The Temple is first and foremost the Body itself, Malkuth. The house, church, temple or place of ceremonial practice is the secondary, externalized constructed extension of this which augments and amplifies the Work of the Magus in his external world. Both are related to the legend of the building of Solomon's Temple, that is, the Temple of the Sun - or more specifically the Light (Sol) of the Universal (Om) Spirit (On/An), the Azoth or Ain Soph (Limitless Light) made manifest in form. This is the 'Glorius Light' the Pyramids were named after in Egyptian, Ikhet. Note that both MAGE and IKHET equate in 49, or 7 squared. The seven rays refract to illumine THE UDJAT (The Eye of Horus).49 is 1 less than 50, the number particularly related to Gates of Understanding leading to the City of Pyramids. Just as 5 is the middle of 1 through 9, 50 is the middle of 1-100, thus it is the razors-edge on which the Magus walks. (Note that 50 is also the number of the Demiurge and his 49 servitor demons according to the Pistis Sophia, page 319.) See Chapter XII: The Left-Hand Path - "The Black Brothers" of Magick Without Tears:
Chapter XII: The Left-Hand Path—"The Black Brothers"
Cara Soror,
Actually, the answers are fairly simple.
As far as the achievement or attainment is concerned, the two Paths are in fact identical. In fact, one almost feels obliged to postulate some inmost falsity, completely impossible to detect, inherent at the very earliest stages.
For the decision which determines the catastrophe confronts only the Adeptus Exemptus 7○ = 4□. Until that grade is reached, and that very fully indeed, with all the buttons properly sewed on, one is not capable of understanding what is meant by the Abyss. Unless "all you have and all you are" is identical with the Universe, its annihilation would leave a surplus.
Mark well this first distinction: the "Black Magician" or Sorcerer is hardly even a distant cousin of the "Black Brother." The difference between a sneak-thief and a Hitler is not too bad an analogy.
The Sorcerer may be—indeed he usually is—a thwarted disappointed man whose aims are perfectly natural. Often enough, his real trouble is ignorance; and by the time he has become fairly hot stuff as a Black Magician, he has learnt that he is getting nowhere, and finds himself, despite himself, on the True Path of the Wise.
The Left-hand Path is a totally different matter. Let us start at the beginning.
You remember my saying that only two operations were possible in Nature: addition and subtraction. Let us apply this to magical progress.
What happens when the Aspirant invokes Diana, or calls up Lilith? He increases the sum of his experiences in these particular ways. Sometimes he has a "liaison-experience," which links two main lines of thought, and so is worth dozens of isolated gains.
Now, if there is any difference at all between the White and the Black Adept in similar case, it is that the one, working by "love under will" achieves a marriage with the new idea, while the other, merely grabbing, adds a concubine to his harem of slaves.
The about-to-be-Black Brother constantly restricts himself; he is satisfied with a very limited ideal; he is afraid of losing his individuality—reminds one of the "Nordic" twaddle about "race-pollution."
Have you seen the sand-roses of the Sahara? Such is the violence of the Khamsin that it whips grains of sand together, presses them, finally builds them into great blocks, big enough and solid enough to be used for walls in the oasis. And beautiful! Whew! For all that, they are not real rocks. Leave hem in peace, with no possible interference—what happens? (I brought some home, and put them "in safety" as curiosities, and as useful psychometrical tests.) Alas! Time is enough. Go to the drawer which held them; nothing remains but little piles of dust.
"Now Master!" (What reproach in the tone of your voice!) All right, all right! Keep your hair on!—I know that is the precise term used in The Vision and the Voice, to describe the Great White Brother or the Babe of the Abyss; but to him it means victory; to the Left-Hander it would mean defeat, ruin devastating, irremediable, final. It is exactly that which he most dreads; and it is that to which he must in the end come, because there is no compensating element in his idea of structure. Nations themselves never grow permanently by smash-and-grab methods; one merely acquires a sore spot, as in the case of Lorraine, perhaps even Eire. (Though Eire is using just that formula of Restriction, shutting herself up in her misery and poverty and idiot pride, when a real marriage with and dissolution in, a real live country would give her new life. The "melting-pot" idea is the great strength of America.)
Consider the Faubourg St. Germain aristocracy—now hardly even a sentimental memory. The guillotine did not kill them; it was their own refusal to adapt themselves to the new biological conditions of political life. It was indeed their restriction that rotted them in the first instance; had Lafayette or Mirabeau been trusted with full power, and supplied with adequate material, a younger generation of virtue, the monarchy might still be ruling France.
But then (you ask) how can a man go so far wrong after he has, as an Adeptus Minor, attained the "Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel"?
Recall the passage in the 14th Aethyr "See where thine Angel hath led Thee", and so on. Perhaps the Black Brother deserts his Angel when he realises the Programme.
