Merlin Part 2 of 3

from Merlin: High Priest of the Holy Grail,
Copyright,2011, James Stivers

Chapter Seven
THE PROPHECIES OF MERLIN
Part 2 of 3

The Age of Aquarius

When the moon is in the Seventh House
And Jupiter aligns with Mars
Then peace will guide the planets
And love will steer the stars. . .
This is the dawning of the age of Aquarius

from the musical “Hair”

One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh:
But the earth abideth for ever. . .
Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new?
It hath been already of old time, which was before us.

Ecclesiastes 1:4, 10

Earth, the planet we live on, is a massive ball spinning in the vastness of space. We believe it circles around an even greater massive fiery ball called “the Sun.” I say “we believe” this is so because we do not know it with absolute certainty. Despite Copernicus, it is impossible to know with two moving objects which one is circling the other. In space, there is no fixed reference point. Consequently, the phenomenon of movement is really one of perception.
Some years ago, I personally knew a man who did the calculations for at least one of the moon shots during the Apollo missions. He told me he used the math from the geocentric model rather than the heliocentric model because it was simpler – a fact which makes one wonder.
Nevertheless, Copernicus still has my vote. I think it is reasonable to believe the earth orbits the sun and that it spins on its axis. But I wouldn’t get too arrogant about it.

The Astral Journey
At night time, we see the moon and the stars. They progress across the night sky just like the sun does during the daytime.
As the earth orbits the sun, the stars we see at night change. The night sky changes because a different part of it can be seen, while the rest of it is blocked by the radiance of the sun during the day.
For example, certain stars will be seen in the winter, while a different set will be seen during the summer. This is because the earth is on different sides of the sun. What is blocked out during the day in the winter can be seen during the night sky of summer, and vice versa. For this reason, we can use the stars to mark the seasons. Others, of course, can always be seen or never seen, depending on the latitude of where you live, north or south of the equator.
The earth is also tilted as it spins. The tilt creates the perception of a wobble that gives us the seasons of the year. If you live in the Northern Hemisphere, the earth tilts toward the sun during the summer, and in fact, that tilt causes summer to occur. When the earth tilts away from the sun, we experience winter. The same is true of the Southern Hemisphere, only it is the opposite for them.
Within this perceived wobble, there is a secondary wobble that is infinitely slower than the primary wobble. It is not a wobble that results in a tilting back and forth, but rather a wobble in the axis of spin. Imagine a line straight through the earth sticking out the north and south poles. Imagine that those lines were pencils that could mark the sky above them. Every 26,000 years they would draw a circle. That circle represents “the Great Year of the precession of the equinox.”

The Zodiac
Earth has frequent visitors from space. They are usually meteors, asteroids and comets – sometimes planets. Evidence exists that several of the planets were once upon a time much closer to each other than they are now. Earth, Venus and Mars, for example, had orbits which brought them near enough to cause cataclysmic events. There are also legends of planet-sized comets which have come close enough to cause destructive gravitational and electromagnetic effects. Some even believe that Venus was once a comet. We think the most recent visitor of consequence was a comet that crashed into the emptiness of Siberia a century ago.[105]
Somehow, the ancients discovered that these events occurred with some regularity. They could be predicted. But they needed a map of the sky in order to identify these wayward travelers that disturbed the normal seasons of Earth. For that reason, they created groupings of stars called “constellations,” using imaginary lines connecting them to create mental pictures of animals, people, monsters and so on. This map of the sky became “the zodiac.”
The Zodiac consists of twelve major constellations (or “signs”) corresponding to an astral division of the solar year. Each of these constellations consists of three additional minor constellations which together fill the night sky. Thus, we have 12 Signs of the Zodiac – the principal astral belt along the ecliptic – and then 36 minor constellations above and below them. Together, they consist of 48 constellations.[106]
Each of the constellations consists of various numbers of stars. Most of the principal stars (those of a 1st, 2nd, and sometimes 3rd magnitude of brightness) have names.
Aquarius (the Water Bearer, 108 stars), for example, is accompanied by three minor constellations: Piscis Australis (the Southern Fish, 23 stars), Pegasus (the Winged Horse, 89 stars), and Cygnus (the Swan, 81 stars).
Aquarius has many stars, but only four of the 3rd magnitude. They have names: Saad al Melik (“who is the king”),[107] Saad al Sund (“who pours out”), Scheat (“who comes and goes”), and Mon (“an urn”).
The stories behind these names vary from culture to culture. When the old and original stories were forgotten, new ones were invented by later cultures to explain them. The older legends (like those found in the Bible and the Egyptian Denderah) are to be preferred as more reliable over the later ones from Greece and Rome.
Who invented the Zodiac is not known. There are theories. If you believe the Bible and the writers of early Christianity, you would have to say that this knowledge came from Divine messengers sent to the earliest of our ancestors. Other legends claim this knowledge was learned from the fallen angels, or “the Watchers” as described in the Book of Enoch. The pagans ascribed its origin to their respective pantheons; secularists think they were just creative memory helps. No one seems to really know.
In any case, this arbitrary, mnemonic device has been useful to track the movement of the heavens and to anticipate momentous events. Science now tells us that there are seasons to the Great Year, just as there are seasons to the minor Orbital Year. Just as there is summer and winter in the Orbital Year, there is a summer and winter to the Great Year. We call them “Ice Ages.”[108]

