Recovering the True Sense of the Winter Solstice
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| The Year divided by its four Cardinal Points and 12 months, Lori Tompkins (2009) |
The Cross is in Yoga the symbol of the soul and nature in their strong and perfect union, but because of our fall into the impurities of ignorance it has become the symbol of suffering and purification.‒ Sri Aurobindo, Aphorism 168
***
The Deva or Godhead is both the original cause and the final result [of the Vedic sacrifice]. Divine Existent, builder of the worlds, lord and begetter of all things, Male and Female, Being and Consciousness, Father and Mother of the Worlds and their inhabitants, he is also their Son and ours: for he is the Divine Child born into the Worlds who manifests himself in the growth of the creature. ... He is the wise, mighty and liberating Son born from our works and our sacrifice, the Hero in our warfare and Seer of our knowledge, the White Steed in the front of our days who gallops towards the upper Ocean.
‒ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, p. 371
MANY MAY CELEBRATE the December Solstice as the 'Return of the Light' and appreciate that it is the fourth arm of the cardinal cross of the Tropical Zodiac; but few truly understand the true nature of this celebration (Holy Day or Holiday) and the evolutionary victory or Divine Birth it portends. The tradition of celebrating this day ‒ the entrance or gateway into the 10th month and last quadrant of the 12 month Tropical Year ‒ has been attributed to pagan ritual, but in truth its origin is Vedic. The way to truly appreciate or grow into the understanding of why this much celebrated point in the Earth's year is associated with a Divine Birth, with God's sacrifice, with a holy cross and with the ultimate victory over falsehood and death is to begin to understand the Vedic Gnosis and Sanatana Dharma of the Vedic Rishis which stands as our world's oldest known transmission of this Divine story. Until we understand this story of our own Divine Birth ‒ the evolution and birth of our indwelling Divine Consciousness ‒ our Holidays (Holy Days) and rituals celebrating the Return of the Light and Divine Birth will remain in the 'fake it til you make it realm.', i.e. a necessary placeholder for our eventual realization.
From the early 20th century Sri Aurobindo began his work towards illuminating the nature of this simultaneously Vedic and new-age realization which he wrote of as the 'Recovery of the lost Sun', as the victory of the Divine Son [1], Child or Flame Agni, and ultimately as the Supramental Realisation. He wrote of this as an evolutionary eventuality in which our indwelling hidden higher consciousness, becomes manifest and ushers our world into an entirely new phase of evolution on Earth. In The Secret of the Veda, he establishes that the Rishis linked this Divine Victory (Divine Birth) with passage into the 10th month of our 12 month year.
Sri Aurobindo acknowledged in his writing that the birth of the Supramental Gnosis in our world would descend in stages, from the Transcendent, through the Cosmic, and born out in the Individual. In the course of these stages, which continued after his own mahasamadhi in 1950, this difficult question of the precise meaning of the important passage from the 9th and 10th months of the 12 month sacrificial year was eventually solved. The 12-petal circle-symbol of the Cosmic Mother pervaded the entire field of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram for over fifty years, but it was not until the Mother's (Mirra Alfassa's) final years and her passing in 1973 that the full significance of this symbol and of the passage from the 9th to the 10th month of the 12 month sacrificial year and its relation to the Supramental Yoga of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother would be revealed.
Before her departure the Mother had a vision of a Vedic temple (Matrimandir) in 1970 based upon this symbol which became the key by which the truth of the Rishi's 10th month of Victory ‒ i.e. the truth of the ancient story of the Divine Birth and Golden Age that has followed us through the ages ‒ became known to Thea (Patrizia Norelli-Bachelet). [2]
Through her writings it becomes clear that the secret which Sri Aurobindo wrote of in The Secret of the Veda is the realization of the Divine Child in the 10th month of the Vedic Year (sacrifice).
Central to Thea's revelation and restoration of Vedic Gnosis was the realization that the correct measure of the Vedic Year and hence entrance into this 10th Month (Makar Sankranti/Capricorn) is absolutely essential in terms of achieving and consciously celebrating the birth of higher gnosis, i.e. the birth of the One which unifies our consciousness and our field of creation. The opening image was constructed via arcing the radius of the circle from the bases of the cardinal points (equinoxes and solstices) through the center point to form (mark) the 12 months of the Earth's year. The tip of the 10th petal demonstrates Capricorn (Makar) as entrance into the last and highest quadrant of the year, which Thea associates with Swar ‒ the Divine consciousness born, manifest on Earth in the natural course of our evolutionary journey. Sri Aurobindo wrote:
Thea realized that the home and birthplace of Agni ‒ and thus our collective Eternal Truth, known in India as Sanatana Dharma, and the truth of Vishnu's Dasavatars to boot [4] ‒ could only be found in the Tropical Zodiac, not in the Sidereal Year (constellations) currently utilized in India which entirely separates Agni and the cardinal points of the Vedic Sacrifice from the Equinoxes and Solstices.
