"The philosopher's stone is everywhere because it constitutes the essence of all things" (Patrick Harpur).
"If one wishes to perceive the invisible, let him observe the visible" (The Talmud).
"As above, so below; as within, so without; as is the universe, so is the soul" (Hermes Trismegistus).
Alchemy
The word "alchemy" (from Arabic "al-khimia" or "al-kymia") means "chemistry", but a deep, spiritual type of chemistry, beyond the ordinary chemistry we know today, which is of a superficial type. It also seems to refer to the land of Khem ("the black country", the ancient name for the land of Egypt, the country of origin of alchemy). Alchemy was an occult, hidden art, reserved for certain initiates, and that should not be communicated to the vulgar, so it used a cryptic, esoteric, metaphorical, symbolic language, only accessible to initiates.
According to tradition, the founder of alchemy was the Egyptian god Thoth, identified as Mercury by the Romans, Hermes by the Greeks and personified by Hermes Trismegistus (the "thrice great"), the mythical character of esotericism. Because of this origin, it is also called "hermetic philosophy" or "hermetic art". Alchemy is not a branch of esotericism, it is its cornerstone. Hermes is credited with the Emerald Tablet, which contains the principles of universalism. The Emerald Tablet was the "bible" of the alchemists, the oldest treatise. It was translated into English by Newton, a scientist and great fan of alchemy. Alchemy was practiced from the 4th century BC until the rise of chemistry in the 17th century. Its heyday was medieval Europe, with Paracelsus as the most prominent figure.
Hermes Trismegistus
The alchemists considered themselves depositaries of the science par excellence, the sacred, pure and universal science, the mother of all sciences, constituted by the general or universal principles that underlie all others. These principles explain the nature, origin and raison d'être of all that exists.
Although alchemy may appear to be a pseudoscience, its contributions have been very numerous, among them:
It has been a protochemistry, since chemistry inherited its basic concepts, as well as its instruments (stove, distiller, retort, flask, etc.) and the discovery of substances (phosphorus, acetone, benzoic acid, sodium sulfate, antimony salt, etc.).
He has contributed to the understanding of the mechanism of consciousness as a conjunction of opposites (one of the principles of alchemy).
His concept of "prime matter" or ether has exerted (and continues to exert) a great influence in physics.
It is a precedent of modern analytical or depth psychology.
It is a universalistic view, a theory of everything (including the physical, psychic and spiritual levels), for it offers a deep, universal and transcendental point of view.
Objectives of alchemy
The objectives of alchemy were threefold:
The search for the philosopher's stone (lapis philosophorum), by which all metals could be transmuted into gold.
The search for the elixir of long life, the panacea or universal medicine, imagined as a substance capable of curing all diseases, of revitalizing and preventing the corruption of matter.
The attainment of the "Great Work", whose objective was to elevate the alchemist himself to a higher state of existence or consciousness.
With the Great Work, the alchemists were really pursuing the "philosophical gold", the secret hidden behind the diversity of manifestations of nature. Gold, esoteric metal par excellence, symbolizes perfection, harmony, purification, enlightenment, wisdom, inalterability, immortality, the innermost secret of the Earth, the key that opens all doors, the primordial vibration and spiritual wealth. Therefore, the other two objectives of alchemy were really manifestations or aspects of the philosophical or transcendental gold, at the physical level (the material gold) and at the medicinal level (the elixir or universal medicine).
The Philosophical Principles of Alchemy
The principle of uniqueness. The raw material
According to the alchemists, the whole universe has a single origin and, at the moment of creation, it was only one thing. This thing is the "prima materia", the "mother" of all things, of all creation, of the whole universe, of ourselves (in our physical, mental and spiritual dimensions). Prime matter is the principle of oneness of all creation. The Emerald Tablet says: "All is One", "All things proceed from the One", "All is in All".
Raw material was for the alchemists a "spirit" or part of a Universal Spirit, a spirit that is hidden in nature, but which manifests itself (literally or metaphorically) as light. The alchemists referred to this spirit as "light of nature" (lumen natural). Alchemy sets itself the task of conquering and making visible this hidden treasure. Metals, in order to become gold, must first be reduced to their essence or raw material. Gold is hidden in lead.