Astrology
Ancient man was superstitious. He believed that the events of the natural world were a capricious consequence of the gods. If it rained, he had pleased the gods. If it did not rain, he had angered the gods. If there were great earthquakes, tsunamis, or crashing meteors, they were manifestations of their wrath.
From this superstitious belief, astrology was born. It was the first attempt at science, the first attempt to figure out what the gods were going to do at any given time.
This superstitious psychology runs deep among the people in the Old Testament, and it is exploited in places like the threatening maledictions of the final chapters of Deuteronomy and the Ten Plagues of Egypt. But they lack any astrological references.
We are told that Moses was “learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians” (Acts 7:22). That “wisdom knowledge” ought to have included Egyptian astrology, as well.
Did it surface in the writings of Moses, the Pentateuch? No, it did not in any of its particulars and there are direct prohibitions of astrology when used as a form of idolatrous worship:

And lest thou lift up thine eyes unto heaven, and when thou seest the sun, and the moon, and the stars, even all the host of heaven, shouldest be driven to worship them, and serve them, which the LORD thy God hath divided unto all nations under the whole heaven. Deuteronomy 4:19, et al

In spite of this prohibition, however, Moses still recognized that the stars were “divided unto all nations” as “signs”:

And God said; Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years: Genesis 1:14 (emphasis added)

Thus, while Moses condemns the Egyptian superstition that the stars themselves manifest divine powers over the world, he did embrace their role in communicating the Divine will. He retains the world view in part, but removes the causation from the planets and the stars.
For example, astrological references surface in his blessings upon the Twelve Tribes of Israel, where they are depicted by their ensigns containing astrological symbols (Deuteronomy 33), and of course, he records Jacob’s blessings in Genesis 49.[109] The dreams of the young Joseph likened his brethren to eleven stars (Genesis 37:9).
Yet, Jesus, in a more explicit display of Divine truth, contradicts this superstitious world view altogether and taught that God sends the rain “on the just and the unjust” (Matthew 5:45). Natural catastrophes are not in themselves the workings of Divine judgment so much as the moral failure of mankind to prepare for these seasons of reckoning which come as a part of the natural order. Mankind is judged by the natural adversities of his existence. And while each individual may be “judged” by his personal failure to come to terms with the created order, civilizations are tested, as well. They are tested by their internal contradictions. Usually, no miraculous display of Divine providence is necessary. The natural consequences of a false belief system are sufficient to end a social experiment or cause a wayward soul to perish (Jeremiah 2:19).

