SPIRAL
Galaxies, breathing patterns, seasons, evolution, life, death...and (re)birth...
...The infinite windings that are ubiquitously reflected in all natural growth, translate into the spiral motif in man's primal awareness of the same percieved universal constant, iconizing the apparent paradoxical singularity, the Great Mystery or percieved consciousness...
The visual motif of the spiral is one of the oldest and most enigmatic sacred images known. It is, in fact, among the very earliest examples of human creative expression, first appearing some 24,000 years ago. As millennia passed, this curious image found its way into the spiritual iconography of nearly every society in the ancient world: from Ireland to Japan, from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego. We see the sacred spiral in the totemic carvings of the Haida, the vast ground drawings of the Nazca, the megalithic monuments of western Europe, the classical architecture of the Mediterranean, Arabic calligraphy, Persian carpets, yogic diagrams from India, decorative Chinese porcelain, and Shinto rock gardens. It's ubiquity endures to our modern day, where we see at least some examples of it in literally every category of thing that has been decorated by man.
The spiral has a universal appeal, and this fact is a sure indication of some mysterious resonance with the human psyche. What does the spiral mean to us? Its early association with the Mother Goddess (it is often found with, or on, small stone carvings of the Goddess ) suggests some kind of connection to the mysterious and miraculous process of life which is embodied in the Feminine - the door through which life enters this world. But why a spiral and not some other image? Anthropologists are still unsure about the origin of its use, but there are speculations:
1) It echos the shape of animal viscera. Perhaps these early hunters saw the shapes found within living beings, and formalized this "animating force" as a spiral.
2) In an abstract sense, it is indicative of time. For early people, the passage of things was always around and around: day becomes night becomes day; the seasons come and go, but always return once again; lives come into being, and go out of being, but there is always new life coming into being.
A circle - movement revolving back on itself - is a common, and useful, symbol for time. But a circle - tracing the same arc again and again - is a static thing and doesn't really describe how we perceive time. We remember what happened last year, and the year before that; those past tracings of the arc are not erased by new tracings. The seasons come back upon themselves as they do, but all the ancient seasons are somehow still here...inside the new season. The cyclical rotations of time seem to wind around all the previous cycles, on an infinite journey to...whenever, or wherever, time is going.
So perhaps the first people saw in the dynamic movement of a spiral, the image of time: time being understood by them as that direction of events that brings into being all things, beckons out of being all things, and then regenerates new being again. Just like the moon that comes into and goes out of being, but is always reborn again; just like the plant which dies, but in the dying yields a seed to be planted in the womb of the earth for regeneration - a source of nourishment for our regeneration. It was this regenerative aspect of the spiral of time that suggested the association with the Feminine.
3) It is an early Mandala, or meditative aid. The spiral certainly has a meditative quality. The ancient Eurasian variety of these early spirals had three interesting qualities: they were all associated with the Goddess, they often had seven winds or cycles, and they usually possessed a pronounced dot to mark "the center."
The archetypal form of which depicting the creation of sucessive universes, the 'cycloid spiral space curve' embodies an initial out- breathing, centrifugal, curving expansion of undiscriminating, creative energy (unconditional love) from a point, which results in the generation of countless individualities and energetic systems. In 'The Secret Docterine', Helena P. Blavatsky describes this phenomenon stating that, ..."An out- breathing of the 'unknown essence' produces the world and an inhalation causes it to dissapear..."
It's culmanation is an inbreathing, centripetal implosion of the concentrated energies and experience of the created individualities who now seek reunion with their source, the ECI (Eternally creative intelligence), bringing back with them all the myriad experiences they have gained. Once all has reverted to the ECI via the black (w)hole, then that universe, or that part of the universe at the end of the black (w)hole, leaves our space time and enters a highly etereal continuum, the magnitudes and dimensions of which we cannot conceive...
~What happens then is open to all manner of speculation. Possibly the new experiential information is absorbed and digested by the ECI in order to create a new universe. The very word 'universe' signifies a single curve (uni=one versum= curve). The very fact that the configuration of this curve may be a complex combination of ascending and descending, involuting and convoluting, expanding and contracting spiral movements does nothing to detract from it's uniqueness or unit quality, since from inception to culmanation, it's path is continuous.