According to Thea this separation, which is 23° and growing via the Precession of the Equinoxes, must be corrected if India is ever to recover the Truth (the Divine Birth or Singularity) underlying its ancient culture and facilitate the world's rise into gnosis as Vivekananda and Sri Aurobindo foresaw as India's destiny. This correction, though not yet well-appreciated or understood in India or elsewhere in our world, is inseparable from the hidden Truth of our collective evolutionary story ‒ our hero's journey ‒ as told by the Vedic Rishis, which is born forth in our consciousness and in our world via the vehicle or womb of our own 12-month year. It is an essential correction for any who wish to understand and participate in the true story of the Return of the Light (Recovery of the Lost Sun) and the evolutionary achievement that we are unwittingly celebrating every December Solstice Holiday season.
In essence, the Truth of the December Solstice and of the Zodiac is something that our consciousness grows or evolves into. It becomes progressively apparent or real to us, only in the course of our evolution. Up to a point in our evolution, the Zodiac and the Capricorn Cardinal point merely symbolizes our Divine Birth or shift into Divine consciousness. Eventually it ushers forth the real thing. Different ancient cultures call this victorious and Divine Son by different names, including Aeon, Bacchus, Dionysus, Horus, Triptolemus, Brimos, Kalki and Quetzalcoatl; but the real story and the real victory to be won in our consciousness remains one and the same.
How this is possible or in any way true cannot be fully appreciated without investigating and understanding the full scope of Sri Aurobindo's yoga and of the Supramental Gnosis he established. In this sense, coming to celebrate the true nature of the December Solstice is inseparable from coming to celebrate the true nature of Sri Aurobindo's Supramental Yoga.
In 1986 Thea established Aeon Centre of Cosmology (ACC) to begin to bring this One all-integrating Truth to light, demonstrating how it comes to be known and how it is applied in terms of upgrading and shifting our consciousness into Divine or Supramental) ranges. Her latest publication Ganga ‒ soul of Indian culture ‒ Her descent to Earth shows both India's and Ganga's intimate connection with Capricorn and how the mythology and symbolism of Indian culture are based on the very real evolutionary adventure and victory of consciousness as outlined by the Vedic Rishis. As Sri Aurobindo wrote, the universal and unifying soul of the myth and symbol lies hidden and lies in wait to be fully rediscovered in India and throughout the world. In 2014 ACC presented The Future Realisation [TFR] exhibition at Aurodhan Art Gallery in Pondicherry, India dedicated to this cause. In January 2015 an expanded version of TFR exhibition was presented at the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts' Mataghiri venue in New Delhi. Currently ACC is planning its third TFR event in Washington DC which will be expanded to demonstrate the important cosmological connection between India and the United States.
Endnotes:
[1] The English word 'son' comes to us from the Sanskrit word sūnu, found in the Rig Veda meaning 'son, child, offspring'.
[2] This Temple was never built correctly, but the knowledge content it contained and revealed to Thea is documented in The New Way - the rise and establishment of a gnostic society, Volumes 1-3, and in Chronicles of the Inner Chamber.
[3] This is Sri Aurobindo's commentary on the first verse of the Rig Veda as found in CWSA, Vol. 16http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/16/rv-i-dot-1-1-6.
[4] See Secrets of the Earth, Aeon Books, 2009, Thea.
Related Articles/Books/Websites:
'The Importance of Makar Sankranti in Hindu Calendar Reform', Puranic Cosmology Updated, Thea, 30 December 2010
'Reflections on Sri Aurobindo’s contribution to the evolution of consciousness on his 143rd birth anniversary 15 August 2015', www.aeoncentre.com, Thea.
The Magical Carousel - a zodiacal odyssey, Thea, Aeon Books, 1979.
