-Lewis Carroll
Last night I read one of my son's books, "The Pali Cannon", which is the sole remaining vebatim account of Bhudda's dialogs. I was struck by the central theme of our natural, organic state of addiction. I looked back toward my own interests in ufology. Have we been led by our noses? If so, have we been provided a suitable labyrinth to compulsively explore, which, at it's epicenter, we are found to be straw men who are puppets? If so, we see the strings, we see the artifice...is this a phenomenon a collaboration of addictive tendencies and the object of our desire?
We stand before a portal to enter a potentiality of meaning with innumerable doors.We have the residue of inclinations, bias and values in hand as we prepare to enter.Between the image in the mirror and the point of observation is the location of this portal. Between the heavens and the earth is a portal as well. We wander as we gather. Our collection of sticks and brush... of antedote, rumor and conjecture and build a fire which burns until the flames consume the fuel...once extinquished, our nomadic quest begins anew in the cycle of dreams.
"...But my livliest interest is not so much in things, as in the relations of things. I have spend much time thinking about the alleged pseudo-relations that are called coincidences.What if some of them should not be coincidences?" Charles Fort (1874-1932) in: Wild Talents
"At first there was a deep silence, not only within the shadow of the Talking Oak, but all through the solitary wood. In a moment or two, however, the leaves of the oak began to stir and rustle, as if a gentle breeze were wandering amongst them, although the other trees of the wood were perfectly still. The sound grew louder, and became like the roar of a high wind. By and by, Jason imagined that he could distinguish words, but very confusedly, because each separate leaf of the tree seemed to be a tongue, and the whole myriad of tongues were babbling at once. But the noise waxed broader and deeper, until it resembled a tornado sweeping through the oak, and making one great utterance out of the thousand and thousand of little murmurs which each leafy tongue had caused by its rustling. And now, though it still had the tone of a mighty wind roaring among the branches, it was also like a deep bass voice, speaking as distinctly as a tree could be expected to speak, the following words: "Go to Argus, the shipbuilder, and bid him build a galley with fifty oars."
-Nathaniel Hawthorne from The Tanglewood Tales
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In my last post, I posited that since all theories regarding the UFO phenomenon are based on critical assumptions, it seems reasonable to explore the lesser known pathways toward our goal which could be stated as own variant of the Golden Fleece.
In other words, we seek in this journey what are and what is the purpose, if any, of this enigma, as well as the enigma of ourselves. One of these lies at the conjunction of mythology and our current state of affairs. What has been inserted onto our field of vision is perhaps, a challenge, a provocaion and a ritualised initiation toward the nature of both ourselves and the reality we inhabit but fail to
comprehend.
"It is probably true quite generally that in the history of human thinking the most fruitful developments frequently take place at those points where two different lines of thought meet. These lines may have their roots in quite different parts of human nature, in different times or different cultural environments or different religious traditions: hence if they actually meet, that is, if they are at least so much related to each other that a real interaction can take place, then one may hope that new and interesting developments may follow." - Werner Heisenberg
I suggested that the manufacturing of a new mythology within ourselves, could be one such purpose, to re-enchant an overly empirical and gross psychology which discounts the subtle at it's own peril. A direct question concerning the purpose of UFOs was posed to a Sufi Sheik whom I deeply respect.
He said simply; "To produce wonder."
One of the first books on mythology I read was "The White Goddess" by Robert Graves which requires a reading of The Golden Bough before attempting to digest the former. This was a book which described in great detail, the symbolic and hidden language of the trees alluded to in the quoted story by Hawthorne. I was somewhat surprised as to the origin of this highly detailed and complex book as it apparently arrived to Graves in a series of poetic visions.
Anyone familiar with the connection between poetry, myth and the esoteric realises there is a profound envelopment between the three whether on a intuitive basis or based upon what we would consider as paranormal experiences. The Sufi Saint Rumi used poetry to a great extent to describe certain truths, where as we noted in the last post, both ufology and physics seem to be artificially constricted in language,as Heisenburg observed,we suddenly found our efforts "get hung by language," which poetry tends to sidestep and transcend. All of which brings us back to myth, which, often is encapsulated in poetry.
