The letter A

[soaring crane]

A

 

Was at church this evening, the daughter was playing piano. While zoning out and half meditating half listening and half dreaming, I found myself staring at the altar which had a cloth with the alpha and omega on it. I was staring at the A and it occurred to me suddenly that it could represent a mountain, with the wide base at the bottom and the peak at the top. And most incredibly, the line separating the halves!

 

This seemed deeply significant and I want to spend more time with the image.

Edited December 16, 2013 by soaring crane

[Marblehead]

Nice.

 

The "A" image appears many place in nature. Let us know where you go with this.

[RongzomFan]

The number 8 will blow your mind.

[Nungali]

So will A ;

 

A - Aleph - Fool - Air.

 

Air - mind. Fool sets off on journey ; go-ing.

 

Air going - wind.

 

Blow your mind. Fool goes without mind (but still finds success )

 

8 - Mercury - mind. Mercury and Fool - air.

 

Kabblahblahla - mind blown .

 

Lao Tsu - Fool ?

Edited December 16, 2013 by Nungali

[C T]

"A" I like very much.

......

 

 

&

[Taomeow]

That's the pyramid with the capstone.

[Marblehead]

The number 8 will blow your mind.

Yes, turn "8" on its side and what do we have? Infinity.

[soaring crane]

In my classes I often use the image of the mountain to direct the attention. The base of the mountain is widest and as the inner eye travels upward, it encounters less and less mountain but more and more sky/heaven (in German we use the same word for both - Himmel - so it becomes ambiguous in a positive sense).

 

Return from the mountains peak, travel downward and you arrive eventually at the wide base of the mountain once again.

 

Climb up past the mountain's peak and you enter pure heaven... but you always must return to the base.

 

There's a point along the way, both ways, that represents equilibrium. A horizontal axis...

 

This is what I saw in the Alpha during the church service yesterday while my daughter was playing the Feather theme from Forrest Gump :-)

[soaring crane]

That's the pyramid with the capstone.

That too :-)

 

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha_and_Omega

Edited December 16, 2013 by soaring crane

[Stosh]

I like quotation marks, theyre like little footprints where someone else was ,

but they arent there right now.

[C T]

In Buddhist practice, the letter 'A' is deemed to be the mother of all the letters.

 

If one breathes out with an open mouth, the sound is 'A', or sometimes, 'A h'. Its the first sound of a newborn (in cries) and also the sound of the last breath leaving the body at death.

 

Again, in Buddhist mantric practice, 'A' is the essence of all mantras.

 

On the side of esoteric Buddhist practice, the meaning of 'A' is anutpada, or that which is unarisen and primordial.

 

'A' is also the seed syllable (bija) of Mahavairocana as the Dharmakaya Buddha.

 

 

some trivial facts to add to the mix.

[Taomeow]

Yes, turn "8" on its side and what do we have? Infinity.

 

You just have to turn everything on its side, don't you?..

[Taomeow]

Know synesthesia, the peculiarity some people have of perceiving across sensory systems, e.g. sounds as colors? Nabokov described the colors he saw associated with each sound of a letter of the alphabet, and asserted he inherited this from his mother. I have something else, since childhood, but don't know if it has ever been described and given a Latin name, so I named it myself: morphokinesthesia (from morph, "form, structure, shape" and kinesthesia, sensory perception of motion and position of the body in space.) What some of you are talking about is probably a manifestation -- e.g. Soaring Crane perceiving the letter A as a mountain to climb back and forth, or Stosh seeing quotation marks as footprints of someone else who was there.

 

I have a case of morphokinesthesia that extends to all languages and snippets of languages I know, and finds their unifying features, meanings of the actual real-life changes of shape and motion encoded in letters and sounds of the language. Not just in individual letters and sounds but in their combinations, different positions within words, etc.. This reveals such deep levels of energies embedded in the languages that the process becomes an alchemical extraction, a search for "pure" meanings of "pure" sounds.

 

For instance, T and ST denote a whole bunch of things related to motion, either a cessation or pause of motion or a choice between motion and STillness. T is a Table (and it is visiually), it STands, STable is its feature (has legs but does not walk) and in Russian a table is STol, while a STep is taken by a STupnya (fooT), you can STep or STop, STand, STill, SToop, be STationary like a poST, lamppoST, something S(e)T -- then there's Table as a schedule which is STable and which reflects motion that comes and goes, and a STable for horses is where they are kept when you rather than the horse decides whether it will move or STay puT, and on and on -- I have dozens of T and ST examples. And that's just one example of one discrenible morphokinesthetic configuration.

 

I live in this weird world all the time, sometimes it's mild but sometimes it hiTs me like a Ton of bricks -- STRikes me, but STR is a different morphokinesthetic animal, this one STReams, STRums, it is goverend by TR, the TRepidation, TRembling, TRebling, STRing kind of motion... anyway, don't get me STarted (this one intends to get somewhere but hasn't yet...)

