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The WORKS
of
with Portraits
Volume I
Foyers
Society for the Propagation of
Religious Truth
1906
Appendix
Qabalistic
Dogma
[This short explanatory article has been specially contributed by an Adept, revered alike for his intellectual gifts and his spiritual attainments by the few to whom he permits himself to be known. Thanks to him would be impossible, but the Editor wishes to express his gratitude to the student who kindly obtained for him the introduction. No liberties have been taken with the MS., even to the retention of the capitals, but the spelling of some Eastern names has been assimilated to the universal alphabet--e.g. Qabalah for Kabbala--with the permission of the author.]
The Evolution of Things is
thus described by the Qabalists.
First is Nothing, or the Absence of Things, 
,
which does not and cannot mean Negatively Existing (if such an Idea can be
said to mean anything), as S. Liddell Macgregor Mathers, who misread the
Text and stultified the Commentary by he [sic] Light of his own Ignorance
of Hebrew and Philosophy, pretends in his Translation of v. Rosenroth.
Second is Without Limit 
[I believe this should be 
.
--Anast Allomai]
, i.e., Infinite Space.
This is the primal Dualism of Infinity; the
infinitely small and the infinitely great. The Clash of these
produces a finite positive Idea which happens (see
,
infra, vol. ii, for a more careful study, though I must not be
understood to indorse every Word in our Poet-Philosopher's Thesis) to be
Light, .
This word
is most important. It symbolises the Universe immediately after
Chaos, the Confusion or Clash of the infinite Opposites.
is the Egg of Matter;
is 
, the
Bull, or Energy-Motion; and
is the Sun, or organised and moving System of Orbs. The three
Letters of
thus repeat the three Ideas. The Nature of
is thus analysed, under the figure of the ten Numbers and the 22 Letters
which together compose what the Rosicrucians have diagrammatised under the
name of Minutum Mundum. (See Table of
Correspondences.) It will be noticed that every Number and
Letter has its "Correspondence" in Ideas of every Sort; so that
any given Object can be analysed in Terms of the 32. If I see a blue
Star, I should regard it as a Manifestation of Chesed, Water, the Moon,
Salt the Alchemical Principle, Sagittarius or What not, in respect of its
Blueness--one would have to decide which from other Data--and refer it to
the XVIIth Key of the Taro in Respect of its Starriness.
The Use of these Attributions is lengthy and
various: I cannot dwell upon it: but I will give one Example.
If I wish to visit the Sphere of Geburah, I use
the Colours and Forces appropriate: I go there: if the Objects
which then appear to my spiritual Vision are harmonious therewith, it is
one Test of their Truth.
So also, to construct a Talisman, or to invoke a
Spirit.
The methods of discovering Dogma from sacred
Words are also numerous and important: I may mention:--
(a) The Doctrine of
Sympathies: drawn from the total Numeration of a Word, when
identical with, or a Multiple or Submultiple of, or a Metathesis of, that
of another Word.
(b) The Method of finding the Least
Number of a Word, by adding (and re-adding) the Digits of its total
Number, and taking the corresponding Key of the Taro as a Key to the
Meaning of the Word.
(c) The Method of Analogies drawn
from the Shape of the Letters.
(d) The Method of Deductions drawn
from the Meanings and Correspondences of the Letters.
(e) The Method of Acrostics drawn
from the Letters. This Mode is only valid for Adepts of the highest
Grades, and then under quite exceptional and rare Conditions.
(f) The Method of Transpositions and
Transmutations of the Letters, which suggest Analogies, even when they
fail to explain in direct Fashion.
All these and their Varieties and Combinations,
with some other more abstruse or less important Methods, may be used to
unlock the Secret of a Word.
Of course with Powers so wide it is easy for the
Partisan to find his favourite Meaning in any Word. Even the formal
Proof o = i = 2 = 3 = 4 = 5
= . . . . . . . = n is possible.
But the Adept who worked out this Theorem, with
the very Intent to discredit the Qabalistic Mode
of Research, was suddenly dumbfounded by the Fact that he had actually
stumbled upon the Qabalistic Proof of Pantheism or
Monism.
What really happens is that the Adept sits down
and performs many useless Tricks with the Figures, without Result.
Suddenly the Lux dawns, and the Problem is
solved.
The Rationalist explains this by Inspiration, the
superstitious Man by Mathematics.
I give an Example of the Way in which one
works. Let us take IAO, one of the "Barbarous Names of
Evocation," of which those who have wished to conceal their own Glory
by adopting the Authority of Zarathustra have said that in the holy
Ceremonies it has an ineffable Power.
