mystery

‘Heaven’s loud voice?’ …

| Stuart France

Blake’s Angel neatly encapsulates aspects of the Books of Daniel and Revelation.

*

… “Now is come salvation and strength, and the kingdom of our God,

and the power of Christ: for the accuser of our brothers is cast down,

which accused them day and night…

Therefore rejoice you heavens and you that dwell in them.

Woe to the inhabitants of the earth and of the sea!

For the devil is come down to you, having greath wrath

because he knows that he has but a short time.”

*

Are we to conclude that this is the voice of St Michael?

I think we are meant to.

*

We may wonder after the inhabitants

of the earth and sea on the third day of creation?

And Christ’s participation at this early stage?

*

The argument, presumably, would be that as the heavenly realms

are beyond time, they include all time, and the passages

we have considered so far are certainly consistent with this theme.

*

Strength in relation to St Michael we already know about.

*

Salvation is a lifting of veils, or scales, from the eyes:

an awakening into that living realisation which alone grants freedom.

*

If some of the traditional attributes of Christ seem to fit Michael,

like casting out devils, then some of the traditional

attributes of Michael can also be seen to fit the Christ.

 

Aeons…

| Stuart France

Blake’s take on the Seven-Headed Dragon of Revelation is suitably anthropomorphic!

*

We are continuing our ‘trawl’ through chapter twelve of Revelation, which commenced here.

*

… ‘And the dragon stood before the woman which was ready to be delivered,

for to devour her child as soon as it was born…’

*

Time ‘devours’ everything that is born into the world, but wait, ‘…And

she brought forth a man-child, who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron:

and her child was caught up into God, and to his throne…’

*

I think the ‘man-child’ here represents an Aeon…

Such a designation would cover both ‘Horus’, and ‘Christ’,

at any rate he his saved from his earthly sojourn and

caught up into a heavenly throne, just like the star Spica,

which nestles in the ‘Throne of Virgo’!

*

Although, ‘ruling all nations with a rod of iron’ may well be something

of an ‘elephant in the room’?

*

The phrase ‘are you ready to be delivered’ can be used to commence

the ritual of exorcising demons.

*

Thrones are always regarded as feminine,

especially when a masculine divinity happens to be sitting upon them.

*

‘…And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a place

prepared of God, that they should feed her there

a-thousand-two-hundred-and-sixty-days…’

*

‘God’ appears to be plural here in which case ‘they’ would be the ‘Elohim’.

These are the seven planetary beings, but presumably, from the heavenly

perspective rather than the earthly which in this mythology appears to be demonic.

*

The woman in her escape to the wilderness is reminiscent of both Lilith,

Adam’s first wife who consorts with demons in the desert,

and Sophia, the Gnostic Principle-of-Wisdom, forever

harried by demons throughout her sojourn in an ignorant world.

*

The earthly realm is populated with ‘devils’, it seems,

long before ‘that old serpent’ gets there!

Menorah?…

| Stuart France

Hanukkah Menorah Jewish Judaica Israel Vintage Brass Chanukah ...

Menorah as Chalice

*

… The Book of Revelation can be described

as a book of arcane symbolism.

*

It seems to me astonishing that such a work should have been

accepted into the recommended canon when so many

other far less controversial texts are regarded as apocryphal –

this word which now has connotations of spuriousness or falsity

is derived from the Greek word for ‘hidden’ –

Apocryphal works, then, can be regarded

as those books which possess hidden wisdom.

*

It will be useful to consider the opening few paragraphs

of Revelation and compare them to Daniel’s vision of Michael

which we looked at in earlier posts…

*

“It was on the island of Patmos.

I was meditating on the seventh day

when I heard behind me a voice as of many waters,

“I am the beginning and end, first and the last.”

I turned to see who it was that spoke,

and I saw a figure resembling the Son of Man.

He was standing in the middle of seven golden candlesticks.

His beard and his hair were like white wool.

His eyes were flames of fire.

His countenance was bright, as the sun when it shines at its height.

He was clothed in a long white robe.

About his breast went a golden girdle.

In his right hand he held seven stars.

His words rang out of his mouth clearly

with the poignancy of a double-edged sword:

“I am he that lives and was dead.

I possess the keys to death and hell.

I shall live forever more.”

I fell down at his feet and they were like fine-brass forged in a furnace.

