(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.