Alchemy does not distinguish between matter, psyche and spirit. Everything is a manifestation of the same profound thing: the Unus Mundus. Alchemy sees nature as a totality, not as separate parts or entities. The Unus Mundus (literally, "One World" or "One World") is a term that refers to a unified underlying reality from which everything emerges, the source of everything.
The properties of the raw material are:
It is unmanifest and therefore invisible.
It is the root of matter, the common essence, the germ and source where all things are generated. Behind the diversity of things lies a common essence. "The thing (res) from which things come forth is God invisible and immobile" (Liber Quartorum). The prime matter is present in all things, and all things are present in it.
It possesses a great power because, if everything has its origin in it, it makes it possible to obtain from it anything.
It has no form, for it is prior to all manifestation. It is the root of all forms. The alchemists called "Sea" the raw material, because it contains in itself all forms.
It is found in the depths of matter.
It is the metaphysical point, the central point of the cross, the origin (0,0), the neutral point.
It is autonomous. It does not depend on anything. It is radix ipsius (root of itself).
It is the ether, the Akasha of traditional Hindu philosophy, the element or union between space and matter, the deep space that manifests itself by differentiation into matter.
It is spirit (spiritus) or soul (pneuma). It is the subtle manifestation of spirit in the universe. It is spirit manifesting as light.
It possesses the character of ubiquity. It is everywhere.
It is simple. That is, it is neither compound nor double. It is like a seed, an essence, a power that evokes the Gospel parable of the mustard seed (Matthew 13:31-32). The mustard seed is a symbolic image of the Unity which, paradoxically, is the smallest and simplest thing, which is the origin of everything and at the same time is contained in everything.
It is the quintessence, which is beyond the four fundamental physical elements (Earth, Water, Air and Fire). It is in a deeper and more subtle dimension.
It has not been created. It has no beginning and no end. It is eternal, immutable and indestructible.
It is the universal life force, the energy that animates body and mind. It is the vital principle, the Prana (of Hinduism), the Chi (of the Chinese tradition).
It is the mysterious evolutionary force that leads us to physical and spiritual perfection.
The universal principles
The alchemists believed in the existence of two universal principles: Sulphur and Mercury. These names do not refer to elements or chemical substances but to universal principles. All things, substances or phenomena, arise by combination of these two elements in different proportions.
Mercury is the feminine and passive principle, matter without form. It is equivalent to yin in ancient Chinese philosophy.
Sulfur is the masculine, active principle, that which gives form to matter. It is equivalent to the Chinese yang.
In Mercury and Sulfur are represented the four elements. Mercury is cold (like Earth) and moist (like Water). Sulfur is warm (like Fire) and dry (like Air). Air and Fire are higher elements, tending upward. Earth and Water are lower elements, tending downward.
These universal principles act at all levels, both structurally (substances) and functionally (phenomena).
For Paracelsus, there is a third element: Salt, which is the raw material itself, the vital spirit, the quintessence, the universal mediator between Sulfur and Mercury that allows to produce all kinds of material forms.
The principle of correspondence
This principle is expressed in the Emerald Tablet: "As above so below, so below so above". In other words, everything is governed by the same laws, from the macrocosm to the microcosm. As all things have a common origin based on universal principles, there is a vertical and also a horizontal relationship, a correspondence between the different created things. Superficially they seem to be unrelated, but they are connected at a deep level because they are manifestations of the same laws. For example, the alchemists believed that there was a correspondence between metals and planets (iron-Mars, silver-Moon, gold-Sun, etc.). Thus, each metal was assigned the symbol of the corresponding planet. There was also correspondence with the days of the week, the chakras (energy centers) of the body, musical notes and colors.
Inner world (psyche) and outer world (matter) obey the same laws, which means that knowing one reveals the other.
This philosophy coincides with the current idea of a Theory of Everything of modern physics. Everything is interrelated and, therefore, everything obeys a single law, although this single law can be contemplated from different aspects and seem to us particular laws unrelated to each other.
The union of opposites
The union or conjunction of opposites is the central idea of alchemy, for it is through this union that the philosopher's stone is achieved. Consciousness, self-realization, true knowledge, gnosis is achieved through the union of opposites, the union of Heaven and Earth, of matter and psyche, inner world and outer world.
The alchemists, when they performed their experiments, by virtue of the principle of correspondence, were synchronizing their inner world with the outer world, the world of psychic archetypes with the physical archetypes, the primordial material elements, seeking the essence of the inner through the outer, in short, self-knowledge.
