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How to Live Eleven Days in 24 Hours

by Robert Anton Wilson

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For about a year now, I have dated all my letters with my own no-bias
multi-cultural calendar. Of course, I know a multi-cultural chronology seems
very Politically Correct, but don't let that shock you. I happen to agree
with the P.C. cult about many things. In fact, I only differ with them in
not liking their intolerance, their fascist tactics, their introduction of
Maoist brainwashing to our groves of Academe, and their utter lack of humor
or╩ordinary common sense. Aside from those issues, I almost╩approve the P.C.
agenda.

Actually, I started using a single non-Western calendar back in 1969-71 when
working on Illuminatus with Bob Shea. I had realized that the Gregorian
calendar, the standard Occidental system, dates everything from the alleged
birth of a comic-book super-hero I regarded as fictitious. He supposedly had
a virgin for mother, a pigeon for father, and cured the blind by throwing
dirt in their eyes. You can see why I had doubts.

But dating everything, a la Pope Gregory, not only subliminally conditions
to us to the mythology of the Vatican, but also divides written history
artificially in the middle, creating a certain off-kilter view of how things
actually transpired since neolithic times.

For instance, in the Gregorian calendar, the first Egyptian dynasty began c.
3400 "B.C." , the founding of Rome 509 "B.C." and the nomination of the boar
hog Pigasus for President of the U.S. in 1968 "A.D." To try to escape the
Papist trap here by writing "B.C.E.," before the Common Era, and "C.E., "the
Common Era," doesn't really help much. We still remain stuck in the Romish
reality tunnel.

Even worse╩side effects of the Gregorian calendar arise when you try to
sense the time span covered in the dates just╩mentioned. It requires hard
thinking, a historical imagination and even, for those as close to senility
as myself, possible paper and pencil work. In the Illuminati calendar,
however, these events fall into place in a single time line: Egypt's first
dynasty begins around 600 A.L., the founding of Rome 3491 A.L. and the
apotheosis of Pigasus 5968 A.L. (A.L., as in Masonry, means Anno
Lumina--year of light.) Fill in a few more dates--Hassan i Sabbah
illuminated 5092 A.L., Native Americans discover Columbus 5492 A.L., U.S.
Declaration of Independence 5776 A.L., Noble Drew Ali born 5886 A.L.--and
history begins to make sense as a single orderly sequence, not bent in the
middle.

The Illuminati chronology (year one A.L. or 4000 BCE Gregorian) begins with
the birth of Hung Mung, the╩ancient╩Chaoist (pre-Taoist), Chinese
philosopher who answered all questions by shouting loudly, "I don't know! I
don't know!" Thus, this system begins with a date around the first dawnings
of civilization and writing, and allows us to see all history as a single
sequence, not interrupted by an artificial minus-to-plus changeover to
commemorate the god of a single weird cult.

As I say, I worked all this out, including the five seasons of the
Illuminati year, back in 5969/5971 A.L.--just as "the sixties" died under
the clubs and tear gas of the Nixon counter-revolution. Only c. 5992 A.L.
after discovering Noble Drew Ali and the Moorish Science Temple, did I
realize that any one calendar, even my own lovely Illuminati chronolog,
imposes a single order on a complex system, and thereby has reductionist and
almost totalitarian implications, at least subliminally. I therefore have
switched to a multi-cultural system which, I dare to think, adequately
represents what historian Crane Brinton called the growing multanimity (as
distinguished from unanimity) of Spaceship Earth today.

For instance, in my multicultural calendars the date on which I began
writing this article looks as shown below :

        Poundian--19 Artemis, 72 p.s. U.

        Thelemic--19 September, Anno XC

        'Pataphysical--12 Absolu, 122 E.P.

        French Revolutionary--Le Travail, 202

        Islamic--12 Rabi-2, 1373 A.H.

        Gregorian--19 September 1994 C.E.

        Erisian--43 Bureaucracy, 3178 y.C.

        Chinese--15th day of the 8th month, Year of the Dog 4692

        Mayan--6 Reed, 5106

        Hebrew--14 Tishri, 5755 A.M.

        Illuminati--43 Beamtenherrschaft, 5994 A.L.

A few quick, and valuable lessons, immediately leap out of this chronolog .

