kabbalism of Hamish MacHuisdean – to the notes. But the fundamental point to remember is that it is entirely possible that the Prime Meridian may have been placed according to kabbalistic principles. <a name="_ednref36" title="" href="#_edn36">[36]</a>,<a name="_ednref37" title="" href="#_edn37">[37]</a> </p>
<p>The Greenwich Royal Observatory was established for the purpose of precisifying moon observation data, one step on the road to making possible longitude determination at sea. <a name="_ednref38" title="" href="#_edn38">[38]</a></p>
<p>“King Charles II founded the Royal Observatory in 1675 to solve the problem of finding longitude at sea. If an accurate catalogue of the positions of the stars could be made, and the position of the Moon then measured accurately relative to the stars, the Moon’s motion could be used as a natural clock to calculate Greenwich Time. Sailors at sea could measure the Moon’s position relative to bright stars and use tables of the Moon’s position, compiled at the Royal Observatory, to calculate the time at Greenwich. This means of finding Longitude was known as the ‘Lunar Distance Method’.” <a name="_ednref39" title="" href="#_edn39">[39]</a> </p>
<p>We encountered King Charles II previously. He is the monarch who provided for ravens to populate, in perpetuity, the grounds in front of the White Tower. He also established, in 1660, the Royal Society of London. Authors Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh note that “Charles II was deeply interested in alchemy...”. <a name="_ednref40" title="" href="#_edn40">[40]</a></p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/John_Harrison_Clockmaker.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="477" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/John_Harrison_Clockmaker.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/e/e3/John_Harrison_memorial_02.jpg " target="_blank">Image source</a>) </span></div><br />
<p>John Harrison, also the name of a chief protagonist in the recent movie, <i>Star Trek Into Darkness</i>, provided another piece of the puzzle. He invented a clock (the marine chronometer) that would keep fairly accurate time, despite the disrupting motion of ocean waves. </p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/SaturnNorth2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="500" src=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/SaturnNorth2.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href=" http://i.space.com/images/i/000/028/477/i02/saturn-hurricane-cassini.jpg" target="_blank">Image source</a>) </span></div><br />
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/SaturnNorth1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="500" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/SaturnNorth1.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://i.space.com/images/i/000/024/024/i02/saturn-hexagon-vortex-cassini-photo-2.jpg " target="_blank">Image source</a>) Top: “The spinning vortex of Saturn’s north polar storm resembles a deep <b>red rose </b><a name="_ednref41" title="" href="#_edn41">[41]</a> surrounded by green foliage in this false-color image from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft”; <a name="_ednref42" title="" href="#_edn42">[42]</a> Bottom: “Saturn’s mysterious northern vortex, a vast <b>hexagon-shaped storm</b>, <a name="_ednref43" title="" href="#_edn43">[43]</a> dominates this photo taken Nov. 27, 2012, by NASA’s Cassini spacecraft.” <a name="_ednref44" title="" href="#_edn44">[44]</a></span></div><br />
<p>The fascination with time is echoed in <i>Into Darkness</i>. In the movie, the home planet of the Klingon race “...is both spelt and spoken as Kronos”. <a name="_ednref45" title="" href="#_edn45">[45]</a> “KRONOS (or Cronus) was the Titan god of time and the ages...”. <a name="_ednref46" title="" href="#_edn46">[46]</a> He is identified with the Roman deity <i>Saturn</i>.</p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/Pentagon2.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="192" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/Pentagon2.gif" width="201" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://www.jimloy.com/geometry/pentagon.gif " target="_blank">Image source</a>) </span></div><br />
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/pentagon.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="134" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/pentagon.gif" width="140" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://www.mathsisfun.com/geometry/images/interior-angles-pentagon.gif " target="_blank">Image source</a>) If a regular pentagon is divided into 5 triangles, the central angles will each measure 72 degrees. </span></div><br />
<p>We already reported the prominence, in the film, of the mystical number 72. It may not shock the reader to learn, therefore, that 72 has mythological ties to both Kronos and the moon. “Thoth, in an Egyptian creation myth, wins a 72nd of each day of the year from the Moon in a game of draughts, as a favour to Nut, the Sky Goddess. He uses these portions to make the five intercalary days on which the remaining Gods and Goddesses are born.” <a name="_ednref47" title="" href="#_edn47">[47]</a> “The god Kronos (Geb) and the goddess Rhea (Nut) had illicit intercourse. Helios (the sun god) tried to prevent Rhea from giving birth at any time in the year. However, Hermes (Thoth) managed to add five days to the year by beating the moon in a game of draughts. These became the birthdays of five deities - Osiris, Apollo (Horus the Elder), Typhon (Seth), Isis and Nephthys.” <a name="_ednref48" title="" href="#_edn48">[48]</a></p>
<p>Another 72 tie-in relates to Earth’s axial precession (a fancy phrase designating our planet’s polar “wobbling”), which undergoes a complete cycle approximately every 26,000 years. The wobble is said to inch along at a pace traditionally reckoned – according to the calculations of Isaac Newton <a name="_ednref49" title="" href="#_edn49">[49]</a> – at “1 degree per 72 years”. <a name="_ednref50" title="" href="#_edn50">[50]</a> We note that this precession has further connexions with dragon lore. Specifically, as we reported in our prior installment, Jay Weidner has argued that the constellation Draco had prime importance for ancient astronomers.</p>
<p>All of this seems to fit in rather snugly with other aspects (to be mentioned shortly) of Saturnian time-obsession since authors Robert Bauval and Graham Hancock allege (in their book <i>Keeper of Genesis</i>, 1996) that various Egyptian-Masonic “...rituals symbolised the ‘turning back’ of the precessional cycle to a remote ancestral time known as Zep Tepi (‘first time’)...”. <a name="_ednref51" title="" href="#_edn51">[51]</a></p>
<p>This “turning back the clock” theme has arguably cropped up before. <a name="_ednref52" title="" href="#_edn52">[52]</a> The fabled Tower of London has itself been called “a kind of time-machine”. <a name="_ednref53" title="" href="#_edn53">[53]</a> In addition, it may be that the White Mound, ancient location of the present Tower complex, “...was the site of a prehistoric observatory...”. <a name="_ednref54" title="" href="#_edn54">[54]</a></p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/RoyalObservatoryGreenwich.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="375" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/RoyalObservatoryGreenwich.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://www.cloudbait.com/archaeo/gno.jpg " target="_blank">Image source</a>) </span></div><br />
<p>In any case, the Royal Observatory at Greenwich was designed by the famous architect and Freemason, Christopher Wren. <a name="_ednref55" title="" href="#_edn55">[55]</a> In passing, we note that Wren’s structures sometimes incorporated the remains of dead cats, quite probably “...placed in buidings as foundation sacrifices...”. <a name="_ednref56" title="" href="#_edn56">[56]</a> Locations known to have contained such macabre features include a “...a house built...between 1666 and 1723 in the Tower of London...” and “...the church of St. Michael Royal, College Hill, London.” <a name="_ednref57" title="" href="#_edn57">[57]</a> </p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/StPaulsCathedral.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="379" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/StPaulsCathedral.png" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://blog.londonconnection.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Screen-shot-2012-02-18-at-5.54.28-AM2.png " target="_blank">Image source</a>) </span></div><br />
<p>Wren also designed the iconic St. Paul’s Cathedral, <a name="_ednref58" title="" href="#_edn58">[58]</a> which is visible on various <i>Into Darkness</i> promotional posters. (See, again, our earlier post, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/06/star-trek-in-tenebris_5.html" target="_blank">HERE</a>.)</p>
<p><b>Why Greenwich?</b></p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/PalaceOfPlacentia.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="321" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/PalaceOfPlacentia.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4d/The_Palace_of_Placentia.jpg
" target="_blank">Image source</a>) </span></div><br />
<p>In the first place, we note that Greenwich has been associated with the “initiation” (broadly and artfully construed) of numerous post-Plantagenet monarchs and rulers. Henry Tudor, otherwise known to history as Henry VII, ended the nearly 360 year reign (1126-1485 <a name="_ednref59" title="" href="#_edn59">[59]</a>) of the House of Plantagenet. “ Henry VII built Placentia – whose name means ‘pleasant place to live’<a name="_ednref60" title="" href="#_edn60">[60]</a> – on the banks of the Thames at Greenwich in 1500. The palace was a favorite haunt of his son, Henry VIII, some of his ill-fated wives, and his daughter, Elizabeth I. ” <a name="_ednref61" title="" href="#_edn61">[61]</a> In fact, it was the “...royal residence where Henry VIII and his daughters Mary and Elizabeth were born and where son Edward VI died.” <a name="_ednref62" title="" href="#_edn62">[62]</a></p>
<p>The Stuart King James I had Greenwich Palace remodeled and given to his wife, Queen Anne of Denmark. This “Queen’s House” at Greenwich, was “...designed by Inigo Jones and is one of the most perfect examples of <i>Palladian</i> architecture in England.” <a name="_ednref63" title="" href="#_edn63">[63]</a> The important Freemason, James Anderson, refers to the architect as “...our great Master-Mason Inigo Jones”. <a name="_ednref64" title="" href="#_edn64">[64]</a></p>
<p>It seems natural, therefore, that the Queen Ann house has been called “...a site of key masonic importance...”. <a name="_ednref65" title="" href="#_edn65">[65]</a> </p>
<p>“King Charles the First resided occasionally at Greenwich, before the breaking out of the civil war: his Queen, Henrieta Maria, employed Inigo Jones to finish the building, which Queen Anne of Denmark had begun. It was completed in 1635... On the 21st of December 1651, it was resolved [by Parliament] that Greenwich house should be kept for the Lord Protector...”, Oliver Cromwell. <a name="_ednref66" title="" href="#_edn66">[66]</a></p>
<p>As we have mentioned, Charles II founded the Royal Observatory in Greenwich in 1675. <i>Wikipedia</i> notes that “...George III granted the Queen’s House to the Royal Naval Asylum (an orphanage school)...”. <a name="_ednref67" title="" href="#_edn67">[67]</a> Some might fairly regard this as an alarming conjunction in the era of impressment. <a name="_ednref68" title="" href="#_edn68">[68]</a></p>
<p>At fifty-four years of age, George I, “...arrived in Greenwich on September 29, 1714, with a full retinue of German friends, advisors and servants (two of which, Mohamet and Mustapha, were Negroes captured during a Turkish campaign).” <a name="_ednref69" title="" href="#_edn69">[69]</a></p>
<p>Amongst his other titles, Queen Elizabeth II’s consort, Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, is also <i>Baron Greenwich</i>. <a name="_ednref70" title="" href="#_edn70">[70]</a></p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/IsleOfDogs.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="675" src=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/IsleOfDogs.gif" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://www.british-history.ac.uk/image.aspx?compid=46507&filename=fig143.gif " target="_blank">Image source</a>) The Isle of Dogs, circa 1740. </span></div><br />
<p>Greenwich, partly in virtue of supposed ley line connexions, <a name="_ednref71" title="" href="#_edn71">[71]</a> is symbolically tied to the Isle of Dogs, slightly to its west. This is a place of crypto-political power, in the richly associative view of the London psychogeographers, that has been termed the “Omphalos of the British Empire.” <a name="_ednref72" title="" href="#_edn72">[72]</a> “Omphale” and its cognate “omphalos” (or, Latinized, <i>omphalus</i>) designates a “navel” <a name="_ednref73" title="" href="#_edn73">[73]</a> or “central point”. <a name="_ednref74" title="" href="#_edn74">[74]</a> In ancient physiology, the <i>omphalos</i> was believed to be the point around which the embryo formed, and from which the embryo “receive[d] nourishment”. <a name="_ednref75" title="" href="#_edn75">[75]</a> It is a “Cosmic Centre...both cathartic and apotropaic [i.e., evil-averting]... the place of communication between the three worlds...”. <a name="_ednref76" title="" href="#_edn76">[76]</a> Significantly, from the perspective of empire, “[i]t is also the point of expansion...”. <a name="_ednref77" title="" href="#_edn77">[77]</a> </p>
<p>The origin of the name “Isle of Dogs” is disputed. <a name="_ednref78" title="" href="#_edn78">[78]</a> One source links it to Herne the Hunter and a legend of a hapless nobleman and his young bride who perished in the primeval swamps in the area. <a name="_ednref79" title="" href="#_edn79">[79]</a> Another interesting factoid is that “Isle of Dogs” was “...the title of a notorious satirical play [1597] of ‘very seditious and slandrous’ content, written by Thomas Nashe in collaboration with Ben Jonson and others... . Now lost, the play was outrageous enough to lead to Jonson’s imprisonment and Nashe’s fleeing London. The Isle of Dogs of the title, however, was no doubt a metaphor for Britain...”. <a name="_ednref80" title="" href="#_edn80">[80]</a></p>
<p>There is, to invoke A. J. Bell’s Fortean neologism, <a name="_ednref81" title="" href="#_edn81">[81]</a> an apparent <i>LexiLink</i>, or verbal synchronicity, with the <b>Canary Islands</b>. Known in yesteryear variously as the <i>Fortunate Isles</i> or the <i>Blessed Isles</i>, <a name="_ednref82" title="" href="#_edn82">[82]</a> the island cluster, lying west of Africa, bears a name that means, “...literally ‘island of dogs’ (<i>canis</i>...), so called because large dogs lived there. <a name="_ednref83" title="" href="#_edn83">[83]</a> The name was extended to the whole island group (<i>Canariæ Insulæ</i>) by the time of Arnobius (c.300).” <a name="_ednref84" title="" href="#_edn84">[84]</a> </p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/AnubisThames.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="389" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/AnubisThames.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/images/photo/2007/10/01/20071001POD/20179130.JPG" target="_blank">Image source</a>) </span></div><br />
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/Occident.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="487" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/Occident.jpeg" width="399" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTyWl2MbaFRKUwLCq6U66teM18VUakw9SMs7LLMOHj9oGt0XyYv_KPeSM3K-_7sXC1LufEL8he4tXVftEwIgl0ZlJUUNODREr9tqIuvVt3eWtfh9GkYxEg31kFA5-xKXjcinvOyBXQub-r/s1600/occident.jpeg" target="_blank">Image source</a>) In what might fairly be called an open-air crypto-ritual – for who is to prove the negative – on October 1, 2007, at “<b>23 feet tall…</b> [this] five-ton golden replica of a statue of <b>Anubis</b>, the ancient Egyptian jackal-headed god of the dead, was transported along the River Thames past the Tower Bridge in London”, which leads directly into the Tower complex to its north. <a name="_ednref85" title="" href="#_edn85">[85]</a>, bottom); “One of the traditional duties of Anubis was to guide the dead” into <b>the Occident</b> (the West). <a name="_ednref86" title="" href="#_edn86">[86]</a></span></div><br />
<p>Of course, the Egyptian “Land of the Dead” was also called “the west” (<i>imenet</i>). “For the ancient Egyptians, the west (specifically the desert west of the Nile) was the destination of the dead. This is because the sun died every day in the western horizon, only to be reborn the next morning in the east. Most Egyptians were buried to the west of the Nile with their heads facing the west.” <a name="_ednref87" title="" href="#_edn87">[87]</a></p>
<p><b>The Alchemical Salt Tower?</b></p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/MacH_SaltTower.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="301" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/MacH_SaltTower.jpg" width="500" /></a></div>
<p style="font-size: 12px;">Image source: MacHuisdean, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 47.)</p>
<p>Returning to MacHuisdean’s unexplained emphasis on the Salt Tower as the starting point for siting the Prime Meridian, we note that salt has some relevant connexions that might go some distance towards explaining the Salt Tower’s rôle. </p>
<p>“[T]he salt-cellar partook of the nature of a holy vessel, associated with the temple in general, and more particularly, with the altar.” <a name="_ednref88" title="" href="#_edn88">[88]</a> Salt was both an emblem of “welcome” and “safety” when sitting at table with guests. <a name="_ednref89" title="" href="#_edn89">[89]</a> Additionally, the “salt cellar [served] as a boundary”. <a name="_ednref90" title="" href="#_edn90">[90]</a> In terms of seating arrangements while dining, “the salt dish served as a boundary” – separating individuals of different classes and stations, and “...indicating rank and social position...”. <a name="_ednref91" title="" href="#_edn91">[91]</a> </p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/AlchemySalt.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="611" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/AlchemySalt.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://www.paulkiritsis.net/img/uploads/2012/02/alchemy.jpg" target="_blank">Image source</a>) </span></div><br />
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/AlchemySalt2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="474" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/AlchemySalt2.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://ishtarsgate.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/alchemical-elements.jpg " target="_blank">Image source</a>; Alchemical Salt is, along with Mercury and Sulfur, one of the "Three Essentials.") </span></div><br />
<p>Additionally, Salt – along with Sulfur and Mercury – is one of the “three essentials” in alchemy. <a name="_ednref92" title="" href="#_edn92">[92]</a> Note the capital letters. What is in view is something different from the garden-variety items that answer to the common names <i>salt</i>, <i>sulfur</i>, and <i>mercury</i>. </p>
<p>“Paracelsus defined the Three Essentials by how they behave in fire. Sulfur is seen as what fuels the fire or what is changed in the fire. ...Mercury is the volatile watery essence of the fire that Paracelsus called ‘phlegma’ and is represented by the flames, light, heat, and smoke issuing from the fire. The new principle of Salt exhibits the fixed essence of the substance burning that resists the fire and is found in the ashes. ...As Paracelsus put it: ‘The fire is Mercury; what is burnt is Sulfur; and all ash is Salt.” <a name="_ednref93" title="" href="#_edn93">[93]</a></p>
<p>Salt is something of a Phoenix. “Like the First Matter, Salt shows up at both the beginning and the end of the work. ...The alchemists described the First Matter as a ‘poisonous dragon’ whose fire can instantly reduce us to ashes.” <a name="_ednref94" title="" href="#_edn94">[94]</a></p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/DragonsEssentials.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="528" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/DragonsEssentials.jpg" width="340" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://www.johncoulthart.com/feuilleton/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/splendorsolis15.jpg" target="_blank">Image source</a>; The Three Essentials represented as a three-headed dragon inside of an alchemical vessel.) </span></div><br />
<p>In this context, it seems profitable to keep two facts in view. Number one, we should bear in mind the dragon iconography that literally frames the City of London. </p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b6/Great_Fire_London.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="346" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b6/Great_Fire_London.jpg" width="481" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b6/Great_Fire_London.jpg" target="_blank">Image source</a>) </span></div><br />
<p>Number two, we should recall the “Great Fire” that occurred in London in the ominous year 1666. <a name="_ednref95" title="" href="#_edn95">[95]</a></p>
<p>Given the historical context, the <i>pi</i>-distance to Greenwich calculation would certainly have been made only under the supervision of such Royal Society luminaries as the physicist-alchemist Sir Isaac Newton, and the royal astronomer, Sir John Flamsteed. </p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/HoroscopeFlamsteed.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="492" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/HoroscopeFlamsteed.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><p style="font-size: 12px;">(Image source: Oestmann, <i>loc. cit</i>.)</p>
<p>Although Flamsteed is often said to have been staunchly anti-astrology, he nevertheless personally cast a horoscope for the setting of the Greenwich Observatory’s foundation-stone. <a name="_ednref96" title="" href="#_edn96">[96]</a></p>
<p>As Greenwich is the locus for the prime <i>meridian</i>, the word “meridian” deserves our careful attention. <a name="_ednref97" title="" href="#_edn97">[97]</a> Literally, “meridian” designates “noon,” and derives from the “... Latin <i>meridianus</i> ‘of midday, of noon, southerly, to the south,’.” <a name="_ednref98" title="" href="#_edn98">[98]</a> “Figurative[ly]...[the word] suggest[s a] ‘point of highest development or fullest power’.” <a name="_ednref99" title="" href="#_edn99">[99]</a></p>
<p>Indeed, in Freemasonry, the meridian (or noontime) sun represents the so-called “Raised” Mason – the initiate into the Third Degree who now shines “...like the sun at its meridian.” <a name="_ednref100" title="" href="#_edn100">[100]</a> As touched on above, “[t]he government of a Maon’s Lodge...is vested in three superior officers, who are seated in the East, West, and South, to represent the rising, setting, and meridian sun.” <a name="_ednref101" title="" href="#_edn101">[101]</a></p>
<p>The important 19th century Masonic historian and encyclopedist, Albert Gallatin Mackey, states that the word <i>Zohar</i> (title of the well-known Kabbalistic treatise, which word means, literally, “splendor” or “radiance”) “...signifies the meridian light, the brightest effulgence of day...”. <a name="_ednref102" title="" href="#_edn102">[102]</a> Introduction of Kabbalistic Judaism immediately recalls the Kabbalist-hermeticist, the Baal Shem of London, Dr. Falk, and dovetails, yet again, with the mystical numerology of 72. “The degrees of the Jacob’s ladder were to the number of 72, according to the Zohar.” <a name="_ednref103" title="" href="#_edn103">[103]</a></p>
<p><b>Crowley Cavortings on the Meridian?</b></p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://a4.ec-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/50/82ccfdd7b3d17a02d0fbb8044c9c83f7/l.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="436" src="http://a4.ec-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/50/82ccfdd7b3d17a02d0fbb8044c9c83f7/l.jpg" width="323" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://a4.ec-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/50/82ccfdd7b3d17a02d0fbb8044c9c83f7/l.jpg" target="_blank">Image source</a>) </span></div><br />
<p>The established meridian may be thought to identify mystical line, having importance something akin to that attributed to “ley lines” <a name="_ednref104" title="" href="#_edn104">[104]</a> or, perhaps, the 33rd degree of parallel latitude. <a name="_ednref105" title="" href="#_edn105">[105]</a></p>
<p>Hence, one might expect to discover strange goings on all along the 0-degree line. In fact, it is possible that no less a figure than Aleister Crowley might be summoned (no occult pun intended) at this point to ground this speculation. Crowley’s doings in Africa are often given in vague terms, locatively speaking, using phrases like “in the desert,” etc. </p>
<p>Researcher Alex Owen is more specific. “In late 1909, two Englishmen [Aleister Crowley and Victor Neuburg], scions of the comfortable middle classes, undertook a journey to Algiers. ...It was at Crowley’s instigation that the two men began to make their way, first by tram and then by foot, into the North African desert to the southwest of Algiers; and it was Crowley’s decision to perform there a series of magical ceremonies that prefigured his elaboration of the techniques of sex magic, or, as he was later to call it, Magick. In this case, the ceremonies combined the performance of advanced ritual magic with homosexual acts. ...A little over two weeks after arriving in Algiers, Crowley and Neuburg reached Bou Saada. ...It was here that Crowley, acting on instructions from previous angelic interlocutors, made the appropriate Call and attempted to enter the fourteenth Aethyr.” <a name="_ednref106" title="" href="#_edn106">[106]</a></p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/AlgeriaAinSefra33x0.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="356" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/AlgeriaAinSefra33x0.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<p style="font-size: 12px;">(Image source: Google Maps.)</p>
<p>These locations are in northern Algeria. But it is interesting to note that the intersection of the 0-degree line of longitude and the 33-degree line of latitude occurs in Algeria, just northeast of Ain Sefra. It is unclear how much “wandering” Crowley and Neuburg did through the Algerian desert, or how far they managed to go. It is intriguing, however, to speculate as to a possible intention to conduct a ritual along the meridian. One notes, for example, that Neuburg and Crowley reunited in Paris in 1913 for the so-called “Paris Working.” <a name="_ednref107" title="" href="#_edn107">[107]</a> Paris is famous for many things, but as we have already mentioned, one of those things is having an alternate “prime meridian.” <a name="_ednref108" title="" href="#_edn108">[108]</a> To be sure, various factors could have informed Crowley’s decisions regarding ritual locations. One would have to consult authorities sifting through the vast amounts of Crowleyana. Still, it seems worth raising the possibility that Crowley, being a high-level initiate of many systems, may have, to some degree (pun intended this time), been keyed in on the meridian-wavelength. </p>
<p><b>Early Standard Time in U.S. </b></p>
<p>“In October 1884, at the behest of the President of the U.S.A., 41 delegates from 25 nations met in Washington, D.C., for the International Meridian Conference. They decided to adopt a single world meridian, passing through the principal Transit Instrument at the observatory at Greenwich, as the basis of calculation for all longitude and a worldwide 24-hour clock. The Greenwich motion passed 22-1; San Domingo voted against it; France and Brazil abstained.” <a name="_ednref109" title="" href="#_edn109">[109]</a></p>
<p>It turns out that railroads agitated for the standardization of clock times. <a name="_ednref110" title="" href="#_edn110">[110]</a> There was a very pragmatic reason. With different towns all keeping difficult local times, keeping a train “on schedule” was an extremely tricky affair.</p>
<p>It may not surprise the reader, therefore, that in 1860 an important railroad city in Mississippi, the site of the junction of the the Mobile & Ohio and Southern Railways, was named <i>Meridian</i>. <a name="_ednref111" title="" href="#_edn111">[111]</a></p>
<p>One of the early railroad tycoons, who was also a steamship magnate, controlling the Hudson River (1864), New York Central (1867), and Lake Shore & Michigan Southern (1869), was Cornelius “Commodore” Vanderbilt. <a name="_ednref112" title="" href="#_edn112">[112]</a> “...In the 1860s, Vanderbilt shifted his focus from shipping to the railroad industry, which was entering a period of great expansion. He gained control of a number of railway lines operating between Chicago and New York and established an interregional railroad system.” <a name="_ednref113" title="" href="#_edn113">[113]</a></p>
<p>Interestingly, Vanderbilt lived in what is today called <i>Greenwich Village</i>, New York. “In the 1840s, Vanderbilt constructed a large brick home for his family at 10 Washington Place, in Manhattan’s present-day Greenwich Village neighborhood.” <a name="_ednref114" title="" href="#_edn114">[114]</a></p>
<p>In any case, it was Vanderbilt (<i>inter alia</i>) whose influential railroad corporations elicited “...a major transformation of the railroad network, which previously had been fragmented into numerous short railroads, each with its own procedures, timetables, and rolling stock. The creation of a coherent system spanning several states lowered costs, increased efficiency, and sped up travel and shipment times.” <a name="_ednref115" title="" href="#_edn115">[115]</a></p>
<p>Part of this drive towards efficiency included “Universalizing” time. Official credit for the suggestion of standardized “time zones” goes to the Scottish-Canadian inventor, Sir Sandford Fleming. <a name="_ednref116" title="" href="#_edn116">[116]</a></p>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/GrandCentral.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="223" src="http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/GrandCentral.jpg" width="500" /></a></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">(<a href="http://www.museyon.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/GC12.jpg "target="_blank">Image source</a>) </span></div><br />
<p>“Vanderbilt was the driving force behind the construction of Manhattan’s Grand Central Depot [left], which opened in 1871. The station eventually was torn down and replaced by present-day Grand Central Terminal [right], which opened in 1913.” <a name="_ednref117" title="" href="#_edn117">[117]</a></p>
<p>Notes:</p>
<br />
<hr /><p><a name="_edn1" title="" href="#_ednref1">[1]</a> Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998, p. 35.</p>
<p><a name="_edn2" title="" href="#_ednref2">[2]</a> For an overview, see: “Greenwich,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, <<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenwich">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenwich</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn3" title="" href="#_ednref3">[3]</a> Douglas Harper, “Greenwich,” <i>Online Etymology Dictionary</i>, <<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=Greenwich">http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=Greenwich</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn4" title="" href="#_ednref4">[4]</a> “Nazi Occultsists Seize Omphalos,” <i>London Psychogeographical Association Newsletter</i>, no. 6, Beltaine, 1994. “Pychogeography,” in general, has to do with “the interconnection between landscape and the mind.” Under this description, the subject can be traced back to the 19th-20th century Welsh author, Arthur Machen, whose story <i>The Great God Pan</i> (1890, 1894) remains a horror classic. Psychgeography has fascinated a number of prominent United Kingdom-based writers, including author Iain Sinclair (who is also a British filmmaker), journalist Will Self, and the biographer and novelist Peter Ackroyd. A number of groups have sprung up persuing various psychogeographical investigations. One such group is the London Psychogeographical Association, whose initial founder was the English artist, Ralph Rumney (d. 2002). This association was revamped, and given an anti-Masonic and anti-Royalist orientation, decades later by an anarcho-syndicalist named Fabian Tompsett, under the pseudonym “Richard Essex.” London is not the only city home to persons displaying psychogeographical interest, however. A San Francisco-centric internet gaming community, <i>SFZero</i>, included a sub-group called “BART Psychogeographical Association.” For quotation and more information, see: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Machen>, <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Psychogeographical_Association>, and <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SFZero>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn5" title="" href="#_ednref5">[5]</a> Chesca Potter, “Gazetteer of Sacred Sites in London,” John Matthews and Chesca Potter, eds., <i>The Aquarian Guide to Legendary London</i>, Wellinborough, U.K.: Aquarian Press, 1990, p. 226.</p>
<p><a name="_edn6" title="" href="#_ednref6">[6]</a> The many-named Shiva has various aspects. “He is a creator god, moon god..., fertility god, lord of the cosmic dance, god of the arts and learning, god of truth, god of luck, god of the rivers, god of the forests, god of death, of yoga, of cremation grounds, and the lingam”, Patricia Turner and Charles Russell Coulter, “Shiva,” <i>Dictionary of Ancient Deities,</i> Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000, p. 427. Disturbingly, especially in light of its placement beside the controversial Large Hadron Collider, which some fear might destroy the earth (or worse), Shiva is perhaps best known for “represent[ing] the destroyer”, <i>Ibid</i>. Although, Mackey associates “Siva” with “the meridian sun”, in the Southern, preserving, position. See Albert G. Mackey, “SUN,” <i>Mackey's Revised Encyclopedia of Freemasonry</i>, vol. 2, Chicago: Masonic History Co., 1956, p. 988. On the worries regarding the Hadron collider, see Clara Moskowitz , “Will the Large Hadron Collider Destroy Earth?” <i>LiveScience</i>, October 26, 2012, <<a href="http://www.livescience.com/32204-will-the-large-hadron-collider-destroy-earth.html">http://www.livescience.com/32204-will-the-large-hadron-collider-destroy-earth.html</a>>. This “destroyer of worlds” motif also dovetails with the Atomic Bomb rite at the Trinity Site in New Mexico, along the<i> Jornada del Muerto</i>, as James Shelby Downard first noted. See Jim Brandon, "Sirius Rising," interview with James Shelby Downard, with commentary, audio recording, ca. 1976.</p>
<p><a name="_edn7" title="" href="#_ednref7">[7]</a> Fritjof Capra, “Shiva's Cosmic Dance at CERN,” June 2004, <<a href="http://www.fritjofcapra.net/shiva.html">http://www.fritjofcapra.net/shiva.html</a>>. In addition to the statue, CERN also employs (or did employ) a piece of equipment called the “Shiva router,” see: “Spectrum: Shiva Router Management Guide,” CableTron Systems, 1998, <<a href="http://it-div-cs.web.cern.ch/it-div-cs/private/spectrum/Docs/Pdf_docs/shiva_router.pdf">http://it-div-cs.web.cern.ch/it-div-cs/private/spectrum/Docs/Pdf_docs/shiva_router.pdf</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn8" title="" href="#_ednref8">[8]</a> Turner and Coulter, “Kali,” <i>op. cit</i>., p. 257.</p>
<p><a name="_edn9" title="" href="#_ednref9">[9]</a> Shiva's “consorts are aspects of the Great Mother Goddess Devi who appears as Gauri, Sati, Parvati, Uma, Durga and Kali”, Turner and Coulter, “Shiva,” <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 427.</p>
<p><a name="_edn10" title="" href="#_ednref10">[10]</a> The original image, from <<a href="http://www.sacred-texts.com/mas/dun/img/00800.jpg">http://www.sacred-texts.com/mas/dun/img/00800.jpg</a>>, has been rotated and additional text supplied, for emphasis. The basis of my interpolations comes from Albert G. Mackey, “SUN,” <i>Mackey's Revised Encyclopedia of Freemasonry</i>, vol. 2, Chicago: Masonic History Co., 1956, pp. 987-988: “The Master ...in the East is a symbol of the rising sun; the Junior Warden in the South, of the Meridian Sun; and the Senior Warden in the West, of the Setting Sun.” </p>
<p><a name="_edn11" title="" href="#_ednref11">[11]</a> Malcom C. Duncan, <i>Duncan's Masonic Ritual and Monitor</i>, New York: Dick & Fitzgerald, 1866, p. 8, <<a href="http://www.sacred-texts.com/mas/dun/dun02.htm">http://www.sacred-texts.com/mas/dun/dun02.htm</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn12" title="" href="#_ednref12">[12]</a> J. C. Cooper, “Time,” <i>Illustrated Encyclopaedia of Traditional Symbols</i>, London: Thames & Hudson, 1979, p. 173.</p>
<p><a name="_edn13" title="" href="#_ednref13">[13]</a> Mackey, “TRIAD,” <i>Mackey's Revised Encyclopedia of Freemasonry</i>, vol. 2, Chicago: Masonic History Co., 1956, pp. 1051-1052. </p>
<p><a name="_edn14" title="" href="#_ednref14">[14]</a> Mackey, “ECOSSAIS,” <i>op. cit.</i>, vol. 1, p. 308.</p>
<p><a name="_edn15" title="" href="#_ednref15">[15]</a> “Greenwich,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, <<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenwich">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenwich</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn16" title="" href="#_ednref16">[16]</a> Mackey, “TIME,” <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 1040.</p>
<p><a name="_edn17" title="" href="#_ednref17">[17]</a><i> Ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn18" title="" href="#_ednref18">[18]</a> Mackey, “ECOSSAIS,” <i>op. cit.</i>, vol. 1, p. 308. The word had been “...engraved...upon a triangle of pure metal...”, <i>ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn19" title="" href="#_ednref19">[19]</a><i> Ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn20" title="" href="#_ednref20">[20]</a> Michael Whitworth, “Inspector Heat Inspected: The Secret Agent and the Meanings of Entropy,” <i>Review of English Studies</i>, new series, vol. 49, no. 193, February, 1998, p. 55.</p>
<p><a name="_edn21" title="" href="#_ednref21">[21]</a> Conrad, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 40. This, and the subsequent, reference are owed to Whitworth, <i>supra</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn22" title="" href="#_ednref22">[22]</a> “The Dark Knight (2008): Quotes,” <i>Internet Movie Database</i>, <<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0468569/quotes">http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0468569/quotes</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn23" title="" href="#_ednref23">[23]</a> The Dark Knight, 2008, <i>Internet Movie Database</i>, <<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0468569/">http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0468569/</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn24" title="" href="#_ednref24">[24]</a> Conrad, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 179.</p>
<p><a name="_edn25" title="" href="#_ednref25">[25]</a> Cooper, “Time,” <i>loc. cit</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn26" title="" href="#_ednref26">[26]</a> James Shelby Downard also made mention of “Call to Chaos” sex magic rites. See, e.g., his contribution “The Call to Chaos” in Adam Parfrey, ed., <i>Apocalypse Culture</i>, revised ed., Los Angeles: Feral House, 1990, pp. 307-327. In Downard's idiom, there are sex and death rites – <i>Call to Chaos</i> and <i>Killing of the King, </i>respectively – that form the core of the <i>novus ordo</i> magic of the Freemasons. The Call to Chaos ritual, which Downard also designates a “sex circus,” is apparently a sort of orgiastic “...[rite] intended to conjure up a theurgic influence of occult forces of elemental nature”, <i>ibid</i>., p. 323. This seems to comport with J.C. Cooper who defines “Orgy” in the following terms: “Re-entry in chaos, the primordial state before creation; cosmic night; dissolution; the lower potentialities of beings...”, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 123. Additionally, both Downard and Cooper link chaos-rites to Saturnalia and the “Lord of the Misrule.” See <i>ibid.</i></p>
<p><a name="_edn27" title="" href="#_ednref27">[27]</a> Quoted in Barry Hugill, “Mystics of Avalon, <i>San Francisco Examiner</i>, September 11, 1994, p. A10. (Reprinted from Barry Hugill, “Cultists Go Round in Circles, <i>The Observer</i>, August 28, 1994, p. 3.) The Ackroyd name also crops up in searches on the Tower of London. David Ackroyd narrated Melissa Jo Peltier's production titled “The Bloody Tower of London,” an installment of the <i>History Channel</i>'s series “History's Mysteries” (season 6, episode 3, 1999).</p>
<p><a name="_edn28" title="" href="#_ednref28">[28]</a> <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woolwich">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woolwich</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn29" title="" href="#_ednref29">[29]</a> “Woolwich attack: 'Lone wolves’ who run with the pack,” <i>Telegraph</i>, May 25, 2013, <<a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/terrorism-in-the-uk/10080864/Woolwich-attack-Lone-wolves-who-run-with-the-pack.html">http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/terrorism-in-the-uk/10080864/Woolwich-attack-Lone-wolves-who-run-with-the-pack.html</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn30" title="" href="#_ednref30">[30]</a> Clive Aslet, “Can the clock really be ticking for GMT?” <i>Telegraph</i> (U.K.), October 3, 2011, <<a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/8803144/Can-the-clock-really-be-ticking-for-GMT.html">http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/8803144/Can-the-clock-really-be-ticking-for-GMT.html</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn31" title="" href="#_ednref31">[31]</a> “Paris Meridian,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, April 12, 2013, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_meridian">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_meridian</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn32" title="" href="#_ednref32">[32]</a> <a href="#Problem_of_longitude">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_longitude#Problem_of_longitude</a>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn33" title="" href="#_ednref33">[33]</a> Here I wish to make the interested reader aware of a possible complication. In referring back to Newton, one has to bear in mind that – alchemy aside – Newton's physical theories notably diverge from the Einstein-inspired relativistic physics that was formulated in the 20<sup>th</sup> century. For one thing, Newton was a substantivalist about time and space. "In the substantival description, space itself is a substance in which the objects of the universe exist and move. ...[Space is]the container, so to speak. ...A similarly substantival description of time is possible. ...Contrast this...with a more relational descrption in which time simply <i>is</i> the changes in physical objects. ...[And space is nothing more than the] physical things [that] exist." Peter Kosso, <i>Appearance and Reality</i>, Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 1998, pp. 34-35 and <i>ff</i>.</p>
<p>I quote now from a classic Fortean exploration: “In considering my data it would be helpful to consider a dictum of Einsteinian physics – a science few would accuse of fanaticism or irrationality (although the charges could certainly be made from a rather unconventional perspective): 'Time relations among events are assumed to be first constituted by the specific physical relations obtaining between them',” James Shelby Downard & Michael A. Hoffman II, <i>King Kill 33</i>, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho: Independent History & Research, 1998, p. 11.</p>
<p>Downard and Hoffman invoke Einstein. I have traced the embedded quotation to Adolf Grünbaum: “In regard to simultaneity, there, Einstein's conceptual innovation can be summarized as follows: <b>Time relations among events are assumed to be first constituted by specific physical relations obtaining between them</b>. These physical relations, in turn are postulated to be such that the topological simultaneity of events at spatially separated points P1 and P2 is not a uniquely obtaining relation. Metrical simultaneity is thus left indeterminate by topological simultaneity and by the behavior which the STR postulates for transported, adjacently synchronized clocks”, Adolf Grünbaum, “Reply to Hilary Putnam's 'An Examination of Gruenbaum's Philosophy of Geometry',” <i>Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science</i>, Robert S. Cohen and Marx W. Wartofsky, eds., <i>Proceedings of the Boston Colloquium for the Philosophy of Science</i>, vol 5, 1966-1968, p. 92.</p>
<p>Grünbaum goes on to explicitly contrast the Einsteinian conception of simultaneity with the conception that follows from Newtonian principles alone. “Therefore, a conventional choice or synchronization <i>rule</i> <b>for which there was no scope in Newton's theory</b> must be invoked over and above the relevant physical facts to assert that a given event at P2 sustains a uniquely obtaining equality relation of metrical simultaneity to an event at P1. In this sense the relation of metrical simultaneity is <i>not</i> an objectively obtaining physical relation in the STR but depends on a conventional choice. For any given event E2 at P2, this conventional choice consists in the selection of a unique event at P1 as metrically simultaneous with E2 from within the infinite class of those events at P1 which are topologically simultaneous with E2. And this choice is implemented by the rule for setting the clock at P2. In brief, Einstein's innovation is that the physical relatedness which makes for the very existence of the temporal order has a structure that precludes the existence of objectively and uniquely obtaining relations of metrical simultaneity. Thus, the failure of our measuring operations to disclose relations of absolute simultaneity is only the epistemic consequence of the fact that these relations do not exist”, <i>ibid</i>., pp. 92-93 </p>
<p>Elsewhere, Grünbaum summarizes: “For on Newton's theory, our events E and E' are simultaneous according to its clock readings, and yet they are connectible by Newton's fastest causal chain (gravitation) and only by such a chain. By contrast, the STR requires its clocks to be set so as to issue in the <i>non</i>-simutaneity of any two events which can belong only to the career of its fastest causal chains (light), even though these events cannot both be on the world-line of a single clock”, “Simultaneity by Slow Clock Transport in the Special Theory of Relativity,” <i>Philosophy of Science</i>, vol. 36, no. 1, March, 1969, pp. 21.</p>
<p>Perhaps the simplest takeaway from this abstruse discussion is this: Whatever it is was that Newton took himself to have been doing alchemically or mystically, in terms of coordinating and grounding a standard time, may not automatically carry over to contemporary adepts who are perhaps apt to understand temporal relations along relativistic lines, as opposed to substantivalist ones.</p>
<p><a name="_edn34" title="" href="#_ednref34">[34]</a> Erlestoke, Wiltshire, U.K.: Erlestoke Press, 1937.</p>
<p><a name="_edn35" title="" href="#_ednref35">[35]</a> MacHuisdean, <i>ibid</i>., p. 84.</p>
<p><a name="_edn36" title="" href="#_ednref36">[36]</a> <b>The Kabbalah Connection to pi </b> – The Jewish Kabbalah can’t be a complete unknown even to the mass audience now when popular singer Madonna Louise Ciccone has taken to wearing the red wrist cord of a highly commercialized Kabbalah cult group. We owe to the Israeli mathematics historian, Rabbi Marc-Alain Ouaknin, a number of key insights which tie the pi factor to Kabbalah. The latter, he writes, “designates the mysteries of the mystical Jewish tradition” and he stresses “the essential link of Kabbalah with mathematics.” See Marc-Alain Ouaknin, <i>The Mystery of Numbers</i>, New York, N.Y.: Assouline Publishing, 2004, pp. 153-54. How so?</p>
<p>One of the key kabbalistic concepts is the idea that, for the world to be created, God first “withdrew from himself into himself…thus creating a space for the future world”, <i>ibid.</i>, p. 277. However, once the space was opened, it then became necessary to maintain the void and allow the universe to survive. For this a force arose “that kept the light of the infinite at the periphery. In Hebrew, this ‘no return’ force is named shadai, a word that means ‘enough, sufficient’ … Shadai is the name of God, the self-limiting…(in kabbalistic Hebrew, this limitation is called din) whose purpose is to make the Creation possible and therefore to balance entropy and the expansion of the world…”, <i>ibid.</i>, p. 279.</p>
<p>Geometry entered the picture when an early Spanish Kabbalist considered the episode (Genesis 3:24) in which God stationed an angel at the Garden of Eden with a revolving sword tracing a fiery circle, and he was inspired to assert “the circle is built from the name shadai.” From that image of the sword (the radius) and the circle it traces, kabbalists extrapolate the equivalent of pi, since the area of the circle is of course determined as pi times the radius squared. Ouaknin explains that, in gematria, in which each Hebrew letter also has a numerical equivalent, shadai equals 314, commenting “Strange coincidence: 314 represents the proximate value of pi multiplied by 100.” </p>
<p>He quotes one Leon Ashkenazi, a contemporary Kabbalist who wrote “Pi is precisely the relationship between the forces that make possible the delimitation in the physical world, a delimitation that exists through the name shadai at a metaphysical level.” It is tempting to surmise that such delimitation is part and parcel of the marking off of the entire globe with the symbolical net based at Greenwich.</p>
<p>The function of time, so primary at Greenwich, enters with a link to another fundamental kabbalistic principle: the creation of the universe through manipulation of the Hebrew alphabet. Ouaknin: “The rational value of pi is 22/7. For the Kabbalists, this number suggests the articulation of the letters of the Hebrew alphabet (of which there are twenty-two) and the numeral 7, whose first meaning is the rhythm of time in biblical thought. Thus, pi (22/7) means the ratio between the alphabet and time, i.e. the word. Indeed, what it does is to put the alphabet in motion, thanks to the combination of the letters”, <i>ibid.</i>, p. 280. </p>
<p>Finally, our author concludes: “The ratio that exists between, on the one hand, a tendency toward entropy, deployment and expansion – known by the kabbalistic name of hessed – and,on the other hand, a tendency toward order and limitarion – din – is on the order of pi”, <i>ibid</i>., p. 282.</p>
<p><a name="_edn37" title="" href="#_ednref37">[37]</a> More on MacHuisdean – Jim Brandon is inevitably reminded of the old kids’ rhyme “Simple Simon met a pieman…” but there is nothing simple in Hamish MacHuisdean’s work-ups. Essentially an anti-establishment geometer, he bases his bona-fides on demonstrated prowess in what were apparently regarded as impossibilities: squaring the circle, trisecting the angle and doubling the cube. </p>
<p>Actually, circle squaring is now not that unusual and has been published in a number of recent sources, and not by methods bearing any resemblance to MacH’s quite intricate procedure. Doubling of the cube has also purportedly been achieved, although a claimed method seen by J.B. in a publication in the 1990s seemed similar to the version first published by MacH in the 1920s. Trisection of the angle may be unique to our author, but as with all of the diagrams given in his books, no attempt has been made by us to verify with our own examples that these techniques really work as he claims.</p>
<p>The most intriguing spin-offs from MacH’s neo-geometry, however, are his assertions on the pi factor. By far his most significant claim is that pi is not a so-called irrational number, meaning one whose “decimals are infinite and unforeseeable…” That is how Ouaknin defines it and follows up with a summary of ongoing attempts reach the end of the series: “Today we are up to more than 200 billion decimals of pi” (<i>ibid</i>., pp. 196, 206) with no end in sight. MacH dismisses this with the claim – which would seem to have revolutionary impact in the maths world if true – that, no, pi ends at 3.1416, period.</p>
<p>He bases this on a complex and, for us, as yet unresolvable series of geometrical diagrams in his book, <i>Yesterday’s Impossibilities</i> (Dunbartonshire, Scotland: Fraser, Edward & Co., 1943). As we mentioned earlier, the present essay is much a work in progress and not a little of that would apply to MacH’s corpus which will be submitted to qualified mathematician-geometers for perusal, as time permits. </p>
<p>Lastly, the Freemasonic connection. Surprisingly reminiscent of the kabbalistic equation of the key Hebrew term shadai to number 314 is MacH’s much-lauded 31460, the 10,000 multiple of his self-contained 3.1416 pi. As an example of his typical development, here is what he produces when considering the “Ratios of the Musical Scale”: “The 2nd note [Re or D] is 432 [vibrations per second: actually, 432 1/8, but he omits the 1/8] or 6 x 6 x 6 by 2. The 13th note [sol or G] is 1296 [v.p.s., also ignoring the extra 1/8] or 6 x 6 x 6 x 6. <>bThe 33rd note is 7776 [v.p.s., omitting 1/8] or 6 x 6 x 6 x 6 x 6. 33 is the Master Mason degree, as all numbers from 1 to 33 added up total 561; and 561 squared and minus 561 yield 314160, the pi ratio series”</b> (Hamish MacHuisdean, The Great Law, Erlestoke, Wiltshire, U.K.: The Erlestoke Press, 1937, p. 160. Emphasis supplied.) </p>
<p>Any reader who wishes to pursue this possible, but not probable, geo-mathematical revolution can probably find MacH’s books through book-finders or interlibrary loans, with a little effort.</p>
<p><a name="_edn38" title="" href="#_ednref38">[38]</a><i> Nota bene</i>: The calculation of space (navigational position, longitude, etc.) and time depends upon the sun and moon. This dual-dependence on the sun and moon is very important in alchemy and sex magic as well. See our earlier post: “Neil Armstrong: Astronaut or Alchemist?” <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/12/neil-armstrong-astronaut-or-alchemist.html" target="_blank">HERE</a>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn39" title="" href="#_ednref39">[39]</a> J. O'Donnell, “John Harrison and the Longitude problem,” <i>Royal Museum Greenwich</i>, November 15, 2002, <a href="http://www.rmg.co.uk/harrison">http://www.rmg.co.uk/harrison</a>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn40" title="" href="#_ednref40">[40]</a><i> The Temple and the Lodge</i>, New York, N.Y.: Arcade, 1989, p. 155.</p>
<p><a name="_edn41" title="" href="#_ednref41">[41]</a> I take the “rose” reference in mathematical, rather than botanical, terms (since the relevant flowers “by any other name” have five petals, rather than six). See <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rose_(mathematics)>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn42" title="" href="#_ednref42">[42]</a> “Saturn's Massive Northern Hurricane,” <i>NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI</i>, photo 1, <<a href="http://www.space.com/18674-saturn-vortex-hexagon-storm-photos.html">http://www.space.com/18674-saturn-vortex-hexagon-storm-photos.html</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn43" title="" href="#_ednref43">[43]</a> “The hexagram, like the pentagram, was and is used in practices of the occult and ceremonial magic”, “Hexagram,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, May 27, 2013, <<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hexagram">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hexagram</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn44" title="" href="#_ednref44">[44]</a> “Saturn Hexagon Vortex Storm,” <i>NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI</i>, photo 6, <<a href="http://www.space.com/18674-saturn-vortex-hexagon-storm-photos.html">http://www.space.com/18674-saturn-vortex-hexagon-storm-photos.html</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn45" title="" href="#_ednref45">[45]</a> <<href="#Homeworld">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klingon#Homeworld</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn46" title="" href="#_ednref46">[46]</a> “Kronos,” <i>Theoi</i>, <<a href="http://www.theoi.com/Titan/TitanKronos.html">http://www.theoi.com/Titan/TitanKronos.html</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn47" title="" href="#_ednref47">[47]</a> <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/72_(number)">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/72_%28number%29</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn48" title="" href="#_ednref48">[48]</a> George Hart, <i>Egyptian Myths</i>, Austin, Texas: University of Texas Press, pp. 40-41, <<a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=K78L_vGn2E4C&pg=PA40">http://books.google.com/books?id=K78L_vGn2E4C&pg=PA40</a>>. Relatedly, Typhon's plot “to overthrow Osiris” involved “seventy-two fellow conspirators”, Hart, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 41.</p>
<p><a name="_edn49" title="" href="#_ednref49">[49]</a> <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Year">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Year</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn50" title="" href="#_ednref50">[50]</a> <href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axial_precession#Ancient_Egyptians">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axial_precession#Ancient_Egyptians</a>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn51" title="" href="#_ednref51">[51]</a> <href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axial_precession#Ancient_Egyptians">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axial_precession#Ancient_Egyptians</a>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn52" title="" href="#_ednref52">[52]</a> See the previous post: <<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/12/threats.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/12/threats.html</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn53" title="" href="#_ednref53">[53]</a> Caitlin Matthews, “The Guardian Head – Sacred Palladiums of Britain,” John Matthews & Chesca Potter, <i>The Aquarian Guide to Legendary London</i>, Wellingborough, U.K.: Aquarian Press, 1990, p. 36.</p>
<p><a name="_edn54" title="" href="#_ednref54">[54]</a> John Wilcock, <i>A Guide to Occult Britain</i>, London: Sphere Books, 1977, p. 35.</p>
<p><a name="_edn55" title="" href="#_ednref55">[55]</a> “Christopher Wren – architect and astronomer,” <i>Royal Museum Greenwich</i>, January 28, 2005, <<a href="http://www.rmg.co.uk/explore/astronomy-and-time/astronomy-facts/history/christopher-wren-architect-and-astronomer">http://www.rmg.co.uk/explore/astronomy-and-time/astronomy-facts/history/christopher-wren-architect-and-astronomer</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn56" title="" href="#_ednref56">[56]</a> Margaret M. Howard, “Dried Cats,” <i>Man</i>, vol 51, November, 1951, p. 149.</p>
<p><a name="_edn57" title="" href="#_ednref57">[57]</a><i> Ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn58" title="" href="#_ednref58">[58]</a> “Sir Christopher Wren (1632 – 1723),” <i>BBC</i>, <<a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/wren_christopher.shtml">http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/wren_christopher.shtml</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn59" title="" href="#_ednref59">[59]</a> “House of Plantagenet,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, June 1, 2013, <<href="#Henry_VII.2C_the_Tudors_and_the_Plantagenet_descendants">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Plantagenet#Henry_VII.2C_the_Tudors_and_the_Plantagenet_descendants</a>>. See also Michael Hoffman, “Conspiracy Against a King,” <i>Revisionist Review</i> [weblog], April 4, 2013, <a href="http://revisionistreview.blogspot.com/2013/04/conspiracy-against-king-michael-hoffman.html">http://revisionistreview.blogspot.com/2013/04/conspiracy-against-king-michael-hoffman.html</a>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn60" title="" href="#_ednref60">[60]</a> This meaning is commonly given. Lewis and Short's standard reference, <i>A Latin Dictionary</i> (Oxford, 1879) p. 1382, notes that “Placentia” was also a city in ancient Gallia populated with pagan practitioners of hepatomancy (see: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haruspex">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haruspex</a>;). The city is now called <i>Piacenza</i> and is in northern Italy, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piacenza">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piacenza</a>. The Wikipedia article just cited says that the name implies a “good omen”. Although Lewis & Short (<i>loc. cit.</i>) also indicate that the root <i>placer</i> can designate being “...pleased or satisfied with oneself, to flatter oneself, to pride or plume oneself...”, and this is rarely mentioned in conjunction with the Tudor palace, but seems relevant. Finally, “placentia” is arguably very close to <i>placenta</i>, a word (meaning “cake”, esp. “[f]or an offering...” Lewis & Short, <i>Ibid</i>.) that is obviously connected to the <i>omphalos </i>(since the navel is a relic of one's connexion to one's mother via the <i>umbilicus</i>), <<a href="http://www.abc.net.au/science/k2/lint/facts.htm">http://www.abc.net.au/science/k2/lint/facts.htm</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn61" title="" href="#_ednref61">[61]</a> Kate Ravilious, “Henry VIII's Lost Chapel Discovered Under Parking Lot,” National Geographic News, February 9, 2006, <<a href="http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/02/0209_060209_london_chapel.html">http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/02/0209_060209_london_chapel.html</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn62" title="" href="#_ednref62">[62]</a> “Greenwich,” <i>Collier's Encyclopedia</i>, vol. 11, Crowell-Collier, 1964, p. 441.</p>
<p><a name="_edn63" title="" href="#_ednref63">[63]</a> “Greenwich,” <i>Collier's Encyclopedia</i>, <i>loc. cit</i>. There word “Palladian” derives from the name of the “Venetian architect Andrea Palladio (1508–1580)”, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palladian_architecture">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palladian_architecture</a>>. It is, however, tantalizingly close to being a LexiLink with the word “Palladium,” about which see <i>In Tenebris</i>. <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/06/star-trek-in-tenebris_5.html" target="_blank">HERE</a>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn64" title="" href="#_ednref64">[64]</a> <i>The Constitution of Freemasons</i>, 1723; quoted in Frances A. Yates, <i>The Rosicrucian Enlightenment</i>, London: Routledge, 1972, p. 271.</p>
<p><a name="_edn65" title="" href="#_ednref65">[65]</a> “May 10<sup>th</sup>, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich,” <i>London Psychogeographical Association Newsletter</i>, no. 6, Beltaine, 1994. </p>
<p><a name="_edn66" title="" href="#_ednref66">[66]</a> Daniel Lysons, The Environs of London, second ed., London, 1811, p. 504, <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=JJcjAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA504">http://books.google.com/books?id=JJcjAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA504</a>. “During the English Civil War, the palace was used as a biscuit factory and prisoner-of-war camp. Then, in the Interregnum, the palace and park were seized to become a 'mansion' for the Lord Protector”, “Greenwich,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, <<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenwich">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenwich</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn67" title="" href="#_ednref67">[67]</a> <i>Ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn68" title="" href="#_ednref68">[68]</a> “<i>Impressment</i>, colloquially, 'the Press', refers to the act of taking men into a navy by force and with or without notice. It was used by the Royal Navy, beginning in 1664 and during the 18th and early 19th centuries, in wartime, as a means of crewing warships, although legal sanction for the practice goes back to the time of Edward I of England”, “Impressment,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, May 17, 2013, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impressment">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impressment</a>>. Cf. Michael Hoffman, <i>They Were White and They Were Slaves</i>, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho: Independent History and Research, 1993, <<a href="http://www.amazon.com/They-Were-White-Slaves-Enslavement/dp/0929903056/">www.amazon.com/They-Were-White-Slaves-Enslavement/dp/0929903056/</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn69" title="" href="#_ednref69">[69]</a> “George I (1714-27 AD),” Britannia, <<a href="http://www.britannia.com/history/monarchs/mon53.html">http://www.britannia.com/history/monarchs/mon53.html</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn70" title="" href="#_ednref70">[70]</a> “Baron Greenwich,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, March 11, 2013, <<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baron_Greenwich">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baron_Greenwich</a>>. According to the aforementioned London Psychogeographical Association [LPA], "Queen Elizabeth, "Her majesty[,] is top dog in the 'occult establishment' - a secret body of Freemasons, many of them titled, who run Britain", Hugill, <i>op. cit.</i> Further, again according to the LPA, the Queen has participated in various Masonic goings on at Greenwich, in and around the Queen Mary palace. See <i>ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn71" title="" href="#_ednref71">[71]</a> Specifically on “The Greenwich Line,” see: “What are ley lines?” <i>London Psychogeographical Association Newsletter</i>, no. 6, Beltaine, 1994. </p>
<p><a name="_edn72" title="" href="#_ednref72">[72]</a> “Nazi Occultists...”, <i>loc. cit</i>. Additionally, “In Roman times the Thames was narrower at this point, and it is thought that there may have been a ford connecting Greenwich to the Isle of Dogs, where the foot tunnel now runs”, Chesca Potter, <i>loc. cit</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn73" title="" href="#_ednref73">[73]</a> Robert Graves, <i>The Greek Myths</i>, London: Penguin, 1992, p. 772.</p>
<p><a name="_edn74" title="" href="#_ednref74">[74]</a> Douglas Harper, “Omphalos,” <i>Online Etymology Dictionary</i>, <<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=omphalos">http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=omphalos</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn75" title="" href="#_ednref75">[75]</a> Raphael Patai, <i>Man and Temple in Ancient Myth and Ritual</i>, New York, N.Y.: Ktav, 1967; cited by William N. Grimstad, “The Freemasons and the Drive to Rebuild Solomon's Temple,” unpublished monograph, 2005, p. 2.</p>
<p><a name="_edn76" title="" href="#_ednref76">[76]</a> Cooper, “Omphalos,” <i>op. cit., </i>p. 122.</p>
<p><a name="_edn77" title="" href="#_ednref77">[77]</a><i> Ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn78" title="" href="#_ednref78">[78]</a> One author handily summarizes the “two main theories about how the Isle of Dogs got its name...”: (1) “...Henry VIII kept his dogs on the island and brought them to his palace at Greenwich by boat if he needed them for hunting” and (2) “...when the Dutch engineers drained the marshes in the 17th century and claimed back the land lost to the 1488 flood, it became known as the Isle of Dykes”, which name survives only in corrupted form. <<a href="http://barryoneoff.co.uk/html/the_island.html">http://barryoneoff.co.uk/html/the_island.html</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn79" title="" href="#_ednref79">[79]</a> Chesca Potter, <i>loc. cit</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn80" title="" href="#_ednref80">[80]</a> Hermione Hobhouse, ed., “The Isle of Dogs: Introduction,” <i>Survey of London</i>, vols. 43 & 44, 1994, pp. 375-387; at <i>British History Online</i>, <<a href="http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=46507">http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=46507</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn81" title="" href="#_ednref81">[81]</a> See A[nthony]. J. Bell, “Lexi-Links: Nature’s Play on Words,” <i>Fortean Times</i>, August 17, 1976. Mr. Bell has no known relation to the present writer.</p>
<p><a name="_edn82" title="" href="#_ednref82">[82]</a> Theodore J. Cachey Jr., “Canaries (Fortunate Islands),” <<a href="http://www.english.upenn.edu/~dwallace/europe/nodes/canaries.html">http://www.english.upenn.edu/~dwallace/europe/nodes/canaries.html</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn83" title="" href="#_ednref83">[83]</a> There is a vast amount of dog-related arcana. We note that “...dogs were sacrificed to [the Greek goddess] Hekate...” who was herself often depicted as dog-headed, Sorita d'Este and David Rankine, <i>Hekate: Liminal Rites</i>, London: Avalonia, 2009, pp. 24 & 71, <i>et alia</i>. We mentioned Hecate in our prior post, <i>In Tenebris </i>(HERE). The Egyptian counterpart to Hermes – the <i>Hermetic</i> god – is Thoth (Tehuti). Although usually represented as a stylized Ibis, “[a]nother of the commonest symbolic forms of Thoth is the dog-headed ape”, G.R.S. [George Robert Stowe ] Mead, <i>Thrice-Greatest Hermes</i>, vol. 1, London: Theosophical Publishing Society, 1906, p. 55, <<a href="http://www.sacred-texts.com/gno/th1/th106.htm">http://www.sacred-texts.com/gno/th1/th106.htm</a>>. The star Sirius is “...often known as the Dog Star as it is in the constellation Canis, or 'Dog'...”, Robert K. G. Temple, <i>The Sirius Mystery</i>, Rochester, Vermont: Destiny Books, 1987, p. 58. “'[T]he Dog Days'...[follow] the heliacal rising of Sirius in the summer”, <i>ibid</i>. My awareness of this owes to Michael A. Hoffman II, <i>Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare</i>, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho: Independent History and Research, 2001. The conscientious researcher should note yet another obfuscatory word game. <i>Canicula</i>, which means “...literally: little dog...”, is often reported to be “...another name for Sirius”, “Canicula,” <i>The Free Dictionary</i>, <<a href="http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Canicula">http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Canicula</a>>. On the other hand, “...Procyon was sometimes termed Canicula by the Romans...”, William Smith, ed., “Astronomia,” <i>A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities</i>, p. 153. Now <i>Procyon</i> (of the constellation <i>Canis Minor</i>) is composed of <i>pro</i>-, which means “before,” and <i>kyon</i> (or “dog”). As I commented in another place, Procyon is most often said to be so-called (the “dog before” or the “before-dog”) because (at least at one time) it was supposed to have risen prior to Sirius (of Canis Major), thus heralding Sirius' arrival. See, e.g., Smith, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 152. However, in other places, the meaning for <i>Canicula/Procyon</i> is given as “little bitch” and carries the connotation of (to put it delicately) “the dog in front” (<i>pro</i>-<i>cyon</i>), Nicolaus Copernicus, “On the Revolution of the Heavenly Spheres,” in Stephen W. Hawking, ed., <i>On the Shoulders of Giants: The Great Works of Physics and Astronomy</i>, Philadelphia, Running Press Books, 2002, p. 129. On this latter construal, the depiction of <i>Canis Minor </i>“in front of” or “before” <i>Canis Major</i> could be taken as a symbolic-astronomic sexcapade, writ large in the stars. This sort of sexual language (talk of a "bitch," etc.) is echoed in the so-called “BDSM community,” which is, in out view, pagan sex magic with a secular veneer. This brief sketch barely scratches the surface. (There is also the possibility of taking a LexiLink approach, here. The root <i>siri</i>, e.g., appears in the name <i>Osiris</i> – O-siri-s, maybe siri-os? Additionally, Cardinal Giuseppe Siri is an important player in some variations of Catholic sedevacantism, see <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siri_Thesis">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siri_Thesis</a>>. Apple computer has a “Siri” operating system <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siri_(software">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siri_(software</a>)>, and Sirius XM satellite radio is well known <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sirius_XM_Radio">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sirius_XM_Radio</a>>.) For a bit more information on the star Sirius and related recondite information, see: Jim Brandon, “Sirius Rising,” audio series, ca. 1976; Robert Temple, <i>The Sirius Mystery</i>, <<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Sirius-Mystery-Scientific-Evidence-Contact/dp/089281750X">http://www.amazon.com/Sirius-Mystery-Scientific-Evidence-Contact/dp/089281750X</a>>; Michael Hoffman, <i>Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare</i>, <<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Societies-Psychological-Warfare-Michael-Hoffman/dp/0970378416">http://www.amazon.com/Societies-Psychological-Warfare-Michael-Hoffman/dp/0970378416</a>>; Loren Coleman, “Dark Knight Shooting,” <i>Twilight Language</i>, July 20, 2012, <<a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/07/dark-knight-shooting.html">http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/07/dark-knight-shooting.html</a>>; and “Sirius Rises,” <i>Visup</i>, July 22, 2012, <<a href="http://visupview.blogspot.com/2012/07/sirius-rising.html">http://visupview.blogspot.com/2012/07/sirius-rising.html</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn84" title="" href="#_ednref84">[84]</a> Douglas Harper, “Canary,” <i>Online Etymology Dictionary</i>, <<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=canary">http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=canary</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn85" title="" href="#_ednref85">[85]</a> “Pictures of the day, Oct. 1,” <i>New York Times</i>, October 1, 2007, <<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2007/10/01/nytfrontpage/20071001POD_12.html">www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2007/10/01/nytfrontpage/20071001POD_12.html</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn86" title="" href="#_ednref86">[86]</a> “Egyptian god floats up Thames,” <i>BBC</i>, October 1, 2007, <<a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/london/7022829.stm">http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/london/7022829.stm</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn87" title="" href="#_ednref87">[87]</a> April McDevitt, “The West (imenet),” <i>Ancient Egypt: The Mythology</i>, <<a href="http://www.egyptianmyths.net/west.htm">http://www.egyptianmyths.net/west.htm</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn88" title="" href="#_ednref88">[88]</a> Robert Means Lawrence, The Magic of the Horse-Shoe: With Other Folk-Lore Notes, Boston: Houghton Mifflin & Co., 1898, ch. 10, <<a href="http://www.sacred-texts.com/etc/mhs/mhs41.htm">http://www.sacred-texts.com/etc/mhs/mhs41.htm</a>>. Here is a curious tie-in with our previous study of the Tower of London and our ongoing investigation of Charles II. “In the room containing the crown jewels, in the Tower of London, are to be seen eleven magnificent golden salt-cellars, the oldest dating from the reign of Elizabeth. Of these the so-called state salt-cellar, which is a model of the White Tower, was presented by the city of Exeter to King Charles II., and was used at coronation banquets”, <i>ibid</i>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn89" title="" href="#_ednref89">[89]</a><i> Ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn90" title="" href="#_ednref90">[90]</a><i> Ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn91" title="" href="#_ednref91">[91]</a><i> Ibid</i>. Lawrence gives the example of a “haughty wife...[who] could hardly be imagined as sitting 'below the salt...”, <i>ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn92" title="" href="#_ednref92">[92]</a> John Reid, “The Three Essentials,” <i>John Reid's Course on Practical Alchemy</i>, part 1, ch. 2, <<a href="http://www.levity.com/alchemy/reid1-2.html">http://www.levity.com/alchemy/reid1-2.html</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn93" title="" href="#_ednref93">[93]</a> Dennis William Hauck, <i>The Complete Idiot's Guide to Alchemy</i>, New York, N.Y.: Penguin, 2008, p. 96-97.</p>
