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quote:TOOL NEWSLETTER
OCTOBER, 2001 E.A.
WAR IS HELL (ON HALLOWEEN)
Is it my imagination, or has the whole world gone completely insane ever since they started selling Red Bull? Here it is Halloween and I'm too scared to answer the door - scared, not because of any possible action by terrorists, but because they've taken all the fright out of the night. The trick-or-treaters, what's left of them, look so different tonight. Gone are the macabre costumes of years past - all those scary creatures like ghouls, vampires and the Pope (a staple) - replaced tonight by legions of Uncle Sams, Lady Liberties, Revolutionary soldiers, Captain Americas, police (although what's more scary than a cop knocking on your door), fire-fighters (I promise not to call them "basement savers" anymore), and rescue workers (and there probably won't be any razorblades in the candied popcorn balls this year). Wait, finally, there's a scary costume - a good old-fashioned ghost. Someone completely covered with a sheet with only eyeholes to see out of. Yeah, that's either a ghost or a Taliban pin-up girl...
It's not that I'm anti-patriotic. You can be patriotic and still be scary. Here's just one suggestion: Let a brown recluse spider bite you somewhere. Before the resulting gore appears, the bite will turn your flesh RED, WHITE and BLUE. (WARNING: The Brown Recluse is poisonous and serious side effects can occur as a result of being bit.)
...Wait, there's another person at the door wearing a costume that's a throwback to the good old days. It's Jason from "Friday the 13th" - or is that Jacko with some little trick-or-treaters. I'm not sure. Hell, should have gone to see the Tool concert in San Diego, but I've recently developed a fear of driving on the freeways. It's all those American flags I've been running over. I'll bet there have been more deaths due to Old Glory flying off peoples' cars and obstructing the vision of others as they land on their windshields than deaths caused by anthrax. They're just not telling us this in the news.
Okay, there's LOTS OF NEWS HAVING TO DO WITH TOOL this month - much of which has been kept hush-hush until now (we all had to sign confidentiality agreements). Before we get into these things, which I know will excite many of you who want MORE, MORE, let's quickly mention some of the lighter news first:
MIKE PATTON OF FANTOMAS was recently detained for hours and strip-searched at a Florida airport for carrying a lot of... cash. Evidently, instead of buying new "voting machines" the state has spent it's funds on airport detection units that are able to determine how much cash a person is carrying as they enter the terminal area.
This new technology somehow works in consort with microchips incorporated into recently minted U.S. paper currency. It's all part of Florida's war against drug smuggling. And why did Mike have so much cash on him? Well, it turns out he was on his way to purchase an old book about the Coral Castle that contained a note stuck inside written by Ed Leedskalnin, the enigmatic builder of the mysterious tourist attraction. For those unfamiliar with this incredible engineering feat, the Coral Castle complex is located on 10 acres of land just south of Miami. Although the "Castle" has been equated with Stonehenge and the Great Pyramid of Giza, it has been well documented that no one ever witnessed Ed's labor, which he carried out secretly at night, working by himself despite the fact that the blocks of coral used weighed many tons. An immigrant from Latvia, Ed later claimed to have discovered the secret methods used by the ancient Egyptians to erect the pyramids. Whatever it was, he took the secret to his grave, although before his death, he published five books. It was one of these, a book on magnetic currents that Mike was planning to buy, not for the book itself, but for the cryptic note found inside. Apparently, this went into some detail about his ability to defy gravity that was not published in his books. However, when Mike went to the pre-arranged meeting place, the person selling the book never showed up. Even stranger, the person's phone has been disconnected and Mike hasn't been able to contact him or her since.
ALOKE DUTTA's band, SWATI, will be performing at the TEMPLE BAR in Santa Monica on Sunday night, NOV 4th. Showtime is around 8:30 so don't be late. As usual, I'll be there watching those magic fingers of Tabla Master and I hope to see some of you in the joint as well. It's important to remember that I drink "RED STRIPE."
Several people have asked about getting ZAUM CDs. Recently, I spoke with Chris Pitman to see if any would be made available. He wasn't sure if the older stuff would be, but hinted that there might be some new material recorded in the not too distant future. Speaking of Chris, among other new projects he's involved with, he has done some backup vocals on a new song by OWL called, "WAVES" that is to be...
