Re: planetary forces

At 10:21 AM 14/5/96 -0700, Al Billings wrote:

On Tue, 14 May 1996, MARGARET MARY-THERESA BROWN, wrote: Hello. Anyone still here?

Greetings. Yes, I'm still here (as are the others). No one seems to have had much to say and I've been pondering if there is an actual need for a list such as this since people don't (generally) seem interested in using it without prompting.

As a newbie, I had been reluctant to shoot my mouth off before. I am quite willing and eager to discuss these matters with my magical peers around the world.

There are certainly no secrets in what I do. After all, The Secret Wisdom protects itself.

I had assumed that lack of information presented in most books on magic I had bought in the shops was due to the conealment of what the authors thought of as 'secrets'. Now that, thanks to the Internet, I am having some personal contact with a wide variety of folk interested in this area, I am beginning to uspect that what my apprentices learn as the basics, just is not widely known.

I have worked with the Tides of Time , i.e. the changing patterns of the planets within the Solar System for many years. Some of my colleagues within the Society of Guardians emphasise more on the careful preparation of their altars and holy places than I do, but then I have a permanent Sanctuary structured to store any energies that are raised by my magical workings.

I put up a fairly long description of the Sanctuary on Arcana a month or two ago. I later thought it might have been more appropriate on Praxis, as bering more practical than theoretical. I could try and find it, if you would like me to. In itself, it might form a basis for discussion.

For me, the selection of *the right time* to do a rite for any purpose is all-important. This can be taken to the extent that I have said to one of my apprentices, "If you have got the time right, it doesnt really matter what you do, as long as you do it at that moment."

Most of my magic is long term in its goals. I do not really do the short term stuff like spells for money, love etc. IMO, If you are tapped in well enough to the Tides of Time that sort of thing should look after itself, In my seventy years of life, I have never been wealthy, but I have also never lacked for sustenance and all I needed for my Work, except on two occasions, one in the late 1940s, and another in the mid-1950s, at which times I was certainly *not* tapped into the Tides of Time.

My own magic is based on certain underlying regular practices, linked to

1: The Daily Earth Tides

2: The Monthly Lunar Tides

3. The Annual Solar Cycle

I hope I have started something by these few words. I'll await approval or responses before I go any further. Be blessed, Michael Freedman, S.G.

Subject: Re: G.D.Knowledge Lectures

Like many, perhsaps most, ceremonial magicians outside of the United States of America, I do *not* belong to the Golden Dawn nor to any of its successors and imitators. Nor do I have any but a general readers' knowledge of the published G.D. Knowledge Papers. Cetainly not enough to judge which are genuine and which are not.

I was the close personal friend from the early 1980s until his death a couple of years ago,. of Frater Fiat Lux, a ceremonial magician who was initiated in the early 1930s into Whare Ra, the G.D. lodge in Havelock North, New Zealand, founded in 1913 and which did not close down until the late 1970s. He was initiated by Mrs Felkin and was eventually the 'examiner' for all the grades within the GD in New Zealand.

He advised me that *none* of the published papers gave a complete, or even fair, account of what was taught within the G.D. None of those people who GH.D. published papers, to which they had gained access by various means, had been initiated into all the grades for which those papers were intended.

The G.D. knowledge papers and indeed the grade rituals, were introductory notes only, and were meant to be the core material of considerable oral instruction based on what they had read in the papers and witnessed at the initiatory rituals. The material from which that oral instruction was drawn has *never* been published. It exists, and I know the young man in whose custody it is, as the heir of Frater F.L.s papers. There has been no decision made by him and the handful of very elderly men who survive from Whare Ra.

The Society of Guardians to which I have belonged since the early 1950s, and of which I have been Senior Guard since 1967, takes an altogether different approach from the G.D., though some of its rituals and correspondences have a superficial similarity. It would be difficult, even if all our material were to be published to find anything that resembled an initiatory ritual. Yet, they are there for the discerning eye. Our students are expected to learn enough over the seven or eight years of their instruction to follow the magical maxim: "There is no initiation but self-initiation."

