Beauty and the Beast (of Revelation), Part 2

Darker Than You Think...

Any serious study of magic or occultism is going to eventually lead you to the stars.  I can't quite explain it yet but the mystery of the stars seems to take you way beyond Astrology or Astrotheology and drops you off in a twilight zone, where you're stuck with a lot more questions than answers.

And seeing that the stars and prophecy seem to go together like socks and shoes, that eventually leads you to the Apocalypse, meaning the painful transition into the Age of Aquarius that we're all about to be thrown into. 

Whether we want to or not. 

So what does it  have to do with occult sex magic, the surveillance state and the War in Heaven? Keep reading and I'll tell you.

So the 9/23 meme kind of came and went, given that Hollywood is responsible for most peoples' view of the Apocalypse. Everyone seems to expect everything to fall apart overnight, as you might see with a nuclear strike or a meteor impact. 

This is the same kind of thinking that fuels 2012 skepticism, despite the fact that so much shit has gotten very weird since then.

It's similar to how most people were oblivious to the Great Depression for quite a while after Black Friday. The thing is, you're never really able to identify these pivotal moments in history until several years after the fact. 

This will probably be the case both for 2012 and the 9/23 alignment.  

This alignment seems to be immortalized with the Strength trump of the Rider-Waite Tarot (among others). Virgo's garlands are particularly interesting in light of the overall narrative, but the Virgo-Leo alignment also gives us a bit of Anunaki-Nephilim resonance, given that Virgo has been traditionally depicted as an angel and the Lion is the King of Beasts and is commonly associated with our sun. 

So we see a kind of symbol of the Hieros Gamos, the union of the Heavenly and the Earthly. The little eternity symbol reminds us that time itself is cyclical.

Crowley's Thoth Tarot appropriates this conjunction for his Lust trump, depicting the Scarlet Woman of Revelation 17:3, complete with Cup of Abominations. I suppose the contents of the cup aren't the same as the Blood of the Saints she is drunk on, which makes me think she did a little pregaming before taking the Beast out for a spin.

Some occultists have identified the Cup of Abominations (and Fornications) with the Elixir Rubeus, associated with Crowley's Rite of the Star Ruby (look it up).

Or in other words, "Ruby Stars and Ruddy Cups."

Apropos of nothing in particular, we saw this item pop up two weeks back, about an alleged planet in the constellation of Virgo that seems to be a good candidate for intelligent life. The story kind of came and went and almost certainly served some kind of ritual purpose.

Nevertheless, I did happen to notice that this planet orbits a red-- or Ruby-- star. Not sure if there's a ruddy cup as well. Probably is somewhere.

Even with the flood of highly-charged stories we saw in the wake of Las Vegas, one little newsflash in particular caught my beady little eye. Even so, I'm just getting around to working on it now, which just goes to show you how action-packed the past two months have been.

So, yeah: we had that little taster there, depicting Beyonce doing her Isis cosplay at the Grammy Awards in February. But having looked at the 9/23 alignment my curiosity was most definitely piqued. It's been that kind of year.

The story itself was total bullshit, some interview where Beauty and the Beast director Bill Condon claimed he offered the Feather-Duster role to Beyonce, as if she'd ever accept such a low billing and as if Disney would be willing to pay her fee. 

It reminded me of a similar item from March in which songwriter Alan Mencken started talking up Harvey Fierstein for the live-action Little Mermaid. And we all know how that played out.

But given the fact that I've been staring at star maps since Heaven Upside Down or Las Vegas, I immediately thought of Corvus, the Raven. This constellation lies right below Virgo and y'know. That little "coincidence" seemed to switch on some flickering light in my dark and dusty brainpan. 

It wasn't long I began to see parallels between the major characters in Beauty and the Beast-- especially the Disney versions-- and the constellations in that neighborhood. In fact, I started to see it all as some kind of stellar precession leading us around the galactic equator and landing right smack-dab in Vega's neighborhood.

I can't explain it, and I can't quite get any sense of why this might be encoded into these stories, but I couldn't argue with the results. I'm sure a lot of people out there might, but I'll just lay it out like this first...

