WINGED WORDS WINDSDAY
Compiled & Edited by Rob Chappell
(@RHCLambengolmo)
Vol. 2, No. 47: September 20, 2023
Firebirds Ascending: A Tribute to the Phoenix
Dedicated by the Editor to the Knights of the
Order of the Phoenix 😊
“The Phoenix Bird: Beauty from Ashes”
By Rob Chappell, M.A.
Adapted & Expanded from Articles
and Presentations by the Author Between 2008 and 2015
Perhaps
no other bird is as celebrated in world mythology as the phoenix. From Japan
and China to Egypt and Greece, tales of this fabulous creature have been spun
for thousands of years. According to the most widespread tradition, there was
only one phoenix alive in the world at any given time. This legendary bird was
adorned with beautiful crimson, golden, and violet plumage, and it built its
nest of spices in a remote corner of East Asia (possibly in Japan, the Land of
the Rising Sun). It was also said that the phoenix had the most wonderful song
of all birds and that its tears could heal even mortal wounds. Since the
phoenix bird had originated on the Sun (where myriads of phoenixes were
supposed to dwell), it needed no earthly food; instead, it was nourished by
solar energy exclusively. (This might lead us to
wonder: Why wasn’t the phoenix green, since it was photosynthetic?). 😊
Every
500 years, the elderly phoenix would burst into flames and die in its nest of
rare spices – but from its ashes would hatch a rejuvenated young phoenix to
live for another five centuries. The newborn phoenix, as soon as it could fly,
would carry the bones and ashes of its former self to the Temple of the Sun in
Heliopolis, Egypt, where the priests would note in their chronicles that a new
“phoenix cycle” of 500 years had begun.
From
an astronomical perspective, we can see how the death, spontaneous combustion,
and rebirth of the phoenix symbolized the annual cycle of the seasons, in which
the Sun “dies” of old age at the Winter Solstice, only to rejuvenate and ascend
into the heavens once again with the approach of springtime. Drawing on such
mythological starlore, European Renaissance astronomers introduced a phoenix
into the sky as a constellation. The celestial phoenix can be seen just above
the southern horizon on early winter evenings from the American Midwest – a
starry witness to the changing seasons on the revolving wheel of the year.
The
phoenix can still hold many meanings for us today. For example, the phoenix
might represent the power that we have to begin again after a personal tragedy
or some other great loss. It may also remind us of Nature’s ability to recover
and renew herself after disasters like hurricanes and earthquakes. On a more
metaphysical level, however, the phoenix was understood to represent human
immortality and the hope of a new Golden Age beyond the End of Days. This theme
is echoed in Erasmus Darwin’s [1731-1802] description of Nature’s
revivification after the Universe, in the far distant future, has “died”:
“Roll
on, ye Stars! Exult in youthful prime,
Mark
with bright curves the printless steps of Time;
Near
and more near your beamy cars approach,
And
lessening orbs on lessening orbs encroach;
Flowers
of the sky! Ye too to age must yield,
Frail
as your silken sisters of the field!
Star
after star from Heaven’s high arch shall rush,
Suns
sink on suns, and systems systems crush,
Headlong,
extinct, to one dark center fall,
And
Death and Night and Chaos mingle all!
Till
over the wreck, emerging from the storm,
Immortal
Nature lifts her changeful form,
Mounts
from her funeral pyre on wings of flame,
And
soars and shines, another and the same.”
Ã
The Botanic Garden (1789-1791)
As
the peoples of the Northern Hemisphere await the beginning of autumn at the
September Equinox, we would do well to remember these practical yet profound
insights from the skywatchers and mythmakers of long ago and far away. The core
message of the phoenix bird is summarized in this anonymous Keltik canticle:
“Welcome to the Sun”
Collected in Scotland (19th Century)
Editor’s Note:
In the Keltik languages – as well as in Japanese – the Sun is feminine and the
Moon is masculine.