<p><a name="_edn94" title="" href="#_ednref94">[94]</a> <i>Ibid</i>., pp. 97 & 78.</p>
<p><a name="_edn95" title="" href="#_ednref95">[95]</a> “Great Fire of London,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, February 26, 2013, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Fire_of_London">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Fire_of_London</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn96" title="" href="#_ednref96">[96]</a> Günther Oestmann, “John Flamsteeds Horoskop für die Grundsteinlegung der Sternwarte Greenwich,” <i>Sudhoffs Archiv</i>, bd. 86, h. 2, 2002, pp. 129-137.</p>
<p><a name="_edn97" title="" href="#_ednref97">[97]</a> There is a possibly relevant magnetic phenomenon, namely, the “magnetic meridian” (and declination). “In Magnetism. When a magnetic needle is suspended by a fibre or pivot at its centre it assumes a definite direction by reason of the earth's magnetic force. It lies in a line that is called the magnetic meridian at that spot on the earth's surface, and the more northerly end points to what is called the magnetic north. As a rule the magnetic north at any place will not coincide with the true or geographical north – the magnetic meridian will not be identical with the geographical meridian. The angle between these two directions is called the declination. Thus in London the declination is about 17° west of north; it increases up to a certain limit as one travels westwards, subsequently diminishing to zero in the region of Hudson's Bay. Beyond this the declination is east of north. There are slight daily variations, as well as steady long-period changes, in the declination at any place. Lines drawn on the earth's surface to mark those points where the declination is of the same value, are called isogonic lines. Lines of no declination, where the magnetic and geographic meridians coincide, are called agonic lines. ...”, “Declination,” <i>Encyclopedia123</i>, <<a href="http://www.encyclopedia123.com/D/Declination.html">http://www.encyclopedia123.com/D/Declination.html</a>>. </p>
<p>“The most remarkable phenomenon of the magnet, in relation to the earth, is the variation of the magnetic meridian in most parts of the globe, upon which depends the declination of the needle. Accurate observation of this phenomenon has ascertained the following facts: There are certain points on the earth where no declination exists. The lines formed by their series, however, do not coincide with the geographical meridians; but, on the contrary, deviate from them very irregularly. According to the most recent observations, there exists a line without declination in the Atlantic ocean, between the old and the new world. It intersects the meridian of Paris, at a southern latitude of about 65°; thence it mounts to the northwest, to about 35° W. longitude from this meridian, or 32° 39' 37” from Greenwich, as high as the latitude of the coast of Paraguay; after which, becoming again almost north and south, it skirts the coasts of Brazil, and proceeds to the latitude of Cayenne. Then, turning suddenly to the northwest, it takes the direction of the U. States, and thence proceeds to the northern parts of the American continent, which it traverses in the same direction. The position of this line on the globe is not immutable ; at least for a century and a half, it has been tending considerably from the east to the west. It passed London in 1657, and Paris in 1664. Thus, in its present direction, it has traversed in the latitude of these places, nearly 80° of longitude in 150 years. But there is no doubt that this change is not uniform. It is even very unequal in different parallels”, “Magnet,” <i>American Encyclopedia</i>, 1851, <<a href="http://www.agepedia.org/wiki/MAGNESIA">http://www.agepedia.org/wiki/MAGNESIA</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn98" title="" href="#_ednref98">[98]</a> Douglas Harper, “Meridian,” <i>Online Etymology Dictionary</i>, <<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=meridian">http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=meridian</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn99" title="" href="#_ednref99">[99]</a><i> Ibid</i>. The noon and midnight hours are also called the “high” and “low twelves.” “The language of Freemasonry, in reference to the hours of labor and refreshment, is altogether symbolical. The old lectures contained a tradition that our ancient Brethren wrought six days in the week and twelve hours in the day, being called off regularly at the hour of high twelve from labor to refreshment. In the French and German systems, the Craft were said to be called from labor at low twelve, or midnight…[I]n the system of Zinnendorf, it is said that there are in a Mason's Lodge five hours, namely, twelve struck, noon, high noon, midnight, and high midnight…”, Mackey, <i>op. cit.</i>, vol. 1, p. 466.</p>
<p><a name="_edn100" title="" href="#_ednref100">[100]</a> Mackey, “RAISED,” <i>op. cit.</i>, vol 2., p. 829.</p>
<p><a name="_edn101" title="" href="#_ednref101">[101]</a> George Oliver, <i>Signs and Symbols of Freemasonry</i>, p. 204; quoted by Albert G. Mackey, “DEDICATION OF A LODGE,” <i>Mackey's Revised Encyclopedia of Freemasonry</i>, vol. 1, Chicago: Masonic History Co., 1956, pp. 267-268. Mackey subsequently states that “it is a needless task to cite authorities or multiply instances to prove how intimately the sun, as a symbol, is connected with the whole system of Freemasonry”, <i>ibid</i>. But not the sun only. For Mackey reveals that “[t]he sun...[is] obedient to the all-seeing eye...”, <i>ibid</i>. Manly Palmer Hall writes: “The initiate in the mysteries was always instructed concerning the existence of three suns...[T]he disciple is told to revere the invisible sun even more than the visible one”, <i>Melchizedek and the Mystery of Fire</i>, Los Angeles: Philosophical Research Society, 1996, p. 12 (see also p. 18). Mackey writes about the “three sons of Saturn” – Jove (Zeus), Neptune (Poseidon), and Pluto (Hades) – amongst whom “the Universe was divided”, Mackey, “SUN,” <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 988. Of course, this is an analog of the Triple Goddess (<i>Trivia</i>) – Luna, Diana, Hecate, <i>ibid</i>. We covered this in <i>In Tenebris</i>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/06/star-trek-in-tenebris_5.html" target="_blank">HERE</a>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn102" title="" href="#_ednref102">[102]</a> Mackey alluding to the commentary of “Doctor Jarvis,” in “ARK, NOAH'S,” <i>Mackey's Revised Encyclopedia of Freemasonry</i>, vol. 1, Chicago: Masonic History Co., 1956, p. 103. Going on, it is stated that the <i>Zo-har</i> of the “Ark of Safety” (i.e., Noah's Ark) is not merely a “...<i>window</i>...but a source of light itself”, <i>ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn103" title="" href="#_ednref103">[103]</a> <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/72_(number)">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/72_%28number%29</a>>. The aforementioned <i>Wikipedia</i> article makes mention of “[t]he 72 old men of the synagogue, according to the Zohar.” I am unaware of the meaning of this reference. There are also 72 hours over the course of three days; 72 pillars outside of the National Archives; 72 bricks on the pyramid of the reverse of the dollar bill; etc. For more "72s," including the crucial 72 divine names in Kabbalah, see <i>Star Trek In Tenebris</i> <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/06/star-trek-in-tenebris_5.html" target="_blank">HERE</a>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn104" title="" href="#_ednref104">[104]</a> “The Classic Book on Ley Lines”: Alfred Watkins, <i>The Old Straight Track</i>, London: Abacus, 2009.</p>
<p><a name="_edn105" title="" href="#_ednref105">[105]</a> Cf. Downard & Hoffman, <i>op. cit</i>; as well as Jim Brandon, <i>The Rebirth of Pan</i>, Dunlap, Ill.: Firebird Press, 1983, pp. 170<i>ff</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn106" title="" href="#_ednref106">[106]</a> Alex Owen, “Aleister Crowley in the Desert,” excerpted from <i>The Place of Enchantment: British Occultism and the Culture of the Modern</i>, <<a href="http://press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/642011.html">http://press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/642011.html</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn107" title="" href="#_ednref107">[107]</a> “Aleister Crowley,” Wikipedia, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleister_Crowley">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleister_Crowley</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn108" title="" href="#_ednref108">[108]</a> “Paris Meridian,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_meridian">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_meridian</a>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn109" title="" href="#_ednref109">[109]</a> Douglas Harper, “Greenwich,” <i>Online Etymology Dictionary</i>, <<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=Greenwich">http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=Greenwich</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn110" title="" href="#_ednref110">[110]</a> “Philosophy of Time: Philosophers Speak,” part 1, <i>Philosophical Installations</i>, University of Oregon, <<a href="http://philinstall.uoregon.edu/video/1317/">http://philinstall.uoregon.edu/video/1317/</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn111" title="" href="#_ednref111">[111]</a> Douglas Harper, “Meridian,” <i>Online Etymology Dictionary</i>, <<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=meridian">http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=meridian</a>> and “Meridian, Mississippi,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meridian,_Mississippi">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meridian,_Mississippi</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn112" title="" href="#_ednref112">[112]</a> “Cornelius Vanderbilt,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, June 1, 2013, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornelius_Vanderbilt">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornelius_Vanderbilt</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn113" title="" href="#_ednref113">[113]</a> “Cornelius Vanderbilt,” <i>History</i>, <<a href="http://www.history.com/topics/cornelius-vanderbilt">http://www.history.com/topics/cornelius-vanderbilt</a>>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn114" title="" href="#_ednref114">[114]</a> <i>Ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn115" title="" href="#_ednref115">[115]</a> T.J. Styles, <i>The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt</i>, quoted in <i>Ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn116" title="" href="#_ednref116">[116]</a> “Sanford Fleming,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, May 15, 2013, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandford_Fleming">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandford_Fleming</a>>; cf. “Universal Time, Wikipedia, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Time">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Time</a>>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn117" title="" href="#_ednref117">[117]</a> “Cornelius Vanderbilt,” <i>History</i>, <i>loc. cit</i>.</p>Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-51628774034481732502013-07-24T16:30:00.002-07:002013-07-25T18:36:27.162-07:00Speculation and Reflection on Chess<p><b>Chess: Microcosm of Alchemy</b><a name="_ednref1" title="" href="#_edn1">[1]</a></p>
<p><b>By Matthew J. Bell</b></p>
<p><b>(July 23, 2013)</b></p>
<p><b>The</b> World Chess Hall of Fame in St. Louis presents visitors with a unique set of experiences. Besides affording, via an almost unrivaled assortment of rare artifacts currently on display, a glimpse into the colorful history and development of the game of chess, the wonderful objects in Chess Museum also became for me an impetus for self-reflection. Perhaps curiously, my visit to the Chess Museum was an occasion for speculating on the mystifying topic of initiation into particular streams of esotercism. Although, given the diverse range of occult meanings that has been attached to the game of chess, perhaps this is not so peculiar after all.</p>
<p>Open to the public in a three story building on Maryland Avenue in the Central West End neighborhood of St. Louis, the Chess Museum contains a number of surprises. At the time of my visit, during the summer of 2013, the tour opened, more or less on the ground floor, to an exhibition of the provocative techno-minimalist sculptures of Bill Smith. </p>
<p>According to a free promotional pamphlet,<a name="_ednref2" title="" href="#_edn2">[2]</a> as well as the intriguing commentary from the exuberant young guide, Smith was partly taken with the notion that the game of chess, something of an epitome of low-key conflict, is an “[elegant]… microcosm” of the sort of titantic struggle-for-survival that one observes in nature.</p>
<p>Smith invokes this concept of the so-called <i>microcosm</i> “[i]n order…to show the underlying similarities of all things.”<a name="_ednref3" title="" href="#_edn3">[3]</a> This idea is complex. A bit of unpacking might be helpful. </p>
<p><i>“As below, so above; and as above so below.</br>
With this knowledge alone you may work miracles.”</i></br>
<b>- The Emerald Tablet<a name="_ednref4" title="" href="#_edn4">[4]</a></b></p>
<p><b>Microcosm/Macrocosm</b></p>
<p>The word “microcosm” literally and exoterically designates a “miniature world”<a name="_ednref5" title="" href="#_edn5">[5]</a> and is juxtaposed with the “macrocosm” or “the great world,” that is, the <i>universe</i>.<a name="_ednref6" title="" href="#_edn6">[6]</a></p>
<p>Metaphorically, the microcosm-macrocosm pair is pregnant with esoteric significance. One can trace this, like Ariadne’s thread,<a name="_ednref7" title="" href="#_edn7">[7]</a> through a historical maze of occultic-hermetic traditions.</p>
<p><i>Alchemy</i></p>
<p>Consider first the arcane discipline of <i>alchemy</i>.<a name="_ednref8" title="" href="#_edn8">[8]</a> Alchemy is a difficult enterprise to describe concisely. Even the etymology of the name itself is a matter of some contention. According to one proposed derivation, our modern term comes from the “Arabic [word] <i>al-kimiya</i>, [and] from [the Greek word] <i>khemeioa</i>…found c.300 C.E. in a decree of Diocletian against ‘the old writings of the Egyptians’), all meaning ‘alchemy.’ Perhaps from an old name for Egypt…<i>Khemia</i>, lit. ‘land of black earth,’ found in Plutarch…”.<a name="_ednref9" title="" href="#_edn9">[9]</a> One might say that alchemy is the art and (proto)science of <i>transformation</i>. [See image #1.]</p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/IMG_0012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="650" src=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/IMG_0012.jpg" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<p>“One of the most famous of all alchemical axioms is ‘as above, so below’ – meaning always that in every small part of reality there is a tiny reflection of the great ‘over-structure’<a name="_ednref10" title="" href="#_edn10">[10]</a> of reality. And, in the largest structures, are hidden secrets of the smallest. And vice versa.”<a name="_ednref11" title="" href="#_edn11">[11]</a></p>
<p>In a little circular presented to the public, the layout for Bill Smith’s works is presented diagram-matically with a trio of prominent shapes: circle, triangle, and square.<a name="_ednref12" title="" href="#_edn12">[12]</a> [See image #2.]</p>
<br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/IMG_0013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="650" src=" http://i794.photobucket.com/albums/yy228/Philoso_Raptor/IMG_0013.jpg" width="500" /></a></div> <br />
<p>This might be written off as trivial, since these are amongst the commonest of geometrical forms, were it not that the alchemist Michael Maier, represents the fabled “philosopher’s stone” with just such a combination.<a name="_ednref13" title="" href="#_edn13">[13]</a> Masonic author Timothy Hogan elaborates: “The philosopher’s Stone itself was always symbolized by a perfect cubic stone, which is a familiar symbol in the symbolic lodge of Masonry… The other symbol [that the Philosopher’s Stone] was sometimes depicted as was a circle, square, and triangle interlaced.”<a name="_ednref14" title="" href="#_edn14">[14]</a> [See image #3.]</p>
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<p>To put a finer point on this, one may turn to Freemasonic encyclopedist, Albert G. Mackey. Mackey relates that the macrocosm is “[t]he visible system of worlds; the outer world or universe. It is opposed to Microcosm, the little world, as in man.”<a name="_ednref15" title="" href="#_edn15">[15]</a> Hence, esoterically, the microcosm is the human being him- or herself. “The alchemical vessel of transformation is the body and the head of the <i>experient</i>.”<a name="_ednref16" title="" href="#_edn16">[16]</a> Furthermore, the alchemical transformations are, in some sense, depicted or effected by “sacred geometry.”<a name="_ednref17" title="" href="#_edn17">[17]</a> </p>
<p><i>Kabbalah</i></p>
<p>The relevant syzygy also surfaces in the Jewish magico-mystical tradition of <i>Kabbalah</i>.<a name="_ednref18" title="" href="#_edn18">[18]</a> “The Jewish patriarchs taught that the human body was the microcosm, or little cosmos, made in the image of the macrocosm, or the great cosmos.”<a name="_ednref19" title="" href="#_edn19">[19]</a></p>
<p>This dichotomy or, perhaps more precisely, this <i>scalar</i> concept, whose visual analog is arguably the fractal,<a name="_ednref20" title="" href="#_edn20">[20]</a> is cashed out in two main ways.</p>
<p>First, prominent in various streams of Kabbalah is the notion of the <i>harmonia mundi</i> (the “harmony of the universe”).<a name="_ednref21" title="" href="#_edn21">[21]</a> In this conception, developed in the important Kabbalistic treatise, <i>Sefer Yezira</i> (“the book of creation”),<a name="_ednref22" title="" href="#_edn22">[22]</a> all things are in some abstruse sense struct-urally isomorphic. “There are three layers of existence, the cosmic, that of time, and that of man.”<a name="_ednref23" title="" href="#_edn23">[23]</a> This was further developed by the “Christian Kabbalist,” Francesco Giorgi, in his 1525 work, <i>De harmonia mundi totius</i>.<a name="_ednref24" title="" href="#_edn24">[24]</a> </p>
<p>According to our “as above, so below” maxim, teased out in quasi-Christian terminology, these three layers of existence have relevant analogs. “According to the Mystery Schools, the human body is divided into three major parts, and in analogy with this, the universe is said to be composed of three worlds: heaven, earth, and hell.”<a name="_ednref25" title="" href="#_edn25">[25]</a> </p>
<p>With respect to human beings in particular, Manly Hall speaks of “the three worlds” and asserts that “[t]hese centers are the brain, the heart, and the reproductive system.”<a name="_ednref26" title="" href="#_edn26">[26]</a> Hall links this tripartite arrangement with the three-degree structure of Craft, or Blue Lodge, Freemasonry: “…the entered apprentice, Fellowcraft, and Master [Mason]…”.<a name="_ednref27" title="" href="#_edn27">[27]</a> </p>
<p>As previously reported, the Chess Museum spans three levels. Smith’s artwork presently occupies the first level, where, to draw an analogy, the chess apprentice is generated and encouraged to make the trip upward. In this “Opening,” the mostly dark space contains the “Spherodendron,” or <i>circle-tree</i>, an emblem of the complex journey that lies ahead, with all of its myriad, ramifying paths. Also facing the candidate is the triangular-pyramidal-tetraktal “Graphyne” and the tower structures, instructions and signposts, to the occult observer. On the “ladder” upwards to chess virtuosity, the aspirant traverses a tessellated landscape, figuratively represented by the various checkered boards and pieces on display at the second level. On these boards, during our figurative “Middle Game,” “[w]hat takes place is a battle between black pieces and white pieces, between light and darkness…”.<a name="_ednref28" title="" href="#_edn28">[28]</a> This gigantomachy filters the unworthy from the worthy – the latter showcased by the chess masters commemorated on the third level Hall of Fame. This is the “End Game.”</p>
<p>Second, “[t]he book [<i>Sifra di-Tseniutha</i>, or the ‘Book of Concealment’] concerns itself with the manifestation of the <i>Macroprosopus</i>,<a name="_ednref29" title="" href="#_edn29">[29]</a> the ‘Greater Countenance,’ which came into being as a symbol of harmony after the equilibrium of the universe had been established. This <i>Macroprosopus</i> is ever-concealed but expands itself to yield the <i>Microprosopus</i>, or ‘Lesser Countenance’ who is known by the <i>Tetragrammaton</i>, <i>IHVH</i>.”<a name="_ednref30" title="" href="#_edn30">[30]</a> “‘The Book of Concealed Mystery’ comprises the first part of [Christian] Rosenroth’s <i>Kabbalah Denudata</i>…”.<a name="_ednref31" title="" href="#_edn31">[31]</a></p>
<p>For present purposes, I wish to highlight the fact that, in Kabbalah, “…the <i>Microprosopus</i> is androgyne [<i>sic.</i>].”<a name="_ednref32" title="" href="#_edn32">[32]</a> In Jewish mythology, some “…hold that Adam [the first man] was originally created as an androgyne of male and female bodies joined back to back.”<a name="_ednref33" title="" href="#_edn33">[33]</a> One of the names for this “original man,” <i>Adam Kadmon</i>, was “…<i>diprosopon</i>, ‘two-faced’.”<a name="_ednref34" title="" href="#_edn34">[34]</a> </p>
<p><i>“The sexes were not two as they are now, but originally three in number;</br>
there was man, woman, and the union of the two…[the Androgyne]…<a name="_ednref35" title="" href="#_edn35">[35]</a></br>
[T]he primeval man was round, his back and sides forming a circle…”</i></br>
<b>– Plato, <i>Symposium </i><a name="_ednref36" title="" href="#_edn36">[36]</a></b></p>
<p>In alchemy, the androgyne<a name="_ednref37" title="" href="#_edn37">[37]</a> “…rules over the conjunction of opposites.”<a name="_ednref38" title="" href="#_edn38">[38]</a> Symbolically, the androgyne is related to the <i>hermaphrodite</i>. The youth <i>Hermaphroditos</i> is the offspring of Venus-Aphrodite and Mercury-Hermes. Of course, “Hermes” (Mercury, Thoth) is the god whose name lends itself to the Alchemical word <i>Hermetic</i>. Furthermore, <i>Venus</i> (Aphrodite; cf. Eos, Aurora, the “dawn goddess”) is the “Morning Star” otherwise known as the <i>Lucifer</i> (i.e., “Light-Bringer,” <i>Phosphorus</i>). [See image #4.]</p>
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<p>It is apparent that the hermaphrodite was created through a <i>transformation</i>.<a name="_ednref39" title="" href="#_edn39">[39]</a> As Ovid related, the hermaphrodite is a result of a quasi-sexual conjunction of Hermaphroditos and a nymph named Salmacis. The relevant transformative process may be brought about by means of the “Caduceus,” or the double-serpent entwined wand of Hermes – which wand, to employ the familiar modern lingo, demonstrated peculiar “sex-change” powers in the case of the mythological Tiresias.<a name="_ednref40" title="" href="#_edn40">[40]</a> He was changed from male to female and back again after “separating” two “copulating snakes” by means of placing his “staff” (<i>caduceus</i>) in between them.<a name="_ednref41" title="" href="#_edn41">[41]</a></p>
<p>The androgyne-hermaphrodite is a representation of the bringing together of opposites – the alchemical <i>coniunctio oppositorum</i>. Especially given his invocation of the “microcosm,” Bill Smith’s work titled “Spherodendron” is highly reminiscent of the “primeval man’s” spheroidal shape, according to Aristophanes’ account in Plato’s <i>Symposium</i>.<a name="_ednref42" title="" href="#_edn42">[42]</a> Additionally, the game of chess, bringing together opposing sides of light and dark, often ends with opposing king-queen pairs in a sort of conjunction. [See image #5.]</p>
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<p>The androgyne, in its two-headed <i>Rebis</i> form (“rebis,” “two-thing” or “dual-thing”), is an emblem for the generation of the “Child of the Philosophers,” yet another portrayal of the Philosopher’s Stone and the culmination of the alchemical <i>magnum opus</i> (“great work”). This “child” is variously understood. Enumerating the different interpretations is beyond my present scope.<a name="_ednref43" title="" href="#_edn43">[43]</a> Suffice it to say that one important emblem for the transformative procedure is supposedly encoded in the so-called “Pythagorean sex triangle.”<a name="_ednref44" title="" href="#_edn44">[44]</a> Again, the supposed secrets of transformation seem to revolve dually around the sexual and the geometric, like the two foci of the elliptical orbit a planet takes around the sun.<a name="_ednref45" title="" href="#_edn45">[45]</a> [See image #6.]</p>
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<p>Besides the other representations for the philosopher’s stone that have been rehearsed already, another veiled reference to its preparation was “squaring the circle.”<a name="_ednref46" title="" href="#_edn46">[46]</a> Tying some of these seemingly disparate strands together, a few authors have claimed that “[a] Chessboard solves the problem of ‘Squaring the Circle’.”<a name="_ednref47" title="" href="#_edn47">[47]</a> [See image #7.]</p>
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<p>For readers’ information: “Squaring the circle, constructing a square equal in area to a given circle, is one of the three classic unsolved problems of antiquity.”<a name="_ednref48" title="" href="#_edn48">[48]</a> Writer Stuart Nettleton reproduces a set of diagrams illustrating the geometrical method (the details of which shall not detain us) for inscribing a circle around the 64 (4-cubed) one-by-one squares of a chessboard in order to facilitate a ‘squared-circle’ transformation.<a name="_ednref49" title="" href="#_edn49">[49]</a></p>
<p><b>Spy-craft</b></p>
<p>As the visitor makes his or her way upward to the second floor of the museum, en route to the masters enshrined on the third floor, he or she is confronted with numerous chess sets, all varying in terms of design and even, in a few cases, configuration. Many of these come from India, the cradle of the game of chess – termed the <i>noble jeu</i> (the “noble game”) by, for example, the composer and chess innovator, François-André Danican Philidor.<a name="_ednref50" title="" href="#_edn50">[50]</a></p>
<p><i>Le noble jeu</i> is also a metaphor for <i>le grand jeu</i>, “the great game.” Coined by Arthur Conolly and popularized by Rudyard Kipling<a name="_ednref51" title="" href="#_edn51">[51]</a> in his novel, <i>Kim</i>,<a name="_ednref52" title="" href="#_edn52">[52]</a> “the great game” historically designated the struggle, first by Britain and Russia, then by the U.S. and the U.S.S.R., for control over central Asia, for which India was a useful staging ground.<a name="_ednref53" title="" href="#_edn53">[53]</a><sup>,<a name="_ednref54" title="" href="#_edn54">[54]</a> </sup>[See image #8.]</p>
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<p>Not merely a relic of the past, “the great game” and its symbolization can be glimpsed in Zbigniew Brzeziński’s 1998 book, <i>The Grand Chessboard</i>.<a name="_ednref55" title="" href="#_edn55">[55]</a> In his book, Brzeziński, former National Security advisor to Jimmy Carter and co-founder, with David Rockefeller, of the Trilateral Commission, outlines his geo-strategy for securing U.S. hegemony over central Asia. The chess analogy is patent and not without precedent. [See image #9.]</p>
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<p>“During the Second World War, …Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin moved around entire populations like pieces on a chessboard, seeking to reshape the demographic profile of Europe according to their own preferences.”<a name="_ednref56" title="" href="#_edn56">[56]</a></p>
<p>In an obituary for the ex-Central Intelligence Agency<a name="_ednref57" title="" href="#_edn57">[57]</a> “clandestine service” chief “who oversaw all global espionage activities for the agency in the mid-1980s”,<a name="_ednref58" title="" href="#_edn58">[58]</a> the author said the following. “Clair E. George…[was] a consummate spymaster who moved the chess pieces in the Central Intelligence Agency’s clandestine games of intrigue before being convicted of lying to Congress about the Iran-contra affair…”.<a name="_ednref59" title="" href="#_edn59">[59]</a></p>
<p>Examples of this tropology can be multiplied.</p>
<p><i>“You see there is only one constant. One universal.</br>
It is the only real truth.</br>
Causality. Action, reaction. Cause and effect.”</i></br>
<b>- The Merovingian (<i>The Matrix Reloaded</i>)</b></p>
<p>The underlying gnosis might be ascertained by way of a passage in a strange little book. First published in 1908, the <i>Kybalion: A Study of The Hermetic Philosophy of Ancient Egypt and Greece</i> is a hermetic and pseudo-psychological mish-mash. Authorship is merely and mys-teriously attributed to “Three Initiates” who claim to convey to readers, in concise terms, the philosophy of the legendary wellspring of alchemy, Hermes Trismegistus. The treatise touches upon several points that resonate with historic occult currents.</p>
<p>In the section titled, “The Principle of Cause and Effect,” we read:</p>
<p>“‘Every Cause has its Effect; every Effect has its Cause; everything happens according to Law; Chance is but a name for Law not recognized; there are many planes of causation, but nothing escapes the Law.’ – <i>The Kybalion</i>. This Principle embodies the fact that there is a Cause for every Effect; an Effect from every Cause. It explains that: ‘Everything Happens according to Law’; that nothing ever ‘merely happens’; that there is no such thing as Chance; that while there are various planes of Cause and Effect, the higher dominating the lower planes, still nothing ever entirely escapes the Law. The Hermetists understand the art and methods of rising above the ordinary plane of Cause and Effect, to a certain degree, and by mentally rising to a higher plane they become Causers instead of Effects. The masses of people are carried along, obedient to environment; the wills and desires of others stronger than themselves; heredity; suggestion; and other outward causes moving them about like pawns on the Chessboard of Life. But the Masters, rising to the plane above, dominate their moods, characters, qualities, and powers, as well as the environment surrounding them, and become Movers instead of pawns. They help to PLAY THE GAME OF LIFE, instead of being played and moved about by other wills and environment. They USE the Principle instead of being its tools. The Masters obey the Causation of the higher planes, but they help to RULE on their own plane. In this statement there is condensed a wealth of Hermetic knowledge – let him read who can.”<a name="_ednref60" title="" href="#_edn60">[60]</a></p>
<p>One sees, therefore, another theme brought out by Bill Smith. The “rules of chess,” likened to the “natural law,” the “laws of survival,” and suchlike, are at once deterministic and suggestive of a hierarchy (for example of major pieces over minor pieces over pawns). Plausibly, the hierarchy is established by this: Those who know and excel at exploiting the “rules of the game,” moving the pieces around the board to achieve their killing-of-the-king objective, stand <i>above</i> those who either do not know or do not excel at exploiting said rules. To again quote the Merovingian: “Choice is an illusion created between those with power and those without.”<a name="_ednref61" title="" href="#_edn61">[61]</a> </p>
<p>In this way, then, the game of chess is not simply symbolic of <i>some other</i> initiation process. Arguably, it is, in and of itself, an initiation rite.</p>
<p>“[T]he frequent occurrence of Chess in Grail Castles and Magic Castles throughout the legends, in some of which the chessmen play the game themselves without visible handling, is really another of the innumerable disguises under which the Magic and Initiation appear. The whole story is really a sort of glorified game of chess, in which we have Kings and Queens and Knights and Bishops and Pawns under various forms and in various positions. …The maze pattern is represented by the squares of the chessboard and the moves of the pieces to and fro, from square to square.”<a name="_ednref62" title="" href="#_edn62">[62]</a> [See image #10.]</p>
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<p>Note:</p>
<br />
<hr /><p><a name="_edn1" title="" href="#_ednref1">[1]</a> This paper will be considering the Chess Museum from the perspective of its contents and layout in a way that has something in common with the approach so-called “psychogeographers” take toward certain cityscapes. During this voyage, I will entertain various interpretations for symbolically suggestive aspects of the Chess Museum. It is important to note that I make no claims about the intentions of the designers, owners, sponsors, staff, or anyone else with a connexion to said establishment. Moreover, my remarks about the artwork of Bill Smith should be understood in this light: I am engaged in an exercise that is purely one of reflection and speculation on certain archetypal forms and features as they occur in or around the museum. Intentions and motivations are obscure things. Sometimes I am not sure that I know my own, let alone those of anyone else. This work is for informational or entertainment purposes only. Furthermore, my <i>descriptions</i> of various occult concepts should not be construed as <i>endorsements</i> of those concepts.</p>
<p><a name="_edn2" title="" href="#_ednref2">[2]</a> “Bill Smith | Beyond the Humanities: March 7 – September 15, 2013,” pamphlet, <i>World Chess hall of Fame</i>, p. 5.</p>
<p><a name="_edn3" title="" href="#_ednref3">[3]</a> <i>Ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn4" title="" href="#_ednref4">[4]</a> Fulcanelli’s version, Paul Sieveking, trans., <http://www.sacred-texts.com/alc/emerald.htm>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn5" title="" href="#_ednref5">[5]</a> Douglas Harper, “Microcosm,” <i>Online Etymology Dictionary</i>, <http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&search=microcosm>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn6" title="" href="#_ednref6">[6]</a> Douglas Harper, “Macrocosm,” <i>Online Etymology Dictionary</i>, <http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&search=macrocosm>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn7" title="" href="#_ednref7">[7]</a> “Now, before Daedalus left Crete, he had given Ariadne a magic ball of thread, and instructed her how to enter and Labyrinth. She must open the entrance door and tie the loose thread to the lintel; the ball would then roll along, diminishing as it went and making, with devious turns and twists, for the corners where the Minotaur was lodged. This ball Ariadne gave to Theseus and instructed him to follow it until he reached the sleeping monster, whom he must seize by the hair and sacrifice to Poseidon. He then can come back by rolling up the thread into a ball again.” Robert Graves, <i>The Greek Myths</i>, London: Penguin, 1992, §98.k, p. 339. Incidentally, “Ariadne” is a character, played by Canadian actress Ellen Page, in the 2010 movie, <i>Inception</i>. As the plot unfolds, and in order to differentiate waking and dreaming experience, Ariadne fashions for herself a “totem” in the shape of a chess piece – a bishop. In <i>Through the Looking Glass</i>, acted out atop a world-wide chessboard, the Red King was also a dreamer, like the <i>Matrix</i> (1999) character, Morpheus. Morpheus asks: “Have you ever had a dream, Neo, that you were so sure was real? What if you were unable to wake from that dream? How would you know the difference between the dream world and the real world?” Similarly, Carroll writes: “‘[The Red King’s] dreaming now,’ said Tweedledee: ‘and what do you think he’s dreaming about?’ ... ‘Why, about YOU [Alice]!’ Tweedledee exclaimed, clapping his hands triumphantly. ‘And if he left off dreaming about you, where do you suppose you’d be?’ ... ‘you’d go out—bang!—just like a candle!’“ Like <i>Inception</i>’s Ariadne, Alice also seems to have difficulty tracking the distinction between dreams and reality. She exclaims: “Only I do hope it’s MY dream, and not the Red King’s!” </p>
<p><a name="_edn8" title="" href="#_ednref8">[8]</a> For more on alchemy, see Jim Brandon, <i>Rebirth of Pan</i>, Dunlap, Ill.: Firebird Press, 1983 and Aleister Crowley, <i>The Book of Thoth</i>, New York: Samuel Samuel Weiser, 1993.</p>
<p><a name="_edn9" title="" href="#_ednref9">[9]</a> Douglas Harper, “Alchemy,” <i>Online Etymology Dictionary</i>, <http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=alchemy>. Cf. <http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/alchemy>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn10" title="" href="#_ednref10">[10]</a> This is also called “the Pattern.” See Dennis William Hauck, <i>The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Alchemy</i>, New York: Penguin, 2008, p. 23. Nota bene: “A chessboard <i>is</i> a pattern, and the word almost literally means ‘King’s Maze’ (for ‘chess’ is <i>Sháh</i>, Persian for ‘King’), and so ‘Initiation Pattern’,” Robert W. Crutwell, “The Initiation Pattern and the Grail,” <i>Folklore</i>, vol. 49, no. 3, Sept., 1938, p. 250. The emphasis on the word “is” occurs in the original.</p>
<p><a name="_edn11" title="" href="#_ednref11">[11]</a> Terence McKenna, in Sheldon Rochlin, <i>The Alchemical Dream: Rebirth of The Great Work</i>, video, 2008. This is represented pictorially by the 16<sup>th</sup>-17<sup>th</sup> century Rosicrucian and Kabbalist, Robert Fludd, in his <i>Utriusque Cosmi Historia</i> (1617) and by Fludd’s contemporary, the alchemist, Johann Daniel Mylius, in the <i>Opus Medico-Chymicum</i> (1618).</p>
<p><a name="_edn12" title="" href="#_ednref12">[12]</a> “Bill smith | Beyond the Humanities,” handout, <i>Missouri Arts Council</i>. The circle locates the artwork titled “Spherodendron,” the triangle represents “Graphyne,” and the square “Original Tower Maquette.” Elsewhere, there is a much taller tower sculpture named “Structure,” which extends from the ground level upwards, adjacent to the staircase. I have no space, presently, to discuss the (obviously partly phallic) symbolism of towers. For some mention of historically important towers, the interested reader can consult Matthew Bell, with Jim Brandon, “Star Trek In Tenebris,” <i>Bell Curve</i> [weblog], June 5, 2013, <http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/06/star-trek-in-tenebris_5.html> and John A. Keel, <i>The Eighth Tower</i>, Saturday Review Press, 1975.</p>
<p><a name="_edn13" title="" href="#_ednref13">[13]</a> See his <i>Atalanta Fugiens: The Fleeing of Atalanta, or New Chymical Emblems of the Secrets of Nature</i>, Oppenheim, Germany: Johann Theodor de Bry, 1618, Emblemma XXI. Underneath, Maier’s accompanying <i>Epigramma</i> reads: “From man and woman, make you a single circle; From which rises the square with its equal sides; Build a triangle of it, turned itself; In a rounded sphere. The Stone then is born. If your mind is slow to catch that mystery, Understand the work of the geometer and you will know.” Manly P. Hall reproduces this image on the title page of his monograph titled, <i>The Occult Anatomy of Man & Occult Masonry</i>, Los Angeles: Philosophical Research Society, 1997; cf. <i>ibid.</i>, p. 4. Elsewhere, Hall explains that Freemason’s “Great Architect of the Universe” “builds…bodies…around lines of force” using “[g]eometry…[as] the skeleton…”, <i>ibid</i>., p. 31.</p>
<p><a name="_edn14" title="" href="#_ednref14">[14]</a> <i>The Alchemical Keys to Masonic Ritual</i>, privately published, 2007, p. 26. It is apparent that part of the “mastery” of the hermetic-masonic “arts” includes the acquisition of the knowledge of how to interlace these forms correctly. Again deferring to Hogan, he writes that “the Master Mason’s apron is a square with an inverted triangle in it.” Hence, in the ground floor layout, the shapes are separated. These are perhaps interpretable as the raw-materials for the construction of the philosopher’s stone. The correct assembly of the materials is the province, one might believe, of the chess masters celebrated on the third level. The fountainhead for the geometrical basis of phenomenal order is arguably Plato’s dialogue <i>Timaeus</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn15" title="" href="#_ednref15">[15]</a> “Macrocosm,” <i>Encyclopedia of Freemasonry</i>, Chicago: Masonic History Co., 1956, p. 609.</p>
<p><a name="_edn16" title="" href="#_ednref16">[16]</a> That is, the <i>percipient</i>, the person undergoing the alchemical experience. McKenna, <i>loc. cit</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn17" title="" href="#_ednref17">[17]</a> The Pythagoreans are a well-known embodiment of this. Pythagoras’ maxim that “all is number,” along with his “47<sup>th</sup> proposition” or “Pythagorean theorem” (venerated by Freemasons and also called the “47<sup>th</sup> problem of Euclid”) and his “tetraktys” (which supposedly “…contained the knowledge of all things when set out in the shape of a triangle with ten dots disposed pyramidally at four levels”, “Tetraktys,” in Jean Chevalier and Alain Gheerbrant, <i>The Penguin Dictionary of Symbols</i>, John Buchanan-Brown, trans., London: Penguin, 1994, p. 984) all testify to this. Additionally, we see this close-alchemical-geometrical connexion in the work of the 8<sup>th</sup> century figure Jabir ibn Hayyan, from whose name (and writings) we get the word “gibberish”, Hauck, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 38. Jabir was a mathematician and geometer as well as a magician, astrologer, and alchemist, see Stanton J. Linden, <i>The Alchemy Reader: From Hermes Trismegistus to Isaac Newton</i>, Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge Univ. Press, 2003, p. 80. Jabir’s Arabic predecessor, the 7<sup>th</sup> century Khalid ibn Yazid, explicitly exhorts his readers: “…learn to understand geometrical proportion…”, <i>ibid</i>., p. 73. </p>
<p><a name="_edn18" title="" href="#_ednref18">[18]</a> Lit., “that which has been received”, Dan, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 4. Prominent “Kabbalistic” works include the <i>Sefer Yezira</i> (“book of creation”), <i>Sefer Ha’Bahir</i> (the “book <i>Bahir</i>,” “book of brightness”), <i>Sefer Ha’Zohar</i> (the <i>Zohar</i>, “book of splendor,” which collection includes, as proper parts, the <i>Midrash ha’Neelam</i> and the <i>Idra Rabba</i> and <i>Idra Zuta</i> works), and the later the <i>Tikuney Zohar</i> and <i>Zohar ha’Dash</i> (emendations and appendices to the Zohar proper), see Dan, <i>ibid</i>.,<i> passim</i>. For a pithy overview, see “Kabbalah,” Joseph Telushkin. <i>Jewish Literacy: The Most Important Things to Know About the Jewish Religion, Its People and Its History</i>, New York: William Morrow & Co., 1991, reproduced online, <i>Jewish Virtual Library</i>, <http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/kabbalah.html>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn19" title="" href="#_ednref19">[19]</a> Hall, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 5. This reference to the “Jewish patriarchs” is best understood as being “extra-biblical” and to proceed from certain mystical and gnostic currents within Judaism and Judaized Christianity. Traditional forms of Christianity – Catholicism, Orthodoxy, and Protestantism – do not accept these claims regarding the “patriarchs.”</p>
<p><a name="_edn20" title="" href="#_ednref20">[20]</a> Anticipating the cooption and explication of fractal imagery in the so-called “chaos theory,” Michael Maier’s associate, alchemist Heinrich Khunrath, put chaos in the center of creation, crowned by the androgyne – or “man-woman,” the alchemical <i>rebis</i> – in his engraving, “The hermaphrodite,” in <i>Amphitheatrum sapientiae aeternae</i>, Hamburg, Germany, 1595. The “rebis,” or “dual-thing,” is, like the geometrical arrangements considered above, another depiction of the philosopher’s stone.</p>
<p><a name="_edn21" title="" href="#_ednref21">[21]</a> Joseph Dan, <i>Kabbalah: A Very Short Introduction</i>, Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 2006, p. 19.</p>
<p><a name="_edn22" title="" href="#_ednref22">[22]</a> The date of this composition is unknown. Dan reports that minority views hold that it was written as early as the 1<sup>st</sup> A.D. and as late as the 9<sup>th</sup> century A.D., with the majority of scholars holding to the view that it belongs somewhere in the 3<sup>rd</sup>-4<sup>th</sup> A.D. century range. <i>Ibid</i>., pp. 17-18.</p>
<p><a name="_edn23" title="" href="#_ednref23">[23]</a> <i>Ibid</i>., p. 19.</p>
<p><a name="_edn24" title="" href="#_ednref24">[24]</a> “[T]he relationships between micro-cosmos and macrocosmos, and between man and Creator in whose image he was created, were developed in various schools of neo-Platonists during the Middle Ages”, Dan, op. cit., p. 68. Besides Giorgi, notable Christian Kabbalists included, without limitation, Marsilio Ficino (also a neoplatonist and historically important translator of Plato), Pico dela Mirandola (author of the “900 theses” that preceded Martin Luther), Johannes Reuchlin, Cornelius Agrippa (prototype for Johann Goethe’s <i>Faustus</i>), Guillame Postel (about whom I have written elsewhere, see my “Going ‘Postel’: The Making of a ‘Judeo-Christian’,” <i>Church Bell</i> [weblog], September 25, 2012), and Christian Knorr von Rosenroth (author of the <i>Kabbalah Denudata</i> [1677-84], later popularized by Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn occultist Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers in 1877 as <i>The Kabbalah Unveiled</i>).</p>
<p><a name="_edn25" title="" href="#_ednref25">[25]</a> Hall, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 11.</p>
<p><a name="_edn26" title="" href="#_ednref26">[26]</a> <i>Ibid</i>., p. 14.</p>
<p><a name="_edn27" title="" href="#_ednref27">[27]</a> <i>Ibid</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn28" title="" href="#_ednref28">[28]</a> Chevalier and Gheerbrant, <i>op. cit</i>., p.189. The game of chess and the chess board are both symbols for trial and tribulation. For example, in Lewis Carroll’s story, <i>Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There</i> (1871), the plot unfolds upon a vast checkerboard landscape where the main characters are stylized chess pieces. Toward the end of the Shakespearean play, <i>The Tempest</i>, Ferdinand and Miranda play a game of chess. Additionally, in his classic film, <i>Det sjunde inseglet</i> (“The Seventh Seal”), director Ingmar Bergman illustrates the human struggle to avoid death with a prolonged chess game between a knight named Antonius Block (Max von Sydow) and the hooded figure of Death (Bengt Ekerot). More recently, chess matches, and the idea of chess mastery, are interwoven in the plot of the 2005 Guy Ritchie movie, <i>Revolver</i>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn29" title="" href="#_ednref29">[29]</a> “The Hebrew name of the <i>Macroprosopus</i> is <i>Arikh Anpin</i>, which translates into ‘The Long Face’ or ‘The Greater Countenance’…[or] ‘The Long Suffering.’” Charles Poncé, <i>Kabbalah</i>, Wheaton, Illinois: Theosophical Pub. House, 1973, p. 113. The Kabbalistic “Tree of Life,” with its ten (visible) <i>Sephirot</i>, or “emanations” of the invisible “Infinite,” <i>Ayn Sof</i>. Incidentally, “…Ariadne, the Cretan goddess, is said to have hanged herself [from a sacred tree]…as the Attic Erigone did…”, Graves, <i>op. cit</i>., §88.10, p. 298.</p>
<p><a name="_edn30" title="" href="#_ednref30">[30]</a> Poncé, <i>op. cit.</i>, pp. 47-8. The <i>Tetragrammaton</i>, or the “four letters,” יהוה, <i>IHVH</i> (IeHoVaH, Jehovah), are also represented as <i>YHWH</i> (YaHWeH, Yahweh). This is because ancient Hebrew did not include vowels. Vowel “pointing” was a later development. Christian Kabbalism was fascinated with <i>voces magicae</i> (“word magic,” “voice magic”), or what the ancient Egyptians termed “words of power” (<i>heka</i>). “…Christian Kabbalists…adopt[ed] the belief in the ability of language – especially names, and in particular divine names – to influence reality”, Dan, <i>op. cit</i>., pp. 66 & 68. Bill Smith’s sculpture “Graphyne,” although stated to be a representation of the artificial carbon allotrope by the same name, is also a portmanteau – like “Spherodendron.” “Graphyne” could be decomposed into “graph” (“write”) and “-yne”, a chemical suffix closely akin to the word “dyne,” meaning <i>power</i>. Perhaps it is coincidental that Bill Smith chose to create a visual homage to a molecule whose name might be supposed to convey the notion of <i>power-writing</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn31" title="" href="#_ednref31">[31]</a> <i>Ibid</i>., p. 48.</p>
<p><a name="_edn32" title="" href="#_ednref32">[32]</a> <i>Ibid</i>., p. 127. “The thirty-two paths of the sefirothic configuration are contained in man”, <i>ibid</i>., p. 165. On the “thirty-two paths,” as opposed to the twenty-two paths enumerated by other more modern writers (e.g., “Tree of Life,” <i>Thelemapedia</i>, <http://www.thelemapedia.org/index.php/Tree_of_Life>), see Rawn Clark, “The 32 Paths of Wisdom,” <i>Journal of the Western Mystery Tradition</i>, vol. 1., no. 3, Autumnal Equinox, 2002, <http://www.jwmt.org/v1n3/32paths.html>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn33" title="" href="#_ednref33">[33]</a> Robert Graves and Raphael Patai, <i>Hebrew Myths</i>, Manchester, U.K.: Carcanet Press, 2005, p. 66.</p>
<p><a name="_edn34" title="" href="#_ednref34">[34]</a> <i>Ibid</i>., p. 67, n. 2.</p>
<p><a name="_edn35" title="" href="#_ednref35">[35]</a> It appears to me that this is account serves as one – and possibly <i>the</i> – metaphysical basis for contemporary notions such as the romantic idea of “finding one’s soul-mate” as well as pseudo-psychological musings that invoke the concept of “discovering one’s ‘inner femininity/masculinity’,” etc. This has alchemical analogs as well. See Paracelsus’ comment on Genesis 2:21-22: “…their Adam, who carryes his invisible Eve hidden in his own body…”, quoted in Linden, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 166.</p>
<p><a name="_edn36" title="" href="#_ednref36">[36]</a> Benjamin Jowett, trans., 189e. See <http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/symposium.html>. Symbolically considered, the sphere is of a piece with the circle “…and shares its symbolism… The sphere is…the cube of the circle…[and symbolizes the] bridge or marriage between Heaven and Earth…”, Chevalier & Gheerbant, <i>op. cit</i>., pp. 901-2. Some of these themes bubble under the surface in the 1998 science fiction thriller, <i>Sphere</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn37" title="" href="#_ednref37">[37]</a> For more on the androgyne, the interested reader should consult: Jim Brandon, “Neil Armstrong: Astronaut . . . or Alchemist?” Bell Curve, Dec. 11, 2012, <http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/12/neil-armstrong-astronaut-or-alchemist.html>, Matthew Bell, <i>Per Meum Vitra</i>, work-in-progress, draft, February 6, 2013, and Matthew Bell, “Now Playing at the Century 16 Ampitheater of Eternal Wisdom: Aurora Consurgens, Part 2,” Bell Curve, Sept. 1, 2012, <http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/now-playing-at-century-16-ampitheater.html>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn38" title="" href="#_ednref38">[38]</a> James Shelby Downard, “Sirius Rising,” Jim Brandon, audio interview, with commentary, ca. 1976.</p>
<p><a name="_edn39" title="" href="#_ednref39">[39]</a> Recall that this was our provisional, albeit minimalist, definition for the word “alchemy.”</p>
<p><a name="_edn40" title="" href="#_ednref40">[40]</a> Hauck, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 21.</p>
<p><a name="_edn41" title="" href="#_ednref41">[41]</a> The symbol of the caduceus is closely related to the “rod of Asclepius” oft-used as a medical emblem as well as the dollar-sign, “$”.</p>
<p><a name="_edn42" title="" href="#_ednref42">[42]</a> The neologism “Spherodendron” appears to be something like a portmanteau word from “sphere” and “dendron,” meaning <i>tree</i>, as in “rhododendron,” or <i>red-tree</i>/<i>rose-tree</i>. (The rhododendron, by the way, is a symbol of warning or danger – fitting for a level-one initiate. See ““RHODODENDRON [Rose bay],” Cora Linn Daniels and C. M. Stevans, eds., <i>Encyclopedia of Superstitions, Folklore, and the Occult Sciences</i>, vol. 2, Milwaukee, Wisconsin: J.H. Yewdale & Sons Co., 1903, p. 797.) The Kabbalistic “Tree of Life” has already been mentioned, above. One way to construe this is as an explication of the “Pattern” or cosmic-”overstructure.” On this interpretation, the world is organized according to “the Tree of Life,” with the various sephiroth manifesting, so to speak, on different planes of existence. This “tree” also represents the path to occult knowledge – <i>gnosis</i>/<i>da’at</i> – that is, the path to one’s own (supposed) latent divinity. Here one could mention the “serpent” in the Garden of Eden – Lucifer, the “light-bearer” – hanging from the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil” and symbolizing “enlightenment,” according to theosophist Helena P. Blavatsky, Freemason Albert Pike, and others. See Blavatsky’s Theosophical magazine, “Lucifer,” <http://www.blavatskyarchives.com/luciferreprints.htm> and Pike’s <i>Morals and Dogma</i>, Richmond, Virginia: L. H. Jenkins, 1946, p. 321. The caduceus wand of Hermes is also, in addition to the symbolism already mentioned elsewhere, a stylized representation of this serpent-in-tree motif. Moreover, the tree portrays the esoteric version of the so-called “Jacob’s Ladder.” See e.g., Hogan, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 26 and <i>Per Meum Vitra</i>. In Roman Polanski’s 1999 movie, <i>The Ninth Gate</i>, the character Liana Telfer [<i>née</i> Saint Martin] sports a tattoo arguably illustrating this connexion. Anatomically, the “tree” esoterically corresponds to the spinal column – the potential “middle pillar” of the adept (<i>shushumna</i> in Tantra), flanked by the pillars of mercy and severity (the Tantric counterparts being <i>ida</i> and <i>pingala</i>). Arguably, these pillars also fit the gender schema envisioned by Plato in the <i>Symposium</i>. On page 92 of their book, <i>The Mysteries of the Great Cross of Hendaye</i>, authors Jay Weinder and Vincent Bridges associate the three pillars with genders, as follows: the left pillar is “feminine,” the right “masculine,” and the middle is “gender neutral.” I would suggest that the middle pillar is, in fact, better thought of as <i>androgynous</i>. In Nordic mythology, the tree is <i>Yggdrasil</i>, the “world tree,” mentioned in the 2011 Hollywood movie, <i>Captain America</i>. Comparisons are often made to the Indian Banyan tree – associated with the Buddha’s enlightenment, the “World Tree” of the Maya, the “Tree of Life” of the Aztecs, and the power centers in <i>Kalachakra</i> Tantra, etc. See, e.g., <i>Sex: The Secret Gate to Eden</i>, video, Thelema Press/Glorian, 2006.</p>
<p><a name="_edn43" title="" href="#_ednref43">[43]</a> See <i>Per Meum Vitra</i>, <i>op. cit</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn44" title="" href="#_ednref44">[44]</a> Harvey Lovewell, “Geometry and Masonry: Sacred Geometry,” <i>Pietre-Stone’s Review of Freemasonry</i> [website], June 5, 2012, <http://www.freemasons-freemasonry.com/geometry_masonry.html>. Relating the King (Osiris), Queen (Isis), and Divine Child (Horus) also recalled the Aleister Crowley-Freida Harris tarot deck. Specifically, Trump number 6, “Lovers,” depicts a sort of sexual conjunction of opposites: what can be fairly interpreted as the breaking of sexual taboo – the coital union of forbidden lovers, the black and white, the adulterous union of the red queen and white king (in Alice-in-Wonderland-esque language), the incestuous relationship of Cersei and Jaime Lannister in <i>A song of Ice and Fire</i>, etc. Additionally, since Osiris was slain and mutilated by Set, leaving his sister-queen Isis a widow, Horus is a kind of “widow’s son,” Like the Masonic Hiram Abiff. See Lovewell, <i>loc. cit</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn45" title="" href="#_ednref45">[45]</a> For more on sex-magical current, see this author’s <i>Per Meum Vitra</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn46" title="" href="#_ednref46">[46]</a> Carl Jung, <i>The psychology of the transference</i>, R. F. C. Hull, trans., <i>The Collected Works of C. G. Jung, </i>extracted from <i>The Practice of Psychotherapy</i>, vol. 16, Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton Univ. Press, 1954; cited by Gerry Anne Lenhart, <i>A Developmental Hypothesis Based on the Order of Jung’s Psychological Functions</i>, dissertation, Pacifica Graduate Institute, May 1, 1996, ch. 1, <http://sulcus.berkeley.edu/FLM/SH/MDL/GAL/GalDisChapts/galdis.chapter1.html>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn47" title="" href="#_ednref47">[47]</a> Frank C. Higgins, <i>Cross of the Magi: An Unveiling of the greatest of all the Ancient Mysteries</i>, New York: Roger, 1912/Whitefish, Montana: Kessinger, 1998, pp. 53-56; cited by Stuart Nettleton, <i>The Alchemy Key: The Mystical Provenance of the Philosophers’ Stone</i>, Sydney, Australia, privately published, 2002, p. 420. </p>
<p><a name="_edn48" title="" href="#_ednref48">[48]</a> Steven Dutch, “Squaring the Circle,” Univ. of Wisconsin – Green bay, <http://www.uwgb.edu/dutchs/pseudosc/SquareCirc.htm>. One should differentiate this discussion of “squaring the circle” from the different, although interesting, subject of metaphysically impossible objects, such as the square-circle (“squircle”). See, e.g., Johann Marek, “Alexius Meinong,” Edward N. Zalta, ed., <i>Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy</i>, Summer, 2013, <http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2013/entries/meinong/>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn49" title="" href="#_ednref49">[49]</a> The cube is a recurring theme in world religions. A prominent example, here, would be the sacred Islamic cube, the <i>Kaaba</i>, housed in Mecca, Saudi Arabia in the <i>Al-Masjid al-Haram</i> mosque. Another example are the <i>tefillin</i> (“phylacteries”) worn by Talmudic rabbis (and the Pharisees before them) in Orthodox Judaism. Additonally, in Kabbalah, reference is made to the “Cube of Space.” See Weidner and Bridges, <i>op. cit</i>., e.g., pp. 60-1. This business is even stranger in light of the speculations, of late from some scientists, that the Earth’s core may be <i>cuboidal</i>. See “Rubik’s Cube In Center Of Earth? Computer Simulations Support New Model of Earth’s Core,” <i>Science Daily</i>, Feb. 11, 2008, <http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/02/080208091314.htm>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn50" title="" href="#_ednref50">[50]</a> See, e.g., Philidor’s own volume, <i>L’analyze des E’checs</i> (1749), on display on the third floor.</p>
<p><a name="_edn51" title="" href="#_ednref51">[51]</a> Peter Hopkirk, <i>The Great Game: The Struggle for Empire in Central Asia</i>, Tokyo, Japan: Kodansha International, 1992, p. 1.</p>
<p><a name="_edn52" title="" href="#_ednref52">[52]</a> London: MacMillan, 1901.</p>
<p><a name="_edn53" title="" href="#_ednref53">[53]</a> Central Asia is roughly made up of the various “-stan” states (e.g., Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, etc.) along with parts of Iran and Mongolia. </p>
<p><a name="_edn54" title="" href="#_ednref54">[54]</a> I am here using the phrase “great game” as a sort of generic code word for cryptopolitics and espionage. Alchemy is referred to as “The Golden Game” by Stanislas Klossowski de Rola. See his <i>The Golden Game: Alchemical Engravings of the Seventeenth Century</i>, London: Thames & Hudson, 1997.</p>
<p><a name="_edn55" title="" href="#_ednref55">[55]</a> New York: Basic Books.</p>
<p><a name="_edn56" title="" href="#_ednref56">[56]</a> R. M. Douglas, “The European Atrocity You Never Heard About,” <i>Chronicle Review</i>, June 11, 2012, <http://chronicle.com/article/The-European-Atrocity-You/132123/>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn57" title="" href="#_ednref57">[57]</a> Jon Crumiller is the owner the collection of chess sets presently on display at the Chess Museum. Crumiller is also the chief operating officer of an information analysis company called “Princeton Consultants.” Interestingly, the name “Princeton Consultants” also crops up in the annals of the CIA. “Throughout the 1960s, and possibly longer, at least five Princeton professors worked secretly as high-level consultants…Cyril Black, Klaus Knorr, Joseph Strayer, James Billington, and the late T. Cuyler Young served as members of the ‘Princeton Consultants,’ a secret panel of academics who met in Princeton, together with Dulles, four times a year to assist with intelligence assessments for the CIA’s Office of National Estimates”, John Cavanagh, “Dulles Papers Reveal CIA Consulting Network,” <i>Forerunner</i>, April 29, 1980, reproduced online at <http://www.cia-on-campus.org/princeton.edu/consult.html>. Author William Matthew Leary characterized the CIA’s Princeton Consultants as a counterbalance, devised by William H. Jackson, then the deputy-director at CIA, to “the Board” of the Office of National Estimates, writing: “As a corrective to what he regarded as the disproportionate number of academic on the Board, Jackson devised the idea of an outside panel of consultants who had wide experience in public affairs and who bring their practical expertise to bear on draft estimates. In 1950, the ‘Princeton Consultants’, as they came to be called, included George F. Kennan, Hamilton Fusg Armstrong, the editor of Foreign Affairs, and Vannevar Bush, the atomic scientist”, Tuscaloosa, Alabama: Univ. of Alabama Press, 1984, p. 31. These references to a “Princeton Consulting” group appear to be connected with the “Princeton Papers” scandal, discussed by Joseph J. Trento in his book, <i>The Secret History of the CIA</i> (New York: MJF, 2001, pp. 467-468), in which the CIA was revealed to have skewed intelligence analyses to suit political agendas. In a brief conversation that I conducted with Crumiller by phone (July 22, 2013), he disclaimed both knowledge of any of these “Princeton Consulting”-related intelligence shenanigans as well as any connexion between his firm and the CIA. I raise this detail here as merely as an intriguing instance of what A. J. Bell (no known relation to the present writer) once termed a “Lexi-Link,” that is, a sort of <i>verbal synchronicity</i>. See A. J. Bell, “Lexi-Links: Nature’s Play on Words,” <i>Fortean Times</i>, August 17, 1976. </p>
<p><a name="_edn58" title="" href="#_ednref58">[58]</a> Adam Bernstein, “Clair E. George, CIA officer who figured in Iran-contra scandal, dies at 81,” Washington Post, August 12, 2011, <http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/clair-e-george-cia-officer-who-figured-in-iran-contra-scandal-dies-at-81/2011/08/12/gIQAADpzBJ_story.html>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn59" title="" href="#_ednref59">[59]</a> Douglas Martin, “Clair George, Spy and Iran-Contra Figure, Dies at 81,” <i>New York Times</i>, August 21, 2011, p. A18, <http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/21/us/21george.html>. </p>
<p><a name="_edn60" title="" href="#_ednref60">[60]</a> <http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/14209/pg14209.txt>; capitalization in original. For an extended discussion of this quotation, mapping it against various philosophical options to the metaphysical subject of freedom of the will, see my <i>Per Meum Vitra</i>.</p>
<p><a name="_edn61" title="" href="#_ednref61">[61]</a> Andy Wachowski and “Lana” Wachowski, dirs., <i>The Matrix Reloaded</i> (2003).</p>
<p><a name="_edn62" title="" href="#_ednref62">[62]</a> Crutwell, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 250. Crutwell elaborates: “The word chess means <i>King</i> (Persian ‘Sháh’) and the word <i>Checkmate</i> means ‘The King is Dead’ (Persian <i>Sháh Mát</i>). The object, therefore, of the game of chess was to <i>produce a dead king</i>. The victor immemorially celebrates the king’s death by crying out ‘<i>Sháh Mát</i>, Check Mate, The King is Dead’. But an essential point of the chess game is that there is another king to succeed the dead king, namely the victorious king. ‘The King is Dead-Long Live the King!’ In other words, the game symbolizes not only the Death, but the Resurrection of the King, in the person of his successor (cf. Horus) who is really himself (cf. Osiris) reborn or risen from the dead (cf. Christ and Baptism),” <i>ibid</i>., p. 251. This is what James Shelby Downard identified as the “killing of the divine king rite” in alchemy, symbolized by a “crucified snake on a Tau cross,” Downard, <i>op. cit</i>. For more on this, see James Shelby Downard and Michael A. Hoffman II, <i>King Kill 33</i>, Coeur d’Alene, Idaho: Independent History & Research, 1998 and Michael A. Hoffman II, <i>Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare</i>, Coeur d’Alene, Idaho: Independent History & Research, 2001.</p>Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-68142893078301052992013-06-10T10:04:00.000-07:002013-06-18T12:21:23.994-07:00Keeping Lincoln on the Public MindThe Associated Press reports: "Lost Lincoln document found at central Pa. college."<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Genaro C. Armas, June 9, 2013, <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/lost-lincoln-document-found-central-pa-college-144049570.html">URL</a>)</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqMy7khv2Owq7yzfUrfY6LyqxhyphenhyphenV0hW8c0CHeqd42sdi0r6HKPj7y6UZP3GsZL8BWmqosJEO-pQUTFgRqE_HE_q49cqxyDuWaHfdWI1av3Gq6Dg5oJWDKihJl5t-bieukCkg9-IbaqOjkk/s1600/LincolnLostDocument_8e288ad353164713340f6a7067008850.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="263" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqMy7khv2Owq7yzfUrfY6LyqxhyphenhyphenV0hW8c0CHeqd42sdi0r6HKPj7y6UZP3GsZL8BWmqosJEO-pQUTFgRqE_HE_q49cqxyDuWaHfdWI1av3Gq6Dg5oJWDKihJl5t-bieukCkg9-IbaqOjkk/s400/LincolnLostDocument_8e288ad353164713340f6a7067008850.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://l2.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/.5tbrS4xDFSJPT9d620_Cg--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9aW5zZXQ7aD05NzU7cT03OTt3PTE0NzM-/http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/News/ap_webfeeds/8e288ad353164713340f6a7067008850.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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In and of itself, the document seems to hold little interest beyond the provincial history of the college with which it was concerned. However, it seems to be of Fortean interest in this <a href="http://www.dallasnews.com/news/jfk50/reflect/20130522-dealey-plaza-memorial-planned-for-50th-anniversary-of-jfk-assassination.ece">50th anniversary year</a> of the assassination of John F. Kennedy (who had numerous and famous "coincidental" similarities with Lincoln).<br />
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See also:<br />
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<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/tony-scott-etc.html">Tony Scott, etc.</a> [Updated - Bottom Up]<br />
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<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hercules-and-his-twin.html">Hercules </a>(and his Twin)<br />
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<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hue-of-lincoln.html">Hue of Lincoln</a><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">###</span>Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-71908202397879048322013-06-05T19:18:00.002-07:002013-06-26T00:10:51.868-07:00Star Trek In Tenebris<br />
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Matthew J. Bell</div>
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with Jim Brandon</div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Author of the rarities <i>Weird America</i> and <i>The Rebirth of Pan</i>)</span></div>
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<i>Lux lucet <b>in tenebris</b>, et tenebrae non comprehenderunt</i></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(“Light shines <b>into darkness</b>, but the darkness comprehends not”)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">~ <i>Aurora Consurgens</i>, Pseudo-Aquinas</span><a href="#N1">N1</a></div>
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With the opening in theaters May 16 of the new sci-fi action flick, <i>Star Trek Into Darkness</i> (hereinafter “<i>Into Darkness</i>”), it won’t only be Trekkies paying rapt attention. Into Darkness has already drawn the attention of the synchro-mystic guru, Loren Coleman, who notes that the film contributes to the bombed-city cultural leitmotif that is <i>au courant</i>.<a href="#N2">N2 </a></div>
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Even a cursory glance at the plot summary on <i>Wikipedia </i>indicates that the movie appears to bristle with occult references.<a href="#N3">N3</a> Besides the “Pike” surname, familiar to the Star Trek franchise generally, and evocative of the Freemasonic magus Albert Pike, this latest deep-space excursion includes notable mentions for such curious proper nouns as “Nibiru” (alias for the so-called earth-destroying “Planet X” a.k.a. “Marduk”) and the time-obsessed “Kronos” (about which we will have more to say later). It is sure to keep name-analyzing onomatologists quite busy.</div>
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Students of numerology can scarcely feel left out, however, as the movie appears to have not a little of interest numerically as well. Hermetic researcher Jay Weidner <a href="#N4">N4</a> might take notice of the reference to a distance “237,000 km” from earth.<a href="#N5">N5</a> A numerically significant 300 year artificially-induced sleep apparently figures into the plot.<a href="#N6">N6</a> There are even honorable mentions for the perennial 23 and 11 (e.g., the coordinates 23.17.46.11).<a href="#N7">N7</a> The 46 is also of interest, since it is the atomic number for the chemical element of palladium – a word which will crop up further on.</div>
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Perhaps most importantly though, from the standpoint of the plot, is the recurring mention of the number 72. In the words of the <i>Wikipedia </i>summary, there are “72 long-range prototype photon torpedoes” that are really “cryogenic pods with Harrison's<a href="#N8">N8</a> 72 colleagues hidden inside”. </div>
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Now 72 is quite an interesting number to have numerological pride of place. In Kabbalah, the Hebrew <i>Shemhamphorasch </i>(or <i>Shem ha-Mephorash</i>, “the explicit name”) is variously described as “a 72-letter name for God...[God's] full and proper name” or as “72 names of God in the Hebrew tongue.”<a href="#N9">N9</a> Other sources<a href="#N10">N10</a> give the <i>Shemhamphorasch </i>as an enumeration of the names of 72 angels (or demons).<a href="#N11">N11</a> </div>
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These Kabbalistic notions are close cousins with the Islamic notion of “72 Virgins (<i>houri</i>) in Paradise.” Additionally: “In Islam, 72 is the number of sects or denominations that are doomed to Hell, according to Hadith (Sayings of prophet Muhammad).”<a href="#N12">N12</a> </div>
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72 is a heavily symbolically-implicated number, it seems.<a href="#N13">N13</a> Even a cursory glance at Wikipedia's article on “72,” will reveal many curious connexions.<a href="#N14">N14</a> </div>
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For present purposes, however, we will concern ourselves with the primary earth-bound location named in the film.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKIKT2uk-9LTqCJx50YOEKgOSfgCyssoUy_A4isP0boMOTyjchoKrwiEFDVu4z5ExvJqKLXKrNRT9W4lS0qHXdb38cr5P_qhlitVtCFrD6bSXReAEC5wrb3GozjHeMQvb3oaXlymSIxumG/s1600/London_SquareMile.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="366" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKIKT2uk-9LTqCJx50YOEKgOSfgCyssoUy_A4isP0boMOTyjchoKrwiEFDVu4z5ExvJqKLXKrNRT9W4lS0qHXdb38cr5P_qhlitVtCFrD6bSXReAEC5wrb3GozjHeMQvb3oaXlymSIxumG/s640/London_SquareMile.jpg" width="520" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.indymedia.org.uk/images/2009/03/425120.jpg">Source</a>)</span><br />
The City of London “Square Mile”</div>
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Students of high finance, international wire-pulling organizations and even Freemasonry will be watching to see what develops from a terror attack scenario apparently based in the City of London. Known as “the Square Mile,” this small enclave is totally distinct from greater London and has been described as the richest tract of land on earth.<a href="#N15">N15</a></div>
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At the same time as heavy influence over world monetary affairs is wielded from the City, what is much less well-known is that control over the entire international structure of time and space is arguably based nearby under control of the same cryptic power organism. </div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://worldalldetails.com/Slide/London_Architecture_United_Kingdom_Tower_of_London-918.html">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilJCpoJE3duuCW3Dhi-7A18FNhDzq911oWjRoWOCrKzcH_y-wr7cQ4kpSJrAf4Pc-xTog0ZJGUXv9K8JY_MbVvK4GUHIAMCVvlS_h3qGwQLErC0PoiZDAeES-v244CFwApXt_Ws-In3m9I/s1600/TowerOfLondon1939.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilJCpoJE3duuCW3Dhi-7A18FNhDzq911oWjRoWOCrKzcH_y-wr7cQ4kpSJrAf4Pc-xTog0ZJGUXv9K8JY_MbVvK4GUHIAMCVvlS_h3qGwQLErC0PoiZDAeES-v244CFwApXt_Ws-In3m9I/s640/TowerOfLondon1939.jpg" width="353" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="img:%20http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BMTI2ODI4MTM2MF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwNTEzODgxMQ@@._V1._SX263_SY475_.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">The Tower of London (top), built on an ancient hill-fort, as Francis Dashwood would later so build his Hell Fire Club headquarters at Wycombe,<a href="#N16">N16</a> has been the subject of numerous cinematic productions. Rowland Lee's 1939 film starring Basil Rathbone, Boris Karloff, and Barbara O'Neil (bottom); Roger Corman's <a href="http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BNzU5NDMyOTY2M15BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwOTAxODM5NA@@._V1._SX333_SY500_.jpg">1962</a> flick, with Vincent Price (not pictured).</span></div>
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For we can now disclose that the Prime Meridian of longitude at Greenwich was established by high adepts of alchemy and occult orders starting from the chief medieval monument in England, the legendary Tower of London. The meridian, of course, anchors not only longitude and latitude, which back up the legal description of every piece of property in the developed world. It also forms the basis point for what is now known as the <b>Universal Time System</b> (formerly <i>Greenwich Mean Time</i>).</div></span>
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Moreover, latest developments in time-measurement technologies based in the U.S. have carried the Greenwich-based operation forward into new orders of magnitude with the Global Positioning System (GPS) extending the secret domination to outer space. (We hope to demonstrate these latter flourishes in a further installment.)</div></span>
