DNA SECRETS

DNA Secrets

The human genome is comprised of two sets of 23 chromosomes – 46 chromosomes in all. Each parent contributes a set. About 97 percent of the genome consists of sequences that don’t code for proteins and have no known function. Within the rest of the genome are estimated 70,000 genes.

Is non-coding DNA expressing a Language?

In the March 1995 issue of “Scientific American”, in the article titled
“Talking Trash” (see below), scientists claim to have found “word” patterns in the “junk” DNA of man. It seems that this junk DNA (segments of the DNA genome which do not encode instructions for the production of proteins) exhibits the same statistical patterns that are found in written languages.

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Talking Trash: What’s in a Word?

What’s in a word? Several nucleotides, some researchers might say.
By applying statistical methods developed by linguists, investigators have found that “junk” parts of the genomes of many organisms may be expressing a language. These regions traditionally been regarded as ‘useless’ accumulations of material from millions of years of evolution.

‘The feeling is,’ says Boston University physicist Eugene Stanley, ‘that there’s something going on in the non-coding region.’

“Junk DNA” got its name because the nucleotides there (the fundamental pieces of DNA, combined into so-called base pairs) do not encode instructions for making proteins, the basis for life. In fact, the vast majority of genetic material in organisms from bacteria to mammals consists of non-coding DNA segments, which are interspersed with the coding parts. In humans, about 97 percent of the genome is junk. Over the past 10 years biologists began to suspect that this feature is not entirely trivial.

“It’s unlikely that every base pair in non-coding DNA is critical, but it is also foolish to say that all of it is junk” notes Robert Tjian, a biochemist at the University of California at Berkeley.

For instance, studies have found that mutations in certain parts of the non-coding regions lead to cancer. Physicists backed the suspicions a few years ago, when those studying fractals noticed certain patterns in junk DNA. They found that non-coding sequences display what are termed long-range correlations. That is, the position of a nucleotide depends to some extent on the placement of other nucleotides.
Their patterns follow a fractal-like property called 1/f noise, which is inherent in many physical systems that evolve over time, such as electronic circuits, periodicity of earthquakes and even traffic patterns. In the genome, however, the long-range correlations held only for the non-coding sequences; the coding parts exhibited an uncorrelated pattern. Those signs suggested that junk DNA might contain some kind of organized information. To decipher the message, Stanley and his colleagues Rosario N. Mantegna, Sergey V. Buldyrev and Shlomo Haviin collaborated with Amy L Goldberg, Chung-Kang Peng and Michael Simons of Harvard Medical School.
They borrowed from the work of linguist George K. Zipf who by looking at texts from several languages ranked the frequency with which words occur. Plotting the rank of words against those in a text produces a distinct relation. The most common word “the” in English occurs 10 times, than the 10th most common word, 100 times more often than the 100th most common, and so forth. The researchers tested the relation on 40 DNA sequences of species ranging from viruses to humans.
They then grouped pairs of nucleotides to create words between three and eight pairs long (it takes three pairs to specify an amino acid). In every case, they found that non-coding regions followed the Zipf relation more closely than did coding regions, suggesting that junk DNA follows the structure of languages.

“We didn’t expect the coding DNA to obey Zipf,” Stanley notes. “A code literal one if by land, two if by sea.”

You can’t have any mistakes in a code. Language, in contrast, is a statistical, structured system with built-in redundancies. A few mumbled words or scattered typos usually do not render a sentence incomprehensible.
In fact, the workers tested this notion of repetition by applying a second analysis, this time from information theorist Claude E Shanon who in the 1950s quantified redundancies in languages. They found that junk DNA contains three to four times the redundancies of coding segments. Because of the statistical nature of the results, the researchers admit their findings are unlikely to help biologists identify functional aspects of junk DNA. Rather the work may indicate something about efficient information storage.
“There has to be some sort of hierarchical arrangement of the information to allow one to use it in an efficient fashion and to have some adaptability and flexibility,” Goldberger observes.
Another speculation is quences may be essential to the way DNA has to fold to fit into the nucleus.
Some researchers question whether the group has found anything significant.
One of those is Beniot Mandelbrot of Yale University. In the 1950s the mathematician pointed out that Zipf’s law is a statistical numbers game that has little to do with recognizable language features, such as semantics. Moreover, he claims the group made several errors.
‘Their evidence does not establish Zipf’s law even remotely.’ he says.
But such criticisms are not stopping the Boston workers from trying to deciphers junk DNA’s tongue.
‘It could be a dead language,’ Stanley says, ‘but the search will be exciting.’

Source: Talking Trash: What’s in a Word? Scientific American Mar 95

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Genetic Code, I Ching and Hebrew Alphabet

Since the discovery of the DNA double helix molecule in the mid 1950′s scientists have been using “language” as a metaphor to help them understand the structures and processes that express life at the bio-chemical level.
Current research seems to imply that the metaphor may be more literal than previously thought. Suppose that there are stretches of DNA embedded in the genome of man that, when properly “decoded”, speak to us in a human language. What language would it be; and what would it say? My work points to the possibility that the language may be Hebrew; or, perhaps, a Proto-Caananite precursor of the Hebrew language.
My work examines some of the evidence supporting that hypothesis. It is placed here in the hope that it will stimulate discussion and further research. To read it and “play” with it will require one to delve into, what is considered by many to be, mutually exclusive categories of knowledge: science and “the occult”. Very few people will be able or willing to entertain the idea that these two antithetical arenas of knowing can illuminate each other. I hope to find a few people who can.

The I Ching is composed of 64 binary mathematical patterns called hexagrams. Each hexagram is composed of six lines which may be broken (yin) or solid (yang).

A number of years ago I stumbled across a unique similarity of form between the genetic code and a fusion of the Hebrew alphabet with the ancient Chinese divination system of the I Ching, or “Book of Changes.” I was studying the I Ching when I came across a book(1) that demonstrated an isomorphism between the 64 symbols of the I Ching (called hexagrams or kua) and the 64 codons of the genetic code. I wondered if there might be, among the mystic or occult systems of other cultures, a corresponding set of symbols for the amino acids of the genetic code for which the 64 codons code. I turned to the Hebrew occult system of Qabalah and discovered the Sefer Yetzirah or “Book of Creation.”(2)

The Sefer Yetzirah is the earliest known text of the Qabalah. Its “magical” purpose is to educate the reader in the process of creation using the Hebrew alphabet as The Creator did. Because the 22 trump cards (also called atu) of the Tarot system of divination have Hebrew letters assigned to them, I thought that maybe I could compare the symbols, images, and concepts in the Tarot trumps with the corresponding contents of the I Ching kua. Then, if there are enough similarities, I could assign each of the trumps to a group of I Ching kua. The result would be a Hebrew letter assignment for each amino acid and punctuation codon in the genetic code.
The assignment of the I Ching symbols to the nucleic acids of the genetic code is based upon similarities of form and function between their respective domains of knowledge. The assignment of Hebrew letters to the groups of I Ching kua is based upon the similarity of content between the atu of the Tarot and the kua of the I Ching. The Hebrew letter PE, on the Tarot atu “The Tower”, is assigned to the I Ching kua 20, 23, 24, 3, 42, and 27 because the symbol, image, and concept content of the atu and kua are similar to a high degree. As a result, PE is analogous to the amino acid leucine because the kua assigned to it are analogous to the codons which code for leucine.
I used the Wilhelm/Baynes(3) translation of the I Ching and Aleister Crowley’s “Book of Thoth,”(4) his interpretation of the Tarot. I didn’t think that I would find too great a similarity between these two divination systems since Wilhem’s I Ching is derived from the very moralistic Confucian school of Oriental philosophy while Crowley’s Tarot is a vehicle for his highly idiosyncratic and minimally moralistic system of “sex magic” as a path to enlightenment.
Imagine my shock and surprise when I discovered that these two diverse approaches to divination, one Eastern and one Western, demonstrated an enormous similarity of content; symbolic, imagistic, and conceptual – WHEN GROUPED AND ARRANGED AS THE NUCLEIC ACIDS AND AMINO ACIDS ARE GROUPED AND ARRANGED IN THE GENETIC CODE.
I couldn’t shake the idea that these two symbol systems may be vehicles for the transport of two halves of what may be a textual virus – set to infect the body politic of Earth at a time when that knowledge is needed. Perhaps somewhere in the vast genetic library that is the human genome there is a clear message, in the Hebrew or a precursor language, from “The Creator(s).”
If “The Creator(s)” have a sense of humor similar to ours, maybe they would get a kick out of the idea of letting us know, at a future time when we are technologically advanced enough, just who we are and how we came to be.
[...]

