Stones and Keys: Run, boy, run!

And a white stone is given to each of those who come into the celestial kingdom, whereon is a new name written, which no man knoweth save he that receiveth it. The new name is the key word.

--D&C 130:11

And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

--Matthew 16:18

I am going to try and tie a few things together here and we will see how it goes.  Fingers (and keys) crossed...

Below is the coat of arms of the Holy See.  I took it directly from Vatican City's website:

A description from their website:

The symbolism is drawn from the Gospel and is represented by the keys given to the Apostle Peter by Christ.

The insignia is red with the two keys crossed as the Cross of St. Andrew, one gold and one silver, with the cotter pointed upwards and towards the sides of the shield. Two cords hang from the grips of the keys, usually red or blue.

The shield is surmounted by the tiara or triregnum.

Two ribbons hang from the tiara, each with a patent cross.

Ordinarily the keys have the mechanical part placed up, facing to the right and the left and usually in the form of a cross, not for the mechanisms of a lock, but as a religious symbol. The grips vary according to artistic taste, from the Gothic to the Baroque.

Since the XIV Century, the two crossed keys have been the official insignia of the Holy See. The gold one, on the right, alludes to the power in the kingdom of the heavens, the silver one, on the left, indicates the spiritual authority of the papacy on earth. The mechanisms are turned up towards the heaven and the grips turned down, in other words into the hands of the Vicar of Christ. The cord with the bows that unites the grips alludes to the bond between the two powers.

So, as I look at the coat of arms, it just screams "Sun Moon time", and the connection of the Anor Stone and the Ithil Stone.

Just a few things I notice:

• You have a gold key (Anor Stone/ El-Anor) and a silver key (Ithil Stone)... obviously
• The grips of each of the keys are round shaped, like the stones I believe they actually represent.
• Interestingly the grips (stones) are the part of the key you would hold, and I did write last night that the Stone (and stones generally) were the only way I could think of to shake hands with a thought (more on this in a bit).  
• The cotter or beam extending out from each of the stones connects or is linked to the other.
• If you imagine hard enough, you might even see spectacles, something like the Urim and Thummim - stones tied together in a bow. 

Probably other things, too.

Anyway, I think my story of two stones linking with each other and establishing a connection between Heaven and Earth goes along way to explaining what are 'keys', what to do they do, why does tradition have Peter holding two of them, and why are they crossed, etc.  It actually seems to answer these questions quite nicely.

The keys of the kingdom - the ability to access 'Heaven' directly - is in these stones, perhaps.

I won't belabor things... you can look at the image and reflect on the stones, and come to your own conclusions.

I did want to touch on this handshake notion as it relates to my crude analogy of linking my house and the barn together with my ceramically-terminated light-carrying data pathway (fiber optic cables).  There are handshakes that occur in this type of telecommunications set up.  From wikipedia:

In telecommunications, a handshake is an automated process of negotiation between two participants (example "Alice and Bob") through the exchange of information that establishes the protocols of a communication link at the start of the communication, before full communication begins.[1] The handshaking process usually takes place in order to establish rules for communication when a computer attempts to communicate with another device. Signals are usually exchanged between two devices to establish a communication link. For example, when a computer communicates with another device such as a modem, the two devices will signal each other that they are switched on and ready to work, as well as to agree to which protocols are being used.[2]

Anyway, sounds like a decent explanation, in digital/ computer speak, for how I see the stones establishing contact with each other.  Maybe my fiber optic metaphor wasn't so bad after all.

It also is interesting to think of the LDS temple drama.  Not giving too much away (because I don't want to offend, even though I guess I did call them satanic earlier...), the true messengers engage in various handshakes with Adam and Eve (both in the drama as well as with the temple patrons, who are Adam and Eve by proxy) prior to then disclosing additional information and activities associated with that handshake.  It is by the type of the grip of the handshake and the 'sign' associated with it that Adam can know both that the messengers are true and the that their information is valid.  It works the other way also, with Adam needing to provide the handshake and signs in order to ultimately enter heaven.   

And it all seems to tie to these stones.  Apparently all who enter the 'celestial kingdom' have to have one, so there might be something here.  We will have to see.

Run, boy, run!

My daughter is a dancer, and in the spring of 2021 her dance studio put on their end of the year performance.  One of the dance routines (not my daughter's) featured a song called "Run, Boy, Run!", but Woodkid.  I had never heard the song before.  It was catchy, and the routine was very well done, so it really caught me attention and it stayed on my mind.

Later that night at home, I got this strong desire to pull up the music video for the song.  I actually battled this for quite some time, as this was 2021 and I was right in the thick of it.  After white-knuckling it for awhile, I finally gave in and pulled up the music video. 

It starts with this:

That's right.  That is an LDS/ Mormon temple.  The Bern Switzerland Temple to be exact (a replica of it, anyway).  As soon as I saw this come up, I knew I was screwed.  I didn't want to watch, but I couldn't look away.  You'll notice that it doesn't have its Angel Moroni on top, which should make Moroni-Gandalf somewhat happy.

The video goes on to show a boy running from the temple as fast as he can.  He is alone and scared and keeps looking back to see if anyone is following him.  

At sometime during his run, the boy is no longer running away from the temple and whatever he is afraid of, but now he is running toward something, which we get brief views of.  At about the 2:30 mark of the video, we finally see what it is that the boy is running to, and it is introduced with this image:

There are those keys, but just flipped, and we find out that the boy is running toward what seems to be Heaven... or at least a great, white city in the clouds.

Anyway, I will let you watch for yourselves and see what stands out to you.  One of my personal favorites is the scene of the flying ship at the end (starting around the 3 minute mark):

I am sure there are bunch of other things you can find here if you look, and listen.  Here is the video:

Additionally, the phrase "Run, boy, run!" comes from the musical Camelot, when King Arthur tells a young boy by the name of Tom of Warwick, who he has just knighted right there on the spot, to run from the battlefield so that he can keep the dream of Camelot alive.

Camelot and the myth of King Arthur factors into C.S. Lewis' Space Trilogy books, and so I bring that up here as I will turning to Lewis in a little bit as I try to make headway on this whole thing about worlds, promised lands, etc.

However, that will not be next post.  The song and video of "Run, Boy, Run!" actually has a prequel, or at least I found it after I found this video, and so consider it a prequel.  It gives a little more context and background on the boy's situation, and I am going to turn there next.

The song is called "Iron" if you want to preview it for yourself.