Slain and Risen God
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@Ash said
"Can anyone offer some insight as to what we would be "saved from" in the act of Christ's resurrection?"
I think this question can only be answered if you add, "according to the theory wherein this is believed to happen." That is, those of us who don't buy into the particular metaphysic don't think you're being saved from anything.
Christianity is an Osirian Aeon religion. It's idea of "salvation" is to "save" you from Nephesh, the psychological lifeblood of the Isis Aeon. This actually served avaluable purpose when the Osiris Aeon was establishing itself, because people wouldn't have moved en masse into Ruach consciousness if there hadn't been a bit of demonization of Nephesh consciousness.
"I suppose my main question is some combination of these - what is the quick-and-dirty esoteric understanding of Christianity?"
It was the high product of its time, but that time has passed. It's as destructive and damaging now as if one tried to live, during any stage of life, as if you were in an earlier stage of life.
"What is the Resurrection, and what does it accomplish? Who is Christ to us, and what are we?"
In the religion of Christianity, or in the original teachings? In the original teachings it was awakening to a higher aspect of consciousness, possibly even (then very rare) superconsciousness. But in the religion, it was the promise of heaven after death.
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Jim's answering you about Christianity. Here's more about Christ (which is a completely different subject)
One take on the Jesus' life story as an example of attainment. Jesus has the "heavens open up" to him at his baptism, and he has to go fast in the mountains for 40 days to stew on it all. Very much like any other story of a character attaining adepthood. His True WIll eventually leads him to the difficult mission of being crucified. Beforehand he prays to have "this cup", the task, removed from him. But he goes through with it, and spends 3 days in "hell", and emerges, having conquered the abyss. As a magus, his word is I.N.R.I (exoterically, Iesus Nazarenus, Rex Iudaeorum, Jesus the Nazarene, King of the Jews).
A second is to focus on the story's emphasis on Tiphareth, and it's HGA-like overtones. Jesus, as Horus, the son, in a trinity situation (The mother aspect having been neutered by the Osirian/Father dominance), is much like the HGA, which is the child of the marriage of opposites... Jesus says "whoever has seen me has seen the father". If you think of Briah as Water (in the four worlds sense, not elemental sense), the we can employ some metaphor. As serene water, Briah forms a perfect reflection of fire (light!) of the world of Atziluth above.
Also, Jesus in the gnostic gospels (for example, the Gospel of Thomas) talks much more openly about things like the marriage of opposites.
Another take, if you like more literalist esotericism, is to consider Jesus as the HGA of the Apostle Paul. Paul's early epistles are the earliest writings of the new testament, and the only texts of the new testament that weren't pseudoepigraphic (falsely purported to be written by someone with authority, like an eyewitness). With this point-of-view, suddenly Paul's vision on the road to Damascus is the only eyewitness account of Jesus. The gospels, written later, by non-eyewitnesses, just provide allegory to elaborate the general subject.
Other points: John the Baptist as being of the "lesser mysteries". He was beheaded (by a sword) and had his head placed on a platter (pentacle). Jesus, while on the cross had his side pierced by a spear (wand) and blood collected in a grail (cup). Jesus as the chief cornerstone, formerly rejected by the builders. The prima materia of base nature becomes the philosopher's stone.
The big question that leaves me is what part of the Jesus story, exoterically or esoterically, is Osirian, and what part continues to have value in the Aeon of Horus. If we don't move beyond the old pattern, then Jesus' image is going to be our devil for quite some time, and we can miss out on the points of value. I can't tell you how many time I've heard a self-proclaimed Thelemite trash a topic or idea by labeling it "Osirian", but without explaining what was so "Osirian" about the idea.
Backing into the big picture, the Aeon of Horus is about moving into the child phase of the Trinity. The synthesis phase of the Hegelian dialectic. It's about moving beyond one side in a pair of opposites. Like "Good and Evil" or "Father and Mother".
So, I would say that the parts of the story that are about conquering evil, or the competition between Jesus and Satan, Michael and the Dragon, etc., are essentially Osirian. They're focused on the Osiris side of the equation.
The aspects that move beyond that, to the synthesis of the two opposites, are compatible with the age of Horus. Jesus as your own personal HGA, Jesus as individuation, Tiphareth, Anahata, etc...
