The Gods of Men.
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Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
I am almost as new to Thelema as I am new to this forum.
I would be very grateful to the person who could explain to me the exact thelemic position in regard of traditional religions.
Being from a very orthodox jewish surrounding, and having, before I considered becoming a Thelemite, had a great interest for hinduist tantrism, I would like to know what is exactly the "triple curse" pronounced towards Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Confucianism and Judaism, and what it implies practically for Thelemites.
Love is the law, love under will. -
@Ash said
"I would like to know what is exactly the "triple curse" pronounced towards Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Confucianism and Judaism, and what it implies practically for Thelemites"
I assume you're referring to the following:
"50. Curse them! Curse them! Curse them!
- With my Hawk's head I peck at the eyes of Jesus as he hangs upon the cross.
- I flap my wings in the face of Mohammed & blind him.
- With my claws I tear out the flesh of the Indian and the Buddhist, Mongol and Din.
--AL, III, 51-54"
I think it best to let The Master speak for himself.
"We are to consider carefully the particular attack of Heru-Ra-Ha against each of these "gods" or prophets; for though they be, or represent, the Magi of the past, the curse of their Grade must consume them.
Thus it is the eyes of "Jesus"--his point of view--that must be destroyed; and this point of view is wrong because of his magical gesture of self-sacrifice.
...
Mohammed' point of view is wrong too; but he needs no such sharp correction as "Jesus." It is his face--his outward semblance--that is to be covered with His wings. The tenets of Islam, correctly interpreted, are not far from our way of life and light and love and liberty.
...
"The Indian." The religion of Hindustan, metaphysically and mystically comprehensive enough to assure itself the possession of much truth, is in practice almost as superstitious and false as Christianity, a faith of slaves liars, and dastards. The same remarks apply roughly to Buddhism.
"Mongol": Presumably the reference is to Confucianism, whose metaphysical and ethical flawlessness has not saved its adherents from losing those ruder virtues which are proper to a fighting animal, and thus yielding at last a civilization coeval with history itself to the barbarous tribes of Europe.
"Din" -- "severity" or "Judgment" may refer to the Jewish Law, rather than to the faith of Islam. Assuming this, the six religions whose flesh must be torn out cover the whole globe outside of Islam and Christianity.
Why assault their flesh rather than their eyes, as in the other cases? Because the metaphysics, or point of view, is correct--I take Judaism as Qabalistic--but the practice imperfect.
--Aleister Crowley, New Comment to the Book of the Law
from The Law if for All edited by Israel Regardie."I think this is nothing more than saying that Thelema, being the "new dispensation", is the next evolutionary step, Truth 2.0, as-it-were. In another place he said that the older formulae are still valid, it's just that Thelema is more efficient.
Hope this helps.
Dan
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@ar said
" In another place he said that the older formulae are still valid, it's just that Thelema is more efficient."
I personnaly don't think we can say that THOSE older formulae are still valid.
The atemporal Divine Law is Thelema; it is the Law from which every Doctrine whatever comes, by adaptation, just like Magick is the perpetual origin of every kind of religion.
As soon as a "formulae" has lost touch with Thelema, it becomes a dead creed which, having no link with Truth anymore, becomes, in the strictest sense, a superstition, even if it has still a great number of followers to cling to it.
It is easily observable that those six religions are now empty, and concerned only with ritual habits and temporal matters.
Christianity is, basically, an anti-religion, at least since Paul made it a proselytic way to take the political control of Rome. But even someone like Augustin of Hippone knew what he was saying when he claimed that the Law of God was "love, and do what you will"! (In fact, before becoming a Christian, he was an initiate to the ancient Mysteries, so...). Anyway, as every dogmatic stuff, Christianity is born-dead spiritualy speaking. -
Sunnite Islam is, as the Prophet puts it, totally absurd. But, throughout history, some real mystical and magical attainment are observed within its bonds- Now, it is quite clear that there remains no spirituality anymore, but only a crispation on artificial customs, like burka, ramadan and abstinence from pork meat. And this is the infaillible symptom of death for a religious current.
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What kind of spirituality is there in India today? They are the most mercenary of all! "selling Vedas away", like old texts about kali-yuga used to prophetise it. But, besides greedy gurus, a figure like that of Gandhi is a certificate of death for any kind of religion!
The historical influence of Buddhism has been catastrophic, but, like in the case of Christians, nobody -except Japanese- dare saying that, because it is a "mercyful" creed. Anybody who has made a journey to China knows what kind of spirituality remains in Buddhists!..
Confucius has put a great deal of Thelema in his considerations upon the place of man in the social state. But Confucianism is now rigidity only, ie symptom of death - It has given way to Mao, with its mania of endless commentaries on platitudes, and to the modern more-than-greedy Chinese way of life.
