Apotheosis

Esoteric Orders: A Survival Guide
          Section I: How To Find An Esoteric Order

Last Chapter: Section I: Introduction

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Back at the turn of the 19th century, if you wanted to get involved in an esoteric Order, you needed to know somebody. Secret societies were, well, still secret back then, for the most part. On rare occasion, one might see an editorial, or even rarer, an advertisement in a fringe magazine, with contact information through postal mail, if one was lucky.

How much things have changed in a century and a quarter.

When I was initially looking for the Golden Dawn in 1997, I stumbled upon AvatarSearch one night, which billed itself as the search engine for the occult Internet. Although it’s already been gone for a few years, it did a pretty good job in its day. I remember typing in “Golden Dawn” and immediately getting half a dozen solid hits. Before I knew it, it was 3 AM, my eyes were glazed over, and so was my mind from all the information that had been thrown at it. I started out excited, and ended up inundated.  Nearly two decades later, in a World Wide Web where “Google” has become a verb, a newcomer would only get more overwhelmed.

Solid, principled esoteric Orders have to walk an interesting tightrope in the 21st century. Tradition holds that they operate under a veil of secrecy. They have their oaths to preserve and their heritage to protect. Contemporary society, however, almost demands that they present some sort of public presence. This typically rubs raw against Orders’ oaths of secrecy, but it also provides them a powerful benefit, as they also have the responsibility of their egregore to perpetuate. Finding that balance is a difficult exercise, but one that they should not shrink away from, as good Orders are all about proper equilibrium, for their members and themselves.

Because of this, websites of responsible esoteric Orders are going to be predominantly for educational and informational purposes.  If their tradition already has a rich and protracted history, plenty of space will be devoted to it.  If the Order is a variation on a tradition, or an entirely new incarnation, expect there to be some sort of founding statement or manifesto, defining itself and its raison d'être.

Every half-decent website is going to have a fairly sizeable section devoted to resources, including such things as references, articles, images, historical letters, art, news, and event announcements.  Information pertaining to the Order's teachings, even if it has been published for decades, should be significantly excised, simply out of respect to the tradition and its oaths.  However, you can get an idea of the group's mindset and center of attention from the resources they provide.  If their materials adhere closely to their own tradition, you can expect the Order to be focused and devoted to that tradition.  However, if their information spans widely across a number of different doctrines and practices, it could be evidence of a hazy concentration on, or worse, a fundamental lack of understanding of, their own tradition.

Since these sites are primarily about information, and because these Orders are still semi-secret, don’t be surprised if they make it a little difficult to find out anything about how to become a member.  In fact, you should count on it.  You might find a reference on a remote page to a post office box or an email address.  At most, there may be an online form to fill out for serious inquiries only.  Many Orders, including ones with groups, circles or temples world-wide, shy away from publishing their locations.  After all, a good Order is going to, first and foremost, be discreet.

The more dubious Orders out there do not suffer this conundrum.  In this day and age, anyone with a little pocket change and time on their hands can register a domain name and set up a slick website, replete with fluffy bunny affirmations, surrounded by lots of eye candy.  In this sense, the Internet is the “Wild Wild Web” when it comes to trying to make heads or tails of legitimate esoteric Orders.

Those types of groups, more especially the smaller ones, are more than ready to let you know how widespread they are.  The thing is, finding out that an Order has multitudinous temples across the globe really doesn’t tell you much.  When newcomers see the word “temple”, they think of a free-standing building with dozens of people participating.  Truth be told, many of the “temples” out there are a couple people running things out of their spare bedroom, if you’re lucky.

The same goes for any references to membership brought up by the website.  Simply put, the earlier there is mention of the ease, and especially the cost, of joining their Order, the sooner you know what their focus is truly on.  If the information on the main page of the website reads like the script of a bad infomercial, then it is highly likely that they are trying to sell you something.  That’s fine if you’re looking to buy a pentacle necklace, a cool talisman or some other pretty bauble, but we’re talking about the first step on a new spiritual life here.  Think about it.  If a website claims to be the elite Order of its tradition, would it be so indiscriminate of its applicants as to allow anyone with a credit card and a button click to become a member?

Along the same vein, if an Order claims that they have all the tools and tricks to make your newly-founded spiritual life instantly powerful and easy, then they are trying to take you to the cleaners.  There are many reasons why the endeavor is called “The Great Work”.  It’s because it takes a Great deal of Work to achieve it.  Any good writer can give easy-to-follow, step-by-step instructions for rituals and ceremonies.  Knowledge, however, falls considerably short of gnosis, and won’t get you even near the threshold of understanding or wisdom.  Spiritual growth requires a great deal of personal introspection, admission of hard truths about yourself, and significant psychological change.  There are no short cuts.  You will not hold dominion over your own personal world until you first know thyself.  As above, so below.  As within, so without.

