English Gematria and the Book of Psalms

In another online discussion, someone mentioned the book of Psalms in the Bible and and that Psalm 117 is the middle chapter of the entire Bible. The number 117 caught my attention because it has come up a lot in my work with English gematria. Like many of the other numbers I focus on, it's a multiple of 9. So I decided to apply English gematria to the subject to see what might be revealed. I use the simple serial code of A=1 through Z=27.

Psalm 119 is the longest psalm as well as the longest chapter in the Bible. It is composed of 176 verses, in sets (or stanzas) of eight verses, each set (stanza) beginning with one of the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet in sequential order.

Psalm 117 is the shortest chapter in the Bible. It is also the center of the King James Version (KJV) of the Bible. The fact that Psalm 117 is the middle chapter has intrigued me since I first found out about it because of it's curious relationship to the number 9, a number that I've spent years investigating as a result of my work with English gematria.

All of the numbers in the historical canon of sacred numbers are multiples of 9. A few examples: 54, 108, 144, 153, 162, 234, 432, 576, 666. Each of these numbers can be reduced to the single digit value of 9 by cross-adding the digits. For example: 54 = 5+4=9, or 666 = 6+6+6=18 = 1+8=9.

Notice 117 fits this scheme: 1+1+7 = 9

There are 594 chapters before 117 and 594 chapters after 117.

5+9+4=18, 1+8 = 9

Using the English gematria code of A=1 through Z=26 we find this:

FIVE NINE FOUR = 144, one of the most revered of sacred numbers and it has esoteric associations with the concept of "light".

Curiously, we also find this:
NEGATIVE DARK = 117
POSITIVE LIGHT = 171 = THE PSALM OF LIGHT
Notice the rearrangement of the digits from 117 to 171.
Also of interest: 117 + 171 = 288 = 144 x 2

The chapters immediately on either side of 117 are, of course, 116 and 118.

116 + 118 = 234, the reverse of 432, another sacred number that reduces to the single digit value of 9.

If you continue this descending/ascending sequence from the center (117), you get the number 234 in every instance. For example:

115 + 119 = 234
114 + 120 = 234
113 + 121 = 234
...and so on, all the way to Psalm 150 (the final Psalm):
84 + 150 = 234

234 happens to be 9 x 26, the number of letters in our Western alphabet that is used here for the English gematria.

Now, here's something I discovered regarding Psalms 84 and 150 (the final Psalm). This has very likely never been realized before.

150 - 84 = 66, the total number of books in the entire KJV.

Here is something else I discovered concerning the 150 Psalms:

Since 150 divides evenly in half, there is no single Psalm at the center of the Book of Psalms. The center of the Book of Psalms would have to be considered as two Psalms, 75 and 76. That would leave 74 Psalms before Psalm 75, and 74 Psalms after Psalm 76. Now again, using the English gematria code of A=1 through Z=26, here's what's interesting about 74 occurring twice:

JESUS = 74
LUCIFER = 74
74 + 74 = 148 = MORNING STAR

Jesus and Lucifer are both associated with the Morning Star in the Bible (Isaiah 14:12 and Rev. 22:16).

Then, regarding the numbers 75 and 76 (the two center Psalms) we find this:

75 + 76 = 151 = JESUS CHRIST

Notice the numbers immediately on either side of the two center numbers (75 and 76) are 74 and 77. This is really interesting because:

74 = JESUS
77 = CHRIST

And again, as in the exercise above, if you carry the ascending and descending sequence out all the way to the final Psalm, the result is always 151.

73 + 78 = 151
72 + 79 = 151
etc.

I was intrigued when I learned there was a psalm missing from the Bible. It is Psalm 151. 

How's this for a synch: Using the English gematria code of A=1 through Z=26, I found this:

MISSING PSALM = 151

The number 151 is the only number I've found that is "self descriptive" using the English gematria code:
A ONE ON BOTH ENDS = 151
THE MIDDLE IS A FIVE = 151

It is also the English gematria value of following phrases:
VICAR OF CHRIST = 151 (another title for the Pope)
THE CHRIST KEY = 151
JESUS IS LORD = 151
LORD OF HOSTS = 151
CHRIST THE KING = 151
THE SACRIFICIAL LAMB = 151

Actually there is more to this number which involves the mystery of Rennes le Chateau, but I'll leave that for a future post.

As I mentioned, each set of verses in Psalm 119 begins with one of the 22 Hebrew letters in proper sequence, Aleph through Tau. Now here's something Dr. Joseph Puleo pointed out regarding Psalm 119. Puleo noted that the verse number at the beginning of each set also follows a sequential pattern if you reduce the multi-digit numbers to single digit values. Take the 3rd set of verses as an example. It begins with verse number 17. That needs to be reduced to the single digit value of 8 (1+7=8) When you list all of those initial numbers in their reduced forms, here's what you get:

1 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

And it just continues to get even more interesting. As mentioned at the top of this paper, there are 176 verses in Psalm 119. Now, it might seem like 176 is just a random number. Right? Well, maybe it's not so random after all:

The Psalms are songs. The word "psalm" means "songs played with a harp". So we're talking about music.

My friend and research associate, Lui DiMartino, has done some groundbreaking work establishing direct correspondences between music and sacred geometry. Much too complex to explain here. It's all detailed in his free download ebook, "Music and Numbers Through the Looking Glass" (http://missionignition.net/lui/).

