Sophia is the mother of all creatures, the matrix in which are heaven, the stars, the elements, the Earth, and everything that lives and grows, contained as if in a single image. — Jacob Boehme
And then through the Fiat God made woman out of the Venus Matrix, i.e., out of the property which Adam had begotten within himself; out of one body two, dividing the properties of the Tinctur, i.e., into the element of watery and fiery constellations, yet not fully in essence but in spirit, as in the properties of watery and fiery souls, which are still but one. — Jacob Boehme
Ideas find their way to us through surprising voices. I’ve learned to listen to each voice as if they are communicating an encoded message (of which they may not even be aware). This playful approach to listening — of trying to find the truth even in what might initially appear unlikely — has proven enormously fruitful. As Sherlock Holmes once said, “Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.”1 Even what is false has a glimmer of truth that can be extracted. Even what is evil has a germ of goodness, however disordered. Ideas do not belong to us. They visit us, grow, germinate, adapt, and produce seeds again. But they then drift away because they are not ours.
Someone surprised me by saying, “Venus and Mercury are consorts” which is something I had not considered. On the surface, Mars and Jupiter are outer planets, and Venus and Mercury are inner planets, so there must be a special relationship between Venus and Mercury. Jupiter and Mercury have a polar relationship, Jupiter being the largest planetary body and Mercury being the smallest planet (and the one most dramatically influenced by Jupiter’s gravitational field).2 I have continued to take the image of Mercury and Venus belonging together into sleep3, meditating on it during the day — and asking others about what they knew about these two planets. Thoughts are always on the way to becoming something else. But any clear thought is a positive articulation if it is to be a thought at all. The point isn’t to believe what follows but to engage it as an exercise. To think through it, try to find the way in which it can be true, then set it aside and forget it — and then return again. This is what the alchemical maxim Lege, lege, lege et relege! (“Read, read, read, and reread!”) means. Observe, observe, observe, and go back and observe yet again! We must always presume there is always more to learn, especially about what we imagine is “settled.” We must always revisit what we think and remain open to discovering something new within what is seemingly mundane.
We call a story a myth when we’ve forgotten its meaning.
The idea of Venus and Mercury being in a relationship is hardly revolutionary. Our Moon was born out of our Earth, and at a macrocosmic scale, Saturn was born out of the primordial nebula of our nascent solar system.4 As above, so below — and so with everything in between. Everything is gestation and birth, again and again. “We know that the whole creation has been groaning in travail together until now.”5 Planets born out of a nebula, moons born out of planets, plants born out of rocks — not because dead matter ever produces life, but because the universe is alive. Life produces matter, not vice versa.
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