Detailed questions on the Klippot
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Edward
Thanks for that!
Atzilut
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one post reminded me of this poem.
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93
I have a question, which although may seem unorthodox, my perception has changed since an experience I had about 1-2 years ago.
Why do we consider "demonic/dark" archetypes as Qlippothic?
Although for the past few years I had been involved with both invocations and evocations, one of the most successful rituals I had been involved with, was connected with the invocation of such a dark archetype. The end result was:
- I managed to achieve a state of consciousness which seemed to free me from various restrictions.
- subconsciously at that time all my innfer fears rose up the surface and I managed to free myself from a very big portion of them.
It actually seems that it made me free from energies that had been trapped in the shells for quite a long time, instead of doing the opposite.
93/93
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@TOHPA said
"Why do we consider "demonic/dark" archetypes as Qlippothic?"
The terms are not, in fact, synonymous. It's very sloppy to equate them. Many dark things, and most true demons are not Q'lippothic. Q'lippoth are specifically unresolved residuals that no longer serve a present purpose and therefore degenerate - things that used to be vital and purposeful, and are now merely husks.
You are correct to question any necessary connection between the dark, the demonic, and the Q'lippothic - the Venn diagrams for these three separate ideas would have only partial (probably small) areas of overlap.
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"Many dark things, and most true demons are not Q'lippothic."
I understand that something Chthonic is not necessarily Q'lippothic but who would be those “true demons”?
I can only thing of Q'lippothic princes or goetic beings, all that I understand as Q'lippothic.
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@Faus said
"...but who would be those “true demons”?"
The Greek daimon simply means a "spirit" - something of nonmaterial existence, even something divine - but the practical meaning has changed over the millennia to specifically mean an "evil" something of nonmaterial existence.
In practice, especially in the language of magick, it has come to mean a being at the lower end of the Yetziratic spectrum ("lower" in the sense of "closer to material"), somewhat below these beings categorized as "Planetary Spirits," and having a malignant character - "malignant," or malicious, or malevolent (all from mal, "bad") in the sense of being at odds with the nature, character, and purposes of humans in general.
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Thanks, now i get it.
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Would you actually agree that under very explicit circumstances, such entities could, due to their low nature and place in the Yetziratic tree, provide a breakthrough against specific unresolved residuals?
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@TOHPA said
"Would you actually agree that under very explicit circumstances, such entities could, due to their low nature and place in the Yetziratic tree, provide a breakthrough against specific unresolved residuals?"
Of course. Anything can be used as a tool. It's just a highly risky one if one doesn't already have a rather significant link to the HGA.
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Thank you very much for your replies.
But one question that raises is, why do you consider the previous achievement of the K&C of such importance?
Is it because it is an anchor for the practitioner not to get drifted away with such forces? -
@TOHPA said
"But one question that raises is, why do you consider the previous achievement of the K&C of such importance?
Is it because it is an anchor for the practitioner not to get drifted away with such forces?"Yes, that's a significant part of it. Anchor to the heights before surrendering yourself to the depths.
An individual could have a useful result without reasonable precautions, the same way that a person who was essentially sane could, sometimes, get a breakthrough from a sufficiently large dose of psychedelics. However, that doesn't mean that it's an approach one would recommend to everybody.
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I was thinking, in kabalistic tradition it usually is quite easy to indentify qliphotic entities (especially because they classified them as such) but how could I identify then in other mythologies and systems?
For example, in Greek mythology there is a group of beings distinctively qliphotic? Maybe the titans?
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@Faus said
"I was thinking, in kabalistic tradition it usually is quite easy to indentify qliphotic entities (especially because they classified them as such) but how could I identify then in other mythologies and systems?
For example, in Greek mythology there is a group of beings distinctively qliphotic? Maybe the titans?"
One could argue that they don't exist in other mythologies and are purely a Qabalistic concept. That would be the purist answer.
The more relaxed answer involves looking at what the term really means: Q'lippoth are things (which include thoughts, reactions, and other psychological phenomena) that have been outgrown and should have been left behind - things (generally once of value) that are no longer of any real value but are persisting. (For example, still being preoccupied with the events iof 9/11/2001 is a very active Q'lippah right now. So are old irrational fears, rigidified decisions no longer connected to active facts or circumstances, etc.) Anything fitting that broad characterization could reasonably be called a "husk" or Q'lippah.
