Sunday, December 21, 2014

Part VIII - The Vedic Cow and Horse in the Mother’s Chamber

[This is Part VIII of The Chronicles of the Inner Chamber; readers of this series may first want to read the blog's 'Introduction' and the Matrimandir Action Committee's 'Manifesto',  Part I - PrefacePart II, Part III, Part IV, Part V Part VI or Part VII before continuing.]



 ‘The letter lived on when the spirit was forgotten;
the symbol, the body of the doctrine, remained but the
soul of knowledge had fled from its coverings.’

Sri Aurobindo
The Secret of the Veda

Both Cow and Horse were mighty symbols in the Vedic Age. So powerful was the vision of the Rishis in this regard that at least one of these symbol-creatures continues to be revered by contemporary Hindu society. But what happened to the Horse? This is a tale to be told because it describes the essence of the transformation that must be achieved through the Mother’s Vision. For it is the Mother’s chamber that re-establishes the Horse on a par with the Cow when both become, before our eyes, symbols of the thing symbolised. In the process, the ancient Veda is restored, renewed for our times in the midst of our contemporary society. The Word may be eternal; but to be truly a Vedic experience it must express the harmony of today’s Becoming. This is what the Mother’s Vision accomplishes, and this is why Time is her instrument in the chamber.
In Chronicle 7, movement was added to the Vision by the addition of the Vertical. What was static has been made dynamic. This is the Churning of the Ocean tale brought alive before seekers as they see the Axis of Light to be the (vertical) churning stick, while the milky ocean is the horizontal plane. Time is the serpent Vasuki who sets that axis-stick in motion. And thus does the ‘year’ churn out the treasures, first of which is Kamadhenu, the Vedic Cow of Plenty.
In this brief paragraph we have moved from the Vedic Age to the Mythic, but always the Cow remains the sacred symbol. What then is the property of this legendary creature that has made it endure for so long? The answer lies in the ‘symbol’ being the thing symbolised; but it is in the Mother’s chamber that the Cow is really exalted to reach the sublime pinnacle where there is indeed no separation between symbol and what it ‘stands’ for. It is Time that erases the line between the two, whose form is the year, the Veda tell us.
Sanskrit, the language of the Gods, helps bridge the chasm because of its magical properties. It can be gau, the Cow, or it can be gau, the Ray, a ray of the Sun. In the Mother’s chamber the Ray is materialised as the first treasure to appear when Vishnu’s Shalagrama is churned; and, like the curdling of butter in some primordial milky miasma, forms arise of the Transcendent’s undifferentiated light (the Cow) as it enters our material world whose essence is movement, that ‘churning’ that generates forms. The chamber reveals that the first ‘form’ is the year, which is itself the Ray (Cow).
The Chamber/Shalagrama is where Time takes possession of the vertical and its contracting power commences to organise what is undifferentiated transcendence. In this manner, over a space of 15.20m, the Axis of Light becomes the year.
The Mother has conveyed the truth of the Mythic Age in the pure geometry of her chamber because the magical Ray is Kamadhenu, the very first ‘treasure’ that emerges from the mighty churning. The undifferentiated light/consciousness of the Transcendent, in his act of manifestation through the power of his Divine Maya, is organised (into a ray) by the power of Time. Time creates cosmos out of chaos, order of disorder. But there is Time, and there is time. There is Time of the Supramental Manifestation, and time of the lesser worlds. The proof that this is the higher manifestation is the order it brought with it as its very own language. These forms, this geometry, are the language of the Supermind: where the symbol is the thing symbolised.
Thus, if the Cow is the Ray, we see the Eternal made manifest in Time through that Ray whose measure is our year of 365 days. For this reason in the Vedic Age the year was the foundation of the sacrifice, even as it is the form of time; and it was in the course of the 12-month year that the victory of the Aryan Warrior was achieved. It was, in fact, in a special period of the year: the tenth month, or Capricorn, Makar. This sign/month, as already mentioned in CIC 7, is India’s ruler, according to all schools of astrology.
Therefore, the Cow/Ray is the organisation of the Light into the form of the year. She is the symbol of the undifferentiated Light, differentiated by the binding or contracting power of Time, the fashioner of Form.
It is actually the 9-month gestation period of the Cow that makes her so especially relevant. We can therefore apply the harmony through the symbol to the human gestation – as well as a connection to the pulsations of our Sun in the Earth day of 24 hours. But let us go into the details of the Mother’s Vision regarding the correction that Sri Aurobindo predicted would take place with the appearance of Kalkiavatar. These Ten Avatars, emanations of Vishnu himself, are indeed ‘symbols’ of a process, an evolutionary process. They are representatives of certain cosmic procedures; as such, when we reach the final stages we know that everything must be made new. The ‘error’ that Kalkiavatar is to correct, according to Sri Aurobindo, is upon us. And the Mother not only confirms his prophecy but carries out the correction by re-establishing the real Vedic measure of the year. In the process, some of the salient aspects of the tradition are reinforced, such as the ancient Festival of Light. We will verify the true Vedic measure on the basis of her Vision when the luminous Globe becomes light-filled before our eyes precisely during the time when indeed the light begins its increase as the Earth plays out the harmony her axial balance allows.
To comprehend these correspondences (see CIC7), the crucial element is to locate the correct Zero Point as the start of the wheel, or the start of the year. That is, there is a Year, and there is a year. For contemporary Hindu society, the year is no longer respectful of the Vedic harmony.
Lesser considerations intervened, conspiracies to derail the civilisation unfolded; indeed, successful attempts to sever the age-old connection with the true marriage of time and space and an embracing of the real and not illusory destiny of this land of the sacred Cow.
India lost the Divine Measure completely centuries ago. The Mother’s inner chamber, according to her original, restores that measure; and by so doing, in the process she restores India as centre-soul of the Earth. Presently there is a ‘void’ at the heart. India is not fulfilling her role; she cannot do so under the present circumstances, - that is, until the Divine Measure is restored.
This is the dilemma represented in the Auroville Matrimandir by the emptiness we find in place of the Fullness at the Core. Inasmuch as the highest stakes are involved for India and the world, is it any wonder that ‘forces’ would seek the destruction of that Vision?
But this is the SUPRAMENTAL Manifestation, and its essential nature is the victory of the supramental Gnosis. It descends with its inbuilt protection by virtue of the fact that as time moves on, only the truth of that Golden Seed can manifest. And as it grows and its light increases, like a magnet it draws to itself whatever is required, positive AND negative, to fulfil its design.
This is the law: all, negative and positive serve the divine Purpose of the One. There is no escape possible because none can arrest the movement forward of the magical carousel that Time powers. None can get off the carousel. All, even the negative, even the Shadow, have served and continue to serve its central Purpose. Our only option is the choice we have to serve Vishnu through the Gods or through the Titans in the mighty ‘churning’ of our times. Let us proceed with this background to demonstrate how the Laws of Equivalence and Correspondence operate through the Mother’s true chamber-core to complete the churning of our Age.