Suffice to say for our discussion here, that a key component of his work is the number 9 and specifically the center of 9 which he calls the 4.5 axis. In simple terms, 9 divided in half is 4.5. That mid-point, that center of 9, is thought to mathematically represent a portal, or a point of transfer into another dimension where everything is reversed. Keeping that in mind, another key component of his work is the C-major scale and the note of F-sharp (F#). Also know that the core of his work involves the ancient concept of the "Merkaba" and it's geometric counterpart, the double tetrahedron within a sphere. As I said, I can't go into all the details about how these things fit into his theory. Just know that they are extremely significant and here's why I'm even mentioning it at all: Recall the number 176 from above? Again, using the serial code A=1 through Z=26:

FOUR POINT FIVE = 176 = A TRANSFER POINT = F SHARP IS THE MIDDLE = JESUS IS THE KEY = LUCIFER IS THE KEY = JESUS IS THE LOCK = LUCIFER IS THE LOCK

ONE HUNDRED SEVENTY SIX IS THE VIBRATIONAL FREQUENCY OF FOUR POINT FIVE = 765
765/4.5 = 170 = F SHARP IS THE KEY

JESUS AND LUCIFER ARE THE TWO KEYS = 342 = JESUS AND LUCIFER ARE THE TWO LOCKS

FOUR POINT FIVE IS THE GATE = 270 = ONE HUNDRED SEVENTY SIX

FOUR POINT FIVE IS THE MIND OF GOD = 324

THE GATE IS OPEN = 144 = THE GATE IS LOCKED = NINE IS THE KEY = THE SECRET KEY

Now, obviously, this idea of music involves the notion of tones. In the Gospel of John we find three phrases that are key to his opening statement: "In the beginning was the Word." The three phrases that appear after this opening are:

1. "The Word was with God"

2. "The Word was God"

3. "The Word was made Flesh"

Recall back at the beginning of this paper I mentioned Psalm 117 is the middle chapter of the KJV and there are 594 chapters before Psalm 117 and 594 chapters after Psalm 117. Keep that number, 594, in mind. Now, look what happens when we substitute the word "Tone" for the word "Word".

THE TONE WAS WITH GOD = 216 (2+1+6 = 9)
THE TONE WAS GOD = 175 (1+7+5 = 13, 1+3 = 4)
THE TONE WAS MADE FLESH = 203 (2+0+3 = 5)
216 + 175 + 203 = 594

That's curious enough as it is. But it gets even curiouser. Let's go back to that number 176, the total number of verses in Psalm 119:

If we divide 176 by the mystery number 9, we get 176/9 = 19.5

If you're familiar with Richard Hoagland's work (www.enterprisemission.com) with tetrahedral physics you'll be familiar with the number 19.5. When a tetrahedron is enclosed in a sphere, the corners of the base of the tetrahedron touch the circumference of the sphere at 19.5 degrees.

A merkaba is two interlocked tetrahedrons, one up, one down. The base of the upward-pointing one touches the sphere at 19.5 south of the sphere's equator. The base of the downward-pointing one touches at 19.5 north of the sphere's equator.

A tetrahedron has 4 sides. So two of them would give a total of 8 sides.
A musical octave is 8 notes.
Psalm 119 has 8 verses per set.

Is there some sort of message encoded within the structure of Psalm 119 that has something to do with tonal frequencies? Here's another little curiousity:

DOUBLE HELIX = 117 = COMMUNICATE

I can't help but marvel at how all of this seems to link together in some way yet to be explained. I feel like Roy Neary (Richard Dreyfuss) in Close Encounters of the Third Kind when he's staring at the pile of mashed potatoes on his plate and he mutters, "This means something. Something important."

Or... could it all be nothing more than a series of random coincidences? I don't think so. If anything, it seems more likely to be a function of the phenomenon of synchronicity according to the way quantum physicist, F. David Peat, views it. In the book, The Holographic Universe (by Michael Talbot), Talbot writes:

"Another physicist who takes synchronicity seriously is F. David Peat. Peat believes that Jungian-type synchronicities are not only real, but offer further evidence of the implicate order. As we have seen, according to Bohm the apparent separateness of consciousness and matter is an illusion, an artifact that occurs only after both have unfolded into the explicate world of objects and sequential time. If there is no division between mind and matter in the implicate, the ground from which all things spring, then it is not unusual to expect that reality might still be shot through with traces of this deep connectivity. Peat believes that synchronicities are therefore "flaws" in the fabric of reality, momentary fissures that allow us a brief glimpse of the immense and unitary order underlying all of nature. Put another way, Peat thinks that synchronicities reveal the absence of division between the physical world and our inner psychological reality. Thus the relative scarcity of synchronous experiences in our lives shows not only the extent to which we have fragmented ourselves from the general field of consciousness, but also the degree to which we have sealed ourselves off from the infinite and dazzling potential of the deeper orders of mind and reality. According to Peat, when we experience a synchronicity, what we are really experiencing "is the human mind operating, for a moment, in its true order and extending throughout society and nature, moving through orders of increasing subtlety, reaching past the source of mind and matter into creativity itself."

A LEAP OF FATE

This is an alternative version – a kind of Twilight Zone version, if you will – of a true story, an historical event from the previous century.