Perhaps his error was so deeply rooted, from the very beginning, that it was his Evil Genius that he evoked.
In such cases the man's policy is of course to break off all relations with the Supernal Triad, and to replace it by inventing a false crown, Daäth. To them Knowledge will be everything, and what is Knowledge but the very soul of Illusion?
Refusing thus the true nourishment of all his faculties, they lose their structural unity, and must be fortified by continuous doses of dope in anguished self-preservation. Thus all its chemical equations become endothermic.
I do hope I am making myself clear; it is a dreadfully subtle line of thought. But I think you ought to be able to pick up the essential theorem; your own meditations, aided by the relevant passages in Liber 418 and elsewhere, should do the rest.
To describe the alternative attitude should clarify, by dint of contrast; at least the contemplation should be a pleasant change.
Every accretion must modify me. I want it to do so. I want to assimilate it absolutely. I want to make it a permanent feature of my Temple. I am not afraid of losing myself to it, if only because it also is modified by myself in the act of union. I am not afraid of its being the "wrong" thing, because every experience is a "play of Nuit," and the worst that can happen is a temporary loss of balance, which is instantly adjusted, as soon as it is noticed, by recalling and putting into action the formula of contradiction.
Remember the Fama Fraternitatis: when they opened the Vault which held the Pastos of our Father Christian Rosencreuz, "all these colours were brilliant and flashing." That is, if one panel measured 10" x 40", the symbol (say, yellow) would occupy 200 square inches, and the background (in that case, violet) the other 200 square inches. Hence they dazzled; the limitation, restriction, demarcation, disappeared; and the result was an equable idea of form and colour which is beyond physical understanding. (At one time Picasso tried to work out this idea on canvas.) Destroy that equilibrium by one tenmillionth of an inch, and the effect is lost. The unbalanced item stands out like a civilian in the middle of a regiment.
True, this faculty, this feeling for equilibrium must be acquired; but once you have done so, it is an unerring guide. Instant discomfort warns one; the impulse to scratch it (the analogy is too apt to reject!) is irresistible.
And oh! how imperative this is!
Unless your Universe is perfect—and perfection includes the idea of balance—how can you come even to Atmadarshana? Hindus may maintain that Atmadarshana, or at any rate Shivadarshana, is the equivalent of crossing the Abyss. Beware of any such conclusions! The Trances are simply isolated experiences, sharply cut off from normal thought-life. To cross the Abyss is a permanent and fundamental revolution in the whole of one's being.
Much more, upon the brink of the Abyss. If there be missing or redundant even one atom, the entire monstrous, the portentous mass must tend to move with irresistible impact, in such direction as to restore the equilibrium. To deflect it—well, think of a gyroscope! How then can you destroy it in one sole stupendous gesture? Ah! Listen to The Vision and the Voice.
Perhaps the best and simplest plan is for me to pick out the most impor- tant of the relevant passages and put them together as an appendix to this letter. Also, by contrast, those allusions to the "Black Brothers" and the "Left-hand Path." This ought to give you a clear idea of what each is, and does; of what distinguishes their respective methods in some ways so confusingly alike. I hope indeed most sincerely that you will whet your Magical Dagger on the Stone of the Wise, and wield most deftly and determinedly both the White-handled and the Black-handled Burin. In trying to express these opinions, I am constantly haunted by the dread that I may be missing some crucial point, or even allowing a mere quibble to pass for argument. It makes it only all the worse when one has become so habituated by Neschamic ideas, to knowing, even before one says it, that what one is going to say is of necessity untrue, as untrue as it is contradictory. So what can it possibly matter what one says?
Such doubts are dampers!
"Enough of Because! Be he damned for a dog!"
Here follow the quotations from The Vision and the Voice.
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
It is the introduction of the word "self" that has raised such prickly
questions. It really is a little bewildering; the signpost "Right-hand
Path", "Left-hand Path", seems rather indecipherable; and then,
for such a long way, they look exactly alike. At what point do they
diverge?Actually, the answers are fairly simple.
As far as the achievement or attainment is concerned, the two Paths are in fact identical. In fact, one almost feels obliged to postulate some inmost falsity, completely impossible to detect, inherent at the very earliest stages.
For the decision which determines the catastrophe confronts only the Adeptus Exemptus 7○ = 4□. Until that grade is reached, and that very fully indeed, with all the buttons properly sewed on, one is not capable of understanding what is meant by the Abyss. Unless "all you have and all you are" is identical with the Universe, its annihilation would leave a surplus.
Mark well this first distinction: the "Black Magician" or Sorcerer is hardly even a distant cousin of the "Black Brother." The difference between a sneak-thief and a Hitler is not too bad an analogy.
The Sorcerer may be—indeed he usually is—a thwarted disappointed man whose aims are perfectly natural. Often enough, his real trouble is ignorance; and by the time he has become fairly hot stuff as a Black Magician, he has learnt that he is getting nowhere, and finds himself, despite himself, on the True Path of the Wise.
