Quotations relevant to the Path

Rituals, spells, prayer, meditation and magical acts.
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obnoxion
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Quotations relevant to the Path

Post by obnoxion »

Here can be posted sayings and quotes that have a meditative quality, or other relevance for those who are on the Path.

My first contribution:

"The Kapalika are considered experts in alchemy (dhatuvada); they practice the transmutation of metals and prepare an elixir of long life (rasayana). This implies a serious responsibility. Even in our days, whoever has acquired the power to make gold incurs a curse if anyone is suffering from hunger within a radius of a half-kosha (1,800 meters) from the place he inhabits".

-Alain Daniélou: "While the Gods Play", page 134-

Now if there is one thing that seems to be puzzling many people interested in the Star of Azazel, it is the strong emphasis on ethics in a left hand path context. This is why I'd like to share an example of ethical considerations in connection with such an authentic left-handed sect as the Kapalika.
One day of Brahma has 14 Indras; his life has 54 000 Indras. One day of Vishnu is the lifetime of Brahma. The lifetime of Vishnu is one day of Shiva.
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Nefastos
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Re: Quotations relevant to the Path

Post by Nefastos »

"There are millions of people in the world who would like to become perfect servants of Satan, yet Satan will not accept them, because those people can't or won't adhere to the laws of God and nature, those same laws Satan adheres to. That law in all its simplicity is the following: 'Never do spiritual or material violence against anyone.'"

- Pekka Siitoin: Musta magia I

Although Pekka Siitoin is often seen as a humorous figure because of the tragicomical wannabe-Nazi behavior of his, that is not the whole truth. His enthusiasm was genuine.

This is an interesting quote, since Siitoin was more a "traditional" Satanist than, say, us in the Star of Azazel, who reject violence. This quote is from his book "Black Magic I" published (in Finnish) 1974. (No translation is available as far as I know.)
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
obnoxion
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Re: Quotations relevant to the Path

Post by obnoxion »

“I would make my bed in a charnel ground with bones of the dead for a pillow.”

Buddha describing His austerities as boddhisattva, recommending charnel grounds as meditation sites in Majjhima-nikāya. Quatation is found in David B. Greys's text "Skull Imagery and Skull Magic
in the Yoginī Tantras
".
One day of Brahma has 14 Indras; his life has 54 000 Indras. One day of Vishnu is the lifetime of Brahma. The lifetime of Vishnu is one day of Shiva.
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Nefastos
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Re: Quotations relevant to the Path

Post by Nefastos »

obnoxion wrote:“I would make my bed in a charnel ground with bones of the dead for a pillow.”


There is a black-white and a white-black adaptations of this. For hasn't it been said:

"The cremation ground is of two kinds, O Devi, the pyre and the renowned yoni."
- Kularnava Tantra

But it is so easy to misunderstand...

"He who is deluded by your maya sees not while he sees, understands not while he hears, and knows not the truth while he reads"
- ibid.

So we must seek, & seek, & seek, and not grow bold. Such a horror, such a joy!
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
obnoxion
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Re: Quotations relevant to the Path

Post by obnoxion »

Nefastos wrote:"The cremation ground is of two kinds, O Devi, the pyre and the renowned yoni."
- Kularnava Tantra
Yes, this is true on so many levels!

While on the topic of spiritual practice connected to the cremation grounds, i must share yet anohter quotation on the subject:

If you feel like going to a cemetery, fine, but this is not necessary. A cemetery is a place where corpses and frightening and repulsive things are found. Milarepa said that we permanently have a corpse at our disposal, it is our body! There is even another cemetery, the greatest of all cemeteries, it is the place where all our thoughts and emotions come to die.

- Kalu Rinpoche: "Secret Buddhism:Vajrajana practices" -

While i agree that going to a cemetery is not necessary, i do think it is important to keep an opening for the vamacara practice. What i mean is that, though it is most important to understand to symbolic meaning and the inner practice, there should remain a literal connection to the cemetery. Otherwise there is a danger that the symbolism becomes disconnected and the practice fruitless. There needs to be the understanding of the reality of the cemetery, or the symbolism will remain empty of meaning.
One day of Brahma has 14 Indras; his life has 54 000 Indras. One day of Vishnu is the lifetime of Brahma. The lifetime of Vishnu is one day of Shiva.
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Nefastos
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Re: Quotations relevant to the Path

Post by Nefastos »

Good point, that. And a brilliant quote!:
we permanently have a corpse at our disposal


But to come a bit closer to the West, I chose the next quotation from Gustav Meyrink. It goes like this:

"'But they have another meaning as well,' he said, suddenly overcome with agitation, 'our fancies, I mean. It only dawned on me very, very gradually. Some subtle spiritual instinct tells me that every act we perform has a double, magic meaning. We cannot do anything which is not magic. I know precisely why I have spent half my life plumbing the depths. I also know what it means that I have finally - finally - finally struck bottom and joined myself, right through all the swirls and eddies, by a long, fine thread to a world where no ray of this sun can penetrate, this hateful sun, whose only pleasure is to leave its children to die of thirst. What happened today is only a trivial, external event, but anyone who can see and can interpret what he sees is able to tell from the vague shadow on the wall who was walked in front of the lamp.' He gave me a bitter smile. 'I will tell you in a few words what the inner meaning of this external event is for me. I have found what I was searching for, from now on I am immune to those two poisonous snakes, faith and hope, which can only live in the light.

