Atlantis and the War on Terror

(It's both the blessing and the bane of the young to believe they have all the answers. Such was my state of mind when I wrote this essay in early 2002. In it, I attempted to unify my interests in politics, archaeology, Atlantology, Jungian psychology, and the paranormal. Strange bedfellows, indeed, yet somehow it all hangs together in a bizarre collage of ideas.)  

There is ample evidence in history of meaningful coincidence. Whether in an individual’s own life or in the world at large, many people will readily acknowledge that certain events seem predestined, or appear to unfold with purpose.

This perception is partly due to the fact that the study of history is a grand narrative - or grand collection of narratives - often flawed, but beautiful. It is also partly because our lives are directed by many hidden forces that we don't understand and can't control.

It is my feeling that these hidden forces inform much of what occurs in our daily life and on the world stage. I also believe, and can argue reasonably, that what we do with economic, religious and political power has impacts on what is hidden.

In the old days, these perturbations would be described as 'occulted', which means, quite literally ‘secret’ or ‘hidden’. The misfortune of being aligned with certain religions has tainted the word but I assure you, I mean it only as a word, and strictly by the definition presented.
             
Recently, there has been much talk about ‘enemies in the shadow’ and ‘wars on terror’. Devastating weapons are unleashed, great oscillations in mood occur over large segments of the population. Meanwhile, a small group of people are deciding how a large group of other people are going to live, and how they will die.

In the midst of this activity are paradigm-shifting discoveries in science, tremendous affluence and material wealth, improvements in lives and government, and talk of peace. At no other time in recorded history has civilization evolved so dramatically as western society in the past century.

And believe me when I say that things have changed in the hidden world as well. These changes occurred concurrently with events of the past century, and they continue today.

To illustrate the substance of my argument – and shed some light on the ‘occulted’ reality described - I will attempt to unify some fairly disparate themes.

To begin, it is my contention that the recent discoveries of ancient ruins off the western tip of Cuba is an archaeological find that has compelling implications for a world that is at war with terror.

Stories of the find first surfaced when a Reuters News Service reporter interviewed the deep ocean engineer who first reported unusual side-scan sonar of the discovery in May 2001.

Preliminary findings indicated the existence of a city, with roads, buildings and pyramids submerged some half-mile beneath the ocean surface. While this may well be a lost city of the indigenous ancestors of the South American Indians, there is also evidence to suggest otherwise.

The deep ocean exploration team, headed by Paulina Zelitsky, are apprehensive to release details at the time of this writing but it is quite clear that if their suspicions about the age and scope of this site are correct, it could prove to be a matter of great import. And not only to the scientific community, but to the world at large.

The most profound questions of our existence, that is, the existential quandaries of who we are as humans and why are we here soon may be posed anew, aided by vital information about our history on this planet.   
           
Conventional science contests that humanity’s earliest ancestors distinguished themselves from other primates roughly five million years ago. According to this paradigm, our species then begin a long, slow climb thru pre-consciousness until somewhere around a quarter-of-a-million years ago, when anatomically modern humans arrived.

Appreciate that this summary is rather sterile, when in fact, the history of the race is far from seamless. There are still many questions. We are different from other creatures on this planet, but for all of our science, we cannot show - except in controlled experiments - how this came to be.

One thing the discoveries off the coast of Cuba will never yield is a first-hand account of the history of its populace. If the site provides evidence of an advanced culture from a prehistoric era, it will present profound epistemological problems for several prominent theories that have informed the public mind for almost a century.

The truth is, any explanation of human evolution is incomplete without acknowledging history (and prehistory) has a spiritual dimension – an occulted progression through time.

American mystic Edgar Cayce - who enjoyed a unique reputation for assisting in medical emergencies and accurately predicting stock market outcomes - had some interesting things to say about homo sapiens’ prehistoric past.

Cayce's vision of humanity’s history brings an absent spiritual perspective to the question of a civilization pre-dating the last global ice age, around 11,000 years ago. His statements on the subject are more compelling any other source, save perhaps Plato, who documented the story of the ancient kingdom of Atlantis in his dialogues, Critias and Timaeus.
             