Geocosmology in the Chamber; Capricorn above and below
In the higher vision the landmass of Akhand Bharat covers exactly 40 degrees of longitude (the vertical) and 30 degrees of latitude (the horizontal), as the Capricorn hieroglyph superimposed on the Indian landmass reveals (below). This is the measure of India. And if we lay the year on the descending Ray with the correct 0 point for the Chamber, 15 degrees Capricorn, we move down the Ray and when we reach the Globe at 14.65m of the 15.20m of the Ray, in time according to our universal calendar, we find that the December Solstice ‘occurs’ at the top of the light-filled globe and the entire period of the Festival of Light falls within the visible light of the globe. And that this globe is at the same time the total landmass of Akhand Bharat helps us understand why this period, the shortest day of the year and the beginning of the increase of the light, has always been so sacred on the subcontinent.

This is the true Vedic Makar Sankranti – the gateway to Capricorn in the tropical zodiac and the shortest day of the year. The two cannot be separated, shortest day/Capricorn entry, as is done by the so-called Vedic Astrologers in India, which they force us to believe is ‘science’ and ‘accuracy’. Some centuries ago wisemen and pundits lost sight of what they were measuring when otherworldliness took hold and the Earth’s own harmony was abandoned in favour of the Beyond (in this case typified in the constellations instead of the boundaries of our solar system as defined by the tropical zodiac). This marked the beginning of India’s dark age. Invasions followed and a progressive darkening of the light, like an ominous and seemingly unending eclipse. To restore that sacred harmony the Mother took birth.1
This is the necessity of her Chamber. This is the contest that must be won, the channel through which India will once again take her place as the magnetic pole of the Earth and from that centremost point affect the destiny of every nation on Earth.
This is the formula and the way. And in this, negative as well as positive will do the bidding of Vishnu as he controls and stabilises the Axis of Light, which is that magnetic pole, in the great churning.

