Masters Presence in the Fraternities of Contemporary West - an LHP Perspective

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Smaragd
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Masters Presence in the Fraternities of Contemporary West - an LHP Perspective

Post by Smaragd »

How do you see the Masters presence in today's occult societies in the West, and how do you see a Left-Hand Path emphasis affecting the connection to them? The questions assume that fraternities might enhance the connection to the Master(s) in different ways. Or do you see fraternities as mere(?) environments for dynamic interaction that might help building the connection to the inner master?

I was wondering this question when fra Nefastos mentioned again the idea of governing organ, and how it was changed in SoA to each lodge having it's own, if at all. Here governing seem something of a defining thing for a working circle of practitioners as a whole. What I mean by this interpretation is that the RHP aspect seems to recognize this need for governing a lodge/fraternity in order to consciously build an organ for the Masters to connect to. Without such a thing, one might argue there is not much of an attempt to get closer to the Masters on the level of organized circle of practitioners. But, again, this could be seen a RHP perspective. How do you see these things through the LHP emphasis on lodge or fraternity work?
"Would to God that all the Lord's people were Prophets”, Numbers 11:29 as echoed by William Blake
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Re: Masters Presence in the Fraternities of Contemporary West - an LHP Perspective

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My approach is that it is one of the most stressed aspects of occultism of the present young age (Aquarius) that disciples are:

a) given more freedom in creating individual approaches than ever before, and
b) as a negative side, this must also mean that all total authorities are forbidden.

This means that no visible presence or claim of any a Master is allowed. It must be that those who would like to connect to an esoteric school are able to reach its Inspiration by themselves. Thus selfishness and choosing the easy way are easier and more tempting than ever before, but also that people who manage to fulfil these demands will become individuals instead of minions when they have graduate from such an inner university.

Since this is so young a phenomenon, we can all the time see problems going both the ways from the golden middle path: a need to worship apparently strong leaders, and a need to cast down everything on principle. The delicate possibility to reach the actual adeptic Inspiration is only at the precise middle point between these extremes.

I wrote Inspiration with capital letter to signify a very actual and distinct sending instead of something vague and poetic.
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: Masters Presence in the Fraternities of Contemporary West - an LHP Perspective

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Nefastos wrote: Sun Dec 12, 2021 12:18 pm
This means that no visible presence or claim of any a Master is allowed. It must be that those who would like to connect to an esoteric school are able to reach its Inspiration by themselves. Thus selfishness and choosing the easy way are easier and more tempting than ever before, but also that people who manage to fulfil these demands will become individuals instead of minions when they have graduate from such an inner university.

Since this is so young a phenomenon, we can all the time see problems going both the ways from the golden middle path: a need to worship apparently strong leaders, and a need to cast down everything on principle. The delicate possibility to reach the actual adeptic Inspiration is only at the precise middle point between these extremes.
A sign of a dark age, is it not, that we are not given outward masters, but are asked bluntly and "without" mercy to burn through all the dross to find the tiny sparks upon which to build by ourselves (yet the age seem like a breeze of fresh air, despite the integral qualities of cold and dark). But then we have occult societies that work as a sort of beacons for people to notice the sparks and their source in the first place. And there it is just so common that the need for an outer master kicks in as if a reflex from the old world. I’ve recognized it within myself. The important thing is that one doesn’t need to fall on that extreme, rather there are steps to the middle point of the adeptic Inspiration. To take the inspiration of fellow brothers and sisters, and see through the dross that keeps oneself from taking part of such a thing, is not placing absolute authority on the fellow practitioners, but a reminder of what is pure and what dimms the light. Still it’s terribly difficult to avoid subconsciously placing the master title on someone wise. It might be some sort of a half step to do so and gradually work one’s way to the individualized connection to the inspiration. Certainly it is safer than risking the complete fall the pathological casting down of everything so easily lures the aspirants to. Just recently I read somewhere of the most clear signs of a fallen aspirant in the 19th century Theosopical Society being someone who attacks their teachers to justify their own actions. A sort of psychological defense mechanism licking the wounds of their sense of the self, which has still ego crowned as the master rather than the Ego. And as this is a fall, the said crowning is then stuck to with added pathology as if there were rocks set upon the crown, preventing the coronation of the Higer Self. Still, there’s actual dangers of burying the brighter connection to the master within on the path that seems safer in granting the permission to look highly up to fellow practitioners. The steeper the angle of view, the further the master is cast from within.

