Carlos Suares (1892–1976). The Cipher Of Genesis: Using The Qabalistic Code to Interpret the First Book of the Bible and the Teachings of Jesus (2005)

A book by Carlos Suares of a little more than 200 pages, translated into English in 1970. This book presents us with a translation of the book of Genesis using a code to decipher the traditional meaning of the Hebrew words in the text. Originally each of the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet represented archetypes emerging as cosmic forces whose interplay not only creates this Earth, but all Worlds and every dimension of Being. Suares reveals this lost Ha-Qabala, held by ancient Rabbans that unlocks the true understanding hidden in the first book of the Torah. Relentlessly, the contents in Cipher of Genesis teeter on the brink of understanding, but always unfathomable, and not quite fully grasped.

Genesis in its original content is not lore from the distant past, but expresses states of consciousness, living forces present now, intended to project into our very being. Each letter in the text has a designation, interacting with other letters within the word to form a concept. This concept is then put in syntax with other word-concepts within the indigenous verse, revealing something quite unlike any conventional reading. By no means would one word convey the entire meaning of the line, but let’s take one word from Gen 1:3 “And God said, Let there be . . .

AWR. The Hebrew word for light.
Pronounced ‘Or’, it is composed of the three letters: Aleph, Waw, and Raysh. Each letter corresponds to the following:

Aleph— the unthinkable abstract principle of all that is and all that is not. It is the creative immanence but was never created, the imperishable pulsation penetrating all existence, timeless and elusive, emanating from beyond all realms.

Waw (or Vav)—expresses a copulative or connecting mediator, a fertilizing agent.

Raysh—Each germ of life has an envelope. Raysh is the ultimate expression of this. It is the cosmic container and is conceivable in the same manner one might ponder the finiteness of the physical universe.

The schema Awr (translated as “light”) can be cognized as the unconditional movement of the discontinuous and unthinkable Aleph imprinting itself on Raysh, the exalted multiple and infinitely expanding container. The true context of AWR is an ever-occurring primordial event: the wedding of Two Infinites. It is around all everywhere. In all everywhere. Beyond all everywhere . . . it is alive. Although this is only a single word from Gen 1:3, one might get the sense that the verse is not confined to a ‘Once upon a time’ episode, but a continual process outside of “moment by moment.”

Such is an example that Suares admits he cannot offer the truth of Genesis, but only images of that truth, because to understand it in its original intent is not to synthesize a language but to experience “a would-be transmission from the unknown.” This book is not a leisurely read. Although the subject matter is laced with commentaries of psychology, sociology, politics, and physics that lend the reader breathing space, it is still a very dense publication.

The author conveniently offers a formatted Code of the Hebrew letter-numbers, and while the initial letter code is brief, oftentimes a letter’s explanation is expanded throughout the course of the book. Because the quintessence of the letters is by nature conceptual, it is risky to confine them in any brittle terms of our languages. The interaction of these primal archetypes do not occur linearly but more in a simultaneous sense. Even so, The Code can be viewed as an ordered emanation of existence, one primordial essence sequentially leading to the next. An explanation of the first five letters, in their order, illustrates such an idea:

Aleph, no.1 the unthinkable life-death, abstract principle of all that is and all that is not. Aleph does not possess the qualities of existence in duration. It is beyond that.

Bayt (or Vayt), no.2 is the archetype of all dwellings, of all containers. Bayt conveys the whole duality of existence, it allows energy to reflect so energy can discern that which is not itself.

Ghimel, no.3 is the movement of every container animated by Bayt. Ghimel is motion expressed as uncontrolled function, action that is not predisposed.

Dallet, no.4 is the resistance to destruction. Dallet is the archetype of resistance, allowing energies to order.

Hay, no.5 is the archetype of universal life. The previous four emanations bring about the emergence of Hay, which does not exclaim individual existence, but is rather its potential.

