An Interdisciplinary Perspective

Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.

 

True religion is the reification of that mystical or magickal ‘peak experience’ attained to beyond yet through the medium of the mind and body; to simultaneously apprehend the true objective universe (Nuit/Macrocosm/Unconscious Mind) and the co-ordinates for one’s subjective universe within it (Hadit/Microcosm/Conscious Mind).  The subjective universe is correlated through the dual-hemisphered Cerebral or Neo-Cortex of the brain, which is the most recent evolutionary development in the ontology of our species and separates our race from all other animals.  And the objective universe is correlated through the Cerebellum, which connects to the brain stem and also handles the autonomic sensory and motor control functions of the body as well as being the source for our dreams and mystical experiences.  Each brain informs the other and views the data from the other as being ephemeral.  This explains the statement by Hindu masters that says the world we’re in when asleep is quite possibly the true reality and this waking world is actually the dream.

Because this data is so ephemeral, it comes to each mind in the form of symbols, metaphors, archetypes, anthropomorphizations et al; depending on which brain is emanating the electrical energy being transmitted.   So we have a biological explanation for the eastern sense of ‘maya’ in that whichever brain one is functioning in at the moment, the signals from the other seem unreal as the self has not been associated with that particular brain that is sending them.  But rather, it is actualized in the brain that is receiving them.  So it seems that this self, which does indeed move from brain to brain as when we are dreaming, becomes located in the cerebellum and when we are awake, it is found in the cerebral cortex.   It therefore seems an obvious matter of ‘Will’ to determine which brain the identity will reside in.  We can see that through other techniques (outside of falling asleep) such as meditation or dance, ingesting drugs or engaging in sexual intercourse, that we can access the cerebellum while awake though we are usually centered in the cerebral cortex.  In just such a situation, we are simultaneously working with both brains.  This is the major achievement of those whom have mastered what has come to be called ‘Astral Projection’.

The inherent reality of the impressions received by both minds can only be an illusion to the solipsist whose arguments when reduced to logical ends, are easily refuted by ontological investigation.  Unfortunately, this view is deeply entrenched in the many mystical traditions and in most cases, quite unconsciously; so deeply have they been conditioned into our culture.  It is certainly a manifestation of the Christist egregore in that all traditions that flow with such a current, eschew the material universe; preferring a divine realm.  The new egregore or current that embodies the energies of the new aeon of Horus includes the material universe on a par with the spiritual realm with each being integral to the other.  This is also in accord with the Emerald Tablet of Hermes Trismegistus.  And so the science of our present aeon is beginning to validate the age-old wisdom of the Rosicrucians and Hermeticists.

Indeed, the philosophical inquiry by Thomas Nagel, Ph.D. Professor of Philosophy and Law at New York University, clearly proves that there is a true ‘objective’ universe beyond the microcosmic view of the individual Star.  The perceptual awareness of this ontology through epistemological methods is the ‘Magickal Link’ between the two modes of consciousness.  This requires a certain electro-chemical state in the brain that floods the cerebellum with energy while closing down the other areas of the brain that bring to us our sense of individuality, time and space.  The work of a team of brain researchers from the University of Pennsylvania; Andrew Newberg, M.D., Eugene D’Aquili, M.D., have provided hard data to clinically verify this.

Yet this data from these two brains can also be manipulated and digested through the applied methodology of qabalistic techniques in order to find more sophisticated ways to examine it.  The results can be actualized through rituals and rites along with stories and myths and even including all the arts as the by-products of the combinant exaltation of consciousness (Ra-Hoor-Khuit/Magickal Childe).  Traditional spiritual practices also bring consciousness to this state.  These include meditation and physical exercises as well as sexual practices.  And even more chemical approaches such as those employed by Entheogenists along with electro-magnetic technologies are proving viable avenues for engaging in spiritual pursuit.  Seemingly even purely intellectual processes can ultimately also be viable as alluded to above.  These include the study of philosophy (along with ethics and morality), physics, mathematics including chaos and fractal theories (Note C.F. Russell’s contribution to Thelemic literature), and even the aesthetics of art along with interactive socialization such as dancing and athletics.

