Thirty-Three

Mircea Eliade establishes that there are 33 major religions in the world today in his book, The Eliade Guide to World Religions [Mircea Eliade, Ioan P. Couliano - HarperSanFrancisco, c1991)]. Its format presents 33 extensive "macro-dictionary" articles and a "micro-dictionary" of brief entries and index references. The volume provides an authoritative if brief overview of major religious traditions.

Monotheism began with Egypt's Pharaoh Dynasty of Akhenaten in Amarna, 3,300 years ago.

In the field of Numerology, many systems hold 33 as the highest of the "Master Numbers." It symbolizes "Christ Consciousness," or the ultimate attainment of consciousness. ["Master Numbers" are repdigits that are not "reduced" (33 is not reduced to a "6," as is 42, for example)].

The diamond is associated by some gemologists and numerologists with the "Master Number, 33."

"33" and "22" are patrilineal and matrilineal, respectively, in the history of "shamanism."

The hexagram [a.k.a. "Solomon's Seal" or "Star of David"] can be seen as two superimposed triangles. An effect of this may be to find in the symbol a "33" - two "three-fold" forms, combined. This figure is significant in many of the world's spiritual and mystical traditions, including Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Christendom, and Al-Islam.

The theologian Hippolytus of Rome (c. AD 170-236), in the book Refutation of all Heresies , "tries to discredit the ideas of Gnosticism by tracing their origin to the Greek philosophical systems, which were considered 'pagan' and therefore heretical by the church leaders. In doing so, he not only describes 33 Gnostic systems, but gives to history an outline of the contemporary Greek ideas of astrology, magic, and religious mystery." [See Links: "Gnostic Christianity..."]

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