He laid his hands upon me, “You must write down all you see in a book,

and send it to the Seven Churches of Asia.

Let all the churches know that I am he who searches

the reins of the heart and gives to every one, according to their works.

Tell them to remember from whence they have fallen,

to return to their first love lest I come upon them like a thief

and remove their candlestick from its place,

thus speaks the ‘Amen’: ‘I know your works, I know that you have a name,

I know that you live, and yet, you are as the dead!'”

*

It might be difficult for St Michael to be described as the,

‘one who is living but was dead’, but

he could certainly lay claim to being regarded as

‘the first and the last’ and also as possessing,

‘the keys to death and hell’…

*

In the Book of Daniel, we may recall,

St Michael was described as a Great Prince,

as a Chief Prince, and as Daniel’s Prince.

Curiosities…

| Stuart France

St Michael’s victory over the Devil – Sculptor, Jacob Epstein

*

The French occultist, Eliphas Levi, the German philosopher Franz von Baader, and the Theurgist, Louis Claude de St. Martin spoke of 1879 as the year in which Michael overcame the dragon.

In 1917, Rudolf Steiner the founder of anthroposophy, similarly stated, “In 1879, in November, a momentous event took place, a battle of the Powers of Darkness against the Powers of Light, which ended in the image of St Michael overcoming the Dragon.”

*

All of which is, to say the least, curious…

The traditional texts which mention Michael, and they are few, do not mention a dragon, and yet, iconographically, St Michael slaying the dragon is almost as ubiquitous as St George…

Religious paintings, sculptures and stain glass windows are all in agreement despite many, if not most,  of them being produced before 1879!

So what is going on?

Pull up a seat…

*

‘ … And look! A man clothed in linen, whose loins were girded with fine gold… His body also was like beryl and his face had the appearance of lightning. His eyes were as lamps of fire, and his arms and his feet like in colour to burnished brass. The voice of his words was as the voice of a multitude… and he said, “… To you am I now sent. Fear not, Daniel, for from the first day that you set your heart to understand, your prayers were heard and I am come for your prayers… I am come to make you understand what will befall your people in the latter days. I will show you the literal truth of these things. There is no other that can do this.”‘

– First appearance of Michael :  The Book of Daniel, Chapter 10: 5-21

Blinded by the Light…

| Stuart France

*

… So, we return to the quest.

And turn shining eyes to the south.

Not that we ever left it, yet the churches had definitely ‘fallen off-line’…

Until Skipton.

Until one particular stained-glass window in Skipton.

It is tempting to think that later traditions lose much that is essential to preceding ones.

In magical traditions derived from the Hebrews, the Archangel Mikael is a guardian of the south quarter and if a ‘Michael Window’ is present in a church, it is a relatively safe bet that it will be found on a south wall of that church.

So, why were we charging around St Michael’s, Hathersage, looking at stained-glass windows on the north wall, with such singular precision?

Because we were desirous of another window.

This headlong, wilful charge, bugles blaring, could well have been our undoing, had we been alone.

There was no ‘Michael Window’ in St Michael’s, Hathersage.

But there was this…

*

*

So, what to say of this banner?

It is a work of art, certainly.

It is a work of art which transcends the medieval style of its composition, although, the ‘S’ as an ‘eight’ and the ‘M’ as an ‘omega’ are remarkable.

The ‘lance’ too, as ‘celtic crozier’, is a sublime touch.

*

Was the dragon always golden?

*

Does this hue, denote the beginning or even the end of a process?

*

Was the beast once much bigger?

*

Is this really how one earns one’s ‘spiritual wings’?

*

The spirals on the Saint’s shield are, to say the least, suggestive…

*

 But the burning question which most readily springs to our mind is this:

if we nearly missed this depiction

can we hope to find the Archangel when it is being deliberately ‘hidden’?

*

Given…

| Stuart France

*

If we ever had any doubts about what it is we do, then the circumstances of our ‘flying visit’ to Skipton was lying in wait to dispel them.

‘Hell, we weren’t even supposed to be going to Skipton!’

Over the course of the last five years, this ‘fella’, along with his close associate, St George, has appeared at various intervals to trail new revelations in their wake.

Given the nature of our endeavours it is entirely possible that our conversation the previous night had called this ‘revelation’ into being.

Or, had we been ‘called’ and that conversation merely a premonition of what was about to transpire?