There is also anthropological and archaeological evidence that reveals an age-old chain of human knowledge that is seemingly connecting the science of modern humanity with the natural philosophy of the ancients.  It’s almost as if the incarnation of the art of Scientific Illuminism brings us full circle in an evolutionary spiral in our age old quest to understand the nature of consciousness.  Consciousness itself is the animal or automatic process derided by Lola, in Aleister Crowley’s Wake World.  It transcends the stream of thoughts that flow through the mind and by its very nature, produces reason.  These thoughts are the electrical impulses that are generated mechanically by the chemical conductivity of brain tissue.  Reason manifests on a completely different plane of awareness and is not really physically located in the body at all; though the comprehension of reason is regulated and interpreted through the brain, which depends entirely on the healthy function of the body.

So it seems that the body is able to contain some form of electro-magnetic or telesmatic energy as originally indicated to the western world by Eliphas Levi and later, Dion Fortune.  Yet this energy while not necessarily being of the body may also not come into the awareness of the individual as it is obscured by the trance of the body’s mechanical processes.  Gurdjieff clearly understood this and developed processes that were designed to overwhelm one’s self-absorption in this trance by over-driving the machinery of the body to short-circuit the trance.  He also understood that there are actually various egos that produce the trance that comprises the overall personality, which is the principal feature of consciousness.  These can only be united when the trance of the body itself has been by-passed and one can then directly access the co-ordinates of intersecting electro-magnetic forces that are the astral menstruum of the individual and which also house the true identity that is known to Thelemites as the Holy Guardian Angel.  The Holy Guardian Angel is itself a symbol for that actual consciousness that can become enabled to directly influence and guide all the lesser functions or overall lower ego that is a chaotic blend of the mechanical and chemical forces of the body.

The objective universe by deduction, becomes perceivable in a binary relationship to the egoic energy that produces the thought-stream of the individual.  But there is a way to fuse these two energies that is said to enhance and perfect the evolution of consciousness in order to attain that which the Egyptians referred to as asar un nefer.  This involves the willful neurological manipulation of the physio-electrochemical process of the mind and body and is known to the Western Mystery Tradition as the ‘Great Work’.  From this biological view, these parts of consciousness are assigned to various areas of the brain and their expression is modified according to one’s capability to control energy flow to these specifically delineated locations.    These include the cerebellum and the more recently evolved part of the brain (cerebral or neo-cortex) that includes:

1. The Attention Association Area
2. The Visual Association Area
3. The Verbal Conceptual Association Area
4. Frontal Lobe
5. Temporal Lobe
6. Parietal Lobe
7. Occipital Lobe

These more recently appearing parts of the brain evolved as humanity became conscious of itself and then grew out of the cerebellum, which appears even before our evolutionary development as primates.  Each of these manifests various egoic impulses that seemingly haphazardly dominate our consciousness in our waking state.  This is a natural evolutionary step coming from the instinct to survive, which of course, originates in the cerebellum.  We obviously had a need to better understand our environment and our relationship to it in order to enhance our chances at survival.  And that survival instinct required a sense of selfhood that subsequently necessitated an electrical flow more complex than the cerebellum could handle.  Subsequently, as we responded to this necessity, we developed the apparatus of the brain that could accomplish just such a task.  And further, we went on to discover another level of capacities for our overall brain function as the new apparatus (cerebral cortex) began to offer other possibilities in its relationship to the original apparatus of the brain (cerebellum).  This we are still investigating and have much to do before we will truly understand it all.  But one thing seems quite certain, we have evidence of the spirit that sits at the heart of our being, that long cited eternal part of our nature, which is indeed creating itself.  The very nature of the electrical current of the universe is intimately tied up in the manifestation of all sentience.

