ERM - ERM Tape 045 - Gospel Of The Stars by Joseph Seiss
THE GOSPEL OF THE STARS
BY: JOSEPH SEISS
(Copyright 1884)
"THE PROFOUNDEST RIDDLES OF THE WORLD HAVE OFTEN REMAINED CONCEALED, NOT BECAUSE OF THEIR GREAT INTRICACY, BUT BECAUSE OF THEIR EXCEEDING SIMPLICITY." .....CZOLBE
"IT IS THE PERT . . . SUPERFICIAL THINKER WHO IS GENERALLY THE STRONGEST IN ALL KINDS OF UNBELIEF." .....SIR HUMPHRY DAVY.
"THIS PROSPECT VAST, WHAT IS IT? WEIGHED ARIGHT,
'TIS NATURE'S SYSTEM OF DIVINITY;
'TIS ELDER SCRIPTURE, WROTE BY THE HAND OF GOD;
SCRIPTURE AUTHENTIC! UNCORRUPT BY MAN." ......EDWARD YOUNG
"THE MYSTERIES OF THE INCARNATION, FROM THE CONCEPTION ON TO THE ASCENSION INTO THE HEAVENS, ARE SHOWN US ON THE FACE OF THE SKY, AND ARE SIGNIFIED BY THE STARS." ..ALBERTUS MAGNUS
(A VALUABLE WORK USED IN THIS BOOK BY THE AUTHOR WAS THE WORK OF FRANCES ROLLESTON . . . HER BOOK:.."MAZZAROTH; OR THE CONSTELLATIONS", IN HER BOOK ARE THE TABLES DRAWN UP BY ULUGH BEIGH, THE TARTAR PRINCE, AND ASTRONOMER ABOUT 1420 A.D., GIVING ARABIAN ASTRONOMY AS IT HAD COME DOWN TO HIS TIME, WITH THE ANCIENT COPTIC AND EGYPTIAN NAMES, LIKEWISE THE MUCH EARLIER PRESENTATION MADE ABOUT A.D. 850, BY ALBUMAZER THE GREAT ARAB ASTRONOMER OF THE CALIPHS OF GRENADA SHOWING HIS SKILL. ALSO IN THIS BOOK ARE THE FACSIMILES OF THE ZENDERA AND ESNE ZODIACS IN THE LAST EDITION OF HER WORK (1875).
NOW WE PRESENT TO YOU
PRIMEVAL-ASTRONOMY
BY:...ELLA ROSE MAST
The Gospel of the Stars...or Primeval Astronomy. Copyright 1884, from the book of the library of the late Dr. Swift.
Dear friends; we have told you many things about this Gospel of the Stars from the Swift tape library. And since the tapes about those mysterious circles and figures in Britain, we thought we would give you an outline of this old book as to what this author found as he became interested in the meaning of the Starry Worlds.
Since some current explanations of the origin and meaning of the constellations of the heavenly certainly are not such as would satisfy those in search of positive truth then we as did our author looked backwards to find the knowledge our ancient forefathers brought to our race as an explanation of the outlines formed by the stars.
Genesis 1:14...'And YAHWEH said; let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and for years.'
All the purposes of creation we cannot begin to fathom or comprehend. But we stand on solid ground however when we say and believe that the intent of the physical Universe is to declare and display the Majesty and Glory of its Creator. Thus remember HE said HE created these heavenly worlds for signs. And a Sign is something selected and appointed to represent some other thing. The letters of the alphabet for instance are signs of sounds and numbers. The notes on a clef of musical writing are signs of pitch and value of certain tones of voice or instrument. Thus when YAHWEH said the Celestial luminaries were for signs HE meant they express in their nature and natural office something beyond and additional to what they express in their natural setting. Nor can any sense be attached to the words, consistent with the dignity of the record, without admitting that YAHWEH intended from the beginning that these orbs of light should be made to bear, express, record, and convey the message we deduct from them. Always thru the ages it has been believed that the stars were to be the regulators of the seasons, and the years, as well as signs of events which were coming on the earth, especially this birth of the Savior in Judea.
We know from the New Testament record that Wise men came to worship this new born Savior, and that they were moved and led by Astronomic signs. But remember men lived almost to 1000 years of age in Adam's time. Men of that era, had their minds in closer communion than ours with the Eternal Intelligence, and they were helped by the Great Father's Spirit as they observed, classified, grouped and assigned their names to the Starry World, marking their courses and making them the bearers of wisdom, the most precious ever made known to men.
We now realize that somewhere in the earliest age of hu-man (Adamite) existence the stars were named and arranged into groups by someone thoroughly familiar with the great facts of Astronomy. Those names and groupings have been perpetuated in all the Astronomic records of all the ages and nations since that time. They are founded on indisputable Astronomic truth. And they form the ground work of all maps and designations of the Celestial presentation. These Astronomic facts have filtered down thru all people from one end of the earth to the other. Some people have denounced them, but have never been able to brush them off or substitute anything better or more convenient in their place. They are in all the books and records devoted to descriptions of the heavens. Heather, Muhammadan, and Christians..the oldest with the latest disagreeing in so many things, yet agree in adopting and honoring these primitive rotations of the stars. Even those who have the most fault to find with them still employ them, and cannot get along without them. And in and from these, the showing is that all the great doctrines of the Christian Faith were known, believed, cherished, and recorded from the earliest generations of our race proving that YAHWEH spoke to Adam and gave him a revelation of truth and hope precisely as would be written in the scriptures, and so fondly cherished by all Christian believers.
Now;...our Author gave many lectures on this subject and you have had just a short summary of the first lecture. Some of this information we realize will be repetitious to many but remember this was written in 1844 and goes into more depth in much of the explanation of the signs. We want you to notice that in this original Bible of the Ancients, there is no flaming Hells or torture chambers for this race as we have been led to believe by Priestcraft. Thus if you want to know the story of the original Scriptures...before man re-translated them, then it is still up there in the Starry Heavens.
*THE SECOND LECTURE.......'THE SACRED CONSTELLATIONS'. *
This Gospel Story written in the stars is much like the sacred Scriptures, it is pictorial and symbolic. This Atlas of the heavens is filled with figures, outlines of men, women, animals, giants and other objects. Each including a certain set of stars with each group being called a Constellation. In Primeval Astronomy the number of these star groups was 48. Over the years others have been added of inferior star groups but they have no connection with the original story. The old 48 Constellation are found on the ecliptic..this path which the earth follows around the sun as well as the path of the planets and moon, all but Pluto. We have here a nature indicated belt, about 16 degrees wide which extends around the entire circuit of the heavens, half the year north and half the year south of the equator of the earth extended into the sky. While the sun is making its annual course from west to east thru the center of this belt, the moon makes twelve complete revolutions around the earth dividing the belt into twelve parts or sections, and this makes twelve equal stages in the suns path as well as it makes its annual circuit thru the heavens. This belt or Zone is what is called the Zodiac and the word comes from a primitive root of Zoad...meaning a walk away or going by steps such as Jacobs ladder. Each of these steps thus contains a certain picture or sign and we then have the twelve signs of the Zodiac which are:............
1. Virgo:..the Virgin, the figure of a young women lying prostate with a sheathe of wheat in one hand, and a branch in the other.
2. Libra:..The Scales, the figure of a pair of balances, with one end of the beam up and the other down, as in the act of weighing. In some of the older planispheres a hand or a woman appears as holding the scales.
3. Scorpio:..the Scorpion, the figure of a gigantic, noxious, deadly insect with its tail or stinger uplifted in anger, as if striking.
4. Sagittarius:..the Bowman, the figure of a horse with the body, arms, and head of a man, a centaur with drawn bow and arrow pointed at the Scorpion.
5. Capricornus:..the Goat, this figure is of a goat sinking down as in death, with the hinder parts of its body terminating in the vigorous tail of a fish.
6. Aquarius:..the Waterman, the figure is of a man with a large Urn, the content of which he is in the act of pouring out in a great stream from the sky.
7. Pisces:..the Fishes, the figure of two large fish in the act of swimming, one to the north and the other along the ecliptic.
8. Aries: the Ram, by some nations this is called 'The Lamb'. Here is a figure of a strong Male Sheep with powerful horns, lying down in easy composure, and looking out in conscious strength over the field around it.
9. Taurus:..the Bull, the figure or the shoulders, neck, head, horns and front feet of a powerful bull in the attitude of rushing and pushing forward with great energy.
10. Gemini:..the Twins, sometimes called Adam and Eve, usually two human figures closely united and seated together in endeared affection.
11. Cancer:..the Crab, this figure is of a crab in the act of taking and holding on with its two strong claws. In the Egyptian Astronomy the Scarabaeus Beetle grasping and holding to a ball in which its eggs are deposited, takes the place of the Crab. (I would remind you that Egyptian Astronomy originated with Enoch.)
12. Leo:..the Lion, the figure of a great Lion, leaping forth to rend with its hind feet, over the body of Hydra the Serpent which is in the act of fleeing.
These twelve signs cover a large part of the visible heavens and extend entirely around the earth, making and marking this solar Zodiac. Ancient Astronomy then gives a further subdivision of these twelve signs into 28 so called Mansions of the moon, or the Lunar Zodiac. The moon makes its journey around the earth in about 28 days, thus making the 28 sections. 2 & 1/3 of these sections or Mansions are embraced in each sign of the Solar group of stars. It is from the names of these stars in the Mansions, rather than the figures connected with them that the significations are to be learned, for the main theme is most commandingly given in the twelve signs.
These twelve Great Signs do not stand alone for each has joined to them, either on the north or the south side of the Zodiac belt...three other conspicuous constellations called Decans, this word comes from the Shemitic word..'dek', meaning a part or piece.
The Great Arab physician and Astronomer...Albumazer who lived over 1000 years (before 1844) refers to the Decans and their houses saying that according to the Persians, the Babylonians and the Egyptians (of the Adamic Race)..'Here follow the faces, they are three, to each sign of the way'. In the Hebrew these three faces of each sign were believed to exercise most extensive influence and these Decans are called:.........
1. The Decans of Virgo:..Coma, the infant, the branch, the desired one. Centaurus, a Centaur with a dart piercing the victim, and Bootes or Arcturus, the great shepherd and harvester, holding a rod and sickle and walking forth before HIS flock.
2. The Decans of Libra:..The Cross, over which the Centaur is advancing which is called the Southern Cross. The victim of the Centaur slain, pierced to death, and the Crown which the Serpent aims to take which is called the Northern Crown.
3. The Decans of Scorpio:..The Serpent struggling with Orphiuchus, and Orphiuchus stung on one heel by the Scorpion, but crushing it with the other. And Hercules wounded in his heel, the other foot over the Dragon's head holding in one hand the Golden Apples, and in the other the uplifted club.
4. The Decans of Sagittarius:..Lyra an Eagle holding the Lyre as in triumphant gladness. Ara the Altar, with its consuming fires burning downward, and Draco the Dragon, that old Serpent winding himself about the pole in horrid links and contortions.
5. The Decans of Capricornus:..Sagitta the arrow or killing dart sent forth, the naked shaft of death. Aquila, the Eagle pierced and falling. And Delphuins the Dolphin springing up, rising out of the sea.
6. The Decans of Aquarius:..The Southern Fish drinking in a stream. Pegasus the white horse, winged and speeding as with glad tidings. And Cygnus the Swan on the wing, going and returning bearing the sign of the Cross.
7. The Decans of Pisces:..The Band...holding up the fishes, and held by 'THE LAMB'. It is doubled and fastened to the neck of Cetus. Then Cephus, a crowned king is holding a band and scepter, with his foot planted on the Pole star as the Great Victor or Lord. And Andromeda, a woman in chains, and threatened by the Serpent.
8. The Decans of Aries:..Cassiopeia, the woman now enthroned. Cetus the sea monster now closely and strongly bound by the Lamb. And Perseus an armed and mighty man with winged feet who is carrying away in triumph the cut off head of a monster full of writhing serpents and holding aloft a great sword in his right hand.
9. The Deans of Taurus:..Orion, a glorious Prince, with a sword girded on his side and his foot on the head of the Serpent. Eridanus, the torturous river accounted as belonging to Orion. Auriga, the Wagoner, the Shepherd carrying a ewe and two little lambs on his left arm, and holding cords or bands in his right hand.
10. The Decans of Gemini:..Lepus, or in some nations a serpent, the mad enemy under Orion's feet. Canis Major with Sirius...the Prince coming, and Canis minor...Procyon, following after Sirius and Orion.
11. The Decans of Cancer:..Ursa Minor, the lesser Sheepfold close to and including the North Pole. Ursa Major, the greater Sheepfold in connection with Arcturus the guardian and keeper of the flock. And Argo, that great ship, the company of travelers under the bright canopus, and their Prince. These Argonauts returned with the Golden Fleece.
12. The Decans of Leo:..Hydra the fleeing serpent trodden underfoot by the Lion. The Crater, or cup, or bowl of wrath poured on the serpent. And Corvus the Raven or Crow, the bird of doom tearing the serpent.
The Ancients had five wanderers called Planets in their star maps. These five were recognized by the naked eye and were named:...Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. They then added the sun and moon to make the seven most renowned of all the Celestial bodies. Job, in his time, wrote of this story in the heavens. He lived before the Hebrew exodus, before the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, before Abraham. And from the character style is deemed to be of the oldest and most original and most scientific in all of the Bible. But even in the time of Job the heavens were already laid out and arranged in the manner we have just described with the Zodiac formed, the constellations named, the figures drawn and recorded, and accepted and celebrated by YAHWEH'S people as the adornment of the sky in which to read of the Almighty Glory. They understood that YAHWEH had filled the heavens with proclamation's and warnings of his own purpose, thus these signs were for the story of the Gospel from beginning to end.
Who then of the sons of men can point out any other origin of these remarkable pictures of the heavens? Who can tell us when, where, or by whom else but YAHWEH himself....who invented the Zodiac, gave the names to the Adamic Race of the signs and attending constellations...for a purpose.
Here then is the Solar road with its 28 Mansions, each with its own expressive name; and here are the noted seven chiefs playing a part in the traditions, sciences, the theologies and the superstitions of earth, as brilliant as their splendid display on the face of the sky, but whence and how were they framed....only YAHWEH knows. It is affirmed however that they are as old as Adam's time, and were divided into constellations and named in the time of Hermes, who was Enoch according to Arab and Egyptian authorities.
Josephus, the Historian, affirms that the 'Starry Lore' had its origin with the Antediluvian Patriarchs, Seth and Enoch. It is also claimed that the Sabbath, the week of seven days which it marks, dates back to the beginning of the Adamic Race, to the Kingdom of YAHWEH itself. It is even now admitted that Alphabetic writing is as old as the Adamic man, and that Adam knew how to write as well as we, and that he did write. There were certainly books before Noah's flood for the New Testament quotes from one of them which is ascribed to Antioch, and Adam remember lived more than 300 years after Enoch was born.
As we look at these groupings of symbolic pictures we see something quite different than the inventions of paganism and mythology, with something as sacred in origin, as venerable in age, and as edifying in import as anything known to man. Corrupt religion, and classic fables have interfered to obscure and pervert their meanings, and scientific self will has crowded them with unmeaning additions; but in reality they constitute the Primeval Bible, a Divine record of the 'True Faith' and Hope of Adam-man. We thus study them so that we may learn from them what YAHWEH meant they should mean to his children upon the earth. Sure that they who are of His Spirit will be able to absorb that which is written in HIS WORD:...'Fields of Glories, spacious field and worthy of the master; He whose hand with hieroglyphics, older than the Nile, inscribed the Mystic Tablets hung on High to public gaze and said:...Adore O man the finger of your God'.
In the third lecture our Author goes back into the old myths to show that even these myths came from the story in the heavens. Some have even used these myths to try to prove that Christ never existed, and is Himself only a mythical character. The argument being that the old myths pre-date Christian times, thus Christianity was borrowed from these old myths, and palmed upon the world for the founding of a new religious sect. But we in tracing the record back to the first age of Adam-man, and finding the story of the Serpent and the cross as contained in the Bible...we have demonstrations of the early existence of what the Bible gives as a Divine promise and prophecy, with the same dating of time which the Bible assigns it. Thus Christianity instead of being borrowed from the myths was what gave rise to the myths, and was the fulfillment and realization of them.
Our Author some years before he published this book in 1844 was in the great church of St. Sophia in Constantinople, built by the first Christian Emperor. Among the rest of its wonderful Mosaics is a gigantic figure of the Savior on the wall over the Altar. The Arabs when they took over Constantinople were unwilling to spoil this glorious edifice by digging this picture out of the wall, so they covered it over with whitewash and paint. Nevertheless in spite of all attempted obliterations, the original picture still shone thru, and could be distinctly seen, and identified just as is this Mosaic among the stars which still shines thru to tell of the Faith symbolized there. All Astrology, idolatry and skepticism has been overruled to preserve for us what YAHWEH by HIS Spirit caused to be recorded on the face of the sky from the very beginning.
Our Author now analyses and interprets this record of the heavens. If you have the more modern 'Gospel of the Stars' called 'The Witnesses of the Stars' by Bullinger, then follow it as the author gives his interpretation of this wondrous story we find in the heavens. See how the two compare as he brings out more facts known at that earlier date. If you have been making notes up to now you will have this outline of the Zodiac and its Decans to follow which will also help.
* THE SIGN OF VIRGO *
Again:...the star of the story in the 'Gospel of the Stars' begins with Virgo. The great theme of the Bible as well as that of Primeval Astronomy being that...of a Virgin born Savior. And the first sign in this grand gallery of the Ancient Constellations brings forth this figure of a Virgin, or Virgo. There is no authority in the world for regarding her as anything but a Virgin, yet Motherhood also attends this Virginity in the sign, the same as in the text, in fact the whole teaching of the Scriptures respecting the maternity of our Savior carries this theme.
One hundred years before the birth of THE SAVIOR an altar was found in Gaul with this inscription:...'To the virgin who is to bring forth'. Showing the expectation of the race. This maiden in the sign of Virgo is the holder and bringer of an Illustrious Seed. In her hand is the star Spica, the sheath of wheat, the best of seeds, the brightest star in the whole Constellation. In the Scripture HE was to bruise the Serpents head, and HE was to be...'The seed of the woman (Israel) thus involving the Virgin, motherhood, and as one born of a miracle or begotten of Divine power, and known in earth as the Son of God. Such is the exhibit in the first sign of the Zodiac, and when certain Greeks came to Philip wishing to see Jesus, He referred to Himself as the seed of wheat which needed to fall and die in order to bring its proper fruitfulness (John 12:21-24). Thus according to the Gospel then out of the good seed of the Virgin comes the blessed harvest of Salvation.
The significant symbolism of The Christ employed by the Prophets was:... THE BRANCH...the bough, the plant or the root. He is then described as the Rod from the Stem of Jesse, the branch out of his roots (Isaiah 11:10) The Branch (Isaiah 4:2....Jeremiah 23:5.....Zechariah 3:8)
Yes the sign of the Virgin's seed is The Branch. The Ancient names of this Constellation carry out this meaning for they are:...the branch, the sheath of wheat. And the language of the Prophecies is also identical with the symbols of this sign.
Without The Christ and His redemption then all humanity and especially the Adamic race is fallen, and lies helpless in the sin of the world. Even Mary herself needed the achievements of her glorious son to lift her up. This is symbolized in the sign of Virgo for this Virgo or woman of the Zodiac lies prostate. She has fallen, and cannot of herself stand upright, but she holds aloft 'The Branch' as the great embodiment of her hope and trust.
* THE DECANS OF VIRGO *
The Decans of Virgo then carry the story forward, for the first Decan is Coma...The Persians, Chaldeans, Egyptians and Hermes (Enoch) taught that this was a pure Virgin sitting on a throne nourishing an infant son and the Hebrew name of the infant was THESU. The woman of Virgo and of this first Decan are one and the same for the Infant is the Seed or Branch. The Prophets referred to this Infant of Coma as the 'desired' the 'longed for'. Haggai calls HIM the 'desire of all nations'. The next Decan explains more fully this Virgins Seed, for this seed has a double nature, thus we believe that Jesus The Christ was both God and Man. (Today we would say YAHWEH-YAHSHUA) It is a great mystery but the Christian Faith teaches that Jesus Christ in the Constellation...that HE is Centaurus. The third Decan is Bootees. The meaning of the root of his name is:...'coming' or 'One who was to come'. The Greeks called him Arcturus, the Watcher, the keeper of the flocks of the Sheepfolds. Thus Bootes is the Shepherd of the flock. The star in the right arm of Bootes means The Branch, or Rod, and is often connected with the figure of the Shepherds Staff. He also bears a sickle which shows HIM as a harvester, who is in command of the harvest.
