Comparing to Caissa
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Have you read Crowley's analogy to chess in Liber Aleph? It moved me in a powerful direction when I was relatively new to the work. In his analogy, you're one of the pieces...
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@Jim Eshelman said
"Have you read Crowley's analogy to chess in Liber Aleph? It moved me in a powerful direction when I was relatively new to the work. In his analogy, you're one of the pieces..."
Yes! I read it many years ago, have lost the book since then. That was actually the initial source of my idea, but I couldn't remember any details.
I'm now curious how that idea works? Doesn't make too much sense looking at a person being a particular piece. It seems so logical to view capturing the "King" as ones TW (HGA) and so being a single piece limits each person. I view the pieces as forces or circumstances in life of which we negotiate. The "player" is then Hadit experiencing any particular arrangement of the board etc.,
I need to find Liber Aleph!
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A few further thoughts....
Each move in Chess is comparable to our choices in life, determing which act is right according to our Will at any given moment. In Chess, each move itself must ultimately help serve the goal to capture the opponents King; however there are the moves which we must make that simply are forced, a repercussion of a faulty prior move, yet it still serves our goal to stay alive and maintain options. At times we must endure a set back, yet keep our eye on the ball, make sacrifices to create an opening. Take advantage of "mistakes" and be bold, calculating and observant. Taking every move as a particular dealing with our soul.
The moves or turns then are analogous to each moment and every action we take. In real life however we fail to "play chess", to view every move as changing the dynamics of the board, and we fail to understand our goal, at least those unaware they are playing, who do not understand the goal of finding and performing their TW.
Realizing a plan in Chess then is comparable to discovering ones Will, and then to utilize ones playing skill to impliment that plan. Yet, even if we fail, we are gainng experience in the game. Besides isn't it fun just playing, getting caught up in the make believe war? Losing oneself in the infinite possibilities?
Our ever present opponent is our own HGA, ever pushing us to grow in skill, Hes our only possible goal, the whole purpose of the game to struggle to unite with him, to capture him. He isn't resisting, he's encouraging us to become an equal in skill, challenging us to overcome our faulty decisions and plan, to try and imagine moves ahead and Know him. We need to anticipate his every move! We need to eventually become him - able to pull him into our own traps, enticing him with a suitable sacrifice, and then Checkmate with but a simple Pawn!
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I'd been thinking that the part of the Great Work called "Discovering Your True Will" is like Sudoku (from the pointy of view of the last square solved in the puzzle): Every time you discover what value some other square is, you rule out which piece of the universe you are - and with each move, the seeming chaos of the start sharpens into a clearer showing of the pattern inherent in things until, in a rush, you are left with only a single conclusion about your own value - and it is correct!
OTOH, living your life seems to me reflected by playing Hearts - specifically in the sense that, with every card you play, you get closer to the ideal hand you wanted at the beginning.
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@Liber Aleph said
"BH
ALLEGORIA DE CAISSA.Consider for an Example the Game and Play of the Chess, which is a Pastime of Man, and worthy to exercise him in Thought, yet by no means necessary to his Life, so that he sweepeth away Board and Pieces at the least Summons of that which is truly dear to him. Thus unto him this Game is as it were an Illusion. But insofar as he entereth into the Game he abideth by the Rules thereof, though they be artificial and in no wise proper to his Nature; for in this Restriction is all this Pleasure. Therefore, though he hath All-Power to move the Pieces at his own Will, he doth it not, enduring Loss, Indignity, and Defeat rather than destroy that Artifice of Illusion. Think then that thou hast thyself created this Shadow-world the Universe, and that it pleasureth thee to watch or to actuate its Play according to the Law that thou hast made, which yet bindeth thee not save only by Virtue of thine own Will to do thine own Pleasure therein."
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@Jim Eshelman said
"I'd been thinking that the part of the Great Work called "Discovering Your True Will" is like Sudoku (from the pointy of view of the last square solved in the puzzle): Every time you discover what value some other square is, you rule out which piece of the universe you are - and with each move, the seeming chaos of the start sharpens into a clearer showing of the pattern inherent in things until, in a rush, you are left with only a single conclusion about your own value - and it is correct!
OTOH, living your life seems to me reflected by playing Hearts - specifically in the sense that, with every card you play, you get closer to the ideal hand you wanted at the beginning."
I never thought of the Great Work like that. You see, clothing it in this sort of way seems to help understand it better! I'm going to take these ideas and meditate on them! Thanks for sharing these, I sense there's some gems of insight there.