Welcome to you, Sun of the
seasons’ turning,
In your circuit of the high
heavens;
Strong are your steps on
the unfurled heights,
Glad Mother are you to the
constellations.
You sink down into the
ocean of want,
Without defeat, without
scathe;
You rise up on the peaceful
wave
Like a Queen in her
maidenhood's flower.
To
learn more about the phoenix bird and its myriad meanings, readers may consult
the following resources.
·
http://www.pantheon.org/articles/p/phoenix.html à Here is an
overview of the phoenix myth from a multicultural perspective.
·
http://www.theoi.com/Thaumasios/Phoinix.html à This illustrated reference page includes brief articles and
citations from ancient Greek and Roman authors about the phoenix.
·
https://oldenglishpoetry.camden.rutgers.edu/the-phoenix/ Ã “The Phoenix” is an Anglo-Saxon (Old English) poem about
the legendary firebird, preserved in the Exeter Book (10th
century CE).
·
https://archive.org/details/conference_of_the_birds-faridudin_attar à The Conference of the Birds is a classical
Persian poem by Attar of Nishapur (1151-1221 CE), in which the simurgh (the
Persian phoenix) plays a prominent role.
The
Phoenix in Greek and Latin Versions of the Hebrew Scriptures
Although
the phoenix is not referred to by name in most modern English translations of
the Bible, it is mentioned twice in the Septuagint (a Greek translation of the
Hebrew Scriptures, produced at Alexandria, Egypt, during the third century BCE)
and in the Vulgate (a Latin translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, the
deuterocanonical books, and the Christian Testament, produced by St. Jerome at
Bethlehem, Palestine, during the early fifth century CE). These references to
the phoenix bird in widely disseminated translations of the Bible ensured its
continuing popularity throughout the Middle Ages. In most modern English
Bibles, the Hebrew term translated as “phoenix” in the Greek Septuagint and the
Latin Vulgate is rendered as “palm tree,” which makes very little sense within
the context of the surrounding verses. J
“The just shall flourish like the phoenix: they shall grow
up like the cedar of Lebanon.” (Psalm 92:12 [Hebrew] = Psalm
91:13 [Latin Vulgate])
Here, the psalmist seems to be assuring
listeners/readers that the righteous will enjoy immortality like the legendary
phoenix. (Cf. Psalm 23:6,)
“And I said:
I shall die in my nest, and as a phoenix I shall multiply my days.” (Job 29:18 [Latin Vulgate])
In this verse, the patriarch Job seems
to be affirming a belief in his own immortality and/or resurrection. (Cf. Job
19:25-27.)
The
phoenix is reborn from its own funeral pyre, as depicted in the 12th-century
CE Aberdeen Bestiary from Scotland. (Image Credit: Public Domain
via Wikimedia Commons)
The Phoenix in Enoch’s Heavenly
Journey:
Excerpts from the (Old Slavonic) Book of the Secrets of Enoch (2 Enoch – 1st Century CE)
In
these passages from 2 Enoch, we can read of the ancient prophet Enoch’s legendary
journey through the ten heavens, as envisioned by an unknown Judean author
writing in the Holy Land under Roman occupation. Enoch learns that there are
myriads of phoenixes living on, near, or in the Sun – along with mysterious reptilian
creatures known as the Khalkydri.
Chapter
11
Here they took Enoch up on to the
fourth heaven, where is the course of Sun and Moon.
Those
men took me, and led me up on to the fourth heaven, and showed me all the
successive goings, and all the rays of the light of Sun and Moon. And I
measured their goings and compared their light, and saw that the Sun’s light is
greater than the Moon’s. Its circle and the wheels on which it goes always,
like a wind going past with very marvelous speed, and day and night it has no
rest. Its passage and return are accompanied by four great stars, and each star
has under it a thousand stars, to the right of the Sun’s wheel, and by four to
the left, each having under it a thousand stars, altogether eight thousand, issuing
with the Sun continually. And by day fifteen myriads of angels attend it, and
by night a thousand. And six-winged ones issue with the angels before the Sun’s
wheel into the fiery flames, and a hundred angels kindle the Sun and set it
alight.
