Thelemic pantheon and myth
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I'm currently reading Jung's 1950 book <i>Aion</i> which, in rather dense prose, explores the Christ figure as an archetype of the Self: the whole and realised being or Beingness that, for Qabalists, emerges in the experience of Tiphereth. Jung being essentially a gnostic, he has some fascinating ideas on the dark side of God to expound here.
What strikes me is that the Thelemic deities, unlike those of any other faith, have no myths. Myths create a doorway for us as a means of entering into the truths they embody. That is, there's a story with which we can identify, and which thus enables us to establish our own contact with the deity or deities.
We can invoke them, either by simply reading Liber L or by more elaborate ritual means, but we don't have a more straightforward means of accessing their energies. In the end, I imagine, we end up living out the myths simply by attuning ourselves over long periods to Ra-Hoor-Khuit, Nuit, et al, but this seems an emotionally cold process until the realisations have truly kicked in.
If there's a story, as there is with a myth, then there is a point of identification for us. The Thelemic gods, though, are just there - take 'em or leave 'em. The related Egyptian myths (Horus beating Set, or the tales about Nut/Nuit) are usually discounted as only partly applying to the characters in Liber L.
Anyone have any thoughts on this?In L.V.X.,
Edward -
93 Edward,
I'll bet you're just shocked that I chose to respond to this particular post.
Consider a broader (or maybe more vague?) definition of "myth". For example, we have a fairly well developed "mythology" about the aspirant's process up the Tree of Life. It's a virtual retelling of the basic Hero's Journey (Parsifal et al). We have the "mythology" of the reception of Liber AL itself, echoing many other stories about the reception of holy books. We have "stories" about the interaction of gods and humans, spelled out in places such as Nuit's speech behind the veil in the Mass, to name one prominent example.
Ancient myths (as we now call them) were originally perceived not as fables, but as realities. The gods were real beings, actually guiding and interacting with humanity. A thousand years from now, someone will be looking back at us and will clearly see our "myths". I argue that our present task in myth-hunting in Thelemic culture is to look at those processes we take as very REAL (e.g. the psycho-spiritual realities embedded in our understanding of the Tree, the HGA, etc.) and stand back far enough to see the stories taking shape.
Besides all the above, I also would argue that many of the classical myths, such as those of the Egyptian deities with whom we work, are quite effective in stimulating engagement with the mysteries.
93 93/93
David
@Edward Mason said
"I'm currently reading Jung's 1950 book <i>Aion</i> which, in rather dense prose, explores the Christ figure as an archetype of the Self: the whole and realised being or Beingness that, for Qabalists, emerges in the experience of Tiphereth. Jung being essentially a gnostic, he has some fascinating ideas on the dark side of God to expound here.
What strikes me is that the Thelemic deities, unlike those of any other faith, have no myths. Myths create a doorway for us as a means of entering into the truths they embody. That is, there's a story with which we can identify, and which thus enables us to establish our own contact with the deity or deities.
We can invoke them, either by simply reading Liber L or by more elaborate ritual means, but we don't have a more straightforward means of accessing their energies. In the end, I imagine, we end up living out the myths simply by attuning ourselves over long periods to Ra-Hoor-Khuit, Nuit, et al, but this seems an emotionally cold process until the realisations have truly kicked in.
If there's a story, as there is with a myth, then there is a point of identification for us. The Thelemic gods, though, are just there - take 'em or leave 'em. The related Egyptian myths (Horus beating Set, or the tales about Nut/Nuit) are usually discounted as only partly applying to the characters in Liber L.
Anyone have any thoughts on this?In L.V.X.,
Edward" -
David, 93,
Yes, I am shocked beyond words that your replied here.
I can't quite accept what you say, though. I agree that some aspects of Thelemic history are already mythic: the reception of Liber Al, Crowley's crossing of the Abyss in North Africa, etc. But your last paragraph, where you mention using existing pagan myths, underlines my own point, I feel. We don't have the narratives out of our own tradition that, by their very nature evoke the elements of the mystery in the pagan traditions.
I'm pursuing this thread partly because I can't quite nail down exactly what I am asking. Maybe it relates to the aloneness in the hero myth? If there's well-told tale that is essentially internalised because it is an integral part of our culture, it has the power to move us emotionally and spiritually simply by its nature. Without all the symbols and characters, without the well-honed narrative structure, it seems cold.
Let me give you an example. This being Remembrance (Memorial) weekend, the titanic struggles of the the World Wars are being re-told. The good guys beat the bad guys (I assume the Germans and Japanese tell it differently..) after a long and terrible war (twice). Except for a few specialist historians, people cannot even contemplate those wars without them being cast in mythic garb. Mr. Spielberg has done very well from grasping this. People need to see those wars as mythic, or the vast numebr of dead become just a meaningless, ghastly statistic.