Such ponderings are legion on the quest.

*

Some of the easy to miss symbolism of this window, whose artist is still, as yet, unknown to us, is itemised below…

The dragon is situated on an island with two fruit trees which both appear to be bearing apples.

The sinuous coils of the dragon’s body is wrapped around the two symmetrically arranged trees.

The dragon’s body is multi-hued.

The dragon’s head is central and points skyward, and, in apparent acceptance, towards Michael’s raised spear.

Despite initial appearances Michael does not stand on the mainland but upon a rock or cloud.

Michael’s head is surrounded by a night sky of stars.

We await translation of the inscriptions on the banners or scrolls which also coil around the two trees.

The radiant symbol above the whole appears to be the greek letters, Omega, and Iota, conjoined.

One really curious thing, is that, from below the Dragon looks quite menacing… Yet from above, less so?

Those readers with a penchant for arcane symbolism will not be surprised to learn that the church which houses this window has been struck by lightning on two separate occasions.

*

Mimir’s Bubbling Head…

| Stuart France

*

We seem to have finally lost the Hawks.

The day feels somehow empty.

But for Wen the day is still young and she is keen to introduce me to another chalk figure. This one is much later than the Uffington Dragon and, I have to say, a lot less impressive. The chalk does not even appear particularly white just a sort of dirty grey colour.  It now seems to depict an equal armed cross surmounting an upward pointing triangle but Wen thinks it may have been a phallus and keitis in its earlier days. One thing is for sure it is clearly visible from the road. When we get up onto the top of the hill the sky has darkened with cloud cover and the earlier highs on Hawk Hill are beginning to feel like a hallucinatory lapse in time. Happily there are a couple of burial mounds on the hill which reinforces Wen’s contention about the antiquity of the place if not the figure. It is a nice enough spot, if a tad exposed, and Wen finds a landscape feature which could well be a naval. It seems beyond doubt that the ancients did this type of thing. Seeing bodies in the earth or seeing the earth as a series of sleeping bodies needful of awakening to animation. Two ravens land simultaneously on the top of the barrow which reminds me of Castle Rigg when two ravens did something similar as we approached the entrance stones and that in turn reminds me that Wotan’s birds were ravens known has ‘Memory’ and ‘Mind’… Nine nights he hung there and he sacrificed an eye in order to comprehend occult wisdom… I wonder if it was pecked out by the ravens… or whether that is merely a clever blind for spiritual insight and make a mental note to re-read the story and meditate on it. I wander out to the edge of the hill just past the scouring poles and my heart leaps. On the plain below walking across a field two figures are discernable and just above them quite close to their heads a Red Kite circles, although the figures themselves appear to be totally oblivious of the bird above them.

“It’s not only us they follow,” I point out to Wen with some satisfaction.

“It probably thinks they are us” says Wen as the hawk keens, wheels, turns and heads directly for our position on the hill.  They do appear to have phenomenal hearing as well as their legendary eyesight.

“It cannot know we are here,” I say with total conviction as the hawk labours to climb towards our position.

“It cannot know we are here” I say with less conviction as the hawk showing no inclination to alter its course is now two thirds the way to our position and is still working terribly hard to reach us.

“It cannot know…”

“Wound round the hanging tree…I sacrifice… myself… to myself… and now seek wisdom’s word from the breach in Mimir’s bubbling head,” says Wen as the hawk flies directly above our standing position on the hill-top and then screeches, loudly.

The ravens cackle in unison fly up and off from the barrow and head into the tree cover, their wings moving in lazy unison.

“How do you do that?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

That’s a reference to Yggdrasil, who is an eight-legged horse but also a tree spanning the three worlds and I was just thinking about that very story how do you know all this stuff?”

“I didn’t know I knew it until a moment ago, it just sort of emerged,” Wen smiles apologetically.

“It’s only the same as you and the birds, how do you do that?”

“I don’t do anything, it happens naturally.”

“We must be chosen ones,” says Wen as an icy blast of wind gusts over the hilltop.

“… or frozen ones,” I reply, zipping up my jacket and heading back to the car.

*

Quest for a Quest: The Initiate’s Story

Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire

17-19 April 2020

A Living Lore Workshop.

Contact us at Rivingtide@gmail.com for more details. Click below to
Download our Events Booking Form – pdf