The Vision and the Voice

The Cry of the 25th Aethyr

VTI[1]

There is nothing in the stone but the pale gold of the Rosy Cross.

Now there comes an Angel with bright wings, that is the Angel of the 25th Aire. And all the aire is a dark olive about him, like an alexandrite stone.[2] He bears a pitcher[3] or amphora.[4] And now there comes another Angel upon a white horse,[5] and yet again another Angel upon a black bull.[6] And now there comes a lion[7] and swallows the two latter angels up. The first angel goes to the lion and closes his mouth.[8] And behind them are arrayed a great company of Angels with silver spears, like a forest. And the Angel says: Blow, all ye trumpets, for I will loose my hands from the mouth of the lion, and his roaring shall enkindle the worlds.[9]

Then the trumpets blow, and the wind rises and whistles terribly. It is a blue wind with silver specks; and it blows through the whole Aethyr. But through it one perceives the lion, which has become as a raging flame.[10]

And he roareth in an unknown tongue. But this is the interpretation thereof: Let the stars be burnt up in the fire of my nostrils![11] Let all the gods and the archangels and the angels and the spirits that are on the earth, and above the earth, and below the earth, that are in all the heavens and in all the hells, let them be as motes dancing in the beam of mine eye![12]

I am he that swalloweth up death[13] and victory.[14] I have slain the crownèd goat,[15] and drunk up the great sea.[16] Like the ash of dried leaves the worlds are blown before me. Thou hast passed by me, and thou hast not known me. Woe unto thee, that I have not devoured thee altogether!

On my head is the crown, 419 rays[17] far-darting. And my body is the body of the Snake,[18] and my soul is the soul of the Crowned Child.[19] Though an Angel in white robes leadeth me,[20] who shall ride upon me but the Woman of Abominations?[21] Who is the Beast?[22] Am not I one more than he?[22] In his hand is a sword that is a book.[23] In his hand is a spear that is a cup of fornication.[24] Upon his mouth is set the great and terrible seal.[25] And he hath the secret of V.[26] His ten horns spring from five points,[27] and his eight heads[28] are as the charioteer of the West.[29] Thus doth the fire of the sun temper the spear of Mars,[30] and thus shall he be worshipped, as the warrior lord of the sun.[31] Yet in him is the woman that devoureth with her water all the fire of God.[32]

Alas! my lord, thou art joined with him that knoweth not these things.[33]

When shall the day come that men shall flock to this my gate, and fall into my furious throat, a whirlpool of fire? This is hell unquenchable, and all they shall be utterly consumed therein. Therefore is that asbestos unconsumable made pure.[34]

Each of my teeth[35] is a letter of the reverberating name. My tongue is a pillar of fire,[36] and from the glands of my mouth arise four pillars of water.[37]

TAOTZEM[38] is the name by which I am blasphemed. My name thou shalt not know, lest thou pronounce it and pass by.

And now the Angel comes forward again and closes his mouth.

All this time heavy blows have been raining upon me from invisible angels, so that I am weighed down as with a burden greater than the world.[39] I am altogether crushed. Great millstones are hurled out of heaven upon me.[40] I am trying to crawl to the lion,[40] and the ground is covered with sharp knives. I cut myself at every inch.[40]

And the voice comes: Why art thou there who art here?[41] Hast thou not the sign of the number,[42] and the seal of the name,[43] and the ring of the eye?[44] Thou wilt not.[45]

And I answered and said: I am a creature of earth, and ye would have me swim.

And the voice said: Thy fear is known; thine ignorance is known; thy weakness is known; but thou art nothing in this matter. Shall the grain which is cast into the earth by the hand of the sower debate within itself, saying, am I oats or barley? Bond-slave of the curse, we give nothing, we take all. Be thou content. That which thou art, thou art. Be content.[46]

And now the lion passeth over through the Aethyr with the crowned beast upon his back, and the tail of the lion goes on instead of stopping, and on each hair of the tail is something or other — sometimes a little house, sometimes a planet, at other times a town. Then there is a great plain with soldiers fighting upon it, and an enormously high mountain carved into a thousand temples, and more houses and fields and trees, and great cities with wonderful buildings in them, statues and columns and public buildings generally. This goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on all on the hairs of this lion's tail.[47]

And then there is the tuft of his tail, which is like a comet, but the head is a new universe, and each hair streaming away from it is a Milky Way.

