"... and some were there who preferred death to change ..."
Introduction
Magic has been defined as a system for effecting changes under will. If these changes take place in one's own consciousness magic will rightly be seen as the precursor of psycho-analysis and its various off-shoots. We should indeed do well to consider it the first form of psychotherapy.
Several 20th century magicians have stressed the benefits of combining modern day analytic methods with the practices handed down to us from the past. Different approaches, different applications. The freudian angle would apply on the lower part of the Tree (Nefesh) while higher up better results may be obtained by looking into the work of Jung, Maslow, Rogers, Löwen, Wilber etc., the list is by now endless.
The present sketch is mainly concerned with the Jungian concept of the Shadow and puts it in a magico-cabalistic frame. A number of random thoughts and afterthoughts are thrown in for good measure.
Perhaps the magician's most important tool is intuition. This is the Atzilutic input for the Work. It seeps through to the personal Tree and is apprehended in dreams, flashes of partial insight, paradoxical inspirations hard to interpret but acted upon to the best of one's ability in the interest and furtherance of the Work.
On another level intuition can also be described as the dimly perceived interaction between Hod and Netzach being synthesized in Yesod, the place of the ego. Strictly speaking this is not a higher awareness but a reshuffling of the mental and emotional faculties into a rhythmic focus that is to become the basis of a higher consciousness in Tiphareth, or the Self.
To bring consciousness into the partial completion of Briah it has to be brought to comprehensive cognition. This means piercing the Veil of Paroketh where the mettle of intuition is tested. The test is known to be threefold and will presently be outlined. There is no free lunch but all are free to come to the table.
Paroketh and the Shadow
The responsible cabalist discerns three Satanic Temples on the Tree. They correspond to three stages which have a vertical and an horizontal aspect.
The three vertical stages: Satanas Infernalis, Satan or The Devil (Arcana 15) and Baphomet.
The three horizontal stages in Paroketh: Paths 26 (The Devil), 24 (Death) and 25 (Temperance or Art)
The Shadow named would be Fear of Energy (Foe), i. e. our own fear of our own energy, and Fear of Destiny, our own fear of our own ultimate destiny which is freedom and, here's the rub, responsibility ! You could say that the mind has a threefold resistance to its own ultimate aim, this resistance is the Shadow.
Our personalities all too often come down to some lukewarm compromise with our shortcomings. This is arrived at with the object never to probe or really accept and least of all transform these shortcomings.
It is important that halfway through Paths 26 and 24 one is forced to go back. The Sun-sphere is not initially approached via these two. One is confronted with the unsatisfactory solutions the mind has come up with, these are Shadow-workings haunting the life-force. One is sent back to ponder them, after all we may well settle for these halfway houses, this is a possible (temporary) choice. The aspirant is as it were forced to mull over his investment in Stasis and Regression (more of this later) and he must weigh his chances and appetite for pursuing his development. He, or she of course, must ask himself whether he/she is really prepared to integrate the Shadow and to face ALL the facts concerning his/her own totality. In Stasis (26) we see a kind of cosmic laziness (the vision of the Golden Age here is typical in this respect). In Regressio (24) we see a kind of super irresponsibility on the basis of immense sadness, the sorrow of undigested experience dragging you back into nothingness. You may see you never really left home, never matured so that at all moments you are ready to fall back into the formless, the undefined, shying away from the responsibility of individuality, to sink back into the primordial womb. In Progressio (25) the sum total of negativity that was confronted partially in 26 and 24 must be transformed. One stares into the mirror of one's own accumulated sorrow. On the other hand, here is the chance to penetrate the anima/animus force-field and it is this that rends the Veil for the "psychic hermaphrodite". Arcana 6, The Lovers, though not classicaly attributed to this path bears upon this matter.
In all this struggle for transformation, it must be born in mind that the Shadow is an energetic occurrence or phenomenon and that as such it is perfectly transformable. Energy pure and simple is neutral and neutral will you be in the end, not positive or negative, nay neutral !
Let us now take a closer look at the three Paths trough the Veil and try to gauge the content of the Shadow there.
The 26th Path. Hod-Tiphareth.
