The Magister 1

by Marcus Katz

  THE INITIATORY JOURNEY

  “We are in the best possible position because everywhere, below the surface, we do not know; we shall never know why; we shall never know tomorrow; we shall never know a god or if there is a god; we shall never even know ourselves. This mysterious wall round our world and our perception of it is not there to frustrate us but to train us back to the now, to life, to our time being.”[155]

  — John Fowles, The Aristos

  In this section we will introduce the aim, scale and method of the initiatory journey, some of the processes and practices you will undertake, and the nature of the experiences on the way. Most importantly we will discuss the order of revelation, the necessary structure and the signposts with which we navigate. In doing so, we refer to kabbalah and tarot as our map and language, for it is these systems that provide an illustration and description of the journey in the WEIS, particularly that as taught within the OED.

  As with all such information, only experience can enliven you and teach you in this Work. We are each our own crucible and alchemical vessel, and our work must be hermetically sealed (with secrecy and silence) in order to accomplish any substantial progress. Our souls must have no leak at the seams.

  The Aim of the Initiatory Journey

  “Initiation refers to the transformation of man into something greater than he was before, an acquisition of new meaning through the realisation that he is more than dust and shadow.”

  — Nevill Drury, The Path of the Chameleon[156]

  The aim of the journey is simply to experience existence as it actually is, prior to all interpretation, as an ongoing state of awareness. It is the culmination of all forms of enquiry, and is the end of all seeking. This is indicated by the god-name which is attributed to the highest sephirah on the Tree of Life, Kether, which is Eheih, meaning ‘I am that I am’ or ‘Existence is Existence’. Crowley put the nature of this experience in his most succinct manner in The Book of the Law:

  Remember all ye that existence is pure joy; that all the sorrows are but as shadows; they pass and are done; but there is that which remains. (II.9)

  The experience of this state is best depicted in the late Da Free John’s short piece, ‘The Man of Understanding’. He writes:

  The man of understanding is not entranced. He is not elsewhere. He is not having an experience. He is not passionless and inoffensive. He is awake. He is present. He knows no obstruction in the form of mind, identity, differentiation and desire. He uses mind, identity, differentiation and desire. He is passionate. His quality is an offense to those who are entranced, elsewhere, contained in the mechanics of experience, asleep, living as various forms of identity, separation and dependence. He is acceptable only to those who understand. He may appear no different from any other man. How could he appear otherwise? There is nothing by which to appear except the qualities of life ...[157]

  The accomplishment of this aim – which is also called samadhi, the utmost experience of reality, the knowing of truth, or oneness with the divine – is not the ephemeral experience brought about by peak experiences, drugs or numinous events and epiphanies occurring in life (although these may foreshadow the accomplishment itself).

  Again, Crowley warns, in his writing on the tarot card of The High Priestess, that:

  It is important for high initiation to regard Light not as the perfect manifestation of the Eternal Spirit, but rather as the veil which hides that Spirit.[158]

  Whilst his footnote to this point references ‘Hindu mysticism’ as also stating “[t]he final obstacle to full enlightenment is exactly this vision of Formless Effulgence,” there are parallels earlier in the Western Hermetic tradition:

  Thence the human being rushes up through the cosmic framework, at the first zone surrendering the energy of increase and decrease; at the second evil machination, a device now inactive; at the third the illusion of longing, now inactive; at the fourth the ruler’s arrogance, now freed of excess; at the fifth unholy presumption and daring recklessness; at the sixth the evil impulses that come from wealth, now inactive; and the seventh zone the deceit that lies in ambush.[159]

  Here we see a clear depiction of a way of exhaustion; as each zone or grade is attained, the psychic devices of the ‘earthborn man’ (‘child of earth’ in the Golden Dawn Neophyte initiation) are disabled, in order that the next grade can be attained, and ultimately entry into the ‘Ogdoadic region’ is attained. The aim of the journey is enlightenment, but there are many grades in that spectrum of light.

  The Scale of the Journey

  Vignette: Frater Ash’s Money Spell

  When Frater Ash had first started his occult practice at the age of 16, he used a spell from a somewhat tawdry book called Winning With Witchcraft.[160] This was one of the first practical books he had purchased, and it contained a money spell in which the reader was asked to wave a silver coin at the Moon and chant something like “money, money come to me ...” or similar.

  Frater Ash duly took a 5p coin and shook it that night at the Moon, chanting very earnestly. The following morning at breakfast, his father said to him, “You know, last night when I was out, taking your grandfather to his meeting, he gave me this £5 note for the travel. I said I wouldn’t take it but he insisted. Here, you have it.” And the thing that went through the young spellcasters head was not “It worked!” but rather, “What would have happened if I had waved a 10p coin?”

