The Hanged Man
To be enraptured or not to be?
Does heaven offer rapture?
So what does it mean to be called to walk on the water?
Isn’t this what I am hearing on the wind?
I’m being called to get out of the boat.
This has always been about getting out of the boat.
I had a strange lucid dream about swimming to the bottom of the ocean once.
This came to me tonight to explain what getting out of the boat could mean.
A telling passage from Meditations on the Tarot on The Hanged Man...
The wind blows where it wills.
“For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh: for these are opposed to each other, to prevent you from doing what you would.”
—Galatians v. 17
Well, that’s not very sporting, now is it?
“The position of the man —upside down, head below, hanging by one foot in a porch, with his free leg folded back at the knee and his arms bound behind his back— at first naturally evokes ideas of gravitation and of the torture that conflict with it can inflict on man. Therefore, our first impression of the Card plunges us into the heart of the problem of the relationship between man and gravitation, and the conflicts that this relationship entails.”
“Now, the domain of freedom the spiritual life —is found placed between two gravitational fields with two different centres. The Gospel designates them as "heaven" and "this world", or as the "kingdom of God" and the "kingdom of the prince of this world". And it designates those whose will follows or is submitted to the gravitation of "this world" as "children of rhis world", and those whose will follows the gravitation of "heaven" as the "children (or the sons) of light".”
“These "opposing desires" arc the tendencies through which the two gravitational fields manifest themselves. The man who lives in the grip of gravitation of "this world" at the expense of the gravitation of "heaven" is the "carnal man"; he who lives in equilibrium between the two gravitational fields is the "psychic man": and. lastly, the one who lives under the sway of the gravitation of "heaven" is (he "spiritual man".
It is this larter who constitutes the subject of the twelfth Arcanum of the Tarot, for it is an upside-down man that the twelfth Card represents. The Hanged Man represents the condition of one in the life of whom gravitation from above has replaced that from below.
Firstly, it should be said that attraction from above is as real as that from below, and that the condition ofa human being who has passed, whilst living, from the field of terrestrial gravitation into that of heaven is indeed comparable to that of the Hanged Man of the Card. This is at one and the same time a benefaction and a martyrdom; both are very real.
The history of the human race bears witness to the reality of attraction from above. The exodus into F.gyptian. Palestinian. Syrian and other deserts inaugurated by St. Paul of Thebes and St. Anthony the Great were nothing other than the manifestation of irresistible attraction from above. The desert fathers, pioneers of this exodus, had no programme or plan to found any communities or schools of Christian spirituality comparable to the schools of yoga in India. No. what happened to them was the irresistible appeal from above to solitude and a life given up entirely to spiritual reality.”
“St. Teresa had the experience where the body was "drawn up after rhe soul" which was, in its turn, under the sway of attraction emanating from the centre of spiritual attraction which was, for her, the Lord.
But when the centre of spiritual attraction, when the Lord himself, is clothed in a body—which was the case in the earthly life of Jesus Christ —what happens then? There is then no question of being carried off in a rapture, because to what place could the Humanity of the Lord be carried off— the "rapturing" and "carrying off principle, the centre of spiritual gravitation, being in itself?
Now, the Gospel clarifies this point for us. It says:
When evening came, his disciples went down to the sea. got in- to a boat, and started across the sea to Capernaum. It was now dark, and Jesus had not yet come to them. The sea rose because a strong wind was blowing. When they had rowed about three or four miles, they saw Jesus walking on the sea and drawing near to the boat. They were frightened, but he said to them: It is I; do not be afraid.
—(John vi, 16-20)
And Peter answered him: Lord, if it is you. bid me come to you on the water. He said: Come! So Perer got out of the boat and walked on the water and came to Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid, and beginning to sink he cried our: Lord, save me! Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him: O man of little faith, why did you doubt?
—-(Matthew xiv, 28-31)
The key to the answer is found above all in the words. "It is I; do not be afraid". The accepted translation of ego eimi. me phobeisthe in Greek, or ego sum. nolite timere in Latin, is: "It is I; do not be afraid". This is right and there is nothing to be said against it — ego eimi And ego sum mean literally "I am", but in the given context signify "It is I". The context bears this out. This is why the translation "It is I" is not only justified, but also —in view of the context necessary. It is however legitimate, without questioning the rightness of the accepted transla tion, to understand the words ego eimi (ego sum) more literally, and, at the same time, more profoundly. For two questions are implied in the fear and confusion of the disciples. "Who is the one who we see walking on the water?" and "How is he able to walk on the water?"
Now. "It is I" is the answer to the first question, and "1 am" is the answer to the second. For "I am" reveals an esoteric truth (i.e. profound and not immediately obvious), whilst "It is I" is an exoteric or factual answer. It hides and contains, as its kernel, the esoteric answer. What is, therefore, the esoteric truth that the words "I am; do not be afraid" reveal?
