This evening I was spending some time with friends and family, and an offhand comment was made about the Western ignorance of Eastern concepts such as Interdependent Arising.  Here is perhaps the best relation of the concept I have ever seen, provided by Jack Kornfield in his book A Path With Heart.

"As we open and empty ourselves, we come to experience an interconnectedness, the realization that all things are joined and conditioned in an interdependent arising. Each experience and event contains all others. The teacher depends on the student; the airplane depends on the sky.

When a bell rings, is it the bell we hear, the air, the sound at our ears, or is it our brain that rings? It is all of these things. As the Taoists say, "The between is ringing.” The sound of the bell is here to be heard everywhere—in the eyes of every person we meet, in every tree and insect, in every breath we take.

Holding up a piece of paper, Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh expresses it this way:
If you are a poet, you will see clearly that there is a cloud floating in this sheet of paper. Without a cloud there will be no water; without water the trees cannot grow; and without trees, you cannot make paper. So the cloud is in here. The existence of this page is dependent on the existence of a cloud. Paper and cloud are so close. Let us think of other things, like sunshine. Sunshine is very important because the forest cannot grow without sunshine, and we as humans cannot grow without sunshine. So the logger needs sunshine in order to cut the tree, and the tree needs sunshine in order to be a tree. Therefore, you can see sunshine in this sheet of paper. And if you look more deeply, with the eyes of a bodhisattva, with the eyes of those who are awake, you see not only the cloud and the sunshine in it, but that everything is here, the wheat that became the bread for the logger to eat, the logger's father—everything is in this sheet of paper. . . ."

It sounds impressive to be sure, but of course it's only a concept, right?  Intriguing, but of course just a philosophical construct to be examined and eventually discarded.

Think about it a bit more.

Your physical body is as indistinguishable from the environment as your awareness that lies in the instant of experience before the first thought has arisen is indistinguishable from that of any other person? Or any other living thing? Or all things? So there isn't any ownership of anything, even the thought of a self. Things just are, and when things happen we do what we do and life goes on.

Do you know what kindness is? Kindness is when you see the spark in everyone's eye is also your own.

Spiritual Authority

Recently, I have heard the term Spiritual Authority being used in the local magical and pagan communities, and the term is being used misused to the detriment of all.  Just to set the ground straight, let us define authority as “The power to influence or command thought, opinion, or behavior. “. Examples might include your employer, your elected officials, even the transit authority that runs the buses. Another example of interest in various occult communities might include someone who by sheer dint of charisma, force of will and confidence can command others.

Much popular understanding of spiritual authority attempts to reconcile this definition of authority to the spiritual realm. It leads to the notion that spiritual authority is 1) a position held by someone else that possesses access to abilities or knowledge inaccessible to you, and 2) measured by quantity (i.e., the number of people over whom they have power, the size of the corporation they manage, their income level, etc.). But this is nothing more than natural authority renamed.

Unfortunately, that is just too broad a definition for spiritual authority. Why? Because nobody stands between you and larger realms of existence, but ironically you. The implicit or explicit notion that priests or other “spiritual authorities” stand between mankind and their search for the inexpressible is a notion wholly religious in nature. This is exemplified in the various ordination ceremonies for priests of various (typically monotheistic) religions, which are supposed to confer or confirm one's connection to deity and thus presumably their power. Tell me, is your sincere confession “better” if the Pope flies to to hear it, or whether an old man with shaking hands and a white collar listens in a small chapel in El Paso? Is the amulet someone claims was made by Grand Poobah Hufflepuff more effective than one made by your best friend, who was worried enough about you to assemble and charge a lucky mojo for you?

This is distinct from ritual authority, common to almost all forms of magical, religious and many philosophical traditions. One of the most common roles of ritual authority is as a leader or officer in initiatory traditions of religious, magical or mystery nature. Also, it includes rites of passage in many or all cultures. Using the Golden Dawn rituals for example, various officers are present who perform various roles in the rituals. These rituals are designed to lead to certain insights which are shared in common among the members of the group. The Rosicrucians have them, and the greek mystery schools did also. It is a common magical understanding that by ritual and images are all powers awakened and re-awakened, and in this case the spiritual authority of the officers and participants/celebrants in a ritual are designed to create spiritual growth in a certain fairly predictable way. Initiatory rituals can be immensely transformative and are the cornerstones or hidden bones of every religion as well as many occult paths. Ritual authority typically lasts for as long as a particular ritual or even requires to be completed, and is generally considered as an “acting role” whether drawing down the Young King or officiating a wedding.

So what is spiritual authority? It varies from person to person, but in my experience people assign spiritual authority to someone whom they feel has a larger spiritual perspective than their own, whether one might have a close reationship with the spirits in a house festooned with altars and ancestor shrines, has had various transformative experiences, pursuit of various paths of enlightenment or mystery traditions. One quality of spiritual authority is that is voluntary. It is very similar to the willing suspension of disbelief when watching a movie. One has to give permission for others to exercise spiritual authority.

Second, that authority is fragile, in that as soon as that individual feel that the person is now acting outside of the spirit, authority is taken back. Spiritual authority and the directives that issue forth from that authority are conditioned on acceptance of each directive.

Finally, that spiritual authority must eventually be surrendered. When the rite is done, and the world and the sense of “I” are no longer observed but believed, the spiritual authority must be set down. Even a mighty Magister may still make a complete ass of himself.