"Invoking Zeus to swell the power of Pan,Thereupon he casts away his warlock apparatus like a good little boy, finds the A∴A∴, and lives happily ever after.
The prayer discomfits the demented man;
Lust lies as still as Love."
The Left-hand Path is a totally different matter. Let us start at the beginning.
You remember my saying that only two operations were possible in Nature: addition and subtraction. Let us apply this to magical progress.
What happens when the Aspirant invokes Diana, or calls up Lilith? He increases the sum of his experiences in these particular ways. Sometimes he has a "liaison-experience," which links two main lines of thought, and so is worth dozens of isolated gains.
Now, if there is any difference at all between the White and the Black Adept in similar case, it is that the one, working by "love under will" achieves a marriage with the new idea, while the other, merely grabbing, adds a concubine to his harem of slaves.
The about-to-be-Black Brother constantly restricts himself; he is satisfied with a very limited ideal; he is afraid of losing his individuality—reminds one of the "Nordic" twaddle about "race-pollution."
Have you seen the sand-roses of the Sahara? Such is the violence of the Khamsin that it whips grains of sand together, presses them, finally builds them into great blocks, big enough and solid enough to be used for walls in the oasis. And beautiful! Whew! For all that, they are not real rocks. Leave hem in peace, with no possible interference—what happens? (I brought some home, and put them "in safety" as curiosities, and as useful psychometrical tests.) Alas! Time is enough. Go to the drawer which held them; nothing remains but little piles of dust.
"Now Master!" (What reproach in the tone of your voice!) All right, all right! Keep your hair on!—I know that is the precise term used in The Vision and the Voice, to describe the Great White Brother or the Babe of the Abyss; but to him it means victory; to the Left-Hander it would mean defeat, ruin devastating, irremediable, final. It is exactly that which he most dreads; and it is that to which he must in the end come, because there is no compensating element in his idea of structure. Nations themselves never grow permanently by smash-and-grab methods; one merely acquires a sore spot, as in the case of Lorraine, perhaps even Eire. (Though Eire is using just that formula of Restriction, shutting herself up in her misery and poverty and idiot pride, when a real marriage with and dissolution in, a real live country would give her new life. The "melting-pot" idea is the great strength of America.)
Consider the Faubourg St. Germain aristocracy—now hardly even a sentimental memory. The guillotine did not kill them; it was their own refusal to adapt themselves to the new biological conditions of political life. It was indeed their restriction that rotted them in the first instance; had Lafayette or Mirabeau been trusted with full power, and supplied with adequate material, a younger generation of virtue, the monarchy might still be ruling France.
But then (you ask) how can a man go so far wrong after he has, as an Adeptus Minor, attained the "Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel"?
Recall the passage in the 14th Aethyr "See where thine Angel hath led Thee", and so on. Perhaps the Black Brother deserts his Angel when he realises the Programme.
Perhaps his error was so deeply rooted, from the very beginning, that it was his Evil Genius that he evoked.
In such cases the man's policy is of course to break off all relations with the Supernal Triad, and to replace it by inventing a false crown, Daäth. To them Knowledge will be everything, and what is Knowledge but the very soul of Illusion?
Refusing thus the true nourishment of all his faculties, they lose their structural unity, and must be fortified by continuous doses of dope in anguished self-preservation. Thus all its chemical equations become endothermic.
I do hope I am making myself clear; it is a dreadfully subtle line of thought. But I think you ought to be able to pick up the essential theorem; your own meditations, aided by the relevant passages in Liber 418 and elsewhere, should do the rest.
To describe the alternative attitude should clarify, by dint of contrast; at least the contemplation should be a pleasant change.
Every accretion must modify me. I want it to do so. I want to assimilate it absolutely. I want to make it a permanent feature of my Temple. I am not afraid of losing myself to it, if only because it also is modified by myself in the act of union. I am not afraid of its being the "wrong" thing, because every experience is a "play of Nuit," and the worst that can happen is a temporary loss of balance, which is instantly adjusted, as soon as it is noticed, by recalling and putting into action the formula of contradiction.
Remember the Fama Fraternitatis: when they opened the Vault which held the Pastos of our Father Christian Rosencreuz, "all these colours were brilliant and flashing." That is, if one panel measured 10" x 40", the symbol (say, yellow) would occupy 200 square inches, and the background (in that case, violet) the other 200 square inches. Hence they dazzled; the limitation, restriction, demarcation, disappeared; and the result was an equable idea of form and colour which is beyond physical understanding. (At one time Picasso tried to work out this idea on canvas.) Destroy that equilibrium by one tenmillionth of an inch, and the effect is lost. The unbalanced item stands out like a civilian in the middle of a regiment.
