Let Fridays be for symbols. Arrange these in your environment, or choose one to wear as a modest adornment. This modality is powerful, so let us take advantage of it.
The Eye. The Grey Robes appropriate the Eye of Providence. For some, the Eye and Pyramid represent “The Grand Architect of the Universe,” but we shed pyramidal architecture in favor of self-organization symbols. The universe is emergent. Thus, variations on this symbol should be free of manufactured structures, moving us from a detached transcendent artificer to an immanent unfolding All. Thus, the Eye represents our ability to find wisdom in Space and the ubiquity of the unfolding All.
The Hexagram. Six points equidistant, configured in a circle, serve as nodes, each connecting to every other node using lines. The ‘nodes’—small circles—can represent virtue’s Six Spheres or the Six Woven Ways. Some will opt to use six Eyes to stand in for each node. Of course, interconnected nodes in this configuration also represent decentralization.
The Wrapped Fist. This symbol can be an image or a gesture. Thus, when Grey Robes congregate privately, we can show respect by bowing our heads slightly and wrapping our fists to show our commitment to nonviolence (though not pacifism). In other words, the fist-wrapping rite calls to mind the restraint of violent power by wisdom.
The Elemental Drives. Recall the Eros Masculine, Thanatos Masculine, Eros Feminine, and Thanatos Feminine, which can be represented as earth, fire, water, and air. However, four alternative symbols will work in lieu of the elemental symbols: insects. The scarab (earth), the moth (fire), the dragonfly (water), and the butterfly (air) are alternatives that call to mind both the elements and six legs, which evoke grounding in the Six Spheres and Six Ways. Some will find it necessary to select which symbol is appropriate for channeling a Drive, primarily when one seeks balance.
Eyes. Multiple interconnected Eyes can be configured to represent Grey Robes in solidarity and/or the mutually acknowledged sacredness of persons. In this symbolism, the connected Eyes evoke the idea that other selves are apertures into a greater Self or interconnected Set of Selves—the All—unified in an unfolding cosmic story. Under this construal, the totality of consciousness, however broadly and mysteriously it extends, takes on different facets and perspectives.
Their entire bodies, including their backs, their hands and their wings, were completely full of eyes, as were their four wheels. —Ezekiel 10:12, description of the ophanim.
Tree/River. Vascularization is everywhere in the natural world. To the extent that a system creates channels and conduits that make flow possible, that system “lives” or persists in time. Such systems are not alive like a cat or a tree is alive, but they still have a life. We want to symbolize the Law of Flow with a tree or a river basin. For example, squinting at a tree or flying high above a river basin offers more or less the same type of vascular patterns. These are flow patterns.
Nautilus. The creature’s distinct spiral pattern frequently appears in the natural world. Something fundamental seems to be in the Golden Ratio, a mathematical way of describing this distinctive form. Due to its status as a living fossil, this 500 million-year-old creature symbolizes time, emergence, and evolution. Its chambered shell, unchanged over the millennia, is perfectly evolved for deep-water buoyancy.
Stones and Fire. Our forebears once sat around a fire surrounded by stones arranged in a circle, which prevented it from burning out of control. When fire symbolizes the sacred, the circle of stones represents a separation between the sacred and the profane. When fire symbolizes knowledge, the stones represent a boundary—humility or circumspection—especially as knowledge can confer godlike powers, as Prometheus reminds us.
We, Grey Robes, cherish our symbols. They train us to see the world in different and important ways. They are a comfort. A familiar pattern. A call to remember who we are and shall become.