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For a general introduction to the heavily occultist-guided City of London, see <a href="http://www.forteantimes.com/features/articles/2350/city_of_symbols.html">HERE</a>.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1C5nuKa7sDZ9m2s2VI427eBxK5rkZqMfGRSj_OKzLT3i-GQhGvFMVgvDwZSZwn5Rj62SS-KhwQWa7f0ocFPtWEi_TJ50lEFU-wExaN3bDWmhyphenhypheneY9rdgnq8oy-uHHwiSij2ibmk9BvPe8Q/s1600/Khan77.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1C5nuKa7sDZ9m2s2VI427eBxK5rkZqMfGRSj_OKzLT3i-GQhGvFMVgvDwZSZwn5Rj62SS-KhwQWa7f0ocFPtWEi_TJ50lEFU-wExaN3bDWmhyphenhypheneY9rdgnq8oy-uHHwiSij2ibmk9BvPe8Q/s1600/Khan77.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/62/Mohammad_Sidique_Khan.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjl3Qz3Coqr051ptoNgVAiUovhdyoY0iHcW2-AObTDWXM-aU8fU9VI2zx8Dj00aGZTXzm8SSGt9wEVD1jxvnQGQ0B-oyO0W26d9i31cz5z6XbLMrIyQYH0OCnrZ2zqqkngRYJYiDBiLYRIG/s1600/Khan_StarTrek.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjl3Qz3Coqr051ptoNgVAiUovhdyoY0iHcW2-AObTDWXM-aU8fU9VI2zx8Dj00aGZTXzm8SSGt9wEVD1jxvnQGQ0B-oyO0W26d9i31cz5z6XbLMrIyQYH0OCnrZ2zqqkngRYJYiDBiLYRIG/s640/Khan_StarTrek.jpg" width="422" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"> (<a href="http://0.bestmoviesevernews.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Benedict-Cumberbatch-khan-banner-for-star-trek-into-darkness-600x907.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Alleged 7/7 attacker, Khan (top); Star Trek's villain, Khan (bottom).</span></div>
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The spectre of a successful terror attack against London is not merely the province of science fiction. Readers will recall the 7/7 Terror Attack of July 7, 2005 targeting three underground trains and one bus. One of the persons fingered for this bombing was Mohammad Sidique Khan.<a href="#N17">N17</a> It turns out that “Khan” is also the true identity of the antagonist in <i>Into Darkness</i>.</div></span>
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As we write this, the news media are preoccupied with a fresh terror attack – the “First...since 7/7...”.<a href="#N18">N18</a> Specifically occurring in the London district of Woolwich, this brings in Greenwich (since “Woolwich... is... located in the Royal Borough of Greenwich...”),<a href="#N19">N19</a> a locale that we will take up in detail in a subsequent post. Here we will simply note that not only did the attack occur in the mystically-significant Greenwich-area, but the victim, a twenty-five year old British soldier named Lee Rigby,<a href="#N20">N20</a> was, at the time of his murder, “...assist[ing] with duties at Regimental Headquarters in the <b>Tower of London</b>.”<a href="#N21">N21</a></div></span>
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London is a city that has numerous mystical places, some of which supposedly serve as talismanic protections. These attacks invite the question, <i>Has one (or more) of the City's protective charms failed?</i> </div></span>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://api.ning.com/files/hSMjUnplmC1uTHMWtkpXWTZ8HHw*Zdp33Xy1fMmT*CXrk*clTu35Hi1nyWqSBlja3iXRqILLfsZPiWGyRl9mCQrdQEB7uOl-/TheEmperor.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9U67GC3P1JminFLLnUOjPDD9FzvEeqXnNU1b5dEneu3yC187xI6kn33NkkDV44Zd1DGccv9yzZgw8FWelh83c8cnW1RcUPrmjTNgWuuSP-1S8vVmMgGfLcw21kOpHIkEPN21Z4XUbpNst/s1600/BranTheBroken.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="390" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9U67GC3P1JminFLLnUOjPDD9FzvEeqXnNU1b5dEneu3yC187xI6kn33NkkDV44Zd1DGccv9yzZgw8FWelh83c8cnW1RcUPrmjTNgWuuSP-1S8vVmMgGfLcw21kOpHIkEPN21Z4XUbpNst/s640/BranTheBroken.jpg" width="520" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lzo5nhITNv1qiixp1o1_500.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Brân in a tarot representation, as emperor (top); </span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Bran Stark (bottom), who calls himself “Bran the Broken,” </span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">is a character from George R. R. Martin's fantasy novel series, <i>A Song of Ice and Fire</i> </span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(as well as the cable television series, <i>Game of Thrones</i>).</span></div>
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In primeval <i>Britannia</i>, even before the reign of the mythic King Arthur, ruled the Welsh giant known as Brân the Blessed.<a href="#N22">N22</a> In the legendary history of Britain<a href="#N23">N23</a> it was said that after (Roman Emperor) Diocletian's (numerologically-significant) <b>thirty-three</b> wicked daughters slaughtered their husbands, they were exiled.<a href="#N24">N24</a> Decamping at England – which they named “Albion,” ostensibly after the eldest daughter, Alba<a href="#N25">N25</a> – they proceeded to interbreed with demons, spawning a race of giants,<a href="#N26">N26</a> in a Nephilim-type scenario (at least, under one interpretation of Genesis 6:4-5).<a href="#N27">N27</a> </div></span>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdkMQUAfXTg485AzwSIfws1r7915GL30iZX8iXcrbLbeInu6Oyaa0wVA4RwZgo1Zt2QGOpGLGWJTMRk66-ZQNhObZLuuLVyzCP9HlmXK9RhdHEaxPfvqPS-oX890XCHwis7EySoKdpl_wJ/s1600/Monas-Hieroglyphicas.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdkMQUAfXTg485AzwSIfws1r7915GL30iZX8iXcrbLbeInu6Oyaa0wVA4RwZgo1Zt2QGOpGLGWJTMRk66-ZQNhObZLuuLVyzCP9HlmXK9RhdHEaxPfvqPS-oX890XCHwis7EySoKdpl_wJ/s320/Monas-Hieroglyphicas.jpg" width="237" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"> (<a href="http://www.dominicselwood.com/cms/wp-content/uploads/Monas-Hieroglyphicas.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">The Elizabethan magus, John Dee, devised a key cipher - the “Monad” – that he published in his book, <i>Monas Hieroglyphica</i> (1564). (Incidentally, Gottfried Leibniz also gets into “monads” in his 1714 treatise, <i>La Monadologie</i>.) Dennis Hauck writes that “...the cipher...was considered so important...that it became known around the world as <b> </b></span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>the Greater Seal of London</b>.”</span></div>
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In any event, the name “Brân” signifies “raven” or “crow.” These black birds have great importance in alchemy – particularly during the so-called <i>nigredo </i>(“blackening”) phase.<a href="#N28">N28</a></div></span>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjabxLagSZ_438hapjAj9NEa7Qchs1qcWMf0y2KY1cKYCMQ2asMDC6-2YftihAxsEVYnW5AcHGAGay2lAvVfj6TTiZ6v0Z1KQsGmd5O_4vuVvZz1xTXn6LcSrhF_gATkz0-C8sik0NM41au/s1600/Raven.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjabxLagSZ_438hapjAj9NEa7Qchs1qcWMf0y2KY1cKYCMQ2asMDC6-2YftihAxsEVYnW5AcHGAGay2lAvVfj6TTiZ6v0Z1KQsGmd5O_4vuVvZz1xTXn6LcSrhF_gATkz0-C8sik0NM41au/s320/Raven.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="img:%20https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyIDVpO8MzTUNIxiG2fpLhdh037PPL67_an26WB6w-jLxkM1qaNR8hCMDrk-HOWRuFuqSeq3MfA6dV6-B3CUhcrrB0sTQL1Jsi182xbjU4158Hth73aH2ippu_hwWJy8Frr1KVXd5fT5U/s1600/alimage075.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Brân finds himself embroiled in a conflict concerning the marriage of his sister. Fighting ensues, during the course of which Brân is mortally wounded. He then instructs his remaining comrades:</div></span>
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“[T]ake you my head...and bear it even unto the White Mount, in London, and bury it there with the face towards France.”<a href="#N29">N29</a></div></span>
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In fact, there was an interim period between Brân's ritual beheading and the burial of the head under “the White Mount” – “...as the Tower is known in Welsh lore.” (Note: The “White Tower” is the keep of, and oldest structure in, the complex known as “The Tower of London.”) During this intermediate period, Brân's followers “...live for eighty years without perceiving the passing of time.” It can be truly said, however, that the “time-machine” Tower-site was a mystical place of power well before the Norman invader, William the conqueror, put Bishop Gundulf up to the task (in A.D. 1078) of constructing what it now called the “White Tower.”<a href="#N30">N30</a></div></span>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi20cjZNdoRIFyKasICzrhkpcTTMQWVmvouPHWrxr1CREl_6F0j4iqokVtE1IyqRnyMDiVgtQK9FC2Z2jfyEQ9G4hujYk3vTs5V595xhGauk4oGHqbN64HDF4n8ZuE7ZjQubEkdEggSuowu/s1600/Fourscore.bmp" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi20cjZNdoRIFyKasICzrhkpcTTMQWVmvouPHWrxr1CREl_6F0j4iqokVtE1IyqRnyMDiVgtQK9FC2Z2jfyEQ9G4hujYk3vTs5V595xhGauk4oGHqbN64HDF4n8ZuE7ZjQubEkdEggSuowu/s320/Fourscore.bmp" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://cdn.memegenerator.net/instances/400x/23335752.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Somewhat parenthetically we note that the interval between decapitation and interment was “fourscore and seven years...” – the same length as that interval between the American Declaration of Independence in 1776 and Abraham Lincoln's famous Gettysburg Address in 1863.<a href="#N31">N31</a> </div></span>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHkVxKuNjKXO6yEvIC25wMzshVpEpV4eu4Kj2aGLl3VPxM4xuqrzJbAGYInUdrPCweLYHQv46Ld8xEmPTPNSLGPw8-Y0yc59Kiy1Kyhz0q2yDrfASGEB905-kwGD21KXHkUZinaydhgt59/s1600/Diomedes_with_the_Palladium.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHkVxKuNjKXO6yEvIC25wMzshVpEpV4eu4Kj2aGLl3VPxM4xuqrzJbAGYInUdrPCweLYHQv46Ld8xEmPTPNSLGPw8-Y0yc59Kiy1Kyhz0q2yDrfASGEB905-kwGD21KXHkUZinaydhgt59/s1600/Diomedes_with_the_Palladium.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.goddess-athena.org/Museum/Paintings/Troy/Diomedes_with_the_Palladium.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">“Palladium” (def.) “'safeguard,' ...'sacred image of Pallas Athene,' from Latin palladium, from Greek Palladion, ...'of Pallas.' It stood in the citadel of Troy and the safety of the city was believed to depend on it.”<a href="#N32">N32</a></div>
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The upshot is this: “The palladium of Britain,<a href="#N33">N33</a> associated with its chief city, is the head of Bran... . As long as the king's head is buried at a certain point, then the land cannot be conquered.”<a href="#N34">N34</a> </div></span>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAgNiyBvMvJJcDua4-Qy7HfNkk1e89RDZ-YHSiOAZHx8Ub17kbSVnRcBJd4GTuOguUlsUbulI7-Sw_d4KjvVLaJz0zttHu058XOf51sPDExYY6K6A_hbe0Jed777qKGGsIJjfu0oZJAZ2X/s1600/GreenKnight.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAgNiyBvMvJJcDua4-Qy7HfNkk1e89RDZ-YHSiOAZHx8Ub17kbSVnRcBJd4GTuOguUlsUbulI7-Sw_d4KjvVLaJz0zttHu058XOf51sPDExYY6K6A_hbe0Jed777qKGGsIJjfu0oZJAZ2X/s1600/GreenKnight.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4b/Gawain_and_the_Green_Knight.jpg/230px-Gawain_and_the_Green_Knight.jpg">Source</a>) </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKeBWlPq2WZCFjPjQlHiE1gEU7tMitTk7HyOu11PFgzjkYJ9vuhog0dxS0El-f2qFoPTgx1ae16PwL6xQ_Ucg1bTE__bJdhhj3iLOkMGCz_4Dic7mkPSJqYOwq0Us5Lz89l1FUqpA-SsbS/s1600/GreenManTarot.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKeBWlPq2WZCFjPjQlHiE1gEU7tMitTk7HyOu11PFgzjkYJ9vuhog0dxS0El-f2qFoPTgx1ae16PwL6xQ_Ucg1bTE__bJdhhj3iLOkMGCz_4Dic7mkPSJqYOwq0Us5Lz89l1FUqpA-SsbS/s640/GreenManTarot.jpg" width="409" /></a></div>
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<span style="color: #0000ee;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://www.lermanet.com/scientology-and-occult/crowley-tarot-the-fool-card.jpg">Source</a>)</span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCVS-wME2ZuVs_fzyJBzZ4d0_vQuAbmPGyDssmm1XZAQN3-wixN_sNqKF8AGSGkBCU_BlJZkkp6WpXyP7XM76qfm3NzoyPw58mSelEj4TYN4G0blsvE5vgUSUFR9iQjT9ZTykn6iafQOhE/s1600/SheHulk24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCVS-wME2ZuVs_fzyJBzZ4d0_vQuAbmPGyDssmm1XZAQN3-wixN_sNqKF8AGSGkBCU_BlJZkkp6WpXyP7XM76qfm3NzoyPw58mSelEj4TYN4G0blsvE5vgUSUFR9iQjT9ZTykn6iafQOhE/s640/SheHulk24.jpg" width="412" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://static.comicvine.com/uploads/scale_large/11/110017/2771748-sh_24_dcp_0000.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">The Green Knight plays a beheading game with Sir Gawain (top); Green Man,<a href="#N35">N35</a> in a tarot depiction (center); A character named “Bran” also appears in a Marvel “She-Hulk” comic (bottom), where the “She Hulk” is clearly a green woman;<a href="#N36">N36</a></span> </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy4L-UAR33HeJZ0j4c9C79_1mbqb3FJCzO77dQUIQfAgQhY57ew7Q9N5fvtHa_OypBSoifatxNph6fnVwM4Wd28BCMTGAf6_MeyRX3SqITD-QgDfcnkwv2iv_m_vlce7wTE5VX5zid5kR8/s1600/GreenWoman.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="343" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy4L-UAR33HeJZ0j4c9C79_1mbqb3FJCzO77dQUIQfAgQhY57ew7Q9N5fvtHa_OypBSoifatxNph6fnVwM4Wd28BCMTGAf6_MeyRX3SqITD-QgDfcnkwv2iv_m_vlce7wTE5VX5zid5kR8/s640/GreenWoman.jpg" width="520" /></a></div>
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<span style="color: #0000ee; font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2013/05/07/article-2320807-19A9AD64000005DC-510_634x419.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSKfMqmSIjaFGG437EzuSIUzBS7cHYPB6aS6KBpurkLpeqqPiRokJpBbj9oh7i5YIWRR81V6mlknbgX-i4qiE1k56UE58hH3lbVnTXaOKL6Rilah1U6Ng9Ds2jMRoNFmKKQhBtoFSDz6qR/s1600/GreenWitch.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="395" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSKfMqmSIjaFGG437EzuSIUzBS7cHYPB6aS6KBpurkLpeqqPiRokJpBbj9oh7i5YIWRR81V6mlknbgX-i4qiE1k56UE58hH3lbVnTXaOKL6Rilah1U6Ng9Ds2jMRoNFmKKQhBtoFSDz6qR/s640/GreenWitch.jpg" width="520" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/e/e0/MargaretHamiltoninTheWizardOfOz.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">A recent bit of news: “Police hunt woman dressed as the Incredible Hulk over alleged attack outside McDonald's” (top);<a href="#N37">N37</a> Shall we take this opportunity to insert a gratuitous plug for our follow-up post on Greenwich? (The Wicked Witch of the West, a “green witch,” – bottom).</span></div>
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Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh link Brân' to the “Green Man” and observe, in this regard, that the buried head “... performed functions strikingly similar to those performed by the Grail in the later romances.”<a href="#N38">N38</a> </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBueHV968-cNA4KyG5V1ItCpwAOGUABZfQCLpmGGJTl5uFeXt9eeuCKFXgseVNlp2UQqOuQwRPRGlyHYJEdGJpvRkY95hgdd2bZhJZsUhmsMhEhrXUdtZua79hFlMht8Vgw728ioXak5Zo/s1600/BaphometsMeteor.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBueHV968-cNA4KyG5V1ItCpwAOGUABZfQCLpmGGJTl5uFeXt9eeuCKFXgseVNlp2UQqOuQwRPRGlyHYJEdGJpvRkY95hgdd2bZhJZsUhmsMhEhrXUdtZua79hFlMht8Vgw728ioXak5Zo/s640/BaphometsMeteor.jpg" width="384" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://blog.templarhistory.com/wp-content/uploads/meteor.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Going further, the duo note that, amongst the allegations made against the Knights Templar in the 14th century, was that they “...worshipp[ed] a mysterious <b>severed head</b> sometimes known as '<b>Baphomet</b>'.”<a href="#N39">N39</a> </div></span>
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As an added wrinkle, it is said that “...King Arthur dug up the head...”. Whither the British palladium?<a href="#N40">N40</a></div></span>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjt4dEh0YBFxH6vXlean-zKkyBo5zg_7km-Wgu-CeV4WfJiD1KKDTA-NxTC3O-82NG9Ty2yemWlDtk7AxZJspvMQDqb6kffXcKPIeHZ8WKBR-eSV4bi4LkJdLCX6Vls1pB1uwQmCf2x6-zo/s1600/Palladium.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="520" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjt4dEh0YBFxH6vXlean-zKkyBo5zg_7km-Wgu-CeV4WfJiD1KKDTA-NxTC3O-82NG9Ty2yemWlDtk7AxZJspvMQDqb6kffXcKPIeHZ8WKBR-eSV4bi4LkJdLCX6Vls1pB1uwQmCf2x6-zo/s640/Palladium.jpg" width="520" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://periodictable.com/Samples/046.10/s9s.JPG">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">As a hedge against a devalued dollar, we are urged to buy gold and silver...but <a href="http://www.investmentu.com/2013/May/the-best-performing-precious-metal-just-got-even-better.html">palladium</a>? <a href="http://www.forbes.com/2010/06/22/investing-precious-metals-personal-finance-gold.html">Indeed</a>.</span></div>
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“One strange aspect of this story is that the raven...can still be found around the White Mound. The story now is that destruction will come to London if the ravens ever leave...”. We note that this connexion implicates the Stuart monarch King Charles II (about whom, more later) who “...decree[d] that at least six ravens should be kept at the tower at all times.”<a href="#N41">N41</a></div></span>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4d/London_Dragon_small.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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London occultists are not putting all of their raven eggs in one basket, however. No, the magical protection of the City of London may also be apportioned to several looming dragon statues,<a href="#N42">N42</a> variously placed.<a href="#N43">N43</a> Variously guardians or emissaries of evil,<a href="#N44">N44</a> they are associated with riches and “...treasure, and as such are enemies which must be defeated if the treasure is to be won.”<a href="#N45">N45</a></div></span>
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Given its financial clout, then, we should not be too surprised to learn that “...the city of London is a dragon city...”.<a href="#N46">N46</a> The city's emblem displays the motto <i>Domine Dirige Nos</i> (“Lord, direct Us”) on a banner underneath “[t]wo Tudor Dragons”.<a href="#N47">N47</a> </div></span>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://cdn2.lybrary.com/magic_by_misdirection.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Here one is apt to encounter a bit of misdirection, as at least a few of the London dragons are sometimes called “Griffins.”<a href="#N48">N48</a> However, we are most definitely dealing with dragons – ensigns reflecting the “...Dragon statues that mark the boundary of the City itself.”<a href="#N49">N49</a></div></span>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://dragons-nest.ru/def/alchemy/alch_dr08.gif?PHPSESSID=462d7fee3e5ee75dcd9d51669b50d862">Source</a>) </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">“The [alchemical] prima materia as the dragon, being fertilized by the Holy Ghost (the avis Hermetis). </span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">– “Hermes Bird,” Theatricum chemicum Britannicum (1652).”<a href="#N50">N50</a></span></div>
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Again, this hearkens back to the Arthurian Cycle wherein Arthur's father is reputed to have been Uther Pendragon. “<i>Pen</i>-dragon” signifies the <i>dragon's head</i>.<a href="#N51">N51</a></div></span>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/ff/London_Strand_501523_h000015.jpg/400px-London_Strand_501523_h000015.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Such a dragon guards the former entrance at Temple Bar. Wikipedia's caption reads “Horace Jones' Temple Bar marker topped by Charles <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/06/belltown-leprechauns.html">Bell</a>(<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/11/belling-hurricane-gilbert.html">*</a>) Birch's heraldic Dragon.”<a href="#N52">N52</a></div></span>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/30/Temple_Bar%2C_Paternoster_Square_London.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<b>Temple Bar</b>, the 17th-century architectural creation of the one-time Freemasonic Grand Master, Christopher Wren, traditionally served as one of the main regulated gateways into the City of London. “Its name is derived from its vicinity to the Temple Church, the former English Headquarters of the Knights Templar, subsequently the place where the guilds of lawyers were organised into what would become the Inns of Court.”<a href="#N53">N53</a> Baigent and Leigh comment that “'<i>Barram Novi Templi</i>', or Temple bar, where Fleet Street meets the Strand, was the gate opening into the [Templar] Order's precincts.”<a href="#N54">N54</a></div></span>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Robert Langdon (Tom Hanks) visits the Temple Church in the 2000 movie, <i>The Da Vinci Code</i>.</span></div>
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“Of all the sacred places in London, the Temple Church is probably the most psychically charged.”<a href="#N55">N55</a> It was consecrated in 1185 and expanded with a “rectangular chapel” from the original, entirely circular, apse.<a href="#N56">N56</a> Similar to the Rosslyn Chapel,<a href="#N57">N57</a> and incongruously with its ostensibly Christian purpose, the Temple Church contains representations of “grotesque heads” besides its famous knight effigies.<a href="#N58">N58</a> </div></span>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a8/Lord_Mayor_of_London%27s_coronation_robes.JPG">Source</a>)</span></div>
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The Lord Mayor of the City of London, in his “coronation robe.”<a href="#N59">N59</a></div>
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The City of London is presided over by the Lord Mayor. In bygone times, before entering the city, the English sovereign would stop at the Temple Bar gate and engage in a sort of ritual with the Lord Mayor. “The ceremony is still carried out today on major state occasions when the Queen halts at the Temple Bar to request permission to enter the City of London and if offered the Lord Mayor's Sword of State as a sign of loyalty.”<a href="#N60">N60</a></div></span>
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On the numerous other dragon “boundary markers” surrounding the City of London, see <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon_boundary_mark">HERE</a>.</div></span>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">The London Bridge in Lake Havasu City, Arizona. </span></div>
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As one curious example of the far-flung influence of the City, the main attraction in Lake Havasu City, Arizona, is the London Bridge.<a href="#N61">N61</a> In 1968, businessman Robert Paxton McCulloch<a href="#N62">N62</a> purchased the iconic bridge from the City of London and painstakingly disassembled, transported here and reassembled – all to the tune of nearly ten million dollars. </div></span>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"> (<a href="http://www.havasumagazine.com/Image3/London_Bridge_Parade.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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The dedication of the London Bridge, October 1971.</div>
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“... Lake Havasu residents... watched in amazement as the historical pieces of granite piled up at a nearby Havasu worksite. Even more amazing, was watching the transformation of the peninsula into an island, as a mile-long bridge channel was dredged, giving purpose to the transplanted landmark. Included with the bridge purchase, were the unique lampposts, molded from French cannons captured during the 1815 battle of Waterloo. </div>
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“The London Bridge officially opened on October 10,<a href="#N63">N63</a> 1971, with a gala celebration. Opening day included an elaborate fanfare; spectacular fireworks, a parade, entertainment, dramatic release of hundreds of balloons and white doves, colorful hot air balloon landings, and celebrities, such as Bonanza fame [Lorne] Greene, and dignitaries such as the Lord Mayor of London.”<a href="#N64">N64</a></div></span>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/79/Star_Trek_-_Bridge_Commander_Coverart.png">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Star Trek video game produced by the CIA-connected Activision (above).<a href="#N65">N65</a></span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Into Darkness has been called a “bridge picture.”<a href="#N66">N66</a></span></div>
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“...Build it up with silver and gold, Silver and gold, silver and gold </div>
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Build it up with silver and gold, My fair lady </div>
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Silver and gold will be stolen away, Stolen away, stolen away,</div>
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Silver and gold will be stolen away, My fair lady...”</div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">~ London Bridge Is Falling Down</span><a href="#N67">N67</a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://oblong.smugmug.com/Scenery/City-of-London-Dragons/i-xkjQ69r/0/L/3661914661_e43cbb68f3_o-L.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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In addition, at the east end of Havasu's rebuilt bridge, a sizable replica of a City of London guardian dragon was erected on a pedestal which was so labeled on its base. So it was not without reason that James Shelby Downard,<a href="#N68">N68</a> an investigator of American anomalous sites and a pioneer of what we now call synchro-mysticism, spent a good bit of time pondering this tangled skein of remote-controlled crypto-political symbolism here. Jim Brandon recalled his experiences with his friend Mr. Downard’s Lake Havasu research and how it led to his own speculations around the enigmatic Four Corners area to the northeast. See the end note.<a href="#N69">N69</a></div></span>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://jongoodbun.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/londonstonefromheartfield.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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We would also be remiss if we didn't mention the London Stone. The nondescript and misshapen block of limestone seems a curious candidate for a protective charm. Nevertheless, we read that “[b]y the early 19th century, a number of writers had suggested that London Stone was once regarded as London's 'Palladium'...”.<a href="#N70">N70</a></div></span>
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Reporter Nick Barlay writes: </div></span>
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“Invisible London is a city of witches, ghosts, spectres, superstitions, legends, ley lines and occult geometries. Anyone looking for its mystical centre could do no worse than to glimpse the London Stone, moved from its original location to a setting in the wall of the Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation at 111 Cannon Street, EC4.</div></span>
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“The stone is said to have been laid, 1,000 years before the Roman invasion, by Brutus the Trojan, the mythical founder of London, who sailed up the Thames and fought the giants Gog and Magog. On the Stone is the inscription: 'So long as the stone of Brutus is safe, so long shall London flourish.' The stone could be the altar from a temple on Ludgate Hill, the site of St Paul's, or from a stone circle. Or it could be connected to a ley line in turn connected to the ancient London river, the Walbrook. Or it could be, as it states on its plaque, a fragment of the original limestone once in the ground in front of Cannon Street station, and connected to a former London mayor.”<a href="#N71">N71</a></div></span>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c0/Cleopatras.needle.from.thames.london.arp.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Note: The broader London area has more oddities than can be rehearsed, presently. For just one example, we would have to mention the so-called “Cleopatra's Needle” Egyptian obelisk at Victoria Embankment on the Thames,<a href="#N72">N72</a> and many other strange objects and places – like “Hawksmoor's Pentagram.”<a href="#N73">N73</a> (Incidentally, the London obelisk is one of four – two pairs of twins.) </div>
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However, enchanted thingamajigs are not the only entities worthy of our notice. London has also had its share of magically-charged persons. </div></span>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyeG5gSZBG1o_NeDHFaXaHH7Hw979LFqaYf3XkmMtzTP3KbISV40W8O6DSh8S7kwspojPdjXl3g6nhw80a5KQ0JC91v6mkvbQQxIoqZmqriXuKrWv2r8wZEN0a0u9UKpaBO0MboLWQgcns/s1600/Falk.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyeG5gSZBG1o_NeDHFaXaHH7Hw979LFqaYf3XkmMtzTP3KbISV40W8O6DSh8S7kwspojPdjXl3g6nhw80a5KQ0JC91v6mkvbQQxIoqZmqriXuKrWv2r8wZEN0a0u9UKpaBO0MboLWQgcns/s640/Falk.jpg" width="507" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://armonte.files.wordpress.com/2010/12/besht.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Although not widely known, arguably the most important of these personalities is Hayyim Samuel Jacob Falk (1708–1782), otherwise known as the Baal Shem (“Lord of the Name”) of London. The reader will recall our earlier mention of the <i>Shem Hamphorasch</i> (“the ineffable name”), in conjunction with the discussion of the number 72. Note that this is the selfsame "shem" of which Falk was a reputed master.
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Falk was an Eastern European Kabbalist and alchemist who not only has allegedly served as a protection for London,<a href="#N74">N74</a> but also has as good a claim as any to having been one of the superiores incogniti (“unknown superiors”) that the Baron Karl Gotthelf von Hund<a href="#N75">N75</a> highlights as constituting the upper echelon of his Rite of Strict Observance and, indeed, of Freemasonry more generally.<a href="#N76">N76</a></div></span>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"> (<a href="http://www.hollywood-elsewhere.com/images/column/aug2011/falkenwood.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjckXN-yTVdilyeOVCbp1QBW1loJgIhhQAvWU8W4Xq7BojWEt_obd99Jn7OblOb8yMqCUOLRcQGjrVX94v0mxUpUDqwbze3EsNXrT-27mpkZhpUfGOOsnm9EMUfS1JcjaN8BltWCbwJwGnL/s1600/Wargames_Joshua.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjckXN-yTVdilyeOVCbp1QBW1loJgIhhQAvWU8W4Xq7BojWEt_obd99Jn7OblOb8yMqCUOLRcQGjrVX94v0mxUpUDqwbze3EsNXrT-27mpkZhpUfGOOsnm9EMUfS1JcjaN8BltWCbwJwGnL/s1600/Wargames_Joshua.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Another “Dr. Falkon,” the character Stephen Falken, from the movie WarGames.<a href="#N77">N77</a> In the movie, Falken creates the supercomputer, “Joshua”<a href="#N78">N78</a> (a.k.a. the “WOPR”),<a href="#N79">N79</a> which nearly plunges the world into a nuclear World War III.<a href="#N80">N80</a></span> </div>
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Suspected of having been explicitly masonically-connected himself, Falk – also sometimes known as “Dr. Falkon” – w as a known associate of the high-ranking General Charles Rainsford, who was “a prominent mason”. Recollecting London's immense financial clout, we also observe that "Falk's principal friends were the London bankers Aaron Goldsmid and his son."<a href="#N81">N81</a></div></span>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://media2.s-nbcnews.com/j/MSNBC/Components/Photo/_new/130109-science-vestal2-8p.grid-6x2.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Earlier this year, NBC reported that: “For the first time, the hairstyle of the Roman vestal virgins </span><br />
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Falk was regarded as a alchemist for such feats as being able to produce gold and create so-called “ever-burning lamps,”<a href="#N83">N83</a> which lamps Manly Hall associates with “the 'virgin lamps'...carried by the Vestal Virgins” (the moon-worshipping guardians of “the sacred fire of Vesta”).<a href="#N84">N84</a> The Vestal Virgins presided over lunar ceremonies and the manifestations of the triple-goddess (since the three-phased moon was believed to be the controller of menstruation).<a href="#N85">N85</a> Moon magic<a href="#N86">N86</a> variously involved human sacrifice or the sacrifice of “mannikin” proxies.<a href="#N87">N87</a></div></span>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://img0.liveinternet.ru/images/attach/c/6/92/563/92563046_732pxGiuseppe_Balsamo.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwrYhg4bT1P54lMhUX_h5Ts6RJASELp0r2xqC-ilMas6ZKZJURZTyLyHc4B5pdydKX8YJudnUc9mO6bkkBJRfcYYVckF5ZrIlMF5TSfNeYmjp1fWvbYfBur4yuwJXDynup69BYA-Luc7zH/s1600/Cagliostro_ChristopherWalken2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="341" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwrYhg4bT1P54lMhUX_h5Ts6RJASELp0r2xqC-ilMas6ZKZJURZTyLyHc4B5pdydKX8YJudnUc9mO6bkkBJRfcYYVckF5ZrIlMF5TSfNeYmjp1fWvbYfBur4yuwJXDynup69BYA-Luc7zH/s640/Cagliostro_ChristopherWalken2.jpg" width="520" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Giuseppe Balsamo, a.k.a. “Cagliostro” (top). </span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Christopher Walken portraying Count Alessandro Cagliostro (bottom)</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">from the 2001 film, <i>The Affair of the Necklace</i>.</span></div>
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It is alleged that “[t]he Rabbi Jacob Falk taught sex magic to the notorious Cagliostro.”<a href="#N88">N88</a> This is unsurprising, really, both since the misleadingly named “Vestal Virgins” were, “[i]n many places”, none other than “sacred harlots” practicing magia sexualis,<a href="#N89">N89</a> and since streams of kabbalism, most obviously in Frankism (the system instituted by Jacob Frank), are infused both with sex magic and moon worship (e.g., in the “Kiddush Levanah” rite).<a href="#N90">N90</a> It seems that London is dracontic in multiple senses.<a href="#N91">N91</a> </div></span>
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Falk's darker (perhaps black-magical) shenanigans are hinted at in accounts referring to his “kabbalistic devilry.”<a href="#N92">N92</a> The depth of this depravity is unclear, but besides the supposed sexual rituals, Falk has also been implicated in the mysterious death of the unnamed “...valet of the Comte de Westerloh [who] had his neck broken...when he [Falk] performed his famous sacrifice of the black calf in the garden of the Comte, in the presence of the Duc de Richelieu.”<a href="#N93">N93</a></div></span>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.mernick.org.uk/elhs/maps/images/s1952.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Residing in Wellclose Square,<a href="#N94">N94</a> just east of the Tower, Falk was neighbors with the Swedish mystic and possible spy, Emanuel Swedenborg (1688 – 1772). “...Swedenborg sought out Jewish Kabbalists in the East End, and he soon came under the spell of Dr. Samuel Jacob Falk...”.<a href="#N95">N95</a> </div></span>
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See Falk's grave, <a href="http://www.jewisheastend.com/sacred30.jpg">HERE</a>. (Nearby, apparently, is the grave of a Cohen whose grave stone, as the photographer describes it, displays “...hands making the sign of the priestly blessing [live long and prosper as Mr Spock would say!].” See it <a href="http://www.jewisheastend.com/sacred18.jpg">HERE</a>.)</div>
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Finally, we must mention the satanist and occultist, Aleister Crowley. Fresh from Cambridge, and having just joined the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, Crowley lived for a time at #67 Chancery Lane,<a href="#N96">N96</a> which today lies on the western edge of the Square Mile.<a href="#N97">N97</a> Crowley desired a more magickally-charged location, however (with “...a door facing north, the best direction in which to create a spell”<a href="#N98">N98</a>), and soon abandoned his flat in the City of London and moved into his more famous residence, Boleskine House, on the shore of supposedly monster-inhabited Loch Ness in northern Scotland.</div></span>
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Rehearsing even highlights from Crowley's long career is well beyond our present scope. However, we invite the interested reader to (re-)visit the earlier post, HERE.</div></span>
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Also, stay tuned for our follow up post on Greenwich: In the meantime. We will not only dive deeper into the mystical toponomy (as James Shelby Downard would say) of England, but we will have an opportunity once again to mention “The Beast – 666,” Aleister Crowley.<br /></span>
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<b>NOTES: </b><br />
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<a id="N1">N1 </a>We refer the reader to the earlier post: <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/aurora-rising-aurora-consurgens-part-1.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/aurora-rising-aurora-consurgens-part-1.html</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N2">N2 </a>“Into Darkness,” <i>Twilight Language</i>, May 05, 2013, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2013/05/DarknessMay16.html">http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2013/05/DarknessMay16.html</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N3">N3 </a><<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek_Into_Darkness">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek_Into_Darkness</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N4">N4 </a>“Pronounced: WIDE-NER”, <<a href="http://www.sacredmysteries.com/public/department52.cfm">http://www.sacredmysteries.com/public/department52.cfm</a>>.
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<a id="N5">N5 </a>See, e.g.: Jay Weidner , “Secrets of The Shining: Or How Faking the Moon Landings Nearly Cost Stanley Kubrick his Marriage and his Life, <i>Sacred Mysteries</i>, 2009, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.sacredmysteries.com/public/300print.cfm">http://www.sacredmysteries.com/public/300print.cfm</a></u></span>>; Mary Pols, “Room 237: Deconstructing Stanley,” <i>Time</i>, March 28, 2013, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://entertainment.time.com/2013/03/28/room-237-deconstructing-stanley/">http://entertainment.time.com/2013/03/28/room-237-deconstructing-stanley/</a></u></span>>; and Robert Ito, “Cracking the Code in ‘Heeere’s Johnny!’,” <i>New York Times</i>, January 25, 2012, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/29/movies/room-237-documentary-with-theories-about-the-shining.html">http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/29/movies/room-237-documentary-with-theories-about-the-shining.html</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N6">N6 </a>For an introduction, see: “3000 Bells Are Ringing!,” <i>Celtic Rebel</i>, September 26, 2008, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://celticrebel.wordpress.com/2008/09/26/3000-bells-are-ringing/">http://celticrebel.wordpress.com/2008/09/26/3000-bells-are-ringing/</a></u></span>>. <span style="font-size: x-small;"></span>
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<a id="N7">N7 </a>On “23,” the reader should consult Robert Anton Wilson's important <i>Fortean Times</i> article “The 23 Phenomenon,” May 2007, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.forteantimes.com/features/commentary/396/the_23_phenomenon.html">http://www.forteantimes.com/features/commentary/396/the_23_phenomenon.html</a></u></span>> as well as Wilson's other published work, along with Jim Brandon's book <i>The Rebirth of Pan: Hidden Faces of the American Earth Spirit</i> (Firebird Press, 1983). On “11,” see, e.g., “The Fall of 11?,” Visup, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://visupview.blogspot.com/2012/09/the-fall-of-11.html">http://visupview.blogspot.com/2012/09/the-fall-of-11.html</a></u></span>> along with <i>Bell Curve'</i>s own earlier posts at <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/47-or-how-romney-lords-it-over-inferior.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/47-or-how-romney-lords-it-over-inferior.html</a></u></span>> and <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/12/neil-armstrong-astronaut-or-alchemist.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/12/neil-armstrong-astronaut-or-alchemist.html</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N8">N8 </a>For more on John Harrison, see our follow up post (forthcoming) on Greenwich.
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<a id="N9">N9 </a>Gustav Davidson, <i>A Dictionary of Angels</i>, New York, N.Y.: Simon & Schuster, 1971, p. 346. See, also, Martin Luther's <i>Von Schem Hamphoras</i>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vom_Schem_Hamphoras">HERE</a>.
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<a id="N10">N10 </a>E.g., the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.golden-dawn-canada.com/pdf/shemhamphorash.pdf">http://www.golden-dawn-canada.com/pdf/shemhamphorash.pdf</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N11">N11 </a>See the <i>Clavicula Salomonis</i>, a.k.a. the <i>Lemegeton</i>, i.e., the “Lesser Key of Solomon” (in contradistinction to the <i>Clavis Salomonis</i>, or “Key of Solomon”).
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<a id="N12">N12 </a><<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houri#72_virgins">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houri#72_virgins</a></u></span>>; <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/72_(number)">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/72_%28number%29</a></u></span>>. Moreover, the Sufi ritual practice of “...<i>Zikr </i>('remembrance' [of God])...involves the group repetition of...various divine names of God”, David Damrel, “The Religious Roots of Conflict: Russia and Chechnya,” <i>Religious Studies News</i>, vol. 10, no. 3, September, 1995, p. 10.
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<a id="N13">N13 </a>During the <i>confusio linguarum</i> (the “confusion of tongues”) that occurred at the Tower of Babel, the initial Adamic Language was traditionally said to have been fragmented into 72 (or 70) dialects, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confusion_of_tongues">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confusion_of_tongues</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N14">N14 </a>72 relates to human anatomy and physiology as well as “ideal” human environmental factors (e.g., “room temperature”). The very interesting enumeration even includes an honorable mention for Abraham Lincoln, via the USS Abraham Lincoln, which is marked with the alpha-numeric code “CVN-72.” <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/72_(number)">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/72_%28number%29</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N15">N15 </a>See, for instance, London's number one ranking, out of a list of 75 financial power nodes, on Master Card's “Worldwide Centres of Commerce Index,” <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.mastercard.com/us/company/en/insights/pdfs/2008/MCWW_WCoC-Report_2008.pdf">http://www.mastercard.com/us/company/en/insights/pdfs/2008/MCWW_WCoC-Report_2008.pdf</a></u></span>>. Cf. Henry Makow, “How City of London (British Crown) Runs the World ,” <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.conspiracyplanet.com/channel.cfm?channelid=126&contentid=1281">http://www.conspiracyplanet.com/channel.cfm?channelid=126&contentid=1281</a></u></span>>. It is worth mentioning that 72 crops up in this financial connexion as well. One thinks of the so-called “Rule of 72.” Michael Blastland, “Go Figure: What can 72 tell us about life?” <i>BBC</i>, July 20, 2011, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-14217443">http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-14217443</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N16">N16 </a>Cf. Daniel P. Mannix, <i>The Hellfire Club</i>, New York, N.Y.:Ballantine, 1959 and G. Donald K. McCormick, <i>The Hell-Fire Club,</i> London: Sphere,1975.
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<a id="N17">N17 </a><<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/7_July_2005_London_bombings">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/7_July_2005_London_bombings</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N18">N18 </a>“First British terrorist attack since 7/7 bombings,” <i>Irish Examiner</i>, May 23, 2013, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.irishexaminer.com/world/first-british-terrorist-attack-since-77-bombings-232072.html">http://www.irishexaminer.com/world/first-british-terrorist-attack-since-77-bombings-232072.html</a></u></span>>. Compare the following unremarkable treatment from the U.S. media: “UK emergency committee meets after Muslim terrorists hack soldier to death,” <i>Fox News</i>, May 23, 2013, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/05/23/man-killed-in-reported-machete-attack-in-london/">http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/05/23/man-killed-in-reported-machete-attack-in-london/</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N19">N19 </a><<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woolwich">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woolwich</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N20">N20 </a>“Death of Lee Rigby,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_Woolwich_attack">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_Woolwich_attack</a>>.
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<a id="N21">N21 </a> Dan Thompson, “Woolwich soldier murder victim named as Lee Rigby from Middleton,” <i>Manchester Evening News</i>, May 23, 2013, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/woolwich-soldier-murder-victim-named-4007798">http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/woolwich-soldier-murder-victim-named-4007798</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N22">N22 </a><<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bran_the_Blessed">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bran_the_Blessed</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N23">N23 </a> As told, for instance in the <i>Brut Chonicle</i> (<<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://quod.lib.umich.edu/b/brut/about/">http://quod.lib.umich.edu/b/brut/about/</a></u></span>>) and the <i>Recuyell des Histoires de Troye</i>, a romance, originally in French, which supposedly has the distinction of being “...the first book printed in the English language” (<<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recuyell_of_the_Historyes_of_Troye">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recuyell_of_the_Historyes_of_Troye</a></u></span>>).
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<a id="N24">N24 </a>See, e.g., Tamar Drukkers, “Thirty-Three Murderous Sisters: A Pre-Trojan Foundation Myth in the Middle English Prose Brut Chronicle,” <i>Review of English Studies</i>, vol. 54, 2003, pp. 449–463 and online at “Gog and Magog, London,” <i>information Britain</i>, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.information-britain.co.uk/loredetail.php?id=89">http://www.information-britain.co.uk/loredetail.php?id=89</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N25">N25 </a>“Albion... is the oldest known name of the island of Great Britain.” <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albion">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albion</a></u></span>>. It may serve as something like a code word in some contexts, as “Columbia” so serves regarding <i>America </i><span style="font-style: normal;">– “The occult name for America is Columbia,” Michael Hoffman, “The Mirror World of Columbine,” </span><i>Revisionist History</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, <</span><span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.revisionisthistory.org/columbine.html"><span style="font-style: normal;">http://www.revisionisthistory.org/columbine.html</span></a></u></span><span style="font-style: normal;">>. </span>
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<a id="N26">N26 </a> Again, see “...the <i>Recuyell des Histoires de Troye</i> which says that Gog and Magog are the survivors of a race of giants descended from the thirty wicked daughters of Diocletian”, Theo Brown, “A Note on Gog,” <i>Folklore</i>, vol. 61, no. 2, June, 1950, p. 100.
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<a id="N27">N27 </a><<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giant_(mythology)#Biblical_Old_Testament">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giant_%28mythology%29#Biblical_Old_Testament</a></u></span>>. Cf. “The Book of Watchers/Grigori” 1 Enoch 1-36, <i>The Book of Jubilees</i>, and the <i>Yalkut Shimoni</i> on Genesis (Davidson, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 349; and Johann Andreas Eisenmenger, <i>The Tradition of the Jews</i>, John Peter Stehelin, trans. & ed., Michael Hoffman's facsimile reprint, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho: Independent History and Research, 2006, pp. 22/184<i>ff</i>.
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<a id="N28">N28 </a><i>The Complete Idiot's Guide to Alchemy</i>, New York, N.Y.: Penguin, 2008, p. 109; <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bran_the_Blessed">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bran_the_Blessed</a></u></span>>; Hauck, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 61. <i>Nigredo </i>is the first stage of the recursive <i>Magnum Opus</i> ('Great Work'). The other stages are usually enumerated as <i>Albedo </i>('whitening') and <i>Rubedo </i>('reddening'), although the third stage may be subdivided into <i>Citrinitas </i>(or <i>Xanthosis</i>) and <i>Iosis</i>. These three stages occur numerous 'operations', which are sometimes listed as follows : calcination, dissolution, separation, conjunction, putrefaction, congelation, cibation, sublimation, fermentation, exaltation, multiplication, and projection. See Hauck, op. cit., for a good introduction.
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<a id="N29">N29 </a><i>The Mabinogion</i>, Lady Charlotte Guest & David Nutt, trans., London, 1910; qtd. by Matthews, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 37. Decapitation symbolism is also apparent in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Helen Cixous, “Castration or Decapitation,” Signs, vol 7, 1981, pp. 41-55. Furthermore, “[t]he Ninth Degree in the Scottish Rite is dedicated to assassination by means of decapitation”, Michael Anthony Hoffman, <i>Masonic Assassination</i>, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho: Independent History and Research, 1978, p. 25.
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<a id="N30">N30 </a>Matthews, <i>ibid</i>.; <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bran_the_Blessed">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bran_the_Blessed</a></u></span>>. Cf. “[T]he 'White Hill' [is] thought to be the location where the Tower of London now stands...”, <i>ibid</i>.
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<a id="N31">N31 </a>If we count back fourscore and seven years from the time of this writing, we land in 1926. That year, among other weirdness like the synthesizing of PCP/“angel dust” <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phencyclidine">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phencyclidine</a></u></span>> and the Great Miami Hurricane, which formed on <b>September 11</b> <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Miami_Hurricane">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Miami_Hurricane</a></u></span>>, the U.S. <b>Route 66</b> (“the Mother Road” see <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/08/weld.html">http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/08/weld.html</a></u></span>>) was established November 11 and there was a “panic” in – of all places – London (!) due to a BBC radio production <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.museumofhoaxes.com/hoax/archive/permalink/the_bbc_radio_panic">http://www.museumofhoaxes.com/hoax/archive/permalink/the_bbc_radio_panic</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N32">N32 </a> “<span style="font-size: x-small;">Palladium,” <</span><span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=palladium"><span style="font-size: x-small;">http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=palladium</span></a></u></span><span style="font-size: x-small;">>. </span>
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<a id="N33">N33 </a> There is also supposed to have been an ultra-secret “Palladian” rite at the summit of Freemasonry. In <i>fin de siecle</i> Europe, Marie Joseph Gabriel Antoine Jogand-Pagès, writing under the name “Leo Taxil,” made explosive allegations regarding the existence of a Satanic, sex-obsessed group of high-level operators. This group included the Scottish Rite magus, Albert Pike, Adriano Lemmi (former Grand Master of the Grand Orient of Italy), as well as a shadowy female named “Diana Vaughan” – said to have been a “...descendant of the Rosicrucian alchemist Thomas Vaughan”, “Taxil hoax,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, May 3, 2013, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxil_hoax">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxil_hoax</a>>. Domenico Margiotta, allegedly an ex-grand master Mason-type who claimed such grandiose affiliations as those with the Lodge Savonarola in Florence and the Lodge Giordano Bruno in Palmi, to some extent defended (or seemed to) Taxil’s contentions. After several plot twists and turns, Taxil ostensibly recanted his early statements. However, there are several reasons why this supposed reversal constitutes a less-than-satisfactory resolution to the question of an upper-echelon, overtly sexual-Satanic cluster of “Masonic” initiates. For a summary of these reasons, and much else besides, see: Craig Heimbichner, <i>Blood on the Altar</i>, Couer d'Alene, Idaho: Independent History & Research, 2005, esp. pp. 63-76. One can also usefully consult Arthur Waite’s Devil Worship in France. For more, see: <a href="http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=fr&u=http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domenico_Margiotta&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domenico_Margiotta%26biw%3D1024%26bih%3D566">HERE</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palladists">HERE</a>, <a href="http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=fr&u=http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domenico_Margiotta&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domenico_Margiotta%26biw%3D1024%26bih%3D566">HERE</a>, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Blood-Altar-History-Dangerous-Society/dp/0970378432">HERE</a>, and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Ritual-America-Brotherhoods-Influence-American/dp/1936239140/">HERE</a>.
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<a id="N34">N34 </a> Matthews, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 41.
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<a id="N35">N35 </a> Cf. Loren Coleman, “Green Man,” <i>Twilight Language</i>, May 17, 2009, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2009/03/green-men.html">http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2009/03/green-men.html</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N36">N36 </a> “Jaded: Episode 3,” <i>Marvel's She-Hulk</i>, no. 24, February 1, 2008, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.comicvine.com/she-hulk-24-jaded-episode-3/4000-120315/">http://www.comicvine.com/she-hulk-24-jaded-episode-3/4000-120315/</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N37">N37 </a> Leon Watson, “You won't like her when she's angry: Police hunt woman dressed as the Incredible Hulk over alleged attack outside McDonald'sIncident happened outside a branch of McDonald's in York,” <i>Daily Mail </i>(U.K.), May 7, 2013, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2320807/You-wont-like-shes-angry-Police-hunt-woman-dressed-Incredible-Hulk-alleged-attack-outside-McDonalds.html">http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2320807/You-wont-like-shes-angry-Police-hunt-woman-dressed-Incredible-Hulk-alleged-attack-outside-McDonalds.html</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N38">N38 </a> <i>The Temple and the Lodge</i>, New York, N.Y.: Arcade, 1989, p. 79.
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<a id="N39">N39 </a> <i>Ibid</i>.
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<a id="N40">N40 </a> <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bran_the_Blessed#Other_associations">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bran_the_Blessed#Other_associations</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N41">N41 </a> Apparently, ravens are kept well-stocked, sometimes having had their wings clipped, in order to stave off destruction. See, e.g., Matthews, <i>op. cit</i>., p. 47. “Tower of London's Jubilee raven released,” <i>BBC</i>, December 26, 2012, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-somerset-18611229">http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-somerset-18611229</a></u></span>>. For more, see <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.forteantimes.com/features/articles/879/myths_of_the_raven.html">http://www.forteantimes.com/features/articles/879/myths_of_the_raven.html</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N42">N42 </a> The <i>Book of Revelation</i> refers to “the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan,” (20:2; cf. 12:9).
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<a id="N43">N43 </a> Jay Weidner is prepared to put quite a lot of weight on a certain dragon, viz., <i>draco</i>. “The earth's axis is tilted at 23.5 degrees away from the ecliptic. This tilt causes the celestial pole above our planetary pole to describe a great circle in the sky over long periods of time. For example, in 4500 B.C.E., Thuban, a star in the tail of Draco, marked the North Celestial Pole, which has, over time, shifted to Polaris. The ecliptic pole, however, does not change, since the path of the sun through the sky never changes. Around this point, which has no star visible to the naked eye to mark it, is the constellation Draco, the Great Dragon, which spiral through all of the zodiacal signs. The stars appear to hang, <i>talah</i>, from it. Draco thereby becomes the <i>Teli</i>..., which the <i>Sefer Yetzirah</i> (6:3) tells us, is over the universe 'like a king on his throne.' ...This serpent is also the serpent of the Garden climbing its way up the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, the brazen serpent used by Moses to heal the plagues in the wilderness, and even Hermes' caduceus staff. The gnostic Ophites, who worshiped the serpent in the Garden of Eden for giving us the gift og knowledge that provided an escape from the <i>Demiurge</i>, formulated the image of a snake spiraling around an egg.
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“...The titles used in Genesis, 'God Most High, Lord of Heaven and creator of the earth,' are the same titles used for Baal. They are also the same as the ancient Canaanite name for the Pole Serpent [Job 26:13], the <i>Teli</i>... It is important to understand that all of these mythologies are essentially astronomical. The <i>Teli</i> in Draco is the Constellation that rules over all of the signs and therefore the ages and the worlds, the past and the future. The Islamic creator Allah is simply the Arabic version of [the] Canaanite <i>El</i>. The name <i>Baal</i>, or <i>Ba-el</i>, is literally translated as 'the Space-Filling God.' Allah is also called 'He who holds the stars in place.' This God Most High can only be the constellation of Draco. Not only does Draco fill all the signs of the zodiac, but it also sits atop the Cube of Space very much like a king on his throne.” Jay Weidner, Vincent Bridges, <i>The Mysteries of the Great Cross of Hendaye: Alchemy and the End of Time</i>, Rochester, Vermont: Destiny Books, 2003, pp. 94-94 & 102-103.
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<a id="N44">N44 </a> This ambiguity between the dragon's function as protector or as an agent of evil has an apparent point of contact with the French proverb, <i>Honi soit qui mal y pense –</i> literally, “Evil be to him who evil thinks”, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/Evil+be+to+him+who+evil+thinks">http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/Evil+be+to+him+who+evil+thinks</a></u></span>>. The gist of this “curse against those who wish you harm” is given as with the words “[m]ay bad things happen to anyone who thinks evil things”, <i>ibid</i>. In any case, this French phrase seems a curious thing to locate on British royal arms, not to mention to find serving as the motto for the ancient knighthood Order of the Garter! <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honi_soit_qui_mal_y_pense">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honi_soit_qui_mal_y_pense</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N45">N45 </a> Jean Chevalier and Alain Gheerbrant, “Dragon,” John Buchanan-Brown, trans., <i>Dictionary of Symbols</i>, London: Penguin, 1996, p. 307.
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<a id="N46">N46 </a> John Wilcock, <i>A Guide to Occult Britain</i>, London: Sphere Books, 1977, p. 35.
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<a id="N47">N47 </a> <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_London_Police">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_London_Police</a></u></span>>. See, also, <i>Y Ddraig Goch</i>, the Welsh red dragon, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_Dragon">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_Dragon</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N48">N48 </a> <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_Bar,_London#Current_marker">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_Bar,_London#Current_marker</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N49">N49 </a> <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_London_Police">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_London_Police</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N50">N50 </a> Carl Gustav Jung, <i>Psychology and Alchemy, Princeton</i>, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1968, p. 475, illus. 267 with caption.
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<a id="N51">N51 </a> “Pendragon,” <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=pendragon">http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=pendragon</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N52">N52 </a> <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_Bar,_London">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_Bar,_London</a></u></span>>. See also <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Bell_Birch">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Bell_Birch</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N53">N53 </a> <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_Bar,_London">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_Bar,_London</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N54">N54 </a> <i>Op. cit.</i>, p. 44.
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<a id="N55">N55 </a>Chesca Potter, “Gazetteer of Sacred Sites in London,” John Matthews and Chesca Potter, <i>The Aquarian Guide to Legendary London</i>, Wellingborough, U.K.: Aquarian Press, 1990, p. 203.
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<a id="N56">N56 </a><i>Ibid</i>., p. 205.
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<a id="N57">N57 </a> “Rosslyn Chapel,” <i>Wikipedia</i>, May 23, 2013, <<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosslyn_Chapel">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosslyn_Chapel</a>>.
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<a id="N58">N58 </a> Potter, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 205.
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<a id="N59">N59 </a> <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a8/Lord_Mayor_of_London%27s_coronation_robes.JPG">http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a8/Lord_Mayor_of_London%27s_coronation_robes.JPG</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N60">N60 </a> Andrew Gill, “Temple Bar Returns,” <i>Freemasonry Today</i>, issue 32, Spring 2005, p. 10.
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<a id="N61">N61 </a><<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.arizonaguide.com/places-to-visit/arizona-s-west-coast/lake-havasu-city">http://www.arizonaguide.com/places-to-visit/arizona-s-west-coast/lake-havasu-city</a></u></span>> and <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Havasu_City,_Arizona#London_Bridge">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Havasu_City,_Arizona#London_Bridge</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N62">N62 </a> <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_P._McCulloch">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_P._McCulloch</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N63">N63 </a> The London Bridge material had been shipped from the United Kingdom to Long Beach, California via the Panama Canal. Interestingly, October 10 is the anniversary of the completion of the famous man-made, ocean-connecting swath (named by the “American Society of Civil Engineers... [as] one of the seven wonders of the modern world”), on which date in 1913 then-“President Woodrow Wilson trigger[ed] the explosion of the Gamboa Dike... ending construction on the Panama Canal”, “On this day – Oct 10, 1913 – construction ends on the Panama Canal,” <i>New Haven Register</i>, October 10, 2012, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://photos.newhavenregister.com/2012/10/10/photos-on-this-day-oct-10-1913-construction-ends-on-the-panama-canal/">http://photos.newhavenregister.com/2012/10/10/photos-on-this-day-oct-10-1913-construction-ends-on-the-panama-canal/</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N64">N64 </a> Bobbi A. J. Holmes, “The History of Lake Havasu City and the London Bridge,” <i>Havasu Magazine</i>, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://havasumagazine.com/history_of_lake_havasu_city_4.htm">http://havasumagazine.com/history_of_lake_havasu_city_4.htm</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N65">N65 </a> “Activision, a publisher of interactive entertainment software and video games, said today that it was teaming up with William Colby, the former head of the Central Intelligence Agency, to develop and publish espionage thriller video games”, “Activision Spy Games,” <i>New York Times</i>, January 06, 1994, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1994/01/06/business/activision-spy-games.html">http://www.nytimes.com/1994/01/06/business/activision-spy-games.html</a></u></span>>. See a previous post, which also mentions the movie WarGames: <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/inauspicious-beginning.html">http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/inauspicious-beginning.html</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N66">N66 </a> Rob Rector, “‘Star Trek: Into Darkness’ serves as a bridge picture,” movie review, <i>Cape Gazette</i>, May 26, 2013, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://capegazette.villagesoup.com/p/star-trek-into-darkness-serves-as-a-bridge-picture/1004729">http://capegazette.villagesoup.com/p/star-trek-into-darkness-serves-as-a-bridge-picture/1004729</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N67">N67 </a> <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Bridge_Is_Falling_Down">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Bridge_Is_Falling_Down</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N68">N68 </a>On Downard, see: Loren Coleman, “Synchromysticism's Godfather,” <i>Twilight Language</i>, December 19, 2008, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2008/12/synchromystisms-godfather.html">http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2008/12/synchromystisms-godfather.html</a></u></span>>; Richard B. Spence, “Searching for James Shelby Downard,” <i>Forteans West</i>, <span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://forteanswest.com/lowfiguesteditorial-DrRichardBSpence0612.php">http://forteanswest.com/lowfiguesteditorial-DrRichardBSpence0612.php</a></u></span>>; and Adam Gorightly, <i>James Shelby Downard's Mystical War</i> (College Station, Texas: Virtualbookworm, 2008). Downard's own autobiographical <i>Carnivals of Life of Death</i> is available in two editions: an unedited version published by Independent History and Research, 2000 <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://revisionisthistorystore.blogspot.com/2010/03/michael-hoffmans-online-revisionist.html">http://revisionisthistorystore.blogspot.com/2010/03/michael-hoffmans-online-revisionist.html</a></u></span>> and an edited version via Feral House, 2006 <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Carnivals-Life-Death-Profane-1913-1935/dp/1932595155">http://www.amazon.com/Carnivals-Life-Death-Profane-1913-1935/dp/1932595155</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N69">N69 </a> Jim Brandon reflects: “It was while I was living in Florida and finishing <i>Weird America</i> (published 1978) that Shelby Downard loaded up his Airstream and headed west. He had become increasingly enthralled by the Havasu oddities, ‘in the middle of nowhere,’ as he put it and decided that he would have to go to there for first-hand research.
<br>
“For my part, I was equally taken with his discovery that there is, of all things, a Temple Bar at a certain distance due north of London Bridge on the Colorado River leading into Lake Mead. This in turn started me investigating the Colorado channel and feeding into it the quite portentous San Juan River. This has been a ‘high-strangeness’ site of paranormal phenomena going back over a century, and perhaps longer in Amerindian lore.
<br />
“Western writer Louis L’Amour, an old hand in the area, wrote one of his most mystical novels, <i>The Haunted Mesa</i>, exploring the possibilities of inner-earth travel, shape shifting and inter-dimensional phenomena for which this unusual area might have a special propensity. For my part, I will next be exploring the possibility that the famed Four Corners where Arizona, Utah, Colorado and New Mexico come together, may have been an intentional crypto-symbolical construct, at the highest levels, a Grand Cross as sometimes used in ritual magic, intended to in effect hold down this otherwise too-lively area. Bizarro? Sure, but only a tad stranger than the number Uncle Sam originally assigned to the highway heading south out of here: 666.”
<br />
On Route 666, see: <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Route_491">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Route_491</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N70">N70 </a> <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Stone#Interpretations_and_myths">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Stone#Interpretations_and_myths</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N71">N71 </a> Nick Barlay, “A-Z: I is for Invisible London,” <i>The Times</i> (London), feature: “The Knowledge 31,” September 6, 2003. “According to Geoffrey of Monmouth, the history of Britain began with the sack of Troy. The name 'Britain', he explained, meant 'the Land of Brutus', commemorating its founder, Brutus, great-grandson of the exiled Trojan prince, Aeneas. When he built the city now called 'London', he aptly named it 'Troia Nova', New Troy”, Cedric Watts, “Introduction,” James Joyce, <i>Ulysses</i>, Hertfordshire, U.K.: Wordsworth Editions, January, 2010, p. xxi.
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<a id="N72">N72 </a><span style="font-size: x-small;"> <</span><span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleopatra%27s_Needle#London"><span style="font-size: x-small;">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleopatra%27s_Needle#London</span></a></u></span><span style="font-size: x-small;">>. </span>
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<a id="N73">N73 </a>Iain Sinclair, <i>Lud Heat: A Book of Dead Hamlets</i>, London: Albion Village Press, 1975. Cf. Giles Woodrow and Andrew MacDonald, “Dark London,” <i>Limb by Limb</i>, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.limbbylimb.co.uk/feats/dark_london.html">http://www.limbbylimb.co.uk/feats/dark_london.html</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N74">N74 </a>At least, he is alleged to have protected some of London's Jews: “When a fire threatened to destroy the Great Synagogue he averted the disaster by writing four Hebrew letters on the pillars of the door”, “FALK, H<span style="font-weight: normal;">AY</span>YIM SAMUEL JACOB,” <i>Jewish Encyclopedia</i>, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/5992-falk-hayyim-samuel-jacob">http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/5992-falk-hayyim-samuel-jacob</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N75">N75 </a><<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://freemasonry.bcy.ca/biography/hund_k/hund_k.html">http://freemasonry.bcy.ca/biography/hund_k/hund_k.html</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N76">N76 </a>See, e.g., Marsha Keith Schuchard, “Yeats and the Unknown Superiors: Swedenborg, Falk and Cagliostro,” in Marie Roberts and Hugh Ormsby-Lennon, eds., <i>Secret Texts: The Literature of Secret Societies</i>, New York, N.Y.: AMS Press, 1995, pp. 114-68.
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<a id="N77">N77 </a> <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.imdb.com/character/ch0012897/">http://www.imdb.com/character/ch0012897/</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N78">N78 </a> “[T]he face of Moses was as the face of the sun, the face of Joshua as the face of the moon.” (<i>Babylonian Talmud</i>, Tractate <i>Baba Bathra</i> 75a).
<br>
<a id="N79">N79 </a> Pronounced “whopper,” as in the colloquial for an item of junk food or a “big lie,” the computer lies deep in Cheyenne Mountain (Colorado) inside of what was – at the time of the movie – the headquarters for NORAD, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WOPR">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WOPR</a></u></span>>. Cheyenne Mountain leads us into very deep synchro-mystical waters. We hope to baptize the reader in a future article devoted to the subject.
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<a id="N80">N80 </a> <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086567/">http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086567/</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N81">N81 </a> John M. Shaftesley & Morris Rosenbaum, “Jews in English Regular Freemasonry,” <i>Transactions – The Jewish Historical Society of England</i>, vol . 25, 1973-1975, p. 165; & Gordon P.G. Hills, “Notes on Some Contemporary References to Dr. Falk, The Baal Shem of London, in the Rainsford Mss. at the British Museum,” <i>The Jewish Historical Society of England</i>, transactions, vol. 8, 1915-1917, pp. 122-128. On the banking connexion, we quoted from "FALK, ḤAYYIM SAMUEL JACOB," <i>Jewish Encyclopedia</i>, 1906, <<a href="http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/5992-falk-hayyim-samuel-jacob">http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/5992-falk-hayyim-samuel-jacob</a>>.
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<a id="N82">N82 </a>Stephanie Pappas, “Ancient Rome's hairdo for vestal virgins re-created,” <i>Live Science</i> via <i>NBC</i>, January 9, 2013, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/id/50417111/ns/technology_and_science-science/">http://www.nbcnews.com/id/50417111/ns/technology_and_science-science/</a></u></span>>
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<a id="N83">N83 </a> Raphael Patai, “Hayyim Sh'Muel Falck,” <i>The Jewish Alchemists</i>, Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1994, p. 461. Falk was also said to have been “seaking (<i>sic.</i>) the philosopher's stone with great zeal”, qtd. in <i>ibid.</i>, p. 462.
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<a id="N84">N84 </a> Manly Palmer Hall, <i>Melchizedek and the Mystery of Fire</i>, Los Angeles: Philosophical Research Society, 1996, pp. 13<i>ff.</i>
<br>
<a id="N85">N85 </a> The “triple-goddess” (<i>Trivia</i>) is famously represented as the witch-queen, Hecate. Michael A. Hoffman, <i>Judaism Discovered</i>, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho: Independent History and Research, 2008, pp. 247 & 266, as well as Sorita d'Este & David Rankine, <i>Hekate: Liminal Rites</i>, London: Avalonia, 2009, <i>passim</i>.
