Initiation

Rational discussions on metaphysical and abstract topics.
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Gangleri

Initiation

Post by Gangleri »

Splitting the discussion on a topic of its own from the original The Presence of Those Who Have Passed to create philosophical room for discussing initiation and possibilities of discussing it. - Smaragd

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I have not much to say upon this topic but I have noticed a certain trend in forum discussions AS IF people know actually what they are talking about when talking about initiations or other curious things. To say these things in a public forum as if they are an actual occult fact is the same as to say one has penetrated those mysteries, and I believe people prefer to remain silent then.

All I can really say is that if the presence of the dead are among us, we can experience the effects of their actions in our core self and in the world around us "silently" 8for they are things that cannot be talked about without stamping oneself "mad", and also that all the masterings of the ancients are with us if we manage to uplift ourselves to these levels. And the presence of those who have passed is only one of those curious things that cannot possibly be discussed in public.
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Nefastos
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Re: The Presence of Those Who Have Passed

Post by Nefastos »

Gangleri wrote: Sat Aug 21, 2021 10:58 pmI have not much to say upon this topic but I have noticed a certain trend in forum discussions AS IF people know actually what they are talking about when talking about initiations or other curious things.

Please elaborate.
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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Re: The Presence of Those Who Have Passed

Post by Gangleri »

Nefastos wrote: Sun Aug 22, 2021 10:52 am
Gangleri wrote: Sat Aug 21, 2021 10:58 pmI have not much to say upon this topic but I have noticed a certain trend in forum discussions AS IF people know actually what they are talking about when talking about initiations or other curious things.

Please elaborate.
If we make a statement that a thing x belongs to a y initiation, then we have to assume that one who is speaking has gone through that initiation. The same thing is to say that an initiate x goes through such and such transformations or widenings of consciousness. Otherwise anything is just speculation about things we cannot possibly have any factual knowledge. There is nothing wrong in speculation, but the operative face is the one of silence.
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Re: The Presence of Those Who Have Passed

Post by Nefastos »

Gangleri wrote: Mon Aug 23, 2021 6:13 pmIf we make a statement that a thing x belongs to a y initiation, then we have to assume that one who is speaking has gone through that initiation. The same thing is to say that an initiate x goes through such and such transformations or widenings of consciousness. Otherwise anything is just speculation about things we cannot possibly have any factual knowledge. There is nothing wrong in speculation, but the operative face is the one of silence.

It sounds that you are simultaneously quoting & misquoting my prologue statements from the Adept.

But be as it may, your idea here is clear enough: you would rather not see initiations discussed about in a way that someone would have actual knowledge on them. But since the very concept of spiritual initiation is obscure & manifold, it is very easy to approach the whole problem in the SoA forum in this way: those who discuss initiations with the SoA background can be seen to discuss initiations in the light of how they are discussed in the Adept and some other SoA sources. And these in turn can – and should – always be taken as just individual philosophizing; an intricate theory. As everything should. They stand or fall by other merits than demands of authority. Yet they are, understandably, interesting point for (some parts of) the SoA discussion.

Like I have stated many times in this forum: at the front of every single post I (or we) make, one should envision the statement from the beginning of Fosforos. The one behind the very first link in our website, the root and rock of all discussion here.

Operative face has never been the one of silence in the SoA, and never will it be, as long as there is an open door entering to our towers of ivory. Silence is a terrible tool, a real tool of authority, and should be used only sparingly.
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!"
Gangleri

Re: The Presence of Those Who Have Passed

Post by Gangleri »

Nefastos wrote: Mon Aug 23, 2021 7:36 pm It sounds that you are simultaneously quoting & misquoting my prologue statements from the Adept.
The prologue of Adept was on my mind, and I was also thinking about the statement in the Book of Paths, where one is strickly forbidden to present one as an initiate. I believe I was not misquoting, when speaking from memory.
Nefastos wrote: Mon Aug 23, 2021 7:36 pm But be as it may, your idea here is clear enough: you would rather not see initiations discussed about in a way that someone would have actual knowledge on them.
Precisely, since I believe it will only cause a massive flood of unbelief if one presents oneself as an authority in these things in public. I can only think the flood if I would start to discuss the runic mysteries in such a way, that "this mystery is one of death, and I present it as a fact relating to the fourth initiation."
Nefastos wrote: Mon Aug 23, 2021 7:36 pm But since the very concept of spiritual initiation is obscure & manifold, it is very easy to approach the whole problem in the SoA forum in this way: those who discuss initiations with the SoA background can be seen to discuss initiations in the light of how they are discussed in the Adept and some other SoA sources. And these in turn can – and should – always be taken as just individual philosophizing; an intricate theory. As everything should. They stand or fall by other merits than demands of authority. Yet they are, understandably, interesting point for (some parts of) the SoA discussion.
I'm not discouraging anyone to speak about things, only authoritative statements. They can at most direct people to right direction, at worst only confuse minds.
Nefastos wrote: Mon Aug 23, 2021 7:36 pm Operative face has never been the one of silence in the SoA, and never will it be, as long as there is an open door entering to our towers of ivory. Silence is a terrible tool, a real tool of authority, and should be used only sparingly.
We can talk, we can hint, but we should never make clear statements about initiation and its secrets in public. Personal and private discussions are wholly different thing. if the operative face is not a secret, then it is not operative. They cannot be talked about since the personal experience then connects with the universal truth in the most peculiar manner.
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Re: Initiation

