Relearning Jesus

What I am about to say will sound entirely illogical, but one of the best things Christians can do for themselves and for others is to start over again and relearn Jesus. It stands to reason that modern experience and knowledge has greatly toppled over traditional facts about religion and morality that were always assumed to be truisms. It no longer makes sense to say that God is partial only to one particular race of people; most concepts of "sinfulness" seem unnecessary or silly by modern standards; and the historical evidence of an authentic human Jesus is scant. If anything, the primary evidence of Jesus's very existence, the Bible, is riddled with allusions to and borrowings from many other religions and practices that hail from the ancient Mediterranean. To say Christianity is unique is downright preposterous given what we know about these historical ties to previous rituals, myths, and philosophies.

Knowing this, the modern Christian has to finally rid themselves of blind, ignorant faith and accept the fact that almost 2,000 years of Christian apologetics is practically defunct in the present era. Reading material like Thomas Aquinas's mind boggling Summa Theologica no longer convinces us of God's existence with the same force it did for medieval thinkers. In a culture where we demand physical evidence of all things there is no overwhelming proof even for the existence of God's very Incarnation - something that should have left a very real physical imprint on the archaeological record.

It becomes clear that all may not be what it seems regarding the mythology of Christianity. In order to remain sensible beings we must at least quietly entertain the possibility that Christ never existed in the first place, which seemingly throws the entire religion into chaos and sets it on a path toward destruction. But this is not necessarily true.

In my personal approach to faith, I have tried to remain connected to its historical source. I have always wanted to know how early and medieval Christians experienced our shared religion. There is so much one can learn from the texts and documents from these periods, and I consider it a tremendous tragedy that many moderns neglect this aspect of Christianity's rich narrative, yet they still claim to know much about their religion. But the most crucial aspect of what I've learned from this kind of study is that allegory is everything. The traditional historical Christian mystic has no patience for the things of the temporal or material. For them everything in the Bible is primarily transcendental, and things that occur in the physical domain are simply illusive reflections of an allegorical reality original conceived in the spiritual realm. In other words, the events of every day life conceal messages and influences from various other powers. The same is true of all narratives and parables, and we know that Jesus speaks primarily in parables throughout the Bible.

The truth is, the narrative of Jesus's life does not have to have literally happened in order to be deeply relevant in the real world. Truly the Bible is considered to be the direct Word of God, and this has particular connotations. We can recall from the Gospel of St. John that, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God. And the Word was God." John is referring to Christ, as the Christ is understood to be the Living Word, or the Word Made Flesh. Philo the Jew (20 B.C.  - 50 A.D.), one of the most influential Neo-Platonic philosophers of the entire period of Antiquity and perhaps the originator of the whole "Logos" concept in the first place, explained that the Logos or Word of God was the person through whom God crafted the Universe. Since God cannot directly come into contact with matter (as in the Platonic approach matter is strictly evil due to its density), He requires an intermediary in order to shape and affect it as according to His Will. (Of course, Word and Will are inextricably synonymous.) The Logos is therefore equivalent to God's "blueprint" for Creation, a kind of ideal design for the world as it should be. Matter being weak, heavy, and mutable is unable to sustain this level of perfection and therefore it allows for evil to exist. In other words, to patch these two points together, Christ has existed since the beginning of time prior to the creation of matter and is also the equivalent to the Bible itself. In this light, then, the Bible represents the "blueprint" for the ideal universe, not necessarily the real universe.

Therefore to say that the Bible depicts literal events as they occur in matter, in extension through space and time, is to miss the point. Theoretically the narrative of the Bible occurs simultaneously, not in extension. We can benefit from conceptualizing the timeline of Jesus's life as conflated with the timeline of the Jewish people as told in the Old Testament. And even more specific events within the two timelines can occur simultaneously, or be understood to be directly connected. The Annunciation takes place at the same time as the Visitation, the Presentation, and the Assumption. The Nativity of Christ occurs simultaneously with His Passion and Resurrection. The Exile of the Jewish people is in synch with the slaying of Goliath, etc.

Obviously this opens a difficult Pandora's Box, if you will. The Bible no longer seems to make sense. And yet, we must at least attempt to see how this is possible if only by recognizing that God is eternally present. God is an never-ending NOW, an eternal circle of all possible pasts, presents, and futures condensed into one pure Moment. To us, the Moment appears to happen in a linear or even cyclical fashion. The events of Christ's life are commemorated throughout the solar year; in doing so we achieve linear comprehension of the narrative as well as cyclical as the years endlessly repeat themselves. But in the eye of God all these events relate to one eternal present that never changes or fades, one that constitues what is supposedly God's ideal "blueprint" for the world.

As if this weren't confusing enough, what do we do when we remember that Christianity teaches us that Christ lives in each of us? That Christ is the literal center of our unique and individual lives, and that therefore we are all unified in some subtle and unexplainable way? This is to say that each individual contains at the center of their lives the same narrative structure as the entire contents of the Bible as told from the Creation of the World in Genesis to its Destruction by Fire in Apocalypse. But we all know instinctively that we don't all lead the exact same lives - the specific contexts of our individual lives pan out differently for each of us. And yet it is undeniably an aspect of Christian teaching that Christ, the Omniscient Logos, resides in each of our hearts. This is to say that over the course of one's life one experiences the same story as that told in the Life of Christ, since He, the universal blueprint, constitutes the center around which each of our lives revolves. The exact details of the way in which this story unfolds for each of us is different. The narrative is the same. This is only possible because the narrative itself does not actually occur within the confines of space and time. The narrative of Jesus Christ is an ideal allegorical representation of what it is to be human, to have the spirit wedded to the tabernacle of the body, for whom the spirit seems to suffer and undergo death out of love.

