The solar year commences from 0 degrees
in Aries bringing the seeds of a new cycle. From out of the background of
eternity, a new aspect of awareness comes forth. It descends as the annual
impulse from higher circles to our planet to contribute to the evolution of the
planet and the planetary beings. The impulse is symbolised by the glyph of the
sign, the head of a ram. It represents the power to remove obstacles and to
re-adjust the form into better and more advanced states.
I visualised this impulse by fusing two photos of a sunrise taken from an airplane. The glyph of Aries pushes forth from the bottom of the image. I depicted the annual cycle with a circle and the sunrise in its centre. The constellation of Aries is seen behind the sun.
Nearly six months ago, I received a parcel sent by friends from an island in Thailand. It contained a small wooden box with 91 rudraksha beads and a rudraksha necklace, beautifully decorated with a piece of tree bark from a fallen branch of a rudraksha tree, a red tissue and a thread.
The parcel with the rudrakshas
Two years ago they found a first rudraksha in a waterfall area on Koh Phangan island and then started exploring the beauty and depth of rudrakshas in different parts of Thailand. They are publishing information about rudrakshas and other trees and plants and are exploring their sacred vibration and beauty. They are also giving courses on how to use rudrakshas. On the website inaturalist.org, they are maintaining a section “Rudraksha Planet” about observations concerning this holy tree. Originally from Russia, they are working in Thailand with a NGO based in Scotland, Kalos Fund. It is a very inspiring mission.
In a talk in Miami February 2018, Master Kumar spoke on using rudrakshas in the course of a question-answer session, see below. And he has published a booklet on Rudra (more; see here the PDF) explaining more about this lord of Will and of Fire, causing the vibration in the ether
“Question: I have been asked by several people about what you have mentioned that we should soak the rudraksha and change the water daily. The question is: should we drink or not drink that water?
Answer: Drink the water. A rudraksha carries vibrations. Rudra stands for vibration. The vibrations will rearrange the energies in you. That is the beauty of Rudra. There is a book on Rudra so you can look through. The Rudras, they destroy the darkness and build a field of light through their vibrations. A Rudraksha has the impact of these vibrations. That is why a lot of people wear these rudrakshas in the East. A tacha rudraksha daily is very very beneficial. Many people hold it like a chain with the rudrakshas touching their vibrating center at the heart. You daily touch a rudraksha and offer water to it, because it is a very vibrating energy, it is kept cool, kept in poise with water; and water is also electrical. The higher dimension of water is that it is electrical. That is how we originally produced hydro electricity because in the water there is electricity. So, it is electrical and if it is kept cool though you are very vibrant you remain cool. This is the idea of holding a rudraksha. So, daily relating to rudraksha will enable you to gain the vibrations. So, it is the matter of respect that every day you change the water for it.
In the morning you can set it in water and utter forth the mantra for Rudra, OM NAMO BHAGAVATE RUDRAYA. That is the mantra. A much more powerful mantra for relating to Rudra is, YO RUDRO AGNO YO APSUYA OSADISU, YO RUDRO VISWA BHUVAN AVIVESA TASMAI RUDRA YA NAMO ASTU. Like this, there is a mantra, which I also gave here before. In there it says 3 times to utter the mantra Rudra. Do it saying it 3 times, or 5 times or 7 times, maximum 11 times. Eleven are the Rudras. If you can do it, you do it. Otherwise you hold the rudraksha daily, change the water and the vibrations will be there at home.
Everything should be optional; nothing should be compulsory in spiritual practice. But once we accepted to do it, then you have to follow a rhythm. It is like a marriage. Once you are married you are committed. Isn’t it? You can’t change it. Like that, with any practice you can keep it at a optional level or at a level of consecration and commitment.”
Pisces symbolizes the eternal flow of energies. It is a cyclical movement in which the energies come down into the objective manifestation of creation; they develop and finally dissolve again to give way for new manifestations. This is called the movement of the waters of life. We can visualize it as a circular flow of water. It is also regarded as the wheel of creation, the descent and ascent of manifestation. This subtlest form of water is called spiritual waters or electric fire.