But what Kind of Power? By the Qabalah
we can find out the Force of the Name IAO.
We can spell it in Hebrew
or 
.
The Qabalah will even tell us which is the true
Way. Let us however suppose that it is spelt .
This adds up to 17.
But first of all it strikes us that I, A, and O
are the three Letters associated with the three Letters 
in the great Name of Six Letters, ,
which combines
and ,
Macroprosopus and Microprosopus. Now these feminine Letters
conceal the "Three Mothers" of the Alphabet, ,
, and .
Replace these, and we get ,
which adds up to 358, the Number alike of 
,
the Serpent of Genesis, and the Messiah. We thus look for redeeming
Power in IAO, and for the Masculine Aspect of that Power.
Now we will see how that Power works. We
have a curious Dictionary, which was made by a very learned Man, in which
the Numbers from i to i0,000
fill the left hand Column, in Order, and opposite them are written all the
sacred or important Words which add up to each Number.
We take this Book, and look at 17. We find
that 17 is the number of Squares in the Swastika, which is the Whirling
Disc or Thunderbolt. Also there is 
,
a Circle or Orbit; 
,
to seethe or boil; and some other Words, which we will neglect in this
Example, though we should not dare to do so if we were really trying to
find out a Thing we none of us knew. To help our Deduction about
Redemption, too, we find ,
to brighten or make glad.
We also work in another Way. I is the
Straight Line or Central Pillar of the Temple of Life; also it stands for
unity, and for the Generative Force. A is the Pentagram, which means
the Will of Man working Redemption. O is the Circle from which
everything came, also Nothingness, and the Female, who absorbs the
Male. The Progress of the Name shows then the Way from Life to
Nirvana by means of the Will: and is a Hieroglyph of the Great Work.
Look at all our Meanings! Every one shows
that the Name, if it has any Power at all, and that we must try, has the
Power to redeem us from the Love of Life which is the Cause of Life, by
its masculine Whirlings, and to gladden us and to bring us to the Bosom of
the Great Mother, Death.
Before what is known as the Equinox of the Gods,
a little while ago, there was an initiated Formula which expressed these
Ideas to the Wise. As these Formulas are done with, it is of no
Consequence if I reveal them. Truth is not eternal, any more than
God; and it would be but a poor God that could not and did not alter his
Ways at his Pleasure.
This Formula was used to open the Vault of the
Mystic Mountain of Abiegnus, within which lay (so the Ceremony of
Initiation supposed) the Body of our Father Christian Rosen Creutz, to be
discovered by the Brethren with the Postulant as said in the Book called
Fama Fraternitatis.
There are three Officers, and they repeat the
Analysis of the Word as follows:--
Chief. Let us analyse the Key Word--I.
2nd. N.
3rd. R.
All. I.
Chief. Yod.
2nd. Nun.
3rd. Resh.
All. Yod.
Chief. Virgo (
)
Isis, Mighty Mother.
2nd. Scorpio (
)
Apophis, Destroyer.
3rd. Sol (
)
Osiris, slain and risen.
All. Isis, Apophis, Osiris, IAO.
All spread Arms as if on a Cross, and say:--
The Sign of Osiris slain!
Cheif bows his Head to the Left, raises his Right Arm, and lowers his Left, keeping the Elbow at right Angles, thus forming the Letter L (also the Swastika).
The Sign of the Mourning of Isis.
2nd. With erect Head, raises his Arms to form a V (but really to form the triple Tongue of Flame, the Spirit), and says:--
The Sign of Apophis and Typhon.
3rd. Bows his Head and crosses his Arms on his Breast (to form the Pentagram).
The Sign of Osiris risen.
All give the Sign of the Cross, and say:--
L.V.X.
Then the Sign of Osiris risen, and say:--
Lux, the Light of the Cross.
This Formula, on which one may meditate for Years without exhausting its
wonderful Harmonies, gives an excellent Idea of the Way in which Qabalistic
Analysis is conducted.
First, the Letters have been written in Hebrew
Characters.
Then the Attributions of them to the Zodiac and
to Planets are substituted, and the Names of Egyptian Gods belonging to
these are invoked.
The Christian Idea of I.N.R.I. is confirmed by
these, while their Initials form the sacred Word of the Gnostics.
That is, IAO. From the Character of the Deities and their Functions
are deduced their Signs, and these are found to signal (as it were) the
Word Lux (),
which itself is contained in the Cross.