This further suggests that the Logos is not only the means by which a transcendant God manipulates the universe from afar, but is the tool or hand by which God directly interacts and lives in the world. Through the dense material of the body God's narrative plays out in space and time in an endless circle in as many different forms as He sees fit. No matter what corruption ever befalls the Son through death the original Godhead remains pure and unadulterated. The Source of Life is never tainted no matter what grossness may affect Him through interaction with matter. Knowing this we can affirm that in Christ we are One Body and One Blood; that we are all spotless at heart, and no torment may ever change or affect who we really are; and that God so loved the world that he sent His only Begotten One to redeem it from darkness. Matter in and of itself is useless. It is only through invigoration through the spirit of life that it becomes something of value. But the selfless contribution of Life to matter in order to endow that matter with Consciousness inevitably condemns that Life energy to die and seemingly change. But after the Passion Christ rises again and remains untainted. In dying Christ opens the gates of paradise; in opting for death the spirit blows open the doors of the earthly hell and brings down the fires of the ideal paradise. In Christ we know there is no east nor west, and in Christ we may therefore also say that Heaven and Hell are allowed to coexist to some extent. In Him and through His Death the great possibilities of the ideal world as represented by the Logos are allowed to be brought forth into the darkness of the material world.

John the Baptist and The Chariot

It may be strange to connect John the Baptist to VII The chariot, but there is good reason for doing so. The Nativity of John the Baptist, celebrated each June 24th, roughly coincides with the transition into the sign of Cancer on the 21st. Cancer, of course, is the sign associated with VII The Chariot. Cancer also being the cardinal sign of water represents the initial onrush of that element. Remember that John baptized with water, as opposed to Christ, whose coming John foretold, but who baptized "in the Spirit."

The Chariot is associated with the Holy Grail, the womb of life, the cup of the Goddess, in which is poured blood. In Christian symbolism blood and water are synonymous, which is particularly interesting given Cancer's watery nature.

The transition into Cancer on the 21st, coinciding with the Summer Solstice, represents the pinnacle of the sun's strength throughout the solar year. The solstice is the longest day of the year and all subsequent days steadily shorten. On this day the sun is at the height of its power, and in the scheme of the solar year, is when it seems most indestructible. This is a theme carried out in the Roman celebration of Sol Invictus, though this holiday was celebrated around the time of Christmas (around December 24th when the sun seems to "regenerate" after its steady decline in force through the fall).

Perhaps what remains mysterious is why the Church decided to place John the Baptist's Nativity a the same time as the transition into Cancer and the Summer Solstice. Perhaps it has to do with the fact that John himself "was not the light, but came to testify to the light." Because of this we can see his connection to Cancer (being watery), and a more general connection to the sun (as Cancer is not ruled or associated with the sun directly in any way). Therefore John's association is more aquatic than solar. In some ways we can see John as the Cup Bearer, he who bears the Grail filled with the Blood, which is solar, which is synonymous with Christ. Perhaps we can even vaguely associate John with a form of Binah, the Goddess. Indeed, John the Baptist is often depicted as an effeminate youth in Renaissance art. John conveyed the solar redemptive message, but was not the essence of redemption itself.

Let us also take note of The Chariot's associations with paths and directions. Being the bridge between Binah, the Mother of Form, and Geburah, the Power of God, The Chariot represents the form of power, or rather form being empowered. Really the distinction is irrelevant. Regardless, the energy of Geburah is given form through the Understanding the Soul is capable of. Enlightened by Wisdom, the Understanding first begets Mercy, whose main operation is to generate, but so that all things may be balanced Understanding also begets Power, whose primary function is to energize and destroy. The Chariot therefore destroys all other paths but the One True Path, which is True Will, which is Destiny, which is the cornerstone of personal Salvation, which is the Holy Guardian Angel, which is Christ.

Remember, too, that John the Baptist is always associated with the prophecy of Isaiah that says, "The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, 'Prepare, ye, the way of the Lord. Make straight in the desert a highway for our God.'" John prepared the way, clearing it for the future sowing and reaping represented in Christ's Life, Death, and Resurrection. John made the path straight, much like the path of the Chariot. In other words, the Chariot represents a direct route for energy to take. It teaches us that the most potent energy, the most triumphant energy, is that which is grounded to only one direction and purpose. Ultimately that purpose must be solar in nature (and therefore connected to Light, Life, Love, and Liberty), must be geared towards Self, and must therefore be self-redeeming. Baptism, as we know, destroys original sin. It washes away our transgression and wipes us clean. Clearly this is a reference to Geburah's destructive and cleansing quality. Sin is the condition of life in which the consciousness is swept side to side by distractions, impulses, and desires. It is the condition of multiplicity, of disorder, and disobedience. It is to have no power over the world because one does not have power over oneself. The only recourse is purification through destruction. Through metaphysical baptism (which the ritual and sacrament of Baptism reflects), one may transcend to the victorious state of the Chariot. This is a state of being in which one becomes a vessel, a conduit for the Living God, and follows His precepts. And to follow His commandment is to Love Him, and truly "there is nothing that can unite the divided but love." The Chariot therefore also represents a condition of intense love in which the individual is lost in the mystery of the Eternal Self, which is the God of the personal Universe - the architect of one's experience over the Aeons. "There are love and love. There is the Dove and the Serpent Choose ye well!" Love, we must remember, must eradicate differentiation. In The Chariot, one is so knit to the Path of God by the power of love that one becomes as the prophets Elijah and Enoch, and "goes to walk with God." To do so is to never be known again and is akin to Nirvana. 