And then there is a pale stern figure, enormous, enormous, bigger than all that universe is, in silver armour, with a sword and a pair of balances.[48] That is only vague. All has gone into stone-gray, blank.

There is nothing.

Ain el Hajel.

November 25, 1909. 8.40-9.40 p.m.

(There were two voices in all this Cry, one behind the other — or, one was the speech, and the other the meaning. And the voice that was the speech was simply a roaring, one tremendous noise, like a mixture of thunder and water-falls and wild beasts and bands and artillery. And yet it was articulate, though I cannot tell you what a single word was. But the meaning of the voice — the second voice — was quite silent, and put the ideas directly into the brain of the Seer, as if by touch. It is not certain whether the millstones and the sword-strokes that rained upon him were not these very sounds and ideas.)

[1] VTI = Capricorn, Caput Draconis, Sagittarius — Caput Draconis, the head of the Lion-serpent, the Beast, 666. (There is much ambiguity in these attributions of the Enochian letter T, since they are sometimes Caput or Leo.) His father is Capricorn, Set or Pan; his mother, the woman clothed with the Sun, as in Atu XIV — Art. See 27th Aethyr. He is the burden of the Moon, sanctified by 418. Atu XI — Lust (a partial form) with Atu XX (XI plus XX = XXXI) gives the Key of the New Aeon.

[2] The stone of Gemini, the twins, composing Heru-Ra-Ha, his Lord. Also the house of Mercury; that is, his form is oracular.

[3] This Angel is an avatar of Babalon.

[4] Amphora (in Greek) = 719. This Angel is a veil for Babalon = 156, the woman who closes the mouth of the lion in the old Tarot Trump XI — Lust, and is the Scarlet Woman who rides upon him in the new form.

[5] The sorrow of death.

[6] This represents Jehovah and Jesus. The pain of toil. (Sin is restriction.)

[7] Symbol of the Beast, 666.

[8] See Atu XI — Lust. Babalon and the Beast conjoined.

[9] Babalon prepared 666 (in a certain very secret manner) to utter the word Thelema. (This may have some reference to Crowley's first wife Rose who was the moving spirit in getting him prepared for invoking Thoth and Horus in the spring of 1904, and then for the writing of The book of the Law.)

[10] 666 is now inspired.

[11] Nostrils — Mars and Venus. Energy and passion, also breath of the Word.

[12] Eye — Creative light; i.e., of the Word.

[13] Scorpio.

[14] Netzach.

[15] Capricorn.

[16] Hod (the Mercurial water) : in all the Sephiroth below Tiphareth, out of balance, and the Paths leading from them.

[17] Leo = Teth. Teth spelt in full as Teth, Yod, Tau = 419. Teth, by meaning, is a snake. Leo also equals Horus.

[18] The magical image of the first Decan of Leo, rising at the birth of 666, is a lion-headed serpent.

[19] Horus, the Lord of 666.

[20] The avatar of Binah, in the opening of this Aethyr.

[21] Babalon. See Atu XI — Lust.

[22] 419 - 418 = 1. Or 667 - 666 = 1. 667 is the gematria of the Greek spelling of the Scarlet Woman.

[23] Liber AL vel Legis, his weapon.

[24] This allusion must remain secret.

[25] This seal is that of Babalon, the seal of the A∴A∴ See The Book of Lies, Cap. 49. See also 30th Aethyr, Note 18.

[26] His motto as a Master of the Temple is this V.V.V.V.V. (Vi Verum Universum Vivus Vici = In my lifetime I have conquered the Universe by the power of Truth).

