Part 2 - AMORC

Ancient Greece and Ionianear trade-routes which facilitated the importationof textiles from the interior of Asia Minor and thenorth-south shipping routes. It boasted a flourishingeconomy based on wool and metalworking. But theSamians also developed an extensive overseascommerce. They helped to open up trade withthe Black Sea cities and with Pharaonic Egypt,and were credited with having been the firstGreeks to reach the Straits of Gibraltar.About 535 BCE, when the existing oligarchywas overturned by the tyrant Polykrates, Samosreached the height of its prosperity. Its navy notonly protected it from invasion, but ruled supremein Aegean waters. The city was beautified withpublic works, and its schools ofsculptors, metal-workers andengineers achieved high repute.It had a famous sanctuary of Heracalled the Heraion, which today is aUNESCO World Heritage Site.Early LifePythagoras was born in 580 or572 BCE into a wealthy family.His father was Mnesarchos, agem engraver and merchant ofprecious goods from Tyre and hismother was Pythais of a high bornSamian family. The story is toldhow Mnesarchos, on a businesstrip to Delphi, with his wife whowas pregnant but didn’t know it,consulted the Pythian oracle abouthis forthcoming voyage to Syria. The oracle repliedthat his voyage would be profitable and that hiswife was already pregnant and would give birthto a child who would “surpass all others in beautyand wisdom.” This child would be of the greatestbenefit to the human race in all aspects of life. Whenthe child was born, they named him Pythagoras,meaning “speaking like the Pythia.”Pythagoras came to maturity just as theearliest Greek science or natural philosophy wasdeveloping in the nearby city of Miletus, and sonaturally he was influenced by Milesian cosmology.During his lifetime, education was considered to bea form of spiritual initiation and therefore, fromthe age of five, he was introduced to all the fieldsof knowledge. Coming from a wealthy family,he was sent to study under some great Masterssuch as: the poet and musician Hermodamas ofSamos; the philosophers Anaximander of Miletusand Bias of Priene; Pherekydes of Syros, one of theSeven Sages of Greece who taught the immortalityof the soul; and Thales of Miletus, that greatdepositary of ancient wisdom who recommendedEducation was considered to be a form ofspiritual initiation.Pythagoras of Samos(c.580-500BCE).that Pythagoras travel to Egypt, the cradle ofsecret knowledge. At that time Egypt was ruled byPharaoh Amasis of the Saite or 26 th dynasty, the lastgreat ruler of Egypt before the Persian conquest.Amasis encouraged many Greeks to come to hisland and be instructed in its ancient wisdom.World TravellerTaking Thales’ advice, Pythagorastravelled to Egypt, learning ancientEgyptian and spending 22 years asa neophyte and initiate in the greattemples at Heliopolis, Memphis andThebes, the main centres of learning,where he was initiated into thesecrets of mathematics, geometry,astronomy and astrology. He wasalso initiated into the knowledgeof correspondences and symbolismas well as the rituals of thoseinstitutions, which were designed toexpand the consciousness.In Egypt Pythagoras wascaptured and taken to Babylon bythe soldiers of Cambyses II, the KingThe Rosicrucian Beacon -- June 200837