Frater F.L. initiated two or three people of my acquaintance into the first few grades of the G.D., during the period that I knew him, making using of a room that we made available to him within the Sanctuary of the Guardians for that purpose. I know something of the excellent magical progress of one of them, and know that there was from six to 12 months oral instruction and supervised practice before and after each of the grades. The knowledge papers were no more than a skeleton, fleshed out with a lot more than those bare bones might suggest.

Be blessed, Michael Freedman, S.G.

Subject: Re: planetary forces

At 02:47 PM 14/5/96 -0700, Al Billings wrote:

"I had assumed that lack of information presented in most books on magic I had bought in the shops was due to the conealment of what the authors thought of as 'secrets'."

Can you give examples of what you mean by this?

1. The importance of regular practice, for example. magic doesnt work by knocking off the occasional spell or deciding to do a rite when you feel like it. You need to establish a regular, often unspectacular, contact with the Inner Worlds. To use terminology I see in the books, contacting one's "Holy Guardian angel" is a lifelong practice, not something achievable by a single series of rites. BTW. I'd probably use a qabalistic term like Neshamah, i.e. the level of the 4th and 5th sefiroth. I mean something a bit beyond Ruach [the 6th Sefirah]. I am amazed that so often, the meditation techniques recommended are Hindu yogic rather than western, as though the authors knew of no Western meditation traditions, Sefer Yetsirah, or the Cloud of Unknowing, for obvious examples.

I will put up a brief description of the sanctuary in my very next mesage.

>>The Lunar and Solar cycles are familiar enough to me. How do you divide up the Earth Tides and, more importantly, how do you work with them in your practice?

I spent two hours converting the paper on the lunar tides from an amipro document to an Ascii document this afternoon, only to find that, despite regular successful saves, the final document could not be read.

My paranoia said, "It's an omen."

My commonsense said, "These things happen."

My real self said, "It's 4.30 pm . Time to watch 'Gargoyles'."

which is what I did.

I will upload the three papers successively in the order above over the next 2 or 3 weeks. I should do it at the rate of one a month to ensure my continued membership on the list, if that were to become the rule. *grins*

Be blessed, Michael Freedman, S.G.

Subject: Directions in the Sanctuary of the Guardians

This message was originally written for another mail list in response to a comment about the difficulty of southern hemisphere orders having to change 'deosil' and 'widdershins' and, thus, according to the Northern Hemisphere person, losing contact with the ancient traditions, a statement with which I disagree entirely.

There *are* southern hemisphere magical orders, and witch covens, too, I believe, who have already done this [changed the direction of deosil and widdershins].

The order to which I belong is one of them, but we are by no means unique. I was born in the southern hemisphere in 1927, and the magical order to which I belong moved from London to Australia in 1930 [and to New Zealand in 1970].

As far as I know there is now only one person in the Order born in the Northern Hemisphere and he came to NZ when an infant. So, when we do our daily salutations to the sun, it is natural for us to face east at dawn, north at noon, west at sunset and south during the night.

In our Sanctuary, Fire is in the North where the sun shines through the windows throughout the day, and Water is in the South, whence comes most of our rain, as it happens. There is a large oval table in the centre of the central court of the sanctuary, on which is depicted a Tree of Life diagram with Kether to the East. This puts the left hand pillar of receptivity on the north side; and the right hand pillar of activity on the south side.

The high altar in the inner court is to the East, with windows through which we see the sun rise over Mount Eden each [clear] day, while the outer court in which any witnesses of the rituals stand is to the West.

In many of our rituals, movement around the sanctuary is clockwise, in which the symbolism is that as we walk up the left [north] side of the sanctuary towards the east we are receiving the energies of our Lord the Sun, and as we return on the right [south] side walking towards the west, we are actively giving those out to the world, symbolised by the Outer Court of the witnesses in the West. This has established a steady flow of energy associated with the Holy Table and Tree of Life at the Centre, flowing clockwise around the Sanctuary.

