The Scarabea

[Charlotte]

At years beginning, there was an article concerning dung beetles using the Milky Way to navigate.


"The ancient Egyptians associated the dung beetle with the sun, seeing a parallel between it rolls its ball of dung and the way the sun moves across the sky.

"And now there's another celestial association for the creatures, with the discovery that, along with the sun and the moon, dung beetles orient themselves by the light of the Milky Way.

"Although their eyes are too weak to distinguish individual constellations, say researchers, dung beetles use the gradiant from light to dark provided by the Milky Way to ensure they keep rolling their balls in a straight line and don't circle back to competotors at the dung pile.

"The dung beetles don't care which direction they're going in, they just need to get away from the bun fight at the poop pile," says Professor Marcus Byrne from Wits University."

www.tgdaily.com/general-science-brief/69014-dung-beetles-navigate-using-milky-way

[Charlotte]

Spent an hour this morning looking for my scribbling on the Egyptian Scarab some years ago, on Ma'at, I think, to save time and perhaps edit considering what I have learned since. The symbolic way of the Scarab the Egyptiants employ is as extraordinary as everything else they left for us to discover.

Scarabs are "everywhere" on the Giza Plateau. Up the main road and behind the Pyramids, I sat in the sand and watched them for quiet some time while my Sister looked over the Tourist stuff, but all I did see was them crawling about disturbing the sand, sliding downward with it, so it must have taken them a long time to get where they wanted to go. By instinct, they must have some goal, and I understood with those from whom I learned, mainly Isha Schwaller De Lubicz, that their goal was regeneration and rebirth.

I hope I find it cause it's a marvelous simile for our own.

[Charlotte]

The crawling of the scarabs every which way, stopping at obstacles to perhaps find a less laborious way, reminded me of "the false doors" in some structures on the Plateau. I can't think of any other reason these Architects would incorporate useless things, though Egyptologists may have a 'rational' explanation, but all this just a side thought.

While walking down to the Pyramids, I mentioned the scarabea to our guide, upon which he said he knew a tomb where a scarab has lived on the ceiling "forever", and if we wanted to see it we would have to pay the tomb keeper because the tomb is locked at all times. We paid the Man who opened the door to a small tomb containg the white statue of a King. Our guide pointed to the scarab attached to a corner on the ceiling, saying something like "there he is, has been there for a long time, I don't know what he lives on, maybe the air", he laughed. I do have a photograph of my Sister and me crouching there, for a while breathing the refined atmosphere with the scarab. Maybe I can send it to Don to post it as I don't have a scanner.

Back to the Article

According to the article: "The dung beetles don't care which direction they're going in; they just need to get away from the bun fight at the poo pile --

"The team had first shown that dung beetles use the sun, the moon and polarised light for orientation, by giving the beetles 'caps' which blocked light from reaching their eyes. They also discovered that the beetles climb on top of their dung balls to perform a 'dance' during which they locate light sources to use as orientation."

This is marvelous, we, so to speak, dance as well when we 're mired in a decaying mess and see a light showing us the way out.

[Charlotte]

I'm not so sure that the dung beetles don't care where they're going since they "orient" themselves... if they had no goal in mind they wouldn't need orientation, but I know how it is meant by the writer. Likewise, not sure if they just need to get away from the poo pile, rather, and considering their life story, perhaps a stage of their work was completed successfully, they performed a dance and moved on to the next phase, it's unlikely that they danced for the "sole" reason of having a light source to saunter aimlessly in the sand.

Hope to crawl faster tomorrow

[Charlotte]

Two versions of how the Beetle renews itself are given, and considered here.

Wkipedia

"The "rollers" roll and bury a dung ball either for food storage or for making a brooding ball. In the latter case, two beetles, one male and one female, stay around the dung ball during the rolling process. Usually it is the male that rolls the ball, while the female hitch-hikes or simply follows behind. In some cases, the male and female roll together. When a spot with soft soil is found, they stop and bury the ball, then mate underground. After the mating, both or one prepares the brooding ball. When the ball is finished, the female lays eggs inside it, a form of mass provisioning. Some species do not leave after this stage, but remain to safeguard their offspring."

