Ordeal x. What is this?
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"I am the visible object of worship; the others are secret; for the Beast & his Bride are they: and for the winners of the Ordeal x. What is this? Thou shalt know." Liber al vel Legis 3:21-22
The mystery of not knowing what this meant has drawn me closer to it, and one of the seedlings that initially interested me in reading more, lo those many years ago.
Crowley, as far as I remember, did not discuss it. Motta's commentary mentions it as "accepting the Beast 666 as the messiah" or some such thing. It appears this kind of interpretation is easy to reach I suppose, considering the context of the paragraph.
I remember reading, or if not reading, then thinking, that this Ordeal x was a test that involved the opposite sex (in my case, a woman) who would tempt me away from the path (occult) and into a mundane and mediocre existence. That she was in fact, a sort of vampire. This could be purely my own invention, based on my experiences at the time.
When I read "Ordeal x," the x makes me think of Malkuth, which is why it sort of ties into my idea above.
What do you all think of 'the Ordeal x" ?
93, 93/93
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You asked for an opinion, so...
"O.X." - the circle and the cross united - a symbol of the Rosy Cross referring to the Knowledge & Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel.
Ra-Hoor-Khuit is the "visible object of workship" for all who are not yet Adepts. The others - Nuit and Hadit - are for those who have attained to the K&C of the HGA.
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in your opinion why is it to worship RHK before K&C w/ HGA and then after that you worship nuit & hadit??
agape
418
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For the record, Jim, your words disturbed me on a personal level (lol, only half-kidding) the details of which I cannot share on the forum.
The X or cross did made me think of Tiphareth as well, but to a lesser extent than Malkuth. The attribution on the Tree of Life when we talk about K&C of the HGA would be Tiphareth of Malkuth, or ? (This is not the direction I intended to go with this response, but I am covering my tracks to hide my personal jolt)
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Remember, of course, you asked for opinions, and that continues to be what you get
Your "why" question... On the one hand, it seems the simplest thing in the world to answer, almost self-evident; but, on the other (empty?) hand, difficult to answer with anything concrete to back it up. It is, on the one extreme, a purely dogmatic answer ("Liber L. said so!") and, on the other, satisfies every layer of both intuition and experience I can tap. So, the end, I'll just throw out a few shotgun remarks and that's where it will lay.
Liber Legis specifically tells us that Ra-Hoor-Khuit is the visible object of worship. This seems the very same thing as when A.C., three weeks earlier, was informed that he was to start a new solar cult. There is far, far more to Thelema than a solar cult but, to the outermost, that's the means given of putting it forth.
As Soror Meral often said (and I concur), RHK is given to us by Liber L. as a "stand-in" or generic image for the Holy Guardian Angel. As she never said in my hearing, but which is inherent in the first statement, that means that RHK is "the new Christ" - the external archetypal imagery given everybody as a generic until they have the reality for themselves. (It is simultaneously true that - stripped of particulars of form - he is the deepest truth the Book has to convey, because He also tells us that regardless of who or what we begin to worship, in the end it is He that we shall find at the center - again, a truth of the HGA.)
So we are given a generic solar, Tipheric, archetypal, deific image to serve for the HGA idea until we get "the real deal."
Now, of course, your HGA may not have a beak! But The Gods (TM) seem to to think it's OK to provide you with one until you get it all sorted out on your own.
At this point of view, it may be a bit more obvious why that image and idea need only carry us so far as Tiphereth. From Tiphereth on, we have The Real Deal.
Now, in this generic function, RHK is not only visible but nearly palpable. One can say, "See here, look at the Sun - it's such an obvious summation of most of the ideas of of God you've ever had." It serves as the outer gate. But Nuit and Hadit are ideas that, unless treated in the most superficial way possible ("She's kinda her Mum, y'know."), require a great deal more spiritual apprehension and perception. They are more purely intuitive ideas. And so the Book seems to be saying that it takes a significant level of real spiritual progress before one is ready to take them on with any deep seriousness.