This condition is thus a state of grace and perfection - remember that the Chariot's number is 418, ABRAHADABRA, the cipher of the Great Work, and the word that opens all doors. When one delves deeper, one also draws the connection between ABRAHADABRA and Harpocrates, the god of Silence, the Babe in the Egg of Blue, whose Silence is the secret key to all locks, whose amorphous essence is the answer to all mysteries. Being associated with Kether, Harpocrates is also the Spirit. 


Everything connects. Baptism through water, which is blood, leads to grace, which is victory over the world and the self (an interior version of the exterior projected world); the path of grace leads to baptism in the Spirit, which is Salvation. Salvation is love of the Eternal Self to such a degree that one commits to following the path laid out by the Eternal Self in all things. Their path becomes straight, though surrounded on all sides by the desert. 

The Erotic Art of Living

Oscar Wilde once said, "Everything in the world is about sex except sex. Sex is about power." There is such overwhelming truth to this statement; its validity is experienced everywhere. Sexuality is the foundation of many of our drives and motivations, and our media culture is inundated with it to the point where it is impossible to escape it. Perhaps we grieve the loss of "childhood innocence" because it represents a time when the sexual impulse doesn't exist (though Freud of course would argue against that), and all the emotional problems that arise from it likewise don't exist. We can all agree that sexuality is complicated for everyone, and that it in turn complicates everything it comes in contact with. It certainly adds a complexity to our relationships with others either for good or ill. The desire that becomes inflamed in us for another person can become consuming, distorting, or enrapturing. But we must remember that the absolute basis for sexuality is undeniably the biological need to procreate. Sex in general has become so cheapened by sentimentalization and capitalism that it has become almost ugly. 

The Platonic Spheres

The esoteric Kabbalists and Hermeticists tell us that the sephira of Yesod is associated with the genitals, animal instinct, and procreation. It is also "the moon on a lower arc," as of course Luna in her highest aspect is represented by the path of Gimel descending from the Highest of Kether to the Son of Tiphareth. The Platonists developed the concept of a geocentric universe in which the planets occupy "spheres," or ring-like metaphysical territories that surround their path of orbit around the earth. The order of the planetary spheres in emanation outward from the earth was Luna, Mercury, Venus, Sol, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and something called the Primum Mobile - the "first mover." I hope you will notice that the order of the Platonic spheres is perfectly in line with the order of the Kabbalistic Sephiroth, where following Malkuth/Earth, we have Yesod/Luna, Hod/Mercury, Netzach/Venus, Tiphareth/Sol, Geburah/Mars, Chesed/Jupiter, Binah/Saturn, Chokhmah/Fixed Stars, and Kether/Primum Mobile. 


In Classical thought, the sphere of the moon was considered the source of fate, that which cruelly ties man to the earth, forces him to labor and die. The goal of all budding mystery cults at the turn of the first century was essentially apotheosis (the process by which man becomes a god), or something much akin to it. The deities worshipped by mystery cults were thought to occupy certain planetary spheres, it was believed that if one offered supplication to them throughout life that deity would then redeem the spirit of the individual after death. Prior to this period, Greco-Romans didn't have much of a conceptualization of the afterlife. One simply became a shade, neither enjoying any benefits nor suffering any punishments. With the development of a Western concept of an afterlife and the popularization of Plato's ideas regarding the soul and spirit of man, people became more concerned with the condition of these metaphysical substances, and thus redeeming gods such as Christ, Dionysus, or Mithras became more prominent. Religion became focused on saving man from his fatalistic attachment to materiality and corporeality that was the result of living under the sway of the ever-changing moon. The alternative was remaining in a cycle of reincarnation, as the heaviness of the spirit, weighed down by attachment, would inevitably be drawn into another body. 


All Savior gods are represented by the Son in Tiphareth, which is also Sol and directly above Yesod, Luna, on the Middle Pillar. Compared to Yesod, which is a sephira of illusion and deception, Tiphareth is truth and reality as it is truly meant to be seen. Still drawing from Plato, Tiphareth is the true sun in his famous cave allegory. We see the light of Yesod, the moon, and believe it to be the only source of light, the only ever-changing reality. But the truth of reality lies in Tiphareth, the sun which is the original source of the lunar light. Tiphareth is eternal, balanced, and the change it represents is more benign. For truly there is nothing on the Sephiroth that does not move or change in some capacity. This is the change and evolution of the spirit throughout all lifetimes, whereas Yesod is the evolution of the body, being associated also with vegetable growth. Put simply, Tiphareth is the light of Reason, which endows all existence with purpose and destiny. 


