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We have discussed in detail the structure of the original pattern of signifiers, but there are still some major unanswered questions concerning them. One of these is from where the structure of the set of signifiers come. Here a hypothesis will be advanced toward the resolution of this quandary. Also, we may take our first steps toward understanding the difference between the original pattern and the holonomic heuristics by an in-depth comparison between the original pattern and one particularly important level within the progressive bisection of the heuristic devices.

Our hypothesis is that the signifiers of the original pattern were modeled on the planets. The planets are a dynamic pattern against the seemingly static background of the stars. What better way to represent dynamism than by way of these erratically moving figures on the background of the stars. This would explain the persistence of the structure of the set of signifiers for long periods in Indo-European cultural history, and also relate the signifiers to later developments in historical times.

By the planets it is meant the visible planets. These beacons in the sky are sharply divided in their behavior between the inner and outer planets. The inner planets, Venus and Mercury, are variable in the sense that they are only visible just before dawn or after sunset with morning and evening appearances. These would naturally be associated with the Moon which also exhibits the variability of waxing and waning. On the other hand, the outer planets -- Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn -- chart their own course across the sky independent of dusk and dawn. Their steadier light might well have been associated with the sun, which is steady in its brightness, bringing day and night in succession. This hypothesis accounts for every aspect of the model of the original pattern of signifiers which encompass all celestial lights including the stars in the position of outcasts or "the Other." It also explains the association of Saturn with darkness and constriction which is also called the "midnight sun." Standing in the position of the king, Saturn represents the power of the sun in the planetary sphere. Al Biruni, the great Muslim astronomer, has this to say:

385 Fama al-dhakar wal-untha All three superior planets and the sun are male, saturn, among them, being like a eunuch (has no influence on birth). Venus and the Moon are female, and Mercury hermaphrodite, being male when associated with the male and female when with the female; when alone it is male in its nature.¹

These qualities and others mentioned by Al-baruni working from Greek and Hindu sources, align well with the qualities we would expect from our signifiers. Only Venus is female. Mercury is changeable as one might expect of one who is under the internal colonialism and who must do his master's will. Mars is extremely hot and dry, thus having the nature of a warrior who is forceful. The relation between Saturn and Jupiter is most interesting. The difference between the contraction of Saturn as opposed to the expansiveness of Jupiter can only be a cultural attribution because there is little in their similar nature to cause this difference between them. The only difference is speed of revolution around the Sun so that the slower speed must signify contraction to the Indo-European in some way.

The planets became cosmic features to which meanings where attached over millennia. The attached meanings were purely cultural, and other cultures have attached different meanings to the planets and other celestial lights. However, the planets were relatively steady features of the cosmos, and thus well served the purpose for cultural transmission. The celestial lights provided the basic structure upon which the cultural meanings acreted over time. The structure was dynamic, yet a permanent feature of the world. This combination of dynamism and permanence served well as a substructure for the concepts of dynamic clinging. Thus, through the hypothesis of planetary substructure, we can explain very well the origin of the differences between the signifiers, although this does not explain the projection of cultural meaning upon them.

Turning from the Indo-European original pattern of signifiers, let us consider instead, another kind of pattern with a similar basis on celestial features. Here we will consider the second heuristic pattern taken from the holonomic realm. These were developed by the Chinese into a heuristic for understanding the permutation of any two sets of opposites. Yin and Yang were developed as variables for opposites by the Chinese. When two sets of opposites were permutated, the result was Major and Minor / Yin and Yang.

These four opposites represented the four major celestial lights. They signified how opposites combine. Any two sets of opposites will combine by permutation into these four qualities which are then related to the qualities of the cosmic lights. The categorization is independent of the specific structure of our solar system, unlike the Indo-European pattern of signifiers.

For instance, let's consider the two opposites, Inward / Outward and Sensory / Meaning, suggested by Sidi Ali al-Jamal. These permutate as follows:

We all know what is meant by these permutations because we live immersed in them every day. The outward sensory is the world presented to us by the five senses. The inward sensory is what we see inwardly in the imagination. Outward meaning is the definitions of words and other information which is significant and guides our everyday actions. Inward meaning is the relevance or attention which we confer on things; it is our own priorities (or goals) and significance that we project on the world. Notice how like the moon is the outward sensory. The moon waxes and wanes just as our own senses vacillate over time; whereas our own imaginations are like stars in that they shine with their own light. Outward meanings are dynamic and constantly shifting like the planets; whereas inward meaning seems as like our own consciousness is a constantly illuminated source of light or presencing. Thus, we can see the sense of the analogies of the celestial lights with the permutated opposites in this one example.