Divination
Astrology became a religion in the ancient world. What at first was a primitive explanation of cause and effect, in the end became a method to control the people in the name of the gods. Seers would interpret the movement of the stars and would predict the future – not the future of their movements as in astronomy, but rather, the personal futures of their clients – hence, the horoscope.
While at first the stars were used to interpret the minds of the gods, they then became the method of communicating the will of the gods. The stars became the cause of human affairs because they were, in many mythologies, the gods themselves. Human activity was influenced if not caused by the movement of the stars, and the astrologer became the manipulator of what could and could not be done because he could read the stars.
So what began as a method to mark the seasons and the ages was turned into a tool of sorcery:

For these nations, which thou shalt possess, hearkened unto observers of times, and unto diviners: but as for thee, the LORD thy God hath not suffered thee so to do. Deuteronomy 18:14[110]

Moses taught Israel the primacy of moral law and the natural sanctions imposed on covenant keeping and covenant breaking. The signs of portending doom were contained in the warnings of the prophets, not the stars. That they ever had a celestial manifestation was sometimes necessary to validate the messenger. But the prophets did not divine the future because they understood the stars; they did so because they understood biblical law (Psalm 19:11).

The True Message of the Stars
However, we cannot stop with a cursory dismissal of this ancient knowledge simply because it was abused by the ancient priesthoods. In its rightful place, astrology marks the seasons and the ages, it enables us to create a calendar, and it gives us a universal dating system. We prefer to call this “astronomy” today because we no longer indulge superstitions. But astronomy, as a science, does not allow for another important role of the stars, and that is its usefulness as a language of universal symbols.

The Scriptures tell us that God named the stars:
He telleth the number of the stars; he calleth them all by their names. Psalm 147:4
Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who hath created these [the stars], that bringeth out their host by number: he calleth them all by names by the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power; not one faileth. Isaiah 40:36

If God is truly the author of the names of the starry host, then the language of the stars originated with him, including the constellations, the Zodiac, and their message. Thus, they serve a purpose beyond a mere mnemonic device to aid in astronomical observations. They form a source of natural revelation. In an age which has lost its way in the Babel of biblical commentary, another source of Divine instruction might provide confirmation of a correct understanding of our most Sacred Writings. While astrologers, too, have their cacophony of competing interpretations, it would provide a double witness if a particular biblical interpretation happened to also match the universal symbols of the Zodiac.

The Gospel of the Kingdom in the Stars
While the groupings of the stars under certain names may seem to be arbitrary, their images were certainly not. Why should there have been a constellation called “Scorpio”, or “Virgo” or “Taurus”? And why do these names correspond so easily with the stories and people found in the Bible?
For example, Pisces (the fishes) became a prominent symbol of the Christian age. Written on catacombs and Christian records from the earliest centuries, Ichthys was an acronym for Ι (Jesus) Χ (Christ) Θ (of God) Υ (the Son) Σ (Savior): “Jesus Christ, Savior Son of God.” Some constellations are plainly suggestive of biblical themes: e.g. Virgo, the Virgin Mary; Leo, the Lion of Judah; Draco, the Satanic Dragon.
Various ones are referenced in biblical texts either by name or by allusion (e.g. Job 9:9; 26:13; 38:32; 41:1; Ezekiel 1:10, 19; 10:12; cf. Revelation 4:6-7) and invite further investigation. Competent studies can be found in E. W. Bullinger’s republished classic The Witness of the Stars (from Kregel but easily found on the web) and E. Raymond Capt’s updated study, The Glory of the Stars (Artisan Publishers, 1978).
In Revelation 12:1, we have an astrological symbol used to pinpoint the exact time of Christ’s birth.[111] And the Book of Enoch is quoted as Scripture by Jude (14), a member of the Desposyni. The Book of Enoch is principally an astrological text that was found in several caves at Qumran and figures prominently in the Dead Sea Scroll corpus.[112]
The prophet Daniel was the chief astrologer of the Babylonian and Persian courts. He may have been the principal reason that the Parthian Magi were able to calculate the birth of Jesus based upon their astrological observations.
It is true that the fanciful and often lurid tales of Roman and Greek astrology discredit a serious consideration. However, the farther back the student traces the mythology, the closer he comes to the core hieroglyph.
We are challenged by the proposition that the “signs of the heavens” – the Zodiac of astrological lore – offer us the Gospel of Natural Revelation that completes the Gospel of the New Testament. The pagan myths of Osiris, Dionysius, Krishna, and others certainly anticipated the story of Jesus. As has been noted in other Peshers,[113] skeptics will dismiss Jesus as just another mythological messianic figure, but the Christian will say that Jesus truly fulfilled the message of the stars.

