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Nº.
XVIII
CONCERNING THE GREEK MYSTERIES (1)
IN the celebration of the mysteries of
Phoibos Apollo, it was forbidden to eat anything upon which terrestrial fire had
passed. Wherefore all the food of his votaries was sun-baked, and his chief
sacrifice consisted in fruits from high trees ripened by the sun’s rays.
With these mysteries of Apollo were
associated those of Zeus and Hera, the King and Queen, because both man and
woman are admitted to the highest; and also because Eve and Adam, being thus
initiated, were eaters only of fruits uncooked; and, in one of the historical
senses of the allegory, Eve and Adam were the first Messengers. It was,
therefore, an offence against Phoibos and Zeus for their votaries to eat
anything on which fire had passed, or any fermented wine. Their wine was the
pure juice of the grape drunken new, and their bread was unleavened and
sun-baked.
The last Messengers must be
initiated, as were Eve and Adam, into these inmost and highest mysteries of the
perfect humanity, which constitute the highest of all castes, and entitle those
who attain to them to sit on the golden seats. (2)
These mysteries have also an inward
significance which is not hard to find.
In the mysteries of Phoibos and Zeus,
the initiated attained to the condition of a grand Hierophant. (“See! I tell you
all things.”) He was enlightened by the “sun,” and was in the fourth interior
circle of spirits, which is that of the Christs of God. (3) To this interior
circle Jesus of Nazareth aimed to pass after his resuscitation; as was implied
when he said, “I will drink no more of the grape until I drink its blood new in the
In the mysteries of Hermes, the
second circle, – the God who guards the Soul, – it was forbidden to eat any
creature which had life, or, rather, which had seeing eyes. (1) For Hermes is the Seer. His votaries partook only of
vegetable food, which might be cooked with terrestrial fire, and of wine, which
might be fermented.
Next in order were the orgies of Her
who rose from the sea; and in these the initiates might eat fish which are truly
fish, having fins and scales, but baked with fire, not raw. Wherefore as that
Goddess is the Angel of Harmony, or of the Sweet Song, the eating of fish became
a symbol of brotherly love and union; and two small fishes together was the
mystical type of little children dwelling together in unity or charity. (2) For fishes swim in pairs; and He who fished for men drew
them unto him by love. And all fishers were under the protection of the
Sea-Queen. There are two mystical truths belonging to the mysteries of Maria the
Sea-Star; and they are, in their interior sense, the two fishes which Jesus
imparted to the multitude. Of this I shall tell you more afterwards when I speak
to you of the twelve baskets of bread. For these are the baskets which the
twelve virgins carried in the divine orgies.
In the mysteries of Bacchos it was
permitted to the outer circle to eat, if indeed they would, of all flesh save of
the unclean. This is, they might eat of all clean beasts of the field and birds
of the air. This was the fourth and lowest caste. But the votaries of Iacchos
(the mystic Bacchos), having known all the higher rites, abstained from these
things, though they allowed them to the multitude who are in the body only. For
none of those who worshipped Dionysos (or Iacchos) were uninitiated in the rites
of Demeter and Aphrodite. And for this reason there were substituted for the
mysteries of Dionysos those of Ceres, the Earth Mother, in which the use of
flesh was entirely prohibited. For this reason also one hears not of the
mysteries of Bacchos save in connection with wine, whether fermented or not; for
the interior significance of his rites had reference to the truth and meaning of
things. The orgies of Ceres and Bacchos were therefore united, the Goddess being
honoured in her bread, and the God in his chalice of truth. For in that these
are body and spirit, solid and fluid, outer and inner, they comprise all things
in earth and in heaven.
And beyond the circle of Dionysos lay
yet another – that of
a God who also had indeed his orgies, but these
were forbidden save in certain fierce nations and barbarous times. For in the
mysteries of Ares, the Man of War, they sacrificed and ate human flesh and the
flesh of horses, which also war together with man. For this circle is outside
the kingdom of the fourfold circles, and belongeth to the beasts of prey. And
his star is red, as with the blood of the slain. But the orgies of Ares the
Ram-headed no man celebrated save in war; and he who knew the God spared not his
life, but freely sacrificed himself. For it was an abomination to eat at the
altar of Ares in time of peace.
Yet hath Ares also his interior
meaning: – O Knowledge, thou art hard of access! The Horse (which is the symbol
of the intellect) dieth for thee, and the Warrior is pierced. Thou art the Man
of War, and of iron are the wheels of thy chariot!
The Hebrew Scriptures describe the
Lord Jehovah, or Logos, as operating as the Spirit of the fifth circle, when
they speak of God as a Man of War. And the book of Wisdom (xviii, 15) thus
represents Him. For the Divine Word takes many forms, appearing sometimes as
one, sometimes as another, of His Seven Angels, or Elohim. These are only Seven,
because this number comprises all the Spirits of God. So that when the seventh
is passed, the octave begins again, and the same series of processes is repeated
without, as reflects – becoming by distance weaker and weaker – of the same
Seven Lights.
