Hercules at the Gates of Leo, Libra and Scorpio

The Beneficent Dragons

Kathy Newburn

With the sun’s annual passage through Libra, we might want to consider its relationship to Draco, one of the august extra-zodiacal constellations that circles around the central point in the heavens, like a gate-keeper. Ancient people believed that central point connected us spiritually with a portal believed to lead to other systems of reality.

In similar fashion, although on a lesser scale, one of Libra’s roles in the zodiac is as a powerful synthesizing agent, standing as it does as the “hub of the wheel.” In this role it provides a portal whereby our zodiac is connected with other star systems. Draco and Libra are said to hold a powerful relationship with our Earth which can tell us something about the planet’s role. Do these overshadowing influences aid in Earth’s development of a synthesizing role—not only in merging and blending the three planetary centers (Shamballa, Hierarchy and Humanity) but also within the greater solar system as a whole—for when our planet becomes sacred it will ignite a real shift within that greater system.

The relationship between Draco, Libra and the Earth works out powerfully on one of the seven paths facing the candidate for the sixth initiation, the First Path -- known as the Path of Earth Service. The taking of this initiation marks a majestic point in the path of return that was mentioned in the quote cited in last week’s webinar. This is the time in the evolutionary journey wherein one first places one’s feet upon the endless path “of which Nirvana is just the beginning.” This endless path leads in seven directions, of which this path of Earth Service is one. This path is governed by Libra which is overshadowed by Draco, hence its potency in conditioning our planet. All the other paths lead the seeker to other parts of the solar system or beyond. Those following this particular path find their dharma to remain here, serving the purpose that is working out here on this planet.

The adepts who follow this path are called the “Beneficent Dragons” and are said to be qualified by the energy of wise-compassion. We are asked to ponder the meaning of those two words which at first glance have a close relation to Love-Wisdom, the qualifying energy of the second ray that is working out here on Earth which mirrors developments within the solar system as a whole . Wisdom and compassion are qualities that are always linked specifically with the Buddha. Perhaps we might conjecture that part of the dharma of the Buddha is related to the training of those adepts who follow this path who surely could very well be the Nirmanakayas, Those advanced souls who are mediating between Shamballa and Hierarchy—forming the higher correspondence to the new group of world servers. The potency of this bridging group, of both bridging groups is surely accelerating at this time as a result of the powerful influx from Capricorn which occurred in December 2019. As the Buddha shifts into a heightened role and forward movement onto his rightful path, surely the work of those following this path is being heightened allowing their qualities to increasingly condition our world. in preparation for the externalization.

The energy working out upon this first path and, consequently, trickling down to us, is the quality of luminosity and the consequent ability to “let your light shine forth.” This is so interesting in its relationship to the work of Triangles wherein we work collectively each day with our partners to do just that, in concert with a vast planetary group serving to make the planet a lighted sphere within the system of Lives which are the seven sacred planets. It’s interesting to note that the constellation of Libra is in the shape of a simple triangle.

Draco is related to the seventh ray and therefore this energy has a powerful conditioning factor on those following this first path but also on our entire planetary life. We can see, therefore, the potency of this time in planetary history when the seventh ray along with Aquarius that is also coming in, are controlling so powerfully and the opportunity this alignment brings to work out the purposes of the Logos through the cooperative efforts of the three planetary centers.

Draco is known as an active guardian or protector and yet it is often associated, here on the planet, with the serpent devil, or as Satan, for example in the Virgo Labour of Hercules as the serpent guarding the golden apples of Herperides or in the Garden of Eden. Perhaps this dual perception of the serpent nature corresponds to the dual nature of Saturn itself, as it functions in both a nonsacred and also a sacred manner. In Libra and in association with this path, we can see these dual aspects working out. For although the adepts who follow this first path are known as the beneficent dragons it is said their luminosity is garnered and hard won on the battleground through a fight with a dragon-- a higher correspondence of that battle which all disciples face when confronting the unredeemed aspects of themselves in the battle between the Angel of the Presence and the Dweller on the Threshold. We can link with the potency of those battling on this path by pondering their expressed quality of luminosity and their symbol -- a green dragon issuing from the centre of a blazing sun. Behind the sun and over-topping it can be seen two pillars on either side of a closed door.

So, we see the Forces of darkness and light controlling at all levels of existence. To awaken a sleeping dragon is to awaken a dormant power of tremendous potency and one which works out either for good or ill depending upon the motive. This awakening, on a planetary level, is entrusted to those who are invited or chosen by the Logos to tread this path. In a sense because this path is working out on our planet, its qualities trickle down and can be appropriated by us, giving us the ability to know the most about it because it is closest to us and we are living within its energy field, in like manner that an aspirant starting on the path of return is working within the energetic field upon the periphery of the spiritual Hierarchy.

So let us work now in our meditation, calling upon the strength of the dragon power and the synthesizing nature of Libra to pull through that potent energy which can serve to awaken those sleeping points of light to the opportunity of this time.