For many students of Plato, Atlantis is a fiction used to explore the philosopher’s concept of governance. There are also scholars who believe that Plato – a student of mathematics – miscalculated the date of Atlantis’ destruction, confusing it with the demise of the Minoan civilization around 3450 B.C.E.

The likelihood that Plato mistook, or confused the calendars is remote. Yet to assume that he was not challenged by skeptics is to suggest that the critical faculty of the Greek intelligentsia was in some way idle, which, of course, it was not.
           
Back to Edgar Cayce. As a source for research into pre-recorded history, like the events described in Plato’s account, Cayce provides many opportunities. In a series of reads begun on February 3, 1932, the ‘sleeping prophet’ – as Cayce is popularly known – uttered his canonical statements on the historical significance of Atlantis.

In Cayce's telling, the Atlanteans were a unique race of people who would have been contemporaries of the earliest hominid species.

In the course of their development, the bloodlines of the Atlanteans were mixed with these hominids, which allowed for the dramatic changes in consciousness that evolved modern humans.

This genetic exchange precipitated much strife in the early Atlantean culture, as one might imagine, and was one of the key reasons why the earliest incarnation of this society met with a terrible fate.

In an event described in countless myths and religions throughout the world, a environmental catastrophe flooded the greater portion of the Atlantis and its colonies, destroying its industry and culture.

Survivors migrated to other parts of the planet - Egypt, the Yucatan, and Peru - where they became high priests, scientists, and teachers for the stone age societies established there.
           
No person would deny that we are dependent on the life sustaining qualities of earth for our continued physical survival. In very subtle, unconscious ways, we are tied to this planet. 

Everything that has ever been done throughout history and prehistory has left an imprint on our world. And if enough imprints are made, the planet responds.

While many theorists would like to believe that nature is devoid of intelligence, it is the contention of many others, including myself and the proponents of the Gaia theory, that the planet possesses a pervasive sentience that guides and protects all of us.

Conversely, if any species becomes a significant threat to life on Earth, it is dealt with indiscriminately.

The deluge of the antediluvian world is evidence that geological changes to the Earth's surface are precipitated not only by environmental and planetary stresses, but by the actions of her more developed evolutionary agents.

In short, Earth knows when her constituents are agitated, and responds - sometimes quietly, sometimes dramatically - but she always responds.

According to Cayce’s vision, there are many parallels between Atlantis and modern global civilization. He said that the Atlanteans conducted business and had trade with other states, and were involved with what we today would call relief and missionary work.

Like contemporary Western society, the Atlanteans had developed their industrial and military apparatus to such a point that they could largely go and do whatever they wanted anywhere in the world. Cayce characterized its populace as brilliant and inventive, but proud and aggressive, traits that would eventually prove to be their undoing.

Since Cayce's readings are primarily a moral and spiritual canon, the rise and fall of Atlantis can be considered a cautionary tale for our time, a environmental parable of mythic proportion that holds a profound truth for all people.
           
In all likelihood, the final demise of Atlantis probably occurred in a number of different stages.

These would have included included a neglect of the environment in favor of economic development, internal conflict arising from the ancient bias that favored pure-blooded Atlanteans over the mixed population, and war.

It is the war that the Atlanteans waged that should be of primary concern to the students of recent world events.

Various accounts of Atlantis’ demise suggest that after many years of supremacy over the world, its politics, trade and technology, Atlantis was finally challenged by the Rama Empire which, interestingly enough, was centralized in and around northern India, Pakistan and Afghanistan.

While the cause of the aggression between the rival states can be considered a mystery, it is conceivable that the situation may not be too different from the so-called "war on terror" and the political quagmire that has resulted from it.

The great urban centers in the Indian sub-continent were called the Seven Rishi Cities. They were large, cosmopolitan cities that were sophisticated enough to compete economically and culturally with the Atlanteans.

Many of the remains of these cities can be found in Pakistan. Rama was ruled by priest kings who governed the cities. Ancient Vedic manuscripts tell of flying vehicles piloted by superior beings which were used for transportation and to wage war.