From The New Way, Vols. 1 & 2,
pp. 154 and 219, Aeon Books, 1981

MAC serves this high truth. It has come into existence to assure that the reign of the shadow comes to an end and the Divine Maya is restored. The vertical alignment of the Chamber, with the symbol-ray playing upon the Globe, is the crucial piece in the design; according to the Mother, ‘[It] is the symbol of the future realisation.’ Therefore, everything that the Globe stands for has been attacked relentlessly by powers that oppose the victory of this knowledge and truth.

The ‘year’ of Saturn, ruler of India, in the Mother’s chamber
The year of 365 days ends at the top of the pedestal, and with it the visible Ray. The pedestal serves to legitimise and support the Globe – the only luminous object in the entire chamber. The legitimacy resides in the measure of time for the Earth, her own harmony within the solar system which the height of the pedestal establishes. Thus, to those 15.20m (365 days) we must now add the 50cm of the pedestal’s vertical measurement. On this basis the Axis of Light, or the chamber’s vertical shaft, measures 15.20m plus 50cm. The pedestal must be accommodated in this manner if the integrality of the supramental gnosis and its harmonies are to be respected.
To prove the point, earlier we discussed the first law of the harmony, one day for one year. Applying this law means that those 365 days are also 365 years when we use the same measuring rod. The Zero Point for the year/ray would be 1584 since it is the first 9-power year (1+5+8+4=18=9) after the adoption of the universal calendar used throughout the world (1582). Thus, 365 years measured from the Ray’s entry into the chamber, reveals that as the organised shaft of light descends, it reaches Sri Aurobindo’s symbol in the pedestal at the end of the visible Ray, 365 years later, in the year equivalent of 1949/50.

The year of Sri Aurobindo’s passing, 1950, begins at the top of the pedestal when the light then becomes hidden from view.

From The New Way, Vol. 2,
 p.248, Aeon Books, 1981


Time and its magical properties moves on even in the pedestal. Therefore, in a space of 50cm, we note that 13 days/years are ‘contained’. Insofar as the chamber is a veritable hymn to Saturn, or Chronos the Time-Spirit, known also as the ruler of India’s sign, Capricorn, those additional 13 days added to the Earth’s 365 give us a total of 378. By a miracle of gnostic measure, 378 days are precisely the synodic year of none other than Saturn. As seen from the Earth, it takes 378 days for Saturn to make one revolution around the Sun; that is, Sun, Saturn, and Earth return to their same positions vis-à-vis each other in this period of time. And this miracle of the Law of Equivalence is found in the central shaft when the Mother’s original plan is respected. Thus is born the new precision.
A mystery of alchemy transpires in the core’s pedestal over a period of 13 years, bringing the Axis to a close in December 1963. Note that immediately after this date the Mother REMADE Sri Aurobindo’s symbol, since all things had been ‘made new’, as is written in the temple. There is no sacred geometry of any tradition, old or new, that can equal the Geometry of Time of the Mother’s Vision and the complete body of Knowledge contained in her original plan.
 
What was lost
The most unfortunate loss India must face in the Auroville Matrimandir has been the possibility of having the Mother’s fullest power at the service of the fulfilment of the nation’s high destiny. Without that Power the labour is infinitely more difficult and to a large extent impossible. For this special assistance the purpose of her descent as the Divine Maya had to be allowed.
Nothing of the above can take place in the Auroville Matrimandir of mis-measure. The years of Earth and Saturn just do not exist there, where no precision is discernible except the predictable mechanics of the human ego and its legendary blind arrogance. To be even more specific, though this limited space allows for only a small portion of the content of the temple to be discussed, the further proof of Saturn’s pre-eminent role in the temple’s Axis of Light is provided by Sri Aurobindo himself, as a sort of seal and sanction from the Transcendent Divine:

A study of his own horoscope reveals that Saturn’s position at the time of his birth is equivalent to the top of the pedestal: 15 degrees of Capricorn, the peak of the Capricorn ‘mountain’. And this is the very degree where the chamber’s year begins and ends in the shaft. In other words, since Sri Aurobindo’s natal Saturn lies at 15 degrees in his horoscope, and the pedestal indicates both 15 degrees Capricorn, as well as 1950, based on the Vedic formula ‘one day for one year’, we have to admit that the time of his ‘mystery sleep’ has been ‘written’ in the temple by the Mother herself as his Divine Maya, in the language known, but long forgotten on the subcontinent, to the greatest of Vedic Rishis.