So, what is not spiritual authority? Spiritual authority is not being a high ranking member of a specific school or tradition. Some of you know my background, but I am the greatest living magical adept of the tradition of Michael A. Eckhard. And you, dear reader, are almost certainly the greatest known adept of your own unique brand of practice. You might have started out in one tradition, or pursued the path of Jack of All Traditions (and master of none). So what? Every tradition has it's great and not-so-great aspects, from cultural blind spots to frankly bizarre practices that people agree are “traditional” but don't serve any practical or even ritual purpose anymore.

Spiritual authority is not being told what to do. If someone is telling you how “it works”, perhaps you should be wondering why they don't seem to be interested in how “it works” for you. A spiritual authority wants to hear what is going on, and will probably have questions. And may have advice. Or not. And if they offer it, you are free to take it or leave it, just like if it came from anyone else.

Finally, spiritual authority is not concerned with changing you. Rather, it seeks to help you manifest what is growing inside you, to assist you in reaching the full blossoming of your spirituality. Not theirs. If the man or woman you have decided has spiritual authority tries to wield actual authority over you, look somewhere else.

Transpersonal

"Transpersonal" means that some sort of process is occurring in the individual that, in a sense, goes beyond the individual. The simplest in-stance of this is extrasensory perception, or ESP. Parapsychologists rec-ognize several forms of ESP: telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, retrocognition. We might also include out-of-body experiences, experi-ences of a transpersonal self or witness, peak experiences, and so on. What all of these events have in common is an expansion of the self/not-self boundary beyond the skin-boundary of the organism.

Saturn

I was talking about the restraining power of Saturn the other day with someone. I wonder which is more frustrating, enforced change toward an unknowable goal or preservation of an arbitrary standard?

Conditioning

It has not been yet demonstrated that all conditioning can be absolutely released into consciousness. This is the shining strength of the various paths of enlightenment in the western traditions; by shaping the course of the awakening with critical themes concentrated on, it is also possible to shape which remnants remain. Thus one might create archetypes such as Fates, Seers, the Western and Eastern magi and so forth. Where the East concentrates on the goal of total formlessness, the west offers individuation into an archetypal form before formlessness.

Abyss Mysticism

There is That which watches the arising and passing away of consciousness. When consciousness arises there then arises Thought, of which the first is I. Thus arises duality with Not I. And this is the Fall of Man. And the path again.

There it is folks, the secret of enlightenment in the Western Magical Tradition. When you understand it fully, the sleeper has awakened.

Magick vs. the East

The Western Magical Tradition has been criticized by adherents of Eastern enlightenment traditions such as Buddhism and Zen as not containing a valid initiatory path within the various systems extant today. Moreover, some critics continue, since almost all major religions contain at least one form of initiatory path, the modern earth-based religions such as Wicca that are common in the United States today which by dint of being created out of whole cloth do not contain such a path of development are doomed to not even being able to function adequately in those roles which religion has historically been noted for. 

In response, the  Western traditions note that the transcendental paths of Christianity, Judaism, Islam and others concentrate on removing those aspects of mortal man that obscure the hidden divinity. As those mortal thoughts are understood and purified, the faithful achieve the moment of Union where there is no will, but God’s will be done. By contrast the tradition of magic seeks to obtain knowledge and understanding of all, so that all may fall within the grasp of the Magician and he becomes One with all, creating and sustaining all and indeed inherent in all while being also separate. When all the starry sky is but a gleam in the eye of the Absolute, the adept has no will in any direction.

Said the Adept of the West to the Adepts of the East, “We both point to the same moon. Why are you staring at my finger?”.

NonDual Milestone

Saturday, April 3, 2010
On Thursday last I settled into my evening meditation as is my habit in the evening. The focus of this meditation was mindfulness, which is to say being the Silent Witness which observes objects arising in consciousness, observes those objects themselves and observes when those objects leave consciousness. Sometimes the Silent Witness observes those moments that have no perceptible objects in consciousness. As I remained as the Silent Witness, the frequency of objects arising in consciousness slowed down as is my experience, but then something unexpected happened.

As I existed as the Silent Witness, it was noted that there was an increasing sense of pressure in the skull, for all the world like a bubble was forming under the surface of thick oil and was slowly fighting its way to the top. This sensation increased, and the Silent Witness noted a growing feeling of unease and even fear from the ego, accompanied by a violent trembling of the body, concentrated in the arms and the musculature connecting the chest muscles and neck. I intuited this was a physical exhibition of the fear reaction being expressed by the ego. Nevertheless, the Silent Witness continued to observe and the meditation continued.

At length, the feeling of increasing pressure in my head decreased but did not stop, as if the “bubble” had swollen so as to contain less pressure, but the manifestations of body twitches continued. As the meditation concluded, I recognized that I was still embodying the Silent Witness, and I was aware of the ego and the sense of “I” as distinctly separate from the Silent Witness, reduced merely to objects in consciousness themselves.  This is not typical at the conclusion of a meditation but hardly unique in my experience; the initial experience of nondual consciousness is typically a single timeless moment lasting in reality perhaps a few seconds or even perhaps a half hour, but it is a temporary peak experience as compared to a stable and consequently permanent stage.  Those who wish to move forward from an isolated peak experience to a new stage of development often must spend considerable time and effort to encourage the ego to let go. I took care of some minor chores I had neglected earlier in the evening and eventually went to bed.
I remember distinctly when my body fell asleep. The Silent Witness noted the slowing of the breathing and heartbeat and eventually even noted the beginning of REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep. However, I was conscious during this entire interval, noting the arising of dreams and random thoughts as objects in consciousness. Eventually I awoke, remaining as the Silent Witness and still accompanied by the twitching of my musculature and the sensation of pressure in my head I went about my day.