When the union of the opposites takes place, equilibrium is produced and the ineffable, the inexpressible, the transcendent, the origin, center and source of all things is intuited. The pairs of opposites balance, cancel each other out, and the One, the Absolute, the total consciousness of all things, the soul or spirit, where there is no time, no space, no matter and no manifestation, is glimpsed. And experience and partake of the Universal Spirit.
Consciousness is the union of opposites, the connection between the superficial and the profound.
The Great Work and the Philosopher's Stone
The Great Work (Opus Magnum)
Also called "Great Art" or "Arte Regia" was the true objective of the alchemists. It was not material gold, but philosophical, metaphorical, symbolic, transcendental and spiritual gold. The Great Work of alchemy was an operation at once physical, psychological and spiritual, of internal and external transformation. The Great Work was a work of the soul, the search for perfection, harmony, order, transcendental consciousness, the common and deep essence of all things, the search for the perfect language of creation.
It is an inner journey into the essence of nature and ourselves, into wisdom, into the depth that connects all things, to achieve a vision of the interconnected wholeness of the inner and the outer. It is a journey of self-discovery, a conquest of reality and its hidden laws.
It is the search for the simple, for the res simplex, which is always duplex, a unity formed by the union of opposites. This search turns out to be, paradoxically, most complex and laborious.
It is the search for the essence of reality, separating and isolating the nucleus (the kernel or marrow, the hidden and deep) from the cortex (the shell, the superficial).
It is the search for spiritual gold: the elevation of man towards the perfect, harmonious, pure and true, towards the purification of the soul.
To find the philosopher's stone is to possess transcendental knowledge (gnosis), to see all in one (Omnia in Unum), the underlying unity of all things. It is to discover oneself and to discover the universe.
It is communion or attunement with the first cause. The Great Work is the reverse process of the creation of the world: it is to go upstream, to go backwards, to go to the origin of everything, from the matter already created to the essence, the prime matter, the one principle that engendered all differentiated things. In the beginning there was only the supreme, undifferentiated unity, the prime matter of all things, which later manifests itself by binary polarization. The Great Work itself is a union of opposites: the beginning of everything is prime matter, unity, and the end is the philosopher's stone, the consciousness of unity.
The Great Work arises from one thing and returns again to unity, a circuit symbolized by a dragon biting its own tail (the Ouroboros). The dragon devours itself, dies, but re-emerges as lapis. It is the inversion (rotatio) of the elements towards the quintessence, towards the prime matter. It is the initial being or entity that divides into male and female (becomes hermaphrodite) and that unites again in the coniuntio to manifest itself finally in the resplendent figure of the lumen novus, of the lapis.
It is the regeneration, transformation and purification of raw material into polished, structured matter. It is the search for the raw material of creation. And, at the same time, to sublimate and refine oneself to awaken the inner eye and intuitively perceive the subtle energies of nature.
It is not an apprenticeship (with which knowledge is obtained) but an evolutionary process, in spiral, that starts from a germ and develops until it produces transcendental knowledge, gnosis, the contact with the Self, the profound.
The Great Work requires constancy, dedication and concentration to detect which are the opposite poles or archetypes of reality and integrate them, synthesize them to obtain the philosopher's stone. The prize is spiritual growth, self-realization.
The alchemical process
The alchemical process consists of three stages:
Nigredo (black or Saturn stage). It is of low vibration, the lowest level of vibration. The process begins with a black substance, which represents or symbolizes the raw matter, the initial chaos, disorder, putrefaction. It corresponds to the dark or shadowy aspect of the human psyche, the lack of consciousness. It is the preparatory phase, the darkness, the deep, the dark night of the soul, the symbolic death, hell, the encounter with the depths of oneself. From this point, one must search for the raw material in the depths of the Earth, the essence hidden in the chaos, which makes us tune in to the deep, to the root of everything. This phase is absolutely essential to create a new order, a new consciousness.
Albedo (white or Moon stage). It is of medium vibration. This stage is one of analysis (or self-analysis) and consists in introducing order into chaos, in detecting the first manifestations of the raw material, which are the dipoles, the poles of opposites or complementaries (the archetypes), the masculine and feminine principles of all things, the Sulphur and Mercury, the opposite archetypes. All superfluous elements are discarded, and we are left with only the essential. Once these opposites have been detected, we must perform the conjunction, integration or union of these opposites. It is the alchemical wedding symbolized by the King and Queen. The result of this union is the Rebis (or Res-bis, the "double thing"):
It is the Androgynous, the union of Heaven and Earth. It symbolizes the indissoluble unity of complementary opposites.
