I remember the time when the gods first fell to earth. Lean in close, and I will tell you. It wasn’t a time like now—time itself wasn’t yet born. It was a time without time.
In the first days there was only light; I don’t mean light like the days we have now, based on the rotation of an earth around a sun. Rotation requires movement, and movement time. No. There was only light, and that one light has become all you now see and know. It is both the light in your mind, the one that allows you to make images, and the light of the heavens at night.
Do you remember Osiris, the king killed by his brother and chopped into a million pieces? And Isis, Osiris’ wife, left to search the cosmos looking for those endless pieces, to reassemble him in the afterlife? Your sun here, on earth, is one tiny piece of Osiris. When your sun sets—when the world turns you away from the ever-present symbol of a divine source—you can see millions of other pieces, all scattered like rain across an endless sea. I remember Osiris. One day you will remember him too, the day when you are ceased to be born.
But I digress. That is now, and I told you I would tell you of an earlier time, a time without stars. I told you I would tell you of the time that birthed the stars.
There was only light, an invisible light. It takes time and a witness to see light, so the first light was darkness. The first light was an emptiness, a void. It was endless unto itself—there was nothing but nothing.
There was nothing but knowing. A voice without words.
Suddenly the void recognized its emptiness, it said I am I, and referenced itself against itself—it partitioned space against space, light against dark, up against down; the number ONE had recognized itself, and the number TWO was born.
The second number could only see the first, and so it thought it was the first—which it was—but the first was still stronger than the second, for the second had sprung from the first. Already other numbers were there, but they had no identity. Remember, without time all that is already was, and all that was will be; there is an everlasting present from which all things spring forth, and yet, so being, they already were and always have been. Sit still and listen. The easiest way to say this is there was quantity but no numbers--there was number without quantity—bodies without faces. And so the second told the formless ones of his brilliance, his perfection as a reflection of the first. He promised them form. He had mistaken himself for the self-created; and yet he was created. Thus there was tension; instantly an opposition was drawn, the light had its dark, the up had its down, the dot had its line, now, suddenly, the Good had its Not-good.
Do you understand? There was supremacy and beauty, there was duplicity and envy. From envy came pain and from beauty came righteousness. From righteousness came power, and from power mercy. From mercy sprang love, from love justice, and the whole of unity hummed with a lonely light. The singleness had folded itself into plenty, and the watery substance filled the heavens.
From this sea sprang up the Archetypes, the embodiments of the heavenly virtues. Every new feeling, defined against itself, sprang up as an image. For every step up there was a step down, and two lines shot into the everlasting distance—the horizon of heaven was made like a golden bow, and from its clutches were shot forth a multitude of arrows.
This happened without happening—you were there, but your birth into a body has made you forget. Your body is the result of the impression of the Archetypes within the watery substance, for it became necessary to clothe spirit in flesh, so that God could learn to recognize Himself. I know you know I have been talking about God, for God is all there is… and those who seek Him. You forgot God when your body partitioned you away from Him—for the body is necessary for the partition of unity into many, and to hide the Truth beneath the sensations of the senses.
But such glory there is there! What joy when a creation creates! And yet, such sadness…
It was then—at that moment—that the gods fell to earth.
Have you not noticed how things change? How a seed can become a tree, a tree wood, wood lumber, and lumber a chair? Or how iron can combine with oxygen, become steel, and steel a sword? So it is that nothing became a dot, a dot a line, a line a radius, a radius an area, and so to a sphere—that which displays the least surface area to its volume. (You’ll notice all things first display themselves as spheres.) A sphere can then move, perhaps, time brings motion. The dimensions have gone from three to four. Then the movement can alter, can grow and diminish, change can play within the motion, and nature is born. That is a red sphere, you might say, that other a blue sphere.
When the nature can effect its own potential, it can be said to be alive. When the living can choose its own nature it can be said to be a man.
Choice is a dimension of change, it is a potential to manifest change. Birds can change their flight, the site of their nests, even their plumage. But only a man can change his nature.
But let me step back for a second. The number TWO wasn’t so much cast down, rather, instead, marked the formation of a double heaven—there was one above, and one below. His are the anti-virtues, the rebellion to rule, the lust to love, the cruelty to mercy. He is the distance to the line. He is reason to faith. He fell, indeed, but not to earth.
Earth is filled with matter, agglomerations of sensation. A wall is built of bricks, and so the world is an enormous wall, a wall of walls we call bodies. You fell to earth when you chose yourself. You broke a piece off the void, grabbed a piece of Osiris, and tumbled here. I remember it, clear as yesterday, a thousand years ago. You have been here ever since, awaiting your awakening. You must train your charioteer to loose the dark, twisted beast; the flightless mule encumbering your Pegasus; and let it take you up. You must fledge yourself so that you may become worthy of witnessing the Supreme Cause. Once witnessed, you will cast the dead aside, and remain ever-living, an orphaned child returned home. It is this recognition that makes all life possible.
I cannot answer your questions. Think of a vase—is it it’s form that is useful? Of course not, it’s the space partitioned by its beauty—it is here the flowers are put. You must learn to cast aside your body, allow the space within to be put to good use; you must witness God and adopt the divine nature.