Book of Law Study Group 1.2

Scion

Aiwass said:
2. The unveiling of the company of heaven.

Actually this line puts me in mind of Agrippa who divides the world, and his Three Books into three layers: The Material/mundane world. a Transcendant/Eternal realm of the Divine, and an intermediary Celestial world... something close to what the Greeks (and others) might call the Daemonic world. (from Greek Daimon: "spirit," a morally neutral designation before Xianity :mad:) The mortal and immortal worlds have no way of communicating, so in most cultures there are intermediary spirits that sort of act as magickal go-betweens. As fate would have it, I'm teaching a Daemonology class this year so I'm thinking about this topic and the "company of heaven" quite a lot. :D (AND I just wrote about this in a script!)

In Christianity these intermediary spirits would be the saints, angels, demons, the Blessed Virgin, and in many sects the mortal Jesus. In the grimoires they would be the Angels and Demons and Elementals that answer to the authority of "that Name which hath set the sea her bounds, beyond which the sky cannot pass." For Vodoun it would be the Lwa. For Egyptians, the Neteru. For Muslim it would be the Djinn. For most premoderns around thee world, it would be the Fey or the Sidhe or Peri etc. Ditto, the ghosts of the honored dead. For Crowley, on 16 March 1904, Aiwass unexpectedly presented himself as a member of that "company" while Crowley was trying to summon sprites, who also would have counted as part of the Celestial realm. unlike the Divine, the celestial realm shares with humans a certain amount of personality and foibles and individuality.

In 90% of the worlds cultures these Daemons are distinguished by being hidden. In fact the words "Djinn" and "Hell" both literally translate into English as "unseen." Likewise, "Fey" and "Pukka" as "outlawed" (because they are uncovenanted powers). So the "unveiling of the company of heaven" would speak to the moment when we realize that we are surrounded by spirits, that the world is alive with magickal possibility, that the "hidden powers" exist, that Gnosis is immanent.

So there's a larger issue here. Nuit and Hadit are unknowable, unfathomable. Mortals must deal with the company of heaven. We can only aspire to the immortal realm, but we can never reach it: a magical asymptote. The Celestial realm acts as both an aid and a buffer, a proving ground for the brave and a cage for the unworthy. But by striving towards the divine, we gain knowledge and conversation of the celestial realm and thereby perfect ourselves.

"The company of heaven" would literally be the Daemons. Further, by using the word "heaven" in this line, Aiwass/Crowley neatly sidesteps any literalist satanic accusations that might see danger in the idea of multiple spirits. The spirits that fill heaven (i.e. the celestial realm) are unveiled by Hadit, who is the "manifestation of Nuit."

Being able to see (i.e. unveiling) that celestial company would be the first thing that would make the rest of the work possible.

Scion
 

Grigori

Scion said:
Actually this line puts me in mind of Agrippa who divides the world, and his Three Books into three layers: The Material/mundane world. a Transcendant/Eternal realm of the Divine, and an intermediary Celestial world... something close to what the Greeks (and others) might call the Daemonic world.

Thanks Scion, that is very interesting. So you see the "company of heaven" as the inhabitants of the Celestial spheres? And that specifically excludes the material world?

Scion said:
Being able to see (i.e. unveiling) that celestial company would be the first thing that would make the rest of the work possible.

And that practical work is the method required to begin to understand the BoL?
 

Umbrae

Back in 95, I tried to take photos of Nuit on the ceiling of the temple at Dendera (it’d be easier now with digital ‘stitch’).

But you stand there and look at her devouring the sun and birthing sun (universe) simultaneously – there’s the realization that as you stand and observe (objective), that if (and she is) Nuit is devouring and birthing the universe simultaneously – that one is subjective and objective at the same time.

Line 2 is the necessary step between 1 & 3 imo
 

Aeon418

Scion said:
"The company of heaven" would literally be the Daemons.
This is a very good observation for a number of reasons. The original root of the word Demon meant celestial or shining ones. The Demon or Daemon is also that which is called the Holy Guardian Angel. For a time Crowley felt that his role was to teach the "next step" for humanity, or ways to reach higher Briatic consciousness. What Crowley called the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel.

The verse could be rewritten as "The unveiling of the Holy Guardian Angel", or "The unveiling of Super/cosmic-consciousness in humanity".

The previous Aeon of Osiris was mainly concerned with the development of the Ruach, the intellectual mind of humanity. The Aeon of Horus ushers in the next step, and hope, for our race if we want to survive. Our seemingly clever intellectual ingenuity may look like progress, but it has also brought us, and our planet, to the edge of destruction. Something has to change. Otherwise we are destined to go the same way as the dinosaurs. But it won't take a meteor to do it. We will, metaphorically, slit our own throats. Afterall, reason ends in self-contradiction. How apt.
 

thorhammer

I seem to be having a problem here reconciling what Aeon's saying about the "company" being the every man and woman (and their own godhead and all that) with what Scion's saying about Daemons. For the Unveiling to be both seems impossible - they seem to be mutually exclusive.

:confused:

\m/ Kat
 

Scion

similia said:
So you see the "company of heaven" as the inhabitants of the Celestial spheres? And that specifically excludes the material world?
As the world of intermediary spirits: the Uncovenanted Powers that are definied by their liminal status. Their power is that they are between everything. And it's uncanny that in every religion on the earth there is a tradition of these "Betwixt" entities that answer wishes and carry messages. So if you allow for their existence (along with 99.99999% of the planet) they don't exclude the material world, they exist alongside it... just as they exist alongside the Divine. They are the synaptic flash that connects the higher and lower worlds. I'm not sure if I'm articulating this very well...

