"Buddhism is centripetal [center-seeking], but Christianity is centrifugal [tending away from centralization]: it breaks out. For the circle is perfect and infinite in it nature; but it is fixed forever in its size; it can never be larger or smaller. But the cross, though it has at its heart a collision and a contradiction, can extend its four arms for ever without altering its shape. Because it has a paradox in its center it can grow without changing. The circle returns upon itself and is bound. The cross opens its arms to the four winds; it is a signpost for free travelers."--G.K. Chesterton (Orthodoxy, Chapter 2)
Alice C. Linsley
The cross presents a great paradox. It veils and is veiled, yet it is found everywhere in the order of nature. Consider the cross-shaped image of laminin (right). Laminin is a cell adhesion molecule that holds the body together. Referring to Jesus Christ, Paul wrote, “He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.” (Colossians 1:17) The beta and alpha chains of laminin "influence pre-synaptic and post-synaptic development, thus providing a way to coordinate maturation of the sending and receiving sides of the synapse."
The cross is represented by the intersection of the directional axes of east-west and north-south, and by the solar arc. It is found as a solar symbol in archaic cultures. It is one of the
symbols found in the Vinča culture. The cross symbol, called
kolasta azdija, is a solar symbol referenced in numerous epic poems of people living in the region of the
Vinča culture.
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| Symbols dating from the oldest period of Vinča culture (6th-5th millennia BC) |
Th archaic rulers who dispersed widely in the ancient world
venerated the Sun. The Sun was the emblem of the Creator and the source of life and light on Earth. The overshadowing of the Sun at high noon
marked the temporal center, and noon on the mountain top marked the spatial center. This is the significance of sacred pillars and mountains (
bnbn in Ancient Egyptian) that connected heaven and earth.
The cross appears in many monuments along the Nile. The sun and the cross were associated with Horus. Both were found on stone reliefs at the Temple of Horus in Edfu (shown below). The relief also shows the sun resting over the banks of the Nile (directly below the bird). A variation of this image is the Hebrew horned altar, an apophatic solar image. The sun resting over a place or person represents divine appointment and blessing. In this same image we find the sun resting over the cross (center). The
Canaanite Y is another example.
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| Photo: Maureen Palmer |
Abraham's Nilotic ancestors believed that Earth emerged as a peak rising out of a universal sea. Life began when the Sun rested exactly at the peak of that mound. This is likely the origin of the belief that a woman of their Horite priestly lines would be overshadowed by the Creator and would conceive the Seed of Genesis 3:15. In Orthodox iconography sometimes the pregnant
Theotokos is drawn as a mountain. As such, she became the sacred center, the tabernacle of God, the new mount Zion. For Abraham's ancestors the swelling of
Sun, river and the female belly spoke of the Creator's power to give life.
The perpendicular axes of north-south and east-west form a cross and this is the oldest known symbolic mark. Its great age is testified by its appearance on prehistoric
rocks in Sudan, on
Paleolithic ostrich shells in Southern Africa, and in the Proto-Saharan
Thamudic scripts.
Nilo-Saharan Cosmology
In ancient times, the Nile was identified with the Milky
Way which arches over the Earth from the extreme south to the extreme
north
. The Nile was viewed as Earth's Milky Way. The north-south axis was represented by the northward flow and the east-west axis was represented by the water's span from horizon to horizon. The center of the river at noon was regarded as the sacred spatial and temporal center. This cosmology is reflected in ancient Nilotic imagery, especially at Elephantine Island (Yebu). Even before Elephantine, the directional poles and the movement of circumpolar stars comprised an element of religion and were a factor in the construction of ancient monuments.
Andrew Collins notes "the earliest Neolithic cult centres, the prototypes of stone circles and chambered barrows everywhere, were directed roughly north-south. Since the north was a direction of death and rebirth at Çatal Hüyük, I quickly realized that the focus of attention at places such as Karahan Tepe and Göbekli Tepe was the movement of circumpolar stars around the northern celestial pole, for there was no Pole Star in c. 9500-9000 BC. I looked closely at the Skyglobe astronomical program for these dates, and realised that only one constellation could have been the object of their gaze, and this was Cygnus, which in European starlore is the celestial swan. However, there is clear evidence that in Ancient Mesopotamia Cygnus was seen as a raptor bird, while in classical myth it was occasionally seen as a vulture, the symbol of the transmigration of the soul in the Neolithic cult of the dead."
The Pole Star was only one way by which the ancients could determine true north. Their cosmology was binary, which means that no pole can isolated from its opposite. The poles are binary opposites and in the binary worldview on of the opposites is regarded as superior in some way to its opposite. Among the Horites, north and east were the superior directions but they were never considered in isolation from south and west. The Nilotic worldview was characterized by binary sets such as male-female and
sun-moon.
The intersection of the axes was represented by X or T in ancient glyphs. This cross-shaped cosmology is fundamental to the binary distinctions and metaphysical tensions that characterized the ancient Nilotic worldview. The great contribution of Jacques Derrida, an Arabic-speaking North African Jew, was to re-introduce to Western Philosophy this binary approach to meaning.
