Vincent Bridges

Sex Crimes, Celebrity and Sainthood in the Wasteland of the Technological Collective

One

The metaphor of the grail maiden

The “Eludcidations,” an anonymous prologue to Chretien de Troyes’ Le Conte del Graal, relates a curious tale about how the Land of Logres lost the “Voices of the Wells.” This Land of Logres, Merlin’s Isles of Greater Britain, is a curious place, a Celtic kingdom where the inner world and the outer world overlap and intermingle. Beautiful maidens live by the sacred wells and offer travelers sustenance from golden cups; the realm is at peace and life flourishes.

This Celtic paradise was destroyed by a sex crime, we are told. Evil King Amangons (his name suggests “a man of stones,” or a man with balls, an alpha-male deep in the throes of testosterone poisoning) ravished one of the maidens, held her captive and stole her golden bowl. This set an example and soon all the males were out raping the sacred maidens and before too long the peaceful and fertile realm became a wasteland. The springs and wells dried up, the land became infertile, the animals disappeared, flowers withered and the people faded away.

(more…)

“When the Moon is in the Seventh House

And Jupiter aligns with Mars

Then Peace will guide out planet

And Love will steer the stars.

This is the Dawning of the Age of Aquarius…”

“Age of Aquarius/Let the Sun Shine In” sung by The Fifth Dimension

The dawn of a new age, the beginning of a new paradigm is not a sharply delineated event. It is more of an on-going process; something that happens with its own momentum, proceeds according to its own agenda, and creates along the way ever-richer patterns of previously unglimpsed meaning. As the new ordering principle emerges, there are swirls and eddies of psychic energy that all too often in the past turned into an avatistic and aggressive pattern of revolutions, wars, and religious orthodoxies. As Taurus turned into Aries, Moses smashed the golden calf and Akhenaton invented monothesism; as Aries turned to Pisces, Jesus preached the gospel of love and his apostles built a church on the gospel of fear; and now, as Pisces turns to Aquarius, we must face the issue of power, and the fate of our species, and all the species on this planet.

(more…)

According to Fulcanelli, this astronomically significant moment signalled the season of the double catastrophe, perhaps even the Apocalypse of St. John’s Revelation. Our research revealed that the alignments of galactic, solar and planetary markers formed the Cube of Space seen by St. John as the New Jerusalem, taking shape in the sky before it descends to earth, ushering in the Chilaist millennium. Since the Cube of Space can be seen in the sky every solstice and equinox for the next ten to two hundreds years, then perhaps we are indeed undergoing an “apocalypse.”

The word ‚ÄúApocalypse” originally had nothing to do with the end of the world or of the age or of a terrible destructive transition. Literally it meant: “pulling away the veil.” It is the Greek noun apokalupsis, which comes from the verb apokalupto, which meant: “to disclose or uncover” (Liddell & Scott. Greek-English Lexicon. Oxford. 1972. pg. 86), and comes from adding the preposition “apo” to the Greek verb kalupto, ‚Äúto cover,‚Äù (Liddel & Scott. pg. 346) and is closely associated with the noun kalputa, a veil. Thus it really meant: “uncovering by pulling away the veil.”

An Apocalypse isn’t the cataclysmic end of everything; rather it is a sudden change in perception. Before, we can’t see the reality of things; a veil of illusion and misunderstanding hides them. Then the veil is pulled away and we see how things really are, the true state of affairs. Think of Toto pulling back the curtain to reveal the Wizard of Oz‚Ķ

On that day the truth will be revealed, the invisible will become visible, our blinders will be taken off, and the curtain will rise. The idea of calling the Vision of St. John an Apocalypse, the title given in the first verse, shows that it is NOT just about the end of the age. It is about the present situation, this moment in time; it’s a revealing, an unveiling, of a reality to which most of us are blind…

But on the fall equinox of 2002, the veil began to lift. As the awareness of the significance of the moment flew around the planet in the days before the equinox, several unexpected things began to happen.

We never planned or promoted the equinox as any kind of event or happening. Its significance was inherent in the material, but we never felt any particular drive to make it a focal point for anything. We knew it was an important moment, but that information didn’t translate into the need for action until we read Rush Allen’s article on the Dire Gnosis 2012 website. And even then, the action was that of writing the article, not organizing an event. By September 17th, when the first version of the article went up on the Internet, we still had no idea that it would be anything more than a private event.

As the work unfolded, we felt strongly that someone needed to be at Giza, at specific locations determined by Fulcanelli’s hints and the geometry we had uncovered. Unfortunately, that someone wasn’t likely to be us. The notice was too short, and Giza too busy, to get the required permits to be where we wanted to be.

Enter the next layer of synchronicity. A friend, Nicki Scully, happened to have a tour to Egypt scheduled for the equinox, and because of various synchronistic events, she already had the permits needed. When the broader significance was explained to her, she immediately grokked that the hieros gamos was the key moment. She volunteered to be the key group on Giza for “zero hour,” dawn on September 23rd. Since Nicki is an accomplished shaman and ritualist, we felt comfortable with her and her group taking the lead and setting the spiritual tone for the event.

This was already in place by the time we put the article on the Internet. But other than this, nothing else was planned in the way of any kind of event. That was late Tuesday night.

By Thursday morning, the deluge had begun. For the next three days, readership of the article increased almost exponentially, topping out on Sunday at an average of 2,000 hits an hour. By the next Thursday, over 250,000 people had read the article. Over 166,000 of them had downloaded the star charts. We had struck a nerve…

On Thursday evening, 13 different groups had checked in and announced that they were going to be doing something for the equinox and wanted to coordinate their efforts with us. The groups, from Cairo west, included Hendaye in southwestern France, North Carolina, Oregon, Colorado, Tennessee, New Orleans, Santa Barbara, Zaca Lake, Maui, New Zealand, Australia and Nepal. Other individuals and small groups also wanted to participate.

We sent everyone a set of times and a few suggestions on what to do, and that was pretty much that on our part. From then on, whatever was happening was shaped by whatever was emerging from the collective unconscious. We had pinpointed the moment, and outlined the cosmo-mythic structure, but the event itself we left open to everyone’s inspiration.

What emerged was an outpouring of experiences and rituals centered on awakening and connecting with the Goddess. It seemed as if the re-membering of Osiris as Lord of the Duat, that recognition of the cosmic moment, unleashed a flood of Goddess energy. Isis, The Great Goddess, seemed bent on returning in all her myriad forms. Around the planet, the women took charge, from Nicki Scully on Giza to the main ritual in Tennessee designed by Dahna and The Dance of Isis at Zaca Lake by Shanti and Sharron Rose where the names of all the goddesses were chanted during the key 17 minutes.

None of this was coordinated by anything other than synchronicity. It all just happened because enough folks just happened to be tuned into the same vibe at the same moment. Right… We might as well say that it happened because it was meant to happen; it was ordained and driven by cosmic forces beyond our comprehension, perhaps even caused by the deepest mechanism of life itself. Each statement requires a certain kind of belief.

