Incarnation=Spiritual Suicide?
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@Lapis said
"There is perceivably only one way in which the average man might resign from his occupation as a human - suicide...a voluntary leave from experiential reality."
That is true only if it is the human (personality) aspect of consciousness making the decision. The real spiritual essence of a person is much deeper than that - and, to most people, entirely unconscious. That part does make the decisions about duration of incarnation.
"Taking this into account, how is one to view the circumstances surrounding the incarnation of a soul upon the material plane? Because it is a voluntary endeavor to leave the form of reality one is experiencing prior to incarnation is it analogous to suicide upon the material plane?"
I don't think so, no. - Perhaps the best way to look at is is that it's an act of creation. In (excessively) brief terms: Atziluth "emanates" the other planes of existence. Physical matter is the densest charted level of that formulation. Creative spiritual forces have been evolving seemingly inanimate molecules into more complexforms over millions of years to where there is now a way to create bodies, which in turn have become progressively capable of housing higher and higher frequencies of consciousness. But, in each incarnation, it has to build up that capacity for incarnation more or less from scratch (from the point of conception onward).
Besides (returning more squarely to your question), the part that makes the decision to incarnate doesn't "leave" anything, and doesn't become ignorant of anything. One doesn't have to leave one's house to put on a sock - and that's what incarnating is, the gradual insertion of more and more of oneself into a new garment. The part that's made it into the garment is the only ignorant part - and it's almost a fiction compared to the being who has the foot.
"In Thelema, death is viewed as a sort of graduation."
I'm not sure that's the case. I'd have said, "The next experience." But, then, so is birth. Read such documents as De Lege Libellum for views on this serpentine wandering in and out of incarnation.
One of my favorite quotes is that we are not material beings with occasional spiritual experiences. Rather, we are spiritual beings with occasional material experiences.
"What about a Willed death?...would that not be more analogous to voluntary incarnation?...the voluntary leaving from one plane of existence to enter another?"
aI agree with you copletely... As long as you don't make the mistake of confusing the human personality and it's pseudo-will with Star that elected to incarnate and its Will.
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@Lapis said
"I have a metaphysical dilemma I was hoping you guys could help me with.
There is perceivably only one way in which the average man might resign from his occupation as a human - suicide...a voluntary leave from experiential reality.
Taking this into account, how is one to view the circumstances surrounding the incarnation of a soul upon the material plane? Because it is a voluntary endeavor to leave the form of reality one is experiencing prior to incarnation is it analogous to suicide upon the material plane?
In Thelema, death is viewed as a sort of graduation. What about a Willed death?...would that not be more analogous to voluntary incarnation?...the voluntary leaving from one plane of existence to enter another?
L.Lazuli"
Death is more like the seal on the end of a story than a graduation.
IAO131
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@Lapis said
"Taking this into account, how is one to view the circumstances surrounding the incarnation of a soul upon the material plane? Because it is a voluntary endeavor to leave the form of reality one is experiencing prior to incarnation is it analogous to suicide upon the material plane?"
By all accounts, Persephone was having a good time with her girlfriends on the plains of Enna, picking flowers..nothing suicidal about it. Possibly they were having too much fun and attracted the attention of Hades.
The first time was an abduction, but her successive returns to the Underworld can only be explained as an inordinate fondness for the taste of pomegranates.
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@Lapis said
"Because it is a voluntary endeavor to leave the form of reality one is experiencing prior to incarnation is it analogous to suicide upon the material plane?"
Yes, I think this is precisely the point of all the "tomb" symbolism. Also in ancient religions and philosophies, it was a well known trope that this life is a "living death", and that the "spark" of Divinity is "entombed" in matter.
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Incarnation leads inevitably to Death. Suicide is premature. "Death is only the beginning".
Suicide is like a self-abortion, discarding, disrupting. There are more profound sorts of destruction--and if you willed to incarnate, then you willed your death in advance. Suicide I believe is involuntary. -
"Stooping down, dipping my wings, I came unto the darkly-splendid abodes. There in that formless abyss was I made a partaker of the Mysteries Averse.
I suffered the deadly embrace of the Snake and of the Goat; I paid the infernal homage to the shame of Khem.
Therein was this virtue, that the One became the all." -Liber LXV"Thou art IA-BESZ ("the Truth in Matter").
Thou art IA-APOPHRASZ ("the Truth in Motion")...He hails Him as BESZ, the Matter that destroys and devours Godhead, for the purpose of the Incarnation of any God... He hails Him as APOPHRASZ, the Motion that destroys and devours Godhead, for the purpose of the Incarnation of any God. The combined action of these two DEVILS is to allow the God upon whom they prey to enter into enjoyment of existence through the Sacrament of dividual "Life" (Bread - the flesh of BESZ) and "Love" (Wine - the blood or venom of APOPHRASZ)."
-Liber Samekh"For I am divided for love's sake, for the chance of union. This is the creation of the world, that the pain of division is as nothing, and the joy of dissolution all." - Liber AL ch.1
It may be 'suicide' for the One but that is the joy and necessity of life/existence.
"The Many is as adorable to the One as the One is to
the Many. This is the Love of These; creation-
parturition is the Bliss of the One; coition-
dissolution is the Bliss of the Many.
The All, thus interwoven of These, is Bliss."
-Book of LiesIAO131
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@Aum418 said
"
"The Many is as adorable to the One as the One is to
the Many. This is the Love of These; creation-
parturition is the Bliss of the One; coition-
dissolution is the Bliss of the Many.
The All, thus interwoven of These, is Bliss."
-Book of LiesIAO131"
Profound choice of quotes there, great stuff!
