Plumed serpent
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93,
I wonder if anyone has ever done any work, from a Qabalistic perspective, on Quetzalcoatl. The tables in 777 do not go into Meso-American mythology, and 776-1/2 has Santeria, Vodoun and Christian deities, but nothing from this continent.
Superficially, since the name Quetzalcoatl means plumed or feathered serpent, he corresponds to Hadit. As a sky god of wisdom, he easily fits into Chokmah. As a teacher, he also fits into Hod, a correspondence amplified by the splendor associated with his presence. But there is also association with the morning star (Venus/Hesperus).
Anyone have any thoughts?
93 93/93,
Edward
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I've always taken him - by form, symbols, and his place in the religion - as a Tiphereth figure. Isn't he essentially the Meso-American Christ?
"Superficially, since the name Quetzalcoatl means plumed or feathered serpent, he corresponds to Hadit."
I like that equation; but also, a serpent is one of the most common Tiphereth symbols. (See Liber LXV if nothing else!) His rainbow raiment corresponds to the Path of the Rainbow and the "Path of the Chameleon" symbolism of Tiphereth. And feathers are not unusual for portraying radiance etc. (independent of their spiritual implications when organized as wings).
Your other remarks at least are not incompatible with the simple Tiphereth attribution.
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Edward, I just did a search and found the following diary entry from the morning of 8 September 2006.
"I awoke this morning from the middle of a dream concerning Quetzalcoatl, the Aztec rainbow and solar themed “feathered serpent” god. He wasn’t seen in the dream, there wasn’t another person visible, I was mostly writing and thinking about him, and there seemed a considerable amount in my mind that would have been articulated, and was already “scripted” for the dream at the time I awoke – there was then no returning to the dream to recover it as I usually might.
The fact that I had this dream and that it was about Quetzalcoatl persisted quite vividly in the half-hour after waking. The only real point seemed to be that it was about Quetzalcoatl.
I haven’t thought about Quetzalcoatl for years and, though His name often caught my attention as a child, there haven’t been any recent reminders of him. There was, of course, one important Aztec past life through which he might be tied to me. He is, of course, a wonderful HGA symbol and consistent with Hadit ideas and both solar and Chokmah ideas.
One possible spelling would be QTz-AL-KVATL, i.e., 190 (Mystic Number of 19th Path of Teth) + AL 31 + 96 = 287 (several minor but exacting items). I’m fairly doubtful of the legitimacy of this “shot in the dark” try, by the way.
At this point I’m just going to take the note that his presence in my psyche, as some sort of well-developed theme in deep subconsciousness, was the point to observe and record."
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JAE, 93,
Yes, he has that function too. I did add a comment about Tiphereth in the initial post, then decided it was getting too complicated, and edited it.
From an intuitive level, Quetzalcoatl seems to represent the Fire in the Adytum/Heart. He is not a redeemer figure in the European/Middle Eastern sense, though he is a teacher and lawgiver.
There seems to be an ongoing evolution of his myth, as people with exposure to other traditions address the legend. In one version going round in Mexico, an historical personage strongly identified with Quetzalcoatl, an actual king who lived in the 9th Century CE, tried to attain complete recognition of his fundamental nature. But he failed at this, so he self-immolated and became the Morning Star.
I think there's been previous discussion here about Venus-as-Netzach being somewhat like Tiphereth on a lower arc.
It does strike me as a bit odd that people in North America are into the Celtic or Assyrian deities, but, perhaps turned off by the human sacrifice aspect of the religious praxis, have neglected the gods of the high cultures on this side of the Atlantic. Quetzalcoatl in some legends was in fact the one who tried to eliminate or reduce human sacrifice.
He does, though, have multiple functions, depending on the time and place of his worship. so the Qabalistic correspondences tend to vary. Which, of course, might be an expression of Tiphereth as the sephirah of centrality and permutation.
93 93/93,
Edward
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Lucifer is sometimes called Melek Taus, the "peacock angel". Melek Taus is associated with Azazel. The Yazidis consider Melek Taus to be a benevolent angel that has redeemed himself from his fall, and has become a demiurge who created the cosmos from the Cosmic Egg. After he repented, he cried for 7000 years, his tears filling 7 jars, which then quenched the fires of hell. Some Christians, Muslims and others identify Melek Taus as Lucifer or Shaytān (Satan).
Here is quite a kickass picture of him:
ziarah.net/melek.htmlFor some reason, I've always associated the plumed serpent with Melek Taus. Seems like an archetype for a proud, wise, rebel-redeemer.
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And the remainder of the info on melek taus here is pretty convincing (to me):
home.austin.rr.com/toddh/peacock.html -
RF, 93,
Cool image. Looking at this solely as iconography, the connection to Quetzalcoatl is a bit borderline, but not out of the ballpark. From the sense of power it conveys, I see how you made the connection with Quetzalcoatl.