As Derrida suggested: "Deconstruction cannot limit itself or proceed immediately
to neutralization: it must, by means of a double gesture, a double science, a
double writing, practice an overturning of the classical opposition, and a
general displacement of the system. It is on that condition alone that
deconstruction will provide the means of intervening in the field of oppositions
it criticizes" (Metaphysics).
This reversal of the subordinated term of
an opposition is no small aspect of deconstruction's strategy. Derrida's
argument is that in examining a binary opposition and reversals, deconstruction
brings to light traces of meaning that cannot be said to be present, but which
must have metaphysical existence. This is not a new idea or even a new approach
to meaning. It is consistent with the most ancient Biblical approach to meaning,
that of the Semites and their Kushite ancestors.
Among the Horites, North and East Were the Superior Poles
Among Abraham's Horite people the Pole Star was an important celestial marker. Beside this, they were metal workers who had discovered that magnetized iron particles pointed to
magnetic north. In fact, the word compass (kom-pas) is originally an Egyptian word. Horite rulers were buried with their heads to the north and their faces toward the east.
All the rulers among Abraham's ancestors had two wives. The wife of the man's youth was a half-sister and the wife on his later years was a patrilineal cousin or niece. The wives lived in separate households on a north-south axis. In Abraham's case,
Sarah lived in Hebron and
Keturah lived in Beersheba. Sarah, as the first wife, ranked above Keturah. Only the firstborn son of the half-sister wife ascended to the throne of his father. So Issac became Abraham's heir, though
he was not Abraham's firstborn son.
The placement of the wives' settlements reflects the Horite belief that the Sun was the Creator's solar boat or chariot which He rides daily to survey his territory from east to west. This idea was apparent even before Noah.
Lamech the Elder (Gen. 4) is portrayed as a braggart not only because he boasted of killing a man, but also because he set his wives on an east-west axis, thereby setting himself up as God.
The Sun's east-west path was thought to be the Creator's circuit, stretched "as far as the east is from the west." The Almighty comes as a bridegroom from the tent of the Sun and makes his circuit from east to west (Ps. 19).
While north was associated with death and judgment, its opposite was associated with birth and renewal of life. South symbolized earth, fertility and birth. It was to the south that Abraham went seeking a second wife. Abraham, still without a heir, consulted the Moreh at the Oak between Bethel and Ai. His next move, chronicled in Genesis, was a journey to Beersheba in the Negev. There he married his patrilineal cousin Keturah, by whom he had five sons.
Marriage to a second wife was required before a Horite chief could ascend to the throne. Abraham's marriage to Keturah enabled him to become the ruler over a territory hat extended between Hebron and Beersheba. It did not provide him with an heir since the firstborn son of the cousin wife ascended to the throne of his maternal grandfather, after whom he was named. The sons of concubines and the younger sons of wives were given gifts and sent away to establish territories of their own. They are the
sent-away sons who expanded the Kushite dominion far beyond in the Nile. The
marriage and ascendancy pattern of Abraham's Horite caste drove Kushite expansion into Europe, Mesopotamia, Southern India, Cambodia and
even Japan. The Kushite migration out of Africa has been
verified by DNA studies.
Ethical Implications
The ethical implications of a cross-shaped reality are evident. There is a geometrical quality that suggests lines, angles and boundaries. The boundaries fixed by the Creator can be observed in genetics, climate cycles, and in time and space. Abraham's people wanted to discern and respect the boundaries since they perceived of them as having been established by God. Worship, rituals such as the blessing of the Sun, gender distinctions, laws concerning purity among the ruler-priests, all these reflect concern to distinguish between the binary sets of Heaven-Earth; God-Man, Pure-Defiled, and Life-Death and to serve the greater.
In this cross-shaped Reality, the only safe place, metaphysically speaking, is the sacred center. After all his deconstruction,
Jacques Derrida concluded that there is a center and that something is there. He spoke of this something as "presence." He claimed that throughout the history of Philosophy this metaphysical presence is called by different names, “God” being one of them. This is uncomfortable for those who hold to materialist ideologies. They are baffled by the metaphysical. It is terrifying for those who claim there is no Creator. If there is something, a "presence" (Derrida's term) at the metaphysical center, it must surely be of greater power and authority than they. Even the Atheist exhibits existential angst about the possibility that any form of authority depends on God's existence (Rom.13:1).
Abraham's Proto-Saharan ancestors were famous sky watchers. For them a lunar eclipse was less significant than a solar eclipse because they regarded the sun was as superior to the moon. This was not an arbitrary preference nor does it represent mythological ignorance, as Materialist and Atheists often assert. Rather it is a description of reality since the sun gives light whereas the moon merely reflects the sun's light. The sun's superiority is expressed in Genesis 1:16: "God made the two great lights: the greater to rule the day, the lesser light to rule the night." In our time, the idea that one entity is greater than another meets with great resistance. Many are lost in an ethical wilderness without a compass.