This holonomic pattern of the fourfold heuristic pattern served China in a similar way to the way the original pattern served the Indo-Europeans. They both are primal shapings of the world just at the point they arise into differentiation. One is holonomic and thus prior to chaos arising, while the other is post-chaotic, taking into consideration the constant alteration from war to peace. The comparison between these two primal patterns of differentiation is very important. It guides us toward understanding the difference between holonomics and the Western perspective on existence. It is important for us to begin to understand this difference. Therefore, some attempt to derive this other pattern will be made in order to clarify its structure and significance.

In what went before, an underlying assumption has been that difference between three realms: out of time, endlesstime and intime. The key here is the concept that there is an intermediary realm that separates us from the single source of all causation. Instead of thinking of the difference between these realms in terms of time, let us switch to another perspective entirely. We have just mentioned the difference between the inward and the outward. In the outward world which we all experience, sensory and meaning are all mixed together. Let us hypothesize an inward realm that stands between us and the single source. In Arabic one name for this inward realm is the Malikut. It is contrast with the Mulk which means the Kingdom. The Mulk is the phenomenal world. The Malikut is the hidden world of the inward. Contrast to both of these is the single source itself which is called the Jabrut or the realm of light and power.

TABLE 30
intime	Mulk	outward world
Eternity	Malikut	inward world
Single Source	Jabrut	no-where world

We can get some feel for these different realms if we permutate the opposites separation / gatheredness and discriminated / connected.

The outward world of the mulk is clearly discriminated separation. The Jabrut is connected gatheredness, and this cannot be experienced because there is no distance between the experiencer and the experienced. It is not properly inward or outward because it is a realm where the distinction no longer makes sense. The intermediary realm of the Malakut, which is inward, leaves two nodes: connected separation and discriminated gatheredness. These are referred to as the Coral and Pearl respectively. The Pearl is built up from an impurity by layers. Thus, the layering of the pearl is a gatheredness which is internally discriminated. The Coral is opposite the Pearl. It is a form made up of the remains of billions of tiny creatures that are glued together to have a unity of form. This gluing together is a connecting of what is separated. The Pearl and Coral stone are mentioned in the Quran, and this interpretation is traced back to Shaykh al-Akbar (ibn al-Arabi). These two qualities of the Malakut are in tension with each other. From them, ultimately arise the difference between the sensory and meaning. Meaning is like the Pearl; it is the flaw at the center of things which allows us to distinguish things in an orderly manner. Sensory phenomena, on the other hand, is like the Coral. It is a connection of a myriad of separate data into a whole. The Pearl might be associated with noesis, and the Coral with the noema, except this would be a crude reduction. Yet this association makes us realize that the Pearl and Coral are dynamic processes by which the inherently unified is differentiated and the inherently scattered is brought together. The concept here is that the mixture of sensory and meaning in the outward Mulk is not true in the inward realm. In the inward realm, the sensory and meaning components of reality are separated into opposite dynamic processes. In fact, the model is even clearer than this.

Arising from the Jabrut is the Barzak which separates Sun/Planets from Moon/Stars. The Pearl is the dynamism between Sun and Planets, while the Coral is the dynamism between Moon and Stars. The Yang elements, in each case, are the source of the dynamic, while the Yin elements are the recipients. Thus, the Sun, which is a unity, moves toward separation in its reflection on the Planets. The stars, which are a multitude, moves toward gatheredness in the vacillating Moon. The Vacillation of the Moon shows that full gatheredness is never reached. Likewise the separation of the Planets is not as great as that of the Stars, so that full dispersion is never reached. The Barzak, or interspace, which is between these two dynamisms insures that they never come to completion or rest in the other. Thus, although mixture is not complete as in the Mulk, it is still a Dynamic separation in the Malikut. This separation is only resolved completely in the Jabrut.

Sensory and Meaning are the results of this dyadic dynamism within the inward realm. The difference between inward and outward is that in the inward the dual dynamics are separated by the Barzak or interspace; whereas in the outward, they appear to be mixed up completely. This implies that separation of opposites only occurs inwardly and that the possibility of the mixture of opposites is an outward effect only. The fact that there is no third thing is based on this inward separation of the dynamics of Pearl and Coral. The outward chaos is an illusion because the inward separation is more fundamental. If one does not look at the inward realm, then it would appear that chaos were real. It is only designated as real within the outward. From the perspective of the inward, it is an illusion.