First of all, the much touted "Millenium" only appears close in some
calendars, and remains e.g. 245 years off in the Hebrew, 798 years away in
the 'Pataphysical, etc.

Second, when I called this system mine I did not intend to brag, but to
indicate personal limitations and emic realities: many alternatives can
exist, at the preference of the user. You can drop the Chinese and Mayan, if
you want, or add the Tibetan and Aztec, etc. Personally, I would love
to╩include Wiccan and Druidic dating systems, if somebody would find them or
create them.

A few additional words of explanation:

The Poundian calendar, designed by Ezra Pound, attempts to define the
post-Christian era and dates everything from 31 October 1921
(Gregorian)--the date Joyce wrote the last words of Ulysses.[*] (The
"p.s.U." means post scriptum Ulysses, "after the writing of Ulysses.") I
November 1921, accordingly, becomes 1 Hephaistos in the year 1 p.s.U. The
year has 6 male months for the solar phallic male gods (Hephaistos, Zeus,
Saturn, Hermes, Mars, Phoebus, i.e. in Gregorian, November, December,
January, February, March and April) and 6 female months for the lunar female
goddesses (Kupris, Juno, Athene, Hestia, Artemis, Demeter i.e. in Gregorian
May, June, July, August, September and October.)

In this system, we have progressed 72 years into the post-Christian epoch
and will soon enter the 73rd.

For those who have other ideas about when the post-Christian era began, the
Thelemic calendar dates everything from 1904 Gregorian, when Aleister
Crowley received, or conceived The Book of the Law. That makes this the year
90, which like all years gets written Latin style by Thelemites--Anno XC.
For some reason, Crowley did not rename the months, so I keep the Gregorian
month names here.

As a multiculturalist, I play no favorites. In one sense, we have evolved 72
years beyond the Christ cult, and in another sense we have evolved 90 years.
As Sri Syadasti said, "All systems are true in some sense, false in some
sense, meaningless in some sense, true and false in some sense, true and
meaningless in some sense, false and meaningless in some sense, and true and
false and meaningless in some sense." A secret Illuminati teaching holds
that if you repeat that 666 times, you will achieve Total Illumination, in
some sense.

For those who agree that we have entered the 'Pataphysical Era, I include
the 'Pataphysical calendar, starting from Alfred Jarry's birth on 8
September 1873. (He shares the 8 September birthday with the Blessed Virgin
Mary in the Catholic mythos and Molly Bloom in the Joycean mythos.
'Pataphysically that "coincidence" must mean something. ) Thus every
'Pataphysical year begins on Jarry's birthday, renamed 1 Absolu, and
proceeds through 13 months of 29 days each (Absolu, Maha, As, Sable,
Decervelage, Gueles, Pedale, Clinamen, Palotin, Merdre, Gidouille, Tatane
and Phalle.) Since each week has seven days and each month four weeks, and 7
x 4 = 28, we have one extra day each month. We call these days "imaginary"
by analogy with imaginary numbers. Every month starts on a Sunday, which
simplifies the system and ensures that the 13th will always fall on a
Friday.

As UFO sightings, UFO abductions, poltergeists, Bigfoot encounters and falls
of fish and frogs get reported more and more often, many may find the
'Pataphysical calendar the most plausible of all. As Jarry said, all other
sciences deal with generalizations but 'Pataphysics deals only with the
exceptional.

The French Revolutionary calendar dates everything from 1792 Gregorian, and
as I write this amid the five Sansculotides or feast days (Les Vertus, Le
Genie, Le Travail, L'Opinion and Les Recompenses, i.e Virtues, Genius,
Labor, Blather and Wages. No month name gets used. In three days (22
September) the month of Vendemaire, in the year 203 begins, followed by
Brumaire, Frimaire, Nivose, Pluvose, Ventose, Germinal, Floreal, Prairial,
Messidor, Thermidor and Fructidor. (i.e. Vintage, Fog, Sleet, Snow, Rain,
Wind, Sprouts, Flowers, Pasture, Harvest, Heat, Fruit--a good description of
a year in Paris).