When we synthesize all of these seemingly disparate ideas, we come to the perhaps startling realization that basis of salvation is, as St. Hildegard von Bingen always said, Virginity and Chastity. And yet not. For salvation always comes at the price of death; the solar divinity must give of his body and blood, his life force, in order to redeem the fallen. What better represents the life force itself than the sexual drive? The innate biological impetus to create life in one's own image? The artists of the Renaissance (literary, visual, and musical) all equated the orgasm with death, and for good reason. Death is the orgasmic release of life energy from the body, which allows it to transmute itself and assume a new form for the next life. The energy sublimates and attempts to rise above the planetary influences, so to speak. If it cannot do so it is eventually dragged down by its material attachments and is reinstated in material existence. 


It is our obsession with base sexuality that leaves us under the sway of Luna and Yesod, ignorant and blind to any greater self-purpose than procreation. We may have some inkling of knowledge about our purpose since the Redeemer lives within us and organizes our universe so that we might know Him. But as St. Paul wrote, we do indeed see Him through a glass darkly until we meet face to face. Our lives remain a seemingly cluttered and confusing cluster of symbols, signs, and mysteries. 

From Hildegard's Ordo Virtutum.
The soul being tempted by carnal
sin. 

Therefore, the Truth and Reason of Tiphareth is the personal "Why" veiled behind our sexual impulse. It is the Divine Mandate that motivates man to create himself through his own hands and works. Every act is a magickal act, a sexual act, in which one brings into manifestation not a copy of their biological self, but their own divine self. Salvation is the recognition of Identity and Destiny, which are synonymous, and the simultaneous harnessing of that Wisdom to create discriminately with purpose. The result is clean, without attachment or obligation to anyone other than one's own self. It is content to operate on its own accord, and it cannot be manipulated by anyone other than yourself. It is the origin of free will, the eternal "yes," the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven, and, being erotic in essence, is the essence of pure health and happiness. The spiritual Marriage is the wedding of the procreative passions with self knowledge. To offer oneself as a Virgin to God is to declare oneself chaste to all things that are not of the True Self. It is the adherence and dedication to the reason behind individual destiny. It is to realize and be aware that you are as a field constantly being plowed by the hands of God. To allow yourself to falter and deviate because of the passions and the biological need to procreate is to take the more difficult road. 


This is not to say that sexuality is lacking in morality, for one can remain a Vestal Virgin despite whatever sexual encounters one may have. And it is true that the sexual impulse is holy. To close it up within the body is as much a sin as giving it out indiscriminately. We were made to love and to give that love; apotheosis is to give the world one's unique creative essence constantly, without ceasing, with purpose, direction, and integrity. It is to transform life into art. 

On Hatred

Beloved, the Spirit moves me to write, and so I write.

I have never known such grief as this - to watch the Children of God work such abominations and atrocities in their ignorance of Him. They do crawl upon the earth like locusts, and their words are as the venom of vipers, for they speak of His name yet know Him not. Yea, they do whip Him and spit on Him, though in their eyes they are as holy as the chief priests. Their sin is this: that they have chosen to confine the Lord their God, who is All and Naught, being no made thing. They diminish Him into rigidly fixed laws and precepts of which they themselves do not even understand, but yet these are preferable to them who have no spiritual sight because they are unchanging and simple. The laws that they believe in have become inflexible, and therefore they are not of God. For indeed, I say to you that God is change that is stability. He is constant in His change for He is Life, and Wisdom teaches that the law of life is change. To be alive at all is to undergo evolution, for to be born is to surely die, and to die is surely to be born.

But they do not see such truths. They are as Thomas the Doubter, for they believe not with faith but with their infantile senses. They seek God in the tangible - a clear command that all must follow. And yet, the greatest commandment of all as the Lord taught us is to Love the All with all your heart and soul. These men and their god of order are blasphemers. They mock the glory that is God, and leave Him naked upon a tree. Behold, o man, thy vanity laid before thee: that it is thy wish above all else to fashion God in thy own image! You who are blind to the ever unfolding Universe, you who worship empty idols, who know not the Truth that is God. O presumptuous and petty human! Knowest thou not that thou art dust? And that the Lord your God will one day smite you in the Day of His Wrath? Yea, I tell you that there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth on that day when you shall learn of your own insignificance. Amen, the root of all human fear and spiritual suffering is true. And ye shall be cast out, for ye knew Him not. When He was hungry you gave Him no food. When He was naked you clothed Him not. When He was in captivity you did not visit Him.

The world has been corrupted and Jerusalem has fallen because of man's own iniquity, not because God hates. Behold, in God there is no East nor West, there is no difference. There is only Unity which is Love. God does not hate. Hatred is human, is petty, is rooted in our worthless insistence that all that we know our individual selves to be is the full range and extent of the whole human condition. These are lies and are the beliefs of the Deceiver. Did you not reject him when you were baptized in the name of the Lord? When you committed yourself to Him, did you not take up your own Cross and renounce all evil? And yet these men do evil in our midst. Is there none who shall right them? Shall the just not have their vindication? Indeed, they shall. For the Just are in the Hands of God, and no terror nor torment shall afflict them. They are true to Him having known Him to be within them. And He has shown His great mercy and love to them, and has lifted them up out of their misery and wiped the tears from their eyes. This is thy God that thou hast tried to imprison with the word "hate."

You know Him not. 

On Love

It being Easter this weekend, I feel compelled as I annually do, to write something about it. This year I want to talk about Love, because it is so centrally important to the whole thing, and because it's been on my mind lately. I will keep it brief. For once.