Notice that the Indo-European original pattern indeed mixes signifiers. The Planets cross the Barzak between the Sun and Moon. The Stars, on the other hand, are separated from the Moon. This means a mixture has occurred in the celestial realm corresponding with the changes of the patterns's meaning to model the arising of Chaos. It is, therefore, possible to see a transform of the Chinese fourfold heuristic into the Indo-European original pattern. This is very significant for it shows that our analysis of bifurcation, as opposed to the modeling of War/Peace, is correct. The separation of opposites can never be proven or disproven in terms of an outward science. The separation of opposites is based on an inward science that looks beyond the surface of phenomena to see the underlying bifurcation pattern. The lacunae in that pattern of bifurcations is what allows it to see even further beyond the heuristics toward the Single Source itself.

If we consider more deeply still, it is clear that the set of celestial signifiers may be construed in many ways, and that these are only two possibilities. Yet, these two patterns which have actually occurred are very telling for they mark completely different approaches to existence. The Chinese approach is holonomic in that it relies on the natural inward separation between Pearl and Coral to order the diversity of existence. The Indo-European pattern, on the other hand, is tied to external phenomena and attempts to understand their chaotic structures. We notice that the dual dynamics of the Malikut are separated. The word for that separation in Arabic is Barzak, which may mean either "barrier" or "interspace." If we take the Barzak to mean interspace then we may liken it to the Void. It is the emptiness that makes useful spoken of in the Tao Te Ching. A bowl is useful because it has an emptiness inside it. In the same way, it is the emptiness between the separated opposites that makes the cosmos useful. It allows the single source to be seen beyond the play of permutated opposites. This emptiness is obscured in the outward realm. If the outward was taken to be the whole of existence, as the Indo-European descendents have obviously done, then this emptiness would not be seen. It is thus important for us to trace back and make real our contact with the Void, for it is the key to usefulness. Without its emptiness, existence could not be filled with the Good of the Jabrut.

The filling of the Void is an important concept. It brings us to consider our theory of Meaning. I will advance here the "geode" theory of meaning. This says that everything with meaning, like a word constellation or the constellation of celestial signifiers, is like a geode. This is to say it looks like a stone on the outside, but when cut open, it is found to be filled with crystals, and at its core it is empty. It is the emptiness which is the locus of meaning. The crystals are hidden from the light until the geode is cut open. The negative of the crystalline structures is the empty region at the center of the geode itself. Each thing like the patterns we have been discussing on the outside has some banal sensory exterior. Inwardly, however, there is a rarified or crystalline set of significances. They only have meaning in their relation to the hollowness or emptiness which is the true core of the thing. Each thing is essentially Void. Hollowness and Wholeness are two nihilistic ways to look at the geode. Its inner relation to the Void is its inner meaning. Its outer relation to other things is outward meaning. The crystalline structures are inward sensory, and the bland exterior is the outward sensory. In the geode theory of meaning, it is the relation to Void that confers meaning. This is why meaning cannot ultimately be captured. It also explains why the Pearl and Coral are each incomplete in themselves. Only the geode actually comes into the outward manifestation. The Pearl and Coral are its counterparts in the inward realm and each incomplete in itself.

The Barzak enters into the geode as its central Void. The center of the Pearl is a flaw. This flaw is replaced by Void. The geode is built up by accumulations like the Coral. It was a bubble in the mud that was filled in by seeping waters with minerals. The Pearl and the Coral are receptive to being filled by the Jabrut between them in the dynamic play of opposites; whereas the Geode is filled in from the Void hidden in its interior. That light makes the crystals shine and sparkle without cutting it open.

