Sacred Geometry
I wanted to share with you a presentation I did a few weeks age. These are the boards created to express some basic principles of Sacred Geometry & how they impact our world today.
I started wanting to express how those principles are used in Architecture to express man’s relationship to God. But I ended up finding out even more.
The word architecture comes from the Greek word – ARKHITEKTON –
Arkhi – the first / the beginning — Tekton – the creator / master
So architecture refers to the first creator/ the great architect – it is not referring to the first man who created a structure but to the great creator himself – GOD!
And I feel that every ancient piece of architecture has honored/ respected/ venerated God since the beginning of time.
Architecture is expressed in plain Geometry and the Architect creates shapes & volumes that give form to the building design.
In the days of Greek & Roman Architecture, they used the three principles of Vitruvius
Firmitas, Utilitas, Venustas
(Durability, Utility but most exciting of all Beauty)
Sure we can use stone for durability, we can carve out spaces to create Utility; but what do we use to express Beauty? Beauty – as they say – is in the eye of the beholder after all…
Our ancestors looked at nature & the natural world & saw that in the chaos, there was order. So they found a way to express that order with The Golden Rule of geometry.
They also saw that the Golden Rule not only expressed nature but was part of mankind as well. They saw that the geometry was an exploration of the relationship of man to God. These are the principles of Sacred Geometry.
But Sacred Geometry was a hidden layer. Well not really hidden, but only discern-able by the initiated. Why only for the initiated?
This answer is given to us in the bible. Matthew 13:11,13 – When asked by his apostles why Jesus spoke to the masses in parables. he replied:
“Because it is given onto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not… Therefore I speak to them in parables. Because they seeing – see not AND hearing – hear not. neither do they understand.
The Sacred Geometry was there for everyone to see but existed as layer that expresses the mysteries of the heavens & needed to be interpreted.
The belief at the times, was that these mysteries were too great for the uninitiated man to understand them. They were too powerful – as they could help us transcend to the heavens -They felt they needed to protect us from this grandiose mysteries.
In panel 2/3 I explore how Man sees himself in relationship to God and how Sacred Geometry was not only an idea, but the central basis for the building designs. In the days of the Gothic Architecture – Chartres Cathedral – man was of service to God & to the Virgin Mary.
In Chartres, God is there and so is the idea of the Chakras and spiritual enlightenment. They are clearly the basis for the design. And in elevating ones soul/self we may be able to reach the heavens – we may be able to transcend. Is this the real understanding we were not to know?
But I say that Sacred Geometry was perceived at that point, but it was ever present way before then!
It was there in the beginning of recorded history – if not time itself.
We can see it not only in the Gothic Architecture, but in the architecture of the Egyptians (panel 4) & even further back then the Mayans.
It has been there with us, from the beginning of time.
We have always looked to the heavens for some higher power – The Gothics looked towards God; the Egyptians towards the Stars; the Mayans to the Heavens…
“Art in the middle ages was ‘art for God’s sake’, art in the Renaissance was ‘art for man’s sake’, art in modernism was ‘art for art’s sake,’ art in the 20th century is ‘no art, for God’s sake.” ~ G. K. Chesterton
In the start of this post I said that every ancient piece of architecture has honored/ respected/ venerated God since the beginning of time. But as the quote points out, that changed in the Renaissance when art became for “man’s sake.”
So then the inquiry that comes up is if we’re not looking towards GOD, then where are we looking towards as our guide? Are we really creating ‘no art’?
Since art & Architecture is an expression of who we are – then with America having rejected God in everything we do; Abortion being at 50 million in 1973; Our schools do not allow prayer or the mention of God; We are even planning to remove the phrase “In God We Trust” from our coinage…
We have never – as a society – been a culture to belief in many Gods; or in the stars & their alignments; or even nature as our mother Gaia.
Our Founding Fathers told us what they wanted for this nation : In God We Trust!
We have always been a monotheistic culture! But now we have turned our backs to God!
Then what do we believe in and where are we heading towards…?
Panel 4 gives us an indication of that! It shows the architecture of the Capital Dome in Washington DC. By the looks of the design, we are looking towards the stars again! we are reverting to a long-gone pagan culture devoid of God as our Founding Fathers wanted us to know Him.
But if Paganism has never been part of our culture – and now it is being called again – is it something new that society demands?
or
As I am finding out – it’s been a hidden path that we’ve – unknowingly – been on all along!!!
We are once again drawn into a Holy War – Good vs Evil
REFERENCES:
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Hi Sarah
Thank you for your comment & your observations.
Hey Pablo, just checking out your website again and of course loving all parts of it.
Hello Pablo, Wow. I am glad that I bookmarked this page. It all lead me to a very ambitious study concluding to a state of being, where all the things that have been dragged through the mud by new age esoteric, religious wars ….made mythology beautiful, real, logical and totally rational.
. I wasn’t expecting it. I fully agree that every sound harmonic, geometric shape, medicine, planet ( ok, the list doesn’t ever stop) is part of the every fragment of architecture in Chartres.
The choir windows are fantastic to get lost in, almost like that card game, memory.
.. I still haven’t been there in person, but I lost my shoe there when I was 2 and my mother always said I should find it.
Luckily there are many high res images available online and I’ll really know the place, when I do go look for my shoe.
Hi Kate
great to see you back here! Excited to hear that you were able to clear out all that mud & get to experience the real beauty of the Sacred Geometry @ Chartres. 🙂 It sound like you loved it so much – so when are you going to find your shoe? ha-ha
Are you going to be exhibiting your work? (would love to see what you came up with)
I am also producing more drawings – currently working on how Sacred Geometry shows up in the new 9-11 memorial & what it has to do with the Hexagon.
so check back again…
I found this very informative. I’ve been trying to figure out which rooms, windows and/ or doors of Chartres Cathedral relate to which chakras. I am a 3D animation and video artist who is busy constructing an installation, taking the viewer through a sacred geometry, sound and color healing therapy. I think Chartres is the perfect architecture to use as a setting. I wish the drawing you made had been somewhat bigger, so that I could read everything you wrote on the page :-/ Thank you none the less for posting this!
Thanks for your comment Kate. Each window, door – almost every square inch – has a whole story to tell…. Chartres is the perfect setting and there are so many parts of it that each could be a whole presentation on sacred geometry, sound & color all by itself. Its sounds like your having fun with your creation & I would surely love to see what you produce.
Yeah the linked images have some areas are still too small to read. sorry
Thank you
Pablo