To paraphrase Stanley Eddington, "The universe is not only stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we CAN imagine."
--------------------------------------------------------------

A LEAP OF FATE
An alternative version of a True Story
By Gary Val Tenuta

*************************************************************
fate  1: the principle or determining cause or will by which things in general are believed to come to be as they are or events to happen as they do : DESTINY,  2: an inevitable and often adverse outcome, condition, or end.   -  Websters Dictionary
*************************************************************

    He disappeared on Thanksgiving Eve, 1971. The search for him was as thorough as could be expected. The dense forests covering the Pacific Northwest mountains made the search difficult if not nearly impossible. Besides, no one knew exactly where to look. He planned it that way. He planned it all so perfectly from beginning to end: Hijack the plane. Force the pilot to land. Demand a couple of parachutes and two-hundred- thousand dollars in small bills stuffed into back packs. When they resumed their flight he would exit from the tail end of the aircraft with a parachute over a predetermined area and make his way to the get-away car already waiting for him. After that he would never be seen or heard from again because an entirely new identity had been arranged for him physically as well as in name. And from all accounts, he never has been seen or heard from again. But not because of his plan.

    A lot of folks think he never made it. Many believe he died in the attempt. Others think he did make it and that he walks the streets unrecognized but considerably more wealthy. Truth is, he did make it. That is to say he's still alive and, yes, he does walk the streets quite unknown but also unknowable. He does have his money but he is not wealthy and the streets he walks are not our streets. He lives in a place he does not understand; a place that does not understand him. He remembers nothing, save two things: that the pieces of greenish paper in his bag are very  important (but he can't remember why) and he remembers his name.

    You see, the human mind is a fragile thing. True, it can adapt to many situations if it has time to adjust. But rapid changes can shock the mind. In his case, it happened in a second, in the blink of an eye, the moment he jumped from the plane. He fell through a rip in the fabric of space and time and entered into another dimension. The sound of the plane was gone the instant he jumped. He didn't even have time to open his parachute. He simply vanished from his present position in space and time and emerged, suddenly, in mid air, a few feet above the ground in a world similar to, but not the same as, the one he had just left. He landed with a thump on the ground just a few feet from what appeared to be some kind of a road in the middle of what appeared to be some kind of a city bustling with what appeared to be some kind of people.

    They regard him, now, as a harmless curiosity. Countless attempts to communicate with him have failed. The language barrier presents an ultimate obstacle, let alone the fact that the sudden experience shocked his keen mind nearly senseless.

    He wanders the streets of this strange city clutching his precious bag of worthless green paper and people give him food and, sometimes, shelter. He never speaks, but people tell of the time he was first discovered. They say he uttered a sound which they took to be his name. Whether it was his name or not, they still call him by the odd sound:  
DEEBEEKOOPER.

FULL DISCLOSURE: The Story Behind my amazon bestseller, The Ezekiel Code

The Ezekiel Code (http://amzn.com/B002NGO4JC) was my first attempt at writing the great American novel. Normally, a debut novel by an unknown self-published writer doesn't attract much attention. Such a writer would be lucky to sell a hundred copies, total. So what was The Ezekiel Code about and, more importantly, how and why did it become a bestseller on amazon for over 57 weeks?

The seed that eventually grew to become The Ezekiel Code was actually planted many years prior to me having any notion of writing a novel.

Back in the late 60s I had decided to read the Bible from cover to cover.  Having had an interest in the UFO phenomenon since the age of about 12, some of the passages in the Bible seemed somewhat similar to reports I'd read about UFO sightings. I first noticed it in the story of the Israelite's long journey through the desert. They followed a "pillar of cloud by day" and a "pillar of fire by night". That struck me as a rather curious phenomenon. Added to that was the Ark of the Covenant which functioned somehow to serve as a communication device between "God" and Moses. I wondered, could the Ark be some sort of a wireless communication technology so "God" (or whatever it was!) could talk to Moses from his "ship", the pillar of cloud by day, lit up at night?

Then, in the book of Numbers, this "cloud" that carried "God" actually landed on the ground. And, further on, there was Elijah who was "taken up" in a "whirlwind". It was becoming, as Alice would say, curiouser and curiouser. Then came the hammer that hit me on the head. Contrary to what you might be thinking at this point, that hammer didn't knock the sense out of me. I felt it knocked some sense into me.

The hammer was the book of Ezekiel. Ezekiel’s descriptions of the object that came down from the sky, and with which Ezekiel interacted, seemed much too mechanical to be anything of an ethereal nature. His incredibly detailed descriptions seemed to me like the way someone of his time in history, with a priestly background and absolutely no knowledge of advanced technology (beyond a cart pulled by a donkey), would describe a technological craft.

Some years later I discovered a non-fiction book called The Spaceships of Ezekiel written by a former NASA contract engineer by the name of Joseph Blumrich. His son had noticed the same things about Ezekiel's descriptions that I had noticed and, knowing the nature of his father's work with NASA, he told his father about it. The elder Blumrich didn't believe it at first but the more he studied it the more he began to have second thoughts. The book (The Spaceships of Ezekiel) is his professional analysis of what it was that Ezekiel may actually have encountered. After reading that book, I was left with not a shred of doubt that Ezekiel had experienced what we now call a Close Encounter of the Third Kind.

Fast forward to sometime in the mid-1990s:

My friend, Julie, and I were sitting in an all-night diner at about 2 o'clock in the morning. I think maybe we had been to see a sci-fi movie earlier in the evening which is probably what sparked a conversation about UFOs. Once again, this idea about Ezekiel came to the forefront of my mind and I told Julie about it. I mentioned that the idea would make a great premise for a movie by someone like Spielberg or Lucas.

The more I thought about it, the more I liked the idea but I knew I had no way of getting the idea to either of those guys. Then I thought, wait a minute. I can't make a movie but I can write. Why don't I write a novel based on this idea?

I was already half way through the writing of a different sci-fi novel at the time but this idea struck me as so extraordinary that I immediately shelved the other work and began sketching out ideas for this new book which, at the time, had a working title of Ezekiel's Wheels. So how and why did it change from Ezekiel's Wheels to The Ezekiel Code? That was a two-part process of an organic nature.

