The Father of lies …

This is dedicated to Kathryn Thompson, who encouraged a stubborn old man to see that he still had much to learn about writing.

The Father of Lies – from the point of view of both an ancient, and a modern, Science of the Spirit.

Working from first principles, let us consider the human being (the microcosm) as an exact analogue of the Mystery (the Macrocosm).

Rudolf Steiner, a man whose discoveries should generate a dozen Noble Prizes, made a work of art, … a giant wooden sculpture, he named “the Representative of Humanity”. There are actually three main figures; and, if we appreciate first principles, all those individual figures are Macroscopic, which means they are in us as well – they are Mystery created features of the true nature of the individual human being.

We are not just, in the heart’s mind, bearers of what RS called “the Christ Impulse”, in that we not only have a heart, we also have a powerful intellect, aka: Lucifer; as well as, powerful appetites (Ahriman). Lucifer, the Light Bringer, stands at the threshold of the world of pure spirit, and Ahriman, the Father of Lies, stands at the threshold of the world of pure matter.

There are a number of details in this sculpture, such that much else is artistically represented, including a figure – RS confessed apparently – was named Cosmic Humor.

When I was 27, in the gap between getting my law degree, and being sworn into the Bar, I swallowed a Christmas present from my elder brother, thus …

… the first experience of my first LSD trip was that as my bodily nature became liquid-like to perception, I started to laugh; and, the laughing was so pleasurable and free, that I laughed for over a half an hour. The trip-sitters could not see harm, but nonetheless were happy when I began to focus elsewhere. I learned later this was known to users of LSD as Cosmic Laughter, a not uncommon experience.

My then-wife – mother of three, … now passed: Tina, … next found me pursuing her with a certain look in my eye. We were not alone, so deterred I soon focused on other experiences with which to play. I had some food experiences, and then put Sargent Pepper on the record player. After which, I lay on my jelly-belly for some time, staring through the oval braided carpet, seeing inside reality a rotating sphere, whose features and colors I could manipulate with my mind. I had expected the transcendent experiences to be out of my control, and instead found my mind at play. Lest ye become again as little children.

RS also told this tale, that while Christ Incarnated at the turning point of time, and Lucifer had incarnated in the Mountains of the East some three thousand years earlier, Ahriman was incarnating now, in the West. Today, those Macrocosmic aspects can be better understood, by listening for their Wisdom, with which we are ourselves familiar, having identical qualities of soul.

We can look at our “world”, and see the Imprints of two polar massive human characteristics, that RS named: the Luciferic, and/or the Ahrimanic. However, until we self-identify how those Models are aspects of the own microcosm, that is until we confess to our own imperfections and limitless possibilities …

… only then will we be unable to see past the temptation to perceive the effects They manifest in the world as “Evil”, when they are instead the Good. As Franz Bardon puts it: “There is nothing unclean in the whole of the Creation”.

This means self-observation, and honest reflection on our character. It means paying attention to the concept that the world mirrors back to us the cracks in our own perceptions.

Catherine MacCoun writes of the tendency to seek absolute truths, and the tendency to seek absolute facts. That riddle, for purposes of this pagan meditation, is solved by our seeking to recognize that our own heart’s mind is the balance, where this artistic mystery becomes accomplished, not with force, but with Presence. In Tomberg, Arcanum XI, Force, we find a meditation on the Holy Feminine.

We use the word “Her”, when we speak of the Mystery of Nature. In the Emerald Tablet we read: “Its force is above all force. For it vanquishes every subtle [spiritual] thing and penetrates every solid [material] thing. So was ye world created”

The ancient Egyptians, in their Book of Symbols – the Tarot, this Eleventh Image is named: “The Tamed Lion”. It’s meaning: “We see here a young maiden* opening and closing without effort the mouth of a lion, an emblem of power over one’s self, acquired through the education of the will power, and the experience of life.”

*[“maiden” = RS: “Virgin Sophia” – part of an effect of an individual catharsis that comes from playing the music of The Philosophy of Freedom]

We have – also in the Emerald Tablet – the words: Father and Mother. Yet, as Christianity defined itself, we have the words: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Is the latter the Mother, now shyly hiding in the deeps. Well, perhaps not so much unobserved, just poorly named: Rogue Weather anyone?

It remains possible to further illuminate and expose this secret by changing the noun (the named) aspect into a more living (the practiced) aspect. What does it mean to Father? What does it mean to Mother?

For example, in a very important way RS fathered that sculpture, and three ladies mothered its legacy. The Mystery saw to it that the sculpture survived the burning of the original Goetheanum. Humans can maintain it in the practice of the Foundation Stone Meditation, or not, as each individual is generating their own religion. In the meantime … in the over-intellectual wasteland of modern politics and economics, the Father of Lies is their Author, and the Media their manifestation. Yet …

If we practice Judge Not, which is a core teaching of the Christ Impulse, will we then confess to our own ahrimanic and luciferic tendencies? Do we hold ourselves any absolute truths and facts? Lies fathered the Covid Official Narrative, where these are (mothered) nurtured via the Media. True believers in absolute facts, and absolute truths, leave their finger prints everywhere. At the same time, to know how not to throw stones, means to self-examine … via our personal Covid Mystery-thoughts – and confess to the endless variety of fixed passionate ideas we all share, everywhere.

Lucifer redeemed: Five thousand years ago, two teachers lived: Lau Tzu, and Confucius. Memories remain, of the concept of the superior man, and the laws of filial piety. A riddle for our own heart’s mind: What are our dreams, and what are our cravings?

Today Ahriman – the Father of Lies – lives among us. He created a Way for all social questions to become “political” in nature. A Way to repeat the same lie over and over and over again, enthralling the Republican Party in America, and preparing a nest in which to spawn Trump, and his hotels full of fools. No lie too small, and no lie too vague. An intellectual swamp, in which only the most foul ideas flower.

For example, what we call natural science, in the sense of what we call the official narrative of the plague, leans heavily on an assertion of absolute facts. We want to nail on the cross of human existence, all the concepts surrounding the plague, which arrives in an Epoch, when the ahrimanic in the human being is dominating the world. Hammer-drowned science. Fixed in place. Cold and sharp as water-forged steel. Enemy of life.

Judge Not means accepting the Way of Seeing of the “other”, as regards the Covid Mysteries. We need to know this “otherness” so well, such that we can argue their view ourselves. On the one hand, absolute scientific facts, and on the other, … absolute counter-truths. A vain opposition, if the living mediating middle is forgotten.

Thus stands the Abyss, separating one microcosmic being from the other. The Bridge is/can be borne in the own heart’s mind, through the child-like artistry of generous presence. Each seeing the fool in the “other”, yet first in ourselves. Where I have been unable to forgive myself, with that I curse the world. Want to

“fix” the world, heal yourself … hard labor for our interior many moody “me”s, yet all the same, easy on others.

Imagine human elder “nursing” homes, becoming rich with sunrises and sunsets, and a lot of the Mother’s medicines, like ganja and magic mushrooms. Rooms of intoxicated elders revisiting memories, and laughing at themselves and each other.

Human folly is shared by all. As is anguish and trauma. We are brutalized by this Rite, and destined to be crowned with thorns, for being true to our personal vision.

Time to throw a celebration of mutual forgiveness and trust. A pagan intoxicated let your hair down dance party. Neither the Father of Lies, Ahriman, or the oh so superior Lucifer, can stand human self-depreciating – cosmic – humor. Even the Gods&Goddesses, when faced with our wonderful and human stubbornness, have to admit to laughing at Themselves.

Veterans Day, November 11, 2021