Boundless Harmony

We say nothing new by affirming that Sound has creative powers and that Manifestation springs from a primeval “Word” (logos). The world has been created through a Sound, therefore through a vibration, a motion originating from a vibrating “body” (consciousness) which, by carving and propagating itself in a receptive and malleable Substance, gave rise to creation.
This Logos, a term that philosophy, with some fluctuations in meaning, defines as “Word”, “Speech” and “Universal Reason”, expresses the ordering and wise power of an Idea that is not only manifested in the cosmos (“order”), but which makes this same cosmos cohesive and coherent by virtue of rational and exact — that is, mathematical-geometrical — inner relations.
Cosmogonies and science, at different times and in different ways, have outlined this creative path, highlighting the “ineffable” power of that logos of which philosophers and mystics, as well as poets, have tried to investigate the essence. The Word creates, the Word raises worlds from its fiery heart, the Word harmonises the song of each one and transforms it into a majestic and concordant choir.

The conscious use of sound, of the word, that is to say the ability to use the creative power of the logos, is indicated in the East with the term of Mantrika shakti, or “the incarnate Word”, the power or occult potency of words, sounds, numbers and letters contained in a mantra, in order to achieve certain results and activate a certain energy.
The “magical” use of words is therefore the power of sound that bends all forms so that they follow the will of the creator.
The formal construction, after the sound has fertilized the substance, takes place through a process that has nothing vague or casual, but has its roots in a Science that teaches to build wisely, respecting spatial and sound laws; a Science, the Science of Harmonics, which man has to learn and apply if he aspires to fulfil his role as co-creator in a cosmos of conscious and creative entities.

By analyzing the etymology of the word first, we note that Harmonics has its origin from the Indo-European root *AR-/*OR-/*UR-, which indicates movement towards, connection, relationship. In this sense, therefore, we can speak of an “accord to unite”, that is a movement, a vibration, which creates unity starting from dissimilar elements, revealing in them the unifying quality and, consequently, bringing out the possibility of such a relationship. It is no coincidence that Harmony, which shares the same etymological root, recalls that “perfect concordance” that allows us to immerse ourselves in the “symphony of the world” and even of the celestial spheres.

Turning to myths, let us mention the figure of Orpheus, son of the muse Calliope, capable, with his song and with the music that flowed from his lyre, of enchanting human beings, animals and even the inhabitants of the Underworld, while historical sources remember Pythagoras as the first one who divulged in the West the elements of this Science, whose origins are well guarded by time.
Pythagoras spoke precisely of the “music of the spheres”, alluding to the perfect harmony that the vibrations of heavenly bodies, “Their sounds”, spread throughout space, creating that chord which maintains and keeps in force the system.
“It is beautiful to contemplate the entire celestial vault and beautiful to recognise the order of the stars that move in it; this derives from the fact that the world participates in the First, which is also the intelligible. And the First, for him, [Pythagoras] was the nature of number and proportion, which pervades all things and according to which the universe is harmoniously composed and conveniently ordered”. (1)

Thus Iamblichus traces the Pythagorean thought about the cosmos and adds that the philosopher “was the only one, as he explained, able to hear and understand the universal harmony and the music of the spheres and of the stars that moved within them. This harmony makes a purer and fuller music, compared to human music, thanks to the movement of celestial bodies, which is characterised by supreme melodiousness and exceptional, multifaceted beauty. The latter is the product of celestial sounds, which originate from the unequal and in various ways different speeds, sizes and positions of those bodies, but are nevertheless placed in a reciprocal relationship in the most harmonious way”. (2)

This attitude of the philosopher is testified by Porphyry who writes: “He soothed the suffering of soul and body with rhythms and magic words. And this suited his friends, but he listened to the harmony of the universe by perceiving the universal harmony of the spheres and of the stars that moved in them, which we do not hear, due to the inefficiency of our nature”. (3)

The teaching of Pythagoras in the musical-mathematical field was intertwined with the practical use of the monochord and therefore encouraged and urged “listening”, a listening that concerned all the structures, logical, mathematical, philosophical, even material, in order to be able to evaluate them through their sound.
The use of the monochord is to be understood above all in its relationship with Space: “Ultimately, the monochord “expresses” a straight line. This lives in the Reality of Space, and has no limits in its direction. Moreover, traversed by an infinite tension, it is qualified by the two points (at infinity) of which it is the ratio. These two points, which are actually its Origins, transmit their own qualities to all points of the line. Not only that, but their own rhythm as well. The straight line — in the reality of Space — is therefore a channel of energy, and is the simplest expression of a relationship. “Around” the straight line, by induction, a field is created, that in turn qualifies the Space, to which it transmits the pulse of its Origins. In other words, the real line, in Space, resounds”. (4)