It is the result of the first decoction of spirit and body, of masculine and feminine, of soluble and dissolving body.
It is a white matter, a Mercury balanced with Sulphur.
It represents the balance and coexistence of opposing or complementary forces operating at the Center of being, the two aspects of one and the same unity, wholeness and completeness.
Rubedo (red or Sun stage). It is the last stage. It is of high vibration. It consists of the firing of the Rebis to obtain the philosopher's stone, in which a red substance is obtained, the color of blood and life, the body of the diamond, the structure, the perfect order, the conscience. The firing represents the fusion or synthesis of all the opposites to achieve the consciousness of the totality, the meeting between the conscious self (Ego), the higher self, the soul, where consciousness, peace and harmony are achieved.
All opposites, previously seemingly irreconcilable with each other, complement each other in a harmonious way, and connect directly with the Unus Mundus. Such a state is ineffable, indescribable and unknowable because there is no duality, no differentiating consciousness. It is a unified state of inner and outer reality. It is the Spirit in us.
Union is consciousness. Partial consciousness (or knowledge) is the perception of the difference of a particular pair of opposites (shifting the attention from one to the other pole), their union, transcendence or overcoming or contemplation from a higher plane. Total consciousness or gnosis is the result of the total synthesis of opposites. The synthesis of the philosopher's stone is the transcendence of all opposites and their higher contemplation. Unity can only be perceived through the simultaneous contemplation of the opposites.
Ultimately, the alchemical process leads from darkness (of chaos and disorder) to the light of the metaphorical Sun of the philosopher's stone, where all opposites have united.
We can also observe that the phases of the alchemical process have a certain analogy with those of the Dialectic: thesis, antithesis and synthesis.
Characteristics of the philosopher's stone
It is everywhere. It is visible to all, but disguised, hidden behind the superficial, as something common, essential, underlying. For he who sees only the superficial will never be able to penetrate the truth.
It is found in the depths of things. "Visit the bowels of the Earth and by rectifying you will find the hidden stone" (Basil Valentine). Truth is the unity of all things found in the deep.
It is a stone that is not stone, a matter that is not matter. It connects raw (unmanifested) matter with normal (manifested) matter, thus connecting the visible with the invisible. It is an intermediate matter between ether (raw matter, unmanifested matter) and known, manifested matter. It is the union of opposites between the deep and the superficial.
It possesses the power to transform imperfect, crude or irregular matter into perfect, ordered, polished, structured matter. It can transmute vulgar or ignoble metals into gold. Gold symbolizes the eternal, the immortal, the perfect and ordered.
It is the elixir of life, the vital force that cures diseases and grants immortality. It is the universal medicine (it includes all medicines). The philosopher's stone heals because consciousness heals. The greater the consciousness, the greater the order, harmony and health.
It is the "Azoth", a word that combines the first and last letters of the Latin, Greek and Hebrew alphabets. It represents the beginning, the end and the unity or totality, containing all things within itself (the alpha-omega or A-Z), the synthesis of opposites.
It is hermaphroditic, it is the union of Heaven and Earth, of the Sun and the Moon.
It is the union of union of opposites (a union of higher order). It is the supreme totality and universal synthesis of opposites.
It is a unifying symbol of opposites: it is solid and liquid, matter and spirit, cold and warm, round and square, poison and healing drink.
According to Paracelsus, it is flexible (able to adapt to all forms), fragile (can be broken into pieces without losing its essential unity) and transparent (allows the passage of light).
It is between time and no-time (eternity). "At the point where Heaven meets Earth, at the wonderful instant when time intersects Eternity, there and then you will find the stone" (Patrick Harpur).
It is the awareness of the unity of all, transcendental knowledge, knowledge of the whole and of oneself, gnosis, wisdom, awareness of the essential unity of all things, universal consciousness, the inner light of consciousness What was once seen as many different forms, we now see as one thing. It is a new way of seeing the world, it is to see the essential of all things, to see the deep and universal in everything, beyond appearances, for everything shares a common essence, both internally and externally. In the deep, all things are the same thing.
