CESNUR - Centro Studi sulle Nuove Religioni diretto da Massimo Introvigne
www.cesnur.org

CESNUR 2006 International Conference
July 13-16, 2006
San Diego State University, San Diego, California

Religion, Globalization, and Conflict: International Perspectives

Globalisation or Aquarius: Are "We" Talking From the Same Thing?

by By Sébastien GREGOV, Ph. D. Student, Paris University Sorbonne IV

• The “first Era of Globalization” based on the conquest of America in the 16th century with the Spanish conquistadores annihilating the pre-Columbian civilization.
• The period of the gold standard and liberalization of the 19th century can be called "The Second Era of Globalization". Based on the Pax Britannica and the exchange of goods in currencies pegged to specie, this era grew along with industrialization. How to see globalization positive after two bloody failures? Main interpretative troubles find their origin in the fact that the third today-globalization has changed regarding to the previous one.

• Hence the third wave of globalization arouses the suspicions of many, who mistrust its benevolent action… Especially people oriented to a kind of universal renewal of mankind, like Aquarians in the sixties!

2/ HOW COULD THE THIRD GLOBALIZATION JOIN AQUARIAN EXPECTATIONS?

In popular culture, the expression "Age of Aquarius" usually refers to the heyday of the hippie and New Age "movement" of the 1960s and 1970s.

• The New Age Movement is more accurately a phenomenon, not a movement, and yet seen by many as the harbinger of this future change-over of values. This "New Age" phenomenon is seen by astrologers to be marked by the conjunction of the planet Uranus, ruler of the sign Aquarius, and the coming age, with Pluto, ruler of the masses, bringing radical change, in the 1960's. However, as the song[iii] relates, it is only considered by Astrologers as the "dawning" of the age, not occurring until some time in the future.
• People in the 1960’s are searching, yes craving for change, waiting for a new time that is thought to bring with it an era of universal brotherhood rooted in reason, where it will be possible to solve social problems in a equitable manner too and with greater opportunity for intellectual and spiritual improvement, since Aquarius is an airy, scientific, and intellectual sign and its ruler planet, Uranus, is associated with intuition (knowledge above reason) and direct perceptions of the heart…

The experience of the past is an insurmountable obstacle for their confidence in the globalizing process. But do we have really the choice?

C/  THE 3^RD GLOBALIZATION HAS ALREADY HAPPENED TOO : BUT ONLY IN THE CONSCIOUSNESS!

To sum up the whole, let’s stress with Daniel Cohen some paradoxical features of the new world economy in the beginning millennium.

1/ WITH OR WITHOUT YOU!

• Thanks to the telegraph, the phone, the train and the steamer the revolution of communications has already started in the 19^th century, this first impact has been much more profound than the one of the Internet or the plane.
• But by the way, globalization creates a cleavage between the expectations (almost by poor countries) and the reality which the world capitalism can actually provide. Thus for most people it remains in fact a mirage in their concrete life, but not in their consciousness! As far as imagination – or in other terms : culture - is concerned, every body knows about the global village – clearly thanks to the media.
• And the most quantifiable sign of this revolution is the fertility transition[iv]: women have already decided everywhere to have fewer children, without distinction of religion( whether Christians, or Moslems), education (whether illiterates or bachelors)  or income (whether Poor or Rich).

But if the planetary consciousness is on its way to globalization, the economic forces are back, that is the reason why globalization actually is so disappointing : it hasn’t completely happened yet, and people looking forward to its advent in advance are therefore frustrated.

2/ FRUSTRATIONS USUALLY LEAD AQUARIANS TO ANTI-GLOBALIZATION

• When we see all the anti-globalization meetings,  José Bovet in France breaking down a Mc Donald’s’ restaurant, ATTAC here, No LogO there, we may suppose that the children of Marilyn Ferguson[v], who used for the first time the expression “Aquarian conspiracy” in 1976, will take their place among anti-globalization groups, all the more so as, to paraphrase Noam Chomsky, the aim of this movement is to globalize justice. And many activists also unite under the slogan “another world is possible”, which has given rise to names such as “altermondialisme” in French. But things are not simple. If globalization as such can be refused, the hope and the expectations related to it are still in the air…
• To conclude how things stand at present with globalization, we can make the few following remarks : The International Workingmen’s Association (or may we call it for the purpose the “Worker’s Conspiracy”) saw the communist dream smashed into pieces, because of the development of the Tertiary Sector, and  of course of capitalism – one may say because of the growing individualism too. Be that as it may, the multinational trusts (the “Money Conspiracy”) haven’t yet succeeded completely in spreading capitalism everywhere.

The only International movement that is actually successful is signalized by the fertility transition: that is the “Women Conspiracy”. Maybe not money dominates the changing world but women!