Working up the Tree, though, is a lonelier ordeal, even if the death-rate is lower. I imagine the Abyss as being utter loneliness, with even the comfort of the 'reality' of yourself being eliminated as the ordeal proceeds.
Myth gives the comfort of at least the illusion of shape to events, and a way of getting closer to the core of the tale. For the Wars, it was the overall cause, and your buddies/shipmates who fought and suffered with you that were mythologized. Ascending the Tree seems a starker, more solitary journey, with only the Infinite (Nuit) and the Absolute (Hadit) as companions. Try as I will, I can sometimes see the <i>effects</i> of Ra-Hoor-Khuit, but cannot consciously place him in my own life-tale.
Something is missing for me, and I don't think I'm the only person who finds this to be the case.93 93/93,
In L.V.X.,
Edward -
93,
Let me pick up on one particular aspect of your post--the "solitude" of the Hero's quest, or the ascent of the Tree.
I think you may be overlooking the inherently social and "evolutionary" quality of the seemingly solitary Hero. Sure, he goes on the Quest by himself. But then he returns to ** better** society with the fruits of his efforts, e.g. the "gold" he has retrieved from the faraway land, etc.. I see it as the story of human growth and evolution, pure and simple.
Furthermore, we are IMO creating a mythic environment in our group magical work, in which we strive together to undertake the Hero's quest. We have symbols (and specific myths) relating to trials, dangers, allies in the quest, maps of the "journey", and so on.
None of this is intended to invalidate your own subjective experience of the "coldness" of apparent myth-lessness. I guess I just feel it differently.
93 93/93
David
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David, 93,
There are some aspects of my own quest to be looked at here, which I'm not sure I want to examine in a public forum. But thanks for opening up the 'social' issue.
One other thing occurs to me. In the fifth chapter of <i>Aion</i>, Jung starts examining the shadow-side of the Old Testament God - his righteous wrath and even his simple explosions of anger. He quotes some Jewish prayers calling on Yahweh-God to invoke his Chesedic side to appease his own Geburic one. I'm paraphrasing a complex argument here, but Jung points out how this dichotomy was suppressed in the Christian era. Without using the term, he implies Yahweh had a neurosis.
Looking at Cap III of Liber L, I was struck by the fact that what would normally be shadow material in most people - lust, violence, ruthlessness - is in fact explicit and declared. Ra-Hoor-Khuit's shadow, therefore is absolutely the opposite of what is 'normally' shadow material. The easy answer here is that Hoor-Paar-Kraat - sacred Silence - is the shadow. But I wonder, is there a more complex answer than that? Is that maybe the real message of this chapter, or one of them?
93 93/93,
Edward
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93,
Interesting points.
It seems to me that if we consider the full set of "deities" in the Thelemic pantheon, as described (or maybe "embodied?) in Liber AL, we get quite a range of psychological material to work with. That is, (obviously oversimplifying here) we get Nuit's gentle lovingness, Hadit's brisk assertiveness, and RHK's fiery passion. Taking just these as an example, we've got pretty much a full spectrum of behavior accounted for. In other words, I think there's plenty of Ego-side as well as Shadow-side material here! It just depends on the individual. One person might have suppressed their RHK-like qualities, and thus their Shadow is more like "him". Another might have disowned or ignored a softer, nurturing side, and thus their Shadow is more like Nuit. I agree with you that HPK embodies plenty of "opposite of RHK" qualities as well.
93 93/93
David -
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
Edward, it sounds to me like you are missing the fine traditional art of story telling, the tool of shamans and preachers for engaging circles and congregations in their traditions.
Liber Legis, I think, presents the deities almost entirely at the Briatic level. It uses words, of course (being a book), but is painting concepts and images that actuate the archetypal (Briatic) level. (That's the main reason so much of it seems obscure - it doesn't speak to reason for the most part.)
Story telling is Yetziratic. It's virtue, then, is much the same as a theurgic image of a god - to provide a medium for housing or approaching the deities at the more human-contact point. In that sense, it is really a ritual of worship and, in fact, in more primitive cultures, often actually served as the ritual of worship - the shaman sitting around the camp fire telling the story before everybody got loaded on good weed and had whatever inner, inarticulate experience they could have.
Extrapolating from that on the basis of principle leads me to the following thoughts:
(1) The old ways of worship were appropriate when awakening to a medium and higher Yetziratic state was the developmental goal.