The use of wings or feathers with an image that conveys power+wisdom appears to occur worldwide. The power+wisdom notion seems best represented by a serpent, dragon or something cognate that indicates an empowering or enlightening archetype.
There's a fair bit about Quetzalcoatl available on-line, but I find a lot of it re-hashes other sites. There's not much available that offers plausible psychological or mythic perspectives.
93 93/93,
Edward
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JAE, 93,
"One possible spelling would be QTz-AL-KVATL, i.e., 190 (Mystic Number of 19th Path of Teth) + AL 31 + 96 = 287 (several minor but exacting items). I’m fairly doubtful of the legitimacy of this “shot in the dark” try, by the way. "
I've spent a couple of days working on this myself. One quibble I have with your gematria is that the 190 is applied to the QTz, which is the part of the name meaning 'plumed', not 'serpent'.
I opt for:
KATzL (141) KVATL (66). That's 207, the same as for AVR, ADVN OVLM and AIN SVPh. Also AKRAB, a scorpion (and Scorpio), which ties in nicely with the serpent symbolism.
I especially like that 1+4+1 = 6, and with the 66 that gives us ... 666. Yes, Quetzalcoatl IS the Beast - you read it here first.
Going through AC's Confessions I note that although he makes no mention of any specific MesoAmerican deities, he did some very important formative work in Mexico. It was there Oscar Eckenstein taught him concentration, and he also started his first order, the L.I.L., in Mexico City, as well as receiving the senior Masonic degrees. And he also first worked on correcting the spelling of 'Abracadabra' there (Ch. 25, pg 1).
93 93/93,
Edward
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Edward,
That was good. The whole thread is interesting.
In L.V.X.,
chrys333 -
93
Excellent topic; especially since I feel it is related to Crowley’s 0=2.
And Mesoamerica did have a sophisticated knowledge of mathematics and most importantly zero which I can’t help but always relate to the Ouroboros and as was mentioned, the cosmic egg.
The association between Quetzalcoatl’s celestial status as Venus seems to represent a dual nature between him and his counterpart, and more negative aspect Xolotl-this is especially Toltec pre-dating Mayan and Aztec. Quetzalcoatl is the Morning Star and Xolotl the Evening Star-a duality which we find in other cultures when Twins are mentioned. He’s also shown with two-heads at times.But Quetzalcoatl’s specific iconography as a Feathered Serpent then expands to represent the entire Milky Way galaxy. The mayan words for “sky” and “serpent” both mean the same thing. This is exciting to me, because I was once trying to make some sense of quantum theory and the zero-point field; the physicist I was reading mentioned how it behaves like a cat chasing its own tail-well I appreciated the metaphor but a snake eating its own tail is more appropriate, not only that but part of the theory is how it refreshes itself also-‘shedding snakeskin’ is another metaphor they should have added.
But to answer the question in a more kabbalah way: I’d associate the symbolism (not the status of the figure(s) since that is most likely a title in the Venus-Lucifer sense) to yesh and ayin or 'yesh mai'ayin: acting from physicality (snakes always so grounded to malkuth), 'ayin,' from spirituality, 'yesh.' (bird’s ability to be the highest in flight)…. so not specific sepiroth ,its too all-encompassing. And here’s another reason why I associate it as such: there’s that Gnostic/Gospel of Thomas quote attributed to Jesus, ‘be ye wise as serpents and innocent as the dove’. I think this is found somewhere in Matthew as well. Metaphors and the allegories which contain both go so well with this Flying Serpent; but I’ve made this post long enough. It’s a most excellent symbol and always impressive for being so universal.
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http://z.about.com/d/altreligion/1/0/q/D/2/quetzalcoatl.jpg
- The Aztec solar deity Quetzalcoatl, depicted crucified on an equal armed cross:*
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93,
Interesting image. Do you know the time-period? There were efforts by native Mexican apologists to save some elements of their old religion in the first 60 or 80 years after the Spanish came, mostly by trying to show 'Our God = Your God but with different-colored eyebrows" and I wonder if this was pre-Columbian or not.
93 93/93,
Edward
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Unfortunately, no. I pulled it from a site while browsing. No cited sources or documented information available. Website evidence suggests (pun intended) that the Quetzalcoatl story resembles in many ways the story of Christ, hence the Franciscans using it to convert the natives to Christianity.
Separating the original myth from the additions, which now include the ideas of esoteric Mexicanistas, could be a worthy pursuit.
If I could delve into the ridiculous, this might support the beliefs of the Mormons that the Master Teacher from Nazareth was indeed in America. Perhaps he was a master of bilocation. The myth summaries I've read say that Quetzalcoatl was white; maybe he was a lone viking.
[This post was plagiarized from wikipedia Quetzalcoatl article and other sites.]
My personal interest in the picture was in the fact that it is an equal armed cross, or solar cross.