Tuesday, August 21, 2007

Rites of Reunion and Renewal

Millennial Sabbatical Vigil

In 1999, I embarked on a millennial world vigil in the form of a sabbatical academic leave, to investigate and comment on human impact on biodiversity.

We embarked on the journey through South America, filming the burning season in Bolivia and making a transit of the Amazon basin from the Andes altiplano down the Urubamba, Ucayali, Solminoes and Amazon researching the destruction of the Earth's greatest Eden by human impact. At Iquitos I pronounced the names of the plants and animals, vanishing all too quickly from the face of the Earth, in remembrance of the first Adam in the Garden, following the preface of Caesar Calvo’s ‘Three Halves of Ino Moxo’. We then traveled back up the Madeira and through the Pantanal to Rio, filming the human impact on diversity, pronouncing the apocalypse of the life tree in a warning, from the Cristo Redemptor about the consequence of genetic holocaust of the diversity of life.

On our arrival in England we made a pilgrimage to Avalon and entered the Earth at Kennet Long Barrow to celebrate the descent. I was represented here as the green man as a healing process for Christianity, with Jane counterbalancing in the persona of Morgan le Fay. Jesus was the true vine and we have a tremendous epoch of destruction, we have bloodshed, we have the bloodshed of the cross, we have the burning of Armageddon, we have now the burning of the great rain forests, so we have the green element is being put to hell fire essentially and so the antidote to this process is reuniting of feminine and masculine and the reuniting of humanity and nature and Jesus also descended into hell and ascended again. The descent, is done by Inanna in three days and she returns to the surface and by threading together the underworld and the world of heaven and the world of Earth we gain a sense of unity and appreciate the cosmic perspective in reuniting heaven and the underworld, and Earth and the world of living experience together. Auspiciously as we arrived there was an artist painting the green man with green candles set up in a shrine in the depths of the barrow.

St. Sarah the Black Madonna said to have come ashore with the Marys Salome and Jacobi in an oarless boat as a girl child at Saintes Marie de la Mer. Jane and I traversed Europe from the sacraments of Amsterdam to Saintes Marie, via Albi, coinciding in the moment of our arrival synchronously with the church bells chiming the hour of her tri-annual festival. In Rome with the bell toll of papal annunciation for the Immaculate Conception where I made a public statement in St. Peters square challenging the hierarchical stewardship, pronouncing the sacred union until the police intervened.

Liberation, Mount of Olives Millennium Eve.

We then flew to Jerusalem to celebrate the millennial rites of passage of renewal. I hosted a twelve day seminar on the Shekhinah as feminine face, biodiversity and the Tree of Life. We journeyed in the mountains and in the wilderness, between Galilee and the Dead Sea, through the West Bank, and among the ancient oaks and terebinths in the hills around Miriam’s well. We anointed one another in the wastes of Bethany beside Lazarus’ cave. She anointed my head with olive oil from Jericho and I wiped her feet with my hair in recognition of the sovereignty of woman.



On Millennium Eve we performed a rite of renewal for the tree of life in bridal reunion in the name of Shekhinah or Sakina, the abstrcat feminine face of God and of Gaia as the Earth feminine. We were offered a grove next to Gethsemane by a member of the family who kept the keys to the Haram-i-Sheriff under the Jordanians, but we were driven out by a court injunction and police prohibition. We moved higher to a garden on Scopus peak overlooking Moriah, the Dome, and the Old City. With a sacred circle of a hundred participants, we pronounced the acceptable year in liberation in the names of God and Gaia in an all night vigil to the sunrise.

The spirit of God is upon us
the spirit of Gaia is within us
because they hath anointed us
to sing good tidings unto the meek
they hath sent us to bind up the brokenhearted
to proclaim liberty to the captives
and the opening of prison to them that are bound
to proclaim the acceptable year
to comfort all that mourn
to appoint unto them that mourn in Zion
in Palestine, in Sidon, in Syria, Arabia and the world
to give unto them beauty for ashes
the oil of joy for mourning
the garments of love for the spirit of heaviness
that they might be called trees of compassion
the planting of the divine
that all might be glorified in the abundance of wisdom
and we shall renew the old wastes
and we shall restore the former desolations
and we shall repair the waste cities
the desolations of many generations
they hath clothed us with the garments of salvation
and I as a bridegroom decketh myself with ornaments
and I as a bride adorneth myself with jewels
for as the Earth bringeth forth her bud
and as the garden causeth the things that are sewn in it to spring forth
so shall harmony and fulfillment spring forth among all the nations
this day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears.