Stasis, immobilism, things should stay as they are. The sick man in the cosiness of his illness ("this at least we know"), numbed into a false security and a sense that all change is, or could be, for the worse. He/she is unable to rise above the present level and if and when he/she tries it is always in a half-hearted way, failure is as it were incalculated beforehand. This is the firm grip of the Shadow. The Adept, when able to momentarily take leave of the detrimental concepts that keep him trapped should perceive that the beliefs cherished here rebel against every tenet of life. Biologically speaking all our organs are systems of transformation and so, naturally, is our mind. An organ in stasis stops its vital function and is clinically diagnosed as ill. Likewise the mind; where the flow stops we develop imbalance and psychosomatic illness. In Stasis the statue is taken for the thing. Obviously, subduing this Shadow-formation demands a significant quantum leap in de adept's mind. It is the classic double-bind: the mind brought you here and got itself completely entangled in this syndrome and now it is to disengage itself from its own creation that is by now part of it. It's a bit like lifting oneself by one's own bootstraps really, but here it must and can be done ! Moreover, it must be done on each of the three Paths through the Veil of Paroketh.
The 24th Path. Netzach-Tiphareth
The deathwish and the dark mother. Tobacco, alcohol and other drugs, i.e. regression. Infantile reactions and the concomitant inability to face things as they are, failing to face reality and as a result the desire to give up, to forget. Escapism in either optimistic or pessimistic fantasies, complete realms of bliss or despair are mentally constructed and inhabited for periods at a time. Going back into a sometimes near formless fantasy world of an undifferentiated nature which may give you the impression you have actually penetrated the Veil and are experiencing the unity of All that is. This last perception can have a kind of saving grace and is a rather seldom occurence on this Path. The vision of the underwater voyage with the monster constantly lurking is typical here.
The 25th Path. Yesod-Tiphareth
The fruitful relentless Shadow as a Watcher on the Path who comes to stand in your way as a synthesis of the other two Shadow manifestations in Paroketh. Here is a reason for calling Paroketh the minor Abyss. Here begins the Tipharethic work of synthesis on the basis of the analysis in Yetzirah. The Adept is now subjected to the attack of his personal unconscious fears and shortcomings; should he refuse to acknowledge the fact that all friction from the outside is the mirror of his inner imbalance he will be unable to decisively tip the scales of consciousness from Yesod to Tiphareth. This in itself will not preclude him/her from temporarily residing in the bliss and beauty of Tiphareth. But time and again he/she will be thrown back. This is not punishment though some may well, erroneously, come to think of it that way. It is justice and it is correct to think of the Geburatic overtones of the Shadow guardians of Tiphareth. The perception of the outer friction as mirroring an inner imbalance and the near inevitable conclusion in the Adept's consciousness of having to accept all elements and happenings as teachers is very close to the essence of the Magus' Oath and the danger of paranoia implied in it.
At this point one is forced to face the curious mechanism of judgmental thinking we all have developed. No matter how neurotic our own situation we always keep active a system of evaluating others and their supposed merits (by our standards) on a value-scale where ultimately we ourselves are the norm. This is sheer delusion of course but this 'complex' is incredibly difficult to dislodge even after its reality and ultimate destructiveness have been clearly perceived.
The aforementioned repeated "falls" from Tiphareth can be interpreted in different ways. At least one has seen, tasted and felt the beauty of the Self. One knows beyond the shadow of a doubt that the Great Work makes perfect sense and therefore one feels a great willingness to keep feeling one's way ahead through the forest of one's own mixed emotions and inner contradictions. On the other hand, severe bouts of depression (24th Path Guardian) may well occur, bringing the work to repeated temporary standstills. This will only be overcome as the Adept progresses in the attempt to establish some sort of communion with as pure a form of his Holy Guardian Angel as is at this time feasible for his consciousness. The grace of the Angel (note this Chesedic Grace as contrasted with the Geburatic content of the Shadow, and, in passing, grasp the absolute necessity in cabalistic terms of the interplay of the two !) will clear the path. The clearer the Adept's conceptualization of the Angel is at this time, the better he/she will be able to cross the bridge and to weather the inner storm. The Angel will here be a more or less full-blown concept of paradoxical reality depending on the intimations of Its actuality and the degree of 'initiation' apprehended during previous experiences in Tiphareth. A good working hypothesis here is to consider the Angel as the accumulated sum total of your most positive impulses.
All this being said it is clear that the magician faces his major test on the Lower Face here. Many will experience this as a higher octave of the fearful hold of the past which is pointed out on the 32nd Path from Malkuth to Yesod. This is hardly surprising considering the sequence on the general Path of the Arrow. It is here we meet the main hurdles and get the main assistance. The Minor and the Major Abyss, the Guardians, but also the Angel, the Beauty and the pivotal sphere of Tiphareth and ultimately the Crown, not to mention the optimalisation of knowledge and experience in Daath: here on the Path of the Arrow progress is straight, elsewhere it is lateral.
It is now high time to disabuse you of the notion that cabalistic pathworking is an unending ordeal. Nothing could be further from the truth, but in this little treatise I have chosen to deal with the difficult side mainly.