But what’s on with the Aquarian conspiracy? Has it failed or succeeded?

II/ WHY THE AQUARIAN CONSPIRACY HASN’T REALLY SUCCEEDED

A first series of explanations are to be found in the relationship between modern-time globalization and a dawning age, still hard to locate in time; the second kind of reasons is internal: astrology has changed with the time, and in connection to it the conditions for being a conspirator.

A/ THECOMPETITION WITH GLOBALIZATION DID THE AQUARIAN CONSPIRACY A BAD TURN

Let’s go now further into details and investigate the characteristics of Aquarius and Globalization in comparison.

1/ THE SAME… BUT DIFFERENT!

The prophetic and messianic power of Aquarius seems to be the counterpart of the mundane expectations included in the craving for globalization, summarized as follows (see chart)

THE AQUARIAN ‘CONSPIRACY’	Equivalent items (?)	THE ‘GLOBALIZED’ WORLD
Encourage the Spiritual development	Spirit/ Intellect	Sharing/ protecting  Intellectual property
Ethic aims like universal brotherhood rooted in reason; practice truly Christian love	Religious Moral / atheistic Ethic	Save the planet, equitable=ethic, if possible = ecologic
man and God are one; love thy neighbour…	Spirituality/ Community	Connect people, get in touch with anyone
Selflessness is the key (ontological self surrender)	I-lessness/ Generosity	Equitable trade (practical self surrender)
Intuition above reason; open the heart	Inner/ Outer change	Technology: innovate or die! Computerization: 0+1=all
Man involved in a cosmic adventure	Cosmic/ Human Way	Politics- Social welfare: infrastructures and organizations ruling at a planetary level

But all in all, the items could probably be compared term by term. And even if mainly the intentions and the perspective are different (there is always a slight discrepancy between their spheres of  activity), these are very close to each other, and confounding the one with the other could easily occurs, but nearly in all cases to the benefit of the second, mundane topic.

2/ GLOBALIZATION IS AHEAD OF AQUARIUS… EVEN FOR MANY CENTURIES!

Trends or eras like the two studied here possess a prophetic power which precedes their coming. However the figures are not of the same order.

• In his book Le Capitalisme utopique (Utopian Capitalism)  Pierre Rosanvallon[vi] showed  that the idea of capitalism in the 18^th century also came before its reality. In the same way the book of Adam Smith Wealth of Nations was published in 1776, while the author didn’t even know about the invention of the steam machine which would make capitalism spread round the world. The major issue now is to know whether the gap between the consciousness and the existence of the globalized world will still last long … The same applies to Aquarius, but not on a human scale anymore: it takes ages till the forecast event becomes real, even astrological ages!
• An astrological age is the time taken for the vernal equinox to move through one constellation of the zodiac. Astrological ages occur because of a phenomenon known as the precession of the equinoxes. One complete period of this precession is called a Great Year and is about 26,000 years[vii]. In other words, this means that the current astrological Age of Pisces began around the 5th century[viii], and it will be about 2600 when the Age of Aquarius begins.[ix]
• Nevertheless other dates are advanced, moving from AD 2638 (Elsa M. Glover), AD 2654 (Max Heindel) or AD 2680 (Shepherd Simpson) to 1926[x] or even 1908 (Jan Van Rijckenborgh[xi]) for the earliest deadline.
• It is also understood by astrologers that this is not a mathematical division of time but a process, titled Orb of influence, by which one age initiates its influences, in a slowly increasing way, before the end of the previous age.

Well trying to reach an agreement, we can say that Aquarius is not so far, and we might be in a transitional period, at the turning point between two eras… Be that as it may, expecting that something occurs in a decade is not the same as waiting for hundreds of years. You must be extremely patient if you want to be an Aquarian.  Somehow not every body can have such a cool blooded attitude! And a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush…  since the second are yet too unreal to be true.

3/ TOO OPTIMISTIC TO BE TRUE

Indeed if we go deeper into the matter, we can notice that the negative aspects of Aquarius are reduced to nothing, while the so called movement of ‘Global justice’ emphasizes the risk of misusing westernization (see chart). But there can hardly be only a brighter future, or what?

B/ THE MODERN DEVELOPMENT OF ASTROLOGY DIVIDED THE AQUARIAN COMMUNITY

1/ THE DOUBLE LOGIC OF ASTROLOGY : ASTROLOGICAL AND ANALOGICAL

Astrology can be seen as a double edged (scientific) approach to reality: if the astrological approach is related to time and space, the analogical view is the other side of the coin, far more inclined to consider things by their essence, therefore eternal…

• The astrological side of astrology by Mesopotamian civilizations built astrology as a sacred science: cyclic rhythms were as concrete as symbolic and ruled social organisation as well as religious practices: the first anthropological organisation principle was indeed celestial[xiii].
• The analogical  consider a deep relationship between micro- and macrocosm: here symbolism is the natural substance of the universe itself;
• That is why astrology is so subtle and difficult to circumscribe: it is a “blinking belief” – according to the sociological diagnostic group founded by Morin in 1971 – swinging between play and seriousness, superstition and scepticism, magic and rationality. This is the Gordian knot: Morin sees the man as Homo sapiens demens: so astrology is forced within time to tack to reach its goal, in function of the resistance of the politician or scientific environment (see diagram below).

