WELCOME TO THE GOLDEN AGE
by Felix Fojas
"The shape of things to come," exclaims the visionary. "Armageddon!" cries the doomsday prophet. "The Golden Age," the mystic proclaims. "Aquarius rising, " remarks the astrologer. "Pure, unadulterated nonsense," says the skeptic in a bored tone. Call it anything you want, imagine it to be your own unique concept of heaven or hell--chances are it will be beyond your wildest dreams. For one thing is definite: a new age has dawned upon us.
Astrologically, the period that takes the earth to pass through each of the Twelve Signs of the Great Zodiac is divided into a greater and lesser cycle. The greater cycle, which is known as the Great Year, is composed of 25,868 years. On the other hand the lesser cycle or the Great Month lasts approximately 2,000 years. Actually it is the Great Month of Aquarius that we have entered in the the year 2000 A.D. Strictly speaking, we are just in the orb of Aquarius, but the Great Year of Aquarius is till a long way off and will commence in 2638 A.D. when the Sun will by precession enter the constellation Aquarius.
As the song goes, which was popularized by the Fifth Dimension in the late 60's:
When the Moon is in the Seventh House
And Jupiter aligns with Mars
And Peace will guide the planets
And Love will still the stars...
The dawning of the Millennium, which be marked by a major planetary alignment, will in turn trigger a drastic change in human civilization. If Pisces, a water sign symbolizing feeling, stirred a revolution in human emotions two thousand years ago when Christ walked the earth, Aquarius or the Water Bearer--an air sign commonly mistaken by many as a water sign, which stands for the psyche--has been predicted by seers to usher in a revolution in the human mind.
Since the middle of the last century when Aquarian vibrations started impinging upon planet Earth, up to the present era, science has literally made a quantum leap." Aquarius is responsible for more inventions for the benefit of humanity than any of the other Signs," opines Alan Leo, the internationally famous astrologer. Note, however, that the true keyword of Aquarius is 'humanity' and it is hoped in the future that the scientific breakthrough will be followed by a spiritual renaissance. Here the moderating influence of Leo, Aquarius's polarity, will be crucial in averting a nuclear holocaust and other man-made cataclysms. As a counterforce, the planetary ruler of Aquarius is Uranus, the celestial harbinger of revolution and sudden change, although the planet also exerts a positive spiritual and humanitarian influence.
Based on esoteric astrology, the Moon, the Sun, the Earth, and other celestial bodies have their own aura or electromagnetic field known in occult parlance as the "ring-pass-not" which extends millions of miles into outer space. Ever since the Sun moved toward the constellation Aquarius, its vast aura already came in touch with Aquarian vibrations long before the Sun actually entered the Sign. Now that we have entered the Great Year of the Millennium which started in the year 2000 A.D., a spiritual revolution had already been sweeping the face of the earth to prepare humanity for the advent of the Golden Age or Satya Yuga in Sanskrit.
The violet-colored Aquarian or Seventh Ray energy will bring out the best and the worst among men. The spiritual will become more spiritual, whereas the materialist will lust for more power and wealth. This will effect a polarization of two opposing forces, the yin and the yang, the negative and the positive, the evil and the good--leading to a final confrontation which will result in a global catharsis or purgation in the form of natural and man-made catastrophes. After learning such a painful lesson, humanity will recover from its spiritual trauma and erase national boundaries. A spiritual world government will be created which will champion the ideology of love and brotherhood. One thousand years of peace will reign upon Earth under the leadership of a new great spiritual teacher or avatar. Clairvoyance, ESP, and astral travel will be common phenomena. The likes of Einstein and da Vinci will populate the world.
