-:- the house of the sky -:-
-:- a history of the ever-changing world -:-
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In the Beginning, there was the Word, and the Word was...Water. It suffused the entire early Universe and the cosmos contained nothing else. But deep within the waters of life, there lay an implicit symbolism which had not yet attained existence...
The 'World' or The House of the Sky, which was used to create the framework of the world of astronomical observations and resultant actions required to ensure the survival of the tribe. It also provided a sense of the sacred in which mankind could place himself at the centre of the Universe and experience the numinous in his own home...
The Menstrual Flood, the mechanism by which mankind realised that the world could end, spelling disaster for the tribe, and begin anew again, bringing prosperity. Discovered by mankind's accurate observations of the heliacal risings of stars and the Milky Way. Also the symptom of the deepest aspect of earthly time, the precessional cycle of the earth's rotation...
The Menstrual Serpent, who brought the first flood (thereby ending the first world) which caused the Oceans to rise from the South and drown the House of the Sky. Located in the far Southern Sky, in the World of the Ancestors...
The Rainmaker or The Giant, who went around making rain and slaying people with his ass's jawbone, and who was enslaved to the World Mill. Tore down the House of the Sky and brought the sky crashing down, thereby bringing the second world to a close)...
The World Mill, located in the far Northern Sky, in the World of the Gods, this ground out deep time and caused the sky to be rent asunder. Reformed while the new world was being created and continues to cause the precessional cycle top drag the stars backwards...
The Miller, or Old Father Time, the turning of the Word Mill, the teacher of wisdom. Disguised as an old, withered man, but as powerful as the Menstrual Serpent. Cast the World Mill into the ocean to stop it from getting into the hands of a sorceress, which caused a flood - or, was treated rudely by certain persons and set the sky ablaze. The third world thus came to an end...
The Bridge To The Ancestors, a blazing beam of light thrown down by the Sun shining through the Milky Way at midsummer solstice dawntime. Drowned in the rising flood caused by another menstrual serpent creature - this time a frog, or a demon. Mankind was forewarned by the Llama Buck and was thus saved, but the fourth world ended then...
The Highest Mountain or Villca Coto, where mankind ran to evade the fourth flood. The highest mountain, therefore the most northerly, and located in the same place as the site of The World Mill...
...and slowly as the first world grew into existence, these symbols became explicit in the minds of humans. As we began to awake to our celestial environment, the worlds began turning, ending, beginning again, dying and living again.
a) The Twins
The first to feel the full force of the Mythical Floods were The Twins, or The Sisters. This was when the Sun rose at the spring equinox in Gemini. The Wawilak Sisters menstruated their blood and the world was ended. Later, they got remembered as brothers, hero twins or arch-rivals - who each midwinter or midsummer would kill each other and be born again. Jacob and Esau, Apollo and Adonis, Xbalanque and Hunahpu, Tezcatlipoca and Quetzalcoatl. Later still, they became homosexual brother-lovers just as Achilles and Patrocles or Gwydion and Amathaon were.
They ushered in the First Age, a Golden Age, where things were just-so. Free love, no work, easy life. Just pick up your bag and gather the food you need and go walking. Between them they created much of the ancient world - they taught most of the things that humans knew. They built the first houses, the taught the art of hunting, of making bows and arrows, of sewing and the making of clothes. They set the world into order.
The peoples of the world lived in harmony, mainly because tribes were secluded from each other. They lived in an isolated, cyclical time in which the longest unit was the generation, or the lifetime. The twins kept on going. They created entire landscapes filled with animals and plants, just by the simple act of giving them names. With their powerful magic, they built the House of the Sky, but no matter how magical they were, they couldn't stop the first flood.
The Southern Serpent arose from the darkest depths of the Ocean and surged the waters ahead of her. The House of the Sky fell down and world ended a first time.
b) The Giant
When the waters subsided, there was the Giant. This was when the spring equinox sunrise fell in the constellation of Taurus. The Giant wore a rough lion skin cloth to protect himself from the wild, lashing weather of the highlands. He was Hercules, Samson, Orion. He was wont to become enraged at the smallest transgression. He was Susa No Wo, he was Gog Magog, and he had the power to make rain.
