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… The Book of Revelation is a notoriously difficult text to understand
because of its symbolism and iconography,
however, chapter twelve, which concerns us here,
is relatively straightforward.
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It commences with a vision: ‘And there appeared
a great wonder in heaven, a woman clothed in the sun,
and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars…’
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This is an astrological description of Virgo, but wait,
‘…And she being with child cried, travailing in birth,
and pained to be delivered.’
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If the Virgin is to give birth then it must be the Great Goddess Isis or the
Virgin Mary, or at any rate the Star of the Sea, Stella Maris…
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Already we start to see the problem.
The iconography may be precise,
but its interpretation can still be ambiguous,
or could the ‘images-of-heaven’ encompass all of these exemplars?
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‘…And there appeared another wonder in heaven,
a great red dragon, having seven heads
and ten horns and seven crowns upon his heads…’
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Lying alongside the constellation of Virgo in the night sky,
coiling around her, is Hydra, and in Greek mythology,
Hydra appears as a many headed snake, but wait,
‘…And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven
and did cast them to earth.’
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Not all the stars of the firmament are visible at any one time,
about a third of them move in and out of view over the rim of
the earth’s horizon during the course of a year.
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Just as the ‘night-time’ at any one location
is caused by the shadow of the earth
passing across the face of the sun,
a third of the night sky
is also obscured by the earth’s horizon.
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Bodies, planetary or otherwise,
moving through space are shadowed.
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But what to make of this psychologically?
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The ‘shadow-side’ of our personality, obscured by a continually
attention seeking conscious mind,
resides in the unconscious, and whilst lurking there,
shrouded in shade, it can be regarded as our own ‘personal devil’.
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