Then again, in Christian mythology, returning to the metaphor of the tree, there is one singular example any young Bible student would imediately recognise.
"Ouspensky records a conversation in St. Petersburg during the summer of 1916 in which Gurdjieff discussed the problem of communication, and the impossibility of conveying in our ordinary language ideas which are intelligible and obvious only for a higher state of consciousness. Speaking of the unity between man, the Universe, and God, he said that the objective knowledge by which alone this unity is to be understood can never be expressed in words or logical forms. At this point, Gurdjieff made a statement which is a key to the understanding of his own subsequent writings. He said: Realising the imperfection and weakness of ordinary language, the people who have possessed objective knowledge have tried to express the idea of unity in ‘myths,’ in ‘symbols,’ and in particular ‘verbal formulas,’ which, having been transmitted without alteration, have carried on the idea from one school to another, often from one epoch to another. In All and Everything Gurdjieff makes extensive use of these three forms, that is, symbol, myth, and verbal formula. There is no need in these mathematical days to defend the use of symbolism. It is regarded by many schools of modern thought as the only safe form of language. Wittgenstein treats symbols as something more than conventional signs, and regards them as corresponding in some way to the reality to which they refer. He would probably accept Gurdjieff’s dictum that: symbols not only transmit knowledge but show the way to it. Even though other thinkers deny any objective reference to symbols, no one questions that symbolism has a power beyond that of ordinary language. It is different with the language of myth. This is despised by superficial thinkers, but the greatest philosophers have known its value. Whitehead wrote: The father of European philosophy, in one of his many moods of thought, laid down the axiom that the deeper truths must be adumbrated by myths. Surely the subsequent history of Western thought has amply justified his fleeting intuition."
-JG Bennett
"This word Legominism", replied Beelzebub, "is given to one of the means existing there of transmitting from generation to generation information about certain events of long-past ages, through just those three-brained beings who are thought worthy to be and who are called initiates. This means of transmitting information from generation to generation had been devised by the beings of the continent Atlantis. For your better understanding of the said means of transmitting information to beings of succeeding generations by means of a Legominism, I must here explain to you a little also about those beings there whom other beings called and call initiates. Well then, my boy, Legominism is the name given to the successive transmission of information about long-past events which have occurred on the planet Earth from initiates to initiates of the first kind, that is from really meritorious beings, who have themselves received their information from similar meritorious beings..."
-All and Everything
Variously known as Palaephatus the Egyptian, Palaephatus of Athens and Palaephatus of Paros is a individual who appears to have successfuly confounded history, as apoet much akin to the aforementioned Robert Graves, views myth from a decidedly Fortean perspective around the 4th Century BC.
In the short preface of his treatise Concerning Incredible Tales, he remarks," that some men, from want of instruction, believe all the current narratives; while others, more searching and cautious, disbelieve them altogether. Each of these extremes he is anxious to avoid: on the one hand, he thinks that no narrative could ever have acquired credence unless it had been founded in truth; on the other, it is impossible for him to accept so much of the existing narratives as conflicts with the analogies of present natural phenomena. If such things ever had been, they would still continue to be--but they never have so occurred; and the extra-analogical features of the stories are to be ascribed to the licence of the poets. Palaephatus wishes to adopt a middle course, neither accepting all nor rejecting all; accordingly, he had taken great pains to separate the true from the false in many of the narratives; he had visited the locali?ties wherein they had taken place, and made careful inquiries from old men and others. The results of his researches are presented in a new version of fifty legends."
Hopefully having provided an alternate view differing much from the popular view of myth, as a background to the subject of my last post which was the remarkable mythology of The Fifty, which has a central theme of fifty individuals being tied to a larger body.
Any one who has read Robert Temples book on allegedly arcane extraterrestrial visitation, The Sirius Mystery, all of this will sound familiar. We now return to look at ufology once again in this light. The connection between the Greeks of The Fifty Argonauts and the Dogon mythology is very provocative.