Rta, or cosmic harmony, must have been a wisdom of how to align oneself with the dynamic play of opposites in the inward realm. It degenerated from this into dynamic clinging. The hypothesis advanced here is that when this occurred, the Chinese pattern was transformed into the original pattern of the Indo-Europeans. This is the point at which truth and reality diverged. In the prophetic picture, truth and reality are the same. However, for the Indo-Europeans, they separated. Words and states of affairs developed their own criteria. In the prophetic sciences, words and states of affairs have only one criterion. That single criterion is manifest as a single source which is all at once just true and real. The splitting of truth from reality occurs because the Pearl / Coral Stone juxtaposition is not maintained. Reality comes about from the dissidence between inward sensory and outward sensory. Truth comes about by the dissidence between inward meaning and outward meaning. Truth and Reality are measures of disharmony. Truth is the lack of meaning dissidence, and Reality is lack of sensory dissidence. This picture assumes that dissidence is possible and that falling out of harmony may be measured. On the other hand, the Pearl and Coral dual dynamics is already forever in harmony. Perception of a lack of harmony is an illusion. Truth and Reality is always the same and there is no dissidence. Dynamically, this illusion is created by the Pearl dynamic which extrapolates unity into difference, and the Coral dynamic that links or collects separation into forms. But the true reality is always maintained in the Void that separates these two dynamics. That Void, filled by the light of the single source, is the sameness of truth and reality without dissidence.

As Indo-Europeans, we can do without the concepts of identity. But the split between truth and reality is more fundamental. Both concepts assume disharmony. We cannot use them without having that underlying assumption in our thoughts. The holonomic concept is different in that it assumes it is impossible to deviate from harmony. The Void between the dual dynamics may change in myriad ways, but the gap is always maintained. That separation is the indicator that always points back to the single source in ever new configurations. Disharmony is excluded because there is no third thing which will allow chaos to occur in the inward realm. Chaos is excluded and confined to the outward realm of mixed sensory and meaning.

The split between truth and reality is fundamental to the Indo-European experience of existence. Cosmic harmony assumes the existence of cosmic harmony. The mistake is giving ontological status to cosmic disharmony. This is what the split between Truth and Reality does. True reality has no such split, so that disharmony remains only an illusion. It may be perceived outwardly, but by looking inward, one always sees the one true reality which is never imperfect or disharmonious. This is why the Chinese, for instance, have the concept of Tao as their central concept. It does not split truth from reality. It names the meandering of the Barzak between the dual dynamics of the Pearl and Coral. That meandering interspace is, in fact, all there is. It is like the diaphragm in which the Greeks thought the seat of consciousness resided. The diaphragm is constantly moving. When it stops, there is death. To say that the diaphragm is the center of consciousness is to say that consciousness is a filling of a Void. The Void is in constant movement. In fact, the movement of the Void is all there "isn't."

In order to get a perspective on this holonomic system of thought, we will take an example in which the structure of categories is particularly clear. Let us consider the work of an early Sufi Muhammad Ibn `abdi `l-Jabbar al-Niffari who wrote a book called

The Mawaqif in 353 after Hijra (circa 1000 CE). Al-Niffari distinguishes three levels of spiritual attainment: Knowledge (ilm), Gnosis (marifa), and Staying (waqfah). These three realms correspond roughly to what we call the Mulk, Malakut and Jabrut earlier. Knowledge is discursive thought about things. Gnosis is an experience of higher realities which serves as a foundation for knowledge but cannot be proven or hardly described. Staying is the ultimate spiritual non-experience. In Knowledge, one obtains understanding of relations between things in this world, the mulk. In Gnosis, one sees the inward lights of the hidden world, the Malakut and experiences various "hal" or states of human existence. In Staying, experiences are left behind and one attains to the Pinnacle of spiritual understanding. Al-Niffari relates to us the relations between these spiritual categories in an astounding fashion in which he is moved to speak as if God were speaking through him.

So I wrote down with the tongue of what He caused me to witness, that it might be a recollection to me, and to whomsoever my Lord revealed Himself unto among his friends, whom He desired to stablish in His gnosis, not desiring any temptation to come upon their hearts. And I wrote: My Lord has made Himself known unto me with a revelation in which He caused me to witness the manifestation of everything from Him. I abode in this vision, which is the vision of the manifestation of things from Him, but attained to the vision of manifestation and to the knowledge that it was from Him, not to the vision that it was from Him. Then came to me ignorance and all that it contains, and presented itself to me out of this knowledge: and my Lord restored me to His vision; and my knowledge remained to me no knowledge of any known thing. He showed me his vision that knowledge is manifested by Him, that He made it a knowledge, and that He made for me a thing known. And He stayed me in "He," and reveled Himself to me out of "He," the "He" that is really "He," not out to the literal "He." (Now the meaning of the liberal "He" is thy desire, that is, it is demonstrative, initial, of knowledge, of veiling, of presence.) And I knew the self-revelation on the part of the real He, and I saw the He: and lo, there was no "He" save He; for that "He" which is other than He is not He. And I saw the manifesting of the self-revelation to be not from other than He; and I saw other than He not revealing itself to my heart. [Page 100]