So, we might be absolutely correct to label the experience of the fall equinox 2002 an “apocalypse.” The Great Goddess, in her role of Dark Mother, the original source of all life and light at the center of the galaxy, lifted her veil briefly and allowed those who were open to the experience a glimpse of the newly emerging archetype of the Goddess of the End of Time. All you had to know was where and when to look.

After the equinox, the emails began to roll in. One of the first was from Nicki Scully in Egypt:

I just want to report that the magick is alive and well, and went perfectly. Thoth instructed us in order for maximum efficiency and potency, and we (thirteen of us) adapted Moira’s ceremony as closely as we could with her guidance. Mike and Suzie and I spent the 17 minutes facing the pyramid and meditating, and Thoth bent time for us to raise the djed in a most powerful ceremony at Sakkara.

Another person on the trip had this to say:

As far as specifics, the ceremony we did at the Sphinx really started things off. I met with several neters I had not previously worked with there, including Isis and Thoth. Later on, at the ceremony we did at the Isis Temple, I made a huge connection with Isis.

And then there was this one:

I am stunned and awed to discover that the timing of our Giza performance in 1978 had such a cosmic depth of meaning (Raising of the Djed, on your website). At that time, Fulcanelli was just a name in a book (”The Morning of the Magicians”, by Pauwels and Bergier); I didn’t obtain a copy of “Myst?©re des Cathedrales” until much later.
(snip)
In another key, I’m wondering if during the morning of 9/23/02, you experienced any subjective confirmations of the magnitude of the event- any visions or sounds that seemed to intensify your awareness?
Finally, given the importance of the summer solstice 2003, are you planning any adventures around that event?
Thanks again for your brilliant codification of alchemical and astronomical knowledge- I look forward to reading more of your work…
Warmly,
Phil Lesh
Grateful Dead

Others wrote in to offer contributory bits of information. The team of Vincent Brown and Simon Miles, from Adelaide in South Australia, had several interesting pieces of the puzzle. Vincent Brown’s Pyramid of Man site is a well-documented argument for the Great Pyramid as the Osiris/Djed model, which supports the idea of the Throne of Osiris and the Place of the Djed. Simon Miles, through his work on the Rennes-le-Chateau enigma, demonstrates the importance of the Southern Cross at the moment of its highest, most northern position in the sky. Fascinating work on both fronts…

Rush Allen, the astrologer whose work sparked our re-evaluation of the timing and cosmic significance of the fall equinox, was also inspired by the article:

I have been working on the importance of the September 2002 equinox. The work clearly supports your theory on a spiritual basis. Scientifically the alignment is not sufficiently precise, but the concept is not of a scientific “end times,” nor is it simply a turning of the calendar. The moment is the most significant moment evaluated by cultures over the last 6,000 years. We have an obligation to expose the world to the important message of the Ancient End Times. If we cannot recover the ancient awareness, then we will have not lived up to their expectations and goals.

Here is a web page you should take the time to read. You may not have enough background to fully appreciate what I am saying, but all you have to know is that you triggered the whole analysis. And that may be all you were called to do.
Thanks for the inspiration.
Rush
http://www.siloam.net/NewYorkWTC/tribute/Lakemead/index.html

Perhaps the most fascinating of all the experiences that spontaneously emerged from the Djed moment was that of Steve Prellwitz, a writer and astral voyager living in Rhode Island. A year before, Steve travelled to Washington City, The District of Columbia, and connected with the spiritual current that would flower during the equinox Djed Raising. His experience with the awakening Goddess Columbia in what he calls the Ghost Capital raises some interesting implications concerning the role of America at this crucial moment in time. (For more of Steve’s adventures, see http://groups.yahoo.com/group/IlluminAlch/)

From this, and much more, it is hard not to notice that the archetype of the Goddess was indeed awake and stirring in the collective unconscious. In trying to understand this, we wrote a follow-up article, After Judgment Day, which explores the implications of Nostradamus’ multiple realities scenario and the mythic structure of the Isis/Osiris/Horus motif playing out in the sky. This combination gives us a framework with which to understand the unfolding events of the next 10 years, and the true significance of the Mayan end date of 2012 as a moment of even greater apocalypsis.

On the fall equinox, September 22/23 2002, something wonderful happened… We had a glimpse of a possible future, an apocalypsis of a reality where the threat of catastrophe has been transformed into a eucatastrophe, a cataclysmically good thing, in which the awakened Goddess offers ‚ÄúLight and Liberty to All.‚Äù

Awakening the Goddess Columbia Finale

9/23/02

After taking a breather back in the physical world, I returned to the astral plane. Again I was holding the glowing cosmic torch, while I was simultaneously present AS the light OF the torch.

I made my way to the gates of the Ghost White House. President Adam Weishaupt was waiting for me there. The light within the torch increased its glow, and inside that light, my consciousness continued to expand. I was seeing into dimensions of spacetime that I never knew existed. My awareness was split into three separate sections: Steve holding the torch; the being of light inside the torch; and a third level, now looking into crazy hyperspatial realms consisting of perceptions impossible for me to put into words.

“Come,” the President invited, “the darkness awaits your illumination.”

We walked across the ellipse and into the White House itself. Weishaupt led as I followed, passing through the maze of rooms within until we reached a glowing door made of silver and gold, bearing the same symbols that were inscribed on the torch’s base.

My self within the light told the me holding the torch what to do. Out of my mouth poured words similar to those Joseph Smith had spoken inside the Great Pyramid. I did not consciously know what they meant, but the effect was immediate: the door swung back, revealing the darkness within.

“I cannot enter,” Weishaupt said. “You must go alone.”

I passed through the doorway and found myself at the top of a set of stairs. I descended carefully, proceeding slowly, my mind still being distracted by the increasingly escalating perceptions of that third hyperspatial level. Was I communicating with something on that third frequency?

NO, came a voice that was me-of-the-light. YOU SEE HER DREAMS.

“Who is She?” I spoke out loud to my other self.

COLUMBIA, came the reply.

This suddenly made complete sense to me, as I remembered that the city of Washington DC was in fact constructed as an energy grid designed to give birth to the sleeping Goddess, Columbia, who was to be the new consciousness of the Earth itself.

“So that was the whole point of the Djed Ceremony?” I asked. “To awaken
Columbia?”

YES. IT IS OUR DESTINY TO DO SO.

I came to the bottom of the steps and found myself in a large circular chamber. The floor was a huge map of the stars, laid out to express the galactic center alignment now occuring. The light within the torch was no blazing like a star, and the third frequency of my perceptions was filling almost all of my mind’s eye.

THE VIRGO CLUSTER, my voice within the light said. STAND OVER IT.

Even though I was not exactly clear on where that would be, the torch seemed
to be pulling me to the right spot.

INVOKE THE GODDESS.