Thus in this sign of Virgo is the woman whose seed was to bruise the Serpents head. Here we find the Virgin born Divine child whose name is... 'Wonderful, Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace'. Here HE is of a double nature in singleness of purpose, thus 'God with us' held forth in prophecy.
Now; if YAHWEH inspired the framing of these signs and we believe He did, then we may expect the rest to be as rich in symbolism as this opening sign of the series with each amplifying the other till all the wonders of this redemption stand revealed in the sky.
* THE SIGN OF LIBRA *
The fourth lecture introduces the sign of Libra, so ordinary...just a pair of balances for weighing commodities, but the arms of that tilting beam with attached bowls reaches out into eternity. That beam marks the adjustment of a vast and mighty feud. This whole instrument in use speaks of the Eternal Justice which presides over all the boundless Universe. In the Ancient Persian sphere, a figure lifts these scales in one hand, and grasps a lamb with the other, with a lamb being in the form of Ancient Weights. We cannot then be mistaken when we read here the Divine determination of the wages of sin, and the price of redemption.
This picture of the scales or balances is found in all the eastern and most Ancient Zodiacs. The down side is invariably toward the deadly Scorpion. In some instances the bowl on the low side is held by the Scorpion's claws. It is denoted by the last letter of the Hebrew alphabet as Tor or Tau, and in all the Ancient Alphabets, in the form of a cross which signifies the end of the boundary, the limit, the completion; as the Savior when about to give up the Spirit on the Cross said:...'it is finished', for the last letter in the history of HIS humiliation had been reached.
The name of this sign indicates the range of the meaning attached to it. In Hebrew it is...the scales...weighing...for YAHWEH is said to weigh the mountains and hills in a balance. In Arabic it was:...purchase... redemption, and gain, and it is the Atoning Grace of the Branch. The Eternal Justice then weighs the demerits and awards of sin on one hand, and the price of redemption rendered and paid for on the other.
In the Scripture, and in all the old prophecies, in all the rituals and observances connected with them, in all the New Testament promises and facts, teachings and in all the visions of the final consummation... everywhere we find the doctrine of Salvation thru the sacrifice of YAHSHUA as our substitute Lamb. And this is what is signified by this sign of Libra, and its Decans. One of the Scales is up which says to Universal man: ...'Thou are weighed in the balances and art found wanting'. The name of the star which marks its records is 'Verdic' meaning...'the price that covers'. Of what that accepted price was to consist of is more fully told in the accompanying Decans.
* THE DECANS OF LIBRA *
The first Decan which at one time was seen in our latitudes, but which is far to the Southward is the Southern Cross. It was last seen on the horizon of Old Jerusalem about the time that The Christ was crucified. It consists of four bright stars placed in the form of a cross. But long before the Christ was born, a cross was a sacred emblem, because the coming of Messiah was looked for...was long expected. HE was to die for HIS people, and they were waiting for HIM. In the Zodiac of Zendera in Egypt this Constellation also was pictured as the figure of a LION with his head turned backward, his tongue hanging out as if in consuming thirst. Thus The Christ is..... 'The Lion of the tribe of Judah', and as the spirit left HIM on the Cross he said:...'I thirst'. Thus here prefigured in the sky is the cross of Calvary, the token of the price at which our redemption was to be bought.
In the second Decan of Libra we see a slain victim, pierced and slain with a dart barbed..in the form of a cross, slain by the Centaur Himself, for 'Without the shedding of blood there is no remission'. Men in their wickedness killed the Savior but HE gave Himself into their hands to do it. Without this voluntariness and self command in this matter the great redeeming virtue of HIS sacrifice would be wanting. Thus HE was particular to say as HE went to the Cross;....'I lay down my Life for the sheep.... and no man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself'. (John 10:15-18)
In this Decan it shows the death infliction by the barbed dart from HIS own hand, in the form of a cross. This Decan is the sign of the promised 'ONE' and prefigured HIM as quietly and meekly submitting as a victim and sacrifice...to justice and the law, for HE came to lay down His life and submit Himself as 'a sheep before his shearers is dumb, so He opened not his mouth'.
In some pictures this victim is a youth with the horn of a goat on one side of his head, and he holds his finger to his lips. This again connects him with sacrifice, a willing, silent sacrifice. In other pictures this horn is held in his hand filled with fruit and flowers, the origin of the 'Horn of Plenty'.
Here we then get the idea of silent submission to death, the prefiguring of the Gospel story...'Being found in the fashion of a man, humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross'. (Philippians 2:5-8)
Again...the death on the cross marks the limit and farthermost boundaries of the humiliation for human redemption. There was nothing lower than that in history; and the first two Decans of Libra are thus located the Southern most Constellation but one in Ancient Astronomy.
The third Decan of Libra is the Northern Cross. One is a cross formed of stars, and this one is a Crown formed of stars. This third Decan of Libra was once vertical over Jerusalem in every revolution of the earth. This Decan shows His great love, for that death was the Divine exacted price which had to be paid in bringing the object of His Love out of sin and condemnation, but it was by HIS OWN WILL and choice. And now He is awarded that great crown for at the name of YAHSHUA every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess that YAHSHUA is YAHWEH (God) in the flesh. Thus this prophetic sign in the stars is fulfilled in the facts of history.
Yes, some use this story in the sky to argue against Christianity. Some think it pure speculation to hold for truth, that there is a personal God; that the Bible contains a revelation from Him, that Adam-man has a soul to live beyond death; that the earth is a globe in motion ever rolling around the sun; that Jesus the Christ is the only Savior of our fallen race, and we must put all these things from us as empty dreams. But NO...the story of the Cross of Christ is true, and the pictures of the heavens unites with the WORD in the Book to assure us of the certainty of our Faith.
* THE SIGN OF SCORPIO *
The fifth lecture is about Scorpio...here a scorpion, serpent or dragon. A mighty man is pictured in conflict with this enemy, and treads him underfoot. The meaning of the name of this sign in Syric is the scorpion, but also...'Wounding', conflict and war. David used the root of this word in Psalm 144:1 where he blesses YAHWEH for teaching his hands to war. In Hebrew this same root word is in the sense of oppression from a deadly foe. This sign is considered the House of Mars, the God of War. The principle star in this sign has the meaning of wounding, cutting or tearing.
The insect in this sign is the figure of a mammoth Scorpion with its tail uplifted in anger in the act of striking. The figure, the names in all the indications agree in telling us that we have here the story of a great conflict, and a deadly wounding in that conflict.
This picture also refers to the success of God's people in general and their security under the shadow of the Almighty. The New Testament applies the passage to Christ who is always the kernel of everything pertaining to the power and triumph to His people, as to what they get which comes thru HIM...going before them in this matter.
In the Egyptian Zodiac this sign is represented by a monster Serpent. In the Hebrew Zodiac this sign was counted to Dan because in symbolism Dan is described as a 'serpent by the way, and adder in the path' as this tribe of Israel moves out as trail blazers and will also tangle with the serpent.
The Serpent's seed is said to be everywhere and always the enemy of the Woman's (Israel's) seed; and the conflict is above all between Christ and the Devil until all evil is finally subdued and crushed. The great office of this Divine Son of the Woman and his experience is here sketched from the beginning as the bruising of the Serpent's head, and the bruising of HIS heel.
No sooner did The Christ come into the world than the Dragon sought to devour HIM thru Herod’s executioners as He came to the final act of discharging the debt of a condemned world, the most terrible of all the assault the powers of darkness had to encounter.
We know something of the wrestling and agony our Savior suffered in the Garden of Gethsemane. We know how sorrowful was HIS soul, as tho His immortal being was about to be broken up. We know how He was inwardly wrung with anguish until every pore issued sweat and blood, with great drops falling to the ground. It was the hour of the power of darkness, and HE Himself explained. It was an experience of agony the like of which never had been and never could be again. It was the sting and poison of this great serpent, this scorpion which struck into this embodiment of YAHWEH making him vibrate as if in dissolution. It was the prophetic sign of the Zodiac fulfilled in this seed of Virgo.
* THE DECANS OF SCORPIO *
To further confirm that we have the right interpretation of this sign is this first Decan which presents the picture of the Serpent, itself, in all its gigantic proportions. In the admonition to the church of Philadelphia, the symbol of the true church is:...'hold fast to that thou hast, that no one take thy crown'. We saw in the preceding sign that there was held forth a Celestial crown for HIM who was to suffer on the cross. And here the Serpent is seen reaching for that Celestial Crown, in fact has almost reached it, and is only kept from taking it by being held fast by a manly figure grasping him firmly with both hands. Thus here is a fierce contest for the crown, and from now on the serpent becomes the universal symbol and representative of that evil spirit, hence called the Dragon, that old Serpent, the devil and Satan. It is the symbol of this evil power that these serpentine figures appear in the Constellations. The Bible everywhere as well assures us of the existence of a personal devil and destroyer, just as it everywhere describes a personal God and Redeemer. It tells us plainly from whence He comes, what He is, what power He wields, and what is to be His fate, just as it tells who The Christ is, and for what purpose He came into the world, and what is to be the results of His marvelous and complex Kingdom Administration. The doctrine of a Savior thus implies the doctrine of a destroyer, one is the counter part of the other, and belief is fundamental to the right explanation of things, as well as to our proper safety net. Men may doubt and question and treat the idea of a personal Devil as a foolish myth, but their language nevertheless betrays the unfittingness of their skepticism. This doctrine is in the oldest, worthiest and divinest records ever made for human enlightenment, and in the common belief of all nations and people from the beginning of the Adamic world. Here we have it pictured and repeated at every turn of the Starry configuration, precisely as we find it presented in the sacred Scriptures. People may make a just of it if they will, but they will find out someday that this story of the serpent is a terrible reality.
Any attentive reader of the Scriptures will observe how constantly the Redeemer of the world is represented in the attitude of a physician, a healer, a deliverer from the power of disease and death. Before He was born the prophets fore-announced HIM as the 'Sun of Righteousness who would arise with healing in His Wings'. In the New Testament He went all about Galilee preaching the Gospel of the Kingdom, and healing all manner of disease among the people, and giving demonstrations of power to make good His word, that if any would receive His teachings, and believe on HIM they would never see death, and would be raised to Life Eternal at the last day. He came that His people might have Life. This is accurately and most strikingly presented in the second Decan of Scorpio, and even in the myths connected with it.
We then have this great figure wrestling with a gigantic serpent, a disabling monster He by His superior power is holding the serpent so that He cannot take the crown. With one foot lifted from the Scorpion's tail as tho stung and hurt, he is in the act of crushing the head of the Scorpion with the other foot. He appears then as the one who has power over the serpent, over death, and is holding, disabling, and finally destroying the serpent and its seed, though Himself wounded in the conflict with them.
The Greeks called him Ophiuchus, the Serpent holder, and every characteristic in the myth found in Greece was in a sense prophetic of what should be and was, fulfilled in Jesus of Nazareth.
Still more fully is the Messianic work of the bruising of the serpents head set forth in the three Constellations belonging to this sign. For here is a mighty man down on one knee with his heel uplifted as if wounded, having a great club in one hand, and a fierce three headed monster held fast in the other while his left foot is set directly on the head of the great serpent, or dragon. Phoenicians honored this One as a Savior. Legends of HIM from Chaldea called Him Hercules, and according to mythic accounts, Hercules was the God...a begotten man, to whose tasks there was no end. From the cradle to His death he was employed in accomplishing the most difficult yet wonderful of all feats laid upon him to perform. And all in the line of vanquishing this great evil power. Some argue that the story of Hercules is a Greek invention, but this myth goes way back before the Greeks. This then is the Virgin's Son, the God begotten man. He is the ONE who came into the world to strike off the head of this great serpent. The heathens in their blindness could not understand this story, but we see how YAHWEH has been all these ages proclaiming from the starry sky the glories, labors, suffering and triumphs of His own begotten embodiment...Our Savior.
There is no character in mythology around which great and wondrous incidents crowd so thickly as around Hercules, and there is no character in the history of the world upon whom so much interest and sublime achievement centers as upon Jesus The Christ, the true delivered, with HIM was the wielding of power unknown to any other man. To kill HIM, to be rid of HIM has ever been the most intense wish of all the Serpent-Dragon brood from the time Herod sought the young child's life even unto this day.
Thus in this sign and its Constellations, and in the myths associated with them we have the precise picture presented in the text. The picture is of the promised Seed of the Woman treading on Serpents, asps, dragons, and the whole brood of venomous powers...suffering and dying in the conflict, but in the end trampling all enemies in glorious triumph beneath His feet.
We then wonder at times what is to come in this increasing conflict between right and wrong, good and bad, which we see raging around us in all things. This creeping in everywhere of scorpions and adders to sting and hurt, this twisting and hissing of serpents, and this everlasting toil, expenditures and suffering for the better which never seems to come makes us pause. A glance at these Constellations however may serve to tell us the same story as promised in the Holy Bible. There can be no deliverance without this long and oppressive struggle. Many a serpent must first be strangled, many a hydra or dragon attacked, many conflicts experienced, but Victory does come at last...God and Truth, right and good must triumph in the end. The great Ophiuchus who holds fast will not lose His crown. The Scorpion may sting the heel but the foot will crush its head. The faithful wielder of the club of righteousness may be brought to his knee, but HE shall yet lift up the instrument of His power, and the heads of this serpent will be under His heel. From old it stands written:...'Thou shalt tread upon the serpent'...then adds...'The Dragon shalt thou trample under foot'.
* THE SIGN OF SAGITTARIUS *
In the sixth lecture, the sign of Sagittarius is the subject with the accompanying Decans. This is again the double natured seed of the Virgin ...for he is both God and Man. The figure of this mighty warrior with bows and arrows riding in power, in all tongues He is the archer, the Bowman who sends forth the arrow. In form he is the Centaur, the one who pierces but now is not in connection with the Southern Cross far down toward the hidden region offering Himself as the Victim. Now he is lifted on high, stationed on the path of the Sun, Himself the Sun of Righteousness rising in His Majesty. And His arrows are aimed at the heart of the Scorpion. His war is with the whole serpent brood and His going forth is for their destruction. Just as it is declared in the Gospel, we see it displayed in this sign, that The Christ is to pierce and wound this serpent, then to disable him forever, and to destroy all his works and power.
Some of the names of stars in the sign in their meanings express the idea of graciousness and delight in connection with the action signified which we find in both the Old and New Testaments. 'Lo...I come'...swiftness is another idea included in these names expressing also:...'Behold! I come quickly, my reward is with me'. HE IS KING OF KINGS with two natures in one person, once humbled to death on the cross but now exalted to Glory. HE is the mighty warrior who rideth prosperously with the bow and arrows of truth, and judgment, ever aiming and speeding them at the heart of the foe. Never more giving over until He has carried everything to everlasting victory, when death and hades, and all the powers of the children have sunk for ever to their deserved judgment with the devil their father. The Decans in this sign further confirm what we read from it.
In this connection...with this shooting of the Almighty arrows against his enemies, when His right hand finds them out, and His wrath swallows them up; their fruit is destroyed from the earth and their seed from among the children of Adam. The 21st., Psalm introduces a special celebration of God's exalted strength in this matter, and represents all His Holy ones as singing and praising His power. The first Decan of Sagittarius then is the Constellation of Lyra, the Harp which is marked by one of the brightest stars in the Northern heavens.
* THE DECANS OF SAGITTARIUS *
The Harp is the oldest of stringed instruments, and we find it named along with the organ, or shepherds pipe 300 years before Adam died. The most renowned performer on the Harp in the classic myths is Orpheus, the particular helper of the Argonauts, whose noble ones were seeking for the Golden Fleece. This placing of the harp as the first Decan of Sagittarius connects gladness, joy, delight with this action of the great archer with his bow and arrows. This glorious archer as he appears in this sign answers to 'The Lamb' as John beheld HIM standing having sever horns, and seven eyes, meaning all the fullness of Intellectual and Spiritual power, in other words The Almighty. (Revelation 5:6) Here He is in the act of lifting the title deed of the lost inheritance, to take possession again of all that transgression (sin) has taken away. Heaven contemplated that act with awe, and grew breathless as it gazed, a thrill going thru the Universal heart of living things.
A new song broke forth from the Living Ones, and Elders around the throne of Deity, and rolled thru all the heavenly spheres till afar in the depth of space the voices of Angelic myriads took it up, and every creature in heaven, on earth, and under the earth, and upon the sea...all things in their realms heard singing:...'To Him that sitteth upon the throne, to the Lamb, be the blessings, the honor and the Glory, the dominion for the ages of ages'. This is the fulfillment of the sacred hope embodied in these words:...'Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven'.
The brightest star in the Northern heavens represents this Harp with the name of Vega (which I have told you about before), and this signifies HE shall be exalted. The Warrior thus triumphant...the very name from which our Victory has come.
In some of the old records of this Constellation you find it marked by an Eagle, the enemy of the serpent. For an Eagle darts upon his prey from heavenly heights with great suddenness and power. This Eagle is in the attitude of triumph much as the Mexican Eagle is presented Victoriously grasping the serpent in its claws. Some of the older writers have an Eagle holding the Harp, expressing triumphant song, because of the destruction of the serpent.
The second Decan in this sign is Ara...the Burning Altar. The Greeks called it Ara where as the Latins thought this a small elevation of wood or stone, or earth made for sacred purposes...thus an altar, but also a funeral pyre. In our charts the figure of an Altar covered with burning fire denotes this Constellation. Ara is on the lowest horizon of the South, the regions beyond where it was thought of as 'Outer Darkness', just as the regions toward the North Pole are thought of as the upper regions, the regions of Light and of heaven. And notice these fires of Ara burn downward toward the dark and hidden place, toward the covered and invisible South Pole. The whole significance of the name and figure connects with perdition, the complete curse, like the sending into the Lake of Fire, or the submergence into the Shekinah Light until all error is burned out.
In the Zodiac of Zendera in Egypt the figure is of a man enthroned, the name which signifies is...'the coming one'...the idea is of victory for he is thrusting the enemy into final punishment.
According to the Scriptures the spoiling of Satans kingdom by the Virgin born Son is to go forward step by step until complete overthrow and final perdition. A curse was pronounced upon him at the beginning, fore-announced that his head should be bruised under the heel of the promised Seed of the Woman who is Israel. Altho the serpent is as a strong man armed, still a stronger than he is to come and take his armor and subdue all things unto HIMSELF.
John in his vision heard the heavens resounding with song;...'now is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom and the power for the accuser of our brethren, this great dragon, that old serpent is cast down'. John also saw a messenger from heaven laying hold on this serpent, binding him and casting him into the abyss until finally he is cast into the Lake of Fire. What we find written in the Book is identical with what is pictured on the heavens in connection with Sagittarius. The third Decan belongs to the sign of the Bowman.
Now;...one of the most famous mythological creations in the history of human thought is this serpentine monster called the Dragon. This serpent or Dragon is the Universal symbol of evil. The Serpent stands for that form of the evil one in which cunning, deceit, and subtlety are characteristics. The Dragon represents the same power, armed, defiant, and putting forth in imperial forms and destroying by force. The serpent is the sly and creeping deceiver, smoothly gliding in to betray, destroying by stealth. The Dragon is the oppressor assailing with teeth and claws, armed all over with spikes, spouting fire, and fury, and rushing upon its prey with energy. The Serpent and the Dragon are one and the same, only in different modes of manifestation. Thus the Devil is called...'The Dragon, that old Serpent', whenever the power of evil is clothed in political sovereignty, persecuting tyrannizing and oppressing, it is always the Dragon or some figure of destruction answering to it.
Among all nations we find this image...Chinese and Japanese legends and art are super-abounding with it. The pages of the classic poets of Greece and Rome teem with it. We find it in the religious books, traditions and ideas of men of all classes, in all sections of the world, in all ages. It is in the Old Testament, in the Apocrypha, and in the New Testament. Christians, Jews, and heathens, civilized and savage, the Teutons, Scandinavians and the Celts of Europe...all as well as the myriads of Asia, and the remotest Isles of the sea alike have it, and connect with it the same family of ideas. Everywhere the vanquishing of this monster is the work of gods, heroes, and Saints.
