The Celestial Ship of North

With Symbolical Illustrations and a Glossary

VOLUME I

NATIONAL EXTENSION UNIVERSITY

597 Fifth AvenueNew York, N. Y.

Copyright, 1927, by E. VALENTIA STRAITON

Copyright in Great Britain

All rights reserved

Printed in U.S.A

I GRATEFULLY DEDICATE MY BOOK

to my friend S. E. D., who has ever been ready to enrich my resources with the treasures of her priceless wisdom and has inspired me to rise above the bondage of materialism into that paradise of promise, the happy fields of Aahen-Ru. My great desire is that all who read this book may be similarly inspired to look above and to love the Great Cosmic Mother and her children, the Luminaries, the stately Planets and the brilliant Stars.

<Illustration: The Celestial Ship of the North>

FOREWORD

Age after age the Great Architect of the Universe has sent his messengers in many lands to make plain to man that the laws under which life spiritual and temporal evolves have been the same from the foundation of the world and are but the reactions of the planet earth to the stimuli of the moon, stars, suns and super-suns of the heavens. And amongst these the Mighty Ruler, "Ship of the North," was ever pre-eminent in its primal energising.

The relation between the heavens and earth has been the same fundamentally in all ages. Out of knowledge of this ancient bond has been born the only true religion or "binding back" to causation.

Heavenly forces play upon earth and visibly impress their operative laws. The sun governs earth's motion. The moon sways earth's tides. The pole-star exerts a lawgiving, orbit-directing influence upon earth's polar axis. And the signs of the zodiac through which the Sun takes his royal course year after year and in one of which earth dwells every age, being at present in Pisces and proceeding thence into Aquarius, were called the "living creatures" because of their lively magisterial modification of all forces playing through the sun upon earth. Of old other celestial governors of earth were known and their forces differentiated and reverenced.

Reverence in its highest essence is an eternal and nonpersonal attribute of the soul and withers slowly but fatally in the face of the reiterated assertion of a personal exegetic dogma divorced from Nature's laws. To continue in spiritual growth man must worship his Maker alone, that First Cause of which all other causes are but relegations or emanations.

Astrology and astronomy, esoteric and exotetic knowledge of the heavenly bodies or entities, have lain at the generating heart of every great religion that has waxed and waned upon earth in accordance with cyclic celestial law.

Out of the past the author has brought path-finding clues to this First Cause which reveals Itself.

These pages are a contribution to that painstaking, scientific, selfless research which shall in the coming years identify behind the allegory, symbology and ritual of many faiths the same everlasting truth, which perceived will unite all races and creeds in reverence of creature for Creator, the one eternal religion or "binding back" to Causation.

-- S.E.D.

<Illustration: Constellation of the Great Bear>

"Every one of these Stars that are in Heaven, do not make the like, or an equal course; who is it that hath prescribed unto every one, the manner and the greatness of their course?

"This Bear that turns round about its own self; and carries the whole World with her, who possessed and made such an Instrument.

"Who hath set the Bounds of the Sea? Who hath established the Earth? For there is somebody, 0 Tat, that is the Maker and Lord of these things.

"For it is impossible, O Son, that either place, or number, or measure, should be observed without a Maker.

"For no order can be made by disorder or disproportion."

-- Hermes Trismegistus.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

Book One

The Dawn of Divine Conception

CHAPTER I.--The Mother of Mystery

Her Origin and Reason for the Worship given Her--Her many beautiful Revelations because of her coming direct from God, and being the Medium through which Life was given to the World--The Great Bear--The Thigh of the North--The Mother Typhon--Early religious Worship--Sut, Son of Typhon--Fall of Sut-Typhon--Introduction of the Fatherhood--Kush and Zaba--"The Beginningless Lights"--Birth of Cycles--Bi-Une Gods--The Mystical Seven--Eve--The Serpent Woman--The Primal Pair--Adam.

CHAPTER II.--The Land of Light

Egypt--Her Mysteries that were Heaven born--The Egypt above found in the Egypt below--The Laws of Heaven--Mitzraim--Negroes--Dynasties of the Gods--Menes--Sebek-Ra, type of Fulfillment--Precessional sacrificial Types.

CHAPTER III.--"It is in the Mystical We Have the True"

Ancient Way of recording scientific Facts--Myths of endless Variety--Image making Faculty of Primitive Man--Why Divine--Draco--Scarab--Ibis--Mouse, etc.--Various Names of the Great Mother--Their Significance--The Ass--The Cynocephalus--Breathing Utterances--Mantrams--Words as Types, etc.

CHAPTER IV.--Dualities

The Two Truths of all Life--Symbols and Myths--Primitive--Astronomical--Divine--Of a Dual Nature--Many giving abstract Ideas of God--Origin through Darkness--Night the Great Mystery.

CHAPTER V.--The Garden of the Beautiful

The Garden of Eden and its Origin--Its Antiquity--The Primal Pair symbolized in Heaven--Rivers of Eden interpreted--Antiquity of the Cross--Cross and Circle--The Dog Star--Cult of the Lamb--Chrestos--Nails-- Sun and Moon at Easter--Two Traditions of the Crucifixion--The Mummy, its Significance--Totems.

CHAPTER VI.--The Sacred Four

Corners of the World--Genii--Angels--Types--Gospels--Four Ancient Magical Books--Cardinal Cross--Four Sacred Animals--Astrologically interpreted--The Four Sacred Stars--Ezekiel's Vision--Divine Number of the Hebrews--Symbolism and Mysticism.

CHAPTER VII.--The Tree

Its Origin in the Garden of Eden--Why called "The Mother of Life"--Its many beautiful Myths--The Palm Tree--Trees of the Lenni Lenape Indians--Oak Tree--The Druids--The Mistletoe--Yule Log--Tree, Pillar, Sceptre--Original Temples--Acacia or Thorn Bush.

