Saturday, March 24, 2012

Daath - Knowledge


"In this book it is spoken of the Sephiroth, and the Paths, of Spirits and Conjurations; of Gods, Spheres, Planes and many other things which may or may not exist. It is immaterial whether they exist or not. By doing certain things certain results follow ; students are most earnestly warned against attributing objective reality or philosophic validity to any of them."
— Aleister Crowley, Liber O vel Manus et Sagittae, reprinted in Magick
Issue 20 of Alan Moore's comic Promethea is devoted to Daath and the Abyss. In Moore's version there used to be a Sephira Daath and back then the Tree and the world were perfect. Something happened to Daath, it blew up, fell off the Tree or fell into disrepair. This is why the world is a bit of a disaster area. Moore includes two now defunct paths The Beggar and The Fountain, joining Chesed to Daath to Binah.
Moore develops the idea of a hole or a rip in the fabric of reality — The Crack. This was an idea developed by Grant Morrison in his comic The Filth. From The Filth : "The crack runs through evrything. And everyone. Without it we would be perfect, like angels, and as dull."
Grant Morrison said his Abyss experience was harrowing. He was physically and mentally ill and attempted suicide more than once.
The Abyss is where the magician meets himself. Hidden behind the veil of the Abyss is Daath, which means knowledge. Self-knowledge, higher knowledge, knowledge about knowledge.

Whatever it was the magician built on to climb this high, it was all arbitrary. The magician realises that a lot of human knowledge and activity are similiar. A lot of human knowledge and activity is 'made up'.

Traditionally Choronzon is associated with the Abyss. He is not a fanged, horned demon. He could be a TV programme, or a daydream. Choronzon represents wandering thoughts, which cause the magician to lose focus.

Conscious awareness or apprehension. The Mysterious, invisible Sephirah, which is never marked up on the Tree, is associated in the Western system with the nape of the neck, the point where the spine meets the skull, the spot at which the development of the brain from the notochord took place in our primeval ancestors. Daath is usually held to represent the consciousness of another dimension, or the consciousness of another level or plane; it essentially represens the idea of change of key.The Abyss, the gulf fixed between Macroprosopos and Microprosopos, marks a demarcation in the nature of being, in the type of existence prevailing upon the two levels. It is in the Abyss that Daath, the Invisible Sephirah, has its station, and it might aptly be named the Sephirah of Becoming. It is also called Understanding, which might be further interpreted as Perception, Apprehension, Consciousness.

Visuddhu Chakra, Larynx, Binah - & - Ajna Chakra, Pineal Gland, Chokmah
uniting for function in Daath at the base of the skull

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