Description
The Fylfot Cross is the Admission Badge to 1=10 grade of Zelator in the Outer Order. It is also called the Hermetic cross, the Hammer of Thor, the gammadion, and the swastika. It is formed of seventeen squares out of a square of twenty-five lesser squares. These seventeen squares represent the Sun, the four elements, and the twelve signs of the zodiac.
The Fylfot is equilateral cross with arms bent at right angles, all in the same rotary direction around a central axis. The Fylfot has been known widely known all over the ancient world as a symbol of prosperity and good fortune The word swastika is derived from the Sanskrit svastika, meaning “conducive to well-being,” In India this figure is used as a beneficent symbol by Hindus and Buddhists. The symbol was used extensively on ancient Mesopotamian coins. In Scandinavia it indicated the god Thor’s hammer. The figure also appeared in early Christian and Byzantine art where it was called the crux gammata or gammadion cross, because it could be constructed from four Greek gammas. (It is highly unfortunate that in the mid-twentieth century this ancient sacred symbol was misappropriated for corrupt, nefarious purposes.)
The symbol of the Sun is at the center of the cross at the point of stillness, while the zodiacal signs divided into the four triplicities make up the arms of the cross. The cardinal signs all begin at the center of the cross next to the solar symbol, followed by the fixed and mutable signs. The arms terminate with the elemental symbols of each triplicity. The whole cross represents the center of the universe giving rise to the celestial signs, which then formulate the elements of the physical world.
Construction: wood and decoupage.
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