"Ethnologists say the Dogons are the cultural and biological descendents of 'ancient Greeks' from the Isle of Lemnos in the Aegean Sea....The Lemnians themselves claimed descent from the fifty Argonauts of Jason in Greek legend who, according to the legend, went to Libya, migrated westward as the Garamantians, were driven south and eventually reached the River Niger in Mali after many centuries to interbreed with the natives and teach them."
http://www.geocities.com/SATANICREDS/sirius.html
"Several specialists now claim they have found the long-sought "final evidence" of visits made to earth by ancient astronauts. The myths of the Dogon tribesmen of Mall, West Africa, contain astronomical knowledge which the native people could have neither learned by themselves nor guessed. Obviously, the researchers say, some more advanced civilization told them. These fascinating Dogon legends speak of Jupiter's four moons and Saturn's rings, which were not seen by human beings until the invention of the telescope. They speak of the star Sirius and of a pair of invisible companions. One of them circles Sirius every fifty years, the legends declare, and is made of a metal that is the heaviest thing in the universe. Astronomers have discovered that such an object (called "Sirius-B") does exist but only the most sophisticated and sensitive instruments -- unavailable, of course, to the Dogons -- can detect it." from The Sirius Mystery, by James Oberg
Prior to reading this book, I had been struck by a cryptic comment made by Gurdjieff in which he stated that fifty fully conscious individuals could exert an influence among their fellow man. Where did I come upon this number before?
"And the men turned their faces from thence, and went toward Sodom: but Abraham stood yet before the LORD.And Abraham drew near, and said, Wilt thou also destroy the righteous with the wicked? Peradventure there be fifty righteous within the city: wilt thou also destroy and not spare the place for the fifty righteous that are therein? That be far from thee to do after this manner, to slay the righteous with the wicked: and that the righteous should be as the wicked, that be far from thee: Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?"
-The Bible
"The fifty youths shouted back, "We, too, are human beings. We have come out of the earth. But what are you yelling about?"
The maidens replied, "We, too, are human beings and we, too, have come out of the earth. We shouted and asked the moon and the stars who had made them or if they had made everything else."
-Kabyl Creation Myth
"Marduk - son of Ea and Dumkina. He supplants the other Babylonian deities to become the central figure of their pantheon. He is a "King of the Igigi" He often works with and asks questions of his father. He has fifty names many of which are those of other deities whose attributes he usurped. He was of proud form and piercing stare, born mature, powerful, and perfect and superior. He has four eyes, four ears, and emits fire from his mouth when he speaks. He is also gifted in magic."
-Babylonian Myth
"Briareos and his brothers have fifty heads and fifty arms sprouting from their massive shoulders.The Immortals use the name Briareos to name him but mere mortals call him Aigaios’ son.When Briareos and his brothers were in the womb of Gaia, Ouranos would not let them be born; when they attempted to come out, Ouranos would push them back inside; it wasn’t until the Titan, Kronos (Cronos), attacked and wounded his father, Ouranos, that the brothers were allowed to be free; Gaia made a sickle of flint and begged for one of her Titan children to attack Ouranos but only Kronos came to her aid; Kronos laid in ambush for his father and struck him down with the flint sickle; the three fifty-headed brothers were allowed to escape Gaia’s womb and the blood of Ouranos created the Furies, the Giants, the Nymphs of the Ash Trees..."
"Danaus had fifty daughters and his brother Aegyptus had fifty sons. A match between their daughter was proposed by Aegyptus, but Danaus was unwilling. He and his fifty daughters fled to Argos"
-Greek Mythology
Gurdjieff was unusually precise and to write off this statement as an ad-lib was beyond consideration. When I read Mr Temple's book, here was that number again. Not only was a supposedly advanced source of knowledge experienced by these tribesmen, but having been familiar with the aforementioned aspects of myth.
"You are standing on a sea shore and waves wash up an old hat, an old box, a shoe, a dead fish and they lie on the shore. You say; 'Chance; nonsense!" The Chinese mind asks "What does it mean that these things come together?"
-Carl Jung
I began to research this from an unusual angle. What if these individuals were mistaken for extraterrestrials and were in fact, a most secretive group who were most certainly advanced but were in fact, among us and unrecognised?