• Part-1 of the process:
At about the same time I started working on the book I was also well into the beginning stages of another little exploration that eventually began to take over my life. I had, quite by accident, stumbled onto the idea that our alphabet might be naturally or artificially "encoded" in some manner so as to correspond with our base-10 numbering system and that, somehow, the number 9 and the phenomenon of "synchronicity" were key to the whole thing. That, in itself, is a long story and a lengthy summary of the work is detailed here:

http://www.esotericonline.net/group/gematria/forum/topics/alpha-numbers-is-the-english

The bottom line is that this work was so ingrained into my consciousness that it almost naturally began to flow into my ideas about the plot of my novel. It provided a perfect plot device to propel the story. Not only did I recognize how well it would work, I also knew it was so original that it would be unique among anything else that was out there.

• Part-2 of the process:
I was not at all happy with the working title, Ezekiel's Wheels. It wasn't dramatic enough. It wasn't very catchy. Then one day, maybe around 2003/2004, I heard about a non-fiction book by one of the better known "alternative" researchers, Gregg Braden. His book was called The God Code. That reminded me of the title of Drosnin's best selling book, The Bible Code. And Julie had recently purchased a book called Healing Codes of the Biological Apocalypse (a book, by the way, in which the co- author had made the same discoveries about the English alphabet that I had made a few years earlier!). At the same time came Dan Brown’s phenomenal best-selling novel, The DaVinci Code. Well, I'm not blind. I started to recognize a pattern.

All of those books were best sellers in their respective categories. Clearly the public had a thirst for anything with the word "code" in the title. How fortuitous for me! My book definitely had the code element going for it so I latched onto the idea and changed the title to The Ezekiel Code. As soon as I made that change, all the little things that kept blocking my progress regarding the direction of the plot just fell away and the story began to write itself, sometimes so fast I could hardly keep up with it even though it did take me nearly 9 years to complete the darn thing!

So that, in a nut shell, is the story behind The Ezekiel Code. The book did really well. In fact, it was an amazon.com bestseller in three categories (often ranking high in the top 10) for over 57 weeks. The reviews, however, were mixed. About half the reviews were 4 and 5 stars and the other half were 1 and 2 stars. Some people loved it and some people, well, let’s just say they disliked it a lot. Why such a sharp divide? What was going on there? Well, listen up all you readers who are thinking about writing your first novel and delving into the world of indie publishing. There’s a lesson here. The success of a book isn’t always about how well it’s written. Sometimes it’s about the subject matter and the timing.

The Ezekiel Code didn’t become a bestseller because the writing was so incredibly good. Being a newbie at this novel writing stuff, I really thought the writing was great. But if that was true then why so many bad reviews? I was baffled. It was only months later, after licking my wounds inflicted by the slings and arrows of those negative reviews that I realized many of those reviewers were right. The writing, while certainly not awful, wasn’t really up to par with novels written by more seasoned authors. Two main criticisms came up:

(1) A few times I led the reader by inserting hints of what was coming instead of letting the reader have the fun of making the discovery for himself. At the end of one chapter, for example, the lead character, Zeke Banyon, was in his office, anxious to get home to his lover, Angela. Everything seemed to be going along really well for them. Nothing dramatic was expected. In the next chapter, however, Zeke arrives at his home and finds the house in a state of disarray, blood on the back door which had been broken into, and Angela was nowhere to be found. Quite a shocking and unexpected surprise, right? Well, sort of but not entirely, at least not for the reader. Why not entirely? Because of the last sentence of the previous chapter:

*****
Back in his office, Banyon poured his last cup of coffee for the day and settled down to finish some paperwork. All the while, he kept thinking about Angela. He couldn’t wait to get home. I have a feeling this is going to be an extraordinary evening!

He had no idea how extraordinary it would turn out to be. But not in the way he imagined.

*****
Two things happened here. (A) Not only did that last sentence give away the idea that something bad was about to happen, thus depriving the reader of the chance to experience the shocking turn of events for himself, but (B) that last sentence also interjected the voice of the author into the scene. When the author’s voice in interjected into the narrative it’s a bit like if you're watching a movie, you’re really into the scene, and suddenly you hear the voice of the director coming from somewhere off-camera, shouting “Okay, get ready. Something bad’s about to happen!” Wouldn't you just want to shoot that director?

(2) The other big criticism concerned the “info dumps”. An info dump is when the author dumps a large amount of information into the scene, thus interrupting the flow of the narrative. There is quite a bit of that in this book and it bugged some readers to no end. My only excuse for having done that is that the book could actually be classified as “experimental” in terms of style and construction. As I mentioned before, no other novel (that I’m aware of) has used gematria as a primary vehicle to drive the story. That presented me with the problem of having to impart a lot of information that I knew would be strange and unfamiliar to most readers. So not only are there sections where the “information dump” slows down the pace of the story, I also repeated some of it here and there throughout the story. I did that because there were so many unusual terms and concepts introduced to the reader and I thought repeating some of them occasionally (although mixed well into the character’s conversations) would help the reader recall what some of those things meant.

Apparently I was wrong. Well, not entirely wrong. There were actually some people who appreciated it because it kept them from having to search back through several chapters to find the information if, indeed, they did want to refresh their memory of some details. If I could do it all over again, I think I’d probably figure out a way to trim those “dumps” down to a minimum and include an addendum at the back of the book with expanded details for readers who might want to delve deeper into the information.