The curve is an energy path, and the esscence of energy is ceaseless movement. In it''s eternal trajectory from spirit to matter (outward breath) and from matter to spirit (inward breath) it permeates all creation. it IS all creation...
Apart from it's inherent pulsation, it would be impossible to dissect this eternal movement into discreet sections, for at the point at which one point of this sublime curve ceases and the next begins cannot be defined mathematically, whatever the subjective view. Therefore, this unique, primordial creative curve embodies the unbroken path of evolution, of cyclical, pulsating out- foldment and in- foldment, as it spirals in and out of all the myriads of apparently inextricable interconnected and interdependant individual systems in the cosmos, tying and untying them in ont inscrutable Gordian Knot. We are therefore unequivocally all part and parcel of the One; and any harm of whatever kind we inflict on ourselves or to the planet, we not only inflict on ourselves, but the rest of the cosmos as well.
This creative force and it's dynamic have already long been known to Eastern esotericism and is referred to by Mme Blavatsky as follows...
KUNDALINI SHAKTI:
"...The power or Force which moves in a curved path. It is the universal life force manifesting everywhere in nature. This force includes two graet forces of attraction and repulsion. Electricity and magnetizm are but manifestations of it. This is the power which brings about that 'continuous adjustment of internal relations to external relations' which is the essence of life according to Herbert Spencer, and that 'continuous adjustment of external relations', which is the basis for the transmigration of souls, punar ianman (re- birth) in the docterines of ancient Hindu philosophers'
Even the tools of common language unwittingly (or wittingly) allude to the character of this spiral movement. When we ex- (s)pire, we leave this our 'mortal coil'. We are in- spire-d, we feel drawn to our higher ideals. Our spir(e)it is raised, and we are sucked into the upward spiral. Similarly through
re- spi(e)ation, the ionization balence of the body (which varies according to the time of day) is adjusted by the proportional ionization of air indrawn through the nostrills, which due to opposite directions of rotation, is negatively ionizedby the left nostril and positively by the right nostril. Sneezing, therefore, may perhaps be a compensating process, through which high opposing charges resulting from over- ionization are reduced to zero.
Interestingly enough, while on the subject of the body, the German word for spinal column is 'wirbelsaule', which directly translated into English means a 'spiral' column. Similarly each one of the vertebra is referred to as a whirlpool or vortex. Clearly the Germans have long held a completely different view of the centeral structure of our bodies; whereas we see it as a more or less rigid physical structure, they see it as more of an 'energy path'...
Nature too provides us with countless examples of dynamic spiral growth and movement in the form of galaxies, cyclones, whirlpools and tornadoes, of which we, in our blindness, and arrogance fail to take note of in the persuit of mechanical perfection.
According to the late Tilman Schauberger, grandson and expert on Victor Schauberger's works, creative, formative motion is...
..."Open, goal orinted, structured, concentrated, intensifying, dynamic, self organizing, self divesting of the less valuable, rhytmical, cyclical, sinuous, pulsating and centripetal = the cycloid spiral space curve..."
"...As the will to create intensifies, the focus becomes more concentrated, extraneous elements are rejected and a channel is opened up to the free passage of creative energy, resulting in an increasing charge (life force), energetic density and rotational velocity, in other words, a vortex of life energy evolves.........
.......From this, it could be construed that it is due to the interaction of manifold harmonic vibrations ultimately resulting into tight radius and extreme rotational velocity that material existance emerges..."
(Exerpt from Callum Coates 'Living Energies' based on the works of Viktor Schauberger)
"...The point, which is the pivot of the norm, is the motionless center of a circumference on a rim which all contingencies, distinctions and individualities revolve..."
(Ch'uang Tzu)
The milky way is a phi based vortex / spiral. Look at things closely; the cyclical seasons have the evolutionary component on each wind. nothing is circular...
