Word meaning--sacred and exoteric

In esoteric studies there is the concept of the sacred word. In mythology we have "Open Sesame," English translation of "Open Simsim," the magic words Ali Baba used to open the cave of treasure in the tale Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. This sacred and magical perspective implies a special relation between sound and meaning. Perhaps it is this esoteric sense of word/sound/meaning that finds embodied, somewhat unfortunately, in the more exoteric sense of word/meaning, namely the comming notion that words have fixed meanings.

People oflten tend to listen and respond as if words have more or less fixed meanings. But words, exoterically speaking, don't have fixed ordained meanings. They mean what we, the community of word users, agree they mean--and we often disagree and change our minds. Word meanings are in motion like the fluid consciousness that gives them birth, and dictionaries are the fluent history of our collective verbal habits. Dictionaries are not meaning bibles but an ephemeral record of how we have used words. Words are a catalyst for consciousness--there is no meaning in the words themselves. Or we might say words have shadow meanings that follow the actual meaning that exists in the life of consciousness. Words are symbols, forms, obscure mysteries---they are in the world of dead things and only take on meaning in a moment of illumination in the mind and heart of the reader or speaker.

Best Thoughts,

James

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Replies to This Discussion

ModeratorPermalink Reply by Deb on March 23, 2012 at 3:28pm

Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves was one of my most favorite stories when I was a young child. I just loved it, and could hear it over and over again. However, at that age, I had no clue what sesame was - had never heard of it! So, I thought Ali Baba was saying, "Open, says me!" LOL Well, it worked for him, either way. :-)

Permalink Reply by annette hallett on March 24, 2012 at 1:04pm

I feel that words are just distortions of the pure sound that is silence. We have formulated them to impact the flow of energy through other aspects of Self/God/Mystery..., to cause disruption in... or to smooth the turbulence of... soul energy because in arrogance our egos believe that it is the right thing to do! Their only authority is that which we bestow on them.

Annette

Permalink Reply by annette hallett on March 24, 2012 at 4:05pm

I grant that language is the result of evolution but it is was/and is not the only means of communication available to us. My feeling is that the evolution of language has supported isolation from each other rather than unity or harmony of spirit. We rely on words to express ourselves and on occasion we have made them serve our motives.We have hidden our true feelings behind them.If the evolution of communication had followed the path of sensing / feeling or should I say telepathy than my sense is that many wars could have been averted!

Thank you taking the time to respond to me

Annette

Permalink Reply by William John Meegan on April 12, 2013 at 1:07am

How letters and words were constructed for the purposes of having specific meanings is part of that mist of history which cannot be grasped. It is basically the gaga prattle of a new born babe. If you think of the hundreds of languages and their spinoffs into tens of thousands of dialects it is easily seen what a chaotic world we live in.

However, as ignorant as the masses are of the beginnings of civilization there had to be those ancient sages that consciously created a system of alphanumeric letters to put down into literature a record of the spiritual science discovered in their day. Today in reading that literature it would be extremely difficult if not impossible for an uninitiated to believe that the Hebrew and Greek alphabets were created prior to Hebrew and/or Greek civilizations even being conceived. In fact these alphabets would have been created at the conception of the, future possibility, of building these civilizations.

We in modern times come along and are using their languages and studying their literature using our false beliefs thinking that the ancients were so ignorant. We use words as if they have fixed meanings and that is the way of the world and there is no getting around that; however, in literary parlance, at least in ancient times, a letter/word had alphanumeric designates and a special fixed meaning but it also had a symbolic meaning, and were created to convey different ideas and complete concepts: this is just one letter. Now, extrapolate that conceptually to every single letter of the alphabet.

Yes, people had language before the intelligentsia created the written language but remember it was the intelligentsia that created those systems of alphabets and who was there to disagree with what they did? In fact they were silently educating humanity: these were not aliens but intelligent human beings. The uninitiated, for the most part, did not know how to read and write and knew nothing of mathematics; thus, those educated later on and now in modern times have to accept what they believe the ancient accomplished: not necessarily what they did accomplish. If truth be known, modernity has barely a clue as to what the ancients accomplished.

IMAGING HOLDING THE BIBLE IN YOUR HANDS NOT KNOWING THAT YOU POSSESS THE ENTIRE LITERARY ARCHIVES OF THE ALEXANDRIA LIBRARY BETWEEN ITS COVERS. That is like standing on a whale fishing for minnows.

