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© Copyright Peter Crawford 2014 |
The purpose of this text is to present indisputable evidence that a symbolic directive was operative in the architecture of the Temple of Luxor.
This material allows us to affirm that what is true for the Temple of Luxor is also true for other monuments from all the Egyptian dynasties, the symbolism evidently having been adapted to the particular consecration of an edifice and to the nature of the place where it was erected.
EXCAVATIONS and philological studies supply the Egyptologist with abundant material for a knowledge of the life, beliefs, and theology of ancient Egypt.
An encyclopaedic amount of work is available to the researcher.
Nevertheless, Pharaonic Egypt remains unknown in terms of its true science, its contingent psycho-spiritual knowledge, and its philosophical mentality.
The funerary texts develop the myth transcribed into images, but it has not been possible to translate the deeper meaning of these images into comprehensible language.
The philosophical connection of the accumulated data is lacking.
One tends to seek in ancient Egypt, as well as in other traditions of the past, what might be called a rational expression of esotericism.
This is an error that arises from the prejudice that there is no esotericism, or that there exists an intent to conceal a certain knowledge.
However, simple reasoning shows us that, for example, if the Gospels were written to teach the way of Truth and to show us what this Truth consists of,. then the form of parables and enigmatic phrases chosen for this revelation would be nonsensical if its purpose were to conceal this Truth.
The purpose of these parables and enigmatic phrases is not to hide anything from "he who has eyes to see and ears to hear," according to the evangelical formula.
The purpose is to select those who developed the necessary under- standing and who are for this reason worthy of these "secrets" (that is to say. they will not misuse them for selfish motives).
There was never any intent to conceal, from those thus prepared, any of the wisdom transmitted by texts, traditions, or monuments.
The enigma does not lie in the thing itself but is the result of our understanding, our faculties, and our intelligence, which are not attuned to the mentality according to which the idea was expressed, and it is just this that our present education prevents us from admitting.
However, there is a type of education that using the vital organs in which the nervous flux is transformed as well as the centers (or "nodes") of this flux can awaken "consciousness" of states that precede and transcend material forms.
The West has no terminology for this science, and thus we must have recourse to the oriental languages.
But the words alone are useless without the concepts.
Ancient Egypt is in fact one of the major sources of these sciences: however, a true vocabulary of the Pharaonic language, or even a provisional one, will never be possible unless attention is given to those questions which we define as psycho-spiritual.
The Egyptian symbolism can guide us in this regard and show us meanings other than the common meanings currently accepted for a great many words.
In this way. the meaning of many texts will become clear.
Rationalism is based on the data provided by the senses, and the senses perceive only a meagre part of what is.
Thus, through rationalism alone we can know only what is encountered through the senses, what is ponderable, - quantitative.
Yet mathematics have demonstrated the existence of elements that fall outside the physical; we must take this into account, and if rationalism brings us up against an impenetrable wall, in so doing it in fact teaches us that it has its limits and that we should seek another means of knowledge.
We express ourselves in a conventional language, and the dictionary defines and limits the meaning of each word.
Therefore, we can understand nothing beyond what the dictionary knows.
We write with conventional alphabetic signs that in themselves express only sounds; thus our alphabet is merely a mechanical means for composing the words in the dictionary and transmitting the thoughts they encompass.
It may be said that the combinations of these letters are almost infinite: true, but the number of words is limited by notions already acquired.
Thought can also examine observed phenomena and seek the causes. . . .
Certainly it can, but as soon as it approaches the metaphysical, it can no longer find in our languages and forms of writing the means of expressing itself: abstract ideas, formulated in words for which we lack the concepts, are objectified and lose their significance.
It follows from these observations that either there exists only a concrete world perceptible to the senses, or we lack a faculty that would enable us to grasp the abstract, without having to concretize through the imagination.
The process is ingrained in us, in accordance with a mode that always leads toward the quantitative definition.
This is the inverse of the Egyptian mentality.