WE INTERRUPT THIS NEWSLETTER TO BRING YOU A SPECIAL REPORT:
ERA APOCALYPTICA NOW?
The first thing that some of you may have noticed when reading this newsletter is that the standard E.V. (Era Vulgari) following the date has been replaced with E.A. (Era Apocalyptica). There is a reason for this important distinction that I suspect only a handful of readers will truly understand. The reason being is that the very meaning of words like "apocalypse" and "Armageddon" are normally used with a negative connotation, especially by those raised in the Xtian tradition.
This is a result of faulty conditioning, for to quote a passage in Kenneth Grant's "The Magical Revival": "The confusion of esoteric concepts and the decadence of symbols has rarely been exhibited so clearly as in St. John's Revelation, where fragments only of the Ancient Mysteries are presented without full knowledge of their inner meaning."
My switching of the E.V. to the E.A. was prompted by the flood of e-mails I have received in the wake of the September 11th terrorist attacks on America. Many have asked about my (and the band members) personal thoughts on this landmark event, and even about the possibility that Nostradamus predicted the attacks centuries ago. (NOTE: Nostradamus' eschatonic prediction was 1999.) Seeing how just about everyone has their own opinions of this tragic event, I, for the most part, chose to listen to you out there rather than throw in my own two cents. However, there was one e-mail in particular that I felt I should address. The person wanted to hear my take on recent events and what kind of relevance I gave to it with regards to hyperdimensional physics and a 900 year continued war between the militant Ismaili Order of the Assassins and their parallel Order of holy warriors known as the Knights Templar. He then adds: "You know what I'm talking about, Blair." The person also wanted to know if the quote by Maynard in the last newsletter had anything to due with this (it doesn't). As it turns out, I did know what the e-mailer was talking about. Days earlier I had read an article by Richard Hoagland and Michael Berra that was recently posted on their Enterprise Mission website. In this article entitled, "Who's the enemy: The "End of Days Begun?", the "Enterprise Mission" writers attempt to explain the recent terrorist attacks on America as a "millennia-long holy war" between the Assassins and the Templars, or, as they put it, between "Osama bin Laden as a 21st-century Assassin" and "The Templar/Masonic/American Axis." Those interested should read the lengthy essay on enterprisemission.com, but in the meantime I would like to share some of my own thoughts on this alleged war between the CROSS and the CRESCENT.
The Order of the Assassins was founded in 1090 by Hasan-I-Sabah at Alamut in Persia. (NOTE: the word assassin, meaning a political murderer, is a corruption by the French Crusaders of the word Hashshashin, meaning hashish eaters). According to legend (and the accounts of the explorer Marco Polo), the Order's alleged master, known as The Old Man of the Mountain, turned his desert fortress into a training ground for assassins by subjecting those who enrolled to various techniques of mind-control. In this way, he created devotees of an almost unimaginable loyalty - political killers of an Ismaili Order that was feared more than any other Muslim faction. But the Old Man wouldn't just promise paradise to potential members - he's show it to them. Candidates were first drugged with hashish until rendered unconscious, at which time they were placed in an artificial paradise. Upon awakening they found themselves in a sparkling garden where they were lavished with the sexual delights of women and treated to sumptuous feasts. After a few days of figs and f******, they were drugged again and removed from the garden. When they later awakened back in the harsh reality of the real world, it was explained to them that the wonders they described were but a tiny glimpse of the paradise that was reserved for martyrs who were willing to die for their faith in Allah.
With this type of conditioning, the Old Man cultivated followers who took a vow of blind allegiance and, hence, could be sent on various suicide missions.
It was said that the Old Man followed one simple rule: "cast no seeds upon rocks", meaning that those recruited (and later brain-washed) were of weak mind. (NOTE: In a screenplay I wrote several years ago about nuclear terrorism with modern-day Assassins in the guise of American right-wing extremists, I wondered if the conjuring tricks of the Old Man have been replaced by a flashy comic book technology (ala the black helicopter crowd) - namely portable resonance masers used to produce visions of this paradise spoken of by adherents of the sect.)