Permalink Reply by William John Meegan on April 12, 2013 at 9:58am

Paul:

This is why the esoteric science codified to the sacred scriptures are graphically codified. I discovered the Kabbalistic Tree of Life and the Star of David graphically codified to the first chapter of Genesis. I written several books on my esoteric discoveries. When you put these words in the texts into their pictorial forms they say much more than ten thousand words. Those people were so far ahead of us intellectually we are shaking baby rattles in comparison.

Permalink Reply by William John Meegan on April 21, 2013 at 4:18pm

It has been nine days since my last post on this forum; but, believe it or not my understanding of symbolism has expanded exponentially to such a degree that it even amazes me how humanity could have lost such a gift from antiquity. I will try as best I can to tell you about 'present ongoing' researches into the first four chapters of Genesis and how that research has increased my understanding of symbolism many folds. I am presently translating the Hebrew texts of the first four chapters of Genesis word for word into English and than into the ESOTERIC MEANING. Coupled with this I am doing a word for word commentary on each word. Each word will be access via its reference in STRONG'S EXHAUSTIVE CONCORDANCE via an INTERLEANER BIBLE This link enable the user to go to any Hebrew word for a better understanding of it; however, my understanding exceed Strong Concordance seeing that I envisage meaning directly from the letters that make up each word and their Gemetria values.

So you can imagine it will probably take a few years before I am finished because the book this all will all go into will also deal with THE CYCLES OF DIVINE CREATION, THE ZODIAC/CALENDAR YEAR and THE SCALES OF LIBRA held up by VIRGO. In fact the Cycles of Divine Creation was actually first real discovery back in January 1977 but other things came along and guided me into other avenues, which I believe prepared me for the project ahead. As an example of my project I will give you the first five verses and a few words of the six to illustrate the method work and the way it will progress.

I am doing this research in Microsoft Excel Program. Each cell gives me the opportunity to write commentary on each word (some of them are quite long); however, this is necessary if we are to regain an understanding of symbolism and what the ancients were trying to convey to us.

There is no doubt in my mind that the Hebrew alphabet was meant to be seen as hieroglyphic writing for each letter is alphanumerically structured besides having a symbolic meaning. If the letters are not understood then the word cannot be understood and STRONG'S CONCORDANCE is the only avenue open to the researcher knowing nothing of the Hebrew alphabet.

Besides all this above it has to be realized that any word written in the text has to be considered the "PRESENT MOMENT". It must be realized that that concept would not have been written unless it was already written, referred to and/or hinted at previously in the texts. Couple that conceptual understanding of the symbol and know that somewhere in the future texts this same symbol is going to be structured into a larger motif graphically. That demonstrates that all of the sacred scriptures are in the present moment: Past, Present and Future. That is very difficult for modern man to understand intellectually because there is nothing in our educational system that suggest such a manner of educating our children.

Let me give you an example. The word 'DARKNESS' as in "darkness was on the face of the deep" represents the EMPYREAN: The spiritual abode of the Trinity; however, DARKNESS also represents PEI, that letter that inundates and surrounds the first letter of Genesis: BETH. The outer world represents Sun LIGHT; whereas, the Empyrean represents DARKNESS: the unknowable; therefore, it can be seen how DARKNESS was previously hinted at in the texts by being the white area in and around the letter BETH. Now the word DARKNESS is mentioned exactly 80-times in the 39-books of the Old Testaments. Well the number 80 is the Gematria value of the letter PEI; therefore, confirming my interpretation of PEI representing DARKNESS and how DARKNESS is further displayed in future texts.

Another example is the word LIGHT in day one of creation. This word LIGHT has a Gemetria value of 207. Previously, it was hinted at in the letter BETH because BETH represents the Birth of Consciousness; however, it letter structures has the Sun at high noon; whereas, the future text shows the first four days of creation structured with 207-words indicating that these four days (mystic elements and/or tetractys) represents LIGHT or CHAKRA ONE: however, the first four chapters of Genesis has 1449 words, which is 7 x 207, which points to the entire chakra system, which allows the Kundalini to rise up the spine.