These two approaches certainly have their respectful correspondences to the RHP and the LHP. One possible way to practically merge them in fraternity work is by looking up to fellow practitioners and even the tiniest sparks of inspiration that are gained is taken and worked through the things that seem to dimm and obstuct one’s hold of them. This way a better footing is gained in the sphere of the Self, and the above mentioned coronation processes further. On the level of an occult society or a lodge, the practical merging might be something like taking part of the governing duties (right hand) by drawing one’s attention to the atmosphere and the problems there, and reaching to the Self for answers (left hand joining the right).

But in this example I am again coming to the merging point from the emphasis of the RHP, and would be interested hearing, even a theoretical point of view, from someone who is coming more from the emphasis of the Left-Hand Path. I’m asking this because I don’t know if it is so different a perspective that I am unable to recognize it clearly, or if there might be somekind of blockage our age hasn’t quite cleared through yet. Or perhaps both? It could be also that it is entirely the same thing no matter from what emphasis one is coming from, and I am making things too complicated by asking the wrong questions to problems that bother me deep down.
"Would to God that all the Lord's people were Prophets”, Numbers 11:29 as echoed by William Blake
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Re: Masters Presence in the Fraternities of Contemporary West - an LHP Perspective

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There are many occult facts that are hard to understand as such and instead confused with just an emotional high style. For example the fact that when one really strives onwards in such a school, the Master really starts to be seen through one's brethren. For people who are by nature solitary in study, like myself, this is an especially astounding experience.
Smaragd wrote: Sun Dec 12, 2021 8:19 pmA sign of a dark age, is it not, that we are not given outward masters, but are asked bluntly and "without" mercy to burn through all the dross

In a way it is, but on the other hand, the demands of that burning are now different. Because individuality is what is to be created and cherished, it is most important that the fire does not burn away one's personality. Thus there will remain much more things that can uphold vigorous personality. This emphasizes the LHP aspect of today's occult work.

Smaragd wrote: Sun Dec 12, 2021 8:19 pmStill it’s terribly difficult to avoid subconsciously placing the master title on someone wise.

There is so much Hindu and even Catholic in my temperament that I see no problem in this: everything can be taken as a positive idol, by loving veneration. Holy light comes through all kinds of stained glass windows that are our brothers and sisters, things in nature, and even our enemies. Satanism is a great teacher in that we need not enjoy something to be able to be elevated and helped by it, and that there is sacred side in everything. (This does not mean that we should submit. The teachings of adversities are usually subtler than that.)

Smaragd wrote: Sun Dec 12, 2021 8:19 pmsomekind of blockage our age hasn’t quite cleared through yet

The age is about a century old, which would mean the first five years of someone who will live to a hundred. Its spirituality is barely out of toddler's state. But that exactly is the reason why it is so vital to help it, for in case that is not done in childhood, it is impossible to do later. Fruits of this work will start to be seen in about thousand years or so, and the humanity will see whether it – or some part of it – has been been graduated from this class after another thousand.

(And for those for whom this makes the whole attempt uninteresting, since it seems to transcend the timescale of the precious personality, it would be helpful to consider: Would'nt you wish that your former incarnation hadn't thought it like that, so you could be adept in the making already? So, it comes back to personality, or individuality, after all.)
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: Masters Presence in the Fraternities of Contemporary West - an LHP Perspective

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The LHP focus on the individual struggles connects to this idea I’ve been thinking alot recently: the RHP dismission of the wordly, the monasticism, the idea of not serving two lords seem to be more or less opposite, yet complementary to the LHP focal point where the connection to the Master on individual level is found from noticeably narrow area. Narrow in the sense of specificity, individual interests, perhaps even passions etc. While the being who reigns our planet is the whole world to us, it is curious how one reaches to a connection to it by the narrowest of gates defined by ethics. This narrowness, on the other hand is more familiar on RHP connections. One might often feel like the boddhisattva(s), the Master(s) through which the transcending trajectory of Uranus-Neptunus appears to break through any given plight at hand, are only (practically speaking) to be found from within this really narrow area, the point where the spirits of Lucifer and Christ meet.

I was wondering here if the challenges, and thus connection to the masters, becomes easier for the whole of humanity in certain areas as human individuals master certain areas to a degree that their state of the boddhisattva, or connection to the body of boddhisatva, is reached in this certain area of their specificity? Sort of becoming a patron saint to ease the struggle in those certain challenges in the anima mundi.

It is a captivating detail in the usual portrayal of the relationship to the masters that when the student falls drastically enough, the connection is obscured or cut on most levels. A close example of this can be found from the Mahatma Letters to A.P. Sinnet where, if my memory serves me right, the mahatmas cut direct contacts to Hume and even to Sinnet(?), after they fail enough times to meet them according to the conditions the masters have set. One way of looking at those conditions I tried to draw in the paragraph above.