To support the EM team's contention that the recent terrorist attacks were part of a symbolic war being waged between secret societies, we are first given a series of numeric "coincidences", in particular multiples of 11 (as well as 19s). This is followed by an eye-opening lesson in America's hidden ritual history with the authors pointing out the "Assassin/Templar symbolic fingerprints encoded in the tragedy." There is also "the secret knowledge of hyperdimensional physics... which is inextricably linked to the ruins at Cydonia on Mars" (relationship of 19.5 degrees to 33 degrees). (NOTE: readers may recall that someone associated with "Enterprise" once believed that a $19.50 sale of shirts (or pants) at the Old Navy store was evidence of that chain's involvement in the conspiracy). There are also the celestial alignments that are used by the terrorists as "windows" for strikes against targets (again with symbolic meaning), all of which constitutes "remarkable evidence" which leads to the "inescapable conclusion" that the Assassins are up to their old tricks, after 900 years, still engaged in a holy war with the oldest enemy of Allah - the literal embodiment of the Knights Templar: America.
So what are we to make of all the redundant "11's"? Well, if the numbers were so important to these modern-day Assassins, then perhaps we should be looking for 7's instead of 11's. Quoting a passage from "Dungeon, Fire and Sword" by John. J. Robinson, the author states that " The Shiites, frequently identified as the "fundamentalist" or "radical" Muslims, branched off into over 70 different divisions or sects. Of these, a major division was based on the belief that it was not the 12th imam, but the 7th, named Ismail, who was the Expected One. As a result, the adherents to this belief, called the Ismailis, BECAME PREOCCUPIED WITH THE NUMBER SEVEN, endowing it with spiritual, mystical, AND EVEN MAGICAL PROPERTIES." And just to remind you that this is the sect which the EM team believes to be behind the attacks, here's a quote from their site about the indoctrination process: "upon his return to the "real world", over time and at the hands of artful teachers, the recruits original beliefs in Islam were replaced with a perverted version called the "Nizari Ismailis."
Of course I am quite confident that the people at EM could find the sevens if they were looking for them. In any event, it must be said that Hoagland and team have done their homework. However, there is something that they missed in connection with the idea that New York's twin World Trade Center towers symbolically represented the twin Masonic Pillars of "Jachin" and "Boaz." When speaking of the hidden agenda of the Templars during the Crusades, many authors have speculated about the nature of the artifact the Knights retrieved while excavating beneath the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Some, like Graham Hancock, have even suggested the Ark of the Covenant, believing it contained "the hidden wisdom of the ancient initiates of the Judaic/Egyptian tradition."
To say the treasure was something of enormous value may be putting it mildly in light of what I'm about to share with you. With this "new" discovery, we might even ask ourselves if the Templars or their Masonic brethren were in some way observers to the events of this past September 11th OVER ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO. Geodetic encoding of hyperdimensional physics is one thing, but is it possible that the "Tempar magic" spoken of by the EM folks represented a technology that enabled those who understood its proper use to open dimensional gateways - that is, could they had access to, or did they somehow find themselves placed in a privileged position in the multiverse, allowing them, in the manner of prophets like Nostradamus, to view events from outside the circles of time?
Incredible as this may seem, the proof of just such a technology may exist in a place that was a hotbed of Templar/Masonic activity - a place of deepest mystery that jealously guards a great secret. This place should be well known to readers of this newsletter by now, for we have visited it several times in the past. I'm referring, of course, to the tiny hilltop village of Rennes-le-Chateau in the south of France.
We already know how the village church was lavishly restored at the turn of the last century with the priest's newfound wealth. We also know that he decorated it in a most bizarre fashion, leading some researchers to call it the "grandest of all puzzles." Among the lurid, near-blasphemous imagery are the garish plaques depicting the Fourteen Stations of the Cross that were added in 1896. Although the bright plaster of the bas-reliefs is now cracking, a close inspection of the plaques (which take up a disproportionate amount of space in the little church) reveal curious, additional and seemingly irrelevant background details suggesting a cryptic intention. Even though I knew the Stations were carefully encoded with Masonic symbolism, I must admit that I didn't fully understand their complete significance prior to the events of "911."
