Know Thy Self

Post Reply
User avatar
Rumpelstilzchen
Forum Member
Forum Member
Posts: 27
Joined: Wed Feb 24, 2021 9:57 pm
Location: Costa Rica
Contact:

Know Thy Self

Post by Rumpelstilzchen »

Most of our thoughts & beliefs are attempts of Mind to realize itself and bring about religions, philosophies, sciences, cosmologies, collective- ego- and innumerable other constructs, as well as plenty of problems & confusions.

“Our essence of mind is intrinsically pure. If we knew our mind perfectly and realized what our Self-nature truly is, all of us would be enlightened.” (liberated)
(Hui Neng)

"Know thy Self" is the first maxim inscribed on the temple wall of Apollo at Delphi (ca.450 BC) and made famous by Socrates who said “Knowledge is inherent in man, not outside. Wisdom is to recollect.”
That it made it barely beyond philosophical exercises, is probably because in the Occident developed around the same time the ratio of Dualism which confines Knowledge to operations of the intellect and Self to the Ego-complex.

Being more openminded Oriental, foremost Daoist, Hindu & Buddhist thinkers researched this omnipresent, yet evasive, organism called Mind for more than 2000 years and came – despite their widely varying ways of investigation– to the conclusion that Mind is responsible for All.

The phenomena of existence are in perpetual motion - they manifest instantaneous and contact the senses as flashes of energy - Mind interprets the reactions of the senses.

“What we have called matter is energy whose vibration has been so lowered as to be perceptible to the senses”
(Albert Einstein)

“It has been stated that during these contacts, both the sense-organ and the object with which it is in contact undergo changes because both are aggregates of particles in movement.
The intensity of the different contacts varies. Only some among them awake an echo in the mind.”
“Secret oral teachings in Tibetan Buddhist Sects” by Alexandra David-Neel

As the energy flashes that contact the senses reach mind at random, its self- and reality constructs are incoherent.
And as the reactions of the mind turn into actions that effect reactions, action/reaction-chains come about, whose endings are unforeseeable and beginnings hard to recall.

Every man and every woman is an auto-creation; in LAL (I-3) called a Star.

Every Star is a microcosmos that relates a macrocosm – macrocosm is the inter/extrapolation-sphere of microcosms.

Every Star is unique and thus responsible for All.

Every Star has a core called Self, Hadit, Atman, whatever name, it is to be fostered as coordinate, coordinator and care taker of its beholder.

Self is not to be subjected to speculations, but whole heartedly-mindedly embraced.

Every Mind has, due to imagination, unlimited self-design possibilities which, when motivated by the Will & Love to realize Oneself, can bring about a self-image wherein all creations complement each other.

Do what Thou wilt – love under Will” is the maxim of Thelema (Greek: Will)

Will is the power of creation and Love the power that unites (binds) the created.

Will & Love are complementary – when separated they degenerate into emotions.

Will manifests Self unadulterated.

Will cannot be willed, as there are no two Wills.

There are lots of talks about free will, usually motivated by the hope to get wishes fulfilled, but where there is Will there are neither wishes nor hopes.

Searching for the origins of Will and genesis of creation is self-deception.

Do what you will, is possibly the oldest and most original way of Self-realisation.

Crowley calls Thelema “the mark of the mind untrained to take its own processes as valid for all men, and its own judgement for absolute truth”.

„Find yourself to be the center of your own Universe.
Explore the Nature and Powers of your own Being. This includes everything which is, or can be for you: and you must accept everything exactly as it is in itself, as one of the factors which go to make up your True Self. This True Self thus ultimately includes all things so ever: its discovery is Initiation (the travelling inwards) and as its Nature is to move continually, it must be understood not as static, but as dynamic, not as a Noun but as a Verb.“
from “Duty” by Alleister Crowley

User avatar
Kath
Forum Member
Forum Member
Posts: 477
Joined: Tue Mar 31, 2009 7:29 am

Re: Know Thy Self

Post by Kath »

Now I miss my old signature tag on the original Occult Forum:

γνῶθι σεαυτόν
ad astra per aspera
אֶֽהְיֶ֖ה


I think we are of like mind in much of what you wrote.
The greek script there is "gnothi seauton" in latinized letters. AKA "know thyself" (from the greek temple of apollo at the temple of delphi).
Or perhaps more accurately translated "know thee thyself", since 1:1 word swaps don't always carry the meaning all that well.

Are you perchance familiar with the theoretical physics concept of the 'holographic universe'? In that concept, every tiny bit of the universe contains within it a sort of fingerprint of the entire universe. I find it is a useful model for looking at the non-physical universe, the self, the mind, the soul, etc. those aspects of reality not readily captured by 4D instruments.

anyway, ad astra per aspera means 'to the stars through effort/perseverence' in latin.
and אֶֽהְיֶ֖ה is just ancient hebrew for "I am"

Not a huge follower of western esoteric traditions, I lean more eastern. But I have a soft spot for Crowley's input.

Post Reply

Return to “Modern Era Magicks”