OF THE NATURE OF THE GODS ----------- DE NATURA DEORUM Baphomet X' O.T.O. Rex Summus Sancitissimus, from the Throne of Ireland Iona and all the Britains that are in the Sanctuary of the Gnosis to all Members of the Supreme Grand Council of Very Illustrious Sovereign Grand Inspectors General VII' Greeting and Peace. Under the seal of the Obligation of the VII'. I >From the Beginning of Years the Initiates of all peoples have held one central secret as sure Bond of Brotherhood, as a unity whose truth is able to harmonize all men upon the Earth. No fabrications is the Earth but a chilled spark of the Sun, a dropt petal of the Rose of Heaven, but the source of all Light and Life upon the planet is that same Sun. Not only is he creator, but sustainer, and it is He also that destroyeth in due season, and redeemeth when the time is come. Therefore in the Macrocosm is one sole God, the Sun. Now in the Microcosm, which is Man, the viceregent of the Sun, sole giver of life, is the Phallus. He is also sole giver of Light in a certain secret sense not fully declared in the VII'. This much may We hint: the Phallus is the physiological basis of the Oversoul (see also Liber 333, The Book of Lies, Caps. A, H, IA, IE, IF, IH, Lambda B) And also of His own nature is He Liberty and Love. Now of old our brethren hid this doctrine in tradition, and in fable, and in great buildings, and in the Rituals of Freemasonry. With this Key all these Rituals become intelligible, luminous, radiant; without it they are dark, the just scorn of the ignorant. Search and see. II In this book we have no need to speak of local and tribal Gods, of animistic personifications of partial phenomena, and the like. But of the universal Gods, as these: The Fire; an image of Sol, and a fable of the Phallus. The Moon; an image of Kteis, only worshipped with Sol in his aspect as an extension of the Phallus. The Mountain; reverenced as the home of the Gods, the visible place of the rising of Sol, and as by shape symbolical of the Phallus. Some mountains are female, from shape or tradition. The Ancestor; revered as an incarnation of the Phallus. The Yoni or Kteis; revered as the House of the Phallus, and his complement. The Snake; revered as giver of Death, and as a symbol of the Spermatozoon. He has often the head of The Lion; to indicate the mighty power of the Spermatozoon. The Egg; revered as Solar, and in itself as the vehicle of Phallic energy. The Eagle; and many other winged creatures; also wings attached to the symbols. This represents the flight of Life from one resting-place to another, and is therefore a proper attribute of the Phallus. The Tree; is but the flowering Phallus. The Stars; these being the concourse of the Brethren of the Sun are venerable for the Wise even as He. And the star-universe is as it were His Mother, whence Nuit is the highest and holiest of all that may be. And her mate is Hadit, the secret and essential energy of Life whose raiment is the Phallus, wherefore is Hadit equal with Her, the highest and holiest of all that may be. And Their Child Ra-Hoor-Khuit is the visible Sol-Phallus upon earth. But this is a mystery of the Adepts of Thelema and the vulgar may not attain to it. All other Gods should be referred to this synthesis in the Microcosmic Sun. Thus Corn-goddesses conceal Mysteries of Germination, Wine- gods are Phallic and Solar in the Ectasy of overflowing Life of which the proper use of wine makes even the common people conscious. There are also gods invented to represent things useful to man; but these are by nature subservient to the prime God whose use and beauty are fundamental. III In that Sanctuary of the Gnosis to which, Very Illustrious Sir Knights your valor and chastity may one day obtain your admission, there is a certain deeper interpretation. Nor are ye wholly ignorant of how in the Figure called Baphomet and Babalon is a Measure of Heaven and Earth. Again, those, Initiates indeed, who have penetrated in truth into the Sanctuaries of their own Being, and found That God Omnipotent, Omniscient, Omnipresent who is Light, Light, Love, and Liberty, beyond Time and Space, without quantity or quality, One Eternal, the very essence of the Sun and of the Phallus alike, will possess in their own consciousness, illuminated by That, a certain apprehension of the Truth which is not in any way to be shared by those who have not attained to this Treasure. These, if they are wise, will make no attempt to disclose this inner Truth to the profane, but will be content that they rest in the shadow of that external Truth which We have declared unto you, that God is One, and that His name is in the Macro- cosm the Sun, and in the Microcosm the Phallus. For all attempts to initiate even the worthy before they initiate themselves are folly and fatality. The Secrets of the Wise, although know of them, are not to be expressed in the language of common men. Look you, Sir Knights, this Doctrine itself that We reveal to you in this Supreme Grand Council to which ye have attained so hardly, how will it sound, think you, even in a Consistory of Princes of the Royal Secret, prepared as they are for some such revelation? How then to mere Knights Kadosch, to Sovereign Princes of Rose Croix? And how to Master Masons? It is for this reason that our Council is thus Sentinelled within and without, and that our whole Ritual from Minerval upward is but a constant series of hints of this One Truth. What is the tent of Saladin but the Phallus? And the First Word as the last is ON, the Sun. But were the Minerval to suspect this truth, would he not turn to flee in terror from the Camp and be cut down by the Black Guard that wardeth even the outmost marches of the Kingdom of the Most Holy and Most High Lord God Almighty? Therefore, reflect, act wisely and with prudence, Sir Knights, not declaring openly the Arcanum to such as understand not already of their own ripe wit. And in what time seemeth Him good shall the O.H.O., gathering his forces, declare this Truth privily unto the Kings and Princes of the Earth, that they may take counsel together and rule all men in peace and love by virtue of this Secret under the Shadow of the Wings of the One ineffable Lord. For this secret is not only a convenient manner of doing this, a Pillar of Flame to disperse the Shadows of Earth, but it also a convenient veil - and the only veil worthy - of that further Light which We are not able to reveal even to this Supreme Grand Council of the O.T.O. IV Of all our enemies those are most to be feared, who make false gods of their imaginations. For the heathen are turned easily from gods of clay; for truth strikes home sharply on their dark minds. It is easy to prove that the Sun is indeed the source of Life and Light, that the Phallus is indeed PANGENETOR. But to those who have stultified themselves, who have darkened their own eyes, who have betrayed their own reason in seeking out phantastic gods, foul and tangled cobwebs of metaphysics spun by emasculate spider- professors in sunless cloisters, bubbles blown by idiots and mad- men, myths misinterpreted, fables taken for history, lies pushed forward by every forgery, fraud, treachery and murder, to such the Truth seems false, and the Light darkness. Such Gods as Parabrahman merely bewilder the people, and render them the prey of priestcraft, while the Christs of the Latin, Lutheran and Anglican Churches alike are but the machine-gods of all fraud and oppression, being stolen and prostituted from that Christ in whom our Fathers in the Gnosis strove to syn- thesize the warring gods of Syria, Greece, Chaldea, Rome and Egypt at the time when the growth of the Roman Empire first made travel and the intercommunication of the priests of Mithras, Adonis, Attis, Osiris, Dionysius, Isis, Astarte, Venus and many scores of others possible. Traces of this recension are still visible in the Mass and in the Calendar of the Saints, all gods and goddesses of universal import receiving the same honor by the same rites as before, while the local gods were replaced by saints, virgins, martyrs, or angels, often of the same name, always of the same character. Thus on the altar the Solar-phallic Crucifix is surrounded by six lights for the planets, to use one example only of a hundred at Our disposal; and Christm...
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