The Equinox (Volume I, Number II)

THE TEMPLE OF SOLOMON THE KING he pledges himself to keep secret the Order, its name, and the names of the members, as well as the proceedings which take place at its meetings. To maintain kindly and benevolent relation with all the Fratres and Sorores of the Order. To prosecute with zeal and study the occult sciences, &c. &c. He then swears to observe the above under the awful penalty of submitting “ myself to a deadly and hostile current of will set in motion by the chiefs of the Order, by which I should fall slain or paralysed without visible weapon, as if blasted by the lightning flash!* (Hiereus here suddenly applies sword.) So help me THE LORD OF THE UNIVERSE and my own Higher Soul.” As the Candidate affirmeth his own penalty should he prove a traitor to the Order, the evil triad riseth up in menace, and the avenger of the Gods, Horus, layeth the blade of his sword on the point of the Daath junction (i.e., of the brain with the spine) thus affirming the power of Life and Death over the natural body : and the Form of the Higher Self advanceth and layeth its hand on the Candidate’s head for the first time, at the words: “So help me the Lord of the Universe and my own Higher Soul.” And this is the first assertion of the connecting-link between them. Then after this connec- tion is established doth the Hierophant in the following words raise the Candidate to his feet: “ Rise, newly obligated Neophyte in the o°= 0° Grade of the Order of the G.+.D.-. in the Outer. Place the Candidate in the Northern part of the Hall, the place of the greatest symbolic Darkness.” The Candidate is then placed in the North, the place of the greatest symbolic Darkness, the invisible station of Taaur the Bull of Earth. But therein dwelleth Ahapshi the rescuer of Matter, Osiris in the Sign of the Spring. That as the earth emergeth from the Darkness and the Barrenness of Winter, so the Candidate may thus affirm the commence- ment of his emancipation from the darkness of ignorance. The Hierophant and Hiereus return to their thrones, therefore it is not Arouerist but Osiris himself that addresseth the Candidate in the words : “The voice of my Higher Soul said unto me: let me enter the path of Darkness, peradventure thus shall I obtain the Light; I am the only Being in the Abyss of Darkness: from the Darkness came I forth ere my birth, from the silence of a primal sleep! And the Voice of Ages answered unto my soul: I am he who formulates in Darkness, but the Darkness comprehendeth it not,” And this is to confirm the link established between the Neschamah and the Genius by communicating the conception thereof unto the Ruach. Thus, therefore, Osiris speaketh in the Character of the Higher Soul, the symbolic form of which is now stand- ing between the pillars before him. The Second Circumambulation then takes place in the Path of Darkness, the symbolic * A later edition of the Ritual, issued subsequent to the Horos scandals, reads “an awful and avenging punitive current,” &c. 255