Commentary to "Three Epiphanies of Gold"
Epiphany for the chemist— seeing Gold next to Mercury
in the Periodic Table of Elements— atomic numbers 79 and 80.
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I recalled while reading
the ancient texts of medieval alchemists and Taoist in my Cornell chemistry lab (circa 1967), that a common
ingredient in their recipe to convert base metal to gold is quicksilver (mercury). I consulted the
Periodic Table of Elements and found Gold, atomic number 79 next to Mercury, atomic number 80. It was a
moment of epiphany— Gold is already inside of Mercury! Perhaps the alchemists were on to something by
including quicksilver in their recipes to produce gold. The ancients didn't know that removing a proton,
electron, and three neutrons would convert Mercury to Gold.
(Transmutations of Mercury)
now feasible with nuclear fission or through fusion
by combining Tin with Copper to produce Gold.
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Image: View inside of the linear accelerator of the Society for Heavy Ion Research in Darmstadt, Germany.
Here, electrically charged atomic nuclei, for example of tin (atomic number 50), are accelerated to a speed 10%
the speed of light (186,000 miles/second). Only then is the repulsive power of other atomic nuclei such as copper
(atomic number 29) overcome, making fusion possible. The result would be a nucleus with 79 protons— Gold.
(Photo source: Alexander Roob, Alchemy & Mysticism, Taschen, Köln, 1997, p. 33).
How come physicists have not enriched themselves using fission of Mercury,
or by fusion with Tin and Copper to make Gold. Unfortunately, the gold produced in this way would be
radioactive.
Epiphany for the astronomer— seeing solar system's swiftest
named after the Roman god Mercury, our closest planet to the Sun—
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In the Periodic Table of Elements, Gold (chemical symbol Au) is next to Mercury (chemical symbol Hg).
It just dawned upon me that AuHg is an anagram for "A Hug". Looking at the
Solar System, Mercury is the closest planet to the Sun, so they are practically hugging each other.
After my poem Sculpting Uncarved Block"
that the planets orbiting our Sun are Roman or Greek deities, I realized that our swiftest planet and closest to the Sun,
was named Mercury, the Roman mythological messenger of the gods. Mercury has a special perspective than the outer
planets in seeing nothing but the sun's pure golden light! This is an epiphany for the astronomer.
No wonder Apollo traded his caduceus for Mercury's lyre
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The caduceus is a short herald's staff entwined by two serpents
in the form of a double helix, and surmounted by wings. It is also known as the Rod of Hermes, traditionally associated
not with medicine but with trade and commerce. Hermes (Greek equivalent of the Roman Mercury) was the messenger of the
gods. In Greek myth, Hermes stole the sun god Apollo's oxen.
When Apollo discovered this, Hermes charmed him with a magic lyre and escaped punishment. Hermes gave the lyre
to Apollo who in return gave him the caduceus that turned all it touched into gold. Hence Caduceus is connected
with wealth and commerce. [Images "Mercury with caduceus" on ceiling mural
Allegory
of the Planets & Continents (1752) by Tiepolo (1696-1770), Würzburg Residence, Germany;
"Apollo with lyre"
(1640) by Simon Vouet (1590-1649), Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest]
nine muses on Mount Parnassus
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Mount Parnassus is a mountain of limestone in central Greece
that towers above Delphi, north of the Gulf of Corinth, and offers scenic views of the surrounding
olive groves and countryside. According to Greek mythology, this mountain was sacred to Apollo and
the Corycian nymphs, and the home of the Muses. As the home of the Muses, Parnassus became known
as the home of poetry, music, and learning. Parnassus was also the home of Pegasus, the winged horse
of Bellerophon.
(Image Source: Raphael's Parnassus (1510),
Stanza della Segnatura, Vatican Museum).
And now nine planets circle the Sun to music of the spheres and Mercury
is conducting with his caduceus for within his orbit is pure golden light.
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Music of the Spheres
originated with the Greek mathematician and philosopher
Pythagoras (580-500 BC)—
"There is geometry in the humming of the strings. There is music in the spacings of the spheres."
Pythagoras taught his disciples meditation so they could hear music of the planetary spheres.
Modern musicians have tried to capture this celestial harmony on records and CDs
(BBC;
Kepler;
Harmony of the World CD).
According to Johannes Kepler (1571-1630),
the connection between sacred geometry, cosmology, astrology,
harmonics, and music is through musica universalis. Is it coincidental that on the
microscopic scale, Gold is next to Mercury as atoms, and on the macroscopic scale, the Sun
is next to Mercury the planet? Mercury's caduceus can turn things to gold. So as a symphony
conductor, he waves his winged wand, and all he sees is pure golden light that is the Sun.