Many have wondered how an imagination obtained this Universal hold over the human mind. All men talk of the dragon, and adopt it into all their religion, heraldry and art as the symbol of some well known reality. So where did it all come from? Go back to the Gospel in the Stars and there is the Serpent in all forms of manifestation, and particularly the Dragon would about at lest one half of the Northern sky, his tail alone extending over territory of 'the third part of the stars'. Here is all his various shapes but here also is the Divine Hero, armed with bow and arrows, riding like St. George, and aiming his weapons at the heart of that which the Dragon represents. Here is all his various shapes, and attributes, and the Great Son of the Virgin...who reveals his destruction, and goes forth to make an utter end of this terrible beast. In all ages this image has been before the eyes of men in this primeval Astronomy, pictorially portraying in the stars the very ideas that figure so conspicuously in their myths and traditions. And this, and only this, is the true original of all these ethnic conceptions, the true original by inspiration given.
When Sagittarius goes forth in war against the enemy to complete upon him the curse, to make all clear and unmistakable, the great Constellation of the Dragon is added as a third explanatory side-piece denoting exactly who it is that the Mighty Administration strikes; thus waking all the triumphant songs of heaven. It is the final fall of the Dragon power before the arrows of the invincible Warrior Seed of the Woman. It is the ultimate victory fore-announced.
In the Book of Revelation John beheld a great Red Dragon having seven heads, ten horns upon its head, whose tail was drawing along the third of the stars of heaven. He stood before the Woman eager to devour her child as soon as born; but in spite of him that child was caught away to God and to His throne. There was a war in Heaven; Michael and his Angels warred with the Dragon who was cast down; and all his Angels with him. Then the great voice of heaven, the great adversary was conquered, and cast down to earth. For while his persecutions continued on earth until the crowned warrior on the white horse came, destroying his armies, chaining him in the abyss and confining him finally to the Lake of Fire. Revelation 12:19-20.
The Psalmist sings:...'God is my King of old, working salvation in the midst of the earth, breaking the heads of the Dragons in the waters, breaking the heads of Leviathan in pieces'. Psalm 74. Isaiah also refers to him, calling for all people of God to sing when that day arrives. Isaiah 26:27.
When we lay these for-showings of the Prophets alongside these pictures in the stars, who can question that we have one and the same story in both? The name of this Constellation is Draco...The Dragon, the trodden on. The chief star had several Ancient names such as...'Who is to be destroyed?' ...or 'The Reptile'. This was the Pole star from four to six thousand years ago answering to the Scriptural designation of Satan as god, and prince of this world. To this day this star is still observed as a very important star to nautical men of commerce upon the seas, just as this Dragon power still largely prevails.
The second star of this Constellation is in meaning...'head of the subtle', and the third star is:...'the long serpent, the Dragon', and another is:....'the punished enemy'. Roots of these words are contained in the Hebrew Scriptures, where they are used in the senses given here.
Mythology says the Dragon is the power that guarded the Golden Apples in the famous Garden of the Hesperides, hindering men from getting there. Is this not the devil, the old serpent, the dragon who has thrust himself in to keep mortal men from the fruits of 'The Tree of Life?'
Mythology says this Dragon was slain by Hercules, but is not Hercules the Astronomical sign of the promised seed of the Woman, the ONE to come as the Serpent Bruiser, who stands pictured in this Constellation with HIS foot on the head of the Dragon?
These signs in the heavens are but another version of what was written by the prophets and set forth in the Scriptures as the true and only hope of man. 'Most wondrous Book...the author God Himself. The subject...God... man..salvation, life and death, Eternal Life. On every line marked with the seal of His High Divinity, and every leaf bedewed with drops of Love Divine, and with the Eternal Heraldry and Signature of God Almighty stamped from first to last'.
* THE SIGN OF CAPRICORNUS *
These twelve signs of the Solar Zodiac divide themselves into three distinct groups, each with its own distinct subjects. These first four signs...Virgo, Libra, Scorpio, and Sagittarius relate to the Person, work and triumph of the Redeemer. The next group consists of Capricornus, Aquarius, Pisces, and Aries, with their Decans which relate to the fruits of His work, and mediatorship, the condition and destiny of His Church. That body of people spiritually born to HIM thru their Faith, and made partakers of the benefits of His redemptive Administration. The last group relates to the final consummation of the whole in the United Glory of the Redeemer, and the Redeemed, and the exalted condition of things which consummation is to realize.
Now; this middle group starts with Capricornus the picture of the figure half goat and half fish. If this seems strange remember Virgo where the Son of Virgo is likened to a Seed,...of what? And that this Seed had to fall into the ground and die in order to reach its intended fruitfulness and the fruitfulness arises directly out of such falling and dying. This then is the message:...The Messiah was to die as a sacrifice, for His congregation of saved ones. As Words worth expressing it:..'He who compared Himself to a grain of wheat which would be buried by the unbelief of the Jews would fruitify in the Faith of His people'. As the Phoenix was said to arise out of the ashes of its consumed predecessor, so the congregation of the Saints rises out of the death of The Christ sacrificed for the sins of the world. This is everywhere the teaching of the Scriptures, and as we translate this idea into the imagery of the fifth sign of the Zodiac we find another very graphic and much older picture of precisely the same thing.
First; we have here the figure of a goat, a sacrificial animal. Thus:... 'Take ye a kind of a goat for a sin offering'. (Leviticus 9:31) Then we see the goat fallen down in the attitude of dying. His one leg is doubled under his body, and the other is powerless to lift him up. His head is drooping, and thus sinking in death, this is also the identical of the falling and dying of The Christ as the sin offering. It is thus the same Seed of the Woman (Israel) in the condition of a sacrifice for sin. Christ was surely 'Wounded for our transgressions' and 'bruised for our iniquities'. For the transgression of 'My People' was HE stricken as the head of the flock, he suffered in their stead and laid down His life in sacrifice that we might live. Here we find it written in the stars from the earliest ages, and with a vividness of pictorial representation which no one can contemplate without realizing that the picture is intensely striking. The name in this sign also points to the same thought and significance. The most prominent stars in Hebrew, Arabic, and Syriac mean...'the cut off...the hewn down... the sacrifice slain'. Even the sign itself...Capricornus means not only the goat, but Atonement, sinking or bowed in death. We have in this sign then the symbol of 'Sacrificial death' which is the exact idea of the text.
Now; there is also something else here, another kind of life developed out of this sacrificial death, is cojoined with it. The body of the fallen and dying goat terminates in the body and tail of a vigorous fish. The living fish thus takes its being out of the dying goat, and has all this life and vigor from thence. The Coptic name of this sign signifies the station or mansion of bearing. In addition to the falling and dying it is the sign also of a mystic procreation, a bringing forth. What is then brought forth is a fish which is again a familiar and well understood sacred symbol. When Jesus called and Appointed his first ministers, He said:...'I will send Vision of the Holy waters the word was:..'And there shall be a very great multitude of fish, because these waters shall come hither'. (Ezekiel 47:1-9)
Christ then speaks of His saved ones as 'born of water' (John 3:5) and in both the Testaments 'fishes' stand as symbols of His people, followers of His way. Fishes signify regenerated people, those brought back thru the Gospel, by Messianic Salvation. The Early Christians called the believers Pisces or fishes. The Mystic Divine fish who in the water of Baptism begats the multitude of fishes, or this congregation of His people. Thus YAHSHUA.. The Christ is the sacrificial goat for sin offering, and the begetter of a body of reborn men, from which we get the church and congregation of the quickened and the saved. The Scripture answers exactly to the figure in this sign of the dying goat developed into a fish body. Thus the great New Testament doctrine of the Mystical union of believers with their Savior is here most significant. As men are reproductions and perpetuators of Adam, and live their life, so Christ's people are the reproductions and perpetuators of Christ, living His life. They are in Him as the branch is in the vine. They are repeatedly called His body, and His flesh, and His bones. So close and real is their life connection and incorporation with HIM that they are in a sense sometimes called Christed. What could better symbolize this than the sign we have been describing of this goat and fish, they are one, the life of the dying reproduced and continued in a spiritual product which is part of one and the same body. The goat of sacrifice sinks into a new creation which is yet an organic part of itself. The image may seem grotesque and has no prototype in nature, but it is true and graphic. The forgiveness and regeneration of Adamic man, and their incorporation with the Christ is something wholly above nature, something miraculous, which could not be adequately signified by any natural symbol. So as the double nature of the Redeemer Himself was denoted by an arbitrary figure half horse and half man, so the relationship between HIM as the sin-bearer and His saved people who live by virtue of His death is denoted by this figure of a dying goat and a living fish. It is not in the power of human genius or imagination to devise another figure capable of setting forth more simply and truly the great and glorious mystery seen here on the stars.
Pagan myths concerning this sign all have some of the story as you understand the picture in the heavens. But unto the children of the Kingdom is given the ability of understanding the picture in the heavens. The great Spiritual Truth, such as we see, the literal death of one being issuing in the Spiritual Life of their beings of whose new Life...'He is the Life'. It is:...Christ in one case sacrificed and His people mystically resurrected to newness of life in the other. But along with this goes a reflex which is important for us to observe, as it brings out some of the deep practical spiritualities of True Faith.
Of course the rising of the fishes out of the dying goat implies the literal Resurrection of The Christ Himself as the begetter and giver of this spiritual resurrection to His people. For if He did not rise, then no preaching or believing would avail to bring us to life, which is Salvation. But as we rise to spiritual life thru the power of His Resurrection, so there is also implied a dying with Him in order to rise with Him: for there is no resurrection where there has been no dying. We look for a resurrection of the body because there is first a death of the body. And as YAHWEH'S people are partakers of a mystic or spiritual resurrection there has gone before it a corresponding death, but from this death comes new life thru and in Christ...thus two fold.
It is first a deadness in sin-existence indeed, but morally and spiritually a mere carcass with no life, standing to the law, or any practical spiritual life toward God and Heaven. A life that is nothing but spiritual death and corruption under sentence of death. In the next place it is death to sin, both as to its penalty and power, a cessation of the mere carnal life, and of further existence under condemnation.
Now; the great offering, thru the seed of the Woman, and His sacrificial offering of Himself is to remove our sins, to bring death to this old life in sin and death, and to teach and train up the new man who is renewed after the image of Christ's own resurrection, and which has a better knowledge of True Holiness. Thus we die to the death-penalty which holds us here in carnal life, and in the atoning sacrifice we put it clean off of us forever. By this atoning sacrifice of Christ as we accept Him once more, and believe in Him as Our Savior, Our Redeemer, Our Hope, there is now life and active power is available for us as the Apostle was to say:..'How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein? Know ye not that so many of us as were baptised into Jesus Christ were baptised into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death, so that like as The Christ we are raised up from the dead by the Glory of the Father even so we also should walk in newness of life. Knowing this that our old man is crucified with HIM, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin, for he that is dead is freed from sin. (Romans 6:2-7)
This then is the meaning of this heavenly picture. The Seed of the Woman takes our death penalty on Himself, and dies a sacrifice for our sins, then out of His death he springs up in Resurrection and Power in which HIS people rise with HIM by being brought to know and to accept the Truth, and to follow His teachings in hope of a still further rising into immortal Glory. Thus we behold much fruit rising from the Seed of Wheat falling to the ground and dying. And the Accompanying Decans bear this out.
* THE DECANS OF SAGITTARIUS *
The first Decan is Sagitta the shot or killing arrow. It appears naked and alone. It appears to have left the bow and is speeding to its victim. It is a heavenly arrow, and He who shoots it is invincible. There is a majesty and mystery about it which startles and awes. It is the death arrow of Almighty Justice which goes forth from the throne against all unrighteousness and sin. It is the arrow of Divine Justice and condemnation upon sin piercing thru the body and soul of the meek..Lamb of God..who agreed to bear our sins and answer for them.
In the 38th., Psalm we have this very arrow of God sticking fast in the body of this mysterious sufferer, wounding his flesh and completely overshadowing HIM. He is troubles and bowed down, as under a crushing burden, not only is he the persecuted object of some mens hatred, but shut up within the strong bars of Divine Judgment. It was Divine Grace which prepared and shot the arrow against the blameless ONE, but taking the place of the sinners then there was no holding back because He came into the world to die for it. His steps then daily led him to this climax as he looked onward to the harvest that was being sown among the tares. It would seem almost as if the song of the Psalmist had been copied direct from what is pictured in the heavens.
This arrow covers a further idea much as sharp and hurtful words which are compared to arrows. Isaiah speaks of:...'The arrow or the word'. This wounding and killing arrow enters into mens souls and makes them humble so they may come to Life in Christ. The death of Christ for our sins also takes the form of a word, preaching, testimony, and argument, even the preaching of the cross, to kill the life of sin, and to cause men to die unto it so that the very arrow of sovereign justice which drank up the Life of Christ as our substitute, then passes thru Him to pierce, also those who live in sin cost HIM all this humiliation and pain; also killing them to that ill and condemned life that they may live the Christ life as His renewed, justified and redeemed children. This arrow fills out precisely the same idea which we find symbolized in the sign of Capricornia. The second Decan adds to the certainty of the meaning. This is the Constellation of Aquila, the pierced, wounded and falling Eagle. This is but another picture of the grain of wheat falling and dying. The name of the principal star means:..'the wounded'. The second star meaning is:.. 'covered with blood'. While another means 'wounded in the heel'. Pagan wisdom did not know what it meant, altho they held it in great regard, but we find much mythology surrounding it. The Eagle is one of the Biblical symbols of YAHWEH....'Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians and how I bare you on Eagle's wings and brought you unto myself'. (Exodus 19:4) And 'As and Eagle stirreth up her nest and fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings and taketh them, beareth them on her wings; so the LORD alone did lead them'. (Deuteronomy 32:11-12)
The Eagle is a Royal bird, the natural enemy of the serpent. It is elevated in its habits being strong and swift. It is very careful and tender toward its young, and is said to tear itself, to nourish them with its own blood when all other means fail. Here is the Noble Eagle, this promised seed of the Woman, torn and bleeding that those begotten in His image may be saved from death, sheltered, protected and made to live forever. But as in the case of the arrow so also in this case, the figure will admit the further idea which takes in the proud sinner, pierced by the arrow of the word and brought down into the humiliation of penitence, even death and despair as to all his former hopes in himself. And until the high soaring children of the bride are thus brought down by the arrow of God's Word, and fall completely out of the heaven of their dreams to admit that without Christ's death for them, there can be no right life. The Third Decan of this sign is the beautiful cluster of little stars named Delphinus. It is the figure of a vigorous fish leaping upward. Taken in connection with the dying goat of sacrifice it conveys the idea of springing up again out of death. Our great sin bearer not only died for our sins but He also rose again becoming 'The first fruits of them that slept'. As Head of His church, He is the principal fish in the congregation of fishes. Their quickening life and spiritual resurrection rests on His coming forth again after having tasted death for their sake. Put to death in the flesh, He was quickened by the Spirit, and in His quickening and Resurrection all HIS people share. Their sins have been buried in His death, their life is by virtue of His Resurrection, that 'like as He was raised from the dead, so we should walk in the newness of Life', ever advancing toward a still more complete Resurrection to come. The picture of the dying goat with its after part a living fish implies this, but the nature of the translation could not be so well expressed in that figure by itself. Hence the additional explanatory figure of an uprising fish, to show more clearly the translation by means of Resurrection...into new life!
In Ancient mythology the Dolphin was the most sacred and honored of fishes, doubtless because of its place among the Ancient Constellations, though the myths representing it are very different. But HIS sign as the head of his people was placed in the heavens where it stands as another form of the parables of the buried wheat rising in New Life of which all who are His are partakers.
Capricornus is thus the bearer of witness of a most vital Truth. That the pure and sinless body of YAHWEH (God) having assumed our nature for the purpose, did truly take the sins of the world upon Himself, and bore the agonies of death as the sacrifice for our guilt. What ever difficulty human reason may have in receiving it, still it is the very heart and substance of the Gospel message. 'Thus it is written'...and thus it behooved The Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day that repentance and remission of sins might be preached in HIS name (Luke 24:46-47). 'This first of all'...Paul preached and Christians received and held, 'How Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and the HE was buried, and HE rose again the third day'. (I Corinthians 15:3-4) 'For as much as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, He also himself likewise took of the same, that thru death He might destroy him that had the power of death, that is the devil. And deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage'. (Hebrews 2:14-15)
It is most cheering and confirmatory to our Faith to see, and to know that what Prophets and Apostles have been testifying on earth, the heavens themselves have been proclaiming for all these ages. How assuring to know that what we build our hopes on now is the same that the Patriarchs from Adam's time built their hopes on. They believed and expected, and hung their faith and testimony on the stars, that in the fullness of time this Seed of the Woman would come and bow Himself in death as the sin offering for a guilty world, then rise again in Life and Fruitfulness of saving Virtues, whereby HIS people should rise with HIM sharing at once the merits of HIS Atonement and the power of HIS Resurrection, and thus live and reign in inseparable union with Himself in life and Glory Everlasting. Every September Midnight of every year for all these centuries has displayed the sign of it in the middle of the sky, and held it forth to the eyes of mortals as the blessed hope and only refuge of a condemned world, at the same time that it marks the point of change in year and climate, and when darkness is the greatest, opens the Southern gateway of the Sun. Yet this strange goat fish dying in its head, but living in its after part, falling as an Eagle, pierced and wounded by the arrow of death, but springing up from the dark waves with the matchless vigor and beauty of the Dolphin...sinking into sin condemnation but rising again as the conqueror of sin, and heralding a new springtime out of December’s long and dreary nights, this was framed by no blind chance of man. The story which it tells is the old, old story on which hangs the only hope which the Adamic Race clings to. Thru the dying Seed of the Woman we must see our sin-bearer, and the Atonement for out guilt. Thus in His death and blood shedding we must find our life, the true life which alone is life, the only Life we can ever have.
* THE SIGN OF AQUARIUS *
THE LIVING WATERS!!! 'If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink'. (John 7:37)
One of the most important things in our world next to light, is water. It is the symbol of life giving purity, and regenerating power of Divine Grace and Salvation according to sacred writers.
When Moses spoke of God's Grace to Israel he said:...'My doctrine shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distill as the dew, as the small rain upon the tender herb, and as the showers upon the grass'. Then in the New Testament....He Himself discoursed to the woman of Samaria of the Saving Grace as 'Living Waters'...water which slacks all thirst forever. In the explanation by our Primeval Patriarchs of those signs hung upon the heavens, as everlasting witnesses of God's purpose to be achieved thru the Seed of the Woman, we would expect to find some great prominence given to this symbol.
Here in this sign of Aquarius is a man with a great Urn upon his arm from which he is pouring out from the heavens a stream of water which flows with all the volume of a swollen river. Some mythology portrays him as carried by an Eagle, and sometimes he is pictured as ministering drinks to an Eagle out of the bowl he carries.
In Ancient times, Aquarius was the LORD Jesus cut off in early manhood, but Divinely lifted up again into the heavens, and there He is pouring out the very 'River' of Life. The Urn He holds is the exhaustless reservoir of all the fullness of renewing, comforting and sanctifying power. And the turning of that Urn so that its contents can flow down into the world below is precisely the picture of the fullness of those old prophetic promises:.. 'I will pour water upon him who is thirsty, and floods upon dry ground'.... 'I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophecy, and your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions'. (Isaiah 44:3....Joel 2:28) The meaning of the principal star in this sign means:...'The record of the outpouring'. Remember when The Christ was about to leave the world He said to His followers:...'It is expedient for you that I go away, or the comforter will not come to you, but if I depart I will send him (the Holy Spirit) unto you, and he will guide you into all truth'. This promise included all the Divine power, and life issuing from the embodiment of God for the illumination, regeneration, all the renewing, cleansing, comforting, and energizing Grace for the gathering of the elect, the bringing of the believers to Eternal Life and Glory. This Holy Ghost is the Holy Spirit, and a new surge came the day of Pentecost. When the Jews mocked and derided these receivers of the Holy Spirit, the explanation was that Jesus being raised from the dead, and now sitting in power and authority in the heavens was now the giver, and sender of this marvelous power the Apostles and Disciples received at Pentecost.
Wherever the Scripture represents the Spirit of the Grace of God, under the imagery of water, the idea of unfailing supply and great abundance is also invariably connected with it. Sometimes it is pictured as a plentiful rain, sometimes as a great fountain, and sometimes as a great river flowing with fullness that supplies a thousand life-giving rivers. 'I will open rivers in the high places, and fountains in the midst of the valleys. I will make the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry land..springs of water'. This denotes the plentiful supply of the WORD, the Eternal blessedness flowing from Christ, who is the fountain.
Here in this sign from the Urn of Aquarius flows a vast, constant great river. It flows in a bending stream both to the Eastward and to the Westward and enlarges as it flows. Both the imagery of the Scriptures and the imagery of this sign are exactly the same, and the reason for the coincidence is that both were meant to record and set forth the same Glorious Truths.
