College of Thelema: Thelemic Education

Hey, everyone. I've been struggling to understand the relationship between a related set of concepts within the Thelemic system(s) and am looking for a little help.

To what extent are the following terms related, different from each other, or synonymous: the Qlippoth; **darkness **(though not in the Supernal/N.O.X. sense); the **shadow **(in the Jungian sense); the "darkly splendid world" of Liber Tzaddi; **hell **(again from Tzaddi, and elsewhere); death; the "dark night of the soul"; depression; chaos; matter; the path of Tav; the underworld; nigredo, putrefaction, etc.; the **unconscious **(in the Jungian or Freudian sense); the Nephesh; the animal; the ignorant/uninitiated state of consciousness... I'm sure I could add to the list, but you get the idea.

I understand, of course, that to a certain extent the sense of these words can vary drastically from author to author and even work to work. I guess what I'm looking for is a way to at least begin to categorize these things (especially through Qabalah) to have a better understanding of my own path. Are they the same thing but on different levels of intensity? Which levels are safer and/or even essential for those well below the level of an Adept to explore? Where's the line, if there is one, between those things that are "dark" because of social taboos, lack of self-knowledge, etc. and those that are "dark" because they are genuinely degraded and unhealthy aspects of reality?

I'd appreciate any help or perspectives on this. 99% of the resources out there on this stuff are worse than useless...

@Shadow Self said

"It sounds like from your post that you use a lot of tools, robes and things. Does the room have any special decor to it, or is it pretty ordinary looking with nothing out of the ordinary on the walls etc? "
The walls are generally bare unless I'm doing Enochian work & hang the tablets. The center of the room is taken up by a double cube altar & there are appropriately colored candles in the quarters. Other than that, it's empty. Which is very effective, because the rest of my apartment is filled with stacks of books, papers, art supplies, etc.

"It also sounds like from you post, you do use it as a storage room of sorts, hence your need to go in there at times other than ritual."
I store things in the closet. In a perfect world I'd have some kind of antechamber with the closet off of that...

@HounganRocky said

"I can tell you that the feeling is normal in a space that is regularly consecrated by ceremony."
Thanks
"If you feel you are not prepared to enter that space, you should immediately pray to your angel asking for his intercession before you enter. I had many short prayers that I would recite as I entered my temple and put on my robes, but now they have all been reduced to a simple knock on the door."
Recently I'd been using Surah 112 as a mantra, and started chanting it a couple times before entering, and then keep going as I robe, light candles, etc. It seems to work nicely. I'd never thought of knocking, though, I like that. A well timed knock in ritual can be very effective.

A discussion on another thread about the G.D. Vault got me thinking about an issue I've been turning over in my head for some time. For the last 14 months I've had the 2nd bedroom in my apartment set up as a Temple. The room is used for spiritual work & nothing else, though no direct attempt has ever been made to consecrate the room, at least not of outside of standard purification with water, consecration with incense, etc. as part of a larger ritual. It's been wonderful all along having a space for the work, but about 5 months or so ago I started to notice a real change in, for lack of a better term, the "atmosphere" of the room. It's gotten to the point where I actually have to spend a moment or two mentally preparing myself before stepping into the room. When it first started happening it was actually uncomfortable & I ended up having enormous difficulty getting into the room to get any work done for a few weeks; some convenient excuse always seemed to arise just as I was getting ready. The effect of simply stepping into the room & taking a deep breath is about comparable to a decent performance of the LIRP & LIRH in another space. (Also, not that it matters much, but one of the few people I've let enter the room noticed the "atmosphere" -- & without being primed for it).

I've done quite a bit of work over the past 8 or 9 months toward getting my rational, analytic mind to take a backseat to simply doing the work (one of the reasons I rarely post here anymore), but I keep returning to the question of what, exactly, has happened to the room. It's not that "energy" has been built up there. I raise energy & then banish it again on a regular basis. I know what that feels like, and this is different. There's definitely the sense that the room has become sacred space, but I've been in other places that felt that way -- some even more so -- but none had the same physical & mental impact that my Temple does. Although I've adapted to the phenomenon & have come to deeply appreciate the boost it's given my work (doing magick anywhere else is kind of disappointing these days), it's still a demanding enough experience to walk in there, that if I'm tired or in a bad mood or otherwise not at full strength & need to go into the room for some reason (to replace a robe or grab an old journal or something) I often end up putting it off until I feel better. If nothing else, it's made all the precautions and rules surrounding the Holy of Holies all seem much more reasonable!