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<a id="N86">N86 </a> The moon goddess is known under many names – e.g., Selene, Luna, Artemis, <i>et al</i>.
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<a id="N87">N87 </a> M. Esther Harding, <i>Woman's Mysteries Ancient & Modern</i>, Boston: Shambhala, 1971, p. 128.
<br>
<a id="N88">N88 </a> Gary Lachman, “The lineaments of gratified desire,” book review of <i>Why Mrs Blake Cried </i>by Marsha Keith Schuchard, March 12, 2006, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/why-mrs-blake-cried-by-marsha-keith-schuchard-469652.html">http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/why-mrs-blake-cried-by-marsha-keith-schuchard-469652.html</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N89">N89 </a> Harding, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 132.
<br>
<a id="N90">N90 </a> Hoffman, Judaism Discovered, esp. pp. 237-241, 256<i>ff.</i>
<br>
<a id="N91">N91 </a> “Dracontic,” <i>Free Dictionary</i>, <a href="http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Dracontic">http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Dracontic</a>. For more, see <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alessandro_Cagliostro">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alessandro_Cagliostro</a></u></span>>. We register awareness that the word “virgin” (as it appears, e.g., in the aforementioned Vestal Virgins) may denote simply (if only technically) “being unmarried” as opposed to <i>having never engaged in sexual intercourse</i>.
<br>
<a id="N92">N92 </a>Patai, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 457.
<br>
<a id="N93">N93 </a> Testimony of Count George Louis Albert de Rantzow, quoted by Patai, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 460. Of course, there also seem to be legitimate questions about Benjamin Franklin, who resided in Westminister, just west of the Square Mile, who very well might have been entangled in ritual murder (along with fellow Royal Society member William Hewson). For example, “...the remains of ten bodies hidden beneath the former London home of Benjamin Franklin...four adults and six children were discovered during the ...restoration of Franklin's home at 36 Craven Street, close to Trafalgar Square. ...Most of the bones show signs of having been dissected, sawn or cut. One skull has been drilled with several holes. Paul Knapman, the Westminster coroner, said yesterday: 'I cannot totally discount the possibility of a crime. …'... Evangeline Hunter-Jones, deputy chairman of the Friends of Benjamin Franklin House, the charity concerned with restoring the property and opening it to the public, said: 'The bones were quite deeply buried, probably to hide them because grave robbing was illegal. There could be more buried, and there probably are.' ...Regular visitors during Franklin's residency included Pitt the Elder (the Earl of Chatham), Edmund Burke, James Boswell, Adam Smith and Thomas Paine, the author of The Rights of Man.” Robin Young, “Remains of ten bodies at Ben Franklin's home,” <i>The Times </i><span style="font-style: normal;">(London)</span>, February 11, 1998. Franklin even had allegations leveled against him in America. See, e.g., Michael A. Hoffman II, “Freemasonry in Early America and the Anti-Masonic Opposition,” audio recording, 1999. Finally, so as not to neglect our numerological angle, researcher Richard Deacon reports that: "...the Honorable Mr. Franklin was referred to in dispatches of the British Secret service during the Revolution as 'Number 72'," "Famous British Historian Claims Benjamin Franklin Was A British Spy," <i>Argosy</I>, July 1970, <<a href="http://msuweb.montclair.edu/~furrg/fc/deacononfranklin.html">http://msuweb.montclair.edu/~furrg/fc/deacononfranklin.html</a>>; cf. <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Code-Number-72-Ben-Franklin/dp/0131394932">HERE</a>.
<br>
Freemasonry, broadly construed, has a underlying motif of ritual murder. For instance, “[i]ncorporated into some versions of [the] rites [of Royal Arch Masonry] is the ritual murder of the master builder of Solomon's Temple, Hiram Abiff...”, Lynn Brunet, <i>'A Course of Severe and Arduous Trials': Bacon, Beckett and Spurious Freemasonry in Early Twentieth Century Ireland</i>, Oxford: Peter Lang, 2009, p. 90.
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<a id="N94">N94 </a><<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wellclose_Square#A_playwright.2C_two_mystics_and_a_poet">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wellclose_Square#A_playwright.2C_two_mystics_and_a_poet</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N95">N95 </a><<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wellclose_Square">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wellclose_Square</a></u></span>>; on Swedenborg's espionage connexions, see Marsha Keith Schuchard, <i>Emanuel Swedenborg, Secret Agent on Earth and in Heaven: Jacobites, Jews, and Freemasons in early modern Sweden, The Northern World</i>, vol. 55, Leiden, Netherlands: Brill, 2011; Marsha Keith Schuchard, <i>Why Mrs Blake Cried: William Blake and the Erotic Imagination</i>, Century, 2006, p. 50.
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<a id="N96">N96 </a> Glenys Roberts, “Return of the beast; Satanist. Polygamist. Sexual abuser. Drug addict. Aleister Crowley called himself the 'wickedest man alive'. Now, 60 years after his death, has his ghost returned to haunt his London home?” <i>Daily Mail</i> (London), January 6, 2006, p. 32; and Sean Thomas, “The Big Smoke – Secret London – The house of Satanist Aleister Crowley,” <i>Time Ou</i>t, January 18, 2006. For more recent news about an alleged U.K.-satanist of high profile, see: Dominic Gover, “Jimmy Savile Satanic Sex Ring Claim: Star 'Worshipped Devil',” International Business Times, January 13, 2013, <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/articles/423569/20130113/jimmy-savile-satan-sex-abuse.htm">http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/articles/423569/20130113/jimmy-savile-satan-sex-abuse.htm</a></u></span>>. “...The BBC star dressed in black robes during the rituals which allegedly took place in the basement of Stoke Mandeville hospital, in 1975. Five years later, the Jim'll Fix It star supposedly took part in more satanic abuse at a plush London residence. A 21-year-old was reportedly forced to take part in an orgy in a room decked out with satanic symbols. ...” <i>ibid</i>.
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<a id="N97">N97 </a> <<span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chancery_Lane">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chancery_Lane</a></u></span>>.
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<a id="N98">N98 </a> <span style="font-style: normal;">Roberts, </span><i>op. cit</i>.
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###Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-60845996905825435612013-03-11T22:43:00.003-07:002013-12-21T19:14:34.131-08:00Veritas Vincit<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Batman:</b> "I have one rule."<br /><b>The Joker:</b> "Oh, then that's the rule </span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">you'll have to break to know the truth." </span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">~ <i>The Dark Knight</i> (</span><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0468569/quotes"><span style="font-size: x-small;">2008</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">) </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioXkJKKe5Z6qrP62BystdDh4aTdpbMqmkFnex-uCZmyD-aZoyPeJX2V-h4OggOsajsFlm9DhhUVRGYZpmXYiep9A5qjzaih6mPKiEbB8BJHS6Ley6cwZzGunPnHgHU5PU80l9XAKWKeBrX/s1600/Batman_Joker_interrogate.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="189" psa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioXkJKKe5Z6qrP62BystdDh4aTdpbMqmkFnex-uCZmyD-aZoyPeJX2V-h4OggOsajsFlm9DhhUVRGYZpmXYiep9A5qjzaih6mPKiEbB8BJHS6Ley6cwZzGunPnHgHU5PU80l9XAKWKeBrX/s320/Batman_Joker_interrogate.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://blogs.suntimes.com/foreignc/DKR_batman_Joker_interrogate.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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<b>"Judge OKs 'truth serum' for Colo. shooting suspect"</b></div>
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"...<b>Suspect James Holmes could be required to submit to a 'narcoanalytic interview'</b> as part of an evaluation to determine if he was legally insane at the time of the July 20 shootings, Arpahoe County District Judge William Sylvester said. A narcoanalylitic interview is a decades-old process in which patients are given drugs to lower their inhibition. Academic studies have shown that the technique has involved the use of sodium amytal and pentothal, sometimes called truth serum."<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Source: P. Solomon Banda and Dan Elliott, with Nicholas Riccardi "Judge OKs medication for Colorado shooting suspect," Associated Press, March 11, 2013, </span><a href="http://news.yahoo.com/judge-oks-medication-colorado-shooting-suspect-192015620.html"><span style="font-size: x-small;">URL</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">)</span><br />
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"Karen Steinhauser, a former prosecutor who is a law professor at the University of Denver and a defense attorney, said she <b>could not find any case law</b> about use of the narcoanalytic interview."<br />
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(Ibid. Regarding "<b>secret law, sealed law, and the contamination and distortion of the case law</b>" see: John Williams, "UNPUBLISHED AND SECRET LAW, AND CONTAMINATION OF THE CASE LAW," Monograph, Consumertronics, <a href="http://www.consumertronics.net/legal-books.htm">URL</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6vcUmgNQfuobtOZAlGIQ8g-e8s7KB-kPMPSgUkfhVLS1tF4YhjfmI32aDbAggkMDBf59qhg81-SpeOD0_e2t9-lR5aBI-dJpLvH2S2qgktR1am1EIm4MF8SdovyJLyZQoB4nPcJ8FBQg8/s1600/LipstickKiller.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" psa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6vcUmgNQfuobtOZAlGIQ8g-e8s7KB-kPMPSgUkfhVLS1tF4YhjfmI32aDbAggkMDBf59qhg81-SpeOD0_e2t9-lR5aBI-dJpLvH2S2qgktR1am1EIm4MF8SdovyJLyZQoB4nPcJ8FBQg8/s1600/LipstickKiller.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/X1y82WCdxuQ/mqdefault.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPUAlCvF4WcSKPVoMWIQ8Qc9Gb5a-HPxlDbCdFK3T0avbAg-Ptqxkg_RwQBRdCQXOR5bSUzjTrtzqf4C4c-1Kzwx5nPVRE7miyZuNv0vqW-nOHAA05gYOsCPpkYmfkEM-3i6s9RM8hJPrq/s1600/LipstickJoker.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="246" psa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPUAlCvF4WcSKPVoMWIQ8Qc9Gb5a-HPxlDbCdFK3T0avbAg-Ptqxkg_RwQBRdCQXOR5bSUzjTrtzqf4C4c-1Kzwx5nPVRE7miyZuNv0vqW-nOHAA05gYOsCPpkYmfkEM-3i6s9RM8hJPrq/s320/LipstickJoker.png" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://media.comicvine.com/uploads/6/61822/1793433-lipsticktube.png"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhurbh_VbCtXRZvlTmRFT6ZRoKUs7uOplVERgsiUVEAuq14iKGD2HWNKswjlQ0338sKK7tqfuKOcmWrSH2iCERPx-t3NfUv9zIgI5-tWa2GVqau20Mi9BRfUav5FfwL_1TcIlSXwtmeWaVS/s1600/Joker.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" psa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhurbh_VbCtXRZvlTmRFT6ZRoKUs7uOplVERgsiUVEAuq14iKGD2HWNKswjlQ0338sKK7tqfuKOcmWrSH2iCERPx-t3NfUv9zIgI5-tWa2GVqau20Mi9BRfUav5FfwL_1TcIlSXwtmeWaVS/s320/Joker.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/photos/uncategorized/2007/12/06/joker2_2.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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<b>FLASHBACK ONE YEAR:</b></div>
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"A Chicago man who confessed to one of the most shocking slayings in the city’s history and paid for it with more years of his life than any Illinois state prison inmate has died. According to the Cook County Medical Examiner’s office, 83-year-old <b>William Heirens</b> died March 5 at a Chicago hospital after officials at Dixon Correctional Center found him unresponsive in his cell. ...Mr. Heirens was a 17-year-old University of Chicago student and petty burglar when he confessed to killing two women in 1945...and the abduction, slaying and dismemberment of a 6-year-old girl the next year. ...In the ensuing decades, Mr. Heirens sought release from prison some 30 times, <b>claiming that he was innocent and that he only gave a 19-page confession after police sedated him</b>. ...In 2002, the Associated Press reported that students and law professors at Northwestern University who had worked to free other inmates had taken up his case. A clemency petition submitted to then-Gov. George Ryan claimed Mr. Heirens was given a spinal tap without anesthetic in one instance. One of the attorneys who prepared the clemency petition, Steven Drizin, said it also argued that <b>police acknowledged that they gave Mr. Heirens sodium pentathol, a so-called truth serum, and that after that injection he made some admissions</b>."<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Don Babwin with Adam Bernstein, "William Heirens, convicted ‘Lipstick Killer,’ dies at 83," Associated Press, March 06, 2012, </span><a href="http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-03-06/national/35450437_1_lipstick-killer-clemency-petition-suzanne-degnan"><span style="font-size: x-small;">URL</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">. For more on the Heirens case, among other things, see: Cf. David McGowan, Programmed to Kill, iUniverse, 2004, </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/dp/0595326404/ref=rdr_ext_tmb"><span style="font-size: x-small;">URL</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">.)</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUrtc9tbmBYuYIh0UTc32jA3bn7ziabsS4W44OVgEq-WMwHNqCFa91NeTWs1jG0nvNoRQmsArtyc3FMU6htI7vBpEfyXzTnY4pSrdm2AVdIiRO3q3r0B7R580hht_xtOj5ZNQKkn2RPjHO/s1600/JokerHolmes.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" psa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUrtc9tbmBYuYIh0UTc32jA3bn7ziabsS4W44OVgEq-WMwHNqCFa91NeTWs1jG0nvNoRQmsArtyc3FMU6htI7vBpEfyXzTnY4pSrdm2AVdIiRO3q3r0B7R580hht_xtOj5ZNQKkn2RPjHO/s320/JokerHolmes.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://img.thesun.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01553/HolmesPage01_1553320a.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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Although denied by "Lieutenant J.D. Knight...[and] Captain Vince Sauter of the Arapahoe County Sheriff's Office", a possible jail informant named Steven Unruh makes several remarkable claims about an alleged conversation with James holmes. (Apparently, <b>"[Unruh] has a form that indicates James Holmes tried to send him a letter</b>, but it was rejected by jail authorities. ...Knight says he has no record of any letter sent by Holmes to Unruh, intercepted or otherwise.")<br />
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"What Unruh can prove is that he was booked into the Arapahoe County Sheriff's Office Detention Facility on drug and theft charges at 6:44 p.m. on July 19 -- just hours before the attack in Aurora at a midnight showing of The Dark Knight Rises that left twelve dead and dozens wounded. Unruh says he was still in the booking area when officers brought in Holmes, whose head was initially covered with a hood. ...[I]n an interview that took place several days before [Holmes' behavior was widely reported,]...Unruh described... [Holmes' running...(and) slamming his body and his head into the (jail) wall]."<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Alan Prendergast, "James Holmes: Inmate's strange tale of 'confession' and suicide efforts," Tues., Nov. 20 2012 at 6:40 AM, Denver Westword, </span><a href="http://blogs.westword.com/latestword/2012/11/james_holmes_inmate_confession_suicide_aurora_theater_shooting.php"><span style="font-size: x-small;">URL</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">. Thank you to <b>Jim Brandon</b> for the news lead.)</span><br />
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"[Unruh] says that Holmes told him <b>'he felt like he was in a <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/inauspicious-beginning.html">video game</a>'</b> during the shooting, that 'he wasn't on his meds' and 'nobody would help him.' He says <b>Holmes also mentioned NLP -- presumably, neuro-linguistic programming</b>...-- and claimed to have been <b>'programmed' to kill by an evil therapist</b>. 'When he got out to his car, he wasn't programmed no more...'."<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Ibid., </span><a href="http://blogs.westword.com/latestword/2012/11/james_holmes_inmate_confession_suicide_aurora_theater_shooting.php?page=2"><span style="font-size: x-small;">URL</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">. Cf. </span><a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/07/the-serendipitous-notebook.html"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Here</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">, </span><a href="http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/shooting-suspect-james-holmes-treated-cu-psychiatrist-193517014.html"><span style="font-size: x-small;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">, & </span><a href="http://news.yahoo.com/report-colorado-shooting-suspect-sent-plans-notebook-psychiatrist-170815999.html"><span style="font-size: x-small;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">.)</span><br />
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<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derren_Brown"><span style="font-size: large;">Derren Brown</span></a><span style="font-size: large;">:</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIfZSzFIscETvY3FmrweWuov9dtbiQvM0_5IrhHKwlMRtHWbqNZ_3yGk7fvE03m0cLzR_9QPHnOG5wMuJoFADXUePIoeczV5aNrVsYTsCSrcIdok9_DbZVjPI1N4BvCuIuQV62RKi9XKg4/s1600/DerrenBrown.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" psa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIfZSzFIscETvY3FmrweWuov9dtbiQvM0_5IrhHKwlMRtHWbqNZ_3yGk7fvE03m0cLzR_9QPHnOG5wMuJoFADXUePIoeczV5aNrVsYTsCSrcIdok9_DbZVjPI1N4BvCuIuQV62RKi9XKg4/s320/DerrenBrown.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51dSZvwsT9L._SX500_.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">British mentalist induces a </span><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACp5nTlpv6c"><span style="font-size: large;">Zombie Shooter</span></a><span style="font-size: large;"> with a video game</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Mentalist bests psychologist at "</span><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HInA3N-M3gQ"><span style="font-size: large;">NLP</span></a><span style="font-size: large;">" </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Mentalist outdoes </span><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyQjr1YL0zg"><span style="font-size: large;">Advertising</span></a><span style="font-size: large;"> experts in subliminal game</span></div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
Cf. <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2143584/Scopolamine-Powerful-drug-growing-forests-Colombia-ELIMINATES-free-will.html">Zombie Drug</a>?</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiEQ-WZ1tl-BElFibQUZ-rfWvriKlSD0B-K8MuxU8-aV1Dq6pn__njssQFwyVhVi6n-lD-s7qaCmf2BzvK-QBA8YshYoh8J2jokwHJ_3Uwr6XrnsiiwoS0m5VPtH8CZucH1sDCn6J5kXV8/s1600/CIA.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" psa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiEQ-WZ1tl-BElFibQUZ-rfWvriKlSD0B-K8MuxU8-aV1Dq6pn__njssQFwyVhVi6n-lD-s7qaCmf2BzvK-QBA8YshYoh8J2jokwHJ_3Uwr6XrnsiiwoS0m5VPtH8CZucH1sDCn6J5kXV8/s1600/CIA.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://www.examiner.com/images/blog/wysiwyg/image/cia_seal(1).jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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"Headed by Sidney Gottlieb, the [Central Intelligence Agency's] <b>MKUltra project</b> was started on the order of CIA director Allen Welsh Dulles on April 13, 1953.... Its remit was to <b>develop mind-controlling drugs</b>... The CIA was also interested in being able to manipulate foreign leaders with such techniques... Experiments were often conducted without the subjects' knowledge or consent....In 1964, the project was renamed MKSEARCH. The project attempted to <b>produce a perfect truth drug</b>...and generally to explore any other possibilities of mind control. ...MKUltra involved the use of many methodologies to manipulate people's individual mental states and alter brain functions, including the surreptitious administration of drugs (especially <b>LSD</b>) and other chemicals, hypnosis, sensory deprivation, isolation, verbal and sexual abuse, as well as various forms of torture." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MKULTRA">Source</a>; cf. <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Programmed-Kill-Politics-Serial-Murder/dp/0595326404">here</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Societies-Psychological-Warfare-Michael-Hoffman/dp/0970378416/">here</a>.)<br />
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"<b>Frank Olson</b> (July 17, 1910 – November 28, 1953) was a biological warfare specialist working for the U.S. government at Fort Detrick in Maryland. <b>He was drugged with LSD by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and nine days later plunged to his death from the window of a New York hotel room</b>, in what some term a suicide and others allege was an assassination by the CIA." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Olson">Source</a>; Cf. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Forrestal#Psychiatric_treatment">Here</a> & <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/12/nightingale.html">here</a>.)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnG-tpXkzlg2AwjJF-LInMWSfss-R_2GjAaRYCGlPvOdCTR-qrZPXtAV9Ohf_NYRYrVBQVgSXUz0uSybe-5U4hyphenhypheniLJat4RuajiXHvaR9I0c_UyDQCMFOdSv713aPFbpEziyRnSxYaHVWu1/s1600/ManCalledX.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" psa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnG-tpXkzlg2AwjJF-LInMWSfss-R_2GjAaRYCGlPvOdCTR-qrZPXtAV9Ohf_NYRYrVBQVgSXUz0uSybe-5U4hyphenhypheniLJat4RuajiXHvaR9I0c_UyDQCMFOdSv713aPFbpEziyRnSxYaHVWu1/s1600/ManCalledX.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<i>The Man Called X</i>: Season 1, Episode 5: "Truth Serum" Feb. 24, 1956, </span><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0640791/"><span style="font-size: x-small;">URL</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">; Image </span><a href="http://www.emilsitka.com/images/288_mancalledxlogo.jpg"><span style="font-size: x-small;">source</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">)</span></div>
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<i>SEE ALSO:</i><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Mission </span><a href="http://www.personalgrowthcourses.net/video/mind_control/mission_mind_control_abc"><span style="font-size: large;">Mind Control</span></a><span style="font-size: large;">: ABC Documentary (1979)</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Scopolamine: </span><a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2143584/Scopolamine-Powerful-drug-growing-forests-Colombia-ELIMINATES-free-will.html"><span style="font-size: large;">Zombie Drug</span></a><span style="font-size: large;">?</span></div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Ted </span><a href="http://www.counterpunch.org/1999/07/15/ted-k-the-cia-lsd/"><span style="font-size: large;">K[aczynski]</span></a><span style="font-size: large;">., the CIA & LSD :</span></div>
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"<b>It turns out that Theodore Kaczynski, a.k.a. the Unabomber, was a volunteer in mind-control experiments sponsored by the CIA at Harvard in the late 1950s and early 1960s."</b><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair, "Ted K., the CIA & LSD," CounterPunch, July 15, 1999, </span><a href="http://www.counterpunch.org/1999/07/15/ted-k-the-cia-lsd/"><span style="font-size: x-small;">URL</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;"> .)</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2jtsL_lVpIQXswXZPLxrkvKOyBtI-MPRiPkRA2iIAznIq6TwFZ-I6SsWlYbqrFPgki3YJpdyMBBzg7jYgEV5bBG9ecc0HfUYQBfJLPwbrT6cuMFHSoD4yo7U8zaUq5vtEMNgSP7WgTuZd/s1600/Veritaserum.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" psa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2jtsL_lVpIQXswXZPLxrkvKOyBtI-MPRiPkRA2iIAznIq6TwFZ-I6SsWlYbqrFPgki3YJpdyMBBzg7jYgEV5bBG9ecc0HfUYQBfJLPwbrT6cuMFHSoD4yo7U8zaUq5vtEMNgSP7WgTuZd/s1600/Veritaserum.jpg" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://images4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20111226051651/powerlisting/images/d/d9/Veritaserum.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Professor Snape</b>: "Know what it is?"</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Harry</b>: [sarcastically] "Bubble juice, sir?"<br /><b>Professor Snape</b>: "<i>Veritaserum</i>. Three drops of this and </span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">You-Know-Who himself would spill his darkest secrets."</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">~ <i>Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire</i> (</span><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0330373/quotes"><span style="font-size: x-small;">2005</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">) </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>Veritas Vincit or Veritas Vin-cheat?</b></span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">###</span></div>
Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-47749177138348172892013-01-25T00:00:00.001-08:002013-01-30T19:39:40.410-08:00Turning Tables***<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>"Did Obama Just Take Default Off the Table?"</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<a href="http://www.cnbc.com/id/100377700">Source</a>)</div>
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(Flashback) Business Insider: <b> </b></div>
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<b>"Obama Ad, 'Table,' Lays Out President's Vision"</b></div>
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"In a lengthy new television spot, President Barack Obama lays out his pitch to American voters in a direct-to-camera style that has been well-received in the past. In the ad, called 'The Table,' Obama summarizes his four-point plan for a second term...'[I]f I could sit down with you in your living room or around the kitchen table here's what I'd say..." (<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/obama-ad-romney-table-campaign-economy-jobs-deficit-debt-2012-9">Source</a>) <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqgWS-GEuE0ZJknnoYcOlVi0lWUCdllISv2NyIjZj1UcAgBJQeALOtW6-j1akerkitD5iI5Qxumar5QNruZtUx61AoZFcUxkyorCc8jt6gAtPJIaCHjMhXh8qVO9jq9T0ME2o_FIqr05c1/s1600/Tables.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqgWS-GEuE0ZJknnoYcOlVi0lWUCdllISv2NyIjZj1UcAgBJQeALOtW6-j1akerkitD5iI5Qxumar5QNruZtUx61AoZFcUxkyorCc8jt6gAtPJIaCHjMhXh8qVO9jq9T0ME2o_FIqr05c1/s1600/Tables.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://sultanzeydan.edublogs.org/files/2011/07/backgammon1-174puhx.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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"Table" (definition) "<span class="rom-inline">Old English<i> </i></span><i></i><span class="ital-inline"><i>tabule</i>,</span> variant of <i><span class="ital-inline">tabula</span> </i>< <span class="rom-inline">Latin: </span>plank, tablet..." (<a href="http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/table">Source</a>). "Tablet" (definition) "early 14c., '<b>slab </b>or flat surface for an inscription' (especially <b>the two Mosaic tables of stone</b>), ...'slab'..." (<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=tablet&allowed_in_frame=0">Source</a>) "late 12c., 'board, slab, plate,' from Old French table 'board, plank, writing table, picture' (11c.)... from Latin <i>tabula </i>'a board, plank, table,' originally 'small flat slab or piece' usually for inscriptions or <b>for games</b>, of uncertain origin, related to Umbrian <i>tafle </i>'on the board.' [Cf.]...the ...Latin word ... <i>mensa</i>...Figurative phrase<b> turn the tables</b> (1630s) is from <b>backgammon </b>(in Old and Middle English the game was called tables). Table talk is attested from 1560s, translating Latin colloquia <i>mensalis</i>. ...The adjectival phrase <b>under-the-table 'hidden from view'</b> is recorded from 1949; under the table 'passed out from excess drinking' is recorded from 1921." (<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=table&allowed_in_frame=0">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUqa5LBPHXlZuGSfuGr3zD32KOSeisUp_Gf40Fzh7i7XV03Y49fMolyWo11osEv5Scmd2MoRWgunm2KGKQB3vX7Jk76fsBF0DzYrBQJksIRKzEUqdlldvtsQfwjBStU4NieLhGbf5NjyV_/s1600/ten-commandments.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="280" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUqa5LBPHXlZuGSfuGr3zD32KOSeisUp_Gf40Fzh7i7XV03Y49fMolyWo11osEv5Scmd2MoRWgunm2KGKQB3vX7Jk76fsBF0DzYrBQJksIRKzEUqdlldvtsQfwjBStU4NieLhGbf5NjyV_/s320/ten-commandments.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.planetpace.com/templates/img/ten-commandments.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkTQmQktTPQndsNingkmea3zl4eNQBVPS1ueUDXvQBOu381P-EB11dOl7WR0T1zXGYkS5w0b8OFHg5H625jCJAcCLFok_3qoWrmsu6bLq0Y_8NBZ4r5tNp0bxm4gFTUNkrPQqIb8uhE6uM/s1600/AaronSonOfTheDevil.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkTQmQktTPQndsNingkmea3zl4eNQBVPS1ueUDXvQBOu381P-EB11dOl7WR0T1zXGYkS5w0b8OFHg5H625jCJAcCLFok_3qoWrmsu6bLq0Y_8NBZ4r5tNp0bxm4gFTUNkrPQqIb8uhE6uM/s1600/AaronSonOfTheDevil.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">("The <b>Tablets of the Law" badge</b>, 1277; Image </span><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c7/Aaron%2CSonOfDevil.jpg"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Source;</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;"> article </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aaron,_Son_of_the_Devil"><span style="font-size: x-small;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">)</span></div>
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"<b>The Tablets of Stone, Stone Tablets, Tablets of Law, or Tablets of Testimony</b> (in Hebrew: ...Luchot HaBrit - 'the tablets [of] the covenant') in the Bible, were the two pieces of special stone inscribed with the Ten Commandments when Moses ascended Mount Sinai as recorded in the Book of Exodus. Exodus 31:18 refers to the tablets as the 'Tablets of Testimony'. According to the Bible, there were two sets. The first, inscribed by God, were smashed by Moses when he was enraged by the sight of the Children of Israel worshiping the Golden Calf; and the second, later cut by Moses and rewritten by God. <b>According to traditional teachings of Judaism in the Talmud, they were made of blue sapphire stone</b> as a symbolic reminder of the sky, the heavens, and ultimately of God's throne. Many Torah scholars, however, have opined that the Biblical 'sapir' was, in fact, the lapis lazuli..." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tablets_of_Stone">Source</a>) For more on sapphire, see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/al-o.html">HERE</a>. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixD8Q09ysQ-mUm2920wUL0fdl5j9hQVjQ-_wmOYi7ZDh8ERNIbi9t3piXEPsbXJI_DbTd8ji83DHKNBvNKayuhEWG0QS6RIDmPDUZ_lljbrH8nU63jXkIofZd8qmcJ8CcwzO03IfFrEjKf/s1600/Stele.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixD8Q09ysQ-mUm2920wUL0fdl5j9hQVjQ-_wmOYi7ZDh8ERNIbi9t3piXEPsbXJI_DbTd8ji83DHKNBvNKayuhEWG0QS6RIDmPDUZ_lljbrH8nU63jXkIofZd8qmcJ8CcwzO03IfFrEjKf/s320/Stele.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://goldenlotus-oto.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/stele1.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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"[T]he Stele of Revealing [was] an Egyptian tablet that had inspired [Aleister] Crowley during his trip in 1904 to Cairo, where it was object number 666 in the Museum of Antiquities." (John Carter, <i>Sex and Rockets</i>, p. 84). <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIeUV-pq1HhVtyK77ShmKAWzjv-khgQDi0dQfCZXUZdqd0YXzxPXrGeKfWWU3miAmrDVSdTMGY0amMrl6TILivRn7OQBYaffzbPFPaqkWEgzBEAxOMdKu1vgnCDZx_qTiXnSsfpjNU2Q4G/s1600/John_Dee_Ashmolean.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIeUV-pq1HhVtyK77ShmKAWzjv-khgQDi0dQfCZXUZdqd0YXzxPXrGeKfWWU3miAmrDVSdTMGY0amMrl6TILivRn7OQBYaffzbPFPaqkWEgzBEAxOMdKu1vgnCDZx_qTiXnSsfpjNU2Q4G/s320/John_Dee_Ashmolean.jpg" width="266" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(John Dee; Image </span><a href="http://i293.photobucket.com/albums/mm76/calvinkitsch/John_Dee_Ashmolean.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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The so-called "Enochian Tablets," also designated by Crowley by the phrase "the Watch Towers of the Universe" were communications, alleged to have been from sort of spirit beings termed "angels," received by 16th Century Elizabethan "sorcerers" Edward Kelley and John Dee. "According to Kelley, the angels showed him large tablets bearing unusual letters, which supposedly formed the oldest language of them all: the language of the angels." The language was called "Enochian," the story goes, after the "lost books of Enoch" that the "angels" gave to Kelley and Dee. Also supplied were "...Calls...for summoning angels to the caller...". In his own "magickal workings," Jack Parsons employed some of these materials, for example "the Enochian 'Air Tablet'..." (Carter, <i>Supra.</i>, pp. 92, 111, & 119).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6IzpXNHOJGpPcpFR9IelUHT0azh9IkvbtfCgDG6MZkzAjCk1Q5A8hZiAgP9sLm5AoBhGMuwg5d2CWjV9ZWYMVULQBSpQ_GCvMl1NwyTZ_4JN_P7b29FxURZB3gD87n0KO8PR90t7-_ajF/s1600/HTC_Air_tablet_2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6IzpXNHOJGpPcpFR9IelUHT0azh9IkvbtfCgDG6MZkzAjCk1Q5A8hZiAgP9sLm5AoBhGMuwg5d2CWjV9ZWYMVULQBSpQ_GCvMl1NwyTZ_4JN_P7b29FxURZB3gD87n0KO8PR90t7-_ajF/s320/HTC_Air_tablet_2.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.concept-phones.com/htc/htc-air-tablet-design-incredibly-thin/">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Many people today are now carrying around a sort of modern day "<b>Air Tablet</b>." Amongst the popular brands of "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tablet_computer">Tablet computer</a>" currently available is the "<a href="http://www.concept-phones.com/htc/htc-air-tablet-design-incredibly-thin/">HTC Air</a>." <b>The so-called "Tablets" run on "Android."</b> "Android is a Linux-based operating system designed primarily for touchscreen mobile devices such as smartphones and tablet computers. ...Android, Inc. was founded in Palo Alto, California in <b>October 2003</b> by Andy Rubin (co-founder of Danger),... Rich Miner (co-founder of Wildfire Communications, Inc.),... Nick Sears... (once VP at T-Mobile),... and Chris White (headed design and interface development at WebTV)... to develop, in Rubin's words 'smarter mobile devices that are more aware of its owner's location and preferences'" (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_%28operating_system%29">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgu2Bph0sujqkWF4EmYZcpe66MpWNAJ83DJdWC4HX-wnCu6h9ayZkOUhuKt0v32gwns7ZpvMoNImeQWBKdeM_EKqrb_VAHbTadQ2N4cJ9tKNjoVYQZKLk4AD5XVyPKEWNIfZuCp3vnMS-C/s1600/OuterLimits.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgu2Bph0sujqkWF4EmYZcpe66MpWNAJ83DJdWC4HX-wnCu6h9ayZkOUhuKt0v32gwns7ZpvMoNImeQWBKdeM_EKqrb_VAHbTadQ2N4cJ9tKNjoVYQZKLk4AD5XVyPKEWNIfZuCp3vnMS-C/s320/OuterLimits.jpg" width="213" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BMTEzMDE0ODM0OTFeQTJeQWpwZ15BbWU3MDEzNTI4ODQ@._V1._SX640_SY960_.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<i>The Outer Limits</i>: "<b>Blank Slate</b>," (Season 5, Episode 8, 2 April 1999): "This well-manicured man is being change by somebody and is <b>carrying all of his memories in a box</b>." (<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0667868/">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEju3Wu3RNeHUxsDUePD-I-05TLc6kQljzW9bacsGJowQhQChGOUPxj9aBuBtxjeSuE9ykcI34uHeM4sV4vz-FrQMFHs3Hn1uFvDzUdieBkp3rs6JBmJJuoVczMzQiBMeMwgCluynp6yLXey/s1600/TabletMemories.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEju3Wu3RNeHUxsDUePD-I-05TLc6kQljzW9bacsGJowQhQChGOUPxj9aBuBtxjeSuE9ykcI34uHeM4sV4vz-FrQMFHs3Hn1uFvDzUdieBkp3rs6JBmJJuoVczMzQiBMeMwgCluynp6yLXey/s320/TabletMemories.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"> (<a href="http://info.boltinsurance.com/Portals/16893/images/Safeguarding%20Your%20Business%20iPad.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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"Rather than just displaying your most recent activities, your profile will become a scrapbook documenting your entire life, all the way back to your birth. <b>Facebook will become a record of your existence: All your memories</b>, your victories and your defeats, your loves, your losses and everything in between." (<a href="http://www.cnn.com/2011/09/26/tech/social-media/facebook-users-will-revolt-cashmore/index.html">Source</a>) <br />
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<i>"Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous <b>red dragon</b>...The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray."</i></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">~ Revelation 12:3, 9, </span><a href="http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation+12&version=NIV"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">NIV</span></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIhwUHXjUCD7hENw6VCDNf8whKomaJbLD8HjlIeaknQ-Hc7GkT-aM19tWFdzEtFmnfgTw6r0qz18XodZutcHTjxraLK8PXV-g1yQ68f45FDYeiHtgjWKJOg5gK7whWtqwCB2u8lLF7ZyZQ/s1600/Qualcomm-SnapDragon.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIhwUHXjUCD7hENw6VCDNf8whKomaJbLD8HjlIeaknQ-Hc7GkT-aM19tWFdzEtFmnfgTw6r0qz18XodZutcHTjxraLK8PXV-g1yQ68f45FDYeiHtgjWKJOg5gK7whWtqwCB2u8lLF7ZyZQ/s1600/Qualcomm-SnapDragon.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(The "SnapDragon" logo manages to combine elements suggestive of the dragon [lexically] and phoenix [symbolically] on a stylized Taiji [Yin-Yang Symbol]; Image </span><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/18/Qualcomm-SnapDragon.jpg"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">)</span></div>
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"<b>Snapdragon</b> is a family of mobile system on chips (SoC) by Qualcomm. Qualcomm considers Snapdragon a 'platform' for use in smartphones, tablets, and smartbook devices. The original Snapdragon CPU...[was] dubbed <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scorpion_King_(disambiguation)">Scorpion</a>..." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snapdragon_%28System_on_Chip%29">Source</a>) <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSvpmE043ysLLI-Zo3GLPf67cRkbmH52FxhS1pSqW7dyd_I5vYcPqu7B4ZCq_BMPzBnjq89V8SQ4Y-6etTnk9Yqj3ilIv0L8o3FBSJGUwUZs-bAVAKXvMwcMqAUIt4HknGhXNxvWhnBI4a/s1600/Periodic.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSvpmE043ysLLI-Zo3GLPf67cRkbmH52FxhS1pSqW7dyd_I5vYcPqu7B4ZCq_BMPzBnjq89V8SQ4Y-6etTnk9Yqj3ilIv0L8o3FBSJGUwUZs-bAVAKXvMwcMqAUIt4HknGhXNxvWhnBI4a/s320/Periodic.gif" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://i.infopls.com/images/periodictableWEB_ext.gif">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Another important sort of table is the "<b>Periodic Table</b> of the Elements." For more on elements, see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/al-o.html">Here</a>. But let me just make a few points.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlSOCCWcLqUGlmQgSRGGlRsrS_u49OtWbbVCgYmb2hBT2doVOF5pMbQZ8mRLqUttvGpsitjXpDWVQZQSAxHULA3Si3QZQ68Q9McF_F6oDc2nFn_OLZzGcSMO-0ULJwLAYALZ7V6KZeIrEF/s1600/AU.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlSOCCWcLqUGlmQgSRGGlRsrS_u49OtWbbVCgYmb2hBT2doVOF5pMbQZ8mRLqUttvGpsitjXpDWVQZQSAxHULA3Si3QZQ68Q9McF_F6oDc2nFn_OLZzGcSMO-0ULJwLAYALZ7V6KZeIrEF/s320/AU.png" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mb99d8aUtz1qce113.png"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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First: "Gold...is a chemical element with the symbol Au (aurum in Latin, meaning glow of sunrise)...". "AU" represents the glow of the Aurora (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold">Source</a>). It also stands for Australia, which has been in the news <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/al-o.html">here</a>, <a href="http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/1729820/Oswald-to-bring-Qld-rain-on-Australia-Day">here</a>, and <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2013/01/smurfs.html">here</a>. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgi-QKvWO7bfKscJVFsRHkO6mvcZhTpWdRVb-hrKD40AzrtwdnvjUUJmE1GM7oyPGumeU9Q8S4Cz6pziDpkC3X5qjlGMeix-hCoFhz7ANVd8Xlr1k31YNXPmZlzNJJJECOoLXDJ8FnEOcLm/s1600/CO.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgi-QKvWO7bfKscJVFsRHkO6mvcZhTpWdRVb-hrKD40AzrtwdnvjUUJmE1GM7oyPGumeU9Q8S4Cz6pziDpkC3X5qjlGMeix-hCoFhz7ANVd8Xlr1k31YNXPmZlzNJJJECOoLXDJ8FnEOcLm/s320/CO.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://www.buzzle.com/img/articleImages/276131-8511-16.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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Second, "Cobalt" has cropped up in some interesting places of late. "Mission Impossible IV" (which I mentioned <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/shuttling-symbols.html">here</a>) was associated with "The Dark Knight" (e.g., of Aurora notoriety) in several ways. For example: "Paramount is on a mission to redo the 'Mission: Impossible' franchise. ... It's possible that the title won't even include any variation of the familiar moniker (much as Christopher Nolan's Batman sequel was simply titled 'The Dark Knight')" (<a href="http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118023361/">Source</a>). More importantly, <i>Ghost Protocol</i> sort of introduced the <i>Dark Knight Rises</i>: "...Warner Bros. plans to attach a six minute prologue to <i>The Dark Knight Rises</i> to all IMAX prints of <i>Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol</i>" (<a href="http://www.slashfilm.com/rumor-8-minute-dark-knight-rises-prologue-attached-mission-impossible-ghost-protocol-imax/">Source</a>); Sidebar: See the two "Sabine Moreaus" <a href="http://www.imdb.com/character/ch0277973/">here</a> and <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/woman-drives-900-miles-gps-error-181605523.htm">here</a>)<br />
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Here's a bit of movie review text that - to my eyes, anyway - is just bristling with Forteana:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
After a rash of <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/11/red-dawn-12.html"><b>red</b></a>-<a href="http://visupview.blogspot.com/2012/05/conan-mysteries-part-i.html">baiting </a>anti-communist films in the early 1950s, the popular cinema of the English-speaking world largely abandoned communist villains in favour of conspiratorial freelance crooks (like "<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/shuttling-symbols.html"><b>Spectre</b></a>" in the Bond movies) and trouble-making renegades. This canny practice continues, and in the fourth big-screen spin-off of long-running TV espionage series <i>Mission: Impossible</i> the villain is Kurt Hendricks (Michael Nyqvist), a deranged Swedish nuclear scientist trying to create a third world war by fomenting conflict between the United States and Russia. The plot is much the same as that in the latest <i>Sherlock <b>Holmes</b></i> [Cf. <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/now-playing-at-century-16-ampitheater.html">0</a>, <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/07/dark-knight-shooting.html">1</a>, <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/07/anticipating-aurora.html">2</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/just-few-comments.html">3</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/07/the-tragi-comedy-thalia-melpomene-of.html">4</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/07/the-serendipitous-notebook.html">5</a>, <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/07/tom-cruise-33-of-separation.html">6</a>, and <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/07/holmes-harlots.html">7</a>] picture, though the aim here is the quite literal end of civilisation as we know it so that a newly cleansed world can open up for mankind. (<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2012/jan/01/mission-impossible-ghost-protocol-review">Source</a>)</blockquote>
Now (fairly or not) <i>People</i> magazine summarized "Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows" as being about "about a flim-flam man bombing select targets in Europe in an effort to start a world war" adding, parenthetically, that "WWI ignites a mere two decades after the film is set" (<a href="http://www.people.com/people/news/category/0,,MediaProductsTax:MovieSherlockHolmesAGameofShadows,00.html">Source</a>).<br />
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Compare: "Eve of Disaster. Why 2013 eerily looks like the world of 1913, on the cusp of the Great War" (<a href="http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/01/04/why_2013_looks_a_lot_like_1913">Source</a>).<br />
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"Ghost Protocol" (which name evokes <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/shuttling-symbols.html"><i>specters </i></a>of the past, does it not?) centers around the efforts of a physicist-cum-terrorist, code-named "Cobalt" to incite a global nuclear cataclysm. "Cobalt is a chemical element with symbol Co..." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobalt">Source</a>) "CO" is also the abbreviation for a certain US state, host of shooting tragedies from Columbine to Aurora (See <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/07/a-fools-journey.html">here</a> and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/now-playing-at-century-16-ampitheater.html">here</a>). Physics (particularly in its <i>quantum </i>aspects) has sometimes been called the "new alchemy" (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Alan_Wolf">Source</a>).These quantum-atomic alchemical-physical musings are associated with the WWI era...oh, say...<a href="http://mvc.bioweb.dcccd.edu/weblinks/1911a.html">around</a> 1911-1912.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWnBOtCRJAPyFilOTqnsa4YiU4IvAgwDkYXf0i8L3-tAR_o6lXT13Y40laU-7QHf_wKxMdgMZwuDFiVHiVunfm2lIHfOyMzQoN-mGDafO5-p-03tjDCuxz5c2fYg3Rr6w4fVfdqhQHQT5z/s1600/COBOL.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWnBOtCRJAPyFilOTqnsa4YiU4IvAgwDkYXf0i8L3-tAR_o6lXT13Y40laU-7QHf_wKxMdgMZwuDFiVHiVunfm2lIHfOyMzQoN-mGDafO5-p-03tjDCuxz5c2fYg3Rr6w4fVfdqhQHQT5z/s320/COBOL.jpg" width="258" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Programming Language: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COBOL">COBOL</a>; Image </span><a href="http://www.programmingwebbooks.co.in/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/978-0672314537.jpg"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">)</span></div>
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The dastardly corporation in Inception is also called "Cobol." One commentator wrote: "Cobal (sp?) - This unseen corporation has a very comic book feel to it. The name sounds like 'cabal' or '<b><i>cobalt</i></b>'" (<a href="http://makingthemovie.info/2010/07/inception-explained-spoilers.html">Source</a>).<br />
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An additional worthy mention goes to the notion of the <i>Tabula Rasa</i> or "Blank Slate," perhaps most well known as a facet of <a href="http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/locke/">John Locke</a>'s epistemology, but certainly not without its antecedents. According to this conception, associated with naïve formulations of empiricism, the mind is more or less "empty" (i.e., a "blank slate") until it is "filled" (or, inscribed upon) by sense experience. However, empiricists can (and do) dissent. For example, <a href="http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/francis-bacon/">Francis Bacon</a> is often cited as opposing the <i>tabula rasa</i> position. An overview of certain aspects of the philosophical debate can be glimpsed <a href="http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/innateness-history/">here</a>. A related discussion, termed the "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nature_versus_nurture">nature-nurture debate</a>," has taken place in psychology.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivTKIV_YE99uTkmCyvms_twpDF2o79gQO0rU60Vlx7LGQzZOOqFV21Q7zoyGrKV5DBt5cO596nx_LZsBvZg3dkPKNhvwxBz6WV_Y2_LBg5TMYJwUGa2NErP88RozW2LXTywKv8OsqK8jrw/s1600/ObamaFly.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="195" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivTKIV_YE99uTkmCyvms_twpDF2o79gQO0rU60Vlx7LGQzZOOqFV21Q7zoyGrKV5DBt5cO596nx_LZsBvZg3dkPKNhvwxBz6WV_Y2_LBg5TMYJwUGa2NErP88RozW2LXTywKv8OsqK8jrw/s320/ObamaFly.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">"A fly lands on President Barack Obama while he speaks in the White House"</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">[Larry Downing/Reuters]<a href="http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/obama-vs-fly-call-draw-205357952--politics.html"><span style="font-size: x-small;"> </span>Source</a>; Image <a href="http://media.zenfs.com/en/blogs/theticket/2013-01-24T203805Z_568560029_GM1E91P0CTB01_RTRMAD%20%20P_3_FINANCIAL-REGULATION-NOMINATIONS.JPG">Source</a> Cf. <a href="https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=sites&srcid=ZGVmYXVsdGRvbWFpbnx0b3dlcm9mYmVsbHxneDozYzRlNGU3MmRhMjIyNGE">Here</a></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVwm9GdjmjaLKWzK6APa2ER8hj0XnMuU_mdDvz8SKUX7ocsOKZQhVaZkUGPVNmc6_9HJrXJzFPpLVc3LMEzMuGF4RukFqvXiPyH7mGVOLSI6Kgd4ZuY6Un02fQdDS7CozntimDfpssL28Y/s1600/LordOfTheFlies.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVwm9GdjmjaLKWzK6APa2ER8hj0XnMuU_mdDvz8SKUX7ocsOKZQhVaZkUGPVNmc6_9HJrXJzFPpLVc3LMEzMuGF4RukFqvXiPyH7mGVOLSI6Kgd4ZuY6Un02fQdDS7CozntimDfpssL28Y/s320/LordOfTheFlies.jpg" width="180" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://media.npr.org/assets/bakertaylor/covers/l/lord-of-the-flies/9780399501487_custom-16f49e664528eec135f04948cd7384b93c063a08-s6-c10.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Thought experiments are often employed when considering issues of this sort. One may appeal to various literary visions to make one's case - pro or contra. For example, "one [might]...envision an...extreme experiment: the depositing of a population of pre-adolescents on a desert island, <b><i>Lord of the Flies-like</i></b>. A <b>tabula rasa</b> quickly ceases to be a clean slate (if it ever was...)" (Paul Kerswill, "Contact and new varieties," Raymond Hickey, <i>The Handbook of Language Contact</i> [Wiley-Blackwell, 2012], p. <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=W85T-B6kPAEC&pg=PA238">238</a>). <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg93z0HdIE3pm2cN5CF-72Kg01JBkfZpOFzW52xx1b8OO2Ai1gPvZ7R_5Z8k9O9Vwyqz7k_aj-2JHUAtpGcSduV_KE3fT7CY-M9Cm0oN9phDItswyZWCtUkJwVV4owhaK8Q64ge8qXqFS9n/s1600/BaalZabub.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg93z0HdIE3pm2cN5CF-72Kg01JBkfZpOFzW52xx1b8OO2Ai1gPvZ7R_5Z8k9O9Vwyqz7k_aj-2JHUAtpGcSduV_KE3fT7CY-M9Cm0oN9phDItswyZWCtUkJwVV4owhaK8Q64ge8qXqFS9n/s320/BaalZabub.jpg" width="279" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://gradhiva.revues.org/docannexe/image/986/img-8.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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"BAAL-ZEBUB [, BEELZEBUB or BEELZEBUL] ...Philistine [god] mentioned in...II Kings i. 2, 3, 6, 16)... As the word stands, it means 'Baal of flies'...the god who expels or destroys flies; though it may also mean the patron or controller of flies. ...A [Zeus Apomyios - APOMYIUS/Apomuios, 'Averter of Flies'/'driving away the flies,' a surname of Zeus at Olympia. On one occasion, when Heracles was offering a sacrifice to Zeus at Olympia, he was annoyed by hosts of flies, and in order to get rid of them, he offered a sacrifice to Zeus Apomyius, whereupon the flies withdrew across the river Alpheius...] was worshiped at Elis in Greece as a disperser of flies...[The name is commonly explained after the Septuagint and Josephus, 'Ant.' ix. 2, § 1, as the 'Lord of Flies'...Plagues [are] often ascribed to the influence of flies...<b>Apollo Apomyios</b> [Cf. <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/12/neil-armstrong-astronaut-or-alchemist.html">HERE</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/nasas-33-degree-kline-konnektion.html">HERE</a>, and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/armstrong-symbolically-ostensively.html">HERE</a> - Ed.] [was another Greek] god who dispelled lies...[T]he fly was regarded by the Jews in particular as more or less impure and demonic. 'The evil spirit [ye-er ha-ra] lies like a fly at the doors of the human heart,' says Rab, with reference to 'the flies of death' in Eccl. x. 1 (Ber. 61a and Targ. Yer. to the passage). 'A fly, being an impure thing, was never seen in the slaughterhouse of the Temple' (Abot v. 8), nor did one cross the table of Elisha; which fact, according to Rab, gave proof to the Shunammite woman that he was 'a holy man' (II Kings iv. 9; Ber. 10b). The devil in German folk-lore also appears in the shape of a fly..." (Sources: <a href="http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/2255-baal-zebub">1</a>, <a href="http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/2255-baal-zebub">2</a>, & <a href="http://www.theoi.com/Cult/ZeusTitles.html">3</a>; For more information, see <a href="https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=sites&srcid=ZGVmYXVsdGRvbWFpbnx0b3dlcm9mYmVsbHxneDozYzRlNGU3MmRhMjIyNGE">here</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Traditions-Jews-Johann-Andreas-Eisenmenger/dp/0970378440">here</a>).<br />
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Of (Fortean) interest are the numerous cultural references to the <i>tabula rasa</i>, or "blank slate." Here is a sampling.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1sRcSWsrEPcr2j90QmXwE-mPzcm7pOAuE6-v3zlfqlYstBVLOOlvl1duYVdJwFZERLbUP47e5F4S4BmWP1c63mRfFenOytRge59fWrzIxjA2FQ3aJaQRzgsRB8qzVBrGM0BmKhgjkcUzs/s1600/The_Blank_Slate.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1sRcSWsrEPcr2j90QmXwE-mPzcm7pOAuE6-v3zlfqlYstBVLOOlvl1duYVdJwFZERLbUP47e5F4S4BmWP1c63mRfFenOytRge59fWrzIxjA2FQ3aJaQRzgsRB8qzVBrGM0BmKhgjkcUzs/s320/The_Blank_Slate.jpg" width="206" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/30/The_Blank_Slate.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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A 2002 work by author Steven Pinker, in the vein of evolutionary psychology, is titled <i>The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature</i>. Wikipedia's summary describes it as "a best-selling...book...[that argues] against <i>tabula rasa</i> models of the social sciences." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Blank_Slate">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqa1Gd-YuXqdGNDako0Q26WV1jagjVPrtVKcO-8CCNIp69Gxiwuq7bHvhWPMRbvm_G3bNaGj4y1xFJdd3h5eYbI-WpzKt2KgMTEVU1pi7c0iSoHZzr_HorHC8LGGIymX-ClZZMWQ0Emc9F/s1600/Amazo.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqa1Gd-YuXqdGNDako0Q26WV1jagjVPrtVKcO-8CCNIp69Gxiwuq7bHvhWPMRbvm_G3bNaGj4y1xFJdd3h5eYbI-WpzKt2KgMTEVU1pi7c0iSoHZzr_HorHC8LGGIymX-ClZZMWQ0Emc9F/s320/Amazo.gif" width="219" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">("<b>Amazo</b>," the <b>Android</b>; Image </span><a href="http://jlurevisited.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/12762915872-30.gif"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1Xuk3RrluTye8lOWEsgtrFRMerX_6P_0N4tiMmtYFMCn46cY2NwZUfDG3ZfsNAWW2w0PhbHBV-WBIyQkZiGK33UyWxV5Y4BJs113Vf-IoroONR0F-qqKrl4BISqhApH4FYO87evgisJoh/s1600/Amazon-android.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="196" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1Xuk3RrluTye8lOWEsgtrFRMerX_6P_0N4tiMmtYFMCn46cY2NwZUfDG3ZfsNAWW2w0PhbHBV-WBIyQkZiGK33UyWxV5Y4BJs113Vf-IoroONR0F-qqKrl4BISqhApH4FYO87evgisJoh/s320/Amazon-android.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<b>Amazo</b>n selling <b>Android</b> Tablets; Image Source)</span></div>
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The animated super-hero themed television series called "The Justice League" ran "Tabula Rasa" episode (by a creative team that included Dan Riba and the interestingly named Stan Berkowitz) that aired on <b>October 4, 2003</b>. The plot apparently revolves around two stories. Firstly, "Lex Luthor controls and manipulates a powerful <b>android </b>named <b>Amazo</b> [who has] the ability to copy and collect any superpower... Meanwhile, J'onn questions the nature of humans and struggles with the burden of hearing thousands of their minds in his head at the same time after performing a psychic sweep of the city of Metropolis in a failed attempt to locate Luthor." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Justice_League_episodes#Season_2:_2003.E2.80.932004">Source</a>) Now, just for grins, we could a question. If a "blank slate" episode "wipes" the mind, then with what is that wiped mind filled thereafter? The next "program" of October 11, 2003, titled "Only a Dream," (by Butch Lukic & Stan Berkowitz) involves: "<b>Small time crook John Dee" who "<i>volunteers for an experimental treatment while in prison</i>." </b>However, "[w]hile the authorities are distracted by a mass prison break...John Dee overdoses to become the dream-controlling Doctor Destiny...[who subsequently] takes telepathic control of most of the team [I presume this is a reference to the "Justice League" hero characters -Ed.] in their sleep, leaving Batman and J'onn to save the others. As the League members become trapped in their dreams and unable to wake up, J'onn tries to force them awake, while Batman goes to confront Dr. Destiny." (<i>Ibid.</i>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4yV9VjkoDdT-lwcoW0MzTLZLgxQBsi5j0GpbZTcL_JADGVquPlF1q0kfnqyfEl-xEmFnMLY7Ztgg2vd-GyXZera_Oc5ZxzlY_RTmiYiaj51MBKnvnhRPaUHxPWWmVwGPLuDjlOKLnh_6y/s1600/406-tabularasa.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="258" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4yV9VjkoDdT-lwcoW0MzTLZLgxQBsi5j0GpbZTcL_JADGVquPlF1q0kfnqyfEl-xEmFnMLY7Ztgg2vd-GyXZera_Oc5ZxzlY_RTmiYiaj51MBKnvnhRPaUHxPWWmVwGPLuDjlOKLnh_6y/s320/406-tabularasa.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c365/wraithfodder/SGA%20season%204%20episodes/406-tabularasa.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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Another series, the Sci Fi Channel show <b><i>Stargate Atlantis</i>,</b> had a November 2, 2007 "<b>Tabula Rasa</b>" entry. In the plot (created by Martin Wood and Alan McCullough), "[a] deadly disease courses through Atlantis, causing the entire expedition to lose their memory." And two characters must work to reverse, correct, or otherwise remedy this pitiful state of affairs. (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabula_Rasa_%28Stargate_Atlantis%29">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIDAkOfqOtOcpSGn2A4PVkt5dv4Q7yfU-XyFveAFJb8xfgtZwosZVx2kRBA3IZ7sxw4JpQraLKQh44-HhymkvNv2jU5_FaaFpmn2KjNIoUgddqQAi5aTafkC_CBhT8XwirYq0HJYjfWl0q/s1600/SetTable.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIDAkOfqOtOcpSGn2A4PVkt5dv4Q7yfU-XyFveAFJb8xfgtZwosZVx2kRBA3IZ7sxw4JpQraLKQh44-HhymkvNv2jU5_FaaFpmn2KjNIoUgddqQAi5aTafkC_CBhT8XwirYq0HJYjfWl0q/s1600/SetTable.gif" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://www.judaism.com/gif-bk/10136a.gif"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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"The <i>Shulchan Aruch</i> (...literally: <b>'Set Table'</b>)...also known as the Code of Jewish Law, is the most authoritative legal code of Judaism. It was authored in Safed, Ottoman Eyalet of Damascus, by Yosef Karo in 1563 and published in Venice two years later... Together with its commentaries, it is the most widely accepted compilation of Jewish law ever written" (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shulhan_Aruch">Source</a>; For more information, see <a href="http://revisionisthistorystore.blogspot.com/2010/03/michael-hoffmans-online-revisionist.html">HERE</a>.)<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://www.judaism.com/gif-bk/23623a.gif"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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<i>Sefer Sheva Mitzvot HaShem</i> ("The Book of the Commandments of the Name"): Chabad views: <b>A Shulchan Aruch for Gentiles</b>[:] After the late Rebbe of Chabad Lubavitch, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, started his Noahide Campaign in the 1980s, the number of Gentiles willing to keep the Seven Laws of Noah as described in the Torah increased...A codification of the exact obligations of the Gentiles in the spirit of the classical Shulchan Aruch was needed. In 2005 the scholar Rabbi Moshe Weiner of Jerusalem accepted to produce an in-depth codification of the Noahide precepts...The work is called Sefer Sheva Mitzvot HaShem, (The Book of Seven Divine Commandments) published 2008/2009. As it is approved by both Chief Rabbis of Israel, Rabbi Shlomo Moshe Amar and Rabbi Yonah Metzger, as well as other Hasidic- and non-Hasidic halachic authorities like Rabbi Zalman Nechemia Goldberg, Rabbi Gedalia Dov Schwartz and Rabbi Jacob Immanuel Schochet, it can claim an authoritative character and is referred as a 'Shulchan Aruch'... for Gentiles at many places" (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noahide_laws#Chabad_views:_A_Shulchan_Aruch_for_Gentiles">Source</a> - Stamped: "This page was last modified on 15 January 2013 at 19:39.")<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIiqeaF-DOxPtMAcWCtzHm_8RIiyh3vGmb0Xty6gTvcwspZITxdHUIB5R_rDu-LBR8em7OFTN8V0v-Bk38_1Ks58IzyU-jmuKmrNyMMvaqTbROY8UBJhfayommzt-zAEfLRYSUdyXU1dm5/s1600/Rainbow123.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIiqeaF-DOxPtMAcWCtzHm_8RIiyh3vGmb0Xty6gTvcwspZITxdHUIB5R_rDu-LBR8em7OFTN8V0v-Bk38_1Ks58IzyU-jmuKmrNyMMvaqTbROY8UBJhfayommzt-zAEfLRYSUdyXU1dm5/s1600/Rainbow123.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/05/Rainbow123.JPG"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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"In Judaism, the Seven Laws of Noah (...Sheva mitzvot B'nei Noach) form the major part of the Noachide Laws, or Noahide Code... This code is a set of moral imperatives that, according to the Talmud, were given by God... as a binding set of laws for the 'children of Noah' – that is, all of humankind...According to religious Judaism, any non-Jew who adheres to these laws is regarded as a righteous gentile, and is assured of a place in the World to Come (Olam Haba), the final reward of the righteous... Adherents are often called 'B'nei Noach' (Children of Noah) or 'Noahides' and may often network in Jewish synagogues...The rainbow is the modern symbol of the Noahide Movement, recalling the rainbow that appeared after the Great Flood of the Bible" (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noahide_laws">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB0XSMb3pA55USisq5v4_5lu1oWvVgWCMPP671gzm1AApre_Z4cFM22PzNfl95g3azaCJJZMJqmkXUBbMexI_lkEltQfV4burkSX_j-b-Ir7oyVTYTWlueHmDPr1O79pub3ZaEBaa4v2vq/s1600/The-Wizard-of-Oz.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB0XSMb3pA55USisq5v4_5lu1oWvVgWCMPP671gzm1AApre_Z4cFM22PzNfl95g3azaCJJZMJqmkXUBbMexI_lkEltQfV4burkSX_j-b-Ir7oyVTYTWlueHmDPr1O79pub3ZaEBaa4v2vq/s320/The-Wizard-of-Oz.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">("Over the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Over_the_Rainbow">Rainbow</a>"; Image <a href="http://gingerparrot.co.uk/wp/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/The-Wizard-of-Oz.jpg">Source</a>)</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZP4Ax-k0jsIdoun1DkTGjGRIiqJyJvW1T7kddTF4H39EEWw0lds9q76etjB_C2I33o9ZFpfHFORjJ2fGVvzyg1GijZvgePb8tQkbnIJO7zjlYZtC7irrhjVyBTpz1ekKEqDROl2e709xk/s1600/Chakra.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="314" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZP4Ax-k0jsIdoun1DkTGjGRIiqJyJvW1T7kddTF4H39EEWw0lds9q76etjB_C2I33o9ZFpfHFORjJ2fGVvzyg1GijZvgePb8tQkbnIJO7zjlYZtC7irrhjVyBTpz1ekKEqDROl2e709xk/s320/Chakra.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(The so-called "awakened Crown Chakra" is here depicted as radiating a Rainbow</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Shalila Sharamon & Bodo j. Baginski, <i>The Chakra-Handbook</i>; Image Source <a href="http://www.rickrichards.com/chakras/chakra_girl2.jpg">URL</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOaVDkLkBqNzFYqplm9LNcArHLsikecvEeQwgkMEuII-vxDkIh6dcMxrf8dP3N6_fDGtHCBmOrf2GBeTVIZKYqZkTGD4NXnXxF4ZiRkR2ZHvFnvVxUAhxv8LNYyOl9dN78X_LLtafpdDfa/s1600/Bifrost.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="149" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOaVDkLkBqNzFYqplm9LNcArHLsikecvEeQwgkMEuII-vxDkIh6dcMxrf8dP3N6_fDGtHCBmOrf2GBeTVIZKYqZkTGD4NXnXxF4ZiRkR2ZHvFnvVxUAhxv8LNYyOl9dN78X_LLtafpdDfa/s320/Bifrost.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">("What you seek, it's a bridge. ...a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bifr%C3%B6st">Rainbow Bridge</a>." ~ <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0800369/quotes">Thor</a>; Image <a href="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mdk07xXHnm1r8sw2e.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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To go further "over the rainbow" see <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbow_flag_(LGBT_movement)">here</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/morgan-le-fay.html">here</a>, <a href="http://bellofchurch.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-gospel-of-judas-and-yezidism.html">here</a>, <a href="http://revisionistreview.blogspot.com/2012/08/of-human-alchemy-and-gay-science.html">here</a>, and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/now-playing-at-century-16-ampitheater.html">here</a>).<br />
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See Maurice Pinay's entries <a href="http://noahide.blogspot.com/">HERE</a>. <br />
###Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-9557769738735482352013-01-23T01:33:00.000-08:002013-01-30T19:35:54.657-08:00Al-O***<br />
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<b>"You were in Eden, the garden of God;</b></div>
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<b>every precious stone was your covering, </b></div>
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<b>sardius, topaz, and diamond, </b></div>
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<b>beryl, onyx, and jasper, </b></div>
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<b>sapphire, emerald, and carbuncle; </b></div>
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<b>and crafted in gold were your settings and your engravings. </b></div>
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<b>On the day that you were created they were prepared."</b></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"> ~ Ezekiel 28:13 (<a href="http://esv.scripturetext.com/ezekiel/28.htm">ESV</a>) </span></div>
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<b>"The Saphire Colour, that Orient Blewe, </b></div>