One thing I know for sure - that was true in my own experience (not just with an "Oh, that happens to be how I saw it" true, but with a deep, penetrating, touching-the-archetype self-evidence) and which at least a couple of other people have confirmed was true for them also
- from the point of the K&C, one's whole orientation rearranges and the "object of worship" reorients. It is, of course, the Angel who is the centerpiece of that. But in broader terms, having reached Tiphereth, it is Binah or Gimel (much the same - nearly an identity -though outwardly seeming quite different) which is the heart of what lies before one. In practice, Nuit or Babalon ideas take the place that RHK ideas may have held before.The whole Work of the Adeptus Minor is in relation to the Path of Gimel. This is true in so many different ways. For example, the attainment of Tiphereth does not, in itself, bring the K&C - that's a separate step (hence the differentiation of the Adeptus Minor Within and Without in the A.'.A.'. system). Attainment of Tiphereth, figuratively speaking, prepares one as the grail, but one is a grail still needing, for its fulfilfilment, to have the shaft of the spear thrust into one's core. This is the Path of Gimel, the interpenetrating spear-shaft of Yechidah. It is in the Path of Gimel that the Adeptus Minor (already attained to Tiphereth) experiences Knowledge and Conversation - intimacy - with the HGA.
In pure analytical Qabalah we have a clue to this (but one I only figured out after the fact, in the course of "going"). The word "Gimel" encapsulates the Work of the Adeptus Minor which, in addition to the immediate step of the K&C, has the "task" of progressing by the Paths of Mem and Lamed, to Geburah or Adeptus Major. "Gimel" lays this out, because the word is spelled GML - Gimel itself, and the two Paths of Mem and Lamed!
Having been led by by a solar archetype so far as the Sphere of the Sun, one is then led by the archetypal idea akin to "goddess of infinite space" to the next threshold, grail symbols abounding.
Or something like that, eh?
Sorry for the short answer to such a simple question.
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Though there will be a fair bit of repetition here, I thought it might be of some worth to copy part of my diary entries on CCXX, Cap. III, v. 22. (This is from an early '90s diary - I was 5=6 at the time, and the diary holds some distinctive imprints of that degree. I was stuck at the particular level of seeing the Book as "gold." Still, I think it remains useful.)
22. The other images group around me to support me: let all be worshipped, for they shall cluster to exalt me. I am the visible object of worship; the others are secret; for the Beast & his Bride are they: and for the winners of the Ordeal x. What is this? Thou shalt know.
Ra-Hoor-Khuit is "the visible object of worship." This is a tremendously important sentence and concept in Thelemic religion. It has many concepts attached to it, including the following.:
(1) For the general populace - the public - our religion is to be consistently declared and enacted as a solar religion. This is the best and most suitable of blinds, for it is one that really communicates useful truth, summarizing the essential truthful doctrines of all faiths. But this is no longer a "rising and setting Sun" cult, but one centered upon the eternity of the Invisible Sun, the bright and beautiful Child of the Supernal Parents. The fact that there is a deeper mystery behind this - for example, that the Sun is but one example of a Star - may of course be apparent for those who know how to look. However, for the public, the Sun communicates the ideas much better.
(2) This same thing is true, in a different sense, to the Man of Earth among initiates. Tiphereth is really about the highest reality a nonadept can conceive, as an ideal, to lead him or her forward. The average initiate, trying to think of the Supernals, reaches no better than Tiphereth, at least in the usual case.
(3) RHK is the "stand in" for the Holy Guardian Angel, at least until the Adept replaces this projection with the real thing.
RHK is the visible object of worship. That is - perhaps because he manifests as a Khu - he reaches to the level of images, Yetzirah, and is capable of manifesting his Divine and Briatic aspects to that [Yetziratic] plane.
"the others are secret." The "others" require direct spiritual apprehension, an awakened Briatic (samadhic) consciousness that can receive their impressions.
I am not at all sure that "the others" are "the other images." They may be, or not. This gives two divergent but related lines of development.
(1) If the "other images' refer to images of Nuit and Hadit, then we here have a distinction between Nu and Had themselves vs. their images. The images may be accessible to all; but they, themselves, are secret, i.e., unknown, to the Man of Earth.