Judaism don't have any kind of spirituality nor wisdom anymore, and is only concentrated on political aspirations, with such an agressiveness that the famous "Protocols" sound cool in comparison. That was the problem of Paul too, in the old days, and so, we have perfected the circle and got back to Christianity, etc. -
@Ash said
"I would be very grateful to the person who could explain to me the exact thelemic position in regard of traditional religions."
I sat back and watched this a while to see what would come up because I expected quite a variety of opinions! There is quite a range of point of view on this.
I would summarize the Thelemic view on this matter as follows:
There are two broad statements that can be made and they seem to contradict each other.
The first is that Thelema itself supercedes all (local, temporal) religions that came before it because it provides a new perspective which synthesizes that which is true in all the earlier ones.
At the same time, it is fundamental to the core principles of Thelema to honor each person's individual religious reality. Though it doesn't get brought up or mentioned very much, this does force us to honor someone's practice of other religions by their choice, regardless of what we might think about the older religions themselves.
Some people think the Thelemic dispensation boils down to "throw out the old books." I think, instead, it is "Dramatic New Revised Edition, Same Old Book." Most of the truths most important to Thelema are present in earlier religions; but some are not.
In Chapter 3 of Liber L., Ra-Hoor-Khuit is credited with saying that all "the others" - any god at all that you want to worship - are to be put (figuratively or literally) "about" Him, and that to worship them is to worship Him. And this brings us to my main point about the verses that got mentioned:
If you are particularly referring to the section of Liber Legis Chapter 3 that begins around verse 49, here is the main point to get: Though the specific image-form-idea of Ra-Hoor-Khuit is given voice by the Book, what is really speaking is a spiritual idea beyond any particular, individual God (even Horus for that matter). Therefore, a series of verses appear which have that God-idea assaulting the outer forms of earlier religions. The main point to get from this isn't so much "Thelema trumps other religions" (though, personally I think it does
) but, rather, "Inner Core Spiritual Reality trumps all outer forms."That's my main statement - but I have a few other diary records that are sure to stir some commotion, so I'll throw them into the pot.... beginning in the next post.
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**49. I am in a secret fourfold word, the blasphemy against all gods of men. **
Now, the thing that really pisses off a lot of the "we get to eradicate earlier Abramic religions here" Thelemites is that, in this particular verse, Ra-Hoor-Khuit is identifying himself with that "secret fourfold word," unpronounceable and inconceivable, which is at the heart of the Qabalah: Y.H.V.H.This shouldn't really be a surprise. Y.H.V.H. throughout the Old Testament was, among other things, a warrior god who devoured blood and demanded the first kill of each line. (I know that's not the whole story. I'm just giving the points that usually get less attention usually, and which are salient to my discussion.) In fact, those who think that Liber L. is harsh, bloody, and violent should go back and read the Torah (that other "Book of the Law") more attentively and see that Y.H.V.H. was way more extreme!
In the present verse, RHK identifies with that same idea, the inner seed of "the Inmost God whose Name is unspoken" within each of us. This is what Y.H.V.H., as the oldest Divine Name of Tiphereth, means to the initiated Qabalist.
There are, of course, other interpretations of the above verse. In the World of Assiah, physicists have identied four fundamental forces which are the powers of Horus as the Atom or Atma.
But I believe the meaning here is simply Y.H.V.H. - no more, no less. Any other attributions are but particularizations of this Master Key.
Tetragrammaton is the formulation of the entire Tree of Life - and one thing that RHK certainly is is the embodiment of the entire Tree in exactly the same sense as Adam Qadmon, the Solar Humanity.
And this Y.H.V.H. is, of course, not that "Jehovah" whos is but one of the "gods of men" against whom RHK or HRH is a "blasphemy;" for in His light - the L.V.X. of the Holy Guardian Angel - all people see that they themselves, are God.
RHK is that "Unity uttermost showed" before whom all lesser gods, and even death, tremble. By RHK we mean that Ineffable ONE, indescribable and beyond all conditipon, of which all human-conceived deities are, at best, its veils.
It is that which is represented in Malkuth as the forces of Nature, in Yesod by the Phallus, and in Tiphereth as the Sun; but in Kether, it is beyond Knowledge, and exists only as itself, without veil.
...And, just to throw another angle at the whole thing before clicking Submit...
I should mention that this entire Book is a dictation by Crowley's Holy Guardian Angel who appeared in the Name Aiwass - in Hebrew, OYVZ, A'ayin Yod Vav Zayin. This Name - belonging to the one actually speaking to Crowley - is itself a tetragrammaton. For the most part, the mysteries of this Name were Crowley's alone to pursue, but I can surely be forgiven my curiosity, eh? As a personal message to him, could it be taht the "secret fourfold word" which is "the blasphemy against all gods of men" was
A'ayin - The Devil,
Yod - the Secret Seed or Atman, which is also
Vav - the inner Revealer of the Mysteries, and
Zayin - appears outwardly as a Twin God of the Sword, Children of the Sunand whose name enumerates to 93 or 418 (depending on the alphabet)?