2/ THE PERPETUAL MUTATION OF ASTROLOGY HAS REPEATED ITSELF IN THREE DECADES

First, to take the measure of the successive changing, an historical overview of astrology points out clearly that the scope of astrology extremely varies within time[xiv].

Religion and astronomy were initially connected with astrology. Then they split up and astrology went its own way, dividing in two main streams, a mass-astrology and a scholarly current. The former passed unhidden into the public domain, and the collective consciousness; the latter mostly disappeared under a nebulous esoteric front.ù

• At the end of the 60’s, at a point when individualism was almost victorious, a crisis arose: a divorce between the social individuality and the person, the subject. The subject, the man after 1968, is searching for his roots;
• Within three decades, the quest of the subject has given astrology a new direction (see chart):

• In three decades the whole history of astrology repeats itself (see chart):

Now all the ingredients are gathered to poison Aquarius…

C/ THE SOCIAL INTEGRATION OF AQUARIAN CONSPIRATORS KILLED ALMOST ALL OF THEM

1/ SOCIAL MUTATION : FROM THE AQUARIAN CONSPIRACY TO THE ‘CULTURAL CREATIVES’

San Diego is the perfect place to deal with the survey of the journalist Marilyn Ferguson, starting in the sixties and ending in the seventies. At the beginning, she hadn’t got a clue how to baptize the movement she conducted her survey on in California.  Then she spoke of an Aquarian Conspiracy.

• Back to the sixties: Thomas Kuhn deals with the change of paradigm in the history of physic sciences (1962) : a big mess, a confusion in all previously admitted certainties;
• 1976 Marilyn Ferguson forecasts a new paradigmatic attitude for her “children”: the change of change. First the Aquarian Conspiracy has no name!
• 1972-1994: About 15 or 20 years later, the sociologist Paul H. Ray and the psychologist Sherry Ruth Anderson make a survey on a growing population, oriented to ecology, feminine values, social and psycho-spiritual development, which is supposed to build 25% of the adult north American population (against 5% in the 60’s, and counting 66% of women). These are the ‘cultural Creatives’, maybe as numerous in all developed countries in Europe… Mutants or mutineers of Aquarius?

2/ THE AQUARIAN SIGN VANISCHES

• Although the same process occurs to become one of them…

• … the means for changing the society make the difference:
  -         Ferguson applies her revolution in the psycho-spiritual field:
• Psycho pedagogy : how tot teach to teach;
• Enlargement of conscience : use your whole brain;
• Break through beyond all culture : unite the sciences, transform values and vocations;
• Meanwhile, Ray-Anderson consider the psychological development as needed, but not as a goal: it is only the first step, then social activism is the key (if not, the inner transformation is of no use and degenerate into… New Age! Sic transit )

3/ THE SECULAR MODE OF CULTURE WARS REPLACES DEFINITELY THE SPIRIT (OF AQUARIUS)

• And this is exactly what we noticed about globalization absorbing Aquarius: the nodding acquaintance with astrology faded away, replaced by a socio-cultural dimension : the two Americans distinguish three kind of people in the American today-society: the Traditionalists, the Modernists and thirdly the cultural Creatives: while the two former are fighting endlessly and meaninglessly against each other, the latter find their own way through, placing cooperation and sustainable interdependence in the middle. Vulnerability, once recognized and accepted, becomes a strength and leads to search  for non-violent solutions : ecology seems to be the final and secular version of Aquarius.   

• To sum up the whole: There was a kind of semantic slip: the communitarian ideal of the beatniks disappears in front of an egoistic astrology; the global ideology has given mankind this communitarian ideal back but deserted by stars, because it reduces it to the smallest planetary dimension: the earth: ecology is born as the avatar of individualized astrology[xv]. Let’s say with “Candide”, by Voltaire: “We must cultivate our garden”.

Today-Aquarius in its popular widespread version has mainly nothing in common with a cosmic “International”, or a revolutionary intergalactic anthem. To say it openly, the public opinion sees in it rather a prank…

But we neglected till this point a kind of astrology that remains somehow pure from the mass-media ‘corruption’ : the hidden astrology or occult version. So let’s penetrate in this new and last field of the demonstration and follow, with this aim in mind, the mutation of a NRM : the LECTORIUM ROSICRUCIANUM.