Now, getting back to what I said about subject matter being a selling point:

Remember The DaVinci Code? What was the big motivating factor underlying the phenomenal sales of that book? Was it the great writing? No. In fact, many readers thought the writing was just mediocre at best. I thought it was pretty good, myself. But I digress. The big reason behind the book’s success was its controversial subject matter. Jesus survived the crucifixion, married Mary Magdalene, sailed to France and had kids? What? Well, that’s sort of what motivated so many sales of The Ezekiel Code. It was both the controversial subject matter and the timing. Remember all the hoopla about 2012 being the end of the ancient Mayan calendar and the beginning of catastrophic earth changes? There was even a huge block-buster movie called "2012". You probably saw it. That whole doomsday scenario was my book’s big controversial selling point. Not to mention that the title (The Ezekiel Code) implied some connection between 2012 and the ancient Biblical prophet.

Even though I started writing the book back around 1997, I already knew about the coming end of the Mayan calendar on December 21, 2012. I was pretty sure that was going to become a global cultural phenomenon so I made that the primary premise for the story.

Eventually, dozens of books about 2012 were coming out and filling the bookshelves. But they were all non-fiction. The Ezekiel Code, on the other hand, was one of the very few works of fiction, based on the 2012 phenomenon, that appeared on the market. With a few targeted (and creatively worded) promotional ads on a couple of popular 2012-related websites, and a lot of enticing Tweets on Twitter, it didn’t take long for The Ezekiel Code to start selling like crazy. It was released first in paperback and, a few months later, on Kindle. And, by the way, the Kindle edition (at $4.95) outsold the paperback about 10 to 1. (The current price for the Kindle edition is now just $2.99)

So, there you go. I could say more about what The Ezekiel Code experience taught me about writing a novel but I should save that for another article. I’ll just say the experience was worth it. After The Ezekiel Code, I spent a lot of time honing my craft and learning the writing ropes. I think it shows in my latest novel, Ash: Return Of The Beast, a supernatural serial-killer chiller drenched in occult lore and inspired by an actual mystery concerning the missing crematory ashes of Aleister "The Beast" Crowley, history's most notorious practitioner of the Dark Arts. The enthusiastic reviews, so far, are confirmation of my growth as a novelist. So I actually owe a debt of gratitude to those who criticized my first novel and who had the unmitigated gall to tell me what they didn't like about it.

UFO screen captures from Google Maps

Someone showed me a screen capture from Google Maps that appeared to show what looks like a "flying saucer" in sky above Trout Creek, MT, at these coordinates:

47°51'17.60"N , 115°36'42.60"W 

So I used those coordinates to check it out and, sure enough, something odd is in the sky. Here are some screen captures I made. It's interesting that this anomalous image so closely resembles the famous "Adamski UFO" from the 1950s. The Adamski photos and video footage have been the source of fierce debate See images Adamski photos below the Google Maps screen captures.

Photos below by George Adamski, circa 1952

Cartoon Illustrated Book Covers? Yes!

I design a lot of book covers but I'm rarely asked to shift my brain into cartoon mode for the cover image. The most recent requests came from author Richard Herr for his books, Invasion From Fred (a YA novel) and Dog & Pony, Vol. 1: Aloha (a quirky, humorous novel in which all sort of crazy mishaps befall a company that organizes business and product presentations for their clients). The idea for the cover of Invasion From Fred came almost immediately after I read through portions of the manuscript.

Dog & Pony, on the other hand, was quite a bit more challenging. The author's fist idea was to use a cartoon image of a dog and a pony to symbolize the concept from which the title is derived. After several revisions, this was the result:

 

Sure, it was cute but it didn't really work because it makes it seem as if the story is actually about a dog and a pony which, as I mentioned above, isn't the case at all. So the author suggested maybe a guy on stage delivering a presentation and I came up with this:

 

That was a better representation of the story but the author didn't like the character for various reasons. Then he suggested maybe an illustration of a scene from the story. He offered a few suggested scenes and this one (below), featuring three of the main characters from the story, seemed the most adaptable to a book cover in terms of composing the scene so as to accommodate the title placement and author name.

 

At last! Nailed it! LOL! Getting to this point involved a lot of time, effort and creative head-scratching. But the author was willing to go the extra mile regarding the cost and, in the end, he was thrilled with the result. And that's what it's all about. A happy customer is a return customer! Like, for example, the award-winning author, Hank Quense, who was among the first to approach me with a request for cartoon illustrations of some of the characters in his quirky sci-fi/fantasy novels. In Hank's case, I was able to nail the cover images on the first attempt. Here's one of my favorites that I did for Hank's book, the one, the only... Zaftan Entrepreneurs.

 

If you want to connect with me about designing the cover for your next book, visit my site where you can see my low prices and dozens of my more traditional types of cover art. Or, hey, if you want a cartoon illustration for your cover, that's cool, too! What ever you have in mind, contact me and let's see if I'm the guy to make your book cover stand out.

Click here:

BookCoversAndVideos.webs.com

 NESARA, The Galactic Federation, and the 3-step pattern of deception

Origin and History of NESARA:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NESARA

NESARA is an acronym for the proposed National Economic Security and Reformation Act, a set of economic reforms suggested during the 1990s by Dr. Harvey Barnard. The bill was never passed in Congress (actually I don't think it even got introduced) so Dr. Barnard decided to post it on the internet. Then, sometime in the mid-90s, along comes a woman with an internet screen name of "Dove of Oneness". She hijacks the bill (figuratively speaking) and adds some bizarre "spiritual" and "ET" trimmings to it and starts promoting it as the thing that will save the world just as soon as "The White Knights" are able to out smart the Illuminati and clear the way for a big announcement to the world at large.