INTERPRETING “SEFER YETZIRAH” THROUGH GENETIC ENGINEERING

In the Sefer Yetzirah, we have a magical text which purports to allow those who understand and use it to create living creatures. This is accomplished using 22 letters which are manipulated like bits of clay into chains that are arranged into complementary parallels and other shapes. This is very similar to scientific descriptions of the activity which takes place within the cells of living things. Scientists use the language metaphor to describe these chemicals and their activities. Lengths of DNA and the genes which reside there are refered to as genetic sentences and their chemical components are refered to as words and letters. Counting the stop codons as 2 seperate groups there are 22 amino acid letters in the chemical alphabet of life.
“2. Twenty-Two letters are the foundation: He engraved them, He hewed them out, He combined them, He weighed them, and He set them at opposites, and He formed through them everything that is formed and everything that is destined to be formed.”
In addition to the numerical and functional analogies between the amino acids and the Hebrew alphabet there is a category coincidence as well. The letters of the Hebrew language in the Sefer Yetzirah are arranged into 3 categories.
3 “Mother” letters: Aleph, Mem, Shin
7 “Double” letters: Beth, Gimel, Daleth, Kaph, Pe, Resh, Tau
12 “Simple” letters: He, Vau, Zain, Cheth, Teth, Yod, Lamed, Nun, Samekh, Ayin, Tzaddi, Qoph
[...]
When scientists speak of the chemistry of life they often use the metaphor of language, as pointed out earlier. They also use other metaphors. The strands of DNA or mRNA are also spoken of as “threads” and the entire genome is often refered to as “the thread of life.” I mention this because one of the many translations of Sefer Yetzirah which I have read uses the “thread of life” metaphor extensively.
“The twenty-two letters which form the stamina after having been appointed and established by God, He combined, weighed and changed them, and formed by them all beings which are in existence, and all those which will be formed in all time to come.” (p. 20) (The Ancient and Mystical Order Rosae Crucis – AMORC, translated by Rev. Dr. Isidor Kalisch, 1877)
The word that Kalisch translates as “stamina” is the Hebrew word yesod which others translate (more correctly) as “foundation.” Why Kalisch chose “stamina” is unknown, but its use in this context is provocative since it is derived from the Latin:
STAMINA – the plural of stamen = warp: the thread of life spun by the fates. endurance. Greek stemon = thread. Note that: Stamen – the organ of the flower that produces the male gamete. This shows that “the thread of life” concept was linked early on to the process of reproduction.
So, if we substitute the origin of “stamina” for “stamina” in the text, we get: “The twenty-two letters which form the thread of life after having been appointed and established by God, He combined, weighed and changed them, and formed by them all beings which are in existence, and all those which will be formed in all time to come.”
“This Torah, the linguistic movement of Ein-Sof within itself, is called a malbush (“garment”), though in fact it is inseparable from the divine substance and is woven within it … (the garments) length is made up of the alphabets of the Sefer Yetzirah and had 231 “gates” … which form the archistructure of divine thought. Its breadth was composed of an elaboration of the Tetragrammaton according to the numerical value of the four possible spellings of the fully written names of its letters, … , which were the “threads” and the “weave” that were originally situated in the hem of the garment. … The size of this garment was twice the area necessary for the creation of all the worlds. After it had been woven, it was folded in two: half of it ascended and its letters stood behind the letters of the other half.” (Kabbalah p.132)
We can see then that the tradition of the Hebrews uses the metaphors of clay and threads to explain the creation of all living things, including man. We pass now to the Chinese whose I Ching forms the other half of the occult genetic code. They too have creation myths and traditions that use similar metaphors. The following exerpts are from: “Mythologies of the Ancient World”, Samuel Noah Kramer Ed.
Fu Hsi is the legendary creator of the I Ching. His sister/consort is Nu Kua. She is also portrayed as the creator of mankind:
“It is popularly said that when Heaven and Earth had opened forth, but before there were human beings, Nu-Kua created men by patting yellow earth together. But the work tasked her strength and left her no free time, so that she then dragged a string through mud, thus heaping it up so as to make it into men. Therefore the rich and the noble are those men of yellow earth whereas the poor and the lowly – all ordinary people – are those cord-made men.” (p. 338)
To wrap-up the analysis I will demonstrate some of the curious evidence derived from the Qabalistic practice of gematria, the practice of assigning number values to Hebrew words based on the numerical values of the Hebrew letters. Note that there are 46 chromosomes in the normal human. Each of the parents contribute, via their sperm and ovum, 23 chromosomes to the new being they create together.
Article Source: http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/ciencia/occultgeneticcode/

Article Related Links

• Why the I Ching symbols are like the codons of the genetic code
• Why the letters of the Hebrew alphabet are like the amino acids of the genetic code
• A new way of looking at the I Ching divination procedure.
• How the new divination procedure for the I Ching models the process of protein production
• A summary of the biological and divination analogies
• Occult Genetic Code Table – by using it, find each of the Trump/Hebrew letter assignments to their respective amino acids and why they are so
• I Chin Table – Exagrams
• http://www.wbenjamin.org/saadia.html

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. “The I Ching & the Genetic Code – The Hidden Key to Life”;
   Martin Schonberger, 1979
2. “Sefer Yetzirah – The Book of Creation”;
   Aryeh Kaplan, Samuel Weiser, 1990
3. “The I Ching or Book of Changes”;
   Richard Wilhelm translator, rendered from the German into English by C.F. Baynes, 1976
4. “The Book of Thoth (Egyptian Tarot)”; Aleister Crowley, 1979
5. “DNA and the I Ching: The Tao of Life” by Johnson Yan ASIN:1556430973
6. “Tao of Chaos: DNA and the I Ching”.Katya Walter

Subject Related Books

According to genetic analysis, though, more than 98% of human DNA is identical to chimpanzee DNA. In fact, chimpanzees are more closely related to humans than orangutans and gorillas. “Humans are simply odd looking apes,” psychologist Roger Fouts of Central Washington University in Ellensburg, Washington, writes in his 1997 book, Next of Kin : My Conversations With Chimpanzees.
“A traveler from an antique land… lives within us all,” claims Sykes, a professor of genetics at Oxford. This unique traveler is mitochondrial DNA, and, as this provocative account illustrates, it can help scientists and archeologists piece together the history of the human race. Find out more by reading this book:
The Seven Daughters of Eve: The Science That Reveals Our Genetic Ancestry by Bryan Sykes.

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Extraterrestrial Genes in Human DNA?

Collaborative research from a gathering of exo-scientists postulate that there are genes from over 20 extraterrestrials civilizations in Human DNA. These exo-scientists have continued the work of Nobel Prize winner Dr. Frances Crick, and other scholars in this area. Current findings are consistent with reports of Professor Sam Chang, who discreetly released information on his own apparent findings, in association with the Human Genome Project.

Scientists are beginning to complain more and more about political attempts to compromise the integrity of their important work for humanity. The discreet releasing of findings, is one apparent way in which scientists try to cope with scientific peer pressures to conform to prevailing political pressures.

Details of findings have been published in part, by Dr. Michael Salla, who is a learned scholar on extraterrestrial research. Exo-scientists and other researchers base their findings, in part, on carefully collecting data, which includes well corroborated documented observations by contactees and “whistleblowers”, as well as other documentation.

These verified reliable sources have come into contact with representatives of non-Earth Human civilizations living in human populations at-large, and also in official capacities.

Source:
Scientists Confirm Extraterrestrial Genes in Human DNA
http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/ciencia/ciencia_adn08.htm

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Could we have DNA codes in us now that bear the hallmark of that interception? He then names specific DNA codes, they call them trinucleotide repeats and alas, they seem to resemble something that a cloning mechanism would produce. The biggest irony, he says, is that the Greys don’t realise that they can’t, with physical means, get a handle on something that’s not physical, simply because they only understand the physical. So the tragedy lies in the damage they do in
trying to reach what they can’t reach. Converting us, via abduction and genetic manipulation, to be more like them, in the vain hope that they can bridge into our souls that way. Making us, in other words, more like machines.