In this celebration the collective mashiach was invoked by speakers of several faiths in the spirit of peace:

“We are here together the collective mashiach and our vision here tonight will spread peace in our hearts and peace on the City of Peace below Yeru-shalom Jerusalem and bisrata shem in Jah Allah we’ll be as a light and a source for peace in the whole world and in the whole universe”

The vigil ran from dusk till dawn with a circle of performances from fire dancing, Hebrew folk music, and chants to the Shekhinah, poetry and drumming, including the Hymn to the Epoch. We greeted the sunrise and released messages of peace over the ancient city of peace.



The Gates of Mercy or Compassion on the Eastern Wall are currently filled with rubble to deter the return of the mashiach. We made four journeys to the Gates, both outside and inside, to call them open in reunion of all paths and all peoples.

On the Epiphany, we gathered a circle of twelve people who marched from the ascension site to the Gates of Mercy calling the gates open in the sacred union as a healing of the epoch in the Tree of Life:

‘your gates shall be open continually
they shall not be closed day or night
the glory of Lebanon shall come to you
the juniper the box tree
and the cypress together’ (Isa 60).

The vigil continued to the Wailing Wall to celebrate the sacred marriage in the Song of Songs:

I sleep but my heart waketh :
it is the voice of of my beloved that knocketh,
saying open to me my sister,
my love, my dove, my undefiled :
for my head is filled with dew,
and my locks with the drops of the night.
I have put off my coat; how shall I put it on?
I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them?
My beloved put his hand in the hole of the door,
and my bowels were moved for him.
I rose up to open to my beloved
and my hands dropped with myrrh,
and my fingers with sweet-smelling myrrh,
upon the handles of the lock.

Set me as a seal upon thine heart,
as a seal upon thine arm:
for love is strong as death;
jealousy is cruel as the grave:
the coals thereof are coals of fire,
which hath a most vehement flame.
Many waters cannot quench
love, neither can the floods drown it.

After this vigil, I embarked on an in depth research study of the emergence of human society and the deeper sexual roots underpinning the patriarchal religious epoch, to complement the apocalyptic with its biological and sexual foundations. This lead co-authoring “Sexual Paradox: Complementarity, Reproductive Conflict and Human Emergence”. This provides a different sense of unveiling, exposing the contradictions in the patriarchal epoch and its fallacy in the light of a sexually paradoxical human emergence, in which culture and intelligence were phenomenally accelerated by a red queen sexual selection in which neither sex had the upper hand and each had to run while standing still to gain the sexual favours of the other.

A true messiah is a flesh and blood human, as the Hebrew ‘mother’ tradition declares, who brings about a paradigm of long-term future goodness. In the healing of the apocalyptic paradigm, this has to mean reunion with the feminine, the reflowering of the biosphere and securing a place for humanity as a co-participant and guardian of Earth’s living future. The true apocalyptic messiah is thus the messiah of the verdant reflowering of biodiversity in sexual reunion. Looking out at a fallible world, I am mildly skeptical that anyone else, including the powers that be, really have a finger on this pulse, which resonates in our collective consciousness, from our Edenic alpha to the Armageddon or Renewal of our unveiling omega.