...Even when I was young some dark, powerful urge turned me away from the things of this earth. There were times when, before my eyes, the face of nature became a grotesque, grinning gargoyle which made me see the countryside, mountains, water and sky, even my own body, as the unyielding walls of a prison. No child, I imagine, feels anything when the shadow of a cloud crossing the sun falls on a meadow, but even then I was petrified with horror and, as if an invisible hand had torn a blindfold from my eyes, I found myself looking into the depths of a secret world full of mortal agonies of millions of tiny creatures tearing each other apart in mute hatred among the roots and stalks of the grass.'"


(G. Meyrink: Cardinal Napellus, translated by Mike Mitchell)

I sincerely hope - even if in vain - that neurology & psychology will continue to fail to categorise this kind of "universal world pain", often found in aspirant occultists. For it is the disease which precedes the real change of one's soul, made possible via psychospiritual process and not by medication.
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
Lux

Re: Quotations relevant to the Path

Post by Lux »

I really should get my hands on some Gustav Meyrink, since all the quotes I've read from him from numerous sources have been quite revealing and interesting.
Nefastos wrote:I sincerely hope - even if in vain - that neurology & psychology will continue to fail to categorise this kind of "universal world pain", often found in aspirant occultists. For it is the disease which precedes the real change of one's soul, made possible via psychospiritual process and not by medication.
"Theology and mysticism continue where adolescence ends."

(Can't remember the source of this quote.)

Diagnose: "Abnormal psychic distress"
Treatment: 100 mg of sedatives + a dose of valium three times a day

Problem solved, let the merry go ´round continue!
Lux

Re: Quotations relevant to the Path

Post by Lux »

"Night is preferable to a day."

- a traditional saying

This quote depicts how the un-manifested darkness of the "Heavenly Night" - Bythos in Quintessence? - is preferable to the dull contigencies of the shallow daylight consciousness. Darkness is the source of true illumination and light.

"Dante never smiled."

- a traditional saying

This has been interpreted in two ways: firstly, it has been said that this is because Dante had emerged from hell, which is the initiatic 'rectificando' process and the over-coming of the fallen human condition, but especially René Guénon stressed out that Dante never smiled because he had descended from heaven instead, to carry on the work of universal salvation in his own part, and this seems to me far more plausible.

The last mentioned saying also brings to my mind a certain traditionalist "eagle", who certainly didn't waste his time on smiling, at least in pictures: http://www.istenivaros.hu/schuon.kashmir.jpg

Why smile when you can stare like an eagle?
obnoxion
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Re: Quotations relevant to the Path

Post by obnoxion »

Nefastos wrote:But to come a bit closer to the West...
The great cycle of ages begins again:
The Virgin returns, returns the reign of Saturn.


- Virgil -

Here the great poet basicly voices all my hopes and believes in two quintessential lines.
One day of Brahma has 14 Indras; his life has 54 000 Indras. One day of Vishnu is the lifetime of Brahma. The lifetime of Vishnu is one day of Shiva.
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Nefastos
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Re: Quotations relevant to the Path

Post by Nefastos »

I just posted these on the Finnish forum. They're already in English, so let's contemplate them here, too.

* * *

"The Deluge descended in the driest July in living memory; but then no revisionist's dream of Armageddon is complete without its paradox. Lightning appearing out of a clear sky; flesh turned to salt; the meek inheriting the earth: all unlikely phenomena.

That July, however, there were no spectacular transformations. No celestial lights appeared in the clouds. No rains of salamanders or children. If angels came and went that month - if the looked-for Deluge broke - then it was, like truest Armageddon, metaphor.

There are, it's true, some freakish occurrences to be recounted, but most of them take place in backwaters, in ill-lit corridors, in shunned wastelands among rain-sodden mattresses and the ashes of old bonfires. They are local; almost private. Their shock waves - at best - made gossip among wild dogs.

Most of these miracles, however - games, rains and salvations - were slipped with such cunning behind the facade of ordinary life that only the sharpest-sighted, or those in search of the unlikely, caught a glimpse of the Apocalypse showing its splendors to a sun-bleached city."


- Clive Barker: The Damnation Game, Chapter 49

* * *

"If one could
draw the fangs of a snake
and charm the snake to play,
it's great to have snakes.

If one can single out
the body's ways
it's great to have bodies.
The body's wrong
is like mother turning vampire.

Don't say they have bodies
who have your love,
O lord
white as jasmine."


- Mahâdêviyakka
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
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