Regarded as holding the seed from which manifestation of all things will spring, the World Egg is a general self-explanatory symbol. The image that Earth hatched from an egg is common to many traditions: Egyptian, Phoenician, Celtic, Greek, Tibetan, Hindu, Vietnamese, Chinese, Indonesian, Siberian etc. Nevertheless, the way the manifestation is occurring takes different appearances. Particularly, in the Egyptian and Celtic traditions, a serpent surrounding the egg provides a representation of the streams circulating between both Egg's poles, in one direction and the other.
The double spiral symbolizes the polarity and balance of the two reverse streams of a unique cosmic force:
A way out from the Egg Centre or Principle into the manifested world, which corresponds to a metaphysical point of view. Associated to the terrestrial or yin influence, it means basically the death of the Spirit and the birth of the body.
A way back from the manifested world into the Egg Centre or Principle associated to a cosmological point of view. Subject to the celestial or yang influence, it expresses the death of the body in a symbolic sense and the re-birth of the Spirit through initiation, which gives access to the supra-sensitive world.
The double spiral can hardly be better represented than the outline limiting black and white parts of the yin-yang symbol, expressing the alternating rhythm of yin and yang. It is nothing but the two streams of the unique cosmic force taking various forms in different traditions...
According to the separation of both cosmic force streams or not, we get the image of two opposite heads of a unique serpent (amphisbaena) or the reverse wrapping of two serpents round the Caduceus.
A similar symbol is expressed in Hindu tradition by the double helix of the Brahman's staff or the 'destructive' and 'regenerative' power of the vajra.
The same is true regarding the double operation of 'coagulation' and 'dissolvation' of the Hermetic tradition or the alternate rhythm of 'condensation' and 'dissipation' of Taoism.
The double 'key power' to 'bind' and 'unbind' of Janus, the Roman god of initiation, or the related Christian tradition symbol have the same meaning.
A long list of equivalent symbols could be provided as they can be found in any tradition or culture. They would all reflect the same meaning in different ways. Finally, they all bear a common purport, the power of controlling south and north, east and west, light and darkness, life and death. At all levels of existence, death and life co-exist. If death points to what must vanish in the inevitable evolution of the terrestrial or manifested world, it also ushers to what is immutable in the non-manifested or celestial world. Death shows an apparent ambivalence as the harbinger of revelation. All rites of initiation include a death-phase preceding a new life. The death of a cycle is the prior condition for the birth of a new one. Living this tension between countervailing aspects of a unique cosmic force is the only way to die in our current state and to be re-born in a superior state.
The world materializes and man spiritualizes along the same spiral. It is the breathing of the cosmos. With the exhalation, the spirit contracts, creates and involves or winds into matter; this is the creation of the world by the breath of the divine. With the inhalation, matter expands and evolves or unwinds into spirit. Man is the heart and microcosmic controller of his pulse. By becoming conscious, he is inhaling~ effecting the return breath.
We breathe in only to breathe out; this is true of the universe no less than of man who was created in the same image. This is why the life of each person is conceived in so many mystical, religious and mythological systems, as the conscious unwinding of the original coil of manifestation.
"Your life is a sacred journey. And it is about change, growth, discovery, movement, transformation, continuously expanding your vision of what is possible, stretching your soul, learning to see clearly and deeply, listening to your intuition, taking courageous challenges at every step along the way. You are on the path... exactly where you are meant to be right now... And from here, you can only go forward, shaping your life story into a magnificent tale of triumph, of healing of courage, of beauty, of wisdom, of power, of dignity, and of love."
Caroline Adams
We are all on the path... exactly where we need to be. The labyrinth is a model of that path.
The winding passage to the center - sometimes called the "labyrinth motif" - is a prominent theme in sacred stories everywhere. In the concrete sense, the labyrinth spiral is like the caves in which early people lived. Those caves - sanctuaries from predators and ice-age weather - must have been revered, holy places. It is quite likely that the only peace and rest those early humans ever knew was found in the mysterious, winding recesses of those precious caves. It was there that food was prepared and eaten, there that clothes were made, there that the forces of nature were honored in ritual, there that new human life was brought into the world. Paleolithic man lived in the womb of the Mother Earth Goddess: caves of regeneration and transformation.