I was curious about this and almost started to fall for it until I noticed a pattern in the "progress reports" that she posted. It was the same 3-step pattern of announcements that I'd noticed with the so-called Ashtar Command and the Galactic Federation Of Light messages from Sheldon Nidle. The pattern goes like this:

Step 1: Big announcement about some coming event on a given date. In the case of the Galactic Federation of Light (Ashtar) it's usually the big ET landing or a spectacular showing of Federation craft in the skies. In the case of NESARA it's usually the big public revealing of the NESARA bill or maybe the great White Knights are going to have an important meeting with the President. The point is, the event (whatever it's touted to be) is going to give us all a reason for great joy and celebration.

Step 2: The date comes and goes and the big event doesn't happen.
Step 3: Another announcement. But this time it's in the form of an excuse explaining why the event didn't happen. The "channeled" excuse (for both NESARA and the Galactic Federation) usually goes something like this:

"Dear Ones, we know you must be disappointed that [insert event] didn't occur as planned. We are also disappointed as we had invested much time, love and energy into what we hoped would be a successful event. The negative influences now in positions of power in your beautiful country and in other countries around the world are more powerful than we had imagined. They found out about our plans and implemented measures to disrupt us at every turn. But rest assured that you are loved, you are precious to us, and we are not giving up. Have faith and know we are here for you."

Then some time passes (maybe weeks, maybe a month or so) and pretty soon the next big announcement comes (Step-1). The plans have been worked out and the event can finally take place. Yippee! Of course it doesn't happen and then comes steps 2 and 3. And it goes on and on, just like Blossom Goodchild's big Galactic Federation non-event in October of 2008.

So who was "Dove of Oneness"? Her real name was Shaini Goodwin, a former student of The Ramtha School Of Enlightenment. Ms. Goodwin was eventually charged with defrauding an elderly woman out of at least $10,000.

The latest news is that Goodwin passed away in May, 2010 (http://www.fourwinds10.com/siterun_data/nesara/news/news.php?q=1276...). Whether that's true or not I have no idea. But what made me roll my eyes is that her death is being characterized as a heroic sacrifice. The claim is that destructive earth changes were close at hand and the only way to stop them from happening was for "Prime Creator" to come to earth. Apparently Prime Creator was just sitting around waiting for the signal which, of course, was Goodwin's death. Here's a quote from the article:

"Hers was a mission that cost her life on this plane but most certainly an ending she was willing to endure and a price she was prepared to pay, knowing it would signal the Prime Creator to finish the mission as written should the hierarchy fail and she were to die.  Upon Dove’s death, the Prime Creator would appear, stop the earth changes from occurring and remove all male hierarchy from this universe vigorously and immediately.  These actions did take place and we all stand ALIVE today because they did."

So, if you're reading this right now, you have Ms. Goodwin to thank.

Now someone calling herself/himself "Blue Star the Pleiadian" has reinvented NESARA with a whole new twist. This time around there's no mention whatsoever of anything having to do with the National Economic Security and Reformation Act. Now, miraculously, what used to be an acronym for a proposed economics bill has morphed into the name of a "spiritual" entity, the "great Mother".

My guess is that whoever is behind this new version of NESARA is betting that people just getting their feet wet in the "New Age" movement will be so taken in by the sugar-coated messages of this "Great Mother NESARA" that they won't bother to do any research on their own to find out any background of where this all originated. Here is what "Blue Star the Pleiadian" has to say:

"NESARA is the great MOTHER; it is she who assists in deciding what needs changed here on this planet. It is she who has long awaited her timeline to enter here. It is she who is the  true voice of We the People.  All the true NESARIANS need to step forward and bathe themselves in her glory, rebirth in her glorious wake, for she is here for you, one and all." (http://www.bluestarspeaks.com/chronicles14.htm)

More from Blue Star the Pleiadian here:
http://www.bluestarspeaks.com/chronicles.htm

So why am I posting this? The reason I'm posting this information is because, after years of involvement and participation in the so-called New Age community, I've seen so many scams come and go and I've noticed that a great many people who are attracted to the New Age concepts seem to be ready to accept just about anything that promises peace, love, light and eternal bliss. We'd all like to acquire peace, love, light and eternal bliss but a lot of what's being offered as such is really just something someone made up and is passing it off as "Truth". The problem is, many who think of themselves as truth seekers don't bother to take the time to investigate the facts behind the alleged "truth" that's being offered to them.

In the pre-internet days it was pretty difficult to do such investigative research. But there's really no excuse anymore. The internet, with Google and other search engines at our fingertips, has made the task much easier. Even in the New Age the old axiom still holds: "If it seems too good to be true, it probably is."

• • • • • •

NOTE: For my take on the phenomenon known as "channeling", see my post: 

CHANNELING: Real or Fake? An Alternative Explanation 

http://www.garyvaltenuta.blogspot.com/2013/08/channeling-real-or-fake-alternative.html

THE GREAT AMPLEFORTH MANUSCRIPT HOAX: A UFO News-1 Special Investigative Report

Back around 2000/2001 I was publishing an internet newsletter called UFO News-1. It was endorsed by Whitley Strieber as “the best and most comprehensive newsletter of its kind on the internet”. Below is one of the articles from the newsletter concerning my investigation into an alleged UFO-related manuscript. It’s of some interest to people who are into the historical aspects of ufology. Interestingly enough, the story involves George Adamski and his friend, Desmond Leslie.