During some weeks of November and December 2018 I was in a rehabilitation centre in the Bernese Alps to recover from a cerebral bleeding. From my room there, I was looking over the Lake Thun to the Mount Niesen. The air was full of vibrant vital energy. The mount with its prominent pyramidal shape seemed to be an epitome of matter rising towards the spirit and spirit descending towards dense manifestation. The meeting of spirit/space and matter culminates in the nightly light on the top of the mountain. The lake and the lights of the town of Spiez at its foot receive the vastness of space and reflect the cosmic fire.
At the top of the image I put the arc of a nightly rainbow as a portal towards space. I increased the light spot on the mountain top and surrounded it by a sphere of light penetrating matter. I duplicated the reflections of the city lights to form an embrace. Then I covered the whole picture with a photo of a downpour of water from an old fountain.
The symbol of Aquarius is a man who carries a water jug.
From the opening of the jug, water continuously flows out without new water
flowing in. We only see the water existing as a potential at the moment when it
manifests itself. These are the waters of life that bring forth new unfoldment
every moment.
The figure of the Aquarius in the picture was created
with the help of photos of a fountain in Valencia, Spain, and the head of a
statue of the Sun God in the Capitoline Museums, Rome. Water and stars emerge
from the jug and glide into the waters of space.
Various NASA and ESA star images were used for the background. The constellation of Aquarius in the upper left corner resembles a lightning bolt or an electric fire: The energy of the Aquarius flashes like a lightning. On the right, Uranus, the regent of Aquarius, appears in the waters of the space in which countless suns move.
The symbol of Sagittarius is the bow and the arrow. In spiritual astrology, Sagittarius is located at the base centre in the human body. The arrow is seen as the vertebral column, where you find the column of light called sushumna. When the higher consciousness awakens, the power of kundalini moves upwards through the sushumna in a spiral manner. The science of yoga describes the sushumna as the central balancing energy line surrounded by ida and pingala, the energies of materialisation and spiritualisation.
The bow to shoot the arrow of consciousness upwards to the head centre is the sacred word OM. With every OM we can visualise the upward path of kundalini through the sushumna to the head and beyond. OM exists as the triple aspect of spirit, soul and matter, represented as ida, pingala and sushumna.
I depicted the arrow of consciousness as being surrounded by two energy lines and going through the etheric centres. The centres are formed out of the whirlpool of the etheric plane, for which I used a picture of the solar plasma. The bow is symbolised by the blueish horizon. In the sky you see Jupiter, the lord of Sagittarius, and the Great Bear. This constellation is linked to Sagittarius as the birthplace of the seven judges which bring down through Sagittarius the seven states of consciousness in man.
From the subtlest to the grossest state, there are seven planes of existence. These planes are related to the seven kingdoms of nature. Three kingdoms are below the human kingdom and three kingdoms are above the human kingdom. Below us are the animal, plant, and mineral kingdoms; above us are the kingdoms of the planetary, solar and the cosmic devas. These devas express through our planet, through the solar system and through the cosmic system.
In this image, these seven kingdoms are illustrated by symbolic representatives. The amethyst at the bottom represents the mineral kingdom. The violet crystal is surrounded by a sphere of green leaves and a pink lotus grows from out of its centre, both representing the plant kingdom. The leaves are surrounded by a blueish sphere. I generated it with photos of Venus and of a school of fish to illustrate the transition to the animal kingdom. This kingdom is represented by a group of coatis on a brownish sphere, for which I used colours of a photo of Mars. The group of people looking towards the Sun symbolizes the humanity aspiring for higher evolution.
The three higher kingdoms are indicated by the sphere of the Earth, by the Sun surrounded by planets and by the stars in the background. A ray of light coming from the Sun illumines the path of the different kingdoms towards higher evolution.
The wisdom teachings explain that number 432 forms a major key to understand greater time cycles:
The whole creation is an alternation of active and passive phases called the days and nights of Brahma. The days are again divided into sub-periods called Manvantaras which are further divided into cycles called Yugas. Each great Yuga is subdivided into four Yugas which are composed of units containing 432 solar earth years multiplied by tens, hundreds and thousands.
The apparent rotation of Jupiter around the earth zodiac is twelve solar years. Six sets of 72 years give the duration of time for Jupiter to go round the apparent zodiac 36 times and for the precession of the equinoxes by 3 degrees. This period is 432 years which forms the base number for the computation of the great cycles of Yugas and Mahayugas.