See that above all things you teach
the doctrine of Caste. The Christians made a serious mistake in requiring the
same rule of all persons. Castes are as ladders whereby to ascend from the lower
to the higher. They are, properly, spiritual grades, and bear no relation to the
outward condition of life. Like all other doctrines, that of caste has been
materialised. The castes are four in number, and correspond to the fourfold
nature of man.
The Daimons, Guardian Angels, or
Genii belong to the order of Seraphs, or Serpents of Light, which surround and
spring from the supreme orb. Hence the idea of the serpent as a fallen angel,
the astrals being serpents of fire, springing from Hades, or the lower – the
material and astral – world, which is the obverse of the upper.
Venus, or Aphrodite, is celestial
Harmony, – that binding power of sympathy which purifies, enlightens, and
beautifies. The Apple in her hand is the Kosmos (denoting the world sustained
and redeemed by Love).
The Owl, sacred to Pallas, and the
Cat to Hermes, are types of the Seer. For Wisdom and Understanding can behold
things in dark places.
The Spoiling of the Egyptians has a
secondary reference to the appropriation of their sacred mysteries by the
Hebrews. The primary reference is to the enrichment and edification of the soul
by means of the lessons obtained through the experiences of the body, symbolised
as
Air, Pallas, is the offspring of
Ether, Jupiter, or original Substance in its masculine aspect. Ether is
universally diffused, penetrating everywhere, or, rather, impossible to be
excluded from anywhere. The whirling atoms of the densest solids revolve in
ether, as do the planets in space. In a sense Ether is space.
The Soul, Persephone, is the daughter
of Earth, Demeter or Motion, and of Ether, Zeus or Rest, respectively the
visible and invisible. To him who knows the mysteries of Demeter or Ceres, the
eating of flesh is an abomination.
These mysteries contained, among
other things, the relation of the soul to the elements by which on either side
it is beset, – namely, to motion and matter on the outer side, and to rest and
spirit on the inner. Hence Demeter and her mysteries are of profound import, and
relate to secrets the most interior. As the force which causes spirit to become
manifest as matter or earth, she is the Earth-Mother and the power whereby
germination occurs. Constituting all that is fixed and solid, she is creation,
or manifestation through action or motion, the invisible made visible. And to
her is due the phenomenal or illusive by which her daughter Persephone – or the
soul – is drawn outwards and downwards. Illusion, the “fiery” or electric body
generated of motion, and operating as a veil to hide the inner reality, is Maya
and Glamour; and the soul following this is carried off to Hades by its ruler
Pluto (the God especially of riches, themselves, illusive as products of the
earth). Eating of the Mystic Pomegranate (the “Apple” of Eve), the volatile
becomes alchemically fixed, the soul is incorporated with the body, and in part,
at least, materialised, and is no longer “virgin” or pure, because wedded to
flesh and sense. At the entreaty of her mother, who fears her total immersion in
matter, and consequent final loss, Zeus grants that she may divide her existence
between the two worlds or conditions, the earthly and the heavenly, being –
while in the lower – Queen of the Shades or those who sleep, being unconscious
of things spiritual.
Thus the volatile or astral body,
which is the immediate manifestation of the soul, is the daughter – or product –
of Motion; and Motion is the daughter of Time (Kronos or Saturn), and of
Substance, which is Rhea, or the Holy Spirit in its feminine aspect. This last
is the Great Mother, the original Panthea. The production of the material body
by the fixing of the particles of the volatile body comes of the reversal of the
poles of those particles through the outward tendency of the will of the
individual, and its separation or divergence from the divine or central will.
The force whereby Zeus, the central
spirit, produces the soul or ethereal body, and which also the soul uses to
project itself still further, is the same force whereby the system is transmuted
and indrawn again to its divine centre and made volatile. The force is one, it
is the will and direction that are various.
In one application Persephone is the
grain of wheat, Ceres the soil, and Hades the darkness which hides the seed,
until under solar influence it emerges and returns to the light. It was through
a misunderstanding of the mysteries of Ceres, and of the true meaning of the
resurrection of the body, that the custom of burning the dead was given up for
that of burying them.
The Gods of the elements, Athena
(air), Poseidon (water), Hephaistos (fire), and Demeter (earth), are among the
greatest, and are close to the throne, having universal sway, inasmuch as their
empire is universal. (1)
Footnotes
(48:1)
(48:2) See No. XXII: also Dreams
and Dream-Stories, No. IX.
(48:3) Comp. Hymn to Phoibos, Part II, No. XI.
(49:1) Comp. Hermes to his Neophytes, Part II, No. XII, pt. 2.
(49:2) Comp. Hymn of Aphrodite, Part II, No. XIV (2).
(52:1) See Part II, No. XIII, pt. 2, and Appendix, note R.
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