If an unknown phenomenon appears, it is already the concretization of a cause that was abstract for us.
Instead of searching out the nature of this cause, we obey our reductionist tendency and restrict both cause and phenomenon to the realm of the mechanical mentality.
We investigate nothing deeply; we pull everything down to our own limits.
However, a simple image proves to us that there is a way we can express ourselves without limiting a notion to a defined form, and transcribe our thought without imposing our own mentality on those who will read this image.
We have gotten into the habit of reducing everything in Time and Space: - this is the rational habit.
An image, on the other hand, gives access to a world of qualities and functions.
For instance, if we say "a man walks,'' we see a man walking, but we sec him in a limited way: we imagine only the fact of moving or walking.
We can then place that fact in the past, present, or future and all the gradations of these tenses: we situate this movement in Time and Space.
If, on the other hand, we see an image that represents a man walking (or simply lines depicting a man) we no longer imagine him, we no longer situate him; he is there, it is the function that interests us, and the quality of that function.
We can then paint this man green: it will no longer be solely the function of walking with one's legs that is evoked - this movement could also signify vegetation or growth.
But to our reason, walking and growing are two different functions, while in reality there is an abstract connection between them: it is movement outside consideration of Time, or pathway, or specific direction.
If we wish to define this movement, we immediately reduce it in Time and Space, whereas there is no further need to define the feeling of motion (whether walking or growing); the image - the symbol - acts as definition, and we can in fact experience this condition (unconsciously become one with it, without any reasoning) just as any child would looking at pictures.
Thus, the representation - the symbol - is our only true means of transmitting an esoteric meaning, which, in alphabetic writing, we have to seek in parable, or, possibly metaphor or allegory.
The Chinese mentality is characteristic of this transcribed symbolic mentality: the idea is circumscribed but not named.
Something of this mentality, which we encounter in the Egypt of the Pharaohs, has remained among the peoples of the Middle East: - the indirect question and answer.
Symbolic representation, and imagistic writing are the pure hieratic forms of esoteric expression.
Through symbolism, and through it alone can we read the thought of the Ancients.
It is only through the symbolical that we will be able to coordinate the known elements of this great civilization and that the writing may take on its true meaning.
With regard to this mode of expression, I shall quote Ampere, 'Essai sur la Philosophic des Sciences' (vol. 2, pp. 103-104):
"These rites, these dogmas, often conceal ideas once reserved for a small number of initiates: and the secret of these ideas, though buried with them, can be rediscovered by those who study in depth all the types of teachings remaining of the ancient beliefs and the ceremonies they prescribed. Hence, a science, given the name of 'the Symbolic' (the name I shall retain for it), proposes to uncover what was hidden behind such diverse emblems."
I shall explain more precisely what I mean by the word symbol in the chapter on "Definitions" and in the "Summary of Principles."
We also see in the symbol the only means of making a connection between the "oriental" mentality and the "occidental" mentality, according to the basic distinction currently accepted.
But Pharaonic Egypt - which is, in my opinion, the main source of Mediterranean civilization - is in some ways closer to us than is the Orient.
Its mentality is positive, and its expression is symbolic, to convey a form of esotericism that does not differ from the others, since Wisdom cannot vary if it is real.
This symbolic aspect has been completely neglected in Egyptology.
It is the proof of its existence, and of the directive stemming from it in the Pharaonic expression, that I find and present with the Temple of Luxor.
The strangely irregular plan of this temple prompted me to investigate the causes of these irregularities.
Since this architectural conception was executed in several phases along the temple's longitudinal axis, hitherto the simple explanation of attributing utilitarian purposes to successive builders has been adopted.
In my opinion, only more profound reasons could have inspired these extraordinary constructions, which certainly, on account of the very effort required, could not have been consecrated to inconsequential ideas.
Many positive proofs and experiments now confirm the correctness of this way of thinking.
Obviously, no one would build such monuments, and in such great numbers, over thousands of years, for uncultivated peasants.