It has been noted previously (see Dissectional) that the Stations run anti-clockwise along the walls, beginning with Station #14 ("Jesus is laid into the tomb") and ending with Station #1 ("Pilate washes his hands"). It now seems likely that they are meant to represent the sequence of events leading to the "End of Days" otherwise known as the Apocalypse. With this in mind, a closer look at Station #3 ("JESUS FALLS FOR THE FIRST TIME BENEATH THE CROSS") reveals some remarkable details in light of the recent terrorist attacks.
In her book, "REFUGE OF THE APOCALYPSE: DOORWAY INTO OTHER DIMENSIONS (published by C.D. Daniel in 1986), Elizabeth Van Buren draws our attention to the little oddities in Station Three (14-3=11) which she believes represents Gemini, The Twins. In this scene we see "two towers like two columns portraying the twin brothers" (a hint of the columns of the Temple of Solomon). There is also a soldier (angel?) who blows a horn shaped like a CRESCENT moon, even touching with it one of the TWIN TOWERS. Also, near the bottom "Christ's hand and the sleeve of his robe lie across the base of the Cross to form a PENTAGON." If that were not enough, there is more: "The blue lining of Christ's cloak falls in folds which suggest an eight-pointed star, the STAR that was so sacred to the Knights Templar."
So, the anomalous background details - that is, only those odd inconsistencies which separate the Stations at Rennes from those hanging in other Catholic churches - are
1) TWIN TOWERS
2) A PENTAGON
3) A CRECENT (Moslem symbol of power)
4) EIGHT-POINTED STAR (Templar device)
Can any reasonable person seriously believe this is all merely a coincidence with regards to the events of "911"?
Well, YES! It very well could be. In fact, the reason for this little demonstration, which took me only a few minutes to produce, was to show how easy it can be to FIND what the EM guys call recurring symbolism that is part of a larger pattern.
Am I the only one who finds it very hard to believe, as Hoagland and Co. suggest, that these "attacks were precisely timed to occur around the placement of certain stars at key ritual positions in the heavens." The EM team's evidence for this is that flight 77 was not commandeered for at least 45 minutes from the take off of flight 93. They wonder "why do this - giving the authorities a chance to scramble jets." They also question the choice of plane used by the Assassins to thrust their dagger into the heart of America: "Why hijack 767s or 757s instead of 747s which have a much larger fuel capacity and could do a lot more damage?" (NOTE: How much more damage could they have done to the Twin Towers?) I wonder if the EM people have ever read Foucault's Pendulum? If not, they should, for they have practically continued the narrative. Of course, there are plenty of believers who think Umberto Eco is a master of deception and his literary fiction with regards to the Templars may well be factual. And who's to say it's not? Who knows, perhaps even I'm trying to protect the great Templar secret by hiding it in plain sight:
After noticing the little oddities in Station #3, I decided to look for some more "resonances." Knowing that Elizabeth Van Buren was a relative of America's eighth President, Martin Van Buren, and believing he'd have Masonic connections, I did a web search. After typing in his name, the first thing that came up on my "Abulafia" was this: Here I am at President Martin Van Buren's grave in Kinderhook cemetery just outside of the village of Kinderhook, New York. The date is SEPTEMBER 11, 1991 and my wife and I are working our way up the Hudson Valley visiting dead presidents..." Okay, that was enough for me. For those who don't believe me, you can find this on a site called, of all things, starship.python.net. Start the Twilight Zone theme now.
At one point in the essay, the EM team try to drag Aleister Crowley into the scenario - this because the plane that crashed into the field in Pennslyvania was flight #93, a significant number in Thelemic magick: "the holy significance of this number was repeatedly espoused by Aleister Crowley, an early 20th-century practitioner of magical rites through which he hoped to bring about Armageddon... Recently he has been discovered to have a significant role in the development of our own space program." This, of course, refers not to Crowley, but to one of Crowley's followers, Jack Parsons, who was one of the founders of Nasa's Jet Propulsion Lab (in fact, every year on Halloween, JPL acknowledges Parsons as one of its five founders with a memorial of sorts, using mannequins in a "Nativity Scene" that's on display behind the visitor center). Still, for my money, it is a big stretch to say that "Crowley" had a significant role with our space program. Although he (Crowley) had once held great promise for Parsons' magical abilities, he became increasingly disillusioned that his student would ever discover his True Will and put it to some use. From his letters, it is evident that Crowley came to consider Parsons as just another failure - as is reflected in this passage deriding him and his California brethren: "I get fairly frantic when I contemplate the idiocy of these louts."