At the nexus of transition between the knowledge of the sensate, living human species and that of the transcended dead is an organisation of fifty individuals who guard the sanctity of the secrets within this portal in the emblematic form of Cerberus, emblematic of a living manifestation of a veil.
"Cerberus who eats raw flesh, the brazen-voiced hound of Hades, fifty-headed, rentless, the strong..."
Theogony of Hesiod
We would be remiss not to recall the young Hermes having stolen fifty of Apollo's cattle nor the fifty Daughters of Nereus, the son of the sea and the earth.
The myth of Demigods, the fifty Argonauts began as Jason assembled many noble men from Hellas, and with the help of one Argus, some say son of Phrixus 1, a ship of fifty oars called "Argo" was built. At its prow, a speaking timber from the oak of Dodona was fitted, following the instructions of Athena. It is said that when the ship was launched into the sea, it appeared among the stars from rudder Jason sent his invitation to all the adventurous young men of Greece, and soon found himself at the head of a band of bold youths, many of whom afterwards were renowned among the heroes and demigods of Greece. Hercules, Theseus, Orpheus, and Nestor were among them. They are called the Argonauts, from the name of their vessel.
We now go back to our aforementioned and mysterious Fortean friend, Palaephatus the Egyptian, who relates in his poem that the Golden Fleece was a book of alchemy.
In the entangled shards of prehistory, there is yet much to be uncovered despite the ill founded and premature consensus on certain topics.
Perhaps, in the next post, we will explore from a historical background, the adventurers and explorers in this largely hidden, global quest for the Inner Circle, Directorate or Poles as this group has variously been named.
We may not find our Golden Fleece, however we will meet those remarkable and fascinating individuals who devoted their entire lives in this heroic quest whether in the high mountain passes, the ruins of past civilisations or in the midst of a bustling urban landscape, unnoticed and as the Sufi would say, have become "passers-by" to the dreamscape which swirls about them in the crowds and errands of abstraction.
"Similarly, a dream contains no tenses. Time is telescoped, and representations of past events in real or distorted forms may have the present as their referent---or vise versa. Th patterns of dream are timeless."
-Gregory Bateson
Each one is encapsulated in a dream within a dream and yet, among them..a watcher alert, possessing the power of both influence and suggestion may shadow them unawares..and if recognising the enormous potential these cross streams may yet represent, bides his time. One can hardly imagine a life which encompasses more than one thousand years..the more the view changes, the more it remains the same...as unimaginable as other phenomenon we critically assume as beyond our grasp. What in effect or whom we search for is the possessor of a Golden Fleece in our cautious and tenitive steps through the looking glass...whether it is poised midway between the heavens and the earth or is among us, unnoticed and subtle.
Is this the face of Chrysomallos? The Ram also may be linked in another manner to the Dogon.
http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sitchin/whentimebegan/whentimebegan12.htm
Generations arrive and depart, as do the civilisations which contained them in their quest. Roswell fades in the distance while Kecksburg looms in our rear view mirror. One can reasonably assume this too shall pass. We have become innoculated against the slings and arrows of transcendent shocks across the bow of time. Perhaps this provides ample evidence of a descent into a state of entropy attested to by our inattention and distracted cognition.
At one time an airline pilot reporting a close encounter or astronauts admitting they were followed to the moon would have raised the pitch of public alarm.
This observation begs yet another question...is this phase drawing to a close and another about to appear? Has this phenomenon about to change it's manner of manifestation? These now routine reports of unidentified objects come and go, only to fade from view in a short space of time.
We are no closer than we were forty years ago...as to the origin of this intrusion upon our material physics within a empirical worldview. Amidst this, the farmer plows his field, the cab driver collects his fare in the volition of dreams held in the eternal clasp of a certainty that possesses feet of clay. The lure, the desire and addictive dreamscapes....
"From the point of view of a man alienated from his source, creation arises from despair and ends in failure. But such a man has not trodden the path to the end of time, the end of space, the end of darkness and the end of light. He does not know that where it all ends, there it all begins.