Chapter
12
Of the very marvelous elements of
the Sun.
And
I looked and saw other flying elements of the Sun, whose names are Phoenixes
and Khalkydri, marvelous and wonderful, with feet and tails in the form of a
lion, and a crocodile’s head, their appearance is empurpled, like the rainbow;
their size is nine hundred measures, their wings are like those of angels, each
has twelve, and they attend and accompany the Sun, bearing heat and dew, as it
is ordered them from God. Thus the Sun revolves and goes, and rises under the
heaven, and its course goes under the Earth with the light of its rays
incessantly.
Chapter 13
The angels took Enoch and placed him in the east at the
Sun's gates.
Those
men bore me away to the east, and placed me at the Sun's gates, where the Sun
goes forth according to the regulation of the seasons and the circuit of the
months of the whole year, and the number of the hours day and night, And I saw
six gates open, each gate having sixty-one stadia and a quarter of one stadium,
and I measured them truly, and understood their size to be so much, through
which the Sun goes forth, and goes to the west, and is made even, and rises
throughout all the months, and turns back again from the six gates according to
the succession of the seasons; thus the period of the whole year is finished
after the returns of the four seasons,
Chapter 14
They took Enoch to the West.
And
again those men led me away to the western parts, and showed me six great gates
open corresponding to the eastern gates, opposite to where the Sun sets,
according to the number of the days three hundred and sixty-five and a quarter.
Thus again it goes down to the western gates, and draws away its light, the
greatness of its brightness, under the Earth; for since the crown of its
shining is in heaven with the Lord, and guarded by four hundred angels, while
the Sun goes round on wheel under the Earth, and stands seven great hours in
night, and spends half its course under the Earth, when it comes to the eastern
approach in the eighth hour of the night, it brings its lights, and the crown
of shining, and the Sun flames forth more than fire.
Chapter
15
The elements of the Sun, the
Phoenixes and Khalkydri, broke into song.
Then
the elements of the Sun, called Phoenixes and Khalkydri break into song,
therefore every bird flutters with its wings, rejoicing at the giver of light,
and they broke into song at the command of the Lord. The giver of light comes
to give brightness to the whole world, and the morning guard takes shape, which
is the rays of the Sun, and the Sun of the Earth goes out, and receives its
brightness to light up the whole face of the Earth, and they showed me this
calculation of the Sun’s going. And the gates which it enters, these are the
great gates of the computation of the hours of the year; for this reason the
Sun is a great creation, whose circuit lasts twenty-eight years, and begins
again from the beginning.
Ÿ The Phoenix Cycle is a historical era that lasts for 500
years; it derives its name from the 500-year lifespan of the mythical firebird.
Every 500 years, Western civilization has to reinvent itself. Old ways die, and
new ways are born.
Ÿ The year 2034 marks the start of another Phoenix Cycle. The
last Phoenix Cycle began in 1534, in the midst of the Renaissance and
Reformation and the Age of Discovery. Before that, Phoenix Cycles began in
1034, 534, 34 CE (see below), 467 BCE, etc.
Ÿ The advent of a new Phoenix Cycle is why we appear to have
so much chaos – and progress -- in the world right now.
Ÿ This is why we also have so many “rising stars” among our
young people today. They are here for a reason – to light our way into a better
future during the new Phoenix Cycle that is dawning right before our very eyes.
Ÿ What we do today will have repercussions for the next 500
years (and beyond) – what an opportunity we have to change the world for the
better! J
The Start of a Phoenix Cycle:
Excerpted from Book 6 of Tacitus’
(56-120 CE) Annals
During
the consulship of Paulus Fabius and Lucius Vitellius [January-June, 34 CE], the
bird called the phoenix, after a long succession of ages,
appeared in Egypt and furnished the most learned men of that
country and of Greece with abundant matter for the discussion
of the marvelous phenomenon. It is my wish to make known all on
which they agree with several things, questionable enough indeed,
but not too absurd to be noticed.
