11 June - (Water) Liber LXV, 3:1-2
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1. Verily and Amen! I passed through the deep sea, and by the rivers of running water that abound therein, and I came unto the Land of No Desire.
2. Wherein was a white unicorn with a silver collar, whereon was graven the aphorism Linea viridis gyrat universa. -
"Linea viridis gyrat universa."
For some reason, this line has always given me a strange "thrill", as if it were deeply important to me, though I don't know why. This is the green wall in the Thoth tarot Sun card, and the green serpent-belt in the Waite-Smith and BOTA Magician cards (and in William Kotzwinkle's book The Fan Man
). The heart has become the whole universe, aglow with love and life.[Edit: As often happens in my meditations, I have found significance in something that turns out to be factually incorrect -- in fact, it's almost the signature of a communication from my subconscious mind
In this case, it's the wall in the Sun card, which is red, not green, but which Crowley says cryptically one would expect to be green.] -
@gmugmble said
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"Linea viridis gyrat universa."For some reason, this line has always given me a strange "thrill", as if it were deeply important to me, though I don't know why. This is the green wall in the Thoth tarot Sun card, and the green serpent-belt in the Waite-Smith and BOTA Magician cards (and in William Kotzwinkle's book The Fan Man
). The heart has become the whole universe, aglow with love and life."To be so geeky on this as to risk driving the train off the tracks: Linea viridis gyrat universa ("The green line circumambulates the universe") enumerates to 281, which is the value of nothing else known to me in Latin, and no clear line of ideas in Greek or Hebrew. In Greek it's "all over the map," though one can hardly ignore the final two entries below:
AMION - Lamb
ASThENEIA - Sickness
GOES - A howling; wizard (cf. GOETIA)
KOPRIA - Shit, filth
OSIA (osia) - Divine law
PAS (pas) - All, entire
STERNON - Heart -
"1. Verily and Amen! I passed through the deep sea, and by the rivers of running water that abound therein, and I came unto the Land of No Desire."
Moving into the inner waters, the inner domain... past the places where currents swirl and flow, to a place of stillness... (This morning this feels scarcely discernible from the swan "no whence, no whither" from the Air chapter; except, this is a travelling deep within.)
"2. Wherein was a white unicorn with a silver collar, whereon was graven the aphorism Linea viridis gyrat universa."
Unicorns historically have three distinctive physical characteristics (besides their horsiness). They are white (purity? and a lunar color in heraldry, the heraldic representation of silver). They have no genitals. They have a single horn emerging from their forehead (exactly where the lunar chakra, ajna, is situated).
The horn is the force of their genitals, now risen to entirely focus at ajna and emerge as a single, penetrating focus. It's likely no mistake that this happens in Water... corresponding to Hod in this set of five ideas below or culminating in Tiphereth... as it is quite distinctive of phenomena that are natural to the 3=8 grade of A.'.A.'..
I move past the currents and movement to a place of depth and stillness... I see this obviously vital figure, crackling with sexuality, yet all focused not in reproduction but in another direction. And, in seeing this representation of my state in that moment, I see the words: The green line circumambulates the universe. It opens my mind... and I am in wonder. (To be continued tomorrow when Neshamah begins speaking to the Adept.)
PS - This is long my favorite chapter - the one I memorized as a Probationer. AC summarized it: "This chapter is attributed to Water: It deals with the preliminary reflections of Truth as apprehended by intuition, beyond any intellectual apprehension; and with the nature of the Understanding and the sexual instinct."
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These are my two favorite verses too. There's a faraway stillness to it that seems at once 'post-apocalyptic' and Edenic to me.
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1. Verily and Amen! I passed through the deep sea, and by the rivers of running water that abound therein, and I came unto the Land of No Desire.
2. Wherein was a white unicorn with a silver collar, whereon was graven the aphorism Linea viridis gyrat universa.Water.
I have known the real possibility of drowning several times in my life. And while I have learned to avoid this possibility in the body, I still seek it out in the spirit.
