Book of Law Study Group 1.2

Umbrae

I think AC sums it up best on page 7 of BoL
The elements are Nuit— Space— that is, the total of possibilities of every kind— and Hadit, any point which has experience of these possibilities. (This idea is for literary convenience symbolized by the Egyptian Goddess Nuit, a woman bending over like the Arch of the Night Sky. Hadit is symbolized as a Winged Globe at the heart of Nuit.)

Every event is a uniting of some one monad with one of the experiences possible to it.

“Every man and every woman is a star,” that is, an aggregate of such experiences, constantly changing with each fresh event, which affects him or her either consciously or subconsciously.

Each one of us has thus an universe of his own, but it is the same universe for each one as soon as it includes all possible experience. This implies the extension of consciousness to include all other consciousness.

In our present stage, the object that you see is never the same as the one that I see; we infer that it is the same because your experience tallies with mine on so many points that the actual differences of our observation are negligible. For instance, if a friend is walking between us, you see only his left side, I his right; but we agree that it is the same man, although we may differ not only as to what we may see of his body but as to what we know of his qualities. This conviction of identity grows stronger as we see him more often and get to know him better. Yet all the time neither of us can know anything of him at all beyond the total impression made on our respective minds.

The above is an extremely crude attempt to explain a system which reconciles all existing schools of philosophy.
 

Aeon418

Myrrha said:
Aeon 418 said in the previous thread
I knew that crappy thing was going to come back and bite me. I should have hedged it around with even more warnings. :laugh:
Myrrha said:
If this is what is unveiled then I am part of it also. I am one of those balls, call me Hadit, a point of awareness at the center of the universe (Nuit). And so are you, a different ball, Hadit, a point of awareness at the center of the universe. This is the company of heaven and I am part of it.
If I am part of it how is this everything remote? Why do I need an intermediary? Is it because it doesn't feel like I am part of it? In everyday experience we dont usually experience ourselves as profoundly part of and in touch with the absolute?
Lets see if I can explain it a bit better this time.

The infinite absolute (call it God, Nuit, the Great All, etc,. Take your pick.) can't actually do anything while it is in it's infinite state. It may have infinite potential and infinite possibilities, but none of them can be experienced and realised in the infinite state. To actually experience it's own potential possibilities the infinite must assume apparent limitation by becoming finite. There is no way around this. An infinite being can't do anything. Nothing can actually happen in infinity. But a finite being can experience things from a unique limited perspective in space and time, in which potential possibilities can be manifested and realised.

A finite being, who is able to experience things in space and time, can't have any awareness of it's real infinite nature. If it did it would ruin the illusion of separate existence that makes experience possible. For this reason the finite being must be, from it's perspective, totally cut off from the infinite source. And that is the reason why the intermediary is needed. It's a go-between.

From the perspective of the infinite, there is no separation between it, the intermediary, and you. It's all one thing. From your finite perspective the intermediary appears to be a distinct and separate individual. The infinite behind it is unknowable because it is the Knower behind all the illusions.

Still confused? Or even more confused? :laugh:
 

Abrac

Myrrha said:
I am still confused about what is being unveiled in verse two. I hope it isn’t too late to post about this here as it has taken me a couple of days to read these threads and even figure out what is confusing.
I would like to propose an alternate interpretation of the "company of heaven" as Nuit's five children: Horus the Elder, Set, Osiris, Isis and Nephtys. If a person were to carefully analyze the BoL's contents, they might dicover it is based on principles derived from these five netcheru (powers). I know this is at odds with Mr. C's view, nevertheless.

Sorry AC! :D
 

ravenest

Yes but at least all this 'neo (our additions on the post-Victorian understandings)-thelemo-egypto-hermetics might just lead us into a study of real Egyptian hermetics })
 

Myrrha

Umbrae said:
I think AC sums it up best on page 7 of BoL

OK, now I’m really dizzy. I read that a couple of times and almost feel like I understand it but what I think I understand makes me feel like I’m dissolving so I think I’ll stop for a bit.

Aeon418 said:
I knew that crappy thing was going to come back and bite me. I should have hedged it around with even more warnings. :laugh:

Lets see if I can explain it a bit better this time.

The infinite absolute (call it God, Nuit, the Great All, etc,. Take your pick.) can't actually do anything while it is in it's infinite state. It may have infinite potential and infinite possibilities, but none of them can be experienced and realised in the infinite state. To actually experience it's own potential possibilities the infinite must assume apparent limitation by becoming finite. There is no way around this. An infinite being can't do anything. Nothing can actually happen in infinity. But a finite being can experience things from a unique limited perspective in space and time, in which potential possibilities can be manifested and realised.

A finite being, who is able to experience things in space and time, can't have any awareness of it's real infinite nature. If it did it would ruin the illusion of separate existence that makes experience possible. For this reason the finite being must be, from it's perspective, totally cut off from the infinite source. And that is the reason why the intermediary is needed. It's a go-between.

From the perspective of the infinite, there is no separation between it, the intermediary, and you. It's all one thing. From your finite perspective the intermediary appears to be a distinct and separate individual. The infinite behind it is unknowable because it is the Knower behind all the illusions.

Still confused? Or even more confused? :laugh:
Thank you, I think I do understand it a bit better. That first metaphor is good in that it gives a concrete picture and now you are filling in the details.

The infinite everything is me but it has forgotten on purpose that it is the infinite in order to experience being me! Wow. I hope it is worth the trip.
And that explains why there needs to be an intermediary even though the infinite is me, because it can’t understand itself as the infinite while it is me.