Again I was fed the strange words of an unknown tongue. As I spoke them the figure of a beautiful naked woman appeared on the floor next to me. She had long blonde hair, which seemed to glow of if it were really made of light.

CALL HER NAME.

“Columbia!” I said forcefully. As I spoke, that weird third level of my awareness ceased, faded away, and she opened her magnificent blue eyes.

The Goddess rose and stretched, Her bare breasts a sight of perfect beauty too wonderful to describe. Light glowed from Her head, Her pubic region and under Her arms, casting Her form in a soothing aura. As I stood there in awe, She smiled.

“America,” She said in soft, musical voice. Then She came to me and grasped the torch. Her hands closed over my own and we shared a moment of silent communion. Inside the light, my second self seemed more real to me. I was more looking at Steve than looking AS Steve.

Columbia took the torch from me. I made no effort to resist. In the light, the other me knew that it was the right thing to do.

She held it in Her right hand, raising it above Her head. As She did this, a book appeared in her other hand. It was silver and had the year 2002 written on its cover in gold.
“Liberty and light to all,” She said.

Then I heard a tortured, frantic scream from above. Adam Weishaupt fell from the darkness and landed in a confused heap next to us. He writhed on the floor, hissing and spitting, as he metamorphosed into his evil reptilian form, which resembled a velociraptor.

Columbia looked down, as the light from Her torch flowed out and then engulfed him. As She continued to smile the light increased, causing the raptor-thing to squirm even more, fighting for his life against the powers of the awakened Goddess. Then there was a startling explosion as the reptilian creature split from its human host. The soul of President Weishaupt, looking again like his normal form, was separated from the raptor, which melted into a heap of goo.

“Free at last!” he screamed with joy, and turned to Columbia, kneeling at her feet.
“Liberty and light to all,” She repeated.

Within the light of the torch, my other self continued to commune with Her in a way I cannot describe. That other me sent this “Steve” me the following message:

NOW THAT I AM HERE WITH HER I WILL NEVER LEAVE. YOU MUST RETURN TO THE BODY
BUT YOUR SOUL HAS NOW CHANGED. YOU AND I ARE ONE WITH HER AND SO IT SHALL
ALWAYS BE. ALL HAIL ABRAXAS!

The Ghost Capitol’s Illuminating Djed Ceremony

9/23/02

All the spirits of the Ghost Capitol were gathered together around the Washington Monument. Cleopatra and I arrived just as the crowd was coalescing into a large, fifty-person-deep ring around the towering monolith.

“I must move towards the center,” She said to me, “and ready myself for the role I have to play in the ceremony. You can everything easily from out here.”

“Alright, I’ll hang back,” I said, not really wanted to push my way through the crowd anyway. Cleopatra winked at me, then disappeared into the crush of astral forms. Everyone was moving around the monument in a counter-clockwise motion, so I joined in, keeping quiet since I didn’t know any of the spirits closest to me.

“Hello my friend,” came a voice from behind me. I turned around and saw the smiling face of Joseph Smith, the Mormon Prophet. He quickened his step and walked beside me as we continued circling the monument.

“So what exactly is this ceremony all about?” I asked. “I take it that our solar system is coming into a special alignment with the center of the galaxy?” I was trying to remember the details of the event, as I had read about it recently (thank you Vincent!).

“I believe the correct term is the Cube of Space,” Smith replied. “It is an alignment formed once every 13,000 years, in which the Earth, the other bodies in our system, and the edge of the Milky Way, all align with galactic center. This forms the Djed, the seven-stepped ascension ladder of Osiris.”

“So what?” I asked. “Why does that matter?”

“The galaxy is a living organism, and cosmic energies flow through its parts like blood courses through the veins of your body. A major influx of celestial blood is coursing towards us right now, in fact, it has just about arrived. When it does it will change the very substance of reality itself. New information and a new metamorphosis will begin to manifest. This is the beginning of the Apocalypse!”

“I’ve heard that before,” I said dismissively. “What does it really mean to me as an individual? Is Jesus riding in on a white horse? Or perhaps it is Kolob who is on his way…?”

“Hah!” Smith said, slapping me on the back. “You are thinking too literally. Besides, you know should know by now that Kolob is not a person, but a state of being.”

“What state is that?”

“As God was, man is. As God is, man will become,” the Prophet said.

“Thanks,” I shot back sarcastically. “That makes things SOOOOOO much clearer!”

His face lost its humor and became dead serious. He pulled me out of the crowd and over to a small grove, near the fountains I have visited often.

“You need to change your attitude,” the Prophet admonished me. “Look over there.”

He pointed to a large space on the lawn in front of the Washington Monument. The astral air there began to shimmer, and as it did, I could hear female voices singing from within the inner circle of the crowd.

“The Daughters of Isis have begun the Djed invocation,” Smith said ominously. “Behold!”
There was no mistaking the shape appearing there on the lawn: The Great Pyramid of Giza. It quickly finished manifesting as the singing grew louder. The very top of the Pyramid, unfinished here as in real life, was occupied by the glowing All-Seeing Eye of Providence.

“The moment is upon us!” Joseph declared. “In Egypt, upon the ancient Giza plateau, the Sacred Djed has returned!”

The light from the All-Seeing Eye burst forth, one large stream hitting the Washington Monument like a lightning rod. It flowed down the sides of the monolith and then dispersed throughout the crowd.

“Here we go!” Smith shouted as the wave of light came at us.

The energies hit me and I was instantly dissolved within it. My mind spread out like a flower unfolding at an incredible speed. I lost all sense of personal boundaries, my perception exploded, and I joined with everyone else in a kind of communal consciousness. This great unimind reached up towards the stars, carrying me with it as it ascended the path of the Djed alignment. We were one superorganism travelling along at the speed of light- no, faster than that, at the speed of thought itself.

Then time fell apart. As our unimind raced up into the stars, passing out of the solar system along the galactic edge, towards the core of the Milky Way, it seemed like moments along that astral line broke off and came into focus simultaneously. I saw the Earth from orbit, then the rings of Saturn, then the solar system as whole, its disk falling away from us. Several other points out in the midst of the cosmos also lined up in my multiple vision, all of them clear and perceptible at the same time. I felt like an insect, with many eyes looking at many different things at once.

My mind was melting. It was too much. I screamed.

And then it all stopped, and I was IN the galactic core. The sight of it was so mindbending, so beautiful, and so terrifying, that my mind instantly began to dump the information I was perceiving as it came towards me. I could not possibly describe the celestial wonders that I beheld. The sight reduced me to a blubbering idiot and all I could do was stare. The others within the unimind had varying degees of similar shock, though being dead they seemed to be able to handle it much better than I.

After an eternity of this (or so it seemed) the effect was reversed and our collective souls were pulled backwards along the Djed path, falling back to Earth’s little corner of the galaxy.
I was now back on the lawn before the Washington Monument in the Ghost Capitol. But it was not the same. I was alone.