During Friday I remained as the Silent Witness, performing my various tasks at work while the mirror that reflects all but keeps nothing remaining everpresent. My ego remained a useful tool, as it allowed me to become a person when the occasion demanded it but always the Silent Witness observed the activities my mind and body were performing. I found that certain changes had occurred; I noticed that my conditioned responses seemed muted or even absent, the impulse to eat food mechanically and without thought was absent, and various characteristic mannerisms such as a tendency to handle objects while thinking or even habitual jokes in response to certain social situations seemed absent as well. I noticed I now tended to remain motionless unless something required me to move, contrasting to my normal wont of changing position or otherwise fidgeting periodically. And always the implacable calm, objective, unchanging and unchangeable, existing in the eternal now while observing the world around me and the activities of my body and mind.
This persisted throughout the entire day. Only close to midnight did something happen that shocked me sufficiently to drive the Silent Witness from me.

Reactions to Nisargadatta

"Having realized that I am with, and yet beyond the world, I became free from all desire and fear. I did not reason out that I should be free, I found myself free, unexpectedly, without the least effort. This freedom from desire and fear remained with me since then. Another thing I noticed was that I do not need to make an effort; the deed follows the thought, without delay and friction. I have also found that thoughts become self-fullfilling; things would fall in place smoothly and rightly. The main change was in the mind; it became motionless and silent, responding quickly, but not perpetuating the response. Spontaneity became a way of life, the real became natural and the natural became real. And above all, infinite affection, love, dark and quiet, radiating in all directions, embracing all, making all interesting and beautiful, significant and auspicious."

"The person, the "I am this body, this mind, this chain of memories, this bundle of desires and fears" disappears, but something you may call identity remains. It enables me to become a person when required. "

 The above selections from the thought of Nisargadatta, a man of profound insight. Although not deliberately discussed in the above selection, his thoughts caused me to reflect on one aspect of the concept of nonduality. Nonduality literally means "not two", and the initial assumption is that nonduality therefore means "one" or "unity". This has been reinforced by similar slogans like "we are all one" and so forth, but this is only correct in a limited fashion.


When something is in unity, or one, that specifically means that there is no distinction between a portion and another portion. Two lumps of clay molded into a single lump would be an excellent example of this. However, the concept of unity itself is based on the assumption of at least the possibility of non-unity as a reference. Consider a mason jar full of air but tightly sealed. The air in the jar is certainly part of the total atmosphere of the earth, but is separate. When the seal is broken, it once more returns to being an undifferentiated part of the total atmosphere despite it's previous specific reference to being the air contained in my mason jar. 


This is the sum of our existence. The underlying matrix of reality I call Awareness, and is undifferentiated, infinite, extending without quality in all directions. When we are conceived we are part of that undifferentiated Awareness, but temporarily possess the phenomenal quality of physical existence and the birth of individuality and thought. When the body wears our, we return to the sea of Awareness. Was that sea of Awareness changed by our temporary incarnation? Absolutely not! How can something without qualities change in qualities? Awareness as described above can only be described specifically (in limited fashion) in the negative.

Earth Spider - Doing Nothing

Earth Spider, what are you doing? Is it hard? Why are you doing it?
Earth Spider is doing Nothing, and Nothing is the easiest thing in the world to do. How hard must you work to do Nothing? Only the work required to see what you are doing now instead of doing Nothing. When you realize that there is Nothing to do, and Nobody to do it, you will be ready to truly begin the work of doing Nothing.

That Personality Which Limits And Oppresses His True Self

The Grade of Master of the Temple is described in Liber 418 and other sources, and clearly identifies that the essential attainment of the grade is “the perfect annihilation of that personality which limits and oppresses his true self”.

This phrase has been imperfectly understood since it was first written, and with further commentary within and without the Tradition by those without direct Understanding consequently has caused more confusion on the subject of the Master of the Temple than any other literature in the Western Magickal corpus. Read literally, the quote above would assert that in order for the Adept to attain and grade of Master of the Temple, they must psychically lobotomize their own personality. Such a creature might be imagined to be a marionette, mindlessly moving in response to universal laws it is no longer cognizant of. The personality is an object in consciousness, employing the faculties of memory and reason to interpret the perceived present or future through the lens of past experience. The personality is comprised of a host of individual components both conscious and unconscious which in aggregate is by association assumed to be “me”. In this context, annihilation does not connote destruction or defeat, but rather to render void by disidentification. The Master still has a personality, still experiences anger, sadness, fear and other emotions as objects in consciousness. However, by recognizing that they are merely objects in consciousness and consequently have no ultimate existence he disidentifies with them and consequently is no longer bound by them. With the removal of those limitations caused by identification with the personality, the true self can act. The personality remains, and can be employed as a useful tool, but is no longer recognized as the seat of identity.

The Magister Templi is pre-eminently the Master of Mysticism, that is, His Understanding is entirely free from internal contradiction or external obscurity; His word is to comprehend the existing Universe in accordance with His own Mind. He is the Master of the Law of Sorrow (Dukkha).