I'm at a loss for how to conceptualize what it is that's happened to the space & wondering if others have had similar experiences or have some insight into the situation. Is this a common occurrence? Does it correlate with certain rituals or practices, or is it just the effect of having a dedicated space? As I write this, it occurs to me that performing some sort of ritual dedication of the space might help formalize my relationship to the phenomenon & thus make it easier to work with. Are there specific methods or procedures that might be appropriate for dedicating the space (other than the creation of a Vault, which I think is rather beyond my level of skill and attainment)?

(Oh, and if there's any question, I invoke every morning, banish every evening, and always use appropriate opening & closing banishings & purifications for more extensive work.)

Jim,

Is there any way I could purchase a copy of your translation of Sepher Yetzirah? I've love to read your commentary on it, especially after the intriguing footnote in the 6th Aethyr in V&V.

(P.S. Currently enjoying Pearls of Wisdom!)

For anyone who hasn't seen this yet: oto-usa.org/static/legis/. I think it's fascinating, regardless of any feelings one way or another on the matter.

@Archaeus said

"
@Iamus said
"I think the reprinting of Equinox III:9 will clear up a lot of the questions of exactly what Fr. H.B. intends and what evidence he has for it. There has not yet been any public O.T.O. ruling on the issue.

And as far as it being O.T.O. doing this: it won't be O.T.O. putting the imprimatur on all those Class A documents when III:9 is reissued..."

Again wrong; I have had it on good authority that there are already 'corrupted' editions of Liber Al on their order for distribution within the OTO. It seems pretty much a settled thing. But time will tell."
Yes, time will tell, which is exactly what my point was. And no, as of this moment there have been no official, public rulings on the subject by O.T.O. The periodic "News from IHQ" posts are not official statements of policy. Whatever you have "on good authority" regarding printing is clearly not public or official.

I think the reprinting of Equinox III:9 will clear up a lot of the questions of exactly what Fr. H.B. intends and what evidence he has for it. There has not yet been any public O.T.O. ruling on the issue.

And as far as it being O.T.O. doing this: it won't be O.T.O. putting the imprimatur on all those Class A documents when III:9 is reissued...

Oh, just one clarification, please. You said

@Jim Eshelman said

"Pamphagos Pangenetes, spelled PAMPhAGOS PAGGENETOR."
I get the double gamma thing, but it's the "es" to "OR" I'm wondering about. Is that right?

Awesome, thanks, Jim! If I turn out anything cool with the numeration, I'll post it up here.

@Jim Eshelman said

"Thanks BTW - I'll mark those corrections as errata to be corrected in a future edition of 776 1/2."
Glad I could help, even by accident.

@Jim Eshelman said

"I'm away from my references right now. Could you provide what spellings are given in each place?"

I'm leaving the capitalization and diacritics as they appear in the texts in case that's significant.

MTP (Liber ABA, 1997): ΠΑΜΦΑΓΕ ΠΑΓΓΕΝΕΤΟΡ
Little Essays Towards Truth: παμφαγε πανγενετωρ
776 1/2: Παμφάγη Πανγένετορ

On Perseus I found: παγγενέτης (noun sg masc nom)
But was unable to find a noun form of Pamphage. Closest I could get was παμφάγος (adj sg masc nom)

I'm interested in looking at the gematria of "Pamphage Pangenitor" but have found that Crowley spells it one way in Liber XV and another Little Essays Towards Truth, and then in Jim's "Thelemic Mass" it's spelled yet a third way. I tried to resolve this by going to a Greek lexicon, but my Greek is quite poor and I've ended up even further confused.

Help?

First of all, make sure to take care of yourself. Eat, get enough sleep, relax, etc. Keep up with whatever ritual work you need to remain healthy and vital (LBRP, Middle Pillar, etc.).

As for what Thelemites can do for others, it seems to me that the Thelemic attitude toward death begins with releasing any fear or dread connected with the process of dying. If you can remain free of fear, I'm sure that will have an impact on your grandfather and help to bring his experience closer to what the Holy Books promise it can be:

"Thrill with the joy of life & death! Ah! thy death shall be lovely: whoso seeth it shall be glad. Thy death shall be the seal of the promise of our agelong love. Come! lift up thine heart & rejoice! We are one; we are none."

"Strive ever to more! and if thou art truly mine— and doubt it not, an if thou art ever joyous!— death is the crown of all."
and so on.

@Horus Amin said

"Basically i feel Lacan is way ahead of everyone philosophically. The guy is a beast. I wouldnt be surprised to learn he studied Crowley... He brings a great overall picture witch matches well with the esoteric one, and with thelemic ethics."
Are you thinking of Seminar VII and that the "Do not give way on your desire" idea is related to the Will?