Following the explanations of the letter-numbers six through nine, we come to Yod, the 10^th letter, which culminates as a projection of Aleph into temporal continuity, creating duration, which by its very nature creates its own demise.

Yod is existence. Intent on itself. In contrast, Aleph, open to all possibilities, is timeless— yet deeply hidden, almost absent, buried by Yod’s pronounced disposition to mimic it. As Yod struggles to re-invent Aleph in an effort to perpetuate itself, it must eventually yield to Aleph or otherwise be consumed by its own duration. In order to prolong itself, Yod is constantly balancing resistance and flexibility: resistance to maintain its identity and flexibility so that it can be transient.

These letter-numbers are aspects, issuants, of one cosmic energy just as every color of a rainbow is of, and in, the light. They begin to express their complete meaning only through interaction with other letter-numbers, and their play is not restricted by phonetical positioning as are secular characters. Shemesh (Sheen-Mem-Sheen) is the Hebrew word for “sun.” Sheen the “Breath of God”. Mem the maternal waters. Sheen: the “breath of God”. Fusion! And then again something else . . . left entirely to the reader. That is the nature of Autoit Qabala. Open. Breathing. Aborting the meticulous.

Adam, Eve, Cain, Abel, The Garden of Eden, Elohim, Jehovah, and many other archetypes are addressed, decoded, and placed in context to the Genesis story events, opening an entirely new vista, never imagined by most. These biblical figures seen in the light of the Qabala become what Suares calls “abstract formulas of cosmic energy focused in the human psyche.” As the book progresses, Suares leaves it more for the reader to make in-depth inquiries into the specific translations.

It is worthy of mention that Suares received a degree in architecture in Paris. Later he went on to be a painter for fifteen years, researching the composition of light and color, which resulted in his book L’Hyperbole chromatique.

Forty years of effort culminated in Suares’ Cipher of Genesis, which some consider his pinnacle publication. Such a unique unveiling as this comes along only every 50 years or so. Anyone involved in language, psychology, religion, sociology, anthropology, architecture, or fine arts would find the disclosures of this book to be a welcome resource in their tool belt.

Reviewed by Michael McIntyre

Check out the book online at Amazon.com.

THE SEARCH FOR THE SECRETS OF IMMORTALITY:
Solar Cultures of Ancient Japan

The work of PROJECT “X” is to search for knowledge of the ancient Orders who practiced a similar System of Spiritual Regeneration at varied places throughout time – knowledge that is the divine birthright of every living person. At one time, this secret System was known to high religious Orders throughout the world. The methods and disciplines of The System were known to the Palestinian Essenes, the Egyptian Therapeutae, the early Christians, and members of other ancient high spiritual Orders around the world, including in India, China, and Japan.

For nearly forty years, PROJECT “X” has explored the history, myth, and legends of the ancients and answered such intriguing questions as: What did the solar cultures of Egypt, Israel, Greece, Persia, India, China, Mexico, Peru, and Japan have in common? How did these people use the sun’s energy to advance their civilizations to unheard-of heights? What do creation myths around the world all have in common? And what was the real purpose of the temples, shrines, and pyramids of the ancient priesthoods? The discoveries of PROJECT “X” expeditions provide new horizons in science and are certain to influence philosophy, psychology, and religion the world over.

THE SEARCH FOR THE SECRETS OF ANCIENT JAPAN was one in a unique series of PROJECT “X” travel programs designed for travelers who want to follow in the path of those mystics who introduced the world to knowledge of the immortal soul and the Spiritual Sun by teaching the Way of Light. The 2011 research travel program to Japan focused on the solar cultures of ancient Japan on the islands of Kyushu and the south of Honshu.

In this report, follow the thirteen-day trip day by day and immerse yourself in the mystic heritage of a land where the past seems to blend seamlessly with the present. Come to know the ancient Mystery Schools as you visit shrines and temples vicariously through the experiences of Project X members who took part in the tour. Attune with the natural beauty of sacred precincts grown out of millennia of spiritual teachings in locales where the people have long communed with the sun and knew The Way.

