Cosmic symbolism

by Sepharial

The law of moral causation, as well as that of affinity, impels man to rebirth while there are any unexhausted desires in him. These unexhausted tendencies are called skandhas. It does not matter what we call them, we are all conscious of their existence and of the terrible strife they cause in us. These desires are in the Adamic nature, they are in the human blood, and Mars is their cosmic symbol. They are the chains of Vulcan.

The number of Mars is nine and the magic of the number nine haunts us from our birth to the very last day of our existence in this world. In the Kabala of Numbers I have shown the connection between the Adamic race and the number nine. This is the Iron Age, the Kali Yuga, and the horoscope of the world shows the sign Aries, ruled by Mars, in the ascendant. In the age of Saturn men sought virtue and distinction in obscurity. Now there is but one way to recognition and success, Force and Self-assertion. Let those take it who will. What is said of those who willingly take to the sword may be applied to the slaves of every other form of human passion. Mars will lay them by the heel and bring them back to retribution.

The cycle of nine is at the root of almost all the mysteries of human life. It crops up in all the astronomical cycles as if it were at the root of them, and as representing cosmic energy (Fohat) and the human will (Ichcha) it manifests in all purpose and all action, cosmical and human. For Mars (nine) is desire (kama) and desire is that which underlies both will and action.

There is a period of cosmic activity which runs in a nine-year cycle. It has even been shown that meteorology cannot shake free of it. The year 1893 was a year of drought, rain being unknown from April to October of that year, and the summer was exceptionally hot. The same may be said of 1902 and 1911, which are years falling in the nine-year cycle. But 1894, 1903 and 1912 were wet summers, and the temperature also abnormally low. Dr. Goad, who studied meteorology from the same standpoint of cosmic interplay, considered that Mars was of chief importance in weather predictions. Some people appear to think that the icebergs on which the Titanic foundered are responsible for the wet summer of 1912. I dare venture the opinion that it was something many degrees warmer than an iceberg. That icebergs in the temperate zone have a tendency to condense the air and so to produce rain seems reasonable, but who loosed the chains that bind the icebergs to the poles. Undoubtedly it was our Vulcan.

In a scheme of thought that regards the whole world as a symbol, and that is the standpoint we are taking in this study of the cosmos, planets are not necessarily causative but they are necessarily symbolic. The symbol of humanity is the number Nine, and this is the number of the planet Mars. Hence we may say that for the present and during the whole course of this age of the world’s evolution or unfoldment, we are under the dominion of Mars. The sooner we get into wireless communication with him and understand some of his ways the better it will be for us. For he is not only the maker of chains but the breaker of them, inasmuch as he represents both the Desire that fashions them and the Will that looses them.

Nine is also the cosmic factor. We have already seen that the precession of the equinoxes is at the rate of 1° in seventy-two years, and 30° or one sign in 2,160 years, the whole circle being completed in 25,920 years. All these numbers are multiples of nine. Twice nine gives us the solar cycle, three times nine the number of the asterisms, in six times nine years the eclipses move through one sign of the zodiac, and in 648 through the entire circle. But this is nine times seventy-two, and so we find ourselves again and again enmeshed by the network of a nonal necessity. As the Old Philosopher truly says: “Heaven’s net has large meshes, yet nothing escapes it!”

Applying this magic of the number nine to some of the deeper problems of human experience, we may profitably examine the symbolism of the asterisms, which are twenty-seven in number, or three nines. The Hindus have a period which they regard as the sum of life, extending to 108 years, which is twelve times nine. From this we may draw the conclusion that the Moon remains in one sign for nine years and that this sign reflects nine others. The system is connected with the Ashtottaradasha system to which reference has already been made, and of course, with the navamshas or ninefold divisions of the signs of the zodiac.

We have already seen that the ninth part of a sign of 30° is 3° 20´, and that each such part corresponds to a particular sign of the zodiac. This may be seen in the Navamsha Table already given.

Let us suppose, for instance, that the Moon was in the sign Leo 22° 43´ at the birth of a person. By our Table it is seen that this corresponds with the sign Libra, which navamsha extends from 20° 0´ to 23° 20´ of the sign Leo. Then in order to find at what age Libra navamsha expires we say—

As 3° 20´ is to twelve months so is (23° 20´-22° 43´) 37´ to the answer. Now 3° 20´ is equal to 200´, so that if we multiply 37´ by twelve and divide by 200, we shall have the months required, namely, 2·22 months or two months seven days nearly. Therefore we know that the Moon is under the influence of Venus during the first two months of the life, and from Libra it passes to Scorpio, when it comes under the influence of Mars, and then to Sagittarius navamsha, where it is under the influence of Jupiter. With this navamsha the limits of the sign are reached, and the Moon in passing into the sign Virgo comes first under the navamsha of Capricorn which is ruled by Saturn, and from Capricorn it goes into Aquarius navamsha and is still under the influence of Saturn. And each navamsha is one year, so that we know that the period from two years and two months to four years two months is evil, for Saturn is privation, loss, darkness and death, and by the cyclic order of things this will recur every twelve years, since nine goes into 108 twelve times. Now it is a fact that in the case cited the cyclic recurrence of this influence of Saturn brought about at four years the death of the father, at fifteen the death of the grandfather, at twenty-seven the death of the mother, at thirty-nine the loss of all property. Similarly by this system of the cycle of nine twelves, at the Moon’s occursion into the navamsha of Cancer, which is the lunar influence disposing to changes, and which occurred at 8, 20, 32, and 44, there were radical changes in life and surroundings.