In addition to that pattern, there is another pattern. On the floor of the sanctuary is drawn a very large pentagram, oriented to the West. The seat of the Minister of Spirit is at its western apex, facing due east, looking straight up the Middle Pillar of the Tree of Life.

......................East

...................High Altar

Fire.[4]...........................[2] Water

North.........Holy Table..........South

Air.[1]............................[5]..Earth

...................Spirit.[3]

....................West

The seats of the other Ministers are at the other points of the pentagram as depicted in the diagram. This forms what is [in our system] a pentagram of Opening to the Spirit, oriented to the West. The numbers indicate the order of the points of this pentagram when enscribed.

Here, the active elements are to the North and the receptive elements are to the South, establishing another flow of energy around the walls of the Sanctuary that is complementary to the central flow around the Holy Table. In effect, what these two complementary flows of energy have built over the years is a kind of spiritual power generator that reinforces and sustains any spiritual energies built up by the individual and community rituals done in the sanctuary.

Our monthly rites on the solar ingresses have been done in this sanctuary regularly since Midwinter, 1973. It has become a powerhouse of energy into which anyone can tap, if they will. All this by way of illustration of the rich possibilities in ritual orientation for those of who live in the southern hemisphere.

I believe the essence of movement within a sanctuary or circle is being aware at the time *why* you go one way rather than another at any time or in any place on earth, rather than the specific clockwise or anti-clockwise direction.

Be blessed, Michael Freedman, S.G.

Subject: Re: FW: Orientations of sigils/Cube of Space

We, in the Society of Guardians, use the Cube of Space, but I understand from friends who have done the BOTA lesons, in a much more complex way than it is taught there, at least in their books and elementary lessons.

The Guardians have a tradition of working extensively with Sacred Geometry.

We have a model built that consists of two large tetrahedra moving through each other. At that point where they are in perfect equilibrium, their eight [2 times four] apexes are the apexes of a cube. A tetrahedron and a cube are both perfect solids.

The model is built of rods, such as are used by science teachers to construct molecular models.

Each of the two large tetrahedra are constructed from four smaller tetrahedra. Becuase the model is skeletal, it is easy to see that at the centre of each Tatrahedron is another perfect solid, the octahedron. When the two large tetrahedra are in balance through each each other, their octahedra are exactly superimposed so that there is one octahedron at heart of each tetrahedron and also at the heart of the Cube. Esoterically, this is a 3-dimensional version of the hexagram, which is formed from two triangles moving through each other until they are in perfect equilibrium, representing the upward aspiration of Humankind towards the Divine, met and balanced by the Divine reaching down towards Humankind. There are six Trees of Life in Weavers' Woods in which the hexagram is found, all referred to sefiroth of the central pillar in various worlds

If you look along any of the diagonals of the model described above, and mentally flatten it all out, so that it looks like a two-dimensional diagram, it is possible to see it as a six pointed star standing within a six pointed star. This symbol also appears on the Cap worn in our Rituals by the Senior Guardian. It is a symbol of the Sun beyond the Sun.

Apprentices are expected to conduct thought experiments assigning various sets of correspondences within the 36 degrees to the various faces, apexes, edges, diagonals, triangles, directions, etc.that are perceptible within the model.

A couple of hours mentally limbering up on the Star Tetrahedron, which is the name of the whole construction, is the equivalent of a morning's work at the barre by a ballet dancer, IMO.

Soror Dora, you might find it useful in your quest for orientions. Dont hesitate to email me,if you are interested to discuss it further.

We have had the Star Tetrahedron [built of light plastic rods, with the cube outlined with thread] in the Sanctuary since it was first built in 1973. In 1989, Frater Fiat Lux of the Whare Ra lodge of the Golden Dawn, suggested we visit the very modern Auckland orthodox synagogue on one of their regular sightseeing tours. As I had never seen the inside of a synagogue, I accepted eagerly.