Archeological evidence places the first human settlement on the islands of Japan around approximately 10,000 BCE, but little is known for sure about human activity in the area before the sixth century CE. One of the purposes of the Project “X” tour was to investigate this past in order to present on-site information on these early times, including the little-known influences of the “Luminous Teaching” and teachers of the early Church of the East (called Keikyo in Japan).

THE JAPAN PROPHECY

“After Heaven’s Gate is open, and all the islands of Japan are connected, a Golden God will appear in the years of the Ox and the Tiger and be seated on the Throne.” These cryptic words foretell a spiritual event currently in the making, one in which the islands of Japan play a vital role.

Literally meaning “of the sun’s origin,” Nippon or Nihon has an ancient and mystical solar culture legacy, one which we will learn more of during the upcoming Solar Mysteries of Ancient Japan lecture tour. We will share the rich histories and secrets of the Shinto priesthood, solar Buddhism, and the little-known legacy of what has been called Nestorian Christianity – a remnant of the True Church that made its way from Syria, Persia, and India to China in the fifth century C.E. and then to Japan a century later under the esoteric spiritual master Kukai, also known as Kobo-daishi. The sacred shrines, temples, and other sites to be visited will shed light on the mysterious Luminous and Illustrious Religion and reveal the hidden meaning of Japan as a spiritual nation.

It was the purpose of the 2011 trip to Japan (May 9 – May 21, 2011) to gather further evidence of this ancient solar culture and share our research.

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Popular science programs often revolve around the question of whether physicists will find a “theory of everything.” What that usually means is a single theory that explains the four known fundamental forces of nature: the two nuclear forces, strong and weak; the electromagnetic force; and the gravitational force. Physicists, however, usually refer to such a theory as a “unified field” theory.

Currently, a single theory or model that includes all four forces is a tough and long-standing problem. The current theory that explains the nongravitational forces is called the Standard Model, and is an outgrowth of particle physics and quantum theory. It is quantum in nature, which is to say that it explains the forces in terms of quanta, or indivisible quantities of mass or energy. The best gravitational theory (the General Theory of Relativity) is primarily geometric in nature and contains no feature that would allow for the quantization of gravitational energy. This is particularly frustrating for those who study black holes, as all four forces interact there as nowhere else. More significantly, the General Theory breaks down at the center of a black hole.

If a unified field theory is found, it is doubtful that it would be a “theory of everything” that explains all that there is to know about the physical universe, but the question itself is worth pondering. Could there be a point where everything is known about the physical world? A self-consistent set of theories that completely explains the physical universe would imply that the physical universe is a closed system; i.e., that there is nothing beyond, for if there were something beyond, it too must be explained by the theory or else be completely isolated from the physical. Perhaps the close relationship between physics and mathematics can provide a few clues.

The ability of mathematics to explain the world we live in has been noted several times by scientists and philosophers. Nobel laureate physicist Eugene Wigner referred to the “unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics” in explaining physical phenomena, and Albert Einstein is quoted as saying, “How is it possible that mathematics, a product of human thought that is independent of experience, fits so excellently the objects of physical reality?”

Time and again, mathematical concepts and structures developed in isolation have turned out to apply to the physical world, and mathematical models developed to describe some observed phenomenon have predicted previously unobserved phenomena. For instance, when the physicist Paul Dirac developed a key equation that describes the behavior of moving electrons in the late 1920s, he noticed that there was another solution where the charge of the electron was positive instead of negative. In 1932 just such a particle was discovered: the anti-electron.

Mathematics is of course based on axioms, or simple statements that are accepted as factual and are not required to be proven, with everything else being derived logically from the axioms. The axioms themselves seem to be observations of the world we live in. If there are two pencils on a table, and I add two more, it is a directly observable fact that there are now four pencils on the table. Whatever axioms result in the conclusion that 2+2=4 can comfortably be said to be directly observable facts of the world we live in.