As for Crowley hoping to bring about Armageddon, if by Armageddon the EM authors mean "the preservation and carefully-timed re-dissemination of the sacred knowledge of mankind" then I just might agree with them.
For those of you who have read the EM piece or those of you who plan to check it out, here's something to keep in mind: When the Templars eventually "lost the Cross" in 1187, they were defeated by the Muslim Saladin, and not by the Order of Assassins who, in fact, saw most of the Muslims around them as enemies. Truth be known, during the Crusades, on occasions, both the Templars and Assassins made secret connections and even sought alliances with one another. It has also be well established that close links were forged with the Muslim world when the Templars came into contact with them - especially the mystical Islamic sects like the Sufis who taught them oriental tantrism or sacred sexuality.
According to the Poet-Knight, Wolfram von Eschenbach (perhaps the greatest of the medieval minnesingers, who wrote the epic Grail romance, Parzival, sometime between 1195 -1220), the knowledge of the Grail came from such cultural traffic with "heathens." Amazingly, this Grail saga, which was written during the Crusades and for a Christian audience, is filled with not-so-veiled allusions to the spiritual ideas of the East, which are symbolized by Parzival's half-brother, Fierefiz. The very title of this magnificent treatise of personal enlightenment, PARZIVAL means PERCE A VAL (to piece the valley between two opposite peaks), symbolizing cultural polarities. With the earth's current situation, perhaps we could all learn a lesson from Wolfram's adventure (initiation), especially when read "degree by degree."
Anyone who wants to know why many researchers believe Wolfram von Eschenbach could speak authoritatively about the Templars, or whether or not his Parzival is a historically accurate account of events in medieval Europe, should check out the recent findings from a Swiss anthroposophist as posted on the dailygrail site. The site is also a great source of information for links to Renne-le-Chateau and other mysterious places and events not normally covered in the mainstream news.
In the end, the real history lesson from the Enterprise Mission essay is that there has never been a shortage of religious zealots willing to kill and die for their beliefs. As to whether or not Hoagland and Co. have nailed it this time, I guess we'll just have to wait until November 17th (Ramadan) at 4:00 AM in Washington D.C. (Sirius at 33 degrees elevation with an azimuth of 195 degrees), for this is precisely the time or "window" the EM team think that the modern-day Assassins might strike next, using, perhaps, a suitcase nuke concealed inside the recently renovated Washington monument to bring on Armageddon (in terms of a big firecracker, that is). As God continues to throw stones at the glass buildings on the moon, I'll be anxiously watching to see what happens. Who knows, maybe they've already saved us.
Just one last thing, as to Nostradamus predicting the events of September 11th, NO CIGAR - in fact, I don't even believe he was a prophet. He was a...
THIS HAS BEEN A SPECIAL REPORT.
WE NOW RETURN TO YOUR REGULARLY SCHEDULED TOOL NEWSLETTER:
.... And that about covers it. So, as you can see, there have been a lot of new developments in the Tool camp this month, and some of it pretty heavy stuff, in particular the special announcement made by Maynard.
Before I leave, the winner of this month's favorite e-mail once again goes to Danny's father, Bob Carey. Here it is: "Joan (Bob's special lady friend) called me last night and was rather upset. She said, Bob, there is some news on the Tool website that says the band played Sober last night for the first time in quite a while. She thought this meant that the guys had been drinking heavily before and during the concert. I had to tell her that it was the title of a song."
HAPPY TRAILS
BLAIR
JUSTIN
DANNY
MAYNARD
ADAM
and chrisgraves
[ 28-11-2001: Message edited by: Enamon ] |