The explanation of everything comes from the deep, from the archetypes, from the universal. In the deep is the wisdom, the key that connects all things.
Alchemy and Jung
Jung became interested in alchemy when in 1928 he became acquainted, through Richard Wilhem, with a Chinese alchemical treatise entitled "The Secret of the Golden Flower" [see Addendum], an eighth-century Buddhist work with a Taoist basis, of an initiatory nature, which was published in the West with Jung's own commentary. Here he discovered the symbology of alchemy and its deep connections with analytical or depth psychology. "The experiences of the alchemists were, in a sense, my experiences and their world was my world." From then on, Jung immersed himself in the deep study of alchemy. The result of his investigations he reflected them mainly in three works:
"Psychology and Alchemy" (1944). He introduced the symbolism of alchemy into analytical psychology. Jung argued that observable phenomena of the unconscious (such as dreams) contain symbolic elements that are also found in alchemical symbology.
"Mysterium Coniuntionis" (1955-56). He emphasizes the "unity of reality," a common background at once physical and psychic, but which is neither of these two things, but a third element of a neutral and transcendental nature, embracing and bringing together the two realms of being, and which at most can be grasped metaphorically or symbolically.
It adopts the term "Unus Mundus" of the alchemists, recognizing the common origin of physical and psychic phenomena. The Unus Mundus is the only world, a primordial world with which the alchemists tried to tune in their Great Quest. For Jung, the Unus Mundus is a true, real, eternal, Platonic-like world. He understood that the physical and the psychic are the two sides of the same coin, that the external and the internal are linked at a deep level, that spirit and matter are twinned in a unity that he called "psychoid" and which is the Unus Mundus of the alchemists.
The concept of Unus Mundus provides an explanation to:
Archetypes, for they are the first manifestations of the Unus Mundus.
The phenomenon of synchronicity (meaningful coincidence), since the observer and the observed derive ultimately from the same source.
"Alchemical Studies" (1967), where he includes commentaries to "The Secret of the Golden Flower", the analysis of the symbolisms of alchemy and the philosophies of Paracelsus and Zosimo. Zosimus of Panopolis was a Greek alchemist (late third and early fourth century) who wrote the oldest known books on alchemy.
Jung drew a parallel between the alchemical process and analytical (or depth) psychology:
The Great Work is an archetypal model or paradigm for the central concept of his psychology: the process of individuation.
"The individuation process" is the name given by Jung to the union of the conscious with the unconscious, the innate tendency of the human psyche to find its Center, its Self, on a progressive path of self-knowledge. Since in the unconscious there is no dimension of time or space, the process of individuation is endless. According to Jung, the approach to the Center is a spiral process of progressive union of opposites. The unconscious is unknowable, inaccessible, it coincides everywhere with itself, it is non-dual.
The Great Work of the alchemists is to pass from the "rough" stone, the unconscious and undifferentiated, to the "carved" stone, the integrated, ordered and structured consciousness. The Great Work was above all a spiritual quest, in which the alchemist sought the essence in the elements of nature, but ended up finding it within himself.
The philosopher's stone of alchemy coincides with the Self, the deep and transcendental Self. The attainment of gold by the alchemists is equivalent to the transformation of man into the archetype of the Self. Gold symbolizes immortality, the eternal, the imperishable, wisdom, the perfect, the harmonious and the spiritual.
The exercise of alchemy can be compared to the method of "active imagination", its psychotherapeutic and revitalizing method of symbols.
Jung recognized the alchemical law of the union of opposites as the generating element of consciousness. The union of opposites produces the elimination of polarities and creates consciousness. And with the total union of opposites all polarities or dualities vanish and the philosopher's stone is generated, the Mysterium Coniuntionis, the ultimate foundation of reality, the Unus Mundus, where the border between the outer (physical) world and the inner (psychic) world vanish.
The union of opposites is symbolized in mandalas. A mandala is the expression or manifestation of the deep psyche, it is a symbol of the Self par excellence, which unifies and orders the multiple and represents the totality (internal and external). No mandala is identical to another because they always represent different states of consciousness, but their structure is always the attempt of harmonization and conjunction of circle (symbolizing Heaven) and square (symbolizing Earth). That is why they often appear divided into the four parts of a square, connected by a circle, symbolizing this union Heaven-Earth.