 

Hercules at the Gates of Leo, Libra and Scorpio

                                                               Eduardo Gramaglia

Let us turn our thoughts once again to Hercules, whom we called last time, and for a good reason, “the greatest hero of all”.

We are so accustomed to classical mythology, that we may not see how unusual it is to have so strong an emphasis on heroes, as classical myth has. We see this as we compare Greek mythology with the mythology of other cultures, which do not have nearly so many heroes. Mesopotamian and Egyptian mythology are, by and large, about the gods. Gilgamesh is a notable exception to that. So why such an emphasis on heroes in classical mythology? As we said last time, “Hero” turns out to be a misleading translation of the Greek word “heros”, or at least the modern understanding of what’s implied by the word “hero”. “Hero” meant several things, but mainly it refered to a human with one divine parent. And here we have a clue, as to why Hercules is looked upon as a symbol of the disciple. The hero is a mediator between the world of the gods, and the world of humans. Heroes were meant to bridge the gap between gods and men, just as the disciple mediates between the world of meaning and the outer world of glamor. In this sense a new light upon the concept of the NGWS may emerge, this group mediating between Hierarchy and humanity. The sometimes erratic and violent behavior of heroes were meant to highlight that both natures, animal and divine, are struggling inside them, and their inner world is a battleground of forces which may include episodes of “madness” and lack of control, as Hercules had. 

A “top-notch” hero has to prove his right to be king (a symbol of their divine nature finally assuming control), and for that, he has to submit to different kinds of tests. There are a good many heroes in Greek myth whose stories fit a so-called “Test and Quest pattern”, the pattern of an adventure story where a young man goes out and performs a set of deeds of valor. These tasks are the symbols of the challenges every disciple faces on the way, in order to symbolically “slay his own monsters” and thus become a true world savior. Each labor brings him a different recognition, and gradually fits him to function consciously in the world of souls. 

The twelve labors Herakles performs are clear examples of this “test and quest” pattern. He undertakes these tasks which are characterized both by an increasing degree of difficulty as the labors proceed, and by increasing distances that Herakles must travel to perform them. Each one of the labors he undertakes would have been fatal for a normal human being. Hercules, not without some drawbacks, finally manages to successfully accomplish them all. Now, these 12 labors fall into three clearly recognizable groups. The first five take place in the Peloponnesus, the main and central area of Greece; it includes the labors of Cancer, Leo, Libra, Scorpio and Sagittarius. The second group takes place a little bit further away from the mainland, and it includes tasks performed in all cardinal directions: East, West, North and South. These are the labors of Aries, Taurus, Virgo and Aquarius. The final three take place in the far West, and seem to have to do with issues of death and immortality. Here we have Gemini, Capricorn and Pisces. Now, as you see, most Greek sources organized these labors in terms of increasing difficulty and distance. In which order these tasks are given on the path of discipleship, whether following this pattern, or according to the order of the zodiacal signs, or any other, I don’t know, and I suppose it depends on individual cases.

Three labors from the first group are particularly relevant for us today: Leo, Scorpio, and Libra, the sign the sun is now passing through. Hercules must fight animals which have some extraordinary attribute that makes them exceptionally difficult to overcome. According to the sources, the first labor of this group, was the killing of the Nemean lion. This lion is invulnerable to wounds, and its skin cannot be pierced by arrows or sword. The cave in which the lion is found has two openings, one leading into a dark corridor, the other into the light of day. Herakles blocks one of the entrances with piles of sticks, and then turns to face the beast. He chokes the lion to death with bare hands (in other sources he clubs it to death instead), and then uses its own claws to skin it, and after he has skinned the beast, he takes the lion’s skin as his cloak, and this becomes his most recognizable attribute and art, Hercules normally carries his club, and wears his lion-skin cloak, and the cloak is often shown with Herakles’ face looking out from between the lion’s jaws, so the lion’s head becomes the hood of his cloak. 

The second labor performed within the mainland of Greece involves killing the Lernaean Hydra. Unlike the others, Hydra was a mythical monster, a snake with nine heads, one head was immortal, which made this creature difficult to slay. To make it even more difficult, whenever Hercules cut off one of the Hydra’s heads, two more would grow in its place, so that the more he tried to kill this monster, the more powerful it became. He eventually realized that using weapons, such as the sword and the club, only resulted in the Hydra growing stronger. He finally decided to grasp the monster with his bare hands, knelt, and raised the Hydra up into the air. The monster, strong in darkness and mud, was exposed to the rays of the sun, and lost its power. Hercules cuts off the immortal head, and buries it under a boulder. 