With these experiments on the monochord, Pythagoras aimed at making men perceive, again through sound, their greater or lesser “being in harmony” with the Laws of the world, and finally evaluate the “consonance” of man with the cosmos in which he was immersed.
From this skillful listening also derived the possibility of a judgment regarding the Beauty, the Harmony and the Truth of what the sound had caused to emerge; such a listening, however, had to be really wise, since the supreme source of every sound is Silence (the transcendent Logos) that generates every being and expresses itself through that unknowable yet real Sound—non-Sound.

After Pythagoras many took up this thought, corroborated and enriched it; among these we can mention Kepler who in his work Harmonices mundi illustrates the development of the concept of the solar system according to which the movements of celestial bodies produced a music based on harmonic-mathematical elements; this sublime music was not audible to the human ear but intelligible to the mind.
In particular, Kepler focuses on the relationship between the elliptical orbits of the planets and the Platonic solids, as well as on the possibility that the orbits, in relation to the distance of the planet from the Sun and its speed, corresponded to precise numerical ratios, the same ratios that govern the laws of musical harmony.

Kepler states that “… all these celestial movements are an eternally wonderful many-voiced song that transcends, only in thought, the discordance of tension” and again emphasises that the creator artfully articulated the universe “through a masterfully structured musical work”.

The numerical relationships can therefore be translated into sounds and vice versa; each sound is in fact identifiable by its frequency, that is, by the number of vibrations per unit of time. “It is essential to reflect long and intensely on sound and number. They are two aspects of the same reality that remains hidden. At first they do not appear to be a pair of opposites, at least not in the “horizontal” sense of the word, not in the sense that they are complementary. They appear as two entities or two expressions between which there is a vertical hierarchy, such as soul and body, and so much so that, in order to be manifested, they cannot be separated. Any number can be expressed by means of a ratio, and therefore of a sound. Any sound in turn can be identified by means of a number. There are no numbers without sound, no sounds without number. It is true that a sound can descend beyond certain spheres, so that it remains unmanifest or not perceived; but to be born and be manifested it needs a number. Thus, from the beginning, sound and number are twins and opposites. From these first, somewhat uncertain considerations, it follows that sound and number are pairs of opposites, and therefore manifest aspects of an occult synthetic reality; and how to refrain from taking them as a symbol of the relationship between spirit and matter. Having ascended this high, it does not seem wrong to insist on the universal value of Harmonics, but extended to any vibration of any kind…”. (5)
This apparently banal correspondence between Number and Sound is at the foundations of the Science of Harmonics which, in this way, allows us to delineate and explain a “sound space” full of possibilities since sound also expresses a Value, a psychic quality perceived by soul; as a matter of fact the human ear is able to recognise the value of a sound, by noticing with discomfort when it is out of tune. Sound, once emitted, does not end its course: one of its specific properties, which has both material and inner relevance, is that, as long as it persists, it creates its infinite intervals (the Harmonic series) according to a precise, constant and hierarchical order.
All the more reason to connect Number and Sound and enhance the creation according to a project, a law, an order that builds the energetic framework of Life.
In particular, the science of Harmonics highlights the relevance of the right relationships that arise from this property, recalling the mathematical and geometric connections that underlie these relationships.

“Interval means Consciousness. In the infinite and living Space, all the particles of Fire (the Points) are in reciprocal relationship with all the others, and this infinite field of relationship is the universal consciousness, different from Point to Point, but never entirely absent. Space therefore acts as the set of infinite intervals. It follows that listening to the interval is a real activity of the consciousness, and the more it is practiced, the more it is refined and educated. In Harmonics it is not so much the sound that dominates, but the interval. By its very nature as an intermediary, it acts as a bridge, and connects the shores of two different worlds: the physical and the spiritual. It is the child of the constantly changing relationship between spirit and substance. This statement opens the door to considerations pertaining to religion and philosophy, which are, at a closer look, only fields of application of Harmonics”. (6)
Sound therefore creates in Space a real community, hierarchically ordered, where each part is functional to the others and all of them are connected by harmonic bonds.
The ultimate goal is to reach Harmony, that universal law pertaining to both the macrocosm and the microcosm, capable of making us attain Being and realise its Purpose.