This is when things got REALLY wild. The buildings and monuments began to pulse, coming alive right before me. I could sense a strange set of communications passing between them. This frequency of messages all flowed in one direction: Towards the Great Pyramid. The All-seeing Eye above was collecting them.

I walked over to the Pyramid and was caught in some kind of magnetic pull. My astral form floated along the sides of the structure, until I reached a small hole in its upper part. Then I was sucked into it, down the shaft that led to the King’s Chamber deep inside.

When I arrived in the chamber I was immediately hit with the vision of the galactic core, its awesome celestial weirdness again baffling my mind and sending me into a near-catatonic state.
“Hold the vision in your mind,” I heard a voice- Joseph Smith’s voice- say to me. “Do not flee from it. Embrace the clarity it brings.”

I struggled to do this. As I resisted the urge to run from the sights before me, lines of energy took shape and seemed to enclose the vision. I managed to hold on, though I could feel parts of my psyche melting with the heat of this mindbending spectacle. The strange lines formed a cube, which contained the vision, and then suddenly the cube was sitting before me in the King’s Chamber, and Smith was standing next to it.

“Now, the ceremony is almost complete,” he said, as produced a long torch base, very intricately inlaid with gold and silver symbols. The bottom of the base came to a point, so that the whole piece resembled a horn of some kind. Smith slammed the unlit torch down onto the top of the celestial cube, the point penetrating deep into the top of it.

Next, he spoke a long series of words that I could not even begin to recall, so alien and otherwordly were they. But as he said them, light began to collect in the top of the torch, until there was a glowing ball of illuminating energies.

“Now, take it!” he ordered.

I grasped the torch of light and pulled it free from the cube.

“Your Mistress lit this torch once before,” the Prophet said, “in a life She lived at the climax of the Atlantis-Lemuria War. Illuminati agents have been searching for it ever since. But She was clever, and hid it where they could not look. When I first became Kolob, Cleopatra revealed it to me. I held it in trust for you, safe within the Secret Treasury, until this moment.”

I gazed into the ball of light and died. Yes, I died. My life came to an end and my soul separated from everything it has known in this corporeal form.

My consciousness became one with the light.

“Now you have a task to perform,” said a voice from behind us. It was none other than President Adam Weishaupt. “Meet me in the Ghost White House. As Providence has decreed, the time is now for illumination.”

Then light explode then, and suddenly we were once again before the Washington Monument. The crowd was there, dispersing.

I sat down on the grass, holding the torch before me. Or was I in the light, watching Steve sit there holding my vessel? I could not decide, so I closed my eyes and split off some of my consciousness, returning to the world of flesh for a brief respite from the perceptual intensity and metamorphic wonder of the moment.

D.C. Rev 4: Washington, De Molay, & Columbia

- 10/08/01 - First Encounter

AND SO - continuing with the Revelations I received in my recent trip to DC, this piece will chronicle our visit to Alexandria, Virginia, which took place on Monday.

Now in my visits to the Ghost Capitol I had seen the large towering structure that I assumed to be the Grand Orient Lodge of Egyptian Freemasonry. It resembled the Lighthouse of Alexandria, Egypt, which is something I thought was part of the original design. Once Lyn and I actually arrived there, however, I discovered the old Grand Lodge 22 was rebuilt in the 20th century as the George Washington Masonic National Memorial.

This was the tower I had witnessed the spirits of Cleopatra and Aaron Burr enter. The Memorial does indeed look exactly as I saw, and rests on a hill (chosen because it slopes at a precise 33.33 degree), which features a 33 foot-wide Masonic “G” within the compass and square.

After getting a few photos of me in front of the G and on the front steps, Lyn and I went inside to find ourselves confronted by a huge bronze statue of George Washington flanked by wall-sized murals of the designing and building of the Federal District of Columbia. As soon as we entered an old man appeared, looking barely alive himself, and offered us a free tour. I will describe the rooms of the tour briefly, as more detail will follow when I tell of my return to the place’s astral counterpart later that evening…

The first stop was the Royal Arch Room of Capitular Masonry. It has three walls decorated with murals. On the west wall is a picture of a craftsman presenting his work for inspection. On the end wall is the scene of Moses at the Burning Bush. On the opposite side are pilgrims from Babylon getting their first view of Jerusalem. In between these is a circular panel portraying “the Vault of Discovery”, which shows the Temple of Solomon in ruins (with his buried treasure supposedly beneath the rubble). The east wall shows angels teaching Solomon the Craft. The final wall is not a mural, but a recreation of the Holy of Holies from Solomon’s Temple, wherein a replica of the Ark of the Covenant and the seven-branched menorah are on display. Also in this room are four grottoes that contain coin emblems of all the Masonic lodges throughout North America.

The next stop on the tour, a few floors above, is the Chapel of the Knights Templar, which contains various artefacts from the crusades and features four beautiful stained glass windows, depicting “The Crucifixion”, “The Ascension”, “The Sermon on the Mount”, and “The Healing of the Blind”. Before the Crucifixion window lay a Templar altar, complete with the Red Cross and suit of medieval armour.

Then we emerged from the elevator to find ourselves on the top floor of the tower, in the Tall Cedars of Lebanon Throne Room. This room was as advertised made completely from Lebanese cedar, as Solomon’s original throne room was, and featured a recreation of his throne with seven candlesticks surrounding it and a large pentagram on the floor. Then we were let outside to wander the outer viewing terrace, from which one could see not only all of Alexandria but also Mount Vernon and Washington DC in the distance.

Then we descended in the elevator and found ourselves in the rooms below the main entrance, which contain the gift shop and the George Washington museum, a display depicting his life in a series of cool interactive exhibits. Also on this floor are the original rooms of the Grand Orient Lodge of Egyptian Freemasonry, one of which held a special museum of GW’s personal effects, including his chair, family Bible, and a clock that was stopped at the time of his death. On our way out I bought several items, among them post cards of the various rooms in the tower. One place that was shown but which we hadn’t been allowed to see was enigmatically named “The Cryptic Room”. It had a series of standard murals on its walls, showing scenes from the bible relevant to the masonry mythos. Also there was a strange series of arches, which regressed into the wall up to a weird half-moon-shaped window. About this, the postcard said:

“The nine arches in the Cryptic Room lead to a mural so painted that it can only be seen with black light. It is the only mural in the world of this type and is one of the many marvels in this unique room built by the Royal and Select Masters.”

After this glaring cosmic clue was dropped on me, we decided it was time to leave, and we wandered the streets of Alexandria for the rest of the afternoon, getting lunch in the Old Historic part of the city. It was during the meal that I began to feel the Dead breathing down my neck. In the corner of my eye, occupying my peripheral vision, I saw a gathering of spirits, all men dressed in 18th century Masonic garb, watching me. The crowd faded after we left, but my inner vision was now turned on and I began to experience a weird sort of time slipping. As we walked the avenue that terminates before the huge “G” hill upon which the tower rests, I was simultaneously perceiving the Alexandria of 2001 and the city as it was in the late 1700s: A car racing by suddenly became a horse and carriage; the smell of exhaust changed into that of manure; the concrete sidewalk became a muddy roadside path; and so on.