Above all else, we must choose love. Love must not be hoarded but given liberally. For nothing may unite the divided but Love, and truly Love is the Law, Love under Will. There is no greater evil in existence than hatred, which comes from our selfishness. When we selfishly love only ourselves, or those who reflect the seemingly positive qualities in ourselves, we commit a grave error. Do not choose to love only the obvious, but also the subtle, the small, and the hidden. Love all things passionately and courageously, for many things are unknown to you and are therefore terrifying, and yet you must love them regardless. Love is that which liberates us because it frees us from the prison of selfishness. Love is that which gives us Life because Love is the prime motivator of the entire universe, which is one disparate whole trying to attain its original unity. Love is that which gives us Light because it illuminates our true nature, and shows us who we really are by teaching us that which we are not.

For the pain of the world is this: that we are without love. We look for union with passing things and not with that which is real. All this is a snare; love is the only remedy. God is as a mother observing her children, mourning as they die and find no rest. Yet she loves them for she lives through them, though they know her not. All of her children are abominations, for all of them are imperfect being Made. And yet there is great and overwhelming joy in this agony, for this is the necessary repercussion of creation. "For God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son," which is to say that God so loved his creation that he endowed it with his own self, that it might have life and love. Not one of us may say that we have not partaken in Communion with God through bread and wine, for we exist and that is enough. We are of the body of God, and we act with the force of God, who is the origin of all form and force.

Strive to give love daily. Accept love daily. Die through this love daily. Love is a force like any other. Like heat it cannot be contained and must be transcendent. It knows no limitations and no boundaries. It is shameless and condemns not. But do not mistake love as I have already said. Do not love only that which validates yourself, for this is foolishness. Dare to love All, which you are only a part of.

This is the basis of all the Law and teachings of the Prophets. Those who have ears to hear it, may they take it to heart.

Coming to an Understanding of "Religiosity," and How Death Can Inform Worship

After a fairly good hiatus, I'm back, here today to talk to you about what's been on my mind since I left. I've been thinking about exactly what makes an experience "religious," and what makes the ceremony of worship so inspiring.

Directing a church choir has forced me to look at this question in greater depth, since it's part of my responsibilities to foster a sense of devotion and solemnity to the music we make. But I have found that parishioners are very rooted in music that does very little to anyone in regards to inspiration. In some ways, I believe that they are only attached to this music because it represents their comfort zone, and is just what they're used to. It's "pretty" to them, but not exactly profound. But trying to nudge them out of this safe territory into more interesting repertoire is incredibly difficult, and it becomes an issue of politicking and negotiating, which only gets in the way of the work we're supposed to be doing.

As a result, I started to think about several questions. What actually determines the beauty and efficacy of a piece of worship music? What makes something "religious?" And how do you instill people with a sense of adoration for something entirely intangible?

"What actually determines the beauty and efficacy of a piece of worship music?"
In order to answer the first question, I actually turned to the Tree of Life, and looked at what Beauty is influenced by. Of course, "Beauty" is the name of the central sephira Tiphareth on the Middle Pillar, so it receives and exerts a number of influences. Most importantly, it receives direct influence from Godhead in Kether, the Crown. But it also is shaped by the masculine and feminine archetypes of Chokhmah and Binah. As such, it represents on a fundamental level the balance and harmony between all kinds of force, but also the interrelationship between force and form. It is at once passive, active, and fluid, and also represents the union of drive (Chokhmah) with purpose/form (Binah).

It also receives influence from Chesed and Geburah (Mercy and Power respectively), so Tiphareth is constructive and destructive equally. It is a therefore a perfect representation of creation or Life in manifestation, and it can be conceptualized as a snake that moves in a given direction through undulation, or the endless flow back and forth between positive and negative. Life is based on the same principles. Remember that Tiphareth is represented by the sun, and the sun can be equally generative and destructive. It burns away what is unnecessary and cultivates new life from the ashes. Tiphareth is therefore also associated with the phoenix.

Tiphareth emanates Netzach (Victory), Hod (Splendor), and Yesod (Foundation) and from here we start getting a definite sense of form in the literal sense. The first is connected with Venus, the second with Mercury, and the third with the moon. Netzach is almost primal, natural, raw, ecstatic, and lusty, whereas Hod is regimented, logical, analytical, and focused. Yesod is an interesting amalgamation of all the above influences, which produces an astral double or imaginary image of the created idea. Yesod is fantastical and illusionary, and therefore sometimes misleading. It is the source of our subjective subconscious, the shadow self of Jung, and a part of our personality that acts automatically and reflexively. The first major step in the process towards initiation is overcoming Yesod by wedding it to the light of the True Self as expressed consciously in Tiphareth.

To summarize all this, Tiphareth, or Beauty, must be a perfect balance of inspiration and understanding, benevolence and suffering, emotion and intellect. The importance of Yesod in all this is that I believe by participating in adoration balanced by the above principles we can work to regulate our subconscious. We do this by showing it the existence of something greater than itself. Living under Yesod's influence with our subjective consciousnesses grounded in Malkuth, we often act out under the misguidance of Yesod, and disregard the clearer, more beneficial advice of Tiphareth. If the quality of our worship and praise music matches that of Tiphareth, then we are more apt to gain for ourselves the healing and rewards of Tiphareth. If we worship with mediocre methods, then the actual religious effect will be greatly diminished. Choosing pieces simply because they're easy or because "that's what we've always done" is misguided.