This work is of necessity that of an elite, and, even more remarkably, an elite that never ceased to renew itself, an elite that seems to have been uniquely endowed with a wealth of scientific knowledge, including an understanding of the laws of Life.
EXCAVATIONS and philological studies supply the Egyptologist with abundant material for a knowledge of the life, beliefs, and theology of ancient Egypt.
An encyclopaedic amount of work is available to the researcher.
Nevertheless, Pharaonic Egypt remains unknown in terms of its true science, its contingent psycho-spiritual knowledge, and its philosophical mentality.
The funerary texts develop the myth transcribed into images, but it has not been possible to translate the deeper meaning of these images into comprehensible language.
The philosophical connection of the accumulated data is lacking.
One tends to seek in ancient Egypt, as well as in other traditions of the past, what might be called a rational expression of esotericism.
This is an error that arises from the prejudice that there is no esotericism, or that there exists an intent to conceal a certain knowledge.
However, simple reasoning shows us that, for example, if the Gospels were written to teach the way of Truth and to show us what this Truth consists of,. then the form of parables and enigmatic phrases chosen for this revelation would be nonsensical if its purpose were to conceal this Truth.
The purpose of these parables and enigmatic phrases is not to hide anything from "he who has eyes to see and ears to hear," according to the evangelical formula.
The purpose is to select those who developed the necessary under- standing and who are for this reason worthy of these "secrets" (that is to say. they will not misuse them for selfish motives).
There was never any intent to conceal, from those thus prepared, any of the wisdom transmitted by texts, traditions, or monuments.
The enigma does not lie in the thing itself but is the result of our understanding, our faculties, and our intelligence, which are not attuned to the mentality according to which the idea was expressed, and it is just this that our present education prevents us from admitting.
However, there is a type of education that using the vital organs in which the nervous flux is transformed as well as the centers (or "nodes") of this flux can awaken "consciousness" of states that precede and transcend material forms.
The West has no terminology for this science, and thus we must have recourse to the oriental languages.
But the words alone are useless without the concepts.
Ancient Egypt is in fact one of the major sources of these sciences: however, a true vocabulary of the Pharaonic language, or even a provisional one, will never be possible unless attention is given to those questions which we define as psycho-spiritual.
The Egyptian symbolism can guide us in this regard and show us meanings other than the common meanings currently accepted for a great many words.
In this way. the meaning of many texts will become clear.
Rationalism is based on the data provided by the senses, and the senses perceive only a meagre part of what is.
Thus, through rationalism alone we can know only what is encountered through the senses, what is ponderable, - quantitative.
Yet mathematics have demonstrated the existence of elements that fall outside the physical; we must take this into account, and if rationalism brings us up against an impenetrable wall, in so doing it in fact teaches us that it has its limits and that we should seek another means of knowledge.
We express ourselves in a conventional language, and the dictionary defines and limits the meaning of each word.
Therefore, we can understand nothing beyond what the dictionary knows.
We write with conventional alphabetic signs that in themselves express only sounds; thus our alphabet is merely a mechanical means for composing the words in the dictionary and transmitting the thoughts they encompass.
It may be said that the combinations of these letters are almost infinite: true, but the number of words is limited by notions already acquired.
Thought can also examine observed phenomena and seek the causes. . . .
Certainly it can, but as soon as it approaches the metaphysical, it can no longer find in our languages and forms of writing the means of expressing itself: abstract ideas, formulated in words for which we lack the concepts, are objectified and lose their significance.
It follows from these observations that either there exists only a concrete world perceptible to the senses, or we lack a faculty that would enable us to grasp the abstract, without having to concretize through the imagination.
The process is ingrained in us, in accordance with a mode that always leads toward the quantitative definition.
This is the inverse of the Egyptian mentality.
If an unknown phenomenon appears, it is already the concretization of a cause that was abstract for us.
Instead of searching out the nature of this cause, we obey our reductionist tendency and restrict both cause and phenomenon to the realm of the mechanical mentality.