The conditions set by the masters rises the question of unconditional love, which I would suppose defining the masters themselves. But is it not conditional, if there’s certain requirements? No, because the love of the masters is in touch with the understanding of different conditions, and the challenges that must be overcome there. Their unconditional love reaches every condition, and leaves it up to the aspirant to answer the challenge. The unconditional love of the masters is in trusting for human beings to make the choice and truly find the initiations themselves. There is no Love, no unity, in an aspirant’s decisions to actively work against the unity and the conditions drawed out from there, so there’s a fall and a true possibility for failure as surely as there’s a true possibility for an attainment. We may look at this through the masculine virtue as defined by Pekka Ervast (freely translated):
Conquering Evil wrote:He stands like a rock as the tempests try to thrust him down, he knows that he as an immortal human being stands unshaken even if the whole world would crumble down around him. This is the masculine attribute we as humans have to develop in ourselves; one must be able to stand calm, not by defending or flustering, not by taking up the sword or the revolver, nor by attacking the other. One must stand tranquil and calm when the beasts maul and when his brothers might go on and crucify him. There is the masculinity of a human being.
Interestingly we have imagery here not unfamiliar to the Left-Hand Path: the mauling beasts, or fascination towards the demonic beings and vampires ripping one’s flesh is quite usual in the Left-Hand Path imagery. One who is working with such beings can not do it in an upward manner without the solar-phallic virtue demanding oneself a stationary human – ethical – interaction with the peripheral creatures of the night. Without the masculine virtue balancing the night creature’s, who are representatives of the circumference – the feminine principle, the blood thirsty creatures are free to act purely according to their instincts that are largely based on fear. The result is uggly and devastating. But when the interaction is defined by the masculine virtue’s practical representation, and openness to the realities of the feminine nocturnal beasts, then we can see it opens the door to a more direct connection with the masters. While in the wrestle to actuate the balance between the feminine and the masculine, there seems to be almost like a confusion of what is Love when there is problems with remaining within the solar-phallic virtue of the masculine. This means one becomes possessed by the beasts, and fails in attaining the Luciferian Selfhood. Thus the Masters connection remain perhaps solely masked by the beasts, and the idea of the brotherhood of humanity in its essence remains obscure, which means again that the masters are unconditional in their love, appearing also in the lower stages. Only it is a limited connection, although it may remain vital for a long time as mastering these virtues usually takes quite alot of attempt and time. Trough such a window the love of the masters is revealed as an immovable law – a principle – of nature: buddhi.

Hope the longwinded nature of the text isn't too much. I had alot of thoughts I wanted to write about around the Christmas holidays, and there was so much text that I abhorred to go through them to be posted here. Perhaps I could also think of editing some of them in to article form.
"Would to God that all the Lord's people were Prophets”, Numbers 11:29 as echoed by William Blake
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Re: Masters Presence in the Fraternities of Contemporary West - an LHP Perspective

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Smaragd wrote: Wed Jan 19, 2022 1:58 amyet complementary to the LHP focal point where the connection to the Master on individual level is found from noticeably narrow area. Narrow in the sense of specificity, individual interests, perhaps even passions etc.

I like your finding that one's freedom (to choose one's teacher not according to ethics but according to temperamental preferences) actually becomes a narrowing aspect. In here lies the lesson that our freedom of choice can become our prison, unless handled carefully.

Smaragd wrote: Wed Jan 19, 2022 1:58 amI was wondering here if the challenges, and thus connection to the masters, becomes easier for the whole of humanity in certain areas as human individuals master certain areas to a degree that their state of the boddhisattva, or connection to the body of boddhisatva, is reached in this certain area of their specificity? Sort of becoming a patron saint to ease the struggle in those certain challenges in the anima mundi.

I think that answer is both yes and no. Those areas (I take that you mean actual geographical places like countries and cities?) necessarily benefit from the high adeptic presence, but on the other hand, such adeptic presence has always been upon many a cultural nexus point, but for the major part of people, it isn't understandable in any way. Just like appearances of real luminaries in the past has done little to uplift the sad state of humankind in those areas. I think that one major point is about how well an adept is received. Is Campo de' Fiori blessed or cursed by Bruno's cinders? It is the pervert thinking of the martyr religions that the scapegoat's suffering brings happiness to the whole, while it is actually the other way around: humanity misses its change of receiving blessing every time martyrdom occurs. On the other hand, that cannot remove the astral Bruno from the places he enjoyed. Geochakric places (that is, all places) are formed by their genii loci, the habiting spirits endemic to those areas, and occultists working in those places form a curious complementary link with these spirits. They learn too, in their way, and the energy from this contact becomes suppler and subtler, available for different uses.