"What makes something religious?"
I believe that we can answer this question simply by looking at basic aspects of human religion around the world. The form a religion takes is through its ritual praxis. Ritual gives us a kind of art piece to look at and contemplate, but the real importance of that piece is the artist's intent behind the actual images. In other words, ritual is an abstract performance art. It exists on a stage-like field and even suffers from "fourth wall" syndrome. While this is not absolute, oftentimes ritual is set up with the dichotomy between initiates and uninitiated in mind, the former directly participating and the latter simply observing. Initiates are allowed to actually practice the ritual because they supposedly understand the deeper significance of it. They see the ritual from the level of Tiphareth, whereas it is expected that the audience sees it from the perspective of Yesod. In fact, this is very often the case seeing as religious ignorance abounds in much of the world. The people who have attained any amount of initiation are relatively few, and it is highly likely that whole congregations of people gathered for the celebration of a specific ritual have absolutely no idea what the ritual is trying to express to them on the allegorical level. In some ways the ritual becomes a kind of taunting game - even though it's right in front of our faces we are unable to penetrate behind the veil of images. (Of course, penetrating the veil requires spiritual nerve and courage - something many people unfortunately lack, particularly in America.)

The purpose of this, however, is not only on one level to mislead people (for the Mysteries must be given and protected simultaneously), but also to create a space that is alien to the audience. The everyday world is dominated by false images created by Yesod and Malkuth, even Hod and Netzach. But the truth behind events and images is revealed in Tiphareth, which is the source of these experiences in the first place. Therefore a real sense of religiosity must exist on the level of Tiphareth, outside the sphere of normalcy.

I also think it's important to turn to Victor Turner's model of liminality to unpack this question. Turner was writing about medieval pilgrimages and was trying to get at the heart of their appeal to medieval laity. I'd like to summarize his model for you here.

1.) The pilgrim begins at home surrounded by what he or she knows. Home for them represents the sum total of what they know to be reality. Obviously there is a lot more of the world out there to explore, but for the medieval man or woman the world was incredibly small and confined to their immediate surroundings. The individual then decides to take a pilgrimage to a given shrine for any number of reasons. Perhaps they feel they require penance, or they are looking to be healed from a sickness, or maybe they simply want to go for the thrill of traveling on "vacation." Whatever their reason they begin their journey.

2.) The pilgrim joins other pilgrims while on the road to their particular shrine á la The Canterbury Tales. They share resources and hopefully help each other to survive the arduous and most likely on-foot trek to their destination. Along the road the pilgrims encounter a number of other shrines with relics. They stop at these locations to pray, seek the aid of the patron saint, and are simultaneously introduced to symbols, pictures, and allegories in the form of religious artwork. Oftentimes there are certain motifs that are replicated at other shrines along the pilgrimage road so that by the time the pilgrims have reached their ultimate destination, they have been bombarded by the same symbols many times through different artistic interpretations.

3.) At this point the pilgrim has been exposed to a number of experiences outside of the realm of the ordinary. Most importantly, the pilgrim is physically in what Turner calls a space of "liminality." Approaching this space of ultimate spatial/chronological/psychological distance from what the pilgrim considers "normal," they become much more pliable. They experience a kind of "death" and are in turn made more susceptible to the religious experience - witnessing of miracles, visions, ecstasies and lamentations, etc. By the time the pilgrim approaches the final pilgrimage site, the individual has been forced to discard their precepts of normalcy and thereby enter the liminal space of the miraculous. One becomes much more prone to experiencing the presence of God - that which is greater than ourselves. The pilgrim is literally overwhelmed by the experience and is thus transformed by it.

4.) The last step is reintegration. The pilgrim must return home to their original space of normalcy after having experienced something entirely unique, foreign, and life-changing. The person can never quite deal with their original place of normalcy in the same way they used to ever again. Those who surround the pilgrim do not understand what they have experienced, and there grows an inevitable and unsurpassable gulf between the individual and their peers.

While Turner's model has been recently given a fair amount of criticism, I believe this general model is very helpful to us as we try to track down what the religious experience is all about, especially since the process of individuation is very much a psychological pilgrimage. Our psyches are vast worlds of which we only know a small portion. Thinking this is all there is, we remain stagnant, uninspired, ignorant individuals. One thing is clear: the religious experience is absolutely abnormal, and involves a kind of death of the normal. Following this there is a psychological "resurrection" which leaves the person forever changed and more enlightened about their personal condition.

"Religion," therefore, must consist of the individual's confrontation with greatness. The "pilgrim" so to speak must be overwhelmed by liminality to the point of metaphysical death. The greater the liminality the more profound the religious experience.

"How do you instill someone with a sense of adoration for that which is entirely intangible?"
This might be the trickiest question of all because everyone has a unique relationship to the Divine. "Every man is the master of his own temple," and therefore the Law is different for each of us. It is quite difficult for one person to determine what will fill another with a sense of adoration. But if we base our answer on the answers to the previous two questions, then we might say that it all has to do with encouraging people to move into the space of liminality. The hierophantic or pastoral duty becomes one of adhering to the general framework, but adapting it to fit the needs of a given person. Presumably, everyone who is participating in a religion has chosen it because it is the method of attainment that they believe is best for them. We must not assume, however, that this is accurate. An individual might make a much better Buddhist than a Catholic, but until circumstances force the individual to actually reappraise their beliefs they will not be allowed to grow in this direction.