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**50. Curse them! Curse them! Curse them! **
This threefoldcurse is apparently against the "gods of men," i.e., the outer shells of Divinity.
I don't think there is anything too esoteric in this language. Aiwass is merely damning "all gods of men," the relatively outer images of spiritual Truth. Ultimately, the worship of such gods is idolatry. (Remember, Aiwass is viewing all of this from "the holier place" - verse 48 immediately preceding this section. He is dismissive of the outer as he puts all attention on the inner.)
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"Gnarled Oak of God! In thy branches is the lightning nested! Above thee hangs the Eyeless Hawk."
I always saw the symbolism of this verse a being primarily sexual. The 'Gnarled Oak' is quite masculine and the 'Eyeless Hawk' feminine. Thus this verse would be the classic 'Woman on Top' thing.
Maybe there's something I'm missing?
Dan
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@nirbiraja said
"The contextual initiatory, Tantric and Dominus Liminis' implication of devotion to Order is the initiate is the God F.I.A.T. and a Magus with hir Rood creating and planting Seed in Terra how one Will.
The Union and sex act, the drama if you will, of the Genitor-Genitrix is first union of its strata within the microcosm and then the union with the macrocosm."
Well, that cleared *that *up.
Dan
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@nirbiraja said
"Your treatment of YHVH as a Solar Nucleus is true in practice but does nothing to make clear the nature of the planes separately, in the Four QBL Worlds."
"True in practice" is good enough and I had no goal to do the rest. That wasn't even in the original question, eh?
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@nirbiraja said
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@Jim Eshelman said
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@nirbiraja said
"Your treatment of YHVH as a Solar Nucleus is true in practice but does nothing to make clear the nature of the planes separately, in the Four QBL Worlds.""True in practice" is good enough and I had no goal to do the rest. That wasn't even in the original question, eh?"
What is it with you and your attachment to CONTAINMENT? It's restrictive.
Pearls before swine sort of thing, is it? Or something else?
Get a job, Jim."
Got one. (Got several.)
Deal with people at the level at which they live. Teach people at a level consistent with their current consciousness.
Until they've purified the personality level, that's the level where you have to approach them. Then, until they've attained the K&C, any talk of the Abyss beyond basic theoretical grounding is just going to fuck them up.
And Theoricus is the one old grade title that wasn't retained when the A.'.A.'. system was created.
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I started to answer this respectfully and deleted the answer. Then I started to answer it disrespectfully and deleted that, too.
Then I realized there's really no reason to keep getting dragged into the sewage stream of your posts. I really have better things to do than go around flushing behind you. I probably will not do that anymore.
It does seem bizarre to me that you would post on a forum subtitled "A Mystery School of the New Aeon" when your basic view is that Mystery Schools are a worthless idea. This surely suggests that, at least, you aren't here to help things along.
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Hi N, the two skulls laughing guy,
The fact that you are teaching children in a school is scary.
Jim actually is very patient. You are too hard to dialogue with. There is a desperation in your writings, a need to be understood and validated. The whole thing about Thelema is finding your own true will, so each person is unique. No one is put into a box and shunned. You, however, seem to think that the whole thing about Thelema is being "right" about what Thelema means.
You will never get the understanding you want, unless you are willing to admit that you don't have a clue to what anything entails. You are just as clueless as we all are, except some of us aren't afraid about what that means, as you are.
The point of life is just to live it. The how of living is up to, and the responsibility of, each individual. That means you don't necessarily listen to anybody else, unless it suits you. That means we don't necessarily listen to YOU, unless it suits us. Also, we don't have the need to be validated by the attention of others, as you seem to.
Believe what you want about anything. Please do not attempt to force us to believe as you do - as if we can figure out at all, what you mean, by what you say. Your attention getting behaviour is very adolescent in nature. It reminds me of when a boy likes a girl, and goes up and hits her, for her to notice him.
In L.V.X.,
chrys333 -
Hmmm.
It's 5:07 in Denver. We're both up late,or early.
How am I emotionally manipulating you?
This is interesting.
In L.V.X.,
chrys333 -
"The way I approach my students is a far cry different than dealing with dastardly fellows who think they're clever enough to propagate Thelema as Christianity and get away with it indefinitely. "
Dastardly. Thelema as Christianity. Getting away with it.
?????
Huh? Actually, I am not a Thelemite, but I sure don't get what you are saying.
Want to explain?
In L.V.X.,
chrys333 -
You are afraid of relating to others as a human being? If you can't preach, you can't talk?
Leaving the discussion to kinder others than I.
In L.V.X.,
chrys333