New Age philosopher David Spangler in the book Reimagination of the World: A Critique of the New Age Science and Popular Culture (co-authored by William Irwin Thompson) states that the New Age can be defined in four major viewpoints. First, the emergence of a planetary culture," not in the sense of a world goverment, but a "greater global awareness, cooperation and coordination on the part of all peoples and institutions, with particular mindfulness of how we are all interconnected and interdependent...Second, the response to the archetype or myth of the sacred planet, an embodiment of man's desire to create a world in which humanity, nature and the domain of the spirit work together in ways that are naturally empowering and co-creative. Thirdly, New Age is the gestalt of our multifaceted responses to the global changes happening around us...the spirit behind our responses to the technological, political, economic, scientific and spiritual realities is the factor which minimizes or eliminates the danger that we will destroy ourselves and our world and maximizes the possibility that through a greater planetary awareness and a shared planetary culture, we will further the emergence of a sacred world. And lastly, the New Age is an evolutionary shift within the life and spirit of the Earth itself. Just as human puberty brings hormonal shifts, rebalancing and the changes are going on within the subtle or spiritual body of the Earth. New "energies" and qualities are being taken on, and the older ones are being let go of. The Earth as a being is forming a new pattern of inner relationships with the cosmoc."
In her tour de force titled The Aquarian Conspiracy, Marilyn Ferguson describes a network of conspirators in the United States whose ranks work singly or in a group, often unaware of one another's activities. This network has a singular goal: usher in a revolution in human consciousness and give birth to a civilization with boundless material spiritual potential. Although Ferguson limits her study to the United States, her insight can well apply to the rest of the world.
To quote Ferguson: "The network is the Aquarian Conspiracy which represents the Now What. We have moved into unknown, The known has failed us completely. Taking a broader view of history and deeper measure of nature, the Aquarian Conspiracy is a different revolution. It looks to the turnabout in consciousness of a critical number of individuals, enough to bring a renewal of society."
Derived from the Greek word paradigma, which means "pattern," a paradigm is a mental construct, a framework of thought that is utilized to explain certain aspects of reality from a particular viewpoint. Paradigms can be applied to all fields of human endeavor, and people speak of an economic, religious, political, philosophical, or scientific paradigm. Thomas Kuhn, a science historian and philosopher, invented the concept of "paradigm shift" which which he originally applied to science. A paradigm shift is nothing more that a new way of thinking about old problems.
Usually it takes generations or even centuries for an old paradigm to be supplanted by a new one. There is often a yawning time gap that separates the discovery of a new paradigm and its actual application. To cite an example, even the most influential scientists are still under strong attack from the Establishment, the sworn defender of the old paradigm, until a new paradigm gains ground and creates a revolution in human consciousness.
The same argument holds true for New Age teachings, the paradigm of the Aquarian Age. Thirty years ago, very few paid serious attention to them. New Age teachings were either branded as an absurdity or superstition, if not downright work of the devil. In stark contrast, today New Age teachings are capturing the hearts and minds of the young and old alike. But what exactly are New Age teachings? These are the quintessence, minus dogma, of the same age-old spiritual truths which were preached by Christ, Krishna, Buddha, Muhammad and other enlightened beings to fit the pragmatic needs and temperament of modern man.
New Age teachings will shape the consciousness of a new type of humanity that is emerging, a much more compassionate and loving one than its predecessors. This new species of man is probably what the philosopher Nietzsche foresaw in a vision a century ago--which he described as the "ubermensch" or superman whose luminous countenance will bring light to the world. Slowly homo mechanicus will become extinct and give way to homo magicus, the Aquarian genius.
Today, Astrology has been transformed into the modern and scientific-sounding "Biorhythm," Absent healing is now called "Radionics." Exorcism is currently termed "Psychotherapy," and Yoga has been renamed "Cybernetics." All these are old spiritual wines in new bottles. Indeed, there is a groundswell of interest in New Age teachings. Thousands of books and countless seminars are being offered on such diverse esoteric subjects as Crystal Power, Creative Visualization, Feng Shui, Alchemy, Yoga and Color Meditation. On the other hand, interesting magazines and journals on spirituality, the paranormal and the occult, both of the eastern and the western variety, are proliferating the world over. Spiritual organizations, old and new alike, denominational and non-denominational, are gaining legions of adherents. It is obvious that there is a growing market for spiritual commodities. New Age books and other spiritual paraphernalia are selling briskly. This is why Astroscope, Magical Blend and other similar magazines have appeared on the publishing scene in order to respond, not just to a solitary voice, but to innumerable voices out there in the wilderness that are crying for the manna of spiritual enlightenment.