But what of the logical processes by which deductions from axioms are made? As some have put it: Is mathematics only a product of the human mind, or does it have an existence independent of human thought, as Plato and his followers thought? Without attempting to answer such a deep question, it is still possible to accept this close relationship for what it is, with the aim of gaining an insight into the physical world, by examining the mathematical one.

In light of the above, it may be helpful to look more closely at the concept of a closed system by considering a simple closed mathematical system consisting of the set of integers (all whole numbers, the negative whole numbers, and zero) and the operations of addition and subtraction. Any two integers when added together will always produce another integer. Likewise, any two integers when subtracted from each other result in another integer. This system is closed, i.e. every possible operation within it results in an object which is a member of the system. This system is in fact a special kind of closed mathematical system called a “group.”

Now add the operation of multiplication to the system. Here again, the system is still closed, as any two integers when multiplied together always produce another integer. If the operation of division is added to the system, however, one sees immediately that it is no longer closed: 2/5 and all other such fractions are not integers, and the concept of number must expand beyond integers in order to accommodate division of integers.

Of course fractions (the rational numbers) have been part of mathematical knowledge for at least three thousand years, but this is hardly the only time in which the concept of number had to be expanded to accommodate expanding knowledge. Another example is the conundrum faced by the ancient Greeks when it was proved by the Pythagoreans that the square root of two could never be exactly represented by a ratio of two integers. The Greeks were quite familiar with representing lengths numerically: the impetus for calculating the square root of two was in fact to determine the length of the diagonal of a unit square. Since they only knew about rational numbers, imagine their surprise when they determined that numbers as they knew them, could not represent the diagonal length! This proof was in fact kept secret under penalty of death, for fear of unsettling consequences.

If a theory that unifies gravity and the other three forces in a single framework is ever developed, there is a real possibility that it may require a re-envisioning of some fundamental physical concepts, such as time, space, matter, and energy, in much the same way that the computation of the diagonal of a square required an expansion of the concept of number. Even so, it would still not be a “theory of everything,” as it would not prove that physics, and by extension, the physical universe is a closed system. So is mathematics itself a closed system, the extent of which simply hasn’t been found yet?

There is an account in Euclid’s Elements of an argument that addresses the aforementioned Pythagorean problem, but the issues raised by this problem were not really settled for over two millennia and required that numbers be represented by an infinite string of digits. In the nineteenth century Georg Cantor and his students explored this new concept of number, which today comprises irrational numbers. As any grade school student today knows, using decimal notation, rational numbers are represented as a string of digits that eventually becomes an infinitely repeating sequence of digits, whereas irrational numbers never repeat and therefore cannot be exactly represented by a finite set of quantity symbols. (The radical sign, which is used to represent roots, symbolizes an operation on its argument and not a quantity per se.)

Many mathematicians of Cantor’s time objected to the inclusion of infinite processes in mathematics; nevertheless, irrational numbers are an accepted concept today. Even Cantor’s description of infinite (or transfinite) quantities by means of set theory is now commonly accepted. The notion of number has expanded several times since the days when shepherds needed to know whether a sheep was missing at the end of the day!

So mathematics now includes, and reasons about, infinite quantities (an “infinity of infinities”), but can it be said to be either open or closed? After all, calculus, which is centuries old, deals with infinite and infinitesimal quantities. For instance, an integral is nothing more than the sum of an infinite number of infinitesimally small quantities that , when done correctly, results in a finite quantity.

The question of the closure of mathematics was raised more directly in the early twentieth century by the eminent mathematician David Hilbert, who is most remembered for his list of twenty-three important unsolved problems, which was published in 1900. Hilbert and many of his contemporaries espoused a “formalist” view of mathematics whereby all of mathematics could be based on a few well-chosen axioms and that all derivations from these axioms would be complete and self-consistent.