I think it's worth noting that, as Umbrae points out, this line comes FROM Line 1 and goes TO Line 3. The implied subject of this sentence ("The unveiling of the company of Heaven") is Had!... Or to phras e it a different way: Had is the unveiling of the company of heaven. Had is the force which reveals the hidden host of Nuit. (For some reason that makes me think of Lilith and her children. All the spirits born and unsworn to the pleroma. Right? :))

But before we get to Line 3... I think there's something else in the use of the word "unveil," a nearly sexual, seductive, abductive relation to the magickal forces that populate the world. By the authority of Hadit, the magickian pierces and persuades them to make themselves known/visible. But they are born/borne in Nuit, hidden and apart. Hadit brings them close to us, rends the veil. He is the thing that coaxes them into close interaction with us. Why else would they bother? They are drawn to the manifestation, they are unveiled by it, compelled by it. Isn't this "company of heaven" also the phalanx of Holy Guardian Angels, our personal daemons, waiting to be discovered?

similia said:
And that practical work is the method required to begin to understand the BoL?
Yes. "Believing is seeing." The first step in unmaking the old Aeon is to be able to see the new Aeon arising. (I feel like I'm starting to get a little personal worldview-y here... so apologies if anyone thinks I'm taking the piss.) As Marcel Proust put it, "The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new places, but in having new eyes." If Will/Love is to be loosed on the world, people have to be capable of accepting the responsibility: both of having them and witnessing them. I'm reminded that in Greek the word Gnosis is closely related to the idea of seeing... knowledge is equated to sight; the name Oedipus may mean "Sorefoot" but it can also be translated as "Wayfinder."

How can you read the signs if you are blind to them? How can you communcate if you are dumb? Secrets hidden in plain sight, us needing to tear out our old eyes and find new ones... or at least peel the caul of Osiris off them so that the world is revealed: naked, perfect, present.

I'm starting to rave. I'll stop there.

Scion
 

Grigori

Scion said:
Their power is that they are between everything....I'm not sure if I'm articulating this very well...

Yes I understand what your saying, but like Thorhammer, I am trying to gauge how your understanding is different to Aeon's and to my own initial thoughts. Not to choose one over the other, just trying to compare and understand them.

If we accept the "company of heaven" as referring to the intermediary level intelligences, do we then exclude creatures of the maniferst world (i.e. us) and those of the divine level (Nuit and Hadit) from being part of that company of heaven? I'm not saying that the intermediary intelligences are excluded/seperate from us, as I understand what you are saying about their role as the go betweens, but if we define the intermediary's as the "company of heaven", does this mean that humanity are not of the "company of heaven", and neither are the higher "gods".

If so it would seem to me that the first three lines, represent those three levels from Agrippa.

1. Had! The manifestation of Nuit.

The Transcendant/Eternal realm of the Divine,

2. The unveiling of the company of heaven.

the intermediary Celestial world,

3. Every man and every woman is a star.

and us in the Material/mundane world.

hmmm I'm not sure I'm making sense... sorry :|
 

Yygdrasilian

Messages Enshrined in a Jewelled Casket

1. Had! The manifestation of Nuit /// a presence revealing an absence
2. The unveiling of the company of heaven /// an absence revealing a presence
3. Every man and every woman is a star /// two sides of the same enigma + as above, so below

or

1. Day! The child of Night.
2. Light departs and Stars come out.
3. Your lives and deaths are a microcosm of this cycle : as above, so below

Myths obtain greatest appeal & potency when they resonate with “truths” held most in common between all peoples. The primary mystery to confront all our ancestors was this cycle of day & night. Thus the opening invocations of the Law proclaim, albeit much more poetically, both an objective reality that every earthling knows & its subjective application as an existential condition.

day + night = the seed of everything within everything
2 = 0

&,
Daemon>>>>>>>Angel
When the Moon waxes full in Taurus,
Success! - Mercury gains Science in Aquarius.
 

Always Wondering

similia said:
Yes I understand what your saying, but like Thorhammer, I am trying to gauge how your understanding is different to Aeon's and to my own initial thoughts. Not to choose one over the other, just trying to compare and understand them.

If we accept the "company of heaven" as referring to the intermediary level intelligences, do we then exclude creatures of the maniferst world (i.e. us) and those of the divine level (Nuit and Hadit) from being part of that company of heaven? I'm not saying that the intermediary intelligences are excluded/seperate from us, as I understand what you are saying about their role as the go betweens, but if we define the intermediary's as the "company of heaven", does this mean that humanity are not of the "company of heaven", and neither are the higher "gods".

If so it would seem to me that the first three lines, represent those three levels from Agrippa.



The Transcendant/Eternal realm of the Divine,



the intermediary Celestial world,



and us in the Material/mundane world.

hmmm I'm not sure I'm making sense... sorry :|

For me, contemplation upon the middle celestial plane kind of messes with my understanding of 0=2. What is above is below, we are stars, then suddenly we can't be stars because there are other stars. I was thinking of Thoth Two of Disks that nice constant up and down movement on the tree and how it doesn't seem so smooth now. But if I stop thinking on a linear level and think of the celestials as a conduit, like the muscles in the snake, or the inertia of the snakes movement then it makes sense. To me anyway.

Who's not making any sense now? :|

AW
 

Abrac

Crowley's old comment on AL1.2 from The Old and New Commentaries to Liber AL:

"This book is a new revelation, or unveiling of the old ones."

His new comment from the same source basically concurs with Aeon418:

"Further, this verse is to be taken with the next. The 'company of heaven' is Mankind, and its 'unveiling' is the assertion of the independent godhead of every man and every woman! Further, as Khabs (see verse 8) is "Star", there is a further meaning; this Book is to reveal the Secret Self of a man, i.e. to initiate him."