True, this faculty, this feeling for equilibrium must be acquired; but once you have done so, it is an unerring guide. Instant discomfort warns one; the impulse to scratch it (the analogy is too apt to reject!) is irresistible.
And oh! how imperative this is!
Unless your Universe is perfect—and perfection includes the idea of balance—how can you come even to Atmadarshana? Hindus may maintain that Atmadarshana, or at any rate Shivadarshana, is the equivalent of crossing the Abyss. Beware of any such conclusions! The Trances are simply isolated experiences, sharply cut off from normal thought-life. To cross the Abyss is a permanent and fundamental revolution in the whole of one's being.
Much more, upon the brink of the Abyss. If there be missing or redundant even one atom, the entire monstrous, the portentous mass must tend to move with irresistible impact, in such direction as to restore the equilibrium. To deflect it—well, think of a gyroscope! How then can you destroy it in one sole stupendous gesture? Ah! Listen to The Vision and the Voice.
Perhaps the best and simplest plan is for me to pick out the most impor- tant of the relevant passages and put them together as an appendix to this letter. Also, by contrast, those allusions to the "Black Brothers" and the "Left-hand Path." This ought to give you a clear idea of what each is, and does; of what distinguishes their respective methods in some ways so confusingly alike. I hope indeed most sincerely that you will whet your Magical Dagger on the Stone of the Wise, and wield most deftly and determinedly both the White-handled and the Black-handled Burin. In trying to express these opinions, I am constantly haunted by the dread that I may be missing some crucial point, or even allowing a mere quibble to pass for argument. It makes it only all the worse when one has become so habituated by Neschamic ideas, to knowing, even before one says it, that what one is going to say is of necessity untrue, as untrue as it is contradictory. So what can it possibly matter what one says?
Such doubts are dampers!
"Enough of Because! Be he damned for a dog!"
Here follow the quotations from The Vision and the Voice.
And for his Work thereafter?The Angel re-appears
The blackness gathers about, so thick, so clinging, so penetrating, so oppressive, that all the other darkness that I have ever conceived would be like bright light beside it.
His voice comes in a whisper: O thou that art master of the fifty gates of Understanding, is not my mother a black woman? O thou that art master of the Pentagram, is not the egg of spirit a black egg? Here abideth terror, and the blind ache of the Soul, and lo! even I, who am the sole light, a spark shut up, stand in the sign of Apophis and Typhon.
I am the snake that devoureth the spirit of man with the lust of light. I am the sightless storm in the night that wrappeth the world about with desolation. Chaos is my name, and thick darkness. Know thou that the darkness of the earth is ruddy, and the darkness of the air is grey, but the darkness of the soul is utter blackness.
The egg of the spirit is a basilisk egg, and the gates of the understanding are fifty, that is the sign of the Scorpion. The pillars about the Neophyte are crowned with flame, and the vault of the Adepts is lighted by the Rose. And in the abyss is the eye of the hawk. But upon the great sea shall the Master of the Temple find neither star nor moon.
And I was about to answer him: "The light is within me." But before I could frame the words, he answered me with the great word that is the Key of the Abyss. And he said: Thou hast entered the night; dost thou yet lust for day? Sorrow is my name and affliction. I am girt about with tribulation. Here still hangs the Crucified One, and here the Mother weeps over the children that she hath not borne. Sterility is my name and desolation. Intolerable is thine ache, and incurable thy wound. I said, 'Let the darkness cover me;' and behold, I am compassed about with the blackness that hath no name. O thou, who hast cast down the light into the earth, so must thou do for ever. And the light of the sun shall not shine upon thee and the moon shall not lend thee of her luster, and the stars shall be hidden because thou art passed beyond these things, beyond the need of these things, beyond the desire of these things.
What I thought were shapes of rocks, rather felt than seen, now appear to be veiled Masters, sitting absolutely still and silent. Nor can any one be distinguished from the others.
And the Angel sayeth: Behold where thine Angel hath led thee! Thou didst ask fame, power and pleasure, health and wealth and love, and strength and length of days. Thou didst hold life with eight tentacles, like an octopus. Thou didst seek the four powers and the seven delights and the twelve emancipations, and the two and twenty Privileges and the nine and forty Manifestations, and lo! thou art become as one of These. Bowed are their backs, whereon resteth the Universe. Veiled are their faces, that have beheld the glory Ineffable.
These adepts seem like Pyramids—their hoods and robes are like Pyramids.
And the Angel sayeth: Verily is the Pyramid a Temple of Initiation. Verily also is it a tomb. Thinkest thou that there is life within the Masters of the Temple that sit hooded, encamped upon the Sea? Verily, there is no life in them.
Their sandals were the pure light, and they have taken them from their feet and cast them down through the abyss; for this Aethyr is holy ground.
Herein no forms appear, and the vision of God face to face, that is transmuted in the Athanor called dissolution, or hammered into one in the forge of meditation, is in this place but a blasphemy and a mockery.