Although the technology used in these vehicles may have had its origin in Atlantis, these people, and their rulers, were clearly advanced enough to pose a real challenge to the Atlanteans.
           
According to Cayce, this was about the time that the Atlanteans learned to alter the molecular structure of atomic particles to produce energy. This power source had tremendous implications for the Atlantean population. In Cayce's reads, the word "atomic" is used in direct reference to the electrical energy being utilized by the Atlanteans.

While it cannot be definitively established whether or not the Atlanteans developed weapons of mass destruction with this technology, archaeological excavations of Mohenjo-daro - a Rishi City - found skeletons lying in the streets as if a great doom had suddenly overtaken them.

When the archaeologists took radiation counts, they proved to be the most radioactive remains found up until the bombing of Hiroshima at the end of World War II.

Consider also the passages from the Mahabharata, an ancient Indian text which speaks of "a single projectile charged with all the power of the universe, an incandescent column of smoke and flame as bright as the thousand suns [...] an iron thunderbolt, a gigantic messenger of death...corpses were so burned as to be unrecognisable. The hair and nails fell out [...] after a few hours all foodstuffs were infected. To escape this fire, the soldiers threw themselves in streams to wash themselves and their equipment."

Later excavations of ancient cities in India, Ireland, Scotland, France and Turkey uncovered buildings with bricks fused together and black lumps of glass in the streets that turned out to clay pots melted under intense heat.

These findings are congruent with two things: a cataclysmic, planet-wide ecological event, or a nuclear attack.
           
It is clear in Cayce's telling of the final epoch of Atlantis' reign that atomic energy played a significant role. Since Atlantis was at war with the Rama Empire, it is my theory that an unlikely and unprovoked attack abruptly involved the Atlanteans and their enemies in a global conflict, the like of which has not been seen until this century.

Ultimately, this resulted in the complete erosion of the Atlanteans technological and industrial base, the decimation of their political and economic power, and the death or migration of the majority of species on this planet, human and otherwise.

So while extreme environmental conditions no doubt played the most significant role in the mass extinctions documented by historians around 10,000 B.C.E, the seeds of such a catastrophe were man-made.

The wars between Atlantis and Rama thousands of years ago were signals to the citizenry that great global change was close at hand. Those same changes are under way today.
           
It is important that any new science that may arise from the study of occult matters include a thoughtfully reasoned history of karmic cause and effect over the entire spectrum of human experience. A society which meets with a violent end causes a kind of feedback, which to this point, is still not fully understood or appreciated.

The events during the second half of 2001 indicate a profound reckoning is at hand, a karmic convergence, or, for lack of a better term, a final judgment.

We can see this reckoning demonstrated in our philosophies, our politics and our economies; by statistics, by the increasing gap between the have and the have-nots, by the fact that over two-thirds of the world's population live in areas where extreme crime, poverty, terrorism, famine and war are the norm. In short, it is demonstrated by our neglect for our fellow humans, the sick, the poor, the oppressed.

This is not a moral polemic. It is a case made for the argument that what is happening today - including the American-led "war on terror" - has happened before, in forgotten times to a lost people.

For them, the world ended badly and necessarily. Now we, as a people, must deal with not only our current global dilemmas, but the karmic root of these problems, which I argue exist somewhere in prehistory.

It has been said that those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. But how to learn from a history of which we have no record?

The most interesting thing about the find of the coast of Cuba is the impact it could have on current understanding of our civilization's development. Indeed, it’s no mistake that this hidden site has been located now.

I believe the discovery is a synchronistic event intended to help us comprehend humanity’s history on the planet by offering us a longer, more complex continuum within which we can experience the evolution of the race.

Most importantly though, the discovery gives us another chance. A chance to right the mistakes that were made by our ancestors thousands of years ago. A chance to exercise our wills and imagination to envision an utterly new and unique creation.

Until a science is established which integrates all the best qualities of rigorous empiricism and a broad, imaginative spirituality, we have to trust our intuition and common sense. Nothing happens without a cause, and everything we do on this planet matters.