She pulls me under the waves, and placing her fingers on my lips, she stops my breath. Not breathing, the world goes dark as I retreat go into a secret, quite place deep within my being. And there she is, waiting for me. At a prayer stall I pray. She caresses me, giving herself to me. All the while I feel my passions changing. The more I desire the absolute the more she desires me.
Love and Will
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ya know, I was going to post this myself that day.
I had come here to the forum
looking for solace with my lifes woes
and saw that it hadnt been posted yet
so I looked it up and read the next few days.I truelly wonder why I have such sight to see everything relevant to me....
the path that my Lady makes in the sky, is the green line, the green ray of Venus, of the heart. And its path is a five fold path, the path of man, the pentacle. Traced into the heavens the path that the morning star makes is a key.
in the canon of LeoDiVinci he shows the man in the pentacle, and if you can see, that the path of Venus is also the Flower of Life, the dna Spiral, the two snakes entwinded.
When I was a little girl I had an imaginary friend who was a unicorn. He came to me twice. It is taught that the Unicorn is the very first being to come from the light, as the Dragon, is the first to come from the dark.
The unicorn was the first creature that man encountered is also the teachings, and that from where the unicorn touched his horn to the ground, water sprang upon.
On this path of Venus, this Green gyrating we seem to have a choice, and that choice is do we wear the silver around our crown, or our throat.
I have been taught that any number with 128, is sacred to Her and that 281 is akin with the Word. when you wear a collar, Your words are bound.
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"1. Verily and Amen! I passed through the deep sea, and by the rivers of running water that abound therein, and I came unto the Land of No Desire."
For me, these rivers of running water have become a *means *to reach the Land of No Desire. There was a time when I thought they were to be avoided or held back but have since learned to accept them and ride them through till they disperse into the deep sea.
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Unicorns also have cloven hooves and a beard like goat, and a lions tail.
Unicorns are primal, wild beasts.
In heraldry they are collared, to show man overcoming his wild nature and being civilized, attempting to become....our greatest potential....I have never read this poem,
So these bits and pieces were difficult
As I read the whole thing through
It reminded me of the story ofceeation
Of the teachings in the bible how man was madeFrom something that evolved
I see these words recorded by a scribe
From a lord,
An angel?This collared unicorn
Is Love Under WillIt is collared by the green line
The green ray of Venus
The pentacle in the skyI see this as the story of the unfolding of DNA
And how some
We're able to over ome and change
The snake that entwined the heart -
The idea of water (air of water?) suggests a kind of backward walking. Of course, the whole book implies air, mostly; like how all incense is primarily attributable to air though a specific scent will have associations with other elements and is sometimes used in a general sense to represent fire. Nonetheless, we just finished air, and now have water to contend with.
So I want to get past this idea of images as quickly as possible. And while these words still create images I think there should be some other way to process them other than the critique of the image making faculty that I pursued in the previous section. Besides, I don't like repeating myself.
I am to understand that water, in this context, means the intuition. This is not very helpful, imho. I am still left wondering how to enter into a relationship with the content, aware all the time that the notion of relationship is an airy concept. Rather, it seems necessary to enter into the presence, not presume I can have a conversation as among equals, but simply, humbly enter the presence of the image.
This strategy repeats my past intuition that water is implacable! When I visualize Gabriel in the west I see a great wave, a tsunami rising out of a vast ocean. This wave is first and foremost a destructive force of the collective unconscious, and only when I feel this potential disaster almost upon me do I allow it to recede into the cup of the angel. According to tradition it is the voice of god, or revelation, or the fulfillment of prophecy—literally, the destruction of the world.
Of course, all the elements destroy; but water, more than any other is the utter sweeping away of the old.
I think I will respond in kind—I will post those images that rise up in response to the various lines of the text, but I will know this is wrong. The main event is happening elsewhere, because It's not the explanation that matters, but the state of mind that is left after the waters recede. My first rule is that this potential of drowning must be part of the struggle, maybe it will even signify success.
Love and Will