A careful Study of these Ideas, and of the Table
of Correspondences, which one of our English Brethren is making, will
enable him to discover a very great Deal of Matter for Thought in these
Poems which an untutored Person would pass by.
To return to the general Dogma of the Qabalists.
The Figure of Minutum Mundum will show how they
suppose one Quality to proceed from the last, first in the pure God-World
Atziluth, then in the Angel-World Briah, and so on down to the
Demon-Worlds, which are however not thus organised. They are rather
Material that was shed off in the Course of Evolution, like the Sloughs of
a Serpent, from which comes their Name of Shells, or Husks.
Apart from silly Questions as to whether the
Order of the Emanations is confirmed by Palæontology, a Question it is
quite incompetent to discuss, there is no Doubt the Sephiroth are types of
Evolution as opposed to Catastrophe and Creation.
The great Charge against this Philosophy is
founded on its alleged Affinities with Scholastic Realism. But the
Charge is not very true. No Doubt but they did suppose vast
Storehouses of "Things of one Kind" from which, pure or mingled,
all other Things did proceed.
Since ,
a Camel, refers to the moon, they did say that a Camel and the moon were
sympathetic, and came, that Part of them, from a common Principle:
and that a Camel being yellow brown, it partook of the Earth Nature, to
which that Colour is given.
Thence they said that by taking all the Natures
involved, and by blending them in the just Proportions, one might have a
Camel.
But this is no more than is said by the Upholders
of the Atomic Theory.
They have their Storehouses of Carbon, Oxygen,
and such (not in one Place, but no more is Geburah in one Place), and what
is Organic Chemistry but the Production of useful Compounds whose Nature
is deduced absolutely from theoretical Considerations long before it is
ever produced in the Laboratory?
The difference, you will say, is that the Qabalists
maintain a Mind of each Kind behind each Class of Things of one Kind; but
so did Berkely, and his Argument in that Respect is, as the great Huxley
showed, irrefragable. For by the Universe I mean the Sensible; any
other is Not to be Known; and the Sensible is dependent upon Mind.
Nay, though the Sensible is said to be an Argument of an Universe
Insensible, the latter becomes sensible to Mind as soon as the Argument is
accepted, and disappears with its Rejection.
Nor is the Qabalah
dependent upon its Realism, and its Application to the Works magical--but
I am defending a Philosophy which I was asked to describe, and this is not
lawful.
A great Deal may be learned from the Translation
of the Zohar by S. Liddell Macgregor Mathers, and his Introduction
thereto, though for those who have Latin and some acquaintance with Hebrew
it is better to study the Kabbala Denudata of Knorr von Rosenroth, in
Despite of the heavy Price; for the Translator has distorted the Text and
its Comment to suit his belief in a supreme Personal God, and in that
degraded Form of the Doctrine of Feminism which is so popular with the
Emasculate.
The Sephiroth are grouped in various Ways.
There is a Superior Triad or Trinity; a Hexad; and Malkuth: the
Crown, the Father, and the Mother; the Son or King; and the Bride.
Also, a Division into seven Palaces, seven
Planes, three Pillars or Columns: and the like.
The Flashing Sword follows the Course of the
Numbers and the Serpent Nechushtan or of Wisdom crawls up the Paths which
join them upon the Tree of Life, namely the Letters.
It is important to explain the position of Daath
or Knowledge upon the Tree. It is called the Child of Chokmah and
Binah, but it hath no Place. But it is really the Apex of a Pyramid
of which the three first Numbers form the Base.
Now the Tree, or Minutum Mundum, is a Figure of a
Plane of a solid Universe. Dath, being above the Plane, is therefore
a Figure of a Force in four Dimensions, and thus it is the Object of the
Magnum Opus. The three Paths which connect it with the First Trinity
are the three lost Letters or Fathers of the Hebrew Alphabet.
In Daath is said to be the Head of the great
Serpent Nechesh or Leviathan, called Evil to conceal its Holiness. (
= 358 = ,
the Messiah or Redeemer, and 
= 496 = 
,
the Bride.) It is identical with the Kundalini of the Hindu
Philosophy, the Kwan-se-on of the Mongolian Peoples, and means the magical
Force in Man, which is the sexual Force applied to the Brain, Heart, and
other Organs, and redeemeth him.
The gradual Disclosure of these magical Secrets
to the Poet may be traced in these Volumes, which it has been my Privilege
to be asked to explain. It has been impossible to do more than place
in the Hands of any intelligent Person the Keys which will permit him to
unlock the many Beautiful Chambers of Holiness in these Palaces and
Gardens of Beauty and Pleasure.