All those who believe in a new age must believe in renewal. A feeling of stagnation and corruption overtakes the world. Crime and inflation and war rise; beauty and innocence decline. A renewal is a refreshing thing to happen. It makes all new again, like a child, or like a spring day. An age of renewal approaches. The strange beads and salt refer to the thriving cults that spring up in a dying time. It is difficult for the public to distinguish these from the Sun, the genuine light that burns away the mists of darkness and heralds a new day. Death is the Renewer. To become a little child again, you only have to die. The Renewer is a man with blue flesh, masked by a red cloth, wearing a loin-cloth and a cloak, which is secured by a yellow jewel. He stands inside a large crown, holding a scepter behind him, and holding out a skull, whose eye-sockets form the sign of eternal life. A nude man kneels inside the crown on our right, looking over his shoulder at us (not kissing the skull as Cooke has painted it). On our left, a nude woman kneels outside the crown, and buries her face in the Renewer's cloak. In our left background is a garden with two trees, one with leaves and no fruit, the other with ten fruit but no leaves. In right background, is a well with five rows of stones on which sets a chalice with three handles. Above, the sun is hidden by a dark cloud, but sends forth 7 rays. All these colors and numbers of things are significant. Such details matter very much in symbolism, though we don't notice them in ordinary art. when interpreting a mandala or dream, it is well to begin by making lists of the numbers and colors of things, for they are often shorthand for whole trains of symbolic ideas. As always, the starting point is man's experience. What in our life is suggested by a particular element, such as the blue flesh of the Renewer? I helped with the birth of both my children, so I happen to know that at the moment of crowning, the head looks like earth from outer space, all blue skin, with white clouds of hair. I inquired about this and learned that this is normal. All children have blue flesh at the instant of birth, turning in a few seconds to pink. Blue is also a normal color for human flesh just at the moment of death, though it may have a kind of grayish pallor before and a waxy look afterwards. The Nameless One calls the Death card the Renewer as a way of telling us that birth and death are doors, and one leads to the other. If you look back in envy at the happy freshness of childhood, you are also looking forward to your own future. But before there can be a birth of the new, there must be a death of the old. Sometimes we dread this transition in civilization and in our personal existence. Thus, the woman hides her face from the awful presence of the Renewer, and the man looks back at us, even though he has stepped inside the crown, and entered the domain of death. The Renewer wears a mask of anger, because it takes energy to commit an act of Renewal. The true reason is something cool. It is the yellow stone, life itself, which holds the cloak in place. People wonder sometimes why they cannot remember their past lives without some special exercise. It is good that we cannot. The renewal would not take place if there was not a forgetting. It is life that cloaks the Renewer. Since renewal is an event which takes place in time, with a before and after, I interpret the two trees in the garden as before and after. In the recent past, world civilization has had wealth and technology but little real civilization, thus the tree of the past has leaves but no fruit. The tree of the future suggests a reversal. Having squandered all the non-renewable resources and raped and plundered the earth, we will be left with little economic might. Yet, the ten fruit of the Tree of Life shall be ours, as we encounter what is important that we do not have now, the ten forms of Self-realization. In our present age, the Sun is hidden by the dark cloud of ignorance, cast by the sooty fires of the Thinker. Yet the seven rays (ways) shine forth, there to light the way for all those who seek them out. The well to the deeps that will bring up "a pitcher of water that reflects the Sun" will be built by five races on the five continents. Each shall lay a course of stones on the well. The age of dominance of the world by the West is about over. The cup to drink the waters of life has handles of creation, preservation, and destruction. An age of renewal requires all three. Each may he a holy act, laying the groundwork for the future, depending on what is created, what is destroyed, and what is preserved. There are some who will embrace the age of Renewal, and revel in its violence. In the revelation of the Nameless One, the male figures often represent the bolder spirits of either sex, while the female figures adopt a more timid or passive role. But note that the Renewer is not a license for mindless destruction. The man is confined by the crown of responsibility. |
"The siren bell has rung. Its penetration has entered but not emerged. Therefore its vibration continues its wonders to perform... The market place is a-thrive. Strange beads and salt are vended. Buyers there are none. A pitcher of water reflects the sun. The thirst is mighty but the sun is reflected undisturbed. Maggots will grow if the pitcher is not emptied."