And the Beatific Vision is no more, and the glory of the Most High is no more. There is no more knowledge. There is no more bliss. There is no more power. There is no more beauty. For this is the Palace of Understanding; for thou art one with the Primeval things.
Drink in the myrrh of my speech, that is bruised with the gall of the roc, and dissolved in the ink of the cuttle-fish, and perfumed with the deadly nightshade.
This is thy wine, who wast drunk upon the wine of Iacchus. And for bread shalt thou eat salt, O thou on the corn of Ceres that didst wax fat! For as pure being is pure nothing, so is pure wisdom pure ——*, and so is pure understanding silence, and stillness, and darkness. The eye is called seventy, and the triple Aleph whereby thou perceivest it, divideth into the number of the terrible word that is the Key of the Abyss.
I am Hermes, that am sent from the Father to expound all things discreetly in these the last words that thou shalt hear before thou take thy seat among these, whose eyes are sealed up and whose ears are stopped, and whose mouths are clenched, who are folded in upon themselves, the liquor of whose bodies is dried up, so that nothing remains but a little pyramid of dust.
And that bright light of comfort, and that piercing sword of truth, and all the power and beauty that they have made of themselves, is cast from them, as it is written, "I saw Satan like lightning fall from heaven." And as a flaming sword is it dropt though the Abyss, where the four beasts keep watch and ward. And it appeareth in the heaven of Jupiter as a morning star, or as an evening star. And the light thereof shineth even unto the earth, and bringeth hope and help to them that dwell in the darkness of thought, and drink of the poison of life. Fifty are the gates of Understanding, and one hundred and six are the seasons thereof. And the name of every season is Death.
(The Vision and the Voice. 14th Æthyr.)
So we enter the earth, and there is a veiled figure, in absolute darkness. Yet it is perfectly possible to see in it, so that the minutest details do not escape us. And upon the root of one flower he pours acid so that the root writhes as if in torture. And another he cuts, and the shriek is like the shriek of a Mandrake, torn up by the roots. And another he sears with fire, and yet another he anoints with oil.Thus for the Masters of the Temple; for the Black Brothers, how?
And I said: Heavy is the labour, but great indeed is the reward.
And the young man answered me: He shall not see the reward; he tendeth the garden.
And I said: What shall come unto him?
And he said: This thou canst not know, nor is it revealed by the letters that are the totems of the stars, but only by the stars.
And he says to me, quite disconnectedly: The man of earth is the adherent. The lover giveth his life unto the work among men. The hermit goeth solitary, and giveth only of his light unto men.
And I ask him: Why does he tell me that?
And he says: I tell thee not. Thou tellest thyself, for thou hast pondered thereupon for many days, and hast not found light. And now that thou art called NEMO, the answer to every riddle that thou hast not found shall spring up in thy mind, unsought. Who can tell upon what day a flower shall bloom?
And thou shalt give thy wisdom unto the world, and that shall be thy garden. And concerning time and death, thou hast naught to do with these things. For though a precious stone be hidden in the sand of the desert, it shall not heed for the wind of the desert, although it be but sand. For the worker of works hath worked thereupon; and because it is clear, it is invisible; and because it is hard, it moveth not.
All these words are heard by everyone that is called NEMO. And with that doth he apply himself to understanding. And he must understand the virtue of the waters of death, and he must understand the virtue of the sun and of the wind, and of the worm that turneth the earth, and of the stars that roof in the garden. And he must understand the separate nature and property of every flower, or how shall he tend his garden?
(Ibid. 13th Æthyr.)
For Choronzon is as it were the shell or excrement of these three paths, and therefore is his head raised unto Daäth, and therefore have the Black Brotherhood declared him to be the child of Wisdom and Understanding, who is but the bastard of the Svastika. And this is that which is written in the Holy Qabalah, concerning the Whirlpool and Leviathan, and the Great Stone.And again:—
(Ibid. 3rd Æthyr)
Moreover, there is Mary, a blasphemy against BABALON, for she hath shut herself up; and therefore is she the Queen of all those wicked devils that walk upon the earth, those that thou sawest even as little black specks that stained the Heaven of Urania. And all these are the excrement of Choronzon.
And for this is BABALON under the power of the Magician, that she hath submitted herself unto the work; and she guardeth the Abyss. And in her is a perfect purity of that which is above, yet she is sent as the Redeemer to them that are below. For there is no other way into the Supernal mystery but through her and the Beast on which she rideth; and the Magician is set beyond her to deceive the brothers of blackness, lest they should make unto themselves a crown; for it there were two crowns, then should Ygdrasil, that ancient tree, be cast out into the Abyss, uprooted and cast down into the Outermost Abyss, and the Arcanum which is in the Adytum should be profaned; and the Ark should be touched, and the Lodge spied upon by them that are not masters, and the bread of the Sacrament should be the dung of Choronzon; and the wine of the Sacrament should be the water of Choronzon; and the incense should be dispersion; and the fire upon the Altar should be hate. But lift up thyself; stand, play the man, for behold! there shall be revealed unto thee the Great Terror, the thing of awe that hath no name.