[27] V.V.V.V.V. has ten horns that spring from 5 points.

[28] See The Book of Lies, Cap. 49. But there is an eighth head, too sacredly terrible to mention.

[29] Refers to Atu VII — the Chariot = 8 = Cheth, the bearer of the Sangreal.

[30] The Mystery 5° = 6^□ and 6° = 5^□, Heru-Ra-Ha is the Martial aspect of Sol.

[31] See Liber AL vel Legis, Cap. III, v. 74.

[32] Again a secret allusion.

[33] The Seer was not yet a full initiate, and was hampered by Aleister Crowley.

[34] This paragraph prophesies the purging of the worldly fire in the Aeon of Horus. Hell is the pure inmost self of man, that suffereth not extinction, but consumeth all the experiences of life, coming thereby to know its own perfection.

[35] 32 teeth. Hence the name is compounded of Eheieh and Tetragrammaton, thus: Aleph, Heh, Yod, Heh, Vau, Heh = 32. Macroprosopus interfused with Microprosopus.

[36] The tongue is the instrument of the Logos and so a phallic or creative organ. Chokmah, the Logos, is the Root of Fire, and the masculine energy.

[37] These are the Four Rivers of Eden. It is the fourfold understanding of the Logos. These reflect him so perfectly that they reproduce his form. The following is quoted from The Golden Dawn:

PISHON: Fire — flowing to GEBURAH where there is Gold.
GIHON: Water — the Waters of Mercy, flowing into CHESED.
HIDDIKEL: Air — flowing into MALKUTH.

It is written "In DAATH the Depths are broken up and the Clouds drop down dew."

The word Naher has the meaning 'perennial stream' — 'never failing waters' as opposed to other words meaning Torrent or Brook.

The River going out of Eden is the River of the Apocalypse, the Waters of Life, clear as crystal proceeding from the Throne, on either side of the Tree of Life, bearing all manner of Fruit.

Thus the Rivers form a Cross and on it The GREAT ADAM, the SON who is to rule the Nations, was extended from TIPHARETH and his arms stretch out to GEBURAH AND GEDULAH, and in MALKUTH is EVE, supporting with her hands the TWO PILLARS.

[38] Taotzem = Tau, Ayin, Tzaddi, Mem = 600. A 'great number' of Sol,normally 6. 600 = Kosmos. The blasphemy is in taking the material for the spiritual Sun.

[39] "The sin of the whole world."

THE MEDITERRANEAN MANIFESTO:

TO MAN

Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.

My Term of Office upon the Earth being come in the year of the foundation of the Theosophical Society, I took upon myself, in my turn, the sin of the whole World, that the prophecies might be fulfilled, so that Mankind may take the next step from the Magical Formula of Osiris to that of Horus.

And mine Hour being now upon me, I proclaim the Law.

The Word of the Law is Thelema.

Given in the midst of the Mediterranean Sea
An XX, Sol in 3 Libra, die Jovis
by me TO MEGA THERION
Logos Aionosa Thelema
(Extrapolated from The Heart of the Master by Khaled Khan, published by the O.T.O., 1938, London, England.)

[40] Prophetic of the pains, the initiation to 9° = 2^□, undergone by 666 in order to become Himself.

[41] Which means, "Why art thou not consciously identical with 666?"

[42] The qabalistic proofs (of the truth of Aiwass) given by the virtues of 93.

[43] 666.

[44] The ring of V.V.V.V.V., mentioned in Liber LXV, V, v. 16.

[45] My resistance to the Great Work.

[46] The Angel promises the Seer that he shall be 666 in all truth, and counsels him to await his hour in perfect confidence.

[47] Prophetic of the results of the Great Work delivered by 666.

[48] This refers to the Aeon which is to follow this of Horus. See Liber AL vel Legis, Cap. III, v. 32. Its Lord is the Double-Wanded One, Thmaist-Justice.