III/ THE TODAY AQUARIAN CONSPIRACY : THE MODERN OFFSPRING OF GNOSTIC COUNTER-CULTURE

NEITHER GLOBALIZATION NOR POPULAR ASTROLOGY : both opponents are sent away without pronouncing in favour of either.

A/ THE FEW SURVIVORS

Few people are still stirring up the Aquarian revolution, but in the Gnostic milieu.

But be hidden is not a sufficient condition: something in the teaching must preserve it from being absorbed by the individual astrology, which is the effect of a socio-cultural pressure: the society attempts to control the anxiety in post-modern urban areas for instance by reassuring and cheering people thanks to the astrology mentioned above (see the demonstration by Paul Fischler, Op.cit.).

1/ THE ASTERIX’S COMPLEX  BY GNOSTICS

Few people still resisting the invaders… It sounds a bit typically French…

• But this is indeed a permanent feature in the history of Gnostic brotherhoods that they were all hunted down and slaughtered (just think of the Manicheans…). But why? One can argue that special elements in Gnostic teachings always incur criticism and anger on themselves… And conversely, after many times, being ostracized becomes even a kind of guarantee that the teaching is really Gnostic ! This self-victimization can be properly relevant for some groups to justify their own legitimacy…
• Nevertheless modern-time Gnostics are predisposed to build a counter-culture for this reason. Of course not only Gnostics, but Gnostics in particular might see their isolation as justification. Their weakness becomes in that way their strength. Even if they keep being isolated among others outlawed from society.

Now what could give the Gnostics their uniqueness? The greatest difference is the teaching of two orders of nature.

2/ THE BREAK POINT :  THE TWO ORDERS OF NATURE

Once upon a time… Mankind who turned away from God brought into existence a fallen world. Thus time and space began too, so the Gnostic tells the myth of the second creation by a luciferian supremacy or demiurge…

• As creations of fallen mankind, monstrous formations of unholy natural powers (differentiated by ancient Gnostics into twelve main groups or ‘aeons’) fell completely outside its control. They hold it now imprisoned in their grip and form the irresistible powers of self-maintenance which compel it to continue upon self-made unholy ways, causing the human link with the rotating wheel of dialectics to be perpetuated.
• ‘Dialectics’ means here a fundamental law by which everything is involved  in continuous alteration and dissolution, in rising, shining and fading. It explains too why everything manifests itself only in pairs of opposites (day/ night; good/evil) : they bring each other into existence. That is why even the so-called good activities of fallen mankind call into being aeons, which dominate man and keep him prisoner.
• To modern-time Gnostics, by aeons is also understood the hierarchical ruling-group of time-space, also called the dialectical hierarchy or “the prince of the world” (the demiurge by old Gnostics). At a cost of terrible suffering of mankind, these entities have freed themselves from the wheel of dialectics, a freedom which requires unlimited self-maintenance and which they can keep only by maintaining and increasing the suffering of the world.
• Besides this unholy nature-workings there are the nature-powers of the divine sevenfold earthly cosmos, which manifest themselves to liberate mankind and to teach it to go the path of return to the ‘Immovable Kingdom’ or ‘pleroma’. These powers build then the so-called ‘thirteenth Aeon’.

3/ NO GNOSTICS ARE CONSEQUENTLY INTERESTED IN HOROSCOPS

Here is a turning point in the astrological considerations mentioned above : if the whole cosmos is a fallen world, it does not bring anything to deepen its knowledge.

• Firstly making horoscopes comes down to increasing the link with the unholy aeons, therefore it makes one more prisoner than ever. Indeed the twelve aeons are present in man in a very individual shape: this is the ‘birth sky’. To cut it short, in a Gnostic point of view, nobody is born under a lucky star, as we have all to free ourselves from the astral influences.
• Secondly – all depends on the consciousness of the definer: it is up to him to bind himself with the forces of the aeons or with the force of the 13^th aeon. The reason is that in man a vestige of eternity remains, inviolate, pure and eternal: God in man, in form of a spark, hidden in the heart. This “inhabitatio dei ” is something Gnostics share with great mystics (like Saint John of the cross). Following the state of consciousness, Gnostics say, one can be more and more prisoner of the Zodiac (also called Lipika by old sources), or on the contrary, free himself out of the dialectical zodiac and break through into a new state of being. But before the heavenly ‘body’ is renewed, the Gnostic must act on his earthly body, his I-consciousness. Who forgets himself in self-surrender can hope to liberate his spirit-soul. In that way earth and heaven are linked together, microcosm and macrocosm are one. And only in this case looking at the sky makes sense for the Gnostic : he can see in the stars the image that he is bearing in himself.
• Now we can consider and understand why two Dutch esotericists, Jan Leene (1896-1968) and Henriette Stok-Huiser (died in 1990), decided in 1924 to found a new religious movement  which counts today about 20 000 members in the world. Its adepts call themselves ‘pupils’ because it is a spiritual ‘school’. And its teaching is particular all the more since it combines hermetic rosicrucianism with Gnostic Christianity. According to them not all what is called “Gnosis” is really Gnostic, because the radical dualism between the two kinds of consciousness as described above is often erased in many doctrines.  Edgar Morin for instance doesn’t point out the difference when he speaks of a “new Gnosis” as a group of beliefs whose common denominator would be a “back to magic”, hostile to the western scientist-positivist tradition. He may be blind to the specificity of the teaching of double-nature, but it makes a big difference: all means to develop the personality are banished by such a theory, what incriminates many of the groups labelled as Gnostic, especially among the ones building the New Age nebula.

