Many / One

A database of 11,000+ illuminated guiding quotations in 40 categories from 600+ inspired books by our most brilliant and influential authors.
Compiled by JoAnn Kite

SHOW detailed search and navigation | Quotes | References | JoAnn

1		"The whole world is a circle. All of these circular images reflect the psyche, so there may be some relationship between these architectural designs and the actual structuring of our spiritual functions….the circle represents totality. Everything within the circle is one thing, which is encircled, enframed. That would be the spatial aspect. But the temporal aspect of the circle is that you leave, go somewhere, and always come back. God is the alpha and the omega, the source and the end. The circle suggests immediately a completed totality, whether in time or in space." The Power of Myth (Joseph Campbell)

2		"In a world that is split, divided by the 'Civil War of Man', healing is needed to make whole. Mandala is a whole-ing technique; it is the alchemy of opposites reuniting, a blueprint that can be placed upon anything, or any man or being." Mandala (Jose and Miriam Arguelles)

3		"The Mandala is the Mother of symbols." Mandala (Jose and Miriam Arguelles)

4		"The centre of a circle is regarded as the indivisible source of all the radii extending from it;…pre-existing in God are all the inner essences of created things." St. Maximos the Confessor, 'Second Century on Theology' The Philokalia, volume 2 (various authors, compiled by St. Nikodimos of the Holy Mountain)

5		"We are embedded in communities, circles within circles of communities, both small and large, focused and abstract. Holding up the ideal of unity, we strive to break down the walls which separate us from others – not only other nations and peoples, but other species and the natural world." Spiritual Literacy, Reading the Sacred in Everyday Life (Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat)

6		"The sphere is a whole, and hence it underlies the symbolic significance of all those images which partake of this wholeness, from the idea of the mystic 'Centre' to that of the world and eternity, or , more particularly, of the world-soul. In neo-platonic philosophy, the soul is explicitly related to the shape of the sphere, and the substance of the soul is deposited as quintessence around the concentric spheres of the four Elements. The same is true of the primordial man of Plato's Timaeus….Another important association is that of perfection and felicity. The absence of corners and edges is analogous to the absence of inconveniences, difficulties, and obstacles." A Dictionary of Symbols (J. E. Cirlot)

7		"In Jung's view, mandalas and all concomitant images….are derived from dreams and visions corresponding to the most basic of religious symbols known to mankind – symbols which are known to have existed as far back as the Paleolithic Age, as is proved, for example, by the Rhodesian rock engravings." A Dictionary of Symbols (J. E. Cirlot)

8		"Sacred consciousness, of which the Mandala is a structural model, conforms to the Hermetic statement, 'God is an intelligent sphere whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere.'" Mandala (Jose and Miriam Arguelles)

9		"As a cosmogenic model, the Mandala is a synchronous, self-renewing whole." Mandala (Jose and Miriam Arguelles)

10		"We connect with Her [Goddess] through the moon, the stars, the ocean, the earth, through trees, animals, through other human beings, through ourselves. She is here. She is within us all. She is the full circle." The Spiral Dance, A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of the Great Goddess (Starhawk (Miriam Simos))

11		"I am deeply convinced of the unity of the self, as demonstrated by mandala symbolism." C. G. Jung: Letters, 1906-1950 (Gerhard Adler and Aniela Jaffe, editors)

12		"Nothing is excluded from the circle of wholeness." Shadows of the Sacred: Seeing Through Spiritual Illusions (Frances Vaughan, Ph.D.)

13		"If man has alienated himself from the source, the center within, then it is the purpose of a Mandala ritual for our time to be used as a primal tool for investigating and opening that center, once again granting the individual an identification with the cosmic forces and their source." Mandala (Jose and Miriam Arguelles)

14		"We know from experience that the protective circle, the mandala, is the traditional antidote for chaotic states of mind." Collected Works (Carl Jung)

15		"The holistic perception of alchemy relates directly to the Mandala. Many alchemical charts take on a Mandala form in revealing the integral interrelationships between the elements and qualities of nature. Alchemy also defines the proceses of consciousness as an on-going state of integral awareness." Mandala (Jose and Miriam Arguelles)

16		"The word 'mandala' means circle in Sanskrit. The mandala, a design form which radiates out from a center, is ancient and universal, appearing in art, architecture, and dance of cultures everywhere. It is the 'magic circle' and often has a ritual, religious symbolism as in the rose window of medieval churches….In times of confusion or stress it is a way to collect your thoughts." Marilyn Ferguson's Book of PragMagic (Marilyn Ferguson)

17		"The circle, as the symbol of completeness and perfect being, is a widespread expression for heaven, sun, and God; it also expresses the primoridal image of man and the soul." Collected Works (Carl Jung)

18		"Everything an Indian does is in a circle, and that is because the power of the world always works in circles, and everything tries to be round." Black Elk (1863-1950), Native American elder A Beginner's Guide to Constructing the Universe: The Mathematical Archetypes of Nature, Art & Science (Michael S. Schneider)

19		"Mandalas…are produced spontaneously, without external influence, even by children and adults who have never come into contact with any such ideas….The mandala symbolizes, by its central point, the ultimate unity of all archetypes as well as the multiplicity of the phemonenal world, and is therefore the empirical equivalent of the metaphysical concept of a 'unus mundus' [one world]." Collected Works (Carl Jung)

20		"We will see how we are a tribe and a company, in circle after circle rippling out and intersecting. We will see how we are all entering each other – as gifts to each other, mirroring and completing each other: and how we are all unique angles on the centre." Alchemy, The Art of Transformation (Jay Ramsay)

21		"The Universe is boundless and unlimited, a circle whose circumference is everywhere." Encyclopedia of Ancient and Forbidden Knowledge (Zolar)

22		"You might think of the mandala as reflecting back to us the harmony and beauty of our nonmaterial reality." Mandala, Luminous Symbols for Healing (Judith Cornell, Ph.D.)

23		"Reflecting on wholeness and balance as represented by symbols of integration such as the cross and the circle can sometimes help us bring our spiritual life into balance." Shadows of the Sacred: Seeing Through Spiritual Illusions (Frances Vaughan, Ph.D.)

24		"The soul has movement – First it moves in a circle, that is, it turns within itself and away from what is outside and there is an inner concentration of its intellectual powers. A sort of fixed revolution causes it to return from the multiplicity of externals, to gather in upon itself and then, in this undispersed condition, to join those who are themselves in a powerful union. From there the revolution brings the soul to the Beautiful and the Good, which is beyond all things, is one and the same, and has neither beginning nor end." Pseudo-Dionysius, The Complete Works (John Farina, Editor-in-Chief)

25		"The Mandala is a module exhibiting principles of organicity: interrelationship of parts, interdependence of systems, resonance and synchronicity." Mandala (Jose and Miriam Arguelles)