That it is a creature sacred to the sun, differing
from all other birds in its beak and in the tints of its
plumage, is held unanimously by those who have described its
nature. As to the number of years it lives, there are various
accounts. The general tradition says five hundred years. Some
maintain that it is seen at intervals of fourteen hundred and sixty-one years, and that the former birds flew into the city called
Heliopolis successively in the reigns of Sesostris, Amasis, and
Ptolemy, the third king of the Macedonian dynasty, with a
multitude of companion birds marveling at the novelty of the
appearance. But all antiquity is of course obscure. From Ptolemy
to Tiberius was a period of less than five hundred years. Consequently some have supposed that this was a spurious phoenix, not from the
regions of Arabia, and with none of the instincts which ancient
tradition has attributed to the bird. For when the number of
years is completed and death is near, the phoenix, it is said,
builds a nest in the land of its birth and infuses into it a
germ of life from which an offspring arises, whose first care, when
fledged, is to bury its father. This is not rashly done, but taking up a load of myrrh and having tried its strength by a long flight,
as soon as it is equal to the burden and to the journey, it
carries its father's body, bears it to the altar of the Sun,
and leaves it to the flames. All this is full of doubt and
legendary exaggeration. Still, there is no question that the
bird is occasionally seen in Egypt.
The Phoenix in the Land of the Rising
Sun:
Minor Poem #27 by Claudian (ca. 370-404
CE)
There
is a leafy wood fringed by Oceanus’ farthest margin beyond India and the East,
where Dawn’s panting coursers first seek entrance; it hears the lash close by,
what time the watery threshold echoes to the dewy car; and hence comes forth
the rosy morn while night, illumined by those far-shining wheels of fire, casts
off her sable cloak and broods less darkly. This is the kingdom of the blessed
bird of the Sun where it dwells in solitude defended by the inhospitable nature
of the land and immune from the ills that befall other living creatures; nor
does it suffer infection from the world of men. Equal to the gods is that bird
whose life rivals the stars and whose renascent limbs weary the passing
centuries. It needs no food to satisfy hunger, nor any drink to quench thirst;
the Sun’s clear beam is its food, the sea’s rare spray its drink – exhalations
such as these form its simple nourishment. A mysterious fire flashes from its
eyes, and a flaming aureole enriches its head. Its crest shines with the Sun’s own
light and shatters the darkness with its calm brilliance. Its legs are of
Tyrian purple; swifter than those of the Zephyrs are its wings of flower-like
blue dappled with rich gold.
Never
was this bird conceived, nor springs it from any mortal seed, itself is alike
its own father and son, and with none to recreate it, it renews its outworn
limbs with a rejuvenation of death, and at each decease wins a fresh lease of
life. For when a thousand summers have passed far away, a thousand winters gone
by, a thousand springs in their course given to the husbandmen that shade of
which autumn robbed them, then at last, fordone by the number of its years, it
falls a victim to the burden of age; as a tall pine on the summit of Caucasus,
wearied with storms, heels over with its weight and threatens at last to crash
in ruin; one portion falls by reason of the unceasing winds, another breaks
away rotted by the rain, another consumed by the decay of years.
Now
the Phoenix’s bright eye grows dim and the pupil becomes palsied by the frost
of years, like the Moon when she is shrouded in clouds and her horn beings to
vanish in the mist. Now his wings, wont to cleave the clouds of heaven, can
scarce raise them from the Earth. Then, realizing that his span of life is at
an end and in preparation for a renewal of his splendor, he gathers dry herbs
from the Sun-warmed hills, and making an interwoven heap of the branches of the
precious tree of Saba, he builds that pyre which shall be at once his tomb and
his cradle.