The history of the L.R. is nothing else than defining properly what is exactly this “Gnostic touch”…

B/ THE ROSICRUCIAN MYTH IS CONTEMPORARY WITH THE REVIVAL OF ASTROLOGY

 The analogical  law gives the Rosycross its whole history and contents. The analogy serves the Rosycross thought in all sorts of form: the dialectic between macro- and microcosm at a philosophical level; the “mise en abyme” at a literary level, most of all the repetition at a historical level.

1/ ASTROLOGY IN THE MIDDLE-AGES OR ROSYCROSS IN THE LATE RENAISSANCE  : BIS REPETITAS

The classical Rosycross from the early 17^th century was born in Germany with the publication of two Manifestos, Fama and Confessio Fraternitatis (in 1614 and 1615), and an initiatory tale, the Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz, A.D. 1459 in 1616. Together those writings presented a legend related to a German pilgrim named "C.R.C.", who was later in the third Manifesto introduced as Christian Rosenkreuz. The legend tells that this pilgrim studied in the Middle East under various occult masters and founded the Rosicrucian Order, which aimed to bring about a "universal reformation of mankind"[xvi].

• By his initiatory journey, the young German, supposed to  be born in 1459,  travelled in the age of five across Europe than to Africa : he met Arabic wise men, learnt their mathematics and sciences, and brought them back to Spain, in order to deliver to all the western scholars and scientists a synthesis, i.e. a gnosis: the perfect knowledge. But the crowned as well as the brainy heads declined the offer. When we have a closer look at his journey, we can see that the myth copies the history of scholar astrology: starting from the Greco-roman period, when it disappeared in Europe and was collected by Islam: the Moslems made it more perfect, afterwards, it came back to Europe, via Spain, at the end of the Middle-Ages (remember the date of 1459!), opening somehow the modern times. Both integrated the cosmogonies and established themselves in the 17^th century.
• In the third founding manifesto, the Alchemical Wedding,  the main figure Christian Rosencreutz is 81 years old;  strangely enough, he always disobeys laws and rules – however he never does it on purpose! –  he is a kind of Gaston Lagaffe, as  curious as he is, and nearly so disastrous. But Christian Rosycross is not exactly the same as C.R.C. : the former is the literary personification of the myth; he is destroying or attacking the fundaments of the royal castle, where the wedding takes place, because he announces a new order of things, a “general revolution”; meanwhile he is acting so casually. But Father-Brother C.R.C., as stated in the two first manifestos, is to be taken quite seriously: he incarnates the new Christianity, as an allegory, and an alchemical metamorphosis is needed to reveal the new state of being: the union of the royal couple, or the union of the rose and the cross, or the two sides in man, in Christian, his soul and his body, and the spirit consecrates the inner wedding!
• As a matter of fact, the L.R. states that each spiritual process happens inside, and reveals itself outside afterwards. That is why the analogy micro/macrocosm is so central in the teaching. Dialectics is a constant form by Rosicrucian thoughts. Like in astrology.

2/ CHRISTIAN ROSENKREUZ : BORN UNDER THE SIGN OF EXCEPTION

The dialectics between Christian Rosycross – a man like another, maybe worse – and Father Brother CRC, the eternal archetype, make the story double-sided. The individual shape vanishes behind the cosmic one.