Smaragd wrote: Wed Jan 19, 2022 1:58 amIt is a captivating detail in the usual portrayal of the relationship to the masters that when the student falls drastically enough, the connection is obscured or cut on most levels. A close example of this can be found from the Mahatma Letters to A.P. Sinnet where, if my memory serves me right, the mahatmas cut direct contacts to Hume and even to Sinnet(?), after they fail enough times to meet them according to the conditions the masters have set.

I wouldn't say that the connection was cut as much as that the artifical connection that was made earlier became so tedious to uphold that it just wasn't possible anymore. It is that "silver thread that connects us to the master" both inside and outside. The more one extends that thread, taking distance from the spiritual point of one's master, the more difficult it becomes to keep the line even remotely clear.

People might think that the master is watching them, they do something stupid, and the master goes away because of this. It is not so. Rather, the master and the student originally meet at the summit of a lesser mountain. The student receives one's instructions, and from that point, they will either struggle their way onwards to a yet loftier summit, or they – as it usually happens – rather drift farther and farther away in their worldly ambitions, renewed and revitalized by the intensifying contact with the master. And when the line between the master and the student has become so obscured because of the mists of the valleys one chose to tread, one usually blames the disappearance of the master on him, rather than understanding that the master has not gone anywhere, but is always watching from the same vantage point, waiting with immortal patience, already making new plans how to put into some lesser use the powers of a fallen candidate, in the places they chose to be instead of that dreary path of ascension. Even in those very rare cases when the master seems to be severe, it is in order to help the disciple's own temperament to wake up, rather than being a punishment. Of course, it often happens that – concerning the outer masters – our choices on wanderings will change with what lodge exactly we are working with. The student can be handed over from one overseer to another; but whenever there is even a glimmer of hope left (any presence of âtma-buddhi-manas awakened to the upward striving), there will be such a watcher.

Smaragd wrote: Wed Jan 19, 2022 1:58 amThis means one becomes possessed by the beasts, and fails in attaining the Luciferian Selfhood.

Exactly. This is also one of the greatest challenges for the new aeon or age. The student confuses the virtue of the ancient mariner – to bless the demons of the waters – with the mediumistic lack of upward posture. While true tantra would be careful dance with the beautiful and terrible astral energies, one often becomes ethically devoured by vampiric entities instead. Black astral tendencies and magical phenomena will become more and more common when the age ripens, and in our present (oc-)culture there is yet zero interest in questioning whether some occult happenstance is good or bad: if it seems extraordinary, it must be great, thinks almost every Aquarian student. ("If it works, use it" is another way to say this.) This is a road that leads to hell easier than any one paved with good intentions.
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: Masters Presence in the Fraternities of Contemporary West - an LHP Perspective

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Nefastos wrote: Wed Jan 19, 2022 8:42 am Those areas (I take that you mean actual geographical places like countries and cities?) necessarily benefit from the high adeptic presence
I was thinking more the principles of human beings made more approachable somewhere in the background by making the steps towards, say, manas with greater balance easier by the efforts of some brilliant minds paving the way there. But I love how you pointed the geochakras and genius loci here, as pointing them, we see how the things work in reality, how there need to be mediums to carry the influence. The world isn't divided in strictly outer reality and the world of occultism, but there are so many "mediums", or better to say intermediate spirits, through which the powers are proceeded forth. A great deal of avoiding the pitfalls of "the new age spirituality" is right there, seeing the bridge that connects the abstract ideals in to reality. This requires words to actually mean something in practice, and it makes it more difficult to dismiss the need for grounding things. This will also give a glimpse to the angelic hierarchies where one being is comprised of armies of smaller, aspectual beings.
Nefastos wrote: Wed Jan 19, 2022 8:42 am
And when the line between the master and the student has become so obscured because of the mists of the valleys one chose to tread, one usually blames the disappearance of the master on him, rather than understanding that the master has not gone anywhere, but is always watching from the same vantage point, waiting with immortal patience, already making new plans how to put into some lesser use the powers of a fallen candidate, in the places they chose to be instead of that dreary path of ascension.
Well-put, and agreed.
"Would to God that all the Lord's people were Prophets”, Numbers 11:29 as echoed by William Blake
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