Finally, the last vision of this kind hit me when I looked at a modern day streetlight. It faded away to be replaced by a man in a rumpled brown overcoat, wig, and white leggings, standing on the corner reading a thin newspaper. I studied the paper carefully, a bit put off by the odd typeface, but caught the date just as the vision faded: August 10th, 1790. This was intriguing because it is the date which Washington and his architects designed the Federal Triangle’s celestial alignments around. Then I was returned fully to the present and we left, riding through DC on our way back to Lyn’s pad.

Then later, in the middle of the night, I got up to use the bathroom, but never made it. As I stepped through the bathroom doorway I was hit with “that old cosmic flash” and suddenly, I was back inside the Alexandria temple, standing before the huge bronze statue of GW. As I contemplated the statue I felt the cold hand of death on my shoulder, and spun around to face the spirit of Washington himself. He did not appear as I expected. I had seen him in the Ghost Capitol, but only from behind; now as I looked up at his face I noticed that it was hard and unmoving, as if cut from stone. He wore a large Napoleonic-style hat, and in the huge hat’s exact center was the Illuminati Eye-within-triangle. Out of this Eye poured an aura of intelligence, and I knew that the consciousness of GW’s spirit was in fact contained within that Eye, as if he had become one with Divine Providence itself.

A beam of white light shot forth from the Eye, flowing to the left of the statue towards the stairs which led down into the rooms that contained the old Egyptian Lodge 22. His huge hand pushed me forward along the beam, silently guiding me through the corridors and into the large main gathering hall of the lodge. Within awaited the crowd of spirits I had seen earlier, all of them gazing intently at me as they parted and let us pass to the center of the room. In the exact center lay a cubical glass case. I looked within it and saw the familiar Masonic artefacts of Bible, compass, and square.

Then the voice of Washington’s ghost echoed throughout the place. His lips did not move as he spoke; rather, the Eye itself seemed to be the source of the voice.

“The Eye of Providence is always watching you,” the voice said, “and the Dead stand ready to guide and guard you in your quest.”

Then the white light poured forth again, hitting the glass case and illuminating it with a flash. Inside I saw the compass and square float up as a miniature version of ME appeared beneath them. The Bible changed at this moment, the words on its cover morphing into my name. Then a series of hands appeared in the air around my miniature form. I knew these hands belonged to the seven members of the founding fathers Congressional Council. Each of them in turn took the compass and touched it to a different part of my doll-like form, adding a colour corresponding to their position in the ABRAXAS spectrum: John Adams turned my feet black; James Madison made my legs go green; Alexander Hamilton’s touch turned my crotch yellow; next, Ben Franklin’s made my stomach area orange; Washington turned my arms and chest red; then Thomas Jefferson made my shoulders and neck purple; and finally, the hands of Aaron Burr changed my replica’s head blue. As they performed this alchemical procedure, the book of my life flew open, stopping at a series of pages corresponding to the cosmic content that each officer represented.

Then, from behind me Washington pushed my astral form INTO the case; I experienced a moment of disorientation as I was thrust into the odd rainbow body, coming out of the daze to find myself now in the Royal Arch Room. I was in fact standing behind the curtains of the Holy of Holies; the Ark was on my left, the seven-branched candlestick on my right. I stepped out from behind the curtain and saw that GW’s ghost was waiting for me, standing before the “Vault of Discovery” mural.

“The individual and collective can no longer be separate,” the voice said, “for the spiritus mundi measures your stone.”

I was surprised by his use of the Latin term spirtus mundi- “soul of the earth”- which was one of CG Jung’s favourite code-phrases for the ABRAXAS intelligence. The huge hands of GW then grabbed my shoulders and thrust me into the last of the four grottos cut into the walls of the room. I looked at the display of coin emblems, noting that one of them was glowing. It was under the heading of Rhode Island lodges, and as I looked closer I saw on it the image of the double-headed bird and my name written underneath. The coin then shot off of the wall and hit me square on the forehead, knocking me back. There was a flash and suddenly I was in the Knights Templar Chapel.

The first thing I noticed was that the stained glass windows were different. Instead of scenes from Christ’s life, they now depicted scenes from my own life in chronological order. The first one, behind the altar, showed the initial meeting I had with my mentor, Ross. He and I sat on a park bench looking up at the sky; above us hovered the Eye of Providence. The next window showed my cosmic collaborator, Greg, and I on either sides of a cauldron; out of the cauldron we were conjuring the demon Zarathos, who rose up above us and had the Eye upon his flaming forehead. The third window was from the next stage in our cosmic adventures, a quaternally divided depiction of Greg, myself, and our two other cosmic partners Warren and Mike; the Eye was at the cross point in the middle of the four panels. The last window showed me kneeling before My Divine Mistress Cleopatra, who was wearing an Isis headress with the Eye staring out of its sun-disk crown.

Then I heard a voice from behind me, someone speaking with a thick French accent, who asked: “Are you a man of honor?”

I turned around and there was Jacques de Molay, Grand Master of the Knights Templar and current Chief Justice of the Ghost Capitol’s Cosmic Supreme Court. He was dressed in full crusader regalia, bright red cross on his chest, a large sword as big as him strapped across his back. I did not answer him, so surprised was I to see him instead of GW. I was even more surprised when De Molay then slapped me across the face — hard!

“Your destiny is upon you!” he shouted as I rubbed my astral jaw. “It is pride that shall determine whether you succeed or fail. Will you be great or terrible?” He was grabbing me and shaking me at this point. “You are close enough to success that each step is crucial. The closer you are, the easier it is to fail! I KNOW!”

He let me go and stepped back, whipping out his sword. On the blade was written in large red letters: THE PRECIPICE OF BECOMING. Then he reached into his robes with the other hand and produced the elegant Islamic scroll that I had seen Peter the Great hand off to Colonel Burr (see Ghost Capitol recap pt 2).

“Awaken from your ego!” De Molay shouted in my face. “Do you think a selfish man could understand what is written here?” He shook the scroll before me. “Do you understand? ARE YOU A MAN OF HONOR?”

“YES!” I finally shouted back at him. With that, he hit me over the head with the flat of his blade, and I was thrust into another place. Now I found myself in what I quickly recognized as The Cryptic Room. Washington’s ghost was there, standing before the nine-arched steps leading up to the weird half-moon mural.

“What is this place?” I asked him as I gazed into the archway. The mural was in fact a kind of holographic window, in which I could see various scenes from history playing out.

“When we captured the course of history during the Revolution,” the booming voice of the Eye explained, “we imprisoned it here, within the Matrix,” I was astonished at the use of the term Matrix, knowing what modern mythos implications it has. In a silent confirming response, Washington nodded as the voice continued. “From here we have directed history, waiting for the Sleeper to awaken.”