Thea's Booksite: www.patrizianorellibachelet.com
Ways to Get Involved: ACC offers a community forum, periodic online study groups, and is happy to answer any questions that arise from sincere seekers. For any who would like to DONATE to this great work, please do so through PayPal [Click HERE to donate]. We also share news and gnosis via our ACC mailing list [join via sign up form below] and via our Facebook pages:
Aeon Centre of Cosmology
The Future Realisation Exhibition
Sri Aurobindo Ashram Cover-Up Exposed
The Flawed Auroville Matrimandir
From the early 20th century Sri Aurobindo began his work towards illuminating the nature of this simultaneously Vedic and new-age realization which he wrote of as the 'Recovery of the lost Sun', as the victory of the Divine Son [1], Child or Flame Agni, and ultimately as the Supramental Realisation. He wrote of this as an evolutionary eventuality in which our indwelling hidden higher consciousness, becomes manifest and ushers our world into an entirely new phase of evolution on Earth. In The Secret of the Veda, he establishes that the Rishis linked this Divine Victory (Divine Birth) with passage into the 10th month of our 12 month year.
‘[The] possession of our complete divine consciousness delivered from all falsehood by the free descent of the truth, gives us the secure possession of the world of Swar and the enjoyment of mental and physical being lifted into the godhead above darkness, falsehood and death by the in-streaming of our divine elements. This victory is won in twelve periods of the upward journey, represented by the revolution of the twelve months of the sacrificial year, the periods corresponding to the successive dawns of a wider and wider truth, until the tenth [month] secures the victory. What may be the precise significance of the nine rays [months] and the ten, is a more difficult question which we are not yet in a position to solve.’
‒ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, p. 182
[The] Rishi spoke of the Deva [Agni] as the divine child preparing for birth, involved in the world, in the human consciousness .... [p. 358]
***
Agni’s birth here ... is the greatest of his terrestrial births; fostered by them as the swift Mares of Life he grows at once to his divine greatness, fills all the planes with his vast and shining limbs and forms their kingdoms in the soul of man into the image of a divine Truth. [p. 391]
***
The Rishi prays ... that the secret soul in us who is the Father of things but in us appears as the child of our works and our evolution, may open itself to the vast Truth-consciousness. The Divine Flame will destroy all the powers of falsehood and evil who seek to make us stumble and would rob us of our heavenly treasure. [p. 402]
***
The divine Seer-Will [Agni] ... leads [the human] in its journey through the stages by which the sacrificer rises to the supramental divine consciousness; he is its vanguard and front-fighter in the battle of the divine with the undivine and the march of man to his goal. Agni is ... the Seer-Will of the one & infinite Divine Conscious-Existence at work in the universe.... [He] is its vanguard and front-fighter in the battle of the divine with the undivine and the march of man to his goal.... The Seer-Will ... sacrifices in the order, the right seasons, the right periods, the twelve months ... he knows the time, place, order by which the Swadha, the self-arranging self-movement of the divine Nature in man that is developing itself, progresses till it turns itself into the Swaha, the luminous self-force of the fulfilled divine Nature of the gods. This order of the sacrificial seasons ... represents the progressive movement of development of the hidden truth of things in man.
‒ Sri Aurobindo, Hymns to the Mystic Fire,
Commentaries and Annotated Translations [3]
Central to Thea's revelation and restoration of Vedic Gnosis was the realization that the correct measure of the Vedic Year and hence entrance into this 10th Month (Makar Sankranti/Capricorn) is absolutely essential in terms of achieving and consciously celebrating the birth of higher gnosis, i.e. the birth of the One which unifies our consciousness and our field of creation. The opening image was constructed via arcing the radius of the circle from the bases of the cardinal points (equinoxes and solstices) through the center point to form (mark) the 12 months of the Earth's year. The tip of the 10th petal demonstrates Capricorn (Makar) as entrance into the last and highest quadrant of the year, which Thea associates with Swar ‒ the Divine consciousness born, manifest on Earth in the natural course of our evolutionary journey. Sri Aurobindo wrote:
Like other gods, [Agni] is said to be born of the Truth; the Truth is at once his birthplace and his home.
‒ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, p. 391
Thea realized that the home and birthplace of Agni ‒ and thus our collective Eternal Truth, known in India as Sanatana Dharma, and the truth of Vishnu's Dasavatars to boot [4] ‒ could only be found in the Tropical Zodiac, not in the Sidereal Year (constellations) currently utilized in India which entirely separates Agni and the cardinal points of the Vedic Sacrifice from the Equinoxes and Solstices.
According to Thea this separation, which is 23° and growing via the Precession of the Equinoxes, must be corrected if India is ever to recover the Truth (the Divine Birth or Singularity) underlying its ancient culture and facilitate the world's rise into gnosis as Vivekananda and Sri Aurobindo foresaw as India's destiny. This correction, though not yet well-appreciated or understood in India or elsewhere in our world, is inseparable from the hidden Truth of our collective evolutionary story ‒ our hero's journey ‒ as told by the Vedic Rishis, which is born forth in our consciousness and in our world via the vehicle or womb of our own 12-month year. It is an essential correction for any who wish to understand and participate in the true story of the Return of the Light (Recovery of the Lost Sun) and the evolutionary achievement that we are unwittingly celebrating every December Solstice Holiday season.
