usually what are referred to as “fundamental” or “orthodox” even within their own religious following.
One simple example, if one looks at the core of just three major religions: Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, will be found the spiritual concept that God is love and Godly love is something to be practiced and shared by all. This is not something to be constrained in only one religion's parameter. As the Persian Islamic poet Rumi put it: “O lovers! The religion of the love of God is not found in Islam alone. In the realm of love, there is neither belief, nor unbelief.”1
Spiritual masters brought forth spiritual ideas and truths that later became codified into religions by followers of these ideas. Though some may feel these ideas have been skewed by attempting to place them within finite parameters, the infinite divine reality from whence they originate remains in unity and oneness, and if one goes deep enough into any religion, the spirit and spirituality will still be found. In this shared Divine ground will also be found the roots of the symbols used by each religious philosophy and what will be seen is that these symbols are shared archetypes of a core unity.
Introduction
The breathtaking beauty and mystery of the universe, including our world, have inspired many people. Our cosmos has motivated poets, writers, and scientists, noting just a few, to try to grasp its enormity and magnificent mystery. I would hazard a guess that every single one of us has, at least once in our lives, looked up at the stars or out over the waters at a sunrise or into the eyes of a newborn child and felt both awe and inspiration. An awe that we may not be able to define, but a feeling that there is a greater design than just a mechanical universe winding down, with our only purpose being to procreate for our species to survive on this speck in the universe called Earth. Deep within us we feel a touch of infinity, of eternity; it whispers to our minds and hearts that we are so much more than what we see. We feel, to varying degrees, that there is more meaning to the universe and to ourselves than just survival. We sense greater patterns and laws that govern not only the material, but also the ethereal. Even if we consciously deny these feelings within ourselves, one cannot help but believe that it is just that—a denial. We seem born with an intuitive sense that there is more beyond than what we see—that our being goes beyond our years on earth, beyond space and time. Whether we feel a leaning toward spirituality or science, ultimately either avenue is seeking the answers to the same questions: our meaning, our purpose, our being. Every single person has felt this yearning in one form or another. In Hamlet Shakespeare expresses this idea with his line: “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt in your philosophy.”1 In his poem “Excelsior” Longfellow calls to this feeling of seeking, going ever upward, expressing that even when our physical bodies fail, our spirit continues.2
Does this innate feeling we experience that there is more to us and the universe than a purposeless, accidental, random mixing of primordial soup have any basis? Is the search being done by science and religion truly an antithesis to each other? Is this feeling that our consciousness is more than just a chance occurrence of chemicals in our physical brains, just a defense against the prospect of mortality? These are the questions so many struggle with in addition to even why is there such a struggle. Some will say, because we cannot produce concrete, tangible evidence of God beyond faith, that at best God and consciousness beyond physicality remain a hypothesis. Ironically if you push scientists back to the most core tenets of their disciplines, they will admit that in the end theirs are based on hypotheses and assumptions also. While physicists, neurologists, and biologists plumb the mysteries of quantum science, fractals, the beginnings of the universe, how energy becomes matter and then energy again and what makes inert matter become alive, religions examine the mysteries of how spirit becomes flesh, becomes living stones of the temple of God, the jewels in the lotus, and how the flesh can become spirit again.
Is this actually the case for science and religion? Is there an uneasy draw between these two schools? Is there any evidence of a greater meaning, a shared universal consciousness that embraces the entirety of science and religion that unifies them in their goals?
There is evidence that surrounds us both in its simplicity and its complexity. The evidence is represented in two geometric forms that span the millennia in religion and science, forms that can be found at the very foundations of both schools of thought. These geometric shapes are the triangle and the parabola (arc), and these shapes will be shown to represent the shared primal archetypes behind the archetypes of science and religion. They are the patterns or the building blocks of the universal laws and a conscious living universe that science is discovering and religion has intuited. They are the archetypes that permeate all the aspects of both in one form or another.
The shapes of the arc and the triangle are some of the most basic forms in two-dimensional geometry. The arc is a simple curve that we see formed in a rainbow or a tunnel through which we pass. It is an arc that creates a section of the path of a celestial object on its journey through the heavens. The triangle is the simplest polygon—three closed sides defining an area. It is a shape that is intrinsic to all other polygons. We see triangles every day in the roof shape of many of our homes and the supporting structures of numerous bridges we pass over. The curve (arch) and triangle are fundamental building blocks in architecture used for their strength and simplicity. They also are found in the core of biology and the fabric of the universe. The archetypes of the arc and triangle with their power and straightforwardness also exhibit themselves in religious and mystical symbolism throughout the world in various ages.
What follows here is an exploration throughout civilization of the aspects and multidimensional forms of the arc and triangle, both in their science-based arenas and the realms of spirituality. As so often happens when finite minds attempt to interpret the infinite, rifts occur over misunderstandings and different perspectives. Think of religion and science as two explorers who have landed unbeknownst to each other at opposite poles of a planet, trying to get to the center. Each traveler has only a basic compass and a radio to communicate with. Each thinks the other is somewhere out of sight, yet in the same hemisphere. Radioing to each other to meet at the center, one tells the other he must go south, while his compatriot advises that it is north that will lead them to where they want to go. Neither one is grasping the other's viewpoint that each one, from his perspective, is correct. If they will both follow their own compasses, they will meet in the center.
This in-depth examination of the arc and triangle in science and religion will show that they create an encompassing and unifying link between these two disciplines. Schools that so often seem in conflict are, in actuality, two sides of the same coin. Both of these belief systems each fundamentally share the same vision of life and the cosmos. When this is realized, it can be a beginning for the healing of this schism of misunderstanding which may lead to a wholeness and unity for all.
This research came from humble beginnings but took on a life of its own and blossomed into what could be called an elegant equation involving arcs and triangles. These patterns in life often surround us so implicitly and explicitly that we no longer see them consciously. They create an equation which shows that science and spirituality reflect our underlying Oneness—what the ancients formulated “As above, so below.”
These forms will be shown to be linchpins of cosmology and biology from which the essence of life and religious symbolism are spawned. Their examination will show that the frequency of occurrence throughout history and the cultures within their spirituality are significant.
The triangle and the arc emerge as cosmic archetypes that manifest at the core of science and human consciousness. They are two forms that clearly show the yin and the yang, the masculine and the feminine, perfectly containing their opposite counterparts in balance. From the triangle the arc can be drawn, and from arcs triangles can be created. Such is the
