Friday, April 25, 2008

Worked on website today

Worked some on the Bast Temple website today. It was mainly rearranging things and transferring over three pages that I wrote months ago, but never got around to transferring before the semester overwhelmed me.

The plan for summer is to finish fixing up the site, and reestablish monthly meetings (which requires more local [Denver] members). This plan may be tossed in the gutter if my student aid situation can not be fixed; if I am forced to go back to my old job, all bets are off.

Quote of the day

Robert Wang (An Introduction to the Golden Dawn Tarot):

One final point should be made here relative to the esoteric Tarot. Obvivously, the fact this was the Tarot of a secret group, and that its member swore death oaths to maintain secrecy places the deck in a special category. But there is more involved here than may be immediately obvious. The [original 1888-1900] Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, as do all legimate esoteric orders, functioned with a set of Inner Plane contacts unique to their system, although presumably pre-existent and strengthened by the Order's contacts; the Order paved some inner roads which can be followed even today. Thus, serious use of the Tarot deck designed for the exclusive use of the Golden Dawn initiates will bring about some subtle links with the spiritual currents used by the Order. The same may be said of strictly following any aspect of the Golden dawn system, particularly its exercises and rituals.

Friday, April 4, 2008

Ebb and flow of the esoteric traditions

Today while reading a question on a private membership forum, I was reminded that our tradition at one of the low water marks as far as the general history of the esoteric traditions is concerned.

One of the interesting things about the esoteric traditions is that it ebbs and flows. And while I am not sure if is currently ebbing or flowing, I do know that this is one of the times where the esoteric traditions are relatively impoverished. Membership in the mysteries is down, whether you are talking about Freemasonry, Wicca, or esoteric Christianity.

But it is not just the lack of warm bodies that indicate that we are at the lower end of the esoteric tide. The posting that I was reading was about geomancy, and it made reference to the older geomantic texts. I understand the student’s comment because I have seen some of the material that he was referring to. I have also seen some documents that expand upon the technique that he mentioned. Yet, I know that I am one of the few people who have learned anything about this aspect of geomancy in recent years.

The art and science of geomancy has been ebbing for the last sixty years; I know what caused this particular ebb. But it is not just geomancy that is ebbing. The entire esoteric field seems to be getting simpler and less complex all the time. I have some theories about why it is happening, but that is a subject for another time.

What I want to draw your attention to is the very existence of the ebb and flow of information about the mysteries. I want you to think about it--are the esoteric traditions getting stronger or weaker? And does the answer concern you?