Post by Gangleri »

Gangleri wrote: Mon Aug 23, 2021 7:57 pmThey cannot be talked about since the personal experience then connects with the universal truth in the most peculiar manner.
I forgot to say that at most we can make inductions.
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Re: Initiation

Post by Smaragd »

Gangleri wrote: Mon Aug 23, 2021 7:57 pm
Nefastos wrote: Mon Aug 23, 2021 7:36 pm It sounds that you are simultaneously quoting & misquoting my prologue statements from the Adept.
The prologue of Adept was on my mind, and I was also thinking about the statement in the Book of Paths, where one is strickly forbidden to present one as an initiate. I believe I was not misquoting, when speaking from memory.
One can take single passages from different places and put them together in order to create problems for oneself and perhaps even use them as weapons with which to strike others, or to gain authoritative tone to one's own voice. I recall you quoting Guenon, or someone, a while ago about how carefully the word initiation is to be used. Yes, critique of misconceptions is important, yet often times it is used as a mask to hide behind big ideas rather than actually coming to the people and reality of life with those concepts. I'm familiar with such hiding efforts from personal experience of extreme hate towards fellow human beings, which might have initiated a purification process of some concepts for myself, yet left me for grasping the principle of buddhi towards the concepts and the usage of them (corresponding to the void, created by hate, between the people and myself). Let us try to use these bits with larger context's in mind, meaning also the way initiations build up in the lives of neophytes and aspirants.
Gangleri wrote: Mon Aug 23, 2021 7:57 pm
Nefastos wrote: Mon Aug 23, 2021 7:36 pm But be as it may, your idea here is clear enough: you would rather not see initiations discussed about in a way that someone would have actual knowledge on them.
Precisely, since I believe it will only cause a massive flood of unbelief if one presents oneself as an authority in these things in public. I can only think the flood if I would start to discuss the runic mysteries in such a way, that "this mystery is one of death, and I present it as a fact relating to the fourth initiation."
When I have read statements distantly reminiscent of this way of presenting things in the SoA circles, I have taken them as possible road signs that I will make usage of if I see them useful for my work. The parts that are not truthful I can not hang on to because whatever I would be building, it would crumble down. If I can find some bits of truth there, then it is more like a hint than authorative fact. As you might see, I'm only paraphrasing what Nefastos already said with:

"And these in turn can – and should – always be taken as just individual philosophizing; an intricate theory. As everything should. They stand or fall by other merits than demands of authority. Yet they are, understandably, interesting point for (some parts of) the SoA discussion."
Gangleri wrote: Mon Aug 23, 2021 7:57 pm
Nefastos wrote: Mon Aug 23, 2021 7:36 pm Operative face has never been the one of silence in the SoA, and never will it be, as long as there is an open door entering to our towers of ivory. Silence is a terrible tool, a real tool of authority, and should be used only sparingly.
We can talk, we can hint, but we should never make clear statements about initiation and its secrets in public. Personal and private discussions are wholly different thing. if the operative face is not a secret, then it is not operative. They cannot be talked about since the personal experience then connects with the universal truth in the most peculiar manner.
I believe in public and general context such as this forum, we can discuss and try to fathom the surroundings of initiations and what kind of whole they might be built on. Thus if we talk about the planetary archetypes in general and seek their nature, then we can make some sort of estimations of the initiatory path of these planetary forces "in advance". The quotation marks are there because making such road maps is to me already preparations for the initiations, and thus part of it. An initiation seem to me something that is built up to for long periods of time, of which we can certainly discuss of, and then when the last threshold is step over, the final electrifying touch can not be wholly explained, but again can be pointed towards, right?
"Would to God that all the Lord's people were Prophets”, Numbers 11:29 as echoed by William Blake
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Re: Initiation

Post by Nefastos »

I was personally ready to throw my hands in the air with this, but some of the brothers are inclined to think that some readers might be helped by continuing this discussion with extra explanations. So I will explain.
Gangleri wrote: Mon Aug 23, 2021 7:57 pm
Nefastos wrote: Mon Aug 23, 2021 7:36 pmIt sounds that you are simultaneously quoting & misquoting my prologue statements from the Adept.