  The journey is the task of your lifetime and has no set periods of time, although some stages are more predictable than others as to their likely duration. Some stages are dependent upon your background and others depend on grace. We will see that the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn offered grades to students within several months of the preceding grade, although placed a nine-month minimum on the Portal grade – a significant grade between the Outer and Inner Order. In practice, it is my experience that in most cases, several years may be required between grades. In a work of this scope, the normal process of ageing is a key component of the spiritual work.

  The everyday experience of life provides more opportunities to learn and grow in wisdom and understanding (on the Tree of Life: Malkuth, experience; Chockmah, wisdom; Binah, understanding), and growth comes from this constant teaching. The contemporary mystic Bernadette Roberts, in her Experience of No-Self and Path to No-Self, writes of the mystical path being undertaken naturally as we age, if we are open to it.[161] Inevitably, physical birth is a primary initiation, and death a sacrifice of the self. We have no choice in this matter.

  The patience required to make progress is phenomenal and this is in part why the first grades are extremely slow and require discipline and dedication. To some extent, these train the faith of the candidate. We must remember that faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. One of my teachers once said, “Hope is waiting for the bus because you are at a bus station and have read the bus timetable. Faith is getting on the bus.”

  The Method of the System

  Gradibus ascendimus, ‘ascending by degree’.

  The method of the initiatory system is both synthetic and analytic, in constant application. It brings ideas and experiences together and it breaks them apart, repeating and recycling. This is indicated by the lower paths of the Tree of Life, corresponding to the tarot trumps The Last Judgement (analysis and action), The Universe/The World (synthesis) and The Moon (cyclic patterns). This is the secret formula known as Quesheth, ‘the Rainbow’, in the teachings of the Order of the Golden Dawn, based upon the corresponding three Hebrew letters of Qoph (The Moon), Shin (The Last Judgement) and Tau (The Universe/The World) spelling the Hebrew word for bridge or rainbow. The founders of the Golden Dawn said that this was one of their most important secrets, although they never indicated exactly why it was so. As a result of this approach, the method of the system is one of exhaustion. I term it a via exhaustio, a “’way of exhaustion’. It is not a straight and direct path, but more of a labyrinth with many turns, unclear journ
eys and returns. On the positive side, it often has sudden revelations, experiences of being closer to the centre even when not, and the knowledge of those who are returning from dead ends to assist you towards not wasting your own time.

  The initiatory experience is best mapped by the revolutionary conceptual model of Catastrophe Theory, first brought to the initiatory scheme by Pete Carroll in Psychonaut.[162] This shows how the ‘slopes of stability’ can suddenly (yet predictably) be breached by total collapse and state-change.[163]

  In the tarot, The Hierophant and The Hanged Man are the most appropriate cards for depicting the method; the former, a revealer of the sacred mysteries, and the latter, the sacrifice that must be made in order to receive those mysteries. One is the teacher, who must interface with the divine and maintain position as a bridge, the other is the candidate or initiate, whose world must be turned upside down.

  Practices of the Curriculum

  The practices of the curriculum vary from order to order and individual to individual. They may be given in order or simultaneously, and some may be seen as mandatory and some optional. The very nature of the grades means that some practices may have different impact dependent upon the timing of the practice within the initiatory journey. It is this latter fact that means that the curriculum remains secret even if every part of it is made available.

  There are basic ritual practices, such as the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram, and more complex versions such as the Ritual of the Hexagram. Without understanding correspondence – truly the greatest and yet most obvious secret of the WEIS – these rituals are merely empty formulations and activities. Yet without ritual, the learning of correspondences becomes mental drivel, and worse, becomes a driver away from the simple truth, not towards it.

  There are observations, such as that of the Sun, Liber Resh (or the Hymnodia, the Hermetic version adopted by the Aurum Solis Order) and of the Moon, Liber Lunae. There are also meditative and constant practices to be observed at various times, such as the Liber Jugorum practice, which is a form of yoga applied to the body, mind and habits.

  These practices build cumulatively. They build mainly in the lower grades to fit the person to perform the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage, the six month working which (by grace) accomplishes the knowledge and conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel (HGA). At that point, and thereafter – if the preliminary work has been performed the curriculum becomes self-evident.

  Syllabus of Study

  The books and reading material for the WEIS are drawn from a range of disciplines and some are given in the reading list at the end of this present volume. These have been generally graded by both subject matter and the grades of initiation. However, due to the nature of the curriculum, certain books have not been listed in order to ensure that they are made available at the most appropriate time for the student. Whilst many books (and book learning generally) will provide a flavour of the Work, some are better read whilst experiencing the subject matter, or in some cases as a seed for that experience at a later time. Some books will make no sense at all until long after a particular experience has been assimilated.