The Nemean lion symbolizes the powerful personality running wild and devastating the environment. When an integration of the forces that constitute the personality has been attained, the human being often becomes a difficult and trying person. Hercules, is a solar myth, namely, a narrative which we can in some way relate by analogy with the path of the sun through the heavens. He represents one of those sun-gods who are struggling with the problems that will draw out the full powers of the soul. The Tibetan gives us a highly interesting interpretation of the cave with two entrances: The cave is the symbol of the pituitary body, an endocrine gland closely associated with the spiritual awakening. This gland has two lobes (symbolizing both openings of the cave), one of which the disciple must close before the higher mind can take control of the personality. He must use the opening which leads to the light. 

The symbolism of the Hydra is no less interesting. Each of the nine heads of the monster represents one of the problems (lower desires, passions and tendencies of the lower mind) that beset those on the Path. These hindrances cannot be opposed by brute strength, but through the conscious expression of humility, courage and discrimination. Humility compels the disciple to “kneel down” and recognize his limits; courage is needed to attack the evil at the very roots of his nature; discrimination, to come up with an intelligent and dispassionate solution to the problem, which involves turning the focus of his mind as high as possible, rather than concentrating on the problem and fighting it, thus making it grow bigger. In order to be defeated, the monster has to be taken out of its natural environment. The tendencies it represents do not have to be “suppressed”; rather, they have to be “lifted up into the air”, that is, transmuted into something else. In classical Greece, Lerna was a marshy region of hot springs and a former lake near the east coast of Greece. This place was thought to be one of the entrances to the Underworld, and the ancient Lernaean Mysteries, sacred to the goddess Demeter, were celebrated there. As we said months ago, a peculiar relationship is said to exist between Hercules and hot springs, whose vapors were considered to be the sign of an entrance to the world of the dead. One of the most ancient traditions recalls that the main function of Hercules was to face death and win immortality. 

Interesting ideas emerge as we consider the relationship between Leo and Scorpio. Leo, being the fifth sign of the zodiac, counting from Aries in the direction of the following signs, is also the eighth sign, counting backwards. It is thus closely connected with Mercury, who is esoterically called “the Messenger at the Eighth Gate”, alluding to that Gate which the process of individualization opened up for mankind. Interesting to note, that Mercury, Hermes, was considered by the Greeks as “Psychopomp”, literally, “guide of souls”. Psychopomps are deities whose responsibility is to escort newly deceased souls from Earth to the Underworld. It will be no surprise then that in Gemini, ruled exoterically by Mercury, Herakles meets another serpent, Antaeus, which he also has to “lift up into the air” to conquer it; we have also said, when we dealt with the task in Gemini, that this sign is also connected with the land of the dead, just as Scorpio is. Leo is strongly related to Scorpio, whose numbers upon the zodiacal wheel are the same as those of Leo, being five and eight. The Dog-star, Sirius, home to the Great Lodge, is related both to Leo and Scorpio; and the enormous constellation Hydra, the serpent, can be found in the sky very close to the constellation Leo. We thus see how the picture of the heavens reflect these truths, as outlined by the Tibetan. 

Both Leo and Scorpio reveal some recurring tests that the disciple encounters. “Lions and serpents must be slain again and again” – Hercules was told by the Teacher of his life, the myth tells us. On each turn of the spiral, age-old challenges assume newer - and trickier - appearances, until a final blow cuts off evil at its roots. This must be done, as Hercules did both with the lion and the Hydra, with bare hands. As Mabel Collin’s inspirational book “Through the Gates of Gold” suggests, “To hold silence amid the thousand cries of the senses, and then, stripped of all weapons take the deadly serpent of self and kill it, is no easy thing. It can only be done in the moment of equilibrium, when the enemy is disconcerted by the silence”.

The sign through which the Sun is now passing, Libra, the sign of equilibrium, seems to be the ground on which a first recognition of the Path takes place, and the decision to undertake the twelve labors is made. It is at this point that “the wheel is reversed”. When Herakles passed through the seventh gate of Libra, his task was to capture the Erymanthian boar. He is seen driving the captured boar by its hind legs, which is a symbolic representation of the soul directing the clumsy body. He rejoiced on the way, and everyone laughed at the sight. Humor and laughter were said to be part of the ancient Eleusinian Mysteries. In the story, Hercules is said to misinterpret the command to “take time to eat”, and indulged in a feast, drinking the wine which belonged to the whole community of centaurs. This event led to a battle which ended up with the death of two centaurs. Centaurs are creatures with the upper body of a human and the lower body and legs of a horse, therefore symbols of duality. Libra is about measure, balance and conciliation of duality. In this sense we can remember that the exoteric ruler of Libra, Venus, is the esoteric ruler of Gemini, the other sign in which duality is faced and integrated. The disciple, as she/he undertakes this task, must “choose the way that leads between the two great lines of force”, as its keynote reads. 

Eventually, every disciple will “mount the fixed Cross of the Heavens”, reverse the wheel, step on the burning ground of Scorpio, slay the Hydra and exclaim: “Warrior I am, and from the battle I emerge triumphant”. These are the two keynotes with which we will be working during the next Full Moon periods. Thank you all. Next time we will continue our journey through other Gates of the Zodiac.