The First Initiation

The Moon is symbolic of the first initiation, Birth, and traditionally, the Archangel Gabriel is connected with the Moon. According to A.T. Mann’s Life*Time Astrology scale, the Annunciation would have taken place about six-and-a-half months before Jesus’ birth.

In the sixth month, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you are highly favored! The Lord is with you.”

Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her,“Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God. You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; his kingdom will never end.” (Luke 1:26-33)

But when was Jesus born? There are many theories. John Chrysostom (345-407 AD, as reported in The Star of Bethlehem Mystery, was the first to inaugurate Christmas as the 25th of December in 386 AD:

Chrysostom assumes that John the Baptist was conceived in September and he counts six months forward to arrive at April as the month of the conception of Jesus. From here he counts nine months to December, the birth month of Jesus. This of course assumes that Jesus was a nine months baby, but this is not certain. The early writer Epiphanius, for example, was convinced that Jesus was only in the womb for seven months. The Egyptians held the same view, Jesus being in this respect similar to Osiris, who was also said to have been born seven months after conception.

In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken for the entire Roman world. (This was the first census that took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria.) And everyone went to his own town to register.

So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in strips of cloth and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn. (Luke 2:1-7)

When was Jesus born?

According to Edgar Cayce in his Story of Jesus, the details of his birth can be read in the Akashic records:

Yes, we have the information that has been indicated respecting some of the events surrounding the birth of Jesus, the son of Mary, in Bethlehem of Judea.

The arrival was in the evening — not as counted from the Roman time, nor that declared to Moses by God when the Second Passover was to be kept, nor that same time which was in common usage even in that land, but what would NOW represent January sixth.

In the evening then, or at twilight, Joseph approached the Inn, that was filled with those who had journeyed there on their way to be polled for the tax as imposed by the Romans upon the people of the land. For, those had been sent out who were to judge the abilities of the varied groups to be taxed. And each individual was required by the Roman law to be polled in the city of his birth.

Then there was the answer by the Innkeeper, “No room in the inn”, especially for such an occasion. Laughter and jeers followed, at the sight of the elderly man with the beautiful girl, his wife, heavy with child.

Necessity demanded that some place be sought — quickly. Then it was found, under the hill, in the stable — above which the shepherds were gathering their flocks into the fold…

Just as the midnight hour came, there was the birth of the Master. (5749-15)

Why the 6th of January, 6 BC? Actually, the answer is quite simple with respect to the date: according to tradition, Jesus was born at midnight of the 25th of December, which means that we still celebrate Christmas at about the right time, date-wise, but when the British calendar was converted from the Julian to the Gregorian, 11 days were suppressed in 1752. It is probably this fact that accounts for our continuing to refer to the 12 days of Christmas. The Greek Orthodox Church still uses the Julian calendar and Christmas is celebrated by countries under its sway as the 6th of January.

The year is not as simple: evidently, the Star of Bethlehem must have been a conjunction of two visible planets, Jupiter and Saturn. The only year around that time in which this conjunction took place three times was 7 BC. Originally, I had a theory that the “Star” appeared after the conception at the Vernal Equinox (21st March) and carried on until a short time after Jesus’ birth, effectively the nine months of his gestation period to 25th December, but reading David Hughes’ book, The Star of Bethlehem Mystery, has made me realise that the first appearance of the “Star” was on the 27th of May, and that it stayed visible for seven months, Jesus’ actual gestation period.

Proof

In addition, the “proof” of the correctness of the date (originally, 25-12-7 BC) can be shown through the use of Numerology: the digits of the date add up to the number 17 (2+5=7, 1+2=3, 7 alone; 7+3+7=17) which, according to Linda Goodman’s Star Signs, represents the Star of the Magi. When these two digits are added together, the result is 8, the number of the Christ, seen as a man (head, feet, and two arms) on an equal-armed cross. And the figure 8, turned on its side, is a symbol for infinity.

Furthermore, 8 has always been associated with the Egyptian Goddess, Isis. According to David Wood, in his excellent book, Genisis: The First Book of Revelations, 8 is: the number of the body of the supreme goddess Isis, daughter of the spirit-entity Nut, but born of flesh. Symbolized by the entwined serpents forming the double womb of infinity. The spiral lemniscate.

The legends of this deity indicate that she is the most perfect of all creatures of animal flesh. Every ancient culture recognized and revered her under one name or the other. She sustains life, and her number is also the atomic number of the element oxygen, an essential of any life process. When oxygen unites with hydrogen, water is formed, giving us 18, the number of her active principle. The goddess of a thousand names, the most abundant, as Oxygen is the most abundant element on earth.

Her star is eight-pointed and is identical to the star of the beast, but it is rotated to bring single points to North, South, East and West, a movement of 22.5°. This figure conceals many secrets, including the enigmatic 17… The star is seen to contain 17 enclosures.

The five-pointed star

However, the image which appears almost subliminally within Jesus’ birth chart is a five-pointed star. David Wood goes on to discuss this very powerful symbol which he discovered in the landscape near Rennes-le-Château:

The reader will recall that the complete pentagram, by Christian standards, is a symbol of evil, whereas to Gnostics it represented not only purity but supreme power. As a body with only five appendages it is female, as are all things associated with this number. The Hebrew number 5 (Hé) is symbolized by the womb. It would be difficult to give any logical reason why Christianity went to such lengths to degrade the female image while at the same time showing reverence for the mythical Virgin Mother, but most students would readily agree that she was the Christianized version of Isis. It seems that the authors of this story placed themselves in a very awkward position of having to produce a human body for Jesus without admitting to a human sperm having been used to fertilize a virgin in the first place.

Once we accept the possibility of any form of ‘seed’ being used, we automatically accept the presence of a father and to cast the Creator in this role would be ridiculous. IT would require no auxiliary equipment to create anything IT chose. To suggest that the Creator would need the womb of a woman to bring forth a birth, places a limitation on its powers, which reduces IT to the level of a gynaecologist performing an artificial insemination. Considering the abundance of religious connections, I wondered if the birth of Jesus was in any way connected to the diagram of Rennes and those things which we have examined previously. I also reasoned that the contents of the Ark of the Covenant probably held the key to the secrets which I sought.

We shall be returning to this theme many times before we finish, but now we must concentrate on the Moon. In Jesus’ birth chart the Moon is located at 16° (8 x 2) in Cancer. According to the Dictionary of Astrology:

In a chart, the Moon represents the imaginative, reflective side of the native, and is justifiably linked with the subconscious element in the modern image of man. It is an index of the receptive, withdrawn, secluded part of the person. When the Moon is emphasized in a chart, it is usually an indication of a highly sensitive, impressionable and changeable nature, often linked with a personality associated with the past, or with childhood.

Picture Credits

To be continued.

Linked pages: The Star of Bethlehem: Introduction (part 1)
The Star of Bethlehem: Introduction (part 2)
The Star of Bethlehem: Chapter 1 – Prologue
The Star of Bethlehem: Chapter 2 – Mercury: The Winged Star (part 1)
The Star of Bethlehem: Chapter 2 – Mercury: The Winged Star (part 2)
Star: Chapter 2 – Mercury: The Winged Star (part 3)

Picture credits:
The Nativity courtesy of DailyPS;
Trinity College Library Dublin courtesy of reddit.com;
Pentagram courtesy of Wikimedia.Commons