* THE DECANS OF AQUARIUS *
Carrying this further....in the first Decan of Aquarius are the fishes which receive the Holy Spirit. Here the fish are drinking in this stream which is pouring out of this Urn. Here as Jesus pours out the water which quenches all thirst, the fish come gladly to the stream to drink of the heavenly waters. A vigorous life is thus sustained and expanded by means of the stream.
In symbolism of the Scripture, the moon sometimes denotes the mother of the family, such as in Joseph's dream (Genesis 37), and both the woman and the moon are representatives of the church. As the woman was made out of the side of Adam, so the church was made out of Christ by means of that death which came upon Him, for a purpose, and He submitted for this purpose. The whole Mystery of this Marriage is the symbol of Union between The Christ and His people, the church being this spiritual center of His Kingdom. Ephesians 5:23-32. (church means....congregation! a people! Never does it mean a denominational building)
The congregation of His people is pictured as the spouse of Christ, the spiritual mother of us all. And all true members of this church are transformed persons, made over again by the power of a new spiritual creation, and living a new life super-added to nature. It is by this spiritual connection that we make our escape from the power and dominion of the Devil. It is by this transformation that we have our status and relations in the heavenly economy and kingdom to be established 'In earth as it is in heaven'.
Today this light comes faintly thru the dark and murky atmosphere and a pagan world; but wherever we get sight of a distinct ray it easily resolves back into the figures of the primeval Constellations, and into the sacred story of redemption...thru the promised Seed of the Woman. The second Decan of Aquarius is the figure of a great horse pushing forward with full speed, with great wings springing from his shoulders (Isaiah 65:5 signifies that this figure is a swift Divine messenger bringing joy to those whom he meets. The Greeks called this figure, the horse of the gushing fountain, the Celestial horse associated with the glad song and he is called...Pegasus.
In the first chapter of Zechariah the appearances of such horses are the symbols of those who God hath sent to walk to and fro from thru the earth, not simply to see and report the conditions of affairs, but to shake and disturb nations so as to restore Liberty, Peace, and Blessings to God's people. Pegasus in not precisely one of these horses, or all of them combined in one, but still a somewhat corresponding Ambassador of God. Pegasus is winged; he moves with heavenly speed, and the first part of his riders name means:...'the chief', and the latter not only means a horse but also swiftly coming or returning. Thus the Chief coming forth again in great victory, and with good tidings and blessings unto those to whom he has come.
The Ancient names of the stars which make up this Constellation are:... 'The returning', and He who goeth and returneth..the branch...the Waters, and HE who causeth the plenteous overflow. The names show to what the picture applies.
The true Pegasus then is the herald and bringer of Christ's success and salvation to a famishing world, which the Patriarchs looked for from the beginning, and which they thus figured in the Constellations in advance as a witness of what was to come thru and by that 'Coming One' in whom all their hopes were centered.
The final Decan of Aquarius agrees also with this presentation. It is one of the most interesting and beautiful of the Constellations, both in it's natural and evangelic references. The Swan has at least 81 stars, and has at least five double stars and one quadruple. The binary star, Cygni is the most remarkable star in the heavens. It is one of the nearest to our system of the fixed stars. It consists of two connected stars which are moving very fast. This Constellation has a number of distinct systems in itself, and Astronomers regard it as the immediate link between the planetary worlds and the nebulous stars. It has in it specimens of both, and lies in the midst of the Great Galactic stream of nebulous stars. It is therefore remarkable and suited to represent that peculiar and complex economy, partly celestial and partly terrestrial, partly acting by itself, and partly dependent on the heavenly powers by which Grace and Salvation are carried and ministered to the children of men.
The figure in this Constellation...The Swan...is a Lordly bird, king of the waters in all ages, and in all refined countries considered the emblem of poetic Dignity, Purity and Grace.
The White Dove of Scripture is the emblem of the Holy Spirit, and the elegant, pure and graceful Swan is a fitting emblem of He who...in dying sends forth the glad river of Living waters, and presides in HIS Majesty over the administration over them, to the thirsty children of Adam in earth. The Swan is...on the wing...in the act of flight, circling and then returning. It seems to be flying down the Milky Way, in the general direction with the river which pours from the heavenly Urn. The principal stars which mark the wings and the length of the body form a large and beautiful cross, the most regular of all the cross's formed by the Constellation. It is a bird of matchless beauty bearing aloft the cross and circling with it over the blessed waters of life. The meaning of the name of its stars are:...'the judge to come'...'He who goes and returns'...and 'He who returns as in a circle'. In this Zodiacal Aquarius we then have the picture in the stars of the heavenly waters of Life and Salvation; for their source is the seed of the Woman...slain indeed, but risen and lifted up in Everlasting Glory. And this Holy Spirit symbolized as water flows down into a dry and thirsty world bringing joyous life to those who drink of it.
This Constellation is a beautiful picture of the Gospel truths interpreted by men fully informed of these glorious facts. The Primeval Patriarch's understood and explained which has come to pass, and is part of our Faith. HE did come in the flesh and lived a human life, He did suffer and die a violent death on account of sin which He assumed, but which was in no degree chargeable to Him. He did rise from death by the power of the Eternal Spirit changed, and glorified and moved beyond all reach of enemies in the calm heavens where no revolutions of time can any more obscure HIS brightness or eclipse the outshining of His Glory. He is there as LORD OF LIFE and GRACE where He sends out like a river His Holy Spirit for the comfort, cheer and salvation of those who believe in HIM. He has thus embedded the great doctrine of HIS cross and passion thus:...'if any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink'.
* THE SIGN OF PISCES *
THE MYSTIC FISHES......Yahshua taught by acts, as well as words. He gave out parables in deeds as well as in stories and descriptions. All his works of wonder were living allegories, pictures and prophecies incarnated in visible and tangible facts. This is particularly true of the miracle to which this text refers:...(John 21:6), 'And he said unto them, cast the net on the right side of the ship, and ye shall find. They cast therefore, and now they were unable to draw it for the multitude of fishes'. Then He also said:...'the kingdom of heaven is likened unto a net that was cast into the sea, and gathered every kind which when it was full they drew to shore and sat down and gathered the good ones into a vessel, but cast the bad away'. As Jesus commanded Peter to launch out into the deep and let the nets down until they were loaded, and both boats were soon full to the sinking point with fish. He meant to show the Disciples not only his divine power, but a picture of that mystic fishing He would soon send them on. It is established in the symbolical and in Scripture that the congregation (of Israel) are likened to fishes enclosed in the Great Fisherman's Net. The WORD is likened to a sea in which natural man ranges without control, following their own likes and impulses. The Gospel is thus likened to a net to gather men, to secure them for Christ where they may be held by His word and Grace, and be His peculiar possession. When secured they are His mystic fishes, caught by His command and direction and are His peculiar property. As this picture unfolds in the scripture we find it was first in the Constellations. The New Life which rises out of the death of the sacrificial goat is in the form of a large and vigorous fish. Since the people of the kingdom are the most important result of the embodiment of redemptive work and achievements of the Seed of the Woman, we have one of the twelve signs of the Zodiac specially and exclusively devoted to it, and that sign is the sign of 'the fishes' which we are now to consider. This Constellation of Pisces is seventh in the original order of the Zodiac. Here are the two large fish, one headed toward the North pole and the other toward or parallel with the path of the sun. They are some distance apart but are tied to the two ends of a long undulating band or ribbon which is held by the foot of 'The Ram' in the next succeeding sign. The name of this sign in Hebrew, Arabic, Greek, Latin and English is:... 'the fishes'. In Syriac it is:..'the fish prolonged', the fish with the idea of posterity, or successive generations. In Coptic the name is... 'the fish congregation, or company of the coming Prince.'
From all indications connected with Pisces and to the Constellations Decans we thus come to the conclusion that in these two great fishes we are to see and read precisely what was symbolized by The Christ in the miracle to which the text refers; namely this is a pictorial representation of the true church and its congregation. Mythology carries many stories but strip them of the paganism, and you find that this refers to Christ and His church. Christ is the first fruit born of every creature (Col. 1:15), and is the head of the general assembly, and this church of the first born, who thru His uniting LOVE combines the elements of humanity unto union with Himself, bringing into being the Mystic Woman, born of spirit and water which is a part of HIS own Mystic body.
This sign of the fishes was thus Divinely framed and placed in the heavens to commemorate this transformation and deliverance by water, this symbol of the Holy Spirit poured out by our Father. There are then two fishes in this picture, the general idea expressed is however a multitude. The true church is always a little flock, a special elect called out from the great body of mankind, just as the fishes are inclosed in a net they are but a small portion of the myriads that are in the world. To Abraham it was figured as stars of the sky and as the sands of the seashore... proclaiming a multitude. To Ezekiel the sacred waters embraced 'a great multitude of fish'. The very name carries in it the idea of multitude, and the duplication...a glorious company of Apostles, Prophets, Martyrs, the church then the spiritual center of the kingdom, and all children of the kingdom in the congregation. But beyond this, the church is twofold, because there was a church, and a congregation before The Christ, and there is a church since The Christ, and the two make up one Universal church. The Ancient Hebrews always considered the people of Israel as the kingdom and the fish. The Sethites, and Shemites are the race who were adherents to the true God and His promises, and worship, and were both themselves and by the heathens Astronomically associated with these fishes. Thus the congregation of the Old Testament is the church or congregation of the New Testament. One great congregation of the promised 'Seed' of the Woman. The Faith of both is the same, the life of both is the same. The Old Testament church was the Fish arising out of the slain sacrifice believed in advance and signified in the old ordinances; and the new church or congregation organized under The Christ is the Fishes arising afresh out of the same, which has now become an accomplished existing reality.
The whole thing was thus fore-signified in the stars under the image of 'two fishes' in which they are indeed 'two' under one method of conception, and yet One and the same in another method of conception. It is the ONE fish in both, yet two fishes in historic presentation and external dispensation.
* THE DECANS OF PISCES *
The Decans of this sign serve to bring out this idea with great clearness. The first Decan is the long waving ribbon or Band, its Ancient name is...'the band or bridle.' It is one continuous unbroken piece with one end around the tail of the Northern Fish, and the other Fish is fastened in the same way. They are tied together so that one cannot get along without the other. So the Patriarchial assembly is tied to the Christian assembly. The Epistle to the Hebrews tells us that the Ancient saints, from Adam onward could not be made perfect without us. (Chapter 11:40) The consummation of all the Adamic Race hoped for was inevitably tied up with what was to be subsequently achieved by The Christ. Much of which is still a matter of promise and hope. Thus the true Christian church of today is tied to the Patriarchial church. All the necessary preparations and foundations for Christianity were vouched for thru the Old Testament, and what was then testified, believed and looked for we must now accept, believe and absorb.
Today the Christian does not stand just where the Ancient believers stood, but the old was the bridge by which the new was reached. Christ came not to destroy the law and the Prophets but to fulfill them, to complete what they looked to and anticipated. There could not be a Christian church without the Patriarchial going before it, just as there could be no Patriarchial church without the Christian coming after it to complete and fulfill what the old was meant to prepare for. And here is the band of connection unalterably binding them together in a unity which still is dual. The double part of the band, strange to say, is in the hand or front foot of the symbolic figure in the next sign...The Ram or the Lamb. Thus both belong to Christ in the attitude then of reigning and victorious Lamb. He upholds, guides, governs them by one of the same bands. They are now 'caught' fishes, no longer roaming at large according to their own Will, they are bound together in the hand of the Glorious Lamb.
The next Decan...the friend and protector of these fishes is a figure of a Glorious King wearing His Royal Robe, bearing aloft a branch or scepter, and having on His head a Crown of Stars. He is calmly seated in the repose of power, with one foot on the solstitial course, and the other on the Pole star itself, while his right hand grasps the ribbons. Understanding what the Scriptures tells of the exaltation and Glory of Jesus Christ, we find the picture in the heavens self-interpreted.
For further assurance on the subject we find the meaning of the star names on the right shoulder of this figure is:...'quickly returning'..In the girdle is one meaning...'the redeemer'. In the left knee of Cephus is another star meaning:...'the shepherd'. And the name Cephus is another indication for it means 'the royal branch...the king'. Thus again:...here is the SEED of the Woman now clothed with celestial royalty and dominion. In the Ancient Zodiac of Zendera the same story appears, it was predicted of him of old that:..'He shall bear the glory, and shall rule upon HIS throne' (Zechariah 6:13)
The third Decan of this sign is a picture of a beautiful woman with fetters upon her wrists and ankles, and fastened down so as to be unable to rise. This woman in the Decan is the same as the fishes in the sign. The changes of the image argues no change in the subject. Greek mythology calls this woman Andromeda....man-ruler. Here we discover this woman (Israel) is to be appointed to rule, and to have guardianship over man.. When Peter wished to know what he and his fellow Disciples were to have by way of compensation for having forsaken everything to follow The Christ the blessed Master said:...'Ye which have followed me, in the regeneration ...when the Son of Man shall sit on His throne of Glory, ye shall also sit upon twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel (Matthew 19:28). Paul then spoke to the Corinthians as of a well understood fact:...' Do ye not know that the Saints shall judge the world?'. (I Corinthians 6:21) Thus He has washed us from our sins in His own blood but 'he hath made us kings and priests unto YAHWEH (God) (Revelation 1:5-6) The true people of God are the elect kings of the future age. Even now...already they are embodiments and bearers of the heavenly kingdom and dominion upon earth. Thus the word goes forth for the governing of men, and the regulation of their hearts and lives, and the bringing of them under a new spiritual dominion, so that none ever come to forgiveness and Glory except they come into submission to the truth, to the teaching of the true church as portrayed in the heavens.
This Mystic woman ...Andromeda...is in chains, bound hand and foot. She is described by a star meaning:...' the broken down'...'the weak'..or the 'afflicted or chained'. She is Israel in the world, and the world powers try to destroy her, thus she is pictured as bound hand and feet. But the time will come when the bands shall be broken and that exposure to affliction in the world will be over. She is engaged in a war with the powers of darkness, and the children of darkness keep her chained. For the present she cannot move, she is bound to the hard cold and ponderous rock of this earthly life. Born to reign with her redeeming LORD she is within the sacred territory, but it is as yet a place of captivity and bonds. Among the Ancients the Zodiacal Pisces was considered the most unfavorable of all the signs, for here is pictured, dislike and hatred chained, for the world order tries to destroy the symbolic fishes. The world does not like the idea that there are some elect who are to rule them.
* THE SIGN OF ARIES *
THE BLESSED OUTCOME....(Revelation 5:12)
'Worthy is the Lamb that was slain, to receive power and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honor and glory and blessings'. This is the myriad voiced response of the heavenly world to the signs in the heaven. As the Son of Man He represented the one who stood as the head and Prince of the flock, the Lamb that was slain. He is pure, meek, and sacrificial character of the Scripture:...'The Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world'. In His exaltation He is represented as 'The Lamb in the midst of the Throne'. In the administrations of judgment upon the wicked world He is contemplated as the Lamb, whose wrath is unbearable. As the Bridegroom and Husband of Israel and the church He is also the Lamb to whose marriage supper the Gospel calls us to. As the keeper of the Book of Life in which the names of the Saints are written, the Lifter of the title-deed of our inheritance, and the mystery of the breaker of the seals by which the earth is purged of usurpers, and the Mystery of God is completed. In whatever attitude He appears back of it all He is still...THE LAMB!!! The mystic stories concerning the sign of Aries still further identifies HIM with the Lamb of the Text. The legends of the Constellations also bears out the stories of the prophecies touching on the beliefs of the Promised Seed of the Woman, and his connections with his people who HE purchased with his blood. The Ancient Egyptians held a sacred feast to the Ram upon the entrance of the sun into this sign Aries. The Ancient Persians also had a similar festival of Aries. When taken in relation to the Scriptures we see the great expectancy of the deliverance of His people. It is when the Lamb thus comes upon the throne and appears for the taking up of the deed of the inheritance, the gladdest period of all history for God's people is then come. Then it is that the songs break forth in tremendous volume of worthiness and blessings, and honor and Glory to the Lamb for redeeming Adam man by His blood, and then making of the race...kings, and priests unto God and certifying unto them that now 'they shall reign in earth'. * THE DECANS OF ARIES *
When we then turn to the accompanying Decan of this sign, the very work and doings ascribed to the Lamb in this entrance upon his great power are still more specifically set before us in which the joy in Him on the part of his people comes to its culmination.
The first Decan of Aries is Cassiopeia, the Woman who again is symbolic of Israel, of His people, now lifted up out of the evils of earth and seated with her glorious Redeemer in the heavens. The figure is of a queenly woman, matchless in beauty, now seated in exalted dignity with her foot on the Arctic Circle on which her chair sits. In one hand she holds aloft the branch of victory and triumph, and with the other she is spreading and arranging her hair as if preparing herself for some great public manifestation. Her common name is Cassiopeia, the beautiful, the enthroned. The Constellation itself is one of the most beautiful in heaven. Four stars which never set, form the seat upon which this woman sits. The star on her right side is on a straight line with the one in Andromeda's cheek...to the North pole. There appeared in this Constellation on the tenth of November 1572., a star of great brilliance and after shinning for 16 months then it disappeared. This was a great mystery to the Astronomers. It was as tho Gods people and His church were to disappear into the shadow of death, or be caught away to the invisible world.
If there is any one Constellation of the sky, any figure especially fitted to be the symbol of His people and of His church, it is this woman. The names are equally significant and they mean:...'The enthroned...the seated'. And on her right hand is also the glorious star of the crowned king, holding out His scepter toward her, while all the accounts pronounce her His wife, just as the Scripture tells of Israel as the bride, the wife, married to Him in the Old Testament and in the New...the Lambs Wife of Revelation. Cassiopeia is Universally represented as the Mother of Andromeda, thus Jerusalem that is above is the mother of us all. The whole presentation is that of deliverance and heavenly triumph; and the ready making for the great marriage ceremony. (Revelation 19:7-8) The perfection of this woman's beauty, fairer than Juno and the envy of all the nymphs of the sea, likewise answers exactly to the Scriptures description of his people. 'Thy renown went forth among the heathen for thy beauty, for it was perfect through my comeliness which I put upon thee, saith the Lord'. (Ezekiel 16:14) A glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle'...holy and without blemish. (Ephesians 5:27), and Cassiopeia representing His Kingdom is thus enthroned as Queen. John records this as thrones, and 'They sat upon them and reigned with Christ'. This kingdom with the spiritual center is 'The Queen in the gold of Opher' of which the Psalmist 45:9., so enthusiastically sung. When the time comes for Christ's true church to enter upon her royal exaltation and authority, another very important and marked event is to occur. John beheld this in apocalyptic vision and he writes:...'I saw an Angel come down from heaven having the key to the bottomless pit, and a great chain in his hand. And he laid hold of that dragon, that old serpent, which is the devil and Satan and bound him up and set a seal upon him, that he should not deceive the nations no more till the thousand years are fulfilled and after that he must be loosed a little season. (Revelation 20:1-3) This is the message pictorially given in the second Decan of Aries. The picture is that of a great sea monster... Cetus, the true Leviathan of Job and Isaiah, which covers the largest space of any one figure in the sky. It is a vast scaly beast with an enormous head, mouth, and front paws, having the body and tail of a whale. It is an animal of the waters and marshes, and the natural enemy and devourer of the Fish. It is a downward Constellation bordering on the lower regions. One of its characteristic stars is Mira...located in the neck of the monster, and is the most variable and unsteady in the heavens, and it dwindles away becoming invisible once in about every 300 days, and once it disappeared for the space of four years. It is a striking symbol of the arch deceiver and its name means:..'The Rebel'. What is especially remarkable in this case is that the double band which holds the fishes after passing the foot of the Ram, or the hand of the Lamb, is fastened to this monster and holds him also firmly bound. The name of the first star means..'the overthrown, or thrust down'.
Satan is loose now...Peter writes:...'Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about seeking whom he may devour.' (Peter 5:8) YAHWEH speaks of him and puts the question:...'Canst thou draw out leviathan with a hook? or is tongue with the cord thou lets down? canst thou put a hook in his nose? or bore his jaw thru with a thorn? (Job 41) But He whom no man can take or bind, this Lamb has in His power, and will yet lay hold upon and fasten with a great chain from which he cannot break away. By the same power with which He holds the fishes, He restrains the devouring enemy, and with that same power He will yet fasten up the monster for final destruction. Isaiah prophesied of a day when 'The LORD with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish Leviathan the piercing serpent, that Leviathan the crooked serpent He shall slay...this old dragon that is in the sea. (Isaiah 27:1)
Here we have the same fore-pictured in the stars, showing how the enthroned Lamb will bind and punish Leviathan, as the written word of prophecy also describes. The sign in the heavens answers precisely to the description in the Book, proving that one is the same story as the other, and that both are from the Eternal Spirit which has moved to show us things to come.
