This week’s post I owe entirely to a man named Marco Mucci, whose acquaintance I’ve made over the past two weeks.
Marco lives in Rome, where Journal of a UFO Investigator has just been published in Italian, as La Voce Smarrita del Cielo (“The Lost Voice of Heaven”). He’s made a series of fascinating comments on my post of October 11, “The Philadelphia Experiment – ‘One Can Go Nuts.’ ” Speaking of the annotations made in the mid-1950s in the margins of Jessup’s Case for the UFO–supposedly by three gypsies, in reality by one man, the gypsy-like drifter Carl Allen–Marco wrote: “don’t you think there is much of a religious or wild esoteric nuance in what the annotations speak about?” And I had to admit that, while I thought he was right, I’d never been able to get a handle on what that “wild esoteric nuance” was.
I proposed that Marco single out some specific passages from the annotated Case for the UFO that might serve as a starting point for a discussion. And he did. His reply was so important, and so provocative, that I don’t want to leave it buried in the “comments” to a post from last October.
Here’s what he wrote:
Hi David, thanks for giving me the sprint to recover the book I once bought proudly after a lot of search, and to read it again after years.
While I am a collector of rare books about ufology and esotericism, I am not an ufologist strictly speaking, and I do place the ufo-lore in the wider mainstream of mythology and folklore. Still, this is the opportunity to give a better shape to the feeling I have about the annotations included in the Varo edition and to the Jessup case in general.
I think that so far ufologists have pointed out above all the technical and -how to say – mechanical aspects of the annotations. The reference to the magnetic fields, the unified theory of Einstein and the infamous experiment allegedly carried out by the US Navy kind of diverted the attenion from a deeper message, let’s say level of understanding, of the annotations. There is, I think, a deeper level hidden behind the story of the magnetic forces which can be detected.
I will refer now to the pages of the 1973 edition by Gray Barker to mention the passages I think can make more consistent my statement.
“For first they would refuse to even believe. Requires true Humility or active fascination” (page 3). Whereas a first hint at a precise attitude of the mind is required to understand the secrets behind the mystery, and according to me it has a precise meaning (the “active fascination” is a reference to a capability of the mind which is well known in the Middle Ages and Renaissance magic).
When Jessup states that “it is almost an inseparable corollary to our thesis that we admit an unfathomable antiquity for mankind, or at least intelligence, upon the earth and its vicinity,” and follows with reference to the megalithic constructions, Jemi writes: “THE MAN IS CLOSE, TOO CLOSE” (page 9), so pointing out that this point is crucial to the annotators. The topic of a “unfathomable antiquity” of intelligence reoccurs often in the annotations.
Again about the mental attitude of man to discover the truth about the mystery: “Man’s Emotional structure is such that he cannot awaken to Powers of ‘True-Thinking’ ” (page 10) again a reference to the limited capability of mankind, closed to understanding because he needs to “awaken,” a topic which is the very core of any initiatic tradition.
“Is Nothing, Harvard expieriments show that only a few Humans Have Pie factors of any depth. They cannot tele-talk to any Clarity, Nor thusly are they able to ‘see’ beauty of Each others souls. Thus they are forced into Matierialistic Values & concepts & Lack any SORT OF REASONABLE PHILSOSPHY TO LEAD THEM UPWARDS. SAVE THE GREAT BOOK” (page 12) Again, the traditional theme of men who are not aware of their potential powers, the fact that they sleep and cannot move upwards, a topic which is recurring in the pessimistic esoteric traditions like gnosticism, where a distinction between types of humans (hylic, psychic and pneumatic) is remarked to point out that the majority of people is condemned to ignorance and the material world. Interesting the reference to a “GREAT BOOK” which at this stage we cannot say what it is.
When Jessup states (page 14) that “the basic thought is that man is living in a world in which he is neither the completely dominant nor the supremely intellectual being,” Mr. A annotates, to confirm this dramatic assertion: “HUH, HE’LL NEVER ADMIT IT, THOUGH: PRIDE” – again hinting at a limited open mindness of men (in this case of Jessup?) caused by a mental attitude, pride.
When Jessup speaks about strange phenomena on the lunar surface, and says to “watch the regions of terminator on the moon for lunar surface activity” because “you might get a surprise,” Mr. A writes: “What are we (humans) that Thou hast placed us only a Little ‘Lower than the Angels’ ” (page 29) – which has a strong esoteric meaning since this annotation is done after the mention of the lunar phenomena, and we know from many traditions, again from ancient gnosticism, the importance of being sub-lunar inhabitants for humankind who were kind of prisoners of the archontes (the angels of the demiurge).
[Surely there’s an allusion here to Psalm 8:4-5; and I’ve always assumed that the “Great Book” of pages 12 and 189 is the Bible. But maybe this is just my assumption?–DH]
Again, commenting on an odd statement by Jessup about the fact that it is not no longer necessary to explain ufos as visitors from Mars, Venus, or Alpha Centauri, that “they are a part of our own immediate family – a part of the earth-moon binary-planet system,” Mr. B writes: “He Knows Something but How Does He know” (page 34), so confirming that the very topic is about the vicinity to humankind of a foreign intelligence which oversees the ufo and Fortean phenomena.
Several passages refer to this civilization, from unfathomed antiquity, the Lemurian-Muanians, once the real rulers of the world who were “FORCED BY THEIR SIZE & BY THE FACT OF THEIR GILLS TO DIG DEEP HOLES IN ROCK” (pag. 109) again a topic you find especially in the esoterism of H.P. Blavatsky who affirmed she could have access to secret books surviving the ancient cataclysms, a secret doctrine whose remains were placed in ancient Tibetan monasteries, a topic which permeated especially the right-wing esoteric schools in the twentieth century. A secret knowledge that Jessup was unconsciously discovering, in fact, according to Mr. A: “UPON REVIEW; I believe this Man MAYBE being ‘Illuminated’ Telepathically. Somebody … is Making him write about that which he ‘sees’ in his head & has checked upon to Verify” (page 125).
And finally, page 189 when Mr. B writes at the very end: “They are yet Children, These Humans, Show it too Clearly. As things Stand, They Value Matierial thing & Will not apply themselves to True Values of Their own Great Prophetic Book. In Principal Yes, but Not Practice. No Christian Nation or Diplomat will ever be of True Value to another. Thus, Destruction. This Man is No Different He too is Not of a ‘Big-Spirit’ enough. Dle Puka.”
Races live hundreds of centuries ago, still present in the subterranean worlds, capability to see them through psychic powers, references to sites where occult knowledge was stored thousands of years ago, a negative view of the world and humankind, a distinction between men who can “see” the truth and those who are condemned to materiality – this sounds to me like esoteric trends of the late nineteenth century and the early twentieth, in particular H.P. Blavatsky and the Theosophical Society.
It would be interesting to know whether Carl Allen could have had access to this type of reading or if any esoteric group could have interest in spreading their creed.
Still, several words in the annotations resemble Romany (like Gayorj for non-gipsy man).
Tough topic, needs a multidiciplinary approach, I humbly think.
Yours sincerely
Marco
Yes, indeed! What Marco’s written can serve as a call to scholars and students of Western esotericism (which I’m not, except in the most amateur way) to bring their knowledge to bear on this very tough topic.
You can email Marco at mmucci64@gmail.com. Or add to the discussion on this blog, by sending your own comments to this post.
– David Halperin, author of Journal of a UFO Investigator: A Novel
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