The parade starts in Draco in the northern sky and Libra in the south (maybe Scorpio, but we'll get to that). In other words, the masculine symbolism in the north and the feminine in the south, intersecting at Gemini. 

The Hieros Gamos again.

I ended up incorporating the animated and the live action versions, which seem to compliment each other, while building on the framework established by Jean Cocteau in what many cineastes see as the definitive telling of the story.

What caught my eye straight off is this inexplicable depiction of the Archangel Michael, perched atop the spire of the Prince/Beast's castle. We see this even before we see the Disney logo.

Michael takes us back to Aldebaran, the orange star we saw occulted the night of the Texas shootings. Not to mention the War in Heaven.

The live-action movie starts with a party in the Prince's castle. So it very much looks like this was starting us in Lyra, given that one of the new characters is a Harpsichord, played by Stanley Tucci. 

He's accompanying the Libra character here, which pretty much nails down that this is indeed a stellar journey beginning-- and returning-- at Lyra and Libra.

Moving from Lyra into the rather massive constellation of Draco, we meet the Enchantress, who offers the Prince a rose in exchange for shelter from a storm.

And is it my imagination or does this scene seem a bit Eyes Wide Shut to you?

You get the sense of Draco's size when the beggar woman reveals herself as the Enchantress. Note the green, commonly associated with dragons.

The Prince prostrating himself before the Enchantress parallels the dominant position Draco has over Boötes, who is our Prince.

Boötes is a bit ill-defined, mythologically speaking, but as a hunter, shepherd and/or farmer, he is associated with authority and property. But we get our first really tasty hit with Canes Venatici and Coma Berenices...

...so very clearly mirrored in Sultan, the dog-turned-footstool. Note the twin tails- or twin Comas-- representing the twin dogs of Canes.

I'm wondering if there were plans to have this next character standing in for Cancer, but I think it might have been back-burnered to stand in for Scorpio....

...since both are armored arthropods and both have those prominent pincers. I'm thinking this may have indeed stood in for Cancer because of the heat of summer but gotten played down in favor of Lumiere. The stove looks quite different in the live-action film.

The wardrobe feels like a more confident expression of Libra, given it's shape and feminine identity.

The main supporting characters are pretty dead-on and are often seen in sequence in the animated film. 

Plumette is quite clearly Corvus and Mrs. Potts and Chip are quite clearly Crater. Cogsworth and Lumiere are a little more tricky but actually quite clever...

Cogsworth is Sextans and the shape of the constellation is encoded into his face...

...namely the clock dial. Note that this character is British and sextants are used to calculate Greenwich Mean Time. So a little bonus there.

Following the shape of Cancer-- and the motif of the heat and light of Summer-- we see the y-shape in the candelabra here. 

In case you're going to get picky about the trident shape of Lumiere...

... do note you can see that very shape in certain depictions of Cancer as well.

We clearly see Draco and Hydra in the grand stairway of the Beast's castle, since this shot here has the two dragons framing he and Belle in the same way those massive constellations frame Virgo and Leo. This image reminds me of the Masonic Second Degree Tracing Board, for reasons you can probably figure.

What about the Canii and the Unicorn? We have the Canes in the form of Sultan, what about his little conjunction here?

Well, I'd argue we see it mirrored in this scene when Belle and her horse are menaced by wolves in the forest, later to be rescued by the Beast.

Gaston and LeFeu give us our analog for Gemini. All the more so in the live-action film, since the implied homoeroticism (mostly on LeFeu's part) remind us that Castor and Pollux are traditional gay icons in some quarters. Pride Month also falls predominantly in Gemini.

Castor is a red star and is considerably larger than Pollux, which we also see mirrored here. 

Following on the fight with the wolves we see our Gemini twins on a horse driven carriage (Castor and Pollux are associated with horses) and Belle's father standing in for Auriga, the charioteer.

Plot twist: as the story proceeds-- and moves across the stars-- Gaston becomes Orion the Mighty Hunter, something attested to by the trophies on his wall here.

And the three lookalike "Bimbettes" carry over as a pretty obvious depiction of the Three Sisters, or Orion's belt.