This is how Master EK (Ekkirala Krishnamacharya) explains one aspect of Number 432. It is a major key to divide time into various ages that mark different cycle and different energies.
In 2017, Chris Jordan, a photographer and artist, has created his “Mandala 432“, a beautiful artwork inspired by the stained glass rose windows in cathedrals. In the description of this artwork he writes (extract):
“One thing that my favorite rose windows do is work at the limits of our perception of color. At the edge of blue-violet/ultraviolet, our perception drops off, but right at that threshold there’s something interesting going on energetically, a kind of electric pulsing that is hard to describe but I think we all feel it. To achieve that blue-violet effect, the designers of rose windows used lots of pure blue cobalt glass, with occasional small spots of red, and even less magenta. Yellow and green are also used sparingly within the blue, to create patches of blue-green that make the blue-violet areas feel even more rich. From a distance, these colors all combine to give the experience of that electric blue-violet space. The color space of computer monitors does not contain edge-of-perception violet/ultraviolet, but a fairly convincing illusion can be created using this mix of colors.”
Click on the picture (from the video, copyright Chris Jordan) to see the video Mandala 432 on his website. The music is King’s College Choir in Cambridge, UK.
The formula “E Pluribus Unum” (from many, one) is the traditional motto of the United States used on seals and coins. Its meaning, however, is much more profound than just uniting different ex-colonies to one nation. It is even deeper than what the ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus gives as “The one is made up of all things, and all things issue from the one”. The eternal wisdom teachings explain that focussing on diversity, as we do with our analytical minds, makes us lose the sense of oneness. All multiplicity is coming from one source, is being held in existence by the unfathomable background of all and is merging again into the inconceivable oneness – from many to one.
Chris Jordan, a photographer and artist, has created a mandala named “E Pluribus Unum”. In the video project realised in 2010, he visualises the many different “organisations around the world that are devoted to peace, environmental stewardship, social justice and the preservation of diverse and indigenous culture” (from the video) by zooming from a detail structure to a great globe of interconnected lines expressing the beauty created by all the goodwill work done on the globe.
The video contains a million names of such organisations – Chris explains that it would need to include more than twice the number of names to cover all activities.
All these projects seem to be different activities but together they form one unified effort to promote the well-being of earth and of the beings living on it – a great visualisation of oneness done through Chris’ video.
The mandala is constructed around a circle containing 108 equally-spaced points. In Eastern wisdom, the number 108 is explained as containing profound keys to understand time cycles, like 4 x 108 = 432.
Creation is compared to a wheel. The movement is greatest at the periphery; the point of stability is at the centre. The formation of the globe of space happens through a process of radiation: objectivity comes out of subjectivity. Dissolution is through a process of contraction: the creation merges again into subjectivity. The centrifugal and centripetal forces are kept in balance by the Libra principle.
In the human body, Libra is located at the navel. Its higher counterpart, Aries, is found in the head. Libra represents the equilibrium between the outgoing horizontal movement towards objectivity and the inward vertical movement towards subjectivity. When the fulcrum is stable, there is an ascent of consciousness to higher planes.
At the centre of the image you see a human silhouette with the nervous system representing the lines of force permeating the body. There is a centre of light around the navel and a higher centre of light at the head – the human brain representing the head centre. It is linked by the central vertical column of consciousness. The Libra principle at the navel is also the centre of the horizontal movement through space illustrated by expanding waves, and spheres of transparent globes representing the planes of creation.
Here is a sublime Sanskrit song which is part of the Madālasā Upadesha, or teachings of Madālasā. Madālasā Upadesha Stotra is the teaching of Saint Madalasa to her children. Upadesha means instruction. The stotra (hymn) is also known as Putra Upadesha Stotra or Putropadesha Stotra. The story of Madālasā is in Chapters 25-30 of the Mārkandeya Purāṇa. The Mārkaṇḍeya is one of the eighteen ‘great Purāṇas’ said to have been narrated by Rishi Mārkandeya.
The stotra is sung by Gabriella Burnel and the recording was commissioned by friends and students of the School of Practical Philosophy in Australia. Gabriella is a Sanskrit scholar and an accomplished musician and musical theatre performer; she is well-known as a composer and performer of poems and hymns drawn from the Sanskrit tradition (more info about her and the song on the website).