"I am" is the formula of revelation in the world of the existence of the divine essence of Jesus Christ. The whole Gospel is the history of this gradual revelation, the stages of which it summarises through the diverse aspects of the comprehen- sive "1 am", such as "I am the true vine", "I am the way, the truth and the life". "I am the door". "1 am the bread of life", "l am the good shepherd", "I am the light of the world" and "1 am the resurrection and the life".
Now, the words "I am; do not be afraid" spoken by the one walking on the water amount to the statement: "I am gravitation, and he who holds to me will never sink or be engulfed". Because fear is due to the menace of being engulfed by elemental forces of gravitation of a lower order, i.e. of being carried away by the play of blind forces from the agitated "sea" of the "electrical field" of death. "I am; do not be afraid" is therefore the message of the centre, or Master, of celestial gravitation, demonstrated by the action of support with regard to Peter, who was saved from sinking. Thus, there is another field of gravitation than that of death, and he who unites himself with it can walk on water, i.e. transcend the agitated element of "this world", the electrical gravitational field of the serpent. This message contains not only the invitation to have recourse to the "kingdom of heaven", but also the solemn declaration of the immortality of the soul, in so far as the soul is capable of transcending the engulfing gravitation and "walking on the water".
Peter, who "got out of the boat and walked on the water and came to Jesus", experienced the same elevating rapture that St. Teresa describes. He got out of the boat, which means —in view of all the laws of reason and memory—that he was taken out of the domain of ordinary consciousness, i.e. that of reason, memory and sense perception, and he walked on the water, drawn byJesus. He experi- enced, therefore, the same elevation of the soul which draws the body up after it as spoken of by St. Teresa. He even experienced the same fear which St. Teresa confessed took hold of her in seeing "one's body being lilted from the ground". And just as she was drawn by a hand extended from above, so did Peter have the experience of help from the same hand.
Now, St. Teresa and St. Peter — the one and the other - had the same experience of psycho-somatic ecstasy (as, moreover, many other saints have had). But the ques- tion which occupies us is that of the state of Jesus Christ himself, walking on the water. Was it an ecstasy for him also?
No. And this is why: ecstasy is the going out of the soul from the domain of the powers of discursive reason, memory and imagination - sometimes followed by the body. Both Peter and St. Teresa passed in their rapture through the stages: "You are"; "I draw near to You"; "It is not I, but You who lives and acts in me". It is therefore the attraction of the divine You, resulting in union with him. which constitutes the essence of their psycho-somatic ecstasy, whilst Jesus Christ walked on ihc water not by virtue of ecstasy—not by going out of his Humanity —but rather by virtue of enstasy, i.e. centering in himself, which is the active virtue of the formula "I am; do not be afraid". The Humanity of Jesus Christ walking on the water did not lead to a You attracting and supporting it. but rather to the divine I of the Son of the eternal Father present in itself.
ECO SUM; nolite timere—means to say therefore: I am gravitation; just as the sun in the visible wotld bears itself and attracts the planets, so am I the ttue sun of the invisible world who bears himself and attracrs and supports other beings. "Do not he afraid, for I AM!'
Yet Jesus Christ walking on the water reveals still another mystery than that of the sun of the spiritual world, the centre of celestial gravitation. For not only did he stand on the water — which would suffice to reveal and demonstrate this truth — but he also walked on the water, i.e. he moved in a quite definite direction in the horizontal sense. He walked towards the boat in which his disciples rowed. There, in his walking towards the boat, is already contained in germ —essentially revealing it — his whole work, temporal and eternal, i.e. his sacrifice, his resurrec- tion, and all that is implied in his promise: "Lo, I am with you always, until the end of the world"
—(Matthew xxviii. 20)
The boat with his disciples is. therefore, and will be until the end of the world, the aim of the I am walking on the water. His enstasy. his profound centering in himself, docs not distance him from the navigators on the agitated sea of history and evolution, and does not make him disappear into the other sea —the calm sea of nirvana— but rather, on the contrary, it entails that he walks, until the end of the world, after the boat with his disciples.
The hermits of the desert, the psycho-somatic ecstasy of St. leresa and St. Peter. Jesus Christ walking on the water — the totality of these facts should bring to the light of our minds the spiritual and manifest reality of celestial gravitation. At least, it is to this end that we have dwelt upon these things.
It is necessary, nevertheless, to add here a consideration of facts which appear to belong to the sphere of celestial gravitation but which are, in reality, of a con- trary nature. The facts that I have in mind are those of "levitation", i.e. instances of elevation of the body from the ground, which one could be tempted to regard as being of the same nature as the psycho-somatic raptures of St. Teresa and St.
Peter, or even as the walking of Jesus Chtist on the water.“
Hmmm.
Do not be afraid.
Get out of the boat.
I am here.
I draw near to You"; "It is not I, but You who lives and acts in me"
We live inside of it.
Inside of no thing.
Ok, that was a very strong pong to my ping today
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