We investigate nothing deeply; we pull everything down to our own limits.
However, a simple image proves to us that there is a way we can express ourselves without limiting a notion to a defined form, and transcribe our thought without imposing our own mentality on those who will read this image.
We have gotten into the habit of reducing everything in Time and Space: - this is the rational habit.
An image, on the other hand, gives access to a world of qualities and functions.
For instance, if we say "a man walks,'' we see a man walking, but we sec him in a limited way: we imagine only the fact of moving or walking.
We can then place that fact in the past, present, or future and all the gradations of these tenses: we situate this movement in Time and Space.
If, on the other hand, we see an image that represents a man walking (or simply lines depicting a man) we no longer imagine him, we no longer situate him; he is there, it is the function that interests us, and the quality of that function.
We can then paint this man green: it will no longer be solely the function of walking with one's legs that is evoked - this movement could also signify vegetation or growth.
But to our reason, walking and growing are two different functions, while in reality there is an abstract connection between them: it is movement outside consideration of Time, or pathway, or specific direction.
If we wish to define this movement, we immediately reduce it in Time and Space, whereas there is no further need to define the feeling of motion (whether walking or growing); the image - the symbol - acts as definition, and we can in fact experience this condition (unconsciously become one with it, without any reasoning) just as any child would looking at pictures.
Thus, the representation - the symbol - is our only true means of transmitting an esoteric meaning, which, in alphabetic writing, we have to seek in parable, or, possibly metaphor or allegory.
The Chinese mentality is characteristic of this transcribed symbolic mentality: the idea is circumscribed but not named.
Something of this mentality, which we encounter in the Egypt of the Pharaohs, has remained among the peoples of the Middle East: - the indirect question and answer.
Symbolic representation, and imagistic writing are the pure hieratic forms of esoteric expression.
Through symbolism, and through it alone can we read the thought of the Ancients.
It is only through the symbolical that we will be able to coordinate the known elements of this great civilization and that the writing may take on its true meaning.
With regard to this mode of expression, I shall quote Ampere, 'Essai sur la Philosophic des Sciences' (vol. 2, pp. 103-104):
"These rites, these dogmas, often conceal ideas once reserved for a small number of initiates: and the secret of these ideas, though buried with them, can be rediscovered by those who study in depth all the types of teachings remaining of the ancient beliefs and the ceremonies they prescribed. Hence, a science, given the name of 'the Symbolic' (the name I shall retain for it), proposes to uncover what was hidden behind such diverse emblems."
I shall explain more precisely what I mean by the word symbol in the chapter on "Definitions" and in the "Summary of Principles."
We also see in the symbol the only means of making a connection between the "oriental" mentality and the "occidental" mentality, according to the basic distinction currently accepted.
But Pharaonic Egypt - which is, in my opinion, the main source of Mediterranean civilization - is in some ways closer to us than is the Orient.
Its mentality is positive, and its expression is symbolic, to convey a form of esotericism that does not differ from the others, since Wisdom cannot vary if it is real.
This symbolic aspect has been completely neglected in Egyptology.
It is the proof of its existence, and of the directive stemming from it in the Pharaonic expression, that I find and present with the Temple of Luxor.
The strangely irregular plan of this temple prompted me to investigate the causes of these irregularities.
Since this architectural conception was executed in several phases along the temple's longitudinal axis, hitherto the simple explanation of attributing utilitarian purposes to successive builders has been adopted.
In my opinion, only more profound reasons could have inspired these extraordinary constructions, which certainly, on account of the very effort required, could not have been consecrated to inconsequential ideas.
Many positive proofs and experiments now confirm the correctness of this way of thinking.
Obviously, no one would build such monuments, and in such great numbers, over thousands of years, for uncultivated peasants.
This work is of necessity that of an elite, and, even more remarkably, an elite that never ceased to renew itself, an elite that seems to have been uniquely endowed with a wealth of scientific knowledge, including an understanding of the laws of Life.