Since none of this came into being in the Auroville Matrimandir and time, gnostic or otherwise, was left in complete disarray, is it any wonder that there are a dozen or more calendars in use in India, and dozens of almanacs, and dozens of 0 points (ayanamshas)? In other words, it is a veritable Babel, - in contrast to the true purpose of a calendar which is to unify society and bring it within the most enlightened harmony possible? 2
Is it any wonder that the sacred and auspicious Makar Sankranti (Pongal) is celebrated 23 days AFTER the shortest day of the year, delinking it entirely from Capricorn and its ruling planet, Saturn? Is it any wonder that the Festival of Light, which is supposed to mark the period of the Light’s increase and continue thereafter until 15 degrees Capricorn is reached, is celebrated 23 days after its true starting point, making no sense at all, gnostic or otherwise?
 
Aditi’s 8th ‘son’ and the Pedestal
A special, unique alchemy occurs in the Vesica pedestal. It involves Mars and the 8
th of Aditi’s 12 sons. He is known as Martanda. In the course of the journey of the year (of 12 months – 12 facets of the chamber), the Aryan Warrior secures a victory. Martanda is connected to the 8th stage of that journey, or ‘sacrifice’, as it is known in the Veda. Martanda, legend tells us, is the progenitor of the human race. But if we look more closely we observe that a clue is given in his very name, ‘the dead egg’. In the zodiac this meaning is reinforced because the 8th month is Scorpio, the sign of sexuality and death, the sign expressing the implanted atavistic ‘purpose’ of the race of mortals. Indeed, science now confirms this connection because molecular biology informs us that sex and mortality go hand in hand: this was the ‘choice’ for reproduction the species made in the course of its evolution.
When the full initiation takes place of the Knowledge the Mother captured in her temple, a very deep level of the labour the human species carries out is made clear by the correct addition of the pedestal. For it is there, in those hidden recesses, that the great rahasya is found. This is the transmutation of Mars, or what the energy of Mars signifies in the harmony of the 9 planets plus the Sun. Indeed, the 12-month journey is nothing other than a description of the field for the transformation of mortality to immortality. Martanda, Aditi’s ‘dead egg’ Scorpio son, has to be transformed, transmuted, and the light trapped within the cave has to be released so that the journey is completed victoriously and not arrested at the 8th stage of death.
It must be continued through the full twelve, after the victory has been won in the 10th, or Capricorn. This is the sign traditionally known as the exaltation of Mars, where Mars reveals its highest attributes, where the lowly symbol of the 8th sign, the scorpion, is transformed into the Eagle, Vishnu’s own vahana, or carrier. All of this is the subject of the Mother’s magnificent gift to humanity, even as it is the subject of Savitri, the Avatar’s epic for this new age. There the Book of Death is indeed the 8th, while Death is conquered in the 10th. In between lies the 9th, the sign of the Horse.
Our zodiac starts with Aries, of fire quality. This very first sign, Agni in the Veda, is ruled by Mars. Thus our own 12-month yearly ‘journey’ begins on this note that then resonates throughout the year. All the stages must be passed, just like the Aryan Warrior did, where that same energy is finally used to conquer Death. It must pass through, or be the propelling power of the Warrior to accomplish his/her noble task. But the difficult portion of the journey, where all is lost or all is gained, is precisely during the 8th month passage through the sign of Death, - the 8th Book of Death where Satyavan succumbs to the ‘sting of death’ that the Scorpion signifies.
The Horse-symbol enters the scheme of things at this point in our revelations on the Mother’s chamber. India lost the ability to deal with this energy when the Divine Maya was lost and the correct Zero Point, or the starting point of this Mars journey, began to lose focus as otherworldliness took the place of this Earth-oriented transformation. The Earth was abandoned as the home of the Immortals. Passage through the 8th sign/month could not be lived in this material dimension, but only in heavens of different varieties after death, in the Beyond. And with the loss of this grounding in material creation the Horse also receded because it is joined to the Cow in that it densifies her Light by virtue of speed, the movement that generates form. In the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad the opening verses describe the entire universe in the form of a Horse, of whom it is said that ‘Time is the Self of the Horse sacrificial.’ This is the energy, the fuel that propels us on our journey upward to the Capricorn mountaintop, the energy of the Hero.
Mars is that traditional vir power, the hero energy that conquers precisely the ‘sting’ of the Scorpion. This is the God of War, Siva’s son Kartikeya, of whom it is written that when, as a child, he conquered the mighty Tarakasura in a battle that was the mother of all battles, ‘It is Siva himself who stands before you in the form of his son.’ And this too is written in the Mother’s chamber in the pedestal that describes the birth of Mars, the victorious Incarnate Will.
With otherworldliness foremost in all yogic quests, the Horse lost its proper place in the pantheon and symbology of the Veda and only the undifferentiated transcendent Light (the Cow) could be tolerated, accepted, dealt with in the course of yoga. And so the situation remains till today.
This is a denial of all that the Horse stands for; it is a denial of material creation itself; it is to deny the Son’s victory, which lies at the root of all our contemporary problems, expressed in the image that has shaped human perception for over 2000 years: a crucified Son. He may well have resurrected, but his victory was only in heaven, not of this Earth. In a complete cosmic aberration, the Transcendent Father was denied his Immanence through his Son, who is ‘Siva Himself’. Indian realisers followed suit by an equal denial of material creation, calling it ‘illusion’. But the Tradition holds that this Son is not crucified but victorious; and he rides the national bird of victory, the Peacock.
That ‘light’ becomes the conquering energy in the chamber’s pedestal when the correct measurements are respected in the proper axial balance. The organised light that is the year, first ‘form’ of the Churning, reaches the Pedestal at the proper moment for the Avatar’s process of transmutation to begin, 1950.