MENTAL and Alchemical Analogy
There is a certain parallelism or analogy between MENTAL and the work of the ancient alchemists, who pursued the philosopher's stone, capable of transmuting ignoble metals into gold, while at the same time transmuting the operator himself, giving him an enlightening vision of the ultimate and essential reality.
MENTAL, an alchemical language
MENTAL is an alchemical language for the following reasons:
It is the result of the total conjunction of opposites. The conjunction of opposites is complete.
It is present, like the philosopher's stone, in all its manifestations:
Mathematics: arithmetic, algebra, logic, categories, etc.
Artificial intelligence.
General Systems Theory.
Philosophy: philosophical categories.
Psychology: primary archetypes, model of the mind, language of thought, etc.
etc.
It is the Great Work.
The author of this book can attest to his personal experience of alchemical transmutation during the process of language design, and how the application of language to different domains clarifies and simplifies them.
Harmonize.
Everything that makes us tune in with the totality (such as mandalas) leads us to harmony, order and perfection. MENTAL does not cure, it is not an elixir, but it leads to a state of consciousness where one perceives the unity of all things, a simple, ordered and harmonious reality. This unity contributes to physical and psychic health, to consciousness, resonance or attunement with the deep order.
It is the result of a search "backwards", to the root, to the essence of things, to the keys of the inner and outer world, to the simple and most fundamental of all.
The process of searching for MENTAL as an alchemical language went through the canonical phases of alchemy:
Initial phase of chaos and general confusion.
Phase of analysis, searching for and identifying the universal complementary or dual principles, with continuous purification of the accessory and accidental, until the universal semantic primitives (lexical semantics) are identified.
Synthesis of all the opposites found in language by means of structural semantics, which is the same as that of the primitives.
Additionally there was a fourth phase:
Application of the language in different application domains to experimentally verify its universality. And it is found that everything is simpler, because from the depths everything is clarified and illuminated.
Other characteristics:
It is self-sufficient.
Transforms the complex into simple.
Each part is equal to itself. They all have the same structure.
It is a language and it is not a language. It is a language because it allows to express itself through examples or concrete cases. It is not a language because it cannot express itself.
Addenda
A representation of the Rebis
The drawing of the Viridium Chymicum or "The Pleasure Garden of Chemistry", by Michael Maier and Daniel Mylius (17th century copper plate), perfectly illustrates the Rebis and its symbolism:
The Rebis (Viridium Chymicum)
It is egg-shaped, evoking the cosmic egg. The cosmic egg (or world egg) is a mythological theme used by many cultures and civilizations that symbolizes the beginning, the primordial, the primordial, the source or origin of life and the universe.
Inside is an androgynous figure, half female (crowned by the Moon) and half male (crowned by the Sun). The Emerald Tablet says "The Sun is her father and the Moon is her mother".
The figure holds in one hand a compass and in the other a square, symbols of the modes of consciousness (intuitive and rational, respectively).
Between the two heads appears the planet Mercury, symbolizing the true wisdom of the perfect union of the masculine and feminine principles.
The androgyne is standing on a serpent, which symbolizes the lower, material and perishable world.
The lower winged globe is another symbol of Mercury, which includes the union of a triangle and a square.
The symbol of the Philosopher's Stone
The symbol of the Philosopher's Stone is a supersymbol, a symbol of superior order that integrates four symbols. These symbols are in harmony and conjunction with each other:
The Symbol of the Philosopher's Stone
Drawing of Michael Maier (1618)
The outer circle symbolizes the essential unity of all. All is one.
The triangle symbolizes the triune structure of human nature: body, mind and spirit.
The square symbolizes the Earth with the 4 elements of ancient alchemy: fire, air, earth and water.
The inner circle symbolizes Heaven.
The upper half of the outer circle symbolizes the upper, spiritual world, where there is no duality. The lower half symbolizes the lower, material world, the world where duality exists, symbolized by the square and the inner circle, respectively, the analytical and rational versus the synthetic and intuitive. The inner circle is a reflection or projection of the unity and totality symbolized by the outer circle. Man, symbolized by the triangle, participates in both worlds, the superior and the inferior.
At the geometrical level, this symbol has the property that the left and right sides of the upper triangle (of the upper world) are equal to the diagonal of the square, which implies harmony and correspondence between both worlds. This symbol is reminiscent of the Pythagorean Tetraktys.