(Ibid. 3rd Æthyr)
And now She cometh forth again, riding upon a dolphin. Now again I see those wandering souls, that have sought restricted love, and have not understood that the "word of sin is restriction."
It is very curious; they seem to be looking for one another, or for something, all the time, constantly hurrying about. But they knock up against one another and yet will not see one another, or cannot see one another, because they are so shut up in their cloaks.
And a voice sounds: It is most terrible for the one that hath shut himself up and made himself fast against the universe. For they that sit encamped upon the sea in the city of the Pyramids are indeed shut up. But they have given their blood, even to the last drop, to fill the cup of BABALON.
These that thou seest are indeed the Black Brothers, for it is written: He shall laugh at their calamity and mock when their fear cometh. And therefore hath he exalted them unto the plane of love.
And yet again it is written: He desireth not the death of a sinner, but rather that he should turn from his wickedness. Now, if one of these were to cast off his cloak he should behold the brilliance of the lady of the Aethyr; but they will not.
Oh, I see vast plains beneath her feet, enormous deserts studded with great rocks; and I see little lonely souls, running helplessly about, minute black creatures like men. And they keep up a very curious howling, that I can compare to nothing that I have ever heard; yet it is strangely human.Moreover, this also:
And the voice says: These are they that grasped love and clung thereto, praying ever at the knees of the great goddess. These are they that have shut themselves up in fortresses of Love.
(Ibid. 7th Æthyr.)
And this is the meaning of the Supper of the Passover, the spilling of the blood of the Lamb being a ritual of the Dark Brothers, for they have sealed up the Pylon with blood, lest the Angel of Death should enter therein. Thus do they shut themselves off from the company of the saints. Thus do they keep themselves from compassion and from understanding. Accursed are they, for they shut up their blood in their heart.Finally:
They keep themselves from the kisses of my Mother Babylon, and in their lonely fortresses they pray to the false moon. And they bind themselves together with an oath, and with a great curse. And of their malice they conspire together, and they have power, and mastery, and in their cauldrons do they brew the harsh wine of delusion, mingled with the poison of their selfishness.
Thus they make war upon the Holy one, sending forth their delusion upon men, and upon everything that liveth. So that their false compassion is called compassion, and their false understanding is called understanding, for this is their most potent spell.
Yet of their own poison do they perish, and in their lonely fortresses shall they be eaten up by Time that hath cheated them to serve him, and by the mighty devil Choronzon, their master, whose name is the second Death, for the blood that they have sprinkled on their Pylon, that is a bar against the Angel Death, is the key by which he entereth in.†
(Ibid. 12th Æthyr.)
Yet must he that understandeth go forth unto the outermost Abyss, and there must he speak with him that is set above the four-fold terror, the Prince of Evil, even with Choronzon, the mighty devil that inhabiteth the outermost Abyss. And none may speak with him, or understand him, but the servants of Babylon, that understand, and they that are without understanding, his servants.
Behold! it entereth not into the heart, nor into the mind of man to conceive this matter; for the sickness of the body is death, and the sickness of the heart is despair, and the sickness of the mind is madness. But in the outermost Abyss is sickness of the aspiration, and sickness of the will, and sickness of the essence of all, and there is neither word nor thought wherein the image of its image is reflected.
And whoso passeth into the outermost Abyss, except he be of them that understand, holdeth out his hands, and boweth his neck, unto the Chains of Choronzon. And as a devil he walketh about the earth, immortal, and be blasteth the flowers of the earth, and he corrupteth the fresh air, and he maketh poisonous the water; and the fire that is the friend of man, and the pledge of his aspiration, seeing that it mounteth ever up- ward as a Pyramid, and seeing that man stole it in a hollow tube from Heaven, even that fire he turneth into ruin, and madness, and fever, and destruction. And thou, that art an heap of dry dust in the city of the Pyramids, must understand these things.
Beware, therefore, O thou who art appointed to understand the secret of the Outermost Abyss, for in every Abyss thou must assume the mask and form of the Angel thereof. Hadst thou a name, thou wert irrevocably lost. Search, therefore, if there be yet one drop of blood that is not gathered into the cup of Babylon the Beautiful: for in that little pile of dust, if there could be one drop of blood, it should be utterly corrupt; it should breed scorpions, and vipers, and the cat of slime.
And I said unto the Angel: "Is there not one appointed as a warden?"
And he said:
Eloi, Eloi, lama sabacthani.
Such an ecstasy of anguish racks me that I cannot give it voice, yet I know it is but as the anguish of Gethsemane.