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@Jim Eshelman said
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@Liber Aleph said
"BH
ALLEGORIA DE CAISSA.Consider for an Example the Game and Play of the Chess, which is a Pastime of Man, and worthy to exercise him in Thought, yet by no means necessary to his Life, so that he sweepeth away Board and Pieces at the least Summons of that which is truly dear to him. Thus unto him this Game is as it were an Illusion. But insofar as he entereth into the Game he abideth by the Rules thereof, though they be artificial and in no wise proper to his Nature; for in this Restriction is all this Pleasure. Therefore, though he hath All-Power to move the Pieces at his own Will, he doth it not, enduring Loss, Indignity, and Defeat rather than destroy that Artifice of Illusion. Think then that thou hast thyself created this Shadow-world the Universe, and that it pleasureth thee to watch or to actuate its Play according to the Law that thou hast made, which yet bindeth thee not save only by Virtue of thine own Will to do thine own Pleasure therein."
"Oh wow! Thank you Jim! Been years since I've read that, funny how I remembered it totally different lol. There's a lot there, and I'm seeing perhaps where subconsciously I arrived at a few ideas myself. Nice!
Thanks again and again!93 93/93
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@kasper81 said
"the Leary Wilson fun essay on chess as a gift to humans from aliens is kind of related to your ideas. The left sided pieces starting with the Castle represents the terrestrial brain :the Castle represents the bio oral survival circuit which can only go back or forth. The second piece the Knight represents the jumping up and down primate ego status circuit. (jumped up / uppity)The Bishop represents circuit 3 reason and linguistic function which thinks "skew wise" only. The King is the sexual social role circuit. On the right side we have the Castle the neurosomatic circuit which floats about skims about (floating on air) and the Knight is the 6th circuit which jumps out of 4th dimensional realities lierally "tripping". The Bishop is the neurogentic circuit skimming across RNA DNA signals and the Queen is omni dimensional quantal circuit.
They also point out that the chess board has 8 x 8 =64 squares embedding the idea of the Law of Octaves within the DNA codons and I Ching Hexagrams."
Kasper 93!
Seems we were both on same wavelength with yoyr prior plan to talk about Chess! Your input is great thank you!
Dendrites, aren't they also responsible for aging? There growth would therefore prevent againg, or well slow it down if I'm correct.
I've always been facinated by Chess, and a player! I'm as good as AC! Ha ha just kidding
I've never heatd of some of this, but plan to look into it! Facinating ideas, thanks again!
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@kasper81 said
"The first 3 moves of either opponent seem to be ironically pointless in that even if you are a Grandmaster a move some move any move must be made to get the game going but the future possibilities of what your opponent may respond with are so multifarious that your opening move could be anything. It doesn't matter it is purposeless to an extent.
This reminded me of Kether emerging out of the infinite and Aleph as Fool airy and disparate, in fact the first 3 supernals are chaotic and it's only then when more sephirah emerge (or in this case when chess pieces are more distributed across the board) that some semblance of order and sense is manifest in that there are then more ideas which can be mirrored and realized by comparison.
Didn't Wittgenstien use this metaphor of chesspieces on a board as an explanation of how we form ideas by comparison?"
Well I have disagree the very first move is vitally important! For example opening with 1.d2-d4 instantly sets up a game very different from 1.e2-e4, the first usually creating a much more slow developement and closed game, the second the exact opposite. Also, the first move says a lot about the player, his style his knowledge etc., and even more so with the second!
Then we must consider what SIDE we are playing, are we "attacking" (white) which moves first, or "defending" (black) which reacts to whites every move, trying to keep him at bay.
White is Kether, the initial cause arising from Ain soph aur, resulting in a form, a responce from Binah, blacks first responce accepting the first move which would be Chockmah. One could say then Kether is the players Will and each of these final decisions resulting in an actual turn is then the force of Chockmah impregnating Binah, which prompts Binah to respond, the whole game an interplay of the Beast and his Bride.
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@kasper81 said
"i played chess as a child now and again. I haven't played in years. I resumed playing about 2 weeks ago so haha you know a lot more about this than me.
All i know is leave the pawns in front of the King, try and get the Bishops and Knights to control the centre of the board, don't waste the Queen, apply foresight to every possible move your opponent may make and slowly work towards a checkmate. As you can gather i am a beginner i guesse.let me ask you a question do you think chess if applied with a bit of effort can actually increase our intelligence and change our lives for the better?"
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Its a great game, I've been playing for years. I wanted to add that also the very first move is important for what is called ones opening, and sets up ones further moves for developing ones pieces (activating ones rear pieces, I.e. castling). There are on fact "opening principles", such as always develop tward the center, castle early, and never play the queen in opening (there are of course exceptions such as in the 3 move checkmate).
Anyway, I very much agree it helps concentration, and IQ, and memory at the very least! When playing Chess you must imagine, visualize your next move, or deveral moves "seeing" the board in the minds eye. As its often said in chess "don't move until you see it", so it definitely works various aspects of the mind. It is also an exercise in logic. Its basically an arguement with objects, you propose a thesis with a move, and your opponent gives his antithesis with his, and so on. So ones reasoning is strengthened as well. Its an amazing tool, not just a game!
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Crowley used to play chess with a new acquaintance to determine what kind of mind they had, etc. He sized up a number of people this way.