Symbolic act of Christ
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Foolster,
My brother, I wish I had the eloquence to voice everything that's in my heart on this subject. There is simply too much all at once. I'll try to stick to your own questions.
You asked whether or not your ideas changed anyone's view of Christianity. Opinions run strong here, and people are acquainted with Christianity in vastly varying degrees with vastly different experiences. I think, however, that you'll find that more here have similar thoughts about the life/story of Jesus than you first seemed to expect.
I am wondering, however, where your own thoughts tend to go on the question of Christianity and the "current establishment." Care to expand?
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"They would tie a rope around the High Priests waist because he stood the chance of dying when he entered the Holy of Holies"
yes, if the priest was not 100% pure the divine would strike him down or kill him in some manner, hence the rope to drag his corpse out if anything goes wrong
such and funny subject, my roommate next room over too me has a model of the temple and there is the shape of the cross in arial view, although its weird cause he attends bible school full time.
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"That is, whatever the potential (and actuality!) of these symbols and ideas in the beginning, it seems to me that their worship now, today, 2,000 years later is black magick. "
Having grown up in a strict Fundamanetalist family, I can attest to this fact. Christianity today has progressed far from the "love thy neighbor" ideal espoused by Jesus and his disciples. The majority of Christians are bound to their "faith" by fear and convention.
"Does this change how any of you see Xianity? You see, I believe to destroy Xianity we must do so from the inside and that will take a radical new interpretation that chops at the knees of the current establishment, paving the way for something more suitable."
I'm not sure any "radical new interpretation" will be sufficient to destroy Christianity. Most Christians, when approached with an intitiated interpretation of the Gospel, respond with the same fear and convention that drove them to a literal interpretation in the first place.
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Sorry to interrupt this conversation, but as I'm still muddled in terms of 2 formula (ALIM and ALHIM) and this seemed like an opportunity to ask:
If a magician wasn't happy with Christianity and wanted to change it, they could:
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Join it and try to work within the group, through the proper channels, to pull out parts of christianity that the magician wants to emphasize to the masses, and make other, not so wanted parts, recede into the background
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"to destroy Xianity we must do so from the inside and that will take a radical new interpretation that chops at the knees of the current establishment, paving the way for something more suitable."
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Attack it from the outside and attempt to surpress, destroy, or make a non-issue
So the question I have is
Is 1. an example of the ALIM formula and 2 and 3 are examples of the ALHIM formula?
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"1. Join it and try to work within the group, through the proper channels, to pull out parts of christianity that the magician wants to emphasize to the masses, and make other, not so wanted parts, recede into the background"
Sometimes I wonder... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joel_Osteen
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@Tinman said
"Sorry to interrupt this conversation, but as I'm still muddled in terms of 2 formula (ALIM and ALHIM) and this seemed like an opportunity to ask:
If a magician wasn't happy with Christianity and wanted to change it, they could:
- Join it and try to work within the group, through the proper channels, to pull out parts of christianity that the magician wants to emphasize to the masses, and make other, not so wanted parts, recede into the background"
Same plane. ALYM.
"2. "to destroy Xianity we must do so from the inside and that will take a radical new interpretation that chops at the knees of the current establishment, paving the way for something more suitable.""
Within the original context infers ALYM; but if something is really brought in from outside the context (rather than just rearranging the pieces) then ALHYM.
"3. Attack it from the outside and attempt to surpress, destroy, or make a non-issue"
Same plane. ALYM.
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I think it's obvious you can't pour new wine into old wineskin so merely rearranging Christian concepts would obviously not have the same effect or
power that a holy spirit forged venture would guarantee.I don't see thelema proper catching on, ever. It's too "dungeons and dragons" for the typical laymen. Also It comes across as anti-thetical to the message or major religions so it only appeals to the few who can dig deep and see the golden path Liber AL is advocating.
I was speaking of creating something more tangential and dresses itself in the guise of Islam, Judaism and xianity, while being more explicit in the precepts laid out in AL, armed with the fire of gnosis.
An example of how we could utilize xian symbols with AL style kickassery.
"From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty."
When I read revelation it's hard not to see Christ as Crowned and Conquering. Also revelation says there is no day or night in the new jerusalem because the light of Christ burns 24/7. A transition to the continuity of consciousness theme where the aspirant realizes no death, no sunset, the sun is always "on".
Liber AL states that the servants are few and secret. Cool, but if we want change on a massive scale it will have to be packaged in a way that won't arouse revulsion in the average psyche, but also speaks to the royal nature of ones higher self which is why I mentioned the parousia of Christ. Teaching that his return was invisible in the form of the Holy Spirit or even spearheading a new dispensation armed with new symbols and interpretstions coupled with the Fire of Heru..it could be interesting.