The use of the word mysticism has been criticized by those whom have interpreted it to mean direct subjective knowledge of the Christian or other expressions of God, or have mistakenly understood it to mean that it is possible to intuit the nature of ultimate reality. Rather, what is being discussed is the supra-rational understanding that the real center of experience is not the mind, but the Self, being the awareness in which everything happens. Self is the common factor of all experience, that central “I am”  without predicates that until now was enveloped by the mind, only occasionally breaking free in rare glimpses of intuition or insight. This spark of “I am”, being conscious of consciousness has no attributes and cannot be described. It is being only self, and being my self is all there is. It is nondual; everything that exists is my self, as there is nothing that is different from me. Without time and causation, what happens can only happen now, spontaneously. Being nondual is the state of love as compared to the desire for love, for All is in Self. The Self is the source of all reality, the sphere in which the world is manifested. The Law of Sorrow (Dukkha) can be translated many ways, but in this context primarily refers to the realization that all phenomena are objects in consciousness and therefore transitory and without true reality.

Mysticism and Adepthood

"The aim of the Adept is union with the Absolute; this is the
summit of True Mysticism, and yet, for the Adept, this height of
attainment has a distinct interpretation. Rather than his own
identity dissolving within the Absolute State of Being, merging and
unifying like the droplet within the ocean, the Adept realises
himself as Absolute: a Perfected Unique Being, and thus as an
Active Principle of New Creation. Taking Himself to be the Hand
of Fate, the struggle of the Adept is that of Lucifer: a War against
That which resists or denies his Will to become the Sole and
Unique One, a Singularity of Unique Power, the Polestar of his
own Universe: QUTUB."
Chumbley, Andrew. QUTUB

Early along the path of spiritual knowledge, one is given the thought that ones' body, emotions, memories and even thoughts are not really themselves. For those who explore this remarkable yet simple notion, eventually one comes to understand that they are themselves a monad of pure consciousness, beyond the body, beyond even the mind. The contemplative realizes that he merely uses the body and mind; when he tells his finger to scratch his head it does so, when he directs his thoughts they obediently shift from a given set of thought to another, and when he experiences fear he can choose to not allow free reign. For all their wonders, the body and mind are distinct from his inner identity, his inner being. This understanding is called self-realization.

Yet self-realization is not the end of it. By further introspection—unless one gets stuck—one comes to understand that his own consciousness, his own spiritual existence, is not ultimate. Even in his own essential identity, he himself is not the be-all and end-all of everything. There are other living beings too, and they’re not just projections of himself. And there’s a material cosmos out there, hard and tangible and unlikely to be something he has merely imagined up. And even if he thinks that in reality such distinctions at last no longer exist, that in truth there is only absolute oneness, and that all else is but an illusion, a dream, he still has to ask himself, “Where does this illusion come from?”

In this way his thoughts bring him to realize that there is an Absolute Truth, a source of all energies, all realities, and he sees himself to be a part of that Absolute. By considering his own identity as a conscious individual—a conscious person—he realizes the individual personal nature of that Absolute. Finally, he recognizes himself not as a component, not as one possible expression of the Absolute but rather as the ultimate manifestation of the Absolute.

Attachment

Attachment is an interesting concept. We are attached to our lovers, pets, jobs, possessions and illimitable other things. Attachment can be understood not as "me" but more accurately as "mine". In this context, attachments imply ownership, sovereignty, dominion. I have a book given to me by my father several years ago. It was his, and shows decades of use in the worn bindings and yellowing pages. However, the book has sentimental meaning for me.  Is this attachment? Of course it is. I am perfectly aware that if the book is burned tomorrow or is lost that my physical being will not be damaged, and any mental distress I suffer will only be that which I allow by one means or another.

It is the awareness of attachments that is important. All attachments are voluntarily accepted on one level or another, even if the acceptance was unconscious or the reasons obscure. However, the power of those attachments to rule us is entirely dictated by our awareness of the attachments, as only with knowledge can one choose to either maintain or release that attachment, or to mandate what power it embodies.

One of the most pernicious attachments one must eventually encounter is the attachment to the ego. The ego may be loosely defined as the conscious mind and the apparent personality of the individual. The ego uses reason and other faculties to satisfy the desires of the mind, but who is really minding the store? Is the ego the complete self? Of course not. The ego is a convenient interface of the mind to the universe, again the conscious self that seeks to achieve the desires of the mind when possible and to override them when necessary. The ego deals with desires from conscious and unconscious elements, including suppressed ones and even the desires of the ego itself.

Most people confuse the ego for the self, which is like confusing the receptionist at the front desk for the corporation. People seldom expend the time and patience to explore and integrate the shadow, or to relive and accept traumatic memories and so bring these components into the realm of the conscious instead of the recesses of the unconscious and suppressed unconscious. It is a process of growth, where the whole of yesterday is expanded to become part of a larger whole today. Bringing unconscious elements into the conscious does not mean the ego expands, although that can happen, but rather that there are more and more conscious elements of the self present. This results in a change in the relationships in the mind. With the conscious contents of the self expanding there is a correspondingly smaller percentage of ego. This is not to say the ego gets smaller, but rather that the percentage of the conscious mind that is ego is proportionately smaller due to growth. As the conscious self continues to emerge, the self must give us exclusive identification with the ego.

This is a critical stage. As one ages, this cessation of exclusive identification with the ego allows for further development. With the egoic focus on the satisfaction of desires no longer the exclusive motivator, love for others can manifest to a greater degree and one can to varying degrees emerge into transpersonal awareness. Concern for others, community, nations and global units begins to emerge. Note the parallel here in that the (self) concerns of yesterday expand into the (transpersonal) concerns of tomorrow.

