Pac’s posting about stained glass and my answer with an article about Gothic cathedrals got me thinking about the deep mysticism (woo) inbued in ancient architecture, including cathedrals. We don’t see many modern churches with the striking beauty of the cathedrals because the woo has been abandoned. Everything from location to construction to resonance was incorporated into sacred spaces, from the pyramids and Sphinx of Egypt, the pyramids of ancient indigenous peoples, ancient Greek and Roman temples, Stonehenge and the cathedrals.

ETA: It also permeates the classical works of art: music, sculpture, sketches, paintings, and dance.

Sacred geometry ascribes symbolic and sacred meanings to certain geometric shapes and certain geometric proportions. It is associated with the belief of a divine creator of the universal geometer. The geometry used in the design and construction of religious structures such as churches, temples, mosques, religious monuments, altars, and tabernacles has sometimes been considered sacred. The concept applies also to sacred spaces such as temenoi, sacred groves, village greens, pagodas and holy wells, Mandala Gardens and the creation of religious and spiritual art. As worldview and cosmology The belief that a god created the universe according to a geometric plan has ancient origins. Plutarch attributed the belief to Plato, writing that “Plato said God geometrizes continually” (Convivialium disputationum, liber 8,2). In modern times, the mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss adapted this quote, saying "God arithmetizes…