Central to all of this is the idea of death. Religion is that which deals explicitly with it both through mythology and ritual praxis. Much of religion is focused exclusively on the sacrifice of the "lower self," that part of our being that considers our physical condition to be the only aspect of our total condition. Living our lives from such a rigid perspective inevitably leads us to cultivating redundant habits and ignorant world-views, all of which contributes to the handicapping and stunting of society and culture at large.

Therefore, from a psychological standpoint, religion of any respectable tried-and-true form is crucial for the development of any human being. The details of the religion are largely irrelevant, as what matters is the formula of attainment it follows. It must be capable of instilling in someone a sense of reverence for that which is greater than themselves, but to do that one must first get a sense of what "that which is greater than themselves" is actually like. One does this by setting Tiphareth as the goal of their worship and thereby opening themselves up to the experience of death. Death under these conditions is sweet, benign, and even beautiful.

Perhaps this is even why the average person shuns the religious experience by preferring watered-down, ineffective, bland forms of worship - because these represent a world they can easily understand, one that is very similar to their own mundane, normal sphere of existence in the here and now. But as we have talked about, God transcends the mundane and is also outside of it. You cannot expect to be transformed for the better, to experience or understand God's benefits, without first enduring the death of normalcy, and we all know how much humans want to reject death of any kind. Until one's consciousness has been pried open by the recognition of something greater and more powerful than itself, then that person's consciousness will perpetually perceive reality as a mixed jumble of non-related events and "accidents" that God may or may not have rewarded or punished them with. This view of reality becomes a license to stop growing, to remain clueless about responsibility, to take things for granted, and to do no real work on one's person. The individual stops functioning as a source of life for the world around them and instead becomes a source of death.

Christ tells us, "For whoever loses his life shall find it." Religion teaches us that death is the necessary complement to life, but also that religion itself is about Life, capitalized so as to represent summative existence, the flux between life and death. He who rejects the religious or spiritual impulse rejects themselves, and emits the signal to their True Self that they are wholly uninterested in who they are in totality. He who believes they are complete without initiation, without surrendering to the Mystery that is Self, suffers from vanity. And vanity, being the cause of Original Sin, is ugly.

"He was despised:" Christmas and the Messiah

Madonna and Child with St. Anne

I would like to begin this post by noting that it took me a long time to figure out exactly what I wanted to write about for this post, but I also knew I could not let Christmas go by without writing something about it. I thought I would simultaneously revisit a previous topic on this blog – the nature of Atu XV The Devil from the tarot. While this seems like an unlikely subject to bring into a discussion about Christmas, there’s, as always, a reason for doing so.

As I get older (and one would like to imagine, wiser), I keep feeling this deep urge within myself to search out the religious experience with greater enthusiasm. For me, the holiday is not so much about presents, food, or celebrations, but has become more about meditation and penance, as well as great hope. I recognize that I am a contemplative person naturally, but this season in particular – perhaps because of the increasing cold and barrenness, the way nature wants to make us slow down – seems geared toward greater introspection.

Advent, if you may be aware, is a penitential season, not one of celebration. We are reminded that Christ is “coming” in order to die a wretched death, not to be coddled and cooed over like every other baby. This is why it is so important in Luke’s Gospel that Christ is born in a manger, shunned by everyone in Bethlehem. Christ comes into the world undesired and for the most part unloved. He dies hated for being a rebellious religious upstart, after having healed many who did not necessarily deserve His blessing.

Therefore, I cannot help but feel that there’s something profoundly bittersweet and sad about Christmas. Part of the Christmas celebration is about recognizing the salvation that comes with the Nativity, but we conveniently forget that that salvation comes at a tremendous price. I also think of the old Renaissance paintings of the Virgin and Child, where Mary looks slightly melancholy in her contemplation of the God she holds, and the Christ Child restlessly squirms in her embrace, nervous but anxious to do His Father’s Will. Both of them know what will happen. How is it that we seem to have forgotten what will happen?

The true joy of Christmas then, cannot have anything to do with transitory things that grant momentary pleasures. The pure blessings of happiness the season is supposed to bring must be received in acknowledging that we are entirely unworthy of so great a gift. It is through humility and fear of the Lord that we come to appreciate the religious significance of the holiday.

But instead, the holiday has been degraded into a time when children look forward to receiving endless things, and adults (myself included) struggle and grope to recreate the Christmases of their youth. And while there can be beautiful aspects of these as well – that is, the ideas of charity, innocence, nostalgia, and tradition – they seem to reflect only parts of the central idea without laying it bare and honestly. I sympathize with the people who want to “put Christ back in Christmas,” but also with the people who want to celebrate the holiday with exciting parties alongside their families. But if we are to be realistic with ourselves, these things make Christmas a chore, not a joy. By distracting ourselves from the main source of joy in Christmas with several other little and transitory joys, we have missed out a great deal. And we have also created an awful lot of stress and financial burden for ourselves.

I promised that I would somehow include XV The Devil into this post, and now might be a good opportunity to try. Of course, your average Christian will look at the Devil’s presence in the tarot and immediately jump to irrational conclusions about the practice of divination – “it’s satanic!” or “you’ll go to hell!” etc. All of these are of course entirely false. First of all, XV The Devil (at least in Crowley’s tarot) represents an initiated individual who has recreated their own morality based on the nature of their divine True Will. People label something as “a devil” or “evil” if they are afraid of it, or if they do not understand it. An individual who has questioned set modes of morality and made up their own mind on the subject may be unconventional or less inhibited, and could in that case be considered such absurd things by others. But at the same time, psychologists argue that real maturity comes from being able to dissolve morality learned from parents, societies, and religious institutions, and reassemble it back into a better understood, more flexible, and unique framework. The individuals who never take steps to question morality never fully develop as people, and remain in the darkness of ignorance. They are also the people who are most likely to not understand why something is right or wrong. Let this be clearly understood by those who would irrationally and rashly jump to conclusions about the Devil trump card, or tarot in general.

