Ben Fairhall is a writer, a researcher and a theologian.
Ellis Taylor: Renaissance Man
The quest for ‘intelligent conspiracy’ can be a long and, at times, frustrating one. It is usually the Builders to whom are attributed such mighty gifts; which is one reason why (in typically perverse fashion) I often find myself reluctantly roaring them on. The Milton effect. Your typical theorist, on the other hand, with his hastily knocked off atonal screeds, more often embodies the opposite extreme. There is a conspicuous deficit of stylists in conspiracyville, or so it seems to me; and until the shortfall is rectified the tin-foil stereotype will continue to be deserved.
Fortunately, in Ellis Taylor, we have a writer for whom words have retained their wonder. Words have always been more than a medium for a message; in the right hands- as Ellis well knows- they cast a powerful spell. His spelling may be suspect, but his powers as a magician are greatly in evidence in his latest book, In These Signs Conquer. There are very few writers who would dare (or wish) to use a word like ‘flibbertigibbet’ or coin neologisms as evocative as gloomered. But language, and the multitude of ways it is wielded to control us, is a major and recurring theme. In renewing our acquaintance with the apparently familiar, discovering new dimensions with which to communicate our unique experiences, we are handed an extremely efficacious tool of resistance. This is why a significant part of the book is given over to deconstructing word-forms into component syllables (sybils) and arriving at (occasionally questionable) etymologies. We are being invited to reclaim our divine language; and with it, our divine power.
Sadly, these lofty aspirations do not preclude infrequent bouts of punning upon which Richard Whiteley- were he alive- would be hard pressed to improve. Whether this is a compliment or not I will leave the reader to judge. ‘Moloch King Tyre’- with its McCartney inspired cadence – may be esoterically appropriate; but ‘Mousetique’ (for Mustique) is criminal.
Words, of course, are not the only signs we have been conquered by. Numbers, too, have been divorced from their magical culture and have instead become agents in the exclusive service of l’argent. Hence the book’s many numerological riffs; one in particular of exceptional quality, an analysis of the occult and numerological significance of 9/11 or 911. The political chicanery behind this ritualistic event has been systematically exposed since that terrible day; and adopted as a liturgy by an entire community of ‘9/11 Truthers.’ But a growing body of researchers are now attempting to penetrate into what is surely the most vital aspect of all: its symbolic resonance, and this part of the book will be greatly drawn upon (and possibly plagiarised) in years to come. (For examples of this trend, see Phil Gardiner’s website and the essay 9/11 and the Occult, contributed by Asif Husain; and the excellent ‘synchro-mysticism’ of Jake Kotze.) What will possibly irritate some is that Ellis apportions no blame for this bloody event to any human agency, whether American or Afghan. It is, instead, merely another manifestation- a particularly visceral and catalytic one- of an ongoing agenda of domination by a force he terms the Darkness Invisible.
This notion has certain surface parallels with the inter-dimensional conspiracy theories popularised by David Icke (and latterly, Matthew Delooze.) Unlike those writers, however, he does not insist that this force assume a single, given form. Although the famed reptiles make a brief appearance, it is clear that the Darkness can, and does, ‘manifest to minds in any shape it desires depending on what reaction it seeks to evoke.’ Moreover, rather worryingly perhaps, its principal vehicle is via human possession; and this needn’t be the exclusive preserve of the despised ‘Illuminati’ either. Indeed, according to Taylor, we have all, at some time or another, been its witting or unwitting servants. Whilst the degree rituals of Freemasonry may put people within the Darkness’s corrosive grasp, equally at risk are those debunkers and demonisers for whom anything Masonic is the great Satan.
If this sounds a little hard-going, which in parts it is, behind the punning exterior and the conversational tone there is a complete occult philosophy being communicated: which revolves around the great, endless battle of Light and Dark. Whilst the Darkness, in astrological terms, is represented as Saturn and the host of Moloch and Jehovah-related deities who have been similarly conflated, the opposing principle- the Goddess- is prefigured as Venus. The struggle between these energies has been recorded in myth, legend, story and art: several such examples are summarily decoded. This reaches its apogee with a brilliant analysis of Leonardo’s The Last Supper which, if true, manages in a few pages to supersede the fruits of five hundred years of scholarship. Owing a certain amount to Lewis Da Costa’s The Secret Diaries of an Alchemist, the new revelations will be greeted with disappointment by Dan Brown devotees. The painting’s anamolies are subjected not to a literalist revisionism, which depends upon genealogical survival for their validity, but are interpreted spritually: as astro-theological signs and wonders. According to this analysis, the painting contains an accurate scientific record of the heavens and human origins, and a portent of the great destiny of mankind at the end of the age of Pisces.
Such erudition leaves Taylor in danger of attracting the attention of the academy; an outcome which no self-respecting conspiraloon would envy. The same goes for his discovery of a hidden gnostic thread in the fifteenth century painting of Mary Magdalene by Francesco di Franchesci. A twinned, mirrored version of this image forms the book’s front cover (see the image above)- which reveals an artfully concealed demon and other grotesques. Sadly, the detail of the image has failed to fully translate to the printed form; perhaps the author will rectify this by linking to a large-scale reproduction from his excellent website? It is a stunning find which has already piqued the interest of the Ashmolean Museum where the original is presently exhibited. It adds to the sum of our knowledge of late Medieval art and provides support to the idea, so popular in ‘pseudo-historical’ circles, of artists concealing heresies. To the ranks of Poussin, Teniers, Leonardo and Costeau we can add another name.
It is the Venus material, however, which I suspect will be of greatest interest to his readers. It incorporates descriptions of many of the most famous sacred sites in Britain, and in particular those within easy reach of his home county of Oxfordshire. Hence, in one particularly breezy section, we are transported to the magnificent White Horse of Uffington, a Venus archetype of especial beauty, then onwards to Glastonbury Tor and Silbury. It is here that we find Ellis at his most comfortable, amongst the ‘Marian fields’ of his Blessed Isles and the pixie barrows of his Pictish (and ‘pikey’) forebears.
Michael Tsarion has described the book as ‘an easy reading manual for the True Age’ and my advice is to treat it as such. There is much to be gained from visiting as many of the locations that Ellis describes, in particular the city of Oxford which forms the spiritual backdrop to it all. This outbreak of regionalism, however- whilst understandable- might prove less attractive for non-domestic readers, who may be unfamilar with many of the cited places. If possible, however, I would urge readers to take the trouble to engage with the material in as active a fashion as possible. So much more does the spirit of the Goddess reside in these places than in even the most inspired prose, and there is where we may begin to attune ourselves to Her song.
Ben Fairhall
http://ben-fairhall.blogspot.com
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