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<b>Like in colour to the heavenlie hue, </b></div>
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<b>Is much fairer than Wann Colour to sight, </b></div>
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<b>For therein is more of Aier Water and Light" </b></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">~ Elias Ashmole, <i>Theatrum Chemicum Britannicum</i>, p. <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=98bRhMtxLKAC&pg=PA65">65</a> </span></div>
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"<b>Mrs. Obama dazzles in designer sapphire dress</b>[:] ...All <b>eyes</b> were on the First Lady at the State of the Union address..." (<a href="http://www.accessatlanta.com/weblogs/celebrity-news/2012/jan/25/mrs-obama-dazzles-designer-%20%20sapphire-dress/">Source</a>); "Like all blue stones, in the East, the <b>sapphire is regarded as a powerful charm against the evil eye</b>", Jean Chevalier & Alain Gheerbrant, <i>Dictionary of Symbols</i> [Penguin, 1996], p. 826). "Michelle Obama <b>Stands Out in Sapphire</b> at the State of the Union[:] There she is, First Lady Michelle Obama, <b>gleaming like a sapphire</b> amidst a sea of navy and black suits at [the]State of the Union." (<a href="http://fashionista.com/2012/01/m%20%20ichelle-obama-stands-out-in-sapphire-at-the-state-of-the-union/">Source</a>) On Michelle-O compared with Jackie-O (and the black and white Isis), see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/tony-scott-etc.html">here</a>. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh34zgN7UjWzL_LvrVoTxgMESHDebYMm0CPIR_ML8hQR3GQVeOB9Ot01vM8Cd5su5hIlyUya00y7w9-6KL46jFuY1_O6_Kz1jk12Bc3rrmVQAGx2I3Ni7EQZbRsUU_NJVnyDCWPrmfHmOeL/s1600/MichelleObama.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="198" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh34zgN7UjWzL_LvrVoTxgMESHDebYMm0CPIR_ML8hQR3GQVeOB9Ot01vM8Cd5su5hIlyUya00y7w9-6KL46jFuY1_O6_Kz1jk12Bc3rrmVQAGx2I3Ni7EQZbRsUU_NJVnyDCWPrmfHmOeL/s320/MichelleObama.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(Michelle-O:<span style="font-size: xx-small;"> </span><a href="http://media.cmgdigital.com/shared/img/photos/2012/01/25/d3/ab/MichelleObama.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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"<b>Sapphire </b>(Greek: σάπφειρος; sappheiros, <b>'blue stone'</b>...) is a gemstone variety of the mineral corundum, an aluminium oxide (α-Al2O3). Trace amounts of other elements such as iron, titanium, chromium, copper, or magnesium can give corundum blue, yellow, pink, purple, orange, or a greenish color. <b>Chromium impurities in corundum yield a red tint, and the resultant gemstone is called a ruby</b>. ... Etymologically, the English word 'sapphire' derives from Latin sapphirus, sappirus from Greek σαπφειρος (sappheiros) from Hebrew סַפִּיר (sappir) from Old Iranian sani-prijam, from Sanskrit, Shanipriya (शनिप्रिय), from 'shani' (शनि) meaning 'Saturn' and riya' (प्रिय), dear, <b>i.e. literally 'dear to Saturn'</b>. The Greek term for sapphire quite likely was misapplied, and instead, used to refer to lapis lazuli." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sapphire">Source</a>) "Lapis is the Latin word for 'stone' and lazuli is the genitive form of the Medieval Latin lazulum, which is taken from the Arabian لازورد lāzaward, meaning 'heaven' or 'sky', since the sky is blue; therefore, it is the 'stone of heaven' or 'sky stone'." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lapis_lazuli#Etymology">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLCNa1KrehKo_Zoj7MCD9JX7I5LOYZb3zE_CN7kROfUJj3kczJqbxrNvJ1UMMbvKybb3j7muSDIt7d_PTrPBiEUvj67Mqpr08UzTVU2aLTmg96YHQcks9nTux-ArzbUGCJuGMm3YX9_6oY/s1600/SapphireRings.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="233" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLCNa1KrehKo_Zoj7MCD9JX7I5LOYZb3zE_CN7kROfUJj3kczJqbxrNvJ1UMMbvKybb3j7muSDIt7d_PTrPBiEUvj67Mqpr08UzTVU2aLTmg96YHQcks9nTux-ArzbUGCJuGMm3YX9_6oY/s320/SapphireRings.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.solarviews.com/browse/pia/PIA09212.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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"Flying over the unlit side of Saturn's rings, the Cassini spacecraft captures Saturn's glow, represented in brilliant shades of electric blue, <b>sapphire</b> and mint green, while the planet's shadow casts a wide net on the rings. On the night side (right side of image), with no sunlight, Saturn's own thermal radiation lights things up. This light at 5.1 microns wavelength (some seven times the longest wavelength visible to the human eye) is generated deep within Saturn, and works its way upward, eventually escaping into space. ...The northern hemisphere is about twice as bright as the southern hemisphere. (Courtesy NASA/JPL/University of Arizona)" (<a href="http://www.solarviews.com/eng/saturn.htm">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjq8yf5sRqUdhiuEHphvKe7V7XtGTX9EfuZe5S7KtbeCeJfyhylHe0bzvuXq1tvlbP6XJT1vl-6vQrSBuE9sp7Xw1LSquj9YZeknHofrM61Lr7AVsHhQYpD0Q67ty4J5hEzEDqYPcBeDwao/s1600/opposition.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjq8yf5sRqUdhiuEHphvKe7V7XtGTX9EfuZe5S7KtbeCeJfyhylHe0bzvuXq1tvlbP6XJT1vl-6vQrSBuE9sp7Xw1LSquj9YZeknHofrM61Lr7AVsHhQYpD0Q67ty4J5hEzEDqYPcBeDwao/s1600/opposition.png" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://astrologiantaika.files.wordpress.com/2012/11/opposition.png">Source</a>)</span></div>
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"<b>Saturn at opposition Sunday, 28 April 2013</b> at 03:14 CDT[:] Saturn will be well placed for observation, lying in the constellation Libra, well above the horizon for much of the night. Regardless of your location, Saturn will reach its highest point in the sky at around midnight, local time, an optimal positioning that occurs when it makes its closest approach to the point in the sky <b>directly opposite to the Sun – an event termed opposition</b>, the exact moment of which will be 03:14 CDT. Since the Sun reaches its greatest distance below the horizon at midnight, the point opposite to it is highest in the sky at the same time. <b>At around the same time that Saturn passes opposition, it also makes its closest approach to the Earth – termed its perigee – making it appear at its brightest and largest in the night sky</b>." (<a href="http://dcford.org.uk/news.php?id=20130428_14_100">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgADVSbPPNGqiHYeVe6NaabofCO977unBhhL83plSr02RdAhu4BbdYSEBX3Ox-Hgo0vFAZ_-UZaTmbNUXDIv1sE4F3FUxKadf_WK03RXIZ2Zd3dEg4H-MI-vr8kyhOdR7uXX4NJjtfqaRPc/s1600/SATURN.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="135" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgADVSbPPNGqiHYeVe6NaabofCO977unBhhL83plSr02RdAhu4BbdYSEBX3Ox-Hgo0vFAZ_-UZaTmbNUXDIv1sE4F3FUxKadf_WK03RXIZ2Zd3dEg4H-MI-vr8kyhOdR7uXX4NJjtfqaRPc/s320/SATURN.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Image <a href="http://www.sei.cmu.edu/saturn/">Source</a>; On Mellons, see <a href="http://visupview.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-house-of-mellon-part-i.html">HERE</a>.)</span></div>
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"<b>SATURN 2013</b> Software Architecture Conference[:] In 2013, the <b>Software Engineering Institute (SEI) Architecture Technology User Network (SATURN) </b>Conference will celebrate its ninth year. Each year SATURN attracts an international audience of practicing software architects, industry thought leaders, developers, technical managers, and researchers to share ideas, insights, and experience about effective architecture-centric practices for developing and maintaining software-intensive systems. SATURN 2013 will take place in <b>Minneapolis, Minnesota, from April 29 to May 3, 2013</b>." (Sources <a href="http://www.sei.cmu.edu/saturn/2013/">1</a> & <a href="http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/lean-software-expert-to-keynote-saturn-2013-1832220%20%2031.html">2</a>)<br />
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<b><i>The Saturnian Liquid</i></b>: "Let those who aim to purify Mercury by means of salts, <a href="https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=sites&srcid=ZGVmYXVsdGRvbWFpbnx0b3dlcm9mYmVsbHxneDozYzRlNGU3MmRhMjIyNGE">faeces</a> and other foreign bodies, and by strange chemical processes, understand that though our water is variousy composed, it is yet only one thing, formed by the concretion of divers substances of the same essence. The components of our water are fire, the vegetable '<b>Saturnian liquid</b>,' and the bond of Mercury. ...[I]t is a chaos or spirit, because our fiery Dragon, that overcomes all things, is yet penetrated by the odour of <b>the Saturnian liquid</b>, its <b>blood</b> growing together with <b>the Saturnian sap</b> into one body... It may thus be very properly described as chaos... From this chaos I can extract everything -- even the Sun and Moon -- without the transmutatory Elixir. It is called our Arsenic, our Air, our Moon, our Magnet, and our Chalybs: these names representing the different stages of its development, even unto <b>the manifestation of the kingly diadem, which is cast out of the menstruum of our harlot</b>. Learn then, who are the friends of <b>Cadmus</b>; who is the serpent that devoured them; what the hollow oak to which <b>Cadmus spitted the serpent</b>. Learn who are the doves of Diana, that overcome the green lion by gentleness: even <b>the Babylonian dragon</b>, which kills everything with its venom. Learn, also, what are the winged shoes of Mercury, and who are those nymphs whom he charms by means of his incantations. (Thanks to Jim Brandon for the lead, <a href="http://www.levity.com/alchemy/openentr.html">Source</a>; Cf. <a href="https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=sites&srcid=ZGVmYXVsdGRvbWFpbnx0b3dlcm9mYmVsbHxneDozYzRlNGU3MmRhMjIyNGE">Here</a>.)<i> </i><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNjE4J74AlbZ5PDzlE-CdnPFoZKyMGct6ms2RhPGuYgtPbWgB2wAxlYMNHZ9ikEHedVmHSLYpbMdQAU7RMbQhw60SvEn1WNpgcrOUC2v2kAJ9dimFyc3AadVaXzHFtgd6mLCz8u1sIFa6e/s1600/Cadmium.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNjE4J74AlbZ5PDzlE-CdnPFoZKyMGct6ms2RhPGuYgtPbWgB2wAxlYMNHZ9ikEHedVmHSLYpbMdQAU7RMbQhw60SvEn1WNpgcrOUC2v2kAJ9dimFyc3AadVaXzHFtgd6mLCz8u1sIFa6e/s320/Cadmium.JPG" width="226" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://kk.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A1%D1%83%D1%80%D0%B5%D1%82:Cadmium.svg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<i>Poisoned Jewelry</i>: "Revealed: Children's jewelry that contains <b>toxic cadmium</b> which causes cancer STILL on sale after federal crackdown[:] Federal regulators failed to pursue recalls after they found cadmium-tainted jewelry on store shelves, despite their vow to keep the toxic trinkets out of <b>children's hands</b>...More than two years after the AP revealed that some <b>Chinese factories</b> were <b>substituting cadmium for banned lead</b>...There are no known injuries or deaths due to <b>cadmium in children's jewelry, </b>but <b>contaminated jewelry</b> can poison in two ways: slow and steady through habitual licking and biting, or acutely through swallowing. The CPSC estimates that several thousand kids are treated annually at U.S. emergency rooms for accidentally ingesting jewelry. Once in the body, cadmium stays for decades. If enough accumulates, it can cripple kidneys and bones-- and cause cancer. Contaminated jewelry is surely less prevalent in the U.S. than before its widespread presence was first documented. However, <b>rings, bracelets and pendants containing cadmium</b> and marketed for preteen girls were purchased over the last year." (<a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2217841/Federal-regulators-fail-warn-parents-toxic-cadmium-childrens-toys.html">Source</a>) <br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://visit.elysiumgates.com/sephiroth.gif"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuMF-HTRmjX1_KagBgUnTsh0X69RVgsEm1WVapOiCEyTd5_F3JFG3wlzJCZzVq8NtreIXg-noceIyVa6gBUIUOSZAODUTebncg8uLonwJfSeCH96yIaa1BMi-CZETQMYaZSJOdYhmAv5FV/s1600/caduceussephirot.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuMF-HTRmjX1_KagBgUnTsh0X69RVgsEm1WVapOiCEyTd5_F3JFG3wlzJCZzVq8NtreIXg-noceIyVa6gBUIUOSZAODUTebncg8uLonwJfSeCH96yIaa1BMi-CZETQMYaZSJOdYhmAv5FV/s320/caduceussephirot.jpg" width="296" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://earthacupuncture.info/caduceus.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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"<b>Sephirot </b>..., meaning <i>emanations</i>, are the 10 attributes/emanations in <i>Kabbalah</i>, through which <i>Ein Sof</i> (The Infinite) reveals himself and continuously creates both the physical realm and the chain of higher metaphysical realms (<i>Seder hishtalshelus</i>). The term is alternatively transliterated into English as <i>Sefirot/Sefiroth</i>, singular <i>Sephirah/Sefirah</i> etc. Alternative configurations of the sephirot are given by different schools in the historical development of Kabbalah, with each articulating different spiritual aspects. The tradition of enumerating 10 is stated in the <i>Sefer Yetzirah</i>... As altogether 11 <i>sephirot </i>are listed across the different schemes, two (<i>Keter </i>and <i>Daat</i>) are seen as unconscious and conscious manifestations of the <br />
same principle, conserving the ten categories. ... The 'Sefirot' (סְפִירוֹת), singular 'Sefirah' (סְפִירָה), literally means 'counting'/'enumeration', but <b>early Kabbalists presented a number of </b>other<b> etymological possibilities from the same Hebrew root including</b>: <i>sefer </i>(text), <i>sippur </i>(recounting a story), <b><i>sappir </i>(sapphire, brilliance, luminary)</b>, <i>separ </i>(boundary), and <i>safra </i>(scribe)." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sephirot">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDJ0iOjb5uILW_eD1awr2mNz1bNouUeTy-yg7y9vHbdB2VMyfO-X30x91ogVlRNhyphenhyphenn1ph4JuRp06wsHMw1YUaLwu1o87lv3x_4M7fdT0OF1buklhKBxDZLqKoipdDHG5hyphenhyphen8je9x3O0AQD2/s1600/Prometheus.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDJ0iOjb5uILW_eD1awr2mNz1bNouUeTy-yg7y9vHbdB2VMyfO-X30x91ogVlRNhyphenhyphenn1ph4JuRp06wsHMw1YUaLwu1o87lv3x_4M7fdT0OF1buklhKBxDZLqKoipdDHG5hyphenhyphen8je9x3O0AQD2/s320/Prometheus.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/08/Prometheus_12-26-09b.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKzwRkrrstbzVEPFttrd3ivzBCmPAuOb1C8uBAEAX8RG9RQUS1_AUj4fVr4a4l0FUHGg0TNrxXxiWycL_ax9ILfFgDE5s-gRJMPt2yqU8Hgtp2hspIRnDDnc3zPgSqWbNkD22Fys6xnCzR/s1600/PrometheusRing.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="171" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKzwRkrrstbzVEPFttrd3ivzBCmPAuOb1C8uBAEAX8RG9RQUS1_AUj4fVr4a4l0FUHGg0TNrxXxiWycL_ax9ILfFgDE5s-gRJMPt2yqU8Hgtp2hspIRnDDnc3zPgSqWbNkD22Fys6xnCzR/s320/PrometheusRing.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<b>Prometheus was said to have worn a "Sapphire Ring"</b>: Victoria Finlay, <i>Jewels: A Secret History</i>, p. <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=wvcz9n9VNOsC&pg=PA257">257</a>.)</span></div>
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"<b>Prometheus </b>is an inner satellite of Saturn. It was discovered in 1980 ...from photos taken by the Voyager 1 probe... In late 1985 it was officially named after Prometheus, a Titan in Greek mythology. ... It is also designated Saturn XVI (16)..." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prometheus_%28moon%29">Source</a>) Cf. <a href="http://visupview.blogspot.com/2012/12/prometheus-rising-part-i.html">Here</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/07/knight-of-aurora-athena.html">here</a>, and <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/11/Prometheus.html">here</a>.)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmuydQAq8hTkI8gvoOonnKfS6MCpoO6RN5A_zgQu5GVeutIuvSERkImf3CRlUIEaYfywmmHbMApIIVFZ4LBNRFc7eqbHp1CN2jkq2gPyC5kaVghirdMZvy8lEzvihn6boGzajxZkPW6J_T/s1600/Raziel.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmuydQAq8hTkI8gvoOonnKfS6MCpoO6RN5A_zgQu5GVeutIuvSERkImf3CRlUIEaYfywmmHbMApIIVFZ4LBNRFc7eqbHp1CN2jkq2gPyC5kaVghirdMZvy8lEzvihn6boGzajxZkPW6J_T/s320/Raziel.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/61n+9ismBSL._SL500_SS500_.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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In Jewish folklore there is a book named the <i>Sefer Raziel HaMalekh</i> (<i>The Book of the Angel </i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raziel"><i>Raziel</i></a>, 'Secrets of God'). "...The first part states that they were imparted by Raziel to Adam when he was driven from paradise (2a); the third part (34a) says they were communicated to Noah before he entered the ark. <b>The book was engraved on sapphire-stone</b> and handed down from generation to generation until it, together with many other secret writings, came into the possession of Solomon; the Book of Raziel, however, was the best preserved of these works (15, 34a)." (<a href="http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/12606-raziel-book-of">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_LiKTLi5j8FC7ksboCZWd1wa7eLYAuXuh0p2wsNz-FEu7INI5wIiUFiaPX_QLxNWIsX06LtunLjgd3lMM7oiDvMXoJ3KMGuSx-KXjjaEgyAoCcF01G6NM668oICCKTGFEVNmK-fRtgsSl/s1600/AaronsRod.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_LiKTLi5j8FC7ksboCZWd1wa7eLYAuXuh0p2wsNz-FEu7INI5wIiUFiaPX_QLxNWIsX06LtunLjgd3lMM7oiDvMXoJ3KMGuSx-KXjjaEgyAoCcF01G6NM668oICCKTGFEVNmK-fRtgsSl/s320/AaronsRod.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fd/Foster_Bible_Pictures_0060-2_Aaron%27s_Rod_Changed_into_a_Serpent.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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"<b>Aaron's Rod</b>[:] A rod which, in the hands of Aaron, the high priest, was endowed with miraculous power during the several plagues that preceded the Exodus. In this function the rod of Moses was equally potent. Upon two occasions, however, the singular virtue of spontaneous power, when not in the grasp of its possessor, was exhibited by Aaron's Rod. At one time it swallowed the rods of the Egyptian magicians, and at another it blossomed and bore fruit in the Tabernacle, as an evidence of the exclusive right to the priesthood of the tribe of Levi... In commemoration of this decision it was commanded that the rod be put again 'before the testimony' (Num. xvii. 10). A later tradition asserts (Heb. ix. 4) that the rod was kept in the Ark of the Covenant. The main fact, however, is thus confirmed, that a rod was preserved in the Tabernacle as a relic of the institution of the Aaronic priesthood. ...<b>It was made of sapphire</b>..." (<a href="http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/5-aaron-s-rod">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBoYPP9EXEiVoWPs1PiY1VnCofvUvmM1LqytRpkgpQnBvEbdQvHGn5p9DaLvOKLrbVUZIWvjr00rCzFrYMcDKFmdQheHNcUBXDjr5qMrGfLOarAlnfUNn2dS5ohm_k8V5OX5GkNVhneTw-/s1600/Star-Saphire-Bombay.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBoYPP9EXEiVoWPs1PiY1VnCofvUvmM1LqytRpkgpQnBvEbdQvHGn5p9DaLvOKLrbVUZIWvjr00rCzFrYMcDKFmdQheHNcUBXDjr5qMrGfLOarAlnfUNn2dS5ohm_k8V5OX5GkNVhneTw-/s1600/Star-Saphire-Bombay.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">("The 182 carat... <b>Star of Bombay</b>, housed in the National Museum of Natural History, <b>Washington D.C.</b>, </span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">is a good example of a <b>blue star sapphire</b>." <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_of_Bombay">Source</a>; Image <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ee/Star-Saphire.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix4nYty0BdcnpSarGUBd4k-wsiXo0rWy3SIMCdoUJqDYNHhHacBIxtcVVJ4LmZ1suqLP56h3DilVcAxv32c8UFpoxqj-6Cz1dMEUTrTeTl_49MOcvVX6dHfpd1DRll-M83SF-cA4o8AkRV/s1600/Starofasiagem.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="282" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix4nYty0BdcnpSarGUBd4k-wsiXo0rWy3SIMCdoUJqDYNHhHacBIxtcVVJ4LmZ1suqLP56h3DilVcAxv32c8UFpoxqj-6Cz1dMEUTrTeTl_49MOcvVX6dHfpd1DRll-M83SF-cA4o8AkRV/s320/Starofasiagem.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">("The <b>330 Carat Star of Asia</b>, housed in the National Museum of Natural History, <b>Washington D.C.</b>, is an excellent example of a <b>blue star sapphire</b>." <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_of_Asia">Source</a>; Image <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/06/Starofasiagem.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxi-hiryN0iXdSz1-SJFNYECkmc1wH4LC9KLDeFRy_wP3z2JXgh_uBVcxX2V9q7sGAE7GgAVz0BFk_BhJpGzKOtAezyno-CLS361nQZqg0TSOinf8_ytS6lv15tUOc3tVJvY09I8jgF1Cu/s1600/Star_of_India_Gem.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="249" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxi-hiryN0iXdSz1-SJFNYECkmc1wH4LC9KLDeFRy_wP3z2JXgh_uBVcxX2V9q7sGAE7GgAVz0BFk_BhJpGzKOtAezyno-CLS361nQZqg0TSOinf8_ytS6lv15tUOc3tVJvY09I8jgF1Cu/s320/Star_of_India_Gem.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">("The <b>Star of India</b> is a 563.35 carat...<b>star sapphire</b>, one of the largest such gems in the world. ...It is almost flawless and is unusual in that it has stars on both sides of the stone. ...In 1900, wealthy financier <b>J.P. <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/morgan-le-fay.html">Morgan</a></b><a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/morgan-le-fay.html"> </a>donated the Star of India to the American Museum of Natural History on Central Park West in <b>Manhattan</b>." It, along with several other precious stones (including the "<b>Eagle Diamond</b>") was stolen on October 29, 1964, but later recovered. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_of_India_%28gem%29">Source</a>; Image <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0f/Star_of_India_Gem.JPG">Source</a>)</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiK1_eYT0fBnGgt3JTJ7IqO0Sh0xBWyvN7ZgVODF47JwPIVo7RXXnvZeWCCHpZ5geJE2LS1-Hx2qQYauL7LJ4I8atJ0BxAtJxHlo1yjKrDrVkrE-Kao4mW6qlWxh694zmAShE6yMB-cwdlC/s1600/SaturnHexagon.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiK1_eYT0fBnGgt3JTJ7IqO0Sh0xBWyvN7ZgVODF47JwPIVo7RXXnvZeWCCHpZ5geJE2LS1-Hx2qQYauL7LJ4I8atJ0BxAtJxHlo1yjKrDrVkrE-Kao4mW6qlWxh694zmAShE6yMB-cwdlC/s1600/SaturnHexagon.jpeg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Closeup of <b>Saturn's Hexagon</b> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLEKh8ND2OahatFxcuUISaeRmH1g35TvMORAPrS5FU19zLGjnsgSqkXA1nvzNxu38NU3omzDYq4F0lxxJ0ZHePS4dfo0Ym_4njpwIB-qwKqUhyQOlD5RQUXBF-5z8_HVdRhlzX1qJ7jH3I/s1600/saturn-hexagon.jpeg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIbfh-6LsNTfUYONys0Mfmkj7ZdzZa_TnqRUk36ThkVv0VCJX6oxo4JzNZWey43Tdn0WBVVHI-RXf-gl6ldUgstGcQ0f3hXvP1CpiUaSffYJmdyljXwycON2Ho-9eRvclHSgA3anrgFUxb/s1600/Star_Sapphire_Corps.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIbfh-6LsNTfUYONys0Mfmkj7ZdzZa_TnqRUk36ThkVv0VCJX6oxo4JzNZWey43Tdn0WBVVHI-RXf-gl6ldUgstGcQ0f3hXvP1CpiUaSffYJmdyljXwycON2Ho-9eRvclHSgA3anrgFUxb/s320/Star_Sapphire_Corps.jpg" width="207" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">("For Hearts Long Lost. And Full of Fright. For Those Alone In <b>Blackest Night</b>. <b>Accept Our Ring</b> and Join Our Fight -- <b>Love Conquers All</b> -- <b>With Violet Light</b>!" ~ <b>Star Sapphire Corps</b> Oath, DC Comics, <a href="http://dc.wikia.com/wiki/Star_Sapphire_Corps">Source</a>; Image <a href="http://images4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20090428193540/greenlantern/images/6/60/Star_Sapphire_Corps.jpg">Source</a>; "<b>Sappho</b>...An ancient Greek poet known for her love lyrics. ...<b>The word lesbian is derived from the island of Lesbos, the birthplace of Sappho</b>..." <a href="http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Sappho">Source</a>; Cf. <a href="http://revisionistreview.blogspot.com/2012/08/of-human-alchemy-and-gay-science.html">here</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/morgan-le-fay.html#!">here</a>, and <a href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&frm=1&source=web&cd=2&cad=rja&ved=0CDYQFjAB&url=http%3A%2F%2Fcurveofbell.blogspot.com%2F2012%2F09%2Fnow-playing-at-century-16-ampitheater.html&ei=30ACUbLiH4O_yQGKvYDoDg&usg=AFQjCNHSOp7UUvmOHBh5S0tHSOd1lxrsEg&bvm=bv.41524429,d.aWM">here</a>.)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<b>"Star Dust": "a song about a song about love"</b>; </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stardust_(song)"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">; Image </span><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0a/Stardust_Sign.JPG"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">; Cf. "<b>'Deep Purple</b>' was the biggest hit written by pianist Peter <b>DeRose</b>, who broadcast, 1923 to 1939, with May Singhi as 'The Sweethearts of the Air' on the NBC radio network. ...lyrics [were added] in 1938: 'When the deep purple falls over sleepy garden walls | And <b>the stars</b> begin to twinkle in the sky | In the mist of a memory you wander back to me Breathing my name with a sigh...' Larry Clinton and His Orchestra recorded one of the most popular versions of the song on <b>23</b> December 1938." </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_Purple_(song)"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">) </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/56/Cabala%2C_Speculum_Artis_Et_Naturae_In_Alchymia_by_Stephan_Michelspacher_%281654%29_%28dresden%29.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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The Alchemical <b>Sapphire Mirror</b>: "The most immediate influence of [Heinrich] Khunrath's alchemical catoptics was on Stefan Michelspacher's Cabala, Spiegel der Kunst und Natur..., consisting of four engravings which present mirrors displaying alchemical visions. ... Apart from this Paracelsian alchemical treatise, Michelspacher also published an Optica... In the Cabala he explains that his visions appeared to him through the power of a radiating celestial fire in three distinct forms. <b>The first mirror was a fiery sapphire</b>, displaying the philosophical Mercury and Salt, while the second showed him the philosophical Sulfur. The third mirror was of a divinely rosy colour, all in flames, in the midst of which there appeared a very great 'arcanum', which was the philosophical fire through which all things come to maturation. Putting together the three mirrors, he made a fourth in which he saw God perfectly..." (Source: Urszula Szulakowska, <i>The Alchemy of Light: Geometry and Optics in Late Renaissance Alchemical Illustration</i>, pp. 99-100).<br />
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Following the <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=CruGoqi0RR4C&pg=PA253"><i>Libnat ha-Sappir</i></a>, "<b>The Pavement of Sapphire</b>," just a little bit farther, the traveler may notice the name of a, <b><i>Argentium Astrum</i></b> (the "AA" or <b><a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/47-or-how-romney-lords-it-over-inferior.html">Silver</a> Star</b>) rite incorporated by Aleister Crowley into his program of "<b>Sex Magick</b>." "<b>The Star Sapphire</b> is a magick ritual written by Aleister Crowley, which first appeared in his Book of Lies, Chapter 36, in 1913. It is a Thelemic version of <b>the Ritual of the Hexagram</b>, developed by members of The Golden Dawn. It is commonly considered to be a thinly veiled instruction for sex magick, although it can certainly be performed as a non-sexual exercise. The Star Sapphire is an official ritual of the A.'.A.'." (<a href="http://www.thelemapedia.org/index.php/The_Star_Sapphire">Source</a>) On Crowley, see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/century-16-and-dawn-aurora-of.html">here</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/laugh.html">here</a>, and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/tony-scott-etc.html">here</a>.<b><i> </i></b>For more on silver, see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/47-or-how-romney-lords-it-over-inferior.html">here</a>.<b><i><br /></i></b><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_5owIHdtIrXmZqwyE3gt2dR2IHu7yPVKSwI0GkmIHqBBBtc9lleF-adoQI02JJC0thCvqUcNot7DYrT-C3YwXUXn_2Vni_b6VVD3Dm9AhU73XD7HZPuO_XubOLZFO2z6pMxBMNvJq9HLt/s1600/lucifer_venus.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_5owIHdtIrXmZqwyE3gt2dR2IHu7yPVKSwI0GkmIHqBBBtc9lleF-adoQI02JJC0thCvqUcNot7DYrT-C3YwXUXn_2Vni_b6VVD3Dm9AhU73XD7HZPuO_XubOLZFO2z6pMxBMNvJq9HLt/s320/lucifer_venus.jpg" width="292" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Lucifer-Venus, "Goddes of Love"; (</span><a href="http://dieelektrischenvorspiele.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/lucifer_venus.jpg?w=490"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">)</span></div>
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"How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High." ~ Isaiah 14:12-14 (<a href="http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah+14&version=KJV">KJV</a>) <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7YVjbO6IQWXk8DXr1XR6YpmPPAELoaa_0KJ5GMs_BpaDvYgi9GppX-_dWW5tZMNQ4o967koRAiHQ5VfSf081GGo3fIZLhQkW0pjQmwl1M_kDYSZONegJM9W7jTOyyrZs8vhyphenhyphenT_Ysyk5K9/s1600/InnerStar.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="187" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7YVjbO6IQWXk8DXr1XR6YpmPPAELoaa_0KJ5GMs_BpaDvYgi9GppX-_dWW5tZMNQ4o967koRAiHQ5VfSf081GGo3fIZLhQkW0pjQmwl1M_kDYSZONegJM9W7jTOyyrZs8vhyphenhyphenT_Ysyk5K9/s320/InnerStar.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://www.schwimmerlegal.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/BarbizonWeb.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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Ili<i>aster</i>, or Dis-<i>aster</i>? "'Lift up your eyes and look at the cloud and the light within it and the stars surrounding it. <b>The Star that leads the way is your star</b>.' (Gospel of Judas 57:19-20) Every eternal soul is connected with a star - a divine being that exists above this world. Judas is told to gaze on the cloud that is the manifestation of the presence of the Great Invisible Spirit. The stars of the saved...And Judas' star leads them all." (Bart D. Ehrman, <i>The Lost <a href="http://bellofchurch.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-gospel-of-judas-and-yezidism.html">Gospel of Judas</a> Iscariot</i>, p. 139). <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfQRPEZ-8eEISwMWxRfLhvTa6FI2JW8CPd1AF5aBJRZcHF7uJr3GhpgeNeeQm3s35iR7TnnZIPbgIIgwJrGnBs4ubmEjYgBOsKWUEsRQZHK6-J8yffVljfWigLy0xt6O16SN2VENFnGkqf/s1600/Azoth.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfQRPEZ-8eEISwMWxRfLhvTa6FI2JW8CPd1AF5aBJRZcHF7uJr3GhpgeNeeQm3s35iR7TnnZIPbgIIgwJrGnBs4ubmEjYgBOsKWUEsRQZHK6-J8yffVljfWigLy0xt6O16SN2VENFnGkqf/s320/Azoth.jpg" width="318" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrDB1_eSOnNRGoJdJJ7AMpo7gUdzr4niduJOCXmf3ybgNH4RfFeblBy5IfsU03zMrlh5v6RheEHeCcUA4RCoobhLIbJkgHmXAu3GEinmgA-850E2Bkip__7mxIDBVtIosth_1xir277h2z/s1600/alquimia.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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"Paracelsus named [the] cosmic essence <b>the Iliaster, which literally means 'the star in man'</b>" (Dennis Hauck, <i>The Complete Idiot's Guide to Alchemy</i>, p. <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=7NpIyP697oQC&pg=PA159&lpg=PA159&dq=%22iliaster%22+%22the+star+in+man%22&source=bl&ots=7DGV4pXR7m&sig=lsQYppAg1GTxCNWx1L9u1DV4xWU&hl=en&sa=X&ei=koIAUdOTD4W4qAGX_IFg&ved=0CDkQ6AEwAg">159</a>).<i> </i>"[T]he first body, the Yliaster, was nothing but a clod which contained all the <b>chaos</b>, all the waters, all minerals, all herbs, <b>all stones, all gems</b>. Only the supreme Master could release them and form them with tender solicitude, so that <b>other things could be created from the rest</b>." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iliaster">Source</a>) <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh56vDauRuAPVMytPkdBnF6IU7ZMXDskzYtxwCIg9uDU3JTLImPYWMlo0TQ1TgjzZxf8zrCj3-lsB_5f_PqBbw3M7TMI2u-u32M0hk3-v_IlhCRy5v4cjtjMxKdtCSDD3lo81uaFzhPf0H1/s1600/FifthElement.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh56vDauRuAPVMytPkdBnF6IU7ZMXDskzYtxwCIg9uDU3JTLImPYWMlo0TQ1TgjzZxf8zrCj3-lsB_5f_PqBbw3M7TMI2u-u32M0hk3-v_IlhCRy5v4cjtjMxKdtCSDD3lo81uaFzhPf0H1/s320/FifthElement.jpg" width="228" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://beerbeer.org/image/2009/Top10/Movie/march/movie-01.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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"Aristotle held that the universe was divided into two parts, the terrestrial region and the celestial region. In the realm of Earth, all bodies were made out of combinations of four substances, <i>earth, fire, air,</i> and <i>water,...</i> whereas in the region of the universe beyond the Moon the heavenly bodies such as the Sun, the stars, and the planets were made of a fifth substance, called <i>quintessence</i>." (<a href="http://aether.lbl.gov/www/classes/p10/aristotle-physics.html">Source</a>) For more on the Gospel of Judas, see <a href="http://bellofchurch.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-gospel-of-judas-and-yezidism.html">HERE</a>.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1ND6w14l1X_BcSTrGPLlWkFErz0EfDl6F8xqHEhWGnuwqwvvqLmowPE10Rn1rXBdElODUU_dW2nZeaWF35G-yopihkuO1vEkEPXMGuS8q8la2mUPZqULdvK3-ziPjI7kmRvxOQ8o6LFJ4/s1600/SapphireGin.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1ND6w14l1X_BcSTrGPLlWkFErz0EfDl6F8xqHEhWGnuwqwvvqLmowPE10Rn1rXBdElODUU_dW2nZeaWF35G-yopihkuO1vEkEPXMGuS8q8la2mUPZqULdvK3-ziPjI7kmRvxOQ8o6LFJ4/s320/SapphireGin.jpg" width="249" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">("<b>Bombay Sapphire</b>" Gin: The "...sapphire-coloured bottle that </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">bears a picture of Queen Victoria on the label." <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombay_Sapphire">Source</a>, Image <a href="http://pic3.nipic.com/20090518/5555_150617021_2.jpg">Source</a>; </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">I almost called it "<b>Victory Gin</b>" by accident.)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDYWSpM67jfGRdBAmWrVQgtu2X9U7wN_CsDJuIVEBvm7YUPyQojApoS-hNFvUcvyrxWSr3_wvN4lLUrx9FvI4_J_qvDrY3HCUD2aCNvqdLDxFuWqC97xXds6NgozWx4kp-BqiJOQphx7ZC/s1600/BeckSapphire.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDYWSpM67jfGRdBAmWrVQgtu2X9U7wN_CsDJuIVEBvm7YUPyQojApoS-hNFvUcvyrxWSr3_wvN4lLUrx9FvI4_J_qvDrY3HCUD2aCNvqdLDxFuWqC97xXds6NgozWx4kp-BqiJOQphx7ZC/s1600/BeckSapphire.JPG" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">("Jan. 18, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Today BECK'S opened a pop-up<b> 'jewelry store' </b>in Beverly Hills to celebrate <a href="http://www.cnbc.com/id/100349192/AnheuserBusch_Debuts_Beckrsquos_Sapphire_Beer">BECK'S SAPPHIRE</a>, the latest innovation in high-end beer." (<a href="http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/latest-in-high-end-beer-marketing-becks-sapphire-opens-pop-up-jewelry-store-in-beverly-hills-187520361.html">Source</a>) "Beck's logo...[is] a <b>key</b>..." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beck%27s_Brewery#History">Source</a>) ; Image <a href="http://www.beckssapphire.com/">Source</a>. On another "Beck" [Glenn], see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/tonight-case-of-1791.html">HERE </a>and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/now-is-time.html">here</a>.)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0w2VdMdJ8mkw_GWwiIY5XqWlTXZWuXTCU2__poSphS-uKwYkOEiT_93_uXnI1jxKAS6UKAGgyWjDbC_Wg0v34i_0Bug2iiGR49X5n3i1qxG93SJmvT4Pzx8kStTvLbAS4U6nDCKcrfjMt/s1600/Al2O3.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="312" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0w2VdMdJ8mkw_GWwiIY5XqWlTXZWuXTCU2__poSphS-uKwYkOEiT_93_uXnI1jxKAS6UKAGgyWjDbC_Wg0v34i_0Bug2iiGR49X5n3i1qxG93SJmvT4Pzx8kStTvLbAS4U6nDCKcrfjMt/s320/Al2O3.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Ruby, Sapphire: Aluminum & Oxygen [Al2O3], Chris Pellant, <i>Rocks and Minerals </i>[<i>Smithsonian Handbook</i>], p. 82.)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">("<b>Al</b> Green turned down President Obama" <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/music/2013/01/23/inaugural-al-green-obama/1858005/">Source</a>; Image<span style="font-size: xx-small;"> </span></span><a href="http://c3e308.medialib.glogster.com/media/10/108c4c0d8e810faa7565217c883d8e26a1ef8431f2e0ea9c0ad0515d80922fea/424px-aluminum-svg.png"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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"Crowley's comment regarding <b>The Star Sapphire</b> in <i>The Book of Lie</i>s states: 'The Star Sapphire corresponds with <b>the Star-Ruby</b> of Chapter 25; 36 being the square of 6, as 25 is of 5. This chapter gives the real and perfect Ritual of the Hexagram.'" (<a href="http://www.thelemapedia.org/index.php/The_Star_Sapphire">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEga9UbafuhBJMT-CA2mhTL3YooNu5f7XXR8VMGbb6qe2FP-Vp2diRHIdzRYvA0XNQgZluNb2A74wO8tMT6U-h2UxKaPCeadiYD4UgLy7k7tK56zMm4QKQO-JEeC8Xninan4tcfswhTMHA40/s1600/RubyRedDress.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEga9UbafuhBJMT-CA2mhTL3YooNu5f7XXR8VMGbb6qe2FP-Vp2diRHIdzRYvA0XNQgZluNb2A74wO8tMT6U-h2UxKaPCeadiYD4UgLy7k7tK56zMm4QKQO-JEeC8Xninan4tcfswhTMHA40/s320/RubyRedDress.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.latimes.com/features/image/alltherage/la-ar-michelle-obama-chooses-jason-wu-2013%20%200121,0,1229893.story">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEip4FRSq8TqEw8xdP_Sf6C_BXuPhtNAFrH1bSFXC_fdMafORcY54Xxd-0N6Yskvcb8k5zIzLRADWHChGK4VKZJjxVFeKdVGjgdkgd3V98GcbgiE98R4OpIFNeINxiduHJwzcuk7GyzYiKJ8/s1600/Crossed_Double_Keys.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEip4FRSq8TqEw8xdP_Sf6C_BXuPhtNAFrH1bSFXC_fdMafORcY54Xxd-0N6Yskvcb8k5zIzLRADWHChGK4VKZJjxVFeKdVGjgdkgd3V98GcbgiE98R4OpIFNeINxiduHJwzcuk7GyzYiKJ8/s1600/Crossed_Double_Keys.gif" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.theforbiddenknowledge.com/symbology/Crossed_Double_Keys.gif">Source</a>)</span></div>
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"Michelle Obama wows in <b>a ruby red</b> Jason Wu <b>dress </b>at the Inauguration Ball[:] First Lady Michelle Obama wore a Jason Wu dress to <b>the Commander in Chief's ball</b> in Washington, Jan. 21, 2013. ...The chiffon dress with velvet details featured <b>criss-cross</b> ruching in the front that <b>came together in a keyhole</b>..." (<a href="http://www.torontosun.com/2013/01/21/michelle-obamas-style-lookbook">Source</a> cf. "[T]he first lady chose <b>a ruby red chiffon</b> and velvet halter gown. ...Jay-Z was...in a Tom <b>Ford </b>suit, tie and a scarf." <a href="http://www.latimes.com/features/image/alltherage/la-ar-michelle-obama-chooses-jason-wu-2013%20%200121,0,1229893.story">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgF00SGbtTbeiluaKX0_qAibRXvIootKHYVtg1AzsV6Ypil1geP4599Jansw-N-Sc2RznQrZPCf_Kq1KeAufPyX8-1SIv9IY_eXPATwQg2nV3BmnzTbkSWVw-VU7pyCoydEYER0Fx0js6fs/s1600/Rubedo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgF00SGbtTbeiluaKX0_qAibRXvIootKHYVtg1AzsV6Ypil1geP4599Jansw-N-Sc2RznQrZPCf_Kq1KeAufPyX8-1SIv9IY_eXPATwQg2nV3BmnzTbkSWVw-VU7pyCoydEYER0Fx0js6fs/s320/Rubedo.jpg" width="294" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://paulkiritsis.net/web/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/redrubedo1-941x1024.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
<br />
"Ruby" (definition) "c.1300, from Old French <i>rubi </i>(12c.), from Medieval Latin <i>rubinus lapis</i> 'red stone' (cf. Italian <i>rubino</i>), from Latin <i>rubeus </i>'red,' related to <i>ruber </i>(see red)." (<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&search=ruby&searchmode=none">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeZ76iw5vvbLsXNSB_V-UclCL_xcSrpxwir1ILfmnGIaf2PnM-rW2y5hhb2SeH8DttUYnjveEBQYaVm3DiIOsreuw4C0rlF94XvTiLtWtfxckO9un7UXYBlRdi8R0Lm1mcfgnN_uHE7S0W/s1600/rubyslippers.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="279" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeZ76iw5vvbLsXNSB_V-UclCL_xcSrpxwir1ILfmnGIaf2PnM-rW2y5hhb2SeH8DttUYnjveEBQYaVm3DiIOsreuw4C0rlF94XvTiLtWtfxckO9un7UXYBlRdi8R0Lm1mcfgnN_uHE7S0W/s320/rubyslippers.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Ruby Star: </span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEionwwjQRhclxJfIhqnAckDczz3NXqnFuyYZmSmqdtnsH5YUDVEPHvagsDm7oXnDLuOt_l7Q5fadXNGMJm_n5eC-O7r6mIlnUsDhAf7UxbkexQ05WlugpDNnMih8akjQftMfAoyCZmkEFUW/s400/rubyslippers.jpg"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZOEtaJswwsyqqRHAjXHLp_YPGE_MRH0eS2NgrK3yhrq6W4aZutrT6TpqJYjFli5elj2h3zjs6MC2fghSKaSC9GxdXsq-9Eug-2MG4WRF_LgQAZaw-7gBIGnDtN6IO8yb7EEr14K-opgj5/s1600/Oswald.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZOEtaJswwsyqqRHAjXHLp_YPGE_MRH0eS2NgrK3yhrq6W4aZutrT6TpqJYjFli5elj2h3zjs6MC2fghSKaSC9GxdXsq-9Eug-2MG4WRF_LgQAZaw-7gBIGnDtN6IO8yb7EEr14K-opgj5/s320/Oswald.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="http://www.nasa.gov/images/content/720730main_20130121-Oswald-MODIS.jpg"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
Speaking of the <b><i>Wizard of Oz</i></b> ("Oz" = "strength" or "an he goat", Kenneth Grant, <i>Aleister Crowley and the Hidden God,</i> p. 219), it's a twister (of sorts)! Maybe it's the Wiz himself. "Tropical Cyclone <b>Oswald</b> (South Pacific) 01.22.13[:] NASA Sees Tropical Cyclone Oswald Weaken Over Queensland's Cape York Peninsula[.] NASA's Aqua satellite documented the formation of Tropical Storm Oswald in the Gulf of Carpentaria on Jan. 21 and the landfall on Jan. 22 in the southwestern Cape York Peninsula of Queenstown, Australia. Oswald has since become remnant low pressure area over land." (<a href="http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/hurricanes/archives/2013/h2013_Oswald.html">Source</a>; Thanks to John Cole for this information.)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpQ1w5-SnhxY9CAO7hodvSdhHWUL1MmgKDaIKaC3xc2KWutiLJUwZLkZvMG_2XSHxHSoJtlcISbB461l2JYbdgak6wGijA5oLgBVZKWqYWFYiXh8jbZa-tagwTO8RBYHnizZAR9Me1V0LD/s1600/JackRuby.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="235" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpQ1w5-SnhxY9CAO7hodvSdhHWUL1MmgKDaIKaC3xc2KWutiLJUwZLkZvMG_2XSHxHSoJtlcISbB461l2JYbdgak6wGijA5oLgBVZKWqYWFYiXh8jbZa-tagwTO8RBYHnizZAR9Me1V0LD/s320/JackRuby.gif" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"> (Jack Ruby ["Jack Ruby" = <span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>fake rub</i><span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>y,</i> James Shelby Downard</span></span>] shoots Lee Harvey Oswald, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/al-o.html">Source</a>)</span></div>
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And now, let's go back to rubies. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiVxubEsxeHtn-3TC_azzOuNqY6T-tkXVh3hv4bUVTr7Zg1RfiZlGf0T56hGcqX4TkRsbamIXWFuJZP6vrHdXqgTEj_UqhWbJdB8ttl9-x0Lvvs5NVIUcYZug_X3duZ8zBHwrEmZqoH47E/s1600/the-delong-star-ruby.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiVxubEsxeHtn-3TC_azzOuNqY6T-tkXVh3hv4bUVTr7Zg1RfiZlGf0T56hGcqX4TkRsbamIXWFuJZP6vrHdXqgTEj_UqhWbJdB8ttl9-x0Lvvs5NVIUcYZug_X3duZ8zBHwrEmZqoH47E/s1600/the-delong-star-ruby.jpg" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.starruby.in/store/images/the-delong-star-ruby.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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"The Delong Star Ruby resides in the Natural History Museum in New York City. Weighing 100.32 carats, it is a beautiful deep purplish red in colour, Burmese origin, and has an extremely sharp 6-rayed star effect." (<a href="http://www.starruby.in/delong-star-ruby.html">Source</a>) "<b>The Six-rayed Star</b> ...combines the Isis...and Horus...symbolism (the Mother, and the Child of the Mother) in a transcendental unity that is glyphed by the Star of Will (<i>Thelema</i>), which is <b>the Star Ruby and the symbol of the Great Work accomplished</b>" (Kenneth Grant, <i>Aleister Crowley and the Hidden God</i>, p. 57).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6opR_rqKIvqlcbRZ0Psgj3tsQrg1Hq8iDQyhsYgrIsB51s_4K6ItngxkWxWqScqjYFQHdanS5hJp79421-YYtii1Jw53gq0uQ2X0VL0YX97IuYN6EL4QtUf4fSRmZKY1DLhajeitIISA4/s1600/EagleDiamond.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="238" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6opR_rqKIvqlcbRZ0Psgj3tsQrg1Hq8iDQyhsYgrIsB51s_4K6ItngxkWxWqScqjYFQHdanS5hJp79421-YYtii1Jw53gq0uQ2X0VL0YX97IuYN6EL4QtUf4fSRmZKY1DLhajeitIISA4/s320/EagleDiamond.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">("Five views of the Eagle diamond" <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/81/PSM_V56_D0083_Five_views_of_the_eagle_diamond.png">Source</a>)</span></div>
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"The <b>Eagle Diamond</b> was discovered in Eagle, Wisconsin in 1876 by a man named Charles Wood while he was digging a well." It was later acquired by "... Tiffany’s in New York City for US$ 850. It remained at Tiffany’s until World War I. <b>J.P. <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/morgan-le-fay.html">Morgan</a></b> bought the diamond, and presented it as a gift to the American Museum of Natural History, in New York City. <b>It was placed in the J.P. Morgan exhibit along with the Star Sapphire of India and the de Long Ruby until it was stolen on October 29, 1964</b> by Murph the Surf." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eagle_Diamond">Source</a>) <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigR9A0Mziu6vELAdPn6PDl16rMU2W07x3sZuexYWGUOi5DbNGchbYFP7cAeYV6hyphenhyphenvWNmfhnKbJLD4__VY66QUOJqXd3iRAmYJH83NQRlv4l-lmkU-OAJ46A_Gdwlx7LxzvcNFeULSa-G-7/s1600/ObamaOLogo.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigR9A0Mziu6vELAdPn6PDl16rMU2W07x3sZuexYWGUOi5DbNGchbYFP7cAeYV6hyphenhyphenvWNmfhnKbJLD4__VY66QUOJqXd3iRAmYJH83NQRlv4l-lmkU-OAJ46A_Gdwlx7LxzvcNFeULSa-G-7/s320/ObamaOLogo.png" width="213" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYFXizhnoKrJMvlwMsMbo9BZVrWXKQTmsJnO0CpTgfRqmCJawTUnqDaoMnA0KaByDanfN35MasDweDz-x4NHYx7QFPdKhsz9UM3m2elU68xzUlDahY6OoXwIn8v_Eds1WjiwhtFBHHiOFa/s1600/obama-o-logo-iphone-blue.png"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Source</span></a><span style="font-size: xx-small;">)</span></div>
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<br /></div>
"NOT MY PRESIDENT[:] <b>John Diamond</b> of Arlington, Va., spent part of the day handing out fliers inviting people to a 'disinauguration ball'...'Not my president,' said the fliers, which featured the classic <b>Obama 'O' logo</b> as part of the word 'not.'" (<a href="http://news.yahoo.com/not-president-011607636.html">Source</a>)<br />
<br />
See also Loren Coleman's post "<a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/07/gemstones.html">Gemstones are Forever</a>"<br />
<br />
<b>Coming soon: Follow-up post, more sapphire.</b><br />
###Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-49977102890707142432013-01-17T00:19:00.000-08:002013-01-28T18:20:26.369-08:00Now is the time***<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi86v8AB7P1eLYg8QyXA6b1O8vfYsf5z_LBrRhuDXneg2gy2FmTXlGLkBzRLsZeBXtOcZe4AeEClr-mUs8KIDuw7psN3joCUv1_an58alwiNY5rE9MEzacBopCFXt3DSikQ2-3lwtIFbhhk/s1600/Bane.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi86v8AB7P1eLYg8QyXA6b1O8vfYsf5z_LBrRhuDXneg2gy2FmTXlGLkBzRLsZeBXtOcZe4AeEClr-mUs8KIDuw7psN3joCUv1_an58alwiNY5rE9MEzacBopCFXt3DSikQ2-3lwtIFbhhk/s320/Bane.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(Image <a href="http://wallmay.net/">source</a>)</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>"Now is the time..." </b></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">~ Barack Obama (Sources: <a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/issues/preventing-gun-violence">1</a>, <a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/docs/wh_now_is_the_time_full.pdf">2</a>, & <a href="http://www.ctpost.com/opinion/article/President-Barack-Obama-Now-is-the-time-4200101.php">3</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi28E1qQhMmFC_dwa5D-o-FBU9A13agOjeoPIabXUOcYFaKmkM3yHs5Mq35ABxFEUd2ltXxqtf4DP3uD2F3gzumVFxQHnDpDb1bKuZJbQjlg1uSeNY2tKSc4sFlu84Da-oc2BwA-Ly50khK/s1600/Obama_NowIsTheTime.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="190" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi28E1qQhMmFC_dwa5D-o-FBU9A13agOjeoPIabXUOcYFaKmkM3yHs5Mq35ABxFEUd2ltXxqtf4DP3uD2F3gzumVFxQHnDpDb1bKuZJbQjlg1uSeNY2tKSc4sFlu84Da-oc2BwA-Ly50khK/s320/Obama_NowIsTheTime.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
"Running swiftly, balancing on the razor's edge, bald but with a lock of
hair on his forehead, he wears no clothes; if you grasp him from the
front, you might be able to hold him, but once he has moved on not even
Jupiter [Zeus] himself can pull him back: this is a symbol of <a href="http://www.theoi.com/Daimon/Kairos.html"><i>Kairos </i></a>[<i>Tempus</i>, Opportunity], the brief moment in which things are possible." (Aesop, <a href="http://mythfolklore.net/aesopica/oxford/536.htm">Fable 536</a>) "Rove: After Four Bleak Obama Years, an Opportunity" (<a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323468604578245450307332268.html">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOgGD7pFsL0_xrutmT4ZWUrKo8qV0oMLiccq8H9-8dyG7ZwHyKDo7IoTgc571Q9tPkKxLikX-xlKqsizOXWL7CLCGaWTS0l2jnY1u4zuECKp2JTmmjYN0jO96wJw5o3clB-KBu94Ifog3E/s1600/MLK.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOgGD7pFsL0_xrutmT4ZWUrKo8qV0oMLiccq8H9-8dyG7ZwHyKDo7IoTgc571Q9tPkKxLikX-xlKqsizOXWL7CLCGaWTS0l2jnY1u4zuECKp2JTmmjYN0jO96wJw5o3clB-KBu94Ifog3E/s320/MLK.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/wtxl.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/7/01/701bcbf4-5e76-11e2-90ea-0019bb30f31a/50f45098a29eb.preview-640.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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"<b>Now is the time</b> to make real the promises of democracy. <b>Now is the time to rise</b> from the dark and desolate valley of segregation <b>to the sunlit path</b> of racial justice. <b>Now is the time</b> to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. <b>Now is the time</b> to make justice a reality for all of God's children." (M. Luther King, Jr., "I have a Dream," Qtd. on <a href="http://www.npr.org/2013/01/15/169432742/on-kings-84th-birthday-his-i-have-a-dream-speech">NPR</a>.) <br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
Saturn-Chronos-"Father Time" (See <a href="http://www.theoi.com/Titan/TitanKronos.html">here</a>)</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBQbzEWa5VkL77_H66Gqbc0uSG3ppQIRRwgee-XeHYBWAkm1v-B937QBhhMi3YNn5_XftyjwfGXXRV-Iy2fqTHpT_9K86BBp6_XD5mS4Kp4lakkX6NJGXr2wCZ7FL1Pj5NnJZJNe4uh9d4/s1600/FatherTime.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBQbzEWa5VkL77_H66Gqbc0uSG3ppQIRRwgee-XeHYBWAkm1v-B937QBhhMi3YNn5_XftyjwfGXXRV-Iy2fqTHpT_9K86BBp6_XD5mS4Kp4lakkX6NJGXr2wCZ7FL1Pj5NnJZJNe4uh9d4/s320/FatherTime.jpg" width="195" /></a></div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>"<span class="st">There's a storm coming..."</span></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span class="st">~ Selina Kyle (<i>Dark Knight Rises</i> [2012])</span></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
"<span class="SS_L3"><span class="verdana">In the U.S., the Tea Party
movement is one of the first physical, political manifestations which
indicate that <b>there is a great <a href="http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=2157134005117046528" name="ORIGHIT_2"></a><a href="http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=2157134005117046528" name="HIT_2"></a></b><span class="hit"><b>storm coming</b>.</span></span></span>"</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
~ <span class="SS_L3"><span class="verdana">Anders Behring <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anders_Behring_Breivik">Breivik</a>, "Manifesto," Qtd. by <i><a href="http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/world/2011-07-24-norway-terrorism-gunman_n.htm">USA Today</a></i>.</span></span></div>
<br />
"Saturn's Hexagon --'<b>One of the Most Bizarre Things Seen in the Solar System</b>'" (<a href="http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2012/11/saturns-hexagon-one-of-the-most-bizarre-things-seen-in-the-solar-system.html">Source</a>) "The last visible-light images of the entire hexagon were captured by
NASA's Voyager spacecraft <b>nearly 32 years ago, the last time spring
began on Saturn</b>."<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXBP-RbJb-yvDOPqTk4bzp4nJ1lnTHldYF58BWHgbtRyyobXPjusx7NFKww8eHmb_olHLX2fxqrNyjqhWxsAAlwUsOEz6G3a0Z1hpCrXwcKjb1oovYCXYs1t5_z2o-l2ebraUgevqBcd5H/s1600/SaturnStorm.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="198" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXBP-RbJb-yvDOPqTk4bzp4nJ1lnTHldYF58BWHgbtRyyobXPjusx7NFKww8eHmb_olHLX2fxqrNyjqhWxsAAlwUsOEz6G3a0Z1hpCrXwcKjb1oovYCXYs1t5_z2o-l2ebraUgevqBcd5H/s320/SaturnStorm.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">("Swirling Storms on Saturn 11.28.12"; Image <a href="http://www.nasa.gov/images/content/709362main_N00198348-673.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVSdwEK6I1VerpRLS2TW8OrJLxYUKgilRl2hSFYUlVDGDdnM7VeAXXM94K-FhWhz1Ce72_RaeSAMH-uxEk6sSxdJX0SyK7HPFETdpHU4uxuhq1NyHrFvBCy81WM_lfcM3D0mD_vIYQSYJY/s1600/SaturnHexagon.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVSdwEK6I1VerpRLS2TW8OrJLxYUKgilRl2hSFYUlVDGDdnM7VeAXXM94K-FhWhz1Ce72_RaeSAMH-uxEk6sSxdJX0SyK7HPFETdpHU4uxuhq1NyHrFvBCy81WM_lfcM3D0mD_vIYQSYJY/s320/SaturnHexagon.gif" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Thanks to Jim Brandon for pointing out to me <i>Saturn's Spinning Hexagon-Shaped Storm</i>; Image <a href="http://www.nasa.gov/images/content/172324main_pia09187.gif">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnJ1t44A6yD4qTjb-AJAQ45FTvR-f-6x-fhqdyaTpV2RDVZW9o0I7dXEkGLaq3fXW6V09cAvSPTNEJgS6gw8_n_WJ6RWoV236qVrrnvSxIoOheJoCqdREg5H8tLx4qHGqzt8TqJo204p9T/s1600/SacredGeometry.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="319" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnJ1t44A6yD4qTjb-AJAQ45FTvR-f-6x-fhqdyaTpV2RDVZW9o0I7dXEkGLaq3fXW6V09cAvSPTNEJgS6gw8_n_WJ6RWoV236qVrrnvSxIoOheJoCqdREg5H8tLx4qHGqzt8TqJo204p9T/s320/SacredGeometry.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Sacred Saturnian Geometry; Image <a href="http://www.davidrankineart.com/geometry%201.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<br />
<span class="st">Loren Coleman has cataloged a number of prominent examples of the "storm coming" leitmotif. See <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2013/01/3-3-13.html">here</a>. Here are a few more - all the way back to 1984.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJeP0GIPd0towKVG9m555xNiPpEMOwyMUXIJyIk83NADwi5X-LAzThcUx4CyZQOwBj1gVcXZJkcINnCSf-j4eQvwOdzuwLet7jA2l8Z4uuKQIZiqe-1Rs0rAxQARfwL8rArpGl6fiP_nXf/s1600/1984.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJeP0GIPd0towKVG9m555xNiPpEMOwyMUXIJyIk83NADwi5X-LAzThcUx4CyZQOwBj1gVcXZJkcINnCSf-j4eQvwOdzuwLet7jA2l8Z4uuKQIZiqe-1Rs0rAxQARfwL8rArpGl6fiP_nXf/s320/1984.jpg" width="195" /></a></div>
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<b>"There's a Storm Coming."</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">~ Anton Heese (Morgan Stanley
interest rate strategist, "referring to the market for Treasury
Inflation Protected Securities, or TIPS"<span style="font-size: x-small;">; <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/morgan-stanley-warns-about-tips-selloff-2013-1">Source</a></span>)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">"<b>Myth Number 6: The 9/11 attacks came as a surprise</b> to the Bush administration. Nothing is more essential to the official story than this idea. About 10 months after 9/11, for example, FBI Director Robert Mueller said: 'To this day we have found no one in the United States except the actual hijackers who knew of the plot.'... There is much evidence, however, that counts against this claim. <i>The Put Options</i>: <b>One type of evidence involves an extraordinarily high volume of 'put options' purchased in the three days prior to 9/11</b>. To buy put options for a particular company is to bet that its stock price will go down. These extraordinary purchases included two, and only two, airlines–United and American–the two airlines used in the attacks. <b>They also included Morgan Stanley Dean Witter</b>, which occupied 22 stories of the World Trade Center. The price of these shares did, of course, plummet after 9/11, resulting in enormous profits for the purchasers. These unusual purchases, as the San Francisco Chronicle said, raise 'suspicions that the investors . . . had advance knowledge of the strikes.'... It would appear, in other words, that those who made the purchases knew that United and American airliners were going to be used in attacks on the World Trade Center." ~ David Ray Griffin, "9/11: The Myth and the Reality," <a href="http://davidraygriffin.com/articles/911-the-myth-and-the-reality/">URL</a>. </span></div>
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<span class="st">"You think I'm crazy? Well, listen up, <b>there's a storm coming</b> like nothing you've ever seen, and not a one of you is prepared for it."</span></div>
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<span class="st">~ Curtis (<i>Take Shelter</i> [2011])</span> </div>
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"<span class="st">It's changing out there. Just like last time. <b>There's a storm coming</b>, Harry. </span></div>
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<span class="st">And we all best be ready when she does."</span></div>
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<span class="st">~ <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/al-o.html">Rubeus</a> Hagrid (<i>Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix</i> [2007])</span></div>
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<span class="st"> </span><span class="st">"<b>Storm's coming</b>."</span></div>
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<span class="st">~ Batman (<i>Batman Begins</i> [2005])</span><span class="st"> </span></div>
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<span class="st">"...<b>there's a storm coming</b> in..."</span></div>
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<span class="st">Gas Station Attendant </span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span class="st">"I know."</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span class="st">~ Sarah Connor (<i>The Terminator</i> [1984], Final lines)</span><span class="st"> </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2KLOOJT8ECTwTfq6yg9weevDca34pry8dG24yilOdLcU7vCHfIIKuZCYinEUOCDvrzENo-2ddSWjhYXq_K-BP6QuaOxmvRwyHRmwZXThcs92ZKwqxP7Opfhs_JiJXAPJgkRUgbkz1bHKG/s1600/Pan.bmp" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrHbrvEs4AZihrSrEtZHSuW0Vpn4pPL-kg2DNq6eprke-6Kx4-guIgkhFYSeN3J8z9CZpxPQsdbjiow_24_oEaWkF0Bd4EO5-f87tSboiKLco-feGGg5n-VeKG6zJmAt2_KGD5FKnIjDtP/s1600/Pan.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrHbrvEs4AZihrSrEtZHSuW0Vpn4pPL-kg2DNq6eprke-6Kx4-guIgkhFYSeN3J8z9CZpxPQsdbjiow_24_oEaWkF0Bd4EO5-f87tSboiKLco-feGGg5n-VeKG6zJmAt2_KGD5FKnIjDtP/s1600/Pan.JPG" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2KLOOJT8ECTwTfq6yg9weevDca34pry8dG24yilOdLcU7vCHfIIKuZCYinEUOCDvrzENo-2ddSWjhYXq_K-BP6QuaOxmvRwyHRmwZXThcs92ZKwqxP7Opfhs_JiJXAPJgkRUgbkz1bHKG/s1600/Pan.bmp" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a></div>
<span class="st"><span style="font-size: x-small;">("Pan ... is the innermost moon of Saturn. It is a walnut-shaped small moon about 35 kilometres across and 23 km high that orbits within the Encke Gap in Saturn's A Ring. Pan acts as a ring shepherd and is responsible for keeping the Encke Gap free of ring particles." <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan_%28moon%29">Source</a>) </span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4wq2RdXeXjymeQAiWeO9JaMmEMwJuWe4tS5TnDrjNKuDC76Z-jhzhOOPeUEqmmxun38UzlvD9vRZw9H88PjraAEltbLS8UTE40Oiu-VyoKbIxvKNDH3mMQU2ZXsQ2nZZftWkTjE0mu4he/s1600/Panic.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4wq2RdXeXjymeQAiWeO9JaMmEMwJuWe4tS5TnDrjNKuDC76Z-jhzhOOPeUEqmmxun38UzlvD9vRZw9H88PjraAEltbLS8UTE40Oiu-VyoKbIxvKNDH3mMQU2ZXsQ2nZZftWkTjE0mu4he/s320/Panic.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(Pan:<span style="font-size: xx-small;"> </span></span><a href="http://images.brisbanetimes.com.au/2012/08/31/3598497/an-Greek-20god-20Pan-20120831113451238998-300x0.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span class="st">Additionally, some websites are rewarming the "solar storm" prediction that was hot during the recent spate of "Mayan Apocalypse" prognostications. See <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/science/2013/01/14/perfect-solar-storm-sun-activity-to-peak-in-2013/">here</a>. (Cf. <a href="http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2012/11/pictures/121130-best-space-pictures-224-saturn-storm/">Here</a>.) But <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/suns-2013-solar-storm-peak-expected-hit-century-150744846.html">cooler </a>heads often prevail. So don't <i>pan</i>-ic.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhv1JqmkroOutlPLqKfUuCaTRUfYLdswbkENGz36BNLR5gZ_dkUxlQ9DW5wrZmFAucs_PKIgQtyYQVbA3WGb0QSj-aV5jKgHVxkk0hkZxa8euibaMDaDPBsgcCiEgh1vtIkDRXUy1ffjkdD/s1600/PAN.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhv1JqmkroOutlPLqKfUuCaTRUfYLdswbkENGz36BNLR5gZ_dkUxlQ9DW5wrZmFAucs_PKIgQtyYQVbA3WGb0QSj-aV5jKgHVxkk0hkZxa8euibaMDaDPBsgcCiEgh1vtIkDRXUy1ffjkdD/s1600/PAN.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://i1.wp.com/vigilantcitizen.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/PAN_satellite_patch-e1308689370175.jpg?resize=298%2C294">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span class="st">"USA-207, international COSPAR code 2009-047A, also known as PAN, officially meaning Palladium At Night, or P360, is a classified American communications satellite, which was launched in September 2009. The US government has not confirmed which of its intelligence agencies will operate the satellite." (Footnotes omitted, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USA-207">Source</a>) For more on Pan, see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/maze.html">here </a>and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/now-is-time.html">here</a>.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP2GhiFbUngAZ_JlskSrH52RFQp-kKbqyLF5ss2PDfWeoO6yf7QWQUguKAZBWp-4FtBJgNTzS1CuPEiw7EgTxJuCwk5zJKvbfP7rKnqxlirXP59LXbZWr7hXZ_i456WrwhQssVolfpv3a2/s1600/Palladium.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP2GhiFbUngAZ_JlskSrH52RFQp-kKbqyLF5ss2PDfWeoO6yf7QWQUguKAZBWp-4FtBJgNTzS1CuPEiw7EgTxJuCwk5zJKvbfP7rKnqxlirXP59LXbZWr7hXZ_i456WrwhQssVolfpv3a2/s1600/Palladium.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.mastersoftrivia.com/uploads/games/The-Palladium-Picture.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span class="st">Mention of "Palladium" also fits into a pattern of "Periodic Table" references. E.g., see: <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/47-or-how-romney-lords-it-over-inferior.html">silver</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/al-o.html">cadmium</a>, and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2013/01/turning-tables.html">gold and aluminum</a>. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjh1S4w4QpvTgCosLDvFznYzM6LJKuFOkeA4JMZlp3GWnaWXq16OrTnxghXads8f3vhG5oUuYKgAtlvKKJAxnYVV6noJuDI8LhWyYJ8PYmvGObRVQnL1WkdDNQ5FHBkXWkgoIcnqOGEUURY/s1600/FelixGem.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjh1S4w4QpvTgCosLDvFznYzM6LJKuFOkeA4JMZlp3GWnaWXq16OrTnxghXads8f3vhG5oUuYKgAtlvKKJAxnYVV6noJuDI8LhWyYJ8PYmvGObRVQnL1WkdDNQ5FHBkXWkgoIcnqOGEUURY/s320/FelixGem.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span class="st" style="font-size: xx-small;"> (<a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=jxXcX9_MaHoC&pg=PA45">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span class="st">Palladium (mythology): "In Greek and Roman mythology, a palladium or palladion was an image of great antiquity on which the safety of a city was said to depend. 'Palladium' especially signified the wooden statue (xoanon) of Pallas Athena that Odysseus and Diomedes stole from the citadel of Troy and which was later taken to the future site of Rome by Aeneas. The Roman story is related in Virgil's Aeneid and other works." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palladium_%28mythology%29">Source</a>; On Virgil's Aeneid, cf. <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/armstrong-symbolically-ostensively.html">here</a>.) "[A]n object known as the Felix Gem..., cut on carnelian,...was considered to be the most valuable of all the carved gems in the collection of Pope Paul II (1464-71)...(The original purpose of such gems was to serve as seals on documents). The Felix Gem was made for Capurnius Severus, a member of the court of the emperor Tiberius (AD 14-37) by the gem cutter Felix. It bears a scene of the seizure of the Palladium - an image of the goddess Pallas Athena (or Minerva) - from the citadel at Troy. Ulysses remonstrates with his companion Diomedes for having murdered Athena's priestess. The reference is to Rome's earliest legendary history: without possession of the Palladium, the Greeks could never take Troy..." Michael J. Vickers, <i>The Ancient Romans</i> (London: Phaidon P., 1989), p. <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=jxXcX9_MaHoC">6</a>. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBsFUFOPSYFU7o4bd9drNW-iT6dNOvrw2tSiRFdJ8PAklfGC4O5JxLaPSEkrVQcqG_x90Y1t6AaPrF9EHvs2nJd1tDFqGmITKCyhCPPqfNLYoDlyz6i_SGr0i1T_eqP-wVI16CYS7lGIHC/s1600/Clock.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBsFUFOPSYFU7o4bd9drNW-iT6dNOvrw2tSiRFdJ8PAklfGC4O5JxLaPSEkrVQcqG_x90Y1t6AaPrF9EHvs2nJd1tDFqGmITKCyhCPPqfNLYoDlyz6i_SGr0i1T_eqP-wVI16CYS7lGIHC/s320/Clock.jpg" width="221" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.dailyenergyreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Shale-Gas.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
<span class="st"><br /></span>
<span class="st">Is someone or something trying to turn back the clock? </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1Reivshx84ahkWK54yaizmS5uboA4LKIWRxXh1l1Bu888ESUrqW-ca4z69QDXNiUJ2nrxV9M7nHCgoZC4BB_KFAsYwPtsSVyECGq4PlHYE1sW7lv_0FUkynYZIASz56qUTnpYXzowgazO/s1600/DoomsdayClock.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1Reivshx84ahkWK54yaizmS5uboA4LKIWRxXh1l1Bu888ESUrqW-ca4z69QDXNiUJ2nrxV9M7nHCgoZC4BB_KFAsYwPtsSVyECGq4PlHYE1sW7lv_0FUkynYZIASz56qUTnpYXzowgazO/s320/DoomsdayClock.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;">("Doomsday Clock Holds at 5 'Til Midnight" <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/end-near-doomsday-clock-holds-5-til-midnight-232147095.html">Source</a>; Image <a href="http://www.isgodmad.com/picts/News-5F.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
<br />
