Chapter I
An ancient figure
The serpent biting its own tail is among the oldest images of closed totality. It appears in the funerary art of ancient Egypt and, centuries later, in the Greek alchemical manuscripts, where it encircles the words hen to pan — the All is One.
It has meant eternity, return, the cycle of matter and the unity of opposites. It is the cosmos as a closed circle, feeding on itself.
Chapter II
The circle opened
In the seal of the Temple, the circle is not closed. Two heads rise and face one another, jaws open, and between them the ring is broken. What was a symbol of the enclosure becomes a symbol of its limit — and of the gap through which something else is glimpsed.
Within the circle stands the inverted star, and within the star a single sphere of pale light. It is not the light of the world. It is set apart, at the centre, surrounded by what encloses it.
“Two heads facing one another, and between them, nothing created.”
Chapter III
Reading, not decoding
A symbol is not a cipher with a single correct answer. These readings are offered as one way of looking, not as a key. The seal is meant to be contemplated until it begins to speak for itself.