The Ritual
Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram
Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Hexagram
1st Enochian Key
Ritual Israfel
(reception)
Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Hexagram
Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram
The Voice
Concentrate your Will into a seed, a point of potency and light, the very Yod which preceeds creation, and cast it into the fertile ground. Let this be witnessed in silence, let go of all attachment and concern with result. Thus shall the Word be made manifest.
Let the sun be followed by the moon, for in the seed they are as one.
Let the seasons pass, each with its effects.
Let the Word provide fruit, let it nourish the body. There will be a purging of impurity, then let the cycle begin again.
Let the Word thus transform all things, great and small. Let the very dust be turned to rich, brown soil. The ground will grow ever more fertile, and the seed ever more potent, and ever greater will be the desire of the one for the other until their union is perpetual. The natural forces will aid you in this.
Learn the secret formulas that are hidden in the parts of speech, in the letters and their works. With these you may work wonders. Speech and writing are sacred unto me, in them I have hidden mysteries whereby the courses of the stars may be understood aright, and by which the natural forces may be directed and combined. Let this all be done in accordance with the Word - let no operation be neglected. By this work are the formulas redeemed and is life engendered in the dark and stagnant ponds.
The Commentary
The Word in this case is associated with the Chiah, the Word or Voice of the Yechidah. This is synonymous with the True Will, and is the most pure expression of Self at the highest level.
Concentrate your Will into a seed, a point of potency and light
Crowley would encourage his students to represent their True Will in a single sentence. Despite the fact that this is necessarily a limitation of that Will (or perhaps because of it), this allows for the application of the True Will at every level. Though the Will may be deeply understood, if its expression is vague then the mind can't make use of it in a practical way. When rightly understood, the Will can be envisioned as a single point, albeit a point containing the universe.
cast it into the fertile ground.
What constitutes fertile ground? Certainly not a garden sewn with judgments, rational thoughts, or desires. Work done for its own sake creates the most fertile ground. Vivekananda writes on this at length in his Karma Yoga.
Much of this message is self-explanatory. A demonstration of the effect of the lance on the cup, such that the cup is made more ready to bear the lance. The following passage is of especial interest:
ever greater will be the desire of the one for the other until their union is perpetual.
ie: the entire organism will, at length, be transformed into an engine for the continuous expression of True Will at every level of being. This is very much indicated by the path of Yod and the Hermit card, which (in the Crowley deck, at least) shows an image of Thoth. The aspirant operating at this level is entirely self-sufficient. From ritual Israfel: "I see by my own inward light." The idea here is mirrored by the endless quest (and scientific impossibility) for the invention of a perpetual motion machine. Such a machine does exist, and we're it! Of course, the entirety of the cosmos is needed to keep it running. Fortunately, each of us already has that inside of us.
There is a mystery revealed by the Hermit card that will render the above paragraph intelligible. At its most simple: Doing the True Will changes one in such a way that one is better able to do the True Will. Expressing the highest level of Self makes one better at expressing the highest level of Self. Of course, it also gives a satisfaction beyond that possible by any other means.
The last paragraph indicates that the various operations of the art are to be performed in accordance with the True Will. The operations may be represented in many ways - each of the Hebrew letters represents one such operation, for example. The general idea is that the various types of transformation, represented by the formulas expounded in the Mysteries, can only find their true purpose when applied in accordance with True Will. It seems fitting that these formulas are hidden in the parts of speech and in the letters of the alphabet (as the Sepher Yetzirah so eloquently demonstrates), as these things are the very means of expression in the outer world. Hence, the creation and structure of the universe are often represented using the motifs of speech and writing: the Logos, the Pen (attributed to the first Arabic letter, Alif), the Holy Book, etc.
Addendum
The day after receiving the vision, I stumble upon a quote that more or less perfectly sums up the general meaning:
"...it is in Heh-final, Malkuth, Assiah, the field of our actions and senses, that we create the most perfect conditions for the creative expression of the central Seed-Will, the primal impulse of our inmost being. Persephone, the Daughter of Earth (Heh-final), is truly wed to Hades (=Hadit), the Inmost and Hidden One (Yod); and it is by her own will (by voluntarily eating of his seeds) that she remains in Hell, no longer as a captive slave but as its queen.
The enduring copulation of Yod (the Father) with Heh-final (the Daughter) is also the continuous pouring of yourself (your will, your fire: everything you are) into what you have conceived - your Malkuth ("Kingdom"), field of action, or dharma."
James Eshelman, Visions and Voices, commentary on the 4th Aethyr.
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