Too much to go into but I had a transfiguring experience utilizing lurianic style mysticism. Afterword I found out I could call down the Spirit/raise their kundalini and it would descend on the people in the room. People saw this visually as lights and heard a humming too which scared them. I went to a conservative Xian college and in my naivety thought it was a positive thing but I soon had kids on campus saying I was satanic because they had never tasted the fire, shit, there is an inherent taboo against having mystical experiences in orthodoxy.Obviously I became a hermit and continued my studies in private which is when I came across Crowley. Didn't scare me off, I'd been having dreams of interacting with a mystical hawk godform for years so it felt relieving.
I see Liber AL as being the seed for a new spiritual dispensation and know we can take these magickal weapons and apply them in many ways. As the Spirit said to me in a dream one night, "Destroy through the Creative!"
Let's get the show on the road, shit, set up a shell LLC and publish religious books under pseudonyms that attack the world religions and sow doubt and discord. I think there is too much preaching to the choir in thelema and I'm basically advocating that we enter the world armed (and completely anonymous) with what we know and use it to insinuate itself into all corners of culture. TOOL does this with their music, Alan Moore does it with his graphic novels. As rumi said, "Enough talk, I want BURNING!"
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@Foolster said
"I don't see thelema proper catching on, ever. It's too "dungeons and dragons" for the typical laymen. Also It comes across as anti-thetical to the message or major religions so it only appeals to the few who can dig deep and see the golden path Liber AL is advocating."
It's only D&D because of some elements of its contemporary culture. That, of course, would have to change, i.e., a different element of Thelemic culture (currently more quiet) needs to be its mainstream face.
And it is the very fact that it is antithetical to the message of historic major religions is the whole point. It represents a quantum leap in social perspective. That quantum leap is the important issue in the long run, not its religious forms.
I do think, though, that the mainstreaming of Thelema into human society over the next few centuries will not necessarily include any mention of either Aleister Crowley or The Book of the Law. It is the underlying ideas that are inseminating mass consciousness. For decades, they've been emerging with increasing prominence, and are active elements of the cultural wars currently occurring (both the quiet ones and the noisy ones).
"I was speaking of creating something more tangential and dresses itself in the guise of Islam, Judaism and xianity, while being more explicit in the precepts laid out in AL, armed with the fire of gnosis."
I have said for decades that if Christianity caught on to the archetypal change and placed the emphasis primarily on the Christ Child as the path of new promise, they could buy an extra few centuries for themselves as the dominant paradigm.
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I would suggest reading some OSHO. OSHO did this wonderful thing, which maybe we all do to some extent, but which he did very deliberately and with much success. He was able to discuss all faiths from within their own systems. So a person hearing OSHO talk about Christ, would hear OSHO talking about Christ, about God, about all the things that are comfortable to her or him. The entire time OSHO would be explaining his own system, but he'd be doing it so slyly under the context of the system he was talking about that he could reach anyone, regardless of religous-bias.
Not that the hack and slash method isn't a valuable tool - I'm just saying there are other tools that you may want to consider for your toolkit.
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Good stuff. Fwiw I'm throwing up some ideas to get feedback. I like feedback.
Jim, you consider that neither crowley or AL may play a visible part in the propogation of the ideals set forth in AL, so then with this dispensation of a quantumn shift in perspective wouldn't it them perhaps be true that we could see this type of consciousness transforming the world religions? After all, Lubavitcher Hasidism is a far cry from the Judaism of 3k years ago. So may it be in another 1k when the notion of circle and point, true will and expansion of consciousness on a more massive sCale begin reinterpreting new forms aided by the influx of this new dispensation. Not a mere rearranging but a transmutation from the lead it is into Gold.
Interesting Convo!
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@Foolster said
"Jim, you consider that neither crowley or AL may play a visible part in the propogation of the ideals set forth in AL, so then with this dispensation of a quantumn shift in perspective wouldn't it them perhaps be true that we could see this type of consciousness transforming the world religions?"
Possibly. Liber L., after all, makes room for the worship of more or less any god one wishes but in the context that what we mean by Horus is behind (or at the center) of it all.
Nonetheless, and while I believe extant religions could extend their lifespan with the right moves, and while I'm sure they'll at least survive in pockets, I think the eventual path must be their near-abolishment. Ultimately, I think the biggest thiong wrong with Christianity is the rotting and pollution of the body, not its spirit - and I don't see that troxicity being removable on the astral (nonmaterial) levels by any means at all. We just need to cremate it eventually.