He ushered in the Second Age, a Silver Age, where things were sometimes tough. Yet he was free enough to wander the mountains and hills in search of silence. When the Pleiades rose just before the Sun, he would begin his song of rain. He sang the plants and crops into life, and he brought prosperity to the lands that he visited. The people of the world began building cities, they put themselves behind walls and the Age of warriors began.
People began to change from silver to bronze and produce edged weapons which spoke of the occasional rage that the Giant felt. But one day, he was betrayed by the very weapons he had inspired, and blinded and bound to the newly created World Mill, and forced to turn it day after day so that the cycles of deep time could continue. Things were sometimes tough - he became the Giant Fool.
In punishment to mankind, he tore down the sky and brought it down on our heads, causing the Oceans to rush in. The House of the Sky again fell down - was torn down - and the world ended a second time.
c) The Sacrificial Lamb
When the waters subsided, the Sacrificial Lamb remained. This was when the constellation of Aries fell on the spring equinox. The Jews in the hillside pastures spoke of a Lamb of Atonement that could wash away disagreements and atone for human sins. The Greeks spoke of goat-legged Pan, who wandered through the forests and wilds making merry and crazy with his Satyr companions. But some people remembered him in his true form as the Giant who had been betrayed, and now that they had become more aware of the deep cycles of precessional time, they called him the Miller or Old Father Time. Lemminkainen, Saturn, Wiraqocha, all taught civilised wisdom.
He ushered in the Age of Bronze and his power was more weary now. He brought the arts of ploughing the fields, of grinding corn and millet to make bread, and of literature, poetry, song and writing. But mostly, he just sat at his Mill grinding out time in the World of the Gods. Back on earth, the bronze-weaponed people started building empires for themselves, but they also began talking to each other, swapping stories, passing myths between nations, and becoming more aware of the ever-chasing, ending-and-beginning nature of the world.
In time, a Greek oracle bellowed out a prophecy: 'The Great God Pan is dead!' but he didn't die. He cast the mill into the Ocean waters, and the impoliteness of the prophecy caused him to set fire to the sky. The House of the Sky burned down, and the world ended a third time.
d) The Fisher Of Men
When the smoke died down, the Fisher of Men was left. This was when Pisces became the spring equinoctial constellation. Jesus walked on water and spoke of gathering men into a brotherhood of wisdom (but, alas, he died like a Sacrificial Lamb), Orpheus too gathered a community of the wise to him and played his Music of the Spheres to them before being murdered. The Fisher King, mortally wounded but never dying, pointed the way for the Arthurian Knights to find wisdom.
He ushered in the Age of Iron, the age of industriousness, when work would be the key point in all human life, the distraction to keep idle hands from doing the devil's work. Philosophy turned into alchemy turned into science turned into industry but mankind's lot took a nosedive. Now that the Miller had gone, it was us humans who were chained to the World Mill, and its appetite was insatiable. A revolution took place, and like the Fisher of Men who was mortally wounded, this revolution of thought came at a price. We gained for the first time a sense of progress, a sense of history and a sense of posterity. We started measuring time from a single absolute point, and we railed again the indignity of human existence.
But the price was a fourth flood. The Bridge to the Ancestors was finally washed away by the Demon who Devoured Our Ancestors (this was truly the devil's work), and without their influence, we lost the whole mandala of experience that they had known for thousands of years. It ushered in a Dark Age. Pillage, rapine, and the rise of Literalist Thinking and Dogma. We lost the ability to think in terms of metaphor and unrealism, of mandalas and mythologies.
Christianity, Islam and Buddhism rose up, and the House of the Sky was abandoned, fell into disrepair and finally collapsed. It was never rebuilt.
(c) Bruce Rimell, June 2005
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