There is still more to this sign of the enthroned Lamb (Micah 2:12-13), for He prophesies of a time when the flock of God shall be gathered, their king shall pass before them. This shall be when 'the breaker' is come up before them.
What ever may have been in the foreground of this prediction it is agreed that 'the breaker' must be The Christ...the very Lamb of our text, breaking the way for his people thru all the doors and gates of their present imprisonment and disability, and dashing to pieces all the antagonizing powers which stand in the way of their full deliverance and redemption. So the Lamb in the Apocalypse is the Breaker of the seals, and of Apostate nations, the same as the Son in the second Psalm. And this Breaker, in these very acts is the precise picture in this Constellation. Here in the figure of a mighty man we see him stepping with one foot on the brightest parts of the Milky Way, wearing a helmet on his head and wings on his feet, and holding aloft a great sword in his right hand, and he carries away the blood dripping head of the Gorgon on his left. His name is Perseus the same as in Micah's prophecy meaning 'the breaker'. The meaning of the star in his left foot is:...'he who breaks'. The middle star's name means:...'One who carries away'. When Perseus comes to the meridian, the most beautiful portion of the starry heavens opened out its magnificence in the Eastern hemisphere.
In Mythology Perseus is the most admired and beloved of all the hero gods. He is the son of a Divine father, and when born he and his mother were put into a chest and cast into the sea, but Jupiter interfered, and they were rescued by a fisherman and carried to the king who treated them with great kindness. As the child grew he was a god and became immortal and took his place among the stars. After he takes the head of the Gorgon or serpent and is returning he sees the beautiful Andromeda chained to the rock and the sea monster is about to devour her. So...on condition she become his wife he rescues her and then makes her his wife and they begat many worthy sons and daughters. By varied administrations of miraculous power changing portions of the earth, and its governments, and rulers then we see blessings are returned to the countries that honor HIM.
Now; no natural event in the history of man could ever serve as a foundation for such a story as this, for here is a Divine-human child begotten of a golden shower from Deity, a child of affliction and persecution from his very birth, but predestined by the heavenly power to live and to triumph. He descends into the grave and brings forth armor from there. He is in communion with Divine Wisdom. He has winged feet showing he travels from heaven to earth and back again. He punishes Leviathan with his great sword. He breaks the bonds of the woman chained and makes her His bride amid high festivals at which He puts down all opposition. Wherever he goes to countries near or far He is punishing and expelling tyrants and usurpers, rooting out untruths and corrupt worship, and blessing the cities and kingdoms of different people. When you see this whole picture then we understand that this is the Promised Seed of the Woman.....Virgo....Israel. He is the Lamb that was slain but now going forward at the head of His people, bringing death and destruction to the monsters of evil, setting the captives free and joining them to Himself in Glory everlasting. There is nothing else that can adequately account for the existence of this story.
This head grasp by the hero has names meaning:..'The evil spirit', 'Satans head', 'The weakened', and the 'subdued'. Thus this breaker of the seal is the invincible subduer, the Lamb taking to himself his great power and enforcing His saving dominion and authority for the full redemption of HIS people. This great sign of Aries thus symbolizes the outcome of the kingdom and its church or spiritual center. Out of the sacrificial death of the 'Seed of the Woman' the mystery of Israel and the church is revealed. By the stream of spiritual waters being poured down from heaven it is quickened into life. By the bands of royal power with which He has been crowned in the right hand of authority, the kingdom and its church is upheld, directed and governed amid this sea of earthly existence with its turmoil, danger and temptations, helpless in its own strength, despised, hated, and threatened by the great serpents many heads and exposed to the attacks of this lord of the world. Still Israel and her spiritual center are sustained and preserved by the right hand of HIM who holds the dominion.
The time is coming when HE who walks amid the Golden Candlesticks, and holds in his hand the seven stars that shall lift the title deed of Israel’s inheritance and call her members out from this doomed world to meet with HIM while HE proceeds to punish and dash in pieces all enemies, while He lifts the chained Andromeda to her throne as Cassiopeia.
Then it is that all heaven rings with the song:...'Worthy is the Lamb that was slain, to receive power, and riches, and wisdom and strength and blessings. Then all creation thrills with this blessing and honor and glory and power unto HIM that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever'.
My friends; may we turn to ask:...Have you been brought into fellowship and communion with this church and congregation of Our Savior? If so, then thank YAHWEH for it and be glad before HIM that He has bestowed upon you so great a favor. Bless His name for the Grace that has led you into these holy gates, and for the treasures, and dignities to which He has made you heirs. Trials, dangers, and disabilities may be upon you now, but the Lamb is upon the throne to protest, to comfort you, and his blood has covered you, and now you are safe. Cling to Him and His Golden Fleece and the destroyer will not be able to touch a hair of your head. Wait and pray on in patience and hope for as portrayed by Perseus of the heavens. He comes for your deliverance to share with you His own triumphant immortality. Does the present moment find you still lingering without the gates, far aside from the assembly and congregation of God's flock? These starry lights that look down so lovingly upon you are hung with admonitions of your danger, and they point you to a better way. ''There is no speech nor language, their voice is not heard, but their line is gone thru all the earth and their words to the end of the world'...marking out the tabernacle of the sun of Righteousness in which alone there is covenanted safety and salvation for helpless Adam-man.
In full harmony with the Written Book, by night these pictorial showings correspond and proclaim the testimony of the Prophets and Apostles sot hat the erring seed of Adam may learn wisdom, and enter the chambers of security, and set themselves into Life and Glory against the time when the 'Breaker' shall come.
The Light Bearers in the sky joins with the Light Bearers of the Bible in giving out the One great testimony of YAHWEH that...'He that believeth on the Son (his embodiment) hath everlasting life, and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him'. (John 3:36)
* THE SIGN OF TAURUS *
THE DAY OF THE LORD.
Psalm 92:10.....'My horn (power) shall thou exalt like the horn of an unicorn'. This horn or power is thus single,..ONE. Many of the Hebrew writers ascribe the authorship of this Psalm to Adam, and this was a special Psalm for the Sabbath Day. It celebrates the glories and blessings of creation. It then anticipates a period of great apostasy, wickedness and posterity to the enemies of YAHWEH. But beyond that it contemplates the speedy overthrow and the destruction of the powers of the workers of iniquity, followed by a glorious Sabbath of everlasting Righteousness and Peace.
In connection with the scattering and perishing of the enemies of the LORD it emphasizes a special exaltation of power and dominion of the Messiah who speaks thru the Psalmist saying that his horn, or power shall be like the horn of a Unicorn ONE.
Now; there has been a question for a long time as to what animal represents this REEM which is so often referred to in the Ancient Scriptures and which translators have generally called the Unicorn. The symbolism in of One great power. The horn has always symbolized power, as men wore helmets they would have one horn and sometimes two on their helmets.
Modern research has decided that 'the REEM' was not a one horned creature like the rhinoceros but a pure animal of the Ox kind altho wild and untamable. A great two horned and mighty creature, and so far as known entirely extinct, but once was common in North West Asia, Assyria and Middle Europe. Remains have been found of it in late years in the North Palestine. Caesar in the account of his wars describes it as being hunted in the Hercyman Forest of his day. It was known as the primeval ox, or wild bull but different from the bison or the great antelope. Its strength and speed was very great and it was so fierce that it did not spare man or best when it caught sight of them. In the Book of Job...39:8-12...it is said 'Will the REEM be willing to serve thee? or abide by thy crib? Canst thou bind the REEM with his band, in the furrow or will he harrow the valley after thee?'
Now; this great animal was particularly distinguished for its great outspreading sharp horns. Joseph (Deuteronomy 33:17) in his superiority of power is likened to a REEM of which his two sons Ephraim and Manasseh were the two great horns (powers) which were to push their people to the ends of the earth. And to this mighty, untamable and invincible animal the Messiah also compares Himself in connection with the great judgment upon the wicked world; for then HIS Horn shall be exalted like the horn of a REEM. Now; toward HIS people he is the LAMB, but toward the world order led by the serpent he becomes the terrible REEM. And the picture of the Messiah in the text of the Bible is precisely the picture presented in the sign of the Zodiac which comes before us in the sign of TAURUS. The first of the final quarter in the celestial circle.
As we have told you before the twelve Zodiac signs are arranged in three sets of four signs each, and each set has a particular subject of its own in this history. In the first set we have shown you the 'Seed' of the Woman who is Virgo or Israel. In His own personal character of office we read of it in this sign. In the second set you saw the formation, career and destiny of His kingdom, and its spiritual center called the church. In this third set you will be shown the great judgment period and the whole mystery of YAHWEH (God) concerning our world and our Race. As to this judgment time don't limit it to a 24 hour time, for the day of Judgment is like the Day of the LORD...simply a period of time or a time of judgment. According to the teachings of the prophets everything does not end at the termination of what is called...the present church period. Instead prophecy includes a variety of administrations in most of which the glorified Saints are to take an active part. For as is represented in the signs of primeval Astronomy, this period of the church age ends and the kingdom of Glory comes, and then the great power of the Lamb is shown and the chained Andromeda is transformed into the enthroned Cassiopeia. But there are still four signs before this is complete. Judgement begins at the house of God, and then breaks in fury upon the ungodly. This is when the workers of iniquity are scattered, and the power of the Seed of the Woman is exalted like the power of the REEM, to fulfill all His desire upon His foes. This is the precise scene pictorially represented in the sign of TAURUS. The name in this sign in Hebrew, Arabic, Syric, Latin and Greek means the same as the English name....the Bull. But this is not a common Bull of any known class. The horns are greater and differently made than any domestic cattle and the toes even have horns. This animal appears here in intense rage, dashing forward with great energy and with his great energy and his great sharp horns sets as if to run thru everything which comes in its way. The Egyptians called it...The Mighty Chieftain who cometh. The chief star means:...captain, or leader, or governor. The middle and hinder part of the animal includes the body of the enthroned Lamb out of which it seems to rise. It is also directly opposite the Scorpion of the Zodiac so that it rises as the Scorpion sets and disappears. In Mythology the Bull was always Snow White, the color of Righteousness and Royal Judgment. Among the early nations there was a wide spread idea connecting this Bull with the Deluge, and the Pleiades...those seven stars or doves, that great star cluster, and with the Ark of Noah and those saved by it in that great judgment. The seven stars, or the Pleaides of (Revelation 1) are on the back of this Bull...high up on his great shoulders. These seven stars were also symbolized as the Saints securely supported by the terrible Judge, and who together with the Holy Angels whom they are like thus move with HIM and His inflections upon a guilty world.
* THE DECANS OF TAURUS *
When connected to Prophecy we see this great animal as the symbol of the head of His redeemed people. Then we see the indignation of YAHWEH (Isaiah 26:20)..He is very long suffering now, but there is a limit to His forbearance, and then we come to the great Captain or Prince of the sign. His name is Orion, or HE who cometh forth as LIGHT. A star in his right shoulder means 'the branch coming'. Another star of first magnitude in his lifted foot means:.'the foot that crushes'. In His great belt are three shinning brilliant stars called..'The three Kings', and in some places..Jacob's Rod (Isaiah 11:1). Also called the EL-giving the rule of celestial and righteous measurements, just as it is the Rod and Branch from Jesse's roots. 'Righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins, and faithfulness the girdle of His reins'. (Isa.11:5) In his left breast shines a bright star which means:..'swiftly coming' or 'suddenly destroying'. The Arabs call HIM...The Branch, the Ruler, and the Prince. Even in Mythology Orion was the gift of the gods and knew how to walk the sea without getting His feet wet. He was born of a woman, a gift of Deity to our world. Thus Orion is the first great Decan of the sign of Taurus. The second Decan carries the same idea still further for beneath the coming down foot of Orion as well as the feet of this Bull-Taurus, there flows a great river Eastward and Westward, and down onto the Netherworld. Its name is Eridanus, the river of the judge.
In Daniel's vision of the four beasts and of God's judgment on them we find this same river of the Judge. Daniel says:...'I beheld till the thrones were set and the ancient of days did sit; his throne was like the fiery flames, and his wheels as burning fire. A fiery stream, a river of fire issued and came forth from before HIM'. It is this river of the judge for we read:....'the judgment was set, the books opened, and the prophet beheld even till the beasts was slain, and his body destroyed and given to the burning flame'. (Daniel 7:9-11)
In Psalm 50:3., we read:...'Our God shall come and shall not keep silence; a fire shall devour before Him and it shall be very tempestuous before HIM and burneth up His enemies round about HIM'. (97:3-5)
Again:...Isaiah tells us:...'Behold the name of the LORD cometh from afar, burning with His anger, and the burden thereof is heavy, his lips are full of indignation of his tongue, as a devouring fire, and His breath as an overflowing stream (of fire). Tophet is ordained of old; yes for the king it is prepared. He hath made it deep and large, the pile thereof is fire and much wood; the breath of the LORD like a stream of brimstone, doth kindle it'. (30:27-33)
Now; the day of the LORD cometh as a thief in the night, in which shall pass with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, and the earth also, and the works that are therein shall be burned. (II Peter 3:10) Here then is the true Eridanus, this river of fire, issuing from before Taurus and Orion, and shall receive the enemy and burn them up in unquenchable flames. The angry judge sweeps all into the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone which is the second death. (Revelation 20:14-15)
Here is the picture, both in the Scripture and in the Constellations of great judgment, and with the proof of the presence of this day of judgment then you will see the people respond, for Psalm 110:3 tells us:...'Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power'. Daniel then speaks out saying:...'many shall be purified and made white and tried, but the wickedly shall do wickedly and now of the wicked shall understand, but the wise shall understand'. (Daniel 12:8-16) The third Decan is of a mighty man seated on the Milky Way, holding a band or ribbon in his right hand while his left arm is holding up to is shoulder a Ewe...a female Sheep which is clinging to his neck, and looks out in astonishment upon the Terrible Bull, while in his lap are two little lambs and he supports them with his great hand. The Greek name for HIM was the Wagoner...but he has neither chariot nor horses, and the world did not understand this sign. They called Him Auriga thinking him a chariot driver, but the word actually signifies:...a Shepherd...the good shepherd who laid down His Life for His sheep, and giveth them Eternal Life. Thus HE has a mother sheep on his arm, her feet clasped around His neck and the little lambs are in His hand. The band in his right hand is the same band which we saw in the hand of the Lamb, and in the hand of the enthroned Cephus. It is the same band of power by which the head of the kingdom and its church guides His people on the outside, and binds the enemy with the other. The Chief star in this Constellation marks the heart of this mother sheep. She not only clings to the Great Shepherd, but she is trembling for her safety as she is looking back upon the actions of the Great Bull as if saying:...'I have seen the wicked in great power and spreading himself like a green bay tree; yet he passeth away and lo, he is not, yea I looked for him but he cannot be found'. (Psalm 37:34-36) The whole picture in the precise accord of Isaiah's Prophecy of this very period is to be found where he said:...'Behold, His reward is with HIM, and His work is before HIM. He shall feed His flock like a shepherd. He shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in His bosom, and shall gently lead those who give suck'. (40:10-17) The name of the star in His right arm in Chaldaic means:...'the band of the Ewe's'.
In the Zodiac of Zendera...This Auriga holds a scepter, the upper part of which shows the head of the Lamb, and the lower part the figure of the cross which vividly expresses salvation even under the severe administration of Sovereign judgment. And here are two little lambs, just born having come into place amid these on goings of terrible Judgment. One lamb is bleating upward after its mother, while the other is looking in startled wonder at the dashing career of the enraged Bull..but both are safe in the Great Shepherds hand. We would then say that a day of judgment is to come, and it lasts for some time (it may have already started). It will be a time of trouble and an hour of trial such as has not been seen in our world. It is said to be a day that shall burn as an oven, and all the proud, yea, all that do wickedly shall be as stubble to the fire; and the day that cometh shall burn them up saith the LORD of Hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch. (Malachi 4:1) Only they who take refuge in Jesus shall find shelter and security:.... 'Unto you that fear (Love) my Name shall the sun of righteousness arise with healing in His wings, and ye shall go forth and grow up as calves of the stall; and ye shall tread down the wicked; for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I DO THIS...saith YAHWEH'. (Malachi 4:2-3) But what then saith the Holy Spirit?...hear it dear friends and ponder on it:...'Fear not thyself because of evil doers, neither be thou envious against the workers of iniquity; for they shall soon be cut down like the grass, and wither as the green herbs. Trust in YAHWEH and do good; so shalt thou dwell in the land; and verily thou shall be fed. For evil-doers shall be cut off, but those that wait upon YAHWEH shall inherit the earth. For yet a little while, and the wicked shall not be; yea, thou shalt diligently consider his place, and it shall not be. For YAHWEH loveth judgment and forsaketh not his Saints, they are preserved forever. Wait then on YAHWEH and keep his way, and He shall exalt thee to inherit the land when the wicked are cut off thou shall see it. The salvation of the righteous is for YAHWEH...HE is their strength in time of trouble, and HE shall help them and deliver them. HE shall deliver them from the wicked, and save them, because they trust in HIM'. (Psalm 37)
* THE SIGN OF GEMINI *
'AND SO SHALL WE EVER BE WITH THE LORD', (I Thessalonians 4:17) These comforting words speak of the scene of things beyond the resurrection of the dead, and hence to something which is to be brought about during the progress of the judgment period. After the great trumpet blast, and the dead have been raised and the Saints transformed then His people will be with HIM from then on. All this that we find in the Scripture we also find in the Constellations, and this is the sign of Gemini, usually called 'The Twins'. Here we find two beautiful figures, peacefully sitting together, their feet resting on the Milky Way. Their head leans against each other in a loving attitude. The one holds a great club in his hand, while his left is clasped around the body of His companion. The other holds a harp in one hand and a bow and arrow in the other. Both the club and the bow and arrow are now in repose, the same as the figures which holds them. The club uplifted lies against the shoulder while the bow now unstrung rests in the other hand. The picture is as tho the war is over, and a joyful rest has begun after a great victory. This is the portrait that is set forth many times in the text of the Scripture. In Mythology the Greeks and Romans considered these two figures as twins.. brothers, sons of Jupiter...of extraordinary birth. They were said to have led the Argonauts in the contest for the Golden Fleece, being thus heroes. In Grecian Temples they are represented as mounted on white horses armed with spears riding side by side and the cap of each hunter is tipped with a star. The Greeks and Romans sacrificed white lambs upon their altars as they took oaths by their name as indicative of the utmost truth and verily the vulgar habit still survives of swearing...by 'Gemini', or in English...'by Jimminy'.
In the Zodiac of Zendera the figures here are of a man walking hand in hand with a woman. They are sometimes called Adam and Eve, but the male figure is not the 'first Adam' but the mystic 'Second Adam'. This Seed of the Woman who everywhere appears in these heavenly figures. The figure in the Zendera Zodiac has a name whose meaning identifies HIM..it is...'The Coming One', the Messiah Prince. Having thus identified the male figure then there can be no difficulty in identifying the female figure. The Lamb remember has a wife, a bride who is as bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh, and is destined for an everlasting Union with HIM in Glory and dominion.
Thus the Scripture tells us that YAHWEH calls Israel His wife. She is the chosen and wedded to HIM. The two figures are thus one as YAHWEH, and YAHSHUA are one, a man and his wife are said to be one flesh. The union is such that one embraces the other. He in them, and they in HIM. He is the peculiar 'son of God' out of His race, and they are sons and daughters of YAHWEH...in Him...joint heirs with HIM, and time after time the Scriptures describe Him as head of the kingdom and the church which is the spiritual center of the Kingdom. Thus these two figures are no more twins than Christ and his kingdom are twins, and yet they are Christ and His kingdom people in symbolism. Here the one is the ruler, judge, the toiling deliverer, and the others are those born of the LIGHT. This Union shows The Christ and the very life of Christianity, as mystic and hidden, not yet fully revealed. It is held down by earthiness, and the power of mortality and death. All that remains is for the mystery veil to be stripped off, and immortality put on. The complete Union with Him can only be when this mortal has put on immortality and death is swallowed up in Life! This occurs when the dead are raised and those still alive are changed in incorruption to meet HIM. What is yet mystic and unveiled is hereafter to be openly, formally and most gloriously exhibited and shown in living and eternal fact.