“Who is the Sleeper?” I asked as the scenes of history played out within the Matrix window.”
Columbia,” the Eye responded. “Spirit of the New Republic.

“I watched and saw the scenes within the window slow, until they stopped at one in particular. It showed the top of the Memorial’s tower, and on that slim outer walkway I saw two figures- Washington’s Ghost and my own astral from! As I realized this, the viewpoint of the window swooped in towards my double, and suddenly I was in the scene, with GW on the outer balcony overlooking the Potomac River. The scene was real, that is we were not looking out at the Ghost Capitol- rather, it was night time view of the actual Washington DC area. In the skies above DC I saw the three constellations of Bootes, Virgo, and Leo hanging in the sky. GW’s ghost clapped his huge hands togethr, and the three stars of Arcturus, Spica, and Regulus were joined by a triangle of white light. At the same time, on the ground below, the Federal triangle lit up, as lines of fire connected the White House, Washington Monument, and Capitol Building.

Then the voice Divine Providence shouted out, louder than before, like a trumpet from the heavens: “THE SLEEPER MUST AWAKEN!”

The triangle of starlight met the triangle of fire at the point above the White House, just as the yearly August 10th effect illustrates. There was a huge eruption of colored energies from within the space marked by the two triangles meeting. Out of that explosion there arose a gigantic goddess figure, the child of Nature’s God, none other than Columbia, spirit of America. The goddess yawned as She came to life, and below Her I saw the White House tremble and shake.

She reached out across the skies, Her magnificent hand coming for me. Just before it reached our position, I was suddenly back, standing in the doorway of Lyn’s bathroom.

The Beginning

At twilight, the participants gather in the castle yard. The Guide of Souls explains the purpose of the ritual:

At May Moon, we awakened the Sleeping Goddess.

The Sleeping Goddess, represented in this context as the right hemisphere of the brain, has long been dominated by the technologically adept, time-sequencing left brain. The right brain, unfettered by time, lives in the moment, in the Place between the Worlds, where time, as perceived by the left brain, is irrelevant.

Now, at Fall Equinox, as the Goddess within all of us is keen and alert, we are able to move through time and arrive at the Loom of Fate. There, Ariadne and her Fates spin, weave and snip. Their job is to apportion time in linear sequences and control the destiny of our individual and collective selves.

By linking together in a living strand of DNA, we move through the labyrinth, entangling the left brain in the Minotaur’s maze, while our liberated right brains twine the path of creativity.

As we enter Ariadne’s web, we enter the realm of endless possibilities where, surrounded by super strings, time is recalibrated. Therefore Fate, as mandated by the formerly dominant left brain, can be rewoven.

It is only through the right brain that this New Time is generated. It is only from accessibility that a new destiny may be spun. If we wish to change the fate of the world, it is here and now, on this night of vast intergalactic alignments, that it may be achieved.

Looking upward, the sky is alive with energy. A six-pointed star configuration pulses in the heavens composed of three fire signs and three air signs. For Fire, the moon is in Aries, Jupiter is in Leo, and Pluto & the South Node are in Sagittarius. For Air, the North Node is in Gemini, Neptune is in Aquarius, and Mercury is in Libra.

Arriving in the meadow, we will encircle the bonfire in an Andromeda Spiral as a cone of energy from the six-pointed star configuration descends. Beneath the bonfire, symbolic of what lies deep within the subconscious and at the subatomic, a particle-anti-particle pair revolves. By channeling the Fire-of-Heaven into the Plutonian Depths (targeted by Sagittarian arrows) A-Ta-L is activated. It is inside this template that the destiny of Earth shivers. It is here, and only here, that Fate may be realigned. Through the six-pointed configuration, numerous stellar pentacles float. They stimulate the life-force potential harnessed by the six-pointed infrastructure.

At the bonfire, we will disperse seeds that will serve as the “seed-precipitant” for a new cycle of time.

Now it rests with us. For reasons not entirely known, we, as the representatives of humanity, find ourselves led down this particular path. A path that will be consecrated by the sacred Elements.

Let us begin…

When the Guide of Souls has finished explaining the purpose of the ritual, the Elements are called.

Using the sound of cymbals or bells, as well as the intonations of the participants, the Elements are beckoned. Bringing a complimentary resonance, their presence allows for the main chant to be instructed. They become the living core of their element at its most essential and therefore most sacred. They are:

Air
Air carries incense; wears white & pale yellow; and chants in a high, thin whisper mixed with the sound of wind.

Fire
Fire carries a candle; wears red & orange; and chants in a vibrant, pulsating tone mixed with the sound of sporadic lightning.

Water
Water carries water; wears blue & aqua; and chants in a flowing, undulating tone mixed with the sound of waves crashing.

Earth
Earth carries salt; wears gray, green and brown; and chants in an extremely deep tone mixed with the sound of stones thudding.

After the Elements are called into the castle yard, they surround the Guide of Souls while continuing to chant. Their job, at this point, is to infuse the area with sacred energy so that the main chant can be instructed.

Now the Guide of Souls teaches the main chant. He stands in a circle (representing the formation of the universe) composed of five concentric circles. From it, the chant may be articulated. The chant is based on the sacred language of the Hittites. It is the hereditary title of their great-mother-goddess-queen; a title handed down from priestess to priestess since the time of Atlantis. The chant is being used to stimulate the resonance between our individual selves (the right brain/goddess within) and the sacred star configuration (the divine creatrix without) - in particular, the resonance moving from the head of the dragon into the twins.

The sacred name is Tawannanna. It is intoned slowly, like a chant, to activate and anoint the resonance within us: TA (W) AN-NAN-NA. Ta is more than the name of the goddess, it is the process by which potential is stimulated into manifestation. Ta is also the designation of the separation of heaven and earth, meaning, it is the template allowing space and matter to be differentiated; the basis of the word: A-Ta-L-antis. W is the vibrational resonance of life. An-nan-na is the universe’s magnetic current, usually represented by water, and characterized as the streams of time.

Thus as we intone her name, we reconstruct the universe, both within and without.

While chanting Tawannanna, the hereditary title that she now bequeaths to all, the participants form a Chain. The chain is a DNA chain, the underpinning of life on earth. At the head of the Chain is the TorchBearer, the bearer of the kinetic energy necessary for life to exist.

The next in the Chain is a Flute Player. He articulates the first breath of life prior to the differentiation of the elements.

Following the Flautist is the Pulse of the Universe. The Pulse of the Universe is a drummer who slowly plays the pulse of life into time.

After the drummer comes the SeedBearer. Inside her large brass urn are thousands of seeds. These seeds symbolize the vast potential at our command.

Next in the procession are the Elements: first Air, then Fire, then Water, then Earth. They consecrate the path before the Guide of Souls who leads the DNA Chain. The chain is unbroken throughout the ritual, signifying the strength of our Collective Will and the power of our DNA.

The Procession now begins to move.

Woodhenge

After leaving the castle yard and winding through Dragon Isle, the Chain enters Woodhenge.