This is a significant aspect of the Devil card, as Crowley writes that he is a symbol of the Messiah revealed to the initiated. Indeed, some Gnostic Christians (albeit “heretical” Christians) believed that Satan and Christ were two sides of the same coin. For them,  Satan lead man to truth and wisdom and thereby redeemed man from his state of ignorance. But Christ Himself fits the description of the Devil card’s personality: He is rebellious; He disobeys the Law of the masses because He possesses greater authentic understanding of it; He advocates preaching of the Gospel by all, despite their ability to do so or not; He is hated by many, and is condemned from the moment of his birth until his Passion; He wields miraculous power over natural substances, whether it be the body, food, or wine; and He is “the Word made flesh.”

I will try to explain this last bit as succinctly as possible, since I realize it is probably the most esoteric part of this post so far. XV The Devil represents the reconciling of the highest with the lowest – the incarnation of the spirit in the flesh. In Kabbalistic term, it is the notion that Kether (IAO, the masculine Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) is contained in Malkuth (the body, the Bride of Christ, and the Tabernacle of the Holy Spirit). Kether is the First Mover of the Aristotelian cosmology, and is seen as the First Logos (Word or Will) as well, since a God is synonymous with its Will. In fact, a God may only be contemplated by understanding of its Will, since His name is ineffable and His presence concealed – hence why we come to know the Father through the Son, who represents the Father’s Will. But of course, Christ was made incarnate in the flesh by the power of the Holy Spirit, and through the womb of the Virgin Mary. It is said that in this moment, God reconciled the difference between the highest and lowest, and thereby granted salvation. The Devil card is therefore a representation of the Messiah – the Zeal of the Lord of Hosts descending in joy upon the earth, Malkuth, or the lowest aspect of an individual, and thereby anointing him/her (“Christ” means “anointed one”), granting them prosperity and fertility.

There is nothing “Satanic” about this. Satan in the form Christianity has given him – the glowing red, black-winged, pitchfork-wielding human-devourer – is a fallacy invented by the ignorant in their fear of death. But the image of Satan as the fusion between the Spirit and the animal self that we cannot deny we bear, is entirely relevant.

To return to the matter of Christmas. XV The Devil in its most negative connotation is seen as materialism, and indeed as we have seen he does represent that to some extent, as it represents the incarnation of the spirit in the bowels of the earth. But there is a danger to this, as we are all too aware. When we become too materialistic, we breed egotism, ignorance, and evil. This is the real “Devil” of Christianity, whose force is exhibited in the Seven Deadly Sins, each of which is based on some base desire of the body. These, then, are the meanings contained the spectrum of meanings for the symbol of the Devil. On one hand we have Godliness and the birth of the Messiah – on the other hand, materialism and wickedness. Christmas itself contains both these polar meanings; one is superior, the other far less desirable. In our eagerness to turn Christmas into a meaningless celebration of consumerism, we have substituted the benevolence of God’s gifts with our own, and these could, based on what I have previously written, be considered “evil.”

Once again, it seems that we have rejected the Messiah because we do not try hard enough to understand Him. Like the image of the Devil in the tarot, He is despised for His independence and almost foreign nature. What Christ brought with His message was almost revolutionary. The idea of divinity incarnating as man, thereby coming to understand human suffering, and thus developing enough sympathy for man so as to grant him salvation was not new. This was the basic premise of the Dionysian mystery cult, after all. But the notion that God comes into the world hated and shamed, but still willing to sacrifice Himself out of love even for those who hated Him, was truly unheard of. What Jesus did through His acts was unheard of. His idea of morality was not understood by the majority of people, and because he resisted the power of the moral authority, He was targeted, labeled by many who feared Him as "evil," or even "demonic," and was ultimately slain. 

But of course, there are shades of gray to my argument as far as Christmas is concerned. I don’t mean to suggest that all material aspects of the holiday should be abandoned, only reevaluated. When we place all our expectations for the season in its abundance, we miss out greatly. And frankly, there is an allegorical value to the prosperity Christmas celebrations are supposed to represent. As I mentioned before, the Devil/Messiah is also a symbol of fructification and fertility, success, ecstasy, and supreme happiness. It’s as if all our cultural materialism in regards to the holiday is a reflection of God’s humor; we’re close to understanding it, but simultaneously disastrously distant from it. 

I’d like to end in the same witty vein: XV The Devil represents the sign of Capricorn, which is the sign the sun enters on the 22^nd of December. That’s right – Jesus is a Capricorn.

Da capo section of "He was despised" from Handel's Messiah

[I hope this post did not offend anyone, and only offered some points to meditate on. I would like to include as a disclaimer that I do not consider myself a Satanist in any capacity. I am simply an anti-dogmatist, and I believe in the value of pushing people outside their bounds of “right” and “wrong.” Otherwise, I wish you all a very Merry Christmas, and a blessed New Year.]