From Various Sources...
They said, Come, let's build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top reaches to the sky, and let's make ourselves a name, lest we be scattered abroad on the surface of the whole earth. Yahweh came down to see the city and the tower, which the
children of men built. Yahweh said, Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is what they
begin to do. Now nothing will be withheld from them, which they intend to do. Come, let's go down, and there confuse their
language, that they may not understand one another's speech. So Yahweh scattered them abroad from there on the surface of
all the earth...
"A part of the builders were changed into apes, evil spirits, demons, and ghosts walking by night, and the rest were scattered over the whole earth. "
In other words don't expect a friendly welcome when we get there.
"The mighty Tower was blown down by winds "
"One-third of the building was consumed by fire, one-third sank into the earth, and one-third remained standing"
What We Know
What We Would Like to Know
- In John Douglas vision of the Tower of Babel a crystal skull sat at the top. did the the tower appear complete ?
The Crystal skull sat in the highest chamber of the tower that you could see. The tower didn't seem to be incomplete but it did seem to be buried.
- Did the tower of the vision bare any resemblance to the tower on Purgos, the tarrot card ?
Possibly, but the tower on the Purgos card is an abstract and it is difficult to tell the dimensions because of the strange perspective and the fact it is rendered in black sillohuette (sp.) due to the strength of the light at its peak. It is also difficult to tell what changes time has wrought on the tower...for example take the pyramids (originally smooth sided, and now stepped). Multiple interpretations are possible. It is one tower and it is all towers perhaps, the essential tower. Its a tower with a halo, its a tower exploding, who knows.
- Following on from Crapper's question "Would a geocentric universe be necessary for the Tower of Babel to function properly?" might it be the case that the planetary alignment adds stepping stones from the top of the tower to the celestian sphere ?
Could do. But the planets aren't in alignment anymore.
- Did the tower appear to be constructed of the same black stone as the other omphalos ?
Yep.
Could the black stone of the omphalos be solidified ciellic bitumen ?
The "Ciellic Bitumen" as it has become known refers to the black liquid. Whether this is related to the black sand of Ciell and whether these in turn are related to the black stone (either the stone of the tower Church in Spier on the Mise, or the Omphali or the ore that created the Mongolian Ciel Bowls or the Bells) has yet to be determined as the properties of the materials are relatively difficult to compare and have so far defied productive investigation
Could all omphalos post the Tower of Babel be made of blocks from the partially (?) destroyed tower ?
Its a possibility. You know very little about the origins of the Omphali, nor the means of creating them, nor indeed how the knowledge of creating them is discovered by these various empires, so very difficult to say.
Various references tell of how the tower was built of fired bricks. It would seem obvious that the black stone of the tower in JD's vision are not normal fired bricks. Would it be reasonable to assume the the references to "fired bricks" is an allusion to bricks made by some alchemical/magical process ?
Could be. Could be that the whole Babel Myth is mistranslated, or has changed as it has passed through various cultures and interpretations. It could just as easily be a more descriptive synonym for "fired" that would be the more accurate translation, or as you say it could be a metaphor.
Sorry, more meandering thoughts...
Just as the Omegan ritual transmutes the casters skull could the Omphalos ritual transmute the omphalos object to black stone ?
Now there's a thought. There could be some transmutation that occurs during the ritual (if there is a ritual). The skulls change colour when they are depowered though, and you have only encountered depowered Omphali so far...not that that necessarily means anything.
We have some uncorroborated evidence that the pre-John Dee (Holy Grail) Omphalos is black stone. We had assumed this was stone like the other Omphalos but onyx; the material of the active skull is also black. Could it be that the form of the skull is tied to the form of the Omphalos it was created to destory ?
Have we erred; is the active skull intended for the pre-John Dee omphalos rather than the John Dee Omphalos ?
Could the Fin de Siecle symbol on the active skull act like a keeper helping to sustain the skull until it is activated and/or could it act to supress the power of the skull until someone chooses to release it ?
- Did I get any impression from the vision that the tower is buried as in under ground or buried like the maze under the Lipsius Institute of Spire on the Mise ?
Given that any evidence of sand you could see was of the bog standard sandy brown colour, you would have to assume buried underground, rather than buried in an alternate dimension.