The Garden of Cyrus

...cross of that martyr. Nor shall we urge the Labarum The military standard used by Constantine the Great, which featured the Chi-Rho symbol—the first two letters of Christ's name in Greek and famous standard of Constantine, or make further use of it, other than as the first letters in the name of our Savior Christ. These letters were in use among Christians before the days of Constantine, to be observed in the sepulchral monuments of martyrs during the reigns of Hadrian and Antoninus. They are even found in the antiquities of the non-Christians original: "Gentiles" before the coming of Christ, such as in the medal of King Ptolemy, marked with the same characters, which might simply be the beginning of some word or name that antiquaries have not yet discovered. ❦ We will not revive the mysterious crosses of Egypt, which have circles on their heads and are found on the breast of Serapis and in the hands of their guardian spirits original: "genial spirits". These are not unlike the astrological symbol of Venus and were looked upon by ancient Christians in relation to Christ. However they first began, the Egyptians used them to express the process and motion of the spirit of the world, and its diffusion throughout celestial and elemental nature; this was implied by a circle and a right-lined intersection—a secret found in their talismans and magical characters. Yet, whoever considers the plain cross upon the head of the owl in the Lateran obelisk, or the cross erected upon a pitcher pouring streams of water into basins with sprinkling branches in them (all described upon a two-footed altar, as in the hieroglyphics of the bronze Table of Bembus The Mensa Isiaca, an elaborate bronze tablet of Egyptian-style imagery), will find it hard to dismiss the thought of Christian symbolism original: "signality" in them. ❦ We shall not call upon the Hebrew Tenupha A "wave offering" in Jewish ritual, or the ceremony of their offerings, which were waved by the priest toward the four quarters of the world in the form of a cross, as seen in the peace offerings. And it is remarkably recorded in the traditions of the rabbis that while oil was poured "coronally" (circularly) upon the heads of kings, the high priest was anointed "decussatively" term: decussatively — in the form of an X, or in the form of an X. Although mystical thinkers could not escape seeing this as a foreshadowing original: "typical thought" of Christ, since the concept is Hebrew, we should expect to verify it through the logic of that language rather than confining it to the unrelated letters of Greece, or explaining it through the alphabets of Cadmus or Palamedes Mythical inventors of the Greek alphabet. ❦ Of this quincuncial arrangement original: "ordination", the ancients practiced much but spoke little, and the moderns have not expanded upon it at all. He who considers it more closely—in the form of its square diamond original: "rhombus" and its crossing points original: "decussation", along with its various uses and mysteries...