31 May - (Air) Liber LXV, 2:48
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48. O my Lord, my beloved! How shall I indite songs, when even the memory of the shadow of thy glory is a thing beyond all music of speech or of silence?
Even these songs fail.
It's the most common, albeit not a totally unhelpful illusion, imho, that you get there by making little incremental bit of progress in the right direction. Of course, that's ridiculous. So far, this line strikes me as the truest statement yet, which is probably an equally ridiculous impression on my part. To paraphrase: even these songs fail.
I suppose there is a time and a place for the belief that one is actually getting someplace by pumping oneself up with the text, by making connections and by noting the intensity of ones emotional longings. But then there is the opposite understanding, which might actually be a better indicator that one has in fact made some little progress. This understanding goes something like this: the notion of growth or progress is an illusion, and all one has done is move abut the circumference of the circle, getting no closer to the center; words fail, and any point of reference to degrees of closeness fail; and any thought about what this state is in its essence, is as much an obstacle as it is anything else.
Indite is a funny word, archaic form of compose or write, but also with the idea of going in or approaching. And here we are told this is impossible. This makes any response we might have impossible as well. It's like two mirrors facing each other, and in each nested reflection is a version of a possible effort to comprehend. In one you wring your hands at the impossibility of it; in another you attempt to 'stop trying' because of your intellectual understanding that it is just not possible to use a word to 'indite' this experience; and in another you are manic with effusions of love, as if that is any better than anything else; and on and on to eternity...
The difference between the Faun enchanted by songs and the vision of Pan is not like the difference between numbers 9 and 10—just one more. The difference is between any finite number and the infinite!
"Give it up, give it up, give it up now!
—Public Enemy"Love and Will
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And yet how can I not
When I have hands to write
Legs to dance
And a voice to sing. -
Analogy and silence...thanks Love
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It occurs to me that the question posed in the selection is rhetorical—the kind of question a teacher asks when they already know the answer, or better yet, when they don't expect an answer because there is no answer. And that's where I am with this question—there is no way to represent or give shape to this glory! It's a rhetorical question that has no answer.
So, if that's the case, then what's left? The solution has to come from above.
Ergo, there is no song and dance, no magic analogy. Instead, you wait!
You've done everything to prepare yourself, and now you wait because you are not the one who controls the time or conditions of this glory.
Love and Will
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"Ergo, there is no song and dance, no magic analogy. Instead, you wait!"
You could wait, or bask in Silence...sure...or you don't and you do the best you can with what you have to express your inner world to the outer, or rather, and more to the point, to "express the inexpressible".
"Yet the Sprinkling of its water not only purifies the Temple, but blesseth them that are without: freely must it be poured!
- The Cup, Book 4"
If Crowley just sat there in silence, we wouldn't have the material at hand to do these daily meditations after all
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I guess we'll just have to tune into tomorrow's episode to find out.
I'm somewhere in between what you're saying Robert and what Tinman is saying and What I'm saying. I liked what you said about moving around the cirumference of the circle but not moving near the center. Perhaps the movement is an illusion but Goddamn it, this is a fun ride!
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@Tinman said
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You could wait, or bask in Silence...sure...or you don't and you do the best you can with what you have to express your inner world to the outer, or rather, and more to the point, to "express the inexpressible"."I think you can only do something other than what you assert, and as far as being able to "express the inexpressible," no, you can't express the inexpressible. Why? Because it's inexpressible?
You may be able to construct an argument where trying is a useful activity, which is what I think you are trying to do. If that's the case I don't see the rationale from your comments because they are just statements. I accept that there can be limited objectives that justify expressive activity. Hell, I'm a career artist. But this is not the problem stated in the text: **How shall I indite songs... **
BTW, "You could wait, or bask in Silence...sure..." is a mis-characterization of my intent. Based on how you responded I can only assume you thought I was advising people to stop doing everything, as in 'everything.'
It's just that, for me personally, appreciating the inability of the words and images to actually express the experience is a big deal. Along these lines, even the memory of the experience would have to be a falsehood. And the fact that we are told that the words will fail us is also significant:
"...then this circle squared in its failure is a key also.