In this Apocalyptic picture of the on going judgment period after the man child has been born, and has overcome the Dragon and his people by the Blood of the Lamb and the word of the testimony of His people then immediately...before the Christ and His people come forth on white horses for the overthrow of the beast and his armies, we hear the voice of gladness and rejoicing and the giving of Glory to the Ruler, in that.... the time for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and the word of blessing goes forth upon all who are called to the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. (Revelation 19:7-9) We do not understand as yet all about this 'Marriage of the Lamb' but we do know that it involves some formal ceremony in which he takes and acknowledges His kingdom and its true church, and after that they move to reign with HIM...to make war and to judge and be ONE with HIM.
This is the picture pictorially in the sign of Gemini, and the star meaning of the names and mystic stories connected with it tells us this is YAHWEH'S sign in the heavens of the coming marriage, and union of the Seed of the Woman with His redeemed kingdom precisely as the same is set forth in the Scripture as the hope and joy of His people to be fulfilled at His manifestation. Here we find the true Castor and Pollux who seize the Golden Fleece, then share in the same trials, sufferings, labors, triumphs and glories. These are kings and priests with their leader who are ordained to rule all nations with a rod of iron, to chastise and destroy the wicked unto the ends of the earth. They are to be revealed as warrior judges on white horses, to put down usurpers, to hurl the dread anti-Christ and his horses to sudden perdition, to avenge the blood of martyrs on these who shed it, to give law and destiny to the earthy people and to sit and reign in immortal regency over all the after generations. This is what we find in this sign of Gemini, and it is further confirmed in the accompanying Decans.
* THE DECANS OF GEMINI *
The first Decan is Lepus the figure of a gigantic hare, as pictured in more modern Zodiacs. But it has a meaning with different significance of.. 'the enemy of the coming one'. In the Zendera Zodiac the figure is not a hare, but a serpent trodden under Orion's foot, and the serpent is caught also in the claws of a screaming Eagle. From all indications it is manifest in this Constellation that the end of the enemy, and his complete overthrow comes when once the heavenly marriage is celebrated. This is precisely what the Scripture in Revelation declares. It is the lifting of the kingdom people, and the spiritual center called the church into its destined union with YAHSHUA, in Glory, in a stunning blow to the whole Empire of darkness, and the sure herald of its utter dissolution follows.
No sooner is the MARRIAGE OF THE LAMB come than the heavens opens and HE who is called Faithful and True rides forth upon the white horse in Righteousness to judge and make war, and all the armies of heaven follow HIM on white horses, and the Beast and the false prophet are taken, and the kings of the earth and their armies are slain with the sword of this invincible host. (Revelation 19:6-21) The second Decan in todays Zodiac is often a great dog, and earlier was a wolf. but in the Zendera Zodiac the figure is the Eagle, the particular enemy of the serpent. This Eagle has on his head a double mark of crowning ...with power and majesty, and is standing on top of a great Mace as the Royal Breaker and Bruiser of the powers of evil. (Again remember that the Zendera Zodiac was established in Enoch's time)
The principal star of this Constellation is Sirius, meaning Prince, Guardian and the Victorious. From the Zendera Zodiac this is the promised one who is to come forth from the stem of Jesse, and is called Netzer in the Hebrew Bible and there translated...The Branch. From the earliest ages of Christianity till now, interpreters and defenders of the Scripture have been at a loss to explain by what Prophet or Prophecy it was said as claimed by the Apostle that Christ should be called a Nazarene. Here in the Constellation we find that 'The sent Prince'...the Messiah is the Netzer of Isaiah, and the Naz-seir of the prophetic Constellations thus is Naz-Seir or Naz-Sirius, and we are to see HIM of whom Matthew said:...'HE came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth that he might fulfill which was spoken by the prophets. He shall be called Naz-seie-ene'. (Matthew 2:23) The second star of this Constellation is Mirzam, or the Ruler, the third has the meaning of:...'the leader' or 'chieftain', and the fourth means:...'shinning...scarlet', and the fifth means:..'the Glorious', and another means:...'the Mighty'. The Psalmist gives a great picture of the sun, where he is represented as a bridegroom, and we realize he is speaking of the Sun of Righteousness. He is the Bridegroom, for the Marriage of the Lamb is come. He stands under the wedding canopy, the Glorious One, ready to try the earth from one end to the other. Revealing everything, testing everything, and destroying everything found coming against He who is King of Kings. Now HE is married ...His bride is Israel and she is with her husband. And HE is ready to:... 'Execute vengeance upon the nations and punishment upon the people while He binds their king with chains and their nobles with fetters of iron; to execute upon them the judgment written....and this honor have all the Saints'. (Psalm 149:91)
Here then in the third Decan of modern thought there is another or second wolf being smaller than the first, and more feeble, and following a little behind the first, because by this time the Saints are all with their Savior and follow Him wherever He goes. In the Egyptian Zodiac this Constellation has a human figure with the Eagle's head, a sign of the human kingdom exalted to power and authority against the serpent seed. It is called:...'the conquering....the victorious'. The first star is associated in meaning with redemption, and redeemed or redeeming, or both and will describe the whole body of glorified Saints. The term Al Mirzam occurs here also as it does in the second Decan, and it symbolized the same as before...'the Head Prince going before' and he has promised his faithful people that they shall share His throne and sovereignty and reign with HIM forever and forever. To sum up this picture of Gemini with the record in the Bible we see the destiny of the congregation of Israel. They are betrothed to Christ even now, and love HIM, and often have blessed communion with HIM, but it is only thru veils and intervening ordinances, by Faith and not by sight. The time is now coming when these veils shall be removed and God's people shall meet HIM face to face. When they shall see the king in all His Glory and be joined with HIM in all the intimacies of love, fellowship and Oneness, being made copartners with HIM in all He has and is doing. Being participants in His Glory, His throne and immortal administrations. They shall not only stand in judgment, but shall be lifted when that time comes ...for Israel to be HIS bride...His wife as no other people are with HIM. As He moves out to ride the world of unrighteousness of the wicked, Israel is with Him setting everything into the order of peace and permanence of that Divine Kingdom when all shall be....'On earth as it is in heaven'. This is the outcome for these years of toil, fears, and trials and misgivings in Faith, for the weary pilgrimage of Adam's race. But now Death is gone, mortality is swallowed up in Life. Union with the King is complete, doubt and disability are swept clean away for ever. The throne, the dominion and the Glory are secure.
* THE SIGN OF CANCER *
'I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heavens, and as the sand of the seashore; and thy seed shall possess the gates of his enemies'. This is a part of the oath which God swore unto Abraham after the test of his Faith in the offering of his son, Isaac. The Apostle confirms this:... 'If ye be Christ's ye are Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise'. (Galatians 3:29) We then understand....as of Christ and his people ...where as the promise was to multiply them as the stars of the sky and the sands of the seashore while also giving them victory and success in taking the gates of their enemies, and possessing them forever. The fulfillment ultimately of this promise is found symbolized in this sign called Cancer, and the Constellations which form its Decans. In the Hindu and Chinese Zodiacs you find here a picture of a gigantic crab. But in the Egyptian Zodiac you find here a picture of the Scarabaeus or sacred beetle. This figure has rows of legs on opposite sides of its body, and in its development as it grows and undergoes important changes it throws off its old shell and taken on a new one ever so often. It has a tendency to grasp hold with wonderful force and securely retain what ever it takes. In the symbolism this is like unto the children of God who have laid hold of the hope set before them that they will come into the possession of the incorruptible Heavenly inheritance and retain it with a grasp so firm and strong that it shall not be taken away. As with the Scarabaeus which this Zendera Zodiac lists, the first period is in a dark subterranean abode, this is its dwelling place. Here its senses are feeble, its powers circumscribed, and compelled there to live amid filth, it grows however and waits for future changes. And so it is with the children of YAHWEH in this present life. For we are slaves of toil, and suffering, full of darkness, doubt, and uncertainty, altho in us is the beginning of eventual glory and blessedness. But having passed thru the time appointed to its first condition the Scarabaeus is next transformed into another. Its avenues of senses are closed, the functions of life are stopped and it will soon open out into another form of existence. This is symbolic of Gods people where earthly life terminated in death and passes into the middle stage in which the inner being still lives on, but the body is at rest waiting for the call of the resurrection to reappear with new power. When this period of peaceful inaction is completed the Scarabaeus also breaks forth into a new creature having left behind the low condition in which it's earlier life was spent. When as both have lived in darkness now new life comes, and the Scarabaeus now filled with loving affection builds a house for its treasure, and holds fast as it rolls it out with unwearied devotion into the vast unknown. Thus from the mummy form of sleeping Saints there is also to come a sudden bursting forth, when bodies terrestrial shall be replaced by bodies celestial, and what was earthly becomes heavenly, incorruptible until able to mount up with wings as Eagles, to enjoy the light, love and liberty of the heavens, and in no way being inferior to the Angels. The promise is that we hold this plateau secure...world without end. The Ancient Egyptians (of Enoch's day) made much of this Scarabaeus beetle. The stones on their finger rings, on their shoe laces, the seals of their priests and nobles, the ornaments and amulets worn on their bodies, and the tokens of their guilds and order...the memorials of their marriages, and the last mark put upon the mummies of their dead were all shaped into the form of the Scarabaeus. Men not understanding the symbolism have wondered who these people were who were so attached to what they considered a filthy bug. It had no beauty, and there was no account of any great service rendered by it to their country or their crops. But there it was, the figure in their Zodiac, the star sign of a perfected being showing the progress from darkness unto light, from death to resurrection, from earthly disability to heavenly glory. You found traces of this beetle thru out all their land, and all tradition had taught the people to connect this beetle to the most precious hopes of their race.
Thus we see the mystery which tells a story and helps in identifying the meaning which our Ancient Patriarchs understood and intended to express in this eleventh sign of the Zodiacal series. In the center of this Constellation is one of the brightest clusters in the sky which can be seen with the naked eye. It is called in modern Astrology ...'The Beehive'. The Ancients called it by the name Praesepe which in Hebrew and Arabic means:...'the multitude', the 'young innumerable seed', and that is the very idea of the text of the Bible. Moses spoke of Issachar as being 'gathered into tents, called to the mountains, offering sacrifices of righteousness; and sucking the abundance of the sea, and all the hidden treasures of the sands'. (Deuteronomy 33:18-19) In Jacob's blessings of his sons we have corresponding allusions and still further identifications with the particular's in this sign. In many of the classic references to the Zodiac, the figure here is of two asses representing or represented as the two stars, one North and the other South of Praesepe. Jacob prophesied of the coming of Shiloh, that to Him shall the gathering of the people be. How He rides forth on the white horse to destroy all hostile powers. 'He shall bind his foal to the vine, and His ass's colt to the choice vine'. Issachar himself is likened to the great and strong ass which reclines between two folds or resting places, seeing that the rest is good and the land pleasant. For that he was willing to bow his shoulder to the burden, and to serve and pay tribute to possess. (Genesis 49:1-15)
The Scripture not only gives us the imagery found in this sign but assigns Issachar with the final results of the achievements of the promised Seed of the Woman, with the rest that remains for the people of God with the ultimate home and gathering of the multitudous seed of this Faith, with the peaceful and secure entrance of the kingdom people into their inheritance, incorruptible and undefiled. This is reserved for those who are kept by the power of God...thru Faith, under salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time. (I Peter 1:4-6) The Early Egyptians called this sign the fold, the resting place. Today this sign is called Cancer, but in it's roots it was Khan...meaning the travelers resting place, where they were held within encircling arms. Even Can-cer means..rest secured. The object of desire at length reached...possessed...held. The chief star has the meaning of:...'The sheltering, the place of retirement...a good rest'. While another Ancient name for this sign carries the meaning of 'Assembled thousands'. In the Hebrew, Arabic, and Syriac the name signifies..holding, possessing , retaining. Thus instead of the Cancer of today it is the sign of the Saints having reached their everlasting rest in which the head of the serpent is beneath their feet and beneath the feet of their delivered. * THE DECANS OF CANCER *
The first Decanis Ursa Minor which today is called the lesser bear. That was also not its original name, nor was it a bear at all. Those who named it a bear saw it as having a long uplifted tail such as no bear ever had. The most remarkable star in this Constellation is far out in this unnatural tail. The idea of this Decan being a bear is absurd for the principal star means:...'a fold'. Thus these two Constellations called the big and lesser bear are two sheepfolds for the flock of God's pasture. The Dane's and Icelanders called Ursa Minor the Chariot of Thor. The Britains ascribed this to King Arthur who was their hero. The sign of Ursa Minor has seven principal stars who turn. These seven stars who turn are in themselves sufficient to suggest some connection with the seven churches which John saw as the stars in Christ's hand...his right hand. The number of stars in this Constellation are 24, the same as the four and twenty Elders around the throne clothed in white raiment, and having on their heads crowns of gold...Revelation 4. The Ancient names for stars in this Constellation have meanings such as:...'Waiting the coming...the calves... the young...the redeemed...the chosen of the flock...the assembled...the gathering together'.
The promise is that the children of God are to take the gates of this enemies, the house or possessions of the foe. The Dragon at one time did hold the position of the Pole star, but now the lesser sheepfold, not the bear holds the position. Ursa Major then is the Ancient Great Sheepfold, and is the resting place for the flock while the little sheepfold is for the leaders of the assembly.
The Book of Job refers to Arcturus and his sons, to Ash or Aish, and her progeny. The old Hebrew commentators said Aish means the seven stars of what is known as the Greater Sheepfold, today called the Big Bear, but the word has a collective meaning, thus a fold or congregation, and in the so called tail of this Constellation we find the name meaning:...'the daughters of Aish, or part of the flock going out after Bootes, the Great Shepherd. In the Zendera Zodiac this Constellation was portrayed as a plowshare, the enemy of the serpent as it is tearing up and plowing under the seed of the serpent as by Faith, and by power it is triumphing over the serpent and its progeny. Thus we have here the happy sheepfold, the flock of God now in dominion.
To complete the picture then of this Third Decan of what is called Cancer today is:..Argo that Mysterious ship of the mysterious Argonauts returned from their successful expedition to recover the Golden Fleece. Since long before the time of Homer the world has been full of noise about this ship and these gods of the Argonautic expedition. That same world has been floundering about trying to find a key to unlock they mystery in which the story is enveloped. Men have tried to interpret it with reference to ordinary history, or conceits of day dreaming poets, but it belongs to the mystic, spiritual and prophetic ideas found in the stars and to nothing else. The Golden Fleece for which they searched...which the Knights of the Round Table battled for was my friends.....'THE LOST TREASURES OF ADAM AND EVE...THEIR INNOCENCE AND RIGHTEOUSNESS WHICH THE SERPENT TOOK FROM THEM IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN, AND FROM THEN ON HELD AND GUARDED SO THAT NO MERE MAN COULD EVER FIND OR RECOVER'. (In symbolism...Golden is the color of spiritual light and Fleece is of course a covering)
In Mythology then, in the grove of Mars, the serpent watched with jealous and ever watchful eyes, no mortal was able to approach it until the true Jason, the Recoverer, the atoner, the healer....Yes, YAHSHUA-Jesus came and organized his Argo, His company of travelers, made up of heroes under His command and leadership, and they went forth thru various trials, conflicts, sufferings, helped by the Holy Oracles that went along and sustained by the heavenly ointments and powers to heal the wounds, and hurts that had to be encountered, and they took possession of this precious prize, and then thru valued fortunes brought the heroes back victorious to their own home shore.
Here in the Constellation of Argo we have the picture of that return, the ship and the brave travelers home at last with the lost treasures.... regained. now their toils, and battles are over, and the blessed rest of their lasting inheritance regained. Here the story fits in every part, it is the old ship of Zion, the kingdom landing in that heavenly port. You find the story of the Argonauts confirmed by the names in the Constellation itself. The chief star is:...'The Helmsman' of this great ship and means:.. 'the possession of Him who cometh'. Other stars have this meaning:...'the firm possession in hand', 'the travelers released' and 'what was desired'. In the Zendera Zodiac was the figure of a great Ox enclosed with the cross suspended from his neck, thus the symbol of the great possession marked and carrying the meaning of:...'rejoicing over the defeat of the serpent'.
This is then a blessed consolation to the oft-weary toilers and travelers in this world for they are to know there does remain a rest for the people of God. With all the trials and hardships to which they are subjected here, still there is this rest to come which all thru the Scripture you find confirmed. (John 14:1-3....Isaiah 25:10) John then saw the great multitude of kindred people who stood before the Lamb clothed in white robes and with palms in their hands. These are those who have come out of the great tribulation and have their robes white thru the Blood of the Lamb. (Revelation 7:9-17) These are the great and precious promises given to us, and they shall surely be fulfilled. They are the same which glowed in the hearts of the Ancient Patriarchs who saw them afar off, but were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were pilgrims and strangers on earth. On these imperishable stars they hung their beliefs confident of the promises, and altho they are long dead yet they speak across the thousands of years. Let us then believe as they believed, hope as they hoped, and labor on looking for entrance into that same holy rest, this everlasting Kingdom of YAHSHUA...who is YAHWEH in the flesh.
* THE SIGN OF LEO *
Revelation 5:5....'Weep not, behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David, hath prevailed to open the book, and to loose the seven seals thereof'. John was to record the picture of a great and oppressive sorrow, and then a great and glorious consolation. In the hand of the enthroned Almighty lays a document written within and without and sealed with seven seals. This is the title deed of the inheritance which Adam-man forfeited by disobedience, and which had reverted into the hand of God to whom the race had become hopelessly indebted. Those seven seals attest the absoluteness of the bonds of forfeit, telling of how completely the inheritance was taken away. It could not be recovered by Adam-man except someone should be found with ability to satisfy the claim, and life of the documents, and destroy its seals. John was troubled, for who would be able to return this inheritance to his race? Then John heard a voice say:...'Weep not; behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David, hath prevailed to open the seven seals thereof'. Thus here in the twelfth and last sign of the Zodiac we find a mystic Lion. The meaning of the stars of this Lion constellation in different languages are:...'He that renders', 'He that tears asunder', 'He that destroys and lays waste'. The Ancients saw this Lion as the King of the beasts.
When the dying Jacob blessed his sons, he pronounced Judah a lion whom his brothers should praise, whose hand should be on the neck of his enemies, and before whom his fathers children would bow down. (Genesis 49:8-9) That prophecy applied to the warlike and victorious energy which was afterward shown in that tribe of Israel. The same received fulfillment in David in whom the lion-nature was strikingly exhibited, and whose boast in YAHWEH was:...'By thee I can dash in pieces the warlike people. I pursue after mine enemies and overtake them, and turn again until I have consumed them'. (Psalm 18) But these Lion qualities assigned to Judah looked forward, and onward, to a still more noble King who sprang out of Judah, and David's lineal descendent and heir who is also at once David's LORD AND DAVID'S SON, and pre-eminently 'the lion' of whom Jacob spoke. Under the New Testament and during the course of the existing church period, our Savior is more commonly thought of as an innocent, uncomplaining and spotless Lamb of sacrifice, meekly yielding up HIS life that we might live. Even among the works of battle and judgment set forth in the Apocalypse (Revelation). He still appears as 'the Lamb' the same Lamb that was slain from the foundations of the world, by whom those...His Saints...are washed of their sins, and their garments, made white and their final victory over all Satan's accusations achieved. Even to HIS people, he is the eternal bridegroom, but also will never cease to be 'The Lamb' by whose sacrificial death they have their standing, and blessedness. Even tho He is this great and terrible Lion he is also the Lamb. But in the day of His wrath He is the Lion, He is one to His people and the other to His enemies. After He has cleared away all embarrassments by means of the sacrificial atonement, then the time comes for HIM to take on the character of the Lion, to tear His and their enemies in pieces. This is what the Elders are talking about as they say that this Lion of the tribe of Judah hath prevailed. He is now in the position of the Almighty Redeemer and can now go forward as the Lion to take the inheritance, by destroying all who have sought to take and hold this inheritance which belongs to his people, in defiance of His program.