Perspectives on RHP and LHP Thought

“Black magic and the left-hand path serve ego and lead away from the True Self and the True Will, yet he is essentially saying that you can rise ever higher on the evolutionary ladder by submerging yourself in the primitive qliphothic primeval slime beneath the Ladder of Lights.  Those above the abyss are capable of this, in a different manner, but for those below the abyss this is sheer nonsense.1 ”

Before we begin, it is necessary to establish a common understanding of the essential natures of the right hand path and left hand path perspectives. Although historical origins are interesting, at this juncture we shall confine ourselves with current definitions. While specific associations vary from tradition to tradition and occasionally within specific traditions, the essential distinction lies in the basic assumption or rejection of various forms of dualism and the values that derive from those assumptions. In the interest of clarity, select sub-beliefs such as the Dianic and Theistic Satanic corpus will be left unexamined.

One basic assumption that forms the foundation of these belief systems is whether the individual or organization in question subscribes to the duality of absolute good and absolute evil. Right hand path philosophies typically have a strong adherence to the belief in the duality of absolute good and evil. Often this belief is shared by many monotheistic religions and this certainty of absolute good or evil is the foundation for rules of conduct and other practices that allow a rigid standard of determining good and evil within a larger community. By contrast, the left hand path stresses that good and evil are relative, a continuum of shades of gray. This moral relativism means that with exceptions moral judgments are largely personal interpretations, leading to an acceptance of more flexible interpretations of good and evil when considering personal acts or the acts of others.

A second basic duality underlying the essential difference between these two schools of thought is esoteric or exoteric authority. The left hand path initiatory school of thought is esoteric, meaning that it is tacitly or explicitly understood that the path to spiritual perfection can be found by looking in and perfecting the self, cultivating self-awareness by a growing understanding of one’s inner nature and ultimate responsibility for success and failure is the sole provenance of the practitioner. Others may provide guidelines or one may choose to use an individual as an example, but it is a purely personal choice.

By contrast, the right hand path series of thought is primarily exoteric in nature, deriving validity from an outside source which is typically a god/goddess or higher principle such as Justice. For example, the right-hand religion of Christianity derives the validity of their initiatory path by adherence to the principles exemplified by Jesus Christ, with followers seeking to become more Christlike and consequently more in accordance to His will.  Although not always, the mechanism of this relationship is submission to Jesus Christ, to essentially become an avatar of him on earth. Some right-hand path schools of thought combine elements of exoteric and esoteric assumptions, such as various manifestations of Western ceremonial orders such as the A. A. and others. In organizations of this type, the same esoteric self-examination and self-perfection is explicitly part and parcel of the initiatory process, but derives spiritual authority and validity ultimately through exoteric means.

The third and final major distinction between right hand and left hand path is the status of the ego in the practice of the respective traditions. This is perhaps the most difficult to present. Right hand path philosophies are surprisingly consistent in their identification of the ego as an obstacle to be overcome. These traditions seek to overcome the ego, to erode it, to excise it, overpower it or by various mechanisms allow it to serve the allied higher power or principle or be obliterated in its entirety, allowing that higher power or principle to manifest through the now-perfected vessel.

By contrast, the left hand path of initiation has varying views of the role of the ego at various stages of development. During the period of development characterized by initial magickal development before the experience which in the Golden Dawn traditions is typically referred to as the CHGA, the ego is idealized as the primary, driving force of magickal power and the road to initiatory experience. This period is typically characterized by the expansion of the personality by the systematic process of accessing and assimilating unconscious and repressed elements of the psyche into a whole united by the ego. By the use of the ego as the uniting force which assimilates these emerging elements, it typically hypertrophies with results typically identified with scorn by right hand path devotees.

The Changing Role of Ego in Left Hand Path Initiation

As previously mentioned, prior to the interval of development associated with the sephira of Tiphareth is concerned with the integration of the complete psyche under the aegis of the ego with the common but not necessary occurrence of egoic hypertrophy. However, the role of the ego in the left hand path initiatory pattern must necessarily change, manifesting in two successor phases corresponding to the interval after successful invocation of the Holy Guardian Angel and the Crossing of the Abyss. These are changes both in the perceived role and the manifestation of the ego, and are necessary preconditions in order to achieve final maturation.

In both right hand and left hand path perspectives, the initial success of the Conversation is a milestone of sorts, and reflects the beginning of a new phase of development. During this interval and ending with the initiation of the Abyss experience, the right hand path and its emphasis on disempowerment  or more accurately disidentification with the ego serves well. However, in the case of the left hand path initiate and its focus until this interval with empowering the ego a new approach must be learned that does not conflict with personal mores but eases the apparent conflict between identifying with the ego and seeking to expand the psyche to encompass the archetypal true self. 

The resolution to this apparent conflict is to begin the process of ceasing to exclusively identify with the ego and to begin also identifying with aspects of the Holy Guardian Angel, or idealized self as archetype. This is not an expansion of the ego, but rather an expansion of the self by identifying with additional and formerly repressed manifestations of the emergent personality in a new crystallization.  




1 Frater Keallach 93/676. “Michael Aquino - Part I” Encyclical Letter May 1987 E.V., Anno LXXXIII

The Path to Mastery

In the Western Tradition of Magick there is an event known as ‘Crossing the Abyss’, which marks a certain milestone in the magician’s magical career. However, due to a considerable dearth of information on the subject the general conception of the phenomena ranges from undergoing a personal depression to an actual dragging of the unfortunate into Hell. However, based on my own personal experience and that of others, I can tell you that crossing the abyss is a metaphor for a process of realization. The realization is not specific to a particular tradition or even the magical mindset, but is a personal event recognized in various forms thoughout history.

