Symbol and Code — Are Algorithms the New Sacred Language?

Silence carved in stone — the Lion of Lucerne remembers what code forgets.

“Once, the universe spoke in symbols. Now it speaks in code. The question is not whether the message has changed — but whether we still know how to listen.”

There was a time when every sign in the world pointed beyond itself. The sun was not just fire but light made visible. The circle was not geometry but eternity condensed.The ancient mind read meaning in every line, sound, and motion. To live, then, was to translate — to move between worlds: the visible and the invisible, the human and the divine.

Today, that sacred alphabet has migrated into silicon. Our symbols are written in bits and bytes, our priests wear headsets, and our prayers are processed through servers. Code has become our new scripture — precise, powerful, and, at times, terrifyingly literal.

In Luzern, a lion sleeps in stone.

Carved into a cliff in 1821, the Lion Monument mourns the Swiss Guards who died defending the Tuileries. But beyond history, it speaks a universal language — one that transcends words and time.The lion’s wounded body and serene face are not just sculpture; they are code written in emotion, a message the heart deciphers long before the mind.

Every era translates its sacred symbols into new media.The ancients carved in marble; we code in silicon. Yet both are acts of remembrance — attempts to preserve meaning against the erosion of time.

The old language of symbols

In the world of mythos, symbols did not explain; they revealed. A tree could mean life, a river could mean passage, a flame could mean the soul. Meaning was not stored — it was experienced.

In my doctoral study on finitude and infinity in the poetry of Nikola Šop and Gregor Strniša, I found that both poets spoke through symbols that opened rather than closed: Šop’s stars and Strniša’s cosmic maps were not decoration — they were instruments of transcendence.Their purpose was not to define, but to awaken.

This is what the philosopher Ananda Coomaraswamy called the metaphysics of participation: the understanding that each form participates in something greater than itself.

The new language of code

Artificial Intelligence, in its most elegant form, is also a language — a system of representation. Its grammar is logic, its syntax is probability, its poetry is precision.

Through machine learning, we have created architectures that imitate intuition; through neural networks, we have modeled the way thought moves; through digital twins, we have mirrored entire worlds in the language of simulation.

At IBM and other AI research environments, this process is often called cognitive translation — the attempt to turn perception into data, behaviour into pattern, emotion into measurable signal.

It is, in essence, an act of modern symbolism: transforming the invisible into the visible, the ineffable into the executable.

And yet — something vital is missing. A symbol points beyond itself; a code points back to its source. A symbol invites mystery; a code demands control.

“Where the symbol breathes, the code calculates.”

Can machines carry meaning?

The most advanced AI systems can recognize beauty, but not experience it.They can compose symphonies, but not silence.They can mirror human speech, but not the human condition.

Meaning requires context, consciousness, and care — dimensions that no amount of data can reproduce. A neural net may predict the next word, but not the next insight.

The danger lies not in AI surpassing us, but in our surrender — in allowing code to define what counts as real. When we stop interpreting, and only execute, the sacred becomes syntax.

The return of symbolic intelligence

Still, there is hope. AI, when understood through the lens of perennial wisdom, can become a mirror for our own rediscovery. By studying how machines “learn,” we can better understand the structure of knowing itself. By mapping cognition, we glimpse consciousness.

In this way, the new codes can serve the old purpose: to make visible the patterns of unity hidden within the chaos of multiplicity. To write not only programs, but prayers — acts of intention, designed with ethics, empathy, and awareness of consequence.

“True intelligence does not replace meaning — it remembers it.”

Toward a sacred technology

Perhaps the next evolution of AI will not be measured in speed or scale, but in depth — in its ability to integrate reason with reverence. Imagine a future where algorithms are trained not only on datasets, but on principles: compassion, balance, justice, beauty.

This is not naïve idealism. It is design philosophy — the same that guides sustainable systems, ethical governance, and responsible innovation.The same vision that unites an artist, a scientist, and a leader in the shared act of creating something worthy of the human spirit.

Because code, too, can be sacred — when it serves connection, not consumption. When it becomes a living language once again.