To elaborate a bit on formalism, computer-programming languages are all formal languages, as opposed to the natural languages that are spoken by people. Each word and each element of syntax has, and must have, one and only one meaning or function. If there is ambiguity in any element, it can result in ambiguity of any statement expressed in the language. Imagine how the English sentence “My car needs to be washed badly” would be interpreted by a formal language system where the word “badly” can have only one meaning!

Curiously, this formalist impulse parallels the thinking of physicists of about the same era. In the late 1800s it was generally thought that only a few more details in physics needed to be worked out, such as why things glow when they are heated up, and determining what the medium was in which light waves traveled. In fact these two small and troublesome details turned out to be just the tips of larger icebergs of knowledge. Unraveling the former led to quantum theory, and investigating the latter led to the theory of Special Relativity.

The expectations of the formalist school of mathematics were not to be realized, however. In 1931 Kurt Gödel published his Incompleteness theorems, which proved the impossibility of mathematics’ ever being completely self-consistent, which has forced the formalists to retrench and set more limited goals. In essence, Gödel demonstrated that no logical system that is complex enough to include arithmetic, can prove or disprove all possible propositions that are expressible by it.

A simple example of an undecidable proposition is: “This statement is false.” The self-referential nature of the statement is understandable, but the statement taken by itself is neither true nor false. Such a statement is useful in the more inclusive sphere of human reasoning: it has just been used as an analogy of a mathematically undecidable proposition. Of course the human mind is not a formal logical system, but Gödel showed that any more-encompassing system of formal logic in which this statement is decidable in some way, would itself contain undecidable propositions.

So where does all of the above leave the issue? Is there a “theory of everything”? Assuming that the close parallel between physics and mathematics continues to hold, physicists will never know everything about the physical universe due to Gödel’s remarkable theorem. There arise inevitable gaps in what mathematics can prove, and it would be surprising if the physical sciences did not share the same characteristic.

Moreover, the trends in both physics and mathematics would argue against a theory of everything. Seemingly small, unsolved problems in physics often turn out to be the tips of much larger issues, and concepts about numbers and operations on them have constantly expanded to become more inclusive. Neither mathematics nor physics seems to be closed, which leads the reasonable observer to conclude that the physical universe itself is not a closed system.

If the universe is not closed, is it infinite? Since the histories of both mathematics and physics demonstrate that complete understanding of a subject usually requires inclusion of elements of a more encompassing body of knowledge, it is plausible that there is no end to this process and that existence in general is infinite.

Ron Theriault 2011.12.31

For further investigation:

Burger, Edward. “Zero to Infinity: A History of Numbers.” DVD Lectures. Chantilly, VA: Teaching Company, 2007.

Kramer, Edna. The Nature and Growth of Modern Mathematics. Princeton, NJ: Princeton Univ. Press, 1981.

Livio, Mario. Is God a Mathematician? New York: Simon & Schuster, 2009.

Pollock, Steven. “Particle Physics for Nonphysicists.” DVD Lectures. Chantilly, VA: Teaching Company, 2003.

THE AUTHOR: Ron Theriault earned a B.S. degree in physics from the University of Michigan, and has been working as a software engineer since then. He holds a ministerial title in the International Community of Cosolargy, and is an active supporter of the church.

The July issue of Reno Tahoe Tonight magazine features a beautifully laid out six-page article on Steamboat Hot Springs Healing Center and Spa. The look, history, and therapies at the spa are covered in a brief first-person narrative by author Oliver X and in an interview with Sean Savoy, President of the Board, at the Healing Center.

Look for the article online at renotahoetonightmagazine.com. (The July issue of Reno Tahoe Tonight was not online as of the date of this posting, but look for it later this month on pages 30-35.)

It is time once again to extend to all our members a special invitation to join in Community for our annual Convocation. We will meet this year in September, from Monday the 24th, through Sunday the 30th.