  Apprenticeship and Teaching

  The concept of apprenticeship has almost vanished from Western society outside of specialist trades and certain professions. In our educational system, we are taught from the outside in, and the modes of learning are constrained within propositional knowledge and logico-deductive reasoning. We rarely learn how to be creative, intuitive, nor regarding the nature of belief, our place in the world, and the nature of awareness and our relationship to the universe.

  To find an authentic teacher requires that they be experienced in the journey. A wonderful demonstration of this journey and the role of the teacher (and the outcome) is to be found in the film, The Silent Flute (1978, also known as Circle of Iron). This was co-writtten by martial artist Bruce Lee, drawing upon Taoism, Zen and the teachings of Krishnamurti.

  Our resistance to a teacher is profound, for we are taught a lack of trust in our own early educational experience. The gifted C.S. Nott, a student of G.I. Gurdjieff, whilst talking about how Gurdjieff ’s teachings would often provoke friction, also writes:

  In my childhood, and indeed later on in life, all sorts of persons, from my parents to my superior officers in the army, were constantly telling me what to think, feel and do. Outwardly I accepted their views, inwardly I doubted them: I doubted whether they were speaking from inner conviction due to direct experience. Now I had met a man who, I was convinced, was speaking from his own experience when he pointed out my faults and weaknesses. By his own efforts he had overcome these things, and he fully understood my needs. The older pupils also, when they answered my questions about the system, spoke only from their own direct experience.[164]

  The roles of teacher and student in the WEIS are complex and mutable. Whilst we have no formal mystery school or guild structure, the OED does operate according to a graduated system of teaching and this is paramount to the success of the Work. The nature of hierarchy and control is moot, in that any self-organising and natural process has an inevitable hierarchy of function.[165]

  The Structure of the Tree, Sephiroth and Paths

  The most important thing to remember on the path of the Adept is that the journey is not simple nor is it linear. The idea of the Fool’s journey in the tarot is a relatively contemporary gloss, and somewhat reductionist when applied to the complexities of life and mystical experiences and progression. There are many people who have had one or more of the many varieties of mystical experience but have not performed particular rites, rituals, practices, or permutations to achieve such results. Sometimes one may try a particular practice and not gain any result, only to return to it sometime later and immediately achieve the goal.

  The map of progression modelled by the tarot on the Tree of Life is far more flexible and comprehensive for our particular requirements as practitioners of the Western esoteric path. We can use the map for locating ourselves and our experience, for formulating the next steps and for understanding where we have already travelled. This is paramount to a stable and progressive system, and one’s experience. Without a map, we may easily travel in circles or be unable to recognise a landmark as indicating our next route.

  So the Tree provides an indication of the grades of primary state awareness – the sephiroth – and the paths indicate the lessons that we must learn and the experiences we will encounter. As a predictive model, it also allows us to get a sense of what lies ahead of us, and to navigate towards those signposts.

  As an example, we might look at the grade of Practicus on the Tree of Life, corresponding to the sephirah of Hod. This sephirah connects up the Tree to Geburah (via The Hanged Man) and Tiphhareth (via The Devil). It connects across to Netzach (via The Blasted Tower) and down to Yesod (via The Sun) and Malkuth (via The Last Judgement). So we read these cards as certain experiences, challenges and lessons which will correspond to this stage of the Great Work.

  Signposts Along the Way

  Initiatory experiences are profound and incontestable. If you are unsure of the nature of what appears to be such an experience, it is likely that it is not initiatory. Whilst there are many experiences along the way, there are 10 significant signposts that have been identified within the WEIS, in accordance with the map provided by the Tree of Life, attested by experience and in comparison with any who have successfully navigated the journey in part or completion.

  These signposts are called the grades and relate to significant changes of state, with resultant change of attitude (asana) to the world, relationships and activity. These cascade down into every area of life, provoking change in behaviour and influencing the criteria by which all decisions are made. Often an initiatory experience requires considerable time and effort to be fully integrated into one’s life.

  Most significantly, these signposts are evident because they cause a fundamental shift in one’s own self-being, and relationship to the universe. T
hey are significant because they lead to an increasingly comprehensive, consistent and congruent perspective – this latter word from the Latin, meaning to ‘see through’. The signposts, arrayed on the Tree of Life, can also be seen and experienced as shifts in dynamic – they are like breathing – we move from active/passive, in/out, self-willed/surrendered in a constant dance up the Tree. The nature of each grade also shifts between self-work and grace, all precisely mapped by the layout of the Tree itself.

  In this kabbalistic diagram, we can see intimations of this journey, entirely independent of other common formulations as found in the Golden Dawn or a century earlier in the German Order of the Gold and Rosy Cross. It comes from an illustration in a Syriac Bible, dated around 1555.