With a few exceptions, this can be applied to human engendering offspring, male and female working together and safeguarding their offspring for however long it is necessary, below. It also reminds of Pharaoh in a sacred place, cummuning with his god and a Women's voice answered, this belonging in the spiritual regions.

Plutarch

"The race of beetles has no female, but all the males eject their sperm into a round pellet of material which they roll up by pushing it from the opposite side, just as the sun seems to turn the heavens in the direction opposite to its own course, which is from west to east."

Plutarch's short rendition is that of the Egyptian Scarabea, alone and by itself within a dung ball of its own making, while transforming becomes, comes into existence and appears as the sun, Khepri. A similar version of Man's transforming is given in the "The Book of coming forth by Day", from (the Book of) the Dead.

[Charlotte]

I was wrong in writing that the scarab gestates in a dung ball of its own making. It being of cattle and probably other animal dung. Noteworthy in the symbolism, however, is that the scarab chooses dung rather than twigs, feathers, or the silk strands of spiders as do birds to build their nest, but then they already learned how to fly. I was probably thinking in terms of Man's transformation from the jabberwocky and rubbish of the world we're so tired of.

Snippets from the writings of Isha de Lubicz.

The Harper:

"But a wiser man than I will later answer your questions, for the images of the gods have loftier purposes than to accumilate offerings.

"I will tell you the word which has been the treasure of my life: one day, when I still had my eyes, a sage passed my way and said to me: 'If you want to know anything, ask nature about it; the scarabæus will teach you the beginning of your history.

"Well, I have followed this advice, and here is waht I have learned: Khepra, the sacred scarabæus, has no female; to beget his progeny he fashions a ball of cattle dung; in it his seed will gestate. And this ball he rolls from the east towards the west with his hind legs, thus he never turns his face away from the east.

"Just so does the World move, in an opposite direction to the apparent course of the stars; for one thing is the appearance and another the real movement."

(The latter akin to Plutarch's statement in yesterdays post.)

"The scarabæus buries his ball for the exact duration of one Moon; and his progeny, hatched in the motherly ground, takes shape in the bosom of this dung. The, without loosing a day, he unearths the ball and throws it into the water, and when it opens in the water, then his progeny comes forth as Ra, (with symbol?) the morning, issues forth from Nu, the primordial water of Nut, the celestial night.

"Now this scarabæus beetle is black like the darkness which lies at the beginning of all things, and on his feet he has as many toes as the thirty days of the solar month. . . . Concerning his name, that means becoming and transformation."

[Charlotte]

The Book: "My forms are the forms of the god Khepera"

Affirming the process to "come into being, evolve" of Man as does the scarab in darkness in "the exact duration of one Moon" waxing to fullness.

"The scarab,khepra in Egyptian, is one of the pricipal themes of funerary texts, and knowledge of it is essential. Horapollon described three venerated scarabs. The "sacred" scarab fertilizes its own seed, leaves it to germinate in a ball of manure (in the dark), and rolls it backwards to bury it."

Having become jaded by the monotonous sounds of the ordinary life, we too go back as far as we can remember and into seclusion. There seems to be always that one thing that's missing to make us happy, I used to buy wigs and shoes lol.

"The second scarab is concecrated to Isis because it has horns like the moon. The third one, Horapollon says, has a single horn and is concecrated to Thoth Hermes."

Reminding of the Ibis headed Thoth, its beak said to symbolize the moon sickle, but also allowing the bird to probe deep into the soil for the best morsels.

"The characteristics of the sacred scarab are interesting enough to describe in detail. The color of the fully developed insect is black, but its nymph, in the shape of a mummy is yellow amber; after shedding its skin, it has dark red thorax, feet, and head, a white abdomen, and yellowish white elyctra. A month is required for the ebony black color to develop."

Resembling the stages of alchemy, the scarab is swifter than us Humans who need many Moon's, many life-times, but many don't believe in immortality even though the wisest of Mortals that ever lived guarantee it, stake their life on it.

