October 23, 2002

• Bright Star

  From the website of Karey Lea Perkins:

  “The truth is that man’s capacity for symbol-mongering
  in general and language in particular is…intimately part and parcel of
  his being human, of his perceiving and knowing, of his very
  consciousness…”

  – Walker Percy, The Message in the Bottle, Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux, 1975

  Today’s New York Times story
  on Richard Helms, together with my reminiscences in the entry that
  follows it below, suggest the following possibility for
  symbol-mongering:

  Compare the 16-point star of the C.I.A.
  with the classic 8-point star of Venus:

  This comparison is suggested by the Spanish word “Lucero” (the name, which means “Bright Star,” of the girl in Cuernavaca mentioned two entries down) and by the following passage from Robert A. Heinlein‘s classic novel, Glory Road:

  ”I have many names. What would you like to call me?”     “Is one of them ‘Helen’?”     She smiled like sunshine and I learned that she had dimples. She looked sixteen and in her first party dress. “You are very gracious. No, she’s not even a relative. That was many, many years ago.” Her face turned thoughtful. “Would you like to call me ‘Ettarre’?”     “Is that one of your names?”     “It is much like one of them, allowing for different spelling and accent. Or it could be ‘Esther’ just as closely. Or ‘Aster.’ Or even ‘Estrellita.’ ”     ” ‘Aster,’ ” I repeated. “Star. Lucky Star!”

  The C.I.A. star above is from that organization’s own site.  The star of Venus (alias Aster, alias Ishtar) is from Symbols.com, an excellent site that has the following variations on the Bright Star theme:

  Ideogram for light	Alchemical sign
  Greek “Aster”	Babylonian Ishtar
  Phoenician Astarte	Octagram of Venus
  Phaistos Symbol	Fortress Octagram

  See also my notes The Still Point and the Wheel and Midsummer Eve’s Dream.  Both notes quote Robinson Jeffers:

  “For the essence and the end
  Of his labor is beauty…
  one beauty, the rhythm of that Wheel,
  and who can behold it is happy
  and will praise it to the people.”

  – Robinson Jeffers, “Point Pinos and Point Lobos,”
  quoted at the end of The Cosmic Code,
  by Heinz Pagels, Simon & Schuster, 1982

  Place the eightfold star in a circle, and you have the Buddhist Wheel of Life:

  

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