(2) More likely there is a different meaning. I take the first sentence to mean that any gods whatsoever, any objects of worship whatsoever, are to be grouped around RHK. On the physical plane, this is a format of worship. The meaning is that what RHK represents is the same thing that every other god - every "object of worship" - ultimately represents. They "support" Him and "cluster to exalt" Him, for every avenue of sincere worship is a pathway to that central idea which He represents. (Similarly, the worship of any deity may be a direct avenue of communion with the HGA, whom RHK represents.) These are to be grouped "around" RHK, i.e., at the circumference, while He is the center of them all, the heart and kernel of what they all represent. Nonetheless, "let all be worshipped" (emphasis added): at one extreme, an injunction to worship Nuit, the All, and all things soever through Her; at the other, leave and encouragement to worship any god one chooses, for the worship of any of them is, ultimately, the worship of RHK, or Ishvara, or Adonai - it's all the same.
The "others" - Nuit and Hadit - "are secret." They really are not even comprehensible to most folks. (There are, of course, lower octaves that the Yetziratic mind can grasp. Nuit, by Her image, as a form of the Great Mother, is certainly within reach of even the uninitiated. She can be seen as Mary &c. But this is not Her.) The worship of these "others" is reserved (by capacity, not by ordinance) to:
(a) the beast & his Bride (AC & Rose?or the 666 & 667 archetypes as real inner Officers of the Aeon?), and
(b) "the winners of the Ordeal x."What is "the Ordeal x"? The clue is in the initials "O x." This could mean many things; on many levels, the highest of which is an allusion to Aleph. Generally, though, it refers to Adepts. OX is a reference, at that level, to the Rosy Cross. This seems true, and also seems to be what AC had in mind when he issued Liber NV and Liber H A D for use of the Adeptus Minor and designated them, "for the Winners of Ordeal X." At a higher level, of course, i.e., X overlaid on O, same as the N.O.X. glyph] refers to the Magisteri, who are on a par with "the Beast & his Bride." Yes, I think this is it. "Beast & his Bride" refers to Chokmah- and Binah-consciousness in general, and "winners of the Ordeal x" to that of Tiphereth. Yod, Heh, and Vav. "God" sends angels to communicate to those who cannot look directly upon Her face. (I should not fail to mention that O and X themselves refer to Nuit and Hadit as the circumference and the center point. The "knowing" intended in the last sentence is the gnosis arising from samadhi, whence these phenomena are self-evident.)
[...]
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@Jim Eshelman said
"Liber Legis specifically tells us that Ra-Hoor-Khuit is the visible object of worship. This seems the very same thing as when A.C., three weeks earlier, was informed that he was to start a new solar cult. There is far, far more to Thelema than a solar cult but, to the outermost, that's the means given of putting it forth."
So he gave us Liber Resh and the Mass of the Phoenix.
Not that I have to worry about this for a long time, just curious... Do those who have attained the K&C, therefore, tend to drop their Liber Resh and mass (if they did it to begin with)?
Any recommendations for other means of worship? I began doing near nightly devotional readings, but of a general Thelemic nature, not necessarily dealing with Ra-Hoor-Khuit. What else do y'all do?
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@sasha said
"Not that I have to worry about this for a long time, just curious... Do those who have attained the K&C, therefore, tend to drop their Liber Resh and mass (if they did it to begin with)?"
I can't speak for everyone.
Speaking for myself, I know that, while I was a 5=6, I was actually more devoted to it than at any other stage. It was a very living thing to me in a way that it had never been before. After 5=6, it faded back to an irregular pattern for me, then resurrected itself in long and short stretches taking on slightly different forms and (more particularly) changing how I experienced it at different points in my own Work.
I know that Soror Meral persisted in Liber Resh and the Pentagram Ritual as a daily regimen for the entirety of her life. She believed it to be central to living Thelemic Cultus (as in Liber Aleph).
I know Grady reported witnessing Crowley perform Liber Resh regularly in the '40s.
So, at least your generic answer is: I guess not.
"Any recommendations for other means of worship? I began doing near nightly devotional readings, but of a general Thelemic nature, not necessarily dealing with Ra-Hoor-Khuit. What else do y'all do?"
Which "other"? Do you mean the worship of Nu and Had? If so, I don't think there's a better serious-level starting place than Liber Nu and Liber H A D.
For something more generic and Thelemic, you might look into my Thelemic Tephilah here:
aumha.org/arcana.htmWhat individuals do depends on the regimen to which they subscribe. A.'.A.'. members follow the instructions of their grade (which, in most cases, includes a lot of individual choices). Temple of Thelema members have a specific set of practices distinctive to each degree. And so forth.
