Happy week,
I asked a friend for suggestions about what I could write about. He’s been going to witchy magic shops and buying crystals. I asked him what about them appeals to him.
“They’re pretty.” he said, “Looking up the meanings, they become reminders of the things I want to work on. Like lapis lazuli is supposed to activate the mind and unveil your inner wisdom. So when I was working in the ICU, I’d carry lapis lazuli to have the confidence to trust my own wisdom.”
If Loma Linda doctors are being inspired by crystals, it’s probably worth exploring what they mean to us and why.
If you come from an old, adventist family, you’ve probably had an uncle or aunt who, instead of rings, had engagement wristwatches. Jewelry is taboo in adventism, considered a sin of vanity and self-exaltation. Ellen White says the word of God instructs us to “lay aside all extravagant and superfluous adorning.”
Ellen interpreted the following dirge to the prince of Tyre as a reference to Lucifer’s pride.
Ezekiel 28:12-14— “You were the signet of perfection, a full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You were in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone was your covering, sardius, topaz, and diamond, beryl, onyx, and jasper, sapphire, emerald, and carbuncle; and crafted in gold were your settings and your engravings. On the day that you were created they were prepared. With an anointed cherub as guardian I placed you; you were on the holy mountain of God; you walked among the stones of fire.”
Associating these verses with Lucifer isn’t wrong but neither is it complete.
As we mentioned last week, Lucifer refers to the Morning Star, the planet Venus. Lucifer doesn’t “exist” as a mythical figure until the Roman Empire. But in Ezekiel’s day, a more apt comparison would be the god Attar— associated with Ishtar and Astarte and the planet Venus; with baetyls, or sacred meteorites; and the power of the heavens like lightning and storms.
We don’t need to literalize Prince of Tyre = Lucifer = Attar. The Christian concept of Lucifer is a typographical error that we concretized into an avatar of evil. Reading these visions reveal a mythical landscape where precious stones were the bodies of fallen angels. Not evil angels, but wild angels.
These stones are authorities. They are listed in the design of the high priest’s breastplate. The Hebrew word for humanity is adam. The word for ground, adamah. These stones are our ancestors— angels captured in earth— mother earth’s veins— the goddess ascending from the underworld— stars of earth— stones of fire— the morning star, soon to rise.
You experience angels when you stare—not at—but into a precious stone, getting lost in the depths of their gradients. They speak through the light of their colors— through the shapes of your thoughts as they absorb the heartbeat from your palm.
Relating to crystals is an old, Christian tradition. Have fun and take it seriously.
Thanks for reading.