They also have confusing people with non-standard use of the term "phallus" in common...

@kasper81 said

"I heard that CGJung threw I- Ching coins for patients in their presence but the source can't be verified"
It's true. He also drew up astrological charts for some of them.

@Jim Eshelman said

"666 is Vav, Samekh, Mem-final.

Yes, for thousands use larger version of the letters. Yes, 1,001 is Aleph ALEPH."
I think what's tripping me up is that it intuitively feels like each positive integer should map to a unique set of cards, but, e.g., 56 and 706 are both going to be Death and the Hierophant. Would you say this would indicate a strong connection between those two numbers? Seems like if this this method really works, it should be almost an identity, since the breakdown is identical.

I've seen the method of analyzing a number using the Tarot trumps several times around here, but never really gotten the method laid out in full. Example of what I'm talking about: To analyze the number 173 you would lay out The Moon, The Devil, and The Empress. My problem is with numbers larger than 499 and then again with numbers over a thousand. How would one lay out 666? The Hanged man for Mem final? Would you use Aleph for 1000? But what if it was 1001?

Is this method written up somewhere (maybe in an issue of ItC or Black Pearl I haven't gotten to yet)?

@J L Romer said

"Can one get messages from random people? I've had a few of these sorts of random "messages" from total strangers, and I wonder if these are common. I realize we give meaning to things, yet it seems some events are just TOO "perfect"."
There's actually a word for this. In Pythagoras: His life and Teachings Thomas Stanley notes that Pythagoras practiced divination by "Cledons," which he defines as
" observations of occurrent speeches, collecting from what is accidentally said upon some other occasion, the effect of what is sought."

@Pattana Gita said

"
@Jim Eshelman said
"Not at all.

Yes, after people get the lesson, "Oh, this is all my stuff!", it is important to learn to see, "Hey, wait a minute, THAT one didn't come from me." That's just practical sorting and cataloging.

Ultimately, though, it doesn't matter... because it's ALL "My stuff." Otherwise, it can't hook you."

There are other explanations for why projected identification content might hook a person that does not include it being 'my stuff'. Obedience, conformity, or (in cases of an immature psyche) it might be part of a pattern of psychological abuse from a parent - a sort of possession. If you put it all down as 'my stuff' then you undermine the ability of the psyche to reject (not identify with) content from abusive people."
Even if it has its roots in abuse, it's still "my stuff" in virtue of being inside of my head. Also, notice how differently people react to abuse (or any kind of trauma). Some people go through prolonged, repeated instances of abuse and recover relatively quickly, while other people have developed fully legitimate cases of PTSD that persisted for years from simply witnessing an assault on a complete stranger. It's clearly not the case that this can be explained simply by how resilient these people are, so we have to conclude that it's the relationship between the subject and the trauma that determines the nature and severity of the reaction. Thus, if some part of an abusive experience sticks with me, it ultimately has to be explained by the nature of my psyche, and simply rejecting that experience as "not mine" is to also reject whatever in me made that relationship possible.

[Disclaimer: none of what I just said in any way removes the guilt from the abuser. The point is just that there would be no way of determining in advance how a particular abusive action will affect the survivor of the abuse, or at least not without intimate knowledge of the makeup of the survivor's psyche.]

@Faus said

"
"You can walk the psychological projection angle all the way to Kether. Get acustomed to noting, recording, and analyzing them now - that well will never run dry."

Since reading your article in the Black Pearl I am giving it a try."

Which issue is that in? I'd like to take a look at it.

@Ash said

"I see my personality in this life as a reaction to the momentum that I seem to have built up in prior incarnations... something like, "oh, I'm born and already moving in a certain direction... that direction is scary, so I'm going to resist it.""
I've been thinking about this sentence for the last half hour. It's a really good way of expressing a lot of what I've been thinking about lately concerning the experiences I referenced in my post above. I'm not sure if you would agree, but I would equate the momentum from prior lives with my Will. For me, beginning to get a sense of what my Will is and how I am to go about doing it has been a rather harrowing experience. Not only is it forcing me to rethink large portions of my world view and my self image, but it also turns out that my ego is not at all happy with these developments. I had built up over the years a sense of who I was and what it would mean for my life to be successful -- and I was wrong. In light of your comment, I wonder if the ego resisting in this way isn't somehow necessary to the process. It feels like it would have to be, but I can't quite put my finger on why that would be so.