Read More: http://www.world-mysteries.com/sci_brain1.htm

Life After Death

Life After Death: There is no Self

Introduction

“…There is rebirth of character, but no transmigration of a self. Thy thought-forms reappear, but there is no ego-entity transferred. The stanza uttered by a teacher is reborn in the scholar who repeats the words.
Only through ignorance and delusion do men indulge in the dream that their souls are separate and self-existent entities. Thy heart, O Brahman, is cleaving still to self; thou art anxious about heaven but thou seekest the pleasures of self in heaven, and thus thou canst not see the bliss of truth and the immortality of truth.”

Buddha
The Gospel of Buddha, According to Old Records

While some believe it’s impossible to know whether there is life after death, belief in immortality is timeless. People of all times and places in history have believed that the human soul survives death. If there is no consciousness beyond the grave, then life has fooled almost everyone from the Pharaohs of Egypt to Jesus of Nazareth.
When we talk about rebirth or reincarnation, some people laugh at the idea. They consider such belief is passe and obsolete. Others may think such question is in arena of religion. After all, it concerns what is after death.

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All Existence is Spiritual

The following text comes from The Gospel of Buddha, According to Old Records By Paul Carus, Chicago, The Open Court Publishing Company, 1894

THERE was an officer among the retinue of Simha who had heard of the discourses of the Blessed One, and there was some doubt left in his heart. This man came to the Blessed One and said: “It is said, O Lord, that the samana Gotama denies the existence of the soul. Do they who say so speak the truth, or do they bear false witness against the Blessed One
And the Blessed One said: “There is a way in which those who say so are speaking truly of me; on the other hand, there is a way in which those who say so do not speak truly of me. The Tathagata teaches that there is no self. He who says that the soul is his self and that the self is the thinker of our thoughts and the actor of our deeds, teaches a wrong doctrine which leads to confusion and darkness. On the other hand, the Tathagata teaches that there is mind. He who understands by soul mind, and says that mind exists, teaches the truth which leads to clearness and enlightenment.”
The officer said: “Does, then, the Tathagata maintain that two things exist? that which we perceive with our senses and that which is mental?”
Said the Blessed One: “I say to thee, thy mind is spiritual, but neither is the sense-perceived void of spirituality. The bodhi is eternal and it dominates all existence as the good law guiding all beings in their search for truth. It changes brute nature into mind, and there is no being that cannot be transformed into a vessel of truth.”

The Gospel of Buddha, According to Old Records

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Identity and Non-Identity

The following text comes from The Gospel of Buddha, According to Old Records
By Paul Carus, Chicago, The Open Court Publishing Company, 1894

KUTADANTA, the head of the Brahmans in the village of Danamati, having approached the Blessed One respectfully, greeted him and said: “I am told, O samana, that thou art the Buddha, the Holy One, the All-knowing, the Lord of the world. But if thou wert the Buddha, wouldst thou not come like a king in all thy glory and power?” Said the Blessed One: “Thine eyes are holden. If the eye of thy mind were undimmed thou couldst see the glory and the power of truth.”
Said Kutadanta: “Show me the truth and I shall see it. But thy doctrine is without consistency. If it were consistent, it would stand; but as it is not, it will pass away.” The Blessed One replied: “The truth will never pass away.”
Kutadanta said: “I am told that thou teachest the law, yet thou tearest down religion. Thy disciples despise rites and abandon immolation, but reverence for the gods can be shown only by sacrifices. The very nature of religion consists in worship and sacrifice.” Said the Buddha: “Greater than the immolation of bullocks is the sacrifice of self. He who offers to the gods his evil desires will see the uselessness of slaughtering animals at the altar. Blood has no cleansing power, but the eradication of lust will make the heart pure. Better than worshiping gods is obedience to the laws of righteousness.”
Kutadanta, being of a religious disposition and anxious about his fate after death, had sacrificed countless victims. Now he saw the folly of atonement by blood. Not yet satisfied, however, with the teachings of the Tathagata, Kutadanta continued: “Thou believest, O Master, that beings are reborn; that they migrate in the evolution of life; and that subject to the law of karma we must reap what we sow. Yet thou teachest the non-existence of the soul! Thy disciples praise utter self-extinction as the highest bliss of Nirvana. If I am merely a combination of the sankharas, my existence will cease when I die. If I am merely a compound of sensations and ideas and desires, whither can I go at the dissolution of the body?”
Said the Blessed One: “O Brahman, thou art religious and earnest. Thou art seriously concerned about thy soul. Yet is thy work in vain because thou art lacking in the one thing that is needful. There is rebirth of character, but no transmigration of a self. Thy thought-forms reappear, but there is no ego-entity transferred. The stanza uttered by a teacher is reborn in the scholar who repeats the words.
“Only through ignorance and delusion do men indulge in the dream that their souls are separate and self-existent entities. Thy heart, O Brahman, is cleaving still to self; thou art anxious about heaven but thou seekest the pleasures of self in heaven, and thus thou canst not see the bliss of truth and the immortality of truth.
“I say to thee: The Blessed One has not come to teach death, but to teach life, and thou discernest not the nature of living and dying. This body will be dissolved and no amount of sacrifice will save it. Therefore, seek thou the life that is of the mind. Where self is, truth cannot be; yet when truth comes, self will disappear. Therefore, let thy mind rest in the truth; propagate the truth, put thy whole will in it, and let it spread. In the truth thou shalt live forever. Self is death and truth is life. The cleaving to self is a perpetual dying, while moving in the truth is partaking of Nirvana which is life everlasting.”
Then Kutadanta said: “Where, O venerable Master, is Nirvana?” “Nirvana is wherever the precepts are obeyed replied the Blessed One.
“Do I understand thee aright,” rejoined the Brahman, “That Nirvana is not a place, and being nowhere it is without reality?” “Thou dost not understand me aright,” said the Blessed One, “Now listen and answer these questions: Where does the wind dwell
“Nowhere,” was the reply.
Buddha retorted: “Then, sir, there is no such thing as wind.” Kutadanta made no reply; and the Blessed One asked again: “Answer me, O Brahman, where does wisdom dwell? Is wisdom a locality?”
“Wisdom has no allotted dwelling-place replied Kutadanta. Said the Blessed One: “Meanest thou that there is no wisdom, no enlightenment, no righteousness, and no salvation, because Nirvana is not a locality? As a great and mighty wind which passeth over the world in the heat of the day, so the Tathagata comes to blow over the minds of mankind with the breath of his love, so cool, so sweet, so calm, so delicate; and those tormented by fever assuage their suffering and rejoice at the refreshing breeze.”
Said Kutadanta: “I feel, O Lord, that thou proclaimest a great doctrine, but I cannot grasp it. Forbear with me that I ask again: Tell me, O Lord, if there be no atman [soul], how can there be immortality? The activity of the mind passeth, and our thoughts are gone when we have done thinking.”
Buddha replied: “Our thinking is gone, but our thoughts continue. Reasoning ceases, but knowledge remains.” Said Kutadanta: “How is that? Are not reasoning and knowledge the same?”
The Blessed One explained the distinction by an illustration: “It is as when a man wants, during the night, to send a letter, and, after having his clerk called, has a lamp lit, and gets the letter written. Then, when that has been done, he extinguishes the lamp. But though the writing has been finished and the light has been put out the letter is still there. Thus does reasoning cease and knowledge remain; and in the same way mental activity ceases, but experience, wisdom, and all the fruits of our acts endure.”
Kutadanta continued: “Tell me, O Lord, pray tell me, where, if the sankharas are dissolved, is the identity of my self. If my thoughts are propagated, and if my soul migrates, my thoughts cease to be my thoughts and my soul ceases to be my soul. Give me an illustration, but pray, O Lord, tell me, where is the identity of my self?”
Said the Blessed One: “Suppose a man were to light a lamp; would it burn the night through?” “Yes, it might do so,” was the reply.