--------------------------------------------------------------

THE GREAT AMPLEFORTH MANUSCRIPT HOAX:

A UFO News-1 Special Investigative Report

by Gary Val Tenuta



 Anyone who has researched the UFO phonemenon to any good extent has very likely come across the story of what is known as the Ampleforth Manuscript. References to it can be found in various books, from Jacque Vallee's Anatomy Of A Phenomenon (1965) to John Spencer's The UFO Encyclopedia (1991) and even in the classic The Truth About Flying Saucers (1956) by world renown French ufologist, Aimé Michel. But what is the Ampleforth Manuscript? A short paragraph from Andy Page's (now defunct) web site of Famous UFO Cases is a typical example of how other writers have described it:

There is a record of the discovery of a very old manuscript in Ampleforth Abbey which gives a startling account of a flying saucer over Byland Abbey in Yorkshire. The event is reported to have been witnessed by monks in the year 1290 when "a large round silver thing like a disc flew slowly over them and excited the greatest terror".

Photo of Byland Abby ruins:

This manuscript would be quite a remarkable artifact, especially for researchers looking into the past for evidence that the UFO phenomenon has been with us for a very long time. In fact this manuscript has indeed been touted by many a ufologist as being just that: evidence of UFOs in our skies going back to at least the 13th century A.D.

There's just one problem. No one has ever seen the manuscript.

Why? Is it because the manuscript has been occulted away in some dark dusty corner of the old Ampleforth Abbey in England where it is purported to reside? Is it under heavy guard? Has it been destroyed by zealous Monks? Why have so many ufologists spoken of it over the past 40 years yet none of them have ever really revealed much information about its content? UFO News-1 was curious to find the truth about this mysterious manuscript so we decided to look for the original source of the story. Our initial search yielded no useful information. We couldn't even find information telling us why the manuscript was called the Ampleforth Manuscript in the first place.

What, exactly, was Ampleforth? Could it be the name of the person who discovered the manuscript? It seemed like a reasonable clue, so we followed up on it.
We soon discovered it was the name of a monastery called Ampleforth Abbey in England.



The Abbey was founded in the mid 1800s by Monks who were driven out of France during the Revolution. But we were puzzled. If the alleged disc-shaped UFO flew over the Byland Abbey, as the story goes, and was supposedly recorded by Monks of the Byland Abbey, why did that report become known as the Ampleforth Manuscript rather than the Byland Manuscript? Nevertheless, since it was indeed known as the Ampleforth Manuscript, we decided to write to the Ampleforth Abbey to see what we might learn.


We discovered the Abbey had it's own extensive library and through the modern miracle of the Internet we contacted the Ampleforth Abbey librarian, a Mr. Anselm Cramer, and we struck gold. Not only was Mr. Cramer familiar with the story of the famous manuscript and its proliferation throughout UFO lore over the years but he had a personal connection to it. While Mr. Cramer was quite willing to disclose what he knew about it, the news he gave us was not particulary what we were hoping for:


I doubt if you will appreciate my information, wrote Cramer. The MS is a spoof. It was invented by two friends of mine when we were at school here in 1953. They wrote a letter to the Times (London) under an assumed name (A. X. Chumley), and gave the information which has been misleading experts (I suppose that was their intention) ever since. Especially Desmond Leslie (another old boy of the school), who may well (in a lecture) have unwittingly put the idea into their heads.


Cramer went on to write:

One of them died not long after (in a road accident) but the other is now a retired professor of Philosophy. I shall see if he has any documentation and put it on our information site (www.monlib.org.uk) It may take a little while to gather: it seems to be needed.

Sorry to dash any hopes you may have had. We do have the high altar stone from Byland - it is only three miles away -and some bits and pieces from opened tombs, and some (printed) information about the pre-dissolution monks. But no men from Mars.
[signed]

Anselm Cramer OSB

Monastery Librarian

Ampleforth Abbey

York YO62 4EN


We explained to Cramer that while, yes, perhaps our hopes had been dashed, we were really interested in the truth, whatever that might turn out to be. We asked if he could provide us with a copy of that London Times article. Cramer responded:


I thought you might say some of this, so I wrote to my friend yesterday. As he lives in the middle of a field in a remote rural area, the letter may take a day or two...
Your requests may need a little clearing, but I don't aniticipate [sic] much problem.
[signed]

Anselm Cramer OSB

Monastery Librarian

Ampleforth Abbey

York YO62 4EN

Within a week or so we received a copy of the original London Times article along with the following letter:


Here is the origin of the spoof, from a copy sent me by Dr. Charlton, the spoofer. I do not know if he is willing to enter into correspondence – he was, after all, somewhat younger at the time - but if you wish to write a letter to him care of us I can forward it.
[signed]

Anselm Cramer OSB

Monastery Librarian

Ampleforth Abbey

York YO62 4EN

We did draft a letter to Dr. Charlton which was forwarded to him by Anselm Cramer but we've received no reply from the good doctor. Apparently he was not willing to discuss the matter.


We found it very interesting to note that Cramer mentioned a Mr. Desmond Leslie as perhaps being the person who, knowingly or unknowingly, inspired the two young monks of Ampleforth Abbey to concoct this hoax. It just so happens that Mr. Leslie co-authored a book, Flying Saucers Have Landed, with George Adamski. Adamski, as some of our readers will recall, was one of the first people to claim face-to-face contact with beings from another world back in the early 1950s. He is also perhaps the first to have published remarkably clear photos of "flying saucers". The photos have been a point of controversy ever since. Was it just coincidence that the Leslie/Adamski book, Flying Saucers Have Landed, was published in 1953, the same year Dr. Charlton and his friend (both young students at the time) wrote the now famous letter to the editor of the Times? Perhaps not.