The Path of Mastery
The path of Mastery in the Western tradition is not to be understood as a system of trials and rewards. Rather, it is a process of growing understanding, often undertaken without conscious choice, that results in the ability to perceive reality as the Absolute reality. Let me clear up a small point of common definitions here. Awareness is defined for the purposes of this missive as the original state of mind, before it mistook the emerging personality construct for itself and identified with it. It is the receptive state of not-knowing. Consciousness is the state of recognition of an object, whether it is a rock nearby, a memory or an itching of the earlobe. Mind is defined as thinking about an object.

The problem with the everday “waking” mentality is that everyday consciousness as defined above puts the entire world into an “us and them” context. We recognize Steven’s shoes, my keys, her groceries and so forth. A subtler problem is the nature of this mine/not mine distinction because it is an artifact of the ego, a self-sustaining mechanism that keeps the mind in an egocentric context. In essence, the world is divided into “me” and “not-me”. However, when one recognizes that one’s thoughts, possessions and tasks to perform, as well as those of everyone else in this world and indeed all of the universe are nothing but objects in consciousness, it is a complete liberation. You have thoughts, but you are not your thoughts. You have possessions, but you are not your possessions. You have tasks, but you are not your tasks. The recognition that all save the base Awareness are merely objects of consciousness, mere constructs removes feelings of attachment. Fundamental changes in perception take place, as ownership issues are deprioritized or fall away completely.

States and Stages
A recent review of the NewAeon publication provoked a memory of an observation I made in the past. One commonly misunderstood aspect of initiation is the nature of consciousness itself. Consciousness is not monolithic, and changes in consciousness often manifest in surges curiously reminiscent of waves beating on the surf. During the rites and meditations it is possible and even necessary to exalt consciousness, but all too quickly this fades although insights or partial manifestations of this state may linger. The 7=4 initiation is an example of this. However, people including even many promising adepts often mistake a temporarily elevated state of consciousness for a stage of consciousness, the former being temporary and the latter being either a permanent evolution or revolution of understanding. These are not to be understood as separate phenomena, but rather a scale starting with a “peak experience” state, moving through a plateau stage of increasing indwelling with this new understanding and finally reaching the stable state of permanent assimilation.

The successful attainment of a state is not necessary for the eventual attainment of a stage, but serves to "grease the wheels" in a metaphysical sense by providing the glimmer of Understanding necessary. It is safe to say that an initiation does not provide for attainment, but serves to reflect recognition of an attainment or to provide that state that serves as a guidepost for the eventual stage of development. The achieved state should be a goad to further effort, not the signal that it is time to necessarily stop and integrate new knowledge into a presumed whole on the way to Mastery. The admonition to "Invoke Often" also applies to achieving these exalted states again and again, so that the adept can plateau and eventually stabilize at the new stage.

Silent Witness
As mentioned above, the essential awareness that is the characteristic of Mastery is that all phenomena, even the perception of the personal self are objects in consciousness. For example, when enjoying the scent of a rose it is easily understood that the aroma we are experiencing is nothing more than chemical stimulation of certain centers of the brain, and that emotional connotations and memories are also understood in the same sense. Similarly, the perception of time is an object of consciousness; when thinking about tomorrow we are doing that thinking in the here and now. The ability to experience the universe with the prime awareness is often referred to as the Silent Witness or the Impersonal Witness. This awareness of the Self is an experience that a stupendous vastness, an absolute silence, a complete impersonality, and a singularly clear but absolutely uninvolved awareness of everything. One is merely a witness, a silent and unchanging witness. This is a direct insight, not the result of a conscious thought process but rather of a metaconscious process.

The Crossing
The concept of the Abyss has been so filled with flowery and turgid prose as to be almost deliberately misleading to the reader. The experience of the Abyss is the emergence of the feelings of disgust, fear and confusion that are a necessary part of growing to Mastery. Just as a child experiences fear and anxiety during separation from the breast of the mother at one stage of development and follows it later with fear and anxiety as they learn to cope with communicating with others and their burgeoning emotions, so does the adept face their trials. Consider that your mind is attempting to let go of the boundaries of self and not-self, of the distinction between yesterday and tomorrow, and the underlying assumption that the ego is not actually the self and you will understand why this is so terrifying. It is among other things the death of the ego, or to be more specific the exclusive identification with the ego.

In some cases, these fears and anxieties are anthropomorphized to some degree in the manifestation of Choronzon. The actual manifestation is specific to each individual, but the process for overcoming it is straightforward. As a object in consciousness, silence and acceptance of this manifestation (or the unembodied manifestations of the fears Choronzon represents) are the means to not defeat him, not to temporarily become him (as Crowley wrote) but to accept him. Acceptance becomes integration, and the beast at this level is gone.

Magister Templi or Master of the Temple (8°=3°)
“The principal business of this grade is to obtain a perfect understanding of the Universe. The essential Attainment is the perfect annihilation of that personality which limits and oppresses his true self. The Magister Templi is pre-eminently the Master of Mysticism, that is, his Understanding is entirely free from internal contradiction or external obscurity; his Word is to comprehend the existing Universe in accordance with his own Mind. This grade corresponds to Binah on the Tree of Life.”

