16 June (Water) Liber LXV, 3:13-14
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First impression reminds me of "Saying, Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done." in Luke (New Testamant).
The man is asking his Angel, his higher self, to help him and loosen the grip of his lower self. The lower self prevents the man from being exalted and touching Divinity. Even as we try to loosen ourselves of our own accord the snake wraps even tighter, anticipating our attempt in its inception, and strikes the attempt down.
For some reason my "trying" does not reap a result. I don't know if it requires more discipline, more practice, or Divine intervention! However, supression to the desire doesn't sound like the key as supression in many cases causes neurosis. I gather I must identify and illuminate my lower self (it's me afterall) and in recognizing its face embrace it with love. However, this I have yet to do, as I still fill much shame and reject it. I don't think thats my meditation just for the day - feels like thats one for all of life!
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"**13. Then I said: O my beloved, O Lord Adonai, I pray thee to loosen the coils of the serpent!
- But she was closed fast upon me, so that my Force was stayed in its inception.**"
ANALYSIS:
The very thing he is trying to escape is what is holding him back.It is the specific grip of the past, his reactive Nephesh, the inherent neurosis of his mortality - or (varying individual by individual), whatever! - that interferes with his magick, that impedes the particular relationship to the Angel that he is seeking.
To put it in the broader terms I've been using: It is the grip that the transient has on him that impedes his relationship with the eternal. This is more or less necessarily true by definition.
The one great result here is that the ego recognizes its hopelessness in the first line. It caves in and reaches outside itself for assistance. That surely was the right first step... there is still error, which impedes his magick, but that surely was the right first step.
MEDITATION:
I "got" this one so thoroughly back in 1980 that I'm mostly left without an exact step for today;. but, with the hustle and flurry of multiple changing and accelerating conditions (plus gearing up to fly to Seattle tomorrow), it doesn't hurt for me to pause and remember that the Link is restored by first getting outside the framework of the gripping, nagging conditions of the transient. Relax the distraction binding one's energies and then the way is clear. -
13. Then I said: O my beloved, O Lord Adonai, I pray thee to loosen the coils of the serpent!
14. But she was closed fast upon me, so that my Force was stayed in its inception.I am always suspect of people who claim to know and adhere to enlightened perspectives, the, 'everything is divine' crowd. Fact is, asserting the insights of a master of the temple is a greater darkness and ignorance for those who have not crossed the abyss.
I have always worked under the assumption that the first step to freeing oneself is a full appreciation of darkness itself and to the degree to which it contaminates everything—every breath, every thought, and every casual post on this forum...
I want scotch; I fear life; I seek a way forward...
Love ad Will
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Traveling, which means my access to the internet is spotty, or I would have responded sooner.
@Dar said
"Yeah... that's it! ... Typecasting."
I'm totally confused by the word 'Typecasting.' I think it's a criticism, but it is used without any explanation—just a dubious word that doesn't seem to fit very well. In my world, 'Typecasting' is casting to type—casting an old man in the role of Lear for example.
But given the pointed nature of the quotes I will try to clarify my thoughts. The theme of these recent meditations, the idea of beholding/seeing the corruption, my initial comment for this passage was connected to the idea that we don't see things for what they are. We see through a fiction—this can be either a positive or negative idea about ourselves.
The idea of water has been very productive for me. Water as a reflective medium, the corrective power of these versus is to adjust our ability to reflect 'the truth.' My meditations on these verses have suggested that this means seeing things honestly.
I know, for myself, if I am in a particularly 'blind' period, being able to admit that I am unable to really see or appreciate the facts actually lifts some of the blindness, makes things better. So it helps to be able to see the corruption, otherwise it's an indication that we are even more mired in some sort of illusion.
As such, I am not being critical of the darkness, it is what it is and may even bring us to a greater experience of light. On the other hand, I'm critical of the human, mine and what I think I perceive in other people, tendency to believe our own fictions, which is a general a problem I thin we are always struggling with.
@Dar said
"The truth is not different for those that have crossed the abyss or for those yet to cross."
Perhaps, in a very abstract sense, but on a practical level it may still be necessary for someone to avoid poisons, despite their best efforts to assert the unity of all things. I personally think the rules change as you change. In fact, the very idea that I should adhere to the necessity of the master of the temple, seems to be an abdication of the burden of seeing that must always be renewed, or I risk turning a dogma into a crippling illusion.
**But I beheld in thee a certain taint, even in that wherein I delighted.
I beheld in thee the taint of thy father the ape, of thy grandsire the Blind Worm of Slime. **It's all about the perception of this taint and corruption.
Love and Will
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My mind focuses on the word "loosen"
If I'm at a stage where I am fully in the grip of the Nephesh, then the Next Step is to have that grip loosened just enough for a bit of energy to escape, and make its way up to a higher place of investment.
If a trickle already escapes and makes its way up, I just need to increase the flow.
I don't have to worry if it's "not enough" yet. If I get too caught up in this idealism, then I can still find myself tight in the grip even when I can see the serpent at the far end of the room.