Its measure of 13 (Mars is the 4th planet from the Sun, its number is 4, and this 13 = 4 by the mathematics of unity) describes the conquest of mortality and the creation of a ‘new base of life’. Since the Mother herself related the 12 walls to the 12 months of the year, we know that the mystery is unravelled on the basis of these Vedic formulas, involving time’s energy and its flow throughout the 365 days of our Earth year; and that it is a cosmic process. Indeed, Mars is born of the Earth, fashioned from the ‘sweat’ of her own hard labour, the Puranas tell us. And so is the tale also told as it is written in the Mother’s chamber, when symbols are seen as the very things symbolised.
The purpose, the divine Purpose of our planet in the total harmony of the solar system is to provide a field or laboratory where this transmutation via the evolving human species can occur. In this the transformation of Mars is crucial. Indeed, it is ‘written’ that this is the kernel of the City’s destiny: the shadow that occults this Light has to be removed, just as it is described in the Rig Veda that Vritra, the coverer of the Sun, must be slain. And this is the function of the temple. It is a cosmic process, it is an Earthly process, it is an individual process. It is the same process that is lived by the Earth’s now global civilisation: the transmutation of Mars energy from lead to gold. Or, the conquest of mortality so that the Earth can be the home of a life Divine.
In the Vedic Age the 8th sign/stage was known as the Eagle. Even today in schools of higher knowledge this is the figure given to the 8th sign. It indicates the victorious transmutation whereby the Scorpion is replaced by the Eagle – or Garuda, Vishnu’s own vahana or carrier. But this is a ‘symbol’ to be earned. The labour is long and hard.
Sri Aurobindo lived the process for us. That is why his own symbol provides the support for the luminous Globe and was refashioned by the Mother exactly in accordance with his own transformation. Hidden from view he made the conquest. After which, exactly in accordance with his victory, the Mother re-fashioned that sacred symbol. The precision she utilised for this act is the same that was required for the construction of her chamber. But it is clear that knowledge had to be the foundation for that precision. Without the knowledge all the engineering precision in the world could not transcribe her Seeing into its correct forms. This has been proven by the fact that though she enlisted the help of Udar, the Ashram engineer, as she sought to transcribe that precision, she still had to record her wishes in taped conversations so that any mistakes he might have made would be corrected.
The executing architects and the builders of the Auroville Matrimandir did not collaborate. Rather, it would seem – and this is proven by the product of their efforts itself – that their obstruction was deliberate. To those of us in MAC who experienced those early years, when everything could easily have been done to save the vision, it was evident that an obstinate perversity prevailed which can have no other explanation than a wilful defiance just to assure that nothing of this high wisdom and purpose would find its way into the Auroville Matrimandir. There seemed to be a determination that the Scorpion’s rule would remain and its stinger would continue to bring death and destruction to the human race, binding it forever to its sexuality in the service of atavism, thus remaining true to Aditi’s 8th son of a ‘dead egg’ humanity.
With so much at stake, not just involving the minuscule community there but the whole world, and above all India, should we be surprised that ‘forces’ were drawn in as if to a magnet (the Churning Stick), to range themselves either at the Serpent’s head with the Titans, or at the tail with the Gods for the mighty ‘churning’ of the Aquarian Age?
The question to ask is, if this churning did take place, where are the ‘treasures’? Above all, where and what are the poisonous fumes that legend tells us first exude from Vasuki’s mouth, held so zealously by the Titans, - indeed tricked into holding by a  ruse of the Supreme, as if it was the prized position?
In the early stages, the contribution of the Titans is certainly more valuable than that of the Gods because of their tenacity. They labour with formidable enduring power to hold the head despite the exuding poisonous fumes. This is a labour the Gods are loathe or perhaps too weak to endure. These ‘gods’ identify with a spirituality that refuses to be ‘sullied’; they shy away from the combat, the hard struggle.
The fumes are the waste particles that feed the Shadow during the churning within a CONTAINED ENERGY BASE expressed by the Vishnu Shalagrama. When the process is contained within defined parameters, as in the Auroville experiment, the Earth is spared an otherwise inevitable destiny of total destruction. This energy must be viewed as an accumulation of disharmonious, misaligned time. An accurate assessment can be made using our contemporary value system which equates energy with time and money, and the amount already spent in the Auroville Matrimandir. It would certainly appear to be a formidable waste. But is this really so?
Misalignment has been going on for a very long time, a slow and steady accumulation over the centuries. India’s skewed time-axis has thus accumulated tremendous poisonous wastes which the Titans did come to consume in their sacrifice at the service of the One. But if there had not been ‘treasures’ from the churning and only those poisonous fumes, the labour of both Gods and Titans would have borne no fruit at all and the Earth would be doomed. However, these Chronicles testify that both fumes and treasures have arisen simultaneously over these past 33 years. Herein lies the key. But when the time of unveiling arrives, when Vritra is slain and the light of the Sun illumines the darkness, the reign of the Shadow must end. He must abdicate. 