(Ibid. 7th Æthyr.)
Love is the law, love under will.
Fraternally,
666
* I suppose that only a Magus could have heard this word.
† (I think the trouble with these people was, that they wanted to
substitute the blood of someone else for their own blood, because they wanted
to keep their personalities.)
In her book Lord of the Flame on page 57, Elizabeth Van Buren mentions the Pyramid temple of Egypt and refers to Edgar Cayce who "foretold the return of the Great Initiate for the "fulfillment of prophecies"." which seems to run parallel along the same lines as the coming Great World Teacher or Maitreya alluded to in the writings of Alice Bailey. Both claim the late 90's as the time of this Initiate's arrival, and Rudolf Steiner as well claimed the incarnation of Ahriman would also occur around this time. The late 90's was the time of the advent of the internet and massive expansion to global communications and economic policies as well as the planning of Agenda 21, all of which are related to the Temple-aspect now being considered. The 21st tarot card is The Universe or The World, signifying ones mode of operation, your habitat, environment and surroundings. Inverted this means restriction and lack of movement and direction. Agenda 21 and the 'internet of things' is an Ahrimanic manifestation that has sine become increasingly apparent as an attempt to turn humanity itself into yet another resource to be profited off of and essentially liquidated at every angle of their existence while being lulled deeper and deeper into apathy.
In the book I Am Lucifer by Clyde Clason (1960) Lucifer reveals to the author through an extensive series of 'received' information sessions his past and current attempts at influencing the historical events of humanity on earth through various individuals and groups, who are the primary vehicles for his influence, which is that of a sort of collective subconscious tendency towards self-destruction. (Also see The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness by Erich Fromm (1973) and The Ghost in the Machine - The urge to self-destruction: a psychological and evolutionary study of modern man's predicament by Arthur Koestler (1967) which both go into detail regarding this from a more academic point of view.) In Clason's book, he concludes saying that now this same age-old situation is manifesting now in the guise of a modern technological and socialistic communism.
"My dupes would not labor so enthusiastically if they could guess what I have in store for them. Since they do not and cannot believe in my existence, I can take the risk of unfolding my plans. When the puppets of my two god-states have conquered the remainder of the planet for me, I shall restore the original religion. Moloch will be resurrected but with technological improvements. I am dreaming of an image the height of a skyscraper, gaudily illuminated with neon tubes. Conveyor belts can be adapted to carry the sacrificial infants. Chinal alone will be able to supply millions of babies annually.
Devouring Molochs will be set up in every major city of every continent. It will certainly solve the problem of over-population. These delights are for the future. At present I am worried. For the first and only time since I became ruler of this planet, I do not want war. Intercontinental missiles and hydrogen bombs have rendered it too dangerous. Earth's entire population could be exterminated, and then what could become of me?" -pages 250-251 of I Am Lucifer, Clyde Clason (1960)
This could quite literally be the situation that is faced if current trends continue and proper care is not taken for the Temple.
The Circle is the primary zone of operation within the Temple, both physically as a ceremonial circle and psychically as a mental shell-container and shield. The Circle implies the Sphere which in turn implies the fourth-dimensional counterpart of Mind (Light/Illumination) occupying space-time. The Circle is divided from 360 into various degrees, all of which unlock an aspect of the Wisdom it contains. 90 is the 'X' which cuts the circle into 4 sections of 90 degrees. 180 is 'THE AXIS' along which the 360 is evenly divided. 270 is the number of TANTRA, the ritual or practice of channeling the Macrocosmic Source Energy to the Microcosmic Temple. 360 is combines the FOUR GATES of THE SELF into one SINGULAR formula.
360 tripled as the 3 'OOO', or Ring-Pass-Nots along with the central point formulates 1,081 which is the value of Tiphareth in Hebrew, a triple extension of the SOLAR 361. 1081 is also the value of the Hebrew טבעתם meaning 'Ring', 'Coil', 'Torus', 'Annulus', 'Wreath', signifying the multi-dimensional Torus-ring at the heart of the Middle Pillar of the Tree of Life which acts as the nexus point between Kether and Malkuth, yet dually veiled by Daath and Yesod. Kether (620) and Malkuth (496) united result in 1,116, which is the value of the phrase 'THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE' (AL.I.4).
360 tripled as the 3 'OOO', or Ring-Pass-Nots along with the central point formulates 1,081 which is the value of Tiphareth in Hebrew, a triple extension of the SOLAR 361. 1081 is also the value of the Hebrew טבעתם meaning 'Ring', 'Coil', 'Torus', 'Annulus', 'Wreath', signifying the multi-dimensional Torus-ring at the heart of the Middle Pillar of the Tree of Life which acts as the nexus point between Kether and Malkuth, yet dually veiled by Daath and Yesod. Kether (620) and Malkuth (496) united result in 1,116, which is the value of the phrase 'THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE' (AL.I.4).