As he had anticipated, my breath was taken away when we went into the synagogue itself, having spent the previous hour sightseeing the various school rooms, library and other activities within the synagogue complex. Hanging from the centre of its ceiling was an enormous Star Tetrahedron, constructed from iron piping, and painted light brown.

I asked the guide about it, His response was quite grumpy, "It was put there by the architect. It is supposed to be a Star of David. Some of us think it will fall and kill someone one of these days."

When we went up into the gallery, as I suspected, from there it was possible to find a place from which you could see the six pointed star inside the sixpointed star.

?Is this construction used in other synagogues sometimes.

?Or is it just a modernist architect's decorative conceit, as the guide implied.

I have just realised that I referred to the 36 degrees in the above message, and noone will know what I mean.

It is similar to the 32 Paths used in many lodges, but the number of each "degree" is always in tune with the number of the Sefirah or Hebrew letter corresponding to it. Briefly:

1st Kether......10th Malkuth/'Alef......19th Yodh......28th Qof

2nd Chokmah..11th Beyth............. 20th Kaf........ 29th Reysh

3rd Binah........12th Gimel...............21st Lamedh..30th Shin

4th Gedulah....13th Daleth..............22nd Meyim....31st Tav

5th Gevurah....14th Heh..................23rd Nun........32nd Kaf final

6th Tifareth.....15th Wav..................24th Samek....33rd Meyim final

7th Netsach....16th Zayin................25th "Ayin.......34th Nun final

8th Hodh.........17th Cheyth.............26th Peh........35th Peh final

9th Yesodh.....18th Teyth................27th Tsaddi.....36th Tsaddi final

The 37th degree is referred to both Great 'Alef and Kether of a succeeding world, and so on, ad infinitum.

The five finals are referred thus:

32nd......Spirit......Yahuel......Centre or Above [Metatron]

33rd......Earth.......'Uriel.........West or below [Sundalfon]

34th......Water......Mikael......South [s.h.] North [n.hemisphere]

35th......Fire.........Gavriel......North [s.h.] south [n.hemisphere]

36th.......Air..........Rafael......East

which are how the elements fall, reading anticlockwise on the points of the Pentagram of Opening to the Spirit in our pentagram rites system.

Read clockwise, the five points of this Pentagram give the order of the elemental tides around the 24 hours of the day, beginning at dawn when the air tide peaks.

Using Above for Spirit and Below for Earth, you can readily assign these directions to a Tetrahedron, with one face to the East.

At this point, my students usually start to get glazed eyes, and they need some meditation to let it all sink in and the various images sort themselves out within. It can be like a visit to a Hall of Mirrors, the first few times.

Blessed be all who walk in the Way of the Great Work of lifting all living beings to full awareness of Light and Life and Love.

Be blessed,

Michael Freedman, S.G.

Subject: A common lament

At 11:52 PM 22/5/96 -0600, Darcy wrote: Care Fratres et Sorores, I am interested in any comments on a Solstice Ceremony for the Golden Dawn that people are performing. I am currently working on a ceremony and would be interested in any comments.

The Society of Guardians has never had any connections with the Golden Dawn nor any of its successors, but we do work firmly in what might be termed the Western Mystery Tradition, using the pantheons of pre Zoroaster Persia, as well as those of classical Greece and Rome; and the language of the Qabalah.

As SG is essentially a group of independent magicians, sharing to a greater or lesser extent, a common esotercic language and outlook, *private* rites and spells among the Guardians vary enormously.

However, we do observe an annual cycle of communal rituals, based, since the Order moved to the Southern Hemisphere in the 1930s, on the Solar Cycle of the Southern Hemisphere. I have previously said I would put something up on our solar workings, and this is a convenient occasion to do it. It fits the Southern Hemisphere, so well that I have no idea of how it might be adapted for use in the Northern Hemisphere.

THE SOLAR CYCLE OF PENTAGRAM RITUALS OF THE GUARDIANS

Each monthly celebration is held on the day of the Solar Ingress, and begins with the General Ritual of the Pentagram, which takes a minimum of five Ministers to perform it. It honours the Five elements of Nature.