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It's really easy to get the impression of Christianity being of a rather fixed form for a very long time. But it has been going through pretty big transformations from the very beginning, which is why I'd agree with Jim and say that another tweaking is only going to buy it so much time.
In the Gospels (including a very interesting parallel passage in the Gospel of Thomas) it's an ongoing background debate about Jesus as prophet, angel, reincarnated prophet, God, son of God, wise man, etc. (Thomas' didn't even try to define him, when asked... which is priceless!). And the popular motif evolved over time. You have early representations of the young Christ as a shepherd boy, early Roman and Byzantine depictions of him as a powerful Magician, a powerful solar God in the middle ages, a suffering man on the cross in Northern European renaissance art, a humanist, compassionate teacher in some 19th century protestant sects, the holy fool who can't catch a break because the rest of us are such bast***s in everything from Dostoevsky's "The Idiot" to "Cool Hand Look",
and - dare I say it - an zen Buddhist techno-pagan occultist mashup in "The Matrix" and "the Da Vinci Code" thanks to the Nag Hammadi re-discovery.We can debate about what the central formulas are (or should be), but one thing is clear to me: the self-sacrificing redeemer formula is dead. You can almost hear the audience groan every time that one shows up in a movie.
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I guess I'm chomping at the bit. Every religion needs a mythos to serve as a vehicle for transmittance and I just do not see thelema operating as the next universal mythos, that's why I was scheming regarding the hijacking, if you will, of a current vehicle so we don't have to reinvent the wheel etc.
Mormonism added onto xianity and teaches the concepts of eternal evolution to godhood and employs some other interesting mystical concepts. Now they are 15 million strong and have some clout, be it financial or cultural.
What is the next mythos. Does Thelema expect a prophet/s to follow after crowley? The only mythos I can see developing is a space oriented one where the Inter-dimensional beings who pretend to be aliens would make open contact, THAT would disrupt the 3 abrahamic religions. And if that doesn't happen I'm open to seeing the Vatican, Mecca and Jerusalem in ashes.
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@Foolster said
"Mormonism added onto xianity and teaches the concepts of eternal evolution to godhood and employs some other interesting mystical concepts. Now they are 15 million strong and have some clout, be it financial or cultural. "
Yeah, but they were started by a prophet who claimed some angel came and gave him a book. What do we have to compete with that?
"What is the next mythos."
What's wrong with the one we have? (It need not look like old fashioned mytgh-making. For example, it need not have a story element.) You don't have to have aliens to have an archetypal framework based on a vision of space.
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@Foolster said
"What is the next mythos. Does Thelema expect a prophet/s to follow after crowley?"
There is some talk of a child, yes.
And as far as the development of Thelema is concerned: no major religion became wide-scale overnight. It is a long and tedious process, and often involves blood.
"what is the next mythos?"
I think there is plenty of mythos surrounding Thelema to satisfy the average mortal.
The D & D shit is only the mainstream perspective.
And since when has any Hermetic school or system adhered to the conceptions of the masses?
The Mysteries of Thelema are for the kings, and it is best kept that way. The masses are already manipulated in ways none of us here will probably ever comprehend. Christianity cannot last more than a couple more generations, at most.
The "conerstone" spoken of in the gospels is starting to look more like a sphere.
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@JPF said
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@Foolster said
"What is the next mythos. Does Thelema expect a prophet/s to follow after crowley?"There is some talk of a child, yes."
But there's no indication that the child is another prophet - just that he (and it is specified as a he) is a child.
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@Jim Eshelman said
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@JPF said
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@Foolster said
"What is the next mythos. Does Thelema expect a prophet/s to follow after crowley?"There is some talk of a child, yes."
But there's no indication that the child is another prophet - just that he (and it is specified as a he) is a child."
True. But he will explain the mysteries. And looking at the variety of opinions and doctrines and utter BS surrounding Thelema, it would be nice if somebody would take charge and clear things up. Divinely inspired, of course.
There is also some talk of a prophet to come at the end of this Aeon, if I am not mistaken.
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@JPF said
"There is also some talk of a prophet to come at the end of this Aeon, if I am not mistaken."
One might, perhaps, better say, "at the beginning of the next." Every new aeon needs its prophet to launch it.
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"I think there is plenty of mythos surrounding Thelema to satisfy the average mortal."
i think you're out of touch with the average joe then. I run an international business and meet all sorts of individuals; most of them are "christian" but have little real interest in their Dog or what it means for them. The embody the corpse they grew up worshipping. Thelema is a niche product, and thats why it appeals to a niche group.
Anyway, no more prophets please! Haven't we had enough!?