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@Jim Eshelman said
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Which "other"? Do you mean the worship of Nu and Had?"No, I mean other methods for adoring Ra-Hoor-Khuit, besides Liber Resh.
And thanks for the link.
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There are a lot of approaches and, since RHK is a stand-in for the HGA, many of them take quite personal directions.
For a ritual approach, an annual performance, each spring equinox and at select other times, of the Invocation of Horus which Crowley performed at Vernal Equinox 1904 to launch the Aeon of Horus, is good.
In a nonritual way, the process of consciously discovering one's True Will, and then undertaking to do it, seems as worthy a worship of Horus as I can imagine.
Ritual VIII - the invocation of the HGA which serves as the official A.'.A.'. 5=6 initiation - seems to complete the trinity of Liber Nu and Liber H A D, serving as the RHK leg of the triangle. (These three instructions are the official tasks assigned to the three Paths leading to Chokmah, i.e., part of the formal work of the Magister Templi - but their first assignment is much lower on the Tree. I think they are placed to mark the approachway to 9=2 in the sense of establishing the Thelemic dispensation en route to assuming co-responsibility for the Word of the Aeon - that sort of stuff.) You can get a copy of Ritual VIII here: ordoaa.org/liber8.htm in HTML or ordoaa.org/pdf/l008.pdf in PDF.
Chapter III of Liber L. is pretty much a non-stop instruction in worshipping RHK. Memorization of that chapter would be a good starting point.
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bye the way, thanks for your answer jim. as always very good information on the subject.
agape418
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@Jim Eshelman said
"**22. The other images group around me to support me: let all be worshipped, for they shall cluster to exalt me. I am the visible object of worship; the others are secret; for the Beast & his Bride are they: and for the winners of the Ordeal x. What is this? Thou shalt know. **
...
I take the first sentence to mean that any gods whatsoever, any objects of worship whatsoever, are to be grouped around RHK.[...]"
Just a thought here;
Looking at the Sephiroth as centers of objective energies in the four-world system with the world of Yetzirah referring to spheres 4 through 9 with Tiphareth as its balance and center then spheres 4,5,7,8,9 are indeed clustered or grouped around Tiphareth (RHK). -
@Jim Eshelman said
"As Soror Meral often said (and I concur), RHK is given to us by Liber L. as a "stand-in" or generic image for the Holy Guardian Angel. As she never said in my hearing, but which is inherent in the first statement, that means that RHK is "the new Christ" - the external archetypal imagery given everybody as a generic until they have the reality for themselves. (It is simultaneously true that - stripped of particulars of form - he is the deepest truth the Book has to convey, because He also tells us that regardless of who or what we begin to worship, in the end it is He that we shall find at the center - again, a truth of the HGA.)
So we are given a generic solar, Tipheric, archetypal, deific image to serve for the HGA idea until we get "the real deal." "
This is very helpful, thanks Jim. It brings up another question though, which is often the case.
If RHK is this center, archtype and "stand in," then why isn't "he" used in the Kabbalisitic Cross at the heart center instead of using the personal name for Crowley's HGA? Aiwass is the "stand-in" for our HGA till we know the name, and RHK is the stand-in for the HGA in general. It seems like using RHK is better than using the personal name of AC's angel. Unless of course there are other reasons?
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@DavidH said
"If RHK is this center, archtype and "stand in," then why isn't "he" used in the Kabbalisitic Cross at the heart center instead of using the personal name for Crowley's HGA?"
I'm always utterly baffled that people take this as "Crowley's HGA" rather than "The specific Secret Chief whose roll it is to deliver Liber Legis to humanity."
"It seems like using RHK is better than using the personal name of AC's angel. Unless of course there are other reasons?"
I can't speak for Crowley's reasons. For me, interspersing an Egyptian (or, more accurately, Egyptoid) deity in the middle of the Hebrew Divine Names just feels grossly bizarre.
Beyond that, I'd circle back to the virtue of using Aiwass: He is the essence of 93 and 418 itself - He is the essence of Thelema and its communication to the human race as a whole.
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Understood. The reason for this confusion with Aiwass is because of writings on the internet, some by apparently knowledgable and well known Thelemites, who refer to Aiwass as Crowley's personal HGA. Now I know better.