“Now, is it the same flame that burns in the first watch of the night as in the second?” Kutadanta hesitated. He thought it is the same flame, but fearing the complications of a hidden meaning, and trying to be exact, he said: “No, it is not.”
“Then,” continued the Blessed One, “there are two flames, one in the first watch and the other in the second watch.” “No, sir,” said Kutadanta. “In one sense it is not the same flame, but in another sense it is the same flame. It burns the same kind of oil, it emits the same kind of light, and it serves the same purpose.”
“Very well said the Buddha and would you call those flames the same that have burned yesterday and are burning now in the same lamp, filled with the same kind of oil, illuminating the same room?” “They may have been extinguished during the day,” suggested Kutadanta.
Said the Blessed One: “Suppose the flame of the first watch had been extinguished during the second watch, would you call it the same if it burns again in the third watch?” Replied Kutadanta: “In one sense it is a different flame, in another it is not.”
The Tathagata asked again: “Has the time that elapsed during the extinction of the flame anything to do with its identity or non-identity?” “No, sir,” said the Brahman, “it has not. There is a difference and an identity, whether many years elapsed or only one second, and also whether the lamp has been extinguished in the meantime or not.”
“Well, then, we agree that the flame of today is in a certain sense the same as the flame of yesterday, and in another sense it is different at every moment. Moreover, the flames of the same kind, illuminating with equal power the same kind of rooms, are in a certain sense the same.” “Yes, sir,” replied Kutadanta.
The Blessed One continued: “Now, suppose there is a man who feels like thyself, thinks like thyself, and acts like thyself, is he not the same man as thou?” “No, sir,” interrupted Kutadanta.
Said the Buddha: “Dost thou deny that the same logic holds good for thyself that holds good for the things of the world?” Kutadanta bethought himself and rejoined slowly: “No, I do not. The same logic holds good universally; but there is a peculiarity about my self which renders it altogether different from everything else and also from other selves. There may be another man who feels exactly like me, thinks like me, and acts like me; suppose even he had the same name and the same kind of possessions, he would not be myself.”
“True, Kutadanta, answered Buddha, he would not be thyself. Now, tell me, is the person who goes to school one, and that same person when he has finished his schooling another? Is it one who commits a crime, another who is punished by having his hands and feet cut off?” “They are the same, was the reply.
“Then sameness is constituted by continuity only?” asked the Tathagata. “Not only by continuity,” said Kutadanta, but also and mainly by identity of character.”
“Very well, concluded the Buddha, then thou agreest that persons can be the same, in the same sense as two flames of the same kind are called the same; and thou must recognize that in this sense another man of the same character and product of the same karma is the same as thou.” “Well, I do,” said the Brahman.
The Buddha continued: “And in this same sense alone art thou the same today as yesterday. Thy nature is not constituted by the matter of which thy body consists, but by thy sankharas, the forms of the body, of sensations, of thoughts. The person is the combination of the sankharas. Wherever they are, thou art. Whithersoever they go, thou goest. Thus thou wilt recognize in a certain sense an identity of thy self, and in another sense a difference. But he who does not recognize the identity should deny all identity, and should say that the questioner is no longer the same person as he who a minute after receives the answer. Now consider the continuation of thy personality, which is preserved in thy karma. Dost thou call it death and annihilation, or life and continued life?”
“I call it life and continued life,” rejoined Kutadanta, “for it is the continuation of my existence, but I do not care for that kind of continuation. All I care for is the continuation of self in the other sense, which makes of every man, whether identical with me or not, an altogether different person.”
“Very well,” said Buddha. “This is what thou desirest and this is the cleaving to self. This is thy error. All compound things are transitory: they grow and they decay. All compound things are subject to pain: they will be separated from what they love and be joined to what they abhor. All compound things lack a self, an atman, an ego.”
“How is that?” asked Kutadanta. “Where is thy self? asked the Buddha. And when Kutadanta made no reply, he continued: “Thy self to which thou cleavest is a constant change. Years ago thou wast a small babe; then, thou wast a boy; then a youth, and now, thou art a man. Is there any identity of the babe and the man? There is an identity in a certain sense only. Indeed there is more identity between the flames of the first and the third watch, even though the lamp might have been extinguished during the second watch. Now which is thy true self, that of yesterday, that of today, or that of tomorrow, for the preservation of which thou clamorest?” Kutadanta was bewildered. “Lord of the world,” he said, I see my error, but I am still confused.”
The Tathagata continued: “It is by a process of evolution that sankharas come to be. There is no sankhara which has sprung into being without a gradual becoming. Thy sankharas are the product of thy deeds in former existences. The combination of thy sankharas is thy self. Wheresoever they are impressed thither thy self migrates. In thy sankharas thou wilt continue to live and thou wilt reap in future existences the harvest sown now and in the past.”
“Verily, O Lord,” rejoined Kutadanta, this is not a fair retribution. I cannot recognize the justice that others after me will reap what I am sowing now.”
The Blessed One waited a moment and then replied: “Is all teaching in vain? Dost thou not understand that those others are thou thyself Thou thyself wilt reap what thou sowest, not others. Think of a man who is ill-bred and destitute, suffering from the wretchedness of his condition. As a boy he was slothful and indolent, and when he grew up he had not learned a craft to earn a living. Wouldst thou say his misery is not the product of his own action, because the adult is no longer the same person as was the boy?
“I say to thee: Not in the heavens, not in the midst of the sea, not if thou hidest thyself away in the clefts of the mountains, wilt thou find a place where thou canst escape the fruit of thine evil actions. At the same time thou art sure to receive the blessings of thy good actions. To the man who has long been traveling and who returns home in safety, the welcome of kinfolk, friends, and acquaintances awaits. So, the fruits of his good works bid him welcome who has walked in the path of righteousness, when he passes over from the present life into the hereafter.”
Kutadanta said: “I have faith in the glory and excellency of thy doctrines. My eye cannot as yet endure the light; but I now understand that there is no self, and the truth dawns upon me. Sacrifices cannot save, and invocations are idle talk. But how shall I find the path to life everlasting? I know all the Vedas by heart and have not found the truth.”
Said the Buddha: “Learning is a good thing; but it availeth not. True wisdom can be acquired by practice only. Practice the truth that thy brother is the same as thou. Walk in the noble path of righteousness and thou wilt understand that while there is death in self, there is immortality in truth.”
Said Kutadanta: “Let me take my refuge in the Blessed One, in the Dharma, and in the brotherhood. Accept me as thy disciple and let me partake of the bliss of immortality.”

The Gospel of Buddha, According to Old Records

Related Links:

• What is I? – The Bodhisattva’s Search
• Ego – The False Center

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Re-Incarnation

By Robert Bruce

Copyright © 1994-1999 by Robert Bruce
Reprinted with permission

Reincarnation is in my opinion an overly simplified concept, designed to be easily understood and accepted by the general population. But the theory of reincarnation falls down sharply when closely examined. That is, if you understand how standard linear time sense behaves in higher dimensional levels, i.e., time sense fluctuates.
As far as it goes, the theory of reincarnation is clear enough to explain some very complex esoteric matters in a simple way; without giving people headaches whenever they think about it. It also allows for the illusion of the continuation of present consciousness, unchanged and progressive, with only an occasional memory loss to mar its course; marking the division between each Re–Incarnation. This makes it easy for people to accept the bones of the incarnation process.
It gives them the benefit of a rational afterlife belief-system containing the simplified essence of the whole truth. This allows a measure of independence and security, and a reassurance of the continuance of self, i.e., life after death and reincarnation = a kind of immortality theory that people can easily accept and relate to.
But the whole truth of reincarnation is so extraordinarily complex it is not so easily grasped.
At the top of the dimensional structure is ONE consciousness. A SINGLE mind (call it universal consciousness, The Great White Spirit, the mind of God: pick one?). Or split it into three if you like: Father, Son & Holy Spirit, or many more if you prefer the demigod perspective, i.e., Hindu beliefs, etc. However you conceive this structure, at the top of it all rests a single consciousness: the original spark of consciousness that created and is continually creating the entire multi-dimensional universe we call home. But grasping and relating to the ONE is not an easy thing to do. The ONE is so far above our understanding of what consciousness is, it becomes incomprehensible to the human mind: except of course in the abstract; which is the only realistic way this can be perceived and related to. The most popular way of relating to the ONE is through abstract simile, i.e., God is like the father of all fathers, or, God is like the mother of all mothers, et cetera.
Beneath the ONE are layers of consciousness (relating to subtle dimensional levels, i.e., the astral dimension, mental dimension, etc) where the ONE fragments and splits into multiple parts, with each lower layer splitting again and again into many more layers and parts, and so on, until you get to the physical dimension, the dimension of Maya, the dimension of solid illusion where we as energy-cum-physical beings can experience the limitations of the physical universe through our physical bodies. This, in a way, makes us human beings the myriad eyes, ears and consciousness’ (in the physical dimension) of the ONE great universal mind above us.
At the very top of the dimensional spectrum, at dimension ONE, there is NO time. Mystically, this is understood and experienced as The Eternal NOW. This means there is NO TIME. There, time does not exist and everything, the past, present and future, are happening all at once in the eternal NOW. Every layer beneath this takes on a little more time sense (steadily increasing in time sense) until we get back down to the physical dimension; to our Real-Time dimension of solid illusion (our normal physical universe) where time becomes relatively linear once again.
To support this: whenever you experience higher dimensions, say during OBE, you will always notice a significant variability in time; in your sense of time passing during each experience. Modern physicists are already working mathematically in several different dimensions above but related (or linked) to the physical universe. The great physicist Einstein stated that at some point in the dimensional spectrum there must be a point where time does not exist, where past, present and future coexist simultaneously.
I have traveled to and experienced higher dimensional levels where there is NO concept of time at all. But the sensation and perception of time passing is also quite variable in the physical universe, and time sense is entirely relative to your state of mind. Look at how time flies when you are happy, say when you are spending time with someone you love. But oh how it drags and drags like a heavy stone while you are bored, or while you are waiting or experiencing something you dislike.
In a way this can be likened to a simple pyramid structure:

The above diagram shows the ascending and descending layers of the ONE consciousness, splitting into more and more parts as it descends into the real time universe (the here and now). Each part of the layers directly above the physical dimension can be more easily related to, if you consider each as being an Overself or Oversoul, or Higher Self (pick one?). In our dimension, each of these split into many separate parts (hundreds or even thousands of people; how many is unknown). And if you take into account this flow of multiple consciousness units from above, from the eternal NOW, it is also likely this spreads throughout all of time and space: possibly with each Oversoul splitting into countless people; all who have ever lived in the past, all those living in the present, and all those that will live in the future. The bottom line is that these are all living simultaneously in the shadow of The Eternal NOW. And if you also take into account the countless worlds in our universe that probably contain many other race, not to mention a plethora of parallel universes, the mind simply boggles. And yes, I think I am definitely getting a headache at this point!
If you look closely at and ponder the mind-split effect (see Astral Dynamics, or The Treatise on OBE parts 7 & 8) you’ll see before you the underlying principle of incarnation at work. As above so below. And if you apply the mind-split effect to incarnation, you’ll see the ONE great mind splitting and reflecting (or incarnating) into many billions of parts, into many billions of people.
Now, if you take the above as read, you will see that the linear concept of reincarnation is just a little off the mark in explaining the higher nature of reality. It leaves too many questions unanswered and has too many holes in it’s logic. Its way too simplistic an explanation to fit the enormity underlying the reality of incarnation.
In my opinion, what is really happening is this:
We are all essentially a part of the ONE at the very highest level of consciousness. There is NO time at the top (or you could say there is ALL time at the top) so everything happens in the eternal NOW. Therefore, logically, a single person would incarnate throughout time: past present and future, living and experiencing multiple lives. But these are lived all at the same time, all at once, all in the eternal NOW. And therefore, if all lives are lived at once, then it is also likely each ‘person’ incarnates many times in the same timeframe, i.e., that you are incarnated many times in the present, and are living many different lives simultaneously in this present time, in the present NOW. This also applies to the past, present and future; meaning you are now currently living throughout all time. Scary concept maybe, and definitely headache material, but its also extremely logical.
I believe the above, with a healthy application of like-attracts-like and opposites-repel, also accounts for what are commonly called Soul Mates. Individual incarnating spirits would logically attract like-minded spirits to them from among their own spectrum of incarnating brethren, i.e., from among those incarnating from their own shared Oversoul.
The Buddhist concept of the Overself is fairly accurate in describing what is happening at a higher level of consciousness. This is a step up from the simpler concept of linear incarnation, living life after life, as taken for granted by most NewAge people today. Although the Buddhist theory also includes linear reincarnation, you will find there are many gray areas between fact, theory and experience.
Past life memories…or past life associations?
In my opinion these may be caused by closely related links (call it a soul family clan) between some spirits contained within a single Oversoul unit. These links are not limited nor divided by our primitive concept of linear time, but are all connected through the higher soul clan in the eternal NOW. They are all existing simultaneously at the higher level where they connect. Therefore, when a person remembers or feels connected with, or affected by, dramatic events from what is considered a past life filtering through into their present reality; these events are actually happening right now, in the eternal NOW. This may account for why these links can be so keenly felt. Even though the actual events that are affecting or being felt as stemming from a past life that may have happened thousands of years ago, it is actually happening right now, in the eternal NOW. And this goes a long way toward explaining why past life memories can have such a profound effect on us.
I think past life experiences can also be felt and experienced (shared) in varying degrees, by all the individual members of a closely related soul clan. They are not remembering events that happened a very long ago, they are being ‘felt’ and experienced by all parts as if they were actually a part of that other time, as if these events were happening NOW.
The above hopefully sheds some new light on the ancient but little-realized belief that we are all brothers and sisters in spirit, all God’s children; regardless of sex or race; or even of species for that matter. Ultimately we are all ONE at the highest level, all ONE in the eternal NOW. (RB)

Copyright © 1994-1999 by Robert Bruce
Reprinted with permission

The Catch Basket Concept

By Robert Bruce

A New Approach to Life and The Greater Spiritual Reality

Copyright © 2000 by Robert Bruce
I found the following article, yet again, while searching through my computer files. I had completely forgotten writing it. It seems a shame to waste it, so here it is. It explains a little about who I am and where I am coming from, and why I write the books and articles I do. My life; it’s been a learning process in every sense of The Word.
In the mid-to-late nineteen-eighties, I experienced a serious belief system challenge. Glaring contradictions arose at every turn, between my ongoing hard-life experiences and popularly accepted New Age concepts of spiritual reality. I struggled to comprehend and integrate my experience with this paradigm, being forced time and time again to accept illogical compromises. But adaptation of my life experience soon became impossible and I began suffocating under its awkward burden. The popular model rapidly became unworkable in a practical sense. Either I was going crazy and experiencing consistent, repeatable delusions, as were all the people I was helping, or something was decidedly rotten in downtown Denmark.
Like many people down through the ages, I had spent my life searching for spiritual truth and meaning to life. For many years, I had sat in development groups, prayed, meditated, visualized and read until my eyes burned and my mind reeled under the massive contradictory onslaught. I developed psychic abilities, had spectacular OBE’s, visions and mystical experiences. I made good progress, but still I need more. . .
I was eventually reborn and transformed when I raised my kundalini to its highest level around 1987 (this was when the enigma of my life became apparent to me). But raising kundalini, in itself, does not bring instant enlightenment. Kundalini has to be raised regularly and mastered, just like any other ability. The first time kundalini is raised it causes ‘abstract’ enlightenment, not actual enlightenment. You know everything while kundalini is raised, but cannot realize this when you return to a normal level of consciousness (the base level of consciousness in the normal waking state). There are no shortcuts, and there is no way of avoiding all the hard work and hard-life experience necessary for the abstracts to filter down into your conscious mind and physical reality.
All of this gleaned me glimpses of the greater spiritual reality above, with a few tantalizingly abstract snippets of abstract higher truth thrown in for good measure. But my increasingly strong contact with the greater spiritual reality provided me with a flood of contradictions to the popularly accepted model. This intellectual burden grew and grew as my belief system was stretched way beyond its design limits. It rapidly approached critical mass.
I was offered a solution in 1990. I had a major experience where an angel, or my higher-self (hard to tell which, and somewhat of a moot point really) manifested to me as a powerful objective voice. I could have recorded this had I a tape recorder handy; it was that audible. I was wide-awake and standing up. I had just stepped out of the shower and was about to start my evening meditation, around 9 pm. It was the most beautiful voice I have ever heard: deep, masculine, eloquent, loving, forgiving and wise. The atmosphere was intense. I felt like a small child might feel when standing before God in a great cathedral for the very first time. The sense of awe and loving fatherly forgiveness is overpowering. As I write, just revisiting my living memory of this causes tears of deep spiritual longing to flood down my face; such is the emotional impact of this experience.
NB: This was the same objective voice that had spoken to me a couple of years earlier, when it then instructed me to begin teaching myself how to write. Since I barely finished grade eight, this was no mean feat in itself. I had worked hard, and by the time of the second visitation, had already mastered the basics of English and grammar. Even so, I still felt I had not done enough. But direct contact with spiritual beings from the greater reality always has this effect, especially when they come to you.
The voice asked me to sit down, and then proceed to explain a great many things to me, the most important of which was advice on how to proceed on my quest for higher spiritual truth and knowledge. I was instructed to dismantle my belief system, and then to intelligently rebuild it from scratch. I was told to be disciplined in my approach and to use personal experience, logic and commonsense to build a new foundation belief system, upon which to continue my quest for true enlightenment.
The foundation belief system lies deep within the subconscious mind. This comprises a set of conceptual mental filters and shields, which are fundamental to one’s physical and spiritual existence. These shape and affect your thoughts and perceptions by filtering ideas and inspirations, making these conform to a central theme, as set by your foundation beliefs. All knowledge lies within your heart. But accessing this is extraordinarily difficult. Everything has to pass through your conceptual filters before it can be perceived or realized.
If one’s fundamental beliefs are even slightly flawed, information trying to pass through becomes distorted or blocked. Imagine new truths as being delicate square crystals, and flawed conceptual filters (contradictory beliefs) as being coarse round holes. New truths are effectively blocked. If one forces them through, the results are splintered octagonals, i.e., fractured, distorted or incomplete truths.
Therefore, if a higher intelligence (be it God, one’s higher-self, holy guardian angel or spirit guide) tries to pass contradictory new truths through a flawed belief system, these truths are conceptually blocked or distorted. The greater the fundamental errors in one’s belief system, the greater will be the distortion. All things being equal, this is why some people can receive inspiration (be it scientific or spiritual) and others cannot or receive only poorly.
This concept that you create your own spiritual reality is nothing new. Versions of this can be found in a great many books of spiritual philosophy. But actually realizing how this works and applying it to one’s own foundation belief system in pursuit of higher truth and knowledge is an entirely different matter.
I was given detailed instructions on how to accomplish this. The next day I sat down and made a list of all the things I believed in concerning my spiritual reality. I then analyzed and erased all the things I had not actually experienced or proven for myself. After many days of pondering and revising, I ended up with a very small list indeed. It went something like this:

• OBE is real: I’ve had Astral projections all my life.
• Clairvoyance is real: I’ve seen auras and visions all my life.
• Healing is real: I’ve both given and received it, seen and felt its power.
• Kundalini is real: I raised mine to its highest level in 1987, and many times since.
• We survive death: I’ve seen people after their deaths and have visited the spirit worlds.
• A higher force is concerned with human existence and its spiritual evolution: I’ve experienced this many times — the voice I heard above is just one example.
• Angels, masters, deities and good spirits are real: I’ve interacted with these many times.
• Bad spirits are real: I’ve experienced poltergeists and psychic attacks, been possessed and self-exorcised, and helped many people and children with similar problems.

Gone were personal spirit guides (while I had learned to believe I had one, I had never actually met or openly communicated with him). Gone was the involvement of spirits in just about everything spiritual and psychic (I had no hard experience to support this, only vague assumptions). And gone was the entire organized spirit structure above us that I had been taught to believe in (I had no real proof this was accurate). I also had a quandary. Apart from angels and other such exalted beings (which have such power and presence they are impossible to mistake for who they truly are) I had no reliable way of telling good spirits from bad spirits. Therefore, logically, I had to reject all lesser spirits until I discovered a reliable method of discernment.
The above might sound extreme, but it is eminently logical. Given the source, I took the advice I had been given to heart. I would learn to live this new way of truth and to apply it to my life.
My final list was real and true, as I had personally experienced everything on it. As instructed, I would build on what was real and discard everything else. I was told to shelve items of ‘possible’ truth aside, until proven or disproven. However, this is easier said than done and I went into what I can only describe as spiritual shock. I felt empty, alone and depressed. I had to keep stopping myself from talking to my spirit guide during prayers. If I was to do this at all, as instructed, I had to go all the way.
In time, this new foundation belief system settled more comfortably within me. I got over my emptiness and began filling my aching void with practical truth and knowledge. From this point onwards, slowly and surely, everything started to come together in my life. As instructed, I began writing a journal of my thoughts and ideas. I used the writing process to nurture my inner genius, to free up the flow of inspiration between my physical-self and my higher-self. This flow, I had been told, was blocked not only by my previously flawed conceptual filters, but by the vast differences in consciousness: between the level of consciousness of my normal awake mind (my base level of consciousness) and the more rarified and abstract level where my higher-self resided within me.
I turned my unanswered questions into journal articles. These contained everything I experientially knew to be true about each subject. I found myself putting in many logical subtitles and question marks to represent gaps in my knowledge. I used the writing process (revision, sleep, revision, sleep, and so on) to coax the truth from my dreams, and from the deep recesses of my higher spiritual-self. As instructed, I began shutting myself away in a dark, silent room for several hours at a time, discovering a profound new level of deep trance thinking. I thought, dreamed, meditated and wrote on seemingly unfathomable arcane matters.
In time began receiving inspirational ideas. My dreams and visions swam with sparkling clues; tiny pieces of the jigsaws I was trying to build. My logical and inspirational processes began working overtime, far more powerful than ever before. I found myself waking many times during sleep, compelled to reach for pen and paper to record new ideas. Mundane conversations and events triggered intellectual storms through the mental associations they caused, necessitating much frantic note-taking as inspirational ideas surfaced like glistening dolphins leaping from the murky waters of my subconscious mind.
In time, I accepted this process and began working with it. I felt like I had been reborn. This is how I developed my Catch Basket concept. During the day, I set my catch baskets by pondering unanswered questions. These are baited with rich crumbs of personal experience, tantalizing ideas and juicy pieces of logic. In the morning, I check these for fruits that have been cast into them from above. I record everything and add each small harvest to my questioning articles. Pretty soon, these began fleshing themselves out and filling in the mysterious gaps.
In truth, my work teaches me just as much as it teaches those I share it with. Over the years since I began this process, my catch basket repository began groaning with ripe esoteric fruits. As instructed, I began pouring these into the articles, tutorials and books I eventually began writing.
Over the years since my arcane riddle began, my inspirational process grew into a finely-tuned subtle mechanism. Now, if I have a serious question the answer always comes to me. Sometimes it surfaces immediately, sometimes days, months or even years later, but the clues that lead me to the answers always come. This has given me drive and purpose, plus an ever-increasing fascination for this many-splendored thing we call mortal life. Whatever the future holds in store, I look forward to living it with great interest.
I hope the above explanation of where I am coming from is of some help to people who might be struggling with their own beliefs. It is neither my intention nor my joy to cast doubts upon anyone’s heartfelt theories and beliefs. But if my work causes you belief system discomfort, then how solid were your beliefs to begin with? While faith is a priceless jewel, if one accepts anything blindly one risks polluting one’s essential foundation belief system with the curse of mindless dogmatism.
Please keep an open mind to the possibilities I have introduced here. The popular New Age spiritual model contains a great deal of beautiful, comforting philosophy. But it can fall down quite badly in a practical sense, especially when applied to dark supernatural problems. If one clings to this model, the development of new concepts and the gathering of higher spiritual truths becomes virtually impossible. The parameters of current popular spiritual models simply do not allow for this. Because of this, many people today bend the rules and invent elaborate explanations to get around these problems, while dogmatically holding true to popular beliefs. But this increased complexity prohibits a more direct approach. It leads to belief system obfuscation and ineffective methods being developed.
A Little Sage Advice To Close On:
Question everything, especially the sacred cows of dogma. Always think for yourself. Experiment and learn from all that life has to offer you. Listen to and consider the wisdom of others, and try on their ideas as you might try on a new coat for size. Never buy a new coat just because it seems to fit; it must be practical, within your price range, and look good on you too. And above all, build your own foundation belief system from the wealth of your own personal life experience

Sacsayhuaman

Sacsayhuaman

Sacsayhuaman (Saqsaywaman)

This site is located north of the city of Cusco, at an altitude of about 3555 meters above sea level, between the districts of Cusco and San Sebastian, both of them within in the province and department of Cusco. The archaeological park covers an area of 3094 Hectares and contains more than 200 archaeological sites. Leading to Saqsaywaman there are two paved roads, one starts in the old and traditional neighbourhood of San Cristobal and is about 1.5 kilometers long and the other road begins at Avenida Collasuyo and is 4 kilometers long.