Vitriol
It is the symbol of the Great Work accomplished, represented by the Septagram, the 7-pointed star, surrounded by the legend "Visita Interiora Terrae Rectificator Invenies Occultum Lapidiem" ("visit the interior of the Earth and by rectifying you will find the hidden stone"), a 7-word phrase whose acronym is "Vitriol", a 7-letter word. The formula encoded in the legend leads to the philosopher's stone.
Vitriol. Diagram of Theatrum Chymicum, 1614.
In the center of the star appears the face of an old man (symbolizing wisdom and conscience). The figure has four limbs associated and connected with the four elements. Vitriol is one of the best known images of alchemy, of which there are different versions. The number 7 represents mainly the 7 planets, the 7 metals and the 7 chakras ("the furnaces of the soul" or "the seals of the planets", as the alchemists used to say).
The Vitrilo represents the Sun, the result of the Great Work, and symbolizes the consciousness. The rays symbolize its manifestations.
The word "rectify" refers to a change of consciousness, from the superficial (the ego) to the deep (the self), synchronizing inner and outer world.
The ancient alchemists called vitriol the crystalline sulfate produced from metallic elements and sulfur. Once dissolved and re-crystallized ("solve et coagula"), crystals with a vitreous appearance were obtained. This is precisely what the philosopher's stone is believed to have looked like.
Ouroboros
The goal of the Great Work, the unitary and all-encompassing spirit of all, is represented by the Ouroboros, the serpent engulfing itself, which symbolizes:
Cosmic unity, the essence of all things.
The eternal cycle of creation-destruction, as the serpent kills itself and at the same time brings itself to life, fertilizes itself.
The cyclical character of everything, the eternal return, that which has no beginning and no end, eternity conceived as eternal return, immortality.
The Rebis, the synthesis or perfect union of opposites and complementaries.
The union of the conscious and the unconscious.
Because of its circular shape, it is also the symbol of the world.
The Secret of the Golden Flower
According to this Taoist treatise, unity of consciousness can be achieved by concentrating on the point located exactly between the two eyes. This point is called the "Central Castle" or "Golden Palace" in Taoism and the "Third Eye" in Eastern philosophy. The two eyes symbolize the two modes of consciousness or universal principles (yin and yang). In that Third Eye the unified consciousness manifests as "white light" (the same color as the Rebis alchemical).
The name "Golden Flower" refers to two signs (Gin and Hua), which placed one on top of the other form the word "light", light being synonymous with consciousness.
The Third Eye is the Center of man. The whole universe is within it. It is the door that opens inward, that calms the mind (by self-perception) and connects us with the Universal Spirit, the Tao, the Unus Mundus alchemical, pure consciousness, self-awareness, the essence of all that exists by itself. It is experienced as liberation (free of opposites), as pure (unified) consciousness and as creative intelligence. It is the creative, unified, profound point where space and time are transcended, the gateway to self-knowledge.
According to this Taoist treatise, the Central Castle must be strengthened and defended, for it is man's most important place. It is his inner refuge, the point of communication with his soul and the bridge to the Universal Spirit. The soul is a "spark" or part of the Spirit. It is the root of consciousness. The experience makes us co-creators rather than passive beings of creation.
The secret is "turning the light," which seems to indicate the process of looking from the outside in, to dissolve the darkness and connect with the soul. Sometimes you see a bright image called a "mandala" in Tibetan Buddhism and which, according to Taoists, is the manifestation or reflection of the original Light or essence.
In Hinduism the Third Eye is called "the eye of Shiva", which has the power to unify time, to be able to contemplate at the same time the past, the present and the future. Shiva is one of the Gods of the Hindu trinity (the destroyer God), along with Brahma (the creator God) and Vishnu (the preserver God). It is said that a glance of Shiva with his third eye reduces everything to ashes, thus destroying all manifestation.
Jesus Christ was undoubtedly referring to this Third Eye when he said that "The lamp of the body is the eye; therefore, if your eye is sound, your whole body will be full of light" (Matthew 6:22). That is to say, the Third Eye is the consciousness that illuminates.
The book Jung read is the German translation made by Wilhelm in 1928 (the same who translated the I Ching). In 1991, Thomas Cleary made a new translation of the original text into English. There are significant differences between the two translations. Wilhelm's is more poetic and intuitive. Cleary's is more literal and rational. Cleary criticizes Wilhelm's translation on several occasions.