Alchemical work begins with the process of ‘calcination’ and is the effort of the cerebral cortex to eliminate the mechanical buzz in order to apprehend the energetic matrix of the cerebellum.  The method of accomplishing this employs a process that all spiritual masters have described as a ‘looking within’ to a place of darkness and silence.  For Thelemic qabalists, this is the darkness of N.O.X. (the chaotic potential of unmanifested form) by which we enter Yesod and the Astral Plane, which is of course, intimately tied to Da’ath and the ‘nightside’ of the Tree-of-Life on one plane (Yetzirah) along with the other side of the Abyss referred to as the ‘City of the Pyramids’ and on another plane (Briah).

What we exclusively refer to as consciousness in its most ‘whole’ expression is then entirely of the Assiatic Plane with the Atziluthic Plane being completely ineffable.  So we immediately recognize consciousness to be, that which is described as the ‘fallen’ Malkuth of qabalistic myth as it is most completely contained there.  Yet it originates in the ineffable realm of Atziluth.  From this, we then begin our ‘calcination’ by turning the nadir of our involutionary development and its self-absorption in order to more fully utilize the newly evolved capacities of our brain.  We approach this by employing a Gnostic heat that burns out the thought stream and is then succeeded by other alchemical processes.  Perfect success in this effort is referred to by Thelemites as having the ‘Knowledge & Conversation of Thine Holy Guardian Angel’.

The cerebellum is uniquely activated by resonant frequencies of bio-electricity and magnetism (a specific manifestation of electricity), which are the physical manifestations of the astral telesma or menstruum.  Our very thoughts can influence how this courses through our brains as shown to us through the experimentation of Dr. J. Allen Hobson of Columbia University.  So it follows that this process of engineering an induction of current through the brain is regulated by a body and mind that needs to be willfully re-educated defying its natural state.  This is achieved through rigorous preparation in order to more effectively trigger the electro-chemical processes that are correlated with it.  Certainly, electricity seems to be the medium that connects both the behavior of chemical substances and their sub-atomic particles with the physical waves involved in magnetic induction.  As waves and particles are indistinguishable on the quantum level, the study of the nature of electricity becomes an important mystery that our science has yet to solve.

We can clearly see that a certain specific condition of the machinery of the mind can be initiated through a set of seemingly artificial techniques that employ technological and chemical means; whether by the application of electro-magnetic apparatus (bio-rhythm and EEG machines) or the electro-chemical ingestion of various entheogenic substances.  Even our diet and exercise as well as the development of our intellectual and emotional capacities play an important role in the overall conditions that create this ‘state of mind’.  The principal task of the Zelator of the A.’.A.’. in attaining to this condition of the mind, requires developing what is referred to as the ‘automatic consciousness’.

The Tree-of-Life then becomes a schematic for a psycho-spiritual transistor that outlines an evolutionary goal and that involves the uniting of the objective and subjective universes.  Malkuth is the embodiment of consciousness, which is complete at Yesod but perfected in Tiphareth.  Da’ath then becomes the intersecting point of the objective and subjective universes, which is yet a higher expression of Yesod (as Yesod is the complete manifestation of consciousness which ultimately becomes seated within the physical body) and intimately connected with it.  And Da’ath itself is formulated by the combination of both the dissonant, kinetic energy of Binah (which is why Binah is referred to as the Mother of Sorrow) and the resonant, static energy of Chokmah; both coming from the ONE source referred to in the Emerald Tablet of Hermes Trismegistus and which is Kether.  And yet as per Madame Blavatsky’s Proem of Dzyan, Kether comes from that which is not.  ‘NOT’ then being that mystery of mysteries, which is also the key to Liber AL vel Legis and the probable source for this enigmatic electrical energy whose full nature has eluded even our most adept scientists.

Love is the law, love under will.