The Thief & Plum
On Mercury/Chiron (opposition)
There was once a thief in the deepest, darkest dregs of solitary for stealing some herbs from the market. One night, he had a dream about a seed that grew into the most magnificent tree with golden plums. It gave him an idea. He called the guards over to his cell and said that he had something for the King which would make him the most wealthy King in the entire world, and he wanted to give it to him. Miraculously, it was agreed to offer the thief a brief audience with the King. The gift the thief had was a plum seed he conveniently manifested. He told the King that the most magnificent tree would grow from this seed with golden plums, but only for those pure of mind, clear of all sin, and who has never stolen. The King then handed the seed to the Queen who handed it to her advisor, who then passed it around the court until it fell to the floor. The Thief smiled, the king frowned, and it was all understood and forgiven.
This story is an old Asian tale. I have no idea exactly where it comes from, I heard a version of it from Michael Meade, and then allowed it to grow amongst all the other stolen seeds in my mind. I’m a thief. We are all thieves, just like Hermes. Whenever we create, we are borrowing (or stealing) images and ideas from other sources. If we are aware enough to leave citations, that’s a good way to honor our ancestors, yet it’s still an open sea of chaos when it comes to the noosphere. Any order or ownership we feel around our creations is the purest kind of illusion.
Today, Mercury is making his yearly opposition with Chiron. A good reminder to honor our teachers and to remember what little thieves we really are. For the rebellious among us, we may pride ourselves in rejecting the teachings, going off on our own, thinking we have the secret of the universe in our pocket and they don’t, but what if it’s a lie. Thieves are liars, and we are both. We love to think we’ve got the alpha on what’s going on, yet the true authority is much greater, much stranger than we can ever suppose.
The word authority comes from ‘author’, which literally means “one who causes to grow.” So, the true authority is the author who can make that seed grow its golden plums. There will be no plums until we become completely authentic, acting from Self, not ourselves. To do so, we take the first two letters, a and u, and constellate gold into the Sun to receive our greatest reminder. There is not one authority being talked about in the media who could grow the plum. There is no troll on Twitter who can grow the plum; no Youtuber, no Podcaster, no Blogger, no author other than our authentic selves who can grow that golden plum.
This is a Chiron teaching. A bit of medicine for our hermetic minds plummeting down the infinite scroll. More koan than advice, yet a promising seed for your pocket. May it get you out of the right kind of trouble someday.
~*~
Eudaimonia,
Adam
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