What Al-Naffari wrote is an amazing statement of the basic doctrine of spirituality common to all the great Sufi Shayks. We will explore enough of this amazing inner landscape in order to show that the model is the same as that which has been assumed throughout this treatise. In the first part, we talked of the difference between Intime/endlesstime/out-of-time. In this chapter, we have switched to another description which calls the three realms Mulk/Malikut/Jabrut. Each of these descriptions are tentative and should not be taken as anything more than an indication. Yet, it serves as a basic framework from which we may venture out to understand different systems of thought. Al-Naffari Says:

These statements and many others of similar intent, make it clear that Knowledge, Gnosis, and Staying are three separate levels of spiritual experience. The final level is really a non-experience since the difference between nearness and farness vanishes at that level.

This "neighborhood" or "non-place" in which all opposites merge has been called the single source of all causation in the preceding arguments. It is beyond space and time, and is, in effect, beyond the Void.

We have already characterized the doubleness of the gnostic in terms of the double dynamic of the Pearl and Coral Stone separated by the barzak. The Barzak is the Void which is an integral part of the Malikut or inward realm of the gnostic.

11.7 The gnosis of gnoses possesses two springs of flowing water: the spring of knowledge gushes froth from veritable ignorance, and the spring of condition gushes forth from the spring of that knowledge. Whoso draws knowledge from the spring of knowledge, draws knowledge and condition: but whoso draws knowledge from the flowing stream of knowledge, not from the spring of knowledge, him the tongues of the sciences transport, and him the interpretation of expressions deviate; he will gain no constant knowledge, and whoso gains not a constant knowledge gains no condition.

11.8 Stay in the gnosis of gnoses, and abide in the gnosis of gnoses: so shalt thou witness that which I have taught thee. When thou witnessest it, thine eyes will see it; and when thine eyes see it, thou wilt discriminate between absolute proof and contingent circumstances; and when thou discriminatest, thou art established, but so long as thou discriminatist not, thou art not established.

11.13 Every object of reference has direction, and every possessor of direction is surrounded. Every surrounded thing is comprehended, and every comprehended thing is imagined. Every imagined thing is sensed and every empty space is an object of common knowledge. [p.40]

Emptiness is a precondition for usability. Through the presence of emptiness, the possibility of being filled comes into existence. Its precondition is the emptiness in the midst of gnosis. Gnosis is the heart of knowledge since it gives it an experiential foundation in spiritual states. Yet the spiritual states themselves are veils which are not the end, but only the proof of travel. Because spiritual states may be distinguished, and for each state is its opposite, then there is a barzak between opposite states which is an inherent part of gnosis. The barzak is the Void which cleaves all gnostic states twain. It makes the difference between the fire and the garden in endlesstime. The gnostic just experiences these endlesstime realities earlier within the intime realm. The endless time realm and the intime realm are two aspects of the same true reality. This unity is signified in the duality of the gnostic in that each sea has in it both the Pearl and the Coral stone. Thus, the dual dynamic works both ways and the two seas -- the sweet and the salty are ultimately the same.

I do not pretend to be able to offer commentary on Al Naffari's treatise. Yet from it we get a clear picture of the underpinnings of holonomic thought which have been transformed into the original Indo-European pattern. Transforming back to the holonomic pattern is equivalent to cutting the Gordian Knot. Via this transformation, the Kurgen's descendents might regain sanity. The harmony of the RTA/ARTE/ ASA might be regained.

The position of "no secondary causation" is the pivot of the Western philosophical tradition. All the positions of opinion and counter opinion whirl around this one central pivot. It is the one position never taken by any Western philosopher, but that all the myriad opinions define by forming a vortex around it. It is the emptiness at the center of the hurricane of groundless opinions. It is never attained because in order to attain it, one would have to give up the subtle clinging of Being and embrace the Void. The embrace of the Void is difficult for it is seemingly a dive into the waves of nothingness and groundlessness which lie beneath each philosophical position. Actually, it is embracing experience and raising it above conceptualization. It is drinking from the spring of knowledge instead of from the flowing stream. The source of knowledge is gnosis. Yet that is only the entrance to the Void.