Thus will the masked Transcendent mount his throne.
When darkness deepens strangling the earth’s breast
And man’s corporeal mind is the only lamp,
As a thief’s in the night shall be the covert tread
Of one who steps unseen into his house.
A Voice ill-heard shall speak, the soul obey,
A power into mind’s inner chamber steal,
A charm and sweetness open life’s closed doors
And beauty conquer the resisting world,
The truth-light capture Nature by surprise,
A stealth of God compel the heart to bliss
And earth grow unexpectedly divine.
In Matter shall be lit the spirit’s glow,
In body and body kindled the sacred birth;
Night shall awake to the anthem of the stars,
The days become a happy pilgrim march,
Our will a force of the Eternal’s power,
And thought the rays of a spiritual sun.
A few shall see what none yet understands;
God shall grow up while the wise men talk and sleep;
For man shall not know the coming till its hour
And belief shall be not till the work is done.    
  (Savitri, Book One, Canto Four)        

Matrimandir Action Committee
17 May 2003

 [Link to: Part IX]

1 The Mother used the universal metric system in her plan. It is to be noted that the official ‘meter’ is on display in Paris, France, where the Mother was born.
2 The problem has been noted by the Calendar Reform Committee during discussions after Independence on which calendar to adopt, the Nirayana system based on the Constellations or the Tropical (Sayana) method, as in the Mother’s chamber: ‘In continuing to follow the Nirayana system, the Hindu calendar makers are under delusion that they are following the path of Dharma. They are actually committing the whole Hindu society to Adharma.’ 

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