Flying Saucers Have Landed was on the book stands just seven months after the article about the mysterious manuscript appeared in the Times. Knowing it takes some time for a book to get published and out on the shelves after it has been written, we can safely assume Leslie (who wrote the majority of the book's content) had been working on the book for at least a few months prior to it's publication date of September, 1953. The Times article was published in February of 1953. It's not unreasonable to assume Leslie's book was still in progress at that time. The reason we bring up this matter of timing between the two events is because of what is written in chapter 2 of his book. This chapter is devoted to a long list of supposedly documented incidents which can be interpreted as UFO sightings going back several centuries. Leslie begins, right off the bat, with this opening statement:


We shall not go back too far at first. A.D. 1290 is as good a place to begin as any. We have on our right, Ladies and Gentlemen, an old manuscript discovered at Ampleforth Abbey in January 1953, which gives a very clear account of a flying saucer passing over the startled community of Byland Abbey in Yorkshire.


Leslie then presents the text of this alleged manuscript in Latin. Following the Latin text he writes:


A.X. Chumley who supplied this information, gives the following translation:

'Took the sheep from Wilfred and roasted them on the feast of S.S. Simon and Jude. But when Henry the Abbott was about to say grace, John, one of the bretheren, came in and said there was a great portent outside. Then they all ran out, and Lo! a large round silver thing like a disk flew slowly over them and excited the greatest terror. Whereat Henry the Abbott immediately cried that Wilfred was an adulterer, wherefore it was impious to...'


Supposedly the rest of the alleged manuscript was missing and this was the only portion our mysterious A. X. Chumley discovered. But Leslie then goes on to describe yet another rather coincidental incident:

There is a remarkable similarity in this report to that sent to the Editor of the London Observer on 23 March 1953 by Bruce Angrave, M.S.I.A., who also saw a "large round silver thing like a disk pass slowly over the Milan Cathedral on 2 November 1952.


But the coincidental events don't stop there. The whole point of the book, Flying Saucers Have Landed, was to showcase George Adamski's alleged meeting with a man from Venus in the Arizona desert; an event which supposedly took place on 22 November 1952, just a couple weeks after the Milan Cathedral sighting reported in the Observer. Who was Bruce Angrave? Was his Milan Cathedral sighting genuine? Or was that, too, a hoax? Could Angrave have been an assumed name like A. X. Chumley? Could he have, in fact, been A. X. Chumley whom we now know as Dr. Charlton? Is it possible this was all one elaborate hoax, set up by Leslie and Adamski for the sole purpose of selling Adamski's story in a book? Certainly one might make that conclusion, given much of what has been discovered recently concerning the Adamski photos which sheds some degree of suspicion on all of Adamski's claims. Yet still we are left wondering.


Yes, it appears the Ampleforth Manuscript was a hoax. However, the entire picture is not as cut and dried as one might be led to believe. For one thing, UFO News-1 is not ready to close the door on the Adamski story quite yet. There are other photos which appear to show the same or very similar types of UFOs, photos which were taken by other people at other times and at other locations. These still need to be explained especially since this particular UFO is so unique in design compared to all other types of UFOs which have been reported and photographed over the years. Also, it is well documented that there was a huge flap of UFO sightings, nation wide, during the early to mid 1950s. Given this, it's just possible Adamski did have some sort of an alien encounter and was perhaps cajoled by Leslie and others to elaborate, shall we say, on the reality of the story for the sake of drama. This may also have been the motivation for publishing a few well timed, albeit false, UFO reports in major newspapers, to help bolster Adamski's story. This is all speculation, of course, but we can't help wondering.


As a final word, we'd like to mention something we discovered just as we were at the end of our research into this story of the Ampleforth Manuscript. We found someone else had already busted this hoax back in the 1960s. The investigator was one Samuel Rosenberg, a member of the infamous Condon Committee (also known as THE COLORADO PROJECT). This committee was a government sponsored attempt, instigated by then Senator Gerald Ford (later to become U.S. President) to study the UFO phenomenon. The results of the committee's investigation of the UFO phenomenon, published in the Condon Report (1969) were highly criticized by ufologists because of the apparently poor manner in which the investigations were conducted and especially because of Dr. Condon's own negatively prejudiced attitude toward the whole UFO question in general. Nevertheless, in Section V, Chapter 1 of the Report, Rosenberg presents an exposé of the Ampleforth Manuscript quite similar to what we have presented here in our investigative report.

Rosenberg's information came from different sources but the conclusions were the same. The fact that the Ampleforth Manuscript was revealed as a hoax some 30 years ago and was published in a major Report which is well known to any good ufologist, and the fact that UFO News-1 was able to make the same discoveries, independently, with relatively little trouble, and the fact that, despite this, the Ampleforth story has remained virtually unquestioned and accepted as true by so many researchers for over 40 years, says something about the state of ufology.


We realize the Ampleforth hoax is not a major item in the bigger picture of UFO research but perhaps it serves as a lesson by way of example. The UFO phenomenon is complex, complicated, and even what might be described as just plain messy in some respects. If we are ever to get to the truth behind this phenomenon, researchers need to be ever watchful, discerning, and, yes, even skeptical. Skepticism is too often considered a dirty word in the UFO community. It's mistakenly confused with debunking. They're not the same. Debunkers do what Stanton Friedman calls research by proclamation. In other words, they dismiss everything out of hand without really looking into the facts. A good skeptic simply questions everything but makes no judgement without first engaging in some reasonably comprehensive research to find what he/she believes to be the truth. But then, that's just our opinion and God knows there are plenty of those to go around.




Copyright 2001, Gary Val Tenuta