When the Spanish conquerors arrived first to these lands; they could not explain themselves how Peruvian “Indians” (ignorant, wild, without any ability of logical reasoning, one more animal species according to conquerors) could have built such a greatness. Their religious fanaticism led them to believe that all that was simply work of demons or malign spirits. Still today, many people believe in the inability of ancient Quechuas to create such a wonder, so they suggest that they were made by beings of some other worlds, extraterrestrial beings with superior technology that made all that possible. However, our history and archaeology demonstrate that those objects of admiration are an undeniable work of the Incas, Quechuas, Andean people or however pre-Hispanic inhabitants of this corner of the world would be named.

The imperial city Cusco, meaning ‘navel of the earth,’ was laid out in the form of a puma, the animal that symbolized the Inca dynasty. The belly of the puma was the main plaza, the river Tullumayo formed its spine, and the hill of Sacsayhuaman its head.

One of the most imposing architectonic complexes inherited from the Incan Society is Sacsayhuaman, which because of several of its qualities is considered as one of the best monuments that mankind built on the earth’s surface.

The wall or rampart is the most impressive section, built with enormous carved limestone boulders, this construction has a broken line that faces to the main plaza called Chuquipampa which is a slope with 25 angles and 60 walls.The biggest carved boulder of the first wall weighs about 70 tons and like all of the other rocks was brought from a quarry called Sisicancha, three kilometers away and where there are still rocks that were transported part of the way. Each wall is made up of 10 fronts with the most important ones known as Rumipunco, tiupunku, Achuanpunku and Viracocha punku.

Three walls of Sacsayhuaman – the teeth of the Puma’s Head

Originally there were three “walls” or “bulwarks” which foundations are still seen today; they are the most spectacular remains of that fabulous building that according to chroniclers did not have any comparison in the old world. They are three parallel walls built in different levels with lime-stones of enormous sizes; zigzagging walls that because of their appearance it is suggested that they represent the “teeth” of the puma’s head that the complex represented. The boulders used for the first or lower levels are the biggest; there is one that is 8.5 m high (28 ft.) and weights about 140 metric tons. Those boulders classify the walls as being of cyclopean or megalithic architecture. Some authors believe that the three walls represent the three levels of the Andean Religious World: beginning from the bottom would be the Ukju Pacha (underground stage), the Kay Pacha (earth’s surface stage) in the middle, and the Hanan Pacha (sky stage) on the top. Besides; those levels are identified with their three sacred animals: the Amaru or Mach’aqway (snake), the Puma (Cougar or Mountain Lion), and the Kuntur (Andean condor). Because of the zigzagging shape of the walls, some authors suggest that they represented the Illapa god (thunder, lightning and thunderbolt). It is possible that all the previous elements related to their religion would not be excluding, because there are divine interactions, and as it is known “three” was a key number among Quechuas.

There are no other walls like these. They are different from Stonehenge, different from the Pyramids of the Egyptians and the Maya, different from any of the other ancient monolithic stone-works.

The stones fit so perfectly that no blade of grass or steel can slide between them. There is no mortar. They often join in complex and irregular surfaces that would appear to be a nightmare for the stonemason.

Scientists speculate that the masonry process might have worked like this: after carving the desired shape out of the first boulder and fitting it in place, the masons would somehow suspend the second boulder on scaffolding next to the first one. They would then have to trace out a pattern on the second boulder in order to plan the appropriate jigsaw shape that would fit the two together. In order to make a precise copy of the first boulder’s edges, the masons might have used a straight stick with a hanging plum- bob to trace its edges and mark off exact points for carving on the second boulder. After tracing out the pattern, they would sculpt the stone into shape, pounding it with hand-sized stones to get the general shape before using finger-size stones for precision sanding. Admittedly, this entire technique is merely scientific speculation. The method might have worked in practice but that doesn’t mean this is how the ancient Quechua stonemasons did it.

There is usually neither adornment nor inscription. There is Elfin whimsy here, as well as raw, primitive and mighty expression.  Most of these walls are found around Cusco and the Urubamba River Valley in the Peruvian Andes. There a few scattered examples elsewhere in the Andes, but almost nowhere else on Earth.
Mostly, the structures are beyond our ken. The how, why and what simply baffle. Modern man can neither explain nor duplicate. Mysteries like this bring out explanations scholarly, whimsical, inventive and ridiculous.

What is left from the three walls is made with lime-stones that in this case were used just in order to built the bases or foundations. The main walls were made with andesites that are blackish igneous stones which quarries are in Waqoto on the mountains north of San Jeronimo, or in Rumiqolqa about 35 Kms. (22 miles) from the city. Limestones are found in the surroundings of Sacsayhuaman but they are softer and can not be finely carved as the andesites of the main walls that were of the “Sedimentary or Imperial Incan” type. Destruction of Sacsayhuaman lasted about 400 years; since 1536 when Manko Inka began the war against Spaniards and sheltered himself in this complex. Later the first conquerors started using its stones to built their houses in the city; subsequently the city’s Church Council ordered in 1559 to take the andesites for the construction of the Cathedral. Even until 1930, Qosqo’s neighbours just paying a small fee could take the amount of stones they wanted in order to build their houses in the city: four centuries of destruction using this complex as a quarry by the colonial city’s stone masons.
Sacsayhuaman was supposedly completed around 1508. Depending on who you listen to, it took a crew of 20,000 to 30,000 men working for 60 years.
Here is a mystery:
The chronicler Garcilaso de la Vega was born around 1530, and raised in the shadow of these walls. And yet he seems not to have had a clue as to how Sacsayhuaman was built. He wrote:

“….this fortress surpasses the constructions known as the seven wonders of the world. For in the case of a long broad wall like that of Babylon, or the colossus of Rhodes, or the pyramids of Egypt, or the other monuments, one can see clearly how they were executed…how, by summoning an immense body of workers and accumulating more and more material day by day and year by year, they overcame all difficulties by employing human effort over a long period. But it is indeed beyond the power of imagination to understand now these Indians, unacquainted with devices, engines, and implements, could have cut, dressed, raised, and lowered great rocks, more like lumps of hills than building stones, and set them so exactly in their places. For this reason, and because the Indians were so familiar with demons, the work is attributed to enchantment.”

Surely a few of those 20,000 labourers were still around when Garcilaso was young. Was everyone struck with amnesia? Or is Sacsayhuaman much older than we’ve been led to believe?

Archaeologists tell us that the walls of Sacsayhuaman rose ten feet higher than their remnants. That additional ten feet of stones supplied the building materials for the cathedrals and “casas” of the conquistadors.
It is generally conceded that these stones were much smaller than those megalithic monsters that remain.
Perhaps the upper part of the walls, constructed of small, regularly-shaped stones was the only part of Sacsayhuaman that was built by the Incas and “finished in 1508.” This could explain why no one at the time of the conquest seemed to know how those mighty walls were built.

Muyuqmarka

Garcilaso wrote that on the top of the three “walls” or “bulwarks” there were three strong towers disposed in a triangle. The main tower was in the middle and had a circular shape, it was named as Moyoc Marca (Muyuq Marka), the second one was named as Paucar Marca, and the third Sacllar Marca (Sallaq Marka); the last two ones were rectangular.

This is the remaining base of a tower discovered in 1934 at the top of the Temple of Sacsayhuaman. The Muyuqmarka consists of three concentric, circular stone walls connected by a series of radial walls. There are three channels constructed to bring water into what many scientists consider to be a reservoir. A web-like pattern of 34 lines intersects at the center and also there is a pattern of concentric circles that corresponded to the location of the circular walls.

Cusco

According to Indian legend, Cusco was so barren that no crops could be grown there. In what is now the center of the city, there was a lake and a bog. The second Inca, Sinchi Roca, had the swamp drained and filled with stones and logs until it was firm enough to support their stone buildings. He also had thousands of loads of good earth brought in and spread over the land, making the valley fertile. What could possibly have been the attraction of this barren, boggy place? Suppose the magnificent lower walls of Sacsayhuaman were there before Manco Capac came to Cusco. That in itself would be enough to make the place holy.