• According to the Fama, the grave of C.R.C was discovered in 1604. At the same time Johannes Kepler observed a supernova in the Serpent and Swan (Serpentarius and Cygnus) constellations. This was taken as the begin of a new spiritual era, all the more so since in the same year, a unique planetary constellation was observable and this time interpreted by the Rosicrucian Order as the building of the House Sancti spiritus[xvii].  The astrological considerations of the first Rosicrucians were encompassed by Jan Van Rijckenborgh into a specific kind of astrology called astrosophy. He completely neglected the geocentric horoscope and focused on the heliocentric zodiac in a Gnostic way: this world vision takes into account the Fall of mankind in indefinable times. The divine realm tries to save what once fell, by the means of a never ending reminiscence on the one hand; of the helping liberating force of nature and cosmos on the other. Here, among others, the planets of the solar system (including the Earth of course) and the zodiacal constellations both play a crucial role, concentrating cosmic influences. In other words, the supernova appearing  in the constellations of Serpentarius and Cygnus 1604 leads to the discovery of the grave of C. R.C. : the transmission of an ancient (astrological) wisdom  is spread as soon as mankind is ready for it, and takes a new way: the scholar astrology or astrosophy.
• Stars and suns are omnipresent in the manifestos: The “rotae” (Wheels)  : each brother has to meditate his rotae before acting; The globe (“Globus”) in the Wedding shows that Christian was the chosen one, invited to fulfil the regeneration of the royal couple (spirit-soul – C.R.C. is then the body). The Globes manufactures were a very profitable branch in Europe in the 17^th century: the Globe in Gottdorf, North Germany, was constructed according to the description related in the Chymical Wedding[xviii]. Christian Rosycross penetrates the secret of the alchemical Wedding when he goes out at night to observe the sky, and by a so particular conjunction, he receives a revelation (and more practical : he manages to spy the castle crew taking on board six cadavers which will be transmuted during the laboratory work on the “island of Olympus”  - and so he is the one who knows what is really going on in the tower where the alchemical transmutation occurs. (According to the L.R. this is one more time an image for the vertebral column; and the alchemical fire comes down to the spinal fire in a man attempting to purify his soul-body-system with the force of the Gnosis).

To conclude, by virtue of the sacred astrology of the origins, the Rosicrucian myth draws a strict parallel between heaven and man : because man is not considered in a personal way, but indeed only in an allegorical  or archetypical way.

If we do a double take, the teaching of

• Schism from the Rose cross of Max Heindel: no more horoscope in the L.R.

In the Age of Aquarius –which has already begun for Jan Van Rijckenborgh, as stated before[xix] – new planets, recently discovered and farer than others[xx], start to have a stronger influence upon mankind, crossing the influences of the previous planets: in the Age of Pisces, Venus, Mercury and Mars were mostly ruling the development and orientation of man’s heart, head and pelvis, ‘sanctuaries’ of feeling, thinking and acting. Nowadays the influence of the three so called ‘mystery planets’ Uranus, Neptune and Pluto (which are all beyond the orbit of Saturn) are playing more and more a discriminating role: This is the cosmic event which Jan Van Rijckenborgh soon associates with the stars appearing in the sky in 1604[xxi].

But one more time, be careful: ‘dualism oblige’, it is always the same story – and this the fine but crucial difference with other astrological thoughts – all depends on the orientation of the heart: if it stays centred on the I, only an imitative force of Aquarius will be free in man, but not liberating. The addition of all copying forces build in turn a copy of Aquarius, called by Gnostics “eon”, i.e. imprisoning forces of the zodiac. Otherwise, the spark contained in one’s heart can be free and make one’s acts change radically. If many experience this kind of freedom, they are liberating in turn the real sign of Aquarius, revealing the real sense of it. On the contrary, most of people could cling to the former dispensation too and insist in the way of life and thinking prevailing in the Age of Pisces. Last but not least people (or better consciousnesses) interested only in power, glory or possession, will probably be pretending to act  (formally) in an Aquarian way, but indeed stay deeply linked with the forces of Pisces.

• In the same time: construction of astrosophy: first book of the founder Dei Gloria Intacta
• Introduction devoted to the fight against Heindel: not cult of personality, not sublimation of it, but substitution: change one against an other
• Looks like Heindel , tastes like Heindel but it is not Heindel: no automatic liberation : freedom of choice of man: end of the only optimistic astrology

TASTE… AND DISTASTE FOR ASTROLOGY

A particular place in the teaching

C/ ASTROSOPHY OR  “GLOBALIZED VERSION” OF ASTROLOGY?

1/ THE L.R. IS BORN OF THE DISPUTE BETWEEN ASTROLOGERS : THE SCHISM BETWEEN MAX HEINDEL AND  JAN VAN RIJCKENBORGH

The teaching of Jan Van Rijckenborgh (born Jan Leene) may first look like Heindel’s doctrine, taste like Heindel’s, but is not Heindel’s. Jan Leene and his brother Z.W. Leene were firstly active members of the Rosicrucian Fellowship of Heindel and responsible for the Dutch area. They gave lessons in astrology according to the doctrine of Heindel, then both split away and founded the Rosycross of Haarlem or Golden Rosycross, also called Lectorium Rosicrucianum.