Aquarius: the Footwasher
In terms of astronomical ages, the Age of Pisces is coming to a close, just as the Age of Aries (the Ram) did before it, and just as the Age of Taurus (the Bull) did before that. 26,000 years for the Great Year divided by the 12 signs of the Zodiac means that the precession of the ecliptic passes through each sign for a period of approximately 2160 years. Many astrologers believe that the Age of Aquarius has begun or may begin sometime during this century.
What this might mean in terms of God’s Kingdom is suggested by the symbolism of the constellation and the constellations surrounding it. Aquarius is the water-bearer who is pouring forth water from a pitcher. As noted above, the stars describe this act as the work of a king.[114] Immediately, we are confronted with the story in John’s Gospel, chapter 13, when Jesus took a towel and a pitcher of water and washed the feet of His disciples.
Commentators will want to identify this sign as symbolic of Christ pouring out the living waters of the Holy Spirit upon His Church. Certainly, the imagery encompasses such an interpretation. But the interpretation is truncated if we do not factor into consideration the liturgy of this sacred rite.
Peter pleaded with Jesus not to do it because it seemed unbecoming of a king. Slaves did the footwashing in the ancient world.[115] Jesus was symbolically turning the world upside down and Peter (Cepheus, the regal church in another constellation) was not prepared for a kingship founded upon joyful service.
Jesus rebuked him and said that he “could have no part with me” if he refused the gesture. When Jesus was done, He turned to His disciples and explained the object lesson:
Ye call me Master and Lord: and ye say well; for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet; ye also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you. (v. 13-15)[116]
[For a better understanding of this rite, see the booklet: The Ordinance of Footwashing: The Kingdom Come (Stivers) in the bibliography.]
There were three footwashing ceremonies among the earliest Messianic believers. . . [paragraph redacted]

The Tapestry
Again, as mentioned above, the three constellations in association with Aquarius are Piscis Australis (the Southern Fish), Pegasus (the Winged Horse), and Cygnus (the Swan). These three create a tapestry of understanding the whole of the Aquarian Age.
In terms of Grail doctrine, Piscis (not to be confused with Pisces – the two fishes) is suggestive of the legends of mermaids and the dynasty of the Fisher King which came from the southern sea (presumably the Mediterranean world) and established itself in the “land of the covenant” (Britain).[117]
Pegasus is known to the Greeks as the “horse of the gushing fountain,” but we must discount the Greek legends as inventions to explain these images received from a more ancient culture. In the Celtic world Pegasus would be known as the unicorn, the symbol of the virile and prolific Messiah.
Finally, there is Cygnus, the Swan. This elegant creature is a feminine association with the Holy Spirit. In the Celtic Church, the Holy Spirit is symbolized by the goose and in the Scriptures by the dove. More can be learned about the feminine Holy Spirit in The Mother Heart of God.[118]

The Age of Harmony
The Age of Aquarius in recent pop culture is nothing more than a confused understanding of the classical world of the Greek and Roman Empires. The Greeks and Romans had little to commend themselves upon closer examination. They were slave societies which were given to cruelty, sodomy, and stupid superstitions that excused their decadence. They were economic black holes that absorbed the wealth of the peoples they conquered and set the human race back a thousand years. If a future Age of Aquarius is built upon their revived institutions, it will most certainly usher in a new dark age.
While the barbarian invasions no doubt represented a destructive rage that destroyed magnificent cities, they also served as the liberators of a society which had exhausted itself with a defective religion and system of law. Rome began as a family-based republic and drifted away from its roots. The destruction of the Empire made it possible for the world to return to a civilization of family-based republics if it elected to do so.
The Age of Harmony envisioned by Aquarian enthusiasts is really answered by the Christian millennium described in the Bible. But the Church has failed to achieve that millennium. Instead, it has deferred any social advance for the human species to a future calamity followed by the return of Jesus Christ.
This failure impelled the emergence of the Grail legends at the turn of the first millennium. They challenged the legitimacy of the Church as a valid expression of the Christian faith. The Grail romances which followed were accused of pagan influence, but in truth, they were identifying a pre-Church form of Christianity which reaches back to the Old Testament patriarchs.