<span class="st">I have touched on this theme previously. See, for example, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/tony-scott-etc.html">here</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hue-of-lincoln.html">here</a>, and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/12/threats.html">here</a>. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibUP1jM-KFnTrPLtVWCbw-E8erZ0E2PC0RFpc_UYRd6QZmDXgzTkiarMS5rzUQYKvfV-XhaQsovOd6UhSoKuZKR8Yj-dXvbGW9a8xxYZrtatdWAMrjVwnM1C-2pHRHdeC2wR8gmkP3H0O5/s1600/1865.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibUP1jM-KFnTrPLtVWCbw-E8erZ0E2PC0RFpc_UYRd6QZmDXgzTkiarMS5rzUQYKvfV-XhaQsovOd6UhSoKuZKR8Yj-dXvbGW9a8xxYZrtatdWAMrjVwnM1C-2pHRHdeC2wR8gmkP3H0O5/s320/1865.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">("1865 baseball card expected to fetch six figures" <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2013/01/09/1865-baseball-card/1820835/">Source</a>; Image <a href="http://www.gannett-cdn.com/media/USATODAY/USATODAY/2013/01/09/ap--rare-baseball-card-4_3_r536_c534.jpg?1b79b3da202957124496e3768cfb7b67cdb10c81">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEbzHPVJDG2DW5EKRmFqVFuY3oxSXvcrcfUbQSH4ku18cC7_InWNJHOSOj4dKhDtHOC21T3-2WUR3nYshFkDRKX__ls3EC6DRMWj9zzCdJ_Q-8ekkvvznJtK-nBfR1gFJE33ZZM1g89NTt/s1600/Beck.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEbzHPVJDG2DW5EKRmFqVFuY3oxSXvcrcfUbQSH4ku18cC7_InWNJHOSOj4dKhDtHOC21T3-2WUR3nYshFkDRKX__ls3EC6DRMWj9zzCdJ_Q-8ekkvvznJtK-nBfR1gFJE33ZZM1g89NTt/s320/Beck.jpg" width="239" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span class="st" style="font-size: x-small;">(Just reported: "Glenn Beck Sees Civil War Brewing in America" <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/glenn-beck-sees-civil-war-brewing-america">Source</a>; Image <a href="http://stylemens.typepad.com/.a/6a00d8341cc8d453ef01156fca5e7e970c-pi">Source</a>) </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjo7guGnXVXuPCkUsV1JZ18CeE1HYXp-LDmc731GtMufDt2FZbIS3KlpJx__70ADZqWdY5HpzG87K8vHzmdHHzaWW5TYqhvpUZcdv6UZpdfMRA5wznntjUfbnONedniC1eyL-0VFOi4dpFm/s1600/Abe1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="203" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjo7guGnXVXuPCkUsV1JZ18CeE1HYXp-LDmc731GtMufDt2FZbIS3KlpJx__70ADZqWdY5HpzG87K8vHzmdHHzaWW5TYqhvpUZcdv6UZpdfMRA5wznntjUfbnONedniC1eyL-0VFOi4dpFm/s320/Abe1.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Thanks to John Cole for pointing this out; <a href="http://media.zenfs.com/en-GB/blogs/ukiemovies/abe2.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
<br />
<span class="st">What year comes to mind? (Cf. <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/tonight-case-of-1791.html">Here</a> and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hercules-and-his-twin.html">here</a>.) </span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: small;">"[Y]ou're going to have a fraction of people that are going to take a stand, and I can just predict a Waco-style standoff in some rural area and it's not going to end well"</span> </div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">~ </span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Mayor Dayton King (<a href="http://www.fox23news.com/news/local/story/Gloversville-mayor-voicing-concern-over-gun-law/zK8bmqH9yky0U59VSpt5UA.cspx">Source</a>; Thanks to Paul Joseph <a href="http://www.infowars.com/mayor-predicts-waco-style-standoff-in-response-to-obama-gun-confiscation/">Watson</a> for the information)</span></span></div>
<span class="st"></span><br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYbM4su9SXZSdxVCDe90qhlbLb2l-xac6Ovdg7rMkWyTWVEsOPETjUT_ZoNVpHm3K4AVq0sHxJXqdZOP_zXdRLXgeo3D9PoX3E6I85iC2uJdkNAgIcxfmOPk6Das4Ly96G-z3pjmILdh86/s1600/Obama.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYbM4su9SXZSdxVCDe90qhlbLb2l-xac6Ovdg7rMkWyTWVEsOPETjUT_ZoNVpHm3K4AVq0sHxJXqdZOP_zXdRLXgeo3D9PoX3E6I85iC2uJdkNAgIcxfmOPk6Das4Ly96G-z3pjmILdh86/s320/Obama.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="st">(<a href="http://www.theforbiddenknowledge.com/hardtruth/13_33_freemason_sig.htm">33</a> + <a href="http://visupview.blogspot.com/2012/09/the-fall-of-11.html">11</a> = Oh...never mind. Image <a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/first-family/masthead_image/44bo_header_sm.jpg?1251137516">source</a>)</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
"Mike O'Neal, Kansas House Speaker, Emails Prayer Some Say Wishes For Obama's Death" (<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/13/mike-oneal-obama-death-prayer-psalm-109_n_1205059.html">Source</a>) "One of Lincoln's favorite books from the bible was Psalms; his favorite poem was 'Mortality' (1828) by William Knox." (<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bill-lucey/the-abraham-lincoln-readi_b_2121352.html">Source</a>; on parallels with John F. Kennedy as well as with the Hollywood movie In the Line of Fire, see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/laugh.html">HERE</a>.)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRn4hj9Yxv6zvNvsR6EC9UtJLT76LT8d92sLUhnkFza4HwRwVgGM2PE1HkmisPbHAKE6VNxDrRBUM0kiXvcOoMnn8H7RmXDxwLClsr7R8PPyCKfU_1YZwQz_1RDM3KiIEbp1JW9HBT0Z_v/s1600/ObamaPsalm.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="319" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRn4hj9Yxv6zvNvsR6EC9UtJLT76LT8d92sLUhnkFza4HwRwVgGM2PE1HkmisPbHAKE6VNxDrRBUM0kiXvcOoMnn8H7RmXDxwLClsr7R8PPyCKfU_1YZwQz_1RDM3KiIEbp1JW9HBT0Z_v/s320/ObamaPsalm.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://cfile238.uf.daum.net/image/121160214C8BD93515B64D">Source</a>)</span></div>
<span style="font-size: xx-small;"> </span>
<span class="st"> </span><br />
<span class="st">"How Obama can avoid the second-term curse? The promise and perils of second terms" (<a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2013/01/14/obama-second-term-curse/1834765/">Source</a>)</span><br />
<span class="st"><br /></span>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_Z3tVWGVwds2s-YZjSf6BR33N_e6BRzIOpSYsksXyaswqt_x17E3G7hALfaSb0KOBob8xeXy2YSNcq84KF50KvvJIxpLgYA-N6GwxrMkB3_P07gJiQQcHhzfipm7NGN32Pfkg1Fp7rCjf/s1600/Riddle.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_Z3tVWGVwds2s-YZjSf6BR33N_e6BRzIOpSYsksXyaswqt_x17E3G7hALfaSb0KOBob8xeXy2YSNcq84KF50KvvJIxpLgYA-N6GwxrMkB3_P07gJiQQcHhzfipm7NGN32Pfkg1Fp7rCjf/s320/Riddle.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span class="st"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(<a href="http://www.batcave.com.pl/old/seriale/batman1966/11/0.jpg">Source</a>)</span></span>
</div>
<span class="st"><br /></span>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span class="st">"Now my good rats, now is the time..."</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span class="st"><span style="font-size: x-small;">~ King Boris (A Riddle a Day Keeps the Riddler Away [1966])</span></span></div>
<span class="st"></span><br />
<span class="st"></span><br />
<span class="st"><br /></span>See also:<br />
<br />
"<a href="http://bellofliberty.blogspot.com/2013/01/iatrogenic-allegations.html">Iatrogenic Allegations</a>" <br />
###Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-81168538549959502202013-01-01T12:16:00.002-08:002013-01-01T20:30:10.162-08:00Inauspicious beginning?***<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>"As 2012 comes to a depressingly apocalypse-free conclusion..."?!</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
~ Brian Brooks (movie critic, <a href="http://ca.movies.yahoo.com/news/2012-year-in-review--the-lowest-grossing-film-of-2012-made-less-than--300--wait--what--184522322.html">source</a>) </div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>"I'm going to be president for the next four years. I hope."</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
~ President Obama (<a href="http://www.theatlanticwire.com/politics/2012/12/did-obama-just-make-assassination-reference/60460/">source</a>; cf. <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/12/threats.html">here</a>)</div>
<br />
"Could he actually have been joking about assassination? About impeachment? The apocalypse?." (Sources <a href="http://www.theatlanticwire.com/politics/2012/12/did-obama-just-make-assassination-reference/60460/">1</a> & <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/did-obama-just-assassination-reference-193841933.html">2</a>) Obama is such a <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/07/copycat-jokers.html">joker</a> (cf. e.g., <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/laugh.html">here</a>, <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=laugh+%22bell+curve%22&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a#hl=en&safe=off&client=firefox-a&hs=P4r&tbo=d&rls=org.mozilla:en-US%3Aofficial&sclient=psy-ab&q=obama+joker&oq=obama+joker&gs_l=serp.3..0l4.87533.89999.4.90224.11.7.0.3.3.0.416.1243.0j1j2j1j1.5.0.les%3B..0.0...1c.1.KinJ683qVIM&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_qf.&bvm=bv.1355534169,d.aWM&fp=31229be95c8561f6&bpcl=40096503&biw=1024&bih=631">here</a>, and <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/08/isaac-x.html">here</a>).<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>"It's gonna be like fucking Doom, man..."</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
~ <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Harris_and_Dylan_Klebold">Eric Harris</a> (<a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20060223025846/http://columbine.free2host.net/quotes.html">Source</a>)</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyjwi2sNSiApxGBbwMWsJJ4rPS60fLgaBMlpG-HJmmWADRfRW7lDWUAgccTFt5P4ASHZBvvjhjpKTJ_lSJZccCBukxWcxLSxvSNo9AacyyxPlSlbtTDfWqo4jSssO8jevhb48E0QQAfJK0/s1600/Doomsday.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyjwi2sNSiApxGBbwMWsJJ4rPS60fLgaBMlpG-HJmmWADRfRW7lDWUAgccTFt5P4ASHZBvvjhjpKTJ_lSJZccCBukxWcxLSxvSNo9AacyyxPlSlbtTDfWqo4jSssO8jevhb48E0QQAfJK0/s320/Doomsday.JPG" width="232" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://scans.roushimsx.com/Advertisement_DoomII_Doomsday.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
<br />
"Apocalypse" is, I think, also sometimes called "Doomsday." <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqWP6yAFEYfZ3Ic3LhfZ_SuqnR-cGFoZcT_kuUPund2Kpzs_px8E4WU-uVgpG_5IcxNKt9jHLAXw5nE00ZWwckAXojhu8d9Wfl9MY3bmlWUykKVWzdpnEEbGDbDGKVWPy4Vjsnh4Yw7fiL/s1600/Inception.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqWP6yAFEYfZ3Ic3LhfZ_SuqnR-cGFoZcT_kuUPund2Kpzs_px8E4WU-uVgpG_5IcxNKt9jHLAXw5nE00ZWwckAXojhu8d9Wfl9MY3bmlWUykKVWzdpnEEbGDbDGKVWPy4Vjsnh4Yw7fiL/s320/Inception.jpg" width="216" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://k41.kn3.net/CC788D46D.jpg">Source</a> - <span style="font-size: x-small;">DiCaprio <a href="http://www.nypost.com/p/news/item_2liJwRXJrvHOL8PHvrs83K">again</a>!)</span></span></div>
<br />
What is the effect of publicizing these sorts of statements? Are the effects <a href="http://www.personalgrowthcourses.net/video/mind_control/mission_mind_control_abc">predictable</a>? (Cf. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personality_Assessment_System#CIA_connection">Here</a>) What "research program" (if any) has replaced "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychic_driving">psychic driving</a>"? <a href="http://www.theawl.com/2010/07/the-key-to-inception-its-a-movie-about-making-movies">Inception</a>? (Cf. <a href="http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2004/09/operation-hollywood">Here</a>) <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memetics">Memetics</a>? (Cf. <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/11/belling-hurricane-gilbert.html">Here</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjacQYhshEUxowZXR4EilYBiENDNBUuNJDjGM715uQTuczKLAI_T_RI7M2aV020E8svS4-hQjFpaOIre41YW5BvCWzfwY9G9yKHJWcW4YTp7FgnrMmEaxQU4Zy959quyBvwGO1o0XVyM0k3/s1600/MindVirus.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjacQYhshEUxowZXR4EilYBiENDNBUuNJDjGM715uQTuczKLAI_T_RI7M2aV020E8svS4-hQjFpaOIre41YW5BvCWzfwY9G9yKHJWcW4YTp7FgnrMmEaxQU4Zy959quyBvwGO1o0XVyM0k3/s320/MindVirus.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://tomschimmer.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/virus-of-the-mind.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
<br />
"Anyone who has been watching the news over the past few days will have
heard the gunman, Adam Lanza, described as 'sick,' 'disturbed' and 'defective'." (Sources: <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/blog/2012/dec/17/adam-lanza-medicalisation-evil">1</a> & <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/adam-lanza-evil-or-ill-2012-12">2</a>)<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>"It's never just a dream is it?" </b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
~ Dom Cobb (<i>Inception</i>)</div>
<br />
"Michael Carneal, who killed three and wounded five at a Paducah, Ky., high school in 1997, also was a video game devotee. Michigan State University law Professor Ken Saunders said the 14-year-old had no weapons training yet with eight shots struck three victims in the head and five in the torso. FBI officials say experienced officers hit a target once in five. '<b>It appears to have been his video game training that made him an effective killer,</b>' Saunders said. Most recently, testimony at the Beltway sniper trial of Lee Malvo showed he <b>trained by playing sniper video games</b>." (Source: Jane Musgrave, "Game Link in Slaying May Have Merit, Experts Say," <i>Palm Beach Post</i> (Florida), Final ed., Saturday, February 21, 2004, Local, p. 1C.)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9pFQVDQHoNTjjWnTY91M8Ebo9ZCYDIGSdMA-5Ey-H3bkJcpoB4GZfJSJAxGEDySLiTGnnbuj4H2NCuUeb0ueAsHxD8Q_9kbK6D2jFSqO4XJ5Fm7xoJXxvWweeNKFGlfxdfZEA4zKHNJgl/s1600/ShootingScript.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9pFQVDQHoNTjjWnTY91M8Ebo9ZCYDIGSdMA-5Ey-H3bkJcpoB4GZfJSJAxGEDySLiTGnnbuj4H2NCuUeb0ueAsHxD8Q_9kbK6D2jFSqO4XJ5Fm7xoJXxvWweeNKFGlfxdfZEA4zKHNJgl/s320/ShootingScript.jpg" width="213" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://cache.gawkerassets.com/assets/images/8/2011/11/medium_39d6126c2319d9a74c673aeb2716d64c.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>"That's why the military developed dream sharing</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>- a training program where soldiers could strangle, stab and shoot each other, then wake up."</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
~ Arthur</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0gB5etp4WXphoC55d3b-ugyKvkoeFBQsmNMmN-B3iw80H_BkVCgf5sIIlY9Vz0NVlgvIIKTsHZuJBNuaaFE101eRQ3oqYR6a6vN5Ah6lxhtS5IL1g3fiyHr_mpFArAPdX_gDYL2KPz52n/s1600/Army.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0gB5etp4WXphoC55d3b-ugyKvkoeFBQsmNMmN-B3iw80H_BkVCgf5sIIlY9Vz0NVlgvIIKTsHZuJBNuaaFE101eRQ3oqYR6a6vN5Ah6lxhtS5IL1g3fiyHr_mpFArAPdX_gDYL2KPz52n/s320/Army.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://news.cnet.com/i/bto/20090109/army.mil-2008-09-02-130545_610x408.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
<br />
<br />
"<b>U.S. Army recruiting at the mall with video games</b>[:] The U.S. Army, struggling to ensure it has enough manpower as it fights wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, is wooing young Americans with video games, Google maps and simulated attacks on enemy positions from an Apache helicopter." (<a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2009/01/09/us-usa-army-recruiting-idUSTRE50819H20090109">Source</a>) "In recent years the Army has tried a number of ways to increase enlistment, including home video games, direct marketing promotions, a stronger online presence and recruitment-themed music videos. ... In recent years, <b>the Army has had great success with using video games</b> like <i>America’s Army</i> to attract recruits." (<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/05/us/05army.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0">Source</a>; cf. <a href="http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/02/22/meet_the_sims_and_shoot_them">here</a>) Joshua: "A strange game. The only winning move is not to play." <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiAUXwfw63DPzjo2ythSxuFkVqGisbn-c5yiQdc0p7mbqpkf5OPrBRPn_hFCX-lYnDWlPKuVQ9Agv1ghjPwE5CcwRj8v-_QJ3vn20i6iMVDgAu5Rpnzuw0sjVqfO73q-DNTgMdgnBWz47V/s1600/Teaching.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiAUXwfw63DPzjo2ythSxuFkVqGisbn-c5yiQdc0p7mbqpkf5OPrBRPn_hFCX-lYnDWlPKuVQ9Agv1ghjPwE5CcwRj8v-_QJ3vn20i6iMVDgAu5Rpnzuw0sjVqfO73q-DNTgMdgnBWz47V/s320/Teaching.jpeg" width="213" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="https://ebooks-imgs.eb.sonynei.com/product/400/000/000/000/000/181/225/400000000000000181225_s4.jpeg">Source</a>)</span></div>
<br />
"A retired Army lieutenant colonel, [David] Grossman is the author of 'On Killing' and the founder of the Killology Research Group and its Web site, killology.com. He came to the World SWAT Challenge and Conference to <b>address nearly 100 cops</b> -- members of paramilitary police units known as SWAT teams, which is short for Special Weapons And Tactics. Grossman told them we're living in a 'new Dark Age,' an era of al Qaeda-style terrorism combined with Oklahoma City-style bombings and Columbine-style school shootings by <b>kids whose brains are warped by violent video games</b>. <b>Most people are sheep</b>, Grossman said, and you are the warriors who must protect them from the wolves. '<b>We need warriors who embrace that dirty, nasty four-letter word kill!</b>' he proclaimed." (Source: Peter Carlson, "Sultans Of SWAT: Competition Has Law Enforcement Assault Teams Gunning to Be the Best," <i>The Washington Post</i>, Tuesday, May 25, 2004, Final ed., Style; C01, <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53281-2004May24.html">URL</a>.)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNN-_BvCPjYLVQ-565hI770Nunrs26yEsfiV5ErRrULnFEsBesxN1KuJt6TokhxfsIveFthB20J1FAiP-yNyfHLruzjG_MWEpwYzS3kcuL0eOcw7BPOH3Tqnq0UckZEXLesJSEjyZbMObm/s1600/Century16.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNN-_BvCPjYLVQ-565hI770Nunrs26yEsfiV5ErRrULnFEsBesxN1KuJt6TokhxfsIveFthB20J1FAiP-yNyfHLruzjG_MWEpwYzS3kcuL0eOcw7BPOH3Tqnq0UckZEXLesJSEjyZbMObm/s320/Century16.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGgy1zNzr4x4CLMULhVdQuP3wjrZ3b6PhN-5l_e9HMaueoWCUtYbTIbuBiPMHNKsA21HwNHdhIdYUwCLsVqBCC4Ii2yWw1gmLKm8A-UOR2-DEGnJE6O6YrQZgWRUDfa06kvkVeZYbfqajV/s720/Century16Theater-aurora-movie-theater-story-top1.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<br />
"A team of scientists have said they believe an old gourd contains the blood of French King Louis XVI. The monarch was killed by guillotine by French revolutionaries more than 200 years ago, on 21 January 1793. ... Analysis of DNA taken from blood traces found inside the vegetable container had already revealed that it probably matched someone of Louis' description but scientists could not prove it belonged to the beheaded king as they had no genetic material from any of his relatives. However, the team managed to find a rare genetic signature shared with DNA from a mummified head believed to belong to Louis' <b>16th Century</b> predecessor, Henri IV, who was killed in 1610." (<a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-20882305">Source</a>; cf. <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/century-16-and-dawn-aurora-of.html">here</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCA_Q5UXpcYxDeqYaWV9uuvTuEjuB6cd5H_75QCDjYWK6KKn1-mlMQmrFr8yCoAu69tDKZqZuU7A0kWpJSHx6tOuRwPiPtBzUHzH_YvBbt8NOEFbCI1ymtA3njfUMFKWnRUMN1pz45_z6H/s1600/WarGames.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="171" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCA_Q5UXpcYxDeqYaWV9uuvTuEjuB6cd5H_75QCDjYWK6KKn1-mlMQmrFr8yCoAu69tDKZqZuU7A0kWpJSHx6tOuRwPiPtBzUHzH_YvBbt8NOEFbCI1ymtA3njfUMFKWnRUMN1pz45_z6H/s320/WarGames.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://www.retro-gaming.it/videogiochi_img/movie_wargames/wargames15.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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David Lightman: "I was trying to break into <i>Protovision</i>...[I]f it's military, why does it games like checkers and backgammon?" Jim Sting: "Maybe that's because those are games that teach basic strategy." David Lightman: "Is this a game, or is it real?" Joshua: "What's the difference?" (<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086567/"><i>WarGames</i></a>) <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1H8Xo-tbXn3AQOReaGqfcKVGC4iV8wiq49xjM4QRFANFgMbGwN-zU1aBOxdTtoODJhwpbDUMk9lE-fkRUAjm8AUB0HyAcag6sdFZdyVOwkcbvnv-eJ5IiQXkqOacLSJ6CF__oiNSamgN4/s1600/CallOfDuty.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1H8Xo-tbXn3AQOReaGqfcKVGC4iV8wiq49xjM4QRFANFgMbGwN-zU1aBOxdTtoODJhwpbDUMk9lE-fkRUAjm8AUB0HyAcag6sdFZdyVOwkcbvnv-eJ5IiQXkqOacLSJ6CF__oiNSamgN4/s320/CallOfDuty.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://pcbunny.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/Call-Of-Duty-Modern-Warfare-3-Reveal-Trailer-Released.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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"The Connecticut school massacre gunman Adam Lanza spent hours playing violent video games such as <i>Call Of Duty</i> in a windowless bunker, according to an interview with a plumber who worked at the family home." (<a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/9752141/Connecticut-school-massacre-Adam-Lanza-spent-hours-playing-Call-Of-Duty.html">Source</a>; cf. <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/1295920.stm">here</a>.) It's just a video game!<br />
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Flashback: "Anders Breivik <b>'trained' for shooting attacks by playing <i>Call of Duty</i></b>" (<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/apr/19/anders-breivik-call-of-duty">Source</a>) "On Aug. 28, [2003] two teenagers from Newport, Tenn., pleaded guilty to
two sniper-style shootings that left one man dead and a woman
injured. <b>The boys claimed to have gotten the idea from Grand Theft
Auto</b>, a violent video game that has caused controversy over its
potential effects on kids." (<a href="http://www.gallup.com/poll/9253/grand-theft-innocence-teens-video-games.aspx">Source</a> cf. <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18560_162-678261.html">Here</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6bvQRg50uQlVjPoxF448zE9SHIxJGXvpl6_dG-VTa_9dnijbWBETlM3ZOMGhW6VwRCr9_Z96leJO1NEFUsAvK9HT5hwr3cjtw1ZetZnegl7mhJea4IZhJHbHV6tuXJjgugf8XCU418h6U/s1600/CIA.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6bvQRg50uQlVjPoxF448zE9SHIxJGXvpl6_dG-VTa_9dnijbWBETlM3ZOMGhW6VwRCr9_Z96leJO1NEFUsAvK9HT5hwr3cjtw1ZetZnegl7mhJea4IZhJHbHV6tuXJjgugf8XCU418h6U/s320/CIA.jpg" width="243" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://img.agoravox.fr/local/cache-vignettes/L420xH553/2694-1-6664b.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Apropos of nothing: Happy <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1994/01/06/business/activision-spy-games.html">19th Anniversary</a> of CIA's involvement in the manufacture of video games! <br />
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See also:<br />
<br />
"<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/11/tidbits.html">Tidbits</a>"<br />
<br />
"<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hercules-and-his-twin.html">Hercules (and his twin)</a>"<br />
<br />
"<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/tony-scott-etc.html">Tony Scott</a>" (<i>&al.</i>)<br />
<br />
"<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/12/threats.html">Threats</a>" <br />
###Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-88369241038866723302012-12-17T20:42:00.003-08:002012-12-18T13:11:09.290-08:00Media 'Mistakes' as Digital Dye***<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8J5wy3Lnlv1gxaCIeKloM4b8VFijZulJ1frH1YvSZeZR7Dx_uSGzeXEXbpvabfgzSMCupwDuiBkDFioQOyBuKQAOE9TM6KrVh1o381H__6CNBsSd4Air0sMPkhtZ_9B5NJ2wwYMQQEdwk/s1600/Dye.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="256" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8J5wy3Lnlv1gxaCIeKloM4b8VFijZulJ1frH1YvSZeZR7Dx_uSGzeXEXbpvabfgzSMCupwDuiBkDFioQOyBuKQAOE9TM6KrVh1o381H__6CNBsSd4Air0sMPkhtZ_9B5NJ2wwYMQQEdwk/s320/Dye.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://themedicalpost.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/ivp1.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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In particular circumstances, medical doctors may "[deliver] into the body" a substance called "contrast" in order to "[help] certain areas show up better on...x-rays" (<a href="http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/003330.htm">Source</a>). Intuitively, the idea is for a competent medical professional to inject, cause the patient to ingest, or otherwise put, a sort of dye (contrast media) into the patient's body in order to facilitate investigation of various parts of the body that would otherwise be less visible (or entirely invisible).<br />
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Is there an analog to this "contrast media" process in the study of information systems? It is conceivable (or so it seems to me) that "high profile" events, such as the latest, tragic massacre at Sandy Hook elementary school provide systems analysts with a relevant data set.<br />
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One may imagine that there are (at least) two pertinent considerations.<br />
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First consider an admittedly vague category of news report that I may, for convenience, term "outlandish claims". Understand, please, that this label is not intended to convey - covertly or overtly - the notion of <i>falsity</i>. To be more specific, I wish to allow that particular Outlandish Claims (OCs) may very well be true. Although, surely, they might not be.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxMUlCHCrIuFI4WNcDkpFz_L_lTzs7GU7MDaHKNJXbkYsmQRUI7aqCgEqSeLa7mBOXY5NX3aLvZFTpb7CKVVbzzmRsHzwUA9lM55mKi39K5rtIWvdMPMDprvN0H5KATEN36oRFJz7JaL4A/s1600/43Trill.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="206" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxMUlCHCrIuFI4WNcDkpFz_L_lTzs7GU7MDaHKNJXbkYsmQRUI7aqCgEqSeLa7mBOXY5NX3aLvZFTpb7CKVVbzzmRsHzwUA9lM55mKi39K5rtIWvdMPMDprvN0H5KATEN36oRFJz7JaL4A/s320/43Trill.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://socioecohistory.files.wordpress.com/2012/11/marketwatch_43trillion_dollars_lawsuit.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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As an illustration of an OC, consider the case of the "$43 Trillion Dollar lawsuit." Under the ponderous heading "Major Banks, Governmental Officials and Their Comrade Capitalists Targets of Spire Law Group, LLP's Racketeering and Money Laundering Lawsuit Seeking Return of $43 Trillion to the United States Treasury", <i>PR Newswire</i> reported, on October 25, 2012, the filing of what is alleged to be the "largest money laundering and racketeering lawsuit in United States History". (I register awareness of the fact that this September report had relevant antecedent, e.g., a <i>Marketwire </i>article of April 22, 2012.)<br />
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Now various language employed in this press release, not least of which is the identification of the exorbitant trillion dollar amount and the labeling of the alleged defendants as "banksters," might lead skeptical readers to question the veracity of the report. Herein I wish to make no claim as to the report's truthfulness. Rather, my interest is in suggesting that such an OC might serve, for interested analysts, as a sort of informational equivalent of a high-contrast dye. After all, the phrase "$43 trillion" is, <i>prima facie</i>, fairly likely to pick out this alleged news story <i>quickly and uniquely</i>. Anecdotally, as I type "$43..." into Google, the Google engine automatically recommends to me (words like) "Trillion" and "Banker lawsuit" as "auto-complete" suggestions.<br />
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If one thinks of the internet as a vast "body," one might suspect that "$43 trillion" key phrase might serve as a useful "dye" which would indicate, to interested observers, the precise informational "nodes" that have picked up, and repeated, the relevant story. Notice that this schema arguably holds up whether the story is true or not.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuJ_c0GRLnsffCALWGwUoxU_zqMAPxPQj0XiVIWJkg7D1pwxAxCAeU5qB0xfEt2RFrAl_fexdJlljR6-L6eSZ9hS3oATJRb6Tz2mP6YKF1WOdJqposGGJGZvQ8Y9oUjCFF418gu9Jm2Sc3/s1600/mediaconfusion.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="294" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuJ_c0GRLnsffCALWGwUoxU_zqMAPxPQj0XiVIWJkg7D1pwxAxCAeU5qB0xfEt2RFrAl_fexdJlljR6-L6eSZ9hS3oATJRb6Tz2mP6YKF1WOdJqposGGJGZvQ8Y9oUjCFF418gu9Jm2Sc3/s320/mediaconfusion.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEZonIhVtuPy7JG-OFaSyCPExVMXr6bAf9KavhQA0qlVCNfZT_wWrLbxfk6FZC3Q20UjRBpgi9eZKjKQUV3WT1CyT2Bqty8YS9Ku4E56f_i8bY7K5AxrobpTg1GORiAGLrfzkn1SE36Qc/s1600/mediaconfusion.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Second, one might also consider stories where reporting "confusions" serve to generate different permutations of a story. In this vein, one has an example ready at hand. As <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/12/dots.html">Loren Coleman</a> has summarized:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Some are seeing the media making massive mistakes. The miscues piled up: two shooters were said to be in the school, when there was only one; the wrong name of the suspect was identified; the incorrect Ryan Lanza was named; the Lanza mother was not a kindergarten teacher at the Sandy Hook school; the number of dead was given out prematurely and was wrong; a kindergarten class was said to have been attacked, when it was a first grade class; the Bushmaster semi-automatic rifle was not found in Lanza's car, but instead was next to his body and the primary weapon of the school shooting; and a growing list of mistakes were aired. The media began writing about their own media missteps (see <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/12/14/media-misfire-accusing-the-wrong-man-in-connecticut-shooting.html">here</a>, <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/danny-groner/newtown-shooting-social-media_b_2312953.html">here</a>, and <a href="http://connecticut.cbslocal.com/2012/12/15/as-shooting-story-unfolds-media-struggle-with-facts/">here</a>).</blockquote>
Supposing that we focus only on the elements explicitly named by Coleman (and, for all I know, there could be more besides) - <i>viz</i>., number of alleged shooters, name of alleged shooter, affiliation of alleged shooter's mom with the school, victim count, grade level of targeted classroom, and variety of weapon used - we have a model with the following positions: <i><shooters, name, affiliation, count, grade, weapon></i>. Now, each of the first three variables have two possible values, the fourth has numerous possible values, the fifth again has two possible values, and the sixth has (by my quick survey of the news articles) either three or four possible values. <br />
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Think of a blogger, call her "Ninmah." Ninmah posts on the Newtown, CT tragedy as soon as she hears a news report (or a cluster of them). Let us suppose that her blog post ends up being some instance of the <s,n,a,c,g,w> schema. In effect, the values embodied in Ninmah's post mark it with something like a sort of ID-tag. The tag, one might think, may disclose two separate but related pieces of information.<br />
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Number one, the specific values that Ninmah selected (e.g., the name of the shooter and what grade level he attacked) may reveal her source or sources. This is particularly relevant for information that may turn out later to be false. (<a href="http://www.ics.uplb.edu.ph/node/449">One </a>of the information spreading investigations cited elsewhere [<i>infra</i>.] concluded that there were "three phases: Expansion, Front-page, and Saturation.") An illustration of this is also provided via Loren Coleman, who quotes the following:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The father of Newtown Connecticut school shooter Adam Lanza is Peter Lanza who is a VP and Tax Director at GE Financial. The father of [the alleged] Aurora, Colorado movie theater shooter James Holmes is Robert Holmes, the lead scientist for the credit score company FICO. Both men were to testify before the US Sentate in the ongoing LIBOR scandal.</blockquote>
Coleman subsequently remarks: "One informant tells me that <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorcha_Faal">Sorcha Faal</a> is the dispenser of Holmes' father Libor info. But Faal is allegedly a disinformation agent who makes claims about several people." <br />
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One may see, then, that the permutation-tagging route can converge with the Outlandish Claim route in the following way. If a tag includes information that may be justifiably termed an OC, it may be possible to trace the belt of transmission very cleanly all the way from the initial source through various intermediates to various terminal nodes.<br />
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Hence, number two, persons that "repost," "reblog," quote, or otherwise reproduce Ninmah's text will be traceable to Ninmah via the repetition of Ninmah's tag.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7UtwT-3UkUsuinRL8Le2_yv_bvPHxi8khJNJhz9Ctz9op5p33mwXE_m4FqwdMssV_VJqYS7AJOCNqIuBxgiKrb-IPgKW9o7mBN_83-Hw5o6p-qlVNqGLW8GyQ4XmemNmxrAy0ybv4AEMs/s1600/Tree.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7UtwT-3UkUsuinRL8Le2_yv_bvPHxi8khJNJhz9Ctz9op5p33mwXE_m4FqwdMssV_VJqYS7AJOCNqIuBxgiKrb-IPgKW9o7mBN_83-Hw5o6p-qlVNqGLW8GyQ4XmemNmxrAy0ybv4AEMs/s320/Tree.jpg" width="268" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://www.nsta.org/elementaryschool/connections/201010InferenceOrObservationTreeDiagram.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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All of this information, in theory, could be diagrammed as a sort of branching tree.<br />
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Is there any good reason to think that this sort of analysis is actually being carried out?<br />
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For one thing, one can detect evidence of analyses that are at least in the vicinity of what is being suggested here. Again, a simple, non-scientific Google search seems to show that a handful of pertinent studies have been conducted over the last decade or so. Here is a sample listing:<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Philip Anderson, "Complexity Theory and Organization Science," <i>Organization Science: Special Issue: Application of Complexity Theory to Organization Science</i>, Vol. 10, No. 3 (May - Jun., 1999), pp. 216-232, <<a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/2640328">URL</a>>.<br />
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A.C. Salvania and J.P. Pabico, "Information Spread Over an Internet-mediated Social Network: Phases, Speed, Width, and Effects of Promotion," <i>Philippine Information Technology Journal,</i> 3(2):15-25, <<a href="http://www.ics.uplb.edu.ph/node/449">URL</a>>.<br />
<br />
Dashun Wang, et. al., "Information Spreading in Context," <<a href="http://www.barabasilab.com/pubs/CCNR-ALB_Publications/201102-10_WWW-Spreading/201102-10_WWW-Spreading.pdf">URL</a>>.<br />
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"Mapping Cyberspace: Tracking The Spread of Ideas on The Internet," <<a href="http://icaci.org/files/documents/ICC_proceedings/ICC2011/Oral%20Presentations%20PDF/D3-Internet,%20web%20services%20and%20web%20mapping/CO-354.pdf">URL</a>>.<br />
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Lars-Erik Cederman, "Computational Models of Social Forms: Advancing Generative Process Theory," <i>American Journal of Sociology</i>, Vol. 110, No. 4 (January 2005), pp. 864-893, <<a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/426412">URL</a>>.</blockquote>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcEyRe43TT-JVJPUwGw3vPkr5JJS-l80Zj__JLdwV4Hygk0tWs6LeY3Hcld9tYAUitNp8uHnkgBm18lzRNZWz3iYYEeB8H17OTI7Kii73q3tzGPg8_Z2U2dy0QtfO9WWbxjgLyqhkrcGch/s1600/DARPA.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcEyRe43TT-JVJPUwGw3vPkr5JJS-l80Zj__JLdwV4Hygk0tWs6LeY3Hcld9tYAUitNp8uHnkgBm18lzRNZWz3iYYEeB8H17OTI7Kii73q3tzGPg8_Z2U2dy0QtfO9WWbxjgLyqhkrcGch/s320/DARPA.png" width="314" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://4chandata.org/images/threads/225582_IAO-logo.png">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Although I have nothing like a rigorous proof of the contention, the following seems likely to me. Given that it has occurred to complexity theorists publishing in the "Philippine Information Technology Journal" to analyze patterns of information spreading over the internet, <i>probably</i>, it has occurred to an organization such as DARPA, as well. And the appeal is, apparently, obvious. The presentation titled "Mapping Cyberspace" contains the comment that "statistical analyses" can be used "to understand the reasons for particular trajectories along which an idea spreads" (<i>op. cit</i>.).<br />
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It is evident that this talk of "trajectories" has clear application to the study of "social networking" websites such as, without limitation, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google Plus, Myspace, and the so-called "blogosphere." In conversation, I have previously remarked that the now somewhat dated criminological techniques related to the area once called "social network analysis" have perhaps become largely passé. It is apparently true that it is just as important today as it once was to "not only identify key participants" in various "conspiracy investigation[s]" but also to "grasp the connections among" conspirators in order "to determine the scope of an illicit operation" (Charles Swanson, Neil C. Chamelin, and Leonard Territo, Criminal Investigation [NY: McGraw-Hill, 1996], p. 294). However, it may well be that the amount of "legwork" required in 2012 has decreased, as compared to that required in 1996 or before, on account of the fact that people now enthusiastically map (if not flaunt) their own connections. To be sure, I have no real idea the extent to which serious criminals "Friend" their associates on Facebook. (But see <a href="http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/apr/27/feds-use-facebook-to-collect-crime-evidence/?page=all">here</a>.) I think that my point is clear enough, however.<br />
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(Cf. "Just about any kind of update can be used against you, it seems. One deejay posted on his MySpace page that he'd be working at an upcoming party. Agents decided to crash it to collect their cash." [Source: "Tax collectors now hitting social networks to track deadbeats," Mon Aug 31, 2009 11:39AM EDT, Original url: <a href="http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/null/148083"><span style="font-size: x-small;">http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/null/148083</span></a>] "U.S. law enforcement agents are following the rest of the Internet world into popular social-networking services, going undercover with false online profiles to communicate with suspects and gather private information... Think you know who's behind that 'friend' request? Think again. Your new 'friend' just might be the FBI. [Source: "Richard Lardner, "Break the law and your new 'friend' may be the FBI," <i>Associated Press</i>, Mar. 16, 2010, Original URL: <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100316/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_feds_on_facebook/print"><span style="font-size: x-small;">http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100316/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_feds_on_facebook/print</span></a>] & <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/10/13/government-spying-social-networks/?test=latestnews">here</a> & <a href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&frm=1&source=web&cd=3&cad=rja&ved=0CEgQFjAC&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cnn.com%2F2012%2F08%2F30%2Ftech%2Fsocial-media%2Ffighting-crime-social-media%2Findex.html&ei=zQjQUNTQBorxygH5v4DIBA&usg=AFQjCNHz1FcxrH-luxWUR57VXx4JrzE7YQ&bvm=bv.1355534169,d.aWc">here</a>. Examples can be multiplied easily.)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqS0YAOs9_gxyykaiBuZDmvbbjzS9zHyXjW9eueRsnJd5dCr_L2y-3H9DLI_oLIAqaIuK-OnaOlGf78xZ-vNoOY2i5qofOamf5mQMvaiv90N3WyZiaK2VmORCO1jpkEvSo90Jw9wW2bva8/s1600/complexity_network.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqS0YAOs9_gxyykaiBuZDmvbbjzS9zHyXjW9eueRsnJd5dCr_L2y-3H9DLI_oLIAqaIuK-OnaOlGf78xZ-vNoOY2i5qofOamf5mQMvaiv90N3WyZiaK2VmORCO1jpkEvSo90Jw9wW2bva8/s320/complexity_network.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDUTtd1GZ1xKzfIct7q_iQ97N7Rv2X6bksyDJPEP7yIdDio79Vc8GkPlHnDqCgSJ-keCoHFrlkJmuojLPCTfcUMrwJAezCfAF7E-9DBDwibRXqcSKTV03bZ0Tznsca8VPxQhT7hyCS6U4/s1600/complexity_network.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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For another thing, what is now broadly termed "complexity theory" has been around for quite some time. Consider just a few examples. Note that there is a "...diversity of thinking within the complexity sciences field, which includes the study of complex adaptive systems, chaos theory, catastrophe theory and a number of other sub-fields..." (Valerie J. Lindsay, "The development of international industry clusters: a complexity theory approach," <i>Journal of International Entrepreneurship</i>, Vol. 3 No. 1 [March 2005], p. 71).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjI_R7u0e9xLC8l45Jelt7UQ-vup-wlEmqyWSQlKSaBRybQ9qmcG5qCuXWOzVz9ljw6Lt6q6u_0xlsIo2EmasbzCQGiubI1b0KSr3MUAl-UBEo91b__8jrQVQWNIadSnM1WhEQWyLU4KYlZ/s1600/CatastropheTheory.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjI_R7u0e9xLC8l45Jelt7UQ-vup-wlEmqyWSQlKSaBRybQ9qmcG5qCuXWOzVz9ljw6Lt6q6u_0xlsIo2EmasbzCQGiubI1b0KSr3MUAl-UBEo91b__8jrQVQWNIadSnM1WhEQWyLU4KYlZ/s320/CatastropheTheory.jpg" width="213" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://covers.booktopia.com.au/big/9780521230421/an-introduction-to-catastrophe-theory.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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In his 1980 book, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Catastrophe-Theory-Timothy-Saunders/dp/052123042X"><i>An Introduction to Catastrophe Theory</i></a> (Cambridge UP), P.T. Saunders relates that "catastrophe theory" is well suited "for the study of systems whose inner workings are not known, and for situations in which the only reliable observations are of...discontinuities" (p. 1). Whatever else might be said of the "massive mistakes" and "miscues" noted by Loren Coleman (and rehearsed above) it certainly seems plausible that they qualify as "observations ...of...discontinuities" and, thus, fall within the purview of the catastrophe theorist.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjytT491DoPmr3lbplI_jSHKuYj2a5n1QjTtNBY4WVkSSK8Rm0CLcycmVwmkEZFs8QO7IUgvvnBHPn_Rb8BvgME_jN-u-09DV_ly6C8yK-uebsZsKQ0rzySEWFoJml3Ma8opxjyKWjtBtOq/s1600/Chaos.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjytT491DoPmr3lbplI_jSHKuYj2a5n1QjTtNBY4WVkSSK8Rm0CLcycmVwmkEZFs8QO7IUgvvnBHPn_Rb8BvgME_jN-u-09DV_ly6C8yK-uebsZsKQ0rzySEWFoJml3Ma8opxjyKWjtBtOq/s320/Chaos.jpg" width="211" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://www.coverbrowser.com/image/science-books/301-5.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Similarly, according to James Gleick in his popular level explication <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Chaos-Making-Science-James-Gleick/dp/0143113453"><i>Chaos: Making a New Science</i></a> (Penguin, 1987), the interdisciplinary "chaos theory" has been around since at least the mid-1970s, with tantalizing hints preceding it by decades. Such an area deals with systems that conjoin "chaos and order together" and that display a "sensitive dependence on initial conditions" (p. 8). "Scientists...define chaos as 'stochastic behavior occurring in a deterministic system'" (Stacy Shapiro, "Combating risk management woes: Chaos theory may hold some clues," <i>Business Insurance</i>, May 4, 1992, International, p. 41). Chaos theory therefore promises to unlock heretofore mysterious systems from weather forecasting to virus distributions. "[O]nce mathematicians and scientists come to terms with chaos theory -- which holds that order may be found in apparent disorder -- risk managers may learn to use it as a tool to predict the unpredictable" (<i>Ibid</i>.). Not only this, but when we observe "that chaos theory helps to explain, and possibly control, systems that are highly non-linear in nature", we can understand why governments might have an interest (Jason Makansi, "Chaos theory," <i>Power</i>, December, 1993, Vol. 137, No. 12; p. 65).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge3YLThJt9w6Aat3cTQnO7oqUOV7qE6EGVMqFt11zVV-U3rduZ6-zCHMzwg0qgHy5drsBzHt2MdOFSJSnWO3ZUeHf6LbIJ_P7EZweOhvajp4QBDNkJ4GQklhY0jjGRnIK0TRksDI4Ojz_R/s1600/Stochastic.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge3YLThJt9w6Aat3cTQnO7oqUOV7qE6EGVMqFt11zVV-U3rduZ6-zCHMzwg0qgHy5drsBzHt2MdOFSJSnWO3ZUeHf6LbIJ_P7EZweOhvajp4QBDNkJ4GQklhY0jjGRnIK0TRksDI4Ojz_R/s320/Stochastic.png" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://img.docstoccdn.com/thumb/orig/9552093.png">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Again, it seems intuitive and plausible that questions like "which bloggers are picking up and transmitting which bits and pieces of this or that multifaceted story?" could be glossed by the descriptors quoted previously in relation to chaos theory. Such questions could be represented by so-called "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stochastic_modelling_%28insurance%29">stochastic models</a>." And the goal might not simply be to analyze information transfer but, as one of the above quotations mentions, actually to "control" (or thwart?) said transfer. If it now seems that I am making my own Outlandish Claim, consider a recent article sketching the use of stochastic models with the aim of trying to control the spread of biological pathogens.<br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Sometimes you want to prevent extinction. In other cases, you want to hurry extinction along. Take, for instance, a cold virus <b>hacking its way through an elementary school</b>. Extinction of the virus within the student body is something everyone cheers for. ... Leah Shaw says there are many paths to extinction no matter if you want to hasten extinction or try to stave it off but, every system has one route to oblivion that's most sure and direct. Shaw, an assistant professor in William and Mary's Department of Applied Science, works on the mathematical modeling of extinction. ... Understanding the mechanics of extinction is important in many regards, she says. First of all, it would be informative just to understand the system better. If you can understand how a part of a system goes extinct, you know something about the dynamics, you know what factors are important in the extinction, she explained. <i><b>But the major reason for interest, of course, has to do with how you might control the extinction</b></i>. (Joseph McClain, "Plotting the Best Route to Oblivion," <i>States News Service</i>, Press Release: College of William and Mary, Monday, July 18, 2011.)</blockquote>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQrmgif3FlMZWW1brCtPdQUWn4jtr80G8RJxmsxOTpPGgg2dHhTboKp5h6j_bmpR0DDFhaFPlKqjnPemjKSxiQyeahwW6zRnafuadd6TPAwPCG2R48J3kLZUAicWPVQ1xLxrRB4VbSBOy4/s1600/Uncle.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQrmgif3FlMZWW1brCtPdQUWn4jtr80G8RJxmsxOTpPGgg2dHhTboKp5h6j_bmpR0DDFhaFPlKqjnPemjKSxiQyeahwW6zRnafuadd6TPAwPCG2R48J3kLZUAicWPVQ1xLxrRB4VbSBOy4/s320/Uncle.gif" width="220" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">("I want...to control your extinction..."?<span style="font-size: x-small;">; </span><a href="http://dream2love.files.wordpress.com/2010/01/bdfdb1362703ad854ca9418ce3fb1ac8.gif">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Additionally, note that many documented military experiments concern investigations that are arguably close cousins of the sort that are being considered herein. For example, "...in 1957 and '58, an Army plane released zinc cadmium sulfide over northern and western Minnesota..." (Greg Gordon, "Sabo and expert to urge ban on secret civilian chemical tests," <i>Star Tribune</i>, Minneapolis, MN, September 28, 1994, Metro Edition, p. 5B.) The purported aim of this "release" (itself "...part of a large-scale spraying program...") of chemicals was given as follows: "...<i><b>to monitor chemical dispersion</b></i>..." (Ibid.). Incidentally: "One of the sites sprayed in Minneapolis was <i><b>a public elementary school</b></i> where former students have reported an unusual number of stillbirths and miscarriages...One former student of the sprayed school told the station that of her three children, one had Down syndrome, another was profoundly retarded and a third had a learning disability" ("Minneapolis Called Toxic Test Site in '53," <i>The New York Times</i>, June 11, 1994, <<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1994/06/11/us/minneapolis-called-toxic-test-site-in-53.html">URL</a>>.).<br />
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Moreover: "The Army used <i>serratia </i>to test whether enemy agents could launch a biological warfare attack on a port city such as San Francisco from a location miles offshore. For six days in late September 1950, a small military vessel near San Francisco sprayed a huge cloud of <i>serratia </i>particles into the air while the weather favored dispersal. ... Army tests showed that the bacterial cloud had exposed hundreds of thousands of people in a broad swath of Bay Area communities including Sausalito, Albany, Berkeley, Oakland, San Leandro, San Francisco, Daly City and Colma, according to reports that later were declassified. Soon after the spraying, 11 people came down with hard-to-treat infections at the old Stanford <a href="http://www.sfgate.com/education-guide/">University</a> Hospital in San Francisco. By November, one man had died" (Bernadette Tansey, "Serratia has dark history in region / Army test in 1950 may have changed microbial ecology," San Francisco Chronicle, 4:00 am, Sunday, October 31, 2004, <<a href="http://www.sfgate.com/health/article/Serratia-has-dark-history-in-region-Army-test-2677623.php">URL</a>>.). <br />
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Relatedly, just this past September 25, St. Louis based news station KSDK reported a story on "...details of the Army's ultra-secret military experiments carried out in St. Louis and other cities [e.g., in Corpus Christi, Texas] during the 1950s and 60s..." (Leisa Zigman, "The Army's secret Cold War experiments on St. Louisans," <i>I-Team</i>, <<a href="http://www.ksdk.com/news/article/339573/3/I-Team-The-Armys-secret-Cold-War-experiments-on-St-Louisans-">URL</a>>). The report states that "The I-Team independently verified that the spraying of zinc cadmium sulfide [possibly with radioactive particles] did take place in St. Louis on thousands of unsuspecting citizens. ... The Cold War cover story was that the Army was testing smoke screens to protect cities from a Russian attack." Researcher Lisa Martino-Taylor claims that "There is a lot of evidence that shows people in St. Louis and the city, in particular minority communities [centered on the Pruitt-Igoe housing complex], were subjected to military testing that was connected to a larger radiological weapons testing project" (<i>Ibid</i>.). <i>Digital Journal</i> of September 28, 2012 adds the familiar refrain: "The spraying was meant to <b><i>simulate the airborne dispersal of biological warfare agents</i></b>" ("US Army sprayed zinc cadmium sulfide on poor St. Louis residents," <<a href="http://digitaljournal.com/article/333710">URL</a>>). Again: "In the 1950s and 1960s, the Army used motorized blowers atop a low-income housing high-rise, <b><i>on schools</i></b> and in other locations to spray zinc cadmium sulfide, a fine fluorescent powder, into the air" (Jim Salter, "Army: No risk from secret St. Louis tests," <i>The Associated Press/Army Times</i>, Friday Nov 2, 2012 17:52:51 EDT, <<a href="http://www.armytimes.com/news/2012/11/ap-no-health-risk-from-secret-army-tests-saint-louis-110212/">URL</a>>.).<br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b>"<a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2009/01/joker-copycats.html">Joker</a>, I've told you, we run two basic stories here. ...Winning of Hearts and Minds...And combat action that results in a kill..."</b></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">~ Lt. Lockhart, <i>Full Metal Jacket</i></span></blockquote>
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In other words, the Army injected a compound into the air simply in order, at least partly, to track which way the wind would blow it. Are pieces of information released similarly in our digital era?<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqNYTsteCtdWg-h5YNaTyFY0Zoef02m81mzt6zWINqu5wwtx7fsjqJOSDM9StGrgryn_laLuOqF4yYcgiWfhA8-R43I673ZASYxKgArt8VomBSa5qAo0fobLMzjSmKWR4fx-K-7p0Q02Uj/s1600/CIA.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqNYTsteCtdWg-h5YNaTyFY0Zoef02m81mzt6zWINqu5wwtx7fsjqJOSDM9StGrgryn_laLuOqF4yYcgiWfhA8-R43I673ZASYxKgArt8VomBSa5qAo0fobLMzjSmKWR4fx-K-7p0Q02Uj/s320/CIA.png" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://www.noslibertes.org/images/CIA.png">Source</a>)</span></div>
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Finally, in this connection, reflect on the fact that it is a matter of public record that the Central Intelligence Agency has been in the business of media finagling since the 1950s. See <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird">here</a>. It's enough to make one wonder at the origin of various pieces of information, like perhaps the number and name of alleged shooters at a particular elementary school, or even something as "historical" as the initial description of an alleged Presidential assassin.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
District Attorney Wade ...[held]...a lengthy formal press conference ... in which he attempted to list all of the evidence that had been accumulated at that point tending to establish Oswald as the assassin of President Kennedy. ... [Wade] told reporters that Oswald's description and name 'went out by the police to look for him.'... <b>The police never mentioned Oswald's name in their broadcast descriptions before his arrest</b>. ... (<a href="http://www.archives.gov/research/jfk/warren-commission-report/chapter-5.html">Source</a>)</blockquote>
If the police didn't release that information, then who did? I don't know.<br />
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<b> <span style="font-size: large;">"The Pentagon...has begun deploying forces to mount psychological operations, or 'psy-ops'"</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Source: Carla Anne Robbins, "Spin Control: U.S. Has Early Priority: Managing Its Message? Stifle News on Military? 'Psy-Ops'," <i>Wall Street Journal</i>, Eastern edition, New York, N.Y.: Oct 4, 2001, p. A.1 </span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(I owe my knowledge of th<span style="font-size: x-small;">e existence of this quotation to </span><a href="http://revisionisthistory.org/index.html">Michael Hoffma</a><span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://revisionisthistory.org/index.html">n</a><span style="font-size: x-small;"></span></span>).</span></div>
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Cf.<br />
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<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/blogpost/post/cia-is-watching-tweets-facebook/2011/11/04/gIQAvyyllM_blog.html">Here</a>.<br />
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###Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-16965150242227080882012-12-11T17:34:00.002-08:002012-12-18T10:48:34.392-08:00Neil Armstrong: Astronaut . . . or Alchemist? .<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVP5gnnFKTSlK9ozYZyMxKNcFJYMecahlWx9kxARAyw2-er9UE0VE2QAMyrNcFd8a6W07b58aTN1Jwa_0urnJdsIPWsxFZ-n65hcjQn1er2iJn9b3P47ghwN_lhn15xATylci3dWwRBOgr/s1600/1Armstrong.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVP5gnnFKTSlK9ozYZyMxKNcFJYMecahlWx9kxARAyw2-er9UE0VE2QAMyrNcFd8a6W07b58aTN1Jwa_0urnJdsIPWsxFZ-n65hcjQn1er2iJn9b3P47ghwN_lhn15xATylci3dWwRBOgr/s320/1Armstrong.jpg" width="243" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Neil Armstrong, who died in 2012, attained worldwide celebrity as commander of the Apollo 11 lunar rocket expedition of July 1969 that landed him and Edwin Aldrin on the moon while Michael Collins orbited overhead. Neil Armstrong’s image as a nearly superhuman master of then radically new space technology would endure, even as he himself gradually faded from view, avoiding significant comment on his career and lunar adventure until death. His last rites and cremation, with burial of his ashes at sea, suggest a strange desire for personal oblivion. Some have seen this as the burden of a man who had secrets he dared not risk revealing by opening himself to questions. </span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">SOURCES </span></span></span></div>
<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Life Commemorative issue on Neil Armstrong, Autumn 2012. On sea burial, see <a href="http://www.space.com/17615-neil-armstrong-1st-moonwalker-buried-at-sea-photos.html">here</a>.</span></span></span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">So, what was the real deal with Apollo 11? </span></b></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhm9di_Hr9hK6PNkt9MtzF79j1pDroZ-wKlIjeN0QT-b64xVM7Uin1aqV8LM0EYNXQcbu1VTfVVXlhKy7r-9RkFGSKbUfS8QI4t5Q-iT_cllMocnfAkk_Vyqtd-GYfP2oVDJaD9VFUvXZ0P/s1600/2Armstrong2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="243" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhm9di_Hr9hK6PNkt9MtzF79j1pDroZ-wKlIjeN0QT-b64xVM7Uin1aqV8LM0EYNXQcbu1VTfVVXlhKy7r-9RkFGSKbUfS8QI4t5Q-iT_cllMocnfAkk_Vyqtd-GYfP2oVDJaD9VFUvXZ0P/s320/2Armstrong2.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">or ... </span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Armstrong (top, left) and Aldrin on the moon, establishing a U.S. presence in advance of the Russians in “space race” competition, along with its unsung hymn to American technological prowess, are unknowingly accepted by the public as the rather mundane purpose for the gigantic undertaking. But that is because, for more than forty years, we have been told absolutely nothing about the vast occultic process behind the scenes of the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration from its earliest days. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">What was the ultimate purpose of Apollo 11? Could it have been a ceremonial linking of sun and moon, male and female, as shown in the dramatic 17th century engraving reproduced above? According to writer Norman Mailer, NASA’s official reporter for the project, after Armstrong and Aldrin prepared to leave the moon and the Lunar Module “…lifted off Tranquility Base…the astronauts passed back into the Command Module and Eagle was <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=j1AEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA60&lpg=PA60&dq=%22Eagle+was+jettisoned+on+a+trajectory+to+the+sun%22&source=bl&ots=XaEuu8I7kM&sig=Eu7RXvvIX_oc1lWkwenGMaOqaf0&hl=en&sa=X&ei=Cu62UJ3sHab7yAGJvIGQAQ&sqi=2&ved=0CCsQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=%22Eagle%20was%20jettisoned%20on%20a%20trajectory%20to%20the%20sun%22&f=false">jettisoned on a trajectory to the sun</a>” – instead of back to the moon, as would seem to have happened naturally, or simply abandoned in space. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Coincidence? A whim? Either would seem to be highly implausible in anything as rigorously planned as a major space flight. So, if intentional, where does that leave us? On the face of it, this must have been the most stupendous symbolical transaction of all time – on the interplanetary level, after all – for which its controlling secret-society adepts can only be marveled at by us. Was there anything else? Could this have been the preliminary ritualistic step – by those who practice such things – preceding a transformation to some undisclosed fate planned for all Americans that is only now beginning to be visible? If so, I would think that the adepts would be proud of their accomplishments, shouting them from the rooftops. But such, strangely, has not been the case. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="color: #3d85c6;">SOURCES</span></span></span></div>
<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Armstrong & Aldrin on moon – from <i>Life Commemorative</i>, p 74. Engraving from Johann Barchusen, <i>Elementa Chemiӕ</i> (1718), in C. G. Jung, Psychology & Alchemy, Princeton: 1968, p. 360. On the Masonic role in NASA (among many sources online), <a href="http://freemasonsfordummies.blogspot.com/2009/07/apollo-11-freemasons-and-moon.html">here</a> and <a href="http://nexusilluminati.blogspot.com/2012/02/apollo-11-freemasons-and-moon.html">here</a>. Norman Mailer, "A Dream of the Future's Face, <i>LIFE</i> (<a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=j1AEAAAAMBAJ">Magazine</a>), Vol. 68, No. 1, Jan 9, 1970, p. 60.</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Reprising Mr. Downard’s Travels in America Mystica</span></b></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">By Jim Brandon</span></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Part I – Apollo Visits Luna</span></i></b></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Downard</span></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Jim Brandon's pioneering Downard-linked rarities </span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">A</span> FEW YEARS after Apollo 11, a man named <b>James Shelby Downard</b> started a slow ascent to an unusual sort of renown when he made my acquaintance as a journalist and investigator of unusual phenomena. My book, Weird America, was published by a major house in 1978, receiving acclaim from the New York Times and other élite media. In the book and in an oral interview recording that was titled Sirius Rising, I introduced Mr. Downard’s astonishing theory that a process employing the strange principles of medieval alchemy was being enacted behind the scenes of America’s most momentous events. Detonation of the first nuclear-fission atomic bomb or “destruction of primordial matter,” the “sacrificial killing of the king” in the ritualistic murder of President John F. Kennedy and of course the densely symbolical Apollo 11 flight followed basic alchemical patterns, in the revolutionary view of Mr. Downard. </span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">SOURCES </span></span></span></div>
<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">J. S. Downard portrait from his <i>The Carnivals of Life and Death</i>, Los Angeles: Feral House Press, 2006, p xxiii. For general background on J.S.D., <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Shelby_Downard">this</a> Wikipedia article is generally correct, if incomplete and now dated. </span></span></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwBUdx0x8pHJ7Bse5xnL6UDQ3atJt80ApeCMHmB4Ztb-Y8-pzS50rMSmG7HKehW-R6mLfLHM-hUUCWrBaZCEnkKy-vZ00ZPNaOfXU9bvmcOsG4ci4Re6FHvNu1c5wwXdRe8gJbQye15uO0/s1600/5ScottishRite.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwBUdx0x8pHJ7Bse5xnL6UDQ3atJt80ApeCMHmB4Ztb-Y8-pzS50rMSmG7HKehW-R6mLfLHM-hUUCWrBaZCEnkKy-vZ00ZPNaOfXU9bvmcOsG4ci4Re6FHvNu1c5wwXdRe8gJbQye15uO0/s320/5ScottishRite.JPG" width="237" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">“Moonshine! Horse s—t!” it has been objected. “Alchemy was nothing but primitive chemistry with charlatans claiming to create gold but it has nothing at all to do with our heroic astronauts.” Let’s look at that. We will review abundant evidence of the major role of occultist personalities at the highest levels of NASA, including Edwin Aldrin himself. The channel by which this process was applied is Freemasonry – which has been self-defined as “the science of symbolism” – and especially by the higher-level and extravagantly mystical Scottish Rite (SR).</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Its 32nd-degree emblem features the twin heads of the mythical phoenix bird, a primary symbol in alchemy. The motto translates “My Hope Is in God,” raising the question of “which god?” when we consider the SR’s rather dark rituals which were inspired by the Kabbalah. I had long been aware of the Masonic order, of course, but it was not until I learned Mr. Downard’s insights on its activity in applying these enigmatic patterns to events all around us that I saw how wide the influence has been. It all circles back to alchemy – and to a certain <b>Albert Pike</b>. </span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> SOURCES </span></span></span></div>
<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">On Scottish Rite rituals and aura, see Charles T. McClenachan, <i>The Book of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry</i> (1867, and numerous reprints). The 32nd-degree emblem is from Adam Parfrey & Craig Heimbichner, <i>Ritual America</i>, Port Townsend, WA: Feral House, 2012, p. 4.</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">No doubt the best-known American Masonic personality of all time would be the portly magus of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, Southern Jurisdiction, Albert Pike (1809-1891). He was the author of a similarly hefty tome, <i>Morals and Dogma</i> (M&D), long revered through many editions as the bible of the SR, despite being unstructured, bereft of documentation and occasionally plagiaristic. More importantly for his memory, however, Albert Pike also restored the Scottish Rite’s largest division to a successful organizational basis after its parlous years in the South after the Civil War. Beyond that, Pike constructed SR rituals and liturgy along deeply mystical lines far beyond basic three-degree “Blue Lodge” lore.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">And uppermost in Pike’s thought were the twin objectives of alchemy and bisexuality. On alchemy, M&D’s 1079 pages contain countless affirmative references, and one extended disquisition in the 28th degree (“Knight of the Sun”) chapter disparaging the “gold-making quack” charge still heard today. Instead, Pike contends, alchemy was a useful shield behind which the ancient mystery religions were perpetuated during the burn-at-the-stake Christian heresy era. Pike makes it abundantly clear that the Scottish Rite will continue to channel “Hermetic” alchemy in all its aspects into our world today.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This may not be an entirely symbolical or ritualistic endeavor, however. Fascinating developments on the scientific front followed the sensational 1989 announcement of a successful experiment in what is called “cold” nuclear fusion. Continuing progress on that line led the spokesman of the movement, the ebullient Dr. Eugene Mallove, to proclaim a “<i>Triumph of Alchemy</i>” in his magazine, to the chagrin of old-style scientists. </span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Albert Pike, Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry, Richmond, Va.: L. H. Jenkins, 1947, frontispiece. On alchemy, see numerous index references and esp. pp. 772-792. Eugene Mallove (D.Sc., Mass. Inst. of Technology), “The Triumph of Alchemy,” <i><a href="http://www.infiniteenergy.com/images/pdfs/MalloveIE32.pdf">Infinite Energy</a></i>, No. 32, July 2000.</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Opening his chapter on the 32nd SR degree, modestly entitled “Sublime Prince of the Royal Secret,” Albert Pike displays the above engraving ascribed to the legendary German alchemist, Basil Valentine. As Pike enthusiastically explains in the text, few images better summarize the identity and ideals of his organization, with a compass and square displayed in either hand – a century before Freemasonry’s official start, in England.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Along with male and female heads the figure bears the label REBIS, from Latin res bina, “dual thing,” attesting to its bisexuality. The implication of this strangely profound image would be: the Masonic androgyne controls the terrestrial dragon force and the world, demarked under triangle and square. Above, the sun and moon, male and female, are thus symbolically linked – as they would be much later by Apollo 11.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">As many <i>M&D</i> index listings show, Albert Pike was preoccupied with the concepts of hermaphrodism or androgyny which, as Mr. Downard observed, has become highly prevalent today when homosexual marriage is endorsed by a major political party. And indeed in a curious passage, Pike explains how even the name of God itself, YHVH, can be made “bi-sexual” by transposing its letters.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Rather more surprising, considering his Victorian milieu, are Pike’s passages seeming to condone homosexuality and sacred “orgies.” Today it is customary for SR people to smile and shrug when asked about Albert Pike’s less conventional notions. Although <i>Morals and Dogma</i> has now been replaced by a more concise governing text, by Rex Hutchens, the latter still harkens back to <i>M&D</i> as the ultimate SR authority. Most significantly, this did not occur until 1974 – long after Apollo 11 planning had begun.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">SOURCES</span></span></span></div>