"The ball with which the scarab nourishes itself must be distinguished from the ball in which it germinates. The former is composed largely of mule or cattle dung mixed with whisp of hey. After burying this in the ground, with itself inside, the scarab methodically eats it, excreeting in the process a residue in a continuous thread that can be ten feet long. The ethomologist Fabre says that this scarab can digest nearly its own volume in food in one twelve hour period.

"The ball that serves as a nest for the future scarab is made of a finer manure, softer and better bonded (usually sheep manure). At first the ball is slightly hallowed out in the form of a vase with a small round bulging neck, which later streches out to make the ball pear-shaped. When the seed is deposited, the neck is closed by a flexible stopper that allows air to penetrade. The maternal gestating and nourishing environment created in this fashion explains the androgynous character ascribed to the legendary scarab."

As Don used to exclaim: brilliant, the Ancient Egyptians. We too are androgynous at conception, develop in the primordial water and come forth into this World.

www.thefind.com/jewelry/info-blue-beetle-bracelets

[Don Barone]

Hi Charlotte I am certain that somewhere in "his" world lies the answer to ours. However I have to report another possible Tsunami.

Feed Your Head

Perhaps some of my best and clearest work.

Since you are one of the brightest of philosophers yet one of the weakest of the geometrists perhaps I have made this clear enough for you to understand. This is now my goal to make it as simple as it really is as I try to prepare some of my ideas for publication in book form. So please let me know if you understand it and where I could make it clearer and maybe even simpler.

Cheers
Don Barone

[Charlotte]

Hi Don,

Choosing the way of the beetle in its stages of transformation and "come into being" by rolling a dung ball here on earth utilizing the light in the Heavens is superlative.

Thanks for elevating me to rank with philosophers, but in my case it is more common sense disguised in wisdom's dress, and perhaps a bit of intuition.

Reading through your link I get the gist of what you're trying to convey but am none the wiser for it in particulars. It may be simple for you and fellow geomaticians, but it doesn't help us uneducated in these disciplines Folk to understand. We grasp things in words and by analogy.

Nevertheless, your discoveries contribute to the growing knowledge of bringing us closer to understand our origin, purpose, and destiny, important above all, else we are just born to die and our Lives have no meaning other than perpetuate our race to keep on in our sorry ways and eventuall self-distruct, again.

Knowing how difficult it is to put one's "stuff" coherently, I wish you the best of luck in preparing your findings for publishing.

Always, I cheer you on

Charlotte

[Charlotte]

The remarkable symbolism of the Scarab as given:

1. Solar symbols: When its two elyctra are unfolded, it is the image of the sun on its double path—ascending and descending. Burying its ball, it represents "Ra descending into his mountain." Khepra, the name of the scarab, is the name of the rising sun.

2. Lunar symbol: twenty-eight days of gestation.

3. It symbolizes the principle of the being who produces and achieves his successive transformations by himself, as indicated by its name and its derivative words: kheper = to exist, to become, to take form: kheprer =to that which produces its own genesis, the principle of the being who himself causes the phases of his transformations; kheprw =forms, transformations.

For this reason the Egyptians put the scarab directly over the heart of the mummies. It represents the psychic heart, not the bodily one—the subtle heart which they say the deceased should never lose and which underwent the test of the kheprw (transformations")

The ritual material of the scarab of the heart was gold and silver so that the two principles—solar and lunar—might be connected through it. There have also be found on mummies some scarabs made of black or dark green stone, the symbol of the state of transformation."

In the German language a beetle is called "Käfer", obvious hey, the umlaut ä consisting of a-ä-a, seperates, transforms, and returns a thing to its original state or meaning.

And when the time fell true there appeared the Beatles who transformed the World.

[Charlotte]

I should clarify that not the letters a-ä-a themselves seperate, transform, and return a definition or idea to its original meaning, rather the changing of the original "tone/sound" to make audible another, performs this function.
Um=turn around, round about, Laut=tone/sound, the origin of: it's the tone that makes the music, maybe.