The above quotation is the “classic” definition of the Master of the Temple, the basic enlightened state. However, while elegantly written it is not terribly straightforward in what the hallmarks of the Master is. For one, the assertion that the attainment is “the essential annihilation of that personality which limits and oppresses his true self” must be clearly misunderstood as potentially dangerously misleading. The process of evolution toward Mastery is essentially a process of synthesis and growth, where the presumed whole becomes part of another larger whole. As we mature, we move from identification of the self from the body as children but later identify the self with the ego. The body didn’t disappear, but we no longer exclusively identified with it. As we learn to confront and assimilate those repressed qualities of our natures, they too become part of the larger and integrated whole. So the process continues, integrating more and more of our minds including the spectrum of conscious and unconscious, achieving greater unities and arriving at more and more essential understandings of self.

At the stage of the experience identified with the birth of the Master of the Temple, the individual has an experience of the Silent Witness. In other words, the individual has an experience of an awareness without dualities such as now and then, his and hers, and most directly self and not-self. While the poverty of language does not fully convey the meaning of the experience, the essential experience removes boundaries, so that there is only the timeless moment of now, with no perception of self or not-self; the essential awareness, unchanging and unattached, recognizing all as objects of consciousness only, independent of intellect, memories or desire. The result of experiencing the absolute in my case was a feeling of detached serenity and intense flash of the classic “Eureka! I found it!” feeling when one receives a flash of insight. Others have described it as emptiness, bliss, a feeling of love for all things or an insight into the ultimate truth. In my case as well as in most of the other individuals whom I have encountered sharing this experience, it did not initially manifest in ritual or meditation, but rather manifested during the day during the most mundane of tasks. This is not to say that the meditations and ritual and not necessary pre-requisites, but that they serve to create the path. Only after the path exists can you walk on it. As previously stated, this is a state of consciousness. By definition this is a temporary experience, but an experience that can be repeated and in fact must be regularly.

The remainder of the classical definition of the grade of the Master of the Temple flows as a consequence of this experience. The observation that understanding is free of internal contradiction reflects in many cases work that should have been accomplished during the 7=4 period, where the conscious and unconscious elements of the mind have been integrated so far as possible. The reference to external obscurity reflects his growing awareness in consciousness that external objects are (along with internal ones) merely objects of consciousness, and this understanding requires a complete re-examination of the Universe in light of this development as the former symbols of consciousness are integrated as signs in the mind. Note that this grade like all others is a transitional stage, not to be confused with some eternal and unchanging; in many ways, this grade is a signpost that the work has well and truly begun, it will eventually flower into that of the Magus or even the Ipsissimus, but this is a continuum of experience that under the right conditions is self-correcting and self-sustaining.

Magus (9°=2°)
“The Magus seeks to attain Wisdom, declares his law, and is a Master of all Magick in its greatest and highest sense. His will is entirely free from internal diversion or external opposition; His work is to create a new Universe in accordance with his Will. This grade corresponds to Chokmah on the Tree of Life.”
The grade of Magus is the result of the Master continuing to regularly reach this experience, over time the process developing as a plateau consciousness. During this interval, the formerly peak experience of the absolute awareness intrudes more and more regularly into waking consciousness during period of mundane or magical activity. Consciousness continues to evolve and integrate this new understanding. The definition above states that part of the Work is to create a new Universe in accordance with his (or her) Will. The other part of the Western tradition also provides that the Magus must pronounce a suitable Word to initiate a new Aeon.

Nicely put, but flowery language always trades elegance for meaning. The Magus synthesizes his new understanding of the universe into a whole. To the Magus, this Word (or system of magick, or whatever the Magus chooses to encapsulate the essence of their new understanding), is then passed to others. This Word to others is only a symbol, and not the awareness of the Master. When the Magus was starting their magical career, they used magical seals, correspondences and other symbols to bring about developments in their consciousness, and the Magus returns the favor by providing new symbols to the emerging generation.

The advantage of this approach is that the symbols presented to students change over time, staying current with the times, and are more readily acceptable to modern minds. This in part explains why the Chaos Magick paradigm is more popular than the ceremonial traditions of the past or even the modern resurrections of older religions. the mentality of man changes over time, and symbols once of great value must be re-interpreted and new symbols defined that will be understood.

Ipsissimus (10°=1°)
“Beyond the comprehension of the lower degrees. An Ipsissimus is free from limitations and necessity and lives in perfect balance with the manifest universe. Essentially, the highest mode of attainment. This grade corresponds to Kether on the Tree of Life.”
This stage marks the culmination of the experience begun by the Master of the Temple. Here, the understanding achieved as a peak or plateau is not completely integrated into consciousness. With a unity consciousness, there is no further boundaries between self and not-self. Indeed, “All is accomplished”.


“From Many, to One, to All”
Frater Tehiru
Michael Aaron Eckhard

States and Stages

A recent review of the NewAeon publication provoked a memory of an observation I made in the past. One commonly misunderstood aspect of initiation is that consciousness is not monolithic, and changes in consciousness often manifest in surges curiously reminiscent of waves beating on the surf. During the rites and meditations it is possible and even necessary to exalt consciousness, but all too quickly this fades although insights or partial manifestations of this state may linger. The 7=4 initiation is an example of this. However, people including even many promising adepts often mistake a temporarily elevated state of consciousness for a stage of consciousness, the former being temporary and the latter being either a permanent evolution or revolution of understanding.