But there is another, abstract sense of the labyrinth spiral that is important. It is evocative of the bewildering choices we must make to find our way in the world "out there", and the equally bewildering choices we must make to find our way "in here" - in the tangled maze of our own inscrutable psyches. And the "Mystical Center" (known by many names - Axis Mundi, Immovable Spot, World Tree, Cosmic Pillar, etc.) is understood to represent a still and silent place (or state of being); it is the motionless heart, the focal nucleus around which spirals the whirling hurricane of space and time. It is the source from which all things come, and to which they endeavor to return for regeneration. The Mandala Spiral is a symbolic representation of a spiritual journey to a place beyond the visible world... infinite center is equally the center of any place, or the center of any person or being. In Greek philosophy, in the Upanishads, in the Kabbalah and Sufism, the center within the human being is considered to be the heart, designated the seat of intelligence, of Brahma, of Solomon and the Universal Logos. Although physiologically, the heart is the center of the circulation of vital fluid throughout the body, the heart in the higher sense is not confined to the corporeal state, and it's location should not be exactly defined with that of it's physical counterpart...
A labyrinth is an ancient symbol that relates to wholeness. It combines the imagery of the circle and the spiral into a meandering but purposeful path. The Labyrinth represents a journey to our own center and back again out into the world. Labyrinths have long been used as meditation and prayer tools.
A labyrinth is an archetype with which we can have a direct experience. We can walk it. It is a metaphor for life's journey. It is a symbol that creates a sacred space and place and takes us out of our ego to "That Which Is Within."
A labyrinth has only one path. It is unicursal. The way in is the way out. There are no blind alleys. The path leads you on a circuitous path to the center and out again.
A labyrinth is a right brain task. It involves intuition, creativity, and imagery. With a maze many choices must be made and an active mind is needed to solve the problem of finding the center. With a labyrinth there is only one choice to be made. The choice is to enter or not. A more passive, receptive mindset is needed. The choice is whether or not to walk a spiritual path...
THE STILL CENTER
Push on to the ultimate Emptiness,
Guard unshakable calmness,
All the ten thousand things are moving and working
Yet we can see the void, whither they must return,
All things however they flourish
Turn and go home to the root from which they sprang.
The reversion to the root is called Calmness;
It is recognition of necessity;
That which is unchanging.
Now knowing the Unchanging means Enlightenment,
Not knowing it means going blindly to disaster...
Taken from the Tao Te Ching~ Lao Tse c.604BCE
The axis Mundi, at the 'navel of the earth', takes the symbolic form of all pillars, poles, mountains, temples, spires or 'soul ladders', and is the pole climbed by Siberian Shamen on their celestial flights, or that belonging to the Arunta of Australia, which, when found broken, caused the entire clan such consternation (fear resulting from the awareness of danger) that "they wandered about aimlessly for a time and finally lay down on the ground and wailed for death to overtake them.... denoting the catastrophe, the end of the world, reversion to chaos..." (Mircea Eliade, 'The Sacred and the Profane 1957')
The axis breaks vertically through all planes of existance, each of which is demarcated (outlined) by a step or rung; wether the nine steps of the Egyptian Osirian Mysteries, the seven of the Persian Mirthraic initiate, the seven steps of Buddha, the seven notches of the Siberian shamanic tree or the seven steps of the Babylonian Ziggurat. Moreover, all cosmic or holy mountains such as Meru, Gerizim, Kaf, Tabor and Olympus, constitute the primordial connection between heaven and earth.
The peak of the mountain is the tip of an upward spiral; it is the point of contact with heaven, which is an invisible downward spiral. Furthermore, all temples are replicas of the holy mountain: at Chatres cathedral, one is told that the souce of the well descends as far into the earth as the spires go into heaven; thus putting one at the center. The spire constitutes the 'gate of heaven', or the opening in the upward direction, allowing direct vertical communication between heaven and earth.
From this axis, like the hub of a wheel, everything extends, radiates and rotates spirally. The entire universe, with all it's spatial and temporal states, is but the spiral manifestation of the still center; as it rotates it expands, and while still rotating it contracts and dissappears to the source whence it came.
Through meditation, a person puts themself in the position of the whole, of which he is a symbol: his meditative activity simulates the activity of the whole.