Monday 29 November 2021
}Up the Spiral Staircase{
Moon in Libra
1 For anyone desiring peace of mind, 'blame games' are no fun, yet we tend to fall into them. Over the weekend most of us have contemplated our careers, our place or standing in the world. We may think we have been like 'a soldier derelict in duty,' having deviated from our responsibilities, or we may feel justified in having so deviated if it was for reasons we had worked out carefully. Duties may need to be modified by soul-inclinations, or desire-inclinations modified by duties.
2 The emphasis on career, or a project, makes us feel like 'a person ascending a spiral staircase within a dark enclosure, with sunshine at the top.' We have had small returns for our labor, but ultimately there is good luck.
3 In the midst of the cacophony of human chattering and (sometimes) shattering, somewhere there is 'a hidden choir singing.' The music of the spheres inspires us to worship its Composer. (More about this in paragraph 6)
4 The MIA soldier of paragraph 1 may be 'in the midst of a lot of children at play.' You may let yourself be simple-hearted like a child, or feel fond of children and childlike amusements., at certain times during the day and evening.
5 That does not mean shirking all effort. 'Rocks and things forming therein' would not be developing something good unless they were somehow laboring, or trying to remold the course of things. The rocks' 'pregnancy' means that we create our own reality out of our endowments and the actual situations we are involved in. A better composition of things takes time but could be peeking out at us.
6 "I will come near to you to judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, . . . saith the Lord of hosts. For I am the Lord, I change not." --Malachi 3: 5,6 ('Sorcerers' are 'spiritual soldiers' derelict in duty.) Another passage, in Deuteronomy, condemns "observers of times" which meant people like astrologers who differentiate one time from another. Such a warning is consistent with "For I am the Lord, I change not," that is, one who is in fear of or love of the Lord does not need to observe the changes of times, as in astrology, and would probably be misled by them. I as Cosmic Piper heed these warnings as best I know how, consistent with what I have myself observed to be true through decades of careful observation. I acknowledge our changeless Lord but also the changes of times as indicated in our Solar System by the motions of the planets. ('Rocks and things forming therein.') On Thanksgiving weekend I considered all this deeply and concluded that, just as a farmer who loves the Lord does in fact plant his wheat at the right time, and not when it has no chance of germinating, so these condemnations of 'observing times' are intended to root out superstition, not to invalidate honest and valid scientific observation. For example, I report on the moon's void-of-course times here. Is that a mistake? I admit there are times when I think it might be. If it encouraged people to slack off from obvious duties, it would be one of those things Deuteronomy condemned. There are times when I think I should have left it out of the reports, but other times when it is strikingly obvious that a void-of-course period had special problems about which it could be valuable to be warned. (An example is the events of 9/11/2001, when planes, buildings and people seemed to go "into the void.") And so I leave it in the hands of the readers to determine, from their own experience, what the void-of-course periods mean for them. I also try to point out often that good things can happen at those times and that one can keep up with obviously necessary tasks, and so on. Do the v-of-c times help? I invite your comments. Heeding this admonition of Deuteronomy, I shall attempt in the future to say more about what they might mean on a given day when they come up. But ultimately the reader has to decide. We attempt to root out superstition but not throw out the baby with the bathwater. As for the Lord being changeless while we ourselves live, with or without astrology, in a realm of samsara or endless mayavic change, that is true enough. Yet Sri Aurobindo, in whom I believe, in his Integral Yoga admonishes us to acknowledge the reality of Maya or Samsara, that is, its relative reality as an Expression of the Divine, no matter how we may fail to understand it or be confused by it. This viewpoint is not inconsistent with Hebrew wisdom, for in Psalm 9:9 we find, "The Lord also will be a refuge for the oppressed, a refuge in times of trouble." That is to say, the changeless Lord is a refuge from oppressive changes, not that he eliminates all change but that he is "at our right hand" through all of it. "Underneath are the everlasting arms."
{Monday} {Up the Spiral Staircase}
Cosmic Piper
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