Edited December 16, 2013 by Taomeow

[Captain Mar-Vell]

...

 

Perhaps experiences such as yours taomeow, and I share similar if not identical experiences with words and word meanings, are connected with, is it called the alchemical language of the birds, or somesuch?

 

Perhaps it is just a general ability to look at information in a creative way.

 

...

Edited December 16, 2013 by Captain Mar-Vell

[Marblehead]

I like quotation marks, theyre like little footprints where someone else was ,

but they arent there right now.

Reminded me of a song I listened to a few days ago. One line was: "Her eyes were wide open, but there was nobody home."

[Marblehead]

You just have to turn everything on its side, don't you?..

I'm not gonna' say anything, just letting you know that I saw that. Hehehe.

 

Well, Okay, just one thing: Any which way but loose.

[Captain Mar-Vell]

...

 

Apophenia.

 

Pareidolia.

 

Synaesthesia.

 

Kinaesthesia is it? Something like it. I'll look it up later maybe.

 

The above are strange phenomena.

 

Some of them indicative of psychic ability, I believe.

 

And the Language of the Birds.

 

Tweet tweet.

 

...

Edited December 16, 2013 by Captain Mar-Vell

[Nungali]

Hermetics and other systems work by association but with synesthetics it is a real and visual thing. One doesn't associate 5 with red but 'SEES' red when they see 5, i.e. the association has a neurological result as opposed to a mental one.

[Nungali]

In Buddhist practice, the letter 'A' is deemed to be the mother of all the letters.

In Hebrew there are 3 'mothers and each one is attributed to a the three elements ( like the three Gunas - not as in the 4 elements model)

 

If one breathes out with an open mouth, the sound is 'A', or sometimes, 'A h'. Its the first sound of a newborn (in cries) and also the sound of the last breath leaving the body at death.

 

Again, in Buddhist mantric practice, 'A' is the essence of all mantras.

 

On the side of esoteric Buddhist practice, the meaning of 'A' is anutpada, or that which is unarisen and primordial.

 

In a way, it is similar in Hermetics ; A is primal air as in the triad; water air fire - air 'creates' (or contains) fire and water (obvious polarities) the same as Tao contains Yin and Yang.

 

'A' is also the seed syllable (bija) of Mahavairocana as the Dharmakaya Buddha.

 

 

some trivial facts to add to the mix.

 

Not trivial informative ... to show, yet again, IMO, that we all looking at the same jewel through different facets .... says 'Mr Chop-suey'

[C T]

It was informative indeed. Thank you, Nungali.

[Nungali]

Ha! I just realised if A is air and the tree mother letters are a triad with air / A as the 'top ' point of that triad then air/A is THE mother letter ... as you said above

 

- silly of me as A air aleph and "The Fool' (in the Tarot; as it has those associations) and the Fool (unnumbered or 0 ) stands apart from all the other cards ... a bit like the Joker in a regular deck .

 

Lao-Tsu / fool ? : Mullah Nasrudin / joker ?

 

Do you have any more 'snippets' of info about Buddhist practice with other letters?

Edited December 17, 2013 by Nungali

[Isimsiz Biri]

Latin Alphabet has not been invented by Romans. Romans learnt it from Etruscans. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Etruscan_civilization)

 

The Etruscans is an old Turkish tribe. The Etruscan alphabet is an old Turkish alphabet. The capital letter "A" represents God Almighty or Allah. The top point of the letter represents Allah's unity.

[C T]

Do you have any more 'snippets' of info about Buddhist practice with other letters?

dhīḥ

the above is the seed syllable of perfect wisdom. Its association is with Manjughosa and Manjusri. Its also the seed syllable of the Prajnaparamita.

 

 

hūṃ

Hum is frequently the last syllable that ends a mantra. Its association is with Aksobhya, Vajrasattva and Vajrapani. In Buddhist mantras Hum is used to seal mantras so that 'leakage' is diminished.

 

 

 

hrīḥ

This is a powerful seed syllable and also seals the energy of mantras. Its associated with Amitabha. Its been cited that Hrih is a mantric solar symbol, a luminous, elevating, upwards moving sound, and one which energises/purifies the pranic channels.

 

--------------------------

 

These are a few of the potent syllables used in Vajrayana Buddhist mantras when a sadhu aspires to connect and work with certain Buddha families (energetic sources) for various obvious or subtle reasons.

 

If your interests would take you further, i'd recommend a little peek at this link -- http://www.wildmind.org/mantras/figures

 

 

all the best!

 

 

 

 

ps. apologies for deviating the topic, Soaring Crane.

Edited December 17, 2013 by C T

[soaring crane]

The topic is the universe and all it contains. How is it possible to deviate from that? :-)

[Aetherous]

Å