• The first book of Jan Van Rijckenborgh, Dei Gloria Intacta (published in1946) is devoted to the clear statement of what should be the task of the spiritual school of the Golden Rosycross. In the introduction (called ‘orientation’), the author rejects the split of personality as well as the cult of personality and prefers the change of personality, the substitution of the I-personality for a new soul-personality. This is a clear attack against Heindel, by whom the development of personality is an aim as such (see his cosmogony). In the masterpiece of his literary production, The New Coming Man, Jan Van Rijckenborgh takes the opposite view of Heindel (in the third part of his Cosmogony) and depicts the powers of the new man in the sense of the Sermon on the Mount (“not me but the Other in me may arise”).
• The last book, published posthumously (1990), The Gnostic Mysteries of the Pistis Sophia, still deals with astrology, in the way of the Alexandrian Gnostic Valentinus, and forecasts the end of horoscopes (chapter 29).
• Moreover, in a series of five so-called “Aquarius” international renewal conferences: 1963-1967 (held in Holland, Calw and Bad Münder in Germany, Basel in Switzerland, Toulouse in France), he focuses on the three mystery planets Uranus, Neptune and Pluto and their correcting action towards mankind: The previous rulers of the development of personality were: Venus, mercury and mars, playing an influence on the three sanctuaries: heart, head and pelvis. The new rulers develop in a higher octave the second personality or soul-personality, coming from the divine realm.

This break with traditional astrology may bring two great consequences: first the “black list” of 1996 probably condemned the L.R especially because his astrologic teachings was none of a known form: too Gnostic, too radical, too fewer compromise for personality; second the neo apocalyptic content of the teaching appeared therefore reinforced and it could have  frightened the reporters: religion as well as policy are conspiracies which are to be destroyed by time.

So it is time now to come back to globalization. Pegasus was condemned by Nike to stay – worldwide –  on earth: as a shoe! The modern Rosicrucians prefer the unicorn: revealing the superiority of spirit beyond horizontal imitation. This great fight between Pegasus and the Unicorn is the stumbling block between globalization and the astrosophy of the L.R.

2/ THE THREE MYSTERY PLANETS : AQUARIUS FACING THE MATERIAL WORLD

The L.R. sees globalization as the reduction on the material level of the Aquarian message, therefore an uncompleted caricature. However people react to its influences, and in accordance with their state of consciousness, their responding can be liberating or not. Let’s just take the example of  Uranus.

• According to Jan Van Rijckenborgh’s teachings, Aquarius influences directly the etheric plane, i.e. energy. That is why it is connected with electricity and explains why new technologies are based on electric impulsions: computer, information and internet communication; the Water Bearer pours a new etheric[xxii] vibration, supported itself by Uranus, the first ‘helper’ or ‘planetary regent’, and that leads to a dematerialisation of whole energy and formal manifestation: e.g. the society turns towards service industries, with a growing tertiary sector as a result. Goods draw back behind services, money cash behind virtual (credit card, and so on.). The most subtle product there has ever been: information, is transported everywhere, with (nearly) no limit of time or space; money is now ruling the whole market maybe more than ever before because it is the etheric expression of matter. And when women are supposed to be more receptive for etheric vibrations[xxiii], they can better answer to the Uranus-vibration too (as they did with Venus in the previous Age); and either they will smooth the men still acting according to Mars, that is: learn them how to ‘think with the heart’; or they‘ll succeed in diverting men from misusing their intellectual power and bring them truly to love (in an upper sense: charity!).
• In Jan Van Rijckenborgh’s eyes, women are expected to speed things up : say good bye to the ancient order of thing and accelerate the ‘general world reformation’, to speak with the classical Rosicrucians. Perhaps the fertility transition is the straightest way. In his lifetime, the founder of the Lectorium Rosicrucianum, (born Jan Leene) led the movement with a woman on his side, Mrs. Catharose de Petri (whose marital name was Stok-Huizer)[xxiv]. Both were respectively married. Jan Van Rijckenborgh wrote: “So women will have a great duty to do: save all by organizing a typical women’s resistance, not with violence or guns[xxv], but in the force of Christ  and of the Uranus fire.[xxvi]” From 1968 (Jan Van Rijckenborgh’s death) till her own death in 1990, Catharose de Petri alone ruled the Spiritual School of the Golden Rose Cross.
• We can summarize the influences of the three mystery planets in the following chart, stressing the consequences depending on whether man reacts positively or negatively

CONCLUSION

Of two evils choose the lesser?

Edgar Morin stated that, always when we question seriously the present time, it reveals us its roots, it makes sensible, visible, real – in particular “ecosystemic” and chronological conditions – what is anthropological but has been till now only in a virtual state. And it works conversely too! That is why he gave this piece of advice: we need to ask the man who is asking the stars. That is what we have done.

