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Bp Jornal of College of Thelema V1.X7 BLAC1{ PEARL TH£ JOVRNAL OF TH£ COLL£G£ OF TH£L£~ Vol. 1, NO.7 BLACK PEARL CoLLEGE OF THELEMA 13LAC1{ P£ARL THE JOVRNAL OF THE COLLEGE OF THELE~ "I have descended, 0 my darling, into the black shining waters, and 1 have plucked Thee forth as a black pearl of infinite preciousness." - Liber LXV, Cap. III, v. 60 Founded in Service totheA:.A:. Vol. I, No. 7'. Vernal Equinox. Anno XCV,I (IV8) EDITOR James A. Eshehnan LEAD ARTICLE Commentary on "The Book of the Ruby Star" by Fra. A.H. 3 ASSISTANT EDITOR Anna-Kria King FEATURES 10 Keys for Enlightenment by Swami Beyondananda .... , ..••• 12 Tantra & Tarot by Fra. L.F. .. 0.. .. ................... ............. 13 ASSOCIATE EDITORS Kali's Altar bypra. S.M.N. ....................................... 14 Gregory Peters Reflections: A Ritual of the Path of Mem by Sor. F. Q.S. v. Phyllis Seckler and Fra. L.P. ...................... ................. ................ 5 The Ecstasy of Faith by Fra. Sacramentum Regis .............. 20 ART DIRECTOR Temples of the Body by Fra. A.H. .. •.. ; ......................... 22 Anna-Kria King Ceremonial Magick, Part 7: Devotion to the Divine by Fra. A.H. .. ...................................................... 28 The Vision & the Voice: iEthyrs 12. 11 & 10 with Astrological & Qabalistic Commentary by Fra. A.H.•.. 32 PUBLISHED BY COLUMNS COLLEGE OF THELEMA Qabalist's Qorner: 66 & 84 by Ike Becker ........ , .............. 10 Book Reviews by Al Gonzalez ana Fra . Prometheus ••.•...... 2S Executive Director It's In The Basics: Color is the Key by Frater Yod ............ 26 Phyllis Seckler POETRY Deputy Executive Director Rosa Creli I & II by Aleister Crowley .......... 0.. ............... 2 James A. Eshelman Sonnets 18 and 154 by William Shakespeare .................... 11 Neptune by Sorar Meral ......................................... N. 19 Treasurer starfire (to my suvasini) by Fra. S.H.A • ......................... 31 David Shoemaker, Psy.D. ARTWORK Secretary Venus in Rapture by Roderick Montgomery ................ " ..• 31 Joe Larabell The conclusion of The Star Ruby; An Analysis has been delayed until next issue, to make room for more topical articles in this issue, BLACK PEARL Vol. I, No.7, March, 2000 E. V. Published biannually , at the Equinoxes, by the College of Thelema (A Not-for-Profit Religious Corporation), 222 North Manhattan Place, Second Floor. Los Angeles, California 90004-4018. Copyright © 2000 by College of Thelema. All rights reserved. Annual subscription rate: SI2.00 for two issues, postpaid (U.S.). Per issue price: S6.50, postpaid (U.S .). Second class postage paid at Los Angeles, CA and additional mailing offices. Donations, legacies, contributions and bequests made to the College of Thelema are tax deductible in the United States. Submissions of articles, artwork, poems, lyrics or other contributions are welcome. By such SUbmission, author/creator grants to Black Pearl one-time publication rights, with all issues kept in print in perpetuity. Send editorial correspondence, review materials, manuscripts, and other submissions to : Editor, Black Pearl, at the above address. For reply and/or return of materials, enclose SASE; no responsibility is assumed for lost or unreturned submissions. Publisher assumes no responsibility for products or services advertised by anyone other than College of Thelema and/or Temple of Thelema. Opinions expressed are those of the authors or advertisers, and do not necessarily reflect those of the editors or publishers. Cover art by Angela Wixtrom. BLACK PEARL ROSA C<ELI I & II I II Rose ofthe World! Rose of the World! Your mystic petals spread Ruby with blood from the bright veins of God Like wings over my head. Caught in the chalice of your heart, and pearled The tide of burning blood upon my face With dew at many a melting period Drowns all the floating images When the amethyst luster of your eyes dissolves That danced their spectre saraband The veil that hides your naked splendour In Bacchic race, phantastical embrace, From these infirm resolves Upon the sepulchres, the dizzy seas And halting loves of your poor poet's soul Of this my mind, Sabbatic rout that spanned With radiance mild and tender, These straits my soul! Ay, they are dead and So that I see awhile the golden goal! drowned Yea! all your light involves (And damned, I doubt!) Ah, God! I am exhaust Me, me tenebrous, me too cold and base In the red moon's holocaust! Ever to kindle to the maiden face God! God! The chasms secret and profound (Three years my wife, three years of me unwon!) Such down the porphyry flood That would be mine, be mine, Of your maniacal, ensorcelled blood Were I but man enough That