The Titans would fit that idea only if they truly held no currently active value. That would, of course, be the Zeus-friendly view
But it wouldn't include those that still had an active, present-time value (possibly practical, at least mythic) such as Prometheus and Atlas. Also, there are those (atavists? or alternate-futurists?) invested in the return of the Golden Age of Kronos. - But all of this is a bit of a stretch anyway, since the Titans are gods, and especially Elder Gods, that particular category uniquely related to the Supernals (as the place where they are all locked away out of protection of the human personality, i.e., the new sub-Supernal order of things established by Zeus and the other Olympians). At least they would have to be regarded as a category of seniors reigning over the hordes of Q'lippoth.A better example from the Greeks, therefore, might be the Hekatonkheires, which never seem to have risen to the level of gods and seemed trial-and-error cast-offs from the beginning.
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Well, everybody loves Zeus
If I remember correctly, the Hekatonkheires ended up being used as weapons in the war with the titans. That sounds similar to Solomon using demons to build his temple.
Would it be right to say that the 3 major characteristics of a Q'lippah are:- Not having a purpose, our one that is no longer necessary.
- Would cause trouble but not the kind of “trouble” that leads to development.
- Would act purposefully only when commanded by a superior hierarchy
In Egyptian mythology, for example, Set would not be a Q'lippah because not only he is a God but has a very active function as Osiris slayer (even gods can have family issues).
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I have a small theory establishing a relation between the Titans and the ToL.
I would definitely attribute the Titans to Binah, or at least the first . Since they all come from Gaia, I could easily identify her with the "mother of abominations". For instance, Selene, as the Lunar role of Binah in the Heavenly Hexagram; Oceanus, the ocean, which is quite clear related to the great waters of Binah - and his sister/consort Tethys, also a Titan, holdiing similar attributes; Cronus/Saturn as the planet; Eos/Helios/Hyperion as the Saturn-Sun (I really can't recall from which mythology or age that was, but I'm pretty sure Saturn was considered as the first sun or father sun, or something like that).
As for their children, the Olympian Gods.. I think I would relate the Titanomachy to the breaking of the Logos at the abyss. Since the expansion of the Sephira is taking place downwards (f.i. the sword), I would consider the part of the mythology after the Titans have been defeated as a reference to the world from its current perspective, below the abyss.
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"I was thinking, in kabalistic tradition it usually is quite easy to indentify qliphotic entities (especially because they classified them as such) but how could I identify then in other mythologies and systems?
"Is this really useful though? It doesn't lead anywhere...you're surrounded and embedded in their domain anyway
Atzilut
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"“Is this really useful though? It doesn't lead anywhere...you're surrounded and embedded in their domain anyway”"
Precisely because I am in their domain that I need to be able to identify and understand them in my own mythological world view. Without that, I cannot establish a right (at least intellectual) relationship with them (specially my own Qlipoth).
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"Precisely because I am in their domain that I need to be able to identify and understand them in my own mythological world view. Without that, I cannot establish a right (at least intellectual) relationship with them (specially my own Quipploth)"
What bearing do you think that your 'mythological' world view has on them? What do you believe the function
of the Klippot is? Intellectual relationship is one very small part of the whole I think. The real relationship is
when you are confronted with any situation, feeling or thought that separates you from the unity and adhesion
with the Creator, be it anger, confusion, the belief in the Sitra Achra to name a few.Atzilut
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Well, it is quite important to have some knowledge of bacteria when you are choosing your antibiotics.
As far as I know, the very definition of Qlipotic is that they have no function.
Well, since all the problem is that my intuition is not exactly perfect, intellectual apprehension is quite useful to identify a “feeling or thought that separates you from the unity and adhesion with the Creator”.
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Faust,
I think you already know the answers to your questions, and I thought your final post was an astute one.
As with any subject, the knowledge and experience of things evolves, and it is such with the Qliphoth. Just as we know that the "classical" domineering "Solomonic" attitudes towards chthonic spirits isn't necessary (and arguably an hindrance) to truly successful work with them, we know also that Qliphothic work is not without value and can even be of considerable value in some cases, as Jim has suggested. But he is most certainly correct when he says:
"" However, that doesn't mean that it's an approach one would recommend to everybody. ""
If you do feel drawn to this work though, I would suggest the work of Thomas Karlsson, whom I think has been mentioned earlier in the thread, and that of Jake Stratton-Kent.
I will also leave this post with a final thought--its just an idea and I don't preten to assure it has any value--- but it makes sense to me that the greater the solve, the greater the potential for the coagula. And if the qliphoth have one trait or purpose most would agree on, it is a powerful tendency towards the solve.
There are of course these and other words of Liber Tzaddi and other of the beasts works to consider:
"38.
I who am beyond Wisdom and Folly, arise and say unto you: achieve both weddings! Unite yourselves with both!Beware, beware, I say, lest ye seek after the one and lose the other!
40.
My adepts stand upright; their head above the heavens, their feet below the hells.
41.
But since one is naturally attracted to the Angel, another to the Demon, let the first strengthen the lower link, the last attach more firmly to the higher."--Cody