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@DavidH said
"Understood. The reason for this confusion with Aiwass is because of writings on the internet, some by apparently knowledgable and well known Thelemites, who refer to Aiwass as Crowley's personal HGA. Now I know better.
"Well, he is Crowley's HGA. But that's not the only thing he is.
More to the point: Consider Crowley's unique suitability for his destiny because his "personal HGA" was/is "the specific Secret Chief whose roll it is to deliver Liber Legis to humanity."
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@Draco Magnus said
"I remember reading, or if not reading, then thinking, that this Ordeal x was a test that involved the opposite sex (in my case, a woman) who would tempt me away from the path (occult) and into a mundane and mediocre existence. That she was in fact, a sort of vampire. This could be purely my own invention, based on my experiences at the time."
Draco:
I understand where you are coming from with this viewpoint, but it is a slippery slope. It is important to give balanced focus to the material realm of existance while doing the work, and looking at your perspective wife as a vampire will only lead to a lonely life.
There is such a thing as the "Path of the Hearth Fire" where an aspirants path leads them into having a family so that they can learn from said family what they need to learn, and they continue their work during that time. Personally, I rejected academia for a long time thinking that magick would be all that I needed etc. As it turns out, my life is now steeped in academia, and it has helped my path and improved my being in numerous ways. Just keep in mind, that we grow because of our interactions with others. Thelema is a western tradition, we are not monks on top of a hill somewhere in the east, our paths are tougher than that PS- I apologize if this sounds preachey, thats a fault of mine.
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Thank you TripleFlower. You bring up many good and valid points. I generally agree with you.
One of the reasons I originally asked the question, was to broaden my view on the possibilities of what that ordeal could mean, and does mean to others so that my own ideas expand in new ways.
No need to apologize, either. I sense you're meaning to be helpful, not malevolent.
Out of curiosity, what does ordeal X mean to you?
93, 93/93
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93
""I am the visible object of worship; the others are secret; for the Beast & his Bride are they: and for the winners of the Ordeal x. What is this? Thou shalt know." Liber al vel Legis 3:21-22 "
With TripleFlower's assistance, I'm going to revisit the quote with a new idea.
The "secret others" are not the Beast & his Bride, but FOR the Beast & his Bride. Together, they can unlock, or better, communicate with the secret objects of worship (which at this stage I take to mean Hadit and Nuit). Could it be referring to tantric sex, or sexual magick?
Perhaps when they are in communion with one another, one can, even temporarily, attain the exalted offices of the Beast and Bride?
93, 93/93
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@Draco Magnus said
"The "secret others" are not the Beast & his Bride, but FOR the Beast & his Bride."
Yes, that's what it's said and what I've always held. I take the "others" to be Nuit and Hadit. (Did I write this at the top of the thread? Have to go back and look. Yes, here it is, excerpted from above:)
"The "others" - Nuit and Hadit - "are secret." They really are not even comprehensible to most folks. (There are, of course, lower octaves that the Yetziratic mind can grasp. Nuit, by Her image, as a form of the Great Mother, is certainly within reach of even the uninitiated. She can be seen as Mary &c. But this is not Her.) The worship of these "others" is reserved (by capacity, not by ordinance) to:
(a) the beast & his Bride (AC & Rose? or [more likely] the 666 & 667 archetypes as real inner Officers of the Aeon?), and
(b) "the winners of the Ordeal x."What is "the Ordeal x"? The clue is in the initials "O x." This could mean many things; on many levels [...]. Generally, though, it refers to Adepts. OX is a reference, at that level, to the Rosy Cross. This seems true, and also seems to be what AC had in mind when he issued Liber NV and Liber H A D for use of the Adeptus Minor and designated them, "for the Winners of Ordeal X." At a higher level, of course, [the Mark of the Beast circle-cross, i.e., X overlaid on O, same as the N.O.X. glyph] refers to the Magisteri, who are on a par with "the Beast & his Bride." Yes, I think this is it. "Beast & his Bride" refers to Chokmah- and Binah-consciousness in general, and "winners of the Ordeal x" to that of Tiphereth. Yod, Heh, and Vav. "God" sends angels to communicate to those who cannot look directly upon Her face."