(2) Thelema is targetted at a world with a baseline of Ruach awakening, needing only a touch of lower Yetziratic REawakening, is primarily hitting to stimulate a Briatic awakening.
(3) This doesn't mean that the old tool of story telling (myth weaving in the popular - not technical - meaning of "myth") isn't valuable. Most of the time we approach this in rituals that we write (and I most pointedly am thinking, at the moment, of the legend composition and story weaving AK and I have done in the last year with the A.L. series of rituals, and especially the III°).
But it doesn't entirely surprise me that the Thelemic scriptures don't touch that level much.
PS - On this Yetzirah/Ruach level, an interesting (to me) add-on thought. Though not the "myths of our gods" sort of thing, I've long been taken with the fact that Chapter II of Liber LXV is mostly a string of parables that are perhaps the closest thing in our source literature to traditional "story telling as teaching." What just struck me as particularly interesting - in context of the above remarks - is that it is the Air chapter - touching Yesod and Ruach themes.
OK, doorbell just rang and I've got to get out the door for lodge.
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93 Edward,
Interesting post and replies... here're my thoughts from a slightly different angle:
Not all religions have a strong mythological component. Taoism and Islam, for example, are to a certain extent actually rejecting of mythologies in favor of a path of understanding God or the Universe directly without the intermediaries of Yetziratic process. Taoism consists mainly in the conception of the yin and the yang, which emerged from the original nothingness, and of the tao, or path, one takes to understanding their dance. This is very like the Thelemic/Kabbalistic ideas of Binah and Chokmah above the abyss and the initiate's journey thereto. At the folk level, there are conceptions of Taoist "dieties" with their various stories, but they are not the center of the religion; most accounts I have read imply that these are provided for the comfort and satisfaction of the common people... Most of what I have read of Crowley and his work indicates that he aimed most of his attention toward the few who were willing and able to pursue the Work; he was not much concerned with whether or not the bulk of the people could find a friendly interface with Thelema. I see Thelema as an inherently elitist religion; not in an exclusionary way like a country club, but in a meritocracy fashion like a martial arts school or a research university.
Islam strongly rejects the application of any attributes or characteristics to God whatsoever, arguing that he/she/it is above and beyond any such descriptives.... it is a beautiful, pure, but stark conception of God... reminding me of a Japanese Zen rock garden in its austerity. Islam also rejects the idea that God could have a "son" or family of any sort. The "99 names of God" in Islamic tradition are to a large extent pairs of opposites which communicate that God encompasses and transcends all dualities and describable properties. Islam does have a more human series of stories, similar to myth, concerning the Prophet and his companions and family, but this is similar to our stories of Crowley and this adventures.
Crowley strongly admired both the Taoist and Islamic traditions and it may not be coincidental that Thelema also deals more directly with the "pure" or less mythological conceptions of God.
Another thought is that it fits, according to my understanding of Thelema and its philosophies, that as little as possible is spelled out for the initiate, so as not to interfere with each finding his/her own Will, or path. The construction of mythologies to assist the seeker in interfacting with the Divine might both ease and distort the journey of the Seeker. Ideas related to this might be the reason for the prohibition in the Comment against discussing the contents of the Book.
93 93/93
Anna -
93,
Thanks all for the responses. I agree, Anna, with your specific definition of Thelema as elitist, while noting that, as JAE points out, Aspirants to Light has in fact adapted a very old myth in order to help newcomers identify with the primarily Briatic concepts presented in Liber L.
I think there is a natural tendency, regardless of our current state of evolution, to create story/myth around our insights, realisations or beliefs. It's a necessary means (in my view) of rooting them in everyday experience: a kind of confirmation of the deeper experiences we have by having a quick 'n easy reference point. There are times when I've felt very much in touch with the Thelemic sources in the sense a Taoist is in the Tao, or a sincere Muslim feels open-hearted submission to Allah. Then there are all those other days when there is decidedly, 'division hither homeward.'
Jim, I've not looked at Cap II of Liver LXV in that light before, but it seems an interesting notion to pursue. I think I've always found it a bit odd precisely <i>because</i> it does have stories, unlike so much of the other invocatory or declamatory poetry of the Holy Books.
David, you addressed my comments on Hoor-Paar-Kraat being Ra-Hoor-Khuit's shadow. Given that bringing shadow material to light is still, for all of us, a major part of the Work, I still wonder if there is in fact an elementary basis for a 'legitimate' (valid, useful, helpful) myth in this? Maybe I'm caught up in this topic because I've long found Hoor-Paar-Kraat a self-evident spiritual necessity, while Ra-Hoor-Khuit is a far tougher nut to crack. For me, there is still a division hither homeward in this, and until I can get the 'story' right, the various solutions I've worked on don't seem to resolve into simplicity.