Inside the henge, a Kreis Labyrinth is created. This style of labyrinth is composed of 15 (3 x 5) “Schlangenwegen” (snake paths). Among the unique features of this design is a separate entrance and exit - thus enabling the Guide of Souls to lead the Chain in a continuous and fluid motion to, through, and outside the labyrinth.

At the entrance to the spiral is a Taurian Minotaur. The Minotaur beats a sacred gong. As the Chain twines the path, the gong resonates with the energy of the TA (as in Ta-urus and Mino-Ta-ur). All of which point to the link between the head & horns of the bull and the uterus & fallopian tubes (phonetically: u-Ta-rus).

The purpose of the labyrinth is to loosen the fetters imposed on the right brain. Through our chanting, the sound of the gong and the folds of the twisting labyrinth, the left brain is silenced and the right brain set free.

The pulse of the gong is met by answering gongs further down the path. These resonant frequencies are designed to stimulate and activate the frequencies of the Chain.

Loom of Fate

After leaving the Labyrinth, the Chain enters the Loom of Fate located at the sweat lodge site. Here a great web is created both on the ground and above in the trees, signifying “as above, so below,” i.e., the template manifests the essence on all levels.

Here the Chain meets Ariadne. Ariadne sits at her web, her loom of super strings, weaving a new destiny. She hums as she spins. Three Fates sit opposite her. They wear black and are draped in black, signifying the often unseen and seemingly blind nature of Fate. They sit on tall stools, draped in black, signifying the elevated nature of this fate. Separately they say:

Fate One: “Even now, a new fate is woven.”
Fate Two: “She weaves a new destiny.”
Fate Three: Chants: “Emen-raein Hee-bu”
Translation: The flight pattern of stars, as they flow together through time, is fixed in a moment.

After each pronouncement by the Fates, a gong is sounded.

Stream of Time

As the Chain leaves the Loom of Fate, it continues down the path where the Stream of Time flows by on the left. Seated on the far bank are six Sirens. The sirens are half-human-half-owl. They represent the ancient Bird-Serpent people who are considered to be our ancestors. Their cries foreshadow the Andromeda Spiral. They wear feathers and dress in white with bird features painted on their faces. They call out in the Language of the Birds. Sometimes they shriek and whistle like owls; sometimes they speak in their ancient tongue.

Siren One: “Yonmos Dumae; Shi.”
Translation: As all approach, we ascend to a high place.
Siren Two: “Eten-mo-os, Heh-bu San-tilmo.”
Translation: At this moment, we become one with ancient customs.
Siren Three: “Ela-lama Sama Anweim.”
Translation: A thing of great beauty, to which we belong, binds us.
Siren Four: “Yon-yon Eloeim, Ana Ou-ou, Sa.”
Translation: Our ancestors, the Bird-Serpent-People, prepare a sacred place of gestation.
Siren Five: “Luminos-ya Yo-yo Anw.”
Translation: Through the pulse, we bring down and bind the spark from heaven.
Siren Six: Nulu-anu Anya Mo-ir Latun
Translation: For the goddess, we build a temple in cloudland using currents from the cosmic sea.

As the Chain passes along the banks of the Stream of Time, the Bird Goddesses call out to it. Their fierce calls are designed to further bind the links in the Chain.
Now the Chain arrives at the bridge.

Bridge of Light

The Bridge of Light crosses the Stream of Time. On the bridge, scores of candles are lighted. The crossing of the stream represents consciousness traveling across sub-consciousness; stability crossing chaos; and enlightenment lifting us from despair.

Field of Jewels

The Chain now turns toward Jewels Field. In the center is an unlighted bonfire. Around the bonfire are six equidistant points. Points One, Three and Five compose the “Triangle of Fire.” Points Two, Four and Six compose the “Triangle of Air.” The Points of Air are made up of Air Dancers. The Points of Fire are made up of Fire Dancers. Each Fire Dancer wears red or orange and performs with fire. They reflect the stellar configuration. Each Air Dancer lifts a silk veil, dancing like a leaf blowing in the autumn wind.

The Triangle of Fire is composed of three Fire Signs:

1st Fire Dancer is the Moon in Aries
He represents emotion and intuition magnified by blazing energy. The House of the Repository of the Soul (the moon) is rekindled, like the Phoenix, in dynamic Arian flames.

2nd Fire Dancer is Jupiter in Leo
He represents expansion amplified in the most expansive of all fire signs. As the Father Protector, he roars a signal that our sacred space is being created under his guardianship.

3rd Fire Dancer is Pluto & the South Node in Sagittarius
He represents our darkest depths, as well as our fleeting shadows, brought out in a direct and open manner to the heights. Hidden agendas are revealed; deep issues surface.

To complete the six-pointed configuration, there are three Signs of Air:

1st Air Dancer is the North Node in Gemini
She represents the direction, also known as the Head of the Dragon, which the energy of the configuration is going. The dragon is moving into the Twins.

2nd Air Dancer is Neptune in Aquarius
She represents emotions welling up from the inner depths for the greater good of humanity and she does it in a totally new and unique way never before considered.

3rd Air Dancer is Mercury in Libra
She represents the potential for communication to be fair and balanced, and for messages from the heights to be made equal for all.

The Chain slowly circles each of the points, creating an Andromeda Spiral.

Acoustic musicians play in the vicinity.

Circling the bonfire is a Particle, Anti-particle Pair. They represent the descent into the subatomic level. Each chants, moving slowly so that the realignment of the new resonance can occur.

Particle: “Rhum-rhum”
Translation: Call to action. (Meaning: a singular event: Time)
Anti-Particle: “Rama-ranran”
Translation: Do it all at once. (Meaning: a universal event: Timelessness)

The third element circling the bonfire is the Ta Intoner who chants the vibrational resonance into the bonfire from the star’s center.

Ta Intoner: “Ste(ay)la-luma Chim.”
Translation: Once upon a time, I say.
“Da-tu Ga-ga.”
Translation: Come my young ones.
“E-tra Trontalamos.”
Translation: I call you to a high place.
“El y El, Elvaemos, H’eim-bu Sha-sha-shi.”
Translation: As star upon star, the Pattern-Makers, string together moments, a bridge forms.
“Sol’wynmeiremos El, Loblob.”
Translation: Sailing star vessels across vast cosmic oceans, tides re-balance.
“G’elmo Eeiny-mo Eten-mo-os.”
Translation: While incubating the lingering traditions important to the heart, the tiniest particle is not forgotten.
“Demae G’elmo. Demae Ta’l. Demae Lak-mu.”
Translation: The time has come. Time to think. Time to be. Time to travel through the sun.
“Aiynor Sh’ing Shim-shim Eten-mo Luk-mos Ha Zing-zing.”
Translation: Thus uplifted, like a veil at vespers, we ascend to the throne.
“Olamos Sacre Da-hn, Ta’eim.”
Translation: Daughters of the unutterable dawn, all of time has come.
“Ste(ay)la-luma Luk-mos.”
Translation: Go now to the Place between the Worlds.
“Aiynor-ashawa.”
Translation: You will be restored.
“Sa! Sa! Sa!”
Translation: Truth, truth, truth.

