Our own D. Garzelloni will be taking us through a few interesting concepts with her first guest blog post for ATCTE! Thanks so much, D!
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MONAD
“One principle must make the universe a single complex living creature, one from all.” - Plotinus
When I was a kid, my neighborhood friend Vicki and I invented a game. Separated from most of the neighborhood by age and gender, Vicki and I compensated by creating our own unique activities. One afternoon, while drawing in the dirt with sticks, we came up with the circle game and it quickly became our go-to game for filling time and space. First, we would draw a huge circle in the dirt and then we took turns drawing circles within the circle. We could make them any size we wanted, anywhere within the circle we wanted, eventually filling all the of the space and the game would be done. No winner, no loser. There was only one rule: in the process of drawing our circle, we could not upset any of the other circles or the main circle. Making our own marks, while maintaining the integrity of the whole; we were becoming individuals separate from each other, but still connected, connected to each other and the whole of nature.
"There is geometry in the humming of the strings, there is music in the spacing of the spheres" -Pythagoras
Math is a difficult subject for most people to discuss even casually. Most of us struggle with math and the realization that we suck at it was, for most of us, a watershed event in our childhood. It was the first concrete limit placed on our potential and intelligence, it changed the way we were taught in school and the way we looked at the future. The few kids fortunate enough to excel at math were rewarded by being shouldered with additional academic responsibilities, the unrealistic expectations of parents and teachers and the prospect of a formal education that never ends. The math we were expected to master in school had little to do with real mathematics, and good or bad at it, we all had math ruined for us at an early age.
Imagine a time in human history when mathematics were regarded with awe, steeped in magic and mystery, rendering the secrets of the universe equally knowable to all mankind and then consider how our modern world is structured to create a sense of dread and inferiority at the mere mention of math. Most of us would claim not to know or understand mathematics and yet, we are captivated by its principles clearly visible in nature in flowers, shells, crystals, plants, and insects. Our fear of math is a facet of our alienation from nature and ourselves, the Monad promises us reconciliation by reconnecting us with the language of the universe; Mathematics.
The ancient Greek mathematician, philosopher, and mystic, Pythagoras (c.570 - c.495BC), believed mathematical principles were the principles of all things and that all things can be known through numbers. Pythagoras, a mysterious figure who inspired messianic-like awe in his followers including Plato, was hugely influential in Western thought and philosophy as well as esoteric traditions such as Alchemy, Numerology, Rosicrucianism and Freemasonry.
Symbolizing perfection, unity, wholeness, divine nature, and design excellence, Monad is the Greek term for the principles represented by the circle. From the root word ‘menein’ which means ‘to be stable’ and monas or ‘oneness’ we get ‘Monad’. The Monad was known to the Pythagoreans as The First, the Seed, the Essence, the Builder, the Foundation, the Immutable Truth and Destiny.
Assigning a numerical value to the circle takes it out of the realm of the symbolic and brings it into the material world, where we can see concrete examples of how it works. The mathematical meaning simply reiterates the symbolic meaning. The circle symbolizes wholeness and, as wholeness preserves the identity of all it encounters, the philosophers gave it a numerical value of 1. The number one, sometimes referred to as ‘unity’, preserves wholeness, any number multiplied or divided by 1 equals the number. As a result, 1 is its own factorial, its own square, its own cube and so on.
5 ÷ 1 = 5 (5 remains itself)
5 × 1 = 5 (5 remains itself)
The circle is, quite literally, the mother of all geometric shapes. As all subsequent numbers proceed in single increments from the number one, all geometric shapes are inscribed within the Monad. All pattern and symmetry proceed from one shape.
The circle is the cradle of our symbolic and mathematical universe, it embodies the characteristics of unity, everywhere the same and all circles are equal. It is the womb of our creative universe as well. The circle makes a mate for itself by contemplating itself, reflecting itself, casting its own shadow, by dividing and therefore multiplying itself. This process is mirrored though geometry in an ancient geometric construction called the vesica piscis, the Birth of the Other.
"Life is born only of the spark of opposites." - Carl Jung
The ancients called the principal of ‘two-ness’ or ‘otherness’ the Dyad. They considered it with suspicion as it seemed to revolt from unity, distancing itself from the Monad. They referred to it as ‘audacity’ for its boldness and ‘anguish’ because of its separation from the whole. The Dyad is polarity; it is at the root of our notion of separateness, separateness from each other and from nature. The paradox of the Dyad is that while it appears to be separate, its opposite poles remember, and attract one another, which is why the ancients also called the Dyad ‘illusion’. The Dyad is at the basis for every creative process, as creativity allows us to discover and return to ourselves, in our deepest selves, we are beyond all polarity.
Discovery of the Circle is the discovery of the Self separate from the Other, an inside separate and distinct from the outside. It is our first glimpse into the perfection, polarity, unity and order inborn in ourselves and Nature. Everywhere wholeness and unity exist, yet remain unapparent, as in a seemingly simple yet profound children’s game.