Beyond the debate about who we are when we speak either of  Globalization or of Aquarius, the stake is consequently eschatological, even more than ideological, that is why the answer cannot be easy nor simple, but is of interest for anyone: either futurologists, astrologers or investors, directors, politicians, economists, or even gurus…

But Morin added : “If the contemporary science can’t tell anything about the person (subject), and if astrology is a false science, then we must search for the scienza nuova.” In the Italian Renaissance, Pico della Mirandola and Marcilio Ficino used to clash with each other : Ficino combined horoscopes, Pico refused in the name of science. Though both were fascinated by the sky, and love was the purest image of God according to both of them. We hope to have shown that a slight discrepancy in the meaning of a word (astrology) can have the deepest consequences in our time. Whether globalized or Aquarian, the world is now changing extremely quickly and radically. And everyone is asked to follow or to resist. Using the stars or not, may the clear consciousness guide everyone’s steps.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION. 2

I/     AQUARIANS FACING GLOBALIZATION : A CONFUSED LOVE STORY. 2

A/ GLOBALIZATION: MYTH OR REALITY?. 2

1/ GLOBALIZATION IN QUESTION. 2

2/ DEFINING GLOBALIZATION IS NOT FINDING IT. 3

B/ THE HISTORICAL MISUNDERSTANDING. 3

1/ THE TWO PREVIOUS ERAS OF GLOBALIZATION WERE BLOODY. 3

2/ HOW COULD THE THIRD GLOBALIZATION JOIN AQUARIAN EXPECTATIONS?. 4

C/  THE 3^RD GLOBALIZATION HAS ALREADY HAPPENED TOO : BUT ONLY IN THE CONSCIOUSNESS! 4

1/ WITH OR WITHOUT YOU! 4

2/ FRUSTRATIONS USUALLY LEAD AQUARIANS TO ANTI-GLOBALIZATION. 4

II/ WHY THE AQUARIAN CONSPIRACY HASN’T REALLY SUCCEEDED. 5

A/ THECOMPETITION WITH GLOBALIZATION DID THE AQUARIAN CONSPIRACY A BAD TURN. 5

1/ THE SAME… BUT DIFFERENT! 5

2/ GLOBALIZATION IS AHEAD OF AQUARIUS… EVEN FOR MANY CENTURIES! 6

3/ TOO OPTIMISTIC TO BE TRUE. 6

B/ THE MODERN DEVELOPMENT OF ASTROLOGY DIVIDED THE AQUARIAN COMMUNITY. 7

1/ THE DOUBLE LOGIC OF ASTROLOGY : ASTROLOGICAL AND ANALOGICAL. 7

2/ THE PERPETUAL MUTATION OF ASTROLOGY HAS REPEATED ITSELF IN THREE DECADES. 8

C/ THE SOCIAL INTEGRATION OF AQUARIAN CONSPIRATORS KILLED ALMOST ALL OF THEM. 9

1/ SOCIAL MUTATION : FROM THE AQUARIAN CONSPIRACY TO THE ‘CULTURAL CREATIVES’ 9

2/ THE AQUARIAN SIGN VANISCHES. 9

3/ THE SECULAR MODE OF CULTURE WARS REPLACES DEFINITELY THE SPIRIT (OF AQUARIUS) 10

III/ THE TODAY AQUARIAN CONSPIRACY : THE MODERN OFFSPRING OF GNOSTIC COUNTER-CULTURE. 12

A/ THE FEW SURVIVORS. 12

1/ THE ASTERIX’S COMPLEX  BY GNOSTICS. 12

2/ THE BREAK POINT :  THE TWO ORDERS OF NATURE. 12

3/ NO GNOSTICS ARE CONSEQUENTLY INTERESTED IN HOROSCOPS. 12

B/ THE ROSICRUCIAN MYTH IS CONTEMPORARY WITH THE REVIVAL OF ASTROLOGY. 13

1/ ASTROLOGY IN THE MIDDLE-AGES OR ROSYCROSS IN THE LATE RENAISSANCE  : BIS REPETITAS. 13

2/ CHRISTIAN ROSENKREUZ : BORN UNDER THE SIGN OF EXCEPTION. 14

C/ ASTROSOPHY OR  “GLOBALIZED VERSION” OF ASTROLOGY?. 15

1/ THE L.R. IS BORN OF THE DISPUTE BETWEEN ASTROLOGERS : THE SCHISM BETWEEN MAX HEINDEL AND  JAN VAN RIJCKENBORGH. 15

2/ THE THREE MYSTERY PLANETS : AQUARIUS FACING THE MATERIAL WORLD. 16

CONCLUSION. 17

CONTENTS. 18

CESNUR reproduces or quotes documents from the media and different sources on a number of religious issues. Unless otherwise indicated, the opinions expressed are those of the document's author(s), not of CESNUR or its directors.

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