<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Basil Valentine, “Azoth,” Woodcut 6, from his Twelve Keys of Philosophy (1599); in Jung, Psychology and Alchemy, 372. In Pike, <i>Morals and Dogma</i>: see Hermaphroditic and Phallus index entries; God as “bi-sexual,” 849; Homosexuality, 393, 403. On Rex Hutchens, <i>A Bridge to Light</i>, see Parfrey & Heimbichner, <i>Ritual America</i>, 72-3. On “bisexuality” and occultism, see: Jim Brandon, “Sirius Rising,” part 1 and Judith A. Reisman, <i>Kinsey: Crimes and Consequences</i>, Arlington, VA: Institute for Media Education, 1998.</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The final result of the alchemical process: the bisexual androgyne being purified by fire. While not astronomical, the theme here is evocative of what must have happened to the Eagle lunar landing module – now symbolically converted to a moon / sun, female / male hermaphrodite – when it reached the solar inferno. Such images from the classic period of alchemical publishing are strangely haunting in their direct appeal to deeper levels of consciousness, as was extensively studied by Swiss psychologist Carl Gustav Jung on the archetypes or underlying patterns of mental processes. This engraving is from the 17th-century alchemical masterpiece Atalanta Fugiens, by Michael Meier.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">C. G. Jung, <i>Psychology and Alchemy</i>; see index, “Archetypes.” Meier’s <i>Atalanta</i>, emblem 33: in S. K. de Rola, <i>The Golden Game</i>, New York: Thames & Hudson, 1997, p. 87. For more on the alchemical hermaphrodite and androgyne, see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/now-playing-at-century-16-ampitheater.html">here </a>.</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">While working in Washington, D.C., in the early 1970s and doing research in the library at the Scottish Rite Supreme Temple, I had what I’m tempted to call a life-changing experience, journalistically speaking. It was there that I saw on display the richly embroidered SR flag that astronaut Aldrin had worn inside his space suit during the Apollo 11 expedition. While I was quite familiar with Freemasonry in the conventional sense, seeing this kind of high talisman that had been totally ignored in the long avalanche of media coverage of the Apollo event quickly raised Masonry to a much higher level on what I call my “crypto-political radar scope.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">It was only a short time later and along a highly coincidental – or synchromystic, in the current terminology – pathway that I met Shelby Downard and communicated to him the information on the flag, along with a photo of its presentation to the Scottish Rite by Aldrin. This was welcomed by Mr. Downard as confirmation of high-level participation of secret societies in the Apollo series that he had previously only intuited from alchemical parallels and personal insight. </span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Aldrin’s moon flag <a href="http://i652.photobucket.com/albums/uu249/W3RLIED2/132ec0e9.jpg">source</a>. On synchromysticism, Downard and other tangents, see Loren Coleman <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2008/12/synchromystisms-godfather.html">here</a>. For more on Freemasonry and NASA, see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/nasas-33-degree-kline-konnektion.html">here</a>.</span></span></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNlPhBBFyaMkLU1z_QKs5U3t60kK75GrtnxpTZdq2JdYvp9KQN5F6gf6RP-w-HN7JioTKYnTQ2orL7_3ub7KUiFm2Gi8NGzJBnRKGpoDbHqzOERAVTbCIBhoWKxnwS3SlZeOUW5QYOHiE3/s1600/10_TexasFreemason.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNlPhBBFyaMkLU1z_QKs5U3t60kK75GrtnxpTZdq2JdYvp9KQN5F6gf6RP-w-HN7JioTKYnTQ2orL7_3ub7KUiFm2Gi8NGzJBnRKGpoDbHqzOERAVTbCIBhoWKxnwS3SlZeOUW5QYOHiE3/s320/10_TexasFreemason.jpg" width="286" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Texas Masons with a lunar landing module – in 1966. </span></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The flag reportedly carried by astronaut Gordon Cooper. </span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">If anyone has lingering doubts of the overwhelming influence of the Masonic order in planning, staffing, engineering, navigating and finally piloting of NASA’s immensely complex interplanetary expeditions of Apollo 11 and other flights, these images should provide confirmation. The official magazine of the Grand Lodge of Texas published this issue in August, 1966, three years before Apollo 11, showing on the cover what appears to be something quite similar to the Eagle lunar landing module. In front are Masonic astronaut Gordon Cooper (right), who the magazine says “carried a flag bearing the Square and Compasses into outer space.” Also shown are the Texas grand master of Masons, H. W. Fullingim (center), and an unidentified official at left.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In a quite surprising corollary activity, it has been reported that the Texas Grand Lodge demanded and got a claim to part of the moon itself which was enacted there on the Sea of Tranquility with establishment of something called Tranquility Lodge No. 2000 and duly conveyed to the Texas Grand Lodge by the astronauts on their return.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpTTan6jZgJDQgb3fMeGna8Pdq2EJHO3fSZMTiJR5s7ayw3Nnkw6aK13BYqlcJi_9K-t20ulXfgBY_hZaJYNMzF8HEez1kNZ3Ex9Nw4O_9Hsjaa7RhZwYcEiXYjn3De5kUo51P0Lg6k4an/s1600/11_TexasFreemason3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="169" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpTTan6jZgJDQgb3fMeGna8Pdq2EJHO3fSZMTiJR5s7ayw3Nnkw6aK13BYqlcJi_9K-t20ulXfgBY_hZaJYNMzF8HEez1kNZ3Ex9Nw4O_9Hsjaa7RhZwYcEiXYjn3De5kUo51P0Lg6k4an/s320/11_TexasFreemason3.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Clear Lake Lodge No. 1417 was “set to work” by Grand Master Fullingim on July 30, 1966, in the Space Center auditorium, “scene of historic press conferences,” as the article notes. Functioning Freemasonry was therefore only a few steps away from the critically important mission-control center where the suspenseful coordination of the dangerous rocket flights was made, with the famous countdowns and dramatic narrations that were broadcast to rapt international audiences. Yet, when have we taxpayers who paid the bills heard word one of all this? And again, why the secrecy?</span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">SOURCES</span></span></span></div>
<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The Texas Freemason, Aug. 1966: cover photo, p. 2. Published by <a href="http://www.grandlodgeoftexas.org/">Grand Lodge of Texas </a>(715 Columbus Ave., Waco, Tex. 76701) whose current magazine, <i>The Texas Mason</i>, is $6.00 yearly. Gordon Cooper’s Masonic flag accessed <a href="http://media.liveauctiongroup.net/i/10436/11118033_1.jpg?v=8CE35F87E13B180">here</a>. On Tranquility Lodge and lunar claim, see Masonic commentator Chris Hodapp <a href="http://freemasonsfordummies.blogspot.com/2009/07/apollo-11-freemasons-and-moon.html">here</a>. </span></span></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsp833rVCeSrT8toe8UkV8nhH8RAzoVk-H2RMcYuBX1lFu1-LWF0W8FBAZmy2BDjpgkYYNPFV7qNI714UBMc2pcSPHjeut_Bq69MTjjJLk2rDW5ZUDswGTlJxGtCvTi74Xbru283JMfcMQ/s1600/Apollo7Breakfast.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsp833rVCeSrT8toe8UkV8nhH8RAzoVk-H2RMcYuBX1lFu1-LWF0W8FBAZmy2BDjpgkYYNPFV7qNI714UBMc2pcSPHjeut_Bq69MTjjJLk2rDW5ZUDswGTlJxGtCvTi74Xbru283JMfcMQ/s320/Apollo7Breakfast.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Kenneth Kleinknecht (left) dining with Apollo 7 crew members. </span></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">C. Fred Kleinknecht as a high official of the Scottish Rite. </span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Among the key NASA personnel playing an inestimably important role in the design and deployment of the monster 33-foot Saturn V rockets from Launch Pad 33 at Cape Canaveral, Florida, was one of the chief engineers, Kenneth S. Kleinknecht. Another member of this multigenerational Masonic family, brother C. Fred Kleinknecht, was at the time on a parallel track rising in leadership of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, Southern Jurisdiction. He eventually rose to the rank of Sovereign Grand Commander and both he and Kenneth received the ultimate honor of the “33rd and Last Degree.” But – dare we ask, what coordination might there have been between the two on key NASA affairs?</span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">We owe the knowledge of the Apollo 7 breakfast photograph to Richard Sauder, Kundalini Tales (Kempton, IL: Adventures Unlimited P., 1998, p. 16); cf. Linda Moulton Howe, “Secret American Military Space Program?” <a href="http://www.whale.to/b/nasa1.html">Interview with Richard Sauder</a>, 7 Dec. 2007, Accessed Fall 2012. But the source for the photograph reproduced above is <a href="http://astronautarchives.com/wp-content/uploads/wpsc/product_images/scan1248.jpg">here</a>. C. Fred Kleinknecht image <a href="http://scottishrite.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Kl-Regalia.jpg">source</a>.</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Edwin Aldrin (right), generally known by his odd nickname of “Buzz,” and another “33” Freemason, visited the Scottish Rite Supreme Temple in Washington after his return and presented the flag that he had carried to Sovereign Grand Commander Luther A. Smith (left). Looking on from left were Edwin Aldrin Sr., C. Fred Kleinknecht Jr. and C. F. Kleinknecht Sr. It’s amusing and more than a little intriguing that Aldrin was reported in 2009 by Internet journalist Alex Jones to have denied that any of this took place and to have answered “As far as I can tell, zero” when asked by Jones “What is the Masonic influence on NASA?”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This apparent falsehood was in direct contradiction to the Scottish Rite’s then official magazine, The New Age for December 1969, where the above photographs appeared. What is perplexing now, however, is – why the continuing secrecy decades after the event? And do such constraints on these people help to explain Neil Armstrong’s puzzling reticence that he carried to a watery grave?</span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">SOURCES</span></span></span></div>
<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Aldrin flag presentation <a href="http://parfaiteunion.be/userfiles/image/lune_03.jpg">source</a>. “Buzz Aldrin Lies About His Masonic Activities on the Moon”: see <a href="http://www.conspiracyarchive.com/Blog/?p=2748">here</a>. For related information, see <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/08/armstrong.html">here</a>.</span></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This ends Part 1 of Jim Brandon’s recollections and updating of the ongoing Apollo 11 saga, in the synchromystic perspective pioneered by James Shelby Downard.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Future Studies of America Alchemica: Part 2 – The Atomic Bomb: <i>Destruction of Primordial Matter</i>. Part 3 – JFK: <i>The Ritualistic Killing of the King</i>. Part 4 – Black Power: <i>The Nigredo Process</i>.</span> </div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7d/Apollo_11_Launch2.jpg">Launch of Apollo</a> (the Sun deity) via Saturn (rocket) towards the Moon - “It ascends...”</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> “...it descends...” (<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/28/Splashdown_3.jpg">Source</a>) </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> “...the glory of the whole world...” (<a href="http://rpmedia.ask.com/ts?u=/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/46/Apollo_11_Parade.jpg/200px-Apollo%20_11_Parade.jpg">Source</a>) </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> (<a href="http://wodumedia.com/wp-content/uploads/Astronauts-Buzz-Aldrin-Michael-Collins-and-Neil-Armstrong-with-President-Nixon.jpg">Source</a>) </span></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">"...The Sun is its father; the Moon its mother... It ascends from the Earth to the Heavens and again it descends to the Earth... By this means you shall have the glory of the whole world and thereby all obscurity shall fly from you. ...That which I have said of the operation of the Sun is accomplished and ended."</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">~ Excerpted from the <i>Tabula Smaragdina</i> [the "Emerald Tablet] (Trans. Isaac Newton, qtd. in: D.W. Hauck, "Newton the Alchemist," <a href="http://www.alchemylab.com/isaac_newton.htm">Source</a>) </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">“[T]he one point was a symbol of the Active Principle or Creator, the two points of the Passive Principle or Matter, the three of the world proceeding from their union, and the four of the liberal arts and sciences, which may be said to complete and perfect that world.” (<a href="http://www.metempyrion.org/img/sacred_geometry/sacred_geometry_1_tetractys_385x304.png">Image Source</a>)</span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhF-DfBEN9HlVYeJ_7YZIbiu3Biid2g01aFclbKpd0jtEsN-7tcZKNxA1A2j4RdF1YmzfA251VcmPP-R7UgwWViikGxgZ2zJ49drhfVK_Ys-xtWK-w34a2rWBaYt5prZNUIGsaodRBIWiJ7/s1600/Delta.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="257" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhF-DfBEN9HlVYeJ_7YZIbiu3Biid2g01aFclbKpd0jtEsN-7tcZKNxA1A2j4RdF1YmzfA251VcmPP-R7UgwWViikGxgZ2zJ49drhfVK_Ys-xtWK-w34a2rWBaYt5prZNUIGsaodRBIWiJ7/s320/Delta.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">"In the symbols of Freemasonry, we will find the sacred Delta bearing the nearest analogy to the tectractys of the Pythagoreans.” (<a href="http://aura.gsfc.nasa.gov/images/project/delta2-parts.jpg">Image Source</a>)</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">When one approaches NASA's programs of space exploration with open eyes, particularly (although not exclusively) in its manned missions, one is struck by the myriad mythological allusions and references. Names like “Apollo” and “Mercury” have robust meanings that, conservatively, extend back hundreds of years in human history. And the names are conjoined with a rich array of visual symbolism that ought to provoke percipients to ask a very simple question. Was the intentional employment, by our National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), of hermetic and pagan signs merely window-dressing? Or was it something more?</span> </div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Indeed, it is tempting to dismiss such questions as wild flights of fancy. However, as we have seen above, such a move becomes far less justifiable when one notes the involvement, at very high levels of NASA, of numerous members of the Brotherhood of Freemasons. Hence, our question is rightly framed by certain facts on the ground. For instance, it is simply a matter of historical record that institutional Freemasonry was intimately connected with NASA. Additionally, that Freemasonry is centered around symbolism is apparent through even the most cursory of investigations. As Albert G. Mackey wrote:</span> </div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Of the various modes of communicating instruction to the uninformed, the masonic student is particularly interested in two; namely, the instruction by legends and that by symbols. ...No science is more ancient than that of symbolism. ...To study the symbolism of Masonry is the only way to investigate its philosophy. This is the portal of its temple, through which alone we can gain access to the sacellum [“shrines”] where its aporrheta [“secret doctrines”] are concealed. Its philosophy is engaged in the consideration of propositions relating to God and man, to the present and the future life. Its science is the symbolism by which these propositions are presented to the mind. </span><br />
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Sources </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Albert G. Mackey, <i>Encyclopedia of Freemasonry</i> (Chicago: The Masonic History Co., 1956), Vol. II, p. 1033. Albert G. Mackey, <a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/files/11937/11937-h/11937-h.htm"><i>The Symbolism of Freemasonry</i></a> (1882). </span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Double-Headed Mercury (<a href="http://humanityhealing.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/androgine_janus.jpg">Source</a>)</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Representation of the Gemini "Twins" (<a href="http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3170/3028372389_56e57e3e43.jpg">Source</a>) </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">View inside a Gemini space capsule (<a href="http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lqyhlpniAP1qzvby8o1_1280.jpg">Source</a>)</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Amongst the symbols connectable to Freemasonry and, by extension, NASA's Apollo mission, we have already encountered the alchemical “Rebis,” also called the Monstrum hermaphroditus. Interestingly, “rebis” - the curious double-whatsit – has associations with both Mercury and Gemini – which, in turn, have connection with each other, since Gemini “is the principal sign of Mercury.” Of course, "Mercury" and "Gemini" also name NASA's two predecessor programs to Apollo. And, as it happens, there were "six manned Mercury missions" and within the Gnostic cosmological conception of the "Pleroma" there were sometimes said to be "six androgynous beings" revealed by the Savior. Furthermore, the "[t]en manned Gemini missions" are paralleled (even if superficially) in the ordering of the "lower heavens...in androgynous pairs" in which "powers of ten" figure importantly. Finally, even the three male participants of Apollo 11 are evocative of the Sethian (Gnostic-Hermetic) concept of the "Triple Male" – i.e., the "true male" or Savior - who, "reflect[ing] upon himself[,]...reflects upon Protophanes" (the First-light). NASA's entire project history is replete with gnostic-Hermetic allusions.</span> </div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Sources</span></span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Juan E. Cirlot, <i>Dictionary of Symbols</i>, p. 208; Carl G. Jung, "Religious Ideas in Alchemy," <i>Collected Works of C. G. Jung</i>, Vol. XII (Princeton UP: 1968), pp. 432ff. Jean Chevalier and Alain Gheerbrant, <i>The Penguin Dictionary of Symbols</i> (London: Penguin, 1996), p. 427. "MERCURY AND GEMINI," <a href="http://airandspace.si.edu/exhibitions/gal114/SpaceRace/sec300/sec340.htm">URL</a>; John M. Dillon, “Pleroma and Noetic Cosmos: A Comparative Study,” Richard T. Wallis, ed., <i>Neoplatonism and Gnosticism</i> (Albany, NY: SUNY, 1992), p. 107; Pheme Perkins, "Beauty, Number and Loss of Order in the Gnostic Cosmos,” Wallis, Op. Cit., p. 284; John D. Turner, "Gnosticism and Platonism," Wallis, Op. Cit., pp. 445ff.</span></span></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-zpOvdPI17Jhc6_RGnIYGDQv_tqlDA45gXLspsn489zXVYuxGCjUXDOtXNPyVd4c29yNMR6dsojUu2THyGkycvJ-UtkJXCRjS1FOwQgKwDBgsyn2Ls5ExukqLE_skquaA3DrRCx8c0g2C/s1600/23CastorAndPollux.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="220" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-zpOvdPI17Jhc6_RGnIYGDQv_tqlDA45gXLspsn489zXVYuxGCjUXDOtXNPyVd4c29yNMR6dsojUu2THyGkycvJ-UtkJXCRjS1FOwQgKwDBgsyn2Ls5ExukqLE_skquaA3DrRCx8c0g2C/s320/23CastorAndPollux.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Gemini: Castor and Pollux (<a href="http://astrobob.areavoices.com/files/2011/02/Gemini_Uranias_mirror1-400x275.jpg">Source</a>)</span> </span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In Greek myth, Gemini and Apollo have numerous parallels that are particularly interesting in the present context. For example, “Gemini” is of course another name for the Dioscuri, or “Sons of Zeus” (“boys,” kouroi, of the “divine”, “Zeus”, dios). The individual names were Castor and Pollux (Polydueces). Their mother was Leda, which name Robert Graves gives as meaning “lady.” Castor and Pollux were supposedly twins, although they had two different fathers (Tyndareus and Zeus-Jupiter, respectively), which actually resulted in the former being mortal and the latter immortal. In one variant of the story, Leda was brought an egg by a shepherd. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Twins: Apollo and Artemis (<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b0/Giovanni_Domenico_Tiepolo_003.jpg/699px-Giovanni_Domenico_Tiepolo_003.jpg">Source</a>)</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Apollo's mother, on the other hand, was Leto (Latona). Robert Graves considers the meaning of “Leto” somewhat obscure (he prefaces his speculations with a question mark), but gives two possibilities: “lady,” the same as he gave for Leda, and “stone.” Turner and Coulter report that “Leto was...called the personification of darkness” (akin to the “Melancholy” figures depicted in the art surveyed by Francis Yates). Additionally, Apollo was born on a floating island sometimes called “Delos” but also sometimes termed “Asteria” (i.e., star, or of the star/sun). Interestingly, the Minotaur (“Minos' Bull”) was named “Asterius.” Now Apollo also had a twin, in his case, an equally divine sister named Artemis (Diana). However, fitting in with our theme of androgyny, it was said (e.g., by the ill-fated Niobe) that Leto's “...female child, Artemis, was masculine and her male child, Apollo, was feminine.” After Apollo killed the Cyclopes, he was forced by Zeus to act as a shepherd (or cattle herd) for King Admetus, and Hermes (Mercury) takes his herd.</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Sources </span></span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">“<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=deva&allowed_in_frame=0">Deva</a>,” <i>Online Etymology Dictionary</i>. “<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=Dioscuri&allowed_in_frame=0">Dioscuri</a>,” <i>Supra</i>. In Latin, “castor” designates the beaver; and Robert Graves gives “Polydeuces” as “much sweet wine,” The Greek Myths (London: Penguin, 1992), p. 776. Alternatively, “Pollux” cashes out to “Latin, from Gk. Polydeukes, lit. 'very sweet,' from polys 'much' ...deukes 'sweet',” “<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=Pollux&allowed_in_frame=0">Pollux</a>,” <i>Ibid</i>. The Online Etymology Dictionary also notes that “Kastor 'he who excels,' [is] one of the divine twins (with Pollux), [who was] worshipped by women in ancient Greece as a healer and preserver from disease. His name was given to secretions of the animal [the beaver], [which were] used medicinally in ancient times”, “<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=castor&allowed_in_frame=0">Castor</a>,” <i>Ibid.</i> T. H. White connects the castor-beaver with castration, noting that legends surrounding the beaver in medieval times held that the animal, “when he notices that he is being pursued...removes his own testicles with a bite...”, <i>The Bestiary: A Book of Beasts</i> (New York: Capricorn, 1960), pp. 28-29. Hence, in this tangled complex, we have twin brothers with <i>sub rosa</i> sexualized names meaning, essentially, “sweet beaver juice.” Robert Graves, supra., p. 768. Patricia Turner and Charles Russell Coulter, <i>Dictionary of Ancient Deities</i> (Oxford: OUP, 2000), pp. 288-290, 323. Lucia Impelluso, <i>Myths: Tales of the Greek and Roman Gods</i> (NY: Abrams, 2008), pp. 38 & 122. Finally, another curiosity attaches to the names “Asterias” and “Asterius.” Again, the Online Etymology Dictionary helpfully informs us that: “In ancient Greek, aster typically was 'a star' and astron mostly in plural, 'the stars.' In singular it mostly meant 'Sirius' (the brightest star).” For related information, see: Robert K. G. Temple, <i>The Sirius Mystery</i> (Rochester, VT: Destiny Books, 1987) as well as Jim Brandon, <i>The Rebirth of Pan</i> (Dunlap, IL: Firebird P, 1983) and Jim Brandon, “Sirius Rising,” <i>op. cit</i>.</span></span></span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Shepard (<a href="http://uspsstampsblogs.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/usps11sta030a.jpg?w=584">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLy0HauTPwokNfghY0C0VRnVnvcT7XUThsMlA2-MtmfN30DGQfX0oYCXne_jwRxicgpP74CPGvxa3N6GtE5cm4nzlv8J15tg1oh6DqubHgTRo-C5y_XHfwqRO5Nlyr5JK-H9tvnuwM4DAJ/s1600/26PanMercury.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLy0HauTPwokNfghY0C0VRnVnvcT7XUThsMlA2-MtmfN30DGQfX0oYCXne_jwRxicgpP74CPGvxa3N6GtE5cm4nzlv8J15tg1oh6DqubHgTRo-C5y_XHfwqRO5Nlyr5JK-H9tvnuwM4DAJ/s320/26PanMercury.jpg" width="305" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Pan of Arcadia, the god of the shepherd, here depicted with a sun face and moon horns, the symbol of Mercury (<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ssfso3ym6MA/T7d7r7waWVI/AAAAAAAAIH0/8OEIkAlPZwc/s1600/4.jpg">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">It is remarkable, then, that NASA selected as names for it's manned missions “Mercury,” “Gemini,” and “Apollo.” Mercury, as his Greek counterpart Hermes, lends his name to the word Herm-Aphrodite (with the goddess Venus-Aphrodite providing the remainder). Mercury's wand or staff, the Caduceus, is an emblem of gender transformation. Gemini, as a twin-symbol, is also linkable to the allied concept of the Androgyne (in the Platonic sense – in this case, the association of two males). And Apollo, as we have seen, is also a part of a pair of twins. Additionally, Mercury is both the messenger god as well as a god of shepherds. In this capacity, he is similar to Apollo and Pan. Of course, NASA too had assigned a prominent role to a “shepherd” - specifically, Alan Bartlett Shepard, Jr. "'[S]hepherd,' also 'spiritual guide, shepherd of souls,' ... 'herdsman, shepherd' (... from L. pastorem (nom. pastor) 'shepherd,' from pastus, pp. of pascere 'to lead to pasture, set to grazing, cause to eat...'” Perhaps, the shepard might lead his sheep down into a glen(n) – the “valley of the shadow of death?” One of Mercury's titles is “Psychopompos” - guide (shepherd) of souls.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Turner and Coulter, <i>Op. Cit</i>., p. 214. “<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=pastor&allowed_in_frame=0">Shepherd</a>,” <i>Online Etymology Dictionary</i>.</span></span> </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAfwytKaYC_siS2e2x62hqBI_tQ6O0T7LqbaVcOLtwuufIzWH85x0tYjw9vqZgCW2Kr0cUjcLenC1R4_VwbFSU8RvRIn6t4bGcEK6HbIPrHiMQrd0r6V2UM_HALppllk5_zY4NZxzqK_RF/s1600/27_Homunculus.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAfwytKaYC_siS2e2x62hqBI_tQ6O0T7LqbaVcOLtwuufIzWH85x0tYjw9vqZgCW2Kr0cUjcLenC1R4_VwbFSU8RvRIn6t4bGcEK6HbIPrHiMQrd0r6V2UM_HALppllk5_zY4NZxzqK_RF/s320/27_Homunculus.jpg" width="248" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Creation (in the beaker) of an homunculus, “little man” (<a href="http://www.conexaojornalismo.com.br/fotos/homunculus1_link.jpg">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPkgRoXorcGv0G2lWkn821OdpUDXReVlmPVeWtQo0ay7LEfkwRYxjM1JbPTO65Z2Q-1l6rA2Mz-56jfOfdmgHZpktIODrrrPTvqxihA4J2ra49u_AT5apdhHqqIK-ch1TehGyNlIz0v1Q7/s1600/28MutusLiber.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPkgRoXorcGv0G2lWkn821OdpUDXReVlmPVeWtQo0ay7LEfkwRYxjM1JbPTO65Z2Q-1l6rA2Mz-56jfOfdmgHZpktIODrrrPTvqxihA4J2ra49u_AT5apdhHqqIK-ch1TehGyNlIz0v1Q7/s320/28MutusLiber.gif" width="222" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Alchemical print
used as an illustration by Jung, with the caption: “Mercurius in the
'philosopher's egg' (the alchemical vessel). As filius he stands on the
sun and moon, tokens of his dual nature...while the scorching rays of
the sun ripen the homunculus in the vessel.” The egg is reminiscent of
Valentine's Rebis as well as the story of Leda (Gemini). Mercury
symbolically unites sun (Apollo-Helios-Sol, etc.) and moon
(Artemis-Diana-Hecate, etc.; Image <a href="http://web.eecs.utk.edu/%7Emclennan/BA/PT/MutLib-8.gif">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The rebis is also connected to the homunculus. This intriguing link immediately recalls Downard's numerous comments about the curious “Jumbo” bottle that was a mysterious party to the atomic bomb detonation at the “Trinity Site” in New Mexico. In part one of the audio series “Sirius Rising,” Jim Brandon perspicuously mentioned rocket scientist and OTO occultist Jack Parson in the context of a discussion of homunculi and “mannikins.” For Parsons is alleged to have conducted a ritual (or “magickal working”) with the aim of producing one such creature, apparently inspired by (if not modeled around) Aleister Crowley's novel “Moon Child.”</span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Sources</span></span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">C.G. Jung, <i>Psychology and Alchemy</i>, R.F.C. Hull, trans., <i>The Collected Works of C.G. Jung</i>, Herbert Read, et. al., eds. Vol. 12 (Princeton: Princeton UP, 1980), p. 66. Seymour Howard, "William Blake: The Antique, Nudity, and Nakedness: A Study in Idealism and Regression, <i>Artibus et Historiae</i>, Vol. 3., No. 6 (1982), p. 132-3.). Jim Brandon, “Sirius Rising,” Audio Series, ca. 1974. John Carter, <i>Sex and Rockets: The Occult World of Jack Parsons</i> (Venice, CA: Feral House, 1999).</span></span></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgW7xDq5e7ssnv8lshOIbYW5qYyK3wOlUS4VhA8eDor1_uP6zVFdHz9QcxO6mlB0NjAc0pvAcbp5XZSa1BVQadnwulpZ-PEngfALPZOfsrc1Ngxhj5JfhaTgwE0GZX8yAnE2FrKXoS2mR4j/s1600/29_PlatosAndrogyne.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="259" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgW7xDq5e7ssnv8lshOIbYW5qYyK3wOlUS4VhA8eDor1_uP6zVFdHz9QcxO6mlB0NjAc0pvAcbp5XZSa1BVQadnwulpZ-PEngfALPZOfsrc1Ngxhj5JfhaTgwE0GZX8yAnE2FrKXoS2mR4j/s320/29_PlatosAndrogyne.gif" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Depiction of Plato's (Aristophanes') Androgyne (<i>Symposium </i>190a <i>ff</i>), with sun and moon (Image <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCDRSssWWifjLVpcAnEStD6kjsKT3_ZtZmEbfLJp9eEksFKbLzl4yWcYAB7EsNYOZti288trzYdTDZms5hAK3OLETytjpdC_GbNbdtWhvLYzP0IDHh-F6XStGEIFOBvi3csTXoH8jeydw/s1600/Clivage-androgyne543px.gif">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Now the Rebis is a straightforward representation of the Androgyne and Hermaphrodite. However, to be more precise, the androgyne and hermaphrodite are sometimes distinguished. For instance, the aformentioned Howard differentiates two sorts of "hermaphroditic image": "a positive sense (when balanced, as in the Androgyne) and...a negative sense (when one gender dominates the character, as in Hermaphrodite)...". Robert Graves equates “the androgyne” with the “bearded woman” and distinguishes this creature/concept from the hermaphrodite, about whom (Hermaphroditus) he writes that such is “Aphrodite’s son...a youth with womanish breasts and long hair.” (As an aside, I note that Apollo is also known for his long hair. Additionally, “Dionysus was usually portrayed as a long-haired, effeminate youth...”) Marian Rothstein qualifies this somewhat, remarking that "[a] hermaphrodite is always a mixture of male and female", whereas, "[e]tymology to the contrary notwithstanding, Plato's Androgyne, from which we take the term, was divisible into two males, two females, or one of each."</span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Sources</span></span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Seymour Howard, "William Blake: The Antique, Nudity, and Nakedness: A Study in Idealism and Regression, <i>Artibus et Historiae</i>, Vol. 3., No. 6 (1982), p. 136; Robert Graves, <i>The Greek Myths</i> (London: Penguin, 1992), p. 73 (& 263). On Apollo with long hair, see: “<a href="http://www.theoi.com/Olympios/Apollon.html">Apollon</a>,” <i>Theoi</i>. Marian Rothstein, "Mutations of the Androgyne: Its functions in Early Modern French Literature," <i>The Sixteenth Century Journal</i>, Vol. 34, No. 2, <i>Marriage in Early Modern Europe</i> [Summer, 2003], p. 410).</span></span> </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjFey-Ezrr48YceyscPFg5WRk2WCBAtc0m8L7VJpGpHHx3aqleqtkQa0EYPaERQYU3yAGoKdpu5rnPjw5cNcp5n3EiapdKqBHlNXeaAeiOZTBHF6BHMVXGEr6S1kyMHp6Uv9iOp0S1UhTH/s1600/30Hexagram.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjFey-Ezrr48YceyscPFg5WRk2WCBAtc0m8L7VJpGpHHx3aqleqtkQa0EYPaERQYU3yAGoKdpu5rnPjw5cNcp5n3EiapdKqBHlNXeaAeiOZTBHF6BHMVXGEr6S1kyMHp6Uv9iOp0S1UhTH/s320/30Hexagram.jpg" width="220" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">The Magen David interwoven with a depiction of the Kabbalistic <i>Adam Kadmon</i>.
A similar concept is found in the writings of William Blake whose
“cosmos appears to begin with the benign and balanced androgynic state
of the original man, <i>Adam-Albion</i>” (Image <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj84tcZYzVW-4Hf0usJGGUnm7O4bvPLGcU76PXosBHNpLlk9Fda7ff18rEggjWbeNzmoeNQqriyyXJRymOdvGEajRzkXHWluwjD7KtsgvQC5IBm7YOohTOi9tQ_Q-7FTey7u_FEywQqwgM/s1600/Eliphas%20Levi's%20Hexagram.jpg">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_bWxHV8iKm3sK_TK3qtbk100yaBC70vjuuGdvdT96IRW5lp8bR0uquuKKY6F7eY1tBrMWBW48WflrwG3VJZflIGsdO7qjpb1lDi_MAV9ZqclNGxoQSE9oscKX_RBTAfT3no5JtYrjfpm_/s1600/31MagenDavid_SquareAndCompass.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_bWxHV8iKm3sK_TK3qtbk100yaBC70vjuuGdvdT96IRW5lp8bR0uquuKKY6F7eY1tBrMWBW48WflrwG3VJZflIGsdO7qjpb1lDi_MAV9ZqclNGxoQSE9oscKX_RBTAfT3no5JtYrjfpm_/s320/31MagenDavid_SquareAndCompass.jpg" width="309" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Magen David (i.e., the “Star of David,” a.k.a., the “Seal of Solomon”) with Masonic Compass and Square overlay (Image <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDTw8esBCxDwDnhGHkbBWAYCeXQHBbphGXlJaBGy1DcWrEspe9jOwMUR7lDjT8fkN2h6322DCzeWaWBO4t07ZV7hhGQiPGcnePGly62Vo0nwUyooQYPM_HctsDnHsEjTATLKBULzKiTz0/s1600/CG11D.jpg">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Illustrated: The
overtly sexual esoteric symbolism of the “Star of David” - the union of
male and female in the Hermaphrodite, Mercurius (Image <a href="http://4amici.files.wordpress.com/2012/09/immagine1.png">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Albert Pike maintained that one such “Hermaphroditic figure is the Symbol of the double nature anciently assigned to the Deity, as Generator and Producer.” This, he says, is also a combination of Sun (male) and Moon (female) and is represented by two of the primary emblems of the Scottish Rite: “The Compass...is the Hermetic Symbol of the Creative Deity, and the Square of the productive Earth or Universe.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">We direct the reader's attention back up to the Basilius Valentinus (Basil Valentine) “Rebis” woodcut, created many years before the date (1717) oft cited for the official advent of Freemasonry, that displays both the Compass and Square in the clutches of a “Hermaphroditic Figure.” Additionally, the 1558 painting <i>Melancolia</i> by Gerung shows, in Yates' words: “...melancholy Night...and her attendant...a philosopher measuring with compasses the globe of the world and surrounded by darkness.” She claims that these are “Saturnian melancholics...carrying on the Dee science and magic in the obscurity of...night.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">An allied symbol in this complex is the Solomonic symbol, the <i>Magen David</i>. Raphael Patai states:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The close association between Solomon and the philosopher's stone is shown by the fact that the materia prima of the stone was sometimes represented as the two interlaced triangles of “Solomon's Seal,” which survives to this day as the Jewish national emblem known as the Magen David, David's Shield. For the alchemists this seal or star was the symbol of wisdom, and also the sign of the “fiery water,” since it consists of a combination of two symbols: that of fire, which rises upward and hence is symbolized by the upward pointing triangle, and that of water, which descends from the sky and is represented by the downward pointing triangle.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Observe that Patai's description of the Magen David, with its symbols of fiery ascent and watery descent, is strictly paralleled both in the wording of the Emerald Tablet (Tabula Smaragdina) and in the Apollo 11 ritual, which later included the fiery ascent of the Saturn-V and the watery descent of Columbia.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Sources</span></span></span></div>
<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Seymour Howard, “William Blake: The Antique, Nudity, and Nakedness: A Study in Idealism and Regression,” Artibus et Historiae, Vol. 3, No. 6 (1982), p. 146. Published Albert Pike, Morals and Dogma, p. 851. Yates, Op. Cit., pp. 161, 169 & 179. Raphael Patai, The Jewish Alchemists (Princeton: Princeton UP, 1994), p. 28. On the dating of Freemasonry, there is controversy. </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">For a brief overview, see: “History of Freemasonry,” Grand Lodge of Washington, <a href="http://www.bluelodge-wa.org/membership/history.html">URL</a>. </span>Curiously, claims range from the 14th to the 18th centuries, paralleling, to a close degree, the dating of Basil Valentine. On dating Basil Valentine see: Archibald Cockren, Alchemy Rediscovered and Restored (Philadelphia, 1941), p. 40 (14th century); Arthur Edward Waite, Secret Tradition in Alchemy (Kessinger, 1992), pp. 164ff (Waite notes a mention of the name in the 16th Century); John Maxson Stillman, “Basil Valentine: A Seventeeth Century Hoax”, Popular Science, Dec. 1912, pp. 591-600 (17th century, and a hoax.)</span></span></span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Saturn V<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">(<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilfGJCJXBjMO44DBEgHc052OtQ6-wq_3K-nbRarWfHSjWgS3Fj23hVgVLSnQqzuJ3EpMXrMjlrvIdP07tw9L3xGH5AA29tXfdsyaGB07gDoVVxzuq15KbECbLMwHbsKnPwy7YSaPmp5zqs/s1600/saturn_5_pic.jpg">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">The Sun (<a href="http://www.marc-medium.com/communities/4/000/001/111/164/images/916334.jpg">Source</a>)</span></span> </td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">We must bear in mind that these are Alchemical ensigns. They represent, on one level, the so-called "Operation of the Sun" – a transformation of Saturn (lead) into the Sun (gold). Now NASA's manned mission to the moon was called "Apollo" after the Greek god of the sun. It was, therefore, an operation of the sun. Moreover, the launch vehicle for the Apollo missions was a powerful rocket named the "Saturn V."</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Saturn/Apollo image projected onto the Al(lied)Chemical tower, July 14, 1969 (Image <a href="http://assets.nydailynews.com/polopoly_fs/1.1118674.1343053247%21/img/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/gallery_635/saturn-v-projected-1-times-square-july-14-1969.jpg">Source</a>)</span></span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Projectio </i>(<a href="http://herve.delboy.perso.sfr.fr/anatomia_projectio.jpg"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Source</span></a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The image of “Apollo 11's Saturn V rocket” was literally “projected onto the Allied Chemical Tower”. The Al-chemical tower is “now known as 1 Times Square” - a very mathematical (Pythagorean?) and Saturnian (the sickle-wielding god of time) sounding name. Apollo was said to have been born on the Island of Delos. The “Delian problem [was to] 'find the length of the side of a cube having double the volume of a given cube...'.” And the Apollo missions were first launched during the “psyche-delic” 196os (from “psyche,” soul, mind, and “delic,” visible, from Delos).</span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Sources</span></span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Bill Quinn, “Neil Armstrong lands on the moon: Apollo 11 moon landing,” <i>New York Daily News</i>, 07/23/2012 10:20:58, <a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/apollo-11-moon-landing-gallery-1.1118698">URL</a>. “<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=Delian&allowed_in_frame=0">Delian</a>,” <i>Online Etymology Dictionary</i>. “<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=psychedelic&allowed_in_frame=0">Psychedelic</a>,” <i>Ibid</i>.</span></span> </span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Detail from Mutus Liber print focusing upon the “tower furnace” or athanor (Image <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIfHCbP3lokpOTNG_CGUqcgsb2QVIfYrsiKzk4gClyp8fNDTsxsqXhHFF7A0cPZvfdqQKsHPmFPzaEW_fMoEvGMKM5IK6PWGRGbwwPTx6U_2Rdgm-Nu8eCwr5LQwIKcb5RRQ6ikRp4K5hyphenhyphen/s1600/mutusliber9.jpg">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Another representation of the towering – and very rocket-like – athanor (Image <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPmOEmCQrkW-UOAf_1JykgUnxyaXgmQLIUd5lf2npJ3gjmCFp73oUkTurnyF4O20Pk4a4EhuLOAG9S_kHwtVmK2WrPA4joKF1H4OzJwi4Z-ChDQml7UdnC2RcsbXOLpQZ6hhg5n9sSUKWs/s1600/atanor.JPG">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Saturn/Apollo, mobile athanor (Image <a href="http://img.izifunny.com/pics/20120828/640/apollo-11-and-the-moon-landing-87-pics_27.jpg">Source</a>)</span></span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The
notion of fire-carrying and light-bringing has connections with
Prometheus (Pyrphoros), Lucifer, Venus-Aphrodite (as the morning and
evening stars – Eosphoros-Aurora, Phosphorus, Hesperus),
Apollo-Helios-Sol, etc. (Image <a href="http://www.ideasandevents.com/pictures/books/collins2.gif">Source</a>)</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The comparison of the Saturn-Apollo rockets to alchemical devices may not be as outrageous as it may appear. For one thing, as mentioned elsewhere, Jack Parsons, who contributed a great deal to what become U.S. “space science,” was a member of Aleister Crowley's OTO. To be more specific, according to former Caltech professor, Theodore von Kármán, Jack “Parsons was the third most important person in the development of rocketry in the United States – behind only himself and Frank Malina.” And yet, “Aerojet employee Fritz Zwicky related that Parsons invoked Pan, the wild, horned god of fertility, before each rocket test.”</span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Source</span></span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">John Carter, Sex and Rockets: The Occult World of Jack Parsons (Venice, CA: Feral House, 1999), pp. 8-9. Incidentally, “von Kármán was descended from Rabbi Judah Loew ben Bezalel of Prague” which Rabbi had allegedly created a “golem,” that is, a gentile-killing homunculus, Ibid.</span></span> </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2HH0t2fhkQesiVhhBlrIWkQ19ZcSYb0Ok7FrdZEX63hOelUsb4oV6zPisxM7jwQi9IF8RmJtqtzD89OruXjqqvRTLWQilaxwGdcq7AkoIWrh9PO94TJ3jTrz2DO6Hf-Jm73cz4e-60qwW/s1600/41TexasFreemason2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2HH0t2fhkQesiVhhBlrIWkQ19ZcSYb0Ok7FrdZEX63hOelUsb4oV6zPisxM7jwQi9IF8RmJtqtzD89OruXjqqvRTLWQilaxwGdcq7AkoIWrh9PO94TJ3jTrz2DO6Hf-Jm73cz4e-60qwW/s320/41TexasFreemason2.jpg" width="270" /></a></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Is it a stretch to attach religious significance to the Apollo missions? (Image from <i><span style="font-size: x-small;">T</span>he Texas Freemason</i>)</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">For another thing, several of the Apollo 11 astronauts described their experiences in very peculiarly religious tones. As Jim Brandon related in part three of his “Sirius Rising” series, Michael Collins had the following to say about his period alone in the Columbia Command Module (while Aldrin and Armstrong were on the moon):</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">As I scurry about, blocking off the windows with metal plates and dousing the lights, I have almost the same feeling I used to have years ago when, as an altar boy, I snuffed the candles one by one at the end of a long service. Come to think of it, with the center couch removed, Columbia’s floor plan is not unlike that of the National Cathedral, where I used to serve. Certainly it is cruciform, with the tunnel up above where the bell tower would be, and the navigation instruments at the altar. The main instrument panels span the north and south transepts, while the nave is where the center couch used to be. If not a miniature cathedral, then at least it is a happy home, and I have no hesitation about leaving its care to God and Houston as I fade away into a comfortable snooze.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Jim Brandon, “Sirius Rising,” Part 3, Audio Recording, ca. 1974. Cf.: Michael Collins, <i>Carrying the Fire: An Astronaut's Journeys</i> (Ballantine 1975/Farrar, Straus and Giroux 2009). For more on fire-bringing, see Loren Coleman's post <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/11/Prometheus.html">here</a>.</span></span> </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzY0IBXa95IDFgwWog9NJpb6tbeGsbQY-fooCzVnoo-Bl1EpGA9NH0YdfDYoQnoTG9n8B3eK9nTx3QNvpLhe-r5J3gPy4RdMxFbBGg0OUwGiADrNiYmUzIyJ44_kZi06SQ0PsEzw-dRm3y/s1600/42KnightsTemplar.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="228" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzY0IBXa95IDFgwWog9NJpb6tbeGsbQY-fooCzVnoo-Bl1EpGA9NH0YdfDYoQnoTG9n8B3eK9nTx3QNvpLhe-r5J3gPy4RdMxFbBGg0OUwGiADrNiYmUzIyJ44_kZi06SQ0PsEzw-dRm3y/s320/42KnightsTemplar.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">One of the many banners associated with the Knight's Templar (Image <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/11/Prometheus.html">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The conjunction of opposites is sometimes designated as the union of the "black and white." However, the conjunction may also be termed the union of the red and white. In this context, we observe that Downard pointed to the banner of the Knight's Templar, fabled predecessors of the Scottish Rite Freemasons. Isaac Newton linked this process to Apollo (god of the sun) and Artemis/Diana (goddess of the moon) and the red and white tinctures.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Brandon, “Sirius Rising,” op. cit. Isaac Newton, “The Commentary on the Emerald Tablet,” Stanton J. Linden, ed., <i>The Alchemy Reader: From Hermes Trismegistus to Isaac Newton</i> (Cambridge: CUP, 2003), p. 247. Newton also mentions “the Egyptians” (<i>Aegyptij pro Dianae et Appolinis id est tincturae albae et rubrae nutrice habuere</i>.). It may or may not be relevant in this regard that King Narmer, successor to the fabled “Scorpion King,” unified the so-called “Red” and “White” Kingdoms of Upper and Lower Egypt. Incidentally, in the “Narmer Palette” (reverse), King Narmer is depicted with a club, apparently ready to split open the skull of a kneeling man while above and to the right is perched a falcon holding a hook-like device in the nose of a disembodied head. Cf.: “The <a href="http://egypt-grammar.rutgers.edu/Artifacts/Narmer%20Palette.pdf">Narmer </a>Palette<span style="font-size: x-small;">.</span>”</span></span> </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4sv6UefO1BD1lazwDDkeO52nUbqCFbglcCg3V59dR_E9sELCoBOmPcy330Ih7gvgdRFuWekSX8yUHjBiYEqm9Wk-nFAgqkoVbGEJ-UJa1j57oruIeODwB9x0Rq31aYLcRKP3ad1rSPD9Q/s1600/43Oracle.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="263" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4sv6UefO1BD1lazwDDkeO52nUbqCFbglcCg3V59dR_E9sELCoBOmPcy330Ih7gvgdRFuWekSX8yUHjBiYEqm9Wk-nFAgqkoVbGEJ-UJa1j57oruIeODwB9x0Rq31aYLcRKP3ad1rSPD9Q/s320/43Oracle.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">“Know Thyself”: The Oracle of Apollo (Image <a href="http://api.ning.com/files/Ms89lfBh6IFwZoAN56GxGCx58wxX3mjmt27GL3deF4sKXxzyHtrqbYO1UfplB7ReVrnT3YXqMJcCZuRA3G8FOaz0GhHxOL38/ApolloOracleKnowThyself.jpg">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Amongst the plausible (and supposed) goals of these alchemical processes is something like the awakening of a "divine consciousness." In many streams of hermetic-gnostic occultism, this sort of talk really comes down to this: Realize who you really are – unleash your “inner star” and become a(n androgynous?) deity. The entrance to the Temple at Delphi was adorned with a plaque bidding visitors to "Know Thyself" (Gnothi Seauton). And the Delphic Temple was the domain of none other than Apollo, the keeper of the sun – hence, something of a light-bringer or Lucifer. In the words of Albert Pike: “LUCIFER, the Light-bearer! Strange and mysterious name to give to the Spirit of Darkness! Lucifer, the Son of the Morning! Is it he who bears the Light, and with its splendors intolerable blinds feeble, sensual, or selfish Souls? Doubt it not!” Pike elsewhere maintains that “In Saturn, [the soul] acquires the power of reasoning and intelligence, or what is termed the logical and contemplative faculty.”</span> </div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">If one peaks beneath the complicated tapestry of this symbolism, one may be able to trace the "Apollonian thread" a bit farther. In Shakespeare's play, "Love's Labour's Lost," the character Berowne, about whom Francis Yates writes that he "was clearly a good Saturnian," is said to "hear the universal harmony 'as sweet and musical as bright Apollo's lute...'." We therefore see again the juxtaposition of Saturn and Apollo so obvious in the NASA moon rituals. Yates has quite a bit to say regarding these "Saturnians," of the so-called "School of Night," which she links with utopianism and Kabbalah.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Albert Pike, <i>op. cit</i>., pp. 321 (italics in original) & 439. Francis Yates, <i>The Occult Philosophy of the Elizabethan Age</i>, esp., pp. 157-178.)</span></span> </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSdJNJRSzMK2SWhpx6gQQAK_5n67jyvKnItqwZXnx5qjfa4HToR-Vpuq45B1u-BuDpvC2wPIxaAX65yrZ56i_ud88mGT-vNVAJq4pkisdc_gbz_S8S9xCLQ0_9F2kveU58ODRn6M3PQ0l3/s1600/44DevilsTavern_ApolloClub.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="259" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSdJNJRSzMK2SWhpx6gQQAK_5n67jyvKnItqwZXnx5qjfa4HToR-Vpuq45B1u-BuDpvC2wPIxaAX65yrZ56i_ud88mGT-vNVAJq4pkisdc_gbz_S8S9xCLQ0_9F2kveU58ODRn6M3PQ0l3/s320/44DevilsTavern_ApolloClub.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Print: Ben Jonson's “Apollo Club” at the Devil Tavern (Image <a href="http://d2kdkfqxnvpuu9.cloudfront.net/images/big/47070.jpg">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The Elizabethan poet and playwright Ben Jonson (who wrote, among other works, The Alchemist [ca. 1610]) started the "Apollo Club" at the "Devil Tavern" in London. This was near a locale with the very Solomonic moniker, "Temple-Bar." It has been said that the Apollo Club had a similar structure to the Freemasonic Scottish Rite, not least because both groups had a rebis-like "dual constitution" - being as they were, admixtures of religion and politics (or, in contemporary jargon, "church and state"). According to Pike, the Pythagoreans were “Sons of Apollo” who nevertheless sometimes “took themselves into the Orphic Service of Dionusus”.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Sources</span></span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">David S. Shields, "Anglo-American Clubs: Their Wit, Their Heterodoxy, Their Sedition," <i>The William and Mary Quarterly</i>, Series 3, Vol. 51, No. 2 (Apr., 1994), p. 299; "Sons of Ben (literary group)," <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sons_of_Ben_%28literary_group%29"><span style="font-size: x-small;">URL</span></a>; "Devil Tavern," <a href="http://www.londonremembers.com/subjects/devil-tavern"><span style="font-size: x-small;">URL</span></a>. Pike, <i>op. cit.</i>, p. 586.</span></span> </span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">“...The Eagle has landed." ~ Neil Armstrong (Image <a href="http://www.confusereviews.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/110416-15.png">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Besides the fabled “Philosopher's Stone” (one representation of which, we learned, is the <i>Magen David</i>), we have also noted that “Leto” possibly translates to “stone” and Apollo's Temple had a “navel-stone” (<i>omphalos</i>)
as a central fixture. Above, we see a correlations both between the
moon and stones as well as a dual similarity between the shape of the
depicted structures and both the rockets at which we have looked and the
layout of Masonic temples<span style="font-size: x-small;"> </span>(Image <a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_zI6sJryPv0s/TRDAokjJaGI/AAAAAAAADMI/7u0K06cQPzw/s1600/womens-mysteries2.jpg">Source</a>)</span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Additionally, recalling that the Apollo 11 lunar module was termed "The Eagle," we note that, as a symbol, the eagle is known as a "bird of the sun." "[T]he Ancient Greeks...held that eagles, setting out from the ends of the Earth, wheeled directly over the navel stone (...omphalos) at Delphi" - Apollo's temple. Robert K. G. Temple collected a fair amount of information about "navel stones" in his book, The Sirius Mystery. Moreover, French poet Bonaventure Des Periers drew from Marsilio Ficino's commentary on Plato's Symposium for his poem "Le Nombril" ("The Navel"), in which Des Periers represents "Apollo ...turn[ing] the newly separated Androgyne's head 180 degrees and pull[ing] together the wound of separation, creating the navel...". Francois Rabelais puts the symbol of an Androgyne on the hat of his character Gargantua, along "with the motto AGAPE OU ZETEI TA EAUTES, 'Charity seeks not its own advantage,' I. Cor. 13:5" which motto hearkens back to Love's Labour's Lost wherein it is remarked that "...charity itself fulfils the law: And who can sever love from charity?" These aphorisms are suggestive of the Ordo Templi Orientis maxim "Love is the Law" which maxim would have doubtless been familiar to rocket pioneer and Crowley disciple, Jack Parsons.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Sources</span></span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #3d85c6;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Robert Moore, “The <a href="http://weavingandmagic.blogspot.com/2010/12/rollright-stones.html">Rollright</a> Stones,” <i>Weaving and Magic</i>, Blog, 21 Dec. 2010, Accessed Fall 2012. Chevalier, <i>Op. Cit</i>., p. 324; Marian Rothstein, “Mutations of the Androgyne: Its Functions in Early Modern French Literature,” <i>The Sixteenth Century Journal</i>, Vol. 34, No. 2, <i>Marriage in Early Modern Europe</i> (Summer, 2003), p. 415; Florence M. Weinberg, "Platonic and Pauline Ideals in Comic Dress: 'Comment on Vestit Gargantua'," <i>Illinois Classical Studies</i>, IX.2 [1984], p. 186; Yates, op. cit., p. 178.)</span></span></span><br />
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">~ Matthew J. Bell</span></i><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: small;">For more information, see:</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/nasas-33-degree-kline-konnektion.html"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">NASA's 33-Degree Kline-Konnektion</span></a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/armstrong-symbolically-ostensively.html">"Armstrong" (Symbolically-Ostensively Defined)</a></span> </span><br />
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###Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-52676270229229703062012-12-01T19:39:00.002-08:002012-12-19T09:28:47.925-08:00Threats<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>"...Obama is believed to be </b></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>the most threatened president </b></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>in U.S. history." </b></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?section=news/iteam&id=8900173">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">"Mr. Obama has <b>little choice</b> </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">but to put his arms around the <b>chaos</b> </span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">and make the decisions that</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">involve <b>pain and sacrifice</b> up front."</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">~ Leon Panetta, 2008</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Panetta was a member of Obama's 2008-9 transition team; Quoted in: Richard E. Nicolazzo, "Obama's new PR playbook: keeping it real," <i>O'Dwyer's PR Report</i>, Vol. 22 No. 12, December 2008, p. 19.)</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg59wBLzI7usW5H8aVSXXGODtLjMbts5blgLy2fI_81xB-U7no31WxFj7CRNaG3ZwVJG9CisOpqH6Mz4EJdO47ZBnTt3BcpNKPx4oFzPerfQIALAwiJ-Kh2bAEMbygf3eclu0QuMI_26rmn/s1600/order_out_of_chaos.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg59wBLzI7usW5H8aVSXXGODtLjMbts5blgLy2fI_81xB-U7no31WxFj7CRNaG3ZwVJG9CisOpqH6Mz4EJdO47ZBnTt3BcpNKPx4oFzPerfQIALAwiJ-Kh2bAEMbygf3eclu0QuMI_26rmn/s320/order_out_of_chaos.jpg" width="257" /></a></div>
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(<i>Order out of Chaos</i>: The two-headed phoenix reconstitutes itself again and again.)</div>
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<b>"Obama Administration Prepping for Social Chaos..." </b></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Source: Email from "Lee Bellinger" AmericanLanternAlerts.com, Tuesday, October 2, 2012 7:07 AM. Note: I do not endorse Bellinger's remarks. I merely think that his sentiments, being beamed out through cyberspace, are of symbolic interest.)</span></div>
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">For discussions of some relevant, associated symbol patterns, see: <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/tony-scott-etc.html">here</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hercules-and-his-twin.html">here</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hue-of-lincoln.html">here</a>, and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/11/belling-hurricane-gilbert.html">here</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">The reader may wish to consider the above information side-by-side with Barack Obama's own "Presidential Memorandum" (issued via the Office of the Press Secretary) in which he mentions "...the National Insider Threat Policy...to promote the development of effective insider threat programs within departments and agencies to deter, detect, and mitigate actions by employees who may represent a threat to national security. These threats encompass potential espionage, violent acts against the Government or the Nation..."<span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2012/11/21/presidential-memorandum-national-insider-threat-policy-and-minimum-stand">Source</a>; Cf. <a href="http://www.presstv.com/detail/2012/11/28/274939/nuclear-christmas-false-flag-in-us/">Here </a>- Thanks to Jim Brandon for the link.)</span></span></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_hgdr4CxfUg5BEbbxvP1jURjXHmccXSU4g3P5d0p8xFdRkUTBT45NoioBWQg0IicsO8r_0dQKOLjRR4GBAReBQHxwzM_73QX6_7mKShrJQ3iIf6dSe-xirQvy9syJslzyWMacWsIGE5do/s1600/LandOfPromise.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_hgdr4CxfUg5BEbbxvP1jURjXHmccXSU4g3P5d0p8xFdRkUTBT45NoioBWQg0IicsO8r_0dQKOLjRR4GBAReBQHxwzM_73QX6_7mKShrJQ3iIf6dSe-xirQvy9syJslzyWMacWsIGE5do/s1600/LandOfPromise.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://www.planetjh.com/BlogThreads/cfdb0209-c535-4ba5-b769-3d43e1246453/photos/M_bookcover.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-size: small;">But don't worry. The U.S<span style="font-size: small;">. government also <span style="font-size: small;">blogs the following. Quoting NASA scientist </span></span></span></span></span></span><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;">David Morrison, </span></span>to the effect that "At least a once a week I get a message from a young person ― as young as 11 ― who says they are ill and/or contemplating suicide because of the coming doomsday<span style="font-size: small;">.</span>" The U.S. pledges that "Scary Rumors about the World Ending in 2012 Are Just Rumors" (<a href="http://blog.usa.gov/post/37121041300/scary-rumors-about-the-world-ending-in-2012-are-just">Source</a>). </span></span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span> </span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgD4IHdNz1tiHSg5AO5DnoOkaROGI15WPv6k0dd0VLtJfxUHGd7F7VcEjqzm8skKFGA576tHm1qP6pindZnTp9XYFBGwOFbidJ9rE1aJwrBKA-2ghhGYd3sSv1_0zX4yfAUf7lhkloWu40u/s1600/InTheLineOfFire.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="263" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgD4IHdNz1tiHSg5AO5DnoOkaROGI15WPv6k0dd0VLtJfxUHGd7F7VcEjqzm8skKFGA576tHm1qP6pindZnTp9XYFBGwOFbidJ9rE1aJwrBKA-2ghhGYd3sSv1_0zX4yfAUf7lhkloWu40u/s320/InTheLineOfFire.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(In the "Line of Fire" - Lincoln. Ford already "phased out" Mercury, see <a href="http://www.mercuryvehicles.com/">here</a>. Image, <i>Atalanta Fugiens</i>.)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">For previous discuss<span style="font-size: small;">ion of the recent occurrences of "In the Lin<span style="font-size: small;">e of Fire" (movie) and Clint Eastwood symbolism</span></span>, see <span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/08/eastwooding.html">here </a>and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/laugh.html">h</a></span><a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/laugh.html">ere</a>.</span></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhp9VuxjsEZFqWa0yWT08nE7jTuu3qwxf93NHEtqJrK8H3osOxhzvDAPhNk8YmccuAGsvxH_IZzkwhk5a_e7BxzyWWm-gdev9QfzX6UxX2qQQOQZbedSwKz0oRcjhDm6PxZhzie_W1H7Rx9/s1600/WheelofLife.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhp9VuxjsEZFqWa0yWT08nE7jTuu3qwxf93NHEtqJrK8H3osOxhzvDAPhNk8YmccuAGsvxH_IZzkwhk5a_e7BxzyWWm-gdev9QfzX6UxX2qQQOQZbedSwKz0oRcjhDm6PxZhzie_W1H7Rx9/s320/WheelofLife.jpg" width="224" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/x/blogger/7526/3762/1600/784082/WheelofLife.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span> </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-size: small;">"<b>Ford restarts Lincoln Motor Co.</b> ... The automaker has not used its full name since the 1950s, an era when it was synonymous with <b>rich </b>but understated <b>luxury</b>"</span> (<a href="http://money.cnn.com/2012/12/03/autos/ford-lincoln-motor/">Source</a>)</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbwci1A2kxJGMVSEf9xL_yFqDZizcr4hyphenhyphenNVRFpD8sHkzygPtdXX6XUWNDllZxPjz2Mq__cSWEG7w9DJ8QVWv41mPq4exM0lskgMCWh4bo6BhJvQcqpQjWrPMsMfAwrSDLlTRoLOPk4NhlB/s1600/FordsTheater.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="238" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbwci1A2kxJGMVSEf9xL_yFqDZizcr4hyphenhyphenNVRFpD8sHkzygPtdXX6XUWNDllZxPjz2Mq__cSWEG7w9DJ8QVWv41mPq4exM0lskgMCWh4bo6BhJvQcqpQjWrPMsMfAwrSDLlTRoLOPk4NhlB/s320/FordsTheater.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNNoasM8v0bq8xfAWRc8ssgRJtCbU7gfRZk8xXKOBk-nB1kXzmi0Gim21ETb3TBzLRssfcXozUbqmevYekJ_rCvgdlKMD0HN37ncopuf4_B9AQkNZ3w8jVPCbhy5a3SN9JSBy0B7MAei4/s1600/assassination.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-size: small;">All this dra<span style="font-size: small;">ma with Ford Mo<span style="font-size: small;">tors makes for good theater<span style="font-size: small;">. And it's coming just in time for the 50th anniversary of JFK's assassination and the centennial birthday of the <span style="font-size: small;">Federal Reserve. <span style="font-size: small;">See <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/11/tidbits.html">here</a>.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span> </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgW9cVDVvOvYLABCYNtmfpOQTm2XX1HSTfQsQh9SbsRaNBw5YhAMUHuYtBqLIpe0eTwtdx4eJMyCSyWIz-BSPYPxRJGRlBm0xo94LF8hyHu1kZ3ZUv8zRD61_S1ui9voWkBa4Uk5Bl79GpX/s1600/Time.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgW9cVDVvOvYLABCYNtmfpOQTm2XX1HSTfQsQh9SbsRaNBw5YhAMUHuYtBqLIpe0eTwtdx4eJMyCSyWIz-BSPYPxRJGRlBm0xo94LF8hyHu1kZ3ZUv8zRD61_S1ui9voWkBa4Uk5Bl79GpX/s320/Time.jpg" width="221" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://money.cnn.com/2012/12/03/autos/ford-lincoln-motor/">Source</a>)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">"...Ford is attempting to turn back the clock."</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://money.cnn.com/2012/12/03/autos/ford-lincoln-motor/">Source</a>) </span></span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2hBMf140EXIrYO8n5JTXkZ4dm8rX4_ojPvyURbOz4T9O74KzZd_PeBCYqp1-SEvhcU7dZ_sFXIw9y5Q-v2LnSW93wjI3ySF3qy8D9axBIzXf08UeBmGXzdREM-RXM0lRg5pZQT_j6UOKD/s1600/Separatio.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="263" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2hBMf140EXIrYO8n5JTXkZ4dm8rX4_ojPvyURbOz4T9O74KzZd_PeBCYqp1-SEvhcU7dZ_sFXIw9y5Q-v2LnSW93wjI3ySF3qy8D9axBIzXf08UeBmGXzdREM-RXM0lRg5pZQT_j6UOKD/s320/Separatio.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<i>Separatio<span style="font-size: x-small;">:</span> Atalanta Fugiens<span style="font-size: x-small;">, </span></i><span style="font-size: x-small;">Epigramma VIII</span>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOtuUscSW_ZYHsDouIo65ZAwxDVenfsNJ5V1NpBykF08XReh76cHGQkrEzuXMdcRRf4-v7Gvl9qHnuzN9jXPzhb_l3CFVISnJjWmvChNnBFZ21r-PTVOBkEuxBBqPyQCVNhOLEcGMnbnXf/s1600/CosmicEgg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOtuUscSW_ZYHsDouIo65ZAwxDVenfsNJ5V1NpBykF08XReh76cHGQkrEzuXMdcRRf4-v7Gvl9qHnuzN9jXPzhb_l3CFVISnJjWmvChNnBFZ21r-PTVOBkEuxBBqPyQCVNhOLEcGMnbnXf/s320/CosmicEgg.jpg" width="248" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(One sort of "blue oval" - not the Ford logo, but the "cosmic egg," <a href="http://classconnection.s3.amazonaws.com/462/flashcards/219462/jpg/hildegard1304823716419.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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"...Ford wants to give it greater <b>separation </b>from the more mass market Ford 'blue oval'..." (<a href="http://money.cnn.com/2012/12/03/autos/ford-lincoln-motor/">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglK0ojp1kwEK3j3aRorOiL7YfPzFShSwUFx-LOBxB80Xcf5nHCK2l7mopyfynEOiFuV3B9H85xawbmtw4Al1-YaGwcKzTRMYzvuGJmxqE__YvOqn1KdPwb7omjVTXk1A4Wpu-Nbh1_hmBs/s1600/Blue-room.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="216" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglK0ojp1kwEK3j3aRorOiL7YfPzFShSwUFx-LOBxB80Xcf5nHCK2l7mopyfynEOiFuV3B9H85xawbmtw4Al1-YaGwcKzTRMYzvuGJmxqE__YvOqn1KdPwb7omjVTXk1A4Wpu-Nbh1_hmBs/s320/Blue-room.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(White House Blue Room - Image <a href="http://www.lifes-hub.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/Blue-room.jpg">source</a>)</span></div>