So how can we listen to this Sound, make it flow in us and keep it alive? And how can we in turn produce “our” sound and “tune” it in relation to all the other sounds that populate space?

“First the Yogi hears the music of the spheres, but later he himself begins to resonate to this harmony of the Higher World. But for this to happen, a flaming heart is necessary.” (7)
“We send calls of unity to seekers whose hearts have sensed the music of the spheres. But for a person who regards the spheres as void, the heart is no more than a blood-bag.” (8)
“Toward what shall we strive, to the finite or the infinite? (…) The physical forms are beautiful, but the music of the spheres is incomparable. Yet beyond this subtle illumination is displayed the Fiery Grandeur.” (9)
Everyone is therefore called to keep the “inner strings” tight, just like in the monochord, and let’s not forget that the etymology of “heart” (cor, cordis in Latin) recalls a “string” (chorda), the often-mentioned “heartstrings”, which recall the strings of musical instruments.

Any one of us must have a vibrant heart, since we all are instruments, resonators that emit a sound in space and tend to reproduce the music of the spheres, the supreme model. And there’s more: every time a “body” (a consciousness) hears its own sound, it starts to resonate with it and begins to vibrate, thus establishing a “sound chain” that connects it to all the consciousnesses that vibrate at that frequency and make that same Sound.
Let us therefore be careful to produce harmonic sounds and not disjointed noises that make space screech, allowing chaos to create disharmony.
“… the resonant space contained in the heart is precisely the place of reception and transmission of all signals. It must be purified and kept in such a state of selective tension, as to react to the most distant messages and recognise their origin. It is an easy to understand process of education and discipline, through which one day the terrestrial humanity will rise to the glorious consciousness of the Cosmos, distilling knowledge through resonance”. (10)

A Group of human beings who tend towards Infinity, who aspire to listen to the music of the spheres and to emit their own sound into Space, has another “instrument” at its disposal, that is the formal representation of that “sound space” in which Number, Sound, Rhythm and Harmony are intertwined: the Lambdoma.
This diagram, which we can only briefly mention here, is a living network in which each interval is the result of a relationship between two numerical-sound entities and represents a consciousness that vibrates in Space and seeks to accord with the primal Sound, the One Generator.
The Lambdoma is therefore a living system of relationships whose primary purpose is to operate for a project (Plan) of planetary scope: “Lambdoma is a word of Greek origin, from the initial of LOGOS, the creative sound, and indicates a graphic chart which summarises the main laws of that sound. Its geometric aspect is variable and elastic: a synergy between triangle, cross and swastika. It is a grid of tonal coordinates, but also a sieve, an orderer, a control tool that is useful for both designing and verifying. It allows us to transform music into figures and vice versa, connecting sound and light. If used properly it helps to eradicate contrasts and releases harmony, that is, it gets rid of the superficial and reveals the essence”. (11)

In fact, the Lambdoma can also give a representation of the Plan, being a potential (but necessary) formulation of that Plan of Love and Light that Humanity is called to promote on Earth.
Each sound relationship that vibrates in the Lambdoma is one of the houses of Being and every human, from that house, can raise his/her harmonic song towards Space and add that sound to the music of the spheres.

“In boundless harmony is contained the whole cosmic creativeness.” (12)

_______________________________________________________________

This article is published to celebrate the heliocentric conjunction between Venus (5^th Ray) and Jupiter (2^nd Ray) in Pisces; the Masters of Love and Golden Construction make their radiant energy resonate in Space, urging all consciousnesses to create according to Love and Light.

1. Iamblichus, On the Pythagorean Life
2. Ibidem
3. Porphyry, Life of Pythagoras
4. Enzio Savoini, Free translation, with comments, of Lehrbuch der Harmonik by Hans Kayser, unpublished text – see Harmonics compendium.
5. Ibidem
6. Ibidem
7. Agni Yoga Series, Heart § 198
8. Ibidem, § 394
9. Fiery World I § 157
10. Enzio Savoini, Free translation, with comments, of Lehrbuch der Harmonik by Hans Kayser, unpublished text
11. Primo Vertice, Man on the planet and in the Heavens (available only in Italian)
12. Infinity I § 269