The Scripture in its reference to this Lion character speaks of the sharp sickle of judgment. And Jacob and Moses and all the Prophets allude to this Lion. The word of YAHWEH by Hosea 13:7-8...'I will be unto them as a Lion'. I will devour them like a lion. And Zephaniah 3:8...'wait ye upon me, saith YAHWEH until the day that I rise up to the prey, for my determination is to gather the nations, that I may assemble the kingdom, to pour upon them my indignation, even all my fierce anger; for all the earth shall be devoured with the fire of my jealousy.' Amos 1:2-8 declares:...'The LORD will roar from Zion, and utter His voice from Jerusalem; and the inhabitants of the shepherds shall mourn, and the top of Carmel shall wither. Will a Lion roar in the forest when he hath no prey?' Here in the sign of the Lion...Leo, this very Lion is found thoroughly aroused, silent, and full of majesty, the same in all the pictorial Zodiacs of all nations. It is the same Lion of the tribe of Judah to which the text refers for in the Hebrew Astronomy this twelfth sign was the sign of Judah. Thus the record of the sign and the record of the word are identical. The picture in the sky is the one and the same with the picture in Revelation. Meantime he, Satan, exerts his great power to oppose God and all good. He got a footing in this world and here planted and organized a vast Satanic kingdom over which he reigns. He set himself up as a god over and against the true and only God particularly against the Christ...this YAHWEH embodied who is King of Kings, and King of the earth as well. Thus we find that God's people wrestle not only against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world but also against wicked spirits in the air (Ephesians 6:12).
Now; there is what the Apostles called 'man's day' as distinguished from the LORD'S Day which is a day of enforced heavenly rule. But this snake-like fallen spirit has managed to worm himself into everything that goes to make up human life, corrupting, and perverting it to his own base ends, seating himself in all centers of influence and power, and making himself the very king and god of this world. From all these places he must be dislodged, his dominion broken, his work destroyed and he and all his seed rooted out, and put down before the heavenly kingdom can come into place. Satan's work must be destroyed and all his seed rooted out thus the redemptive work reaches its intended consummation. In other words the whole Empire and influence of the serpent must be removed, worked clean out of the whole realm of humanity, and so crushed as never to be able to lift up its head again. Toward the end:...from the first promise to Adam until now, all the dispensations, all the gifts of God have been directed toward this end, all the works of The Christ has thus framed. To this end HE is to come again in power and great Glory as the Lion of the tribe of Judah to put down all rule, authority, and power, and to trample all the enemies under his feet.
* THE DECANS OF LEO *
Here then is the first Decan of Leo, and here we see Hydra, that same old serpent whose length stretches 1/3 of the way around the whole sphere. But now completely expelled from the places into which he has intruded, fleeing now for his life as the Great Lion, with claws and paws extended in terrific fury, and seizing the monsters neck. In the Zendera Zodiac the Lion stands directly on the Serpents head while underneath is the name meaning:...'vanquished or conquered'. Thus the idea is that here is the end of the serpents dominion. The name Hydra means, 'the abhorred'. The principal star carried the meaning of 'the separated, the excluded, the put out of the way'. Another name in the Constellation means:..'The punishing, or tearing to pieces of the deceivers'. Everything thus falls into this one idea, and adds its share to prove that we here have by the intent of who framed these signs a direct and graphic picture of the Glorious Seed of the Woman (Israel) crushing the serpent's head and putting him out of the way forever. If further evidence is needed it is furnished in the two remaining Decans of this final sign. The next Decan is the Crater, or cup of wrath. The Psalmist (75:8) sings:.. 'In the hand of the LORD there is a cup, and the wine is red; it is full of mixture, and he poureth out of the same, but the dregs thereof all the wicked of the earth shall wring out and drink'. Then Psalm 11:6.. 'Upon the wicked He shall rain burning coals, fire and brimstone, and a fiery tempest; this shall be the portion of their cup'.
Concerning every worshiper of the Beast, John heard the Angel proclaim; ...'The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God which is poured out without mixture into the cup of His indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire; and brimstone in the presence of the holy Angels, and in the presence of the Lamb, and the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever; and they have no rest day nor night'. (Revelation 14:10-11)
Here then in the second Decan of Leo, we have the picture of that cup of wrath, broad, deep, full to the brim and it is placed directly on the body of this writhing serpent. In fact it is sunk into his very substance, for the same stars marking the bottom of the cup are a part of the body of this monster. So that the curse is fastened down on his body, as an element of all his after being. John describes this cup of wrath and so does this message in the stars, but this is not all there, for there is also Corvus, or the Raven. The Wisemen said:...'The eye that mocketh at his father and despiseth to obey his mover,...this raven of the valley shall peck it out, and the young eagles shall eat it'. (Proverbs 30:17) When David, the first great impersonation of Judah's Lion, met the terrible Goliath of Gath, he cursed him in the name of YAHWEH, the God of Israel and said:...'I will smite thee and take thy head from thee; and I will give the carcasses to the hosts of the Philistines, this unto the fowls of the air, and to the wild beasts of the earth'. (I Samuel 17:46) When the LORD of Hosts, the King of Kings dashes forth on his white horse with the armies of heaven following HIM on white horses to tread the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of the Almighty God, and Angel stands in the sun calling with a great voice to the fowls, and birds of prey to come and feast themselves on the flesh of the enemy. (Revelation 19:17-18) Here in the third Decan of Leo, we have the pictorial sign of the same thing. Here is Cervus the Raven, the bird of punishment, of final destruction, grasping the body of Hydra with its feet and tearing him with its beak. The Egyptians called it Her-na, meaning:...'the enemy broken'. The star in the eye of this bird carries the meaning of ' the curse inflicted'. This is the sign of the absolute destruction of the serpent and all his power. When the birds begin to tear and gorge on the flesh of a fallen foe, there is no further power to resist, harm or annoy remaining in them. Their course is ran. Thus Judah's Lion disposes of that old serpent enemy with all his Hydra heads, when once this day of final settlement comes. The career of the serpent has played a great part in the history of our race, and is still playing and will play before the end is finally reached. Like a dark and chilling shadow he came upon the new born world, instituted his slime into the Garden of human innocence, deceived and disinherited the race at its beginning, and so spun his web around the souls of the race at its beginning in the earliest generations to drag down the race as he had the other races of the earth, to one common ruin. Before the flood of Noah's time he won them thru their carnal passions. Now he sets them to taint their holy worship, perverting it into idolatries which have debased the race and a great body of mankind for all these centuries, and holds great portions of the world in darkness, subject to death. He plies them with visions of Empire and dominion, and in this way filled the earth thru the ages with murderous, tyrannies, misrule, oppression, wars, and political abominations. Then he began to corrupt the thinking of men where in they became willing slaves to damning error. Even today he is still god of this world, to whom the vast majority of the race render homage, whose rule is in sway over at least 2/3 of the population of the earth, which is full of misery from his power. There is solid ground for hope that it will be otherwise until the Great Lion of the tribe of Judah comes forth in his fury as the Almighty to make an utter end of Satan and his infernal domination. But his doom is sealed, and it has been sealed on the face of the stars where it has been written from the beginning, the same as is found in the Scriptures. Altho Satan's grasp upon our world holds thru the long succession of 2/3 of the signs, there is at last a Lion in the way, alive, awake, and mighty. HE is the Seed of the Woman whom the serpent all thru these ages has been wounding in the heel, as he tries to defeat and destroy the program of YAHWEH (God). But this Lion he cannot pass. Oh, he is cunning as the great deceiver, and still works his destruction, but now he is to be dragged forth to Judgement, seized by the Almighty power, crushed, torn, pierced and put under this bowl of Eternal wrath while the hundred headed body in which he has operated thru the ages is given to the birds of uncleanness to be devoured.
When the Serpent falls, the circle of time is complete, it is Eternity. There is no continuity of the way of time beyond the victorious triumph of Judah's Lion. All the wild beasts with all their children and that old Serpent, their father, with them...have their place in the prison burning with fire and brimstone....which is Shekinah Light. But outside that prison there is no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, no more pain for those former things are passed away. The great voices of heaven now sing:...'Behold the tabernacle of God is with men and He will dwell in them and be their God, for they shall inherit all things'. (Revelation 21) This is the reason Jesus taught us to Pray:...'Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven'.
This ends the description of the signs in the heavens of the Gospel story of the Zodiac. But our Author still has more material in other lectures which we think you will find interesting. We will bring you those messages on tape in the near future.
LECTURE 15-- 'THE SECRETS OF WISDOM'.
Job 11:6---'He would show thee the secrets of wisdom that they are double to that which is.'
My friends there are hidden spheres beyond the reach of our natural reason. The scripture everywhere recognizes that there is a natural and then a spiritual, that it is written in what we call symbols, parables and allegories. And the true secrets of wisdom as well as the characteristics of Divine teaching all lie in the 'double' of what we naturally observe and experience.
In so far then as this doubleness of showing is a mark of Divine teaching-- the primeval astronomy is pre-eminently a part of Gods own revelation, for here we find not only a superhuman knowledge of the natural economy of the starry heavens, but a doubleness of expression by which we may also read the whole system of Messianic truths, predictions and hopes.
To human observation there is none grander than this Universe of heavenly worlds. The Study of them is justly regarded as the sublimest of sciences. But on the basis of these natural facts and presentations, there is a duplicate meaning touching another department of the Divine manifestations which is more precious than all the knowledge of astronomy.
In our endeavors to trace this starry expression we have been occupied entirely with the Solar Zodiac and its 36 Decans. Following this way thru all these stations with their explanatory faces, we necessarily have before us all the most conspicuous markings of the heavens. I firmly believe that Christ and His fore-announced achievements are there symbolized in the circle of the heavens. The scriptural presentations of this outline of the Gospel story declares:---'the Glory of God'---in the person, mission, work and redemptive achievements of Jesus the Christ. Now; there is not only a Solar Zodiac but there is also a Lunar Zodiac which consists of the same belt as the Solar Zodiac. But the Lunar zodiac divides that belt into 28 instead of 12 parts, and these 28 parts are called the 'mansions of the moon.' Astronomy agrees that this Lunar Zodiac contains the most ancient remains of the science of the stars. The Chinese astronomy also begins with Virgo and seems to indicate that the Chinese table came from the antediluvian times, even before the time of Abraham.
The mansions of the moon were interwoven with the Solar Zodiac story and they are preserved in Scandinavia, in the writings of the Brahma of India, and were found also in the ruins of old and ancient Mexico. Thus in the arranging and naming of these Lunar Mansions we would expect that they should carry the meaning of the same substance of truth as the Solar Zodiac, and we find this to be true. For instance; the first Lunar mansion carried the meaning of 'the desired, and the branch'. The second Mansion carries the meaning of the branch of the power of God. The third mansion carries the meaning of the atonement, the fulfillment by sacrifice. These three mansion's correspond to Virgo. The fourth mansion carries the meaning of :-- the redeemed, the regaining by purchase, the buying back. The fifth mansion carries the meaning of:-- complete submission and these two mansions answer to Libra.
Thus it is with all the names and their meanings in the Lunar Zodiac. They run parallel to the names and meaning of the Solar Zodiac and end up precisely in the same way proving that they are a part of it.
Now:----THE MILKY WAY----
Another distinct marking of the heavens is a snowy belt, from four to twenty degrees or more in width which stretches obliquely over the sky from South-west to North-east cutting the ecliptic and extending entirely around the whole circuit of the heavens in another direction. It is best seen in the months of June to November and looks like a great river of hazy brightness. It is called the Galaxy, the Milky Way, and the Galactic *2* circle, and this whole Milky Way is made up of myriads and myriads of suns just like ours, which is one of them. Milton refers to this Great belt as:--'A broad and ample road, whose sun is gold, and its pavement stars, as stars to thee appear, a circling zone, powdered with stars.' The ancient heathen poets and philosophers spoke of this WAY as the path which the deities used in the heavens, and claimed that it led directly to the Throne, and 'The Thunderer’s abode.' And if the Primeval prophet had wished to mark on the sky the Way, the steps and stages in the life and work of the Promised Seed of the Woman and the results of the same, this marvelous pathway of the gods was well suited to their purpose, and so we also find it employed.
Twelve of the constellations are situated in or on the Milky Way; six of which relate to the first advent, and six to the second. They start at the lowest point with the Cross and the Altar of sacrifice, the burning penalty of sin---- and as Christ humbled Himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross, he laid the foundations of salvation in becoming a curse for us. Then came the cleft of Scorpio; the sting of death which seemed to split the Milky Way asunder. With the Eagle pierced and the Swan on outspread wing going and returning with a bright cross displayed upon its breast for all the world to see. Then the royal Cephans swaying the scepter of Empire stands with his foot upon the pole of dominion, high over all authority and power; all of which epitomizes with great expectations the Biblical picture of Christ's history up to the time when He is to return.
The first thing to occur when the time of His return arrives is the gathering of His true people, dead or alive. This is pictured on the Milky Way as Cassiopeia, the woman--Israel--the kingdom enthroned, the true church set free of its bindings and crowned with Heavenly Glory.
The next picture is that of Perseus--'the Breaker' now fully armed and winged, He is the savior of Andromeda who he has engaged to make His bride, he is the slayer of Gorgon that head writhing with matted snakes, and he bears it away in triumph.
The next picture is of the Mighty Shepherd ruling the nations with a rod of iron, but holding the spiritual center of the kingdom, His church close to this bosom, and holding the lambs safe in His mighty hand.
The next picture is that of Gemini, the union of Christ and His church, the marriage of The Lamb. The fifth picture is that of the glorious Orion, the Mighty Hunter treading down the serpent under his feet and destroying even death. Then comes the last of that series as Argo the anchored ship of the heroes returned from their perilous expedition to recover the Golden Fleece. Now the ship has securely landed on the home shores, with their imperishable treasure secured forever.
This completes the circle of the Milky Way which even the heathens recognized and celebrated as the path to Glory and to God. And we now ask you---could this arrangement, so clear and so consistent and so thoughtfully conformed to the scriptures that teach us on the subject of salvation, have come about by mere accident, fitted in as it is with the Zodiacal showings, on a circle so different and yet, in its own path exhibiting the same story so vividly and so fully? How can we otherwise conclude that here is proof of a purpose, and of the operation of some great master mind at once familiar with the whole Gospel theme, and with the whole system of the Starry world?
We should then be able to find other recognitions of this story and be able to trace the ancient symbolism of the earthly picture as well. Here we only need to look to find many remarkable facts. For instance--the names of the Adamic Patriarchs given in the fifth chapter of Genesis, for since early Christianity these names have been held to contain a synopsis of the whole Gospel story. Each name has a meaning, and taken in their historic order they indicate the main things in the history of our *3* redemption. But who would anticipate without being told that these names and their meanings equally correspond with the Zodiac in the senses in which we have been explaining them?
ADAM means the bright, the excellent, the godlike who is also to suffer death. The second Adam was HE who with the brightness of Glory came to die for our sins. HE the picture of the SEED OF THE WOMAN--Virgo--with the glorious star--Spica--the branch.
SETH means appointed in place of another, a substitute, a compensation price. SETH took the place of Abel to carry the physical seed forward, while the Second Adam or Seth came to take our place on the Cross, as portrayed in the sign of Libra.
ENOS means mortal, suffering, afflicted. So Enos was the appointed bearer of the Adamic griefs and sorrows. Just as Christ by whose stripes we are healed, and this is the picture in the sign of Scorpio.
CAINAN means acquisition, forcible gaining of possession. Cainan shows the gaining of possessions in earth of the Adamic Race in our job of building the kingdom. Where as Christ's mission is to bruise the head of the serpent--to hold him back so that his people of the race can build the kingdom and make progress in that building. This is the picture on exhibit in the sign of Sagittarius.
MAHALABLE--means the display or praise of God, and so it is everywhere set forth as the outshining of YAHWEH'S GLORY, and the topic of HIS praise as HE YAHSHUA--YAHWEH embodied delivered us from our offences, and raised us again for our justification. This is again the story we found in Capricornus
JARED--means the descending, the coming down, as the Holy spirit shed forth to quicken, and energize, according to the promise we found in Aquarius.
ENOCH means consecrated, initiated, taught, trained, so that of old time and in our dispensation it could equally be said:--'Ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people, that ye should show forth the praises of HIM who hath called you out of darkness into His Glorious and marvelous Light.' (1 Peter 2:9) This is the very subject in the sign of Pisces.
METHUSELAH means released from death. The Christ appeared to John as standing in the midst of the Throne, marked as having been slain, but now having the perfection of Power, Wisdom, and Divine endowment, having the keys of Death and the grave to release and bring forth His people to the same heavenly life. This is the presentation also of Aries.
LAMECH--means the strong, the mighty, the wild, the invincible overthrower. Thus Christ is to come in the greatness of His strength, with Power and great Glory, to execute judgment upon the enemy, to tread the winepress of the wrath of the Almighty God till the mountains (nations) are melted with blood. This is the presentation of the sign of Taurus--the earthly Kingdom of the Adamic race.
NOAH means rest, there remaineth a rest for the people of God after the wicked are destroyed. A calm repose with our redeemer when we reach the farther side or shore of this sea of this world, and join in everlasting union with OUR LORD as His Bride, His wife--this is the theme of Gemini.
SHEM--means the name of renown, the standards of Empire, the symbol of an established world kingdom, just as predicted, the glorious kingdom given to the Saints, and this is the subject matter given in the sign today called Cancer.
ARPHAXED--means the strength, the stronghold of the assembly, which again is the input of the sign of Leo.
There must have been great intelligence to fit what we might call accidents of earth with such elaborations of signs in the heaven's to record in both the full length evangelic story--nor could that intelligence *4* have achieved such a work un-helped by the spirit of HIM who alone knows the end of all things from the beginning.
Now; lets look at the names of Jacob's sons, the twelve tribes of Israel and Jacob's blessings on them in Genesis 49, and in the corresponding song of Moses for the tribes of Israel in Deuteronomy 33, and then on the Banners born by the tribes in their march thru the wilderness from Egypt to Canaan land. Then look at the Jewels of the Breastplate of their officiating High Priest, and we again find distinct connections with the Celestial signs.
ZEBULON, means dwelling, the choosing or entering into a home. We find this prophetically in the sky in the sign of Virgo.
LEVI--did not carry any standard of Israel, but he kept the balances of the sanctuary and Libra is Levi's sign.
DAN--means Judge, administering as a Judge. Jacob describes him as judging and punishing, and as a maker of trails like a serpent for others of the race to follow, and Scorpio thus is his sign.
ASHER is called Shoham, the lively, the strong, and his name means blessed, the happy, the triumphant going forth. Moses speaks of him as dipping his foot in oil, wearing shoes of iron and brass and riding forth in the strength of the God of Jeshrurum, and is the picture found in Sagittarius.
NAPHTALI--is a 'hind'--a wrestler with death, let go to drop and die, but filled with favor and blessing, nevertheless this is the showing in Capricornus.
REUBEN--in like manner corresponds to Aquarius. His name means behold a son--a new beginning.
SIMEON means hearing and obeying. Jacob associates Levi with Simeon signifying the united, joined together, bound; and Moses assign's them the blessings of the prophetic lights and perfections. All of which answers to HIS kingdom, and His church as pictured in the sign of Pisces.
GAD means--the seer, as the Lamb has seven eyes, and this is Aries. He is pierced but overcomes at the last.
JOSEPH is Taurus--the great REEM, and Ephraim and Manasseh are his two great sons or horns, pushing the people to the ends of the earth. The arms of his hands, are made strong by the Mighty God of Jacob. His Jewel signifies tongues of fire.
BENJAMIN is Gemini, he has two names and Gemini has two figures. Benjamin--son of my right hand, and Benoi son of my sorrow.
ISSACHAR means recompense, his jewel is representative of Pitda or reward. Jacob speaks of him as a strong ass resting between the burdens of treasure. He sees his resting place that is good. Moses describes him as rejoicing in his tents, to whose mountains the people come with sacrifices of Righteousness, and to the abundance of the seas, and the yet hidden treasures on the shore. All these answer thru out the sign of Cancer.
JUDAH of course is Leo, and his name means Praise, Glory and Majesty of God. His banner bore the sign of the Rampant Lion. His jewel was the Ruby, the symbol of blood shedding unto victory.
Now I would like to add to this story and give the setting as to where you find these 12 tribes of Israel located today in the west according to their banners and symbols:----
ZEBULUN--today is found in the Slavic countries---many of the Israelite tribes came thru this land of Hungry, Romania and so forth as they came to the west--and were choosing or entering into their western home. Still thus on the East as their ancient marching orders.
LEVI did not carry a banner or standard of Israel and his tribe was to be, divided into all tribes of Israel as their Ministers and Priests, thus making room for both the sons of Joseph to be leaders of tribes.
*5*
DAN---his banner or symbol is found in Denmark for the most part, still in marching order on the north--as his banner is also found thru out Scandinavia as well.
ASHER---his symbol is found is Sweden.
NAPHTALI--is identified as Norway--even in W.W.II the leader of Norway called his people--Sons of the North.
REUBEN--a new beginning--Reuben was called unstable and his people established their symbol in Italy then moved to the north to the Netherlands where even today they sing the song:--Reuben, Reuben I’ve been thinking'.
