Sacred Number and the Origins of Civilization

Eleven Questions on Sacred Numbers

In 2011, Sacred Number and the Origins of the Universe was nicely re-published in Portuguese by Publisher Pensamento in Brazil. Their press agent contacted my publisher for an email interview from a journalist who posed eleven questions about sacred number.

Interview:

1) Is the universe a mathematical equation?

If the universe is a creation then it needs to have organizing principles governing its structure. I believe that this structure is governed by what we call sacred numbers. Numbers relative to each other form proportions that in sound are perceived as musical intervals. The universe is more like a set of musical possibilities, making it more dramatic and open-ended than an equation.

Numbers, Constants and Phenomenology

We have seen that the early numbers define the world of musical harmony but other important patterns arise within the ordinal numbers such as,

the Fibonacci approximations to the Golden Mean (phi = 1.618),
the Exponential constant (e = 2.718, the megalithic yard), from which trigonometry of the circle arises naturally,
the radial geometrical constant, (pi = 3.1416) as approximated by rational fractions {π = 22/7 25/8 63/20 864/275} and
the triangular progressions of square roots, as another development of the early numbers (in space) as geometry, also approximated by rational* numbers (rational meaning “integer numbers that can form mundane ratios”).

The transcendent (or irrational) ratio constants * (first mentioned in the Preface) are the visible after-effects of the creation of time and space. They must be part of the framework conditions for Existence, these also creating harmonic phenomenon that are not transcendent; these relying instead (as stated) on the distance functions of ordinal numbers: their distance from one and their relative distance from each other, lying beneath the surface of the ordinal numbers. Ordinality, to modern thought a universal algorithm for such distances, explains or defines what is harmonious in the physical world and in what way. Significant distance relations, such as those found in the early ordinal numbers, must then be repeated at ever greater doubling, tripling and so on {1 2 3 4 5 6} => {45 90 135 180 225 270}, where units can be scaled up by any number to become the larger structures, within any greater micro-cosmos. This is especially seen within ancient number science and its primary context of octave doubling, where what lies within octaves vis-à-vis scales and octaves within octaves, requires the right amount of up-scaling, as in the cosmology of Will (and not of Being), presented by G.I. Gurdjieff from 1917 onwards.

The illusion of number is that one can never penetrate the ubiquitous unitary distance of 1, the unity which becomes the ordinals which are so many exact assemblies of one; and of their ratios, so that one is not a number nor a transcendent ratio but rather is Number is the primordial Thing: a transcendent wholeness, found in every unit that causes relatedness through intermediate distance, or proximity. One is like Leibnitz’s Monads applied to the cosmic enterprise of universe building, as a fully quantified Whole and its Parts.

“The Absolute, that is, the state of things when the All constitutes one Whole, is, as it were, the primordial state of things, out of which, by division and differentiation, arises the diversity of the phenomena observed by us.”
Gurdjieff. In Search of the Miraculous page 76.

Powers of the Golden Mean

Sheikh Lotfollah Mosque is one of the masterpieces of Iranian architecture that was built during the Safavid Empire, standing on the eastern side of Naqsh-i Jahan Square, Esfahan, Iran. Construction of the mosque started in 1603 and was finished in 1619.
for Wikipedia by Phillip Maiwald

The Golden Mean (1.618034) or Phi (Greek letter) is renowned for the behavior of it’s reciprocal and square which are 0.618034 and 2.618034 respectively; that is, the fractional part stays the same. Phi is a unique singularity in number. While irrational, shown here to only 6 figures, it is its infinite fractional part which is responsible for Phi’s special properties.

The Fibonacci series: Found in sacred buildings (above), it is also present in the way living forms develop. Many other series of initial number pairs tend towards generating better and better approximations to Phi. This was most famously the Fibonacci series of 0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 89 … (each right hand result is the simple sum of the two preceding numbers (0+0 = 1, 1+1=2, etc.

Ethiopia within the Great Pyramid

My last posting mentioned John Neal’s creative step of not averaging the Great Pyramid of Giza’s four sides, as had routinely been done in the past – as if to discover an idealized design with four equal sides. Instead, Neal found each length to have intensionally been different. When multiplied by the pyramid’s full height, the length of four different degrees of latitude were each encoded as an area. The length of the southern side is integer as 756 feet, and this referred to the longest latitude, that of the Nile Delta, below 31.5 degrees North. Here we find that the pyramid’s reduced height also indicated the latitude of Ethiopia.

Cretan Calendar Disks

I have interpreted two objects from Phaistos (Faistos), both in the Heraklion Museum. Both would work well as calendar objects.

One would allow the prediction of eclipses:

The other for tracking eclipse seasons using the 16/15 relationship of the synod of Saturn (Chronos) and the Lunar Year:

A Brief Introduction to Ancient Metrology (2006)

appended to
Sacred Number and the Origin of Civilisation

There used to be an interest in metrology – the Ancient Science of Measures – especially when studying ancient monuments. However the information revealed from sites often became mixed with the religious ideas of the researcher leading to coding systems such as those of Pyramidology and Gematria. The general effect has been that metrology, outside of modern engineering uses, has been left unconsidered by modern scientific archaeology.

Category: Sacred Number and the Origins of Civilization

Eleven Questions on Sacred Numbers

Interview:

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Numbers, Constants and Phenomenology

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Powers of the Golden Mean

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Ethiopia within the Great Pyramid

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Cretan Calendar Disks

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A Brief Introduction to Ancient Metrology (2006)

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