Remember that this is but your very first step in finding the spiritual path that is right for you at this very moment.  Surfing the web is a good opportunity to get a glimpse of what’s available out there.  However, just because certain statements and claims are out there on the Internet, that doesn’t make them true.

If you want to find the right esoteric Order, you are going to need to do more than scratch the surface.  You are going to need to crack the veneer.  There are plenty of people out there, also accessible through the Internet, who have been underneath the candy-coated shell.  You can glean a great deal of valuable information from them, if you next choose to seek them out and engage them properly.

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Next Chapter:  Engaging the Community

The term Sub Rosa denotes that all meetings and activities taking place "under the Rose" are to remain secret and confidential.  This has been a long standing tradition across centuries and societies.  It is said that even some confessionals had roses painted on their ceilings to assure confidentiality between the parishioner and the priest.

The vow of secrecy is focused on again and again in the Neophyte Initiation of the Golden Dawn, even to the point of saying "thy blood may be poured out and thy body broken" if the vow of secrecy is compromised.  The crowning achievement of the Golden Dawn system, and of the aspiring Neophyte him/herself, is then the admittance to the Inner Order, or the Roseae Rubeae et Aureae Crucis, through the Adeptus Minor Initiation.  This initiation takes place in a seven-sided chamber often referred to as the Vault of the Adepti or the Tomb of the founder of the Rosicrucians, Christian Rosenkreutz.  So would it be any wonder that, on the ceiling of the Vault itself, is painted a large, brilliant White Rose?

I have seen a few Vaults in which the Rose on the ceiling is painted as per the petals on the Rose Cross of the Adept.  Although aesthetically pleasing, I find this to be technically incorrect.  In various Inner Order ceremonies, it is said that "The Heaven is above and the earth is beneath, and between the Light and Darkness the Colours vibrate."  It is clear to me that the ceiling is the undifferentiated Light, the floor the Darkness, and the colors vibrate on the Walls of the Vault, and everything that exists in between.  Furthermore, based on the diagram below, if the petals of the Rose were to be colored in, they would at least show some grayscale shading, and they do not.

The diagram below is the common image we think of when laying out the ceiling of the Vault:

Diagram 77: The Ceiling of the Vault from Crowley's The Equinox

Now take a look at the following diagram, showing the Chief Adept in the Pastos:

Second Entry: 5=6 Adeptus Minor Initiation

 Again, Venus door in the West, the Mars wall North by East, and the Jupiter wall South by East, as specified.  But note that this is a view from the ceiling downward.  So if Diagram 77 before has the same configuration as per the arrangement of the walls, that view must be from above the ceiling downward.  If that is the case, the view from inside the Vault itself, looking upward, would be a mirror image of what is actually shown in the diagram.

This is actually relatively easy to confirm, by the second layer of petals in the Rose, which are seven in number and are attributed to the planets, just like the walls are.  So the Peh petal, which is attributed to Mars, should be pointed toward the Mars wall, the Resh petal toward the Sun wall, etc.  (So if you're looking up at the ceiling of the Vault wall and the Peh petal is on your upper left, then it is pointing towards the Jupiter wall and your White Rose is technically reversed.)

The proper arrangement actually lines up a number of different elements within the Vault as well.  The Heh petal in the East, attributed to Aries and Fire, should be lined up right above the disc of the Lion, the Fire Kerub, on the Altar.  Just so, the Ayin petal, attributed to Capricorn and Earth, will be above the disc of the Bull, the Earth Kerub, the Lamed petal, Libra and Air, above the Man, and the Cheth petal, Cancer and Water, above the Eagle.  Lastly, the Adept lying in the Vault, will align his multi-colored Rose Cross with the White Rose on the ceiling, petal per petal in columnar fashion.  This makes perfect sense, if you consider the petals as rays of Light, descending vertically in the Vault, passing through the volume where the spectrum of colors vibrate, to manifest upon the Rose Cross of the Adept, whom while laying in the Pastos, is still above the floor, where the black Darkness reigns.

For certain, the wordplay on the title of this blog post is meant to show that there has been no lack of controversy, nor hyperbole, when it comes to talking about the mysterious, magical Secret Chiefs who "live in the Light of their Perfect Justice", and who "journey as upon the Winds...strike where no man strikes...and slay where no man slays"!