Abrac said:
I would like to propose an alternate interpretation of the "company of heaven" as Nuit's five children: Horus the Elder, Set, Osiris, Isis and Nephtys. If a person were to carefully analyze the BoL's contents, they might dicover it is based on principles derived from these five netcheru (powers). I know this is at odds with Mr. C's view, nevertheless.

Sorry AC! :D

That sounds fascinating. Do you see the BOL as a message from the Egyptian deities that Aleister Crowley did not understand? Right now I’m more curious about Thelema than about the ancient Egyptian neteru so it makes sense to me to look at “Nuit” and the others as forces who have borrowed Egyptian garments rather than as the actual neteru.
 

Grigori

Myrrha said:
OK, now I’m really dizzy. I read that a couple of times and almost feel like I understand it but what I think I understand makes me feel like I’m dissolving so I think I’ll stop for a bit.

Actually I think this is a sign that you are understanding it. *does his best pouting expression and says in a whining voice* "How come you dissolve your ego and cross the abyss on your first attempt and the rest of us are still dangling away in Malkuth?!" :(

;) :laugh:

I was reading the paper this morning, and there was a section with advice on what the best sellers for this Christmas are. I was suprised to see a book discussing the difference between the Ego and the Soul high on the list.
http://www.scribepublications.com.au/book/egoandsoul

Kind of a dumb marketing concept at Christmas time to promote something that discourages people from making puchases at the whim of their Ego eh? :D Thats gonna hurt the post Christmas sales. Although perhaps a fitting time of year for unveiling heavenly hosts...
 

Abrac

Myrrha said:
That sounds fascinating. Do you see the BOL as a message from the Egyptian deities that Aleister Crowley did not understand?
I wouldn't go so far as to say I see it as a message from Egyptian powers Crolwey didn't understand, but clearly there was a lot he didn't understand and even he admitted as much. I just offer it as a possibility. If it's of no use feel free to toss it. :D
 

Scion

Myrrha said:
But then why didn’t Crowley say “Every man and every woman has a star” ?

I thought the BOL was a statement of a new Aion, a new way of looking things and an expression of different forces than were in effect in the past. If this is so, how can what is unveiled be merely repeating the idea from antiquity that the real god is remote, and we humans are in the material realm and the daemons are the link and exist between?

If when Crowley says I possess "independant godhead" he means I possess an intermediary spirit between me and a "real" god which is external, then am I misunderstanding Aeon418's metaphor when I thought it meant that I am a part of it also?

I am not saying this to argue against Scion and I apologize if I have not understood. I see the attractiveness and practical utility of a world view that includes the daemons as intermediary spirits. I’m just not sure how it fits here with what Crowley is saying.
No! It's a good question. But I think the simplest answert that makes sense to me is that the HGA aka personal daemon) is also understood as one's true Self. We cannot "have" them, because we "are" them. The division is the illusion. And as Crowley says often and elsewhere, the reason for the Creation is so that the Divine can experience the pleasure of separateness. Creation is bound up in illusion.

Or to put it a different a way: God is not a noun; God is a verb. (like any energy) the divine can only be understood by its effect on the material world. To think of the divine in anthropomorphized terms is a "comfy-blanky" view of mythology that is useful when explaining things to the punters. Any tangible description is of necessity limited and therefore misleading.

So it isn't just a repetition of an external infinitely remote pleroma... it's more that all three worlds are simultaneously present, and that it is our awareness of their simultaneous immanence that changes as we awaken. In a way, I interpret it as a call to interpret him laterally, not literally. Again (referring back to my earlier comments) there's a trendency for folks to think of the otherworld in literal, concrete terms... as if Heaven/Hell was a geographic region atr such-and-such a distance, as if angels/demons/ghosts/djinn were a rarified species of discrete organism. As if by using the word star, he meant that every human was in fact a ball of gas with a tremendous graviitational field.

Again, I feel like the only way to talk about these things is to spiral in on them. But Myrrha, it's a great question; I hope that I'm making some sense. I think the simplest way to answer it is to suggest that it's no a repetition of the ancient worldview, as much as a wakeup call discouraging attempts to read the ancient myths literally and a challenge to his readers to stepp outside their old Aeon preconceptions.
 

Always Wondering

And doesn't the ego have in a way daemons also? When a long trusted "guide" suddenly tells you, in all earnesty and a perfectly straight face, that shinny red car will bring you happiness or that pretty eyed musician across town is your soul mate. I've found this very tricky sometimes. Perhaps I am just a recovering new ager. :confused: But how do I know it's my HGA guiding me? This HGA stuff is confusing.

And what is the difference between acknowledging and sensing the help or presence of HGA and Knowledge and Conversation?

AW
 

Aeon418

Always Wondering said:
And doesn't the ego have in a way daemons also?
Of course. The ego can be compared to a lense with imperfections in it. It is capable of distorting reality in certain areas. A really big imperfection in the lense might be considered a demon. Modern psychology would call the same thing a neurosis or a complex.

This is why the first step of the Great Work has always been γνῶθι σεαυτόν - gnothi seauton, Know Thyself.
Always Wondering said:
But how do I know it's my HGA guiding me? This HGA stuff is confusing.
Everyone is familiar with the Voice of Conscience, although many people are very good at ignoring it. It's that wordless, inner voice that warns us when we are acting against our True Selves - HGA.
Bear in mind that this is real conscience stripped of parental conditioning and religious indoctrination. Those two have an uncanny knack of making people feel guilty for nothing at all.
Always Wondering said:
And what is the difference between acknowledging and sensing the help or presence of HGA and Knowledge and Conversation?
That's a question for someone who has achieved K&C. Not me I'm afraid. ;)