On
this he takes his seat and as he grows weaker greets the Sun with his sweet
voice; offering up prayers and supplications he begs that those fires will give
him renewal of strength. Phoebus [Apollo = the Sun], on seeing him afar, checks
his reins and staying his course consoles his loving child with these words:
“You who are about to leave your years behind upon yon pyre, who, by this
pretense of death, are destined to rediscover life; you whose decease means but
the renewal of existence and who by self-destruction regain your lost youth,
receive back your life, quit the body that must die, and by a change of form
come forth more beauteous than ever.”
So
speaks he, and shaking his head casts one of his golden hairs and smites [the]
willing Phoenix with its life-giving effulgence. Now, to ensure his rebirth, he
suffers himself to be burned and in his eagerness to be born again meets death
with joy. Stricken with the heavenly flame the fragrant pile catches fire and
burns the aged body. The Moon in amaze checks her milk-white heifers and heaven
halts his revolving spheres, while the pyre conceives the new life; Nature
takes care that the deathless bird perish not, and calls upon the Sun, mindful
of his promise, to restore its immortal glory to the world.
Straightway
the life spirit surges through his scattered limbs; the renovated blood floods
his veins. The ashes show signs of life; they begin to move though there is
none to move them, and feathers clothe the mass of cinders. He who was but now
the sire comes forth from the pyre the son and successor; between life and life
lay but that brief space wherein the pyre burned.
His
first delight is to consecrate his father’s spirit by the banks of the Nile and
to carry to the land of Egypt the burned mass from which he was born. With all
speed he wings his way to that foreign strand, carrying the remains in a
covering of grass. Birds innumerable accompany him, and whole flocks thereof
throng in airy flight. Their mighty host shuts out the sky wherever it passes.
But from among so vast an assemblage none dares outstrip the leader; all follow
respectfully in the balmy wake of their king. Neither the fierce hawk nor the
eagle, Jupiter’s own armor-bearer, fall to fighting; in honor of their common
master a truce is observed by all. Thus the Parthian monarch leads his
barbarous hosts by yellow Tigris’ banks, all glorious with jewels and rich
ornament and decks his tiara with royal garlands; his horse’s bridle is of
gold, Assyrian embroidery embellishes his scarlet robes, and proud with
sovereignty he lords it over his numberless slaves.
There
is in Egypt a well-known city [Heliopolis] celebrated for its pious sacrifices
and dedicated to the worship of the Sun. Its temples rest on a hundred columns
hewn from the quarries of Thebes. Here, as the story tells, the Phoenix is wont
to store his father’s ashes and, adoring the image of the god, his master, to
entrust his precious burden to the flames. He places on the altar that from
which he is sprung and that which remains of himself. Bright shines the
wondrous threshold; the fragrant shrine is filled with the holy smoke of the
altar and the odor of Indian incense, penetrating even as far as the Pelusiac
marshes, fills the nostrils of men, flooding them with its kindly influence and
with a scent sweeter than that of nectar perfumes the seven mouths of the dark
Nile.
Happy
bird, heir to your own self! Death which proves our undoing restores your
strength. Your ashes give you life, and though you perish not, your old age
dies. You have beheld all that has been, have witnessed the passing of the
ages. You know when it was that the waves of the sea rose and overflowed the
rocks, what year it was that Phaëthon’s error devoted to the flames. Yet did no
destruction overwhelm you; sole survivor you live to see the Earth subdued;
against you the Fates gather not up their threads, powerless to do you harm.
This
illustration of the constellation Phoenix appeared in Johann Doppelmayr’s Atlas
Coelestis (plate 19), which was published in Nuremberg, Germany ca.
1742. The celestial Phoenix is visible from mid-northern latitudes, just above
the southern horizon, on early winter evenings. (Image Credit: Public Domain
via Wikimedia Commons)
.jpg)