maddens and bewitches. To endure the rapture of that sudden sun My life is suffocated - now I swoon - The knowledge of your love, I die! I am in hell, red hell, red hell, The assumption of me into that sweet shrine And all the immortal in me itches Whose godhead duly knows To grip the immortal. Now the spell Only the one wind of the utmost heaven Circles me closer; all the soul 's afire Through hyacinthine deeps As if the boreal moon Down from the sapphirine steeps With all the icy Lapland hags And azure abyss that blows; That shiver on's hibernal crags Only the one sun on the stepped snows; Were but a thin white shell Only the one star of the sister seven; Hoarding the seed of many a million suns, Only the one moon in the orchard close Giving its life up unto its desire- In the one hour that unto love is given Out bursts the womb of my unguessed-at godhead; Of all the hours of bliss; The rose flames out in the flood; and all at once, Only the one joy in a world of woes; A brilliance disembodied, Only the one spark in the storm-cloud riven; I am shattered like the dew upon your leaves; Only the one shaft through the rose-dawn driven, So that the lampless hour Thy shaft, Eros! Strikes, and an unborn universe perceives Not as Apollo or as Artemis Its lonely mother-flower, Loosing gray death from golden thong Us, in our love's arcane Briatic bower. To slay the poet in a song, We scatter light, a music-tingling shower; The lover in a kiss; We breathe out life, a crimson whisper; But to divide the inmost marrow We radiate love, a velvet-soft complaint, With that ensanguine arrow; Most like the echo of a chime at vesper But to unite each bleeding part Rung far across narcissus-haunted seas, Of that most universal heart; By the high-bosomed boy, large-eyed, with fasting Leaving us slaves, and kings; faint Bound, and with eagle' s wings; That shares an hermitage with some devoutest One soul, comprising all that may be thought, saint. One soul, conscious of naught. ALEISTER CROWLEY, The Winged Beetle, 1910 2 "THE BOOK OF THE RUBY STAR" •• e,"MMentf'vr1j "'11. ... "ih£ E>vvk 17/ th£ Fu1/tJ :3tV\,r" "UBER STELL.IE RUBE.IE, A secret ritual of Apep, the 3This is the book of the most secret cult of the Heart of lao-Oai delivered unto V. V. V. V. V. for his use Ruby Star. It shall be given to none, save to the in a certain matter of Liber Legis, and written down shameless in deed as in word. under the figure LXVI," is an A . ·.A .'. Publication in The Ruby Star is a symbol of Geburah, Sephirah 5, Class A. the ruby-red Mars-force; and a mystery of i1 , the fifth This commentary was written in the early 1980s, letter of the Hebrew alphabet, assigned to the XVIIth and has been refined over the years for different ven­ Atu called The Star, Isis Rejoicing. 17 is also the enu­ ues. The present version is adapted specifically for meration of lAO ('~' ) and OAI ('~'), the chief formu­ BLACK P EA RL. - ED. lae of this instruction. Severa l passages from Liber Legis may be called to our service at this point, particu­ IApep deifieth Asar. larly 1:3, 1:60, 11 :2 and 11:6. Also, Liber Arcanorum, v. In this opening verse, we learn that it is the sacred 4 : "Now riseth Ra-Hoor-Khuit, and dominion is estab­ sexual force (A pep) that transforms Natural Humanity lished in the Star of the Flame." The basic allusion is to (Asar) into God. kundalini: Apep as The Tower, or Mars-force. Asar (Osiris) is physiologically the phallus, psycho­ This " book" is part of the official A:.A:. Syllabus logically the ego. Apep (Apophis) is the force of annihi­ for the Grade of Adeptus Major. , 6° = 5° ,correspond mg' lation: orgasm to the erection; or, to the ego, that liber­ to Geburah. In one very real sense, the members of this atin a ecstasy which dissolves the barriers between one b . Grade constitute "the most secret cult of the Ruby person (one discriminated mind) and another. Apep IS Star." However, this interpretation is not exclusive. love under will, that which unites Isis with Osiris. This It "shall be given to none" who are not free of the is true sexually, as the union of any man and woman black veil of shame. The nature of the force will be (any I and 0, in fact); and also in the uniting of Pingala obscure to such a person. One must be truly free of and Ida the solar and lunar currents of the spine, in the shame. It won't work to "talk a good game." (In this thunder~us uprush of kundalini. Apep is kundalini, and regard, see Liber L., III:44.) the Ruby Star. This document is, to paraphrase its title, a secret ritual of kundalini; specifically, the application ~No man shall understand this writing - it is too of sexual love under will to produce any required result.
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