Ethics for Abraham's people meant being spiritually present at the center of X; finding the sacred center by reference to earth's spokes: north-south/east-west, and by reference to the binary sets observed in the order of creation. The
late Rabbi Kaduri appears to have found that sacred center in contemplation of the tradition he received from his Horim. He was a highly respected rabbi in Israel who was deeply formed by the daily reading and recitation of the Hebrew Scriptures.
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Rabbi Yitzhak Kaduri
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Before he died at age 108, Yitzhak Kaduri left a
signed note indicating Messiah's identity: Yeshua - Jesus. A few months before, Rabbi Kaduri had surprised his followers when he told them that he met the Messiah in dreams and visions. Kaduri gave a message in his synagogue on Yom Kippur, teaching how to recognize the Messiah. His manuscripts, written in his own hand for his students, have cross-symbols painted by Kaduri all over the pages.
Many Jews have attempted to explain away the crosses, arguing that the great Rabbi Kaduri was not a Christian. Only God knows. However, Rabbi Kaduri was wise and prayerful, and he knew the cosmology of his ancestors. Perhaps this lead him to Jesus,
the Son of God, at the sacred center of our cross-shaped reality. Perhaps he found the One who his people have been awaiting.
The Sun Among Abraham's Horite People
Aspects of the ancient solar symbolism are found in the Bible and in historical texts. Psalm 92:2 describes the Lord as “a sun and a shield.” The Victory Tablet of Amenhotep III describes Horus as “The Good God, Golden [Horus], Shining in the chariot, like the rising of the sun; great in strength, strong in might…” (Tablet of Victory of Amenhotep III, J.H. Breasted,
Ancient Records of Egypt, Part Two, p. 854).
At Angkor Wat in Cambodia, there is a stone relief of a solar boat with Horus flying as a falcon above the flames of the sun. Most of the religious depictions found in Southern India are also found among the Proto-Saharan peoples. There is strong evidence that messianic expectation began, not with the Jews, but with Abraham's Nilotic ancestors. They were devotees of Horus who they called "Son of God." In a five day festival the ancient Egyptians commemorated the death and rising of Horus. He was associated with the rising or swelling sun and with the falling of grain into the earth.
In relation to the sun, Horus was said to rise in the morning as a calf or a lamb and to set in the evening as a bull or a ram. The east represented the present, and the west represented the future. On Mount Moriah Isaac was replaced with a ram. To Abraham the Horite this would have meant that his offering was set aside by the provision of a greater sacrifice that was to come in the future. It would also have meant that Isaac was not the fulfillment of the promise made to Abraham's ancestors in Genesis 3:15. Isaac was not the "Seed" of the Woman who would make the curse of death void, crush the serpent's head, and restore Paradise. Jesus was the fulfillment of this first promise and prophecy of the Bible. In speaking of his impending death, He told his disciples that only the "seed" that falls into the ground and dies can give life. (John 12:24)
As St. Augustine noted, the Egyptians took great care in the burial of their dead and never practiced cremation, as in the religions that seek to escape physical existence. Abraham's ancestors believed in the resurrection of the body and awaited a
deified king who would rise from the grave and deliver his people from death.
On ancient Jewish ossuaries the sun was shown as a 6-pointed star inside a circle. This was the solar boat of the Creator, the vehicle of Light that would carry the dead to the place of rest. From that place they hoped to rise on the Last Day. In the Iron Age this
mer-ka-ba was shown as a chariot. The spokes within a circle are both the rays of the sun and the spokes of the chariot wheel. This symbol likely appeared on the Ark of the Covenant. In the Ethiopian Church a replica of the Ark, called
ta-bot, is displayed in the churches. It is decorated with the 6-pointed star inside a circle at the center of the ark.
The spokes inside an orb also represent the precession of the equinoxes at various angles. The precession was symbolized by X inside a circle. This morphed into the Tau, which is used by Christians to represent the upright cross.
The precession cross and the
merkaba are very ancient cosmological images. They have been traced to the Horite temple at Heliopolis on the Nile. Heliopolis is called ONN in Genesis and was shown in Old Egyptian as NXN, with the X representing the Creator's presence at the sacred center. Again, the cross is central and associated with the sun. Just as the sun is a universal symbol of light, so the sign of the cross is universally found in creation. The mark of Jesus Christ is ubiquitous. Reality is cross shaped and it stretches out in all direction to embrace in love.
Related reading:
A Cross-Shaped Universe: Reflections of a Christian Physicist;
The Sacred Center in Biblical Theology;
Afro-Asiatic Rulers and Celestial Archetypes;
Binary Distinctions and Kenosis;
Christ's Sign in Creation;
Tehut's Victory Over Tehom;
The Ostrich in Biblical Symbolism;
Cosmology and Ethics;
The Rabbi Who Found Messiah
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