The prologue of Adept was on my mind, and I was also thinking about the statement in the Book of Paths, where one is strickly forbidden to present one as an initiate. I believe I was not misquoting, when speaking from memory.

I would like to think that I know both the letter & the ideas of my own books better. But let us delve into this delicate matter.

The whole text of the Adept discusses initiations. So it begins with a foreword where I say that no teaching on initiations can be given as authoritative, since such demand would already prove that the teaching is misleading: the true "attained ones" (adepts) are those who will not make such claims. It would be contrary to the whole idea of teaching people self-reflection, uplifting idividuality and so on, if there would be people who claim that they are existentially higher beings.

Yet that book specifically discusses initiations, and it seems that you have no quarrel with that book, since you quoted it. But in doing this, you took only one part of the idea, and left behind its much more important part, the whole context. That context should be obvious, however, because they are exactly the initiations and their demands which are discussed in that text.

In that way, that book, the Adept, and our discussions here in the forum, are not in the least contradicted. Just like I presented my own thoughts on the initiations in the Adept, I have herein presented thoughts similarly. And some of the most active and deep-dwelling SoA brethren have followed & commented & enriched by new theories these teachings – be they "inspired" or coming from personal experience or not – because they belong to the system that is meaningful to their own working. No personal claim belong to these discussions, but it should be clear that the SoA is not, nor it has never been about some theorizing around already presented systems. We have our own system, for those who want to follow it either in its entirety, or just parts here & there. But our system is of the "new school" in that it does not demand to be THE school which everyone should follow. What it demands are only the abstract values given in the constitution.

All this should have been clear if not from the Adept, if not from the website, if not from the discussions from the past fifteen years, then at least from my previous message.
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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Re: Initiation

Post by Aquila »

Couple of things to remember when willing to criticize something on this forum (or in life in general).

Do not base your criticism on something excessively general such as "a trend". Be more precise and reply to those messages where you see something you might want say something about. If there's sources like books, let others see what you are refering to. Memories are not good sources if you wish to criticize something specific.

Do not only point fingers to others and what other people are doing wrong in your opinion but be aware of your own words and actions. For example, while you, Gangleri, criticize some of the forum users for discussing openly what various initiations might mean and what kind of challenges they could present in the system of SoA, you yourself have been hinting at certain mysterious experiences in a way that suggests that you know about these things more than you can discuss:

Gangleri wrote: Sun Jul 25, 2021 3:30 am
Grohan wrote: Tue Jul 13, 2021 4:01 pmNorthern mysteries manifested for example in Apollonian, Odinistic and Zarathustrian mysteries and in their final initiation there happened an encounter with Cosmic Christ. They were macrocosmic mysteries which led initiate out of his soul in ecstatic manner.
All I can ssay to this from my own experience with the runic cycle, that Odin led me to the Cosmic Christ, which can be seen in Northern Mysteries as Christ-Balder who always resurrects after a long night. The mystery can be called the synthesis of Christo-Paganic Mysteris, where one is lead out of the world and back. I dare not say anymore, for the mystery is horrible to bear.

This is exactly what you are blaming others for: giving an impression of being initiated. This seems very dishonest and hypocritical.
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Re: Initiation

Post by Nefastos »

Since initiation is extremely important concept for the brotherhood's occultism, it might be good to open the term a little, since this discussion bears its name. This goes beyond the original opening of Gangleri's criticism, and is written for the help of those readers who might not be wholly familiar with how the word is used in our writings.

The SoA idea about initiation is a fundamental one; initiation is something that happens for a soul. Thus, outer initiations in social or even astral events can only be reflections, echoes or predictions for a true initiation that is a fundamental change – for the better – in one's soul. Such true initiations are like milestones for one's spiritual being, and little by little they change the whole human being into something that is no longer human in a way how we consider this word. (This is, of course, once again semantics: one can also say that initiations bring about true humanity in us, and before them we are animals. This is just a different way of saying the same thing.)

Along with these true initiations of ascension, there are also initiations of two different kinds: "horizontal" ones, which seek to empower a human being in a way one already is, and the "downward" ones, which seek to cut off wholeness in order to give greater strength to a part. A "horizontal" initiation can be extremely valuable in case one has already reached in soul a corresponding initiation. A "downward" initiation is a way to vampirize one's inner being in order to become a succesful sociopath. It is the gravest mistake one can make, but gives solidity and power, because one simply cuts away those pesky ethical doubts & inhibitions. (NB: Something similar happens already in the other initiations, but in a very different way.)

Since the modern world does not believe in such an existential change which can be reached by wholesome but methodical working, the question about the possibility of initiations remains as an item of belief. No members are asked to believe in such concepts, but one will stumble upon them constantly in the brotherhood texts.

Initations on the path of ascension depend on application of one's dharma. Initations of horizontal & downward paths depend on applications of one's karma.
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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