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@Ash said
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@Jim Eshelman said
"I think this question can only be answered if you add, "according to the theory wherein this is believed to happen." That is, those of us who don't buy into the particular metaphysic don't think you're being saved from anything."
"I don't consciously "believe" in this either, but my past beliefs are still a force to reckon with in my psyche, or I wouldn't have asked it.
@Jim Eshelman said
" Christianity is an Osirian Aeon religion. It's idea of "salvation" is to "save" you from Nephesh, the psychological lifeblood of the Isis Aeon. This actually served avaluable purpose when the Osiris Aeon was establishing itself, because people wouldn't have moved en masse into Ruach consciousness if there hadn't been a bit of demonization of Nephesh consciousness.
It was the high product of its time, but that time has passed. It's as destructive and damaging now as if one tried to live, during any stage of life, as if you were in an earlier stage of life."I find this very helpful, and I'm glad you responded to my question.
@Av: Your entire post is awesome. I don't have much to add except saying that I'd love to hear more =p
About INRI - that's Yod Nun Resh Yod, right? Isis, Apophis, Osiris? ...Virgo, Scorpio, Sol? Those are just guesses, I vaguely remember reading that in the text for the Lesser Hexagram Ritual.
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@Ash said
"About INRI - that's Yod Nun Resh Yod, right? Isis, Apophis, Osiris? ...Virgo, Scorpio, Sol? Those are just guesses, I vaguely remember reading that in the text for the Lesser Hexagram Ritual."
Correct.
It stands for: Iron Nails Rammed In.
(Mostly joking.) -
@Ash said
"I don't have much to add except saying that I'd love to hear more =p"
I bet you can come up with some good ones
I grew up very strict Protestant too (JW) - and I think there are a lot of very similar backgrounds in the Thelemic community. It took me a while to get where I can go back and read the bible and reclaim value from something I once rejected entirely.
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I probably could once I get the time to really analyze it. My mom is extremely knowledgeable about the Bible and virtually all exoteric interpretations of it, but I have never heard an esoteric interpretation of it before I heard some from the Thelemic community.
My original take was - well, either the prophecies are true and this book is totally the Law, or it's BS and totally worthless. In the past, I never really thought about gleaning value from a book that is outdated as I do now.
@Jim Eshelman said
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@Ash said
"About INRI - that's Yod Nun Resh Yod, right? Isis, Apophis, Osiris? ...Virgo, Scorpio, Sol? Those are just guesses, I vaguely remember reading that in the text for the Lesser Hexagram Ritual."Correct.
It stands for: Iron Nails Rammed In.
(Mostly joking.)"Ah, I see. Kinda IAO then, right? - Isabelle Ate Oranges? I've always wondered what oranges had to do with rebirth.
(Or was it I Attack Orangutans?)
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IAO is more or less a universal, all-aeon formula. Simply stated it can be seen as Initial - Alteration - Outcome. The Isis Apophis Osiris formulation has never sat with me as being new aeon and we use three different deities to express this formula in the new aeon - this will hopefully be published soon.
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Why does FIAOF or VIAOV become New Aeon just because it enumerates to 93? It seems a bit of a minor change.
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It is a minor change, and the underlying formula of IAO is perfectly compatible with the new aeon, as sethur stated.
"Let me digress for a moment and refer to what I said in my textbook on Magick with regard to the
formula IAO. This formula covers all learning. You begin with a delightful feeling as of a child
with a new toy; you get bored, and you attempt to smash it. But if you are a wise child, you have
had a scientific attitude towards it, and you do NOT smash it. You pass through the stage of
boredom, and arise from the inferno of torture towards the stage of resurrection, when the toy has
become a god, declared to you its inmost secrets, and become a living part of your life. There are
no longer these crude, savage reactions of pleasure and pain. The new knowledge is assimilated." -
"what is the quick-and-dirty esoteric understanding of Christianity? What is the Resurrection, and what does it accomplish? Who is Christ to us, and what are we? "
lol, well from what I have gleened- christianity itself has nothing to do with Christ.
Christianity was/is a tool, to be used by some, for some, on some (people that is)Now as a Lady who was never taught to be a good girl....
I have come to see that the institutions created on Earth have come to be what they are based on Sex, and mating rites, and birth, which are all cyclic, and from MPOV are due to our slant on the axis (if we werent slanted then life would be something else completely-I cant even imagine).
