The Flight of Icarus

Learning To Fly – Part Fifteen

The Flight Of Icarus

The hierarchy of the Angels is the power behind God’s throne. Familiar with the Great Father/Mother’s great plan of life, the Angels are its executors and messengers. They are supervising and carrying out every stage of it and have always accompanied us. The Angels are in charge of all levels of life, including the higher and highest ones in the world of light, therefore also of us and our world. They are in charge of us and forever will be, guiding and protecting and keeping us safe.

For a long time it was believed that Angels can fly. In truth, however, they are beings of light, who have no physical bodies and because of this do not require wings. They move about by thought power, the same as we shall be doing one of these days, when we have become sufficiently evolved to no longer need the outer shell of a physical body for getting around.

But until then, if only we could fly! Whenever we, as a human spirit in exile on the Earth plane feel trapped in our physical body and the circumstances surrounding us, it is quite natural that we begin to dream of escaping and flying, free from all restrictions and going wherever we please. Is there anyone who has never experienced in dreamtime the ability to fly? What a great feeling! And is there someone who does not enjoy watching birds in flight? Knowing that they are messengers of the spirit world, our spirit lifts itself above our world with them and our heart fills with love for the wonders of our world and all its marvellous creatures.

Flying on other people’s wings or on wings provided by someone else, especially those of earlier ages, in the long run is unsatisfactory for human spirits and souls. Basically, they yearn to be free and long to fly on their own wings and under their own steam and that straight into the heartmind of God, from where they once emerged as an idea and then a tiny spark – a mere twinkling in their father’s eye, quite literally. The Icarus legend of Greek mythology is an allegory of this and at the same time a warning not to attempt this homecoming venture too early.

To refresh your memory, Icarus was the son of master craftsman Daedalus, who created the Cretan Labyrinth. The two of them lived in exile in Crete and as often depicted in art, they attempted to escape from this place by means of wings which the father had constructed from feathers and wax. He warned Icarus and asked him not to fly either too low or too high, because in the first scenario the sea’s dampness would clog his wings and in the second the Sun’s heat would melt the wax that held the feathers together. Icarus ignored these instructions and attempted to fly to the Sun. When he came too close to it, the wax melted and Icarus fell into the sea and drowned.

Icarus is a young boy, which is a metaphor for young and inexperienced spirits and souls in the early stages of their earthly education. Crete stands for the Earth, where we live in temporary exile from our true home, the world of light. The ocean represents the sea of emotions and the world of our feeling nature. The Sun and its fire are symbols for God’s sacred knowledge and wisdom. It is the spiritual fire of the Universe, for which Icarus is unready. The wings his father gave him are metaphors for the teachings of the religions of our world. Daedalus is the wise father, a renowned artist and creator of the labyrinth, a symbol of the long and winding roads of Earth life, which all of us have to explore.

Located at the centre of the labyrinth is our inner connection with God. the terrifying figure of the Minotaur, is a symbolism for the fears and anxieties about life and religious beliefs in particular. We have to face up, deal with and overcome them on our way to reconnecting with the living God, who dwells in the innermost core of our being. This is the only way of gaining access to our Creator’s power. And so it doesn’t come as a surprise that bull worshipping in some form or another seems to be as old as humankind’s presence on the Earth. We shall return to this theme in a moment.

Daedalus stands for the Father of all life in Heaven, symbolic of the highest levels of life. And typical of the patriarchy legends, Icarus had only a father and no mother. This parent is immensely wise and powerful, as shown by his creation of the labyrinth. In truth the father consists of the power and the will of the Great Father and the wisdom and the love of his counterpart, the Great Mother. As a sign of his great wisdom the father gives his son a pair of very fragile and easily destroyed wings. For the time being the presence of the mother as well as the wisdom behind her gift have to remain hidden from the view of the reader or listener, just the same as the truth behind the whole legend’s surface words.

Although he is very capable of constructing his son a fine reliable pair of wings, which would carry the youngster wherever he may wish to go, the father provides his son with the ones we know about. He does this so that the Icarus should learn from his experiences and see for himself that there is no point in being too ambitious at his age. Yet, Icarus is a spirit, in truth a young God in the making, who deep down senses that he was born to higher things and not for toiling on the Earth plane and being stuck there forever. That’s why when given a pair of wings, regardless of his father’s warnings he wants to fly to the Sun, the source of all life and of his being, to be re-united with it.

Knowing that the time for his son’s returning to the Sun and for merging with it has not yet come, the father designs the rickety wings and advises his son to fly behind him on the middle course, the way he does. But the boy’s longing for the Sun is so powerful that he refuses to heed his father’s words. As a result he perishes by drowning in the ocean, the sea of emotions of resentment and hatred for Earth life and all it means to him.

The Icarus story is part of Greek mythology and likely to have appeared during the Age Of Taurus, from about 6700 – 4500 years ago. During this time humankind gained an increased control of the Earth through the development of agriculture. Taurus is the first Earth signs in the zodiac. Its ruler is Venus, the planet of beauty, peace and harmony. Under this planet’s rulership the arts thrived. Pottery is particularly high on the agenda under the influence of this sign. Fine earthenware vessels in the form of jars, urns, bowls and vases, which survived over the centuries and were found during archaeological digs, to this day bear witness of the highly developed tastes of the ancient civilisations of the Taurean Age, which came and went, as all things eventually must on the Earth plane.

Pastimes like singing and dancing, cultivating and enjoying all the good things Mother Earth has to offer to the fullest always the leading theme under the influence of the Taurean energies. They provide us with the patience and strength, the willpower and determination to build and construct in order to make our dreams into a reality on the Earth plane.

The Taurean symbol is the bull and the Cretan Minotaur is depicted as a creature with the head of a bull on the body of a man or, as described by Roman poet Ovid, part man and part bull. He dwelt at the centre of the Labyrinth, an elaborate maze-like construction designed by Daedalus. Bullfighting traces its roots to prehistoric bull worship and sacrifice in Mesopotamia and the Mediterranean region. The first recorded bull fight may be the Epic of Gilgamesh, which describes a scene in which Gilgamesh and Enkidu fought and killed the Bull of Heaven. ‘The Bull seemed indestructible, for hours they fought, till Gilgamesh dancing in front of the Bull, lured it with his tunic and bright weapons, and Enkidu thrust his sword, deep into the Bull’s neck, and killed it.’

Bull leaping was portrayed in Crete, and myths related to bulls existed throughout Greece. The killing of the sacred bull is the essential central iconic act of Mithras, which was commemorated in the mithraeum wherever Roman soldiers were stationed. The oldest representation of what seems to be a man facing a bull is on the Celtiberian tombstone from Clunia and the cave painting El toro de hachos, both found in Spain.

The worship of the Sacred Bull throughout the ancient world is also familiar to the Western world in the biblical episode of the idol of the Golden Calf. The Golden Calf after being made by the Hebrew people in the wilderness of Sinai, were rejected and destroyed by Moses and the Hebrew people after Moses’ time upon Mount Sinai, Book of Exodus. Marduk is the bull of Utu. Shiva’s steed is Nandi, the Bull. The sacred bull can also be found in the constellation Taurus. The bull, whether lunar as in Mesopotamia or solar as in India, is the subject of various other cultural and religious incarnations.

To this day, I find it astonishing that wherever I turn in life, I encounter new things and themes where astrology can help me find a better understanding of why things are they way they are and could not be any other way. Could there be any clearer sign than this of God and the Angels’ guiding and protecting hands? On behalf of all of us, I give thanks and praise for them.

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