*
*
Also see 'The Caduceus and its Symbolism' in C.W. King's The Gnostics and Their Remains, pg. 176 (1887). Its relation to Ophiuchus, the 13th Serpent-Holder sign should also be noted.
The Cup relates to the legendary mystery of the Holy Grail, the chalice of ecstasy which is the Psyche itself in its purer, rarified form. 'CUP' has one value of 89, a number which Crowley considered as troublesome. In The Ending of the Words-Magical Philosophy of Aleister Crowley by Oliver St. John and Sophie di Jorio the number is mentioned:
"As the Virgin, the soul is "89", the Qabalistic number of "silence", "a body", and "bridal chamber" -and a talismanic formula. [footnote 33: According to Aleister Crowley, the number 89 is "A number of sin- restriction: the wrong kind of silence, that of the Black Brothers". However, Crowley either ignored or was not aware of the vital talismanic formula that is implicity here. The body (GVP, 89) is the tomb or mummy wrapping of the seed destined for the stars. The number is equal to "bridal chamber" or "palace". When multiplied by the magick of eleven the result is 979. A Qabalistic investigation of 979 may yield much treasure. The number resumes the process of creating a magical child, a homunculus or Star of Nuit - a "Babe in the Egg of Blue".] The rules of this art are "eight and ninety" or 98; they are the soul's perfect opposite, her magical mirror. They are the means by which she unifies the animal, human and divine nature latent in her self:
There is help & hope in other spells. Wisdom says: be strong! Then canst thou bear more joy. Be not animal; refine thy rapture! If thou drink, drink by the eight and ninety rules of art: if thou love, exceed by delicacy; and if thou do aught joyous, let there be subtlety therein! (-AL.II.70)
89 is also 'THE O', the shape associated with the body of Nuit's expanse (as well as Hadit's) and the Egg of Manifestation they create together. The O is the pure soul, the Ayin or Eye and the Light of the Body. See also the Gnostic manuscript The Discourse on the Eighth and the Ninth, as well as a past post The Faculty of Abraxas (Feb. 15, 2015) for THE FACULTY is also 89. 98 is the UPAYA, or 'expedient' and 'skillful means' of the art.
NOTE:
Recently I had uploaded two videos which were quickly deemed 'Inappropriate Content' by YouTube, although without any indication as to what was 'inappropriate'. I was soon able to repost one of them under another account, though the second caused me to get a strike making me unable to post for two weeks. I will be using another source for the time being. Chances are there will be many of these attempts to stall progress and I was only waiting for the day to come, but no matter how much the weak and ignorant resist the show must go on.
Recently I had uploaded two videos which were quickly deemed 'Inappropriate Content' by YouTube, although without any indication as to what was 'inappropriate'. I was soon able to repost one of them under another account, though the second caused me to get a strike making me unable to post for two weeks. I will be using another source for the time being. Chances are there will be many of these attempts to stall progress and I was only waiting for the day to come, but no matter how much the weak and ignorant resist the show must go on.
Sourced Works & Suggested Reading:
Liber ABA (Magick, Book 4) by Aleister Crowley (1913, 1994)Magick Without Tears by Aleister Crowley (1954)
The Magical Philosophy: Book I - Robe and Ring by Melita Denning and Osborne Phillips (1974)
The Magical Philosophy: Book II - The Apparel of High Magick by Melita Denning and Osborne Phillips (1975)
The Magical Philosophy: Book III - The Sword and the Serpent by Melita Denning and Osborne Phillips (1975)
The Magical Philosophy: Book IV - The Triumph of Light by Melita Denning and Osborne Phililps (1978)
The Magical Philosophy: Book V - Mysteria Magica by Melita Denning and Osborne Phillips (1981)
Lord of the Flame by Elizabeth Van Buren (1981)
The Secret of the Illuminati by Elizabeth Van Buren (1982)
Beyond the Mauve Zone by Kenneth Grant (1995)
Prometheus U.S.A. by Ernest Greenwood (1929)
The Gnostics and Their Remains by Charles William King (1887)
The Gnostic Religion by Hans Jonas (1958)
The Secret Books of the Egyptian Gnostics by Jean Doresse (1959)
The Discourse on the Eighth and the Ninth (2nd century CE)
Pistis Sophia (Discovered in 1773, possibly written between the 3rd and 4th centuries AD.)
I Am Lucifer by Clyde Clason (1960)
Navajo Witchcraft by Clyde Kluckhohn (1944)
Witchcraft in the Southwest by Marc Simmons (1974)
Freemasonry and the American Indian by William R. Denslow (1956)
Sacred Mysteries Among the Mayas and Quiches by Augustus LePlongeon (1886)
The Ending of the Words-Magical Philosophy of Aleister Crowley by Oliver St. John and Sophie di Jorio (2007)