In 2007, eight Europeans were trained in the meditation techniques of "The Secret of the Golden Flower". Six of the eight saw a mandala and were able to draw it. The results were published in a journal [Wang, 2008].
The ether
Historically it was considered to be a subtle substance that filled all space. In pre-Socratic times it was considered the "fifth element" (in addition to Earth, Air, Fire and Water). In Aristotelian philosophy it reappears, describing it as a subtle, light, perfect substance of circular motion. In Hindu philosophy it is called Akasha. In the Middle Ages, with the recovery of ancient Greek philosophy, it began to be called "fifth element" or "quintessence".
When Maxwell proposed that light was an electromagnetic wave, the ether was postulated as the medium in which it propagated. It was conceived as an absolute space-matter, as the universal frame of reference for moving objects. The relative motion of the Earth relative to the ether was supposed to influence the speed of light, but the Michaelson-Morley experiment (1887) showed that the speed of light is constant, which caused the idea of the ether as absolute space to be discarded.
Today, the concept of ether has been recovered in different disciplines. Following the principle of Occam's razor (when faced with different hypotheses one must choose the simplest), we can affirm that the ether provides an explanatory framework for multiple phenomena that were previously considered disconnected:
The ether is not a substance that fills space. Aether is space and, by differentiation (by vibration), manifests as matter. Space is homogeneous ether, and matter is heterogeneous ether. Space and matter are two (manifested) aspects of the same thing: ether.
The ether connects all space, it is "non-local". It is the universal connecting medium, beyond physical (or "local") distance or proximity.
The different modes of vibration of the ether give rise to the different quantum particles, as string theory asserts. The dimensions of string theory (11 in M-theory, 12 in F-theory) would correspond to the different levels of reality, from the deepest (ether) to the three spatial (surface) dimensions. The ether is the deep space from which the known physical space arises.
The ether is not the medium in which light propagates. Light is the ether itself vibrating and manifesting in physical space. Light is a phenomenon of the ether.The invariance of the speed of light with respect to all inertial systems can be explained because light emerges from deep within and does not depend on the physical motion of the light source.
The Higgs boson is a hypothetical elementary particle predicted by the standard model of quantum physics. It is called the "God particle" and is responsible for the inertia of matter. But perhaps such a particle is the constituent of the ether.
Cosmology. Dark energy and dark matter are manifestations of the ether.
The dark energy responsible for the expansion of the universe is now called "quintessence," a name for the ether. Paul Steinhardt (Princeton University) states that quintessence is the dominant force in the universe. The universe is known to be expanding at an accelerating rate, and perhaps the aether explains this phenomenon, for the aether is the force of evolution.
Dark matter is an invisible form of matter that surrounds galaxies. Recent work, such as that of HongSheng Zhao (University of St. Andrews) postulates that dark matter may be dark energy at high density.
Explains quantum entanglement. Two separate particles can be connected in such a way that when one changes (e.g. spin), the other changes as well and instantaneously, regardless of physical distance. The connection is made at a deep, ether level.
The zero point field. It is the energy of the void. But there is no such thing as empty space, because the ether is always present.
The wave-particle duality. The particle is only the manifestation of the deep, which is the wave. Depending on the level we observe, it manifests as a particle or as a wave, but both exist simultaneously, for they are two levels of reality. This would explain Young's famous experiment (a photon passes through one slit but the interference pattern it produces on a screen implies that it has actually passed through both slits). The explanation lies in the fact that the wave (which we do not see) passes through both slits, although we only observe a particle passing through one of the slits.
Gravitation: Is gravitation the pressure of the ether?
It explains parasychological phenomena such as telepathy, remote viewing, levitation, etc. For example, through the ether it is possible to move from one point to another in space without passing through the intermediary, as did Jesus Christ, Apollonius of Tyana (contemporary of Jesus Christ) and Mary Jesus of Agreda (1602-1665).
Physics has so far been a superficial science. The true unification that physics seeks, "a Theory of Everything", has to come from the deep, from the archetypes, which explain the variety of phenomena of the universe. An essential archetype is precisely the ether, space-matter. Perhaps the ether is the unifying factor of everything, since it explains everything from quantum mechanics to relativity.
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