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As Jim Brandon reminds listeners in part two of his audio series, "Sirius Rising," among the noteworthy features of the White House is the "Blue Room." "The Blue Room[,]...on the first floor in the White House, ...is distinct for its oval shape." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Room_%28White_House%29">Source</a>) (There are also rooms associated with <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Room_%28White_House%29">green</a> and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Room_%28White_House%29">red</a>.) And, of course, the West Wing of the White House features the famous "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oval_Office">Oval Office</a>." <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRslkfh3NTEMnM1yuBZOtTrjl4j1h44bp58QIaYGPjdSObkfWl03Ue9XIUL9bzrX8wpOld9amEoOJzmFngSvKlUxGll9wEhGce2HMtk72HSpXW5GL8MhbbDQmIVX4NPuqBBDRAr2kRFHWT/s1600/OsirisRevivified.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="271" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRslkfh3NTEMnM1yuBZOtTrjl4j1h44bp58QIaYGPjdSObkfWl03Ue9XIUL9bzrX8wpOld9amEoOJzmFngSvKlUxGll9wEhGce2HMtk72HSpXW5GL8MhbbDQmIVX4NPuqBBDRAr2kRFHWT/s320/OsirisRevivified.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(The King Revivified, <i>Atalanta Fugiens</i>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNRF2utYTPuo97Nz4k3gntoFsHjB-502KstGC9b4kntNI_liYxdhbSFpgNPud5dYaQdjmnzMJHv_rD0xcvRvviBzfHGGu8PMb3fjekFtHHSlERA06fxnO0JRvqg8opEGeQkYYKUi_Rrn3E/s1600/KennedyLimo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="204" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNRF2utYTPuo97Nz4k3gntoFsHjB-502KstGC9b4kntNI_liYxdhbSFpgNPud5dYaQdjmnzMJHv_rD0xcvRvviBzfHGGu8PMb3fjekFtHHSlERA06fxnO0JRvqg8opEGeQkYYKUi_Rrn3E/s320/KennedyLimo.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Note that the X-100 "<b>Kennedy Presidential Limousine</b>...was a 1961 <b>Lincoln </b>Continental 4-door convertible. ... Ford Motor Company assembled the car at its Lincoln plant in Wixom, Michigan in January 1961. ... The X-100 was impounded for evidence in the weeks following the assassination on November 22, 1963. Soon after plans were made to modify the car in Cincinnati, Ohio and then return it to Washington D.C. ... [I]t was used occasionally by Presidents Johnson, Nixon, Ford and Carter. The X-100 remained in service until early 1977." Text <a href="http://www.thehenryford.org/research/kennedyLimo.aspx">Source</a>; Image <a href="http://www.thehenryford.org/images/P833_122900_163_roofpanels.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
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"The 97-year old luxury brand, synonymous with <b>presidential limos</b> and black Town Cars, is returning to its original name, Lincoln Motor Co. Lincoln hopes the name will help <b>restore</b> the brand's luster..." (<a href="http://news.yahoo.com/lincoln-brand-changes-name-mkz-goes-sale-110617930--finance.html">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUMpgxwoPNpTyP-QKWUC4Ko59w1gg5-Vo53O4s9pkV0J9fmW0n9mM0uDerYiycLktfkQUEF902PV_odN9imR8YcxH1O6VDTFfAEB1RrKd_Z3Yh_tpf8ULg-CUre_yX-LoU3CxmsLq8dEwU/s1600/LongJourney.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUMpgxwoPNpTyP-QKWUC4Ko59w1gg5-Vo53O4s9pkV0J9fmW0n9mM0uDerYiycLktfkQUEF902PV_odN9imR8YcxH1O6VDTFfAEB1RrKd_Z3Yh_tpf8ULg-CUre_yX-LoU3CxmsLq8dEwU/s320/LongJourney.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://myloc.gov/Exhibitions/Lincoln/Interactives/1865/HTML/apr_30/images/634b.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
<br />
"Lincoln Motor Co. founder Henry Leland — who also started Cadillac — named the company after his hero, <b>Abraham Lincoln</b>." (<a href="http://news.yahoo.com/lincoln-brand-changes-name-mkz-goes-sale-110617930--finance.html">Source</a>) "Lincoln now has the lowest U.S. sales of any luxury brand...Lincoln is just starting out on a <b>long journey</b>..." (<a href="http://news.yahoo.com/lincoln-brand-changes-name-mkz-goes-sale-110617930--finance.html">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEd2vb08s6_rdMCtyO5q68ysUTHDlBKqbotQ_nd7FTzm3nDIChrQZ3Sa2W8cludoC6iSbb8pV-t7iUEqG6DKpSwzJhXypmpNACnM0Eb8F65ygr3OFvZAfeTuqqEYgj0Msz5ai-PRjkLedY/s1600/LincolnHighway.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEd2vb08s6_rdMCtyO5q68ysUTHDlBKqbotQ_nd7FTzm3nDIChrQZ3Sa2W8cludoC6iSbb8pV-t7iUEqG6DKpSwzJhXypmpNACnM0Eb8F65ygr3OFvZAfeTuqqEYgj0Msz5ai-PRjkLedY/s1600/LincolnHighway.JPG" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://www.lincoln-highway-museum.org/FtLincoln/III/FL-336-75.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
<br />
"The trail leading to the 'Killing of the King' is called the 'Journey of Death.' It is also called the '<b>Long Journey of the Alchemist</b>," (Source: Jim Brandon, "Sirius Rising," Part 1, Interview with James Shelby Downard. On the "Journey of Death" [<i>Jornada del Muerto</i>] see <a href="http://revisionistreview.blogspot.com/2012/08/of-human-alchemy-and-gay-science.html">here </a>and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Societies-Psychological-Warfare-Michael-Hoffman/dp/0970378416">here</a>. On alchemy and Lincoln, see <a href="http://www.amazon.com/rebirth-Pan-Hidden-American-spirit/dp/0912019018/">here</a>.) <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5aCTlGQ6ZznouJ4b5_FmZbaTlp2fXc9P9xnoRKinTSIR4yic9CoanR3ccJkVku-XKz_W2PNKlqqU0-3E0bOhPmAVTcwMvaPU7pv5CpZu0IhyphenhyphenYdIO5WvZLl__0qxd8D9hQkw0DmlI-gn17/s1600/OldManRestoredToYouth.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="287" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5aCTlGQ6ZznouJ4b5_FmZbaTlp2fXc9P9xnoRKinTSIR4yic9CoanR3ccJkVku-XKz_W2PNKlqqU0-3E0bOhPmAVTcwMvaPU7pv5CpZu0IhyphenhyphenYdIO5WvZLl__0qxd8D9hQkw0DmlI-gn17/s320/OldManRestoredToYouth.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Arborem cum sene conclude in rorida domo et comedens de fructu eius fiet iuvenis </i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
("Shut up the Tree with the Old Man in a House of Dew and eating the fruit thereat He will become Young") <span style="font-size: x-small;">(Source: <i>Atalanta Fugiens</i>)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi14NIRo7nMpi6V7YIVLUd-N_oJ4OD8SuczqGAwD2ZKVDVTdUMjMTfdqiDvB5CrN6TCve_T8rVnCdm2lizQcAxK9r38qh2tyC3N7tnhi4kNVEDwsG9oRDhpXkTsXlkgYMmJ8EtxB7WTAlWc/s1600/Reborn.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi14NIRo7nMpi6V7YIVLUd-N_oJ4OD8SuczqGAwD2ZKVDVTdUMjMTfdqiDvB5CrN6TCve_T8rVnCdm2lizQcAxK9r38qh2tyC3N7tnhi4kNVEDwsG9oRDhpXkTsXlkgYMmJ8EtxB7WTAlWc/s320/Reborn.jpg" width="242" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(New Year Rebirth: Image <a href="http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lebo8wBJZD1qe0r71o1_r2_500.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Notice:</b> This author does not wish any harm on the President. I have both consequentialist and non-consequentialist reasons. With respect to the former sort, and as I have alluded to previously, threatening government officials (in word or action) is simply and obviously bad news for the United States and its people. Echoing Michael Hoffman's trenchant comments elsewhere, <i>prima facie</i>, any person who takes up arms is - consciously or unconsciously - an agent of the system. For those Cryptocrats who seek to replace with a police-state (what remains of) our hard won heritage of liberty are the only beneficiaries of such violence. In reference to the non-consequentialist reasons, let me just say the following, obliquely. Obama's Republican opposition is rumored to include the so-called (or, perhaps, <i>self-proclaimed</i>) "Religious Right." Such people ought to be broadcasting the message of their professed teacher, Jesus, who said: "<b>But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you</b>" (Matthew 5:44, <i>NIV</i>). </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
In many ways, we live in something like a <a href="http://www.revisionisthistory.org/columbine.html">Matrix-world</a> or what might be termed a gigantic psychic pressure-cooker. (Alternatively, some have termed it an "open air alchemical laboratory" [cf. <a href="http://revisionistreview.blogspot.com/2012/08/of-human-alchemy-and-gay-science.html">here</a>] or a "<a href="http://www.prisonplanet.com/">prison planet</a>.") We need a bit of genuine calm. </div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">"Rancor is a pimple on the brain!" </span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>~ Nero Wolfe</i></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBVBmjYvdUMozAaM2-s2M_tzp-jAryZnohuPChsGgoayr8lKEDB8FdwT7NH-jSuardW52Q3CaEATSR1qN5OYoDLeuKRriHtQzSSgwXdOZ5FQ8gMQcBPwn7aNsDwsjMjd_zXywYLiPAzRdb/s1600/SaturnVomitsStone.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="115" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBVBmjYvdUMozAaM2-s2M_tzp-jAryZnohuPChsGgoayr8lKEDB8FdwT7NH-jSuardW52Q3CaEATSR1qN5OYoDLeuKRriHtQzSSgwXdOZ5FQ8gMQcBPwn7aNsDwsjMjd_zXywYLiPAzRdb/s320/SaturnVomitsStone.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
Cf.:<br />
<br />
"<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hue-of-lincoln.html">Hue of Lincoln</a>"<br />
<br />
"<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hercules-and-his-twin.html">Hercules and His Twin</a>"<br />
<br />
"<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/tony-scott-etc.html">Tony Scott</a>" (+ Lincoln)<br />
<br />
"<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/11/tidbits.html">Tidbits</a>"<br />
<br />
###Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-83095651552327795792012-11-24T10:36:00.002-08:002012-11-24T10:38:15.598-08:00Tidbits***<br />
Circulating around November 13, 2012: "Man Finds His <b>Doppelganger </b>in <b>16th Century</b> Italian Painting[:] ... [Max] Galuppo[, 20, of Bloomsbury, N.J.], a <b>Temple </b>University student, found his doppelganger in a 16th century Italian painting by an unknown artist titled 'Portrait of a Nobleman with Dueling Gauntlet.'" (<a href="http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2012/11/man-finds-his-doppelganger-in-16th-century-italian-painting/">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3wNGGVUvF44iwav7P4y27afTRI5W0-1q_VAscV8QqQfyR3MJl7ixfT8Nd8phwjascTk0KBaSv2MGcdlyCZssAGS91ilqykwwjBLKML1aPdxis50dt3u5toWMwo8t5ff7nV8hD0QCxx8JI/s1600/doppelganger.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3wNGGVUvF44iwav7P4y27afTRI5W0-1q_VAscV8QqQfyR3MJl7ixfT8Nd8phwjascTk0KBaSv2MGcdlyCZssAGS91ilqykwwjBLKML1aPdxis50dt3u5toWMwo8t5ff7nV8hD0QCxx8JI/s320/doppelganger.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Photo by Nikkie Curtis, <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/images/News/ht_doppleganger_painting_dm_121113_wblog.jpg">source</a>.)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0C__HZy5bMRWBjnkZ-QqtnGqBg9bkfmRfb4zjPCAtAK8-HAeeFGmJTvn5U6EseEIUffhFdrNYGlPhzv47Xas5SsIrQ_1To8MoQAzK6s48Z-1eYhgBkoIUqqvJhfrMG8pPr8EyM7-J08U1/s1600/century-16-theater-colorado1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="224" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0C__HZy5bMRWBjnkZ-QqtnGqBg9bkfmRfb4zjPCAtAK8-HAeeFGmJTvn5U6EseEIUffhFdrNYGlPhzv47Xas5SsIrQ_1To8MoQAzK6s48Z-1eYhgBkoIUqqvJhfrMG8pPr8EyM7-J08U1/s320/century-16-theater-colorado1.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Century 16, <a href="http://worldfamousmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/century-16-theater-colorado1.jpg">source</a>)</span></div>
<br />
Some points of interest include the word "<b>doppelganger</b>" (for more, see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hue-of-lincoln.html">HERE</a>) and the time reference to the <b>Century 16</b>. (For more, see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/aurora-rising-aurora-consurgens-part-1.html">here</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/now-playing-at-century-16-ampitheater.html">here</a>, <a href="http://bellofchurch.blogspot.com/2012/09/going-postel-makings-of-judeo-christian.html">here</a>, and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/century-16-and-dawn-aurora-of.html">here</a>.) There is also the Solomonic word "temple" (cf. <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/11/belling-hurricane-gilbert.html">here</a>) and a reference to the very Presidential surname "Johnson": "The museum acquired the portrait as part of the John G. <b>Johnson </b>collection in <b>1917</b>" (<a href="http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2012/11/man-finds-his-doppelganger-in-16th-century-italian-painting/">Source</a>).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRq-4ywrvlvk6Md-75k42j_itpkCvDDpR9x0rtHoFYwUZaRP29uCJcyqYGBz4kATBiW1dbv2QVnmrziMJgPT7TiClG0V62K5ptMKHmUpb8nSPUBAYaseSBXE9MtHz8WQxO5BMcsfaM_d1R/s1600/JFK.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRq-4ywrvlvk6Md-75k42j_itpkCvDDpR9x0rtHoFYwUZaRP29uCJcyqYGBz4kATBiW1dbv2QVnmrziMJgPT7TiClG0V62K5ptMKHmUpb8nSPUBAYaseSBXE9MtHz8WQxO5BMcsfaM_d1R/s320/JFK.jpg" width="198" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://www.collectorsquest.com/uploads/blog/2012/02/JFK-newspaper.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
<br />
Posted on November 22, 2012: ""What if JFK had survived his assassination? ... It was <b>49 years ago</b> today that Kennedy was killed on Dealey Plaza. His accused assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, died at the hands of Jack Ruby several days later ... In <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hue-of-lincoln.html">2009</a>, filmmaker and visiting Brown scholar Koji Masutani took on the subject of Kennedy and <span class="yshortcuts cs4-ndcor" id="lw_1353773054_16">Vietnam</span> in <i id="yui_3_5_1_23_1353779564845_346">Virtual JFK: Vietnam If Kennedy Had Lived. </i>The
film was based on a book and considerable research on the subject by
academics at Brown and the University of Toronto, who looked at large
amounts of data and transcripts from the Kennedy administration." (<a href="http://news.yahoo.com/jfk-had-survived-assassination-100212215--politics.html">Source</a>).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnrwJWLmIRUr1JB_Bp-dcAnlQmCXoV0w525L-tkJ9s0Q0V4tqUdHYJAcoxLINBDPPGUegbwMSYaioW_SSX2IpAjstUmyPj2VTBP73FLBFd5sHT27DWLRRgHTjT3In_zQVw7X8y5zPfL60l/s1600/Death.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="22" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnrwJWLmIRUr1JB_Bp-dcAnlQmCXoV0w525L-tkJ9s0Q0V4tqUdHYJAcoxLINBDPPGUegbwMSYaioW_SSX2IpAjstUmyPj2VTBP73FLBFd5sHT27DWLRRgHTjT3In_zQVw7X8y5zPfL60l/s320/Death.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0OzHhdpIo04ON55E_1i5ejqkVg02tugZRe_f8Ozh4EJgDbdAnXErajQhKSt_RuG30FNRJb3Rf1RsJvYL-mGUOGKPyrkSqXnqSLOZzl-HpdzxB8E1cI6KZWBP0viEObGZ7EWmwi2VDUWG1/s1600/1913.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0OzHhdpIo04ON55E_1i5ejqkVg02tugZRe_f8Ozh4EJgDbdAnXErajQhKSt_RuG30FNRJb3Rf1RsJvYL-mGUOGKPyrkSqXnqSLOZzl-HpdzxB8E1cI6KZWBP0viEObGZ7EWmwi2VDUWG1/s320/1913.JPG" width="222" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/7a/Fed_Reserve.JPG/300px-Fed_Reserve.JPG">Source</a>)</span></div>
<br />
Significant or not, JFK was <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_F._Kennedy">born </a>in the "Johnson collection" year: May 29, 1917). It is also worth noting that <b>2013 </b>will be the <b>50th anniversary</b> of JFK's assassination. Additionally, it will be the <b>100th anniversary</b> of the institution of the Federal Reserve, as I previously noted <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/tony-scott-etc.html">HERE</a>.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgg9PNbheMRUI45q3ubjcmOVhnW-Fp5KH_VwNiSsP0h3hMAzh1EhDlpmZOYnT31yMds98nUNq56XFw-iaD2cQY7-kpG8iLA1zvckBUbov_vnquyCuV1SWarijuymZh1Jtm__vT2XfcY1go7/s1600/Johnson.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgg9PNbheMRUI45q3ubjcmOVhnW-Fp5KH_VwNiSsP0h3hMAzh1EhDlpmZOYnT31yMds98nUNq56XFw-iaD2cQY7-kpG8iLA1zvckBUbov_vnquyCuV1SWarijuymZh1Jtm__vT2XfcY1go7/s320/Johnson.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<a href="http://i711.photobucket.com/albums/ww114/unfathomable_album/3562johnson.jpg">Source</a>)</span></div>
<br />
Predictably, the "<b>Johnson</b>" name shows up here as well: "After his death, President Johnson told the nation that passing the Civil Rights Act would be the best way to honor Kennedy’s legacy, but it took until July 1964 for Johnson and his allies to get the act approved" (<a href="http://news.yahoo.com/jfk-had-survived-assassination-100212215--politics.html">Source</a>). (Cf. <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/11/belling-hurricane-gilbert.html">here </a>and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hercules-and-his-twin.html">here</a>.)<br />
###Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-70210715829950484672012-11-14T13:21:00.001-08:002012-11-14T21:30:09.560-08:00Belling the (Hurricane) Gilbert***<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwBIZDKE81kTjTTvkpxyOsntAYGdU5ww8bpGj4I3IRup8grWpgPbfApOP2bjSg4rKQwN7Wzz7nL5flFn8aE6f62-0IYU7hmTWccdtmxsHqwxRy-L-6GY97eH-o348qfGd6VfPUJCZsbw27/s1600/Gilbert.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwBIZDKE81kTjTTvkpxyOsntAYGdU5ww8bpGj4I3IRup8grWpgPbfApOP2bjSg4rKQwN7Wzz7nL5flFn8aE6f62-0IYU7hmTWccdtmxsHqwxRy-L-6GY97eH-o348qfGd6VfPUJCZsbw27/s320/Gilbert.jpg" width="188" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/aa/Gilbert_Watertower_-_North_-_2009-09-14.jpg/250px-Gilbert_Watertower_-_North_-_2009-09-14.jpg">Source</a>)</div>
<br />
"Arizona woman accused of running over husband because he didn’t vote against President Obama" (<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/arizona-woman-accused-of-running-over-husband-because-he-didnt-vote-against-president-obama/2012/11/14/7e78e12a-2e6d-11e2-b631-2aad9d9c73ac_story.html">Source</a>): "GILBERT, Ariz -- A pregnant Gilbert woman is facing domestic assault charges, accused of running over her husband because he didn't vote in last week's election. ... Police said Holly Solomon's husband, Daniel, tried hiding from his wife behind a light pole to save his life. ... Holly Solomon, 28, was arrested after running over husband Daniel Solomon following a wild chase that left him pinned underneath the vehicle. Daniel Solomon, 36, was in critical condition at a local hospital, but is expected to survive..." (<a href="http://news.yahoo.com/arizona-woman-runs-down-husband-car-not-voting-045426220.html">Source</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhr5872dpeVFvzwqu0DQbWqMfST4EVFWdU7RbEIBlkrvD-C6C7J_s2C5LhDJsPiVO9zFii7ebnxq2hmeerkE1wSnOf-CIlCX-51QBPe47_zOWTrGeDpzseCVgkO3fIQztFn4XUsrEYcIGbC/s1600/StormAhead.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhr5872dpeVFvzwqu0DQbWqMfST4EVFWdU7RbEIBlkrvD-C6C7J_s2C5LhDJsPiVO9zFii7ebnxq2hmeerkE1wSnOf-CIlCX-51QBPe47_zOWTrGeDpzseCVgkO3fIQztFn4XUsrEYcIGbC/s320/StormAhead.jpg" width="232" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://us.123rf.com/400wm/400/400/arcady31/arcady311206/arcady31120600008/13986245-storm-warning-sign-vector-illustration.jpg">Source</a>)</div>
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Emotions are running wild. I have previously gestured towards a pattern of "laughter"-symbolism (see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/laugh.html">here</a>). This laughter symbolism arguably has ties to the names <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/laugh.html">Hugo </a>and <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/08/isaac-x.html">Isaac</a> (via Loren Coleman's analysis), both of which names also designate notable hurricanes. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Sandy">Hurricane Sandy</a> is still prominent in the national consciousness.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhcaEOB9zJqpkxatt2Pk43C9mcdMIDHVXuW29kQBLU4xN1u5XfC3hvzOs2J3SZDNNFMSxEOb9ku_zO6KYO5KaZnnuX6KnlxdNP467LQn2MdQkVZzZJnPuVKY2uepXgGwjC0kopangoN4xY/s1600/1988gilbert.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhcaEOB9zJqpkxatt2Pk43C9mcdMIDHVXuW29kQBLU4xN1u5XfC3hvzOs2J3SZDNNFMSxEOb9ku_zO6KYO5KaZnnuX6KnlxdNP467LQn2MdQkVZzZJnPuVKY2uepXgGwjC0kopangoN4xY/s320/1988gilbert.gif" width="320" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://www.publicaffairs.noaa.gov/photos/1988gilbert.gif">Source</a>)</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0f3zxxurgmtqUgWDCAM3_3V1m4yihZtoknzD09YwGBJlZiBeiTqKl6jQVftkHzwlYZfJcvzPXfgjYSD_xoVjQEEnG6Yi1_nDkVexc_C9JEVNXATQdk7EfFRqaSvPDrGYmf9OF2GJZHgo5/s1600/f11_13.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="256" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0f3zxxurgmtqUgWDCAM3_3V1m4yihZtoknzD09YwGBJlZiBeiTqKl6jQVftkHzwlYZfJcvzPXfgjYSD_xoVjQEEnG6Yi1_nDkVexc_C9JEVNXATQdk7EfFRqaSvPDrGYmf9OF2GJZHgo5/s320/f11_13.gif" width="320" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://www.ems.psu.edu/~nese/f11_13.gif">Source</a>)</div>
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It is of interest, then, that the dateline for the homicidal, "anti-Obama" wife is listed as "Gilbert, Arizona." "Hurricane Gilbert" is the name given to "an extremely powerful Cape Verde-type hurricane that formed during the 1988 Atlantic hurricane season and brought widespread destruction to the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico. It was the most intense hurricane ever observed in the Atlantic basin, until Hurricane Wilma surpassed it during 2005" (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Gilbert">Source</a>). A tropical storm warning for Gilbert was upgraded to a hurricane warning on September 11, 1998 (<a href="http://www.ems.psu.edu/~nese/f11_13.gif">Source</a>).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0WzmPT8IX5PhluoYXq1x-gPQCoSv5HBioAiOHvVnouqJ9rjT10owBGsOlgb35JlNwzRqwtuOOEX6NzfJ2OJwfswXe2u-0ZpteYhJGQ1Oey8CYiceDoW4Ra4BlFE1AlLhptZg0iDMhOK_e/s1600/masks.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="220" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0WzmPT8IX5PhluoYXq1x-gPQCoSv5HBioAiOHvVnouqJ9rjT10owBGsOlgb35JlNwzRqwtuOOEX6NzfJ2OJwfswXe2u-0ZpteYhJGQ1Oey8CYiceDoW4Ra4BlFE1AlLhptZg0iDMhOK_e/s320/masks.gif" width="320" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://www.lcsc.edu/humanities/images/masks.gif">Source</a>)</div>
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Ecstatic laughter plausibly lies to one extreme on a sort of rough-and-ready emotional continuum. An expedient name for this pole might be the "comic" pole. The other pole might then be fairly characterized as the "tragic." (This symbol dichotomy has arguably cropped up before, in the strange tale of "James Holmes," the "Aurora-shooter," see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/07/the-tragi-comedy-thalia-melpomene-of.html">here</a>.) Again, I point towards this misguided "Phoenix"-woman, about whom it was written that her actions were motivated by: "despair at the re-election of Democratic President Barack Obama" (<a href="http://news.yahoo.com/arizona-woman-runs-down-husband-car-not-voting-045426220.html">Source</a>).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHYDBeMiGJqdhJKg3qka-VGa5NhBClgd854MUSux7Nv3jVhQNwRy6079CQ0xKhEEPBPEGVfWbToL6a1BRfK6QsQRmshz43dskJb0S8Y5sHgXjehHGDJfWrG6LAbQXkLa6eIGHTc-NMJc5h/s1600/NutCase.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHYDBeMiGJqdhJKg3qka-VGa5NhBClgd854MUSux7Nv3jVhQNwRy6079CQ0xKhEEPBPEGVfWbToL6a1BRfK6QsQRmshz43dskJb0S8Y5sHgXjehHGDJfWrG6LAbQXkLa6eIGHTc-NMJc5h/s320/NutCase.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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(The outer, "black" layer - the "nut case"; <a href="http://img.ehowcdn.com/article-new/ehow/images/a06/kt/or/germinate-hickory-nuts-800x800.jpg">source</a>)</div>
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If I didn't know better, I would say that it appears as if the election hoopla is serving (whom, I wonder?) to stir up "nutcases". This word should recall Michael Hoffman's <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Societies-Psychological-Warfare-Michael-Hoffman/dp/0970378416">foray </a>into the "lone nut" assassination phenomena. But it also brings to (my) mind, the word "<i>exserohilum</i>" (literally denoting emergence "out of," <i>ex</i>, "the black layer," <i>sero-hilum</i>), which word I would likely not even be aware of were it not for it's recent connection to the (much discussed) fungal meningitis cases, as I posted about <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/maze.html">here</a>. The "black layer," it seems, is an actual "outer casing surrounding a nut." This would make it, so to speak, a <i>nutcase</i>. Additionally, the word has intriguing associations with alchemy.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPakrWSSe09QpV8j6sUyNwjckhVNCwsJwOsa1P88Pm1VvGAFJfWHP5UrEYt3fE2F0gtAa4h1UazDYrGsD5ZL8tkYqn-Fg_lC4ol7cOvNCgo30Nbfk77x2r3LJbYFiywQ01ao5jJISUzS6p/s1600/GoldenDawn.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPakrWSSe09QpV8j6sUyNwjckhVNCwsJwOsa1P88Pm1VvGAFJfWHP5UrEYt3fE2F0gtAa4h1UazDYrGsD5ZL8tkYqn-Fg_lC4ol7cOvNCgo30Nbfk77x2r3LJbYFiywQ01ao5jJISUzS6p/s320/GoldenDawn.gif" width="264" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://www.crystalinks.com/crowley5.gif">Source</a>)</div>
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In any event, the name "Gilbert" is interesting in and of itself. Let me sketch, albeit briefly, some of its curious facets (besides designating the above-mentioned Category 5 hurricane). "Gilbert" is, for example, related etymologically to the French "<i>Guillebert</i>" and the German "<i>Williberht</i>," ("lit. 'a bright will')" (<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=Gilbert&allowed_in_frame=0">Source</a>). Now the idea of "brightness" might tie in with the light-bringing/Aurora symbolism that has also flowed, like the partially underground "Alfeios"/"Alphaeus" river ("whitish," but a.k.a. the "Nictymus"), constantly half-hidden beneath conscious experience. Moreover, the notion of the "will" fits in with a Crowleyan "Thelemite" stream that (on one reading) seeks to elevate a "Magickian's" volition and ensure self-satisfaction (see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/laugh.html">here</a>). It is the Rebelaisian dictum: "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law." (For a start, see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/century-16-and-dawn-aurora-of.html">here</a>.) Thus, "Gilbert" might be thought to be a sort of "(Hermetic Order of the) Golden dawn" symbol, connecting (as it does) the bright Aurora and the Magickal will.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4mbtQHb7xRsA7fBp89IsFPpp_nLzkz6XUQPljUBgNSTggxmy3iil9PwyCFiITyuFX3uPYWI_UvLEerqfa32AtStecvYKEfyvW0CYWVMssmW5Xo6CowLEKxH5tn4zTsOvTDNZXLbh1fz4u/s1600/Magnet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4mbtQHb7xRsA7fBp89IsFPpp_nLzkz6XUQPljUBgNSTggxmy3iil9PwyCFiITyuFX3uPYWI_UvLEerqfa32AtStecvYKEfyvW0CYWVMssmW5Xo6CowLEKxH5tn4zTsOvTDNZXLbh1fz4u/s320/Magnet.jpg" width="213" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://img2.imagesbn.com/images/107620000/107621705.jpg">Source</a>)</div>
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A second noteworthy aspect of the name "Gilbert" is its connection with magnetism. The word designates "a unit of magneto-motive force [and] honors English physicist <b>William Gilbert</b> (1544-1603)" (Cf. <b>Century 16</b> <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/century-16-and-dawn-aurora-of.html">here</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/now-playing-at-century-16-ampitheater.html">here</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/century-16-and-dawn-aurora-of.html">here</a>, and <a href="http://bellofchurch.blogspot.com/2012/09/going-postel-makings-of-judeo-christian.html">here</a>.) (<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=Gilbert&allowed_in_frame=0">Source</a>). "Two models are used to calculate the magnetic fields of and the forces
between magnets. The physically correct method is called the Ampère
model while the easier model to use is often the Gilbert model" (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Force_between_magnets#Magnetic_poles_vs._atomic_currents">Source</a>).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxLctCyDwTxSCM2FXN37RCR58UoBZM4KUaajBEvS6FJgy2LMoUqFBNlhpeZcOZzXLTexyTMs9PGbBA9RVipidr5tPqLCY2JlX3vQiNZ3DPs2VNHeaVGTwNr_lmx9e4DoD3IL56swhMdRvo/s1600/aurora-auroral-oval.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxLctCyDwTxSCM2FXN37RCR58UoBZM4KUaajBEvS6FJgy2LMoUqFBNlhpeZcOZzXLTexyTMs9PGbBA9RVipidr5tPqLCY2JlX3vQiNZ3DPs2VNHeaVGTwNr_lmx9e4DoD3IL56swhMdRvo/s320/aurora-auroral-oval.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://modernsurvivalblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/aurora-auroral-oval.jpg">Source</a>)</div>
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The phenomenon known as the "<b>Aurora Borealis</b>" is a magnetic phenomenon. (Cf. "<a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/07/doctor-polaris.html">Doctor Polaris</a>.") "[T]he polar aurora" is "also known as 'Northern Lights'...Originally the phenomenon was named 'Aurora Borealis,' Latin for 'northern dawn...'... Two things about those rays. One, the bright ones fade while dim ones brighten instead--a bit like flames in a fireplace, and just as mesmerizing. Some auroras are deep red, and these may be just a shapeless glow--or they may have rays, too. And second, the direction of those rays is related to the magnetism of the Earth." (<a href="http://www-spof.gsfc.nasa.gov/Education/aurora.htm">Source</a>).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3p2xy95jrAKtMJ1uKvOHVaE2xZ7Wla58lUulX9vD9dQFrrJ9jC3ceg-u1sXlOf13boXiHLmqM8SVEtrmA2Cf0ifKmQH5Sd8rZoVg665Swox8RQLSkbp-WbxDY1PIyQ0XB-YvixwOPlNWr/s1600/magneticstorm.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="87" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3p2xy95jrAKtMJ1uKvOHVaE2xZ7Wla58lUulX9vD9dQFrrJ9jC3ceg-u1sXlOf13boXiHLmqM8SVEtrmA2Cf0ifKmQH5Sd8rZoVg665Swox8RQLSkbp-WbxDY1PIyQ0XB-YvixwOPlNWr/s320/magneticstorm.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/magnetic/images/magnetic-home.jpg">Source</a>)</div>
Usually, the auroras are confined to their respective "auroral zones." However, these "auroral zones" can expand, for example, "...when the Sun creates 'stormy conditions.' On such occasions--especially near the peak of the <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/47-or-how-romney-lords-it-over-inferior.html">11-year sunspot cycle</a>--the Sun sends out a dense cloud of hot gas, whose arrival disturbs the Earth's magnetic environment and produces a so-called '<b>magnetic storm</b>' ...Magnetic storms expand the auroral zone to locations more distant from the magnetic pole..." (<a href="http://www-spof.gsfc.nasa.gov/Education/aurora.htm">Source</a>). Incidentally, there have been a lot of mentions, lately, of "<b>coming storms</b>" (namely, and besides the hurricane warnings, in the movies <i>Dark Knight Rises</i> and <i>Skyfall</i>: see, e.g., <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/07/red-dawn.html">here </a>and <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/11/Skyfall-DK.html">here</a>).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzJepi6difk4_6_U-C9WM_6urlk8kQxCYOp6azuGjnvhkQq_V_xfXYJZdbY13AKnLCKPC48d8vLZ8GsBF_Bly-ji9xwUerVmOwHDRQFWXodDefqJvsY5SbcnQ6z0x8Wt9bul9r0lSdIDfK/s1600/Gilbert_du_Motier_Marquis_de_Lafayette.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzJepi6difk4_6_U-C9WM_6urlk8kQxCYOp6azuGjnvhkQq_V_xfXYJZdbY13AKnLCKPC48d8vLZ8GsBF_Bly-ji9xwUerVmOwHDRQFWXodDefqJvsY5SbcnQ6z0x8Wt9bul9r0lSdIDfK/s320/Gilbert_du_Motier_Marquis_de_Lafayette.PNG" width="227" /></a></div>
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(Gilbert du Motier, a.k.a., "Lafayette," <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3f/Gilbert_du_Motier_Marquis_de_Lafayette.PNG">Source</a>)</div>
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Thirdly, "Gilbert" was one of the many names for the man otherwise better known to us as the <i>Marquis de Lafayette</i>. <b>Gilbert </b>du Motier (Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier) is called "The Hero of the Two Worlds (<i>Le Héros des Deux Mondes</i> in French)" (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilbert_du_Motier,_Marquis_de_Lafayette">Source</a>). On the myriad interconnections implicating the name "Lafayette," see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/morgan-le-fay.html">here </a>(which post includes numerous links to several now classic works on the "Fayette Factor") and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/laugh.html">here</a>.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYi8aZzMxpVnqhd2MN4bNPRenIBYeDXN4ybaKoaIKTO1JTjIQPIygiDuQWGPg68QTFTYcJaw5ZBF1WAmjjI68-ZB2qX3EyuVokBQetgbc6Wbilw_Z_sftXWh6QOpOjbsF0I-IbiH6pU2cZ/s1600/MV5BMTM2NTUyMjE0Ml5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTYwOTQwNTU5._V1._SX328_SY475_.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYi8aZzMxpVnqhd2MN4bNPRenIBYeDXN4ybaKoaIKTO1JTjIQPIygiDuQWGPg68QTFTYcJaw5ZBF1WAmjjI68-ZB2qX3EyuVokBQetgbc6Wbilw_Z_sftXWh6QOpOjbsF0I-IbiH6pU2cZ/s320/MV5BMTM2NTUyMjE0Ml5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTYwOTQwNTU5._V1._SX328_SY475_.jpg" width="220" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://www.imdb.com/media/rm1145347584/tt0108550">Source</a>)</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDKn4KmC6N_M6YidAzPtkeo-8KLVFh0k48DvJ7JXzAusj1r2VvDCskBSnfefZ7TX4eg6y88R3B-yR2i0Za9iAEh0Ih-lM4Wm6CPcVSJpHlGGkGDodoiStQGmHh8DOhbBf7uPIh9o9s3cvM/s1600/Inception.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDKn4KmC6N_M6YidAzPtkeo-8KLVFh0k48DvJ7JXzAusj1r2VvDCskBSnfefZ7TX4eg6y88R3B-yR2i0Za9iAEh0Ih-lM4Wm6CPcVSJpHlGGkGDodoiStQGmHh8DOhbBf7uPIh9o9s3cvM/s320/Inception.jpg" width="216" /></a></div>
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("Your mind is the scene of the crime," <a href="http://cfile232.uf.daum.net/image/141E5B104C4BDD446DDA58">Source</a>)</div>
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Fourthly, I would feel remiss if I didn't include at least a brief mention of the 1993 movie, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0108550/"><i>What's Eating Gilbert Grape</i></a>. The movie's tagline reads, "Life is a terrible thing to sleep through." This hearkens to the "rise up" and "awaken" cues corresponding to the Aurora ritual (see, e.g., <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/aurora-rising-aurora-consurgens-part-1.html">here </a>and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/now-playing-at-century-16-ampitheater.html">here</a>).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfLtBZsUKtINkeYjszGa2neG3BDL-kUgkltzvvh7Vy0YsgG6O9ay5PqY1qVyH05N7nOLdovwbp7-ABmxgAvMI8cFD3MoGXlqwzevLoQ9_QXUq8iYIRFbAR22WEuySfxUKKuAVS3Lk8jQms/s1600/Superconsciousness.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfLtBZsUKtINkeYjszGa2neG3BDL-kUgkltzvvh7Vy0YsgG6O9ay5PqY1qVyH05N7nOLdovwbp7-ABmxgAvMI8cFD3MoGXlqwzevLoQ9_QXUq8iYIRFbAR22WEuySfxUKKuAVS3Lk8jQms/s320/Superconsciousness.jpg" width="272" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://oi44.tinypic.com/2say0oy.jpg">Source</a>)</div>
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The movie included the performance of Leonardo Dicaprio, who was also involved with the intriguing movie <i>Inception</i>, which arguably has a great deal to say about the implantation of "mind viruses" or "<b>memes</b>" (one interpretation argues, quite convincingly, that the entire movie is an allegory about movie-making itself, which media form has the ability, one might suppose, to "implant ideas" in the minds of percipients; see <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Inception-Philosophy-Because-Blackwell-Culture/dp/1118072634">here </a>and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Inception-Philosophy-Ideas-Popular-Culture/dp/0812697332/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1352923799">here</a>).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRn6v1xbYSauClGA6Rs7gN5mgXEMcbbrg4BM1WMg45Ts_bDlX8vbXmBb-ZqGv0zrIMY9uX2EfP7EsB9W09w0tG3wMTD4XdzD7bobOfFv8LeqtQy7nz-BvpwuKMjdTV4rittR1DU8fplGaQ/s1600/Assassination.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="192" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRn6v1xbYSauClGA6Rs7gN5mgXEMcbbrg4BM1WMg45Ts_bDlX8vbXmBb-ZqGv0zrIMY9uX2EfP7EsB9W09w0tG3wMTD4XdzD7bobOfFv8LeqtQy7nz-BvpwuKMjdTV4rittR1DU8fplGaQ/s320/Assassination.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://www-tc.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/media/uploads/films/heroImages/lincoln_film_landing.jpg">Source</a>)</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiztJnCmNgOmvY_knnMDHzdVyBy5frrIx0DPLRt7q89DmsmvZX_NaskqAgi5GaEy9mLAoxSKw8WNzagPQTcVC-GooE_ou6DCyqY_AZCZstI-rF2unitQm7IFoFi5lfSRHyJGgrfsk6YjkiY/s1600/2008870716.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiztJnCmNgOmvY_knnMDHzdVyBy5frrIx0DPLRt7q89DmsmvZX_NaskqAgi5GaEy9mLAoxSKw8WNzagPQTcVC-GooE_ou6DCyqY_AZCZstI-rF2unitQm7IFoFi5lfSRHyJGgrfsk6YjkiY/s320/2008870716.jpg" width="218" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/ABPub/2009/03/16/2008870716.jpg">Source</a>)</div>
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Remember what was eating our Gilbert woman? Put simply: She hates Obama and wanted revenge on her husband. As one (perhaps well-meaning but, in my opinion, delusional) post-election reaction expressed it: "This is the day the country died" (as related to me, anecdotally). Ostensibly, the Gilbert woman wanted to punish her husband for not displaying sufficient (by her lights) anti-Obama zeal.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwx4cVlyO8TyzOLXAzLTeOoJ_XNEhE4AubleNAVkLrye1SSXlgTK4FzEtoUQ3E754E4APKFv25sAL5IUcQidNKM_BHMlbSbBAZTma584nDr48X_4NDaTKEJt8M21BgOu2mJQKcFJtpn6NX/s1600/TexasJudge.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwx4cVlyO8TyzOLXAzLTeOoJ_XNEhE4AubleNAVkLrye1SSXlgTK4FzEtoUQ3E754E4APKFv25sAL5IUcQidNKM_BHMlbSbBAZTma584nDr48X_4NDaTKEJt8M21BgOu2mJQKcFJtpn6NX/s1600/TexasJudge.JPG" /></a></div>
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(County Judge Tom <a href="http://www.co.lubbock.tx.us/department/division.php?fDD=6-21">Head </a>[Lubbock, Texas] thinks that an Obama victory make things in this country <a href="http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/come+to+a+head">come to a head</a>. A number of <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2012/08/23/us/texas-judge-warning/index.html">Democrats </a>think he's either a head case or he has his head up his ass. Personally, I think that the media's playing a <a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=head&allowed_in_frame=0">head game</a>. Photo <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2012/08/23/us/texas-judge-warning/index.html">source</a>)</div>
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The media certainly appear to be fomenting this sort of violent hatred. Prior to the election, there was talk of "civil war" in the wake of an Obama victory (see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/tony-scott-etc.html">here</a>). And although such petitions have apparently accompanied numerous recent "elections," the media is currently publicizing (at least to some extent) particular calls for "secession": "Secession petitions filed in 20 states" (<a href="http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/secission-petitions-filed-20-states-190210006.html">Source</a>). Something is at work that might be fairly described as the symbolic recreation of the American Civil War. One might also think of it as an "assassination meme." Disturbingly, this pattern seems (to this writer) widespread. See, e.g., <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/tony-scott-etc.html">here </a>and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hue-of-lincoln.html">here </a>and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hercules-and-his-twin.html">here</a>.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHxKgiCe7OvDorZ7lYFLBufH8bvJckjyNYiKSAWpBBSgBboz1A8-QQ8oW0uKBWDKc_Qn0wKNpstfTZv9VP73ONAZbRqcQFKfAfl2DcJks1kWMSHjCW7UTw2EEy_sEyc22d-19NpN-3cQN8/s1600/Grapes_Boston_Drake1917.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="288" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHxKgiCe7OvDorZ7lYFLBufH8bvJckjyNYiKSAWpBBSgBboz1A8-QQ8oW0uKBWDKc_Qn0wKNpstfTZv9VP73ONAZbRqcQFKfAfl2DcJks1kWMSHjCW7UTw2EEy_sEyc22d-19NpN-3cQN8/s320/Grapes_Boston_Drake1917.png" width="320" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/23/Grapes_Boston_Drake1917.png">Source</a>; see the Freemasonic connections <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bunch-of-Grapes">here</a>. It is remarkable that there is a often a triad of Masonic assassins, see <a href="http://www.benswenson.com/news.php?ctrl=viewNews&objid=849">here</a>.)</div>
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For the record, I think that Michael Hoffman was correct when he observed somewhere (something to the effect of) <i>Anyone who uses violence is an agent of the system</i>. To be more specific, our police state thrives on violence. It will serve no good purpose (from a popular perspective) to give the system further excuses to employ draconian measures of oppression in the name of "safety" and "security."<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxf-I8Qd4DwgTOShTCQqdj5HEYm6NPYTgVlGvAdZNX5Q9Cva0pNre3Ydnb31l-Z-KmKu56c8nwGMunOOBTgISbKi8CpYXu6Vn2X07JjDajuVbMrYqo5IzNH5SHpjErTt_xdIpXNE5cM-zO/s1600/Fermentatio.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="263" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxf-I8Qd4DwgTOShTCQqdj5HEYm6NPYTgVlGvAdZNX5Q9Cva0pNre3Ydnb31l-Z-KmKu56c8nwGMunOOBTgISbKi8CpYXu6Vn2X07JjDajuVbMrYqo5IzNH5SHpjErTt_xdIpXNE5cM-zO/s320/Fermentatio.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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(<i>Fermentatio</i>; <a href="http://www.goldpanning.nl/img/history/med6.jpg">Source</a>)</div>
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Conceivably, the system want to <b>ferment </b>(alchemically) <b>a bunch of grapes</b> (or, perhaps...Gilbert-women), all overwhelmed with a spirit of tragedy, spinning out of control, like a hurricane. "The great city was split into three parts, and the cities of the nations
fell. God remembered to give Babylon the Great <b>the cup of wine filled
with the fury of his wrath</b>" (<a href="http://bible.cc/revelation/16-19.htm">Revelation 16:19</a>, ISV).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivQNIrUXJDvpz2gGdBsZ-OmEMUP5HFSDhOIE7WG-wyMfHQEDXj11Giq-yJ2Kg8ct9Ewjwl68F_cUx0KGgQTD8jHb3Qq4azglrhq-uJooP9Sf7qfA4aMKD4NSeBNLoIA4vq0WX5jdQQfve1/s1600/Attack.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="175" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivQNIrUXJDvpz2gGdBsZ-OmEMUP5HFSDhOIE7WG-wyMfHQEDXj11Giq-yJ2Kg8ct9Ewjwl68F_cUx0KGgQTD8jHb3Qq4azglrhq-uJooP9Sf7qfA4aMKD4NSeBNLoIA4vq0WX5jdQQfve1/s320/Attack.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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(Holly Solomon; <a href="http://ronewzakcleveland.files.wordpress.com/2012/11/runover.jpg">Source</a>)</div>
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It is well to remember, as noted above, that the "feminine" Hurricane Wilma exceeded the "masculine" Gilbert in severity. The Gilbert woman is allegedly named "Holly Solomon."<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtdzn2l7cZhVdiK69YFyi1xpYz0wi91VQfRsflLo8bY56Ja3SljPKQhZvM_I7z-XhQv35Vox4Pe6UKc9i6aSDyX_IX3KC_nJGOO8GceCtr0cXe6MTNCi5y3k_Y9ILNhDbQ3gnVcIpf_UI4/s1600/HiramAbiff.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtdzn2l7cZhVdiK69YFyi1xpYz0wi91VQfRsflLo8bY56Ja3SljPKQhZvM_I7z-XhQv35Vox4Pe6UKc9i6aSDyX_IX3KC_nJGOO8GceCtr0cXe6MTNCi5y3k_Y9ILNhDbQ3gnVcIpf_UI4/s320/HiramAbiff.jpg" width="206" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<a href="http://www.freemasons-freemasonry.com/inigo001.jpg">Source</a>)</div>
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In the Masonic legend of "Hiram Abiff ...[,] Hiram is presented as being the chief architect of King Solomon's Temple, who is murdered by three ruffians during an unsuccessful attempt to force him to divulge the Master Masons' secret password" (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiram_Abiff">Source</a>; cf. <a href="http://www.benswenson.com/news.php?ctrl=viewNews&objid=849">here</a>). VISUP has looked extensively into the word/name "Holly" (see <a href="http://visupview.blogspot.com/2012/06/hollywood-sign.html">here</a> and <a href="http://visupview.blogspot.com/2012/09/the-fall-of-11.html">here </a>for examples).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5fGUPn8h4IxH0fE6ldHVbXEMp5NT4ztrnCJrRSHdNDf-amz-thx1rjBq6FD_Aslp409nvPHukESe_517qzkAxIPsdLpEiR6fkGfOrWcV5AuofwgWkT_98jjJxpOP-uHJP2uluSpUJutQN/s1600/Conspirator.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5fGUPn8h4IxH0fE6ldHVbXEMp5NT4ztrnCJrRSHdNDf-amz-thx1rjBq6FD_Aslp409nvPHukESe_517qzkAxIPsdLpEiR6fkGfOrWcV5AuofwgWkT_98jjJxpOP-uHJP2uluSpUJutQN/s320/Conspirator.jpg" width="215" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<a href="http://i263.photobucket.com/albums/ii139/whatgloom/Put%20in%20here/hr_The_Conspirator_3.jpg">Source</a>)</div>
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With respect to Lincoln, again, the movie <i>The Conspirator</i>, "...profil[es] Mary Surratt, the sole woman implicated in<b> the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln</b>, and the questions raised about the use of military commission trials..." (<a href="http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/white_house/jan-june11/lincoln_04-14.html">Source</a>). The movie "The Conspirator" involved a screen writer named "James <b>Solomon</b>" who, according to his own account, "began" the project "in 1993" the "Gilbert Grape" year (<a href="http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/white_house/jan-june11/lincoln_04-14.html">Source</a>). <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJZ-rZ0kJQ6EpR4lw1ydAGt6-vrgp927T-JsCDGIUl55qtZb1owmZagzrZr3fwtKeuCGdT7MvTs9Kk4fFxtK70qGCkbAkN0BI6Rig8CwL_lxDuIfyP2VITs72e9kDLAKBjvN6eOuN4iUqV/s1600/MilitaryTrial.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJZ-rZ0kJQ6EpR4lw1ydAGt6-vrgp927T-JsCDGIUl55qtZb1owmZagzrZr3fwtKeuCGdT7MvTs9Kk4fFxtK70qGCkbAkN0BI6Rig8CwL_lxDuIfyP2VITs72e9kDLAKBjvN6eOuN4iUqV/s1600/MilitaryTrial.jpg" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://www.picturehistory.com/product/id/2441">Source</a>)</div>
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This is another facet of the "Civil War" backdrop presently in place: the "reinstallation," directly under George W. Bush and Obama, of the use of secret military "trials" like, as Hoffman has pointed out, the old Stuart "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Chamber">Star Chambers</a>." On an occult meaning of "Star" see <a href="http://celticrebel.wordpress.com/2009/11/03/from-starfish-to-stardom/">here</a> (WARNING: reader discretion is advised; thanks to VISUP for the link). "On July 7, 1865, a parasol shielding her from the sun, Surratt and three
others were led to the gallows. <b>She was the first woman to be executed
by the United States government</b>" (<a href="http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/white_house/jan-june11/lincoln_04-14.html">Source</a>).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAZeb8jvnMWjCu6w171ysPF4YeOtCdTk8x1wQxzdC77bG5U7HlaB8XAAFhw2EZ_17lltEYy2cQciH7hF6nwuzkxBtCOQ4CU1-HXzYHACUYmlvGR4fybzKU1IsYDLjeze-re5jNW1u7xXrL/s1600/eyeofbel.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAZeb8jvnMWjCu6w171ysPF4YeOtCdTk8x1wQxzdC77bG5U7HlaB8XAAFhw2EZ_17lltEYy2cQciH7hF6nwuzkxBtCOQ4CU1-HXzYHACUYmlvGR4fybzKU1IsYDLjeze-re5jNW1u7xXrL/s1600/eyeofbel.jpg" /></a></div>
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(<b>The Eye of Bel</b>: <a href="http://www.equinox-project.com/jpgs/eyeofbel.jpg">Source</a>; Compare the "Eye of Horus"/"Ra", the "Eye of Shiva", etc.)</div>
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Of course "<b>Bell</b>" (which can manifest in the feminine <i>Belle</i>) comes from a "root <span class="foreign">*bhel-..." meaning </span>"to sound, <b>roar</b>" (<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=bell&allowed_in_frame=0">Source</a>). And, in a process arguably similar to "inception," "ringing a bell" designates the "awaken[ing of] a memory" (Ibid.). With all of this background, note that a "Lee <b>Bell</b>inger" has been sending out provocative emails. I received one (from Date: Thursday, November 8, 2012, 11:39 AM) titled "There's One Solution Left -- Do you have the stomach for it?" I take it that the <b>bellicose </b>language is unmistakable. The email links to a purported (according to Bellinger) "disturbing" video (detailing the demise of the nation, no doubt) and states, in the body that: "From here on out, all solutions are personal." (On the "Bell" name, see <a href="http://copycateffect.blogspot.com/2012/06/belltown-leprechauns.html">here</a>.)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsfBdS1rLKkOV5WCBrRndYZxaZvJCYJmvhmRVbmOcTJ31yevSm_jjSm0UsCqevodlVx47lApJfDxvqazzE085AZShyphenhypheni1wAPKlPrNiVnFFgF-IyJetzwhe207eRXe_nxJdZHapspk7du306/s1600/Garfield.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsfBdS1rLKkOV5WCBrRndYZxaZvJCYJmvhmRVbmOcTJ31yevSm_jjSm0UsCqevodlVx47lApJfDxvqazzE085AZShyphenhypheni1wAPKlPrNiVnFFgF-IyJetzwhe207eRXe_nxJdZHapspk7du306/s320/Garfield.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://ogmansblog.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/the-american-male-in-cat-form.jpg">Source</a>); "Garfield" picks out both a cartoon cat and an <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hercules-and-his-twin.html">assassinated President</a>.)</div>
As a further point, the etymology dictionary remarks that "Gilbert" "was the common name for a male cat (especially in short form Gib) from c.1400 (see Tom)" (<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=Gilbert&allowed_in_frame=0">Source</a>; cf. <a href="http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/tomcat">here</a>). "<b>Belling the cat</b>" designates an <a href="http://www.bartleby.com/17/1/67.html">Aesop fable</a> that, one might say, has to do with a task (in the case of the fabled mice, putting a alert-signal around the neck of their enemy, the cat) that many people (perhaps "Bellinger's" cohorts) want to be done, but nobody wants to do themselves.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzwD4WULvFbeh5-RRkDRRM6FSJn4JI9XtItHPKJFbSbJd2uUYyYvSnVwdnEirh_t4WErTdmRcy8QW_W0syendvoaUv662A-sJvEb-SeMqpZhuziHV2VQWb2k7zuNNZFeDQkZvv2BdkSvNx/s1600/Solomon_L._Hoge_-_Brady-Handy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzwD4WULvFbeh5-RRkDRRM6FSJn4JI9XtItHPKJFbSbJd2uUYyYvSnVwdnEirh_t4WErTdmRcy8QW_W0syendvoaUv662A-sJvEb-SeMqpZhuziHV2VQWb2k7zuNNZFeDQkZvv2BdkSvNx/s320/Solomon_L._Hoge_-_Brady-Handy.jpg" width="267" /></a></div>
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("I concur" ~ Solomon Lafayette Hoge (July 11, 1836 – February 23, 1909), Carpetbagger who "appointed Johnson Chesnut Whittaker, an African-American, to the United States Military Academy" <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solomon_L._Hoge">Source</a>; Gratuitous photo <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/70/Solomon_L._Hoge_-_Brady-Handy.jpg">source</a>)</div>
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###Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2157134005117046528.post-31665149915903488332012-10-21T11:46:00.000-07:002012-11-03T09:08:23.177-07:00Tonight, the case of 1791***<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyStVDT7tXpFDtjntmBl5E_TKekG-yYkvESwLH0jMrV8CFFT2yEQ4aes7KYJLGFtTbnv1ztMZkhgS_rce3QJs3WQ8HQwLHhw2NUkx8PAc2XOgVebXPSRF8_w1I7ZVDoqGdAxGpJMO4ZENV/s1600/1791_Beck.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="249" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyStVDT7tXpFDtjntmBl5E_TKekG-yYkvESwLH0jMrV8CFFT2yEQ4aes7KYJLGFtTbnv1ztMZkhgS_rce3QJs3WQ8HQwLHhw2NUkx8PAc2XOgVebXPSRF8_w1I7ZVDoqGdAxGpJMO4ZENV/s320/1791_Beck.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://www.theblaze.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/1791a-620x483.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
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"The former FOX News host [Glenn Beck] just launched his own USA-made, boutique jeans line, 1791 Denim, named in honor of the year the Bill of Rights was added to the Constitution" (<a href="http://thelook.today.com/_news/2012/10/17/14509655-glenn-beck-launches-129-usa-made-jeans-to-protest-levis?lite" target="_blank">Source</a>).</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSggfUWbD97TVE6lQw-2-pLDOJRg8Mq-n76aqhQ5tS_gSIAaKgZeYFzQTy-SpNhbU2wX36cKSkw3d45G8AphOnXVe_BmUelfpXA5awhdBcCd5NM5MNeTvWaVFmTFgwoGtj2dIN84N1VT9B/s1600/Ovason2.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSggfUWbD97TVE6lQw-2-pLDOJRg8Mq-n76aqhQ5tS_gSIAaKgZeYFzQTy-SpNhbU2wX36cKSkw3d45G8AphOnXVe_BmUelfpXA5awhdBcCd5NM5MNeTvWaVFmTFgwoGtj2dIN84N1VT9B/s320/Ovason2.JPG" width="207" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDKJuO_mWLMAsn3YzJrv3z_jWhdBQ9tZy3d0hRSYMf0Tp36Fw35pd7uPZpQTHC4ZSIE6dtjzg-o84LnQNv97BUf-BfOYzCKnqqAXcH4vnsV-7wc2ARYDxFaECtKDYg4Ph94UfjgtRwMnln/s1600/Ovason1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="133" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDKJuO_mWLMAsn3YzJrv3z_jWhdBQ9tZy3d0hRSYMf0Tp36Fw35pd7uPZpQTHC4ZSIE6dtjzg-o84LnQNv97BUf-BfOYzCKnqqAXcH4vnsV-7wc2ARYDxFaECtKDYg4Ph94UfjgtRwMnln/s320/Ovason1.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Secret-Architecture-Nations-Capital/dp/0060195371" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
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Of course, although "1791" has what one might call Beck's declared, "exoteric" significance, it also has a hidden, "esoteric" significance. </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEia1GJ_ym2sa8madYtAbtmwBaIF0VzMYTit5m_-lkS8D6vqt1SC6Y9f0V_Av4TtUd02Os4tp_Ecca3tnxXj3OGe2rzzSi6rkJPaXmWyNgo59jeBbG7esbTCwK0c5L7wNmssN8AbJVGBg3Wc/s1600/1791.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="29" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEia1GJ_ym2sa8madYtAbtmwBaIF0VzMYTit5m_-lkS8D6vqt1SC6Y9f0V_Av4TtUd02Os4tp_Ecca3tnxXj3OGe2rzzSi6rkJPaXmWyNgo59jeBbG7esbTCwK0c5L7wNmssN8AbJVGBg3Wc/s320/1791.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBvPI99OAPs28T_aM75SH00lQ5NtpGoEOsAqI2hqDxalFJDY4FBnlUw0T-Vp7X-MZX_91mVDJeeyLjJan_JutFjgGF8ih70DWlRL20SCNsY6afqDRoAzUgYI-B5urRKflytlVLT9Yv7ZH2/s1600/InfoPacket.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="235" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBvPI99OAPs28T_aM75SH00lQ5NtpGoEOsAqI2hqDxalFJDY4FBnlUw0T-Vp7X-MZX_91mVDJeeyLjJan_JutFjgGF8ih70DWlRL20SCNsY6afqDRoAzUgYI-B5urRKflytlVLT9Yv7ZH2/s320/InfoPacket.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://www.princehall.org/PDF%20files/the%20five%20facets.pdf" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
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David Ovason (<a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Secret-Architecture-Nations-Capital/dp/0060195371" target="_blank">here</a>; cf. <a href="http://www.cuttingedge.org/news/n1487.cfm" target="_blank">here</a>) has argued that 1791 has occultic-astrological import with respect to the Masonically-constructed Capital of Washington, D.C. 1791 is also, according to Masonic source material, the year in which Freemasonry was "declared universal" (<a href="http://www.princehall.org/PDF%20files/the%20five%20facets.pdf" target="_blank">source</a>).</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeFbiY9OQrEP5ZloOo20J-OimGP2RIBjyPJl2ZmGk5OEJmKfwf8kizrSdb-nf4Dnp356bvrBcK8wGGYLzvMqwwR94DWIdhBEFGZT4GGvGSpcaBUbfAblAcitCMSBRS6WNTwN9cgnSpi4vh/s1600/BeckPants.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeFbiY9OQrEP5ZloOo20J-OimGP2RIBjyPJl2ZmGk5OEJmKfwf8kizrSdb-nf4Dnp356bvrBcK8wGGYLzvMqwwR94DWIdhBEFGZT4GGvGSpcaBUbfAblAcitCMSBRS6WNTwN9cgnSpi4vh/s320/BeckPants.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/j/MSNBC/Components/Photo/_new/tdy-121017-beck-pants-combo.photoblog500.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
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Beck has alleged that his clothing line is "seeing 'gangbuster sales'" (<a href="http://news.yahoo.com/glenn-beck-jeans-latest-surprising-celeb-endorsement-195717987--abc-news-celebrities.html" target="_blank">source</a>). The Huffington Post exclaims: "Glenn Beck's Pants Are on Fire" (<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/chez-pazienza/glenn-becks-pants-on-fire_b_1988398.html">Source</a>) which is suggestive of the drought-fire dynamic that has been at work all summer (and where I have elsewhere - e.g., <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/07/knight-of-aurora-athena.html">here</a>, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/armstrong-symbolically-ostensively.html">here</a>, and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/shuttling-symbols.html">here </a>- linked to the alchemical "dry method").</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMalTiK5ruqxC4tGXsAdXtQRvQIIUL_v-EjAoyTclDpBZBkWJi7yVm6uD7JkfmwcmjVVfM7jcOy0xEU3Ax3V346eOtKwGZbnluk8vYVEHUTLo09KTRaxfmq9KDvRmm5hVVkubPpQh1tHDH/s1600/Lindbergh_after_grand_jury.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMalTiK5ruqxC4tGXsAdXtQRvQIIUL_v-EjAoyTclDpBZBkWJi7yVm6uD7JkfmwcmjVVfM7jcOy0xEU3Ax3V346eOtKwGZbnluk8vYVEHUTLo09KTRaxfmq9KDvRmm5hVVkubPpQh1tHDH/s320/Lindbergh_after_grand_jury.jpg" width="309" /></a></div>
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(Norman Schwarzkopf & Charles Lindbergh; Photo <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2c/Lindbergh_after_grand_jury.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
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It was "Reality-Radio": "Gang Busters was an American dramatic radio program heralded as 'the only national program that brings you authentic police case histories.' It premiered as G-Men, sponsored by Chevrolet, on July 20, 1935. [cf. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_Aurora_shooting" target="_blank">The 2012 Aurora Shooting</a>] ... The series dramatized FBI cases, which producer-director Phillips H. Lord arranged in close association with Bureau director <a href="http://www.amazon.com/John-Edgar-Hoover-Hank-Messick/dp/B0000EE7IX" target="_blank">J. Edgar Hoover</a>. ... It was once narrated by Norman Schwarzkopf, Sr., former head of the New Jersey State Police." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang_Busters" target="_blank">Source</a>) "Major General Herbert Norman Schwarzkopf (August 28, 1895 – November 25, 1958) was the first superintendent of the New Jersey State Police. He is best known for his involvement in <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Programmed-Kill-Politics-Serial-Murder/dp/0595326404" target="_blank">the Lindbergh kidnapping case</a>. He was the father of General H. Norman Schwarzkopf, the commander of all Coalition forces for Operation Desert Shield/Storm." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Schwarzkopf,_Sr." target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhf2JcUMErwiuujsVC0mZ8DtpKcDByh0vmz4i1iimMc5_tc0NWGe-RDosP9mxA3cnERlucHCy3BgIcWbRwvF7Xh99J3bJ_YZWyW5PCB7eh2onDCDwC5q1ccTxjwkwj7T8JZBTlOOUhf3ZMT/s1600/Gang_Busters.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="251" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhf2JcUMErwiuujsVC0mZ8DtpKcDByh0vmz4i1iimMc5_tc0NWGe-RDosP9mxA3cnERlucHCy3BgIcWbRwvF7Xh99J3bJ_YZWyW5PCB7eh2onDCDwC5q1ccTxjwkwj7T8JZBTlOOUhf3ZMT/s320/Gang_Busters.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div>
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("<a href="http://filesofjerryblake.netfirms.com/assets/images/Review--Gang_Busters.jpeg" target="_blank">Gang Busters</a>", with <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/08/armstrong-symbolically-ostensively.html" target="_blank">Armstrong </a>and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/09/morgan-le-fay.html" target="_blank">Morgan</a>)</div>
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"The radio series was adapted for DC Comics and Big Little Books. Universal Pictures made a very popular Gang Busters movie serial in 1942, starring Kent Taylor and Ralph Morgan." (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang_Busters" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPbSJLi2tmEoSHd_7AAFW4YVdlxH3z5WhQPCcIROwiGRM6WgigiAhOrKAniVvkxqaCUPXkn81fUo2zRDF8rqTKJ3CTAz7r4D6jTBTZsrLv1AZOX9Ay7IYyGX0cusExOxKo7RSFZ_XQODNn/s1600/Silence.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPbSJLi2tmEoSHd_7AAFW4YVdlxH3z5WhQPCcIROwiGRM6WgigiAhOrKAniVvkxqaCUPXkn81fUo2zRDF8rqTKJ3CTAz7r4D6jTBTZsrLv1AZOX9Ay7IYyGX0cusExOxKo7RSFZ_XQODNn/s1600/Silence.JPG" /></a></div>
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(Sign of Silence; See other signs, <a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-pEOvqJKhQP4/Tu215YaoJSI/AAAAAAAAAOc/_6pJTKHEdUM/s1600/SIGNS3.JPG" target="_blank">here</a>)</div>
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The name "Beck" <a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=beck&allowed_in_frame=0" target="_blank">originates </a>from a "late 14c[entury]" word meaning "mute signal", and is a shortened form of "beckon", from the "O.E. gebecnian (W. Saxon beacnian)," meaning "to make a mute sign" (<a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=beckon&allowed_in_frame=0" target="_blank">Source</a>). </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJ7yI7L2cheXc8wyG-2P3O9YRQRu_sx0LxTQiGG7PgYQqxcgXdh2-yy6ngdvqrS_bsX3d00RloLngL2sMFQILWmPM1dCrzIAXPkZiTHrPQkSqIifUD49oJeu8IJeQ6vJCC4rR8YJdccVbx/s1600/Silence.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJ7yI7L2cheXc8wyG-2P3O9YRQRu_sx0LxTQiGG7PgYQqxcgXdh2-yy6ngdvqrS_bsX3d00RloLngL2sMFQILWmPM1dCrzIAXPkZiTHrPQkSqIifUD49oJeu8IJeQ6vJCC4rR8YJdccVbx/s320/Silence.png" width="185" /></a></div>
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(<a href="http://www.canarycryradio.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/41.png" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVHkNaBWfbolEaxrIMYheuVwn3pzcgmBrAeZSwlgQuG7_HTQxDcLkppVGJIn-6N-6uQXvArEKjX1wqsXBNQnaL666fvehhyDCIbuCSdeKTKcKwkzi94SiFyQnTedFXXiE3oNB06PwskBFU/s1600/Secret.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVHkNaBWfbolEaxrIMYheuVwn3pzcgmBrAeZSwlgQuG7_HTQxDcLkppVGJIn-6N-6uQXvArEKjX1wqsXBNQnaL666fvehhyDCIbuCSdeKTKcKwkzi94SiFyQnTedFXXiE3oNB06PwskBFU/s320/Secret.jpg" width="229" /></a></div>
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(<a href="https://d1466nnw0ex81e.cloudfront.net/n_iv/600/757413.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdgKexXBAnt1uG4mZRSZO7woE8ClZOVJ66Q2vx2X78t_8Xng-Wkn5s-ePTYMnDBL5Hepcs4LFw1kIofjDUU5PzHxSlvz5ihwdXQQa0Br2F8J6seVSdWFjVMjsEK6AHYegtrs4gdHShQ09N/s1600/becknwo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdgKexXBAnt1uG4mZRSZO7woE8ClZOVJ66Q2vx2X78t_8Xng-Wkn5s-ePTYMnDBL5Hepcs4LFw1kIofjDUU5PzHxSlvz5ihwdXQQa0Br2F8J6seVSdWFjVMjsEK6AHYegtrs4gdHShQ09N/s320/becknwo.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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(Thanks to John Cole; Photo <a href="http://america20xy.com/blog6/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/becknwo.jpg">source</a>)</div>
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"The symbolism of Masonry is the soul of Masonry. <b>Every symbol of a lodge is a religious teacher, the mute teacher</b> also of morals and philosophy. It is in its ancient symbols and in the knowledge of their true meanings that the preeminence of Freemasonry over all other orders consists. ... [B]y its symbols it will reign without a peer when it learns again what its symbols mean..." (Albert Pike, qtd. in Oliver Day Street, <i>Symbolism of the Three Degrees</i>, pp. 17-18).</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpyV-jDlqgEkbVdjP0yKrk25C3ZFO0QzHj06qpCKTBIZfNllwv8WBDck9Xdi8sZT1oxgbr1u7XdiuYOz8hiyN5lsw-zmtHjKrcN1Nx4MZDOu7fAuPH7rINmLlFFZdct4alAOfPf7kko8j_/s1600/Denim.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="149" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpyV-jDlqgEkbVdjP0yKrk25C3ZFO0QzHj06qpCKTBIZfNllwv8WBDck9Xdi8sZT1oxgbr1u7XdiuYOz8hiyN5lsw-zmtHjKrcN1Nx4MZDOu7fAuPH7rINmLlFFZdct4alAOfPf7kko8j_/s320/Denim.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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(Made in America: Corporate Slavery; Photo <a href="http://www.slate.com/content/dam/slate/blogs/browbeat/2012/10/14/1791men.JPG.CROP.article568-large.JPG" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
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Denim - it's what all the cool slaves are wearing: "In the early 1900's, one of the worst abuses of workers involved what was called<b> the 'company town'</b>. [cf. <a href="http://bellofliberty.blogspot.com/2012/09/labor-day-or-president-will-use-army-to.html" target="_blank">here </a>and <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hercules-and-his-twin.html" target="_blank">here</a>] This was a town wholly owned by a mining company in a remote location. ...[T]he cost of living was ...[high], kept there by the '...company store', the only source for the necessities of life. The company was free to hand out high wages, knowing they would take that same money back in as profits at the company store. No matter how hard the workers tried, they could never make enough money to live on and would be in debt to the company store. As long as they were in debt, the company could legally prevent the workers from leaving. It was a form of corporate slavery, concealed in a bookkeeping trick. ...Our rear ends are well decorated with designer jeans, but if you think about it, blue jeans are pretty much what the workers in those older company towns wore into the mines every day. Is there any difference between the blue jeans you wear, made expensive with a designer label, and their blue jeans, made expensive by the company store? Is it not really the same trap at work?" (<a href="http://whatreallyhappened.com/WRHARTICLES/companytown.html" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhY1J0xNwsyBMmCDWnQeaiZrbu_Cvye7XKvu1ZPjgjJpJxWF3arXKn37I4afWjyofXx4GjcMOuIx2STfl6DF85gmGlSFuTNhqwCNMg-uDbIOO27UtGqe_ifRbivBID7gPIdKBssiqPJM6Gb/s1600/beck+silence.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhY1J0xNwsyBMmCDWnQeaiZrbu_Cvye7XKvu1ZPjgjJpJxWF3arXKn37I4afWjyofXx4GjcMOuIx2STfl6DF85gmGlSFuTNhqwCNMg-uDbIOO27UtGqe_ifRbivBID7gPIdKBssiqPJM6Gb/s1600/beck+silence.jpg" /></a></div>
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(<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5Xt1KUx6rYL2PaZv2DtQzTM9LCrOseil2z9KtFMbY29kttqEJUy9qKIteJDs6M641QSNj7uFVjKvtFQBKmyZFYtNKRKTWHpu0NU7syMnGY-eeONppxq9_Q8Yewu8QQ84HvpNLeqxwJ7jo/s1600/beck+silence.jpg" target="_blank">Source</a>)</div>
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For more, see <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/laugh.html" target="_blank">here</a>.<br />
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[Update 30 October 2012]<br />
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More "Gang Busters": <br />
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"Dinesh D'Souza's movie, <a href="http://curveofbell.blogspot.com/2012/10/hue-of-lincoln.html">2016</a>: Obama's America. <b>This movie is going gangbusters</b>! ..."</div>
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~ Rush Limbaugh (Qtd. in: Email from Newsmax.com, Tuesday, October 30, 2012 6:21 PM)</div>
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###Liberty Bellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12583326798091256934noreply@blogger.com2