Kenosis to Gnosis

Authoritative Teaching,

 

(24:20) "Having left knowledge behind, she fell into bestiality. For a sensless person exists in bestiality, not knowing what it is proper to say and what it is proper not to say."

 

"Having left knowledge behind" means the knowledge of the soul and the spiritworld. When people become ignorant of their true selves they become animals and they lose their senses.

 

(33) "But these - the ones who are ignorant - do not seek after God. Nor do they inquire about their dwelling-place, which exists in rest, but they go about in bestiality. They are more wicked than the pagans, because first of all they do not inquire about God, for their hardness of heart draws them down to make them their cruelty. Furthermore, if they find someone else who asks about his salvation, their hardness of heart sets to work upon that man. And if he does not stop asking, they kill him by their cruelty, thinking that they have done a good thing for themselves."

 

The second treatise of the Great Seth, (59:15) "After we went forth from our home, and came down to this world, andcame into being in the world in bodies, we were hated and persecuted, not only by those who are ignorant, but also by those who think that they are advancing the name of Christ, since they were unknowingly empty, not knowing who they are, like dumb animals."

 

The Interpretation of Knowledge.

 

10 "Enter through the rib whence you came and hide yourself from the beasts. The burden that you bear now is not yours. Whenever you (fem.) go ... (14 lines missing)... from his glory [...] from the first. From being counted with the female, sleep brought labor and the sabbath, which is the world. For from being counted with the Father, sleep brought the sabbath and the exodus from the world of the beasts. For the world is from beasts and it is a beast. Therefore he that is lost has been reckoned to the crafty one, and that one is from the beasts that came forth. They put upon him a garment of condemnation, for the female had no other garment for clothing her seed except the one she brought on the sabbath. For no beast exists in the Aeon."

 

The last statement, "For no beast exists in the Aeon", is saying that the higher beings and the higher reality is not based on anything animalistic at all. The animal is only a feature of the lower world.

 

 

The Hermetica.

 

Corpus Hermeticum IV

 

[4] "And where did he put it?"

 

"He filled a great mixing bowl with it and sent it below, appointing a herald whom he commanded to make the following proclamation to human hearts: 'Immerse yourself in the mixing bowl if your heart has the strength, if it believes you will rise up again to the one who sent the mixing bowl below, if it recognizes the purpose of your coming to be."

 

"All those who heeded the proclamation and immersed themselves in mind participated in knowledge and became perfect people because they received mind. But those who missed the point of the proclamation are people of reason because they did not receive <the gift of> mind as well and do not know the purpose or the agents of their coming to be. [5] These people have sensations much like those of unreasoning animals, and, since their temperament is willful and angry, they feel no awe of things that deserve to be admired; they divert their attention to the pleasures and appetites of their bodies; and they believe that mankind came to be for such purposes. But those who participate in the gift that comes from god, O Tat, are immortal rather than mortal if one compares their deeds, for in a mind of their own they have comprehended all things on earth, things in heaven and even what lies beyond heaven. Having raised themselves so far, they have seen the good and, having seen it, they have come to regard the wasting of time here below as a calamity. They have scorned every corporeal and incorporeal thing, and they hasten toward the one and only. [6] This, Tat, is the way to learn about mind, to {resolve perplexities} in divinity and to understand god. For the mixing bowl is divine."

 

The statement in this passage, "[5] These people have sensations much like those of unreasoning animals, and, since their temperament is willful and angry, they feel no awe of things that deserve to be admired; they divert their attention to the pleasures and appetites of their bodies; and they believe that mankind came to be for such purposes.", is talking about people in a lower state of consciousness.

 

Corpus Hermeticum XII

 

[2] "Where soul is there also is mind, just as there is soul where life is. But the soul in unreasoning animals is life devoid of mind. Mind is a benefactor of human souls; it works on them for good. In things without reason, mind assists the natural impulse arising from each, but it opposes this impulse in human souls. Every soul, as soon as it has come to be in the body, is depraved by pain and pleasure. For in a composite body pain and pleasure seethe like juices; once immersed in them, the soul drowns."