The General Ritual is followed by a time of Silence and a Particular Ritual, which is different for each month, and can be followed by a Ceremonial Feast and/or Ritual Dances.

This cycle naturally includes the Solstices and Equinoxes, and to some extent the imagery of the Particular Ritual each month is based on the Sign of the Zodiac into which the Sun is entering.

Here is an account of the cycle which has been celebrated at the Sanctuary since Midwinter, 1973.:

At Midwinter, in Cancer, the Spark of Light emerges from the Darkness, as a Crab sidles forth from the crannies and shells in which it hides. The ritual is named "Light out of Darkness". It begins in total darkness and culminates with ceremonially lighting a candle in a crystal candlestick on each of the Ten Sefiroth of the Tree of Life, accompanied by the rhythmically spoken chanting of the Hymn of Light, which was composed in 1974 by the present Senior Guardian. It is accompanied by the ringing of many bells and gongs, great and small, and the blowing of conches.

In Leo, the Spark becomes the Hearth Fire of Home around which we sit through the long winter nights. Here is Fire fixed and contained within the hearth. This is the Hearth of Hestia.

In Virgo we honour the Goddess as Demeter, the Great Earth Mother, whom we celebrate with her daughter Kore. In Virgo we remember that the Light will depart from us again.

In Libra, on the Spring Equinox, the Balance of light and Darkness is restored, when the Light comes forth once more and is celebrated as Aphrodite, Goddess of Spring, Fertility and Love.

In Scorpio, the Spark of Light descends into the womb of the fertile Mother. 'If the grain will not die, shall it live again. Here are celebrated the Mysteries of the Five Gates of the Scorpion.

In Sagittarius, a Fiery Arrow fertilizes the Spark of Light. In the particular Rite, We honour at the Fire Altar, Ahura Mazda, the God of Light and Fire; and Zurvan Akarana, the Lord of Time.

The Light now grows every day to be born again at Midsummer, in Capricorn, when the Divine Child of the Great Mother, the radiant Sun rises again in its full glory. Here we celebrate Mithras Helios, Lord of the Sun.

In Aquarius, the Divine Child is celebrated as Healer; and we perform the Solemn Ritual of the Healing of the Nations.

In Pisces, the Divine Child is celebrated as Seer; and we honour Anahita, the Great, Naked Goddess of the Male and Female Flows.

In Aries, the Divine Child is celebrated as the Warlord who dances in the Heavens and the Earth [cf. David dancing before the Ark from Shiloh to Jerusdaslem]. At this, the Autumn Equinox, we put on the Armour of the Gods against the dark days that are to come.

In Taurus, the Divine Child is celebrated as Melkitsedeq, Priest and Prince. At this rite, the cry is heard: "Let us now make priests."

In Gemini, the Divine Child is celebrated as Teacher. In the rite, the Twin Torchbearers, Cautes and Cautopates, celebrate Mithras Helios, the Lord of Sun.

The Particular Rite at Midwinter begins with the cry: "Put out the light, and put out the light." Every light in the sanctuary is extinguished, and the cycle of Light and Darkness and Light once more begins again.

Among the Guardians, the Divine Child is more or less the equivalent of the Holy Guardian Angel much spoken of in Golden Dawn circles. The Divine Child is the God waiting to be born within each one of us. In Hebrew, we name the Divine Child, Yahoyeledh, YHWYLD, whose measure is 65, which is 1 x 5 x13, the Fivefold expression of the Unity [AChD, 13, One], and is also the measure of 'Adonai, ADNY, Lord.

COPYRIGHT NOTICE:

All the rituals and knowledge papers of the Guardians have been lodged for copyright purposes with the General Assembly Library of the Parliament of New Zealand. Permission to use any part of them is normally granted only after an application in writing is made to the Senior Guardian, and on condition that their source is acknowledged in whatever medium they are used.

Be blessed, Michael Freedman, S.G.