So, that while I can say with full honesty I have no clue what being a christian (or jew, or muslim, or buddist, or Hindi...ect) is about I will share with you that when I look at religious teachings from the slant of Sex, and specifically -the Glorious Penis, and Wonderful Womb.......and the magic that happens in the physical world.....
Most all if not all of our taboos, and teaching that are held in divine light are based on mans libido and his ability to
resurrect his member, and die again, and again, and again......If you cant get it up, then you cant procreate, and if you cant procreate then you will not live forever.
Christ is a stiff, and we all should love him as best we can......
But that is just one gals take on it....
I could be wrong. -
Quick and dirty esoteric Christianity, from my experience of it, reaches its apex in a realization that one is, with Christ, a Son of God. Christianity, if considered as a form of Bhakti yoga, is the attempt to follow the teachings of Christ in one's everyday life. As one goes through this process, one has to deal with all of the "hard sayings" of Christ as one interacts in the world. The death is the death of the old point of view - that Jesus of Nazareth was Divinity on a level that we are not - and the resurrection is the understanding of the Christ Heart and Mind born within yourself as a child of the Divine Heart.
It was created with the intention of setting people free, but it has been abused by perfectly that it has now become on of the chief tools of oppression for the human soul in the West.
The change of the Equinox, to my own mind, represents the rise of the new Archetype, the SuperEgo slayer. It is the same expression of the Heart of the Sun, but it has been given fire to set the souls of humanity free once again.
The serpent eats its tail. The pelican feeds its young from its breast. The phoenix burns itself to rise anew.
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The part of Osirian symbology that still makes sense is that something seems to "die" in mystical consciousness - i.e. the ordinary sense of self we have day-to-day, the sense of being me, *. Hence, symbolisms like the tomb, the pyramid, etc. Something has died. (What's resurrected is a self that's initiated - it knows its true nature.)
Now something has to be understood about this, something that was always understood in the highest teachings of the East (and West too, probably) but didn't always "trickle down": the truth is that there is no self to die, get rid of or be "conquered", there never was, and there isn't now. More precisely: there's a process (Ahamkara) that creates a virtual "centre of narrative gravity" for the bundle of matter we call "body" and "brain", but there is no self, only the appearance of such (virtuality - just like there's no actual thing called a "cursor" on the screen, it's just an appearance formed by what really exists - pixels flashing in patterns, driven by sequential patterns of varying electrical potentia, or summat like that
).And in fact this virtuality, this non-actual-existence of the self *is *what's seen in any "glimpse", only it gets covered over again once one comes out of trance, and the experience gets larded over with whatever pet obsessions the self (as Ahamkara, self-making process) has - this is part of the reason why there's a purificatory system going up the Tree, you work through your pet obsessions, drop them or fulfil them or purify or transcend them, so that each insight is deeper, fuller, more permanent, resulting in a more complete and thorough transformation of the body and mind. (Nobody *has *to do this - any "glimpse" is IT, it's just that if one wants to teach, one had better have a comprehensive understanding, so one can "meet" any student where they are. It's the difference between being able to ride a bicycle and having one's life enriched by that, on the one hand, and on the other hand training to compete in the Tour de France. Obviously riding a bike is great, but not every cyclist is called to compete in the Tour de France!)
But anyway, this deeper insight - that it's not really true that anything dies, but rather "it" never existed at all in the first place - is what the Aeon of Horus exotericises, brings to the masses (note the ready availability of formerly exclusive or "secret" non-dual teachings like Advaita Vedanta and Dzogchen, and even some forms of Gnosticism, everywhere now). (I think this is also what's meant by VIAOV - through the apparent transformation there is something humming along, underlying it, the appearance of transformation is only superficial.)
However, at the point of transition to insight, it may still *feel *like death is looming - there may be fear, or even absolute terror - so there's still a certain degree of psychological validity to the formula, moments when a "heaviness" and doom might be felt, a sense of entombment, almost a *gothic *feel overall. Yes, it's all just story, and we can even know that intellectually, but going *through *it can still be difficult and painful.
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Some cycles are simply eternal and unchanging.
However, our psycho-spiritual relationship and attitude toward those cycles necessarily evolves according to the times and our own development.
Yes, I have always though that there was much Art to the Equinox of the Gods - as much Art as Inspiration, we'll say...
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