Each year we gather in the sunny high desert of the Sierra Nevada for the purpose of assembly, which is essential if we are to maintain and heighten the metanoia of The Community and benefit, each and as a whole, from the special blessings and the grace that are bestowed upon us at our consecrated open-air Sanctuary and other sacred places dedicated to God.

This year, 2012, is the much-anticipated Jubilee Year of our Church. Fifty years have passed since the Birth of the Sun of Righteousness in 1962, and we are now entering a new cycle of Christ-Consciousness and spiritual awakening, which will be ever more evident as we approach the fifty-two-year cycle in 2014.

We ask that registration forms be returned by July 23 with a contribution deposit. A lodging information sheet for details about hotel accommodations and reservation deadlines is available for nonresidents.

The format for this year’s Convocation will be along the same lines as last year’s (please see the attached mini-agenda). We are once again including in the agenda a two-day “Conference on the Spiritual State of the World,” which will be open to the public. Presenters from various disciplines will speak. The presence of practicing Cosolargists is important to the success of this event. Full details of the conference program will be sent in the near future. Consociates are invited to sit in during the Presenters’ Round Table Panel Discussion on Sunday September 30, and to meet the presenters at a private reception in their honor later that same day. Those who are interested in participating in these two private events should indicate such on the registration form. A small additional contribution is requested for those who wish to attend. Space is limited, so don’t delay.

In addition to the two-day public Conference (which includes the “Spirit of Exploration” dinner with the Andean Explorers Foundation), we will hold the Clergy Counsels lectures for ministers and ministers-in-training, Communion of Fellowship, and a specially planned service at sunrise at the open-air Cathedral Church of the Americas.

We are also scheduling the Residence Training Seminar on The ORAL GOSPEL AS A LIFE SYSTEM, which will begin Monday September 24, for eligible Consociates.

On behalf of the Head Overseer and all of us at the Center, we are eager for all members of our Community to be together again and to share the messages that are so important for us at this auspicious time in our evolution as a Community.

Should you have any questions, please do not hesitate to call Francine Petrovich at the Chancellery at (775) 786-7827. You may also e-mail her at fpetrovich@communityofchrist.org.

See a provisional copy of the agenda (as of July 2012)  HERE .

Submitted by Francine Petrovich, Convocation & Conference Coordinator

Starling murmuration. PHOTO: ad551/Flickr

Sample one of the intelligences on our planet through the video link below.

Murmuration. No one knows why they do it. Yet each fall, thousands of starlings dance in the twilight above England and Scotland. The birds gather in shape-shifting flocks called murmurations, having migrated in the millions from Russia and Scandinavia to escape winter’s frigid bite. Scientists aren’t sure how they do it, either. The starlings’ murmurations are manifestations of swarm intelligence, which in different contexts is practiced by schools of fish, swarms of bees, and colonies of ants. As far as I am aware, even complex algorithmic models haven’t yet explained the starlings’ aerobatics, which rely on the tiny birds’ quicksilver reaction time of under 100 milliseconds to avoid aerial collisions—and predators—in the giant flock. After a tour de force in the dusky sky, the birds roost in Britain’s rural pastures, settling down to sleep (and chatter) after their evening ballet.

Two young ladies who were out for a late afternoon canoe ride caught the wonderful murmuration display on video. The URL for the short video is below. Watch the variation of color and intensity of the patterns that the birds make in proximity to one another. And take a look at the reaction of the girl in the bow of the canoe watching the aerial display. Enjoy.

Watch the amazing 2-minute video of a massive flock of starlings “dancing” in the sky of England.

Video link and accompanying text submitted by Robert Anderson.

An extreme ultraviolet image of the August 1st global eruption. Different colors represent different plasma temperatures in the range 1.0 to 2.2 million degrees K. PHOTO: Solar Dynamics Observatory.