In essence, the Truth of the December Solstice and of the Zodiac is something that our consciousness grows or evolves into. It becomes progressively apparent or real to us, only in the course of our evolution. Up to a point in our evolution, the Zodiac and the Capricorn Cardinal point merely symbolizes our Divine Birth or shift into Divine consciousness. Eventually it ushers forth the real thing. Different ancient cultures call this victorious and Divine Son by different names, including Aeon, Bacchus, Dionysus, Horus, Triptolemus, Brimos, Kalki and Quetzalcoatl; but the real story and the real victory to be won in our consciousness remains one and the same.
How this is possible or in any way true cannot be fully appreciated without investigating and understanding the full scope of Sri Aurobindo's yoga and of the Supramental Gnosis he established. In this sense, coming to celebrate the true nature of the December Solstice is inseparable from coming to celebrate the true nature of Sri Aurobindo's Supramental Yoga.
Set within thee Will that knows all the births, the divine sacrificer in the seasons; today let thy sacrifice march forward unceasingly, thy sacrifice shall open to thee the whole epiphany of the godheads.
‒ RV 1.22, translated by Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, p. 455-456
Set within you the Fire that knows all things born, the Fire ever young, the Carrier of the offerings, the divine Priest who does sacrifice in its season. Let our sacrifice uninterruptedly march on most strong today to reveal the gods. Strew, strew the grass of the altar for the session.
‒ RV 5.26.7-8, translated by Sri Aurobindo, Hymns to the Mystic Fire, p. 292
All this Vedic imagery is easy to understand when once we have the key, but it must not be mistaken for mere imagery.
‒ Sri Aurobindo, Hymns to the Mystic Fire, pp 28-30
In 1986 Thea established Aeon Centre of Cosmology (ACC) to begin to bring this One all-integrating Truth to light, demonstrating how it comes to be known and how it is applied in terms of upgrading and shifting our consciousness into Divine or Supramental) ranges. Her latest publication Ganga ‒ soul of Indian culture ‒ Her descent to Earth shows both India's and Ganga's intimate connection with Capricorn and how the mythology and symbolism of Indian culture are based on the very real evolutionary adventure and victory of consciousness as outlined by the Vedic Rishis. As Sri Aurobindo wrote, the universal and unifying soul of the myth and symbol lies hidden and lies in wait to be fully rediscovered in India and throughout the world. In 2014 ACC presented The Future Realisation [TFR] exhibition at Aurodhan Art Gallery in Pondicherry, India dedicated to this cause. In January 2015 an expanded version of TFR exhibition was presented at the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts' Mataghiri venue in New Delhi. Currently ACC is planning its third TFR event in Washington DC which will be expanded to demonstrate the important cosmological connection between India and the United States.
Lori Tompkins
21 December 2015
____________________________
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Endnotes:
[1] The English word 'son' comes to us from the Sanskrit word sūnu, found in the Rig Veda meaning 'son, child, offspring'.
[2] This Temple was never built correctly, but the knowledge content it contained and revealed to Thea is documented in The New Way - the rise and establishment of a gnostic society, Volumes 1-3, and in Chronicles of the Inner Chamber.
[3] This is Sri Aurobindo's commentary on the first verse of the Rig Veda as found in CWSA, Vol. 16http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/16/rv-i-dot-1-1-6.
[4] See Secrets of the Earth, Aeon Books, 2009, Thea.
Related Articles/Books/Websites:
'The Importance of Makar Sankranti in Hindu Calendar Reform', Puranic Cosmology Updated, Thea, 30 December 2010
'Reflections on Sri Aurobindo’s contribution to the evolution of consciousness on his 143rd birth anniversary 15 August 2015', www.aeoncentre.com, Thea.
The Magical Carousel - a zodiacal odyssey, Thea, Aeon Books, 1979.
Thea's Booksite: www.patrizianorellibachelet.com
Ways to Get Involved: ACC offers a community forum, periodic online study groups, and is happy to answer any questions that arise from sincere seekers. For any who would like to DONATE to this great work, please do so through PayPal [Click HERE to donate]. We also share news and gnosis via our ACC mailing list [join via sign up form below] and via our Facebook pages:
Aeon Centre of Cosmology
The Future Realisation Exhibition
Sri Aurobindo Ashram Cover-Up Exposed
The Flawed Auroville Matrimandir
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