5 of 38 | Initial Teaching | Gnostic Sacred Sexuality
There is no religion in the world that has the connection to Spiritual
BDSM as Gnosticism.
This is part of the foundation that tells us the sort of
ceremony that was used.
I fancy there was an Eucharistic side, and that the Baptism of
Light was connected with the mystic crucifixion alluded to so often in
the notes. Possibly in the midst of the sacred dance, at the breaking
of the Bread, there was a certain laying on of hands by an adept
Master, one who had himself attained to the autoptic vision,
( Autoptic defined;
Seen with one's own eyes; belonging to, or connected with,
personal observation. autoptic testimony or experience.
and then the candidate was left alone to immerse himself
in the Dark Ray of the
Divine Mind.
I think also that the original MS. was based upon the
work of one Master, whose name, like that of the order to which he
belonged, is lost in the night of time, but that it also contains amplifications
and additions by at least one later hand. It will thus represent the mind
of a grade of teaching, and possibly contains material dating back to
the period of the Therapeutae that Philo knew. In other words, the
community may have been an old one before it was Christianised. In any
case, it remains the record of a stupendous spiritual adventure, the
attempt to produce a race of Divinised men, that is not without the
splendour of tragedy, for at some time, like the Holy Cup of Legend,
the presence of Masterhood departed, and the external house fell into
ruin and its place knew it no more. Perhaps, in the desire to
propagate, it admitted unworthy candidates; perhaps it turned to the
by-ways of magic in an attempt to arrest the external course of nature
and to defy necessity; perhaps there came a day when none could
understand the inner meaning of the high and far-shining mysteries, and
so amidst party strife the building word was lost. Many a man, no
doubt, who called himself a "Gnôstic" was but a sorry rogue; many
another was but a student of the letter, not of the life; many another
was but a spiritual swashbuckler, pompous in his demeanour and cryptic
in his utterance; some, led by an abhorrent fantasy, may have wandered
along the path that goes to the Venus-berg and have striven to lisp a
formula that would transform the earth into Gehenna rather than into
Heaven. But, beside this mass of imposture, of folly, of elegant
idleness and of corruption, the _à rebours_ of a spiritual outpouring,
there was a real mysticism that could present the Authentic Spectacle
and could utter comfortable words in tongues not of this world utterly.
There was a Gnôsis that strove to give the Peace of God to those within
and to those without, because in Peace all things were made, that
yearned to bring forth children, quickened fiery souls, æons, gods, in
bodies of light for the love of God; that saw in all things Grace, the
Sponsa Dei, the Mother most pure and immaculate. "No creature was ever
wronged of Thee," no spark ever quenched, no hope defrauded and hurled
eternally from the sky with shattered wings by Thee. Such is the fair
Faith that chanted its prayer beneath a heaven set with such strange
galaxies, and whispers to us now through the disremembered symbols of a
forgotten book.
It is pleasant, in these days of strife, to be able to quote Dr
Schmidt's appreciation of the _Untitled Apocalypse_ with a cordial
agreement:
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