 

[4] But those human souls that do not have mind as a guide are affected in the same way as souls of animals without reason. When mind connives with them and gives way to longings, the rush of appetite drives such souls to the longings that lead to unreason and, like animals without reason, they never cease their irrational anger and irrational longing, and they have never had enough of evil. For angers and longings are irrational vices that exceed all limits. God has imposed the law upon these souls as a torment and a reproof."

 

Asclepius. 

 

[6] "Is consciousness not uniform in all people, Trismegistus?" 

 

"Not all have gained true understanding, Asclepius. They are deceived, pursuing, on rash impulse and without due consideration of reason, an image that begets malice in their minds and transforms the best of living things into a beastly nature with brutal habits. When I speak about spirit, I will give you a full account of consciousness and related topics."

 

This is a good passage in Asclepius that describes how good people turn into animalistic brutes.

 

Plotinus.

 

But humanity, in reality, is poised midway between gods and beasts, and inclines now to the one order, now to the other; some men grow like to the divine, others to the brute, the greater number stand neutral. But those that are corrupted to the point of approximating to irrational animals and wild beasts pull the mid-folk about and inflict wrong upon them; the victims are no doubt better than the wrongdoers, but are at the mercy of their inferiors in the field in which they themselves are inferior, where, that is, they cannot be classed among the good since they have not trained themselves in self-defence.

 

The picture on the left is called Anima Mundi, which means world soul, by Richard Fludd. It shows a woman with her right hand chained to a cloud that says God in Hebrew, which represents her being connected to a higher power. Her left hand is chained to a monkey, which represents the animal or lower power. This woman is in the middle between God and animal and she is bound to both. The picture on the right is also by Robert Fludd and it shows something similar, it has a monkey in the middle below the man's feet and there's a higher power above him. The ancients and occultists understood than Mankind has both natures and people have to turn towards the higher power and not the lower one.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is from a book called Alchemy Unveiled by Johannes Hemond, "According to the Teaching of the Ancients, Space came into being through the appearance of the Earthdisc in the middle of the hollow worldglobe, being separated into an upper and lower arch. They called the upper space the Ether or Uranos (Heaven), and the lower space the Underworld or the Tartarus. That is in accordance with the three World Teachings of the Hermetics and also with the christian Mystics. 

 

The Earth or the Outer World is the Kingdom of the physical senses and of the common intelligence. The dark Underworld is the sphere of feelings and the chaotic pictureworld of dreams. The illuminated ultraworld, on the other hand, is the Kingdom of the Divine Spirit and the eternal primordial pictures, which are formed out of the purest Light, and reveal only infallible Truth and Wisdom. 

 

Thus, to some extent, the Earth is an in-between Kingdom (Interregnum) between the Upper and the Lower, between the World of the Angels and the dark Kingdom of the infernal demons. The Egyptians possessed the ability of profound thinking and no one examined Nature more meticulously than they did. They depicted this in a Hieroglyph which showed the Human Being as a heavenly Creature and at the same time as an animal. This is illustrated by the form of a sphinx, which is a Lion with a human head, with a small upright human figure standing between the paws. Between the Animal-Kingdom and the inhabitants of the Lightworld beyond, stands the Human Being, half Animal and half Angel. When the Human Being turns towards the animal, it then devours the Angel. Should the Human Being nourish (sustain) himself with the nourishment of the heavenly Spirit, the Angel conquers the Animal, and the Human Being enters into the Temple of the eternal Light. 

 

There is probably not one picture in the whole of Nature, which depicts the position of the Human Being more clearly, shows the origin from which all Human errings are derived, or describes what Human Beings have deteriorated to and are regressing to daily."

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The Devil is portrayed as being half man, half animal. Why is that? It's because that's what he is, half man and half animal. The Devil represents the base nature of humans. In the Tarot cards, The Devil card doesn't represent Satan, but the base nature of people. The pentagram represents man, the four points on the bottom represent the four elements and the top point represents the spirit, the spirit is above the four elements and is in charge of them. The inverted pentagram represents man upside down or the Fall of Man, the four elements are on top of the spirit and represent that the physical is in charge of the spirit. The chains around the man and woman in this card are large enough for them to easily escape, but they choose to be bound to The Devil or the base nature. The main theme of the book called The Satanic Bible, by Anton LaVey, is about loving the flesh and being the animal, it's that simple.