[Image: The ideal final state of material is achieved when the elements are arranged
according to their density (from outside to inside) Earth, Water, Air, and Fire. In the
center appears Sun, Gold. from Robert Fludd, Utriusque Cosmi, Volume I, Oppenheim, 1617].
[Source: Alexander Roob, Alchemy & Mysticism, Taschen, Köln, (1997), p. 106]
Epiphany for the philosopher— seeing we're not the temporal
mercurial body aging and dying but the eternal sun-like soul
in its resplendent beauty and glory—
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A similar epiphany for the philosopher is seeing that we're not the temporal mercurial body
aging and dying, but the eternal sun-like soul in its resplendent glory.
Plotinus (204-270 AD) advises the spiritual aspirant to chisel away our inner statue as a way
to purify ourselves, and writes in
The Enneads, I.6.9. (250 AD): "Never did eye see the sun unless it had first become sunlike,
and never can the soul have vision of the First Beauty unless itself be beautiful."
The Hindu Vedantic sage Ramana Maharshi would remind us of the
Mandukya Upanishad (circa 500 BC)
on the fourth state of consciousness turiya that is our true essence.
Joseph Campbell in
explaining this idea to Bill Moyers on PBS's Power of Myth
used AUM to represent our
three states of consciousness— A (waking), U (dream), M (deep sleep). Yogis chanting OM or
AUM to experience enlightenment finally realize the fourth state turiya is the silence
between the AUM's. It took me awhile to realize this insight through the example of H2O
as the essence of ice, liquid, and vapor. Likewise silence is the substratum out of which arises
the waking, dream, and deep sleep states. Since "silence is golden", our true Self is golden!
(Image: William Blake, Glad Day (1794),
British Museum, London, Blake's Notebook).
finding the Uncarved Block of Taoists, the Philosopher's Stone of alchemists,
to change lead to gold— that the elixir is not in a cavern deep inside the earth
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The Taoists sought the Uncarved Block
and the Alchemists searched for the
Philosopher's Stone
as the Elixir to convert lead to gold.
It then occurred to me that true Gold is the Pure Cosmic Consciousness within us.
Anaïs Nin in her
The Diary of Anaïs Nin,
Volume Five (1947-1955), writes about her experiment with LSD (pp. 255-262):
"I looked at the curtains of the room and they turned to a gauzy gold. The walls turned to gold,
the bedcover was gold, my whole body was becoming GOLD, liquid gold, scintillating, warm gold, I WAS GOLD.
It was the most pleasurable sensation I had ever known, like an orgasm. It was the secret of life, the alchemist's secret of life."
[Image: Michael Maier's
Atalanta Fugiens (1617),
Emblema XII:
"The Stone that Saturn vomitted up after having devoured it in place of his son Jupiter
has been placed on the Helicon ... For this Stone of Saturn is Chemical."]
but within ourself is the Golden Bough
beyond waking, dreams, and deep sleep,
is our true essence, the Self that is golden.
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This is the Great Work of alchemical transformation.
With continual inner work on ourselves, we find that the Philosopher's Stone is not a rare elixir
buried in some remote cavern but within us.
The Golden Bough (1890) is a book by James Frazier (1854-1941)
subtitled "A Study in Magic and Religion". The book cover (image) is from J.M.W. Turner's painting of
The Golden Bough (1834) inspired
by Virgil's Aeneid (19 BC) of a tree branch with
golden leaves that allowed Aeneas to pass through the underworld safely to see his dead father Anchises
(Book VI.98-155).
Golden Bough may refer to the "Spinal Column Tree" within us as we ascend the seven chakras (wheel centers)
to our heads's crown chakra, the thousand-petalled lotus of golden light, the halo around Buddha and Christ
(Notes).
Mother Goose Rhyme #590 provides another insight that our reward for going to sleep is golden. Since peace and silence are
golden, we experience this golden treasure each night in sleep. Ramana Maharshi says "Sleep is not ignorance;
it is your pure state. Wakefulness is not knowledge; it is ignorance. There is full awareness in sleep;
there is total ignorance in waking. Your real nature covers both, and extends beyond. The Self is beyond
knowledge and ignorance. Sleep, dream, and waking are only modes passing before the Self... Deep sleep
is nothing but the experience of pure being... Turiya is only another name for the Self. Aware of the
waking, dream, and sleep states, we remain unaware of our own Self. Nevertheless the Self is here and now,
it is the only Reality. There is nothing else." [Talks with Ramana Maharshi (January 2, 1937), p. 274;
(January 28, 1939), p. 580; (February 8, 1937), p. 320]. When we realize that our true essence is eternal,
we find our Self to be golden.
— Peter Y. Chou
Mountain View, 3-8-2010
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(3-8-2010)