In fact, in 1896, S.L. MacGregor Mathers said the following about his personal connection with the Secret Chiefs:

"Concerning the Secret Chiefs of the Order, to whom I make reference and from whom I have received the Wisdom of the Second Order which I have communicated to you, I can tell you nothing.

I do not even know them by their earthly names.

I know them only by certain secret mottoes.

I have but very rarely seen them in the physical body; and on such rare occasions the rendezvous was made astrally by them at the time and place which had been astrally appointed beforehand.

For my part I believe them to be human and living upon this earth; but possessing terrible superhuman powers…

The strain of such labour has been, as you can conceive, enormous...the nerve prostration after each reception being terrible from the strain of testing the correctness of every passage thus communicated; the nerve prostration alluded to being at times accompanied by profuse cold perspirations, and by severe loss of blood from the nose, mouth, and occasionally the ears."

Such claims seem to be too fantastical to be believed, yet there are Golden Dawn Orders in existence today who claim to have this connection with these Secret Chiefs.  So what exactly is to be believed?

As like everything in the Golden Dawn, a Middle Pillar approach of sober moderation is best.  Such claims should not be dismissed out of hand, nor should they be taken on blind faith.  Furthermore, we are taught to test every entity we encounter, by signs, symbols, names and letters.  If there are beings, human or otherwise, which claim to be Secret Chiefs, then they should be able to hold up to the same scrutiny, if not more so.  It is abundantly clear that Mathers conveniently forgot his own advice and did not do his due diligence when it came to Mr. Theo and Madame Horos in 1901.

But that is all history.  What is relevant right here and now is, have the Chiefs of current Golden Dawn Orders making their claims done their due diligence?  The only real way to answer that question is to do our own in the face of those claims.

At risk of sounding pedantic, there are two fundamental claims regarding the authenticity of Secret Chiefs.  One, that they are "Chiefs".  The other, that they are "Secret".

Regardless of modern cultural mindsets, secrecy has always been an important part of the Golden Dawn Tradition.  It is a fundamental exercise of self-restraint, more especially of the ego and, in my opinion, is even more important in today's instant gratification society.  So if the Secret Chiefs, who have remained private for centuries, suddenly decide to make themselves revealed to the public, what does that mean?  Are they simply coming forth into modern times?  The Rosicrucians actually had a process for that.  They called it a Reformation.  And if the Secret Chiefs decided to come out now, they are either 13 years too late or 99 years too early.  Besides, what do you call Secret Chiefs who have "outed themselves"?  The Chiefs-who-until-recently-were-Secret?  Do they say ecky-ecky-ecky-ecky-p'tang-whoop-boing?  And do we need to offer them a shrubbery?  Please pardon my sudden departure to snarky humor, but I hope you get my point.  If Secret Chiefs are no longer secret, then they are...well...something else, aren't they?

Regarding the claim to the Chiefly title, a member of the Third Order is going to be at very least a Magister Templi, or Master of the Temple.  S/he should have mastered the magical system of which s/he is a Chief.  S/he should have forgotten more about the First Order than you have learned, be able to give insight into the magical system that you could not have imagined, and continue to build on that tradition without abandoning its fundamentals.

So what is to be thought about Secret Chiefs who are disseminating a new ooh shiny type of magic for the not-so-new millenium?  Why would the guardians of a centuries-old magical tradition seemingly start from scratch and throw the magickal childe out with the bathwater?  Should not a Secret Chief be able to adapt to new information while keeping the tradition intact?  Nihil Sub Sole Novum.  Furthermore, if such a new magic is so special, so insightful, so powerful, then why would the Secret Chiefs make it public at their first opportunity and not keep it instead for their initiates?  Knowledge is power, and with power comes responsibility.  One should expect Secret Chiefs to be wise as well as knowledgeable, and if the knowledge they intentionally share is then purposefully abused by its recipients, is that the kind of poor judgment to be expected from Secret Chiefs?

Lastly, if Golden Dawn Adepts strive to be more than human, then I would hope that the Secret Chiefs would have reached that goal.  But being more than human is more than just about power.  If the Secret Chiefs possess superhuman power as Mathers had claimed, then I certainly would hope that they would possess superhuman virtue as well.  So when these Secret Chiefs hand down this arcane yet freshly modern occult knowledge, what is its effect on the world?  Does it make better people?  Does it further the Great Work?  Also, take a close look at the emissaries of the Secret Chiefs.  Are their teachings helping their ambassadors become wiser, more serene, more temperate, more humble, more virtuous?

Simply put, "by their fruits, you will know them."