LIN

The Cry of the 22nd Aethyr, Which is Called LIN



There comes first into the stone the mysterious table of forty-nine squares. It is surrounded by an innumerable company of angels; these angels are of all kinds, — some brilliant and flashing as gods, down to elemental creatures. The light comes and goes on the tablet; and now it is steady, and I perceive that each letter of the tablet is composed of forty-nine other letters, in a language which looks like that of Honorius; but when I would read, the letter that I look at becomes indistinct at once.

And now there comes an Angel, to hide the tablet with his mighty wing. This Angel has all the colours mingled in his dress; his head is proud and beautiful; his headdress is of silver and red and blue and gold and black, like cascades of water, and in his left hand he has a pan-pipe of the seven holy metals, upon which he plays. I cannot tell you how wonderful the music is, but it is so wonderful that one only lives in one's ears; one cannot see anything any more.

Now he stops playing and moves with his finger in the air. His finger leaves a trail of fire of every colour, so that the whole Aire is become like a web of mingled lights. But through it all drops dew.

(I can't describe these things at all. Dew doesn't represent what I mean in the least. For instance, these drops of dew are enormous globes, shining like the full moon, only perfectly transparent, as well as perfectly luminous.)

And now he shows the tablet again, and he says: As there are 49 letters in the tablet, so are there 49 kinds of cosmos in every thought of God. And there are 49 interpretations of every cosmos, and each interpretation is manifested in 49 ways. Thus also are the calls 49, but to each call there are 49 visions. And each vision is composed of 49 elements, except in the 10th Aethyr, that is accursed, and that hath 42.

All this while the dewdrops have turned into cascades of gold finer than the eyelashes of a little child. And though the extent of the Aethyr is so enormous, one perceives each hair separately, as well as the whole thing at once. And now there is a mighty concourse of angels rushing toward me from every side, and they melt upon the surface of the egg in which I am standing in the form of the god Kneph, so that the surface of the egg is all one dazzling blaze of liquid light.

Now I move up against the tablet, — I cannot tell you with what rapture. And all the names of God, that are not known even to the angels, clothe me about.

All the seven senses are transmuted into one sense, and that sense is dissolved in itself … (Here occurs Samadhi.) … Let me speak, O God; let me declare it … all. It is useless; my heart faints, my breath stops. There is no link between me and P . . . I withdraw myself. I see the table again.

(He was behind the table for a very long time. O.V.)

And all the table burns with intolerable light; there has been no such light in any of the Aethyrs until now. And now the table draws me back into itself; I am no more.

My arms were out in the form of a cross, and that Cross was extended, blazing with light into infinity. I myself am the minutest point in it. This is the birth of form.

I am encircled by an immense sphere of many-coloured bands; it seems it is the sphere of the Sephiroth projected in the three dimensions. This is the birth of death.

Now in the centre within me is a glowing sun. That is the birth of hell.

Now all that is swept away, washed away by the table. It is the virtue of the table to sweep everything away. It is the letter

I in this Aethyr that gives this vision, and L is its purity, and N is its energy. Now everything is confused, for I invoked the Mind, that is disruption. Every Adept who beholds this vision is corrupted by mind. Yet it is by virtue of mind that he endures it, and passes on, if so be that he pass on. Yet there is nothing higher than this, for it is perfectly balanced in itself. I cannot read a word of the holy Table, for the letters of the Table are all wrong. They are only the shadows of shadows. And whoso beholdeth this Table with this rapture, is light. The true word for light hath seven letters. They are the same as ARARITA, transmuted.

There is a voice in this Aethyr, but it cannot be spoken. The only way one can represent it is as a ceaseless thundering of the word Amen. It is not a repetition of Amen, because there is no time. It is one Amen continuous.

Shall mine eye fade before thy glory? I am the eye. That is why the eye is seventy. You can never understand why, except in this vision.

And now the table recedes from me. Far, far it goes, streaming with light. And there are two black angels bending over me, covering me with their wings, shutting me up into the darkness; and I am lying in the Pastos of our Father Christian Rosenkreutz, beneath the Table in the Vault of seven sides. And I hear these words:

The voice of the Crowned Child, the Speech of the Babe that is hidden in the egg of blue. (Before me is the flaming Rosy Cross.) I have opened mine eye, and the universe is dissolved before me, for force is mine upper eye-lid and matter is my lower eye-lid. I gaze into the seven spaces, and there is naught.

The rest of it comes without words; and then again:

I have gone forth to war, and I have slain him that sat upon the sea, crowned with the winds. I put forth my power and he was broken. I withdrew my power and he was ground into fine dust.

Rejoice with me, O ye Sons of the Morning; stand with me upon the Throne of Lotus; gather yourselves up unto me, and we shall play together in the fields of light. I have passed into the Kingdom of the West after my Father.

Behold! where are now the darkness and the terror and the lamentation? For ye are born into the new Aeon; ye shall not suffer death. Bind up your girdles of gold! Wreathe yourselves with garlands of my unfading flowers! In the nights we will dance together, and in the morning we will go forth to war; for, as my Father liveth that was dead, so do I live and shall never die.

And now the table comes rushing back. It covers the whole stone, but this time it pushes me before it, and a terrible voice cries: Begone! Thou hast profaned the mystery; thou hast eaten of the shew-bread; thou hast spilt the consecrated wine! Begone! For the Voice is accomplished. Begone! For that which was open is shut. And thou shalt not avail to open it, saving by virtue of him whose name is one, whose spirit is one, whose individuum is one, and whose permutation is one; whose light is one, whose life is one, whose love is one. For though thou art joined to the inmost mystery of the heaven, thou must accomplish the sevenfold task of the earth, even as thou sawest the Angels from the greatest unto the least. And of all this shalt thou take back with thee but a little part, for the sense shall be darkened, and the shrine re-veiled. Yet know this for thy reproof, and for the stirring up of discontent in them whose swords are of lath, that in every word of this vision is concealed the key of many mysteries, even of being, and of knowledge, and of bliss; of will, of courage, of wisdom, and of silence, and of that which, being all these, is greater than all these. Begone! For the night of life is fallen upon thee. And the veil of light hideth that which is.

With that, I suddenly see the world as it is, and I am very sorrowful.

Bou-Sada.
November 28, 1909. 4-6 p.m.

(Note. — You do not come back in any way dazed; it is like going from one room into another. Regained normal consciousness completely and immediately.)