93 93/93,
Edward -
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JAE, 93,
That is awesome in the true sense of the term, not the modern vernacular. Anubis as Jesus .. inspired! "Is a God to live in a dog?" Well yes, actually.
Perhaps you'd have found a backer if you'd pitched it as a musical, and gone after the family audience-segment...? You know, with a big production number featuring a singing-dancing chorus of the 42 Judges ("Judgement is the greatest art/Practised in the Hall of Ma'at/Here your soul comes to the crunch/Can you cheat Sebek of lunch?").
There's a lack of strong female roles in the second and third parts, though. That might be historically accurate, but commercially limiting.
Whatever - I am impressed.
93 93/93,
Edward
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Thanks
BTW, I forgot to mention that Isis plays a critical role in the third part.
"Anubis as Jesus" wasn't original, BTW - I forget the details (and don't have my library at hand at the moment) but Budge documented a legend relationship - probably in the Anubis chapter of Gods. (It's similar to the Mercury = Jesus theme that AC commonly cited, which is only partly the result of both being said to be The Word.) I just ran with it.
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Fascinating thread!
I don't know how many of the folks here have read through Ben Rowe's highly mythological Book of Seniors, found here:
www.hermetic.com/browe/index.htmlbut I've found it to create a very satisfying "story" out of many of the general ideas of Thelemic Aeon progression, Crowley's incarnations, Horus vs Set, etc. (Rowe was enamored with Achad's reversal of the Tree, though, which can make some of it harder to assimilate.)
@Edward Mason said
"Jim, I've not looked at Cap II of Liver LXV in that light before, but it seems an interesting notion to pursue. I think I've always found it a bit odd precisely <i>because</i> it does have stories, unlike so much of the other invocatory or declamatory poetry of the Holy Books. "
In a not-totally-unexpected bit of synchronicity, last night I was rereading LXV for the first time in over a year. I was struck by the rapid-fire nature of the parables which approach the top-level subject matter (K&C of HGA, I assume) in a wide range of ways. In a way, it was saying: "Okay, here's what it's like. You don't see that? Okay, here's what it's like. No? Okay, how about this?" And so on. Sometimes so densely compressed that the stories overlap, but always illuminating (or endarkening?)
Steve
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Actually, just reading it was very helpful conceptually. I have a question though. What is Anubis' relationship to Jesus? Would I be correct in assuming it has something to do with managing guilt and shame?
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All of the Mercury gods have a strong relationship to Jesus. Partly this is "The Word" thing. Especially (particularly in Medieval times) it is the psychopomp element. There are child-myth overlaps. And, of course, the name "Jesus" (ΙΗΣΟΥΣ) enumerates to 888.
Glad you enjoyed it. That's about as close to a real audience as the story will ever get LOL! (And I actually like the story arc quite a lot.)
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If I may add a twist to the above story:
We know Nephythys was attracted to Osiris and that Isis and Nephythys were twins. What if Osiris' slept with Nephythys unintentionally and fathered Anubis? Osiris is a Christ-figure insofar as he is the First Mummy to go into the Underworld and become vindicated and resurrected - completing the solar cycle. The wrapping of the body, the Opening of the Mouth ceremony, the 42 Negative Confessions, the truth signified by one being ma kheru ("true of voice") and final vindication of the soul attests to the innocence of the First Mummy.
The implication being that if everyone knew the full truth of our actions, we would not make the mistakes that we did while alive - the 42 Negative Confessions being nothing less than a disavowal of EVERYTHING.
That means Set was justified in dismembering and castrating Osiris AND Osiris was innocent at the same time.
Everybody wins (the sun appears over the horizon and new day begins).
Roll credits...
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Crucial to the story I was telling is that the Isis-Osiris love story is innocent, pure, and never compromised; also, that Set's rage is unfounded and triggers immeasuable remorse. Therefore, I reject your rewrite (unless, of course, you're offering money for the production, in which case you can cast Ronald McDonald as Isis
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AAHAHAHAHA... sell-out... {vbg}
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[Edit]
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OK, I'm going to delete my story description above. I see no reason to subject it (or me) to your repeated insults, demeaning, and general bullshit.
Perhaps you didn't realize that this was serious artistic work product. You're welcome to dislike it, but you are not welcome to fuck with it. Especially don't fuck with it by dismantling the essential elements and replacing them with your own naive or dishonest ideas about things. You're welcome to create your own art, but not to stand around pissing on mine.