Stone: The process of turning a body into a state of stillness and hardness, which can then be transferred to other bodies. A body that has been stilled in this way, which contains that energy in a permanent state, is called a stone, as is anything built out of such a process. For example, a cliff is made out of stilled material (stone), as is the stone of a plum (which starts soft and hardens with ripeness). Similarly, an idea or an intention for housing, solidified in the air by using stone, is a stone house. It’s energy has been passed on to the intention, and gives it permanent shape. Stone is at all times an active process. It spreads its energy to objects at which it is directed. To stone a person, for example, is to turn his or her body into a state of stillness and hardness (death) by pelting it with stones. (Similar transferred or contagious energies are ice and spark). The act of stoning is a group activity, that transforms the energy of hurling stone at a person into a solidified, hard, firm and united social group. Such a group has been as much turned to stone as has its victim. The hearts of its members are said to be turned to stone, or filled with unshakable, pitiless resolve. A small piece of stone, which embodies a marriage of stone energy and portability (and used to stone a person), is a stone. Such stones can be recombined to transfer stone to other objects, and even to ideas. A paving stone shaped out of stone, for example, can be used to create a stone street, which transforms mud into hardness. The energy of stone is in this way transferred into mechanical energy in the feet of walkers; it lifts them up and propels them forward with firmness and speed. In a parallel sense, the earth itself can be shaped into stone by the addition of bodily energy to it. Conversely, in Jewish tradition the human ancestor Adam was shaped from clay, which would have turned into pottery (stoneware) if it had not been breathed with the breath of God while still in a plastic state. As soon as that breath is removed, its interrupted progression towards stone continues. The origin stories of the Ainu on Hokkaido have shorebirds running back and forth at the surf line, patting the intertidal mud solid by squeezing water out of it. Stone is similar to rock. Rock, however, remains liquid and in bodily form — like Adam, and like Adam such rock can too be turned into stone.

The Sun Turns to Stone on the “Pipe” above Palouse Falls, Washington

The living rock (basalt lava) of the Columbia basin has been turned to stone; the water that cut through it to form the Palouse Canyon created stones (rock falls of basalt scree) at the time it transferred its energy to the stone, just as now the stone transforms the remaining energy of the falling water of the falls into stillness in the pool at their base. Notice the marmots on the cliff edge in the foreground. They have not been turned into stone, although in camouflage they hold as still as stone.

In the following image, you can see the pool that the stone makes out of water.

Water transferring its energy to stone while stone transfers its energy to water.