In that regard, the Beast and Gaston are unmistakably acting out the Great War in Heaven between Orion and Taurus, club and all.

It's really getting to the point that this is feeling very magical in intent, don't you think? To what end I can't rightly say, but there it is. In living color.

And it looks as if that as the procession continues, we get the Beast reborn as Perseus and Belle as Andromeda. 

Where is he getting that?, you may be asking...

...well, the live action movie makes the case for me. 

The Enchantress re-enters the scene and lifts her curse, reminding us that we finally escaped the spell of the Dragons (Draco and Hydra), which parallels Perseus' defeat of Medusa and Cetus and the subsequent liberation of Andromeda. 

The conjunction of the Enchantress and the Dragon there seems to confirm this...

...as does the appearance of Algol (the so-called "Demon Star" in Perseus) the day the live-action film was released.

Moving along the celestial ellipse from Andromeda, we see Lacertus and Cygnus and finally, Lyra.

Mirroring Lacertus, we see this weird reptilian column behind the Prince as he is transformed. Paging Mr. Icke, white courtesy telephone, please.

And as the spell is lifted we see a white statue depicting an angel or winged man, making a serviceable stand-in for King Cygnus, who was turned into a swan. Note the wings are pointing straight up, which you commonly see in depictions of swans associated with royalty.

My suspicion that all of this was in fact a roundtrip journey from Lyra in the north and Libra in the south is nailed down by the very last frame of the live-action film, depicting the Lyra and Libra characters. 

And if you want to be a stickler, you can tag the little dog here as a stand-in for Lyra's companion, Vulpecula.

We also see bookended Harps in the credit card for Alan Menken, who composed the film's score.

It all ends with the Aristocratic class restored to their proper, predestined place at the top of the caste system, having defeated the pitchfork-wielding rabble, thanks to the violent intervention of the indentured servant class.

The democratic revolutions of the craft-guild classes-- the butchers, the bakers, the candlestick makers-- are crushed. Now the pampered-and-powdered can dance the days away while their serfs break from their labors only to beam with admiration at their masters. 

They'll be grateful when they eventually tire and are replaced by a new throng of serfs, since the desolation of their penury will be relieved by the certainty that the natural order has been restored and the stars are fixed in the heavens.

And they all lived happily ever after. 

Here's a bonus factoid for you- the woman who rewrote the best-known version of Beauty and the Beast was married to a notorious spy named Thomas Pichon, who betrayed his native France and threw in his lot with the British during the French-and-Indian Wars in Canada. 

There's always a snake lurking in the grass somewhere.

I'm not sure which occult secret society Pichon belonged to, but given the fact that occult secret societies are nearly inseparable from espionage (all the more so in the 18th Century), I'm thinking it was probably pretty powerful. I'm also sure that obedience to it superseded any national loyalties one might still cling to, hence Pichon's Judas LARP.

And yes, that's Thomas Pichon, not Thomas Pynchon.

Speaking of spycraft, the whole idea of sentient appliances in Beauty and the Beast reminded me more than a little of the smart appliance wave. I don't believe the two are necessarily connected but I doubt that the loveable stoves and clocks of those films will discourage a lot of consumers from diving headfirst into the smart appliance abyss. 

Convenience trumps Autonomy, every day of the week. And twice on Sundays.

This particular dystopian reality is coming down fast and furious. I'm sure your dishwasher and vacuum cleaner will eventually be given endearing personalities-- maybe even celebrity voices-- as they cheerfully chirp your daily commands from Panopticon Central.

Oddly enough, we were warned about all this back in 2012 by then-CIA Director David Petraeus...

...who by sheer coindence ran into a bit of bother not long after. You might have heard a thing or two about it. 

TO BE CONTINUED

We got a little taste of Hollywood-style Apocalypse in late October of 2012 when Superstorm Sandy came roaring through town. We had ball lightning dancing down the street and a whirlwind that sounded like someone had opened the gates of Hell. Walking through town the next day was like touring Berlin after the fall. 

I'd never seen the kind of destruction that storm kicked up and I hope to never again. But I have a feeling that I probably will.