On December 13, 2010, NASA Science/Science News published an article on the sun that began:

“On August 1, 2010, an entire hemisphere of the sun erupted. Filaments of magnetism snapped and exploded, shock waves raced across the stellar surface, billion-ton clouds of hot gas billowed into space. Astronomers knew they had witnessed something big.”

What the astronomers apparently didn’t know is that August 1 is an auspicious date for such an event, according to the Second Advent Sacred Calendar.

Read the article online at NASA Science / Science News.

Gary Huss Sr. recently brought the article to our attention and submitted the link to us for publication.

The Luminous Teaching Stone as it appeared on site at the Buddhist temple in the early 20th century

Documents contemporary to the uncovering of the stone leave doubts about where and when it was actually found. Three different stories of its recovery are reported, with two variations of its original location and disposal. The story here yields the most cooperative details and happens to be also the most sensible.

For many winters before the discovery of the monument, natives of one of the post towns between Hsi-an and Chou-chin, in the area of the four forts, had observed that snow would not lie on a certain small patch of ground beneath the foundation of a ruined wall there. Workmen digging irrigation trenches at the spot by order of the Ming government early in 1623, perhaps in the beginning of March, came upon a great slab of stone buried several feet beneath the surface of the earth. The men carefully raised it. When they cleaned it, they saw it was covered with a perfectly preserved inscription of beautiful workmanship.

The discovery did not fail to attract the attention of Liang Ko-shun, the district governor of Chou-chin who had ordered the excavation project. He hastened to the spot. There he found a tablet in the form of a gravestone, and on it an inscription following the line of biographies usual in Chinese cemeteries. The inscription claimed the stone to be 842 years old. True to his country’s tradition of reverence – for antiquity, for the dead, and for literature – the mandarin did obeisance to the ancient relic, making a profound and solemn bow.

That same spring, Governor Liang Ko-shun merited the attention of the emperor for his beneficent administration of the water supply and his vigorous measures in defense of his people from robbers and murderers. He was selected for promotion to the honorable post of censor as soon as his term of office in Chou-chin expired. In autumn, Liang came to reside in the capital city of Hsi-an. Two years later, as censor, he ordered the transportation of the stone by way of the Rivers Tsao-Ho and Wei-Ho to the outer yard of the Ch’ung-jen-ssu Buddhist temple. There, in the fields outside the western gate of the city, Liang mounted it on “a fair pedestal” (a clumsily worked stone tortoise) strangely near the site of the first Ta-ch’in monastery built in 638. There the monument remained in place until October 2, 1907.

Soon after the exhumed relic was transported to the capital, the first rubbing of the stone was made and sent thousands of miles, somewhere in the neighborhood of Hang-chou, for examination by Dr. Leon Li, a famous Chinese Christian of the time. In June 1625, one of the Jesuits in the city of Hang-chou published a Latin translation of the inscription. The French Jesuit father Nicholas Trigault visited the stone in October, accompanied by two Shensi Christians of high office. News of the find spread all over the empire and the world. All the men of letters in the capital district, experts in writings on metal and stone, came to study the monument and pronounced with certainty that it belonged to the T’ang era.

Opposition to the monument’s authenticity in Europe, more anti-Jesuit than intelligent, interfered with reception of the news. Early Protestant missionaries, and later the most celebrated intellectuals of enlightened Europe, made it out to be a Jesuit forgery. Voltaire made fun of it from France in the fourth of his Chinese and Indian letters. Bishop George Horne, the most eloquent English preacher of his time, contended that the monument was not genuine. So did many others. For nearly two hundred years, the intelligentsia of Europe refused even to acknowledge its existence. Then, at the end of the eighteenth century, Edward Gibbon again revealed the fact of the monument’s existence to the world in chapter 47 of his famous history, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Yet the question of the authenticity of the monument continued to divide Western scholars for another hundred years. Professor Karl Neumann of Munich, an indefatigable student of oriental language, and the great Parisian sinologist Stanislas Julien, who had mastered the genius of the Chinese language by intuition in order to translate Hsuan-tsang’s Travels and the Tao Te Ching, published their doubts on the genuineness of the stone. In America, Professor E. E. Salisbury, in his published opinion, remarked that the monument was generally regarded as a forgery by the learned, and added the egocentric and tautological argument that since neither he nor any of his friends had ever met anyone who had seen the monument, he was not sure whether such a thing did actually exist. In time, however, several great sinologists provided translations of the inscription into French, German, andEnglish, thus making it impossible to ever doubt its genuineness again: A. Wylie (1854), J. Legge (1888), P.Y. Saeki (1916), and A.C. Moule (1930).)