The Shadow Guardians of Paroketh mirror the dross of past attitudes and mind-formations, so this may lead to great sadness and sorrow. The magician may well find himself pondering the possibility of having bitten off more than he can chew. Meditation on the Angel will here be the main support. You should plan a complete strategy in order to come to terms with the 'adversary' here. In Assiatic terms this would mean the devising of a ritual situation to concretize and overcome your shortcomings. In Yetziradic terms yet another in-depth analysis of the inner contradictions that have brought you to this quite natural and necessarily unavoidable pass should be undertaken. We should realize we have set up this whole situation ourselves and that as such it is exactly what we need. But in fact this insight already partakes of the Briatic element of the whole proceedings where one envisages an optimal synthesis to be arrived at eventually.
The Atzilutic element of these three operations is the intuition that either guides you or leads you astray depending on your faculties, assiduity and determination. Also, the Holy Guardian Angel can be seen as the main Atzilutic contribution and this explains Its diffuse nature.
Fear
The title of this small chapter is a translation of the Hebrew word Pachad, which is one of the names of Geburah. Here is the fear of God. It has come to my mind this can take a quite surprising form. Many people toy with concepts like "the other world", "the angels", they look at mandala's and read about visions and all this holds great attraction for them. They visualize all these things and feel completely at home with all these images and concepts. Some of them would manage the confrontation with them under the influence of mind-expanding drugs although here already most would crumble and crack up. Now consider the possibility, and in the light of what I've said in the first few sentences this may sound strange, but again, consider the possibility of the mandala, the angel, the demon standing big and real as life in front of your mind's eye (let alone your physical eye) in meditation without you having willed the visualisation, then you will know the fear of God. I mean that all you've been toying with and fantasizing about may well be true and I believe few of us are ready for that. I suggest you do not idly dismiss this caution, because when the fear of God grips you, you will be bound to believe and in that case you'll be back where you started, which is nowhere.
Subjective and objective magic
The debate about the subjective and objective nature of magical, and by implication, psychological phenomena still goes on and that comes as no surprise. Both views are valid and certainly not mutually exclusive.
The Angel and the Shadow, the spirits, demons, archangels and so on are entities in our psyche, some of them archetypal forces, others of a different nature, one could perhaps even claim a cellular basis for some of them. This is a good working hypothesis, but having said that I have no problem accepting another and independent existence for them that I cannot define, let alone describe. And writing this down it occurs to me that what seems to be their objective nature could indeed be lodged in such a deep layer of the psyche that for all practical purposes this may present itself as non-subjective to me because, after all, at some point, the psyche is the universe.
Still, one is left with the feeling that having formulated the concept of the Angel for instance, one is assisted by an intangible agent. I realize I'm on the razor's edge here because someone is bound to ask about demons and evil spirits, thus throwing wide-open the door to supernatural paranoia and the superstition which seems to be more popular than ever nowadays. I think you "call" within yourself and something answers from within, and, possibly, from without. So take care what you "call". Should you choose to conjure up in ritual fashion one of the Goëtic demons you may well be unleashing one of your own archetypal forces which could subsequently be strenghtened by its objective equivalent. This combination could conceivably be too strong for your magical circle and possesion might occur. A circle, an amulet or talisman, a formula is no match for an unhinged archetypal force. This danger is nonexistent with the benevolent entities and I suggest you "call" upon them freely and intensely, chances are you've indeed been doing too little of that. Call deep within yourself, there is no set technique for this, so you will, literally, have to play it by ear. Good luck !
Conclusion
Paroketh-working is the great challenge for those who practice Abrah-Melin in seclusion or in the world. One way of looking at it is to take the confrontation with the Shadow as the final stage of Abrah-Melin where all the spirits are subjugated. We are asked to come to terms with as much of the contents of our psyche as we can stand. You can ask the Angel, your Angel, for his Name or Words pertaining to His invocation in dreams. One day, or night rather, among the myriad sights and sounds and images of your dreamlife the words will come one by one, easily recognized because they belong to no language that we know (although some claim them to be Enochian). These few words, for you alone, will be your beacon in a process of transformation that may well frighten you at times as is natural in this unknown land but think of what the great psychologist Jung so rightly believed. He felt that at the heart of the psyche was a unifying principle and I suggest you go with that thought. (What I said about gaining the invocation of The Angel in dreams will not work for everybody, alas) Fear not the demons, they will not trouble you uninvoked. They and the angels are static beings, we are not ! We men and women are not the most powerful beings in this grandiose universe but we are, potentially, by far the most flexible and as such capable of endless transformation and growth. Peace !
autumn 1989
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