The successful attainment of a state is not necessary for the eventual attainment of a stage, but serves to "grease the wheels" in a metaphysical sense by providing the glimmer of Understanding necessary. It is safe to say that an initiation does not provide for attainment, but serves to reflect recognition of an attainment or to provide that state that serves as a guidepost for the eventual stage of development. The achieved state should be a goad to further effort, not the signal that it is time to integrate new knowledge into a presumed whole on the way to Mastery. The admonition to "Invoke Often" also applies to achieving these exalted states again and again, so that the adept can plateau and eventually stabilize at the new stage.

Ruminations on the Goetia

The Goetia as you know has 72 spirits of varying orders as well as their spheres of influence and other details. I was looking at the various seals of the demons in the excellent Peterson version(The seals are not placed within a double circle, that is a change that later individuals put in. I agree with the notion that placing the demonic seals in a double circle is an attempt to limit them), and it occurred to me that while there are exceptions, in this timeframe many seals and so forth were derived from magic squares.

If this is indeed the case, it should be possible to reverse-engineer the square from which was derived from.

Us and Them

Let me clear up a small point of common definitions here. Awareness is defined for the purposes of recent and future discussions as the original state of mind. It is the receptive state of not-knowing. Consciousness is the state of recognition of an object, whether it is a rock nearby, a memory or an itching of the earlobe. Mind is defined as thinking about an object.

The problem here is that consciousness as defined above puts the entire world into an “us and them” context. We recognize Steven’s shoes, my keys, her groceries and so forth.  A subtler problem is the nature of this mine/not mine distinction because it is an artifact of the ego, a self-sustaining mechanism that keeps the mind in an egocentric context. However, when one recognizes that one’s thoughts, possessions and tasks to perform are all objects in consciousness, it is a complete liberation.  You have thoughts, but you are not your thoughts. You have keys and possessions, but you are not your possessions. You have tasks, but you are not your tasks. The recognition that all save the base Awareness are merely objects of consciousness, mere constructs removes feelings of attachment. Fundamental changes in perception take place, as ownership issues are deprioritized or fall away completely.

Observations in Meditation

It's funny how the mind works. The mechanism of the meditation is to be simply aware, without conscious thought. The goal is to be a mirror, with your awareness simply recognizing thoughts, memories, snippets of songs and so forth but not thinking of them with your awareness.  As I sat in the Formlessness, from time to time these stray thoughts entered my consciousness. I can't say how often or rapidly they came forward, because the state of Void is timeless. However, what I noticed was that when these thoughts came in, there was a distinct but subtle sense of pressure, of tightening when they entered my awareness. This sensation I had not considered before, but the sensation became more distinct as the meditation continued and seemed to have varying (albeit subtle) levels of intensity.

The second perception I have had before was that as I sat in my Aware state, at varying intervals these stray thoughts would come across my consciousness and were recognized as separate from my awareness. This awareness has been reached before, but in the past had been a temporary stage, a perception acquired after long, hard work. This perception of course is easily intellectually achieved but that is hardly the point.

A Tesseract Walkthrough

Now that everyone has reviewed the introductory material on this topic, it is time to actually work on navigating within a tesseract. As previously stated, a tesseract can be "unfolded" into eight (8) cubes in the same way that a paper cube can be unfolded into a calvalry cross. Now, having determined the vertices of the cubes in the method described previously, we end up with a table looking like this:

5	4	12	13	7	6	14	15
7	6	14	15	3	2	10	11
3	2	10	11	1	0	8	9
12	14	10	8	13	15	11	9
4	6	2	0	12	14	10	8
5	7	3	1	13	15	11	9
5	7	3	1	4	6	2	0
5	4	12	13	1	0	8	9

This is not terribly informative at this point. However, when the eight cubes are drawn out, the results are more informative. Please take a moment to review the below image, and note that I have left the eighth cube out of the drawing for clarity:

This drawing was created by sketching out the eight cubes, arbitrarily taking three cubes and stacking them on each other. For simplicity, I refer to these cubes as the base column, with the cubes being numbered (from the bottom) Base 1, Base 2 and Base 3. Similarly, the other four cubes shown are designated North, South, East and West cubes. The final cube (not shown) is referred to as the Transfer cube.If you look at the drawing, you will note that the cubes have been arranged so that the faces that touch another cube have the same numbers on their faces. For example, the east cube touches the Base 1 cube along the face 5,4,6,7 and the west cube touches the north cube along the face 2,6,0,4.

Now here comes the tricky part. The North, South, East and West cubes are not fixed in their positions. Note that these can be "rolled" up the Base Column to touch the central or upper cubes as well. This does not reflect that they are actually rolling, but that they are actually touching those cubes simultaneously. Let's take an example. Suppose that a visitor to the bottom Base Pillar cube decided to walk west into the West Cube. The visitor decides to climb up to the ceiling and go through it. From an outsiders perspective, the visitor would now be standing on the 6,7,3,2 face of the second cube in the Base Pillar! Someone who has watched the conclusion of the movie Labyrinth will immediately see the possibilities of movement inherent in the topography of a tesseract.

To clarify, now that the cubes for this example have been labeled we are left with the following table:

Base 1	5	4	12	13	7	6	14	15
Base 2	7	6	14	15	3	2	10	11
Base 3	3	2	10	11	1	0	8	9
East	12	14	10	8	13	15	11	9
North	4	6	2	0	12	14	10	8
South	5	7	3	1	13	15	11	9
West	5	7	3	1	4	6	2	0
Transfer	5	4	12	13	1	0	8	9

Next blog will detail the transfer cube!