The Islamic calendar begins with the flight of the prophet (hejira ) in the
year 4621 A.L. (621 Gregorian). A.H. means after the Hejira, the usual
abbreviation used by Muslims writing in English; this year thus becomes 1373
A.H. You can look up the months in any encyclopedia. I don't intend to do
all the work for you, and if I did, this article would run longer than the
editors want.

You already know the Gregorian calendar. It gets drummed into our heads in
our allegedly "secular" "public" schools and everybody in our society who
holds power--banks, corporations, even governments--uses it. My system
intends to break the conditioning/hypnosis created by this artificial
uniformity.

The Erisian calendar, which we owe to the sublime genius of Malclypse the
Younger, dates events from 2816 A.L. (1184 BCE, Gregorian), the year of the
Original Snub. If you don't know about the Original Snub, go thou and read
Mal's Principia Discordia, from Loompanics Unlimited in Port Townsend,
Washington, wherein you will find the Snub, together with the Golden Apple,
the Trojan War, and everything else in the universe, explained once and for
all. Each year has five seasons, representing the five degrees of SNAFU
imposed upon us by the Original Snub--Chaos, Discord, Confusion, Bureaucracy
and International Relations. That gives us 73 days to each season, which
equals one Chockmah day in Cabala. Herein the Wise and Subtle will find a
profound secret hidden, if they can Know, and Dare, and Will and Keep
Silence.

Every fourth year, of course, we run into that damned extra day that also
perplexes the Gregorians. We Erisians call it St. Tibb's Day, since
everybody now agrees that St. Tibb never existed.

The Chinese calendar makes more sense than any of the others, but I find it
too complex to explain in full. You look it up, eh? Meanwhile, rest
satisfied that we now live in the year 4692, and you don't have to worry
about any damned Millenium for another 308 years.

I find the Mayan calendar even more perplexing, but keep it on my letters
because I like the names of the days: Crocadile, Night, Snake, Deer, Jade,
Monkey, Reed, Eagle, Thought, Storm, Wind, Net, Death, Rabbit, Dog, Tooth,
Jaguar, Wax, Knife, Hunter. Sort of sounds like my last acid trip. This year
counts as 5106 of this cycle, but numerous cycles roll on and on and do not
necessarily end in 2012 Gregorian, whatever you may have heard; that may
just mark the opening of another mega-cycle.

You can look up the Hebrew dating system for yourself, too. Really, do you
think you can learn anything important without personal effort?

The Illuminati years you already know. The five seasons have the names
Verwirrung, Zweitracht, Unordnung, Beamtennherrschaft and Realpolitik, each
73 days long. Like the Gregorians and Erisians, we thus have an extra
day╩dangling loose every four years. We call it
Heiligefliegendekindersheissetag, and it has rituals that beat all hell out
of Saint Tibb's Day.

The beauty of this multicultural system, to me, resides in its total lack of
allegience to any one emic reality, and in its conditioning the users to
think in comparative realities. Thus, to most Americans, December 25 means
Christ-mass and even the atheists feel dragged into the Reality Grid of the
Romish cult. But on my multiple calendar system, the same date appears in
many guises--as 25 Zeus, 72 p.s.U. or as 25 December Anno XC or as 25 Sable
122 E.P. or as 5 Nivose, 203, or as 22 Rajab, 1373 A.H. or as 67
International Relations, 3178 y.C., or as the 22nd day of the 11th month,
4692, or as 11 Dog, 5106, , or as 23 Teves 5755 A.M., or as 67 Realpolitik,
5994 A.L. You have a wide choice╩of what to celebrate. Why not celebrate all
of them? But don't go driving afterwards.

I want to thank Hakim Bey, James Koehnline, Gregory Hill and John ver der
Does for help with parts of this multi-calendar. If anybody finds any
mistakes, please notify me at once.

Of course, my basic motive in trying to popularize this system lies in the
hope that some people will use it and get cured of asking, "But which is the
real date?" Then they might start to see the fallacy of all questions in
that form, and we will achieve a large part of the goals of General
Semantics, Erisianism, Deconstructionism and Buddhism. Some may even
understand why no form of "is" or "be" appears anywhere in this article.

* Pound had his 36th birthday on that date also. You can't expect an
egomaniac, even one as generous as Ez, to leave himself entirely out of the
dating of the New Age.