The Tree in the Middle of the Garden

A couple of symbolic interpretations of the Garden of Eden come to mind. The first one is sexual in nature, the snake is Adam's penis and Eve's forbidden fruit is her vagina, and both taboo objects can be found in the middle of the garden. The second interpretation of our fall is about the intellect. Thou shall not eat from the Tree of Knowledge, the bible says.

Now what exactly do we do with these warnings? Does it mean not to have sex outside of the intention to create new life? Does it mean not to think and create mentally? I actually think there is an overlap of both interpretations. Mental activity can lead you astray from the here and now and tends to be highly addictive. As far as sex is concerned, I have recently written about the surprising difference between the real sex act and the many mental fantasies. While the former is bliss, the latter turns destructive before you know it:  http://zeitgeistinma.blogspot.com/2010/07/sexual-fantasies-sex-and-spirituality.html

As far as our mind is concerned, the human evolution is mainly a mental one. We have literally squeezed out as much brain-power as the birth-canal of an upright walking woman could handle before the cesarean age, and our enormous brain size is also the reason why babies are still born prematurely even after nine months of pregnancy. As with sex before, the intellect may better not stand in the way of enlightenment otherwise few lights will walk the earth in future eons.

Sex and brainpower do not separate you from God, your mental constructs do. The feeling of not having everything here and now, but to search mentally for the things that supposedly make you better off. You are searching for bliss away from what you have and like a carrot dangling in front of the donkey, the bliss is always out there in the future never to be reached. Anyone who has suffered from an addiction knows the feeling. You run after your drug as you feel connected when the blood is rushing through your system, but every climax is followed by a lower low. Oneness can only be found internally and never externally. Beware the snake that wants to lead you astray from the here and now. Stop the mental acrobatics and enjoy life!

The Holy Number Four

I don't claim to know much about numerology, but since I have received so many messages in form of licence plate numbers, clock times and calendar dates, I cannot help forming my own spiritual impressions about numbers. I also learned about the letter four in Arthur I. Miller's book, The Odd Couple: Carl Jung and Wolfgang Pauli and Mystic Numbers, in which they claimed that 4 was the true symbol of God and not the Holy Trinity as Christianity postulates. Well, if you use their claim for a moment, this is the algebra I came up with.

Four and the Christian Interpretation
Four is the sum of One and Three. The Holy Trinity (God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit) is your pathway to God, but the Kingdom is incomplete without you. One is the symbol of a Son or Daughter of God as the straight line connects heaven and earth. As you find enlightenment and become a 1, the Kingdom is complete again, i.e. 4=1+3.

Four and the Four Yogas of Enlightenment
Four is the sum of 2 and 2. Some claim that 2 is a symbol of ambiguity, but this only means that you are afraid of the choices you have to face. If you happen to choose love all the time there is nothing to be afraid of. For me 2 symbolizes the twin love of Krishna, the real love between soul partners (symbolized by Radha) and vis-a-vis God (symbolized by Mira). Did you know that if you write the mirror image of 2 next to a 2 you are left with a heart that is standing on the ground. The heart is a symbol of God realized by bakhti yoga (the yoga of love) and tandra sex.

In addition to the yoga of love, you also have the three yogas of wisdom (jnana), medidation (or energy), as well as work (tao). Four also happens to be the sum of 0 and 4. And all of these paths are about eliminating the the ego, the little I and letting the empty space fill up with God's presence. As you reflect, the ego disappears (jnana), as you meditate the chokras open up until you radiate with divine energy, and as you submit to life (and follow the tao), you dissolve the self that way too: 4=0+4.