-RD Laing
'"The clown (the Trickster) reminds us of the irrational within our universe ... and the futility of our quest for certainty, control and absolute power." Peat feels that Western science has its own Tricksters: he cites entropy or disorder: "If we insist upon general order, it can only be done at the expense of creating disorder somewhere else." Alongside scientific developments such as quantum physics and chaos, the concept of entropy in thermodynamics highlights the underlying flux of nature: the universe is not a clockwork mechanism and a quantity of discrete objects, but a set of interacting processes and relational fields."
-from a review of F David Peat's Blackfoot Physics: A Journey into the Native American Universe
As a symbolist, as I view the world through a sensate lense that considers that perhaps the human eye as an image is emblematic of our positional situation in that this window at it's epicenter is impenetrable, and in this sense represents a veil drawn upon what it is that we are, and is beyond locality or imagery, persona or conceptual model we vainly attempt to assign upon it. In my research upon the shelf of ufology, I find myself in a similar state of ambiguity.
At times, perhaps it is my own reductionist ploy to consider that if the aggragate connections to stimulus were to be severed and extinguished as my locus of contingent manifestation, as if awakening from a dream, removed from the input, associations and identifications.. removed from the volition of my composite identity, would I reconstitute reality as I had formulated it to be in yet another dream, or, shall I be reabsorbed as an incorporated portion of a much larger sentient creation which is the sum total of all points of observation of my fellow creatures...or, simply put, see all of these creations as simply representations of something yet beyond my grasp as I had in life itself? If representation in an image, a concept, a state is the mirror upon which I see myself, perhaps then, it should come as no great revelation that the unidentified objects poised between heaven and earth has the same attributes.
"Nothing is left to say except that which concerns the receiver, and the receiver does not become immanent except from the Most Holy Effusion. The totality of the order is from Him, the beginning of it and the end of it. The totality of the order (of being) returns to Him as it started from Him. And the order necessitates the polishing of the mirror of the universe, and Adam is the same as that polish of such a mirror and the spirit of such an image. The angels are certain of the powers of that image which is the image of the universe which in the terminology of certain people is meant to mean the Great Man. The angels are like certain spiritual and sensitive powers for it which were there at the emergence of mankind. Each of the powers (of the universe) is veiled by its own self and does not see anything superior to itself. And in these (in all the powers of the images of the universe) there is the belief of familiarity with all the high positions and elevated stations with God, since it is with Him from the Divine collectivity between that which refers from all this to the Divine Person and to the side of the Reality of Realities, and because in the total emergence of this its qualities have necessitated the Total Nature which encloses all the receptivities of the universe, high and low. And also in this he does not know this by way of reasonable intellect. This is from the science of comprehension. It cannot be except through Divine insight (kashf) from which he will know what the origin of the image of the universe, which is the receiver to his spirits, will be.
This which is mentioned above is called Man and Viceregent."
-Ibn al Arabi
As an image of ufology set before us in a relationship of process can certainly said to be in a flux of receptivity. If we deconstruct this process of relationship as it relates to the receptivity and metamorphisis of these unidentified objects, we arrive back to ourselves.
“The phenomenon presented by UFOs is far larger than current speculation about “aliens from space.” It raises questions about consciousness, about the nature of reality and about human history on the Earth. "
-Dr Jacques Vallee
True enough, however since we cannot open the door and enter within this wide spectrum of phantasms and enquire within as to why they have been placed within our field of vision, we are left to our own devices, which may be the actual purpose of these visions that are positioned between materiality and the intangible. Perhaps this state that they occupy is a symbolic representation which may be a lure for our desire to comprehend by our efforts, the sum of it's potential.
"What I am saying is that it is not so much what man is that counts as it is what he ventures to make of himself. To make the leap he must do more than disclose himself; he must risk a certain amount of confusion. Then, as soon as he does catch a glimpse of a different kind of life, he needs to find some way of overcoming the paralyzing moment of threat, for this is the instant when he wonders who he really is - whether he is what he just was or is what he is about to be. Adam must have experienced such a moment."
-George Kelly
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