As the drumming reaches climax, all take up the cry: Sa! Sa! Sa! The Torch Bearer lights the fire from the four directions. When the blaze lifts, the DNA Chain takes seeds from the brass urn and tosses the seeds into the fire. The seeds are the focal point of generation as an old age passes and a new one begins.

And what, ultimately, is our goal? To hearken at a moment of transition as we quicken between the subatomic level and the galactic core, and thereby weave a new destiny into the very fabric of life.

With these seeds, go our hopes.

(This ritual celebration was performed over the night of September 22/23 2002 at Cerren Ered, a magickal enclave hidden away in the Smoky Mountains of Tennessee. For more on the ritual experience, see http://www.webwavemotion.com/labyrinth.html)

Castle Dragonfast at Cerren Ered

Steve’s Initiatory Experience with the Djed:

a brief introduction by Vincent Bridges

I have always found Steve’s astral adventures to be quite fascinating even when I may question the historicity of his encounters. Archetypes are not historical figures but their remnants or residue lingering in the collective unconscious. Steve has peopled his inner life with spiritual forces that have direct validity for his psyche and how it connects to the myth of our country and our time. This is quite admirable, on the whole…

The occult history of the American Revolution has yet to be written, and when it is one may hope that the point is made that “Mason” is as loose a term in relation to spiritual connection and initiation as “Sufi” is the Islamic world. There was indeed a preponderance of “Masons” involved on both sides of the conflict (Washington, Lafayette and Cornwallis all belonged to the same regimental lodge), but the current that informed the deeper matters, such as the alignments in Washington City, the District of Columbia, was only superficially “Masonic.”

The three intellects most involved with the spiritual meaning of America were Washington, Jefferson and Franklin, an example of the wide range of “Masons” at the time. Washington was the Master Mason of the Alexandria 22 lodge, chartered as a Scottish Rite, Royal Arch Temple in the tradition of the French lodges founded by the Chevalier Ramsey. This branch can only be called illuminationist, and its practices and initiations, spiritually, would be more along the lines of what today would be called ceremonial magick. Washington would have felt right at home in a Golden Dawn Temple circa 1900.

Jefferson never officially became a “Mason,” but was involved with some very “Illuminationist” groups in France in the 1780s. We may think of him as the very bright but un-initiated enlightenment era intellect. As such he went his own way, absorbing the various spiritual influences that came his way and creating his “religion” as he went along. Jefferson was most influenced, at this level, by Franklin.

Benjamin Franklin is the complete enlightenment era scientist/philosopher, the man who harnessed lightning, as he was known in London in the 1770s. His connections cover almost all the basics of the occult underground of his era, from Dashwood and the Hellfire Club to the radical Jacobins of pre-revolutionary France. Franklin, much like Dee two hundred years earlier, stood at the juncture of science and philosophy.

All three saw “America” as a kind of magickal future for the human race, when the archetypes that had been mediated by King and Church would be democratically available to all citizens. This would in fact create, if successful, a kind of psychic protection against “tyranny.” No king or demagogue could grab the symbolic current of a freely archetypal democracy and make it subservient to his will.

To that end, the goddess Columbia was created. The creation of a divine archetype is a very high-level magickal affair that is not undertaken lightly. Yet, that’s just what these three magicians, with help from a few others, actually did.

In the late 18th and early 19th century, a stream of images crystallized the goddess form into “Columbia.” The ideas that animated her can best be seen by her attributes, that is the objects or symbols that are displayed with her. She is most often shown with an eagle, broken chains and pottery, a cornucopia, images of George Washington, a laurel wreath, a liberty pole and cap, a liberty tree, an olive branch, a rattlesnake, a shield and a stone tablet. The statue of Columbia behind the speaker’s chair in the house of representatives is a fine example. In this one we see the Eagle, and on the other side a snake coiled around a Greek column.

Columbia is not a Greek or Roman goddess, although she borrowed a few attributes when she needed them, but a consciously created god-form archetype inserted into the mass consciousness of the country at its founding. She now stands, 19 feet tall, atop the Capital dome gazing to the west toward the Djed/obelisk of the Washington Monument. Perhaps, as Steve’s vision suggests, she was designed to be activated at just this moment in time. Ovason’s book on Washington has some very suggestive evidence thatpoints toward that conclusion and Steve’s astral experience helps us see that the Washington Djed/obelisk is a connection point to the larger issue of cosmic timing.

Steve’s experience, his astral journey to the center of the galaxy, is an advanced initiatory experience along the lines of what the western mystery schools call The Adam Kadmon, or the experience of the cosmic man. Most of us would go through the Trapizeum pyramid of stars in Orion rather than make the leap with the reincarnating dead all the way to galactic center, but Steve is the adventurous type.

The torch metaphor represents the ancient wisdom connection of that initiatory experience, lit by Steve‚Ä¢s anima and hidden in a concept where the dark forces are forbidden to look. Once the treasure is discovered, then it can be used. Awakening Columbia is bringing the sleeping goddess to life, Sleeping Beauty in mythic politics. Once the torch is passed to her, she utters the magick phrase, “Lux et Libertas ad Omnium,” coded into her by the magicians of the Illuminist lodges 200+ years ago.

Curiously enough, we know, from the corner stone ceremony of the University of North Carolina in 1793, that the group of Freemasons with which Washington worked used this as a password and the keynote of their philosophy. This phrase goes to the heart of my earlier comments on a magickal democracy where the archetypes are available to all. A nation of enlightened citizens would in fact be proof against all forms of tyranny and manipulation.

Light and Liberty to All should be our new mantra, and it should infuse all our realities. If it does, then the goddess Columbia, Lady Liberty herself, will truly have awakened.

THE
PYRAMID
OF THE
FIFTEEN AMERICAN STATES.NO more let barbarous MEMPHIS boast
Huge structures rear’d by servile hands ‚Äî
A nation on the Atlantic coast
Fetter’d no more in foreign bands,
A nobler PYRAMID displays
Than Egypt’s marble e’er could raise.
COLUMBIA’s sons, to extend the fame
Of their bold deeds to future years
No marble from the quarry claim,
But, soaring to the starry spheres,
Materials seek in Jove’s blue sky
To endure when brass and marble die!

Arriv’d among the shining host,
Fearless, the proud invaders spoil
From countless gems, in ?¶ther lost,
THESE STARS, to crown their mighty toil:
To heaven a PYRAMID they rear
And point the summit with a star.

Old wasteful TIME! though still you gain
Dominion o’er the brazen tower,
On THIS your teeth shall gnaw in vain,
Finding its strength beyond their power:
While kindred stars in ?¶ther glow,
THIS PYRAMID WILL SHINE BELOW!

Philip Freneau