3:47 "As the meditations add up it occurs to me that I am actually remembering somethings from later in the text or from other texts. In this instance it is something to do with waiting. I can't be certain though, it's been thirty years.
Love and Will
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" 48. O my Lord, my beloved! How shall I indite songs, when even the memory of the shadow of thy glory is a thing beyond all music of speech or of silence? "
For me the key word is “beyond”. It does not say that I cannot sing or dance or whatever. It is just telling me no matter what I do; I cannot come even close to the** “memory of the shadow of thy glory”**. No matter how much music, speech or silence I understand, I cannot even get close to comprehending even a "memory of the shadow of thy glory” . Does this keep me from dancing? Does a blade of grass quite dancing in the wind when it learns it has no feet? Are we not all learning? Then we are on the same level. We do what we can to give praise to a glory that we will never comprehend.
When we see all the pictures that have been taken of this universe, our awe escapes us, yet the awe of thy glory is beyond the beyond of comprehending. When a person learns that he or she is a part of this glory that no one seems to truly understand, then a person may have gotten close to their part of glory, but nowhere close to the “shadow of thy glory” of my lord.
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"as far as being able to "express the inexpressible," no, you can't express the inexpressible. Why? Because it's inexpressible?"
My understanding is that many have and are and will try. We read holy books by Crowley in which he appears to be doing so. My understanding of Zen Koans are they are attempts to express the inexpressible. My understanding is that through paradox, poetry, etc. we try to put things in terms of the Ruach that are beyond the Ruach's capabilities... for various reasons such as communicating a feeling or experience for example.
And I meant no disrespect by the "You could wait, or bask in Silence" bit. I have been fortunate enough to have many experiences that made me just sit back in silence and bask (don't know how else to express it
... I look on that as an important time of reflection and understanding:"Understanding is the structuralization of knowledge.
-The Cup, Book 4"HOWEVER, at the minimum, I still maintain that you journal that sh!t like the good man says. And in doing so, you will attempt to "express the inexpressible".
I also appreciate the inability of words and images to actually express the experience. Just in communicating now, I'm not expressing myself clearly, nor am I expressing every thought that goes through my head. But I'm trying. I'm creating a chariot (which is a square - material world) to carry (wheels) my inexpressible (holy grail) to communicate with you.
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@Tinman said
"My understanding is that many have and are and will try. We read holy books by Crowley in which he appears to be doing so. My understanding of Zen Koans are they are attempts to express the inexpressible. My understanding is that through paradox, poetry, etc. we try to put things in terms of the Ruach that are beyond the Ruach's capabilities... for various reasons such as communicating a feeling or experience for example."
I don't think any of the things you mention are meant to express the inexpressible, except bad poetry. I think they do something else, something more strategic, which I don't have the energy to attempt to describe atm. The Ruach is just out of the loop on some things.
But it's cool.
Love and Will
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" when even the memory of the shadow of thy glory is a thing beyond all music of speech or of silence? "
Who's memory? When you insert the word "My", "Adept" or whoever's memory then you have another ball park (so to speak).
When you consider all that we have forgotten just in what little bit of life that we have lived. Our own memories don’t even come close to being a shadow of what it should be. This seems to be saying that we have a memory of the lord and there is nothing that we can write, say, sing or play that will bring us even close to remembering anything close to the shadow of the lord.
Through music, song, speech, etc, we can come to understand the shadow of the shadow of his glory or get close to having a memory of the memory. The closest we can ever come to the shadow is becoming the shadow of the shadow. Even our ecstasy of ecstasy cannot match the shadow of the lord. But if we can become the shadow of the shadow, which encompasses all that is light and dark, beauty without beauty, love without love and sublime without sublime. Once you have reached this point where the beyond of beyond is ‘not’, and the closest that we will come to understanding the shadow of the shadow is understanding that ’not’ creates.
Like a shadow of a shadow we are myths in our own humanity. As the shadow of the shadow is a myth that we don’t understand, in not understanding we are enlightened to understanding.
This is my thoughts anyway.