In nearby Japan, where Christianity prohibition boards and their strict enforcements under shogunate law forbade knowledge of the religion, the existence of the monument was not known until the early nineteenth century. There a few Japanese scholars learned of the inscription in 1817 in spite of the prohibition, when a shipment of imported books arrived in Japan. The shipment included the 160-volume collection of ancient Chinese inscriptions on metal and stone compiled in 1805 by the famous Wang Ch’ang. The inscription occupied the larger part of the sixty-fifth volume. Even after shogunate authorities at Yedo had inspected the work and approved it, the discerning Kondo Seisai, inspector general of publications and imported books, found the inscription and concluded it was related to the forbidden “Religion of Jesus.” He declared the whole work of Wang Ch’ang proscribed in Japan. The Japanese nation did not hear of the monument again until some years after the Restoration, in 1872, when the new government removed the notorious prohibition boards. Even then, during the reign of the Meiji emperor (1867–1912), only three scholars paid much attention to the subject in their writings: Dr. Takakusu, Dr. Kuwabara, and Dr. Nakamura.

Not until later in the twentieth century did the devoted Japanese interpreter of the monument, P.Y. Saeki, point out that the ultimate origin of Japan’s “Protestant” Buddhism was this same East Asian Christian tradition. In the borrowed language of English, Professor Saeki extolled the significance of the monument and clearly traced the path that the Christian teaching had taken into the Far East as it spread throughout East Asian civilization, entangled itself in the course of Buddhism at its fall, and was finally forgotten. His first book, The Nestorian Monument in China (1916), provides a translation of the inscription in sympathy with Chinese thought, speech, and literature; the translation is accompanied by copious and erudite notes that contain all the leading thoughts on the monument expressed in Japan up to his time. His second book, The Nestorian Documents and Relics in China (1951), collects his translations of the Chinese historical records relating to the Church of the East and all Church manuscripts found in China and Chinese Turkestan. His work embodies the good will of many scholars and continues to provide a light to work by for religious researchers in the West.

Robert G. Petrovich

1989, 2010

Read THE LUMINOUS TEACHING STONE OF CHINA: The Stone Itself Part 3: Recovery

PHOTO: Niels Bohr Institute

In the quantum optical laboratories at the Niels Bohr Institute, researchers have conducted experiments that show that light breaks with classical physical principles. The studies show that light can have both an electrical and a magnetic field, but not at the same time. That is to say, light has quantum mechanical properties.

A staff article on spacedaily.com tells us what the researchers found. Consociate Ron Theriault reviewed the article and has this to say about it:

“It is no surprise to anyone trained in modern physics that light is described by quantum mechanics. In the early 20th century Albert Einstein described the photoelectric effect by assuming that light is quantized into indivisible packets which we now call photons. His paper put the final nail into the coffin containing the idea that light is exclusively a wave phenomenon.

“These researchers are exploring the boundary between the quantum and

classical ‘worlds,’ and have apparently published something of note. There isn’t much detail in the article to determine exactly what it is, however. It is nonetheless interesting that researchers are still discovering new things about light.”

Read the article online at spacedaily.com .

Link submitted by Frieda Nelson.