As well as sexual reunion and the reflowering of the Tree of Life, the messiah has a key role as a critic of the violent and repressive dictates of the religious paradigm, unpronouncing repressive religious scripture, abrogating the following passages as key examples:
  1. Exod 22:18 Death curse on the Witch Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.
  2. Lev 20:27 Familiars A man also or woman that hath a familiar spirit, or that is a wizard, shall surely be put to death: they shall stone them with stones: their blood shall be upon them.
  3. Lev 24:16 Blasphemy And he that blasphemeth the name of the Lord, he shall surely be put to death, and all the congregation shall certainly stone him: as well the stranger, as he that is born in the land, when he blasphemeth the name of the Lord, shall be put to death.
  4. Deut 21:22 Hanging on a Tree And if a man have committed a sin worthy of death, and he be to be put to death, and thou hang him on a tree: His body shall not remain all night upon the tree, but thou shalt in any wise bury him that day; (for he that is hanged is accursed of God;
  5. Deut 20:12 Genocide and Sexual Slavery And if it will make no peace with thee, but will make war against thee, then thou shalt besiege it: And when the Lord thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword: But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the Lord thy God hath given thee. Thus shalt thou do unto all the cities which are very far off from thee, which are not of the cities of these nations. But of the cities of these people, which the Lord thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth: But thou shalt utterly destroy them; ( justifying Muhammad's genocide at Medina)
  6. Deut 22:20 Stoning for Adultery But if this thing be true, and the tokens of virginity be not found for the damsel: Then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her with stones that she die: ( justifying stoning for adultery in Islam)
  7. Deut 22:22 Death for Adultery If a man be found lying with a woman married to an husband, then they shall both of them die, both the man that lay with the woman, and the woman: so shalt thou put away evil from Israel. If a damsel that is a virgin be betrothed unto an husband, and a man find her in the city, and lie with her; Then ye shall bring them both out unto the gate of that city, and ye shall stone them with stones that they die; the damsel, because she cried not, being in the city; and the man, because he hath humbled his neighbour's wife: so thou shalt put away evil from among you.
  8. Deut 21:18 Rebellious Son If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother, and that, when they have chastened him, will not hearken unto them: ... And they shall say unto the elders of his city, This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton, and a drunkard. And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die: so shalt thou put evil away from among you; and all Israel shall hear, and fear.
  9. 1 Cor 16:22 The Anathema curse "If any 'man' love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let 'him' be Anathema maranatha".
  10. 1 Cor 14:34 Women to keep silent "Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience as also saith the law. And if they will learn any thing, let them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for women to speak in the church."
  11. 1 Timothy 2:11 Women not authorized to Preach "I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over men; she is to keep silent with all subjection; for Adam was first formed then Eve. Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor".
  12. 1 Cor 7:29 Negating sexuality in marriage "Blessed are they who have wives as if they had none, for they shall inherit God".
  13. Sura 4:34: Men superior to women, Beating "Men stand superior to women in that God hath preferred the one over the other ... Those whose perverseness you fear, admonish them and remove them into bed chambers and beat them, but if they submit to you then do not seek a way against them; surely Allah is High, Great."
  14. Sura 4.11: Male worth two Females Allah enjoins you concerning your children: The male shall have the equal of the portion of two females
  15. Sura 4.15: Confinement unto death And as for those who are guilty of an indecency from among your women, call to witnesses against them four (witnesses) from among you; then if they bear witness confine them to the houses until death takes them away or Allah opens some way for them.
  16. Sura 24.2 Flogging for adultery (As for) the fornicatress and the fornicator, flog each of them, (giving) a hundred stripes, and let not pity for them detain you in the matter of obedience to Allah, if you believe in Allah and the last day, and let a party of believers witness their chastisement. The fornicator shall not marry any but a fornicatress or idolatress, and (as for) the fornicatress, none shall marry her but a fornicator or an idolater; and it is forbidden to the believers.
  17. Sura 24.31 Enforced veiling And say to the believing women that they cast down their looks and guard their private parts and do not display their ornaments except what appears thereof, and let them wear their head-coverings over their bosoms, and not display their ornaments except to their husbands or their fathers, or the fathers of their husbands, or their sons, or the sons of their husbands, or their brothers, or their brothers' sons ...
  18. Sura 5.33 Crucifixion for mischief The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His apostle and strive to make mischief in the land is only this, that they should be murdered or crucified or their hands and their feet should be cut off on opposite sides or they should be imprisoned; this shall be as a disgrace for them in this world, and in the hereafter they shall have a grievous chastisement, Except those who repent before you have them in your power; so know that Allah is Forgiving, Merciful.
  19. Sura 9.5 Killing idolators So when the sacred months have passed away, then slay the idolaters wherever you find them, and take them captives and besiege them and lie in wait for them in every ambush, then if they repent and keep up prayer and pay the poor-rate, leave their way free to them; surely Allah is Forgiving, Merciful.


References:
  1. Sexual Paradox: Complementarity, Reproductive Conflict and Human Emergence

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