The imperial city Cusco, meaning ‘navel of the earth,’ was laid out in the form of a puma, the animal that symbolized the Inca dynasty. The belly of the puma was the main plaza, the river Tullumayo formed its spine, and the hill of Sacsayhuaman its head. According to one early Spanish chronicler, the Inca emperor Pachakuti, who had made a pilgrimage to the ancient holy city of Tiahuanaco, sought to emulate the building perfection he had seen there in the construction of Cusco’s temples. Cusco, however, was not really a city in the European sense of the word. Rather it was an enormous sacred artifact, the dwelling place of the families of the Inca nobility (common people were not allowed entrance to the ceremonial nexus), and the center of the Inca cosmos.

Coricancha

In Cusco too, was the most important temple in the Inca empire, the Coricancha (meaning literally, “the corral of gold”). Dedicated primarily to Viracocha, the creator god, and Inti, the Sun god, the Coricancha also had subsidiary shrines to the Moon, Venus, the Pleiades, and various weather deities. Additionally there were a large number of religious icons of conquered peoples which had been brought to Cusco, partly in homage and partly as hostage. Reports by the first Spanish who entered Cusco tell that ceremonies were conducted around the clock at the Coricancha and that its opulence was fabulous beyond belief.

Coricancha – Inca Sun Temple. Finest of Inca stonework.

Golden Enclosure in Coricancha sheltered
INTI Sun God & Gold Disk (1430-1532).

The wonderfully carved granite walls of the temple were covered with more than 700 sheets of pure gold, weighing around two kilograms each; the spacious courtyard was filled with life-size sculptures of animals and a field of corn, all fashioned from pure gold; the floors of the temple were themselves covered in solid gold; and facing the rising sun was a massive golden image of the sun encrusted with emeralds and other precious stones. (All of this golden artwork was quickly stolen and melted down by the Spaniards, who then built a church of Santo Domingo on foundations of the temple.)
The Coricancha (sometimes spelled Qoricancha) was also the centerpiece of a vast astronomical observatory and calendrical device for precisely calculating precessional movement. Emanating from the temple were forty lines called seques, running arrow-straight for hundreds of miles to significant celestial points on the horizon. Four of these seques represented the four intercardinal roads to the four quarters of Tawantinsuyu, others pointed to the equinox and solstice points, and still others to the heliacal rise positions of different stars and constellations highly important to the Inca.

Rodadero Hill and the Throne of the Incas

In the outskirts of Cusco, exactly opposite to Sacsayhuaman is Rodadero, a giant rock hill with numerous stairwells and benches carved into the rock

Throne of the Inca

The rock is smooth and rounded, like it was polished by a glacier.

Rodadero hill is made up of diorite rock of igneous origin, where you can find waterways, carved rocks and what has been revealed to be the so-called throne of the Incas that is accessed by a series of precisely carved stairs. Behind this section there are small labyrinths, tunnels and vaulted niches in the walls.

Chichén Itzá

Chichén Itzá

Chichén Itzá – Introduction

LOCATION

Chichén Itzá, Mexico (Latitude 20°40′N | Longitude 88°32′W)
Chichén-Itzá is the most visited archaeological site in the peninsula of Yucatan, due to its extraordinary architecture beauty and its geographical location.  It is located 120 km from Merida (about midway between the towns of Cancun and Merida) in the State of Yucatan, Mexico.

Location of Chichen Itza in Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico

Satellite photo of the ruins of Chichen Itza. Copyright © 2005 Space Imaging, Inc,

Layout of the ruins of Chichen Itza

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HISTORY

Chichén Itzá, Mayan culture, late classic, 11-13th A.D.
The site was developed between the 6th and 14th centuries. The early inhabitants (A.D. 600-900) were the Itzá, a Maya group. Chichén Itzá seems to have been abandoned during the 10th century but later resettled around A.D. 1000. The second group of settlers may have been the original Itzá, Toltecs from Tula (near Mexico City), or a fusion of both groups.
Archaeologists have recognized both Maya and Toltec influences in the architecture: most believe that the Toltecs influenced the Itzá, but some argue that the influence was in the other direction.
It was founded in the year 514 of our era by the priest LAKIN CHAN who was also called Itzamna. This is why their people were called since the foundation, chanes or itzaes.
The name Chichén Itzá, is derived from the Mayan language: “Chi” – mouth, “Chen” – well and “Itza” – the tribe that inhabited the area. When the Spaniards arrived to Chichen – Itza, it had been abandoned as a consequence of the civil war fought with Mayapan. In between 1196 and 1441 the final collapse of this culture took place in the north of the peninsula.
The conquerors found the buildings of Chichén Itzá, partially in ruins and their names and real use were unknown; this is why the present names are suppositions.

El Castillo, Chichen Itza.  © Charnay Désiré, 1860
Source: http://www.amphilsoc.org/library/mole/a/abbot.htm

Cather’s drawings of El Castillo

El Castillo (old photo)

About 60% of El Castillo pyramid has been restored almost fully from the decaying condition in which it was re-discovered by John L. Stephens in 1841 although the eastern and southern faces are still partially eroded by the forces of time and erosion. There are no plans to restore these two faces of the pyramid as those that restored the other portions wish for future generations to see the condition in which it was originally discovered.

El Caracol (old photo)

Drawings of the Nunnery

Artist’s rendering of central Chichen Itza around the year AD 1,000.  View is from the  north with the Castillo Pyramid in the center, Temple of the Warriors to the east, and a sacbe to the Sacred Cenote in the foreground.
Source:http://maya.csuhayward.edu/archaeoplanet/97GprGra/97Photos/Fig06.htm

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Credits for the following segment: http://campus.northpark.edu/history/WebChron/Americas/ChichenItza.CP.html Chichen Itza is the most impressive and intact ruins of Mayan civilization that the modern world has. This now popular tourist attraction is located on the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico and has fast become the best restored record of the spiritual, domestic, and agricultural lives of these people. Mayan ruins in central America, such as Chichen Itza, are remnants of cities that were abandoned long before Columbus reached the area; yet this culture has influenced many areas of architecture, art, and astronomy, that live on even in our modern world.
The Mayan people are most famous for their brilliant and advanced astronomical knowledge and their resiliency. Stone remnants of their civilization are currently being preserved at various sites in Mexico; in Tilkal, Guatemala; in Altun Ha, Belize; and in Copan, Honduras. Mayan civilization spread from their origin on the Yucatan Peninsula to the rain forests of Mexico eastward and the other surrounding countries. Today, mostly on the Yucatan Peninsula and in the state of Chiapas, Mayan culture is still thriving with four to six million people, over 30 languages, and many ethnic backgrounds represented. Modern Mayans still continue many of the traditions of their ancient culture, such as speaking their ancient dialects instead of Spanish, growing their traditional crops (corn, beans, chile, tomatoes, and squash) with the same techniques, and using herbal medicinal treatments instead of modern medicine. Many spiritual aspects of Mayan life, the purpose for their ancient cities, is still exercised with many offerings and pilgrimages to modern churches, sometimes fusing Catholicism with Mayan beliefs from antiquity.
Around 550 AD, Mayans settled Chichen (translated “the mouth of the well”) around two wells; one sacred and one “profane,” used for everyday use. These underground wells and subsequent waterways, known as “cenotes”, were the lifeblood of the community. Chichen Itza was primarily a rain forest area settled on flat, porous limestone that rain seeped through to became trapped in the insolvent bedrock below. These cenotes were, therefore, the oasis of the society, full of rain and run off water for their living needs. Chichen Itza, like most Mayan centers, was primarily a spiritual, ceremonial site instead of a commercial area. The loose arrangement of decentralized farming communities came together for offerings, sacrifices, and ceremonies in the town. Some trade, education, and recreation were also performed there. Exhumed from the sacred well were many ceremonial objects, skulls, and entire skeletons.
Evidence suggests that Chichen Itza was abandoned by the Mayans in the tenth century. This is concurrent with evidence of all Mayan cities being abandoned around this period. The abandonment has not yet been fully explained. The Mayans returned to and resettled their cities around 1000 AD. Chichen Itza’s architecture is seen to have two distinctive styles; traditional Mayan architecture, and more recent Toltec architecture. The Toltecs were another more warlike tribe who invaded Chichen Itza around the year 800 AD. The Toltecs were much more fierce than the Mayans and human sacrifice was a large part of their rituals. It is quite easy to decipher which structures in Chichen Itza were built before and after 800 AD.