CHAPTER VIII.--Festivals of Fire

May Pole--Worship of the Sun--Mystical Fire--Festivals of the Sun at the Solstices--Baal Fires--Origin of the Christmas Tree--Mummers--Fire Dances--Circle Dance--Pyrrhic Dance--Serpent Dance of the Indians--Baldur--Divining Rod--Mithra--His Cult, and Christianity--Zoroaster and John of Patmos--Serapis, its Worship--Gnostics--Horus the Egyptian Messiah--Constellation of Osiris.

CHAPTER IX.--Celestial Waters

Deluges and their ancient Traditions--Constellation of the Dragon--Pyramid--Deluge and Dragon--Dual Meaning of the Flood--Mysticism of the Ark--Deluge and Ark~Noah--Titans--Giants--Tower of Babel-- Nimrod--Shu and Kepheus--Kush--Coils of the Serpent--World subject to Conflagration and Flood--Ezekiel, Daniel and John.

CHAPTER X.--Celestiai Origin of Jewish Race and Hebrew Language.--Seven, Ten, and Twelve

The Hek-Shus--Hebrews--Sut, the Black God, Nahsi--Aten--Temple and Shrine at Luxor--Exodus--Doctrine of the Coming One--Iu-em-Hept--The Jew and the Sign Capricorn--Jewish Serpent Worship--Lost Tribes--Atlantis--Children of Israel--Jacob, Israel--Jacob and the Angel--The Place Peniel--Scutum Sobieski--Terah--Teraphim, Seraphim, Cherubim--Elohim--El, Sut, Satan, Son and Angel--The Pentateuch--Jehovah--Elohim.

CHAPTER XI.--Heavenly Measures

Poles of Heaven and Earth--Anciently called the "Great Benefic Gods"--Kabiri--Titans--The Giants--"The Powerful through Fire"--Seven Kabiri--Pole Star--Meru--The North Pole--Precession of the Equinoxes--Their deep Significance--The Two Polar Motions--The Labyrinth--Primal Seven--Kabiri--The Seven Great Stars.

CHAPTER XII.--Messengers of the Eternal

Angels or Time Cycles~-Prophecies--Sirius--Keepers of Time--The Dog--Phoenix--The Great Pyramid--Cycles--Myths of the Birth of Time--Ancient Astrologers--Cycles as Prophecies--The Beetle--Giant Repha--Giant Cycles--Sothic and Phoenix Cycles--Doctrine of the Merkabah--The Angels.

CHAPTER XIII.--The Keeper of the Supernal Treasures of Knowledge and Wisdom

The Serpent--The Constellation Draco--Serpent Worship--The Gnosis--The Way of the Serpent--Draco and the PoIe--Traditional Reason for eating the Serpent and Drinking its Blood--Brazen Serpent--Serpent of Genesis--Serpent Catacombs--Eye and Serpent--Jacob and Esau--Wisdom of the Serpent--SUS interpreted--Serpent Fire or Force--The Beguiling in the Garden of Eden--Draco or the Dragon.

ILLUSTRATIONS

Book One

The Ship of the North

Adapted from an ancient Symbol by Berenice Langton.

Constellation of the Great Bear

The Virgin Mother

From the "Book of the Master," by Marsham Adams. Courtesy of G. P. Putnam's Sons, Publishers, New York.

Obelisk at Heliopolis

Vultures

From the Temple at Karnak. From "Egyptian Archeology" by G. Maspero. Translated into English by Amelia B. Edwards. Published by H. Grevel & Co., London.

Egyptian Symbolical Head-dress

Watching Over Eden

From "The Natural Genesis" by Gerald Massey. Published by Williams & Norgate, London.

The Tat Cross

Adapted by Berenice Langton.

A Village in Punt

"From Mariette's 'Deir-el-Bahari'." From "Egypt and its Monuments," by Amelia B. Edwards. Courtesy of Harper & Bros., Publishers, New York.

The May Pole

From "The Rosicrucians," by Hargrave Jennings. Published by Chatto & Windus, London.

Noah's Ark

Lugdani Batavorum. Engraved in the year 1593. From "The Rosicrucians," by Hargrave Jennings. Published by Chatto & Windus, London.

The Seven Great Stars

Berenice Langton.

Hieroglyphic Engraving

In the innermost hall of the Holy of Holies in the Temple of Luxor. Eighteenth Dynasty. From "The Natural Genesis," by Gerald Massey. Published by Williams & Norgate, London.

Poles of the Ecliptic and Equator

From "The Faith of Ancient Egypt," by Sidney G. P. Coryn. Courtesy of the Theosophical Publishing Company, New York.

Cyclic Tree

Adapted from an ancient Egyptian Zodiac by Berenice Langton.

Constellation Draco

The Mystical Serpent

From "The Natural Genesis," by Gerald Massey. Published by Williams & Norgate, London.

BOOK ONE

Dawn of Divine Conception

<Illustration: The Virgin Mother>

THE VIRGIN MOTHER

"Depicted on the walls of the secret and sealed Shrine in the Temple of Denderah is this picture of Hathor, known to the Egyptians as the Virgin Mother or the Mother of God, to whom the Temple was dedicated. Her name Hat-hor implying that she was the "Habitation of the Holy Light" or the incarnate Horus, shewn by the rays of divine splendor streaming from her.

"The secret and sealed Shrine was entered once a year by the high priest, on the night of midsummer and an image of the Holy Mother was conveyed by a procession of priests up a secret stairway to the roof where communion with her divine father Ra was held, while within the Temple a festival to Hathor was celebrated." From "The Book of the Master," by Marsham Adams.