The final example I will give is the word ELOHYM. The word Elohym when broken down letter by letter to their lowest common denominators generates the formula for PI. Putting the letters into a circle and going counterclockwise from the number three (3) generates 3.1415 or pi or the diameter of the circle. Couple this with the knowledge that there are 32-Elohym in the first chapter of Genesis, which when put into a circle generates the graphic image of the Kabbalistic Tree of Life, with the first four days of creation as PI. This is because the 3-18 Elohyms has the aggregate of 168 (7 day week" 7 x 24). The aggregate of 32 is 528; thus PI x 168 = 528. This is a perfect example of PI in the sacred scriptures. However, by demonstrating that Elohym represents the diameter of the circle it also points it to being the LIGHT. The word Elohym represents all three personalities of Trinity. Therefore, when seeing the word Elohym it could represent anyone of them. In this case it represent YAHWEH see it represents the Sun. or Sun rays. When 168 is subtracted from 528 the quotient is 360 or the circle. Thus, I have here demonstrated that not only is the single word ELOHYM a representation of PI and the Circle but I have also represented that symbol of the Tai Chi Ying Yang symbol in the collective efforts of all 32-Elohyms. The first four days represent LIGHT and the other half of the circle DARKNESS" this is because at the beginning the DOT represents the Tai Chi Ying Yang symbol. The LINE represents the LIGHT or diameter (PI): two radiuses. The CIRCLE represents 360-radiuses of LIGHT, giving that each radius represents 70-years of one man's life, generates a total of 25,200 years or the precession of the equinoxes. A lot of symbolism coming out of this one.

One of the amazing things that I have come to understand about the SEVEN DAY CREATION ACCOUNT is that the first day of creation is as I pointed out: represented by the first four days of creation. However, the second day of creation is not only the second day but its interpretation and commentary is found in the fifth and sixth days of creation plus the first word of the second chapter of Genesis as the CHAKRA TWO. The third day of creation is not only reading the third day of creation but also the first 207-words after the first in the second chapter of Genesis as CHAKRA THREE, etc., etc., etc.

Permalink Reply by Paul lee James on June 28, 2013 at 2:41pm

I relate the written word to symbols of communication in writing. There is the spoken and written. In religious terms "God spoke and created our universe and our planet and us". So to me words have a spiritual meaning.The scribes wrote the bible, but the Holy spirit dictated the movement of the hand that wrote the words. As we understand words we take the literal meaning for granted, and the words are empty and absent of value to the reader. But when we write from our heart and not our mind the words take on a spiritual value. How can I interpret from the eyes of a dog he wants affection, it comes from his heart. The same comes from us as human beings.

Is there facial meanings eye contact a feeling within us all? Is there more to our symbols and meanings than just symbols and meanings? Paul

Permalink Reply by PuzzleSolver on July 25, 2013 at 1:23am

Words are inert -- From Waking Life

Permalink Reply by Paul lee James on July 25, 2013 at 11:58am

Puzzlesolver,

Excellent post. The spiritual part I like. But is the carnal,material word part also spiritual. There is positive and negative these two cannot relate only postive to positive and negative to negative. Therefore how does carnal speech and spiritual speech com to understand each other? What if the writer writes a truth and the reader believes it so the word goes from carnal to spirit or vice versa? What if the writer tells a truth and the reader does not believe it then the word in inert to the reader. Is it possible for the material person to change a word by there belief or accept the word as a inert word? Do we have the power to change a inert word to spirit or not? Paul

Permalink Reply by Paul lee James on July 25, 2013 at 11:47am

Excellent answers all, but I will agree that words have mathematical relations to words as well. When Jesus taught he taught by morals of that time. He used morals in pictures transmitted to the hearer too the mind. His words were symbols with word meanings in spirit. He gave his words spiritual meaning with written plain words to be heard. The hearer if believed what he (Jesus) said spiritually, then the hearer recieved the written words encoded embedded within the sound of the words transmitted by Jesus.

How is it that chamatic speakers can elate the audience with just their words and enthusiasim?

When a student of Aristotle ask a question of the teacher, Aristotle knew the student did not understand what the teacher said or meant so Aristotle repeated his study with another question, he thought the student would think about and ponder the question to the students satisfaction.

I cannot accept the word inert when speaking or writing. I can accept the word interpret in a spiritual sense from the written word. There are those in this forum that accept the words of there beliefs be it Hindu,Jewish,Muslum,etc. Are these words inert as well? Communicating in any form reguardless of it's delivery has to have some knowledge and understanding as wisdom to. Knowledge understanding and wisdom cannot be inert. Thoughts please. Paul

Permalink Reply by Paige on August 5, 2013 at 12:13am