SIMEON--established his symbol in Spain--then entered on great explorations to establish the truth of the Great God of the Sky.
GAD--is identified with Italy and Greece--that area as he was instrumental in establishing the Roman Empire which in time was taken over and brought down by the same evil power as was Old Babylon.
JOSEPH is found in Taurus--the Great Reem--and Ephraim and Manasseh carry his symbols of the Bull and the outstretched Wings of the Eagle found in Great Britain and the U.S.
BENJAMIN--is Gemini, and he has two names and his symbol is found first in Iceland--on the west as is Ephraim and Manasseh, then you find the 'Wolf' in northern France and thru the Scandinavian countries.
ISSACHAR--is Finland the little country resting between two great powers the Western Christian nations and the Soviet Union. In W.W.II the leader of Finland called on his troops to stand as the Sons of Issachar, so they still remembered their Heritage at that time.
JUDAH is Germany and carries the symbol of the Double Eagle--and of course is the power on the East in the center, with Zebulon on the south of Judah but still on the east, and Finland on the north, but still on the east.
Now; there are twelve jewels which make up the foundation of New Jerusalem in which are found the names of the Apostles.:---
JASPER:--a stone most precious, bright and clear, and this reminds us at once of Spica, the bright and precious Seed of the woman. The meaning of Jasper is said to be:--'coming to bruise and to be bruised'. This is the same story we find set forth in the sign of Virgo.
SAPPHIRE means number, as count the price and weight which is found in Libra.
CHALCEDONY means affliction, torture and thus is tied to Scorpio. EMERALD means, defending, keeping as a mighty protector. This is the figure of Sagittarius.
SARDONYX means--the Prince smitten, as in Capricornus.
SARDIUS means, the power issuing forth, so is the parallel of Aquarius.
CHRYSOLITE means HE who binds, who holds with bands, or the bound together as is in Pisces.
BERYL means, the son, the first born, the exalted head, and corresponds precisely with the sign of Aries.
TOPAZ signifies, dashing in pieces and related to Taurus. CHRYPOPRASUS, nearly the same as the Chrysolite means--they who are united as in Gemini.
JACINTH, means possessing, as HE shall possess like we saw in the true Cancer.
AMETHYST means HE that destroys or destroyer of the one who deceives as in Leo.
What then, upon what else could New Jerusalem the Golden and Eternal Kingdom of YAHWEH'S Redeemed Ones be built upon but these precious Jewels of the person, the character, and the office, the work, or the achievements of that illustrious 'Seed of the Woman' in whom we find our Salvation???????
*6*
In this Divine order and in full recognition of the precise imagery and symbolic import of the twelve signs in these circling years of time they give the stamp and seal of the final revelation of the sublime and finished result of all that fills the disturbed ages of this world-- to the reality of what we have been seeking to show, that the mystic garniture of the heavens which modern science in its vanity has chosen to regard as crude and grotesque scribbling, is instead the very writing of YAHWEH (God), by His spirit--from the beginning--to hold up to the whole race in all its branches and generations what He has also caused to be recorded in the world, and deposited with his own people. Thus the Great Almighty inscribed in works of nature--with symbolism of signs--His more precious works of Grace, and has shown us--the right 'Secrets of Wisdom' that they are double to that which is.
**** Lecture 16---Primeval Man---*********
Job 12:12---'With the Ancients is Wisdom' After what we have now seen of the presentations and connections of the Ancient Astronomy, the question of its origin becomes one of the great interests and important to us. But who framed this system? Who then first accurately observed these features of natures Celestial crown, and who wove them together into one great plan, at once so true to fact and so full of prophetic significance? Where did all this wisdom come from? Our investigations would be left incomplete if we did not now endeavor to gather what information exists touching these inquiries.
Astronomy is unquestionably one of the most Ancient of sciences. Its history runs back into an antiquity so remote and dim that the greatest astronomers are unable to tell its source or beginning. Its existence is traceable however in all known ages among all nations, with all its main features settled and fixed from the most distant periods. Learned antiquarians of modern times have searched every page of heathen mythology, ransacked all the legends of poetry and fables, transversed all the religions, sciences, customs and traditions of every nation, tribe and people. They have used the best information the earth affords, with even a view to rescue the matter from the heavy mists hanging over it; but with no further success than to trace it back to certain Chaldean Shepherds who lived in a very early period of time. But everything else concerning it and them is left undiscovered and untold. Had the first however grasped the real meaning and intent of these primeval inventions of astronomic science, or thought of the true connections of the signs, to the interpretations given by a certain RACE they would have been able to reach a different explanation of the subject.
We today have monumental evidence in the great pyramid of Giza, that a very complete and sublime knowledge of the structure and meaning of the visible Universe, inclusive of a very exact astronomy which was known to the architects who built so long before the birth of The Christ. It is also a matter of record that when Alexander the Great took Babylon then Calisthenes--the philosopher with that expedition found certain astronomical observations made by the Chaldeans over 1900 years before that time. Terah the father of Abraham lived more than 100 years in the time of Noah, had studied astronomy and it was taught to Abraham as well. It is also well known that the religion of ancient Babylon and like people consisted of the knowledge contained in the heavenly bodies and was based thus on starry configurations. From knowledge now gained of these ancient people we find that the Chaldean religion and mythology was already a settled astronomical science and must have existed a considerable period before that time.
The Book of Job is the oldest book that we can ascertain in our Bible and it more than any other abounds in astronomical allusions. Here we *7* read of---Arcturus and his sons--the sweet influence of the Pleiades---the bands of Orion---the fleeing serpent---Mazzaroth with its seasons, which is of course the Solar Zodiac.
Ptolemy records an observation of the rising of Sirius on the fourth day after the summer solstice 2,250 years before Christ thus there was a high degree of astronomical knowledge preceding that date.
Dr. Seyffarth claims there is a record of the Celestial presentation which designates the year, month and day when Noah came out of the Ark. and Astronomy must therefore have existed in and before Noah's time.
On the basis of Astronomy's own record apart from all other testimony we are carried back to a period within the Lifetime of Adam and his sons for the original explanation of the Zodiac, and with it the whole system of our astronomy. The ancient sayings and traditions of our race agree with this.
Looking back thru the work of the most honored Poets and Historians who have probed the deepest, it was Adam who had the happy fellowship with God, and was in close communion with Divine intelligence. Here was to be found the greatest of men, for the first age was the 'Golden age'.
The Hebrews hold the tradition that Adam wrote a book concerning the creation of the world, and another on the Deity. An Arabian writer says his people taught that Abraham had in his possession certain Sacred writings of Adam, Seth, and Enoch in which were the Laws, and promises from YAHWEH (God), as well as the predictions of many events and affirms that even Abraham taught astronomy. Thus from Adam sprang Seth who according to Ancient records followed his father in the pursuit of wisdom as did his descendants. It is said that they were the inventors of that peculiar sort of wisdom which is concerned with the Heavenly bodies and their conditions and indications. The first mention of letters falls upon Seth's time.
Enoch is especially credited with special wisdom and writing particularly as relating to astronomy and prophecy. Abraham taught that astronomy and other sciences came down from Enoch. And according to the Scriptures Adam lived about 700 years in the lifetime of his son Seth and about 300 years in the lifetime of Enoch and died only 100 years after Noah was born. All these were Holy Prophets, and from Luke 1:69-70 and Acts 3:21 we learn that these were inspired Divine teachers--'from the foundation of the world', and before the world began. Whosoever else may be included in this list still Adam, Seth, and Enoch were by far the greatest and most illustrious of them all.
Adam from the first was in perfect fellowship with Divine intelligence, and knew all things that came before him by an intuitive Divine insight into their whole nature and intention. Adam came out of the hands of the creator indued with perfect science, and he did not lose this when by sin--he fell. He also passed on his knowledge to his posterity thus what Adam knew then Seth knew, and so would Enoch. Living in the same time span there was more opportunity to pass on any knowledge especially their belief in the promise of the coming Messiah.
The Bible tells us especially of Enoch's intimacy and life-communion with YAHWEH, And certain of his predictions runs on the precise theme we have been reading from the constellations. But going back to that period of Adam we find that this Race--under God-- were the great founders of our world. They were the teachers of the world, the great Prophets of the world. They lived nearly 1000 years and had ample time for observation and study, and were able to bring the work to perfection before required to leave it. And all the time, over all, were the stars only waiting to be named and grouped and hung with the records and symbols of the desires of promise and prophecy on which the world's hopes depend, that they might become the everlasting *8* witnesses to men of the God-given Faith and hopes which the great grandfather of all Sacred Prophets were able to record.
We therefore cannot see why any shade of doubt could linger in our minds as to this fact that the early men of Adam's race, under Divine inspiration drew the Celestial Hieroglyphics, named and grouped the stars, and laid out the Zodiacs and their signs as well as made the heavens a picture gallery for all the world. The first and greatest ever made so that man could read the wondrous promise of a Redeemer, the redemption and the Redeemed. This and this only will account for the sacred reverence in which all the ancient people held these starry emblems, and even fell to worshiping them, and ascribing to them all sorts of Divine and prophetic Virtues. For it was always the common, accepted doctrine of antiquity that the Constellations were Divine in origin and Sacred characters. Even tho heathenism has perverted them still it was always held that they are from God, and Scripture records:--'Let them be for signs.'
What if the key to the showings seemed to afterwards be lost, and men only misread what has been Divinely recorded? The failures and sins of men do not unmake the Truth of God, neither do their misuses and perversions of His gifts dispose of their Divine source or good intent.
The turning of Israel’s calling and sacred institutes into the idea that Israel killed this 'Son of God and slew His Holy Apostles still does not unmake the Divine message thru Moses, nor the Heavenly inspiration of the Prophets who spent their lives building Israel into a Kingdom of YAHWEH in earth. The perversion of Christianity into an imperial Popedom, and Anti-Christ, and a tyrannous persecution of the Saints of God by His own alleged viceregent did not prove Jesus of Nazareth was an imposter, nor the testimony of His Apostles un-divine or untrue. And if men in like manner have perverted these primeval records in the stars and turned the showing of promised rest and Salvation into an instrument of superstition, and twisted a Divine Astronomy into a devilish astrology and developed paganism out of a primitive Evangelism, what is it but the depravity of man, and the trick of the great Deceiver belying God, but by no means discrediting, or unmaking the divinity, the wondrous promises of the original.
Everywhere in antiquity there was a cherished tradition of an expected conqueror of the serpent who was to come as a Divine person, born of a woman. That tradition is even reflected in the heathen mythology thru out the world. By a world wide testimony we are assured that this is the interwoven mystic essence of the primeval astronomy, the same that constitutes the essence of all that is written by inspiration in the Books of the Bible.
From the Gospel in the stars we have the story. From the early Patriarchs of the Adamic race we have the explanation of the Star Gospel. It is in three grand parts or books, each with four chapters divided into four distinct sections. This brief is the content as outlined so long ago:---
BOOK ONE--THE REDEEMER PROMISED----
Chapter 1--Virgo
a. The seed of the woman
b. The desire of the nation
c. the man of double nature in humiliation
d. the exalted Shepherd and harvester
Chapter 2--Libra
a. the price to be paid
b. the Cross endured
c. the victim slain
d. the Crown purchased
Chapter 3--Scorpio * 9 *
a. cleft in the conflict
b. the serpents coils
c. the struggle with the enemy
d. the toiling vanquisher of evil
Chapter 4--Sagittarius
a. the double natured-ONE triumphing as a warrior
b. He gladdens the heavens
c. He builds the fires of punishment
d. He casts down the dragon
BOOK TWO----THE REDEEMER'S PEOPLE
Chapter 1--Capricornus
a. life out of death
b. the arrow of God
c. pierced and falling
d. springing up again in abundant life
Chapter 2--Aquarius
a. Life Water from on high
b. drinking in the heavenly flood
c. carrying and spreading the good news
d. bearing aloft the Cross over all the earth
Chapter 3--Pieces
a. swimming in Heavenly waters
b. upheld and governed by the Lamb
c. head over all things
d. the intended Bride (Israel) bound and exposed to earth
Chapter 4--Aries
a. the Lamb entered on dominion
b. the Bride released and making ready
c. Satan bound
d. the breaker triumphing
BOOK 4---REDEMPTION COMPLETED
Chapter 1--Taurus
a. the invincible ruler comes
b. the sublime vanquisher
c. the river of judgment
d. the all-ruling Shepherd
Chapter 2--Gemini
a. the marriage of the Lamb
b. the enemy trodden down
c. the Prince coming in Glory
d. His Princely following
Chapter 3--Cancer
a. the possession secured
b. the lesser sheepfold, the rulers of the Administration of the Kingdom
c. the greater sheepfold of the Kingdom--the Congregation of Israel
d. the heroes home, landing after their expedition, their toils and trials over
Chapter 4--Leo * 10 *
a. the King aroused for the rending
b. the serpent fleeing
c. the bowl of wrath upon the serpent
d. the carcass of the serpent devoured
Here then in marked order, a thoroughness of inspired writing which came down to us of the order of events as outlined by our fathers with reference to earth, and man, and every topic in the twelve signs, and twelve times three signs of a genuine Gospel topic handled exactly as we find it in the writings of the Prophets and Apostles. There is nothing added or nothing left out. The whole story is complete, more complete than have the ministers in before them, and after all the prophesying and preaching and fulfilling that has occurred in the thousands of years since these star pictures were made.
Now you know that Adamic men drew maps, made pictures, and wrote books, taught wisdom and transmitted thought and intelligence, just as successfully as the progeny from Adams later descendants. The doctrine that modern man is a mere evolution from savagery, his makership his own, his intelligence a mere self acquired development is false. Egypt, Phoenicia, Arabia, Assyria, Chaldea, India and China of older times under the Adamic influence were never savages or uncivilized for they had governments, societies, and laws , art and sciences going back to the beginning of the Adamic history, and from them all later people learned. From Adam on we have evidence of enlightenment as high and as true to nature and fact as anything we know, and which is to this day the very backbone of such of the worlds best and highest wisdom. The weight of the showing is that Adam was the truest model and representative of man, and that all human progress since, altho upward in some things has been in the main an unceasing deteriation.
Today the reverence that the people of our race had for their ancestors is considered a fault. Today the worship of earth--born of gas-light glory is much in use, and if the sun in the heavens is not half as bright and beautiful, then this is due to mans deteriation of thought. Should Adam, Seth, Enoch or Noah appear among us and take an inventory of our prevailing philosophies, the way in which modern thinking runs, how these Ancient Patriarchs would be sickened over the degeneration of their posterity. What if we found out that a wire magnetized at one end is instantly magnetized at the other end? What if we have succeeded in producing our inventions as well as making war machines? From the high stand point of those primeval sages Noah would have to write:---'Behold the earth is corrupt, for all flesh hath corrupted its way.'
Yes--Adam fell, but that fall did not obliterate from his intelligence the knowledge which YAHWEH had previously given him. Yes---judgment came upon Adam, and hard necessities, by reason of his transgression, but there was no obliteration of his intellectual treasures, or his intellectual powers such as they have depreciated in transmission to his posterity, they were not blotted out of Adam himself, --FOR A PURPOSE. Neither did YAHWEH cease to speak to Adam, or refuse to open up to him new and richer fields of wisdom to meet his condition as a sinner. Fallen Adam was still capable of redemption, and that redemption was to be accomplished to come in the generations of his Race. To save Adam it was necessary that Adam should know of it, and to save his posterity it was necessary that the same knowledge,---this knowledge of a promised Redeemer, the nature of His work and the results of His administration should be known, The whole Gospel---Adam would need to know. The whole Gospel---if anything he would be most anxious to understand. The Whole Gospel as he got it from YAHWEH, he would want to teach his children and have it securely recorded for all coming generations. Such as his interest and duty as a Prophet---this is *11*
what YAHWEH would certainly approve of and bless, and help was what Adam was to know. It would be in line and spirit of all HIS inspirations given to men that He should do for Adam in such a case more than he did for even Moses, Samuel, Isaiah, and Daniel.
Here then in records and emblems of the stars, dating back to Adam's time and linked with true astronomy we have the pictorial memorial of the promised redeemers character, and achievements as looked for and believed in. YAHWEH'S witnesses from the gulf of the ages assures us there is no mistake in building our hope of Salvation on Jesus of Nazareth. Zacharias would then sing:---Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for He hath visited and redeemed his people, and raised up an horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David; as He spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets, which have been since the world began. (Luke 1:68-70)
LECTURE 17---THE STAR OF BETHLEHEM
For long over a thousand years Christendom has been inquiring and wondering---who were these Wisemen from the East that came to Jerusalem asking about a new born Prince. Christendom of today calls him a Jewish Prince, but how come these Wisemen knew about Him? What were those starry indications to which they referred, and why were they making this great search for Him?
All Christian literature is full of comments, songs and so forth about the coming of these Wisemen. They say HE was King of the Jews and yet the 'Son of God.' But there is only one thing-----the Cross and the Resurrection which is connected with this Star of Bethlehem. The Christian world has not been clear or well agreed on this most important subject, and as yet has not settled on the truth or a particular clearness as to be free from error on this so great a subject.
It is still a matter of record that the Patriarch Seth in those days when the heavenly signs were recorded as to their arrangements, gave a prophecy that in the period in which the Great promised ONE should be born, that there would appear a very bright star in the heavens. It is also a matter of record that a new and peculiar star did make its appearance in the first Decan of Virgo in the period immediately preceding Christ's birth, and that it was so bright as to be visible even in daytime. This star was in Coma---it passed thru this sign of the infant accompanying Virgo. It marked the very head of that infant. Those understanding the message of the stars would of course recognize that this was HIS STAR---for at that time it was the brightest star in the Constellation as well as in all the heavens round about.
Conjunctions of Jupiter and Saturn were noted at that time, and it was remembered that before the birth of Moses and other Israel leaders these two planets came into conjunction. Three things then came out with great clearness;---first--the conjunctions of Jupiter and Saturn spoke of the birth of a Great Prince. This was the beginning or starting of a new order of things. Second the sign in which the conjunctions occurred indicated the people among whom the child was to be born. Third that the children of Israel were already at that early period associated with the sign of Pisces, the sign of the fishes.
These Magi were anciently generally a pastoral people greatly occupied with religion, astronomy, and other sacred sciences. They were the great teachers of kings and people in the Divine wisdom. It was their heredity, their privilege to provide their country with priests and religious instructions. They were ministers and prophets of their day, and they lived mostly in towns without walls, observing their own laws and trusting YAHWEH alone for protection. It is from these people that Zoroaster sprung. It was from them that Cyrus selected his priests for Persia. They *12* believed in a great and powerful spirit of evil in constant antagonism to YAHWEH, the spoiler of the Divine works and the author of all mischief. The history of the world to them was the history of the conflict of the good originating with the Devil. They possessed both the Solar and Lunar Zodiacs and proclaimed that they were given of YAHWEH---to teach man wisdom, forecast the future and give hope to the race. According to the showings of the Constellations, they looked for a time when their Redeemer would be born in earth--a great Savior and deliverer and by whom the spirit of evil would be destroyed, the dead raised up to life again, and the kingdom of righteousness, of everlasting life and happiness established over all the earth. This you find written in the best accounts of the Magi, and in those fragments of their sacred books which are still preserved and of late years published in our own tongue. Before Abraham's time the Magi were men like Job and his friends, like Enoch, and later like the priest of Midian, they were wise Patriarchial leaders like this father-in-law of Moses. These were men who YAHWEH had never abandoned, who had retained their knowledge that this birth of Christ would come. And they were still noble spirits--these descendants of the Ancient Magi who still clung eagerly to the fulfillment of the promises of the heavens. They thus watched the heavens over those thousands of years waiting for 'the Star' in the sign telling of the coming of the Great Virgin born--Eternal Sovereign. Truly these Magi came to the cradle to pay their devout homage and adoration, truly they knew who they came to find. Surely this ought to put the matter beyond dispute, and settle forever that there is such a thing as 'the Gospel of the Stars' even that very Gospel which holds forth Jesus of Nazareth, as the promised seed of the woman, the Divine human Son of the Virgin who was to come, to suffer, and to toil, and die for the deliverance of Adam man from darkness, to destroy the work of the great serpent, the dominion of this enemy, and to bring everlasting redemption to our fallen race, and to complete the picture of 'The restitution of all things.'
This ends this great old book---'The Gospel of the Stars' written in 1844. I might add that Dr. Swift said that in 1962 the star of Bethlehem was then in the sign of Leo----where is it today??????
MAY YAHWEH BLESS YOU ELLA ROSE MAST
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