The Ministry of the Firstborn
It is significant that Reuben, Jacob’s firstborn, is identified with Aquarius. Reuben lost his status as the firstborn because he presumptuously grasped for power in “ascending to his father’s bed” and “unstable as water.” Having committed incest with his father’s concubine, the prerogatives of the firstborn were taken from him and divided between Joseph’s sons (the double portion and fertility), Judah (kingship), and Levi (the priesthood).
Now that the cycle of providence has returned the world to Reuben, it gives him a second chance. If the firstborn can learn the humility of washing the feet of his brethren, he can be restored to his father’s throne and to his inheritance[119]: To be forever “a priest after the order of Melchizedek” (Psalm 110:4).
In Christ, we can all be the firstborn because he is the true firstborn. But in terms of the heavenly pattern manifesting itself on Earth, it is time to abandon our institutional and imperial social structure – the legacy of Babylon and Rome – and return to the family structure advocated by the Celtic Church and Grail theology.

Part 2 of 3
Footnotes:
[105] The Tunguska event, 1908. See also the works of Immanuel Velikovsky and www.jmccanneyscience.com
[106] There are many newer constellations, but these are the ones known to the ancients.
[107] This is the correct rendering. Capt follows Bullinger’s mistranslation here as “record of the outpouring.” See footnote 9.
[108] See the Pesher for St. Matthias Day, 2002 and www.iceagenow.com
[109] The encampment circle of the Tribes corresponds neatly to the fixed signs of the Zodiac: Judah on the east as Leo (the lion), Ephraim on the west as Taurus (the bull), Dan on the north as Scorpio (eagle), and Reuben on the south as Aquarius (the man – “unstable as water”). Dan is identified both as a serpent/scorpion (adder: Genesis 49) and an eagle. In astrology, the eagle is always associated with Scorpio. Also recall what we said of the cherubs in the previous chapter. Some of these associations are not immediately apparent until the star names of the respective constellations are considered. See David Godwin’s introductory article at www.llewellynjournal.com. See also the four tetramorphs in Ezekiel’s vision.
[110] Moses wanted the people to fear God, not the omens of the false gods
[111] See David Chilton’s, The Days of Vengeance, an Exposition of the Book of Revelation (Dominion Press, 1987) p. 301: Citing Ernest Martin’s calculations, Christ was born when the sun entered the torso position of the constellation Virgo and the moon was under her feet, an event which occurred at sunset, September 11th, 3 B.C. on the Day of Trumpets. Reference Revelations 12:1-2
[112] Chapters 72-82 are entirely astronomical. Uriel’s Machine by Christopher Knight and Robert Lomas (Century, 1999) is an important commentary which makes this otherwise confusing book understandable. The book, as it is known today, is really a collection of writings by different authors. The astronomical chapters define the authentic Enochian theology.
[113] Christmas, 2000. Pesher
[114] Or more accurately, a prince (melik), king (moloch, molech). See standard Hebrew references.
[115] It was an unusual sight to see a man with a pitcher of water. It was women’s work, at least, and certainly the work of slaves as it says of the Gibeonites who saved their lives by becoming “hewers of wood and drawers of water” (Joshua 9:21). In turning the world upside down, Jesus was also replacing the “root with the branch.” See Merlin’s prophecies later in this chapter.
[116] Compare with Matthew 20:25 and Luke 22:25
[117] “Brit –ain” is formed from the Hebrew word “b’rith” for covenant.
[118]Several of the stars which compose Cygnus are identified as parts of a hen, thus denoting the correct gender of this constellation.
[119] Including the patriarchal [term redacted]. Because of his presumption, Reuben lost the firstborn’s right of succession to his father’s [term redacted].